The Lesson of Her Death

deer-chewed.
    Beside him, dressed in a beige uniform and tan windbreaker, Wynton Kresge was carrying a Remington pump shotgun. The gun had a stiff sling but he did not carry it slung. He held it two-handed like a soldier, index finger pointed forward outside of the trigger guard. The men walked quickly, Corde consulting two sheets of dark-stained typewriter paper as if they were instructions on a scavenger hunt.
    The sky was milky. The sun, a white disk low in the sky, was trying to burn off the overcast, but the density of gray meant that it was going to lose. The forest, the cow pasture, the yellow-green carpet in front of him were an opaque watercolor. A coal black grackle flewimmediately toward him then turned abruptly away, startling both men.
    At an old burnt-down barn that he had forbidden Jamie and Sarah from playing in, they turned right. Beams of the silo rose like charred bones. They walked on, over an old railroad bridge then followed the gravelly roadbed to the Des Plaines. They walked along the bank through more woods until they found the house. Corde folded the sheets of paper and put them in his pocket.
    The house was another dilapidated colonial, two stories, narrow and sagging. This one was set in a grim, scruffy clearing, past which you could see storage tanks along the river. A tug towed a rusty barge upstream, its harsh, chugging engine irksome in the heavy air.
    In the front yard was parked a green car. A Hertz sticker in the windshield. Corde read the plate.
    “It’s the one Gilchrist rented.”
    Corde crouched and Kresge knelt beside him, under cover of a fallen branch. Corde looked at the ground. He said, “You stay outside. No matter what you hear. If he comes out alone, stop him. He’s the only one who knows where Sarah is. I want him alive.”
    Kresge said, “I’d feel better calling in some backup. That’s what the manual says in cases like this.”
    Corde kept studying the house. Lord, it seemed ominous—towery and pale, mean. He said, “I’m going to get my daughter one way or another. I may need some time with Gilchrist by myself.”
    Kresge looked long at Corde, considering these words. He turned back to the house. “How’d you know this was his place?”
    Corde shushed him. Together they closed in on the colonial. Kresge crouched behind the Hertz car and rested the shotgun on the hood. He pointed at the front and back doors, nodding, meaning that he could cover them both. Corde nodded back and, crouching, ran to the front of the house. He paused beside the rotting gray porch. He caught his breath then eased slowly up to thedoor. He smashed the door in with a vicious kick of his boot and stepped into the rancid-smelling house.
    The room was milky, as if illuminated through smoke or mist. Light, already diffused by the clouds, ambled off the silver maple leaves outside and fell ashen in the room. The carpet, walls, plywood furniture, paintings seemed bleached by this weak radiance.
    A terrible moment passed. Corde believed the house was empty and Gilchrist had escaped from them again. Then his eyes grew accustomed to the weak light and he saw at the end of the room a pale shape, a sphere that moved. It was mottled with indefinite features like the surface of the moon. Corde saw that it was a man’s head and that he was staring back at Corde.
    The man slowly rose and stood behind a cluttered desk. About six-two, graying brown hair, trim, gangling arms and long thin hands. He wore a conservative light green tweed sports jacket and tan slacks. His face gave no clue that he was surprised by the intrusion. He examined Corde with brown eyes that were the only dark aspects of his person.
    He looks like me
was the thought that passed involuntarily through Corde’s mind.
    “Gilchrist,” he said evenly, “where is my daughter?”

L eon Gilchrist walked through a thick beam of dusty light and stopped ten feet from Corde. He folded his arms. A mirthful half smile was on his face. “Well, I am surprised, Detective Corde.”
    “I want to know where she is.” Corde’s voice trembled. “I want to know now.”
    “Of course you do.”
    “Sarah!” Corde shouted, looking at a stairway that led to the second floor.
    “I was just thinking of you,” Gilchrist said mildly. “You’d be surprised how often you’re in my thoughts. About as often as I am in yours, I’d guess.”
    Corde stepped forward, raising his revolver to Gilchrist’s chest. The professor glanced down at it