8-12-84
0830
MISPER 13 yr old boy
Dark brown hair, brown eyes, 5’ 1” app. 105lbs.
Last seen wearing blue jeans, gray tank top, white Converse LA84 Olympic sneaks w/ blue stars. Scar above right eye. Speaks with slight lisp.
Report filed by Bud Stewart, father.
1905 Sheridan Ave
LKL corner of 10th St. & Hillcrest Dr. while on paper route
Christopher Thomas Stewart
“Chris”
Case #84–5482
Status: Open
His eyes snagged on the words paper route, and a small bean of dread dropped into the pit of his stomach and began to sprout vines.
A missing paperboy.
It couldn’t be happening again.
* * *
After eight hours of shoe leather, the sun slid behind the houses in the west. In the fading light, Dale and Lieutenant Duff stood on the street corner where Chris Stewart had last been seen at sunrise, sitting on a patch of grass, rolling his newspapers.
Images between the two cases had been overlapping each other in Dale’s mind all day. A warm, early morning. A quiet, middle-class neighborhood. A pile of undelivered newspapers. A boy who had seemingly vanished into thin air.
The prickly vines in Dale’s stomach now pressed against his organs. At least that was how he described his anxious feelings to Dr. Smith. Like something crowding out his insides.
“FBI wants all the van delivery routes and drivers for the entire South Side,” Duff said. “You’ll be working with Agent Miller from the Omaha bureau.” He stared at Dale. “Write it down.”
“Sorry.” Dale refocused and scribbled the note in his sketchbook.
Duff ran his fingers through his salt-and-pepper hair and spit on the ground. “What a shit deal this is.”
After interviewing and clearing every member of the Stewart family, after searching the Stewart home, yard, and neighborhood, after putting up roadblocks around the entire South Side and conducting hundreds of traffic stops, they still had little more than the basics: Bud Stewart reported that Chris left their house just before five AM. The van driver from the Register said he dropped off three bundles a few minutes after five, where Chris was waiting alone at the corner. About an hour later, calls started coming in from customers complaining they didn’t have their papers yet. Route manager got to the corner around six fifteen and found a half dozen rolled papers in a delivery bag, but not a single paper delivered. No Chris. Manager took the bag and delivered the papers himself. Once finished, he went to the Stewart home around seven thirty to give Chris hell for oversleeping. But when Bud searched the house, no Chris. Concerned, Bud hopped on his motorcycle and searched the neighborhood for about fifteen minutes. After finding no sign of the boy, he called it in, and Dale was handed his second missing-paperboy case in less than two years.
Duff shouted at a patrol officer to move a group of onlookers away from the scene. He turned back to Dale.
“Give me the witness timeline again.”
Dale read from his notes. “A few passersby saw Chris talking to a man in what appeared to be a friendly conversation around five fifteen. Another said five thirty. Another still said five forty. One said the man looked thirty to thirty-five. Clean-cut. Neat dark hair parted in the middle. One had him with something around his neck, maybe Walkman earphones; another said a black sweatband.”
“We’ll get the witnesses in tomorrow, and you can start sketching,” Duff said. “Who’s this again?” He pointed to the small brick house on the corner of Tenth and Hillcrest.
“Guy named VanZante,” Dale said. “Retired Polk County sheriff, if you can believe it. Didn’t see or hear a thing. Broke down when I told him what happened this morning. Both he and the wife checked out. Said we can use the house for anything we need.”
Duff looked hard at Dale. “The kid disappeared in the front yard of a goddamned retired sheriff?” He yanked on his tie. “No time off till this kid is found. He’s already been missing nearly twelve hours. The clock is ticking.”
“Yes, sir,” Dale said.
“I’m heading back downtown to get a hotline set up. Pull everything you have on the Klein case. All your old notes, interviews, everything. And get in touch with the West Des Moines guy still on it.”
Dale wrote notes from Klein case and stared at his handwriting. There wasn’t anything in the Klein file or in his old notes that would help them.
He’d thought the move and promotion would be a fresh start. He’d promised Connie it would be.
“Goodkind!”
“Yeah. Sorry.”
“I know the Klein deal is sour for you, but you’re the only man in our department who worked on it and has experience with a missing kid.”
“Of course.”
“I’m taking the parents downtown.”
“Yes, sir.”
Duff clapped his hand on Dale’s shoulder. “Finish up here, then meet me back at the station.”
Dale agreed, and Duff walked away.
He checked his watch. He should’ve called Connie hours ago before he left the station. He never meant to do this—completely forget about his wife and son for hours at a time, standing them up without so much as a phone call because he got preoccupied by a case—and no amount of apologizing ever helped.
He climbed the small hill of the VanZantes’ yard and knocked on the door. Mrs. VanZante answered, and Dale asked to use their phone again. She ushered him inside to the telephone in the kitchen.
First try, the line was busy. Dale hung up and waited a minute, then dialed the rotary again. This time, it rang once and Connie answered.
“Where have you been?” she snapped, assuming correctly it would be Dale calling. “You missed your son’s birthday party and he’s heartbroken. We’ve talked about this a hundred times, Dale. I’m done making excuses—”
“Connie, listen,” he said. “Don’t be mad. I’m working a case. I caught it this morning right before my shift ended and I didn’t have time to call.”
She exhaled loudly into the receiver.
“Another paperboy went missing early this morning,” he said.
He waited, strained to listen. Trying to read her silence was like trying to read air.
“Con? Are you there?”
“God have mercy,” she whispered. “The poor family. Who is it?”
“Bud and Cindy Stewart. They live over on Sheridan.”
“That’s barely four blocks from us!” she cried.
“I know. Don’t let Curtis out of the house alone for any reason,” he said. “I’ll be home as soon as I can.”
“Dale.”
“Yeah.”
She hesitated, the line clicking between them. “Never mind,” she finally said, and hung up.
Back outside, Dale finished taking notes of every nearby side street where a car could’ve been parked for a quick getaway. He rubbed the back of his neck, trying to work out a hot muscle just above his left shoulder. He walked along the Tenth Street sidewalk, slowly, scrutinizing every inch of pavement he could see in the fading light.
Someone across the street shouted for a flashlight. The neighborhood was noisy and still buzzing with officers from the department, guys from the Iowa Division of Criminal Investigation, and a half-dozen suits from the Omaha FBI field office. It was hard to concentrate.