Cyrus for that job application.”
Cyrus Mann looked serious, but not unpleasant. His hair was slicked back, and he’d shaved, so it must have been after the casual shot by the car. He wore a clean, button-down shirt, and he smiled gently, showing no teeth. His eyes were deep and dark, and revealed a depth of sorrow with which Casey could relate. “Did he get the job?”
“Never found out. It was soon after that he was—he died. It became a nonissue, especially since Lizzie disappeared.” She sat down, the enjoyment she’d shown at seeing the old pictures draining away. “So she’s really gone? You finally found her, and she’s…gone?”
“I’m sorry.”
She didn’t speak again for a few minutes, while she warred with her emotions. She idly paged through the album, her jaw set in that way people do when they’re trying not to cry. Suddenly she stood, put the album back in the box, and pulled the other box closer. “This is what I really wanted you to see.” She reached in and took out a folder, which she laid on the table. It was fat and tattered, with papers sticking out the sides, and scribbled notes on the cover. “I kept a whole file of everything from after it all happened, along with whatever else I could find. It was so…I felt guilty, of course, and sad.” She swallowed. “And also scared. If it could happen to Lizzie…” She let out a breath and picked at the folder before finally opening it, revealing a stack of newspaper clippings, hand-written notes, photos, and scrap bits of paper. She held out the top one, and Casey took it. Eric looked over her shoulder. It said simply, “Dad call,” along with a number.
“That’s my handwriting,” Betsy said. “A cop left a message on the answering machine, asking my dad to call down to the station. Didn’t say why. I didn’t really take any notice. I was a teenager, you know?” She sniffed. “That piece of paper changed my life. Changed all our lives. I dug it out of the trash because, well, I’m not sure why. It just felt wrong to throw it away, like it was any old message.”
She took back the paper and laid it face down on the open side of the folder.
“This is the very first news article. The Denver Post. First time Marshland had made that paper in ages. Usually they pretend we’re not here, since all we have is your usual small town kind of news, but this…I guess it was going to sell papers.”
The headline screamed, MAN MURDERED, TEENAGE GIRL MISSING, which was a minor variation of the article Casey and Eric had found earlier.
“If you read it you’ll see they make a big deal about the fact that our cops aren’t big town, like if only they had been, the murder would have been solved overnight, and Liz would be back home. Or Uncle Cyrus wouldn’t have been killed in the first place.” She shook her head. “Our cops may work in a small town, but they’re smart. And they care about us.” She smoothed her hand over the paper, then turned it over to join the scrap message. “It wasn’t until the next day that the papers said anything that might have actually been true.” She handed Casey another article, and Casey read it.
“It says here he was involved with some shady people,” Casey said, referring to a quote from someone who said she saw some people hanging around Mann’s car during the previous week. “Do you know who they might be?”
“No idea. But I don’t believe it. Uncle Cyrus may have been stubborn, and maybe a little stupid for living in that car, but he wasn’t a bad guy. He wouldn’t have done anything dangerous. Not with Liz around. He knew if he got desperate he could come to us.”
“This person still around?”
“Nope. Died several years ago. I never was quite sure if she was telling the truth, anyway, or just wanted the attention.”
“How about your dad? You think he would know who these bad influences were?”
Betsy sat back and pushed the folder toward Casey, who kept it going toward Eric. He pulled up a chair and began going through the stack.
“Dad’s around, sure, but I doubt he knew anything. Uncle Cyrus and he really didn’t talk much. Dad tried, but…I didn’t even tell him about what you said during our phone call yesterday. He gave me the message, and I said I’d take