Dope Read Free Page A

“we’re not so sure.”
    â€œShe started coming home later and later. Drunk or whatever she was.”
    â€œIt seemed normal,” Mrs. Nelson pointed out. “She was a young girl and she wanted to have fun. She wanted to spend some time in the city.”
    â€œShe wanted to go to Barnard,” Mr. Nelson said. “So she went to Barnard. We thought . . . You can imagine. We thought she’d get it out of her system after a few years of living in the city. Sow her wild oats and then get married or even start a career, whatever would make her happy.”
    â€œShe always loved to draw,” Mrs. Nelson said. “I thought she might like to work in fashion or advertising or something like that. It might be fun for her.”
    â€œBut that didn’t happen?” I asked.
    â€œNo,” Mr. Nelson answered. “No. Instead we got complaints from the dorm mother, then from the dean. Nadine was coming home late, staying out, failing her classes.”
    â€œEven art,” Mrs. Nelson pointed out.
    â€œEven art,” Mr. Nelson agreed. “And she was avoiding us. We hardly ever saw her anymore. Finally one night it all exploded. The dorm mother found something in her room—a kit for injecting drugs.”
    â€œ Shooting up, ” Mrs. Nelson clarified. I nodded solemnly.
    â€œWe wanted to take her to the doctor,” Mr. Nelson continued. “But she refused. It turns out there wasn’t anything the doctor could do for her anyway. . . . Well, I’m sure you know about that.”
    I nodded again.
    â€œShe promised to stop on her own,” Mr. Nelson said. “But she didn’t. She couldn’t. This went on for months. Finally, they had to expel her from school.”
    â€œThat was when she left,” Mrs. Nelson cut in. “The day she had to leave the dorm. We went to go pick her up—”
    â€œShe was going to come home with us.”
    â€œBut she wasn’t there. She had left the night before. Just left, in the middle of the night.”
    â€œWe haven’t heard from her since.”
    â€œHow long ago was that?” I asked.
    â€œThree months ago,” Mrs. Nelson answered.
    â€œAnd you’re just starting to look now?”
    They looked at each other, annoyed. “We’ve been looking,” Mrs. Nelson said. “First we called the police—”
    â€œThey didn’t care. They said they would look into it.”
    â€œWe never heard from them again,” Mrs. Nelson continued. “That was the New York City police. Of course everyone in Westchester was very concerned, but there was nothing they could do. We tried looking around on our own, talking to her friends at school, trying to find out where—where people like that would be. But we got nowhere.
    â€œSo we hired a private investigator.” Mrs. Nelson reached into her purse and pulled out a photograph. “He found out she was living with this man, Jerry McFall, in some little dump down on Eleventh Street. But by the time he told us about it, they were gone. He couldn’t find them again.”
    She handed me the photo. A man and a girl were standing on Eleventh Street, near First Avenue. It was a sunny day. The girl was looking down at the ground. She had light hair and light eyes and small symmetrical features that didn’t draw any attention. She was pretty, but only if you took the time to look. And there was nothing there to grab you and make you do that. Her hair was pulled back in a ponytail and she wore a tight black sweater with a black skirt and white high-heeled shoes. She looked like a cross between a college girl and a whore. And she didn’t look happy.
    The man didn’t look happy, either. He wore a wide-brimmed hat and a fancy tweed suit. He looked like a pimp. He was thin and his face was long and narrow. I guessed he was a little younger than me, maybe thirty, give or take a few years. His eyes were dark and