Part 23 (1/2)

Growing up in Alta Lobo, Emma had seen similar places, ramshackle run-down houses with a lot of junk around. But most people did something to try to make even the poorest house a home. They'd put a violet in the window, or some silly statue in the yard.

There was nothing like that here, nothing that would make this bleak place a home. Just junk and red dirt a shed, a house and an old pickup truck. The pickup wasn't even any kind of real color. It had a coat of rusting gray primer on it, and nothing more.

Marsh turned off the engine and muttered dryly, ”As I think I might have mentioned, my father never cared a whole lot about living well.”

They got out of the car, crossed the cleared s.p.a.ce and entered the house under the sagging overhang that served as a front porch.

It was no more inviting inside than out. The front door opened into a living room with brown carpet, brown chairs and a brown couch. The smell of mildew hung in the air and not a single picture graced the dingy walls.

”This way.” Marsh led them down a dark, narrow hallway, past two bedrooms on the right. The hallway jogged left at the end. A few steps and they confronted a padlocked door.

Marsh had the key.

They entered Blake's ”office.” It consisted of a battered desk with a computer on top, a wall lined with metal bookcases, some scarred file cabinets, an old portable typewriter on a cheap stand, a window air conditioner and a closet. Emma opened the closet door. Like the metal bookcases, the closet was stacked high with old newspapers and magazines.

Marsh booted up the computer, then offered the squeaky swivel chair to Jonas. ”Be my guest.” Jonas took the chair. The computer required a pa.s.sword, which Marsh provided. ”It's 'surprise.'”

Jonas typed in the word at the prompt and he was in. ”Your father gave you the pa.s.sword before he died?”

”No. He gave hints. The hints were in certain things he said to me and of course, the word was pasted on the front of his sc.r.a.pbook. But he never told me directly. What fun would that have been for him?”

Jonas swore. ”Your father had one sick idea of fun.”

”You'll get no argument from me on that point.”

Jonas began to explore the computer, checking through the different programs stored inside, scrolling through files, seeking some hint of something that would lead him to something else, some clue that might end up helping him to discover what had happened to a baby who had vanished three decades ago.

Emma went through the file cabinets, which Marsh said Tory had already looked through once. She found file folders full of clippings articles about everything from how to build your own storm cellar to a thousand and one uses for old newsprint. She found folders with Blake's bills in them utility bills, grocery receipts, bills for meals at places like Pizza Hut and Taco Bell. It looked as if the man had kept every piece of paper he ever got his hands on.

She also found folders with people's names on them. Most of the names she didn't know. But there was a folder for Marsh and one for Jonas. One for Tory and one for Kimberly. One for Blythe and one for Amanda. There were folders for other Bravos, too: Jenna and her sister, the three Wyoming cousins and their families and several more that Emma didn't recognize offhand.

As a rule, the folders with people's names on them were empty. But Blythe's folder held a couple of clippings, both of them less than a year old. And Jonas's contained one clipping, about some business deal he'd made back in March.

She showed the clippings to Marsh and Jonas.

”He probably planned to paste them into that book of his,” Marsh said. ”But he died before he got around to it.”

The computer, like the file cabinet, contained hundreds of files labeled with people's names. In those files were phone numbers and addresses, notes about places of business, likes and dislikes, hobbies and pastimes. As in the cabinet, there was a file on Marsh and each member of his family and on Jonas and Blythe and Mandy.

”What was he plannin' to do with all this information?” Emma asked no one in particular after they'd been in that room for about an hour and a half, getting nowhere, looking through dusty papers and scanning computer files that seemed to have no other purpose than the secret invasion of other people's privacy.

”Whatever it was, he won't be doing it anymore,” Marsh said. He was leaning over Jonas's shoulder as Jonas opened folders and scrolled through files. ”I don't know about the two of you, but I find that very rea.s.suring.”

”It's just too bad he didn't keep a file on Russell,” Emma said. ”Except in the sc.r.a.pbook, we haven't seen that name anywhere.”

Marsh made a noise of agreement in his throat and glanced her way. She thought that he was thinking just what she was right then. That there was no file on Russell because he had died three decades ago. What would be the point in keeping track of the dead?

Jonas pressed his fingers to his forehead.

Emma put her hand on his shoulder. ”That headache is still bothering you, isn't it?”

”It's all right, Emma.” He gently shrugged her off. ”We need a nerd,” he said. ”Someone who can get in here deeper than I know how to.”

Marsh was nodding. ”You're right. The old man must have deleted things, and maybe some of what he got rid of would be of use to us now. An expert might be able to retrieve it.”

”I know one or two bona fide computer geniuses,” Jonas said. ”I'll make a few calls tonight, see if one of them would be willing to fly out here tomorrow morning and have a look.”

”Sounds like a plan.”

”In the meantime, I see he's got a port here for a Zip disk. Maybe we ought to make a backup copy of everything on his hard drive just in case something happens to this computer.”

”Good idea,” said Marsh. ”I think I saw some of those bigger disks around here somewhere...” He knelt and pulled several of them from one of the lower left-hand desk drawers. ”Here we go.” He set the fat gray disks on the desk. Jonas picked up the top one, removed it from its case and inserted it into the port.

Emma turned to the file cabinet again and started in on the N's. Marsh had already gone back to thumbing through the dusty stacks of newspapers and magazines. Jonas completed his task of copying the contents of the computer onto the Zip disks. Then he remained at the computer, scrolling through file after file.

It was after five when he sat back in the swivel chair. ”That's it.” He rolled his shoulders, as if to loosen the tension gathered there. ”I've opened every file in this d.a.m.n machine at least every one I can manage to access. And I have found zero. Nada. Nothing at all that might get us any closer to figuring out what happened to my brother.”

Emma had found nothing, either. She shut the bottom file drawer and brushed off her hands as Marsh tossed the magazine he'd been thumbing through back onto one of the dusty stacks.

Jonas rubbed at his eyes. ”I can call around, as I said, for someone to get out here and have a closer look at this computer. But after that...”

Marsh sank to the edge of the battered desk. ”We've kind of run out of places to search, haven't we?”

”Don't forget the rest of the house,” Emma reminded them. ”n.o.body's gone through the kitchen drawers, or your father's bedroom, have they?”

”No,” Marsh said. ”And you're right. We should go through the whole place. I would have guessed, if there were anything more for us to find, it would have been in this room. But you never know...”

Jonas stood. ”We'll check the rest of the house tomorrow. And go through the shed.” He shrugged. Emma thought he looked very tired and way too resigned.

He didn't think they were going to find anything. She could see that in the weary lines of his face, hear it in the flat tone of his voice.

At Marsh's house, they met Kimberly, as well as the little girl's cat, a good-natured gray tabby named Mr. Pickles. Kimberly was very pleased to learn she had a cousin from Los Angeles .

”I think we'll have to come and visit you, Cousin Jonas,” Kimberly announced. ”It'll work out great. We can go to Disneyland and Universal Studios while we're there.”

Jonas said he'd look forward to that visit and really seemed to mean it. He told Kimberly about Mandy.

Emma watched him with the little girl, noted the warmth in his eyes and the openness of his smile. He really had come a very long way since their marriage. Blythe would be proud.

Now, if they could just find Russell...

But a day of fruitless searching had created serious doubts on that score. After Kimberly had gone to bed, the grown-ups made themselves comfortable in the family room and discussed the situation.

Jonas said, ”I think we've already got all the clues Blake left for us.”