Kathy Keating, a cute blonde from Chicago he barely knew, said, "Are you all right?" Looking concerned. Like he had inoperable cancer. She was standing at the front desk, talking to Canzio. He was sitting in a chair behind the desk in the school lobby. Canzio was about five six, a Roman with a Caesar haircut and long sideburns, Chip thought he looked like an extra in a spaghetti western.
"We're so glad you're safe," said Beth, a pale dark-haired goth from Boston he'd seen around the BU campus. She was shuffling through her mail.
Chip glanced at Brianna. "What's going on?"
Brianna shrugged and shook her head. Trish walked through the lobby and didn't say anything to anyone, still angry McCabe didn't go with them.
"Dude, what's good?" said Cody Gorman, a six-foot-four surfer from Huntington Beach, California. "Where you been?"
"Messina," Chip said.
"Bitchin'," Cody said. "Catch any sick waves, or was it mush?"
"Mushburger, dude," Chip said, using one of the five words of surfer slang Cody had taught him.
Canzio stood up and said, "Signor Chip, I am so glad to see you. Are you all right? I must notify Signor Rady at once."
He picked up the phone, punched in a number.
"Signor Tallenger has return." He listened. "Young Signor Tallenger. Si, just now."
He hung up the phone, glanced up at Chip.
"Signor Rady say to tell you he will be right here."
"For what?" Chip said. What was going on?
Canzio said, "To see you. Are you hurt?"
"Why would I be hurt?" It was really getting crazy.
Canzio said, "Do you need medical attention?"
"No, I need my mail."
Canzio said, "Yes, of course." He turned and took three envelopes out of Chip's mail slot and handed them to him.
Frank Rady appeared now, entering the lobby, walking fast, coming toward him.
"I called your father. He's on his way. We never gave up hope. "
"We went to Messina," Chip said. "Spent the weekend on the beach."
His dad, Mr Rady and the Rome cop, Captain Ferrara, all had their eyes glued to him, staring with somber expressions. They were sitting at a small round table in Rady's office, and Chip felt claustrophobic. He moved his chair back to give himself more room.
Rady said, "Why didn't you sign out? You know it's mandatory, school policy."
He was trying to deflect any blame, cover his ass.
"I did," Chip said.
"What're you talking about?" his dad said. He was wearing a crisp white dress shirt with his initials, CET, Charles Erickson Tallenger, on the right cuff, as always. Erickson was Chip's grandmother's maiden name.
"When students leave campus for an extended period of time — weekends included — they're supposed to fill out a form and give it to whoever’s at the front desk," Frank Rady said. "So we know where our students are going, where they're at."
"I gave it to Franco," Chip said. "Thursday through Sunday — Messina, Sicily."
"We have no record of it," Rady said.
There was no record because Chip forgot to do it. His word against Franco's. Who were they going to believe?
"We tried your cell phone," his dad said.
"I misplaced it," Chip said.
"You misplaced it, or lost it? What's that, the third one this year?"
There was his dad on his case, giving him a hard time as usual. He decided not to tell him he dove off a cliff into the Mediterranean and the phone was in his pocket and he didn't realize it. That would've sounded even dumber.
Now Captain Ferrara, who hadn't spoken, said, "If they did not kidnap young Signor Tallenger, who do they have?" He stared at Chip when he said it.
"I don't know," Chip said.
"Maybe they didn't kidnap anyone," his dad said. "They tell us they've got Chip and we don't know where he is, can't reach him so we believe it."
'I was just thinking," Chip said. "It could be McCabe."
His dad looked at him now, waiting for an explanation.
"He was supposed to go with us," Chip said, "and never showed."
"Find out if McCabe's here," his dad said to Rady. "That shouldn't be too difficult, should it?"
Rady got up and walked out the room. "What do you think?" his dad said to Captain Ferrara. "They have someone. They are not bluffing. But if the school did not know your son's travel plan, how would the kidnappers?"
Fifteen minutes later Frank Rady came back in the room and said McCabe had missed his Italian class Thursday evening. He hadn't checked out and hadn't picked up his mail since Wednesday. No one working the front desk could remember seeing him for a few days.
It wasn't conclusive, but it didn't look good, either. "Captain, what do you suggest we do?" "There is nothing we can do. We wait and see."