by Nicci French
Unbelievably, the party in my house was still going on, like an organism that refused to die whatever was done to it. I retreated with the phone into the utility room that led off the kitchen, and shut the door behind me. A female voice answered and I realized I hadn’t considered precisely what I was going to say.
‘This may sound stupid,’ I said. ‘I think my daughter may be missing.’
The woman stopped me right there and took my name and address, then Charlie’s full name and age. She didn’t sound impressed by my answers.
‘How long has your daughter been missing?’
‘It’s difficult to put it like that. She was staying with a friend last night, but she was due back a couple of hours ago and…’
‘A couple of hours? And she’s fifteen years old? I’d really give it a bit longer than that.’
‘Hang on,’ I said. ‘I know it doesn’t sound like much time but something’s gone wrong. We’re due to go away on holiday. We’re supposed to be leaving before one and it’s twenty to twelve now. She knows about that, she’s excited about it. She had to get back – she had to pack her things. It’s not just that. She organized a surprise party for me this morning but she didn’t turn up at it. Why would that be? Something’s happened.’
‘She’s probably been held up.’
‘Of course she’s been held up,’ I said. ‘The question is, what has held her up? What if it’s something serious?’
We were locked in a battle of wills. I didn’t know who this woman was. Was she a policewoman? Was she a receptionist? I could tell she wanted me to go away and wait for the problem to sort itself out. But I wasn’t going to go away. I stayed on the line, argued and insisted, and finally she asked me to wait. She had her hand over the receiver and I heard her muffled voice asking somebody something. When she came back on the line, she told me that an officer would drop round to see what was happening.
‘Soon,’ I said. ‘If anything has happened to Charlie it’s urgent. Time is very important.’
I only ended the conversation when the woman had agreed that the officer would be with me in a few minutes. Now I had to wait for the police to arrive. What did I do in the meantime? I couldn’t just stand there. I had to finish my packing. I could throw out the last of my so-called guests. No. All that could wait. Charlie was all that mattered. Was there anything productive I could do before the police came?
I opened the door. A teenager I didn’t recognize was opening my fridge. She looked round at me unconcernedly.
‘The newsagent on The Street,’ I said. ‘Do you know what it’s called?’
She paused, a carton of orange juice in her hand. ‘Walton’s,’ she said, and poured juice into a glass.
I found the name in the phone book and rang it. ‘Hello,’ I said, when a woman answered. ‘Mrs Walton?’
‘No,’ said the woman.
‘But this is Walton’s?’
‘That’s right.’
‘My name is Nina Landry. I’m Charlotte’s mother. Did she do her paper round this morning?’
‘I think so.’
‘Didn’t you see her?’
‘Gerry,’ the woman shouted, ‘who did the papers this morning?’
I heard a voice say something I couldn’t make out.
‘Yes,’ said the woman. ‘She did them.’
‘What time did she get there?’
‘That was before I arrive. Probably between nine and nine thirty. That’s when she usually comes.’
‘Thanks.’
I rang off. Was this good or bad news? She had been around, but that was hours ago. Suddenly it became clear. My soon-to-be-ex-husband. I dialled his number. A woman answered.
‘Hello, is Rory there?’
‘Who’s this?’
‘I’m sorry, who are you?’
‘You first.’
‘I’m Nina.’ There was a pause. Further explanation was called for. ‘His ex-partner.’
‘Yes, Nina. I know all about you. I’m Tina.’
Tina. At his flat. Answering his phone. Knowing all about me. I hadn’t heard anything about a Tina. Where had she come from? When? I grimaced into the phone, happier to know that Rory had found someone else as well and also feeling strange that both of us had moved on so quickly. How could so many years of marriage just disappear?
‘Is Rory there?’
‘He’s out.’
Tina seemed to want to talk but I rang off immediately and dialled Rory’s mobile.
‘Hi, Nina,’ he said.
‘Rory, is there something I should know?’
‘I think there’s rather a lot you should know. Is there anything particular you had in mind?’
I steadied myself. For a long time, all conversations with Rory had been like teetering on the edge of a steep hill. One careless step and we would tumble into an increasingly bitter argument.
‘You were talking about seeing Charlie earlier.’
‘I was talking about seeing the children, about missing the children.’
‘That’s what I meant.’
‘Are you ringing to apologize?’ he asked.
‘What about?’ I said, regretting the words as soon as I had spoken them.
‘I don’t think we should go into that. All I want to say is that I know we’ve got our differences, but I really hoped you’d keep the children out of it.’
‘Rory, if you knew the lengths I’d gone to to do just that.’
There was a silence on the line: he’d hung up. I redialled.
‘Feeling better?’ he said.
‘Is Charlie with you?’
‘Would it be a problem if she was?’
‘Don’t mess about. We’re meant to be leaving for the airport in a few minutes. If you’ve picked her up, then –’
‘Then what?’
Deep breath. Slow deep breath.
‘Just drop her back. We’re in a desperate rush.’
‘But I haven’t picked her up.’
‘She’s really not there?’
‘Are you saying I’m lying?’
‘I don’t understand this,’ I said. ‘I’ve already called the police and an officer is on his way. So if –’
‘What the hell are you accusing me of?’ Rory said, his voice turning angry. ‘I’m her father. What’s going on? Where is she?’
‘I don’t know. I hope it’s nothing – well, it’s bound to turn out to be nothing. Probably she’ll just turn up.’
‘But you’ve called the police?’
‘It was just in case.’
‘Just in case what?’
‘I thought it was sensible.’
‘Right. I’ll be over. I’m coming now.’
‘No, Rory. Please –’
It was too late. He had hung up again.
With no compunction, embarrassment or shame, I went round the house emptying it of people. I shooed some teenagers off the stairs, I told the vicar how nice it was to see him but that I was about to leave. (Didn’t he have a church to go to? A sermon to write?) I hustled Derek or Eric along the garden path. I woke Eamonn up from the sofa. But I found time to ask them all about Charlie. If they saw her, tell her to ring me. It was urgent.
Jackson and a friend were wandering around, the camcorder still recording. I pulled the friend away, reunited him with his mother and wished them a happy Christmas as I steered them out firmly into the street. I saw on my mobile phone that it was eleven minutes to twelve. In half an hour or so we were meant to be heading for the A12, on the way to meet Christian, on the way to the holiday we’d been planning for so long.
At the gate, I turned and held Jackson tightly by his shoulders.
‘Listen now,’ I said. ‘Charlie’s missing. At least, she’s not here. And though I’m sure it will be fine, it’s a bit odd. Do you have any idea whatsoever of where she might be?’
He shook his head mutely.
‘She said nothing to you?’
‘No.’
‘If she doesn�
��t turn up soon,’ I continued, ‘we’re not going to get that plane.’
‘We’ll be able to get another one later, though, won’t we? Mum?’ His eyes filled with tears and he wrenched himself away from me and kicked at a stone.
‘The important thing is to find Charlie,’ I said.
‘Yeah,’ he mumbled. Then, ‘She’ll be all right, won’t she?’
‘Yes,’ I said.
In the house, Renata was clearing glasses off surfaces and stacking them in the dishwasher, not briskly but with a lethargic sadness that made me want to scream. The party had barely started before I’d ended it, and yet there was an extraordinary mess everywhere – bowls of crisps, saucers with cigarettes stubbed out in them, mud on the carpets and tiles, a smear of blood leading from the bottom of the stairs into the hall, a smashed bottle by the front door.
‘Right, Nina,’ she said, picking up a bowl and staring at it hopelessly. ‘You can leave all of this to me. I’ll put all those flowers in water for a start.’ Tears were rolling down her cheeks, and I saw that she was hobbling a bit, presumably from her collision with Sludge and Karen.
‘No,’ I said. ‘I’m sorry, and I know this isn’t what you came for, but here’s what I want you to do, Renata. Can you take Jackson and Sludge and walk through the town? Ask if anyone’s seen Charlie.’
She looked doubtful. ‘Who? Anyone?’
‘Jackson will point people out, won’t you, my darling?’
‘Oh,’ said Renata. ‘Yes, of course. I’ll just get my jacket on…’
‘Have you got a mobile?’
‘Yes.’
‘Call me if there’s any news.’
‘Are you staying here?’
‘The police are coming.’
‘Oh.’ Her face became grave. She glanced sideways at Jackson and pulled her features into unconvincing cheeriness. ‘Right, then,’ she said heartily. ‘Let’s be off. Lead on, Macduff.’
‘What?’
At any other time, I would have laughed at the sight of Sludge racing down the road with her demented crab-like gait, red tongue lolling and ears turned inside out, pulling Renata after her in a stiff-legged, braking run. Jackson jogged behind them, looking like a troll in his oversized skiing jacket.
I went back into the house. Where were the police? They’d said just a few minutes. The timer-clock on the oven told me it was eleven fifty-three. I picked up a small bunch of flowers and put my face into the satin cool of their petals, thinking furiously. She’d left the sleepover at between nine and nine thirty and I knew she’d gone straight to the newsagent…
The bell rang and I ran to the door.
‘Nina Landry?’
The man who stood there was quite short and stout, and he wore a uniform that was slightly too tight for him. He had short brown hair and jug ears. His face was weathered and inappropriately cheerful. ‘PC Mahoney,’ he said.
‘Come in,’ I said. ‘Mind the broken glass.’
We walked through the living room, which looked a bit like a crime scene, and into the chaos of the kitchen. He probably expected me to offer him tea but I didn’t have time for that. I pulled out a chair for him, sat down myself at the littered table and looked at him. He pushed away a bowl of crisps, pulled out a notebook and a pen, licked his finger and flipped over several pages. He wrote the date at the top, then glanced at his watch and wrote the time as well: 11.54, I read upside-down.
‘Let me take a few details.’
‘I’ve already done that. When I called.’
‘Your daughter’s full name and age?’
‘I already gave it,’ I said. ‘To the woman at the police station.’
‘Please,’ he said.
‘Charlotte Landry Oates. Landry after me and Oates after her father,’ I added, forestalling his next question.
‘Is Mr Oates here?’
‘He doesn’t live with us,’ I said, and watched the expression on his face become shrewd as I said it. ‘He left at the start of the year.’ I didn’t wait for his next question. ‘Charlie’s fifteen. She was born on the third of February.’
‘So she’s nearly sixteen.’
‘Yes, but –’
‘And when did she go missing? The duty officer said it was just an hour or so ago.’
‘I don’t know exactly. She was at a sleepover, and then she did her paper round. I was out, doing errands, and I expected her to be here when I got back, which was later than I’d thought because on the spur of the moment I rang up a friend to look at my car and then – oh, that doesn’t matter. The point is, she wasn’t here when I got back.’
‘And that would have been when?’
I remembered Karen telling Eamonn, as he shuffled out of the door of their house in his bare feet and trench coat, that it was gone half past ten. And when I’d gone into Charlie’s room her sheep clock had sounded the hour.
‘It must have been about eleven. She wasn’t there and that was odd because we’re going on holiday. Were going on holiday. I don’t think we’ll make it now. We needed to leave at one or one thirty at the latest, and she was going to come home and pack. Plus she arranged this party for me. I wouldn’t have worried otherwise, but this makes no sense. She was so excited. We’ve been planning this for ages.’
‘Where are you going for your holiday?’
‘Florida,’ I said impatiently.
‘Nice. Just the three of you?’
‘Four. My boyfriend is coming as well.’
‘New boyfriend?’
‘Quite, why does that –’
‘Does your daughter get on with him?’
‘Yes. I mean, there’ve been… but yes, basically.’
‘Mmm. Does Charlotte have a mobile phone?’
‘I’ve been ringing it. No answer. I’ve rung the friend she was with last night. I’ve rung the newsagent to check she did the paper round. I’ve spoken to her best friend. Nobody knows where she’s got to.’
I wanted him to tell me it was nothing to worry about, and when he did I felt frustrated because I knew he was wrong. ‘I know Charlie,’ I said insistently. ‘I know this isn’t in character. Something’s wrong. We have to find her.’
‘Ms Landry,’ he said kindly, ‘I understand what teenagers are like. I’ve got one myself.’
‘You don’t know what Charlie’s like.’
‘Teenagers,’ he continued, as if I hadn’t spoken, ‘go missing all the time. You wouldn’t believe how often they’re reported missing and then they turn up, a few hours later, the next day. I’m sure your daughter will come home soon. Have you had an argument recently?’
‘No.’
That wasn’t strictly true, of course. I rarely lose my temper, but Charlie quarrels with everyone, whether they participate or not. She has a strictly confrontational attitude towards the world. When I picture her, she has her hands on her hips or her arms folded provocatively. She challenges people, she glowers, she squabbles, she storms out of rooms and slams doors. But she’s like Rory, or like Rory used to be: quick to anger and quick to apologize or forgive, generous and contrite to a fault, never bearing grudges. She argued with me yesterday, and she argued with me the day before that and probably the day before that as well, about the fact that she’d lost her physics coursework on her computer and hadn’t backed it up, about whether she and Ashleigh could go to London for a concert on a school day, about why she had to go to her father’s when there was a big party on Sandling Island that evening, about eating an entire pack of ice-cream but leaving the empty tub in the freezer as an irritating decoy, about borrowing my shoes without asking and breaking the heel… But those were small tiffs, the daily stuff of Charlie’s life.
‘No,’ I repeated. ‘We hadn’t argued.’
‘Boyfriend trouble?’ he asked.
‘No,’ I said. ‘Charlie doesn’t have a boyfriend.’
‘As far as you know,’ said PC Mahoney, smiling humorously at me.
‘She would have told me,’ I said. ‘She tel
ls me things.’ For she did. Charlie gave me her anger and impatience, but she also offered me her confidences, often in a touchingly candid way. She’d told me about the boys who’d asked her out; she’d confessed about getting horribly drunk on Bacardi Breezers at Ashleigh’s house, so that she’d thrown up on the neat green lawn; she’d asked my advice about spots and period pains, talked about how she felt stifled by her father’s over-protectiveness. ‘Look, this is all irrelevant.’
‘How about at school? Was she happy? Any trouble with her peer group?’
‘Nothing that would have made her run away from home.’
‘There was trouble, then?’
‘She was bullied for a bit,’ I said shortly. ‘She was the new girl and didn’t fit in. You know how vicious girls can be in a group. But that’s all stopped now.’
‘Mmmm.’ He stood up suddenly, tucking his notebook back into his pocket. ‘Let’s pay a visit to Charlotte’s bedroom.’
‘What for?’
‘Up the stairs, is it?’
He was already on his way, and I followed him.
‘I’ve already looked. There’s nothing to see.’
‘This one?’
‘Yes.’
PC Mahoney stood stolidly in the doorway, gazing in at the catastrophe of Charlie’s room. The air in here smelt thickly fragrant: Charlie loved creams, lotions and bath oils. After she had taken one of her epic showers or lain for hours in a sudsy bath, she would drip her way into her room and rub cream into her body, spray perfume over it and into her coppery hair.
‘Not very tidy, is it?’ he remarked mildly.
He stooped down, picked up a Chinese wrap that lay at his feet, like a bright, wounded bird, and placed it carefully on the unmade bed. He frowned at the havoc around him. He stepped further into the room, his substantial frame making the space seem smaller and darker. There were lace knickers on the floor, two bras, fishnet tights, a puddle of trousers, as if Charlie had only just stepped out of them. There was a box of chocolates a boy had given her recently, most of which had gone. A notebook with her slapdash writing in it. A poster of a rock star I didn’t recognize was coming away from the wall, a photograph of a younger me and Rory, holding hands, smiled from the corner. A collection of postcards Blu-tacked above her bed showed pictures of a giant stone foot from the British Museum, a white beach, a blue Matisse collage. A mosquito net was suspended from the ceiling above Charlie’s pillow and PC Mahoney had to bend his head to avoid getting caught in the white gauze. His thick black boots moved softly across the carpet and I could almost hear Charlie’s voice hissing in my ear, ‘Get him out!’ There was an empty beer can next to the overflowing waste-paper basket and he touched it with his foot as if it was evidence.
