"Would I be on my knees if I was okay?" Harry snapped. "He hit me in the ulcer."
Marv helped Harry to his feet and they ran into the park, looking for Kevin. Ahead of them was a typical late afternoon Central Park scene: joggers, people walking dogs, a horse-drawn hansom cab waiting for a fare, and a group of schoolchildren wearing caps or hooded coats, going home after a field trip. Harry and Marv smiled. It was obvious where they would hide if they were a kid.
They waded through the crowd of children, yanking the hats and hoods off every boy who appeared to be Kevin's height. But none of them was Kevin.
"I don't get it," Marv said when they'd finished. "We checked every kid."
"We should have shot him when we had the chance," Harry grumbled, looking around at the trees and joggers. "I hate pulling a job knowing that kid's out on the loose."
"What can he do?" Marv asked. "Kids are helpless."
"Not that kid," Harry replied.
"Hey, he don't got a house full of dangerous goodies this time," Marv said. "He's alone, and he's in the park, and it's gonna be dark soon."
Harry saw that his partner was right. The sun was sinking behind the buildings to the west, leaving long shadows across the bare trees and bushes. Pretty soon it would be night.
"Grown men come in here and don't get out alive," Marv said.
"Yeah." Harry started to grin. He liked what he was hearing.
"Good luck, little fella!" he shouted, and then turned to Marv. "I think it's time we paid Duncan's Toy Chest another visit."
Curled up in the storage box behind the hansom cab, Kevin heard Harry's shout. It might've been a trick to get him to come out, so he stayed in his hiding place even longer. It was dark in the storage box and smelled like horses, but Kevin knew it was better than winding up in the bottom of the Hudson River.
A long time passed. Finally, when Kevin was certain the bad guys must've given up searching for him, he pushed up the lid of the storage box and peeked out. The sun had disappeared behind the buildings. The sky was gray and the park was dark and cold. All the joggers and dog walkers he'd seen before were gone. He climbed out of the box, stepped over a frozen puddle of water, and watched the mercury vapor streetlights in the park slowly start to glow. Kevin hugged himself and shivered. He was alone, without a place to stay that night, without a way to fly home or to Miami or anyplace else.
And it was Christmas Eve.
"I want to go home," he sniffed. "Mom, where are you?"
Christmas Eve
Miami, Florida
4:35 P.M.
The rain poured down relentlessly. The motel room felt damp and smelled like wet towels left in the hamper too long. Kate sat on the bed staring at the dull black rotary phone on the chipped night table. In a chair nearby Peter was slumped down, snorting and twitching in a fitful sleep, while the kids sat around the flickering TV in the next room, watching It's a Wonderful Life in Spanish.
The phone rang and Kate grabbed it. "Yes?"
"It's Officer Bennett, ma'am. We've located your son.
"Ohmygosh!" Kate gasped and shook Peter's shoulder.
"What? What is it?" he asked groggily.
"It's Officer Bennett," Kate said. "They know where Kevin is."
"Where?" Peter sat up, instantly awake.
"Where?" Kate asked the police officer.
"New York City, ma'am," Officer Bennett replied. "He's wanted for unauthorized use of a credit card in the Plaza Hotel."
"What!?" Kate gasped.
"What!?" Peter gasped.
"He's wanted for unauthorized use of a credit card," Kate told her husband.
"I'm sure he only did it because he was scared," Kate told the police officer. "He's not a troublemaker."
"Who cares about that?" Peter asked. "Do they have him?"
"Do they have him?" Kate asked.
"I'm afraid not, ma'am," the officer said. "Some of the hotel people tried to question him about the card and he ran away."
The disappointed look on Kate's face said it all. "Darn it," Peter muttered.
"We'll catch the next flight," Kate told Officer Bennett. "And thank you so much for your help."
She hung up and looked sadly at her husband. "So we know he's in New York. By himself. I don't know whether to be thrilled or terrified."
"I wonder if he'd know enough to go to my brother's place?" Peter said.
"I thought they were in Paris?"
"They are. But maybe they have a housesitter."
"Didn't you say they were in the middle of a major renovation?" Kate asked.
Peter nodded and sighed. "You're right. The place probably isn't even inhabitable right now."
Uncle Rob's house was on a dark side street about a block from Central Park. As Kevin walked along the cracked sidewalk, he could see that the neighborhood wasn't what he had expected. Instead of individual houses with lawns and trees like Oak Park, the houses here were actually three- and four-story brick buildings pressed right up next to each other. And there were no lawns at all. Just a small garden in front of each building. While some of the buildings had lights on inside and looked inhabited, others were nothing more than shadowy wrecks, with boarded-up windows and doorways blocked with cinder blocks.
Kevin stopped in front of Uncle Rob's house and felt his heart sink. The building was dark and boarded up. The whole first floor was hidden behind a scaffolding of loose wooden planks laid across a metal frame. A long yellow refuse chute ran down from the third floor to a big metal Dumpster on the street.
Kevin stared up at the brass knocker on the front door. On the slim chance that someone was actually inside, he climbed the concrete steps and knocked.
No one answered.
Kevin knocked again. When that didn't bring an answer, he pressed his nose against the first-floor window and looked inside. The place was a wreck. The walls had been stripped away, leaving a wooden framework. The floor had been ripped up, too, the bare beams covered here and there with large flat sheets of plywood. Scattered around the plywood were ladders, workmen's tools, coils of rope, bricks, and cans of paint and varnish.
Kevin backed away from the window and looked up and down the sidewalk. The street was dark and empty. Down at the corner some men carrying a loud radio shouted and laughed. Kevin shivered and felt a little scared. He kneeled down in front of the door and pushed open the mail slot.
"Hello? Uncle Rob? Anyone home?"
No one answered. It was hopeless. Kevin walked back down the front steps and started back down a street called Central Park West. He stayed on the west side of the street, where the buildings were, until he came to a corner and saw several men in tattered coats sifting through garbage bins for soda cans. Kevin glanced nervously across the street where a tall shadowy stone wall ran next to a dark sidewalk. On the other side of the wall was Central Park. It looked scary on that side of the street, but there might be fewer people. So when the light changed, he crossed.
Kevin walked quickly down the sidewalk next to the wall. The wind made the branches of the trees rattle and throw gnarled shadows over him. Suddenly he tripped over something and looked down to find a dirty-looking man huddled in some ragged blankets.
"Hey, watch it!" the man shouted angrily.
Kevin jumped away and quickened his pace. His heart was pounding and his mouth felt dry.
Kevin started to run. He didn't want to be in this cold shadowy place with all these scary people. Suddenly he saw a cab parked at the curb.
"Hey, taxi!" he shouted. A second later he yanked open the door and jumped in. The cab was dark inside and Kevin could see only the silhouette of the driver's head and shoulders. He slid into the backseat and tried to catch his breath.
"Boy," he gasped," it's scary out there."
The cab's interior light went on and the cab driver slowly turned around. He had a pock-marked, unshaven face, a bent nose, cracked and bloodied lips, and eyes that were dull and cloudy. When he saw Kevin, he grinned, revealing pitted,
discolored teeth.
"Ain't much better in here, bud," he said.
"AAAhhhhhhh!" Kevin screamed and jumped out of the cab. Desperate to get away from all those horrible people, he ran into the park and followed a trail through the trees that led to a large mass of dark gray rock rising out of the ground. Kevin found a deep gap between two boulders and squeezed in between them. The walls of rock around him were cold and uninviting, but he'd finally found a quiet place where he could catch his breath and be alone.
As he gasped for breath, he felt his stomach start to churn and growl. He realized he hadn't had anything to eat since the pizza in the limousine that morning. Opening his backpack, he took out a bag of Doritos and quickly tore it open.
Boy, he thought as he pressed a handful of corn chips into his mouth, I don't ever want to take a vacation like this again.
A "cooing" sound startled him and he turned to find a pigeon standing on the rock behind him. Kevin smiled. Well, at least this was one creature that didn't mean him any harm. Glad to have some company, he broke off a piece of a Dorito and held it out to the bird, who eyed it for a moment and then plucked it out of his hand.
"I guess you missed dinner, too," Kevin said. "My mother told me never to touch birds. Especially city birds. But you don't look so bad. At least you're nicer than the people around here."
The pigeon finished the Dorito and Kevin decided to give it another piece. But when he looked up, instead of one pigeon, there were now ten looking down at him from the top of the rock.
"Where'd you guys come from?" Kevin asked, surprised. The pigeons answered by cooing and Kevin knew what they wanted. He reached into his backpack, but there was only one bag of Doritos left.
"I hope I have enough for everybody," he said as he crumbled up the last of the corn chips. "How hungry are you guys?"
But instead of taking the crumbled chips, the pigeons started to fly away.
"Hey! Come back!" Kevin cried. "Where're you guys going?"
All the pigeons left except one.
"Well, at least you have some manners," Kevin said. He held out the Dorito crumbs, but instead of eating, the pigeon started to rise from the rock. Kevin couldn't understand how this was happening, especially since the bird wasn't flapping its wings. Then something began to appear under the pigeon's feet . . . knotted, filthy gray hair, a forehead streaked with grime, bushy eyebrows, then eyes!
"Ahhhhhhhhh!" Kevin screamed and jumped back. It was her! That crazy disgusting pigeon lady! He turned and tried to run, but his foot got caught in a crack between the rocks. Meanwhile the pigeon lady was coming closer. Kevin had never seen anything so disgusting. He tugged and tugged at his foot. Now she was reaching toward him with filthy, gnarled fingers. Kevin covered his face with his arms. What was she going to do?
CHRISTMAS EVE
CENTRAL PARK
5 P.M.
Kevin felt the pigeon lady's hand go around his ankle and push down gently until his foot was freed. Terrified, he took his hands away from his eyes to see what she was going to do next. But all she did was back away. Suddenly Kevin realized she hadn't meant him any harm. She'd only tried to help.
Curiosity replaced his fright. Kevin took a step toward her, but the pigeon lady looked nervous and backed away some more. Amazing, Kevin thought. She must be the only person in New York who's scared of me.
"I'm sorry I screamed in your face," he said. "You were just trying to help me, right?"
The pigeon lady nodded and took another step back. Kevin could see she was really nervous.
"I'm Kevin McCallister," he said. "Your birds are real nice."
The pigeon lady stopped backing away and stared curiously at him.
"I've seen you before," Kevin said. "You had pigeons all over you. At first it looked kind of scary, but if you think about it, it's not so bad. They must be all over you because they like you.
The pigeon lady blinked. Kevin wondered what she was thinking. Maybe she didn't like people talking to her. "Hey, if I'm bothering you, just tell me and I'll leave."
She started to open her mouth. Kevin thought she was going to say something, but at first no words came out. Then she said "no" in a voice so small Kevin could hardly hear it.
"You sure I'm not a pain?" Kevin asked. The pigeon lady shook her head.
"Good." Kevin felt relieved. Then he became aware of other sounds around them, like a whole chorus of cooing birds. He looked up at the trees and saw the dark outlines of hundreds of pigeons on the bare branches.
"Will those pigeons come back on their own or do you have to call them?" he asked.
The pigeon lady looked up at the birds and then reached into her pocket. She took out a handful of seeds and put them in Kevin's hand, motioning him to throw them.
"They hear it," she whispered.
Kevin threw the seed and it scattered over the rocks. Immediately, the pigeons swarmed down and started pecking.
"Hey, that's great!" Kevin said.
A crooked little smile appeared on the pigeon lady's face as they watched the birds feed. Then a chilly gust of wind blew past carrying old brown leaves and scraps of newspaper. Kevin shivered and wished he could get something warm to drink, but he didn't want to leave the only friend he had in New York City.
"It's pretty cold out," he said. "I could sure go for a hot cup of chocolate. How about you?"
The pigeon lady gave him a puzzled, uncertain look.
"Maybe you prefer coffee," Kevin said. "Either way it's my treat."
In a million years Kevin couldn't have imagined the place where the pigeon lady wanted to drink her coffee. After picking up cardboard take-out cups at a coffee shop, she led him up a fire escape alongside Radio City Music Hall. They climbed through a window near the roof and sat on a metal grating. As Kevin sipped his hot chocolate, he stared down through the grating at the stage below where a dozen ballerinas in fluffy white tutus twirled to music played by the orchestra.
"I've heard that music before, but I can't remember where," Kevin said, cradling the hot container in his hands.
"It's the Nutcracker," the pigeon lady said. "They do it every year around this time."
In their tutus, the ballerinas looked like swirling, spinning white flowers.
"It's nice," Kevin said.
"And warm," the pigeon lady added, cupping her coffee between her fingers.
Kevin looked back at the window they'd climbed in through. The panes were frosted with ice, and cold air was seeping in. "Is this where you live?" he asked.
"No," said the pigeon lady. "I have an apartment.''
"Do you have any kids?"
The pigeon lady shook her head and looked down at her coffee. "I wanted them, but the man I loved fell out of love with me. It broke my heart. Every time a chance to be loved came by after that, I ran from it. You might say I stopped trusting people."
"No offense," Kevin said. "But that seems like a dumb thing to do."
"I was afraid of getting my heart broken again," the pigeon lady explained. "Sometimes you trust a person, and when things are down, they forget about you."
"Maybe they're just too busy," Kevin said. "Maybe they don't forget you, they just forget to remember you. I don't think people mean to forget."
The pigeon lady shrugged. "Maybe. But I'm just afraid if I trust anyone, I'll get hurt again."
"I can sort of understand that," Kevin said. "I used to have this really nice pair of roller skates and I was afraid that if I wore them, I'd wreck them. So I kept them in the box. And you know what happened?"
The pigeon lady shook her head.
"I outgrew them. I never got to use them outside. Just a couple of times in my room."
"A person's feelings are a little different than skates," the pigeon lady said.
"But it's kind of the same thing," Kevin said. "If you aren't gonna use your heart . . . if you just keep it to yourself maybe it'll be like my roller skates. By the time you do decide to use it, it may not be any good. So why not
take a chance?"
The pigeon lady nodded. "There's some truth to that."
"I think so," said Kevin. "Your heart may still be broken, but it's not gone. If it was gone, you wouldn't be this nice."
The pigeon lady glanced back at the icy window and sighed. "It's been so long . . . I mean, it's been a couple of years since I even talked to someone.
"That's okay," Kevin said. "You're really good at it. You're not boring, you don't mumble or spit when you talk. You should do it more often. I think you'd just have to wear an outfit that didn't smell like pigeons."
The pigeon lady looked down at her dirty clothes as if seeing them for the first time. "I guess I was working pretty hard at keeping people away."
"I know what you mean," Kevin said. "I always think I'll have a lot of fun if I'm alone. But when there's no one around, it isn't fun at all. I don't care how much some people bug me, I'd rather be with somebody than by myself."
"So why are you alone on Christmas Eve?" the pigeon lady asked. "Did you get into trouble?"
Kevin nodded sheepishly.
"You did something wrong?"
"A lot of things," Kevin admitted
The pigeon lady studied him for a moment. "Did you know that a good deed erases a bad deed?"
"It's probably too late for that," Kevin said with a shrug. "I doubt I'd have time to do enough good deeds to erase all the bad things I did."
"You'll be fine," the pigeon lady said with a smile. "It's Christmas Eve. Good deeds count extra tonight."
Kevin's eyebrows rose. "They do?"
The pigeon lady nodded. "Why don't you think of the most important thing you can do for others right now and go do it."
Kevin wondered what that would be. It didn't seem like there was anything he could do here in New York, but maybe if he tried he could come up with something. He got up.
"I better go see what I can do," he said. "But listen, if I don't see you again, I hope everything comes out all right. And say good-bye to your birds for me, okay?"
"I will," the pigeon lady said.
"And if you need somebody to trust, it can be me," Kevin added. "I promise I won't forget to remember you."