The Driver

10

Milton made his way towards the house that Madison had run to last night, the one with the old man who had threatened to call the police. It was another big place, a sprawling building set within well tended gardens and fronted by a stone wall topped with ornamental iron fencing. Milton buzzed the intercom set into the stone pillar to the right of the gates and waited. There was no answer. He tried again with the same result. He was about to leave when he saw the old man. He came out of a side door, moving slowly and with the exaggerated caution of advanced age. Behind him was a wide lawn, sloping down to the shore. A collie trotted around the garden with aimless, happy abandon, shoving its muzzle into the flowerbeds in search of an interesting scent.

“Can I help you?”

“I hope so,” Milton said. “Could I have a word?”

Milton assessed him as he approached. He was old: late eighties, he guessed. He was tall but his frame had withered away with age so that his long arms and legs were spindly, sharply bony shoulders pointing through the fabric of the polo shirt that he was wearing.

“What can I do for you?”

“I was here last night.”

The man thought for a moment, the papery skin of his forehead crinkling. He remembered and a scowl descended. “This morning, you mean?”

“That’s right.”

“She woke me up, all that racket, my wife, too. You with her?”

“No, sir. But I drove her out here.”

“So what are you? A taxi driver?”

“That’s right.”

“What’s your name, son?”

“John Smith. And you?”

“Victor Leonard.”

“Sorry about all the noise, Mr. Leonard. The disturbance.”

“What the hell was she so exercised about?”

“I was hoping you might be able to tell me — did she say anything?”

Milton watched through the bars of the gate as he pursed his withered lips. “Didn’t make a whole heap of sense. She was in a terrible panic. Just asking for help. I’ve no idea what she wanted help for. She had her cell phone out and kept trying to make a call but it didn’t look like she was getting through. I could see she needed help so I told her she could come in. My wife, Laura, she sleeps downstairs because she’s just had her knee replaced, she was up too, all that noise. I got her inside but then she got a whole lot worse. Couldn’t make any sense out of her. Laura picked up the phone and started talking to the dispatcher, ‘this girl here is asking for help, can you send someone to help her,’ and as she finished the call and turned to her and told her to sit down and relax, the police were on their way, as soon as she said that, out the door she went.”

“And?”

“And nothing much. Police came around half an hour later. It was a single officer, he had a look around the place. Said he looked around the whole neighbourhood but he couldn’t find her anywhere. They asked me the questions I guess they ask everyone: what did she look like, what was she wearing, what did she say, all that. I told them what I could remember.” He paused. “I’ve got six kids, Mr. Smith, and I’m sure one or two of them could probably tell you more about drugs than I could. But, you ask me, that girl was pretty well drugged up. She had her hand on the sideboard to help her stay upright. Big eyes — pupils practically as big as saucers. She almost fell over twice while I was talking to her. And she wasn’t making any sense. If that’s not someone under the influence of something or another, I don’t know what is. You ask me, whatever she thought her problems were, they were in her mind — hallucinations or whatever you want to call them.”

“Did you see where she went?”

“Over the fence. Straight into Pete Waterfield’s garden, I guess because he had his security light on, looked like maybe he was in. She pounded on his door but he’s off on vacation with his grandkids and when she didn’t get an answer she kept on going — into his back garden and then away.”

“That leads down to the cliffs?”

“Sure does. You see the boat he’s got parked down there? Behind the car?” Milton said that he did. “She crouched down there, between the two, as if she was hiding from something. I saw her try and make a call on her phone again but I guess it didn’t get anywhere, like the others, because she upped and made a run for it. And that’s the last time I saw her.”

“Yes,” Milton said. “Me too. The cliffs are fenced off there?”

“Around the house, sure they are. But not further down.”

“You think she might have gone over the edge?”

“I hope not. That’s a fifty foot drop right onto the rocks.” He paused. “What’s it got to do with you, anyway? She’s just a customer, right?”

“I’m worried.”

“Ain’t like no taxi drivers I know, get worried about the people they drive.”

“I think something bad has happened to her.”

“Nothing bad happens around here, Mr. Smith.”

“I don’t know about that.” Milton took a business card for his taxi business from his pocket. “I appreciate you talking to me. Maybe I am worrying too much, but maybe I’m not. The police won’t even treat this as a missing person enquiry until she’s been gone a couple more days and, even then, it’s not going to be very high up their list of priorities. I wonder, if you think of anything else, or if you hear anything, or if anyone says anything to you, could you give me a call?”

“Sure I can.”

Milton passed the card through the bars of the gate.

“One more thing,” he said. “The house over there” — he pointed to the house he had just been inside — “do you know who owns it?”

“The company place?”

“What do you mean?”

“It’s owned by a company, one of the tech firms down in Palo Alto. Was on the market last year. Ten million dollars. What do you think of that?”

Milton made a show of being impressed.

“Good for the rest of us, too. They send executives there to stay — guys they’ve just hired before they can find a place of their own. None of them ever make much of an effort round here with the rest of us. Not unreasonable, I suppose. Why would they? They’re only stopping on the way to something else.”

“Know who’s in there now?”

“Afraid not. It’s empty, I think.”

“Apart from last night.”

“You can say that again.”

Milton thanked him and the old man went back to his front door. Milton turned back to the big house again. The place was quiet, peaceful, but there was something in that stillness that he found disturbing. It was as if the place was haunted, harbouring a dark secret that could only mean bad things for Madison.

11

Milton pressed the buzzer on the intercom and then stepped back, waiting for it to be answered. It was early, just before nine, and the sun was struggling through thi

“Hello?”

“It’s John Smith.”

The lock buzzed. Milton opened the door and climbed the stairs to the second floor.

Trip was waiting for him inside the opened door.

“Morning, Mr. Smith.”

“Anything?”

He shook his head.

Milton winced. “Two days.”

“I know. I’m worried now.”

He led the way into the sitting room.