Dear Santa Part 20

She signalled to Sandra Thomas, who was just pa.s.sing by with a tray heaped high with cookies.

"We need you to take over here, Sandra," Katherine said.

"Vic and I have to attend to an emergency situation involving one of the children."

Sandra nodded and immediately launched herself into the swarm of children surrounding Vic.

"Santa has to go now," she boomed.

"His sleigh is double-parked. But, Mrs. Santa sent these just for you guys."

The tray of cookies distracted the children long enough for Katherine to drag Vic away and tell him quickly why the party had to be over for him for now.

He followed her immediately, without even so much as a parting, "Ho, ho, ho."

Chapter Twenty-One They made it across town to the Cathedral in record time, even with Vic taking the time to change out of the Santa Claus suit.

"My guess would be that Coyote is trying to be as inconspicuous as possible," Katherine had said.

"Being met by a man in a red suit stuffed with pillows might defeat that purpose."

Vic had to agree with that logic. But he definitely didn't agree that there was any logic at all to having Katherine come along on this little adventure. He had no idea what might turn out to be waiting at the other end. What if somebody had intimidated Coyote into making that phone call to Vic's house? What if this was a setup? With those possibilities in mind, and maybe some worse ones too, Vic had stopped by the hallway cabinet on the way out of his house and retrieved his gun from the hidden compartment there. "What's that for?" Katherine asked.

Naturally, she'd refused to credit his objections to her coming along to meet Coyote. Naturally, she was also watching every move Vic made.

He wouldn't have put it past her to follow him upstairs so she could make sure he didn't sneak out the bedroom window when he was supposed to be changing his clothes. They were better off that she hadn't, of course. The thought of getting Katherine into his bedroom and keeping her there was very tempting even for a man on a mission of mercy. Maybe too tempting to resist.

"Why are you takin ga gun?" Katherine repeated, not allowing him to avoid the question as he would have preferred to do.

"Just in case," he said, figuring she'd give him an argument for sure about carry ing a firearm. He was more than a little surprised when she didn't.

The cathedral stood at the top of a steep hill. Two roads bordered a triangular park across the street from the church and converged at the bottom of that park to form a single road down the hill all the way to the Hudson River. Two Gothic spires thrust high into the night sky above the sandstone face of the old building which had commanded these heights for almost a century and a half. Vic could see why the boy might choose a place like the cathedral to hide. This holy fortress looked like it could stand against any enemy, especially the unG.o.dly ones. He look Katherine's arm as they crossed the street.

Vic looked around in every direction. He knew he couldn't depend on the powers of the church alone for protection. He had to keep a sharp eye out for more earthly demons. Down Eagle Street across Madison Place and on the same side of Eagle as the cathedral the Executive Mansion loomed. This was the residence of the governor of New York State, and this area was called the Mansion Neighborhood because of that huge old house. The governor's residence was lit up now with spotlights set all around the grounds, as if to shield it from the residents of some of the much smaller and less impressive buildings advancing toward the mansion up the hill. By comparison, the cathedral struck Vic as much more vulnerable and exposed the way it jutted right out onto the street with nothing but a cast-iron fence to hold back the dangers of the world.

"Where do you think he could be?" Katherine asked. "He said he'd wait by the front steps."

Coyote was nowhere to be seen. In fact, the streets were deserted.

Last-minute holiday shoppers would have no business in this neighborhood.

They'd be crowding the malls on the outskirts of the city tonight.

"He probably decided he should keep out of sight," Vic said.

"Maybe he's inside."

He climbed the few stone steps to the wide doors. A wreath of evergreen boughs tied with a wide red ribbon had been hung above each of the three entrances. Vic tried the handles to each of the sets of double doors, but all of them were locked. He turned and shook his head at Katherine as he walked back down the steps.

"Not here," he said, gazing around again. "Maybe he got scared and ran away."

"Maybe."

Vic scanned the front of the cathedral again. Large pots containing even larger pine trees had been set at each side of the stone steps.

Coyote could have hidden behind one of them, but he wasn't there.

"Let's check the park across the street," Vic said.

He hooked his hand around Katherine's arm as he made his way to the curb.

"I wish you hadn't insisted on coming along he said. " I don't like the feel of any of this. "

"I care just as much about Coyote as you do," she said with a tug at his hand as if to pull away from him.

Vic tightened his grip on her.

"That has nothing to do with it," he said.

"I don't know what we might be walking into here."

The stark truth of that sent his free right hand darting into his jacket pocket, where it encountered nothing but his car keys. He had told himself that guns weren't always the answer to a problem, though some of his father's former a.s.sociates believed they were. The thought had been enough to make Vic decide to leave the gun in the car until he could scope out the situation. His fingers closed around the car keys as he stopped walking and turned to face Katherine. He could see the resistance in her eyes even before he began to speak again.

"There could be trouble here tonight," he said trying to make his voice convey the truth of that.

"I don't want to take the chance that you might get hurt. I think you should wait for me in the car."

"Absolutely not," she said, pulling harder against his grasp on her arm.

Vic dropped the car keys back into his pocket and took hold of her other arm as well. He pulled her so close she could hardly avoid looking up at him.

"All I'm asking is for you to sit in the car while I scout things out and make sure there's no real danger."

She stopped pulling away from him and stared up into his face. In the light of the bright streetlamp he could see the sadness come into her eyes. He would have taken her into his arms if she hadn't raised her gloved hands and placed them both flat against his chest.

"I was forced to sit and wait and do nothing while Daniel died," she said.

"Please, don't ask me to sit and wait and do nothing again."

The tremor in her voice resonated in Vic's heart. For an instant, he could see her sitting in a hospital corridor, anguish shadowing her lovely face, her hands clutching each other in her lap. He could imagine how helpless that would feel, and how unbearable. He dropped his hands from her arms and reached up to brush a stray curl away from her cheek. The thought of anything happening to her out here made his fingers tremble, and he had to take a deep breath before he could speak.

"If you're coming along you have to be very careful," he said.

She nodded.

"I will be."

"And let me take the lead."

He was ready for an objection to that when a sound behind them made him put that last request into action and shove her protectively behind his wake. He spun just in time to see one of the wide church doors slowly opening.

"It's me," a boy's voice called from behind the opening cathedral door.

Coyote's head emerged a second later. Vic breathed a sigh of relief.

Before he could think whether or not he should stop her, Katherine had darted out onto the curb and across the sidewalk. She reached Coyote just as he was letting the door to the church close behind him. She crouched down to his height on the top of the stone steps and wrapped him in an embrace.

"Thank heaven you're safe," she said.

"We've been so worded about you."

Vic half expected Coyote to pull himself out of her arms. Boys his age had a way of doing that when it came to physical gestures of affection or concern, but Coyote didn't pull away. Instead, he did quite the opposite. He wrapped his own arms in their pitifully thin jacket as far around Katherine as he could reach. In that one movement, Vic could see, plain as day, the ordeal this little boy had been through and how glad he felt that he was no longer on his own.

Vic walked up the steps and put his arm around Coyote, too.

"Everything's going to be fine now, son," Vic said. He glanced up at the cathedral doors and said a little prayer that he would turn out to be right. He also found himself wishing he really could be a father to Coyote, and to Sprite as well.

He was sure he'd be able to do a better job of protecting them than anybody else had managed so far. Tooley Pennebaker tried her best, and the mother was too sick to do anything. The children's father had disappeared long ago and most likely wasn't coming back. Vic had been a kid on his own at too young an age himself. He still remembered how lonely, and how scary, that was. He said another small prayer that Coyote and Sprite might be spared that loneliness and fear. His second glance at the cathedral brought another thought suddenly to mind.

"How did you get inside?" he asked Coyote.

"The place was locked up tight when I tried the doors."

"I found another way in."

Something in Coyote's voice, a hint of guilt, told Vic the boy had broken into the church. He probably knew a lot about how to break into places. Vic couldn't help but wonder what other talents for deception Coyote might have developed. A kid had to master a lot of not-so-nice skills when it came to surviving on his own out in the world. Vic also couldn't help but wonder how much of what Coyote had done and led them to believe so far might be a product of those deceiving ways. Vic would have liked to push that grim thought out of his head, but he had to be realistic about what might or might not really be going on here.

"Let's get going," he said as he stifled a sigh and straightened up.

He left his hand resting on Coyote's shoulder, but it felt more tentative there now. Katherine stood up too. She'd pulled off her gloves and was smoothing Coyote's cropped hair away from his dirt-smudged face with her fingers, but she was looking at Vic. He caught a glimpse of the question in her eyes before he turned away.

She must have heard the note of suspicion in his voice. He'd heard it there himself.

"Why don't we take a little walk and talk a bit?" she said.

Her suggestion let Vic know his guess had been right.

KATHERINE FELT GUILTY about keeping Coyote out in the cold, but she had detected the doubt and distance that came over Vic all of a sudden and knew those doubts needed to be cleared up. Her instincts told her there was no better time than right now for that clearing up to begin. The police would be involved soon. They would certainly have to be called in, the minute she and Vic got Coyote back to Vic's place. In fact, they should probably take the boy directly to the police station now. She didn't want to do that, at least not just yet. There was no telling what would happen to Coyote's story once he had to tell it to a policeman. The best chance they had of finding out the unvarnished troth was to go after it right now.

Coyote shrugged in answer to her suggestion that they take a walk, but he didn't say anything. She hoped that wasn't a sign that he intended to clam up nowjn the face of questioning. As if to confirm that fear, he slipped away from her touch and headed down the church steps onto the sidewalk. He turned left toward Madison Avenue. His bouncy stride had carded him halfway to the corner before Vic called out with some urgency in his voice.

"Hey, wait up, kid. Let's stick together here." Katherine saw Vic glance furtively around as he hurried on ahead to catch up with Coyote. She glanced around, too, but saw nothing that looked even remotely like danger. Vic and Coyote were at the corner by then. Vic unzipped his jacket and took it off then slipped it over Coyote's shoulders. Katherine was as warmed by that gesture as Coyote must have been. Vic might have his doubts and suspicions, but he still cared about the boy. She was relieved to see that because she cared so very much herself, about both Coyote and Sprite. Suddenly, she realized, in something of a flash, how important it was to her that she and Vic feel the same way, especially about this one thing.

She hurried to catch up with them as they rounded the corner.

"I thought we might walk the other way, back down the hill," she said as she joined them.

"We might find a coffee shop or a restaurant to go into where it's warm."

She didn't know of any place like that in the direction they were headed.

"I like the Plaza," Coyote said.

"I spend a lot of time over here." * Katherine had grown wise enough in the ways of street kids since she came to the Arbor Hill Center to understand that Coyote might actually mean he'd have lots of places to run away from them and hide again once he was on familiar ground. On the other hand, he might also mean he'd feel safer where he knew his surroundings. He had certainly experienced precious little safety lately.

"All right," she said.

"We'll walk this way, but let's stop for a minute first and sit down."

She headed toward a low wall just beyond the fenced-in cathedral grounds where a driveway led to a parking lot for Empire State Plaza visitors. The much-acclaimed architectural marvel was a popular tourist attraction in the daylight hours. By this time of night, and two days before Christmas, the buildings were closed and the streets were deserted. Katherine sat down on the low wall. The much higher wall of the State Museum, a tiered building that always reminded her of an Egyptian tomb, loomed to her back and shut out some of the wind.

"Coyote, we need for you to tell us what exactly you've been running away from," she began as soon as they had joined her.

She drew Coyote down to sit next to her on the wall, but Vic remained standing. She understood he would want to be in a position to watch both them and the street.

"I been running away because of something I saw that I'd be better off if I hadn't," Coyote said very fast, as if letting go of a burden he'd been carrying too long.

Katherine had been concerned that he might not be willing to talk and they would have to pry the story out of him. She could tell now that wasn't going to be the case. She felt her own relief as he hurried on.

"I saw a guy dump a bundle in an alleyway off Broadway. I went there to mail my letter to you about the fund money. I was in front of the post office near the corner of Livingston when the car pulled up down the street and this big guy got out."

"Is that the black car Sprite told us about?" she asked.

"Yeah. That's the kind of car it was," Coyote said nodding.

There was something in the quality of Vic's silence that let Katherine know how skeptically he was listening to what Coyote had to say. She hoped Coyote wouldn't read that skepticism and stop talking.

"What happened then?" she asked.

"The man opened the trunk and took out a long bundle. I think it was wrapped in a rug, but the paper didn't say anything about a rug, so the big guy must have taken that away with him."

"What paper are you talking about "The Chronicle," Coyote said matter-of-factly, as if she should have been expecting him to follow the local news while he was on the run.

"I been looking for copies in wastebaskets ever since that night, just so I could see if they wrote about what happened. It was in there the second day, how they found the guy right in that same alley where I saw the black car pull up."

"What guy did they find?" Vic asked.

Katherine could see that Coyote had Vic's full attention now. She wished the expression on his face didn't reveal quite so obviously how little he believed of what he was heating.

"They found a guy named Gilford Vogel. The paper said he worked for a place in Troy that did import stuff. I don't know what that means, but it said he was a bookkeeper there."

Katherine guessed that Coyote was providing as many details as he could because he wanted them to think he was telling the truth.

"They had the whole story right there," Coyote went on.

"The paper said the cops think it was a robbery, but I know it wasn't. I saw who put the guy there. I even saw his face. That's why he's been after me ever since."

"What else did the Chronicle say?" Vic asked, his disbelief more apparent than ever.