Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 129, Nos. 3 & 4. Whole Nos. 787 & 788, March/April 2007

The Day After by Barbara Callahan

Copyright © 2007 by Barbara Callahan

As this issue goes to press, the U.S. mid-term elections are only a couple of weeks behind us, which makes the following story seem timely. It’s a tale about the ruthlessness of politics in our age — and how that ruthlessness might lead to something more dangerous… Ms. Callahan has been contributing to EQMM for many years.

If I took a survey of victims of various calamities and asked, “What was the best day of your life?” I believe their answers might be “the day before I was viciously mugged in the park” or “the day before my lab test came back positive” or “the day before the flood waters ravaged my home.”

The day before might have been filled with mundane chores like cleaning out the garage, catching up on paperwork, or shopping at the super-market. Yet in its ordinariness the day before glows with a luminosity that outshines every other day of one’s life, a wonderful but unappreciated time before the calamity occurred.

I spent my day before in my office tidying up, a euphemism for routine chores like the dispensing of documents that had successfully shredded the political career of Josephine Klymer, a former candidate for governor from the New Visions party. Into the machine went legal records affirming her as a corespondent in a nasty divorce suit, as well as data on a fifteen-year-old shoplifting conviction. Since I would be taking my first real vacation in years, aside from an occasional overnight at my cabin in the mountains, it was essential that I not leave any evidence that might compromise my sources — the paralegals, administrative assistants, disgruntled employees, and computer hackers who feed the voracious appetites of those who thrive on holding on to political power.

As an “oppo,” an opposition researcher for the Reliance Party in my state, I provided a catering service, so to speak, for the mighty. For fifteen years, I compiled information on candidates from the opposition party. The dossiers I created successfully blocked New Vision-ers from any significant offices. From my humble beginnings as an envelope-stuffing college volunteer in the senatorial reelection campaign of Will Stafford, I graduated into the exciting and well-paying world of oppos. Will Stafford himself spotted my talent after I passed along to his campaign manager the gossip that jump-started my career.

“So you’re the pretty little thing who discovered my unworthy opponent’s sleazy activities, which just happened to get leaked to the press,” Will said.

Blushing, I told the senator that on a date, I saw the candidate and a young woman sipping wine at Rosie’s, an out-of-the-way bar. When they left, I thought we could have some fun by following them, which we did, to Rendez-Vous, a bar/motel favored by those whose trysts do not require romantic ambience.

After my recitation, Will ran his index finger across his lips, a now too-familiar gesture, zippering his smile as a prelude to serious scrutiny. At that moment, I knew I was being assessed by a master appraiser, but I had to wait until after his landslide victory to know why.

At the celebration of his win he deftly maneuvered past the crowd of the party faithful, shaking hands only when necessary to part the seas of well-wishers, and came to me.

“Outside,” he said, nodding toward the exit leading to the parking lot and then turning toward the celebrants and selecting a recipient for a bear hug.

Too nervous to get my coat, I obeyed and waited, shivering, next to the building, wondering why I had been jettisoned from the celebration. Thoroughly chilled after five minutes and regretting not having driven to the event, I sidled over to the nearest car, praying that it would be unlocked. As I touched its handle, a high-pitched alarm lacerated the stillness of the night. I charged back to my wall and crouched behind a trash can as light flooded the parking lot.

Will Stafford himself strolled casually toward the Lexus and deactivated the alarm. Of all the cars in the lot, I had chosen his to break into.

“You can come out now,” he said, “and legitimately get into my car.”

Grateful for potential warmth, I climbed in.

He drove about a mile to the duck pond in Stenton Park before speaking. “Well, now I know three things about you,” he said. “One is that you follow orders immediately no matter how uncomfortable you might get. Two, you are not above a little lawbreaking to get what you need, like seeking shelter in my car. And three, you have a nose for sniffing out garbage, like who is cheating on whom.”

That night those three qualifications landed me the high-paying job of Director of Research for the Reliance Party.

“Just tell your friends, Anne,” he ordered, “that you oversee research on legislation that I’ll have to vote on.”

I never saw a piece of legislation, but I did see documents removed from the offices of psychiatrists, lawyers, and commissioners of various state departments, as well as reports submitted by our private investigators. Not all my research material, however, arrived via paper. Eve Granahan, our crack computer hacker, transferred e-mail files from unsophisticated users into my computer under the file she named Karaoke after “the amateurs that croak their hearts out to us eager hackers.”

The amateurs skewered by Eve’s scorn were those who didn’t realize that their e-mail messages, as well as photos appended to them, did not disappear into the ether when they hit the delete key. Her latest contribution to Karaoke featured J. Robert Banning’s romp in the surf with two bikini-clad teenage boys. No matter that J. Robert was only twenty-one years old and his only elected office was that of senior class president of Masterson College. He came from a socially prominent family who had retired from New Visions state politics before Will Stafford arrived. Quite possibly, the good-looking scion might cast his political genes upon the scene in the near future. Preparing well in advance for that eventuality, we were collecting data to smudge the family album. No matter that J. Robert’s surf buddies were his nephews visiting from Ibiza. If J. Robert ever did decide to toss his hat into the ring, we would toss the photo to the media. Taken by surprise, and before he could sputter an explanation, J. Robert’s campaign volunteers would be drawing Groucho moustaches on his posters.

Compiling dossiers on potential candidates is essential for effective, timely opposition response. It would be foolhardy for an oppo like myself to wait until a candidate is announced and thereby lose precious time scrambling for damaging material. Professionals must anticipate. In a sense, I was like obituary writers who for the sake of timeliness have researched and written up the entire lives and careers of celebrities months and years before they die.

Although not as well endowed as our winning team, New Visions does fund a part-time oppo of their own, a high-school music teacher, a clarinetist, actually, whom I had dubbed the oppo-tune-ist. Between directing the band and teaching classes, Jeffrey Cobb didn’t have too much time to research our slate. An expensive lunch at the Salle de Fleur for his ex-girlfriend netted me the information that Jeff’s oppo dossier consisted only of a portfolio of newspaper clippings.

Over créme brulée, Jeffrey’s ex confirmed something I had long suspected — New Visions had a dossier on me.

Feigning shock, I watched as she removed a folder from her handbag. Expecting a meager newspaper clipping or two, I was not disappointed. I flipped past them but frowned at the single sheet of paper in the folder.

“Read it in the privacy of your home.” She grinned. “And thanks for the lunch.”

On the way to my condo, I thought about the possible revelations on that sheet of paper. The five parking tickets accumulated in the course of my work, paid for, of course, by the party? The time before I proved my worth to the party when I bought a three-hundred-dollar dress, tucked the tags inside, and wore it to a formal occasion before returning it to the store? My several library fines? Merely peccadilloes. I live such a blameless life that Will Stafford refers to me as Mother Superior.

Prepared to be amused by the non-revelations, I poured myself a glass of Chardonnay and opened the folder. Several newspaper photos of me at political galas fluttered to the floor. In one, I was wearing the black organza number I returned to the store. At the time it appeared in the News, I prayed that the salesperson from Bon-Ton didn’t see it.

The single sheet of paper, however, rested in my lap for several minutes after I read it. In a flippant style, Jeffrey Cobb wrote about me as if he were briefing a frat brother about a potential blind date.

I sipped my wine and conjured up the memory of Jeff Cobb flashing his orthodontist’s expertise at me as I passed out the senator’s leaflets to the Political Science Club. Who is this guy grinning like an idiot, I thought. Did I know him from somewhere, and if so, how could I forget his radioactive smile? I read on.

I crumpled the paper and threw it across the room, mumbling, “Don’t bet on it, Frat Boy, you’re not cool enough to outwit the Machiavellian Mama.” In need of a refill, I went to the fridge and poured more wine while thinking that I’d skewer that creep. “Jeffrey Cobb, you’re shish-kebab,” I said aloud. Amused, I repeated the silly rhyme all the way back to the sofa until I sank onto the cushions and started to cry.

Okay, I chose my job, knowing full well the land mines I’d have to set to destroy our enemies. For the most part, I believe I have done the public a service, saving them from some really toxic types, but I also admit that I deprived the public of some really deserving types by magnifying their transgressions or making some up. What Jeffrey Cobb doesn’t know, however, is that I have on occasion refused to deliver the dirt on a sympathetic person, such as Matt Myers, who was running for a municipal judgeship. Sure I knew that Myers was seeing his secretary away from work, but I also knew that his wife was a paraplegic to whom Matt had devoted almost his entire life. Myers lost, but not because of me. So, Jeff, you rude dude, I am not a heartless monster.

The phone rang, shattering the maudlin moment. It was Will with his usual terse message: “Tomorrow, eight-thirty, same place.”

Although it’s doubtful that any opponent would have been so foolhardy as to tap Will’s phone, the senator kept his calls short, believing, perhaps, that a network of spies was being paid by the word by the mysterious “They” that dogged him. The command to go to the same place meant the duck pond at Stenton Park.

He arrived before I did, which allowed me to watch him toss breadcrumbs to the ducks, his affection for them his most, and possibly his only, endearing trait. Although charisma-deprived, the sixty-five-year-old senator, short in stature and long in craftiness, had won four elections by presenting himself as Silent Will, a man of few words who could be trusted like his hero Silent Cal Coolidge. Aware that this Duck Pond Summit meant a new assignment, I hesitated by the weeping willow tree, still stung by Jeffrey Cobb’s write-up. After a few seconds, I pulled myself together and approached the senator. Unhappy at being tailgated, Will emptied the bag of breadcrumbs and barked, “You’re late.”

By a mere two minutes, actually, but to Will Stafford, no minutes of his life ranked as “mere.” Without further preamble, he said, “New kid on the block. Just moved back from eighteen years in Colorado. Maintained a residence here, which qualifies him to run for freeholder. Already sent in the paperwork. Registered as a New Visions candidate. Thirty-eight years old. Widower with one child. Good-looking guy. Get something on him quick.”

“Name?”

“Greg McKenna.”

Energized by the anticipation of hunting new quarry, Will tipped his hat and strolled briskly out of the park. Depressed about going after a widower with a child, I stared at the ducks for a while before calling Eve, the computer whiz, on my cell phone. In terse Stafford-speak, I said, “Greg McKenna, thirty-eight years old, Colorado.”

Two hours later, Eve tossed a printout on my desk.

“I found only one Greg McKenna and he’s from Glenwood Falls.”

Reluctantly I read the information, then relaxed. St. Peter himself would usher this guy right through the Heavenly Gates.

“You found a real saint,” I said. “Choir director, Boy Scout leader, on-time taxpayer, thirty-five years at the same sporting-goods company. Not a parking ticket nor a complaint about a barking dog.”

Beaming, I reached into my handbag and handed her the usual cash payment.

Eve scowled. “You’re not very sharp today.”

“Oh, did I miss something?”

“Maybe math isn’t your forte,” she answered. “Check out Greg McKenna’s work record — thirty-five years with the same company. He must have started there when he was three years old. Your guy is thirty-eight, right?”

She shoved the money into her backpack. “Some kind of scam is going on, but I have absolute confidence that you’ll snuff it out. Ciao.”

Identity theft, of course. For the first time since reading Jeffrey Cobb’s write-up on me, I welcomed the thought of nailing another opponent. In fact, I intended to have some fun. Before I’d pass this data to Will, I’d schmooze a bit with the fake Greg McKenna at the Meet the Candidates reception the next day.

Feeling downright sadistic — a much more uplifting feeling than Jeffrey Cobb-inspired guilt — I breezed into the Shelton Hotel. As I was checking my coat, Will Stafford tapped my shoulder.

“What have you got for me on that matter we talked about yesterday?”

“Nothing yet, but I’m working on it.”

“Don’t dawdle. I want a full report by Monday.”

Nodding toward the banquet room, he added, “Get some face-time with the Colorado Kid. Over by the nonalcoholic punch bowl.”

I waited a moment until Will had floated into a sea of sycophants before heading toward the punch bowl, where I witnessed an enchanting sight: A tall, slender man bowed to a little blond-haired girl and in a princely gesture handed her a cup of juice. She in turn curtsied to him. Registering my first sight of Greg, widower and father of a four-year-old, sapped some of my oppo resolve. When he glanced at me and smiled, I saw an adult version of Jim Driscoll, my first love in high school. In complete meltdown, I focused on a three-tiered plate of cheese cubes and nervously stabbed at them, creating a pyramid on my dish. And I don’t even like cheese.

Chiding myself for this foolish reaction to a good-looking man, I put my plate on an empty table and headed toward the lounge to comb that man right out of my head. With each fierce swipe I reminded myself that this sweet-looking guy had stolen the identity of Greg McKenna and that he mustn’t be too swift in the brains department not to realize that we’d spot the deception within hours of his filing his candidacy. Regaining my oppo resolve, I pledged to demonize him.

Having mentally rejoined the battle, I marched over to the drinks table and seized a glass of white wine. On my first sip, a bump against my arm sent the soothing liquid down my skirt. I whirled around and saw the handsome prince hug his little princess and tell her that it was Daddy’s fault that the punch spilled on my skirt.

“I bumped your arm, sweetheart,” he soothed. “I’ll tell the pretty lady I’m sorry.”

Clumsily, he grabbed several napkins from the table and thrust them at me, accompanied by a chorus of “I’m sorry” and “I’ll ask the waiter for club soda.” Blushing and mumbling for him not to bother, I dabbed at my skirt and joined the regulars paying homage to Will, who scowled at me for leaving Greg McKenna. For the first time in our relationship, Will’s displeasure didn’t faze me. I needed time to reclaim my oppo persona before I did my job and morphed the handsome prince into a frog.

Perhaps pricking my thumb as I arranged the roses Greg sent to my home the next day should have served as a warning about succumbing to fairy tales, but it didn’t. Heart fluttering, I read the attached card:

Dear Anne,

A kind schoolteacher who is quite the political activist saw my dilemma over the spilled wine and gave me your address. Please accept these roses from Melissa and me. (She still feels responsible.) Melissa is hoping that she can treat you to lunch at McDougal’s. I’ll call tomorrow to see if you’ll agree.

Greg McKenzie.

Greg McKenzie! Not Greg McKenna! I grabbed my roses and danced around the room, ignoring the little drop of blood that fell on the carpet. One of Will’s cronies had goofed. I waltzed over to the phone to call Eve and order a search on the real name, but skidded to a stop. No, I would not call Eve. At that moment it didn’t matter to me what the party needed to know about Greg McKenzie. I had learned all I needed to know about him from a spilled glass of wine.

And from a spilled container of French fries. How graciously he scooped up the mound that my elbow had sent to the floor of McDougal’s.

“Just want to lighten the clean-up load of the minimum-wagers,” he smiled as he dumped them into the trash bin.

“Daddy always says we should help people we don’t even know,” Melissa said. “Do you help people you don’t even know?”

“Well, I try to,” I told the sweet child, and blinked away memories of hatchet jobs on strangers, grateful that a misspelling had kept her father’s head off the block. And such a nice head it was, I thought as he grinned at me, slid back into his seat, and put on his political hat.

“There are so many items on my agenda,” he said, “but I am a complete unknown here. I’ve been away since high school. I have no name or face recognition. I need something big to get my candidacy out there. I almost don’t know where to start.”

But like a seasoned politician, he did start, and sometime during Melissa’s sundae, he got the cue that I thought came too soon. His daughter yawned.

“She’s preparing me for the reaction of constituents to long-winded types,” he laughed. “It’s time to take the princess back to the castle.”

Protesting non-fatigue, Melissa dimpled at me before turning to Greg and saying, “But we will see Anne again, won’t we, Daddy?”

“I sure hope so, Princess,” he answered.

“Maybe a trip to the zoo?” I offered to show my willingness to include Melissa in a future relationship, a suggestion I later regretted not because of the child, but as evidence of my utter naiveté. She clapped her hands and Greg smiled. We made a date for the following Tuesday.

As a trio that focused on Melissa’s needs, we arranged to visit other child-friendly spots as soon as we left the previous one. My feelings for Greg blossomed as I witnessed his love for his daughter and experienced his gratitude for my presence at these outings. At the zoo, he held my hand as we sat on a bench and watched Melissa laugh at the monkeys. In the darkness of the aquarium, he put his arm around me as I shuddered at the sight of the sharks at feeding time. When leaving Bo-Peep Land, he kissed my cheek before settling Melissa into her booster seat to return her to day care and to go to his job at a law firm.

Those signs of affection helped to quiet the nagging thought that I might as well be auditioning for the job of Melissa’s nanny. True love, as my forty-seven-year-married mother used to say, starts as an ember and turns into a flame. Easy does it, I told myself. Besides, those child-oriented “dates” served my purposes well. None of Will Stafford’s inner circle hung out at Bo-Peep Land or any of our other venues to report to the chief that his oppo was consorting with the enemy. And whoever was managing Greg’s campaign was doing a wonderful job of keeping him away from the age group that actually votes. Greg didn’t need my help to lose; his endearing political cluelessness would do the job.

Unfortunately, the neglect of my oppo duties did not go unnoticed by a real pro. Accustomed to instant results, Will summoned me three times in a week to the duck pond — a place I didn’t dare go with Greg and Melissa.

“So where’s the stuff on McKenna?” he growled.

Hoping to buy time for my relationship with Greg McKenzie, I didn’t correct Will’s mistake.

“I’m working on it.”

“What’s taking so long?”

“My computer genius ran into a firewall.”

He frowned. “So get another one, someone smart enough not to run into a wall.”

I flashed him a superior smile. “Firewall is a computer term for protection devices. She’ll get past it.”

The second time, I told him that Eve was nanoseconds away from chiseling through the firewall. The third time, I told him that Eve was inside the vault, but the data bank had changed its coding system. From the look he gave me, I knew there would be no fourth time, at least at the duck pond.

In high color and high dudgeon, he arrived at my office in no mood to play computer games.

“I’ll have that report on McKenna by five today or you can start clearing out your office.”

As soon as he slammed the door, I started the purification process, not on my resume but on Greg’s background. I made him good, but not too good, hoping I might in my fictionalized account hit on some truths. In our child-centered encounters, aside from political views and his parenting philosophy, I had actually learned little about him — except references to hiking in Colorado. I realize now that I was unwilling to probe so that if pressed by the party, I could function like a spy who knows only a small piece of the puzzle.

The Greg McKenzie for Will’s Eyes Only had won a basketball scholarship to the University of Colorado, but had a mediocre first year along with problems with grades. He dropped out of school for a year and worked as a guide for fishermen and hunters, but returned to the academic life at Sayres Junior College in Wyoming, where he excelled, and returned to the university to graduate with a degree in political science. He went to law school, didn’t make the Law Review, but passed the bar on his first try. After school, he worked at a firm specializing in corporate law. When his wife died, he was so preoccupied that he forgot to pay several hundred dollars’ worth of parking fines and had to go to traffic court or lose his license.

At four-thirty, I hand-delivered the goods on the nonexistent Greg McKenna.

Without a word, Will motioned me to sit on the chair next to him, a strategically placed seat for those destined for up-close-and-personal bawling-outs. The almost spotless report I turned in merited a stentorian outburst: “Pure unadulterated pap… paying you six figures for this junk… this guy can give our party trouble… you find out he had some parking tickets… where did you get this stuff from, the Little Scouts Monitor?… I want dirt and you give me the cleanest little boy in the class… you’re losing it.”

When he paused for breath, I amazed myself by standing up and shouting, “No, you’re losing it. You’ve wallowed in mud so long you can’t believe that there’s anybody out there who’s decent. This is a good man, Will Stafford, a real novelty in our line of work. And by the way, I’m sick of digging up dirt. I quit!”

Backing away, but not out of fear, I headed toward the door, where I paused for a second to give Will rebuttal time, to launch a string of his pithy epithets that would have furthered my resolve to quit. Nothing. Only a full second of ponderous silence. Ominous, but I didn’t care. For the first time since becoming his employee, I felt noble.

At home, I composed my short and noble resignation letter: “I can no longer participate in a process that believes in the inherent evil in all human beings.” Two days later I received a letter from Will: “Resignation not accepted. You’ve been working too hard and I regret going off about Greg McKenna. Enclosed is vacation pay.”

Wow! I had bullied a bully and won. I practically skipped into the natural-history museum to meet Greg and Melissa for a tour designed for preschoolers. After exchanging a hug with the child, I suggested to Greg that we three lunch afterwards at Delilah’s Deli, a favorite spot of Will and his staffers. Now that Will had accepted the fact that I couldn’t find anything on Greg, I had no reason to hide from my boss. In fact, my going public would show Will how hard I tried to get inside Greg’s head. But instead of responding happily to the idea of going to lunch at an adult place, Greg frowned.

“Listen, I have a favor to ask of you. I have to meet a client nearby for a deposition that won’t take long. I was going to ask you if you could stay with Melissa for the hour and then I’ll pick her up. She’ll have lunch at day care.”

Although acutely disappointed, I managed a smile as he slipped into the crowd. Unaware that her father had left, Melissa pulled me toward the long line of excited children and advised me not to be afraid of the dinosaurs that we’d see. In the middle of an explanation of the pterodactyl’s eating habits, my mind drifted and slammed into the Big Doubt. Could Greg be hiding us out in children’s places because he was seeing another woman?

There was a way to find out, but I hesitated to use it since pumping a child had never been in my repertoire. However, my need to know quickly muffled the small voice of my newly awakened conscience. As Melissa squeezed closer to me to allow another child to see, I put my arm around her small shoulders. She would know about her father’s friends. I stroked her long blond hair and said, “Melissa, does your daddy have any other friends that he sees a lot?”

“Only Jeff,” she whispered as the docent continued to speak.

Delighted with her answer, I avidly followed the dinosaur’s menus. As the tour was returning to the rotunda, Melissa spun around. Lip quivering, she asked, “Where’s Daddy?” At that moment, Greg waved to her from the end of the line.

“I stayed too long looking at the reptiles,” he told her, “and lost my place.”

At the gift shop, as Melissa debated over buying Terry Pterodactyl or Iggy Iguanodon, Greg said, “I’m sorry about not going to Delilah’s. I just realized that we have had no time alone together and these juvenile outings might not be too interesting for you.”

“Oh no,” I protested, but not too strongly.

“I’m thinking of taking some time off now to gear up for the real work in the primaries. If you can take some time off too, would you like to go away with Melissa and me? Someplace quiet, away from phones and TV? Maybe the mountains?”

“That would be great,” I answered.

“The three of us could have a wonderful time outdoors.”

He paused before adding meaningfully, “And Melissa goes to bed early.”

“That would be great,” I repeated and I actually think I batted my eyelashes. “As a matter of fact, Will just suggested that I take some time off before the heavy hitting starts.”

He smiled, then frowned. “I hope it’s not too late to rent a cabin for next week. I know fall is a popular time in the Poconos.”

“That’s not a problem,” I answered. “As luck would have it, I own a family cabin in the Poconos that I hardly use. I loved it as a child and I know Melissa will too. Absolutely no twenty-first-century intrusions. It’s completely stocked with nonperishable food. Hospitality of the mountains, you know.”

“Fantastic.” He smiled.

We sealed the arrangement with a surreptitious kiss behind a display of children’s books.

To eliminate worries about anyone finding incriminating material in my office, I shredded files for three days. Officially on vacation, I was interrupted only once. Eve stopped in one morning looking for more work.

“Looks like you’re clearing out,” she said. “New job?”

“No, just a vacation.”

“No business for me, then, while you’re away?”

“No.” I smiled.

“Not even some more sleuthing on McKenna, the ID thief?”

“Not even on him.”

“I think you’re making a mistake,” she said on her way out.

The first chill of foreboding hit me.

“I don’t think so,” I said softly.

“Suit yourself. Ta ta.”

The morning of the fourth day, I packed for the mountains — plenty of jeans and tees, but also a teddy or two, just in case. Since Greg wasn’t to pick me up until twelve-thirty, I had time to go into the office to finish purging the files, not realizing that henceforth I would look upon this day of mindless chores as the best day of my life, the day I’d return to in a nanosecond if only God let us shift our life gears into reverse.

At ten-thirty, I had nothing left to do but prop my feet on my desk and stare at my suitcase and backpack and visualize using their contents during my time with Greg. Just as I was picturing Greg lifting me onto the swing hanging from the oak tree next to the cabin, the phone rang.

For a moment, some kind of background whirring sound kept me from making out the caller.

“Sorry about the traffic noise,” Greg shouted. “I left my cell phone in my car, so I’m calling from a pay phone. I’m having a bad car day. My car died right after I dropped Melissa for the morning at day care. I rode with the tow-truck driver to the dealer’s and the news isn’t good.”

“What’s the matter?”

“Some kind of complicated under-the-hood problem and the mechanic needs a part from another shop. It looks like we won’t be able to leave today.”

After my stomach dropped from the penthouse to the basement, I brightened. “No problem. We can take my car.”

“I don’t think so. I left Melissa’s booster seat and CDs in the car. I can’t ask the dealer’s driver to go back to get them. He’s taking me and three other people home. He just stopped to get gas. Besides, it’s being towed to another location and this driver doesn’t know where. So leaving today’s off. Melissa is going to be devastated.”

“Not if I leave now and go to Kiddie Korner and buy another one and some CDs for the trip,” I quickly offered.

Pause. “I don’t like to trouble you.”

“No trouble, a pleasure.”

“You’re wonderful. I’ll reimburse you. And I’ll try to get to the cabin tonight. This will work out.”

And it did work out, at least the logistics part of the plan on my end. I went to Kiddie Korner, bought the booster seat and several children’s CDs. I set the booster seat into the backseat of my car and strapped it in. At twelve-ten, I arrived at the library and waited outside as Greg had asked until he arrived via bicycle with Melissa on the child’s seat.

“This is fun,” Melissa called. “I hope Daddy always picks me up on a bike.”

“Not likely,” he grinned, mopping his forehead. “I’ll take Melissa into the children’s room to get Emma and the Playful Platypus.” And to me he said, “Wait for me in the adult section, okay? I need to go over a few grown-up things with you.”

After settling Melissa with her book, he rushed into the room and with no preliminaries, launched the knockout punch.

“I called the dealer before I left home. The car won’t be ready until tomorrow.”

“That’s no problem. We’re taking my car anyway.”

He ruffled my hair. “It’s not that simple. I’m going to have to wait till tomorrow. I can’t go away and leave it at the dealer’s after I hassled him to do a rush job. Stan’s a friend as well as a constituent and he promised to drive it to my place himself. I’ll come up tomorrow.”

Taking a backseat to Stan the dealer hurt, but I refrained from losing my cool. A well-trained political operative, I knew better than to come between a candidate and a constituent.

Ironically, we stood by a paperback section labeled Romance Novels as he matter-of-factly assigned me the Nanny role with instructions about Melissa. She didn’t need to stop for bathroom breaks — a veritable camel, that child; she should eat her peanut butter and jelly sandwich and carrot sticks in the car — they were in her backpack along with juice; and she should sing along with the CDs I bought — because listening to the car radio with its news about fires and floods upsets her.

I was about to say, Yes, Mr. Rochester, but bit my tongue as I remembered that Jane Eyre did marry her boss.

“One more thing,” he said as we headed back to Melissa. “I looked up directions to your cabin on a map. Then I checked highway conditions. You should take the alternate route. There’s major construction on the main highway to the Poconos.”

At the entrance to the children’s room he hugged me.

“I’ll really miss you tonight, but I’ll make it up to you tomorrow night,” he whispered, then squared his shoulders and slipped to the side of the entrance, out of Melissa’s sight.

“Listen, Melissa’s been terrible about goodbyes ever since her mother died. I don’t want her to make a scene. She’ll be all right if she doesn’t see me. I explained everything to her and she’s okay with you taking her and she’ll be asleep before she realizes I won’t be there till tomorrow. I’m going to slip out the back.”

He kissed me and murmured, “I’m a worrier, so please call me after Melissa’s asleep, usually by eight, and let me know you arrived safely. My phone number is on a card in Melissa’s backpack.”

Warm from the kiss, I watched him leave, then went into the children’s room and hugged Melissa. “Let’s go,” I said.

She looked around then started to cry, “Where’s Daddy? I didn’t give him hugs and kisses.”

So much for Daddy’s slipping away to avoid a scene. I tried to soothe her, but she howled. Several mothers and children looked our way. The librarian frowned.

I picked her up and hugged her. She dropped the book. I retrieved it and hurried out the door, hoping Greg hadn’t gotten far so he could perform the goodbye ritual. I couldn’t see him. When we got to my car, I pointed to a stack of children’s CDs.

“You pick out which one you want to play first.”

Her cries reduced to hiccups, she browsed through them and selected Mother Goose Rhymes. “Can we play them all?” she asked.

“Each and every one,” I answered as she went unresisting into the booster seat. After a silent thank-you to Mother Goose, I drove off. After singing along with her, and quite enjoying it, I was given permission to pick out the next CD, a medley of children’s songs.

“ ‘Old MacDonald,’ ” I said and slid it in.

After e-i-e-i-o-ing it through all the animals in the barnyard, I begged for a break.

“Oh, all right,” she answered, “as long as you play the ‘Are You Sleeping, Brother John?’ song next.”

I agreed, but first she sipped some juice.

“Okay,” she announced, “my whistle is wet. Now we can sing again.”

“Whistles are wet,” I said, “who taught you that? Daddy?”

“No. Jeff did.”

Jeff again. To keep from probing the child about Jeff, I quickly slid in the tape and my unconscious beamed up a disturbing wordplay. Instead of the song’s “morning bells are ringing,” I sang, “warning bells are ringing.”

Was I warning myself that Greg might have more than a friendship with this Jeff? The sight of the cabin surrounded by spruce trees and set near a cliff with a spectacular view of mountains haloed by an October haze swept anxieties away. This cabin held warm memories and would log many more, I hoped.

As soon as I unstrapped Melissa, she ran to the porch to hug Max, the smiling wooden bear my father had carved for my fifth birthday.

When we went into the retro living room — knotty pine panels and Early American furniture — Melissa ran to the glorious stone fireplace.

“Can we have a fire? Can we? And can we invite the bear in?”

“We can have a fire, but I think we’ll have to wait for Daddy to bring the bear in.”

Next Melissa and I climbed the stairs to the loft. When she opened the door to the smaller room, she squealed with delight. It was decorated in a Heidi theme: mountains, wildflowers, and a Swiss-type bed. She jumped on it and hugged the pillow.

Being in the bedroom reminded me of sleeping gear. Being new at nanny-hood, I had forgotten to get a suitcase from Greg.

“Sweetheart,” I confessed, “I forgot to ask Daddy for your night things. And he might not get here until after your bedtime.”

“That’s okay,” she said, fluffing up a pillow, “we keep pajamas and my extra Emma doll and extra toothbrush in my backpack in case I get tired in Daddy’s office if he’s working late. So if I fall asleep, Daddy carries me to the car and puts me to bed.”

“Smart Daddy,” I said as another warning bell tolled. Had Daddy lied about the car not being ready today because he wanted a child-free night to spend with someone else?

Melissa’s tugging on my arm steered me away from dark places.

“You said we were going to build a fire,” she pouted.

“Well, what are we waiting for? Let’s go outside and gather some twigs for kindling.”

After filling a basket with twigs, we tossed some onto the large logs already positioned in the fireplace. When the firestarter worked on the first try, we settled onto the sofa and watched the tiny flames mature into a blazing fire. Melissa clapped her hands at the sight and beamed at my suggestion that we eat our macaroni-and-cheese dinners in front of it.

After eating, Melissa snuggled close to me. I could love this child, I thought. Before she could fall fully asleep, I walked her upstairs, brushed her teeth, and put on her pajamas. After tucking her in, I started reading Emma’s adventure with the playful platypus. By page five, she had fallen asleep.

I went downstairs and added more logs to the fire. The night had grown very cold. Sleet scratching against the windowpanes reminded me that winter comes early to the mountains. Since it was slightly after eight, I retrieved Greg’s phone number from Melissa’s backpack and tapped it into my cell phone.

He picked up on the first ring. Before I could say hello, he panted, “Who is this?”

“It’s Anne.” I laughed. “You sound, Mr. Lawyer, as if you’ve been chasing an ambulance.”

“Anne who?” he choked.

“Anne who,” I echoed calmly, preferring his playfulness to his initial panic and then answered, “Anne, the Mountain Maiden.”

“How is Melissa?” he shouted.

I paused and tried to make sense of his mood. Acute separation anxiety, I concluded as he repeated, “How is Melissa?”

“Greg, calm down. She’s fine. She’s sleeping.”

“She’s not hurt?”

“Of course not. Oh, you must be worrying about the drive up here. We did fine and managed the hilly terrain quite well.”

“Is she crying for me?”

“No, Greg. I’m sorry to disappoint you. I gave her dinner and read to her and she’s sound asleep.”

“So what do you want from me?”

“Just her clothes.”

“You’ll have to tell me where you are.”

“In the living room of the cabin.”

He dropped the phone. I heard rustling in the background. Rummaging noises? Looking for a pen? Why the need to write down the word clothes? But maybe he wanted to know more about the weather to include boots and rain gear. I heard a door close. Was Jeff there? Was Greg shooing him out?

Then I heard nothing.

Silence. A broken connection. I tried again and heard a busy signal. I paced the living room, waiting for a callback. Surely he had Caller ID. Minutes ticked by. Exasperated, I lay down on the sofa and pulled an afghan over me. Too tired to worry if his acute anxiety was a harbinger of our life to come, I fell asleep. And had a weird dream. Max, the wooden bear on the porch, had invited other wooden bears to a party. Their heavy paws thumped against the floor and one of them bumped against the switch next to the door, sending beams of light boring through the windows.

I tried to cover my eyes but a non-bear advised me to put my hands behind my back and told me I had the right to remain silent. As I tried to make sense out of this nightmare, someone ran past me and bounded up the stairs.

By the time I blinked my vision back I saw Greg rush past me, carrying the sleeping Melissa in his arms.

During the times when I’m not longing for the day before my arrest as a kidnapper, when I was attending to mundane chores, unaware that I was experiencing the best day of my life, I replay the story of my role in the perfect non-crime devised by Greg and his college roommate, Jeff — the oppo who had called me Machiavellian Mama. I marvel how I cooperated in my own victimization. Sure, Greg was clever and I was vulnerable. In the words of the tabloid — Caught! — I was a “lonely single longing for love and a child of her own.”

Not included in Caught! was Greg’s intense ambition to break into the political scene. He had the charm and the looks, but he also had a past, a past that would have been discovered by a skilled oppo like me. Jeff knew I would have tagged Greg out before he reached first base. To defuse me, Greg and Jeff, whom I totally underrated, systematically played me to perfection by throwing out the McKenna name to the party and betting that once I met Greg and learned his real name I’d be smitten and would not research him. The other part of their plan — establishing a relationship between Melissa and me so that she would be unaware of her “kidnapping” — evolved successfully in all the children’s places we visited.

Blinded by my eagerness for time away with Greg, I walked blissfully into the trap — never doubting that his car had broken down; never suspecting that, contrary to what he said, Melissa would cry if he stole away without her seeing him; never turning off the children’s CDs in my car to listen to the radio; never leaving the alternate route to go on the highway that flashed the Amber Alert; and never realizing that his strange “separation anxiety” was make-believe anguished parent-talk to a kidnapper for the ears of the FBI agents who simply needed to read Caller ID for my number and subsequent identification.

To ensure that Melissa was asleep when the raid occurred, Greg had to buy time at least until eight P.M. He rushed back into the library as soon as we pulled away and slipped into the role of distraught father. The librarian described me to him. As a delaying tactic, Greg offered up to the FBI the name of a freelance court reporter who had been friendly to Melissa. She also resembled me. After being shown a driver’s-license photo of her, the librarian identified her as the kidnapper. Unable to contact her at the courthouse or home, the authorities immediately issued an alert. Not until six-thirty did a friend of hers inform the FBI that the woman was vacationing in Nassau, a fact known to Greg. That subterfuge gained Greg the time needed to wait until I called and told him Melissa was asleep. I also learned that an anonymous caller had dialed the Amber Alert number, saying that she had seen a car driven by a woman with a young girl who resembled Melissa go down Tamarac Road in the Mountain Top Development. The FBI learned my identity from my cell phone number and my location from the caller, most likely Jeff’s new girlfriend.

No longer lacking face time and name recognition, Greg captured the hearts and votes of viewers as the scene of the father/child reunion played over and over on local TV. If Melissa had asked about me, no one could have heard her. Greg held her tightly and smothered her with kisses. Anything she said went into his shoulder. A teary-eyed interviewer cooed about “happy endings” before asking Greg about me.

He sighed. “The poor woman. I met her once at a cocktail reception and Melissa spilled juice on her skirt and apologized adorably. She must have fixated on her then and stalked us.”

Melissa. I love that child and I wonder what Greg told her about me. That I went away like her mother did?

Eve visited me in jail and brought me a printout on Greg McKenzie.

“You should have let me check him out,” she chided.

Aside from minor college hijinks like stealing the mascot of his alma mater along with Jeff, the incident that might have sunk his career had I found it occurred on a winding road in Colorado. Greg’s car skidded and careened into a ditch, killing Melissa’s mother. Suspecting drunkenness, the police on the scene advised the Midlothian Hospital medical personnel to test him for alcohol.

He was never charged. His blood test mysteriously disappeared from the hospital.

“Something so convenient arouses my hunter’s instinct,” said Eve. “So I checked the background of Jeff Cobb. Found out that he worked at Midlothian in maintenance while he was studying for his master’s. Same time as McKenzie’s accident. He quit the job the day after. McKenzie’s sister-in-law and her husband petitioned the court for custody of Melissa, but were turned down. This data is useless now. He’s got everyone so charmed that no one will care about the accident.”

The knowledge of the accident and Melissa’s mother’s death would have impelled me to don my oppo hat and interview police, EMT responders to the scene, and hospital personnel and have them swear Greg was drunk. Machiavellian Mama would have vaporized his chances, but she was otherwise engaged.

Aside from Eve, my only other visitor was Will Stafford. He believes I’m innocent, but he chuckled in admiration at the “best damned oppo dirty trick” he’d ever seen. He’s paying for my lawyer, who raised both eyebrows when I told him my story.

“Look, you say you went all those places with McKenzie and his daughter, yet no one’s come forward who saw you with them. There’s not one phone call from his cell or home phone to your cell or home. And there’s only one call from you to him, from your cell to his home phone on the night of the kidnapping.”

“Alleged kidnapping,” I snapped. “We made arrangements when we were with Melissa. And he did call my office twice, once to set up our first date and again the day I picked up Melissa. I know the last call was from a pay phone. Isn’t there a record of either call?”

“Yes, but there’s no proof the pay-phone calls came from him. There’s no proof of any connection with him or with the child, and she can’t testify. Give me something concrete.”

He called for the guard, then opened his briefcase and handed me some books.

“My wife went to your condo and picked up those books you asked for.”

Wondering why I even asked for them since they belonged to the day before, I tossed them onto the bed in my cell. Ruefully, I watched as the volume of Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s Sonnets From the Portuguese hit the floor. I had actually been reading those poems on the day before when my fatal romantic side held me captive. A white card bookmarked a particular poem. Masochistically, I picked up the book to read what I had once considered so meaningful.

I smiled. “Something concrete, you said. How about fingerprints?”

The card that marked my place was much more interesting to me than the poem. It was literally my ticket to freedom and perhaps Melissa’s return ticket to relatives in Colorado who wouldn’t manipulate her. It accompanied the roses sent by Greg as an apology for spilling wine on my skirt, asking me to lunch at McDougal’s. And even better, silly old starry-eyed me had clipped a memento to the card. It was the receipt from McDougal’s that Greg had left on the table. I had taken it for insertion into a future scrapbook to be labeled “Our First Meal Together,” a romantic lunch consisting of one adult McDougal burger, one adult garden salad, and one child’s Fun Meal.