try begging
It's Suzy. Thank you, I should do it."
The child gave his mother a puzzled look, but after being urged again, he obediently greeted her.
"I'm touched."
Damn it. I should have been wearing sunglasses.
Grace turned toward the door so the officer couldn't see her or the child's eyes and began to speak.
"I... have a favor to ask."
"Yes, go ahead."
"Could you please give me a cup of warm tea? The old lady outside looks cold."
"Ah... Okay, let's do that."
As the officer went into the break room inside the police station, telling the story of an old woman begging for a living, Grace quickly put the child down and headed behind the desk. She ripped the flyer off the wall, stuffed it into her handbag, and returned to Ellie. She took her sunglasses out of her bag and put them on just as the officer came out holding a steaming cup.
"Madam, please have a drink before you go."
"No, I'm fine. Thank you."
"That's what I have to say. Goodbye, little girl."
Grace quickly left the police station while the officer offered her grandmother tea.
"I'll do my best to look after you."
"that's right."
Grace held Ellie tighter on the tram ride home. She had done something good and almost fallen into that man's trap. Her heart was still pounding.
As Ellie, who had been muttering things like, "I wish Santa would give me lots of presents because I did good deeds, and I wish he would give me a dollhouse," fell asleep, Grace carefully unfolded the wanted poster in her handbag.
A girl with blonde hair and dark blue or turquoise irises. The date of birth was written at the end.
The wanted person is a woman in her mid-to-late 20s with blue-green irises. There is a very high possibility that she is in possession of a firearm, so there is even a note saying to report her immediately if found.
Grace gritted her teeth as she looked up, thankfully there were no pictures.
The charge is kidnapping.
The flyer crumpled in Grace's hands.
This is unbelievable. Kidnapping. My daughter, kidnapped.
Thanks to that unscrupulous lunatic, Grace suddenly became the woman who kidnapped her own daughter.
I was angry, but at the same time, I felt relieved. It meant that he still couldn't forget her and was chasing her. Tomorrow, that man would come here. He wouldn't even dream that she was not far away, so I couldn't help but laugh.
Grace closed her handbag with the crumpled paper. She was going to take this home and burn it.
The flyer had to be stolen. If you see it later and call the number listed here, it will be a problem.
I won't doubt it. I won't even remember this.
The wanted poster had been up for quite some time, so the paper was yellowed. Just like the missing person posters that the man had distributed on every street before, people become desensitized to information that is repeatedly exposed to for a long time. The police probably wouldn't even remember that the poster was there. The fact that he had been going around Prescott like it was his home and had never been caught by the man is proof of that.
It'll be okay.
Grace tried to calm her increasingly anxious mind. In the past, she would have left this place immediately. But now that Ellie had grown up, it was impossible to move the place she had finally settled down in, when it was not even certain that she had been caught. Grace hugged her daughter, praying that nothing would happen.
"What happened?"
The policeman, who was going inside after receiving the empty cup from the old woman, asked his subordinate who had just returned from the department store.
"This is the child I was looking for."
"That's good."
The officer, who was nodding and heading to the break room, stopped and asked.
"Where did the flyers that were over there go?"
"What kind of flyer are you talking about?"
"That kidnapper's wanted. The woman and the baby's eyes were blue-green. That's ridiculous. Wait a minute... ."
The officer's eyes widened as he suddenly stopped talking and stared into space.
º º º
Upon arriving at Prescott Central Station, the Winstons were greeted by staff from the film studio. Leon followed their instructions and was about to get into a sedan when he stopped.
"Whoa! Abu-."
The child's voice was heard. Leon turned his head toward the sound with his heart pounding wildly and thought that he must have gone crazy.
A strange woman was coming out of the station pushing a stroller. The baby in the stroller was obviously not his daughter. She was not yet old enough to be babbling or riding in a stroller.
The child has already grown up.
"Leon?"
He was looking around like a madman again, and then suddenly came to his senses. His mother, who had gotten into the car first, was looking at him with a puzzled look. Feeling the gazes of his younger brother, the Grand Duchess, and the attendants, he got into the car as if nothing had happened.
Leon laughed at himself reflected in the car window, his eyes fixed on the passing scenery.
You're looking around for that kid.
It was crazy. It was obvious that it shouldn't be here.
"Ah, yes... Then I guess there's nothing I can do. Yes, thank you."
Grace hung up the phone and sighed. She had stopped by a number of places on her way to work, and had even called the circus management office, but all she heard was that the show was sold out the day before.
Ellie, who had been singing about wanting to go to the circus while putting my stuffed rabbit in Grace's hat last night, would be disappointed if she found out. She thought about buying tickets in advance for next year, but gritted her teeth when she saw the guest list spread out on the desk.
Who are you to call me a kidnapper?
The more I thought about it, the angrier I became. Just as I was gritting my teeth and thinking about punching the bastard in the face when he arrived at the hotel in Prescott, not far from here, the phone rang. Grace got up from her seat and answered the phone at the desk next to her.
"This is the office of the president of Grant Pictures."
[Sally?]
"Anna, Mrs. Tate. Sally is out for a moment."
[Oh, really?]
"What's going on?"
[That's why I can't go to work today.]
Grace was shocked to hear the news, having assumed that Mrs. Tate had gone straight to the Paramoor Theater since she had not come to work.
[... It just broke.]
He said that he broke his leg when he fell off his horse while riding every morning.
"Oh my god, are you okay?"
[Oh, I feel so good right now. This feeling of floating on a cloud of morphine is the best.]
The boss made a silly joke and then gave instructions to Grace.
[So, could you please tell Sally to do Mr. Grant's escort today instead of me? Sally sang a song about wanting to see Count Winston, and now she's got her wish.]
"Oh, yes. Haha... I'll tell you that. Don't worry and get some rest."
[Okay, please.]
Grace hung up the phone and left a note with Mrs. Tate's instructions on her colleague's desk before returning to her seat. She looked down at the guest list once more and took the receiver with a deep sigh.
"This is the office of the president of Grant Pictures."
Then I gave the operator the hotel number I had found in the phone book. After a long and anxious wait, someone in the suite finally answered the phone.
[Yes, where are you?]
It was a voice I heard for the first time.
"This is the office of Grant Pictures. Could you speak to Stanley Pierce?"
In the hotel suite, a late breakfast was served as sumptuously as a full dinner, but Leon made an excuse that he had to work and sat alone at the bar on the other side of the restaurant, pouring himself a cup of coffee.
"under...."
He let out a long sigh, his head resting on the hand holding the cigar. His head was throbbing, perhaps a side effect of the medicine. His head pounded along with his pulse. Every moment of his heartbeat was torture.
The premiere was at 7 p.m. He had about nine hours to rest by then, but it was meaningless to him. There was no rest for a corpse outside the grave.
This time, I was thinking about quitting the clown show, which was not going to yield any results in attracting the woman, and going back to the annex.
"dismissal."
Pierce came in and handed me a small envelope.
"This is a telegram from Lieutenant Campbell."
"Campbell?"
The moment the envelope was handed to me in one hand, the suite's butler appeared and called his attendant.
"Mr. Pierce, you have a phone call."
Pierce left immediately, and Leon put the envelope down on the bar and asked for a cigar. The thought of what might be written inside made his head ache even more.
It was clear that there was an emergency situation in the special task force. I didn't even think about reporting on that woman. I decided not to have any empty expectations anymore.
After he had finished drinking his coffee, he reluctantly opened the envelope and unfolded the paper inside.
[Woman and child. Witnessed yesterday in Prescott City.]
From then on, every moment of my heartbeat finally had meaning.
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