PART II

CHAPTER 17

Dennis fills me in on the urgent walk—he refuses to let me jog—to the Gazette offices. I have to agree it’s quite the story. A child disappears without a trace in 1944, wearing a sweet little sailor suit (Miss Colivan was correct about that), and shows up twenty-four years later. Only Amory Bauer has met with him so far, but he’s convinced the new arrival might be Paulie. The man, who goes by Kris Jefferson, refused to tell Chief Bauer what happened all those years ago, but he said he’ll talk to someone at the paper when he’s ready.

The familiar thrumming of standing on the cusp of a big break crackles like fireworks across my skin. I don’t want to outright ask for the story for fear of being turned down, so I just keep asking questions.

Dennis opens the office and leads me to the newspaper morgue—I was right that the second door led to it, wrong about how provincial it would be. He lets me pull up the stories on microfiche, reading over my shoulder as I search. His breath smells like onions.

I discover only two articles. The first:

Lad Disappears in Lilydale

September 6, 1944

The tiny desk in the Lilydale Elementary classroom still has the paper sack six-year-old Paulie Aandeg brought to the first day of classes sitting on it. He was excited to start kindergarten. He packed crayons, a tablet, a pencil and a bag of potato chips. He took the potato chips when he was excused for lunch at 11:30 and left the rest. He hasn’t been seen since.

Wearing a hand-me-down sailor suit and new white shoes, Paulie attended his first day of school with considerable enthusiasm. He was walked there by his mother, Mrs. Virginia Aandeg, who sources say gave Paulie’s teacher instructions to keep Paulie until she picked him up. At 11:30, the teacher excused all the kindergartners for lunch. The distraught teacher, who asked that her name not be used, remembers Paulie stepping outside with a registration card in one pocket and the chips in another, but “he was a quiet child. I don’t recall him speaking all morning, and so when I didn’t see him return after lunchtime, I assumed he left with his mother.”

Paulie’s disappearance has rocked the tiny village.

Led by Grover Tucker, Stearns County sheriff out of Saint Cloud, and with the help of local police officer Amory Bauer, an extensive, coordinated manhunt took place, but not one clue was uncovered. “We won’t stop looking until we’ve found the child,” Officer Bauer said.

Lilydale businesses have closed today to help the search. Farmers have been urged to check their barns and cisterns, and housewives have even looked inside their furnaces for the missing child. Saint Cloud-based civilian air patrols have scoured the countryside, and men have walked hand-in-hand down the shallow Crow River on the edge of town, searching for any sign of Paulie.

Two schoolgirls claim to have seen Paulie walking toward the river shortly after lunch. Mrs. Robert Cunningham, a local resident, said she saw a child walking along a ditch carrying a piece of paper around 1:00 or 1:30 p.m.

Paulie’s mother, Mrs. Aandeg, says she thinks she knows what has happened to her child but cannot prove it. She refused to say any more to this reporter.

The article includes a photo of the child, smiling shyly, hair cropped short, wearing his sailor suit. It twists my heart. The second piece was published five days later and features a photo of a much-younger Stanley and Dorothy Lily posed next to Ronald and Barbara Schmidt. Stanley is standing tall, squinting at the camera, and in that youthful incarnation, he looks like someone I used to know. Dorothy and Barbara are holding their hands over their eyes to shade them. Young Ronald is such a perfect replica of Deck that it haunts me.

I read:

Home of Missing Boy Destroyed in a Fire

September 11, 1944

Tragedy has again struck Lilydale, Minnesota, hitting the same family it devastated on September 5 with the disappearance of a child. The house of Mrs. Virginia Aandeg, whose son, Paulie, left school last Tuesday and has been missing ever since, burned to the ground late last night. There were no reported injuries in the fire. In fact, locals speculate Mrs. Aandeg may be on the run in reaction to the disappearance of her child and was not at home at the time of the fire.

Paulie Aandeg was the subject of an area manhunt when he went missing on his first day of kindergarten. Stearns County Sheriff Grover Tucker was the lead on the investigation. According to Sheriff Tucker, “We’ve run down every tip and aren’t sure where to take the case. The entire Lilydale area has been scoured, bloodhounds and Civil Air Patrol brought in and witnesses questioned. It is troubling that the boy’s mother is nowhere to be found. We’ll have to assume the two disappearances are connected.”

The town is reeling from the double tragedies. “While this is truly terrible, we’re coming together as a community,” said Mr. Ronald Schmidt, owner of Schmidt Insurance. Mr. Stanley Lily, local attorney, declared that “through a local organization, my wife and I are making sure there is always a home for Mrs. Aandeg in Lilydale if she returns, and we will never stop looking for Paulie.”

Lilydale truly is a gem of a community, even in tragedy.

For his part, Sheriff Tucker is not hopeful that Paulie Aandeg will be located. “While I believe we’ve hit a stone wall,” he said, “we know there is something off in the village of Lilydale. If anyone has something to report, they’re encouraged to call my office.”

“Oh my god,” I say, falling back like a rag doll. “That unfortunate mother.”

“I’d forgotten about the fire,” Dennis says quietly.

I tap the microfiche screen with my fingernail. “Only two articles. Why didn’t the story get more coverage?”

“It did in the Twin Cities’ papers, if I remember correctly,” he says. “I was overseas when the story broke, but everyone from Lilydale remembers it. The rumor was that Virginia Aandeg killed Paulie by accident, burned down her house when the police started sniffing too close, and then fled.”

I think about what Miss Colivan said about Paulie last night, that his mother had abducted him. Small-town rumors appear to provide the most vicious form of the telephone game. “If he’s truly back, then that rumor is shot dead.”

Dennis shrugs. “I never believed it. I didn’t know her well, but she seemed like a good enough sort. Drank a little too much, that’s all.”

Does his gaze carry judgment? Does he know that I was out at Little John’s? “I wonder what happened to the boy after all.”

Dennis threads his long, elegant fingers together. “With luck, we can ask him ourselves.”

I still can’t believe that this plum story has landed in the Gazette’s lap. According to Dennis, a Father had run over from next door to say that Chief Bauer had called, saying he’d just met with a man claiming to be the original Paulie Aandeg. Dennis immediately came looking for me.

It’s flattering.

“With any luck,” I agree, nodding as I lean forward to reread the first article. Paulie had walked to school with his mother. She told his teacher not to let Paulie leave without her, but somehow, the teacher forgot, or Paulie wandered off, or he was kidnapped. The article isn’t clear.

The only interesting nugget is the name of the local lead: Amory Bauer. Lilydale’s current police chief and the man Paulie Aandeg—Kris Jefferson—first came to upon his return. And then there’s Sheriff Tucker’s cryptic quote: “We know there is something off in the village of Lilydale.”