The Singing Bone by Beth Hahn Page B

His expression is more sympathetic than she expected.
    He looks away, and she follows his gaze. There, she sees them again—the teenagers from the rocks. They’re climbing the hill that leads away from the river, and when they see Hans and Alice watching, the boy with the black hood turns to face them. He sends a howl into the sky. Likely, he’s no one. He’s just trying to scare them—and he has. Alice realizes Hans’s hand is on her arm—he’s ready to pull her along if he begins to run. But the boy turns and begins climbing up the hill again. The boy looks back one more time, and Alice hears him laugh. She wonders how many Wyckians are out there, what sort of threat they pose— You know what to do , she hears Mr. Wyck say. It doesn’t take an army of Doug Ramseys. It only takes one.
    â€œYes,” she says, turning to Hans. “Yes. I’ll go.”

13
    Hans thought Alice would be different. He doesn’t know why—or what he expected. He didn’t expect to like her—that’s it. His only references until their meeting were transcripts and news articles—and Jack ­Wyck’s drawings. He looks down at the photos of the expressionless girl, the hollowed eyes, the dark circles. It was a face that made one stop and look again, a face that made one ask What happened ?
    But the woman he met was nothing like that. She was elegant, intelligent. Under any other circumstances, he would have wanted to ask her to dinner. He would not have handed her a letter from a psychopath.
    Hans looks across the table at Ariel. The waitress at the diner is different this time, and Hans is relieved. He doesn’t want to talk idly about the film or Jack Wyck. He doesn’t want to speculate—not with a stranger, anyway. He can speculate with Ariel, who has her head bent over a court transcript. She’s reading one of Alice’s statements. She looks up at him. “When will I get to meet Alice?”
    â€œSoon,” he says. “We’ll do an official interview, but let’s give her some time.”
    â€œDid you like her?”
    â€œI do.”
    Ariel gives him a sly smile. “Hans likes Alice,” she says. They’re both relieved for the joke. Ariel sets the court transcript aside and puts her elbows on the table, leaning towards Hans. “So,” she says. “What’s she like?” Ariel is in the habit of pulling her sweater sleeves over her hands and holding them in her fists. The arms of her sweaters are all stretched, Hans has noticed.
    â€œScared.”
    Ariel sighs, sitting back in the booth. “I almost forgot to tell you,” she says. “I’ve tracked down Stuart.”
    â€œWhere is he?”
    â€œGet this. He’s a brain doctor. He studies sociopathy .”
    â€œWhat about Allegra?”
    She shakes her head. “Zip. Nothing. It’s like she just walked off the edge of the earth.”
    Hans tries to imagine this. He sees a woman standing on the tip of a jagged overhang, the sky all around her. She steps off, first moving one foot tentatively, then the other, but instead of falling, she simply vanishes.

14
JUNE 1979
    â€œWhat else are you going to do?” Trina asked them. It was right before graduation, on one of those summery, end-of-school half-days when they rolled the car windows down and turned the radio up. They’d driven to the mall to help Molly look for a gift for Stuart, who was about to turn twelve, and were making a slow shuffle through JCPenney. “You can hang at your mom’s and work here for the air conditioning,” Trina continued, running her fingers across the department store’s jewelry display. She picked a gold chain up with one finger. “Go to the pool, maybe?” Trina looked at Alice. “Field parties? Endlessly make out with Dan Crew but never fuck him?” Alice rolled her eyes. “This is pretty,” Trina said,