Excerpt from

Something Evil

Solomon knows his wife is unhappy but he doesn't have time for that now. He's working with the police on a kidnapping case, teenager Amy Basile, hoping to save her life. When the phone rings, he knows it's his police detective friend.

"Hello, Mike. You got a phone call, didn't you?" He could suddenly see it. Evelyn and little Johnnie in a doctor's office.

"Yeah, uh, two calls," Mike replied.

"A personal one. How's the kid?"

"My kid? Oh, uh, it isn't much. He was horsing around on the way to school and slipped on a patch of ice. Cut his forehead. They're putting in a couple of stitches. Compared to Basile, we got off easy."

"What about Basile?" He hadn't seen that. Only Mike's son.

"It could be a hoax. Basile got a call from somebody who claimed to be the kidnapper. Told him his daughter's dead. It was an overdose of chloroform during the abduction."

Solomon was silent. And angry. Even knowing she was dead, they had collected the ransom. He could never get used to it. These animals. But that was too good a word for them. The worst kind of animals were people.

"Was it the same voice?" he asked.

"When the guy called that first time, Basile didn't talk to him. They called the office and his secretary got it. Remember, they ripped out the phone at the house."

"Right."

"We've still got to find her, Sol."

"And him."

"There was another call," Mike went on. "Somebody named Iris Knapp. She saw that thing about you in the paper yesterday."

"And?"

"Another kid missing."

"When?"

"A year ago. We didn't have it. She lived in Paterson then. She's alone and it's her only kid, four years old. She doesn't have much hope, but she wants to know."

"Anybody'd want to know," said Solomon. "Okay, I'll give her a call. What's her number?"

Mike gave him the number and Solomon dialed it, still thinking about Amy Basile. At least it had been a quick death, but it didn't jibe with what he had seen. He couldn't understand it.

Iris Knapp had a job with an insurance office. She was in a hurry to get started, and asked if he would meet her after work the next day.

He could already see her, a young, round-faced woman with curly blond hair, wearing a green pantsuit. He saw a black car driving through the woods.

And then he saw water. He saw ripples in the wind, ripples that seemed to blow on forever.


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