forty-five
wednesday, april 30

The Christmas lights were bundled, and a few dozen computers were stacked and ready for transport. Between the decoy recyclables and the e-waste neighbors were likely to dump at their curbs, Jimmy expected the route to be chock full of choice pickings for hungry scavengers. According to Jimmy, the scavengers would case the area during Wednesday’s evening hours and return after dark, before the scheduled Thursday-morning pickup. Although there was no law against taking curbside garbage, scavengers didn’t want the hassle of having someone call the police, because it would slow them down. Hence, scavenging typically occurred during the cover of nightfall. Frank had arranged for five unmarked cars to cover the streets in hopes of spotting the scavengers. Once the scavengers were identified, Frank hoped they’d lead us further up the garbage pyramid. Frank wasn’t interested in a two-bit scavenger; he wanted the guy that was buying in volume, enough to fill a warehouse. Although not endorsed by the Cold Spring Harbor police, Charlie and I had planned on taking the Gremlin out for a spin after dark.

“You’re sure you’ll be okay?” I asked Katrina as I gave her belly a pat. What I guessed to be a foot kicked back at me. Boy, this kid was impatient. “Hey, you,” I yelled at Katrina’s mid-section. “You’re not done cooking yet.”

“I think tomorrow is my day,” Katrina said as she helped Charlie load the car with snacks of an unhealthy variety for the stake-out. “If this baby were any lower it would need shoes,” she quipped, handing me a bag of unopened candy. A bag of unopened anything was a rarity at Harbor House.

“Where did this come from?” I asked.

“Whoops,” Charlie said, pointing to the recently purchased bags of candy. “The candy would be my fault. I had an uncontrollable fit of consumerism.”

“I think I can ignore it,” I said as I opened the bag and shared some treats with Katrina. “We’ll be back before daybreak,” I assured her before climbing into the car with Charlie.

We turned out of the driveway and headed to the center of the square-mile area Frank and Jimmy had drawn out on the town map. As we entered the Recyclable Zone, as Charlie insisted on calling it, it was obvious the extensive preparation had been worth the effort. Almost every house had a neat pile of tempting trash just begging for a scavenger to haul away.

“This rocks,” I said as I eyed the garbage. “You know, we could actually use some Christmas lights.”

“Don’t worry, I kept a few boxes for us,” Charlie said as he chomped through a bag of heavily seasoned chips.

We passed Cheski and Lamendola and moved on until I found an unmanned street. I parked the Gremlin and turned off the lights. Charlie dusted his hands off and lit up his phone. “If someone spots us, we’ll pretend to make out.”

I laughed casually, but I was so nervous about where this sting would lead, I would have made out with Bob’s murderer if I thought it would help. “Angry Birds?” I said, glancing at Charlie’s phone.

“Nope. I created an avatar for myself on the Other Life site, and I’ve been trying to track the Maid. Charlie shook his head, indicating his frustration. “I don’t think she’s been online since the day we scared her off.”

“If I were Gayle, I’d have created a new avatar by now.”

Charlie looked at me. “Ce,” he said, “that’s an epic thought.”

And it was. I realized we had been insanely remiss in not considering the possibility that Gayle, my hair-altering biological daughter, could have taken on a new virtual identity. If the Other Life site was a communication tool for Gayle, then she’d still need to be on it to further her effort to solve Bob’s murder.

I leaned into Charlie’s phone to see the Other Life home page. “I’m not even sure what to look for,” I said.

Charlie took a deep breath and exhaled. His breath smelled like barbecue sauce, and I had to admit, it was a bit intoxicating—in a drunk fraternity party sort of way. “Frank’s gonna kill me for this,” Charlie said, punching the pad on his phone, “but I’m going to log on as Bob for a minute to see if I can root her out with her new identity.”

“You can’t do that,” I said as I grabbed the phone. “You’ll scare her off again.”

“If Bob doesn’t send a message, she may not notice his avatar has signed on.”

“She’ll know!” I yelled and made another play for the phone. While Charlie and I were wrestling for the phone, I caught sight of a car moving slowly down the street with its lights off. I took Charlie’s face in my hands and kissed his chip-laced lips. Without breaking the kiss, I forced his head to the right so I could see over his shoulder and out the car’s back window. Charlie, thinking my aggression was rough foreplay, stuck his tongue in my mouth.

I pushed him back. “Dude, this is the undercover part. It only needs to look real.” Then I tilted my head at the car inching along the road.

Charlie wiped his mouth and adjusted the rearview mirror for a better view. I rested my head on Charlie’s shoulder, as if the lovers had taken a breather. “Roll down the window,” I whispered.

A cool breeze entered the car and night sounds filled the Gremlin. Luckily for us, the scavengers stopped at the house nearest our car. Of course, the fact that we could see them meant they could also see us. Charlie put his arm around me and nibbled at my ear. “Just keeping it real,” he chuckled. “Wouldn’t want to blow our cover.”

I allowed Charlie a tiny bite out of my ear lobe as I studied the car. “Dodge Caravan with New York plates,” I said. Charlie licked my neck, and I pinched his arm. “Cut it out,” I hissed. Charlie reached under my shirt and around my back, feigning an attempt to unsnap my bra. “Nice try. You know I never wear a bra.”

“Just checking,” he panted in my ear, and I shoved him when I heard chattering from the direction of the scavenger’s car.

“They’re speaking Chinese,” I whispered as I tucked my t-shirt securely into my shorts. “The tuba lady said the truck that emptied the warehouse had Chinese lettering.”

Charlie turned his phone back on and snapped some pictures, and then he texted Frank. Within seconds, Frank texted back. The other police vehicles had all spotted the same thing. The scavengers were all Asian.

“What else did Frank say?” I asked.

Charlie read Frank’s text: “Great undercover work, Chuck. Now take your hands off my girlfriend and bring her home.”

“Come on.”

“The last part is true. He wants me to take you home.”

“No way,” I said, voice rising. One of the scavengers stopped loading their car and glanced in our direction. Charlie took the opportunity to kiss me again. As the car pulled away, Charlie released me. It took a second longer to disengage from our embrace than I would have liked, but I chalked it up to tension and an excessive amount of sugar.

As soon as the scavengers were out of sight, Charlie jumped out of the car and ran over to the nearest house. I watched as he bent down and searched the shell of a computer. He jogged back with a few empty boxes in his hand and loaded them into the trunk. “The computer’s been stripped and the Christmas lights are gone.”

“What about the hard drive?”

“Intact,” he said as he pointed forward. “Let’s see if we can catch up to them.”

I drove slowly enough to not arouse suspicion but fast enough to catch a boxy Volvo station wagon combing the street for recyclables.

“More scavengers,” I said as the Volvo’s brake lights indicated the car was about to stop. “What should I do?”

Charlie said, “Roll slowly.”

As we came up behind the wagon, my nerves kicked in, and the overwhelming smell of junk food in the car triggered a wave of nausea. Charlie rolled down his window and leaned out.

“Good haul tonight. Huh?” Charlie called out to one of the scavengers filling the trunk with boxes of Christmas lights. Charlie pointed to our hatchback crammed with boxes. The Asian man nodded quietly. Charlie turned to me and mouthed, Stop. “Are you headed back to Chinatown?” Charlie asked, and the man nodded again. “See you there,” Charlie replied giving him a thumbs-up.

The man smiled. Just one big, happy family of scavengers.

Well,” Charlie said as he dialed his phone. “At least now we know the scavengers’ final destination.”

“How did you know they were going to Chinatown?”

Charlie laughed. “Racial profiling at its worst.”

I heard Frank’s voice through Charlie’s phone. “Got anything?”

Charlie told Frank about his exchange with the scavenger. He hung up the phone and reached for the bag of candies. “Road trip,” he said.

“Seriously?” I asked. “Are we really driving to Chinatown?” Charlie offered me some sweets, and I slapped his hand. “I’m freaking out over here. You’re not nervous?”

“No,” Charlie said, looking down at his phone.

“Can’t you at least be nervous for me?” I asked. “My daughter is in trouble and the only lead we’ve got is Chinatown. Have you ever been to Chinatown in the middle of the night?” I prattled on, my frayed nerves making me sound exactly how I felt—scared and helpless. I swatted at Charlie’s hands again as he played with his phone.

He held his cell up in the air like a bratty boy torturing a shorter sibling. “I’m not worried,” he said, “because I think I’ve got a lead on the Maid.” Charlie held up his phone to reveal an Other Life virtual world, squeezed into the frame of his cell phone. “I think she’s using the name Marian now.”

“As in Maid Marian,” I said slowly. “And what had Bob been calling himself?”

“Bobin,” Charlie reminded me.

“Bobin and Maid Marian,” I said. “Why the Robin Hood reference? Are they giving garbage to people who don’t have garbage?”

“The swelling masses of the garbage-poor,” Charlie joked as he gestured to Frank’s car.

We pulled next to Frank, and he instructed us to park. “Any chance I can get you to go home?” Frank asked me. I shook my head and moved to the back seat of the Gremlin while Frank took the driver’s seat. He started the car and checked the gas gauge. That’s when I knew we really were headed to Chinatown.

“Frank,” Charlie said when we were finally situated, “I have something to tell you.”

The idea that Gayle had taken on a new online persona in attempt to solve Bob’s murder was scary and exciting at the same time. If the avatar names Bob and Gayle had chosen were references to the story of Robin Hood, then it was possible Bob and Gayle had attempted to right a wrong. I wondered if, like the GroundSweep organization, they were reporting toxic sites or recycling infringements to government officials. Given Kelly’s description of his daughter, a little girl who wrote a letter to the Pope to stop what she thought was an injustice, it was entirely plausible. As for Bob, he had spent his whole life advocating for a better environment, hence the theme of hope in his dioramas. Frank would be thrilled with what Charlie had found.

“Tell him,” I said to Charlie.

“I tried to kiss CeCe,” Charlie said.

Thank God I was seated in the back, because my face felt like I had swallowed of bag of Red Hots. What was Charlie doing?

“It was stupid,” Charlie continued. “I thought a parked couple wouldn’t arouse suspicion.” Then he help up his hand, still red from my slaps from fighting over the phone, as evidence of my virtue. “The girl’s got balls,” he said, and he then turned to wink at me.

“You’re an asshole,” I moaned. “Frank, he’s exaggerating,” I said, “but he does have something on his phone that requires your attention.” Of course by now, I realized what Charlie had done. He recognized my feelings for Frank were genuine and by taking the grenade up-front, neither of us would have to worry if Charlie slipped up about our make-out session at a later date. I guessed that Charlie, too, had felt the old energy between us lighting up again, and he wanted to shut it down quickly. It was a risky move on his part, considering Frank’s job entailed cutting liars down to size. I hoped, as I’m sure Charlie did, that the minute he revealed what he had found about Gayle, Frank would be too distracted to delve deeper.

“I haven’t been slapped yet, but I’m sure it will be my turn soon,” Frank replied. “What do you need to show me?” And with that, the three of us hovered over Charlie’s phone.

“I opened an account and created my own avatar. I went back to the virtual world where Bob’s avatar still stands. At first, because Bob’s avatar wasn’t active, he hadn’t attracted many visitors. Earlier tonight, however, I noticed a female avatar by the name of Marian standing next to Bob. When I looked at Marian’s profile, I could see the avatar had been created only a few days ago.”

“Is she communicating with anyone?” Frank asked.

“When someone approaches Bob, she repeats the same thing. Hold on, short delay. As if she’s speaking for him.” We fell silent.

“She’s trying to fill in for Bob,” I said.

Unfortunately, we still had no idea what filling in for Bob meant.