driveways. One homeowner had placed a Jet Ski up on sawhorses with a FOR SALE sign.
“You’re approaching your destination, Mr. Underwood.”
“Yes. I know. Switch off.”
The Google Maps camera car had photographed a lawn with four apple trees. Since then, Uncle Roland had removed one of the trees and placed a carved sign in front of his house.
LOON LAKE TAXIDERMY
SAVE YOUR MEMORIES
I drove a hundred yards down the road, then pulled over and tried to figure out what I was going to say.
The thermal scanner displayed an image of infrared radiation. It had a pistol grip and looked like a video camera. As I walked up a stone pathway to the house, I raised the scanner and pressed the trigger. Cold areas were displayed on the screen in shades of purple and blue. Warm spots were colored red or orange, and a human face was bright yellow. The scanner showed the building’shot-water lines and two active floor heaters. On the ground floor, a single Human Unit moved through a front room and then stepped behind a wall.
I dropped the scanner into my shoulder bag and knocked on the front door. When no one answered, I entered a room that was filled with stuffed dead animals. A worktable was near the wall and, clamped to the edge, there was a premade wooden deer’s head with a set of real antlers attached to the skull. A little bell rang when I closed the door and Roland Jefferies came out of a back room carrying a patch of deerskin. Uncle Roland looked like an older version of the thickset man with stubby legs who had posed for the photograph hanging in Emily’s kitchen.
“Good afternoon, my friend. How you doing?”
“Mr. Jefferies?”
“That’s me.”
“I’m David McCormick, a human resources manager for BDG in New York. Your niece, Emily, works for our bank.”
“Yeah. I got a phone call from some guy at the bank named Evans.”
I nodded. “Jerome Evans is in charge of corporate security. Eight days ago Emily left her desk and never returned. She hasn’t contacted the bank and we’re worried about her safety.”
Uncle Roland kept smiling. “Maybe she got tired of workin’ for your bank. Can’t say I blame her. Sounds like a boring job … making deals and pushing money around all day long. My work might look easy, but it’s a real challenge. It’s not so easy to make a dead cocker spaniel look like he’s happy.”
“Do you know where Emily is?”
“Nope.”
“Aren’t you worried?”
“Should I be?”
“People don’t usually disappear like that.”
“Hard to vanish when the EYE program is tracking everything we do. But I’m not worried about Emily. My niece is as tough as nails. When she was thirteen years old, she left her crazy parents, bought a bus ticket, and came here to Chestertown. Then she called meup on a phone and told me to pick her up at the post office. Her parents thought she was possessed by the Devil, so they didn’t fight me when I went to court and became her guardian.”
I was aware of the revolver strapped to my ankle and the automatic concealed beneath my jacket. “The bank wants to find Emily. We’d like to make sure that she’s safe.”
“Sorry you had to drive all the way up here, Mr. McCormick. But I appreciate your concern. If I hear from my niece, I’ll tell her to call you guys. Have a safe drive back to New York City, and watch out for that speed trap in Warrensburg.”
I stepped back out into the cold air and smelled the blue-green scent of pine trees. When I reached the LOON LAKE TAXIDERMY sign, I stopped and pointed the scanner at the house. If Emily was hiding in an upstairs room, Uncle Roland would have immediately reported my appearance. I peered through the walls for a minute or so, but Roland continued to stand alone at his worktable. The thoughts in his brain were transformed into a glob of blurry yellow light surrounded by a grid of hot-water pipes.
The trip to New York was a straight line south dotted by a series of discount shopping
“You’re approaching your destination, Mr. Underwood.”
“Yes. I know. Switch off.”
The Google Maps camera car had photographed a lawn with four apple trees. Since then, Uncle Roland had removed one of the trees and placed a carved sign in front of his house.
LOON LAKE TAXIDERMY
SAVE YOUR MEMORIES
I drove a hundred yards down the road, then pulled over and tried to figure out what I was going to say.
The thermal scanner displayed an image of infrared radiation. It had a pistol grip and looked like a video camera. As I walked up a stone pathway to the house, I raised the scanner and pressed the trigger. Cold areas were displayed on the screen in shades of purple and blue. Warm spots were colored red or orange, and a human face was bright yellow. The scanner showed the building’shot-water lines and two active floor heaters. On the ground floor, a single Human Unit moved through a front room and then stepped behind a wall.
I dropped the scanner into my shoulder bag and knocked on the front door. When no one answered, I entered a room that was filled with stuffed dead animals. A worktable was near the wall and, clamped to the edge, there was a premade wooden deer’s head with a set of real antlers attached to the skull. A little bell rang when I closed the door and Roland Jefferies came out of a back room carrying a patch of deerskin. Uncle Roland looked like an older version of the thickset man with stubby legs who had posed for the photograph hanging in Emily’s kitchen.
“Good afternoon, my friend. How you doing?”
“Mr. Jefferies?”
“That’s me.”
“I’m David McCormick, a human resources manager for BDG in New York. Your niece, Emily, works for our bank.”
“Yeah. I got a phone call from some guy at the bank named Evans.”
I nodded. “Jerome Evans is in charge of corporate security. Eight days ago Emily left her desk and never returned. She hasn’t contacted the bank and we’re worried about her safety.”
Uncle Roland kept smiling. “Maybe she got tired of workin’ for your bank. Can’t say I blame her. Sounds like a boring job … making deals and pushing money around all day long. My work might look easy, but it’s a real challenge. It’s not so easy to make a dead cocker spaniel look like he’s happy.”
“Do you know where Emily is?”
“Nope.”
“Aren’t you worried?”
“Should I be?”
“People don’t usually disappear like that.”
“Hard to vanish when the EYE program is tracking everything we do. But I’m not worried about Emily. My niece is as tough as nails. When she was thirteen years old, she left her crazy parents, bought a bus ticket, and came here to Chestertown. Then she called meup on a phone and told me to pick her up at the post office. Her parents thought she was possessed by the Devil, so they didn’t fight me when I went to court and became her guardian.”
I was aware of the revolver strapped to my ankle and the automatic concealed beneath my jacket. “The bank wants to find Emily. We’d like to make sure that she’s safe.”
“Sorry you had to drive all the way up here, Mr. McCormick. But I appreciate your concern. If I hear from my niece, I’ll tell her to call you guys. Have a safe drive back to New York City, and watch out for that speed trap in Warrensburg.”
I stepped back out into the cold air and smelled the blue-green scent of pine trees. When I reached the LOON LAKE TAXIDERMY sign, I stopped and pointed the scanner at the house. If Emily was hiding in an upstairs room, Uncle Roland would have immediately reported my appearance. I peered through the walls for a minute or so, but Roland continued to stand alone at his worktable. The thoughts in his brain were transformed into a glob of blurry yellow light surrounded by a grid of hot-water pipes.
The trip to New York was a straight line south dotted by a series of discount shopping
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