The orange tint that colored the air signaled that the day was coming to an end, and that the night would be taking over soon. Even though the two detectives had managed to gather a lot of information in just one day, Mayhew thought that there were still a few more things that could be done before the day came to an end.
As he walked between the old and decrepit buildings of the town, Mayhew couldn't help but glance around the alleyways that passed by with a focused eye.
'If I could bet on one place for that drunk woman to be wobbling around, then I would bet on one of these alleyways.'
But as the detective passed more and more alleyways, he simply saw no sign of the drunk woman that he had talked to in the morning. So after some time, Mayhew gave up on trying to find her—for today at least.
After some more silent walking, the hazel-eyed detective would stagger slightly as he felt the path below his feet change gradually.
'Looks like I am entering the so called: Sunny Glade Park.'
The thick concrete slowly became thinner and narrower. All around him, the collapsing Soviet-style buildings became less and less—until there were no more. The roads disappeared as well, and all of that space was instead covered by short green grass that was drowning in piles of shallow snow.
Mayhew looked around the area with a slight frown on his face.
'I wish I had brought Margret with me.'
Mayhew usually wasn't the one to sense unseen danger, that was his partner's job after all. So it came as a shock to him that when he looked around this area, he felt a strange sense of dread loom over him.
This dread...what was it?
Did he forget something? Was someone looking at him and he just hadn't noticed them yet? Maybe he was just paranoid because of all of the missing person reports pointed to this park as the main disappearing area.
If only Margret had been here. With her intuition, she would have figured something out with this feeling.
Whatever the case was—whether alone or not, Mayhew had to take a look around the park.
So that's what he did.
The middle-aged detective walked deeper and deeper into the park, and only after walking for thirty minutes or so did he realise just how big the park actually was.
Gazing around the snow-covered grassy field, the detective wasn't surprised by the lack of people considering what time it was. However, there were still a few people that he could see in the distance.
A group of people especially caught his eye. The detective could see that they were sitting on wooden benches, and he could also tell that the group was doing...something, with their hands. Mayhew wasn't quite sure what exactly they were doing but their hand movement seemed very deliberate and calculated.
Just as the detective turned his body toward the group of men, ready to make his way to them, the voice of a child reached his ear and instantly made him stop dead in his tracks.
"Mama!"
Turning toward the area where the sound had come from, the detective quickly spotted the person that had cried out for their mother.
It was a little girl, no more than 10 years old. She was sitting on the snowy grass, crying. And just a few meters in front of her, the edge of a massive forest watched her in silence.
The Starego Dębu forest.
A small defenseless girl crying alone whilst standing just a few meters away from the forest edge. This scenario could not be any more perfect for a serial killer lurking nearby. Though thankfully enough, Mayhew had spotted the child first.
As the detective walked toward the crying child, he couldn't help but stare at the 'Old Oak Forest' as it would be called in English. Mayhew could feel a cold breeze brush against his body as he approached the tree line, and that made goosebumps involuntarily appear on his skin.
It wasn't strange for there to be a breeze coming specifically from the forest, considering that in the distance where the forest ended, there was a row of mountains standing firm. Mountains were a natural area for strong winds to generate after all.
Still though, the breeze did make Mayhew worry about the child's health. What if she had caught a cold? Was there even a working hospital here?
These questions made his steps just a little faster.
"Hey there, are you alright?"
Hearing the polite voice of the middle-aged detective, the girl turned around wiping her tears with the back of her hand.
"N-no. I want m-my mama. Where is she?"
Mayhew smiled and knelt beside the child.
"To be honest with you, I don't know where she is. But if you could answer some of my questions, I am certain that I can find her. Can you do that?"
Nodding her trembling head, the girl said:
"I-i can. Yes I can!"
Mayhew nodded with a warm smile.
"Well firstly, how about you tell me your name. And your last name would also help."
The girl did not linger with her answer.
"I'm Elżbieta—Elżbieta Pawlak."
Mayhew pulled out his notepad and pretended to write the information in a professional manner. This little gesture made the little child—Elżbieta Pawlak, calm down just a little.
Looking up at the middle-aged man, the child's eyes now seemed filled with interest.
Looking back at her with a gentle smile, the detective spoke.
"Your eyes are better now. Keep them this way. The brighter the better."
The little girl did not seem to understand what the hazel-eyed detective was talking about and instead spoke her own mind.
"Hey mister, are you like...a detective?"
Mayhew put his notepad down and scratched the back of his head.
"Well I was hoping to keep my cover up for just a little longer, but it seems that you saw right through it, good job. Yes, I am a private detective."
Elżbieta's tears were now all but dried and an engaged expression was now stuck on her small face.
"So you go around and find bad people who try to hide, right?"
The detective tipped down an imaginary hat.
"That's me."
The girl was now fully smiling. And seeing her smile and seeing her eyes shine, made the detective's own eyes light up.
"Well young lady, how about you tell me your mother's name so I can get you to her as quickly as—"
"Can you find the monster hiding in the forest?"
...
There was silence.
And even more silence after that.
Looking back at the little girl who was still smiling innocently—Mayhew's smile dimmed slightly.
"I'm sorry I didn't quite catch that, what did you want me to find?"
The girl glanced back at the forest and then once more at the detective before answering.
"The monster in the forest. He really scares me and my friends, so can you find it and teach it a lesson?"
Mayhew's smile that had once dimmed was now completely gone, replaced by a very deep frown.
Placing a hand on the girl's shoulder, the detective spoke to her—his tone now being slightly cold.
"A monster huh? That's funny. There is no need for you to worry about such things, because they don't exist. In this world, there are only humans and animals. Which is why we as people need to take care of each other even if we don't want to. Monsters...they don't exist."
Glancing at the detective's hand, the little girl's smile was now gone as well, replaced by a slightly uncomfortable expression.
"B-but my friends saw—"
His hand slightly tightened on her shoulder.
"They were lying...and that's okay. Yea it's not a good thing to lie, but we as humans have to forgive them and see the positive. And the positive is that your friends, despite being liars are still people just like us. They have a light in their eyes—even if small, they still have it."
The little girl now seemed very much concerned and moved her tiny hand over to the detective's hand, which was still clenching her shoulder.
"M-mister, can we find my mama now. I-i am scared."
Seeing the frightened little girl, Mayhew lingered for a moment.
Then, he slowly removed his hand from her shoulder and stood up.
Regaining a bit of his calmness back, the hazel-eyed detective looked down with slight guilt in his eyes.
"Sorry about that Elżbieta, I got a little carried away. Yea, we can go find your—"
Only in the middle of his sentence did he realise that the small girl had disappeared.
He whipped his head around in worry, but that concern was quickly abolished as he spotted the child running in the distance.
And she was not just running to nowhere, she was running toward a black-haired woman that seemed to be in her early thirties.
Looking at the daughter and mother reunite in the distant grassy field, Mayhew wanted to smile.
But he couldn't, since he had just done something that he wasn't proud of.
'I shouldn't have been that direct with her. I frightened the poor girl.'
And the matter of fact is that he usually never was that direct with a child. This was something that he himself couldn't quite understand why he did it.
'...No time to linger on it though. I'm on limited time.'
The sun was already dangerously close to being eaten by the distant mountains, and once that happened, the night would commence.
Turning his head toward a certain group of people that he had spotted earlier, the detective began to walk toward them.
Though before leaving, he did glance one more time at the forest tree line.