The Stolen Child(95)

Edward stuck his hand straight into the pie, pulled up a clump of yellow goo, and crammed it in his

mouth.

She laughed. "Just like his daddy."

Thank you, my love. She returned my smile.

After the boys said good night and Edward lay sleeping in his crib, Tess and I washed the dishes

together, staring out the kitchen window. The stars shone like pinpricks in the cold black sky, and the

hot water in the sink, along with the roaring furnace, gave the room a steamy languor. I put down the tea

towel and, from behind, wrapped my arms around her, kissed her damp warm nape, and she shivered.

"I hope you didn't get too mad about Jimmy going on about how Eddie doesn't look so much like

either one of us."

"I know," she said. "It's creepy."

For a split second, I thought she suspected something was awry, but she spun herself around to

face me and grabbed my face with her rubber gloves. "You worry about the strangest things." She kissed

me, and the conversation went elsewhere.

A few nights later, Tess and I were asleep in bed, Edward down the hall in his room. She woke me

by shaking my shoulder and speaking harshly in a sort of shouted whisper. "Henry, Henry, wake up. I

heard noises downstairs."

"What is it?"

"Would you listen? Someone's down there." I grumbled that it was nothing.

"And I'm telling you, someone is in the house. Would you go check?"

I rolled out of bed and stood there for a moment, trying to rouse my senses, then headed past

Edward's closed door to the top of the stairs. I did not see, but had the sensation, that a light had gone

out downstairs and that some-thing moved in a blur from one room to the next. Anxious, I took the steps

one by one in a sort of hypnotic trance, sorting through my drifting emotions as it became darker and

darker. At the bottom, I turned into the living room and switched on the lights. The room appeared

unchanged except for a few photographs on the walls that were slightly askew. We had hung a kind of

fam-ily gallery, pictures of our parents, images of Tess and me as children, a wed-ding photo, and a

parade of portraits featuring Edward. I nudged the frames back in line and in the same moment heard the

deadbolt turn at the kitchen door.

"Hey, who's there?" I yelled, and sped out in the nick of time to see the backside of an imp

squeezing through the opening between the door and the jamb. Outside in the cold, dark night, three

figures sped across the frosty lawn, and flicking on the floodlights, I called for them to stop, but they had

van-ished. The kitchen was a mess, and the pantry had been raided of canned goods, cereal and sugar,

and a small copper saucepan, but not much else. A bag of flour had burst when they squeezed through

the door, leaving a dusty trail dotted with footprints. The oddest sort of break-in by a bunch of hungry

thieves. Tess came downstairs and was shaken by the disturbance, but she shoved me out of the kitchen

to put it back in order. Back in the living room, I rechecked our belongings, but they were all there—the

TV, stereo, nothing of value gone.

I examined the photographs more closely. Tess looked almost exactly the same as she had on our

wedding day. Sergeant William Day stared out, frozen in the past in his military dress. From the corners

of her eyes, Ruth Day watched her son, hardly more than a child with a child, yet full of love and pride.

In the next frame, there I was, a boy again, looking up and full of hope. But, of course, that wasn't me.

The boy was too young. And in that instant, I realized who had come and why.

Tess came in and laid her hand on my back. "Shall we call the police? Is there anything missing?"

I could not answer, for my heart was pounding wildly and an over-whelming dread fixed me to the

spot. We had not checked on our son. I sprinted up the stairs to his room. He lay asleep, knees drawn

up to his chest, dreaming as if nothing had ever happened. Watching his innocent face, I knew at once

that he was blood of my blood. He almost looked like the boy I still see in my nightmares. The boy at the

piano.

• C H A P T E R 3 0 •

I tucked her letter into my book and went to look for Speck. Panic overwhelmed logic, and I ran

out onto the library lawn, hoping that she had left only moments before. The qow had changed over to a

cold rain, obliterating any tracks she might have made. Not a single soul could be seen. No one

answered when I called her name, and the streets were curiously empty, as church bells began to ring

out another Sunday. I was a fool to venture out into town in the middle of the morning. Following the

labyrinth of sidewalks, I had no idea which way to go. A car eased around a corner and slowed as the

driver spotted me walking in the rain. She braked, rolled down the window, and called out, "Do you