24 Hours

Karen glanced at the bathroom door. “I’m going to come, honey, but-” She paused, unsure what to say. How much reality could a five-year-old absorb and still function? “Baby, Mama doesn’t know how to get to where you are. Are you still at the place where I gave you the shot?”

“Uh-huh. I ran outside the cabin. I was hiding in the woods and Mr. Huey yelled that there’s snakes and bears. Then I heard the phone inside.”

“Listen, honey. Do you remember how to call nine-one-one? If you do that, the police can come get-”

“I already did that. The lady wouldn’t listen! Mama, help me.”

“What the hell are you doing? Give me that goddamn phone!” Hickey was coming through the bathroom door, trying to move quickly but not wanting to put too much weight on his injured leg.

“Mama?” cried Abby.

“Give me the phone!” Hickey roared.

Karen grabbed the. 38 off the bed, pointed it at him, and fired.

Hickey hit the floor like a soldier under incoming artillery and covered his head with both hands.

“Tell me where my baby is, you son of a bitch!”

“Mama? Mama!”

Hickey didn’t speak or move. Karen fired into the floor, missing him by inches. “Answer me, Goddamn IT!”

“Stop shooting!” he screamed. “If you kill me, your kid is dead!”

“Right along with you! get it?” Karen tried to speak calmly into the receiver. “Stay on the phone, baby. Mama’s fine, but she’s busy. Are you in the cabin now?”

“I’m in a little shed outside. I’m on a tractor.”

Abby’s captor was certain to focus on any structures as he hunted for her, no matter how simpleminded he was. It was like looking for your car keys under the streetlight.

“I want you to go back outside, Abby, into the woods. Make sure Mr. Huey isn’t around, then sneak out of the shed, get down in some bushes, and stay down.”

“But it’s nighttime.”

“I know, but tonight the dark is your friend. Remember Pajama Sam? No need to hide when it’s dark outside?”

“That’s on the computer. That’s not real.”

“I know, baby, but the woods are the safe place for you now. Do you understand?”

“I guess so.”

“Do you think your sugar ’s okay?”

“I guess.”

“Don’t you worry, sweetie. Mama’s going to come get you.”

“You promise?”

“I promise. Now, I want you to look outside, and then run into the woods. Take the phone with you, and stay on the line. Don’t hang up, okay? Don’t hang up.”

“Okay.”

Karen covered the phone with her hand and pointed the gun at Hickey’s head. “Get up, you bastard.”

He looked up, his eyes bright with anger. Maybe with surprise, too, she thought.

“I said, ‘get up’!”

Hickey flattened his hands on the floor and raised himself slowly, then leaned against the frame of the bathroom door for support.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” he asked.

She gave him a cold smile. “I’m changing the plan.”

NINE

Dr. James McDill and his wife sat across from Special Agent Bill Chalmers, a bland-faced, sandy-haired man in his early forties. Agent Chalmers’s tie was still neatly tied despite the fact that it was 11:30 P.M. McDill had called the Jackson Field Office of the FBI a few minutes after Margaret’s mini-breakdown, and that call had resulted in this meeting.

He had planned to come to the Federal Building alone, but Margaret had insisted on accompanying him. Chalmers met them in the empty lobby, escorted them through the unmanned security post and up to the FBI floor. They arrived to find most of the office complex empty and dark: a government-issue cube farm lit by glowing computer screens. Chalmers led them back to the office of the SAC, or Special Agent-in-Charge. A nameplate on the desk read FRANK ZWICK.

The Jackson FBI office had a distinguished or notorious history, depending on what part of the country you were from. It had been established by J. Edgar Hoover himself during the terrible civil rights summer of 1967.

“I’m not quite clear about some of the things you said on the phone,” Chalmers said from behind his boss’s desk. “Do you mind if I ask some questions?”

“Fire away,” said McDill.

“We’re talking about a kidnapping-for-ransom, correct? And wire fraud, it sounds like.”

“Yes, to the first question. To the second, I imagine so.”

“And this happened one year ago today?”

“Give or take a few days. It happened during the same annual medical convention that’s going on right now in Biloxi.”

Chalmers pursed his lips and gazed through the window, toward the old Standard Life Building, illuminated now by cold fluorescent light. After a few moments’ thought, he looked the heart surgeon directly in the eye.

“I’ve got to ask this, Doctor. Why did you folks wait a whole year to report this kidnapping?”

McDill had rehearsed his answer during the drive over. “They threatened to come back and kill our son. We’d paid the ransom. It was a hundred and seventy-five thousand dollars, which, frankly, isn’t much money to me. Especially weighed against the life of my son.”

“But didn’t you tell me the kidnappers told you they’d done the same thing before?”

“Yes.”

“So you must have feared from the first that they would do it again, to another child. Another family.”