âNo.â
âShe wasnât one of ours,â Sam says, as if willing it so.
âYou guys were out here celebrating though, werenât you? Axel and the campaign going door-to-door?â Jay says, repeating the rumors he heard.
âRuby set out a pound cake,â Jim says, looking at his wife.
âItâs still sitting on my kitchen counter,â she says, crossing her arms in irritation.
âWe werenât able to make it to every house that night,â Sam says, glancing from his grandson to Marcie, the communications director. âBut the bottom line is, the campaign has no knowledge of the girl or what happened to her.â
âWeâve put together a search, first light tomorrow,â Arlee says. From a leather tote at her feet, she pulls out a roll of paper, weathered at the edges. She unfurls the map across the coffee table. Itâs Pleasantville, each block broken into tiny squares, pencil marks scribbled on each plot of land, notes about the residents in every house in the entire neighborhood. Itâs the Voters League map. âWeâll attack this like any other canvass, like every outreach weâve ever done, on any and every issue that affects this community. House by house, weâll find out who saw what on Tuesday. Weâll start to piece together her last hours.â
âPastor Jennings at Gethsemane, and Pastor Williams at Hope Well Baptist,â Morehead says, âweâre all planning to make statements during this Sundayâs services, warning our congregations about the threat. Iâm advising folks to meet their schoolchildren at the bus stops if theyâre able. Students, the girls especially, should walk in groups of two or three, everybody in before nightfall. The Blue Hawks,â he says, speaking of the boysâ basketball team he coaches at the rec center, âweâre thinking of starting a patrol group for the neighborhood. Weâre asking folks to be on the lookout for any strange faces hanging around.â
âYou still having problems with the trucks?â Jay asks.
Arlee nods, and Jay makes a note to call Sterling & Company Trucks first thing in the morning. It isnât a part of his official duty as Pleasantvilleâs civil attorney on record, has nothing,in fact, to do with the chemical fire. But for years Sterling has been allowing its commercial drivers to cut through the neighborhood on their way to the Port of Houston, and a while back Jay agreed to intervene. He sent a few strongly worded missives on his letterhead, but apparently these arenât doing the trick, because two, three times a week, Sterlingâs drivers still tear through in 18-wheelers and oversize box trucks, men who have no business in Pleasantville. âIâll get on it tomorrow,â he says. It would give him something to do.
CHAPTER 3
By Friday morning, her pictureâs in the paper.
The Houston Chronicle runs a small piece in the City Section, page 2.
When she first sees the girlâs face, Lonette Kay Phillips is sitting in the front room of her duplex on Marshall Street in Montrose, in a run-down, redbrick colonial that rests directly behind the West Alabama Ice House, where Lonnie passed a good amount of time the previous night, drinking her way through the worldâs weirdest blind date. Itâs a high school graduation picture, black gown and fingers cupping her chin, the whole deal, surrounded by three inches of copy, more than Lonnie would have thought the Chronicle would spare for the occasion. Back when its rival, the Houston Post , was still alive,the Chronicle had ignored the stories of the two girls who had disappeared off the streets of Pleasantville, their bodies found less than a city block from where Alicia Nowell was last seen. Lonnie, who had a Shiner Bock and two arsenic-white Hostess Donettes for breakfast, wipes the powdered sugar from her fingers onto the thighs of her jeans and
âShe wasnât one of ours,â Sam says, as if willing it so.
âYou guys were out here celebrating though, werenât you? Axel and the campaign going door-to-door?â Jay says, repeating the rumors he heard.
âRuby set out a pound cake,â Jim says, looking at his wife.
âItâs still sitting on my kitchen counter,â she says, crossing her arms in irritation.
âWe werenât able to make it to every house that night,â Sam says, glancing from his grandson to Marcie, the communications director. âBut the bottom line is, the campaign has no knowledge of the girl or what happened to her.â
âWeâve put together a search, first light tomorrow,â Arlee says. From a leather tote at her feet, she pulls out a roll of paper, weathered at the edges. She unfurls the map across the coffee table. Itâs Pleasantville, each block broken into tiny squares, pencil marks scribbled on each plot of land, notes about the residents in every house in the entire neighborhood. Itâs the Voters League map. âWeâll attack this like any other canvass, like every outreach weâve ever done, on any and every issue that affects this community. House by house, weâll find out who saw what on Tuesday. Weâll start to piece together her last hours.â
âPastor Jennings at Gethsemane, and Pastor Williams at Hope Well Baptist,â Morehead says, âweâre all planning to make statements during this Sundayâs services, warning our congregations about the threat. Iâm advising folks to meet their schoolchildren at the bus stops if theyâre able. Students, the girls especially, should walk in groups of two or three, everybody in before nightfall. The Blue Hawks,â he says, speaking of the boysâ basketball team he coaches at the rec center, âweâre thinking of starting a patrol group for the neighborhood. Weâre asking folks to be on the lookout for any strange faces hanging around.â
âYou still having problems with the trucks?â Jay asks.
Arlee nods, and Jay makes a note to call Sterling & Company Trucks first thing in the morning. It isnât a part of his official duty as Pleasantvilleâs civil attorney on record, has nothing,in fact, to do with the chemical fire. But for years Sterling has been allowing its commercial drivers to cut through the neighborhood on their way to the Port of Houston, and a while back Jay agreed to intervene. He sent a few strongly worded missives on his letterhead, but apparently these arenât doing the trick, because two, three times a week, Sterlingâs drivers still tear through in 18-wheelers and oversize box trucks, men who have no business in Pleasantville. âIâll get on it tomorrow,â he says. It would give him something to do.
CHAPTER 3
By Friday morning, her pictureâs in the paper.
The Houston Chronicle runs a small piece in the City Section, page 2.
When she first sees the girlâs face, Lonette Kay Phillips is sitting in the front room of her duplex on Marshall Street in Montrose, in a run-down, redbrick colonial that rests directly behind the West Alabama Ice House, where Lonnie passed a good amount of time the previous night, drinking her way through the worldâs weirdest blind date. Itâs a high school graduation picture, black gown and fingers cupping her chin, the whole deal, surrounded by three inches of copy, more than Lonnie would have thought the Chronicle would spare for the occasion. Back when its rival, the Houston Post , was still alive,the Chronicle had ignored the stories of the two girls who had disappeared off the streets of Pleasantville, their bodies found less than a city block from where Alicia Nowell was last seen. Lonnie, who had a Shiner Bock and two arsenic-white Hostess Donettes for breakfast, wipes the powdered sugar from her fingers onto the thighs of her jeans and
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