The Year of the Ransom

30 October 1986

Mr. Everard is a surprise. His letters and then his phone calls from New York were, well, polite and kind of intellectual. Here he is in person, a big bruiser with a dented nose. How old is he, forty? Hard to tell. I’m sure he’s knocked around a lot.

No matter his looks. (They could be might sexy if things took that turn. Which they won’t. Doubtless for the best, damn it.) He’s soft-spoken, with the same old-fashioned quality as his communications had.

Shake hands. “Glad to meet you, Miss Tamberly,” the deep voice says. “It’s kind of you to come here.” Downtown hotel, the lobby.

“Well, it concerns my one and only uncle, doesn’t it?” I toss back.

He nods. “I’d like to speak with you at length. Uh, would it be forward of me if I offered to stand you a drink? Or dinner? I’ll be putting you to a certain amount of trouble.”

Caution. “Thanks, but let’s see how it goes. Right now, frankly, I’m too keyed up. Could we just walk for a while?”

“Why not? A beautiful day, and I haven’t been in Palo Alto in years. Maybe we can go to the university and stroll around?”

Gorgeous weather for sure, Indian summer before the rains start in earnest. If it lasts we’ll have smog. Right now, clear blue overhead, sunlight spilling down like a waterfall. The eucalyptuses on campus will be all silvery and pale green and pungent. In spite of the situation (oh, what has become of Uncle Steve?) I can’t keep excitement down. Me, with a real live detective.

Turn left in the street. “What do you want, Mr. Everard?”

“To interview you, exactly as I told you. I’d like to draw you out about Dr. Tamberly. Something you say might give an inkling.”

Good of that foundation to care, to hire this man. Well, naturally, they have an investment in Uncle Steve. He’s doing that research down in South America, that he’s never talked much about. Must be one dynamite book he means to write. Reflect credit on the foundation. Help justify its tax exemption. No, I shouldn’t think that. Cheap cynicism is for sophomores.

“Why me, though? I mean, my dad’s his brother. He’d know a lot more.”

“Maybe. I do intend to see him and his wife. But the information given me says you’re a special favorite of your uncle’s. I’ve got a hunch he’s revealed things about himself to you—nothing big, nothing you imagine is very special—but things that might give some insight into his character, some clue as to where he went.”

Swallow hard. Six months, now, with never so much as a postcard. “Have they no idea at the foundation?”

“You asked me before,” Everard reminds. “He always was an independent operator. Made it a condition of accepting the funds. Yes, he was bound for the Andes, but we hardly know more than that. It’s a huge territory. The police authorities of the several possible countries haven’t been able to tell us a thing.”

This is hard to say. Melodrama. But. “Do you suspect . . . foul play?”

“We don’t know, Miss Tamberly. We hope not. Maybe he took too long a chance and—Anyway, my job’s to try understanding him.” He smiles. It creases his face. “My notion of how to do that is to start by understanding the people he feels close to.”

“He always was, you know, reserved. Quite a private guy.”

“With a soft spot for you, however. Mind if I ask you a few questions about yourself, for openers?”

“Go ahead. I don’t guarantee to answer them all.”

“Nothing too personal. Let’s see. You’re in your senior year at Stanford, right? What’s your major?”

“Biology.”

“That’s about as broad a word as ‘physics,’ isn’t it?”

He’s no dummy. “Well, I’m mainly interested in evolutionary transitions. Probably I’ll go into paleontology.”

“You plan on grad school, then?”

“Oh, yes. A Ph.D.’s the union card if you want to do science.”

“You look more athletic than academic, if I may say so.”

“Tennis, backpacking, sure, I like it outdoors, and fossicking for fossils is a great way to get paid for being there.” Impulse. “I’ve got a summer job lined up. Tourist guide in the Galapagos Islands. The Lost World if ever there was a Lost World.” Suddenly my eyes sting and blur. “Uncle Steve arranged it for me. He has friends in Ecuador.”

“Sounds terrific. How’s your Spanish?”

“Pretty good. We, my family, used to vacation a lot in Mexico. I still go now and then, and I’ve traveled in South America.”

—He’s been remarkably easy to talk with. “Comfortable as an old shoe,” Dad would say. We sat on a campus bench, we had a beer in the union, he did end up taking me to dinner. Nothing fancy, nothing romantic. But worth cutting those classes for. I’ve told him an awful lot.

Funny how little he’s managed to tell about himself.

I realize that as he says good night outside my apartment building. “You’ve been most helpful, Miss Tamberly. Maybe more than you know. I’ll get hold of your parents tomorrow. Then back to New York, I suppose. Here.” He takes out his wallet, extracts a small white oblong. “My card. If anything else should come to your mind, please phone me at once, collect.” Dead seriousness: “Or if anything happens that seems the least peculiar. Please. This might be a tad dangerous, this business.”

Uncle Steve involved with the CIA, or what? Suddenly the evening doesn’t feel mild. “Okay. Good night, Mr. Everard.” I snatch the card and hurry through the door.