I spent a few minutes trying to calm Alice down as we started to check some of the places Bailey Mae liked to hang out. Bailey Mae hadn’t been to school that day or to the library or to the sad little arcade where she sometimes played out-of-date games. Alice had gone to sleep early the night before, after her shift at the bottling factory in Gardnertown. Bailey Mae usually came home about eight o’clock. She’s a smart fourteen-year-old, and a quarter of the town is related to her.

We wandered around town, asking a few questions. No one thought it was unusual, because I am the unofficial private investigator for the whole area.

Mrs. Hoffman on Dubois Street hadn’t seen Bailey Mae but took the time to thank me for finding her son, who had been on a bender in Albany and didn’t have the cash to get home.

After nearly an hour, I tracked down Timmy Jones, a buddy of mine from high school who now worked for the Ulster sheriff’s office.

Timmy raised his hands, showing his thick fingers, and said, “I spoke with your cousin Alice already. We’re making a few checks, but Bailey Mae has wandered off before.”

I knew she sometimes got frustrated and left the house, but she usually ended up at my house or my mom’s house. I said, “She’s a good girl.”

“No one’s saying she’s not. But we can’t just call out the troops every time a teenager is out past curfew or mad at their parents.”

“Bailey Mae is more responsible. She wouldn’t do something like that.”

Finally Timmy said, “Okay, we’ll get everyone out looking for her. But get your family involved, too. There’s more of them than there are cops in the area.”

Chapter 4

Chapter 4

Bailey Mae has always been my favorite relative, and I have plenty to choose from in Marlboro. After I rounded a few up and explained the situation, the look on my cousin Todd’s face said it all: they were worried. Bailey Mae is the family’s shining light. Todd is a self-centered dick, and even he was concerned enough for our little cousin that he closed his precious auto repair shop to help search.

I pulled Alice aside and hit her with some simple questions about what was going on around the house, what the last thing she said to Bailey Mae was, and whether they’d been fighting. The usual.

She said, “I told you everything. There were no problems. I haven’t been drinking and she hasn’t been angry. The only thing that’s new is that she’s been hanging out with Natty a little bit.”

That caught me by surprise. I blurted out, “Natty, as in my brother, Nathaniel?”