The Stolen Child(106)

"In Cheb. Remember Father Hlinka?"

"Cheb? That was nine years ago. Is that what you were doing? What possessed you to investigate

the Ungerlands?"

Total silence gave me away.

"Were you that jealous of Brian? Because honestly, that's a little crazy, don't you think?"

"Not jealous, Tess. We happened to be there, and I was simply trying to help him trace his family

tree. Find his grandfather."

She picked up the passenger list and her eyes scanned it to the end. "That's incredible. When did

you ever talk to Brian Ungerland?"

"This is all ancient history, Tess. I ran into him at Oscar's when we were engaged. I told him we

were going to Germany, and he asked me if I had the time could I stop by the National Archives and

look up his family. When I didn't find them there, I thought maybe his people were from someplace else,

so I asked Father Hlinka when we were in Cheb. He found them. No big deal."

"Henry, I don't believe a word you're saying."

I stepped toward her, wanting to enfold her in my arms, desperate to end the conversation. "Tess,

I've always told you the truth."

"But why didn't Brian just go ask his mother?"

"His mother? I didn't know he had a mother."

"Everyone has a mother. She lives right here in town. Still does, I think. You can tell her how

jealous you were."

"But I looked her up in the phone book."

"You're kidding." She crossed her arms and shook her head. "She remar-ried years ago when

Brian was in high school. Let me think. Her name is Blake, Eileen Blake. And she'd remember the

grandfather. He lived till he was a hundred, and she used to talk about that crazy old man all the time."

Giving up, she headed for the staircase.

"Gustav?" I shouted after her.

She looked over her shoulder, scrunched up her face, found the name in her memory. "No, no

...Joe. Crazy Joe Ungerland is Brian's grandfather. Of course, they're all crazy in that family, even the

mother."

"Are you sure we're not talking about Gustav Ungerland?"

"I'm going to start calling you Crazy Henry Day... You could have asked me all about this. Look, if

you're so interested, why don't you go tall Brian's mother? Eileen Blake." At the top of the stairs, she

leaned over the railing, her long blonde hair falling like Rapunzel's. "It's sweet you were so jeal-ous, but

you have nothing to worry about." She flashed her crooked smile .ml set free my worries. "Tell the old

girl I said hello."

Buried to her neck in fallen leaves, she stared straight ahead without blinking, and the third time I

passed her I realized she was a doll. Another had been lashed with a red jump rope to a tree trunk

nearby, and dismembered arms and legs poked up at odd angles from the long, unmowed grass. At the

end of a string tied to a chokecherry limb, a head hung and rotated in the breeze, and the headless body

was stuffed into the mailbox, anticipating Saturday's post-man. The masterminds behind this mayhem

giggled from the porch when I stopped the car in front of their house, but they looked almost catatonic

as I walked up the sidewalk.

"Can you girls help me? I seem to be lost," I said from the bottom step. The older girl draped a

protective arm across her sister's shoulder.

"Is your mommy or daddy home? I'm looking for someone who lives around here. Do you know

the Blakes' house?"

"It's haunted," said the younger sister. She lacked two front teeth and spoke with a lisp.

"She's a witch, mister." The older sister may have been around ten, stick-thin and raven-haired,

with dark circles around her eyes. If anyone would know about witches, it was this one. "Why do you

want to go see a witch, mister?"

I put one foot on the next step. "Because I'm a goblin."

They both grinned from ear to ear. The older sister directed me to look for a turn before the next

street corner, a hidden alleyway that was really a lane. "It's called Asterisk Way," she said, "because it's

too small to have a real name."

"Are you going to gobble her up?" the smaller one asked.

"I'm going to gobble her up and spit out the bones. You can come by on Halloween night and make

yourself a skeleton." They turned and looked at each other, smiling gleefully.

An invasion of sumac and overgrown boxwood obscured Asterisk Way. When the car began to

scrape hedges on both sides, I got out and walked. Half-hidden houses were scattered along the route,

and last on the left was a weathered foursquare with BLAKE on the mailbox. Obscured by the shrubs, a

pair of bare legs flashed in front of me, racing across the yard, and then a sec-ond someone rustled