Chapter 8

Jayzu sprinted to the Treehouse. His footsteps pounded the bridge across the Boulder Ravine, making it sway violently. He hoped to see Charlie or at least JoEd. Waiting for news of Charlotte was unbearable, and it angered him that he was being kept from going to her.

He arrived at the Treehouse and only slowed down to navigate the spiral steps to the deck above. Out of breath, he collapsed on a bench.

“Charlie,” he managed to gasp out.

Rika dropped out of the branches above and plopped onto the deck next to him. “Not here, Jayzu. He’s with Charlotte.”

“Where are they?” Jayzu asked more vehemently than he intended, but he had not fully regained his breath.”

“Well, I can’t say,” Rika said. “All’s I know she’s somewhere safe on the island but JoEd says she doesn’t know where she is. That’s truly all I know, Jayzu.”

It was not enough just to know she was safe. I really need to see her. He sat up straight and stroked Rika’s back. “Is JoEd here?”

“Nope, but he should be back by nightfall.”

Jayzu looked down at the deck in the depths of guilt and despair. He had not seen Charlotte for days. All of his mechanisms, his lies, his pretenses had blown up in his face. Hot tears stung his eyes. I only wanted to help her. 

Jayzu stood up. He paced the deck as Rika watched, her head following him back and forth. “Charlotte must be starving by now. I must know where she is so I can bring her food. How can Charlie even feed her?”

Rika tilted her head to the side. “I can’t say. But the lot of them—JoEd and his zhekkies—could bring her food.”

“From where?” Jayzu said and stopped pacing for a moment. “She cannot eat raw fish or bugs and crows do not cook.” He raked his hands through his hair.

“I don’t know,” Rika said, flapping her wings impatiently. “But maybe you can help. Run on back to your cottage and bundle up some food for her, and bring it back here. JoEd and his zhekkies will take it to her in the morning.”

He looked down at Rika and frowned. “I can feed her and get her water! I just need JoEd or Charlie to take me to her.”

His cell phone rang loudly. He pulled it out of his pocket, glanced at the screen and sighed. Mrs Braun. She had left numerous messages: Henry was dead. Would Father Manzi please officiate his funeral on Saturday?

“Hello?” he said, as if he did not know who was calling.

“Father Manzi?” Mrs Braun said. “Oh! I am so happy to have reached you! I—”

“And I am so sorry, Mrs Braun,” he said. “I have been trapped on the island for the past few days, without cell phone service.” He had already used that lie, which seemed less grievous than coming up with a new one. 

“Of course I will officiate Henry’s funeral. And please accept my condolences, though I know he was rather trying at times.”

“That is an understatement, Father,” Mrs Braun said with a chuckle. “And by the way, I have changed my name back to my maiden name. I am now known as Gabrielle DuBois, if you please!”

“I am surprised,” he said. “But Gabrielle is a lovely name, as is DuBois.”

After the call ended, he left the Treehouse for his cottage. At least he could bring a bag of food and water for Charlotte. But why are they keeping me from her? He did not run, but walked at his usual pace, stewing over his frustration, anger, guilt, and shame. 

His cell phone rang again. He glanced at the screen and winced. Majewski. Damn. He had not called the Captain to arrange to be taken to the city today.

“Hello Thomas.”  He kept on walking.

“When are you arriving?” Majewski said without greeting him. “Did you forget to text me?”

“Uh, no,” Alfredo said. “I’m sorry, Thomas. The Captain has been in MacKenzie for the past couple days. He said he will not be back for two more days. I should have called you.”

Lie #something—he had lost count. It had completely slipped his mind to call the Captain, largely because he had been sure Charlotte would show up and…what—? He had no idea.

“Yes, you should have,” Majewski said tersely, after a long silence. “So when may I expect you?”

“Saturday,” Alfredo said calmly. “I have to officiate at Henry Braun’s funeral Mass.”

“You’re sure the Captain will have returned?” Majewski said.

“Yes, he is quite dependable,” Alfredo said. “But I will call you if he has not shown up as expected on Friday afternoon.”

“See that you do so this time,” Majewski said, and ended the call. 

Jayzu put the phone into his pocket. 

Absent-mindedly he walked back to his cottage, feeding his anger with suspicions . Why are they keeping her from me? Why will they not tell me. 

He stopped at the hermit’s chapel without really knowing why—or that he had intended to go to his cottage and get some food for Charlotte. He hesitated outside the door, until a voice from above said: “Do come in.”

Looking up, Jayzu saw two large ravens staring down at him: Starfire and NoExit. He opened the door and entered. The interior was dimmer than usual—being that it was a cloudy day. No dappled patterns of branches and shadows appeared on the dirt floor. Only shadows.

Starfire and NoExit entered the chapel through a larger hole in the roof and perched on the wooden kneeler in the center of the chapel. Jayzu could see them well enough thanks to that hole, and the open door which let just enough light in.

“We were just discussing Charlotte,” Starfire said. “It seems that while you were looking for her, she became frightened of something and ran into the Deeps,” Starfire said.

Jayzu had wandered into The Deeps once, and promptly got lost. He wandered for hours in the darkness until at last he found his way out. He never again entered The Deeps.

“Do you know what frightened her?” NoExit said.

Both ravens peered at him, the doorway’s light reflecting off their opaque black eyes and their feathers. Magnificent birds, both of them

Jayzu had the strong impression that they both knew the answer.

“Well, I believe she was out wandering in the forest, even though I told her to remain at the Treehouse,” Jayzu began lamely, trying to formulate the words to diminish his part. She apparently saw some people she did not expect.”

The ravens looked at one another for a moment.

“We understand she saw a woman, a friend of yours—yes?” Starfire said, prodding Jayzu toward the truth.

After a long silence, Jayzu replied, “Yes.” There was no way around it. He sighed and looked at the ground. “She followed the woman back to my cottage.”

The two ravens stood still as stone on the kneeler; neither spoke. Jayzu shifted his weight from one leg to the other. Minutes rolled by and no one uttered a word. 

“Jayzu,” Starfire said, his voice stern and commanding. “You must tell us what Charlotte saw, or heard, at your cottage.”

Jayzu inhaled deeply and let the breath out slowly. “I am not precisely sure, but I believe she went inside my cottage after I escorted my guests—the woman and her husband to the inlet where the Captain waited to take them back to the city.”

“And?” NoExit said when Jayzu did not continue.

“I, uh, believe she saw a portrait of herself on the wall,” Jayzu said. 

“Really?” NoExit said. “A portrait of herself? Did you paint it?”

“Um, no,” Jayzu said. “A friend of mine did.”

“And who might that be?” Starfire said so placidly, Jayzu was certain that he already knew. 

Why are they playing with me like this? 

“The woman that Charlotte saw in the forest painted it,” Jayzu said. Giving up avoiding telling the two ravens the truth, he continued: “The woman claims she is Charlotte’s daughter.”

“Hmmm,” NoExit rumbled.

“And what does Charlotte think about that?” Starfire said.

“I have no idea,” Jayzu said. “To my knowledge she did not have a daughter, or she would have mentioned it to me.”

Starfire grew impatient. He turned to NoExit and said: “Charlotte does not remember having a daughter, who I am told the was born soon after Charlotte was taken to Rosencranz by her brother. Who happens to be Jayzu’s superior.”

How do they know this? Charlie must have told them—how else? Jayzu felt angered and betrayed. 

“I see,” NoExit said. “ This is what frightened her so badly. That is complex.”

“Complex, yes,” Starfire said to NoExit—as if Jayzu was not there. “As I told you, during her flight away from Jayzu’s cottage, she stumbled upon the sole mildornia bush on the island—in The Deeps. She mistook the berries for an edible fruit and ate one.”

Starfire turned to Jayzu and said: “And that is why she is experiencing a memory dislocation, which has taken her back to a previous time. Before she knew you.”

“Mil—dornia?” Jayzu stammered.

“Yes,” Starfire said. “She said she was hungry and found the berries. But they taste quite awful so she did not swallow any. Yet she imbibed enough to be affected by the mildornia’s hallucinogenic properties. She is back in the past, evidently before she met you.”

“That is,” NoExit interjected. “She thinks it was her brother who had been chasing her and following her this afternoon. She has otherwise no knowledge of you, Jayzu.”

“Jesus,” Jayzu said, stunned. He felt as if he had been  gored. “I—it was —me who rescued her—” he choked out. “Thomas—he—brought her to Rosencranz!” He fell to the floor, as if crushed by the heavy weight of despair.

Starfire flew to the floor next to Jayzu and put a wing on his back. “We will try to bring Charlotte back to the present.”

“How will you do that?” Jayzu asked, lifting his head.

“The Mildornia Trance,” Starfire said.

In Gabrielle’s mansion on the hill overlooking the river, Henry’s absence reigned supreme, echoing off the walls, and impossible to ignore. Strange that she should feel his lack of presence so acutely now. It was not as if she wanted him undead. Not at all.

But there was a hole where Henry used to be. Like an unnecessary organ that had been removed, leaving an empty space inside her. The guts of her life had not yet adjusted.

Changing her name had been a start. But what now?

The former Mrs Braun had kept herself as ignorant as possible of Henry’s business affairs. She only wanted to know the names of the projects, so that at night before she went to sleep, she could atone for her lavish life.

“Forgive me, Lord Jesus, for the Ledford Arms.” Or, “I beg forgiveness for AgMo.”

These names were shorthand for the stories behind them, all of which were about  her living off the largesse of someone’s exploitation. She lacked nothing that money could buy, paid for by the sufferings of others.

With Henry gone, she had immense freedom. I can do whatever I want! But I cannot just sit on his pile of money, nor spend it all on myself.

She planned to donate huge sums of cash to homeless shelters and food banks, though she knew that Henry’s entire wealth was but a drop in the bucket of what it would take to make any meaningful progress to house the homeless, feed the hungry, clothe the naked in the city of Ledford alone.

But what of happiness?

What did she even know of happiness?—other than she had not found it in a lifetime on her knees, begging forgiveness for all the things she had, but never really wanted—a big house. A Bentley. A husband who did not love her. A dead baby.

She felt adrift. “What does Jesus want from me?”

Jules Sackman would tell her what she was supposed to want, which more resembled what he wanted. What Jesus wanted of her, she was pretty sure it would be the direct opposite of whatever Jules had in mind. 

As Henry’s widow, she didn’t need any more money. Aside from Henry’s estate, she’d  also squirreled away a few dollars here and there and invested them in U.S. Treasury Bonds, a few gold mines she had shrewdly bought and sold with perfect timing, and a few semi-socially-responsible mutual funds. 

The hole in her soul now demanded her attention. For the first time since she was 15, she was free to think about what she wanted to do with her life. Not what her father wanted, or Henry, or Jules.

Or Jesus … since he wasn’t talking.

Gabrielle brought her afternoon coffee and the stack of newspapers she had not finished plowing through to her table on the patio. She read and re-read all the newspaper articles about the woman, Charlotte Steele, who had disappeared from Rosencranz.

She sat back in her chair and gazed into the far distance of her girlhood. It had been decades since Rosencranz had wrecked her life. She hoped Charlotte Steele yet lived, had found her freedom. And a way to be happy.

“Miss Minnie?” A familiar voice brought her back to her backyard.

Two crows gazed at her from across the table. She blinked a couple times and smiled “Willy! Floyd!” she cried out. “I haven’t seen you in ages! And I’ve got so much to tell you!”

“Do tell!” Floyd said as he wiggled his way into her embrace.

“Well,” she sighed, stroking his sleek black head. “First, Henry is dead. Second, I have changed my name from Minerva Braun to my former name before I met Henry. My name is now Gabrielle.”

Willy said, “You don’t say!”

“Gabrielle,” Floyd said, a sudden faraway look in his eyes. “Sounds like a movie star!”

“I like it!” Willy said. “Fits you so much better!”

“Gabrielle!” Floyd repeated dramatically. He was obviously quite swept away in one of his fantasies, born from his early nesting days when he and his brother Willy hatched and fledged in a nest at the drive-in movie theater. 

Floyd jumped to the table, flung a wing out to one side, and bowed low. “Lady Gabrielle, Your Grace. Your Ladyship. Honor me with your favor!”

“Oh, stop it!” she laughed, waving her hand across his outstretched wing. “You gentlecrows have always have my favor!”

“But Henry, Miss Gabrielle,” Willy said. “He is gone? Truly? As in checked out?”

“Kicked the bucket?” Floyd said.

“Hung up the fiddle?” Willy said.

“Bit the big one?”

“Bought the farm?”

“Gave up the ghost?”

The brothers nodded at one another after each euphemism. Gabrielle sat back, shaking her head and chuckling, in spite of herself.

“So you’re happy now?” Willy said after they’d depleted their entire knowledge of American death slang.

“‘Cuz he ain’t here no more to bother you?” Floyd said.

She inhaled deeply, and slowly let it out. “No.” How could she ever explain to the crows her months at Rosencranz, and what they did to her there, and what that did to her life. “It’s a long story.”

But for the grace of God—they could have killed me.

“Henry gave me a comfortable life,” Gabrielle said. “But I am not unhappy he is gone. Because now I can do whatever I want.”

“And what might that be, Madame?” Floyd asked. “Will you sell the old homestead and travel the world?”

Gabrielle gazed up at the house she had lived in since she was a teenager, newly married to Henry. He had bought the house as a wedding present as well as for his portfolio. Now hers.

“I’m thinking,” she said, “I will sell this place. I don’t have a lot of happy memories here. And besides, it’s just too big.”

“Where will you go?” Willy asked. “We do hope you stay within flying distance, Miss Gabrielle.”

“Yeah, we’d hate to see you not here,” Floyd said.

Willy turned his head toward his cousin. “That’s ridiculous! How can you see her if she is not here?”

“Exactly,” Floyd said. “We’d hate that wouldn’t we?”

Gabrielle laughed. “I would miss you too! But I have not decided what I’ll do, or where I would go. I’ve lived as Mrs Braun for so many years, I hardly know who I am at all.”

“Well, that’s what you can do now!” Floyd said. “A voyage of self-discovery! How exciting! Will you get some Tarot cards and do vision quests and sweat lodges and stuff?”

“I hadn’t thought of Tarot cards, Floyd!” she said. “Or sweat lodges. But who knows? It could happen!”

The Church would not approve. But she was sick of not being approved of—that had been her entire existence for over forty years. Henry had been a total atheist. He believed in nothing but what you could grab out of life. There were no second chances. No afterlife, no reincarnation. Just the here and now.

“What better place to make a pile of money than right here and right now?” Henry was fond of bellowing. “Make hay while the sun shines!”

Gabrielle glanced down at the newspaper on the table. Charlotte Steele’s sad yet defiant eyes spoke to her. “Maybe I’ll take Henry’s money and buy the old Rosencranz mansion”

“Rosencranz?” The two crows said in unison as they looked at each other. “The nut house?”

“Asylum,” Gabrielle said. 

“But what if there are ghosts, Miss Gabrielle?” Floyd said.

“Old buildings like that always have ghosts,” Willy said. “Expecially places like Rosencranz.”

“I expect there are ghosts,” Gabrielle said. “That’s why I want it.”

After Floyd and Willy left for important business of the day, she picked up the phone and dialed the number she had circled in the newspaper.

“Crawford Realty, how may I direct your call?” a cheery voice answered.

“Peggy McFarland,” Gabrielle said. “Tell her I am interested in her showing me the Rosencranz property.”

Sam drove his flesh-colored pickup truck to Kate’s apartment on the other side of the river. He had planned to buy her dinner—perhaps she would allow it this time.

They left Kate’s on foot. The restaurant was just a few blocks away. 

Sam held the door open to the cozy little place he and Kate had discovered tucked between First City Bank and the old Ledford Title Company building. They’d become regular customers at the Feast For Crows, which featured wild food—either grown locally on the many farms that surrounded the city, or taken from the pockets of woods that still existed. No actual crow, of course. And no road kill.

Kate had pretty well refused to eat ‘corporate food’ as she called it—which meant food products whose purpose was less, or not at all, about nutrition and sustaining the body, but about delivering wealth into the pockets of the few.

The menu comprised an odd assortment of many entrees. Amusing, yet delicious. Among the rotating menu items were Burgers, Fries, Pizza, Pad Thai, Chicken Fried Steak, Fish Tacos, and sometimes Sushi, depending on the whim of the chef. Red Raven Ale on tap, but you could get all the local brews in bottles.

The building had once been the brick-making factory that once thrived and served not only the vicinity of Ledford, but bricks were shipped to other states as well. The exterior was as utilitarian and clumsy—what Sam liked to call “the Soviet Style”. The nostalgia for the preservation of old classic buildings, even factories, had visited Ledford and a couple of 30-somethings left the madness of the West Coast, and bought the old building.

A Feast For Crows was charming inside—the owners had cleaned and polished the old work tables which were now used for dining. 

“Pretty quiet night, Marcus,” Sam said as they were escorted to a table at their favorite restaurant.

“It is indeed,” the said. “Hoping people will come for a bite after the movie at the Bijou.”

“What’s playing?” Kate asked as he handed her and Sam a menu.

“Murder of Crows,” he said. 

Sam and Kate looked at each other in mock horror.

“It’s not about crows, though,” the waiter said, smiling. 

“Really?” Kate said. “What’s it about?”

“Murder,” Marcus said. “And plagiarism.”

“You have a good day?” Sam said after Marcus left.

“Not really.” Kate said. “Our friend Jules Sackman is all butt-sore that he is not getting his hands on Henry Braun’s estate. He’s giving me some grief. I have threatened him to leave Gabrielle alone.”

Marcus brought salads and a baguette, and grated some fresh parmesan cheese on Kate’s and ground black pepper on Sam’s.

“Will he?” Sam said after Marcus left.

“Hopefully,” Kate said. “I’ve threatened him with a complaint to the Bar if he harasses either one of us. And, I’ve got a private eye who’s been following Jules around, smiling as he writes in his notebook. He’s a bit spooked.” She grinned wickedly.

Sam laughed. “Paranoia,” he sang, “don’t let it destroy ya!”

“And that’s the good news,” Kate said as she tore off a chunk of bread. “You know I am also probating Smitty’s estate. Unless Jade can find a will, it’ll be a pain in the ass because I can’t find a birth certificate for Jade. It oughta be in the county records, even if she was born at Rosencranz.”

“My cousins and I were all born at home,” Sam said. “We all had to get affidavits from family doctors and relatives and neighbors who could verify our family origin. Some kids used Baptismal certificates, but we never got baptized.”

Kate nodded and shoveled a forkful of salad greens into her mouth. “That’s pretty typical,” she said after swallowing. “But I can’t find an affidavit or a baptismal certificate, or anything.”

“Maybe the pipes burst in the basement where the boxes are and hers happened to be in one of them, and unfortunately drowned?” Sam suggested.

“The clerk said there hadn’t been anything like a flood or a fire,” Kate said, her fork poised in midair. “I asked her how have many birth certificates the county has for babies born at Rosencranz. She allowed as how it had been many years since Rosencranz birthed babies, but said there was no reason why the babies born there would not have a birth certificate. And, she said she would have to dig out the older files and would let me know. ‘No names, mind you,’ she said. I told her I just wanted a number.” 

“That’ll help—won’t it?” Sam asked.

“Who knows?” Kate said, shrugging. “The clerk was curious—so maybe she’ll turn up something at least interesting.”

Marcus brought their dinners. “Anything else?” he asked.

“Nope, thanks,” Sam said. “We’re good.”

“And then,” Kate said after Marcus left. “After that, I got a call from Majewski. He was pretty sloshed. He wanted to know if I’d heard from Alfredo, and then he told me he’d been out to Kafka Memorial.” She picked up her fork.

“And?” Sam said as he sliced off a chunk of his steak.

“He found out that someone visited Charlotte several times in the past few weeks who claimed to be a doctor. And, he said they told him at Kafka that this doctor and Charlotte had several conversations. As in, Charlotte spoke to him. As in this doctor speaks Patua’.”

Sam’s fork froze in mid-air. “Who told him that, now?”

“The receptionist at Rosencranz, and now at Kafka. Her name is Dora Lyn,” Kate said. She drew in a deep breath and let it out slowly. “So, this doctor person presented proper identification to prove who he was—Dr Collins. Completely bogus. There is no Dr Collins anywhere in the entire world.”

Sam put his fork back down to his plate.

“Sam, Alfredo mentioned to me a couple weeks ago that he was thinking about getting Charlotte out of Rosencranz. I ripped him a new one. I told him that would be a felony and he would go to prison. I really thought he had listened to me.”

Sam looked down at his plate, and said nothing.

“Do you have any ideas about where this fake doctor that could’ve been Alfredo’s twin got a fake ID?” Kate asked.

He looked up at her helplessly. Like a mouse caught in a trap he could not escape from. 

“Alfredo is likely to become a ‘person of interest in Charlotte’s kidnapping,” she said after Sam again didn’t answer. “So, if you had anything to do with her disappearance from Rosencranz, I need to know. Now.”

“I did not make Alfredo’s fake ID,” Sam said.

“But you know who did,” Kate said, arching an eyebrow.

“Yes,” Sam said after a long silence.

Snuffing out his annoyance with Alfredo for missing his appointment again, Majewski phoned his secretary at his office in D.C.

“Is everything under control?” Majewski asked. “I might need to be here for a few more days.”

“Yes, Father, all is well,” the secretary said. “There really is no need for you to be here right now. You have the Cardinals Retirement party on the 25th, but other than that, most everything happens via the internet, so you could be anywhere in the world. And, if there are important documents that need your actual signature, we can fax or overnight them.”

Majewski could maintain this remote operation for a couple more weeks, then he’d have to return to Washington.

He leaned back in his chair and gazed out the window. He had moved to a hotel Downtown, on the other side of the river near St Sophia Cathedral. By day he occupied one of the empty offices at St Sophia’s, and conducted his usual business there. By night he retired to his hotel near the Waterfront. He had great views of the river, the bridge, the barges, and the other half of the city. 

Crows were everywhere. Watching him…

The window in his office on the 3^rd floor of St Sophia’s faced the river, and framed the island. Like a portrait. Ah, Wilder Island. Jewel in the distance, sparkling in the sun, a siren song that beckoned to him, heart, body and soul. He never stopped tiring of imagining living comfortably in a small cottage he built for himself in the cool forests full of birds and no humans, save Alfredo. 

But all his efforts to obtain a visit to the island had come to nothing.

“I don’t know how to contact the Captain,” Kate had said. “He just shows up whenever we needed to go to the island, presumably because Alfredo sent him.”

Why in heaven’s name did I not ask for the Captain’s phone number?

Manzi had been quite cagey lately—so unlike him. Majewski really didn’t believe Alfredo’s excuses for not showing up for their appointment—as he was required, being that Majewski was his complete superior.

It had become impossible for Majewski to keep the thought at bay, that Manzi was not only responsible for Stella’s disappearance, but was also harboring her on Wilder Island. If only he wasn’t acting so guilty.

Majewski’s irritation with being stood up by Alfredo dissipated. Now with an afternoon on his hands, he took a leisurely lunch at his hotel’s restaurant. He dawdled through the meal, re-reading the newspaper. Stella had dropped out of the headlines, though a cursory summary of the continuing investigation appeared in a smaller article on the bottom half of the front page. The last paragraph of the article, as usual, stated that the Rosencranz facility was up for sale—for $2million.

Which reminded Majewski again of something that ditzy receptionist Lora Lyn—no Dora Lyn—that airhead at the receptionist desk when he’d gone to Kafka Memorial had told him. Stella’s file had almost nothing in it—in spite of having resided at Rosencranz for over 20 years. She had said maybe the rest of Stella’s records were in an old vault in the basement at Rosencranz.

The tiny seed of anxiety that her words had implanted into Majewski’s brain had not gone away. In fact, it had grown.

The article listed the realtor’s name, but he didn’t call her, lest it attracted any undue attention to his interests. Perhaps there is a caretaker on the property who can show me around. He’d explain that he didn’t want to waste a realtor’s time showing him, as he had no intention—nor the wherewithal—to buy the place.

“There’s an ancient vault in the basement under the kitchen,” Lora Lyn had said. “That’s where a lot of the older records got stored after we went to computers. Most of the paper records were destroyed when they were uploaded  into the system.”

Were her records still in the vault? 

He had to see what was inside that vault before anyone else does.

His cell phone rang. Detective McDermott. “I am sorry for the short notice, Father Majewski, but I’d like you to be present this afternoon at a meeting with the investigative team. We’ve  come up with with a few leads.”

“What leads?” Majewski asked.

“We will reveal what we can at the meeting this afternoon, McDermott said. “I hope you can make it.”

“I will be there.” Majewski was extremely curious about what leads they had found. Had they interviewed Lora Lyn yet? “Though I am not sure how helpful I can be, as I had not seen my sister in a number of years.”

Twenty-two years, in fact. 

“Any information you can give us about your sister will be extremely helpful in finding her,” McDermott said. “I assure you.”

When they do, that will direct their attention onto Manzi.

And that was the last thing Majewski wanted to happen. He’d have to devise a plan to protect Manzi, while sending Stella back to the asylum. The prime objective is ensuring that plans for his future retirement on Wilder Island doing research with Alfredo Manzi on the Patua’ language would remain intact. 

Stella is not part of the plan. If they ever find her alive, she’ll have to go back to the institution. That’s all there was to it. If for no other reason than she was taking up too much of his attention.

He could see no way the three of them could co-exist on the island. He shook his head in distaste. I’ve got to get Manzi out of the picture, until this all blows over. Stella will be found, he was certain. Dead or alive. Though it would be easier for all concerned if she were dead. He’d perform heartfelt Last Rites, with Manzi standing next to him, seeing her off to whatever awaited her. It would not be Manzi.

If she were alive, she’d be sent to Kafka Memorial. He was her legal guardian and would see to it.  

Majewski drove to the police station to meet with Detective McDermott, whose office was Downtown—on the same side of the river as he was now, at his new hotel. That was a bit more convenient.

Splitting the city into halves, the river reflected the gray clouds overhead, blurring the boundary between Earth and sky. Wilder Island seemed to float like a solid shadow…forbidding, secretive, aloof. 

And by rights, mine.

“Gentlemen,” Detective McDermott said to the small group of detectives and police officers investigating Charlotte Steele’s disappearance, “I’d like to introduce Father Thomas Majewski— the vic’s brother. I’ve asked him to join us today, to provide possible insight into his sister’s whereabouts, as well as the perp who kidnapped her.”

“Uh, yes, thank you, Detective McDermott,” Majewski said after nodding to the detectives murmuring greetings. “I am happy to be here, and I hope to offer some assistance is finding her. Hopefully safe and sound.”

“When was the last time you had contact with Alfredo Manzi?” McDermott asked.

“This morning, actually,” Majewski said. “He was supposed to come into the city and meet me, but was unable to.”

“Why was that?” McDermott asked.

“The only way off the island is by boat,” Majewski said. “Father Manzi said the only boatman that services the island was down river in MacKenzie until Friday.”

“I see,” McDermott said. “We’ll get to this boatman later. It’s Alfredo Manzi we want to talk about. We have some information that suggests that Alfredo Manzi, whom you supervise, might have been involved in her abduction.”

Majewski raised his eyebrows. “I would be astonished if that were the case.” He paused, shaking his head, frowning. “How do you even know she was abducted? Perhaps she wandered off—the grounds were not at all secure.”

“Father Majewski,” McDermott said, claiming the high ground of authority in his domain, the police station, and therefore civil law. “Your sister was not released from the institution. Therefore, as a mental patient who is unable to make her own decisions, we must treat her absence as an abduction.”

“As a child, my sister loved the woods,” Majewski persisted. “She found a small island in the stream that flowed through our property and built herself a little cabin. She cooked meals and—”

“We scoured the asylum’s entire grounds and the surrounding woods,” McDermott said as he held a hand up silencing Majewski. “If she had simply wandered off, we would have found her, or some evidence of her. She would need food and water—it’s hard to imagine she could find those things by herself. Therefore, she must have had help. And not just from Manzi.” 

Majewski shook his head and spread his hands out in a gesture he hoped would convey non-comprehension. “I am truly shocked. I have known Father Manzi since before he took his vows, I cannot even imagine that he would do such a thing.”

“Yet, it’s true,” McDermott said, throwing a sympathetic scowl in Majewski’s direction. “We consider Alfredo Manzi a person of interest in Charlotte Steele’s kidnapping. We have a witness who worked at the old Rosencranz facility who identified a photo of him as Charlotte’s visitor.” 

“But that’s just preposterous,” Majewski said, still pretending to reel at the news.

“Yet, someone who matches his description had been visiting her at Rosencranz,” McDermott said, “disguised as a doctor in the weeks prior to her disappearance.”

Majewski drew his mouth into a tight line and shook his head. Lora Lyn had evidently told the police the same story she had told him. “I am truly stunned that he would do something so illegal, and underhanded. Impersonating a doctor? He’s a priest, for heaven’s sake! Who is this witness?”

“Someone who worked at the asylum,” McDermott said and picked up the remote for the projector. “Let us move on. When was the last time you were on the island?”

“About three weeks ago,” Majewski said. “After which I returned to Washington. As you know, I arrived back in Ledford early Sunday morning to try and identify the body you found. It was my intention to visit the island for a couple days, but I have been unable to reach Father Manzi, until yesterday.”

”Have you tried to get to the island on your own?” McDermott asked.

“No,” Majewski said. “It is my understanding that no one gets to the island without Father Manzi arranging for a certain riverboat captain to take them there.”

“Why is that?” a detective asked. “Can’t you just hire another boatman?”

“The river is choppy around the island,” McDermott said to his man. “As I understand it, the underlying geology is pretty busted up, according to the professors at the U. The island sits on a layer of caves and tunnels—they say that’s why the river’s so hard to navigate, water’s being sucked down under, making the eddies and whirlpools, not just in one place, but everywhere. It’s dangerous for small boats to get anywhere near Wilder Island, and no one even tries anymore, since the days of the old hermit—other than this one boatman.”

McDermott kept his eyes fixed on Majewski for a few seconds before advancing to the next slide. “We think she was taken to Wilder Island by this boat,” The next slide appeared. “By this boatman. Do you know him?”

McDermott slowly encircled the slightly blurred image of the Captain’s face with his red laser pointer. “This is the man known around the City Docks and the Waterfront as ‘the Captain’.” 

“Of course,” Majewski said, allowing a slight note of irritation to creep into his voice. “That is the Captain.”

“Check out Mr Clean!” one of the detectives cracked.

“Check out the tats!” the other said. “Man, he’s pretty well covered except for the chrome dome.”

From his fingertips to his shoulders, then down under his tank top, the man was covered with color: fish leaping through foamy waters at birds sailing through swirling air. 

“Must’ve cost him a fortune,” the first detective said.

“Real name: Andrew Shepherd,” McDermott said, twirling the laser around the figure. “No criminal record. No physical address—apparently he lives on his boat. He  generally docks at night on the western side of the island. His income seems to derive from ferrying small groups of people up and down the river between MacKenzie and Ledford. He drops them either at the Waterfront, or the city docks in the morning, and shuttles them back down river in the evening.”

McDermott scratched his head. “That western side is the roughest, rockiest part of the island. It is virtually un-navigable. Except apparently, by the Captain.”

“So, this old tattooed dude kidnapped the vic?” one of the detectives asked. “I thought the priest was the perp.”

“We think the Captain was an accomplice, but Manzi was the master-mind behind it all,” Detective McDermott said. He turned to Majewski. “We were hoping you could set us up with the Captain and his Treeboat. We’d like to pay a visit the island.”

Several of the officers chuckled. Everyone in Ledford called the Captain’s small craft ‘the Treeboat.’

“I’d love to,” Majewski said. “Unfortunately, I honestly do not know how to contact the Captain. Father Manzi always made those arrangements.”

“I see,” McDermott said. He advanced the projector to the next slide. An aerial view of Wilder Island appeared.

“We are fairly certain Charlotte Steele is on the island. And we believe, in spite of the good Father Majewski’s character reference, that Alfredo Manzi brought her there, and is with her still. But they may leave at any time. If they do, it’ll be via the same way they came. We now have the island under surveillance–24/7.”

“If we could only get to the island,” one of the detectives said. “And if she’s there, we’ll find her.”

“We’ll find a way to force the Captain to take us there,” McDermott said. “But the island is densely wooded, and Manzi would know where to hide. Remember he’s been living there for months. Remember also what happened to Henry Braun when he tried to force his way onto the island.”

The men all nodded, recalling the photo in the newspaper of Henry Braun encased in bird poop.

“We believe the vast network of crows that ran Henry Braun and his investors off  was orchestrated by Manzi, as was the kidnapping of Charlotte Steele. Lastly, Manzi arranged for the Captain to pick her up somewhere and take her to the island. Manzi was the mastermind that controlled and directed it all. That was abundantly clear, even then.”

“How did the vic get to the river?” one of the detectives asked.

McDermott said, advancing to the next slide. A flesh-colored pickup truck appeared. “We believe she was taken to the river in this truck, which was seen in the area with a flock of crows following it —shortly before the asylum was attacked by them.”

“Is that Manzi’s truck?” a detective asked.

“No,” McDermott said. “It is registered to Samuel Howard.”

Majewski was stunned.  

If only they didn’t have DNA…that body may as well have been Stella, but for the DNA test. It would have been a whole lot easier if he could have identified the body to police satisfaction.

If she were found alive, however, it would not be difficult to have her committed again, being that he was her guardian. One way or another, Stella will be out of the way. It was only a matter of time. Meanwhile, there was no use in throwing Manzi under the bus over her.

Majewski maintained his silence and a straight face.