Antenna Syndrome Read online

  Jack sat at the computer. He made me a copy of the work order and played a video clip of a white delivery van arriving at the house. Its sidewall decal read “Virtual Air” with a website and an 800-number. I noted those details and copied the van’s plates. A tall guy in serviceman coveralls got out of the van and approached the front door. A few minutes later he returned to his van, loaded a dolly and wheeled it inside. Fast forward, an hour later he wheeled it out and drove away.

  “Get me a few screen grabs of that guy’s face.”

  While Jack was doing that I dialed Virtual Air’s 800-number. I got a message saying, due to a high call volume, my waiting time would be ten minutes. I didn’t have time to wait. I called an acquaintance who had access to DMV records. We’d never met and I knew him only by his avatar name, Finder. In a minute he told me the van was registered to a numbered company in Brooklyn, with an address on Neptune Avenue I suspected had been obliterated five years ago and never rebuilt.

  Chapter 6

  We returned to the hallway on the ground floor. Jack opened a pocket door, revealing an elevator with room for four people if they stood on each other’s toes. “This is the common access to Marielle’s third-floor suite.”

  “Did the technician go up there?”

  “No, he only serviced the second floor unit. I was in the kitchen all that time, drinking coffee and watching the news.”

  We returned to the foyer and started up the stairs to the second floor. Jack paused at the landing. “I just recalled something else about that technician...”

  “What’s that?”

  “Pulling the loaded dolly up these stairs, it was thumping hard on each step. When I said, be careful, don’t chip the lacquer, he carried it the rest of the way. Didn’t make a grunt, just a quick snatch-and-lift and took the stairs two steps at a time.”

  “Maybe he pumps iron.”

  “He didn’t look it. All skin and bone, couldn’t have weighed more than one-fifty. When I heard him move, I thought there was something wrong with him.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “First I thought, the tools on his belt were knocking together.” Jack clucked his tongue. “Climbing the stairs under load, it was loud, but once he set the dolly down, it was more subtle. But I think it came from his joints – hips, knees and elbows - clicking like a cricket. Weird, huh?”

  I chewed on that one. Tall skinny guy with wraparound sunglasses and a slit mouth. Makes cricket noises and drives the dogs wild. It wasn’t much of a personality profile but I got the general idea – a total freak!

  Jack walked me around the second floor, Harris Jordan’s private area. The master bedroom and adjoining bathroom were as big as my condo. French doors opened onto a wooden deck at the rear. Jack pointed out the AC unit that had been serviced. There was also a spare bedroom with bath, an exercise room with some nice equipment, and an office den that smelled like a cigar humidor.

  “Here’s the third floor exit conforming to fire code.” In the den he opened a closet where several sports jackets hung from a rod. He pushed them aside to reveal a small door at the back of the closet.

  “Normally, it’s locked from the other side so you can’t access the third floor from here,” Jack explained. “But after Marielle disappeared, I looked around to see how she could have left other than by elevator. Had to be via these stairs.”

  We passed through the small door. A narrow flight of stairs rose to the third floor. He pointed at the lock. “When I came down through here yesterday, I unlocked it and left it that way.”

  I examined the lock, an antique but sturdy spring-bolt. From the stairwell side, a simple twist of the bolt knob would open it. From the closet side, someone would need a key to get upstairs.

  “An old lock,” I observed. “Ten minutes with a bobby pin, I could probably pick it. Someone with the right tools could do it in seconds.”

  “Or Marielle could have given someone a copy of the key,” Jack said. “Hell, she could have crawled down the stairs and opened it by hand.”

  “You really don’t think she was kidnapped, do you?”

  “No.”

  “Maybe the AC technician came here with an empty box. That’s why he carried it upstairs so easily. He gained access to the third floor via this hidden stairwell. He could have brought Marielle down to the second floor, put her in the box and wheeled her out of the house.”

  “Right under my nose,” Jack sighed.

  ~~~

  We went up to the third floor. Marielle’s studio took up the north half. The south half was divided among a bedroom, a lounge area and a kitchenette, from which there was a walkout to a deck with a bay view.

  We’d barely arrived on the floor when Vivien stepped out of the elevator. She gestured with her hands to say, what’s up?

  “I showed him the back stairs,” Jack said.

  I circled the studio. A table was scattered with brushes, paints, palettes, rags and thinners. More than a dozen canvases were in various stages of completion, half lacquered and wall-mounted, the rest on easels with outlines and tones blocked in. The subjects were all insects.

  A ladybug nestled on a leaf from whose tip hung a dewdrop. Body hair fuzzy with pollen, a honeybee crawled across a sunflower. A praying mantis, fore-claws cradling the headless body of its mate, stared out from a large canvas.

  “Aren’t they amazing?” Vivien said.

  “Is this hers?” I rested my hand on what I’d first taken for a laundry trolley. A leather seat was slung hammock-style from a sturdy aluminum frame. A gearbox connected a battery-powered motor to four wheels.

  “One of Mr. Jordan’s engineering friends built her this work chair.”

  An overhead rail on a beam crossed the ceiling. Gymnast rings on ropes hung from brackets that could be positioned anywhere along that rail.

  “She worked out on them for exercise,” Vivien said. “And used them to change from one chair to another.” She indicated another motorized chair nearby, a conventional one with padded seat, armrests and control stick.

  In the lounge was a sectional sofa, an entertainment system, a desk with a computer and a musical keyboard. The bedroom had a double bed and a large collection of dolls. A drive-in closet contained a few clothes and more dolls.

  In the kitchenette I opened the fridge, finding cartons of juice, some fruit in the crisper, a few cheeses and a bottle of white wine.

  “Did she eat by herself, with her father or you folks?”

  “Most of the time she ate alone. Each day I’d tell her what I was making, or solicit requests. Usually I’d bring it to her, or send it up by elevator if she preferred. Sometimes she came down to eat with me, and we’d chat, but then she’d go back upstairs. Sometimes I served her and Mr. Jordan dinner in the dining room, but those were rare occasions.”

  “Sounds isolated. She got a problem with people, or what?”

  “She was never interested in people. But insects, that was something that got her excited.”

  I saw no sign of a struggle, but maybe she hadn’t offered any resistance. Despite the amenities, the place had the feel of a minimum security prison.

  “Was she happy here?” I asked Vivien.

  “Her art occupied her. And when she wasn’t working, she had music, movies, books, online art exhibits…”

  “Didn’t she ever leave the house?”

  “Only in the summer. She liked to go out in the garden, where she’d sit for hours with her camera and digital recorder, taking pictures of bugs and recording her ideas.”

  “No social life?”

  “She was very self-conscious from an early age. It was strange, because most kids with disabilities don’t see themselves that way. She didn’t want to go out in public – with the norms, she called them. She treasured her privacy.”

  “Her father didn’t try to influence her?”

  “When she was young, he’d wanted her to attend a school for the gifted. But she insisted on being home-schooled. It was difficu
lt, because she went through tutors like a clever child through simple games. Mr. Jordan had her tested and found she had a genius-level IQ. Nobody was smart or complex enough to sustain her interest. It’s hard to understand, but she just wanted to be left alone with her art.”

  “An all-consuming hobby.”

  “Oh, she’s no amateur,” Vivien said. “She’s been selling for the past five years and making very good money. In the past year, well over a million.”

  I’d always suspected I might be in the wrong business, but this was a shock. “How many paintings did she have to sell to make that?”

  “Four or five.”

  Obviously I was no judge of art, but I could do basic math. If four or five paintings sold for a million, there was enough finished work here for another million or two, and as much again if the others could be finished. “You must be proud of her.”

  Vivien beamed. “She’s so talented. I’ve been fortunate to share in her success. She pays me generously to represent her at gallery shows. It’s given me the opportunity to meet her agent Mr. Schiller and many of the buyers.”

  I caught a grimace from Jack. I wondered how well he managed on whatever Jordan paid him. Whatever his salary, I bet it wasn’t enough. I’d been around the block, and he struck me as a bit of a player.

  “What’s the arrangement with Schiller?”

  “Marielle has a contract to deliver four paintings a year. She’s very productive and usually delivers one or two extra. Mr. Schiller handles the branding, marketing and sales.”

  “Does he have a gallery?”

  She recited a phone number and an address on Greenwich Avenue. Good memory, I thought.

  “Marielle’s worth a lot for someone her age,” I said. “Does she have a will?”

  “She arranged it all last year. A lawyer came with his assistant to have the documents signed and witnessed. A third of her estate goes to me, the rest among various charities.”

  “Why you and not her father?”

  “He’s already wealthy,” Vivien shrugged. “And I’m the only mother she ever had. But it’s all hypothetical anyway. In the normal course of events, I’d likely die first. Aside from having no legs, she’s very healthy.”

  “If her father’s rich, why didn’t he get her fitted with prosthetics to lead a more normal life? There’ve been huge advances in the past decade. He could have got her the best on the market.”

  “He discussed it with her more than once, but she refused. I was there one day when she screamed at him, ‘Maybe you’re ashamed of me, but I like myself the way I am. You’re not going to turn me into some cyborg.’ He was hurt by her words. He’s not ashamed of her, just confused about the life she’s chosen.”

  I went out onto the deck, which had a modest setting of patio furniture. Flower boxes clung to the railing. I couldn’t name the flowers but the blossoms were large and colorful. Dozens of bees crawled among them, getting all fuzzy with pollen before taking a flight path to the southwest.

  I watched them. I didn’t get out of the city much and hadn’t seen bees in years. It was easy to be fascinated by insects. They seemed to have such an ordered social existence, it was almost enviable compared to humans.

  I looked out on Oyster Bay and saw a few sailboats in the breeze. That’s where I should have been, enjoying a day off with my wife and daughter, getting some sun and salt air, reveling in the freedom of wind in my sails, not standing here on the balcony of Bug House, wondering which way to turn. But I reminded myself I had cash in hand with a promise of more if only I could find this girl. Maybe she was the light at the end of my tunnel.

  Chapter 7

  I went back inside. Jack and Vivien were sitting on opposite sides of the kitchenette counter.

  “There’s been no ransom demand?” I asked them.

  “No,” Vivien said. “That’s odd, isn’t it?”

  “Not if she wasn’t kidnapped,” Jack said. “Not if she just ran away.”

  “That’s ridiculous,” Vivien said.

  “Why would she run away?” I asked Jack.

  “Because she’s twenty years old and virtually a prisoner here.”

  “She had everything she needed,” Vivien said. “We love her.”

  “At twenty, you’re not looking for that kind of love,” Jack said.

  “What if there was a ransom demand?” I persisted.

  “I have access to Marielle’s bank account,” Vivien said. “Sometimes she needed me to buy things that can only be bought with cash.”

  “Like what?” Jack said. “Jordan’s domestic credit card covers groceries and household items. Doesn’t Marielle buy her art supplies online? What’s the cash for?”

  Vivien shrugged. “Marijuana, among other things.”

  “Marielle smokes pot?”

  “It gave her inspiration and appetite. It helped her to see humor in a world gone off the rails.”

  Jack and I looked at her and came to the same conclusion, but he said it out loud. “You probably smoke it with her too.”

  “So what?” She gave him a look of defiance, like the figurehead on a Viking ship setting off to plunder the Saxon shore.

  Jack shook his head. “If Jordan knew this, we’d lose our jobs.”

  Vivien ignored him. “I have access to her account, but I’ve never abused it,” she told me.

  I was tempted to ask how much money she could withdraw but, absent a ransom demand, it was hypothetical. So I changed gears.

  “I did some research on my way here. I know Jordan adopted Marielle when her mother died giving birth.”

  “It was hard, raising a child without a mother. Especially one with special needs. By the time we hired on, he’d been through half a dozen nannies.”

  “So you’ve practically been a mother to Marielle since she was four. You must have been very close.”

  “I don’t know about that.” Vivien’s voice cracked a little. “It was hard to get close to her.”

  “How do you mean?”

  “She was moody. She’d say strange things, far beyond her years. It could be unnerving.”

  “For example?”

  “Because of her handicap, I was always offering help. But even when she accepted it, I felt her disdain, like she was disgusted with her own disability, or angry at me for making it obvious.

  “Sometimes she’d say, ‘It’s not a good time for you to be here. You should go away before something bad happens.’ This, from a four-year-old.

  “When she was seven, I went into her bedroom one night to check on her and arrange her blankets. She seized my wrist and said, ‘I’m not a child, I can do that myself. I don’t like to be disturbed when I’m thinking.’ She frightened me sometimes. There were days when I didn’t know whether to hug her or strangle her.”

  “You must have been tempted to quit.”

  “More than once. But Mr. Jordan would offer more money, saying it was so hard to find help for Marielle. He’d cry and beg me not to leave them.”

  I looked at Jack. He nodded and shrugged, it was pathetic but true.

  “I guess the money’s been worth it?”

  Vivien shook her head. “I’m no mercenary. I love Marielle. She might be difficult, but her genius needs protecting. And however much she resists me, she also needs me. Now and then she’ll say something nice, and that makes it seem worthwhile. Maybe it’s pathetic, but I need her too. Jack and I have no children. She’s not perfect, but she’s my surrogate daughter. I guess our karma drew us together.”

  Jack’s gaze did a slow roll to the ceiling and back.

  “What about Natalie? Where’s she fit in?”

  “When Mr. Jordan adopted Marielle, his wife took Natalie and moved to Florida. We’d scarcely known Natalie existed until she was fifteen, when she started coming here for a few weeks each summer.

  “After Natalie got into Dartmouth, she made some New York friends, and started spending whole summers here. After college, she moved to California. I think she needed s
ome distance from her mother. But she also needed her father. That’s why she kept coming back, looking to be part of a family she never really had.”

  “How’d she and Marielle get along?”

  “In small doses, fine. Although ten years apart, they were smart girls and shared an intellectual rapport. But they competed for the affection of a father who didn’t have time for either of them. It was sad. Marielle became hostile toward her older sister. I guess she envied her. You’ve seen Natalie – she’s quite beautiful...”

  I nodded. She was. Some guys might have done her a favor on looks alone, or the promise of something other than financial inducement. I looked at Jack and wondered if he’d ever entertained inappropriate thoughts of college-age Natalie here during the summers, taking the sun in her bikini by the pool...

  What had Natalie said to me? I don’t want to get into it, but let’s just say it was no longer a healthy environment and I needed to move on.

  “Did Marielle have any friends at all?”

  “None.”

  “Not even on Facebook?”

  “I thought you meant real friends.”

  “She ever mention any virtual friends?”

  Vivien bit her lip. “She swore me to secrecy. She’d be furious if she knew I’d told anyone about her personal life.”

  “The girl’s disappeared,” I said. “If you want her found, give me something to work with. If you don’t, you’ll never see her again.”

  Vivien lowered her face into her hands. “There was a guy on Facebook she liked. They used to meet on a virtual reality site, using 3-D goggles. But he’s never been here and she’s never been out of the house.”

  “This virtual Romeo got a name?”

  “Eddie. Edward Crabner.”

  “What do you know about him?”

  “Only that he’s handicapped, but has a brilliant mind.”

  “You know where he lives?”

  “Manhattan. East Village, I think.”

  “You got coordinates for him? Phone, email…?”

  “No,” she said. “Anyway, how close a relationship could they have had without face-to-face contact? She wouldn’t just run off with a virtual stranger.”