The truth was that we hadn’t expected Crystal to agree, but David did have Ralph Goodson and the polygraph machine ready in an interview room two doors down. We escorted Crystal and made the introductions, then waited while the stooped man with the bow tie and high-water pants hooked her up. Crystal fidgeted in the chair, uncomfortable for obvious reasons. It wasn’t exactly like settling in to watch television on a favorite recliner at home. After Goodson secured sensors around Crystal’s chest, one on her finger, and a blood pressure cuff on her arm, David and I left and walked one door down, into an adjoining observation room to watch and listen through a one-way window and an intercom.
“I don’t think these machines really work,” Crystal complained with a disgruntled frown. “I’m willing to try it, but you make sure you don’t ask any trick questions.”
Goodson, a former private investigator, nodded as if in agreement. He looked like a high school chemistry teacher, and Crystal seemed to take his gesture as reassurance. “Young lady,” he said, peering over the top of his wire-frame glasses, “you just relax and tell the truth. No problem, right?”
“Okay,” she mumbled. “No problem.”
From where we stood, David and I watched the machine trace graphs measuring Crystal’s blood pressure, breathing, heart rate, and perspiration. Goodson asked the control questions, her age, her name, where she grew up, Joey’s name, and his birth date. To my surprise, the resulting graphs appeared odd. If Crystal was telling the truth, the lines should form an even pattern. They weren’t.
“Was your son at the park with you this afternoon?” Goodson asked.
“Yes,” Crystal answered, her heart rate increasing.
“Do you know where he is now?”
“No,” she said, clipping off the word. On the graph, her blood pressure rose, making an elongated arc.
“Do you know who has him?”
“No,” Crystal said, again causing another jagged blip.
“Are you a truthful person?” he asked, his voice even.
“Yes,” she said, fidgeting in the chair, and the stylus careened upward.
As the test went on, Crystal’s results began to look like a piece of paper she’d had Joey scribble on. Afterward, we stood with Goodson in the hallway while Crystal waited in the original interview room. “I’m not sure,” the polygrapher said. “I wish I could be more helpful, but it’s a strange result.”
“How strange?” David asked.
“It appears she was deceptive even on the control questions,” he said. “Usually when I see that, it means the subject is attempting to beat the test by confusing the result. That they’ve prepared, either taking some kind of drug or psyching themselves into it, by muddying up their minds or using physical tricks like muscle tightening. But that young woman had no idea she was taking the polygraph until she was already here. Right?”
“That’s right,” David said. “We just told her minutes before we walked her in.”
“That doesn’t make sense,” Goodson said, shaking his head. “When did she prepare? How did she know what to do to try to confuse the test?”
“Unless she suspected she might have a reason to be given a polygraph and she did some legwork beforehand,” I speculated, glancing at David. “Maybe she knew it was a normal investigator’s tool, and that we would ask the parent of a missing child to take one.”
“But then she had to know her son would go missing,” David said, connecting the dots. “Otherwise, why prepare?”
“Yes, she would have to have known the boy would be missing,” I said.
“I guess that’s possible,” David said, running his hand over his chin while he mulled over the possibility. “We know she didn’t prepare for the polygraph after the abduction. Until she came here, she never left the park.”
“Maybe we’re off here. Is there some other possibility?” I asked, gesturing at Goodson. “Bottom-line this for us.”
“The report is going to read that she shows signs of deception,” the polygrapher said, frowning. “My take is she intentionally manipulated the test to prevent us from getting a good reading. I can’t tell you if she knows where the boy is and who has him or not. I can tell you that she’s not cooperating with the investigation.”
Minutes later, Crystal stood at the front desk, announcing she was leaving. She never asked if she’d passed the polygraph, which seemed odd, so David told her anyway. “The polygrapher says your test showed signs of deception.” He let that sink in, then added, in case she needed an interpretation, “We continue to have the impression that you aren’t being honest with us.”
“It’s all witchcraft,” she said, her eyes narrowing. “I’ve told you everything I know. If that’s not enough, I can’t help you. I don’t know where Joey is, but I think you should all be looking for him, not harassing me.”
I leaned closer. “Young lady, you have some things to think about. The first one is, do you want us to spend our time investigating you or looking for your son? Because if you’re intentionally screwing us over, all you’re accomplishing is putting the focus on you and taking it off finding Joey.”
“I’ve told you the truth,” she said, defiant. She had a deputy beside her, one who had been assigned to take her to her apartment to find a more recent photo of Joey. As she turned and they walked away, Crystal ordered: “Now find my son.”
“So what’s she covering up?” I asked a few minutes later.
Before we introduced ourselves to Joey’s dad, David and I detoured to the break room for a cup of coffee. David’s face was flushed, and I knew why. I was angry, too, and disgusted. First she’d given us an old photograph of the kid, and now it appeared Crystal was trying to beat the lie detector.
“It has to be something that ties her to the kid’s disappearance. Otherwise, why lie?” David answered. “Funny thing is, why’d she talk to us without a lawyer? Why’d she agree to take the lie detector? If she’s screwing us around, why’s she acting at all as if she’s cooperating?”
“Probably figures she’s smarter than we are, that she can fool us. The old photo,” I asked, “you think it’s on purpose?”
“Could be,” he said. “I don’t know.”
“How much damage did releasing it to the press do?” I asked, figuring I knew the answer but wanting to hear his thoughts.
David frowned. “Substantial. The television stations have already shown it. We’ll try, but it’s most likely too late to stop the newspaper from running it in the morning. We’ll put the new one out, but we’ll never erase the old one from memories. It’s like Crystal Warner is trying to throw up roadblocks, keep us from finding the kid. What do you think?”
“I don’t know,” I admitted. “It could be that she consciously misled us, or it could be that she’s young and ignorant, and too angry to understand that what she’s doing could get her son killed. Let’s go talk to the ex-husband.”
“In a moment,” David said.
I turned and looked back at him, wondering. He had a glimmer in his eye, one I’d come to recognize. He pushed the break room door shut. The heavy aroma of a popcorn bag inflating in the microwave and the sound of snapping kernels enveloped us, while under the fluorescent lights, David pulled me close, slipping one arm around my waist. His right hand migrated around my neck and he urged me forward, until his open lips were full on mine, and my breathing became quicker. Then he whispered in my ear: “You look so beautiful. I can’t tell you how much I regret not being alone with you tonight.”
Rather than answer, I kissed him back and then whispered in his ear, “Now let’s go find Joey Warner.”