After the assembly, he’d received a call from the fire lieutenant, who reported that Bunny Starch’s blue Prius was gone at daybreak when the crews had returned to the Black Vine Swamp. The lieutenant surmised that, sometime during the night, Mrs. Starch had found her way back to her car.
That theory was bolstered by the information from Libby Marshall, who’d burst into Dr. Dressler’s office and blurted the story of her asthma inhaler so breathlessly that he feared she might need to use it.
The facts strongly suggested that Mrs. Starch was alive and had safely exited the wilderness. How else would Libby’s lost medicine have been delivered to her front porch?
What nagged at Dr. Dressler was this: Nobody had seen or spoken to the biology teacher.
She hadn’t shown up for classes that morning, which, given the circumstances, was excusable—yet she hadn’t even called to say she’d be absent. That was a violation of the Truman faculty attendance policy, and nobody was a bigger stickler for school rules than Mrs. Starch.
In eighteen years she’d missed only one day of teaching, when she accidentally rolled her car while swerving to avoid a rabbit on the way to school. She’d borrowed the ambulance driver’s radio to call in sick, and the next day she had returned to Truman with a plaster cast on one arm, a patch over one eye, and two metal pins in her collarbone.
After Libby left his office, Dr. Dressler immediately tried calling Mrs. Starch’s cell phone … and calling and calling and calling. Then he phoned her house—no answer there, either. It was baffling.
Dr. Dressler reluctantly agreed that the sheriff’s deputies should go ahead and interview the students. Technically, at least, Bunny Starch was still a missing person.
* * *
After speaking with Libby, Nick and Marta expected Mrs. Starch to be waiting with a pencil twirling in biology class. They were surprised to see Miss Moffitt sitting at Mrs. Starch’s desk, and even more surprised when a sheriff’s deputy poked his head in the doorway and asked for Duane Scrod Jr.
Miss Moffitt said, “Duane’s absent today.”
“All right.” The deputy scanned his clipboard. “How about Graham Carson?”
Graham eagerly raised his hand, and the deputy motioned for him to come along. Graham was beaming self-importantly as he marched from the room.
“I don’t get it,” Marta murmured to Nick. “What’s with the cops? Don’t they know the old bird is okay?”
Nick was mystified as well. If Mrs. Starch was safe, why were the deputies hanging around and asking questions?
Another uniformed officer entered the classroom and called Marta’s name. Her eyes widened and she looked fretfully at Nick.
He said, “No big deal. Just tell ’em what you know.”
After a few minutes Marta returned and, looking annoyed, plopped down at her desk. “I told him Mrs. Starch was all right, but he just kept on asking me more stuff.”
“Like what?” Nick said.
“No talking, please!” It was Miss Moffitt. Sternly she pointed at the blackboard, upon which she had chalked the words “Reread Chapter 8.”
Libby Marshall was called out next, and Nick assumed that she’d be the final interview. Once Libby told them that Mrs. Starch had delivered the asthma inhaler last night, the deputies would realize there was nothing to investigate.
But Libby came back to class red-faced and fuming. Nick wondered what in the world was going on.
One by one, the remainder of Mrs. Starch’s biology students were summoned. Sometimes the interviews were short, and sometimes they lasted awhile. There were so many interruptions from kids coming and going that it was difficult to concentrate on the Calvin cycle, or any other topic in the biology book.
Nick was the last to be called. He was led to an empty classroom by the same female deputy to whom he’d spoken near the Truman statue. The deputy told Nick to sit down (which he did) and relax (which was impossible).
“Let’s go over what happened on the field trip yesterday,” she said. Balanced on her lap was a clipboard holding a blank report form, upon which she’d printed Nick’s full name. “When Mrs. Starch turned back to look for the young lady’s asthma inhaler, you’re sure she was alone?”
“Yes, I saw her walking down the boardwalk all by herself,” Nick said.
The deputy scribbled on the paper.
Nick quickly added, “She must be all right, because she brought back Libby’s asthma inhaler last night. Did you know about that?”
The deputy nodded and kept writing.
“Then I don’t get the point of all this,” Nick said.
“Let’s go back to the day before the field trip,” said the deputy. “I want to ask you about something that happened in class between Mrs. Starch and a boy named Duane Scrod.”
Nick felt the muscles in his neck stiffen. “She pointed a pencil at him, and he bit it in half.”
“Didn’t he also threaten her?”
“What do you mean?”
The deputy said, “Some of your classmates remember Duane saying something like, ‘You’re gonna be sorry.’ And then Mrs. Starch saying, ‘Is that a threat?’ Do you recall such a conversation?”
Nick recalled it quite clearly. He also recalled worrying that Smoke might be serious. Nick felt uneasy telling this to the deputy, because he couldn’t be sure what Duane Scrod had meant.
But Nick’s father had taught him to always be truthful, no matter how hard it might be.
“Mrs. Starch told Duane to write five hundred words about pimples,” Nick began. “That’s no joke.”
The deputy obviously had heard about the essay from the other students, because she displayed no reaction.
Nick went on: “Then Duane said something like, ‘You’ll be sorry,’ whatever. He was mad—kids say all kinds of stupid stuff when they’re mad.”
The deputy took a few more notes. “Does Duane have a nickname?” she asked, as if she didn’t already know.
“Smoke,” Nick said.
“Why do they call him that?”
“Because that’s what he wants to be called.”
The deputy glanced up. “Some of the other students said it’s because he’s a pyromaniac—because he likes to mess with fire.”
“I don’t know. We don’t hang together,” Nick said.
“But you’ve heard that rumor, right?”
Nick could sense that the deputy wanted him to say that Duane was a nut case. “I thought you wanted me to stick to what I saw and what I know,” he said. “I didn’t think you were interested in rumors.”
The deputy raised her eyebrows. “Sometimes rumors turn out to be true, Nick.”
“Can I go back to class now?”
She said, “That wildfire at the Black Vine Swamp wasn’t really a wildfire. It was arson.”
“What?”
“The investigators called it a ‘controlled burn.’ Whoever set the fire also dug a trench line on the other side so it would burn itself out. They knew what they were doing,” the deputy said.
Nick was dumbfounded.
The deputy tapped her pen lightly on the clipboard. “Do you think Duane would ever try such a thing, to get back at Mrs. Starch for what happened in class? Light a brush fire to freak her out and spoil the field trip?”
“I have no idea,” Nick said honestly.
In his mind he was replaying the glimpse of that tannish blur in the cypress trees, the panther that turned out to be a human. Maybe it was Smoke.
Nick kept this thought to himself. He needed to go home and look at the videotape of the swamp prowler again.
The deputy went on: “Duane was pretty angry about that essay assignment, wasn’t he?”
“Sure,” said Nick, thinking: Who wouldn’t be angry? Mrs. Starch had totally humiliated the guy.
“Were you aware that Duane got in trouble once for burning down a construction trailer out near Immokalee? He was only ten years old when it happened,” the deputy said. “Another time, they caught h
im torching a billboard on the interstate, using mops dipped in gasoline. Three in the morning, a state trooper busted him.”
“Are you serious?” Nick was stunned. Those weren’t typical dumb-kid pranks; they were crimes.
“Are you afraid of Duane?” the deputy asked.
“Not really. He doesn’t hassle anyone.”
“Was Mrs. Starch afraid of him?”
Nick had to chuckle at that one. The deputy asked what was so funny.
He said, “If you met Mrs. Starch, you’d think it was pretty funny, too.”
The deputy scribbled another few lines, then capped her pen. “Nick, do you have any idea where we might find Duane?”
Nick firmly shook his head. “Nope. That’s the truth.” The deputy rose. “Thanks for your help.” “I really don’t know the guy at all,” Nick insisted. “That’s the thing. Nobody seems to know him, do they?” She opened the door and motioned for Nick to leave.
SIX
After classes let out, the deputies stopped by the headmaster’s office and said they were done with all the interviews except for two.
“Well, I haven’t heard from Mrs. Starch yet,” Dr. Dressler told them, “and Duane Scrod is absent from school.”
The female deputy said a detective would follow up on the case, if necessary. “It’ll be hard to prove the young man lit the fire,” she said, “but sometimes they’ll come right out and admit it when you ask ’em. Pyros are funny that way.”
Dr. Dressler sat upright. “Whoa—back up a second. You think Duane started that wildfire?”
“Didn’t anybody tell you?” the female deputy said.
The headmaster shook his head numbly.
“The kid has a history of doing this stuff,” the other deputy added.
When she told Dr. Dressler about the other fires, he couldn’t conceal his shock. “I had absolutely no idea,” he said gravely. “Let me give you the boy’s address.”
“We already got it, thanks. From his juvenile jacket.”
Dr. Dressler had heard nothing back from Duane Scrod Sr. regarding his son’s whereabouts, which wasn’t surprising. Perhaps the deputies would have better luck getting information from the man with the loudmouthed parrot, or whatever the heck kind of bird it was.
The headmaster wondered why the school files contained no record of Duane Jr.’s past arsons. He assumed that Duane’s rich grandmother had pulled some strings to conceal those incidents from the Truman admissions committee.
It was disturbing for Dr. Dressler to think that any student might be capable of setting a dangerous blaze to get revenge against a teacher whom he didn’t like.
But, as the deputy had said, proving guilt would be difficult, if not impossible. The fire department’s investigators hadn’t found anything incriminating at the scene, not even a burned match. The arsonist had done a good job of covering his tracks.
As soon as the officers left, Dr. Dressler tried calling Mrs. Starch, and again there was no answer at home or on her cell phone.
Dr. Dressler’s secretary popped her head in the doorway. “The Carsons are here,” she said.
The headmaster grunted dejectedly. At least once a week, George and Gilda Carson came in to talk about their son Graham, who they were convinced was a genius and should be advanced by at least one and possibly two grade levels.
Dr. Dressler knew for a fact that Graham Carson was a rather average student who would benefit from an algebra tutor and possibly a little extra help in French. He was a nice enough kid, just a bit overeager—and much more tolerable than his pushy, self-important parents.
“I can’t deal with the Carsons. Not today,” Dr. Dressler told his secretary.
“But they’re waiting in the hall.”
“Tell them I’ve got strep throat. Or my cat’s having dental surgery. Make up something!” the exasperated headmaster said, and crept out the back door of his office.
Even with his map tracker, Dr. Dressler had trouble finding Mrs. Starch’s home. The address listed in her employment file was 777 West Buzzard Boulevard, which did not appear on the GPS data disk.
So the headmaster located East Buzzard Boulevard and went west until the pavement stopped and the roadbed turned to dirt. He drove for another two miles until he reached a dead end, where a solitary tin mailbox poked up from the saw palmettos.
The number on the mailbox was 777, but there was no name.
Dr. Dressler got out of his car and scanned the scrub and woods for signs of a building. He found a scruffy narrow path that looked more like a wagon trail than a driveway, and cautiously he trekked along the winding course until it led to a clearing.
And there, shuttered and sagging, stood a three-story wooden house. Weeds crawled up the walls, and shades had been drawn behind all the windows.
As he’d be the first to admit, Dr. Dressler was not a particularly brave soul. He was uncomfortable in such a scraggly, untamed place, far from the comforting clatter and clang of civilization.
Staring with trepidation at the old house, the headmaster couldn’t push out of his mind the dark rumors that he’d heard about Bunny Starch. The same impulse to flee that Dr. Dressler had fought during his visit to the Scrod residence tugged at him even more urgently now.
But again he resisted his fears—Mrs. Starch might be ornery and odd, but she was a loyal and valued member of the Truman School family. It’s my duty, Dr. Dressler told himself, to make sure she’s all right.
He would have felt better about the mission—much better—if Mrs. Starch’s blue Prius had been parked beside the house. It wasn’t.
Dr. Dressler called her name, but there was no reply. His pulse was fluttering as he approached the front steps.
“Mrs. Starch? Are you home?”
Nothing.
“Mrs. Starch? It’s me, Dr. Dressler.”
He put one foot on the porch, then froze.
A rat was perched on a rocking chair. It was staring at him.
Not a little white rat, either, but a chubby brown one. Its mouth was open in a slight sneer, revealing long, yellowed front teeth.
Dr. Dressler wasn’t fond of rodents, large or small. They ate garbage and carried terrible diseases and nested in attics and produced hordes of filthy baby rodents ….
“Scat!” he said, clapping his hands. “Go away!”
The rat didn’t move, which was distressing.
Maybe it’s got rabies, Dr. Dressler thought anxiously. Maybe it’s going to leap for my throat!
“Shoo! Get lost!” he cried.
The rat didn’t blink, didn’t even twitch. Dr. Dressler thought this was very suspicious.
He got an idea. He took the car keys from his pocket and tossed them at the rat. The keys clunked the vermin on the head and knocked it off the rocker onto the planks of the porch, where it lay motionless.
Motionless and stiff as a board.
“You’ve gotta be kidding,” Dr. Dressler muttered.
The rat wasn’t alive. It had been stuffed, like a deer or a trout on a trophy wall.
When the headmaster picked it up by the tail, he noticed something fastened around its neck: a tiny leather collar with a brass nameplate.
Dr. Dressler peered at the name engraved on the stuffed rat’s collar: CHELSEA EVERED.
The headmaster shuddered slightly. Chelsea Evered had been a star student at the Truman School a few years earlier—straight A’s, swim team, tennis team, early acceptance to Rollins College.
But Dr. Dressler remembered something else about the girl: she had once asked for—and received—a transfer out of Mrs. Starch’s honors biology class.
Judging by the name on the rat, Mrs. Starch had never forgiven Chelsea Evered for that.
Dr. Dressler carefully placed the taxidermied rodent back on the rocking chair and, after getting up his nerve, knocked on the door. He was greatly relieved when there was no response.
Hurrying down the steps, he glanced back at the gloomy, lifeless house and wondered if
the headmasters of other private schools ever had to cope with teachers as weird as Bunny Starch.
A long striped snake scooted across Dr. Dressler’s path, and he broke into a heated jog. He was sweaty and out of breath by the time he reached the car. He jumped inside and locked the doors.
That’s when something about Mrs. Starch’s mailbox caught his eye, something he hadn’t noticed when he arrived.
The little red flag was raised.
Which meant that she was sending out mail, which meant that she really had found her way home from the Black Vine Swamp … and that she was alive and well.
Which was good news—the best possible news, in fact!
Yet why, wondered Dr. Dressler, hadn’t she returned his many voice messages? Why wasn’t she picking up her phone?
The headmaster unlocked his car door and furtively got out. After looking around to make sure he was alone—and, standing on the edge of those woods, he was very alone—he opened Mrs. Starch’s mailbox.
Only one letter was inside. Dr. Dressler was startled to see his own name on the envelope, addressed to the Truman School.
The headmaster knew he should wait for the postal service to properly deliver Mrs. Starch’s letter, but curiosity got the better of him. He snatched the envelope from the box.
Not wishing to encounter the mailman and have to explain why he was taking the letter, Dr. Dressler drove straight back to campus.
There, in the privacy of his office, he opened it and began to read:
Dear Dr. Dressler,
It is with great regret that I must request an indefinite leave of absence from my position at the Truman School, due to a sudden family emergency.
I’m sorry for any inconvenience that this may cause my students and fellow faculty members. Be assured that I will return to my teaching duties as soon as my personal situation is settled.
Thank you for your patience and understanding, and for respecting my privacy on this matter.
Most sincerely,
B. Starch
The letter had been typed on Mrs. Starch’s personalized stationery. The headmaster reread it twice before folding it back into the envelope.
Mrs. Starch’s file already lay open on his desk. Dr. Dressler leafed through every page—her job application, her pension records, her insurance forms.