In this chapter, Roy Ray and Delphi become allies and make a crucial discovery.  The setup is like a detective story where a question is raised and then answered.  Or part of it is answered: we seem to be a step closer to an answer by the end, but we've also raised more questions.  I've heard that every story is a mystery story, in that there should always be an element of suspense, of What's going to happen next??  Suspense is what keeps the reader turning pages.  Do you think this is true?  And if so, do you want to go to the next page after this chapter ends?  Tell me what you think here.

One problem the author has to solve in telling a story is how much to reveal and how much to keep hidden.  I've hinted that the radio is important, but you may not have given it much thought as the action moved forward.  Now, as the radio turns up in an unusual place and reveals its particular quality, you may remember those hints and think, "Aha!  I knew there was something about the radio!"   That's an author "trick" that the reader willingly goes along with: burying clues that the reader is meant to discover with a little mental "aha!" click.  We live for that!

You may have noticed that the car is important too.  I wanted to use a Dodge Charger because I remember them from when I was growing up--also, a 1969 Charger was the "star" of the TV show (and later movie) The Dukes of Hazard.  But I don't know that much about cars, so I've just started to do some research into exactly what year the Charger should be.  If you're into automobiles and would like to give your opinion, here are some links to look at.

Chapter 9

TWO STEPS FORWARD . . .

Roy Ray nearly rolled off the bed in astonishment.  "You?!"

            "Yes, me.  Who were you expecting?"

            "I was--I wasn't--never mind.  How'd you find my number?"

            "It's in the phone book."

            "Oh yeah.  Right.  Are you . . . I mean, are you okay?"

            "Why wouldn't I be okay?"  She was beginning to sound a little doubtful, like she'd called the wrong person.

            "I . . . don't know."

            "Oh.  Well, anyway--"  The voice charged up to full wattage again.  "I just called to say, I

proofed that film from yesterday and printed some of the good ones.  Do you want to see them?"

            "Sure!  Sure I do.  But . . . I'm sort of grounded right now."

            "I heard.  How does a birdboy get grounded?"

            He ignored her merry laugh, having heard every possible variation of that joke already.  "Hold on a minute; let me talk to my mom, okay?"

            "Okay."

            "I mean, don't go anyplace or hang up by accident--"

            "I'm holding!"

            He put down the phone and darted out of his room to find his mom shoveling cream of wheat down Davy.  Talking her into letting Delphi come over would have been hopeless, except for the pictures.  They didn't have any really good ones of him; it had been a while since the last paparazzi had snuck into town and tried to snap a shot of him flapping in the sky (BIRD BOY CAUGHT IN THE ACT!), but those always turned out blurry.  Mr. Rappaport vetoed school portraits by traveling photographers because of the you-know-whats: "Just asking for trouble," he said.  So all they had were snapshots.

            "She wants to see them." Roy Ray told Delphi on the phone, a little breathlessly.  "Just

don't say anything about Bill the Lizard, or the fight, or the rescue."

            "What rescue?" she asked, then laughed.  Her chirpy personality grated on his nerves. 

"Oh, I like this one."  Mrs. Rappaport pulled out one of the prints.  "He looks so thoughtful."  That was the one Roy Ray thought was stupid; standing at half-lift, ankles crossed, gazing down at his hands.  What he'd been thinking was, How big a fart could I make right now?

"I like this one."  He pointed to the one action shot among the prints, of him banking between two portable classrooms.   One wing up, the other down, his expression grim and determined.

"That's impressive," his mother agreed.  "And very. . . advanced.  Are you really flying there, Roy Ray, or did you pose that somehow?"

"Mom!"

"It's for real," Delphi said.  "But it's the second take.  When he tried it the first time, he smacked into the wall."

"Delphi!"  She was showing his mother a little square on the proof sheet that captured the embarrassing incident.  "It wasn't my fault.  The wind threw me off."  Actually it was a mass of cold air, surprisingly solid, that bumped into him.

His mother lay aside the proof sheet with a shudder.  "I have an idea that the less I know about your flying the better.  I'd like prints of these four, Delphi.  When you get around to them.  And now I have to repot some geraniums, but stay as long as you like.  Help yourself to the lemonade in the fridge.  And Roy Ray, please watch your brother while I'm out there?"

            Delphi said no thanks to the lemonade and seemed in a hurry to be gone.  "I can't wait to print these.  My first sale!"  As she gathered up her proofs and stacked them in a black portfolio, a pinkish glow spread across her face and even her hair quivered with excitement.

            Roy Ray needed her to stick around.  He needed to know if she could provide any clues about G's disappearance, but couldn't figure out how to lead up to it.  "So . . . where do you live?" he began, stalling for time.

            "Wrong side of the tracks," she said cheerfully.

            "You mean, you're poor?"

            "I mean I live right by the railroad tracks, just outside the city limits where all those little old houses are.  Which I guess means I'm poor."  She shrugged her camera bag over one shoulder. 

            "Wait!"  Roy Ray flapped and glided into her path.  "Uh . . . How'd you get the camera?"

            "Oooo.  That's freaky, when you do that.  My dad's does freelance on the road, works out of his camper.  Last time he stopped by he left me the camera and showed me how to develop black and white film."

            "You mean you have a--whaddya call it--darkroom and all?"

            "Sort of.  I have a bathroom I can use when nobody else is in it.  That's why I'd better get home and watch for my chance."

            "How come your dad doesn't stick around?"

            Her expression soured; he'd touched a sore spot.  "Gee, what a question.  Now that you mention it.  I'll ask him when he decides to stick around."  She headed for the door again, and Roy Ray was frantically trying to come up with something to make her stop--when she stopped.  "Oh yeah--I was meaning to ask you.  Did you notice that cold spot on the playground yesterday?"

            He stared at her with his mouth open.  For the second time in one day, something he couldn't figure out how to make happen had happened all by itself!  ". . . Cold spot?"

            "Uh huh.  I felt it twice: first when I was setting up that shot with you flying between the buildings.  It kind of brushed my back.  And a few minutes later, when I followed you around the corner?  I walked right through it."

            "What does that mean?  Usually?"

            "It could mean a ghost, or some kind of aura.  Did you feel it?"

            "Uh . . . maybe."

            "I knew it!"  She made a little leap of excitement.  "I love this little town.  Weird things happen here."

            "Yeah."  Roy Ray's feathers raised as he recalled the coldness that had knocked him off his stride--wondering, for the first time, if it might be the same phenomenon he'd felt on top of the water tower.  A ghost, or a--what did she call it?--an aural?

            Delphi was babbling on: "I kicked and screamed when my mother told us we were moving here, but it's turned out to be wicked cool.  I can't wait to tell my dad."

            "Why did you move here, anyway?"  Nobody ever moved to Tomahawk Chop on purpose.

            "Oh, there's this newspaper advice column my mom reads all the time.  She finally decided she needed a full-time advice-giver, so she did some research and found out where the lady lives.  Would you believe it's right here?"

            "Really?"  What a coincidence.  "Have they met yet?"

            "No--my mom's trying to figure out how to make it happen so she doesn't look like some kind of stalker."

            Roy Ray decided to go for the direct approach.  "Speaking of advice, I've, uh, got this problem.  Maybe you can help."  Then he told her everything.

            "Wow," she said, after he had.  But then she went on to say that she had not talked to Mr. G yesterday, last night, or ever. 

"Then I'm stuck," Roy Ray sighed.  "I don't know what to do now."

            Delphi brushed her fingers through her hair.  "You need more clues.  Have you searched his room yet?"

            Once she mentioned it, it seemed an obvious Step One.  "Uh, no."

            Delphi stood up.  "What are we waiting for?"

            It was nice, Roy Ray decided, to have somebody help him think.  Because once they went

to the garage and everything seemed exactly the same as always, he didn't know what to search for.  "Is it possible he set this up?" she asked.  "Like, he's just trying to make you believe he was kidnapped?"

            "You mean, he lied when he wrote that note?"  This thought was like an ice pick; it stopped Roy Ray as cold as that air mass in the playground.  "No," he said, after a moment.

            "Are you sure?  How do you know?"

            "I just do.  Some things you have to know, like your parents love you and the air can really hold you up and the sun'll come up tomorrow--"

            "Okay, okay--calm down.  If he was kidnapped there has to be some sign of it, like something out of place.  Look really close--do you notice anything different?"

            Roy Ray forced himself to look, though he was still strangely uncalmed by the thought that Mr. G might not be what he'd seemed.  "I don't see anything."

            "Come on, Roy Ray, it's your garage.  Hey--try this.  My dad told me once, if I'm looking for good photography subjects, to close my eyes for a minute, then open 'em and try to see everything fresh."

            It was worth a try.  He closed his eyes and held the quivering lids down while taking a deep avain breath.  When his lungs were full, his eyelids flew up.

            "Well?" Delphi asked after a few seconds.

            It worked.  The extra oxygen--or something--seemed to sharpen his vision.  For a second, he saw everything outlined by a thin edge of light.  There was something different: the jelly glass that used to sit on the table, with Mr. G's toothbrush in it, was now on the shelf with his dad's socket wrenches.  And there was no toothbrush in it, but something else.  Coming closer, Roy Ray made out a small brown plastic lid or . . . or knob.  Like you'd find on any appliance or--"Radio!"

            Roy Ray snatched up the glass.  "This is the knob from his radio--I'm positive."

            Delphi's dark eyes brightened.  "What kind of radio?  Short wave?  Boom box?"

            "Maybe short wave.  It was an old-timey wooden one."

            "Anything special about it?  Did he listen to it a lot?"

            "I'm not sure.  It was usually late at night when he listened.  One time when I walked in he was turning the knob, and weird noises were coming out."

            "You mean static?"

            "No, that's why I noticed.  They were the kind of noises you don't hear from a radio. Or anything else."

            "Like what?"

            Roy Ray closed his eyes again and tried to think himself back to that night.  "This fluttery sound, like a whole bunch of birds taking off together.  And then there was a voice, kinda singing, only it wasn't in English and there weren't any instrument with it, and . . ."  Now that he tried to describe it, he realized it was basically indescribable.  

            Delphi ran her fingers through her hair again.  "Okay.  Maybe it was important.  So important that they took it when they took him."

            "Then why leave one knob behind?  On purpose?"

            "I don't know."  She folded her arms and started pacing off the floor, looking from side to side.  "Unless he left it there because he wanted you to find it.  In case something happened to him."

"He could have just told me in that note."

"Maybe he didn't have time, or didn't want to risk it being read by the wrong person.  If the knob is a message, what does it say?"

Roy Ray tried to imagine the limit of a plastic knob's conversation.  "Uh . . . Here I am.  Not where I belong . . . Where's the rest of me . . . HEY!"  He flipped to the rafters and swung himself back and forth a few times.  "Where's the rest of me?  The radio is hidden somewhere!"  Then he stopped, and hung there like a bat, except right side up.  Which would have been upside down for a bat, of course.  "But where?"

Delphi was tapping her pursed-up lips as she walked around the garage, looking behind boxes and under frames.  "Tell me more about it.  Like how big is it?  Where would it fit?"

Roy Ray fluttered down and joined the search by opening the freezer lid.  "Um . . . about this size."  He held up a box of Granny's Home-Fried Chicken Nuggets.  "Rounded a little at the corners, but pretty square."  He closed the freezer.  "Like a shoebox.  Or . . ."

Or what?" Delphi prompted from the opposite corner of the garage.

"Like a car battery."  Roy Ray was looking at one, on the metal shelf against the wall.  It was almost exactly the size of Mr. G's radio.  Maybe a little shorter.  That's what struck him first, and what struck him second was this: the customary place for this battery was not on the shelf but under the hood of his Dad's 1978 Dodge Charger-that-wouldn't-charge.

He vaulted over the car and yanked open the driver's door before his feet landed.  Delphi was beside the hood, feeling for the catch as he popped the release lever.  She hoisted the hood, and they stared together at the wooden box that was imitating a battery.  The top was black with grease and the two bolt heads did a pretty good job of looking like terminals.  But they were just sitting on the surface; when Roy Ray swiped at them, they clattered on the concrete floor.  Then he reached down and carefully lifted it out.

"Awesome!" Delphi exclaimed.

Roy Ray felt the same, but couldn't say it.  He was suddenly all choked up, wondering what had tipped off Mr. G that he was in danger.  Did he have a hiding place in mind for the radio or was the Charger a last-minute inspiration?  And if he knew trouble was coming--

"Maybe he got away in time!"

"Who?"  Delphi set the radio on the table and wiped it off.

"Mr. G.  Maybe he's hiding out in the bush."

"What bush?" 

"That's just what he calls the countryside.  He's Australian."

She was barely listening to him.  "This thing is really old--it doesn't even have an FM band.  Here . . ."  Delphi's voice softened.  "You want to, like, turn it on?"

"Okay."  He felt softer too, almost shy.  He snapped on the plain brown knob and turned it clockwise.  A burst of static leapt out of the box, making him jump.  He carefully turned the tuner knob.  But the first station he came to was KRST, a classic rock station his dad liked, then his mom's Oldies station, then talk, then country, and so on.  He and Delphi each traveled up and down the AM band without picking up anything unusual.

"So maybe it's just a radio," he said finally.

She stared at it, chewing on a hunk of her hair.  "It's not just a radio.  Nobody would go to all this trouble if--"

Suddenly she tilted back the box with both hands, squinting at the two speakers covered by faded knobby fabric.  The wooden front was cut in a lattice pattern to let the sound through.  "Look at this.  See that spot on the cloth, that's just a little darker?  Maybe thinner too?  Like that spot gets pushed a lot?"

Roy Ray squinted at the place.  It was hard to make out: the barest smudge in the center of the speaker.  "I'm going to push it," she said.

"Okay."

First she turned the volume up a little.  Then she pushed--

Nothing happened.  She pushed again, harder.

Immediately the sound changed, from a buzz to a swoosh.  Or something like that--as he listened, Roy Ray decided it was like wind, but wind with a voice and a pulse, speaking in gusts that just missed making words.

"Awesome," Delphi said again.

On to Chapter Ten

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