Little Girl Lost

by Wendy Corsi Staub

  “It’s not like she was ever arrested or kicked out of school, but she sure didn’t worry about rules or laws or what anyone thought. She smoked whatever she felt like smoking whenever and wherever she felt like doing it. Cigarettes, pot, God knows what else. And she didn’t drink beer or mixed drinks like the rest of us. She drank Scotch.”

  “Scotch?” Barnes thinks of Perry Wayland’s penthouse bar, with its row of high-end single malt bottles.

  “The good stuff. Straight up. She never seemed drunk, though, or stoned. Gypsy was always in control, keeping an eye on things. On people. There were always a lot of guys around her. Women, too. I had a little crush on her myself, and I got the feeling it was reciprocated.”

  “So she was . . .”

  “Bisexual? I heard rumors.”

  “College campus, the seventies . . . free love, right?”

  “There was nothing that impulsive or whimsical about it. She was calculating. She knew exactly what—and whom—she wanted, and she always got it—him, her . . .”

  “So if she’d wanted Perry Wayland, even though he had a girlfriend . . .”

  “Oh, please. I knew his girlfriend. Wife, now. Those two were perfect for each other.”

  She waves her half-eaten apple toward the bins of produce along the sidewalk at a Korean market. “They were both bland as those bananas. Now, it looks like they’ve been fruitful and multiplied into a whole bunch. I saw their family picture in the paper this morning. Perry, Kirstie, and three tiny Kirsties. You’re wondering if he ran off with Gypsy Colt, right?”

  Barnes nods. “Do you know if they ever got together in college?”

  “People talked. Perry wasn’t really her type, so everyone wondered what she saw in him. No woman likes a blah guy—or girl, for that matter—unless she’s pretty blah herself.”

  “Like Kirstie Billington?”

  “Right. Gypsy couldn’t have been as interested in bananas as she was in . . .”

  “Apples?”

  She grins and takes another bite of hers. “Exactly. There were plenty of interesting people around that campus at that time. Perry Wayland wasn’t one of them. He was smart, but everyone was. Came from big money, but a lot of us did. But you could be in a room with him for an hour and you’d never notice him unless he stepped on your hand. That’s actually how I met him.”

  “He stepped on—you mean your foot, right?”

  “No, my hand. It was a crazy party. Not my usual scene, but a friend dragged me there. Not Perry’s scene, either, he said. He wanted to go back to the dorm to study, but he said Gypsy wanted him to stay.”

  “So he stayed.” Barnes nods. That sounds familiar. Even then, women were bossing Wayland around.

  “Gypsy got him to loosen up, though. She talked him into trying a hit of acid.”

  “Why?”

  “I don’t know. For kicks, I guess.”

  “And he did it?”

  “Yep. Then she got him to drive everyone out to the Cape in his car to watch the sun come up. He had this big black Cadillac convertible, and we all packed in. We went skinny-dipping at the beach. Gypsy was the first one in. It was September. She was tan with no bathing suit lines. We all noticed. Obviously, not her first time skinny-dipping.”

  “How about Perry? Did he do it?”

  “He kind of had to. But he was the last one in.”

  “Did you notice whether he had a tattoo?”

  “A tattoo?” She laughs. “No way. He was a pale, scrawny little thing, complaining about the cold water and worrying about sharks. Anyway, no one lasted long in there. We left and went to breakfast—Gypsy’s idea. Perry paid—also her idea.”

  “So she used him for his car and his cash?”

  “There were other guys with cars and cash. Way better looking, way sexier guys. But they probably weren’t so compliant.”

  “Did Kirstie know about Perry and Gypsy?”

  “If she did, she probably didn’t feel threatened. She had the pedigree. Perry would have been disinherited if he tried to marry a girl like Gypsy Colt.”

  “How do you know?”

  She turns to look at him. “Because I grew up the same way. And I didn’t marry a Perry Wayland.”

  “Your parents disinherited you?”

  “So they say. They’re still alive and kicking, so time will tell. But if they did, it’s worth it.” She flashes a small smile. “Sometimes, a fortune comes with more baggage than you’re capable of carrying for the rest of your life.”

  Before they part ways at the subway station, Andrea promises to put him in touch with someone at Brown who can share specifics about Gypsy Colt. Barnes thanks her, and she wishes him luck.

  He eyes the subway. Downtown, or up? If this case were just about a runaway millionaire, he might go up to Harlem to check on Wash. Or all the way down to Brooklyn, and his newborn daughter. But what if Wayland had something to do with those two dead women in Boston?

  At least Margaret Costello’s not in danger. She’d turned up in police custody, arrested for possession and disorderly conduct in last night’s Tompkins Square Park raid. Right now, the Butcher copycat is the least of her worries.

  Barnes spots a phone booth outside a deli, and he heads in that direction. His empty stomach is queasy from all the caffeine, but he buys a cup of coffee and gets two quarters in change. Outside, he feeds one into the phone and calls Wash. He’ll be watching cable news, and may even have an update on the Boston case before it reaches Barnes through official channels. And he might have contacts who can provide information on the Butcher’s surviving rape victims and their offspring.

  The line rings, rings, rings . . .

  “These days, I’m always home. And if I’m going to be gone for any length of time, I’ll make sure you know where to find me.”

  Barnes hangs up and retrieves the quarter that clatters into the coin return. Consulting the number scribbled on a note in his pocket, he pushes the coin back into the slot and dials the neonatal ward.

  “Hi, this is Stockton Barnes, and I’m calling to check on my daughter.” Somehow, the word rolls off his tongue, unexpected fluency in a foreign language.

  “What’s her name?”

  “Charisse Barnes.”

  “Charisse Barnes . . .”

  “Sorry! Slip of the tongue. I meant Montague.”

  “Montague Barnes?”

  “Charisse Montague.” So much for fluency.

  A pause. “I don’t see any patients here by that name.”

  “Oh, you need the patient’s name? Delia Montague.”

  “She’s the mother?”

  “Yes. And I’m the father.”

  “You said.” Another pause. He can hear bustle in the background, and phone lines ringing. “There’s no phone extension in the room, so I can’t—”

  “That’s okay, I don’t need to talk to her. I just wanted to know how the baby is doing.”

  “I can’t release that information over the phone.”

  “What? Did something happen?”

  “Sir, for all I know you might be anyone, and I can’t—”

  “I’m not anyone! I’m the father!”

  “That very well might be the case, but—”

  “It is the case. Look, just tell me if there was some kind of emergency with my daughter . . . She was just born this morning, and she was early.”

  Her tone softens slightly. “I understand your worry. I wasn’t implying that there was an emergency, just that I’m not supposed to give out information about patients’ conditions over the phone because there have been a few kidnappings in area hospitals.”

  “I know that. Can you just let me talk to Delia, then?”

  “We’re very busy here. If you’ll hold, I’ll find someone to go see if Ms. Montague can speak to you directly.”

  “Hold for how long? I’m on a pay phone.”

  “It’ll be a few minutes. Five, maybe ten . . .”

  He closes his eyes briefly, face tipped skywar
d. “Okay. I’ll call back. I just . . . I wanted to make sure Charisse is hanging in there.”

  He pauses, hoping for reassurance.

  “All right, then, goodbye.” She hangs up, and his own words echo back loud and clear.

  “I’m not anyone.”

  Barnes uses the other quarter to call Stef at the precinct.

  “Where the hell are you?”

  “Uptown chasing a lead on Gypsy Colt. She’s—”

  “Boston Homicide called. They found a cufflink at the scene. It was monogrammed PAW.”

  Perry Archibald Wayland.

  Chapter Eighteen

  Bernadette DiMeo-Anderson goes to church every weekday morning before heading to the lab where she works as a research scientist, and seven times every weekend: three masses on Saturdays and four on Sundays, including the six o’clock evening service.

  That one always feels anticlimactic, populated by people who have better things to do on Saturdays, sleep in on Sundays, yet drag themselves here out of good old-fashioned Catholic guilt inflicted by a spouse, a parent, or maybe themselves. Bernadette used to be shocked to see the younger crowd wearing jeans at that mass. Father Joe, the older of the two priests, liked to comment on that. Father Dennis, the younger one, said he was just glad everyone showed up.

  The old rules seem to be loosening up a bit, but Bernadette can imagine what her parents would have said about jeans at mass. Or about Father Dennis, who wears them himself when he’s off. Bernadette sees him around the neighborhood sometimes, and he looks just like anyone else. He always smiles and stops to chat with her.

  Father Joe never does.

  That’s because he knows.

  She told him years ago, in the confessional.

  Back then, tormented by the secrets and by familiar urges, she believed it was the right thing to do. As soon as she’d uttered her sins aloud, though, she knew it was a mistake. She could feel the judgment oozing through the mesh screen that separated her dark little booth from his; could hear it in his voice when he told her he could not absolve her sins unless she went forward and owned up to what she’d done. According to him, she had to make it right with the rest of the world, not just with him, and with God.

  “Are you going to tell?” she’d asked him, alone in the dark, clutching her rosary beads so hard her diamond dug into her palm. She was still married then, and always turned her ring around when she left the apartment, so that no one would see the large gemstone and mug her.

  “I can’t reveal what you’ve told me. I can only offer counsel and guidance to help you do the right thing.”

  Bernadette had thought the right thing was going to confession. She hadn’t realized there was more to it.

  Someday, she prays, Father Joe—or God—will absolve her. Going to early mass every morning before work and all weekend, every weekend, may or may not help. Her divorce definitely did not.

  When she left Doug, she hoped to have the marriage annulled.

  “On what grounds?” Father Joe asked, and proceeded to run through the possibilities. Fraud, bigamy, willful exclusion of children . . .

  Nothing applied. Not even that. Doug had never wanted children, and she couldn’t have them. Not anymore.

  Not since she was seventeen, when she’d perforated her uterus with a wire coat hanger.

  Doug never knew about that. He just thought she was a feminist. That’s why she’s hyphenated her name. But it’s not why she never had a baby.

  Father Joe knows about the coat hanger. Knows the rest, too.

  He never quite meets her eye when she files past him with the rest of the parishioners after mass.

  “Enjoy your weekend,” he tells everyone, standing in the doorway shaking hands. “See you next week. Enjoy your weekend . . .”

  He says the same thing to her now. He said it earlier, too, after four o’clock mass, and knows he’ll say it again tonight after the seven o’clock and another four times tomorrow.

  “Enjoy your weekend,” he tells her, grasping her warm hand in his cool, bony one, and staring at a spot beyond her left ear. “See you next week.”

  Does it count as a lie? He knows he won’t see her next week. He’ll see her in a couple of hours, unless something happens to one of them in the interim.

  She descends the steps to the street, buttoning her old wool dress coat. It’s warm—much warmer than the one she had on the night that she . . .

  But she doesn’t like to think about that, even now. So she thinks about the coat, wishing it were more fashionable. These days, everyone is wearing a straight cut, ankle-length dress coat with shoulder pads, or an oversized menswear look. Her coat is hopelessly outdated, knee-length and flared, with a belt and wide lapels. Fashion shouldn’t matter when you’re barely making ends meet as a single woman in the city. But it would be nice, she thinks, to have something new for a change.

  She hurries down Eleventh Avenue, past meandering tourists browsing restaurants for a pretheater dinner. They should have made reservations, but nobody ever seems to plan ahead.

  Nobody but Bernadette.

  That’s why she stops at the corner deli to get a paper cup of Italian wedding soup and half a ham sandwich for dinner. She’s not hungry now, but she will be after the final mass of the evening, and this deli closes early.

  “Want chips, Bernie?” asks the young man behind the register, and she shakes her head.

  “Not tonight, but thanks, Andy.” She takes the brown paper bag and heads wearily back out to the street.

  The weather is changing. The zippers on her cold-weather skirts are a little tight. If she can’t afford new clothes, then she can’t afford to gain any weight.

  Always thinking ahead . . .

  The landlord is raising her rent on January first.

  Her friend Sally, who lives in the apartment next door, is already planning to move full-time to her boyfriend’s place in the Catskills. She spends every weekend up there as it is. Bernadette feeds her cat while she’s gone, and she returns the favor whenever Bernadette leaves town for a conference. She’s going to miss Sally.

  “How about you, Bernie? How are you going to stay here?” Sally asked.

  “I can’t, unless I take a second job.”

  “I saw a sign in Macy’s the other day. They’re hiring weekend cashiers for the holidays.”

  “I’ll check it out,” Bernadette murmured, knowing it’s out of the question.

  Her Saturdays and Sundays are encompassed by church. Seven masses on weekends and five during the week might not preserve the roof over her head, or keep her from burning in hell for what she did nineteen years ago, but what other hope does she have for salvation?

  The cufflink changed everything.

  Until it turned up at the Boston murder scene, Barnes wasn’t convinced Wayland’s disappearance was connected to the murders. The newspaper clipping found in the Mercedes could have been a fluke. And the timing?

  Wayland goes missing, and women start turning up dead. So what? How many other people have vanished this week? Are they all suspects?

  But now . . .

  “It just doesn’t make sense,” Barnes tells Stef, finishing his cigarette as they cruise the Sheepshead Bay neighborhood, looking for a place to park. “How does Perry Wayland live his whole life as an upstanding citizen and then one day, just pick up and leave his family—”

  “Happens all the time.”

  “I know, but it’s the rest of it. Killing the girl a serial killer left behind twenty years ago? And her kid?”

  Stef shrugs. “You never know what people are hiding.”

  “If Wayland did something like that to his own wife, I’d understand.”

  “Yeah, she’s a real—”

  “No, just . . . it happens. Crime of passion. But how’s he connected to Tara and Emily? What does he have to do with the Brooklyn Butcher case? What triggered him to revisit it now?”

  “Stock market crashed.”

  “Except, he saw it coming
and protected himself. So if Black Monday was the trigger, it’s for another reason. And the cufflink feels off. Any other random belonging dropped at the scene—anything, loose change, a key, a glove—those things aren’t going to point to Wayland right away. But something engraved with his initials?”

  “You’re right. It seems too pat. So you think someone’s trying to frame him. Hey, there’s a spot.” He brakes and backs up.

  “That’s too small. You can’t park this tank in there.”

  “Watch me.”

  With guidance from Barnes on the curb, and considerable maneuvering, Stef does manage to wedge the sedan between a delivery truck and a Plymouth Volaré. He climbs out of the car huffing as if he’s just run a marathon, and points at a pair of striking young women talking to a man on a nearby stoop.

  “Is that the Polish chick who was just on the cover of Playboy?”

  “You mean Paulina Porizkova?” Barnes peers at the taller of the two, her long hair flowing, long limbs bared despite the chill. “She’s Czechoslovakian, by the way.”

  “Same difference.”

  “No, it’s not the same dif—”

  “Whatever. That’s her.”

  “No, it’s not!”

  Stef turns to look at him. “You never got that hot dog, kid.”

  “What?”

  “You skipped lunch. Low blood sugar. It makes you crabby.”

  “I’m not—”

  “Go in there and get yourself a bag of chips.” He points to a small Ukrainian grocery on the corner. “Make it two—I want barbecue—and a Diet Coke. I’ll wait here.” He leans against the car hood, facing the two young women.

  Not hungry, but glad for a momentary reprieve, Barnes heads into the store.

  A blonde woman greets him somewhat warily from behind the counter. A little boy kneels on the floor nearby. He shares her high cheekbones and coloring but not her reticence, impishly brandishing a ragged stuffed animal with a mock-ferocious roar.

  “Uh-oh, buddy. Looks like a fierce . . . what is he, a bear?” Barnes asks the child.

  The mother is beside them in a flash, with a protective hand on the boy’s shoulder.

  “What you need finding, mister?”

  “Just a snack, and a Diet Coke.”