Challenge (8 page)
Authors: Ridley Pearson
Natalie Shufman hurried through the lobby for the street and fresh air. She’d been looking for the boy when a young girl had tugged on her sleeve and detained her. In that instant she’d spied a uniformed cop patrolling the lobby and, taking no chances, she’d left immediately.
She wondered if her own people had ways of tracking her. She hadn’t checked in since the call she’d placed from Chicago’s Union Station. They had to be wondering why. Trying to find the boy was not the smartest thing she’d ever done. But she felt an obligation to alert the boy of the trouble he was in.
The adrenaline settled out of her as she reached the sidewalk. She knew the boy’s name—Steven Trapp—from studying the science challenge program.
Now out on the street, she wasn’t sure what to do. She’d broken the rules by coming to Washington. Her disobedience would carry consequences. She had to do this quickly. The group struck fast, and violently. She needed to get back to Chicago as soon as possible. She’d think of some excuse for her absence once she got back.
She summoned her courage and returned to the hotel. She headed to a house phone and was about to pick up the receiver when she spotted the curved eye of a security camera looking down onto her from the ceiling. Once the mother reported the call—and she was sure to do so—Security could trace it to a particular phone, the location of the phone to a particular security camera, the camera to her face.
Her face.
She couldn’t use the phone to warn them. She’d need to meet with the boy and the mother in person.
This wasn’t going to be easy.
Grym tapped his watch, wondering if the time could possibly be correct. He’d fallen asleep in the hotel room. He glanced outside at the dusk. But it wasn’t dusk; it was dawn. He recalled leaving the train station and riding a city bus to within a few blocks of the Grand Hyatt. He recalled checking into a hotel just down the street from the Hyatt. He remembered the walk-through of the Hyatt and the adjoining convention center, staking out where the science challenge would take place, getting his bearings.
But he had lain down for a nap and fallen asleep—for the night. The science challenge’s orientation was scheduled for nine a.m., less than two hours from now.
He had to use that time—when mother and son would be occupied with the orientation.
He needed that briefcase; he’d do anything to get it, including breaking and entering.
He quickly showered and changed clothes, the time ticking in his head. It was imperative that by Sunday morning he have the contents of that briefcase in hand. He concentrated on this one task, blotting out all else. There had to be a way.
SATURDAY, MAY 31,
OPENING DAY,
THE CHALLENGE
Opening day of the science challenge competition always drew a large crowd: parents, corporate sponsors, and the press. The floor of the conference center had been turned into a kind of gymnasium, with bleachers on the sides. The contestants occupied chairs on a raised platform at one end of the rectangular floor. The judges occupied the very front row of the stage.
There were fifty students taking part in the challenge, one from each state, but many of the states had sent a reserve challenger as well—in case for any reason the chosen participant couldn’t take part—so Steel’s impression was that there were more like seventy kids onstage.
The event began with a demonstration. Last year’s winner took the floor. A robot went out and tried to pick up a glass. The glass shattered and the crowd let out a collective sigh of disappointment, only to be surprised when a second robot scurried out and cleaned up the mess.
The crowd applauded.
The introductions began. As each name was called, the student rose, walked to the front of the stage near a microphone, and shook hands with the judges, then returned to the seating area.
“It’s going to be okay,” he whispered to the boy sitting next to him, whose name tag read:
JIMMY KRUEGER
.
“Those are
TV cameras,”
Jimmy croaked.
“Yeah,” Steel said out of the corner of his mouth, “but who’s going to watch the National Science Challenge besides our grandparents?”
Jimmy cracked a smile. He breathed for what sounded like the first time in several minutes. “I’m Jimmy,” he said.
“Yeah. I’m Steven. But I’m called Steel.” He paused as he watched the boy try to digest this. “It’s a long story,” he said.
“Montana,” Jimmy said.
“Indiana,” replied Steel.
The stage lights bore down on him from high overhead, blinding him from seeing the audience. He discovered if he tipped his head slightly and raised his hand, he could see better. He saw Kaileigh in the bleachers, thinking what an injustice it was that her invention had been stolen and she wasn’t sitting up here with him. There were a lot of people out there—most of them adults. His heart did a little dance in his chest.
To watch the audience was to see proud parents mouthing the name of their kid as he or she was introduced, to see the cameras in the far back of the room turning their single gray eyes in one direction or another, to see journalists taking notes.
There, two rows up the bleachers on the left, Steel spotted his mother. Her face begged him not to be mad for staring.
Steel nervously looked away and caught sight of West Virginia: a tall girl who wore thick glasses and had invented an automatic gear box for a mountain bike.
He shielded his eyes: was that who he thought it was?
“There’s no way I’m ever going to win this thing,” Jimmy said, discouraged.
Steel mumbled, “But we get a private tour of the Air and Space Museum and free passes to the Spy Museum. You gotta admit that’s kinda cool.” He couldn’t get over what he’d seen—whom he’d seen.
“I’d rather have a chance at winning. My father expects me to win. Yours?”
He forgot about Jimmy’s question, and never answered. Because he panicked.
There, between the cameras at the back, stood the same two agents who had stopped him in Union Station. Federal agents.
Larson and Hampton stood next to a camera tripod. Larson had no great love of the press, and he was uncomfortable standing near them. All of a sudden it felt to him as if the kid onstage had spotted him.
He signaled Hampton, and the two split up. Hampton took one set of bleachers, Larson the other. The plan was to work their way closer to the stage while searching for a man matching Grym’s description.
But what followed surprised Larson: the moment he and Hampton passed halfway, a woman rose from her seat in the bleachers, moved down to the floor, and came right for him.
Larson recognized her as the boy’s mother: Judy Trapp.
She stopped only inches from him, and though at first she made an effort to contain her voice, reason gave way to emotion, and with it her volume increased.
“How dare you
follow
us here! What is it you want? Do you know what kind of trouble you’re causing? Steel needs to concentrate.”
The judge onstage was continuing the introductions.
Judy headed back to her seat.
The judge rambled on, but neither Larson nor Judy Trapp was listening.
Larson’s phone vibrated at his side. He glanced over and saw Hampton with a phone to his ear.
“Yeah?” Larson answered.
“I’ve just spotted the woman from the train. Fifth row, on the aisle.”
Larson identified the woman. Same hairstyle. Maybe Hispanic. He couldn’t be sure.
“Move in.”
Steel couldn’t breathe. It was like one of those nightmares that can’t get any worse, and then it does. First his mother had gotten up from her seat—a major embarrassment. Then she’d approached the tall agent.
He felt cold all of a sudden. Cold, and sick to his stomach.
Grym spent less than an hour at Shipping Central, a copy shop that offered everything from Internet access to FedEx. He color photocopied his Michigan driver’s license—registered in the name of George Peters—on to a clear mailing label, and then tested attaching it to a blank, white luggage tag that cost all of a dollar. It looked good. Then he bought time on the computer-and-scanner combination and scanned his driver’s license. All he needed was the right last name—the family name the room would be registered under. Working with Photoshop, he changed the name from George Peters to George Trapp, printed it out on a clear mailing label, and fixed the label to the luggage tag. A careful policeman would spot his handiwork in little time, but Grym was betting that a hotel desk clerk would not scrutinize the license too closely. As it turned out, he was right.
He explained to the clerk at the Grand Hyatt that he’d arrived after his wife and son, and wanted to check in and then meet them at the science challenge. He made himself into an impatient father, eager not to miss his son’s big moment.
He kept the license in his hand as he presented it; he did not pass it to the man behind the registration desk. The clerk glanced up at it, saw his picture, and confirmed the family name. “Welcome, Mr. Trapp.” A moment later, Grym had a key card to room 1434.
He knocked twice. Waited. Knocked again. As he’d expected, mother and son were down in the convention center at the science challenge. Grym entered the small room. A short hallway led to a bathroom to his right and a closet to his left. The room held two queen-size beds, both unmade, an armoire that contained a TV, a desk and chair, and blackout drapes on the windows. He heard the thump of the dog’s excited tail and spotted the beige plastic crate in the corner.
The open mouth of an unzipped duffel bag called to him from a bench at the foot of the bed. He spotted a roller bag, also open. He made quick work of searching the room for the briefcase.
It wasn’t there.
He kept his work patient and calm: he didn’t want them knowing he’d been here. Wondering if the kid had somehow gotten the briefcase open, he went about searching for the photograph—the all-important photograph. This search had to be done even more carefully, and he went about it methodically, leaving no spot untouched. He checked inside the dog cage: nothing.
He was about to give up when he checked the bedside drawer. He picked up the Gideon Bible and rifled through its pages.
A piece of paper fluttered out like a tiny moth. It settled on the carpet.
Grym bent over, retrieving it. He held it up to his face, pinched it between his thumb and index finger.
A receipt from Union Station. At the top it read:
DAY STORAGE
.
Grym turned it over, a smile widening across his tired face.
It was date-stamped the day before.
Natalie Shufman had surprised the boy. A moment passed before she saw his mother talking to…
Could it be? But yes, it was!…
one of the agents from the train. The mother’s gesturing was heated and intemperate.
Then she spotted the other agent from the checkpoint at the train station. He had his cell phone glued to his ear and was looking up at her.
Applause from the crowd.
If she was going to do this, it had to be now. Natalie stood and made her way toward the mother, two rows below.
If caught, then all was lost—not only for her but for the boy as well.
Steel saw the woman from the train approaching his mother. All she could possibly bring was trouble.
He looked for some way off the stage.
Behind him there had to be exits.
He looked for the red glow of a backstage exit sign.
There!
Well off to the side and behind him. He saw not only an exit sign, but below it a crack of daylight from a partially open door.
Backlit and silhouetted in that shaft of light he saw…
For a moment he…floated, his head swooning. There was a man standing in the shadowy wedge of light that filtered through the barely open door. Steel couldn’t make out any of the man’s features. But he didn’t need to.
The silhouetted shape took form.
It was his father.
Steel’s legs went rubbery and weak. He reached for one of the chairs onstage and managed to keep his balance.
He took off running, dodging through the occupied chairs and heading straight for the exit, where the shape of a man exploded into the sunlight of the door opening and then vanished on the other side.
Natalie Shufman reached the mother.
“You don’t know me.” She spoke with urgency, conveying the importance of her message. “And I don’t know you or your son, but I’ve come a long way to tell you your boy is in danger.”
The mother was too stunned to speak.
Natalie took advantage of the pause. “Leave town. Now. Forget the challenge. Trust me, you’ll be glad you did.”
“Who are you? Why are you doing this to me?” The mother sounded on the edge of tears.
“Your son—” But there was no time. Natalie met the mother’s eyes, attempting to convey her sincerity. “Please, just leave here. Today. Right now. Get him home safely. I can’t do anything more to help you.”
With the agent nearing, Natalie abandoned the mother and headed toward the back.
She might have been pursued by the agent had the mother not cried out at the same moment.
“Steel!” A near scream.
Natalie glanced up onstage. The boy sprinted off the back of the stage and disappeared.
The agent gave up his pursuit, turned, and headed toward the stage.
“Steel!” the mother shouted out again.