Taken?

Rob felt energized by the possible sighting of Erin and decided to have a nice, leisurely supper. He did that, and returned to his room just before nine o'clock. He spent the rest of his evening relaxing in front of the TV, his ever present notepad on his knee in case something new came to mind. Before he went to bed he checked for any messages that may have been left on his voice mail, and phoned his home number in Duluth to get the messages from his answering machine. There were three, all phone calls from close friends looking for updates on his search for Katy. He would contact them all tomorrow. Tonight he wanted to get a good sleep.  

--Day 6--

Saturday morning Rob awoke feeling very refreshed, having slept the whole night through. When he slipped on his wristwatch he checked the date and saw that it was already the 14th. It was hard to imagine that four days had passed since he had last seen his daughter. He felt more hopeful than he had the previous morning, and was very happy to see that this morning had dawned bright and sunny with hardly a cloud in the sky. Today he intended to cover some of the back roads in the Grand Marais area. Most were gravel roads and they would have been terrible to drive on during the rains of the previous day.

It was after 9 a.m. when he finally got on his way. He had called Detective Maki to let him know about the possible sighting of Erin at the Grand Portage Casino. Unfortunately the detective wasn't quite as enthusiastic as Rob, stating that the sighting was what police sources would call unconfirmed. He said that he personally wouldn't want to put too much faith in it. In addition, he said that eyewitness identifications were notoriously unreliable, and that most courts were now giving them less weight than they used to.

Detective Maki managed to cut down Rob's optimism, but it was still greater than it had been 24-hour before. He set out with his series of maps, choosing to drive down the better county roads before he chose some of the lesser dirt roads. He had brought along a sandwich and a couple of bottles of Coke for the trip, and managed to drive almost 100 miles of secondary road before he stopped for his lunch. During his lengthy drive he had seen few people to display his poster to, and only a couple of commercial enterprises where he was able to leave a copy.

The afternoon was spent in the same way, driving down what seemed to be endless winding roads, with absolutely no discoveries of any brown cars, and with no sightings of anyone even remotely resembling Erin or Katy. By the end of the day his gas tank was nearing empty and his optimism was at almost the same level. He returned to Grand Marais hungry, tired and feeling as though his day had been an almost total waste of time.

Where the previous evening had been spent enjoying a good meal eaten in a good frame of mind, his Saturday night supper consisted of pizza and a draft beer. He was just more interested in getting back to his room to rest, and to rethink his quest, than he was in having a relaxing and pleasant meal. By the time he got to his room he was ready for bed, and it took all of his effort to force himself to have a nice hot shower before he retired. Before he fell asleep he spent several hours tossing and turning, wondering if he was ever going to accomplish his goal of reuniting his family.

--Day 7--

The next morning, Sunday, began as bright and clear as the previous one. The lovely weather helped to re-energize Rob and he left before nine o'clock with his maps spread out on the seat and a smile on his face. This day was spent covering the side roads north from Grand Marais to the Canadian border. There were very few of them and very few homes located along them. Again he did not find any brown cars, and only a few people to whom he could show his poster. He did find a tourist outfitter who agreed to put up one of his posters.

It was another long day for Rob, one that he felt allowed him to give good coverage to that whole area north of Grand Marais. By the time he got back to Grand Marais it was 7 p.m., and all of the roads on his maps for Grand Marais and to the north, were marked as having been covered during his drives on Saturday and Sunday. He checked his voice mail and his answering machine in Duluth as soon as he got into his room, but the only messages were from a couple of friends and family. There were no new reports of sightings of either one of his missing family members.

Considering that he felt he had well covered the area, he decided that in the morning he would drive back to Duluth so that he could talk to Detective Maki in person and plot his next moves. He was also running out of clean clothing, and would need to either purchase more or get home so that he could do some laundry. Grand Marais was not far enough away from Duluth to cause him a problem if he needed to get back in a hurry. It was only a two hour drive and since he had already met with officers from both of the local police forces he felt that he was likely able to depend on them to check something out for him, if it seemed very important.

--Day 8--

He got his usual early start on Monday morning and was packed and checked out by eight o'clock. He decided to have a quick breakfast before he hit the road, and by nine o'clock he was already 20 miles south of Grand Marais. His drive back to Duluth was uneventful but as he drove he noticed there were a large number of roads leading off the main highway, and several small towns along the way. He would have to come back soon and check all of them out. He knew it would take hours and hours of driving and he wasn't looking forward to that prospect. The last few days had been very tiring.

Once Rob was back at home he called on his next door neighbor, Herman McLean, to collect his mail and newspapers from the previous week. He had a slight hope that there might be a card or letter from Katy explaining why she had disappeared, but deep down he knew she hadn't left on her own. It would have been too simple a solution and it wouldn't have done anything to explain why Erin disappeared.

Rob quickly scanned the newspapers looking for any mention of Erin or Katy and did find several mentions by the local court reporter. She seemed to have developed an interest in the situation, and Rob decided that she might be a good source to contact. He thought that maybe if he gave her further details she might be able to keep it alive in the public eye. Rob suspected that the news media would soon tire of the case if nothing new developed. He was determined not to let that happen.

Just before noon Rob phoned Henry Brown to see if he could meet him at the office to settle his leave of absence from work. He was told that he could come in any time during the afternoon to take care of it so he made an appointment for 1 p.m. Rob felt he may as well get that taken care of so that he wouldn't have to worry about work for the time being. His next call was to Doctor Gloria Baker, the psychologist. He was able to make an appointment for 3 p.m. with her, as she had had a cancellation. His final call was to Detective Maki, who had nothing new to tell Rob.

Rob's final call was to Jim Randall, who had been putting up posters around the Duluth and Superior, Wisconsin areas. Jim had completed the work late on Sunday night, and was enjoying a day off from his job so that he could recharge himself from the busy weekend. Rob thanked him profusely for his efforts and apologized to him for forcing him to miss a day of work. Jim told him not to worry about it in the least, as it was something he felt he had to do for his sister and niece. He offered to do more to help Rob, whenever there was something he could do.

By the time Rob was finished with his phone calls he had to leave for the office in order to keep his appointment with Henry Brown. His boss advised him that his first three weeks off would go against his vacation allotment, and the subsequent weeks would be taken as a leave of absence, without pay. He signed the required forms and picked up his vacation pay.

Rob appreciated the cooperation his employer had given him and promised to be back as soon as it was possible. He was told that the programming work he started had been passed on to another programmer in the office who felt that Rob's notes on the job were sufficient to enable anyone to carry on the work. Rob was happy that it wouldn't be necessary for him to come in and instruct someone else on how this job should be completed.

Rob had over an hour to spare before his appointment with Doctor Baker, so he decided to drop in at the police station, to find out how the technicians had made out analyzing what they had found that night in his home. He knew they weren't going to tell him anything directly, so he headed for Detective Maki's desk on the third floor. When he got there he saw the detective was once again hard at work at his desk, so Rob walked directly over and sat down beside it.

When the detective glanced up and saw Rob he stopped what he was doing, and said, "Mr. Walsh, it's good to see you again. It looks like your trip up the North Shore has people noticing your wife's and daughter's pictures. We've had three calls in the last few minutes, which is good, but none of them appear to be destined to be of much assistance. More of the 'I think I saw her ahead of me in the grocery store line' type of sighting. Even if they are legitimate sightings they don't really tell us anything helpful, beyond that she could be in that area. The cell phone call and your two likely sightings already confirm that."

Rob asked the detective, "What about the search for evidence within my house and cars; was anything found? Anything at all that would help explain what has happened to Katy and Erin?"

"Nothing at all I'm afraid. The only thing that would be nice would be if we could get fingerprints for Erin and Katy, so that we can eliminate theirs from the ones we retrieved from your house."

Rob thought about what the detective had just said, and replied, "If I can bring in items that I'm sure they have touched, would that help?"

"That might help an awful lot. If you can be sure that they have touched the items we should be able to get their prints from them. We would likely want items that would give us all of their prints from both hands, as we cannot tell which fingers have created which prints, without a reference."

Rob promised to see what he could do about obtaining items with Erin's and Katy's fingerprints on them, and said he would bring them in to the technicians as soon as he could. Rob and Detective Maki parted on very amicable terms, and as Rob left the building he felt it seemed that the detective no longer had any lingering doubts about Rob's intentions in the whole matter of his family's disappearance.

As he drove to the address that Doctor Baker had given him, Rob was already thinking about which items he could select that would be likely to provide Erin's and Katy's fingerprints. By the time he pulled up to the curb at her address he had already decided which would be the most likely ones. He had made himself a note, and was all prepared for when he got back home after this appointment.

Doctor Gloria Baker did not fit the mental image of a psychologist that Rob had arrived with. She was much younger, probably no more than 30, which was young enough that Rob wondered if she really would have the know-how and experience to offer him good advice. Her petite good looks and short blond hair contrasted sharply with his expectations. He had imagined a graying scholarly type with glasses, so he was left with the realization that stereotypes typically fell short of reality.

It turned out that this first appointment was not going to include much at all in the way of advice giving, rather he spent the entire time explaining to her what had happened over the course of the last four months. He told her everything he could think of about the disappearance of both his wife and his daughter, and her only questions were about how he had felt about things as they happened, and what he had done since these events.

His one hour appointment was over before he knew it, and her only advice to him was given as he was walking to the door with her. She told him that he needed to be as strong as he could for his family's sake, because no matter how upset he was, it was obvious that his wife and daughter would be much more affected. They were the ones who were separated from everything they knew and were comfortable with. While he was driving home all he could think of was how much fear and anxiety they must be going through. It was enough to make him feel guilty about being free to come and go as he pleased.

When Rob got home he immediately set about collecting items that could be used to obtain Erin's and Katy's fingerprints. For Katy he decided to take two of her favorite CDs in their cases, and for Erin he picked a wall-mounted collector's plate that he had seen her place on the wall using both hands. He managed to pick up these items while wearing a pair of rubber gloves, and placed them in plastic bags. When he had them secured in a box he immediately left for the police station to take them to the technicians in the investigations department. He got there just before they closed for the day.

After he was finished giving them the information and the items, Rob went upstairs to see if Detective Maki was still in the office. The man was hard at work at his desk so Rob just walked in, so that he could speak to him. Again the detective was surprised to see Rob, and asked him what brought him back to the office so soon.

"I just wanted to tell you that I brought in some items that should have my wife's and daughter's fingerprints. I've left them downstairs with the technicians. Perhaps you can give me a call when you find out if they have enough samples on those items, and if not, I will try to find some more."

Detective Maki said, "You know, with all of the work you're doing we're going to have to hire you I think." He laughed and continued, "Seriously, with you traveling around looking for your daughter and wife, there is the chance that you could actually run into the person who has one, or both, of them. That might not be so good if they are violent, since you're going into these situations completely unarmed. You should consider taking training and applying for a permit to carry a gun. If you pass a background check it would be legal in Minnesota now. It's been called 'Right to Carry' legislation."

Rob thought about this for just a moment and asked, "How long would it take to do this? I don't really want to spend a lot of time on something like that if it's going to take me away from my search for my family."

Maki searched around on his desk and pulled out a piece of paper. He read it through and then said to Rob, "There's a course this week that will run from eight to 10 p.m., Wednesday to Friday. It requires a test on Saturday morning, and if you were to pass that it would take another week to do the background check. If everything went well you could have a permit by the end of next week."

Rob thought about it for only a very short time and asked Maki, "Where will I have to sign up for this course? Do you foresee any problem in my getting a permit?"

"There should be nothing to stop you getting it if you have basic common sense. The classes are run by one of our officers in a meeting room at the Edgewater Motel and at a firing range downtown. There's a number here that you can phone to put your name on the list, if you want to do it." He handed Rob the paper he had been looking at.

Rob thanked him for letting him know about the class, and called the number using his cell phone. Within five minutes he had his name on the list for the Wednesday night class, and had been told in which room the class would be held.

Before he left Rob asked Detective Maki, "Has there been any more response to the posters I've been placing? I haven't had any calls personally."

"Nothing that means anything. We've had two calls this afternoon, but again they were of no real help. Both of the calls were from the west end of Duluth. We sent an officer to investigate one of them, but it turned out to be a case of mistaken identity. Don't worry, we'll take anything substantial very seriously," Detective Maki said.

Rob left the police station for the second time that day and headed over to his brother-in-law's. He needed to get some of the posters from him so that he could continue distributing them the next day. He intended to start covering the stretch between Duluth and Grand Marais as he hoped that maybe someone had seen Katy on her way to Grand Marais. On the way to his brother-in-law's he stopped at a fast food restaurant and had a very quick meal. There would be time for better quality meals when he wasn't as busy as today.

Jim Randall met Rob at the door when he arrived, and handed him a box full of posters. He carried a second box, and together they took them down to Rob's car and put them in the back seat. When they had them loaded in the car the two men stood beside it and talked.

"I really have to thank you for all of the work you did distributing these posters around Duluth and Superior. You've saved me a lot of time covering this area. If there are still more areas to cover this coming weekend perhaps I can get you to help me again. I'm going to start covering from here to Grand Marais in the morning."

"I'll be more than happy to help you Rob," Jim said enthusiastically. "Erin is the only sister I have, and Katy is my only niece, and I just wish I could do more."

"Well, I'm going to try and cover the north section completely in the next two days. The main area that will be left would be down to perhaps Hinckley in the South, and I wouldn't mind going maybe 50 miles to the west on 53. Considering that there was that one phone call from Grand Marais that was made by someone with Katy's phone, I really want to concentrate on that direction. I have absolutely no logical reason to think that the two of them are together, other than the way the circumstances of their disappearance match so closely. That being said though, I think that it's just the only way I can look at it," Rob said.

The two men shook hands, and Rob got in his car and headed back home. He had spent a lot of time thinking about how to continue his search, and it seemed reasonable to think that if he was right, and Erin and Katy were together, the only sensible direction to assume they had gone was north along Highway 61 towards Grand Marais. For that reason he was not going to go a long way off Highway 61 as he distributed his posters. If he was lucky, and got an early start, he might be able to cover the entire section of highway in one day.

When he got home Rob did some laundry and minor housekeeping. He had already decided to get to bed early so that he could start on the road by 6 a.m. His plan was to drive up to Grand Marais and then work his way back towards Duluth. He should be able to get there by just after eight o'clock and by then most of the businesses would be open. That way he could make the best use of his time. Wednesday was going to be a busy day, as he had his second appointment with Dr. Baker arranged for 1 p.m., and that evening would be the first class for the firearms training course. He would use Wednesday morning to finish any of the routes to the north that he didn't have time to finish Tuesday.

Rob was in bed by 9 p.m. and had set the alarm for 5 a.m., as he felt that would allow him to get away by six. He had accomplished quite a bit today and it didn't take long for him to fall asleep. As often happened, he dreamt of his wife and daughter and happier times. He felt refreshed when the alarm woke him the next morning.