Paper, Lady?

Paper, Lady?


Jim Jarvis, having finally convinced the uniformed officer out front that he did, in fact, live inside this particular house, rushed into the living room and past the two plainclothes detectives standing between the door and his wife, Claire.  He took her in his arms and hugged her, even as tears began running down her cheeks - and not for the first time today, if the collection of used tissues he could see in the small wastebasket next to the sofa was any indication.

Turning toward the detectives, Jim demanded, "What's going on here?"

The older of the two detectives identified himself and his partner as Sergeants Ferris and Castle, then explained that Mrs. Jarvis had purchased three newspapers from a nearby newsstand, which had caught the interest of the vendor.  He had left his assistant in charge and followed her from a distance, all the while trying to tell the 9-1-1 operator what was going on.

"He saw her turn down the alley behind your house," said Detective Ferris, "and, upon reaching the corner, found he couldn't follow her, because there wasn't anything to hide behind and he was afraid he'd be spotted.  He made a guess on which gate she'd used, then passed that to 9-1-1.  We sealed both ends of the street and the alley -"

"Yeah, I noticed that," Jim interrupted, sarcasm and anger evident in his voice.

"And we asked the residents at each end," continued the detective, "if they knew of anyone on the block that matched her description; we were directed to your house."

"Well, I'll grant that buying three papers is a little unusual," Jim allowed grudgingly, "but what made him decide to follow Claire?"

"Haven't you been following the stories in the papers and on TV?" asked Detective Castle.  "Three kids have disappeared from this general vicinity in the past two weeks and, in two of the disappearances, a woman generally matching your wife's description was seen in the vicinity around the time the kids went missing."

"We don't watch much TV," Jim answered, still holding his sobbing wife, "and we don't take a paper, so we weren't aware of these kidnappings.  And anyway, there must be dozens of women in the area who "match" Claire's description; some of them must buy newspapers at this guy's stand.  What made her so special?"

"In each case," replied Detective Ferris, "a ransom note fashioned from letters and words cut from a newspaper was sent to the kid's family.  The purchase was unusual, the vendor remembered the description from the news reports, and made the connection.  When you arrived, Mrs. Jarvis was just trying to explain about the newspapers."

Claire made a visible effort to compose herself, then said, "I...I bought them to make scrapbooks for my husband, so he'd have a little reminder of home on his business trips.  You know - some local headlines and stories, pictures of places we've visited; things like that."

"Claire, I didn't know you did scrapbooks," Jim said, still a little bewildered by the whole turn of events.

"Jenny - you know Jenny; she and her husband, Mark, live down the street," Claire answered.  "She got me interested in it, when we were talking last week about how Mark traveled a lot and then I mentioned your upcoming trips.  It was supposed to be a surprise, something for you to take with you to Atlanta next week, then another one for Dallas the month after next..."  Claire's voice trailed off.

Just then, the patrolman came into the room.  "Detective Ferris?  We just got a call over the radio.  The kids have been found - two houses down and on the other side of the alley.  The woman that was with them was arrested.  From the description I heard, she could be this lady's sister.  The lieutenant said you should get over there pronto."

Jim looked at the detectives.  "Well... what happens now?" he asked.  "She didn't do anything wrong, you know."

The detectives had the grace to look embarrassed.  "Sorry about the mix-up, folks; we'll be going now," Detective Ferris finally said.  "Oh, and, uhh... have a nice trip, sir."


[687 words]