Double

“Meaning what about Ruth Ferguson, Miss Pollard?”

“Meaning just what I said. She abused Timmy. You don’t know that, do you? Well, it’s true.”

“Abused him how?”

“Whipped him. Locked him in a dark closet for hours at a time, without food, when she decided he’d been naughty. God, what I’d like to do to that woman!”

“How do you know all this?”

“Carl found it out. She’s not the only one who can hire detectives.”

“So you snatched Timmy and brought him here. Kidnapping is a major crime, Miss Pollard. You can get twenty years in jail for it.”

“I don’t care about that. Don’t you understand? We had to get Timmy away from his mother before she really did something ugly to him.”

“‘We’?” I said. “What’s your relationship to Carlton Ferguson?”

“I live with him. I have ever since he divorced that bitch and moved down here.”

Which made her the “very beautiful woman” Pablo Venegas had told me about, the one who shared this villa with Ferguson. Yeah, that figured. Having her grab the kid out of his school was better, safer than hiring somebody. The fewer people who knew where Timmy was being taken, the slimmer the odds that he could be traced. Keep it in the family, I thought cynically, that’s the best way to do it.

“Aunt Nancy! Hey, where are you?”

We both turned. Timmy came running out of the tunnel in the back wing — a white streak in a pair of flowered swim trunks, wet blond hair flattened down on his head. He slowed when he saw us, stopped altogether when he recognized me. But then he smiled and came the rest of the way to where we were; he seemed pleased to see me, the way kids are when they get an unexpected visit from an adult who was nice to them.

“You’re the man from San Diego,” he said. “The man with the funny name.”

I nodded. “How are you, Timmy?”

“Great! My dad’s got a neat pool.”

“He does, huh?”

“Yeah. Aunt Nancy wouldn’t let me go swimming any of the other places, but ever since we got here I can swim all I want.”

“Good for you.”

“I’m getting a tan too. See?”

He turned around so I could see that the white skin of his back was reddened with a light sunburn. But I could also see something else, something that brought a tightness into my chest and made my hands flex involuntarily. Down low on the boy’s back were a series of horizontal, all-but-healed marks that looked to have been lacerations — the kind you get when somebody lays a stick across your hide.

I glanced at Nancy Pollard. She knew I’d noticed the marks, and her mouth was set in a thin, tight line. Her expression said: There, you see?

Timmy was facing me again. “Did you come here to see my dad?” he asked.

“Yes. But I wanted to see you, too.”

“You did? Really?”

“Really. Is your dad here now?”

“Sure, he’s out by the pool. Come on, I’ll show you.” He wheeled and ran a little way and then stopped to see if we were following. “Come on! You too, Aunt Nancy!” Then he was off again, into the shadows of the tunnel.

I went after him, not hurrying; Nancy Pollard fell in alongside, walking in a stiff-backed way, eyes straight ahead. When we emerged onto the terrace I saw that it was about the size of a football field, floored in squares of colored tile, with a waist-high stone parapet all around. The pool was on the left, an L-shaped job made out of gray stone, without the usual diving board and chromium ladders, so that it resembled a pond. A couple of wooden walls had been erected on the inner sides, to help support a clear Plexiglas roof; the other two sides were open and had pole supports and rolls of mosquito netting — a nifty arrangement that would allow you to drop the netting and swim at night without getting gnawed on.

Near the pool was a palm tree to provide shade, and under its fronds, on one of several pieces of dark wood deck furniture, was a brawny guy in trunks and huaraches and a pair of wraparound sunglasses, reading a magazine. He glanced up as Timmy raced toward him shouting something about a visitor, and when he saw me he got up on his feet. It was like watching a bear get up. He had enough hair on his chest and shoulders and arms to make a winter coat for a midget.

Timmy ran to him and he put his arm around the boy. He wore an expression of mild puzzlement, but that changed when Nancy Pollard nodded at me and said, “Carl, he’s a detective,” in a flat warning voice. His face closed up hard, his eyes got dark with anger and something else — resolve, maybe. You could see the muscles tensing up and down his body.

I stopped and Nancy Pollard stopped, and we all looked at each other in heavy silence. I didn’t want to talk in front of the boy, and neither did Ferguson. He said, “Timmy.”

“Yes, Dad?”

“Go inside and ask Maria-Elena to bring three bottles of cold beer and some snacks. Stay there and help her get everything together.”

“Do I have to?”

“Yes. Go on, now. Be a good boy.”

“Can I have another of those mango drinks?”

“Tell Maria I said it was okay.”