Herman Weiss’ house was at the end of a cul-de-sac with homes close on either side. The front lawns were neatly trimmed, the sidewalks smooth, and the thick green hedges guarded against prying neighbors’ eyes and ears.
I parked in the driveway. Cody parked on the street. The garage door was closed, but I could see a Honda inside.
At the front door I rang the bell, with Cody next to me. He held up his phone. “This is him,” he said. “Student ID.”
Weiss was balding, in his 50s, with glasses and bushy eyebrows. “Okay.” I pressed the doorbell again.
Then I noticed that inside the screen, the front door was open two inches.
I rang again, then knocked. “Hello? Anybody home? Mr. Weiss? Hello?”
No response.
“This isn’t strictly legal even if the door is open,” I whispered to Cody as I gave the door a push. “Hello?”
I stepped inside, calling out Weiss’ name again. No answer.
A strong odor drifted in the air. I sniffed. Burnt coffee, as if someone had left the coffee maker on all day and let it boil away and scorch the pot. That wasn’t good, was it?
I took a few steps forward, saw the kitchen, then turned to a room on my right and froze. “Oh hell.”
A man lay on the carpet, arms awkwardly outstretched. Blood leaked from the back of his skull on the carpet, and blood stained the sharp edges of a bronze bookend lying right next to his head. A pair of glasses lay next to one hand, the lenses cracked.
I recognized the receding hair and bushy eyebrows from Cody’s phone. Herman Weiss. Still breathing.
Behind me Cody grunted. “Oh my—what the—how the—”
“Don’t touch anything.” I knelt next to him and pressed my hand on his chest. His heart was beating firmly inside his ribs.
“Call 911,” I told Cody. “Use the phone here. Don’t tell them your name, just say there’s a guy who needs help. Leave the phone off the hook.”
Cody looked around the room, confused. “Where’s the phone?”
“Try the kitchen.” I pointed.
While Cody headed for the kitchen, I checked around. An end table had fallen over next to Weiss, but otherwise the room didn’t look trashed. The TV was intact, no lamps were broken, and the bookshelves were still crammed with hardcovers. I checked out a few spines. Most of the titles had the word “magic” in them.
No sign of Marcy’s book, but I didn’t spend much time looking for it. I backed out of the room, careful not to touch nothing.
In the kitchen I saw the coffee maker, the pot blackened on the bottom. Cody was talking.
“Yeah, I think he was hit on the head or something. He’s still breathing.” He looked at me, and I waved impatiently. “Hurry, please.” He started to hang up, then remembered my instructions and set the receiver on the counter.
“Now what?” Cody asked when we were outside.
I hesitated. I didn’t want to get bogged down explaining to the police what I was doing in Weiss’ house. And Weiss would be fine. I hoped.
I led Cody back to my car. “This group of students, they met here? Anywhere else?”
“Let me—” He closed his eyes to think. “There was Elise. Elise Maimon. And Juana Norris, she was another one, older. Close to Herman’s age. Elise is more like Marcy’s age. A few guys—”
“Can you get their addresses?”
He reached in his rear pocket. “Give me a minute.”
I heard the ambulance wailing in the distance. “Let’s go. Text me with Juana’s address.”
Cody went to his car. I started up, passed the ambulance heading toward Weiss’ house, and pulled over a block away, with Cody right behind my bumper. While I was waiting for his text, my phone buzzed. Marcy’s parents.
“We just—got—an email.” Marian Pratt was gasping, fighting down sobs. “It said—she said—”
“‘I’ll see you in my next life,’” her father read, his voice shaky. “”I love you both.’ Do you have any idea where she is?”
I twisted around to look at Cody’s car. He saw me, and held up his phone. My phone beeped with a text message. Juana’s address.
“Maybe,” I said.
Juana Norris’ house was set back from the road, behind a tall fence and a lawn that needed mowing. Cody followed me up the walk, breathing shallowly, nervous. I was nervous too, but I did my best to hide it. From myself more than him.
What was I going to do if Marcy was here? That depended on why. If she was being held prisoner for some kind of Satanic ritual, I could call the cops. Unless they overpowered me and offered me as a human sacrifice to appease their ancient gods, or something. If she was here on her own, the most I could do was ask her to call her parents. Maybe snap a picture to show she was safe.
It didn’t matter. The house was empty. We rang, knocked, and peeked in windows, but the lights were dark and everything was locked. At least we didn’t spot any bodies inside.
“Now what?” Cody’s eyes darted around, afraid of the neighbors as we stood in front of our cars. Maybe he was starting to regret tagging along with me.
Unfortunately, I needed him now. “Elise Maimon?”
He sighed. “Yeah. Give me a second.”
He had the address and the phone number a minute later. I thought about time. I didn’t know if Marcy was in immediate danger, and I didn’t want to spend the rest of the afternoon and evening driving back and forth through Northbrook and its surrounding suburbs. I hoped this woman knew something.
I called Elise Maimon using Cody’s phone, so she’d be more likely to pick up. It buzzed four times. Then: “Yeah, this is Elise, you know what to do . . .” Beep.
I handed the phone to Cody. He said, “Elise, this is Lance Cody. Have you seen Marcy Pratt lately? Please call me.” He left a number, then hung up and looked again at her contact form. “There’s another number. Maybe a landline.”
“Call it.” It was worth a shot.
Two rings. “Hello?” A young woman’s voice.
Cody spoke again. “Hi, I’m trying to reach Elise Maimon? Is this her number?”
“Uh, yeah, but she’s not here right now. You want to leave a message?” She sounded bored.
I took the phone. “Hi, my name’s Tom Jurgen. I’m a private detective and I’m trying to locate Marcy Pratt. She’s a friend of Elise’s, I believe.”
“Uhh . . .” Her voice was suspicious. “Who did you say you are?”
I repeated my name. “She’s not in any trouble,” I said, hoping that was true. “Marcy is a missing person. I’ve been hired by her parents. I’m wondering if Elise might have any idea where she is.”
“I don’t—I’m just her roommate. Wait, Marcy? Black hair, tall like a basketball player? I think she was just here.”
I restrained the urge to rush for my car. “How long ago?”
“Half an hour. Forty-five minutes? She and a guy.”
“What guy?”
“I didn’t get his name. I don’t know him.”
“Where’d they go?”
“They, uh, I think she said Sacred Grove. She was kind of in a hurry.”
I looked at Cody. “Sacred Grove?”
He shook his head.
“Okay, thanks,” I told the roommate.
“Wait, is everything okay? You said she’s missing?”
“Hopefully we’ll find her. Thanks for your help.” I hung up, handed Cody his phone, and dug my own phone out to search. “Sacred Grove, Sacred Grove . . .”
It was a cemetery.
My GPS mapped out a 20-minute drive. I had my car door open when I remembered Cody, who was still standing at Juana’s front door.
“You coming?” I asked. Not sure what I expected. Or wanted.
He looked away from me. “I can’t. I—I think I’ll just go home.” He glanced back at the house. “After Herman, I mean . . . I just can’t.”
“I understand.” Finding a body with a bashed-in skull would freak anyone out. It freaked me out, but I kept hearing the Pratts’ frantic voices in my head.
Cody took a step to his car, then hesitated. “Will you call me?”
“Sure.” I slid into the seat and started the motor up. Cody watched me back away. I waved, turned the car around, and hit Rachel’s number as I hit the gas.
“Tom Jurgen’s office, Tom’s lowly peon speaking, how may I serve you, O Master?” At least she sounded in a better mood now.
I told her where I was going. “Maybe I’ll find her there. I hope.”
“Well, be careful. I have class, and I won’t be able to concentrate if I get a text that you got killed or something.”
“That would ruin my day too.” I signaled for a right turn. “Anything on Miskal?”
“Oh, yeah. Demon. Bad news. There’s more, but I’m on my way out the door right now—”
“All right, thanks. You finish your ethics paper?”
“I found one to plagiarize. That’s ethical, right?”
“As long as they don’t catch you. I’ll call you.”
“Be careful,” she said again. “If anything happens to you, I’ll be too cranky for sex.”
“I’ll keep that in mind.”
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