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Rational Conduct

By Kevin Tatro (US)

Chapter Three

Ripped Apart by Wolves

Chapter 3 – Ripped Apart by Wolves

His body screaming, David woke from this latest fantasy.  Real screaming.  It was Ashley. Out front.  Real screams.  He bolted from the chair.  Through the deteriorating fence gate.  There was no Ashley.  Ashley’s older sister Callie was now screaming.  When she was upset, she was really upset.  Her face contorted into something really strange yet pitiful.  She had a way of constricting every muscle in her beautiful face, till you could barely see her eyes, and all of her teeth would stick out of quivering lips almost like a bear growling, while tears burst from her eyes and poured down her cheeks through the corner of her mouth and ran right off her chin.

“That man took her.”  “In the car.”  “He took her”.

“What man?  Who? Where is he taking her?  What are you crying about?  What’s wrong?

And as she always did when angry or upset in her grizzly bear face, the look instantly disappeared, and with it the passion, and for an instant she would stand outside the emotion and state her case. “She’s in that car!”  As she pointed down the road where the ass end of a black Mercedes was screaming away with a cloud of exhaust from big car being forced beyond its capacity.

Callie was pointing to it in horror.  It was surreal, like a TV episode, only the acting was too good.  Could he be in another nightmare? Another daydream?  Another concocted fear to add to the memories of real and imagined fears that were a part of his every day?  This looked to be the real thing.  The thing that couldn’t be real seemed to be the scene that came with the actual touch and consequences of reality.  He’d been here before.  It didn’t seem that he would awaken from this episode.  It was in all possibilities, a true break from reality and a thundering crash into his fantasy of fears, but he was buying off on it and was diving into it, because he had to… if it was real.

Calmly he spoke to Callie. “We don’t know the man who took her and she didn’t want to go?” 

“Yes.”

“Go inside. Call 911.   Tell them what the car looked like. Where it was going.  What the guy looked like.  Do it now!  Run!”

He beat her to the house and already had his keys in hand by the time she reached the kitchen.  She raced right past him to the phone.  She looked good.  Gorilla face was gone and she was ready to do battle.  No doubt she was her father’s child.  She could handle this and would do everything she had to.  He could trust her.

He ran through the garage and out to the driveway, contemplating the direction the kidnappers would take.  David lived in the suburbs but the highway interchange was close, and they would be heading in any one of four directions with six more interchanges available within ten minutes.  Damn!  He weaved past the garbage cans and bikes in the garage and was in his car in an instant.  Precious time was lost and he would need serious luck to have any chance of catching them.

The immediacy and the craziness of it all allowed him to focus all his energies on the task.  It was like work. He didn’t have time for guilt.  As the engine fired up, he visualized how far the black Benz had traveled, running calculations as his car insanely sped in reverse across the front lawn and over the curb.  The traction control prevented his rich man’s rocket sled from boiling the tires off the rims.  Nice owning a sports car with a big V8 engine, but it would do no good if they got to the interchange before him.  It was only a couple of miles over narrow New England cow paths that had been paved to look like roads, and if these clowns knew the roads, he didn’t stand a chance.  Unless he picked exactly the route they took, he would be blasting down the highway at insane speeds in the wrong direction.  How far would he have to travel before he gave up and headed in another direction?  How far could a big black Benz travel at high speed before being overcome by one first class, all out, crazed madman in one really fast car.

After hitting 73 mph and slamming into third gear in a 25 mph zone, he punched on the car phone and screamed 911 into the voice activated system.  As the phone connected, he muttered to himself and was a bit amused that the hot rod had started to burn rubber and the traction control kicked in again when he ripped the clutch at better than seventy.  Another unanswered telephone ring and he was in fantasy thoughts again.  He was like a race car driver with the crowds applauding his driving machine and his skill.  The smoking rubber and ridiculous speed was an overwhelming favorite of the crowds that neither had the money to build a car like this or the balls to drive it. He broke from the dream and, began chastising himself for thinking about anything other than getting his daughter back.

“State Police now!  National importance.”  He’d heard this once on a cop show and the operator transferred the James Bond type character immediately.  When the female voice started, he cut her off.  “911 emeer..” “State Police now!  It’s urgent, disaster, emergency.”  He realized that what he actually said made no sense, but the operator must have understood, and he had a professional female voice on the line at once.  He never heard what she started to say, but he had been glad he had never actually used the ‘National Importance’ line as it really would have sounded stupid, and the operator connected him instantly anyway.

“A black Mercedes.  Large.  Probably four door.  Last seen traveling south on Sky Line Drive in Orange, CT.  They’ve abducted a ten year old girl.  Name Ashley Knapp. The car is believed to be heading for the interchange of the Merritt parkway and the Route 95 connector traveling at high speeds.  We need to stop I-95 North and South, Route 8 in both directions and the Merritt Parkway North and South.  It’s also possible they are making for route 34 heading towards New Haven or Derby.  We have to move now.  It’s been less than two minutes.”

“We already have a call in on this.”

What? How could they?  It just happened!

“That’s probably my daughter.”

“Where are you? We’ll need you to speak to an officer.  We’re sending one to your home.”

“That’s fine but the next ten minutes are our only chance.  This is a stranger abduction, with no clue as to why.  I’m going to hit route 95 South.  I’m in a Black four door BMW, that won’t be stopping for anything but a Black Mercedes, until I reach Westport.  Please do something about the other highways.”

The cell phone was dead again.  He cut off the professional policewoman and she would be pissed, but she would take the call seriously and would probably send a few cars out to route I-95 to look for this speeding madman.  That would cover 95 southbound, which was the second choice of where David believed his daughter was heading.  He would be taking the first choice of the Merritt Parkway South.

The black BMW had been downshifted and cleared the first major right turn doing better than fifty in what was typically a twenty mile per hour turn onto the road by the golf course.  The brakes had performed well slowing the car from 90 mph on the straightaway, and the rubber smell was thick as the car slid sideways around the corner.  The car was in second again, and accelerating fast as he took the left turn by the golf course.  Nearly eighty miles an hour within a couple of seconds as he was air bound up over the wide uphill blind corner where they were cutting trees for the new subdivision.  If a logging truck was around the corner he stood a pretty good chance of dying, but it was all or none.

Without even thinking about the intersection ahead, the car cleared most of the dirt and muddy pavement where the trucks could have been, and was already upon the wildest curve in the whole road before David removed his foot from the gas peddle. Downshifting a gear into second and dropping the clutch the car shuttered a bit as the wheels tried to slow, and the badly abused tires barely hit the rough pavement below.

He was doing sixty when he came into a corner he would barely have traveled thirty-five late at night when no one was around.  He had almost died here once when he was coming home from work at 2:00 M and a deer jumped across the street.  He had been doing forty coming the other way, and had nowhere to turn on the road that was not quite wide enough for two cars to pass comfortably.  That moment had almost been a peaceful one.  By the moon he had a picture framed with an old farmhouse on the left and a stone wall hugging both sides of the road.  The dear had been in the center frame, beautifully picturesque, all lit up with the high beams in the middle of his windshield.  How he missed hitting the deer was still a mystery, but he did miss it, and he recalled a glimpse of it as it landed in the trees on the other side of the stonewall.

The right front wheel rocketed off the 200-year-old dirt mound built up against the old stonewall and the car ricocheted back in the direction of the roadway.  He would break a hundred on this downhill straight before he ran into the last big turns where he might do seventy or eighty in a twenty five mile an hour zone where his crazy fast driving wife had gotten a ticket for doing forty-two earlier that year.  After those two big ridiculously fast turns, he would hit one fast ninety degree turn and then a very sharp steep uphill S turn right before he reached the highway interchange.  It was a Saturday afternoon and he gave no thought to the potential for traffic.  The traffic entered his calculations, but was given zero weight, as it was irrelevant.  The deal wasn’t going to happen at all without taking that possibility out of the calculation completely.  It was all or nothing.

Callie was at home, now crying on the line.  The 911 operator was keeping her on the line till the local police could get there.  She was twelve years old and sometimes still seemed like a little kid, but she was more than an average kid, and provided the operator with all the relevant info she could think of before kindly telling the operator she had things she had to do.

The operator objected in her best-trained voice but Callie apologized as she hung up on her.  Callie knew the Orange police would take a few minutes to get to her end of town, and knew she had time for a few quick calls before they got there and started treating her like a kid.  She dialed a number she knew all to well.  Within two minutes she was speaking with the operator of Rock 99  who had her on the radio live with her story of her missing sister and the car that took them. 

The police did arrive at the home in only a few short moments.  It was great timing.  Callie had still been on the phone with the radio station, but had run out of things to say.  The police had entered the home without knocking, and were desperate to do something.  The people of the town later said they hadn’t seen anything like it before, with the fire horn sounding for volunteers and every patrol car on duty wailing sirens and speeding in every direction the kidnappers may have taken.  The phone began a non-stop ringing first from the radio station and then from the TV stations and everyone who listened to those stations. 

The State police would later pick up Callie’s older sister at a friend’s house where she had been sleeping, and grandma and grandpa would be called to the house to keep an eye on them both while they located their mother.  Later that day both Grandma and Grandpa would be treated by paramedics, and Grandpa would spend a portion of the ordeal in the hospital, where his aging body would feel the fatigue of two prior heart attacks and his current case of diabetes.   Grandma would stay at the home where her daughter would be waiting for word from her husband and answer the persistent questions from state police and FBI investigators.

Meanwhile, dad was in a full blown schizophrenic episode.  Either that, or he was totally in tune to what was going on and was performing a General Schwartscoff military miracle to find his daughter.

“Josh! Its David”  “Get you buddies moving.  Ashley has just been abducted from my home.  I don’t know who it is.  It doesn’t make sense.  Happened just two minutes ago….Gotta go.”

 Josh was an FBI man.  Into banking crimes and financial matters, but he would know who to call.  He wasn’t the most senior guy in the world, but everybody liked him and trusted him, and if he needed something everyone would do anything he needed.  David knew he put Josh in a spot, but Josh would take him seriously and would get people moving.  That would cover the delay in the reaction time that would normally happen at the FBI when they began questioning the local police about how the husband and wife got along and if anybody they know could have taken Ashley, and if it was truly a stranger who had taken the child.  Could she be over a friend’s, yada, yada, yada?  Josh wasn’t surprised that David said little and then hung up the phone.  David always acted like he was at work.

“Rock 99”  “Can I help you”  “Yeah, I need the D-jay on the air now.  My daughter has been kidnapped.”  The phone clicked and he was being transferred.  Very strange, he was sure he’d be seen as a nut and patched to the office of loony fan diversions.  “We’re on the air live with the father of the kidnapped child.”  “Where are you? Can you tell us what happened?”  Hard to believe, but a moment of stunned silence from the man who was the fastest gun in the west.  The gunslinger was unable to move for a moment as he was outgunned by someone.  How did they know?

 “Sir?”… Mr. Knapp” 

“Yeah.  I’m here….It’s a Black Mercedes.  Grabbed her from Skyline Drive in Orange.  Happened three minutes ago.  No idea who took her.  She’s ten years old. Looks seven or eight.  Blond hair.  Glasses.  Very short for her age, but smart.  Brown eyes.  She was screaming when she was taken and is probably crying.  Didn’t see who took her but they were driving fast.  I’m guessing whoever took her is heading for one of the Interstates.  Any listener who sees her should call the police.  Thanks for your help, I gotta go.

 “But can you please…..”

The call was cut short and the next one made. The stench of burning rubber made it hard to breath and the car interior was fogged with tire smoke.  “Mom’s cell phone.”  The speed dial played the number.  “Hello.”

 “Phyl, Ashley’s been taken.  The cops are at our home.  Callie is there and Jamie is on the way.  Call 911.  They’ll meet you and bring you home.  Don’t drive, call 911 now.  Gotta go.  Love ya.      “Are you there?”

“Ya….es,  “But..”

“No buts or nothing.  Call 911 now.  Got it.”

“Yes” She shriveled.

“Goodbye.  I love you.”

She could handle it.  She would get the family together. Get the kids settled.  Have the friends lined up to help out.  Calm Grandma and Grandpa, who may or may not make it through this without a fatal heart attack.  He, the general, would give her no more jobs.  She had her hands full.  She could handle this.  She always took care of the disasters while David was at work. Truly an amazing woman.  She could be happy playing Go-Fish with the kids, understand a fifty million dollar deal he rambled on about, tolerate his insanity, and still smile and dismiss it, knowing nobody ever asked how her day was.

The BMW rocketed through the last big corner without encountering any serious obstacles.  The highway intersection was thirty seconds away and he would be almost airborne at ninety miles and hour by the time he saw the interchange.  It was possible he would see which way the car went.  Either that or he would be heading Southbound toward New York on a hope that he would see something.

Not a car in sight, and the need for speed was not posed.  He could enter the highway at just slightly over twice the speed limit and certainly catch up to the bad guys if he chose the right direction.   He would stick to the plan.

The shift into third gear spun the tires again as he hit seventy-five miles an hour. The shift into fourth was less eventful at over one hundred, just a few feet past the Sikorsky Bridge where the steel decking became tar again.  The speed was unimportant as he shifted into fifth.  Traffic was light and the cars flashed past him.  He hoped to hell he didn’t need the sixth gear which could take him well past one hundred and fifty.  There was no way the Benz could be that far ahead of him.

Moments passed without anything eventful occurring.  The petal was still to the floor as the speedometer cleared one twenty five and the driving was now getting a little hairy.  No black Benz in sight.   Time to call the station again.  Convenient the kids had programmed the station number into the cell phone.  All he had to do was say 99 Rock and there was the D-jay waiting for his call.

“Listeners have seen ya flying like a bat at of hell on the Southbound Merritt.”

David hadn’t seen any cops but that was sure to bring em on.  Announce a madman over the radio and tell the cops where he is.  He could only hope the cops were too busy to be listening to a music station. 

“Anybody seen anything?”

 “Listeners.  We’ve got the kidnapped girl’s father on the line.” ….

“Please, has anybody called in?”

 …. “Phones been ringing like crazy. Again for those listening, please don’t call unless you have information.  We need to keep this line open.   Had about a thousand reports of Black Mercedes This is Fairfield County.  I think about every other car is a Benz.  But we did hear of one in your area.  A homeowner on Wheelers Farm Road reported seeing one heading for the connector.”

              “Thanks  Please tell the police”

This sucks.  It’s too late.  If that Benz didn’t show up soon he had obviously gone the wrong way.  He slipped the car into sixth gear with the driving really crazy now.  The vehicle floated, and steering was more like begging the car to go in the right direction.  At nearly three times the speed limit, life was getting bizarre.  This wouldn’t last much longer, a bit further and he would turn around.  No chance he wouldn’t have caught up with them by now.

 And he wouldn’t.  They were behind him.