beyond precious,” commented Blum.
Pine turned back to Ridley. “So you remember my parents?”
Ridley’s smile vanished. “I knew and liked your mom very much, Lee.” She caught herself. “I mean, Atlee.”
“‘Lee’ is just fine, Mrs. Ridley.”
“I was older, of course. But we were good friends, me and your mother. Julia worked some to make ends meet and had to go on errands and appointments, and that’s why she needed a babysitter. Your dad, I didn’t know as well. But he sure loved his little girls.”
“How did my mom get to those places? She didn’t have a car that I knew of.”
“Oh, I’d let her take my old Dodge pickup truck. That’s what I would drive over in. She couldn’t pay much, and I rarely asked for any money. My husband had a good paying job. We didn’t need anything extra.” She paused and her face crinkled even more deeply, like a flower reversing to a bud. “My ‘payment’ was to spend time with you girls.”
Blum said, “I wish you’d lived near me. I had six kids, all under the age of twelve at one point. Most days I felt like I’d been hit by a freight train.”
“And you remember what happened then?” asked Pine, her gaze on Ridley.
The old woman nodded slowly. “Yes, I do. It hit the whole town hard. Never had anything like that happen here. And thank God we’ve never had anything like that again.”
“What can you tell me about it?” said Pine. “I was still very young and really have a lot of memory gaps. Plus the adults back then didn’t talk to me about it.”
“Well, I’m sure they were quite worried about how it affected you. Now, I went to the hospital to help your mother. She pretty much never left your side while you were in there.”
“I remember waking up and seeing her.”
“She was so broken up. Lost one daughter and nearly lost the other. I don’t know if you realize how close you came to dying, Lee.”
“No, I guess I don’t. What about Mercy’s disappearance?”
“Well, as you probably know the police were as puzzled as everyone else.”
“Sheriff Dalton from Macon County,” said Pine. “I didn’t remember his name, of course. I looked him up later.”
“Yes, well he’s dead now, but one of the deputies who worked on the case is now the sheriff over in Macon.”
“Which deputy?”
“Dave Bartles. He was one of the first deputies at the house after your mother called 911. I know because Julia called me, too, and I rushed over there. Now he’s getting close to retirement.”
Blum said, “But we’re in Sumter County, like you said. Why would the Macon County police be involved? And why not the police here in town?”
Pine glanced at Blum. “Andersonville doesn’t have its own police force. The law enforcement comes from the Sumter County Sheriff’s Office. But we lived right across the line in Macon County, so the Macon County Sheriff’s Department did the investigating.”
Ridley nodded. “And they called in the state police to look at things. And the FBI, too.”
“Because it was a kidnapping,” said Pine.
“Yes, I guess that’s right. Now, Cy told me about you being with the FBI. I…I suppose your becoming an agent maybe had something to do with what happened to your sister.”
“It did, yes,” said Pine. Maybe more than I thought.
Ridley drew a long breath and eyed Pine anxiously. “Well, the long and the short of it was the police believed your daddy had done it.”
“And I told them it wasn’t him,” Pine said firmly.
The old woman said, “I knew your father had nothing to do with it. And the fact was they could never prove anything against Tim, and then y’all moved away.”
“I don’t think we had a choice,” said Pine. “My dad got fired from the mine. We couldn’t survive here.”
“The thing is, Lee, you and your family disappeared in the middle of the night.”
“I remember we moved very quickly one night, but you mean they didn’t tell anyone?”
“No, they didn’t. You were there one day and gone the next. This was only a few months after you got out of the hospital. I went over to check on everybody and the place was empty. Not that y’all had much. But there was really nothing left. A few sticks of furniture. Your parents must’ve gotten a U-Haul trailer or something. I couldn’t believe my eyes. There was no note or anything. Not a word to anyone. Haven’t heard from them since.”
Pine slowly took this in. “I