Four-Two-Four
Marcy Rudd had mixed feelings about the promotion she was offered. On one hand, she would benefit from the additional money, and the prestige that went along with the new title would be a boost to her ego. On the other, she would have to uproot her family and move to Atlanta. Before making any decisions, she discussed the matter with her husband.
"How could you pass up the chance to run the southern district office?" Hayden asked when she went to him for advice. "Not to mention, you'd be the first female partner in the firm."
"I became an architect because I wanted to design houses, not get bogged down in the administrative end of running a company."
"If you feel that way, turn the position down."
"Of course, it is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity," she admitted. "If I were single, I wouldn't think twice about accepting it, but I have you and Cody to think about. I have to do what's right for the family."
"Cody is only four years old. It ought to be easy for him to make the adjustment."
"It will mean taking him out of daycare."
"Which we would have to do in September anyway when he starts kindergarten."
"And what about you? You'll have to quit your teaching job."
"So? They have schools in Georgia."
"But you've got tenure here."
"I've got a master's degree in education. I shouldn't have any difficulty finding a job. Besides," he teased. "You'll be bringing in the big bucks. I can afford to stay home and play Mr. Mom until something comes along."
"Do you think you'll like living in the South?" Marcy asked once the decision to take the promotion was made. "You were born and raised in New England."
"I'm not sure if I'll like the heat in the summer, but one thing is certain. I won't miss shoveling snow in the winter."
When Marcy announced her decision to the senior partners of the firm, they named her replacement in the Boston office before she could change her mind.
"The company wants you in Atlanta as soon as possible," the head of human resources told her.
"I'd better go to Georgia and begin house hunting then."
"Don't worry about the move. We'll handle everything. There's a new gated community on the outskirts of Atlanta that's perfect for a young family. It has all the amenities: pool, playground, tennis courts. I'll send you a link to their website. You and Hayden can see if it's the kind of place that appeals to you."
When she got home from the office that evening, she and her husband looked at the promotional material for Twelve Oaks Estates.
"Look at the map," she said with amusement. "All the streets are named after characters from Gone with the Wind: Rhett Butler Road, Scarlett O'Hara Street, Ashley Wilkes Way, Melanie Hamilton Avenue."
"That's not surprising. After all, Margaret Mitchell was from Atlanta."
"Twelve Oaks? That was the name of the Wilkes's plantation. I wonder why they didn't call it Tara Estates instead."
"Maybe that name was already taken," Hayden suggested, as he continued to read about the benefits of buying property in the gated community.
"How do you feel about living in a townhouse?" his wife asked.
"It says here it's maintenance-free living. That sounds nice. Not only will I not have to shovel snow, but I won't have to mow the lawn or rake leaves either."
"What will you do with all that free time?"
"I'm not sure. Maybe I'll become a Civil War reenactor or delve into the history of Atlanta."
"That's what makes us a perfect team," Marcy laughed. "You learn about the Old South while I concentrate on building a new one."
* * *
At the end of June, the Rudds moved into their new townhouse on Bonnie Blue Butler Boulevard.
"Want to see where we're going to live from now on?" Marcy asked Cody when she unlocked the front door for the first time.
"Where's my room?" her son replied.
"All the bedrooms are on the second floor."
After a quick inspection of the ground floor—kitchen, dining room, living room, home office and powder room—the family headed upstairs where there were three bedrooms and two bathrooms. Additionally, a family room and laundry area were in the basement.
"It looks like the movers did a good job," Hayden observed. "All we have to do is unpack our clothes."
"That can wait until later. I'm starving."
"Do you want to go out and see what restaurants are in the area or would you rather have pizza delivered?"
"How does that work in a gated community?"
"I assume we just notify the security guard at the gatehouse, and he'll let the delivery driver inside."
"Let's do that then."
Hayden took out his cell phone and searched for the nearest pizzeria. Thirty minutes later, a large pepperoni pie and a small dessert pizza were delivered to the townhouse.
"I'll go upstairs and tell Cody it's time for dinner," Marcy announced.
"No need to do that," her husband said. "We have an intercom in the kitchen."
He pressed the button and called into the speaker, "Time to eat, Little Guy."
"Look, we've got pizza," his mother said when the youngster took a seat at the dining room table.
"Four-two-four," he answered.
"What's that, the words from a new song you heard on Sesame Street?" his father inquired.
"Four-two-four," the boy repeated.
"What are you talking about?" his mother asked, when she put a slice of pepperoni pizza in front of him.
"It's a secret," the four-year-old whispered.
"Oh! A secret," his father said, grinning with amusement. "Well, we won't try to force it out of you then."
"I thought I saw a swing set in our neighbor's yard," Marcy told the boy as she poured him a glass of milk. "It would be nice if you had someone to play with right next door."
"Four-two-four."
Since all their attempts to engage their son in dinner-time conversation failed, the Rudds talked to each other, mainly about their plans for the immediate future. Marcy was to report to her new office the following Monday morning. That gave her three days to get settled in. Meanwhile, Hayden would continue the job search he started while they were still living in Massachusetts. So far, he had yet to find an opening for a teaching position in the Atlanta area.
"What about substituting until a full-time job becomes available?" his wife suggested.
"I'll try that. I'm also going to look into tutoring opportunities, both at the high school and college levels. A friend of mine from UMass got a job tutoring college athletes. He made more money working a few hours a week than I did working as a full-time teacher."
"But you didn't become a teacher for the money. You wanted to educate young minds and help instill a love of history in your students. Will helping football players pass open-book tests so they won't lose their athletic scholarships satisfy you?"
"I don't know. Maybe I could impress upon some running back that there's more to life than football and kegger parties."
"Four-two-four," Cody said, more to himself than to his parents.
"On that note," Marcy declared, "let's see what this apple strudel dessert pizza tastes like."
* * *
"Good morning," Hayden said when his son came down to breakfast.
"Four-two-four."
"Daddy's made you Mickey Mouse pancakes—your favorite," Marcy announced, putting a squirt of Hershey's syrup into the boy's glass of milk.
"Four-two-four."
"Ten-four on that, Little Guy," his father teased, using the police code signifying acknowledgment.
"You're ten-four?" Cody asked, staring at his father's face. "No. You can't be; you're too old."
With that, the child pushed back from the table, his pancakes uneaten, and ran upstairs to his bedroom.
"What do you suppose that was all about?" Marcy wondered.
"I don't know. Maybe all this four-two-four business is a reaction to the move."
"You don't think ...?"
Her voice trailed off as though she were afraid to put her thoughts into words.
"Think what?" her husband prompted.
"Never mind."
"No. I want to know what's on your mind."
"Do you think we ought to have him ... tested?"
"There's nothing wrong with Cody," Hayden insisted. "If there were any signs of autism, the teachers at his preschool would have spotted them already. They all claim he's an unusually bright boy."
"You're right," his wife agreed. "It's probably just the excitement of the move. I'm sure he'll be fine in a day or two."
"What do you say after we go grocery shopping, we introduce ourselves to our new neighbors?"
"That's a great idea," Marcy said. "That way we can find out how many young children live on Bonnie Blue Butler Boulevard."
Once Hayden finished his son's pancakes, he headed to the master bedroom to unpack while his wife cleaned up the kitchen. By midmorning, the Rudds were ready to set out on their shopping trip. As they neared the main gates of the development, they had to pass two parallel rows of oak trees, six on each side of the road.
"There are the twelve oaks," the history teacher pointed out. "Just like in the movie."
"I didn't even notice them yesterday," his wife said.
"That's because we were eager to see our new home."
"I'm glad the developers didn't cut them down. They're beautiful old trees."
"While we're out, we might as well stop for lunch. What do you feel like having, Cody?"
"Four-two-four."
"I'm going to assume that's police code for a hamburger happy meal."
As she was putting the perishable groceries in the refrigerator later that afternoon, Marcy looked out the kitchen window and saw a little girl, approximately the same age as her son, playing on the neighbor's swing set.
"Stop what you're doing," she called to Hayden who was stacking canned and boxed goods in the cabinets. "We can finish that later. The neighbor's kid is outside."
"I'll go get Cody."
Several minutes later they walked out the front door and crossed the stretch of lawn that separated the two houses.
"Hi, there!" Marcy called to the woman who was watching the little girl play.
"Hello," she answered. "You must be the new neighbors. My name is Trudy Jacobson."
The Rudds introduced themselves and their son.
"Gracie!" Trudy called to her daughter on the swings. "Come meet the boy next door."
The little girl obediently got off the swing and headed toward her mother.
"I'm glad to have another young child on the street. Gracie has been so quiet and reserved since we got to Atlanta. Hopefully, being able to play with someone her own age will snap her out of it."
The little girl stared at the boy as though she recognized him.
"Three-zero-five," she said.
"Four-two-four," Cody replied.
The two children then reached out their right arms and clasped hands. Without a glance at their parents, they walked off hand-in-hand toward the swing set.
"That was weird!" Hayden cried.
"Gracie has been like that since we moved in," Trudy explained, wiping a tear from her eye with the back of her hand. "All we've been able to get out of her is three-zero-five—whatever that means."
"Our son has been behaving the same way," Marcy said. "Only with him, it's four-two-four. We asked him about it, but he told us it's a secret."
"It must be something they both picked up from watching television," Trudy concluded, anxious to find a logical explanation for her daughter's odd behavior.
"I'm sure that's what it is," Hayden agreed. "The shows on PBS are always throwing facts and figures at them."
The two women went into the Jacobson's kitchen for coffee, leaving Hayden to watch the kids.
"I wanted to stop by and give you a proper welcome," Trudy confessed, "but I thought I ought to wait a day or two to allow you time to unpack and settle in."
"The movers set up our furniture and unpacked most of our belongings for us," Marcy explained.
"Aren't you lucky! Alton and I moved in three weeks ago, and we've still got boxes to empty."
"So, you're new to the neighborhood, too?"
"Twelve Oaks is a brand new development. The first few homeowners moved in at the end of April. In fact, only a small portion of the land has been developed. There are still quite a few acres that haven't been cleared yet."
* * *
Early Monday morning, Marcy kissed her husband goodbye and headed toward the front door.
"I'll wish you good luck on your first day," Hayden said, "even though I know you won't need it."
"Thanks, but your opinion is biased. Kiss Cody for me when he wakes up."
As she neared the main gate, she saw a sign on the community bulletin board announcing the first annual Fourth of July picnic. Immediately, she had a vision of Vivien Leigh surrounded by adoring young men at the Wilkes's barbecue.
What a great way to meet the other people at Twelve Oaks, she thought.
July 4, or Independence Day, is a truly American holiday with time-honored traditions. It is a day celebrated with parades, backyard barbecues and fireworks. Public buildings and homes across the country proudly display the Stars and Stripes.
When the Rudds arrived at Twelve Oaks Estates' picnic grounds shortly before noon, they were delighted to see at least two dozen children were already there, playing quietly together near the clubhouse. Hayden was surprised at how well-behaved they were.
"There's Gracie," Marcy told her son. "Do you want to go play with her?"
Cody nodded his head and walked in the direction of the little girl from next door. When the other children saw him approach, they stopped what they were doing and gathered around him.
"Four-two-four," Cody announced.
One by one the others did likewise: six-three-seven, two-one-eight, five-zero-nine and so on.
"I don't suppose you know what that's all about?" one of the other parents asked the newcomers.
"I haven't a clue," Hayden replied. "My son's fascination with three-digit numbers only began once we moved in."
"My boy, too. When the wife and I lived in Seattle, he was a rambunctious one, always getting into something. But almost immediately after we arrived in Atlanta, he started with all this one-seven-seven nonsense. Now he mopes around the house like a zombie."
"Well, at least these children seem to be able to get along."
"It's still not normal. He used to like to climb trees, ride his skateboard and play video games. He doesn't even turn on the television anymore."
"What does he do all day?" Hayden asked.
"Just sits in his room. It's downright creepy. It's like he's waiting for something, but he won't say what. All I get out of him is that it's some kind of secret."
As bottles of beer were uncapped and people helped themselves to nacho chips and pretzels, more parents expressed similar concerns. Every one of them was experiencing the same behavior from their children, and no one had an explanation for it. By the time the hamburgers, hot dogs and chicken drumsticks started coming off the giant barbecue grill, seventeen more youngsters joined their peers near the clubhouse. They, too, introduced themselves not by name but by number.
"Cody," Marcy called into the crowd of children. "It's time to eat."
"I have to go to the bathroom," he announced when his mother put a hot dog, ear of buttered corn and slice of watermelon in front of him.
"There are restrooms in the clubhouse," Trudy said.
"Come on," his mother told him. "I'll take you."
"I can go by myself."
Marcy's gaze went to the clubhouse door. Was it safe to let her four-year-old son go by himself?
"I'll go with Cody," Gracie volunteered.
"Me, too," one of the older boys, added. "I'll look out for the both of them."
"All right," Marcy reluctantly agreed. "But hurry back."
"Four-two-four."
As she ate her potato salad and listened to Trudy's conversation with Hayden concerning the Confederate heroes carved into Stone Mountain, she kept an eye on the clubhouse door, waiting for her son to return. More and more children entered, but she had yet to see one come back out. She looked at her watch. Five minutes. Six. Seven.
What's taking him so long?
Marcy looked at the families sitting at the picnic tables. There were mothers and fathers but no children.
"What are they up to in there?" she said aloud.
"What's that, sweetheart?" her husband asked.
"The children all went into the clubhouse."
"Do you think they're plotting something?" he joked.
Other parents began questioning their children's absence as well.
"Something's not right," Marcy declared, as a feeling of foreboding came over her.
Hayden got to his feet and walked in the direction of the clubhouse. When he opened the door and looked inside, the color drained from his face.
"There's no on in here," he cried.
* * *
"Close to fifty children were at the picnic," Hayden said with disbelief. "Where did they all go?"
"They couldn't have just vanished into thin air!" Trudy tearfully insisted as parents scoured every inch of the clubhouse, inside and out, looking for a hidden trap door or other concealed exit.
After an hour of searching the neighborhood, the guard at the gate called in the police. Officer Myron Shimmerhorn quickly responded.
"You've all searched your houses thoroughly?" he asked. "You're absolutely sure the children are not gathered together in someone's basement, playing a joke on you all?"
"We've all gone home and checked," Hayden replied. "We've looked in closets, attics, basements, garages and tool sheds. There's no sign of them."
"They have to be somewhere around here," Trudy reasoned. "It's a gated community. They can't have gotten out."
"The only gates are at the main and back entrances of the development. There's no fencing around the perimeter. Vehicles will have a hell of a time getting in and out without passing through security, but anybody can just walk out through someone's backyard."
"Why are we paying all this money to live in Twelve Oakes Estates if our children are no safer here than in non-gated communities?" the distraught mother asked.
"For one thing, there's the prestige of living in an exclusive enclave," the guard answered truthfully. "Then there are the amenities the development offers."
"Who cares about a swimming pool and tennis courts at a time like this?" Trudy screamed.
"Calm down," her husband cautioned.
"The hell I will! I want my little girl back."
"All right," Officer Shimmerhorn shouted to the group. "I want ten of you to get in your cars and keep patrolling the streets. Give three blasts of your car horn if you find any of the missing kids or see anything suspicious. The rest of you will come with me."
The Rudds and Jacobsons were in the second group and followed the policeman and the department's K-9 Unit into the undeveloped portion of Twelve Oaks. Several parents volunteered items of their children's clothing to give the dogs a scent to follow. When the trained German Shepherds failed to locate a trail, Shimmerhorn sent the unit back to the clubhouse.
"We know that's where the children were last seen," he told the animals' handlers. "The dogs might tell us where they went from there. Meanwhile," he addressed the searchers, "we keep looking in these woods."
After two hours of combing the heavily wooded area and undergrowth, a number of the searchers, the Rudds among them, came upon a clearing in the trees.
"I wonder if we're still in the development," Marcy mused, walking through the tall grass.
A moment later she tripped over an unseen obstacle and fell to her knees.
"Are you all right, honey?" her husband asked, immediately going to her aid.
"I stepped on a brick or something," she said.
After clearing the grass and weeds with his hand, Hayden spied a small concrete plaque in the ground. Although the elements had eroded its sharp lines over the years, he could still make out the writing. Engraved on the stone were three digits: one-seven-seven.
"I have no idea what this is, but be careful where you walk," he warned his wife. "There might be more of them."
As he predicted, approximately four feet to the right of the first stone was another, this one bearing the number three-zero-five. The third such stone they found gave the parents cause for alarm.
"Four-two-four," Marcy read, her voice quivering with fear. "And three-zero-five. That's the number Gracie kept repeating. And one-seven-seven—the little boy from Seattle."
Hayden walked ahead, reading numbers off other stones, "Six-three-seven, two-one-eight, five-zero-nine. The children must have been here and seen these markers."
"Cody started with all that four-two-four nonsense the day we moved in. He had never seen these stones, nor had he met any of the other children who might have told him about them."
"I don't get it! What does all this mean?"
One of the volunteers called in by Officer Shimmerhorn, Yancy Worrell, a retired police officer who was born and raised in Atlanta, overheard the father's question.
"Are you talking about the grave markers?" he asked.
"Grave markers?" Marcy echoed.
"Those numbered stones. They mark the graves of the orphans buried in this cemetery."
As they continued to search the clearing, Yancy told them about Riverdale, the orphanage that once stood on the grounds.
"Not all of them little ones living there were orphans," he said. "Some were just children abandoned by their parents and those born out of wedlock."
"Couldn't the authorities find homes for them?" Marcy asked.
"At first, yeah. But then came the Depression. People couldn't afford to take on another mouth to feed. That was when the orphanage was reclassified."
"What does that mean?"
"Back then the government paid higher subsidies to hospitals than to orphanages, so Riverdale was reclassified as a mental asylum."
"But what about the children that were already there?" Hayden inquired.
"They were treated as mental patients. Being normal kids, they rebelled. Some were given electro shock treatments, and a few were even lobotomized in an effort to control them."
"That's horrible!" Marcy exclaimed.
"Eventually the government got wise to what was going on, and they closed the place down. The remaining children were sent elsewhere, either to other facilities or to new homes. In the Sixties, they tore the buildings down and covered over the foundations. There's nothing left now but this cemetery and the old playground."
"Where's that?"
"Just up ahead."
As the Rudds neared the abandoned playground, they could hear the faint sound of children's laughter.
"They're there!" Marcy cried with joy, believing she would find Cody at last.
"Where are those voices coming from?" Hayden wondered when they found nothing at the playground except broken, rusty swings and a sliding pond.
"They're coming from right here."
Although no one was able to explain how or why, the searchers could hear the children but not see them.
* * *
"I'm going back to the playground to continue the search," Hayden announced at daybreak the following morning.
"You hardly slept at all last night."
"Who can sleep when your child is missing?"
"And what do you hope to accomplish by going back there?" Marcy asked. "Every inch of that place was searched. The children aren't there."
"I know that, but there might be some tiny speaker on the ground, projecting their voices—just like Officer Shimmerhorn suggested."
"And if you find the speaker, how will that help? We still won't know where they are."
"I've got to do something! I can't just sit tight and wait for the police to investigate."
"All right. You go, but I'm going to stay here. Maybe someone will call with a ransom demand."
As she waited for the phone to ring, Marcy searched the Internet for information on Riverdale. Eventually her efforts uncovered a list of the children buried in the asylum's cemetery.
In the far-left column of the table were the numbers of the graves, one of which stood out: four-two-four. Her eyes traveled to the right where the names and dates of birth and death for each deceased child were given in the succeeding columns.
Oh, Christ!
There was her son's name: Cody Rudd. And he was four years old when he died! Marcy immediately reached for her cell phone and called her husband.
"Have the kidnappers contacted you?" he asked upon answering.
"No, but there's something you've got to see."
"I'll be right there."
"Look!" Marcy said, thrusting a printout of the list at Hayden the moment he walked through the door.
"I don't recognize all the names, but those I do correspond with the children living in Twelve Oaks."
"They're also the names of those buried in Riverdale's cemetery."
"Cody? No! I can't be. It must be either some bizarre coincidence or an elaborate and cruel scam."
"Or ...."
The word hung in the air, neither parent wanting to consider a third possibility.
* * *
The police held a private meeting with the parents of the forty-eight missing children. They were then able to identify the forty-eight names on the list and the corresponding numbers to the left of their names.
"You're saying the boy I raised from birth is the reincarnation of the orphan buried under marker one-seven-seven?" the man from Seattle asked, his skepticism apparent from the sarcastic tone of his voice.
"I'm saying that's one possible explanation," Officer Shimmerhorn replied.
"Why are we wasting our time listening to this crap?" he retorted. "This isn't helping us find our son."
"Let's look at the evidence again," Hayden suggested. "One, all our children were obsessed with three-digit numbers since arriving at Twelve Oaks. Two, many of us saw them go into the clubhouse, but no one saw them come back out. Three, the police dogs couldn't trace a scent beyond the immediate area. Four, those markers have been buried in the ground for close to ninety years; they weren't put there recently. Five, I've contacted the state and local historical associations. They've both authenticated the list of the children buried in that cemetery. And, six, ...." He hesitated momentarily before continuing, "there are several witnesses who claim to have heard laughter and children's voices in the vicinity of the abandoned playground—me and my wife among them."
"And what are we to conclude from these facts?" Trudy asked, wiping her eyes with a tissue.
"That the children are dead and buried in that old cemetery."
There room erupted into cries of disbelief and shouts of denial.
"How could you say such a thing?" the mother from Seattle demanded to know.
"Do you think I want to believe this?" Hayden cried. "My own son is one of them. But as much as it breaks my heart to admit it, I think he's back where he belongs: buried in Riverdale's cemetery."
Understandably, the majority of the parents refused to see the truth. They preferred to follow the advice given by the National Center for Missing Children and put their faith in the authorities' ability to find their sons and daughters. As the years passed, however, not one of the Twelve Oaks children was ever found.
* * *
Five years after the birth of her second child, Marcy Rudd was offered another promotion. This time she was given the opportunity to head the San Francisco district office.
"What did you tell them?" Hayden asked when she came home from work that evening.
"I declined the offer. They then tried to tempt me with even more money, but I stuck to my guns. I'm not leaving Atlanta."
Twelve Oaks Estates, although once a highly desirable, upscale community, had, since the children went missing that tragic Fourth of July, failed to live up to its early potential. The wooded land around the orphanage/mental asylum was never developed. The gates at the entrances were removed, and people of all incomes moved in. Still, to the Rudds, the house on Bonnie Blue Butler Boulevard was home.
Every Sunday, the two of them, accompanied by Trudy and Alton Jacobson, who were still living next door, visited the old cemetery. The parents had erected proper headstones to memorialize Cody and Gracie and kept the grass around their graves neatly trimmed and free of weeds.
As Marcy replaced the wilted flowers that marked her son's final resting place with fresh ones, she could hear coming from the abandoned playground the sound of children's voices.
"Four-two-four," she whispered.
"Four-two-four," came a barely audible reply.
This story was inspired by an article I read on the Duplessis Orphans, 20,000 Canadian children who, in the '40s and '50s, were wrongly certified as mentally ill by the provincial government of Quebec in a scheme to misappropriate additional subsidies from the government. Some orphanages, a number of which were run by religious organizations, were reclassified as mental asylums.
Since Salem has nine lives, he decided to create his own font to mark the end of each one. (He threw in the zero for good luck!)
