by Sam Hayes
‘You done it now, you stupid idiot. What you go and do that for?’ Brenna leans on the door frame and gestures at the mess. She’s trying to detach herself from her brother, his actions, their lives, herself. Brenna doesn’t know how to help him, but like me, she knows this is bad. She knows that Gradin is disturbed by a secret he’s struggling to keep to himself. It was the guilt, not Gradin, that did this to my kitchen.
Ed uprights a kitchen chair and bends the teen on to it. ‘Stay there and don’t move.’ Gradin is so scared he can’t even breathe, let alone run for it. Murray stands guard, but I can see he really needs to help Julia, who is still on the floor. Ed crouches at my side and takes a deep breath. ‘Mary . . . Mary,’ he pleads.
In my head, I sing: Quite contrary . . .
MURRAY
I pick up her shoe. I pick up her bracelet, likewise her cardigan, her hairband and the pile of snotty tissues that lie strewn around her. Then, piece by devastated piece, I pick up Julia.
‘Mummy, are you OK?’ Alex always calls her ‘Mum’. He strokes her limp wrist. Julia flinches briefly.
‘Mummy’s upset about Flora,’ I tell him, and swallow the knot of fear that’s worked its way up my gullet since Ed left Northmire with Gradin. ‘And all this mess doesn’t help either.’
‘I can clean it up,’ Alex offers, and briefly I smile.
Instructing Alex to take charge – because I believe in second chances – I shrug into my coat. ‘Look after your mother, son. Keep her and your grandma warm and make them a drink. If you can find a cup. Don’t answer the door unless it’s me or Uncle Ed, and stay near the telephone. I’m going to find your sister.’ I pat his shoulder, then opt for a kiss on the head.
‘Go, Dad!’ Alex cheers as I leave the house. A second later I return for the car keys. I wink at Alex and blow a silent kiss at Julia. It gives me the shock of my life, but she blows one right back.
Ed is in his office, alone, smoking, bent over his computer as it rattles through a search. He looks up when I walk straight in. ‘Is the desk sergeant asleep again?’
‘It’s all right. He did his job.’ I sit down opposite, entering Ed’s frustrated cop zone of smoke and despair. ‘You look nearly as bad as me.’
‘I have an entire team out there searching for Flora. It’s headed by one of the area’s best detectives. I’ve requested special police abduction experts to join the case. They’ll be here in the morning. And Murray, I’m ordering a wider search of the river for tomorrow afternoon.’ Ed hangs his head.
‘She’s not dead,’ I say.
‘It will have been a couple of days by then, and if she did have an accident and fall into the water, then . . .’ he looks away, ‘then decomposition will bring her to the surface. It’s the earliest we could expect that to happen. I’m sorry, Murray.’
No one should be sorry. Not yet. That word, that single word, brings me to my feet with my hands slammed firmly on Ed’s desk. ‘She’s alive,’ I say, my voice as tight as a noose. ‘Just find her.’ And as if by magic, Ed’s computer ceases its rattling search and spews up a list of names. At the very top of it is Dr David Carlyle.
I pull the small metal flask from my jacket pocket but it’s empty. I chuck it on the desk and it skids on to the floor. ‘There’s some Scotch in the filing cabinet if you’re in need.’ Ed looks like he could use one himself.
‘No. Nothing. I don’t need anything.’ My body is screaming for a drink. It will help me concentrate. It will help me piece all this together with Ed, who has agreed to let me stay on at the station. Any news about Flora and we’ll be the first to know. ‘Tell me again what the computer searched for.’ A grizzled batch of eighty-four known criminals and suspects slides up and down Ed’s monitor as he plays with the mouse, thinking, pondering.
‘Local offenders, ex-cons, anyone released from custody living within a ten-mile radius of Northmire. Some of these names go way back.’
‘But not Carlyle’s,’ I say. ‘He’s new to the area.’
‘That’s where you’re wrong.’ Ed pours two Scotches anyway. ‘Technically I’m off duty so this doesn’t count. And technically I shouldn’t be talking about Carlyle.’
I slide the tumbler of whisky away. ‘Not for me.’ I shift my chair to get a better view of the computer monitor. I will not drink. There is something bigger in my life now.
For a second, Ed is protective of the screen and he tries to tilt it away. The files are confidential. Maybe it’s because he understands my pain as a father that he finally twists the monitor so I can see it and allows me to take control of the mouse.
‘I shouldn’t be telling you this either, but Carlyle was tried on suspicion of rape back in the seventies.’ A mug shot of him resolves on the screen. ‘I’m sorry I had to keep that from you and Julia.’ He shudders as the Scotch hits his throat. ‘Jesus, I shouldn’t be telling you now, but under the circumstances . . .’ Ed sinks his head into his palms.
I am stunned. I stare alternately at Carlyle’s face and the tumbler of whisky. Neither is attractive. ‘He’s got a violent history?’ I stand up; sit down again. ‘Rape? Why didn’t I know about this? I’m his damned lawyer.’ Not a very good one, it would seem.
‘Nineteen seventy-six. He was acquitted on two charges. The complainant cried rape but Carlyle insisted it was consensual and the jury agreed. There was an assault charge as well but the records are patchy. I can’t find any details of what kind of assault supposedly took place. Anyway, it appears there wasn’t enough evidence to secure a conviction on that either.’ Ed knocks back the shot in one. ‘Don’t feel bad, Murray. Why would Carlyle tell anyone about his previous charges if he didn’t have to, even if he was acquitted?’ He paces the room, leaving footprints of guilt because he hadn’t spoken up, because he hadn’t warned Julia. ‘And don’t think we haven’t paid him a visit since Flora went missing. He was top of my list.’ Ed answers my next question. ‘No sign of him.’
Carlyle was with Julia the morning Flora went missing, I want to say. And I want to grab Ed by the collar and demand why he didn’t warn us earlier about these charges. But all I can manage is, ‘Who was he supposed to have raped?’ A sick feeling sweeps through me.
Ed’s face snags with worry lines. ‘I don’t know. Not without a judge’s warrant, and that takes time. An anonymity law was passed in the seventies protecting the identity of women who claimed rape. It was meant to encourage more women to report the crime; meant to secure more convictions. Whoever it was, speaking up didn’t do her any good. Anyway, this is hardly relevant to finding Flora.’
‘I suppose not,’ I say, mulling over this incredible news.
‘Look, Murray, I arrested Carlyle because of pretty strong evidence in the Covatta case. The CPS chucked it out when the DNA evidence, my best shot at a trial, didn’t stack up. The samples harvested were from a third party. Not Carlyle, in other words. And there was no way the Crown Prosecution was buying the previous allegations as current evidence. The man was acquitted back then. Believe me, I’ll get justice for Grace and her family, but not before I’ve found my niece. If I’m honest, I don’t think Carlyle’s got anything to do with her. What would he want with an eight-year-old girl?’
‘That’s where you’re wrong. There’s a common denominator here, Ed, and we’re overlooking it.’
‘We? When did law school start giving out police badges?’
I ignore him. ‘It’s Julia. My wife, your sister-in-law. She’s the one person that links all these incidents. Think about it.’
‘Murray, just so you know, before you go any further, I was running this computer search for another detective working on a different case. Carlyle heads the bill because he’s the most recent arrest with certain other credentials in this locality. This wasn’t for Flora’s case.’
‘I said think about it!’ I didn’t mean to yell. ‘Grace Covatta is assaulted. Who finds her? Julia. Which school does the girl attend? The one Julia teaches at. Christ, Grace is even in her English class.
With me so far?’ I pause; fight away the urge as the Scotch catches my eye. I turn away. ‘Carlyle is arrested for assaulting Grace, and who is he dating? Julia. While all this is going on, Mary Marshall – Julia’s mother – refuses to speak, and the last person she saw before she was struck dumb, apart from the foster kids in her care, was David Carlyle. A little girl goes missing, and who does she belong to? Ju-li-a Marshall .’ I couldn’t say it any clearer.
Ed is silent. Calmly he sits beside me and stares at Carlyle’s computer file. ‘Déjà vu?’ I suggest. ‘Carlyle walking away, free as a bird yet again?’ I’m gasping for air – knowing I’m drowning, knowing how to swim, but my hands and feet are tied. Above me I see Flora’s face, begging me to save her.
‘I suggest you find a friendly judge to get you a warrant,’ I continue. ‘We need to know who it was Carlyle raped thirty years ago.’ A sick feeling spreads through my entire being as I remember what Chrissie said about the treatment plan set out for Mary.
But my thoughts are interrupted when Ed’s phone rings. Connected or not to the disappearance of my daughter, I want Carlyle put away – away from my family for good.
Ed hangs up. ‘There’s been a possible sighting of Flora near Hogan’s Lane. A woman is being brought in to the station to make a statement.’
‘Hogan’s Lane,’ I say, chewing over the name although not initially remembering why it should sound familiar. ‘Hogan’s Lane . . . Get me a map.’
In a second, a detailed map of the area is on Ed’s screen. ‘Now tell me I’m crazy.’ I jab my finger at the monitor. ‘Hogan’s Lane. Carlyle’s house.’
JULIA
How am I supposed to do anything? How am I supposed to do nothing?
‘Alex, do you know anything at all that could help find Flora? Was she behaving strangely when Dad left you on the boat?’ I’ve asked him a thousand times already. Alex is pale and shivering and his eyes have dark rings round them. He is sitting opposite Mum beside the kitchen fire, which went out hours ago. I am crunching through the wreckage of Gradin’s outburst as if maintaining constant movement will help find Flora. But it just wears me out.
An entire day and night without Flora.
To stop myself thinking about where she is at this precise moment, I rummage through Mum’s kitchen cupboards and find a bottle of cooking sherry.
‘If it works for your father, then it’ll work for me too.’ I glare at Alex when he stares at me, shocked. I don’t even bother to use a glass – there aren’t any – and neck straight from the bottle. I choke, but a couple of decent swigs later the alcohol loosens my thoughts enough to figure out a plan.
‘I’m going to David’s house,’ I say, wondering if I’m already over the limit. I crouch down next to Mum, deliberately pushing my face near hers. I swear she recoils from my breath. ‘Will you be OK while Alex and I are out?’ I glare at the woman in whom I have placed my trust for the last thirty years. She is a stranger. I take her shoulders and shake her. ‘Mum, do you understand me? I need to be with David for a while. Can’t you just say one word, for Christ’s sake? You owe me that.’ Through her pupils, I see a thousand thoughts flashing in her mind. If only she would translate them into words. It makes me think I’m going mad, but as we leave, I swear I hear her say Goodbye.
The Land Rover is ancient and probably hasn’t been started up in years. It’s a long shot, I admit, but I’m desperate. It sits in the barn looking as if it was last used in the Second World War. Mum doesn’t go out of the village very often, and then she usually takes the bus. ‘We’ll damn well walk if we have to.’ Murray has taken my car because his is still being repaired.
The keys were always left in the ignition, and after all these years I half expect them to either be lost or rusted solid. Alex climbs in beside me. I remember as a kid it was a treat to ride in the Land Rover. Sometimes Murray and Nadine would come with us, their mother having packed a picnic. We’d bump along, singing, the canvas roof rolled up under our feet, our hair tangling, Mum smiling from within her headscarf.
Miraculously, oddly, the key turns, and after a couple of attempts the vehicle starts as if it’s used every day. ‘Thank God,’ I say, and leap out again to fling open the huge wooden doors of the barn. The headlights form two cones in the dark winter afternoon; beacons for Flora as we trundle down the lane towards David’s house.
A family constantly changes, I told myself. It was nothing to worry about. These things were sent to try us. Good times out of bad. I jollied myself along because essentially things were happy in our household.
Flora fitted right in at her new school. She was learning fast and had made new friends. Alex was picked for his school football team, I’d been promoted at work and taken on extra hours, while Murray was getting stuck into his new job. His boss was a powerful woman, clearly keen for him to do well.
On that wave of hope, the relief that my family was settled, content, doing what families do best – muddling through the days in a blur of homework, cooking, bills and washing – Murray went and kicked a hole in it all by drinking even more. Were we too settled for him? Was family life just too content, forcing him to smudge it out with Scotch every night, every day, every morning?
‘You need help, Murray. More than I can give you.’ It splashed the tiles, my clothes, the floor, as I glugged two nearly full bottles down the sink. I’d found them amongst the kids’ outdoor toys in the garden shed. ‘Get help or get out.’ That was the first time I threatened divorce. I would need to say it a thousand times more before he finally believed me.
Over the years, I tried everything to stop Murray drinking. We went to group meetings together but he refused to speak about his problem. I booked counselling but he didn’t show up. I took the kids and went to stay at Northmire for a week, but when I came back, the house was full of empty bottles. I tried talking to him about it but we ended up fighting. I tried ignoring it, but he still drank and drank.
‘You saved me from drowning, Murray. I want to do the same for you.’ If I didn’t know the reason why he drank, I stood no chance of being able to fix things.
‘It’s simple,’ he once said, although back then I didn’t understand. ‘I’m so frightened, so terrified that I’ll wake up one morning and it’ll all be gone. All this.’ He had tears in his eyes. We were in our kitchen. The kids were scoffing food. Murray spread his hands wide around the room, around all of us. Back then, I didn’t know what he meant.
‘He was right,’ I say over and over. ‘He was right, he was right, he was right.’ I’m crying, hardly able to see the road ahead as Alex and I speed to David’s house, to sanctuary.
‘Who was right?’
‘Your dad. He was right about it being the most terrifying thing in the world. Enough to drive him to drink.’
‘Mum, what are you talking about?’ Alex is concerned about me. I am crying, sobbing, driving, talking nonsense.
‘I understand him now, really I do.’ I pull the Land Rover back on course as my blurred vision takes me on to the verge. ‘About how losing all this is so terrifying that you can’t stand to think about it. That’s why he had to take the edge off his life. It was simply too good.’
‘Losing what? What was too good?’
‘All of this, all of us. Our family. Dad, Flora, you, me. Tell me we can’t be the only ones left, Alex?’
MURRAY
The car sits slewed to a halt in the mud, blocking the top of Hogan’s Lane. I leave the headlights on because down here it’s pitch black.
‘Flora! ’ I scream, praying that somehow the vibrations of my voice, my need, my fear will get through to her. I regret not waiting to hear the woman’s statement at the police station. She would have given a more precise location. The lane is several miles long, and being so familiar with the waterways, I know the River Cam snakes very close to here.
I stop and stare out into the night. For all I know, the woman could have seen Flora yesterday. For all I know, it wasn’t even Flora she saw.
When the light from the car peters out, I rely on my torch. I’m still on the lane, trudging down the wet verge, flashing the light in a wide arc, not missing any spot. Several times my heart skips at the shining discs of animal eyes; several times I lunge at the hedgerow in case my daughter is hiding there. If I have to, I’ll search the entire world with a flashlight to find her.
I pick up speed, running down the lane, and ahead I see a bridge; a familiar bridge, one that I passed under on Alcatraz not so long ago. In my mind I form a mental map. I am near the river. If this is the bridge with the yellow graffiti on its side, then – I stop running in order to concentrate – then over there, right across those two or three fields is . . . My heart skids into overdrive.
‘So over there,’ I whisper into the night, ‘is David Carlyle’s house.’ In response, an owl flaps from a tree, scaring the life out of me.
I point the torch in the direction of his property. I can’t see a thing. I continue down to the bridge, and before I can pick out the arched brickwork by torchlight, I spot the jagged shapes of the graffiti spray-paint on the bridge. In my mental map, I recall the head of the tiny lane where I left the car when I illicitly visited Carlyle’s place. I leg it back up the road to fetch Julia’s car.
Wherever I turn, Carlyle is always there.
Five minutes later, with the car left in the gateway the other side of the river, I’m striding down the remainder of the lane to David’s house. There are two criss-crossed squares of light in the blackness.
In the front garden, I pick my way across frozen flower borders to get a glimpse through the small gap in the curtains. I press my face close to the cold glass.
