The Dreams of Ada Read Free Page A

cries would not be heard, and leave her with a long walk back to the road, so you had time to get away, this might be the place. Baskin cruised the dividing and redividing narrow blacktops, looking for the grayish pickup. He found nothing but dark trees silhouetted against the sky.
    He headed back toward town, cruised the narrow streets. Nothing. He went out to Kerr Lab, a federal environmental research facility at the southern end of town; it is set far back from the main road, behind a large parking area, surrounded on three sides by thick woodlands—another likely spot for rape and abandonment. He did not find the truck or the girl.
    He drove back to McAnally’s, where the others were milling around. He decided he’d better let his boss know about this one. He telephoned Detective Captain Smith at home.
    The captain and his wife were already asleep. They had to deliver newspapers in the morning. Smith listened groggily to Mike Baskin’s tale.
    “Treat it as a crime scene,” he said.
    He hung up the phone and soon went back to sleep.
    Months later, Dennis Smith would think ruefully that, had he known all that was to follow, he would have gone to the scene himself that night. But there was no way of knowing, even then, if that would have made a difference.
             
    In the small apartment above the dental offices of Dr. Jack B. Haraway, one of several apartments in the two-story brick building, Steve Haraway’s studying was interrupted by the ringing of the phone. Was this Steve Haraway?—yes—whose wife works as a clerk at McAnally’s?—yes—is she at home?—no, she’s working tonight—well, you’d better get over to McAnally’s, your wife is missing.
    Missing?
    He hurried down the flight of stairs, tall, thin, dark-haired, light-complexioned. He had talked to Denice on the phone less than two hours ago, about 7:30. When he got home from work. They talked around that time every night on the four days she worked: Thursday through Sunday. Missing? Nothing had been wrong; things had been slow at the store; she’d been able to get some studying done.
    He drove out on Mississippi, curled right at the four-way stop sign.
    They’d met nearly two years before, when Denice—Donna Denice Lyon, then—moved into an apartment in the building owned by his father. He was living in a smaller apartment then. She moved in along with her younger sister, Janet. He and Gary May had stood there and watched them move in. Very pretty, Donna Denice was, though shy. She’d be going to East Central.
    He sped out Arlington, going east, past the blinking yellow caution light at the entrance to Valley View Hospital. Directly across from it was We-Pak-Um, where he himself had worked all day. It was still open.
    They’d been married in August, at the First Christian Church, in which his parents were active. An imposing edifice, across the street diagonally from the courthouse square, from the county courthouse. He sped out Arlington. Invisible in the darkness on the right was the foundation of a new building, a future law office: Wyatt & Addicott.
    And then, a quarter mile farther, McAnally’s.
    Yes, that was her driver’s license. Yes, that was her purse, her car keys. Yes, that was her car parked beside the building. Her schoolbooks. Yes. Yes.
    No, he wasn’t sure what she’d been wearing; he’d been gone when she left for work. But he could be pretty sure. Blue jeans. She always wore blue jeans to work. And tennis shoes. They were comfortable. Some kind of blouse—he didn’t know which one today—and a hooded sweatshirt that zipped up the front. She usually took the sweatshirt; it was cold in the walk-in cooler. Yes.
    There was nothing more he could do here. If she called, she would call him at home. He’d better get home and wait by the phone. Yes. If they learned any more, they could call him there.
    He went home to the apartment. When he and Denice got married, they’d moved into hers; hers was bigger. The