Where Are the Children? by Mary Higgins Clark Read Free Book Online

play a game on Mommy.
    'It's a game,' he told this little boy. 'I'm an old friend of your mommy's and she wants to play a birthday game. Did you know it was her birthday today?' He kept patting the little girl while he spoke. She felt so soft and good.
    The boy - Michael - looked uncertain. 'I don't like this game,' he said firmly. Unsteadily he got to his feet. He pushed aside the hands that were touching Missy and reached for her. She clung to him. 'Don't cry, Missy,' he said soothingly. 'It's just a silly game. We'll go home now.'
    It was obvious that he wasn't going to be fooled easily. The boy had Ray Eldredge's candid expression. 'We're not going to play any of your games,' he said. 'We want to go home.'
    There was a wonderful way he could make the little boy co-operate. 'Let go of your sister,' he ordered. 'Here, give her to me.' He yanked her from the boy. With the other hand he took Michael's wrist and pulled him over to the window. 'Do you know what a telescope is?'
    Michael nodded uncertainly. 'Yes. It's like the glasses my daddy has. It makes things bigger.'
    "That's right. You're very smart. Now, look in here.' The boy put his eye to the viewer. 'Now tell me what you see . . . No, squeeze your other eye shut.'
    'It's looking at my house.'
    'What do you see there?'
    'There are lots of cars . . . police cars. What's the matter?' Alarm made his voice quiver.
    He looked down happily at the worried face. A faint pinging sound came from the window. It was starting to sleet. The wind was driving hard little pellets against the glass panes. The visibility would be very poor soon. Even with the telescope it would be hard to see much. But he could have a wonderful time with the children - the whole, long afternoon. And he knew how to make the boy obey. 'Do you know what it's like to be dead?' he asked.
    'It means to go to God,' Michael answered.
    He nodded approvingly. 'That's right. And this morning your mother went to God. That's why all the police cars are there. Your daddy asked me to mind you for a while and said for you to be good and help me take care of your sister.'
    Michael looked as though he'd cry too. His lip quivered as he said, 'If my mommy went to God, I want to go too.'
    Running his fingers through Michael's hair, he rocked the still-wailing Missy. 'You will,' he told him. 'Tonight. I promise.'
     
    CHAPTER NINE
    The first reports went over the wire-service tickers at noon, in time to make bulletins on the news broadcasts throughout the country. Newscasters, hungering for a story, seized upon it and sent researchers scurrying to the
    files for records of the Nancy Harmon murder trial.
    Publishers chartered planes to send their top crime reporters to Cape Cod.
    In San Francisco, two assistant district attorneys listened to the bulletin. One said to the other, 'Have I always said that bitch was as guilty as if I'd seen her kill those kids myself? Have I said it? So help me, if they don't hang this one on her, I'll take a leave of absence and personally comb the globe to find that Legler slob and get him back here to testify against her.'
    In Boston, Dr Lendon Miles was enjoying the beginning of his lunch break. Mrs Markley had just left. After a year of intense therapy she was finally beginning to get pretty good insight. She'd made a funny remark a few minutes ago. She'd been discussing an episode from her fourteenth year and said, 'Do you realize that thanks to you I'm going through adolescence and change of life all at once? It's a hell of a deal.' Only a few months ago she hadn't been doing much joking.
    Lendon Miles enjoyed his profession. To him the mind was a delicate, complicated phenomenon - a mystery that could be unravelled only by a series of infinitely small revelations . . . one leading slowly, patiently into the next. He sighed. His ten-o'clock patient was in early analysis and had been extremely hostile.
    He switched on the radio next to his desk to catch the balance of the noon news and was