"'I try to be good."

"You are a good boy, Jimmie! This isn't about you."

"Then why does she leave?"

His Aunt Lynn hugged him. Her breasts made him feel safe.

"I don't know. She just does. You know what I think?"

"Uh-uh."

"I think she's trying to find your father. Wouldn't that be great, if she found your daddy?"

Jimmie felt better after that, and even kind of excited. Jimmie had never met his father or even seen a picture of him. No one talked about him, not even his mom, and no one knew his name. Jimmie once asked if his grandfather knew his dad, but the old man had only stared at him.

"Your stupid mother probably doesn't even know."

Jimmie's mom stayed gone five days that time, then, like always, returned without explanation.

Now, all these months later, that evening after her twelve-day absence and the announcement of Jimmie's new name, Jimmie and his mom were eating hamburgers at the tiny table in their kitchen.

He said, "Mommy?"

"What is it, Elvis?"

"Why did you change my name?"

"I gave you a special name because you're such a special little boy. I like that name so much I might change my own name, too. Then we would both be Elvis."

Jimmie had spent most of the past twelve days thinking about what his Aunt Lynn told him that summer – that his mom was searching for his daddy when she went away. He wanted it to be true. He wanted her to find him and make him come home so that they could be a family like everyone else. Then she wouldn't go away anymore. He worked up his courage to ask.

"Were you trying to find my daddy? Is that where you went?"

His mother stopped with the hamburger halfway to her mouth. She stared at him for the longest time with a harsh cast to her eye, then put down her hamburger.

"Of course not, Elvis. Why ever would I do something like that?"

"Who's my daddy?"

She leaned back, her face playful.

"You know I can't tell you that. Your daddy's name is a secret. I can't ever tell anyone your daddy's name and I won't."

"Was his name Elvis?"

His mother laughed again.

"No, you silly."

"Was it Jimmie?"

"No, and it wasn't Philip, either, and if you ask me every other name that ever was I'll tell you no, no, no. But I will tell you one special thing."

Jimmie grew scared. She had never told him anything about his father, and he suddenly wasn't sure he wanted to know. But she was smiling. Kinda.

"What?"

She slapped the table with both hands, her face as bright as an electric bulb. She leaned close, her face playful and gleaming.

"Do you really want to know?"

"Yes!"

His mother seemed alive with an energy that she could not contain. Her hands kneaded the edge of the table.

"This is my gift to you. My one special gift, a gift that no one else can give to you, only me."

"Please tell me, Mama. Please."

"I'm the only one who knows. I'm the only one who can give you this special thing, do you understand?"

"I understand!"

"Will you be good if I tell you? Will you be extra-special good, and keep it a secret just between us."

I'll be good!"

His mother sighed deeply, then touched his face with a love so gentle he would remember it for years.

"All right, then, I'll tell you, an extra-special secret for an extra-special boy, just between us, forever and always."

"Between us. Tell me, Mama, please!"

"Your father is a human cannonball."

Jimmie stared at her.

"What's a human cannonball?"

"A man so brave that he fires himself from a cannon just so he can fly through the air. Think about that, Elvis – flying through the air, all by himself up above everyone else, all those people wishing they could be up there with him, so brave and so free. That's your father, Elvis, and he loves us both very much."

Jimmie didn't know what to say. His mother's eyes danced with light as if she had waited her entire life to tell him.

"Why does he have to be a secret? Why can't we tell everyone about him?"

Her eyes grew sad, and she touched his face again in the soft and gentle way.

"He's our secret because he's so special, Elvis, which is both a blessing and a curse. People want you to be ordinary. They don't like it when people are different. They don't like it when a man soars over their heads while they stand in the dirt. People hate you when you're special; it reminds them of everything that they aren't, Elvis, so we'll keep him as our little secret to save ourselves that heartache. You just remember that he loves you and that I love you, too. You remember that always, no matter where I go or how long I'm away or how bad times get. Will you remember that?"

"Yes, Mama."

"All right, then. Now let's go to bed."

Her crying woke him later that night. He crept to her door where he watched his mother thrash beneath her sheets, speaking in voices he did not understand.

Elvis Cole said, "I love you, too, Mama."

Four days later she vanished again.

His Aunt Lynn brought Elvis to his grandfather, who took the newspaper outside so that he could read in peace. That night, the old man made them potted meat sandwiches with lots of mayonnaise and sweet pickles, and served them on paper towels. The old man had been distant all afternoon, so Elvis was scared to say anything, but he wanted to tell someone about his father so badly that he thought he would choke.

Elvis said, "I asked her about my daddy."

The old man chewed his sandwich. A dab of white mayonnaise was glopped on his chin.

"He's a human cannonball."

"Is that what she told you?"

"He gets shot out of a gun so that he can fly through the air. He loves me very much. He loves Mommy, too. He loves us both."

The old man stared at Elvis as he finished eating his sandwich. Elvis thought he looked sad. When the sandwich was gone, the old man balled his paper towel and threw it away.

"She made that up. She's out of her fucking mind."

The next day, his grandfather called the Child Welfare Division of the Department of Social Services. They came for Elvis that afternoon.

time missing: 31 hours, 22 minutes

I brought the tape home, and played it without stopping to think or feel. The SID would digitize the tape, then push it through a computer in an attempt to determine the caller's location by identifying background sounds. They would map the caller's vocal characteristics for comparison with suspects at a later time. I already knew that I didn't and wouldn't recognize the voice, so I listened to get a sense of the man.

"They slaughtered twenty-six people, fuckin' innocent people! I'm not sure how it got started -!"

He had no accent, which meant he probably wasn't from the South or New England. Rodriguez had been from Brownsville, Texas, and Crom Johnson from Alabama; they both had thick accents, so their childhood friends and families probably had accents, too. Roy Abbott had been from upstate New York and Teddy Fields from Michigan. Neither had accents that I could remember, though Abbott spoke with the careful pronunciation of a Yankee farmer and used expressions like "golly."

"They were in the bush, off on their own -"

The man on the tape sounded younger than me; not a kid, but too young to have been in Vietnam. Crom Johnson and Luis Rodriguez both had younger brothers, but I had spoken with them when I got back to the world. I didn't believe that they would be involved. Abbott had sisters, and Fields was an only.