brother said that someone had placed a baby carriage on their porch with a tape recorder playing a baby’s cries. The perp (or perps) must have used this diversion to take David Olson from his bedroom.
The police pulled out all the stops (and spent most of the town’s budget, the sheriff knew) to close down roads and highways. Deputies and volunteers walked through the entire town, including the Mission Street Woods. But in the end, they couldn’t find so much as a footprint.
It was as if David had been taken by a ghost.
When they were unable to find a suspect, the suspicion turned to the family. To sell a few papers, some muckraking reporters accused David Olson’s father of killing his own son. The “Mad Dad” story stuck for a little while, especially when it was discovered that the family had taken out a whole life policy on David. But without any proof, the story quickly died (along with the newspaper sales), and the reporters focused on the older brother.
The worst of them accused the older brother of murder. The best of them simply asked the question, “How does it feel to know you were there when David was taken?” The older brother, to his credit or detriment, was very open with the reporters to keep the story alive. But eventually, other news became more interesting, and the family was left with the burden of being the only people who knew how the story ended. How the crime was never solved. How the perp (or perps) were never caught. How the family was left to find meaning in the place of answers. How the town stopped looking because they were out of leads and needed the money for road salt to keep the rest of their population safe.
The sheriff put the case file away with the Missing poster on top. Then, he looked up at all the current Missing posters on his bulletin board. Faces of men, women, and children. Sheriff’s departments would send these pictures to one another like boys trading baseball cards. All in the hope (vain or real) that by some miracle, a child taken in Hershey would wind up in Philadelphia. Or the old man with dementia who wandered off in Harrisburg would somehow find his way to Pittsburgh. Sometimes, the faces changed when a child was rescued, Grandpa was found, or a teenage runaway decided that the hell at home was nothing compared with the hell on the street. But as much as the faces changed, the bulletin board never did. It was always full like the opening of The Brady Bunch.
The board was such a constant that the sheriff rarely noticed a particular face above the others. But there was one Missing poster that stood out to him now. Maybe it was her age. Or her blond hair. Or the fact that she looked a little like the girl with the painted nails. Whatever it was, the sheriff was always aware of one missing girl.
Emily Bertovich.
She had gone missing four months ago, but her parents must have had some pull in their hometown of Erie, Pennsylvania (or a whole lot of money). Because her case was still treated like it was twenty-four hours fresh. New pictures. New posters. Even the old milk carton campaign came back for this girl. Her poster looked as new and freshly printed as David Olson’s was brittle and faded. Someday, Emily’s poster would be old, too. And hopefully, she would be safe in her mother’s arms. The sheriff could feel his mind wandering again from Emily Bertovich back to the girl with the painted nails, but he quickly stopped himself.
He had work to do.
The sheriff went outside to dig his car out of the snow. Then, he drove his cruiser over the salted roads, looking at the children playing on the 3 Hole Golf course with that amazing sledding hill. He saw the little kids in their colorful jackets running up the white, snowy ridge.
Just like balloons in the sky.
He cracked the window a little to take the fog off his windshield. Fresh, cold air filled the car. He heard the children and their screams of delight as they raced down the hill and ran back up only to race down it again. The sound made him smile. A bright moment in a grey day.
The sheriff finally arrived at the old folks home. Mrs. Collins was on the porch, standing next to her mother in the wheelchair. Her mother