Free Flight of the Stone Angel by Carol O'Connell Page A

scream as she bolted to the far side of the square.
    A tall stocky woman, wearing an apron and carrying a covered tray, appeared on the steps of the municipal building beside Charles.
    “Alma!” she called out to the running woman, but the purple-haired Alma never looked back. The stocky woman shrugged and carried her tray across the square to Jane’s Cafe, where Darlene had gone with Ira.
    Charles turned back to the alley in time to see Henry Roth emerge. The mute was smiling at the running woman’s back, as though pleased with some handiwork of his own. Charles had the feeling of something gone terribly wrong with the universe today. In the face of that woman’s extreme distress, Henry Roth’s smile was unnerving. This was simply not in the artist’s character, or what Charles had surmised of it.
    Henry discreetly signed his farewell to Charles and walked off in the direction of his truck. And now it was the sculptor’s back that was marked. His departure was followed by the eyes of the man on the bench, the one who so resembled the late Babe Laurie. This man now turned his gaze back to Charles, and with only a nod, he renewed his invitation to sit down and pass the time.
    But something was different. The man’s aspect had altered. Now the eyes were far from serene; they were alive with light. He wore the winning smile of a wild and handsome child. A lock of hair strayed over one eye, and he grinned to say he had a card trick Charles might like to see, or a secret he might want to know. Come to me, said the disarming face of a charming, barefoot boy of ten. We’ve got games to play, places to go.
    So compelling was this silent call, Charles was made young again, and he was moving slowly toward the bench.
    Then he stopped, as though he had met with a wall.
    This was no shoeless, artless boy, but a grown man with heavy boots and an agenda involving subterfuge. Here was a polished actor with at least two personas.
    Charles thought he had done well against the sheriff, but elected not to press his luck with a man who made an art form out of guile. So he nodded an acknowledgment, shrugged his apology, and turned toward Jane’s Cafe.
     
     

CHAPTER 6
    Aboveground phone lines and power cables were tucked away at the rear of the building. No jarring reminder of modern times marred its historical character. Even the wavy distortions in the window glass of Jane’s Cafe were true to the period. Near this window, the mother and son were seated at a table laid with a wine-red cloth and sparkling white napkins.
    Charming.
    However, when Charles entered the cafe, he found himself back in the correct era. A giant coffee machine gurgled in time to the music of soft rock. A gleaming metal and glass counter lined the back wall. Deep stainless-steel wells were filled with an amazing variety of salads, breads and cold cuts to be loaded on trays and paid for at the electronic cash register. All the white napkins were paper, and all the red tablecloths were washable, late twentieth-century plastic.
    He collected a broad array of sandwich makings, condiments and salad greens on his tray. After paying for it, he settled down at the table next to Darlene and Ira Wooley. The woman was speaking to her son in a soothing mother voice, but the young man wasn’t listening. He was absorbed in constructing a tower of food on top of a slab of rye bread.
    In a soft-spoken, one-sided argument, Darlene pointed to the items that would set off Ira’s allergies, and then she pulled out the offending layers. The boy stared at the mutilated sandwich for a moment, and Charles braced himself for the screaming fit common to autism. But Ira was very calm as he quietly disassembled the sandwich and began again with a new slice of bread from his mother’s tray. He worked deftly, despite bandaged hands and the splints on two fingers. Charles determined that there was nothing wrong with any of the motor skills, as Ira laid a precise line of sardines across a