The Child

by Fiona Barton

  “Both the Sarahs live just near the industrial estate, but I haven’t seen them since I had my tubes tied.”

  Kate nodded with a sympathetic wince. The level of instant intimacy always astonished her. She’d met this woman half an hour ago and she now knew her reproductive history.

  “Took ages to get over,” Toni said. “They said I’d be out of bed in two days, but was I, buggery?”

  “Poor you,” Kate said—the catchall phrase for halting an interviewee in his or her unwanted reminiscences.

  “What about Jill and Gemma?” she prodded Toni back on track.

  “Oh, they married and moved to Kent or Essex, I think. God, I haven’t thought about them for years. We were all so close then, but we just lost touch. I moved to west London for a few years when I got my first office job, and that’s all it takes, isn’t it? The ground closes over you. When I came back, they’d gone and I was married.”

  “I know.” Kate stirred her cup sympathetically. “What about the others in the photo? The girl who fancied your brother?”

  “Harry? Oh yes. Don’t know where she went either. Nothing would surprise me. I’m not being much of a help, am I?”

  “Nonsense. You’ve been brilliant. Thanks so much, Toni. You’ve been a godsend.”

  Toni grinned back at her. “Loved it. It’s got my juices flowing and I think I’ll try to set up a reunion. A return to 1985. I’ll go on Facebook and find them all.”

  “Let me know who you hear from, then,” Kate said. She would look on Facebook herself, but she knew Toni would have a better chance of finding and hearing back from the disco girls. “And make sure you invite me. I love a boogie.”

  Toni squeaked and started doing a hand jive.

  FORTY-SEVEN

  Angela

  THURSDAY, APRIL 12, 2012

  It was Nick who answered the door to the officers. He’d come home for lunch and to pick up a bill he’d left on the hall table. He never used to come home in the day; he preferred a packed lunch or a sausage roll from the bakery round the corner—but since the news about their baby, he made excuses to pop back. Angela suspected he wanted to keep an eye on her.

  He’d cried with her when she told him they’d found Alice. He’d come home that day to find Angela sitting in a silent house. No radio or television on to keep her company, as usual. And she’d looked at him and he’d known.

  “It’s her, isn’t it? Our baby,” he’d said. And he’d cried as if he’d never stop.

  “I never thought we’d find her, Angie,” he’d sobbed. “It all felt unreal, all these years. I began wondering if we’d even had a baby. I mean, I only held her once before she was gone. I thought it was my punishment for hurting you.

  “I am so sorry, Angie. So sorry for everything.”

  She’d shushed him. But she felt deeply shaken for him—it was the first time he’d said anything so nakedly honest about his feelings for their first daughter. Or about his guilt. He’d never said anything like this before—not even in their darkest early days—and she wondered if she had made it impossible for him to be open with her. Her anger and all-consuming grief had filled every corner of the house. He’d had to be the strong one. But what had been going on in his head for all those years?

  Angela felt she was rediscovering her husband and the marriage that might have been if . . .

  She’d rocked him back to calmer waters until they both quieted.

  “Now what?” he’d said, looking at her. “What’s going to happen now?”

  “The police are coming to talk to us tomorrow. They’re going to try to find out who took our baby, love.”

  “How will they? After all this time?”

  “I don’t know, Nick. But at least we know where she is. Alice.”

  They’d rung the children straightaway, before the news leaked out. Patrick had listened in silence as his two played up about bedtime in the background.

  “God, Mum. I can’t take it in,” he’d said finally. “Where was the body found? Woolwich? That’s miles away. How did it get there?” he said.

  Concentrating on the facts, she thought.

  Louise had burst into tears, as Angela knew she would.

  “How are you feeling, Mum? How’s Dad? You must be in pieces,” she said. “I’ll come round now.”

  Their daughter had obviously rung Patrick because he arrived just after his sister and stood awkwardly in the doorway as Louise and Angela hugged and cried again.

  When they had stopped and everyone had sat down, Angela told them the story of Alice’s abduction again. It was the first time in twenty years it had been mentioned in the family—Nick had told Angela to stop upsetting the children with it and she’d complied. But that night, everything could be spoken about. Apart from Nick’s betrayal. She wondered if Nick might confess it to them himself. It was his secret after all. But he didn’t. Some things were probably best left unsaid.

  “So it’s going to be in the papers tomorrow?” Patrick had asked. “Will we get reporters coming to the house?”

  “I don’t know, Paddy,” Angela said. “I hope not, but if they do, you don’t have to say anything. Just ask them to contact the police.”

  “Oh, Mum, this is going to be so awful for you,” Louise said. “Do you want me to come and stay?”

  “We’ll be fine, love,” Nick had said firmly. “We’ve coped with losing Alice all these years. We can cope with this.”

  But he’d started coming home at lunchtime, pretending to have left something or that he’d just been passing. She loved him for it.

  • • •

  The Family Liaison Officer, a sweet-faced woman called Wendy Turner, rang them each morning with an update or a question, and Nick was relaxed when he went to the door.

  “Oh, hello, Wendy. How are you?” Angela heard him say, and she poured his soup back in the pan.

  “Didn’t expect you, Andy. You’d both better come through. Angie is in the kitchen.”

  DI Sinclair came in first and Angela pulled out a chair for him without speaking. Detective Constable Turner stood with her back against the counter.

  “Sorry to come unannounced,” DI Sinclair said. “But I wanted to bring you both up-to-date with the investigation.”

  He sounded formal, and Angela sat down across from him with Nick standing behind her, his hands on her shoulders.

  “What is it?” she asked.

  “Well, we’ve established that Alice’s body was buried in Howard Street in the 1980s. We know this because of the history of the site and forensic analysis of the debris around her body,” he said.

  Angela went to speak but Nick stopped her. “Let Andy finish, love,” he said quietly.

  “I know this must be distressing for you both. But we are doing everything we can to find out what happened to Alice. I just want to reassure you of that.”

  Nick spoke first. “Thank you for telling us, Andy. Will this help you find Alice’s kidnapper?”

  “It might,” the officer said. “We’ll be looking at who moved into the terrace in Howard Street in the early eighties. It’s at least ten years closer to today so people’s memories may be clearer.”

  “Who would bury a body after ten years?” Angela said.

  “We don’t know,” DI Sinclair said. “Not yet.”

  FORTY-EIGHT

  Kate

  FRIDAY, APRIL 13, 2012

  Kate filed the new story about Alice at 9:07. She’d had it written the day before—as soon as she’d put the phone down on DI Sinclair. But she’d waited to phone Angela for a quote that morning—“We don’t know what to think. We are just glad she’s been found,” she’d said. Kate had given the story a final tweak after the officer rang to give her the go-ahead at 8:40.

  “Go easy on the headline, Terry,” she said as she reread her copy over his sho
ulder. “Let’s not go too gruesome. Think of the parents . . .”

  Terry had quickly typed “Zombie Baby Rises from Grave,” laughed at Kate’s expression, and deleted it.

  “Just kidding, Kate. How about ‘Alice Buried Ten Years After Kidnap’?”

  Kate nodded grumpily. She knew he’d add “Shocking Revelation by Alice Cops” or something equivalent when she’d moved away but watched as he clicked the copy through.

  “Okay, link tweeted and headline posted on Facebook, publishing on the website now. It’s a good story, Kate. And exclusive for the next thirty seconds. Anyway, what the hell’s gone on there? Shoebox under the bed? In the freezer? What made them decide to bury the body at all?”

  “Good question, Terry. Andy Sinclair says there isn’t enough material to say if the body was mummified from being aboveground or had been buried and dug up. A lot of this is going to be guesswork. They’re concentrating on tracing people who came to live in Howard Street in the early eighties.”

  “Okay. Assume you are, too?” Terry said.

  “Of course,” Kate said. “Going out on it now.”

  • • •

  Joe had found Alistair St. John Soames listed in a flat in Peckham.

  “There’s no Mrs. Soames, unless she’s a foreigner and not on the electoral roll,” he said conversationally, as they drove past dozens of practically identical fried chicken shops.

  Kate’s sons collected the names of fried chicken shops—it had started as a joke, but they had a list of over 120 by now—but she decided not to share such family minutiae with Joe.

  “Doesn’t seem to have held on to his money,” she observed. “This is where poverty lives, round here.”

  Good. He might be more cooperative if he thinks there could be some cash in it, she thought.

  There were five doorbells to choose from at the address, each bearing a faded name on a piece of card.

  “Can you make these out?” she said, peering at them. “Can you see ‘Soames’?”

  Joe’s younger eyes deciphered the writing and Kate pressed the bell for flat 4. There was silence.

  She waited and then rang again. Nothing.

  “Once more for luck,” she said and pressed long and hard then did a couple of staccato dings for emphasis. “That’d wake the dead,” she said.

  There was a crackle and an angry voice barked: “Stop ringing my bell. Who the hell are you?”

  “Mr. Soames? I’m from the Daily Post. I wondered if I could have a word.”

  “The Daily Post? What do you want?”

  “I’m doing a piece on the discovery of Alice Irving’s body in Woolwich. In Howard Street, Mr. Soames, and I need your help. You used to be the main property owner in the area and the locals say you are the man I need to talk to. The fount of all knowledge, they say.”

  “Flatter, flatter, and flatter again,” an old news editor used to say. “Gets you through the door every time.”

  “Oh. Come up then,” the voice said and buzzed them in. Kate went first.

  “And we’re in,” she said cheerfully.

  The door to Soames’s second-floor flat was open and he stood just inside, waiting. He was a shambling figure, with day-old bristles and dressed in a jumper and pajama bottoms, the frayed cord holding them up dangling limply.

  “I hope we didn’t get you out of bed,” Kate said. Soames eyed her suspiciously.

  “Bit of a slow starter these days,” he said and led them into his sitting room. It looked like a burglary had taken place. A table was overturned, a spilled bowl of Rice Krispies had pebble-dashed the carpet, and a landslide of books and stray pieces of paper littered the floor.

  “Excuse the mess. Had a bit of an accident this morning,” the old man said, waving his hand over the disaster zone.

  Kate stooped to pick up the bowl and table. “There you go,” she said. “Did you hurt yourself?”

  Soames looked pleased at the attention. “No, no. Just a bit clumsy when I first get up. It’s my age.”

  “Shall I make you a cup of tea?” Kate asked and smiled at him. He had lonely old man written all over him. A bit of a gift for her. Lonely people loved to talk.

  “How lovely,” he said. “What was your name again?”

  “Kate, Kate Waters, Mr. Soames.”

  “Call me Al,” he said and grinned roguishly. Kate’s stomach turned. Be nice, she told herself.

  “This is Joe Jackson, my colleague,” she said. Joe was standing behind her, apparently afraid to move in case he set off another avalanche of detritus in the flat.

  “Pleased to meet you, Joe,” Soames said, extending his hand. They shook and Joe balanced himself on the arm of an overstuffed armchair.

  “Goodness, you’ve got a lot of stuff in here,” Joe said.

  “Souvenirs of a life well lived. And a lot of rubbish,” Soames said, standing by a mantelpiece studded with dusty ornaments and ancient stiffies—gilt-edged invitations—to parties long over. Kate noticed that his pajama bottoms were coming adrift and hoped they’d stay up.

  “Why don’t we sit down, Al?” she said sweetly, mouthing to Joe to put the kettle on.

  “Yes, of course. Where would you like to sit, my dear?” He was now clutching his pajamas to stop them from falling down, and she looked round desperately. Every seat was taken, but she moved a stack of magazines from a dining chair and brought it close to the old man’s armchair. He hovered at her elbow as she arranged things, patting her shoulder as she sat and then taking his own seat. Always the gentleman, she thought.

  “Now then. You want to talk about my properties in Howard Street,” he said and settled back to give them the benefit of his experience.

  “Yes, particularly in the eighties, Al,” Kate said.

  “I had five houses in that street, if I remember. Dozens of others elsewhere. Quite an empire,” he said.

  “Really? That’s amazing,” Kate said, egging him on. “So, you must have had hundreds of tenants.”

  “Of course.”

  Soames grinned. The rogue emerging again. “Turned them into bedsits. Lots of lovely young girls, I remember.”

  “I bet,” Kate said and Soames winked at her. A quick wink. But it spoke volumes. She felt sick.

  A rattling of china heralded the return of Joe, carrying a tray of cups and saucers. Everything had a patina of grease on it and Kate tried to drink without her lips touching the rim of the cup.

  She had been in worse homes. There was one where she had to step over dog mess in the hall, and a house where a mother served her child’s tea, a fried egg, from the frying pan straight onto the arm of the sofa. Other people’s lives, she told herself.

  She put the sticky cup on the floor. “I’ll wait until it cools down,” she said.

  “Have you kept lists of your tenants in Howard Street, Mr. Soames, er, Al?” she asked. “Would be great to see who was living there at the time Alice was buried. And I’d love to hear more about you in those days. Your memories, I mean.”

  Soames went pink with pleasure. “Well, if you really want to, my dear.”

  “Have you got any photographs of you from those days? It would be great to see them.”

  “Oh yes. I kept everything,” he said.

  • • •

  Kate had sent Joe out to get some sandwiches while she carried on charming the old man. It was getting towards one o’clock and she’d offered to get Soames some lunch, but there was nothing in the fridge apart from a pork pie with a fuzz of mold blurring its outline and a half-empty bottle of gin.

  “Haven’t managed to get to the shops yet,” Soames had said and she wondered when he had last been out of the flat.

  “Don’t you have any help here, Al?” she asked.

  “The girl in the flat downstairs sometimes pops by to see if I’m still alive,” he said gloomily. “
Lovely girl. Beautiful long hair and a darling figure.”

  “Right,” Kate said. “I meant a cleaner or someone to do the shopping.”

  “No. I don’t need anyone to do that. I’m fine. Been on my own for years. Since my wife buggered off, really.”

  “It must be lonely, though,” she said. “Do you have a family, Al?”

  “Yes, two children. Girl and boy. But they are off doing their own thing. Got their own sprogs now. They don’t want to bother with an old fart like me. I prefer to be independent, anyway,” he said. He looked a bit teary, Kate thought, and patted his hand automatically.

  He grasped her fingers as she moved her hand away and held on tight, surprising her with the strength of his grip. “You’ve got lovely eyes,” he said.

  “So have you, Al. Now shall we look at those photos?”

  “They’re in my bedroom,” he said softly. “Bet you go into strange men’s bedrooms all the time.”

  “No, not really,” she said, easing her foot off the flirtation pedal and praying that Joe would come back soon. She was pretty sure she could fight off a man of Al’s age if it came to it, but she didn’t fancy the skirmish.

  “You stay there, Al. I’ll get them,” Kate said firmly.

  He told her there was an album and a carrier bag of loose pictures on top of his wardrobe so she took the dining chair to stand on.

  The bedroom curtains were still drawn so she yanked them open to let some light into the room. The pale sunlight filtering through the dusty panes revealed a scene of Dickensian squalor. The sheets on the bed were gray and stained and there appeared to be a chamber pot under the bed. She tried not to breathe through her nose as she clambered up on the chair to peer into the dark space above the wardrobe. Al’s voice suddenly came from far too close to her.

  “Have you found them?” he said. “I’ve got a lovely view from here . . .”

  Kate looked down, silently cursing the fact that she’d worn a skirt, and saw him propped in the doorway, ogling her legs. Bloody hell, he must be desperate, looking at fifty-year-old knees, she thought.