And Then There Was One

by Patricia Gussin

  “‘I was stuffing two bulky sleeping bags in the trunk of my Honda, which was parked next to the passenger side of a maroon sedan, or maybe brown, not a new model, but I’m not good with cars. That’s when I heard a child’s voice so I turned.’”

  Streeter paused to assess the Monroes. Both were listening intently. Scott had grabbed Katie’s hands to keep them from shaking. Streeter returned to his notes. “‘I saw a little girl. What she had said was, plain as day was, ‘Is she going to be okay?’

  “‘It was the little girl in the pictures. The one in the multicolored pants, a geometric design, and a yellow top, the one with the ponytail and a red ribbon. She had cute red sandals with black trim. I thought she sounded upset. Not really scared, more like concerned. But not frightened. I did wonder what she meant. Like, was someone ill? But I never found out.’”

  Katie gasped, said nothing, but her eyes started to blink.

  Streeter read on. “‘The other girl with no ponytail, in a very pretty lavender sundress with lacy straps crisscrossing in the back — I was sure they were twins — how could I have known they were from triplets — didn’t say anything. I did notice her cute sandals, shiny white with a big yellow daisy.

  “‘Then the woman they were with unlocked the car with a key, and the girl with the ponytail got in the passenger side of the front seat. The woman had to kind of push the other girl into the backseat. Not shove, just sort of nudge. I did hear her say, ‘Hurry up,’ but I thought nothing of it.

  “‘Once I got home and watched the news and saw the newspaper, I was sure that they were the missing children. Both had light brown skin and dark hair, very pretty. Made me wish that I had a little girl.’”

  “They got in her car?” Scott interrupted. “They just got in her car? With no protest? Voluntarily?”

  “Did either of them say anything else?” Katie asked, sitting on the very edge of her chair.

  “No,” Streeter said, returning to the written statement.

  “‘Once they got into the car, I’d finished loading my stuff and I got in my car and drove away. I left the parking lot before they did.’”

  “Unfortunately, she didn’t notice the license plate and her description of the car was not very helpful. But she did have one crucial piece of information. She described Sammie’s and Alex’s shoes. The girls’ shoe detail had never been disclosed to the media.”

  “Who was this woman?” Katie asked. “Was she white or black?”

  “A white woman. Middle aged. Auburn hair, with some gray. Hair style described as poufy. She was wearing a dark blue dress, on the long side. White sneakers, white socks.”

  “Sammie got in the front seat, and Alex got in the backseat?” Katie said in a near whisper.

  Scott’s voice boomed in comparison to hers, “And they didn’t seem panicky or even frightened?”

  Streeter observed both parents intently as he answered, “Shiela Gladsky repeated over and over that the girls looked concerned, not scared. That leads me to ask, could Alex and Sammie have gone with a relative or friend of the family?”

  “How old was this woman?” Scott asked. “And she was white?”

  “Early fifties, the witness estimated. Definitely white. The witness described her as moderately overweight, not stylishly dressed.”

  “They would never have gone off with a stranger,” Scott said.

  “We asked Mrs. Gladsky to take a lie detector test. She did. She passed.”

  “Katie and Scott looked to each other, the obvious question on each face, “Do you know who this could be?”

  Streeter scrutinized them. With this eye-witness report, it seemed more likely than ever that the abductor was known to the girls. The investigation would be taking a more inward look, unfortunately disrupting an already distressed extended family and circle of friends.

  “And Sammie said, ‘Is she going to be okay?’” Katie said. “What did she mean by that? Who is the she?”

  “We don’t know, Dr. Monroe, but we judge Mrs. Gladsky to be credible. Her description fits with Courtney Davis’s report, the woman with two screaming kids whom Jake Plummer interviewed at the mall that Sunday. She said the woman wore a darkish blue dress that came mid-calf and sneakers. She described her as mid-fifties, sloppy, overweight, with teased auburn hair, streaked with grey. The woman had one child in each hand and they were walking fast. The Davis woman never saw the woman’s face, only her backside.”

  “My God, Scott, who could she be? Two witnesses saw them with a white woman?”

  “The description of the children met the description of Alex and Sammie. But until Sheila Gladsky came forward, we had no description of the woman’s face and we still have no idea where she may have taken the girls or who put her up to it.”

  Streeter handed Katie and Scott a police artist’s sketch. An overweight, middle-aged woman in an unstylish housedress with auburn hair strewn with streaks of gray.

  “Nobody I’ve ever seen,” said Katie.

  “Nor I,” said Scott. “Can we have some copies to show to our families? Maybe somebody will recognize her.”

  Streeter handed him several copies and then closed his briefcase, preparing to leave. There was much to be done. “I’m afraid that we’ll have to question your friends and relatives again on both sides of your family, and because the woman is Caucasian, we’ll start with the Monroe side.”

  Streeter had already interviewed Scott’s two brothers and their families as well as his famous sister, Monica, and her husband. Among them all, he’d found nothing but grief. Scott’s mother had died thirty years ago and his father, Nick Monroe, was at Mayo Clinic, recovering from heart surgery. Today, he would dispatch Agent Juan Ortez to Rochester, Minnesota. If something evil was beyond the caring veneer of the Monroe family, Nick Monroe, the patriarch, would know.

  In the back of Streeter’s mind had always been the nagging suspicion that the girls’ abduction could be related to some form of racial prejudice. Racial purists still existed. The election of a biracial president of the United States last year should have squelched that philosophy, but who knew what evil lurked in the minds of the modern neo-Nazi’s? One of the worst, the National Socialist Movement, was headquartered in Detroit. He’d gagged when he’d read the twentyfive points of their creed — only those of pure white blood could be members of the nation. Very repulsive stuff.

  Streeter had never addressed the race issue with the Monroes, and he decided to do so now. “You asked about whether this woman was black or white,” he began. “Has there been any tension or any criticisms of the biracial aspects of your marriage? Any individuals that have expressed any objections or dissatisfaction with the marriage of a black woman to a white man?” Streeter knew he had to tread carefully here. He wished he paid more attention in the diversity classes the agency made them take.

  Scott slumped forward, gripping the edge of the table so fiercely that his knuckles turned a starker tone of white. “You think that Sammie and Alex are in the hands of white supremacists?”

  “I just raise the question,” Streeter said, recalling the “one drop rule.” Dating back to slavery, still pervasively embedded in American society to the point that in some communities biracial individuals are still considered black no matter what their appearance if they have even a fraction of African heritage. Case in point, Barack Obama, white mother, black father, almost universally classified as black. In reality, Barack Obama is a biracial American, obviously a powerful role model for the Monroe children.

  “That doesn’t make sense,” Katie said. “Alex and Sammie went off without a struggle. How could a hateful racist get them to do that? A white woman simply leading Alex and Sammie away in her car? I can’t see a racial angle here. And the answer to your question, Agent Streeter is no. We haven’t been experiencing any racial unpleasantness. Don’t you agree, Scott?”

  “Yes, but what if —?”

  “Look when we’re out with the triplets, we get a lot of looks. We used to get
them as a couple before we had kids. Curiosity, yes, but not bigotry. Nothing that would come even close to outright racism. But then again we refuse to raise our racial antennae out there. So we might have missed something. What do you think, Scott? That woman who took our daughters is white.”

  “I just can’t see it. Yes, we know all about the theoretical implications for biracial families. And there are many: ideological, institutional, and individual racism. We debate all this with our friends, but none of that theoretical stuff has interfered with our lives. I can’t think of a single incident over all these years. Could something have changed? Or maybe we didn’t notice it?”

  Streeter was becoming uncomfortable and wondered whether it had been wise to raise the racial issue. The Monroes had so successfully built their life devoid of racial prejudice and he didn’t want to jeopardize that by pursuing a futile avenue of investigation. Earlier he’d consulted with the Department of Justice’s Community Relations Service, the arm of the department that dealt with hate crimes. CRS had been created following the 1964 Civil Rights Act. It had no law enforcement responsibility, but intervened in suspected discrimination issues. He’d kept an open line of communication with them, but no hints of hate-crime motivation had surfaced from any source.

  “There’s one more thing,” he said. “Before I go —”

  “I have to get back to Jackie,” Katie interrupted.

  “Okay, Katie, but you and Scott have things to talk about,” Streeter said, scrutinizing them, not able to shake the remote possibility that they were involved, individually or together. “Once you’ve had a chance to think about that woman who was seen with Alex and Sammie, maybe something will come to you.”

  “The ransom demand? Anything from Norman Watkins?” Katie said, once they’d reached Jackie’s room. “Or Keith Franklin?”

  “No,” Streeter said, “but Agent Camry will be staying here, at the hospital. She’ll let you know immediately if we have something.”

  “Thanks, Tony,” Katie said. “We’ll be with Jackie. They’re setting up a couple of cots for us in her room.”

  “Is she going to be okay?” Streeter asked. The question made his heart stop. The exact words that Sammie had said four days ago before getting into a car with that woman, Is she going to be okay?

  CHAPTER 30

  Continental Flight 61 from Brussels to Newark, New Jersey,

  Lands Safely after Mid-flight Death of Pilot.

  — International News, Thursday, June 18

  Marge Spansky clomped down the basement steps, carrying a large plastic bowl brimming with popcorn. She’d promised the twins that she’d be back after their dinner to read to them. Jennifer had asked for Heidi, Marge’s all-time favorite, and Jessica wanted to read the next installment of the The Bobbsey Twins. Those two didn’t know how good they had it.

  As she passed the door leading to the outside, she looked to make sure that both the bolt and the chain locks were secure, and at the bottom of the steps, she unlocked the door to the basement with the key around her neck.

  First, she blinked, then dropped the bowl of popcorn, when she opened the door. Strewn about were scraps of paper. Parts of board games, doll clothes, their clothing. What had they been thinking? Were they trying to play a trick on her? This was not funny.

  “What have you two done?” Marge stared at the mess, her face turning shades of red. “You’ve trashed the place.”

  Before they could answer, she swooped inside. The girls sat on folding chairs at the twisted cardboard table, their faces sassy and fresh.

  Marge lunged at them, unable to control the anger bubbling up inside. Such defiance could not be tolerated. Jessica swung out of the way, but Marge’s slap connected with the side of Jennifer’s face.

  “Stop it,” Jessica shouted. “You hit her!”

  Marge reached out to grab Jessica, but Jennifer pulled on her arm, and Marge stepped backward.

  “You’re going to pay for this,” she warned. “Now get the broom and clean up this mess. Forget me reading to you tonight.”

  Jennifer moved to get the broom, but Jessica stared at her with a sullen look. Before she unlocked and relocked the room, Marge lifted Jessica up by her hair and smacked her hard across the face.

  “Double trouble,” she mumbled on the way out.

  Dr. Susan Reynolds and Lucy Jones were about to leave for the evening, hoping that Katie and Scott could get some sleep in the cots adjacent to Jackie’s bed.

  Since Streeter had shown them the police artist’s sketch, they’d searched their memories again and again. The FBI had e-mailed the sketch to everyone in their professional and personal universe, but got no plausible match. The Tampa field office had promptly checked out the two new leads Agent Rusk got from his visit to Roberta and the Cutty boys. Camry had passed on the results: nothing.”

  “Waste of time,” Rusk told Streeter from Tampa. “Babcock, the Cutty cleaning woman. Nice lady. Thinks Cutty was a pompous jerk, but she knows nothing about Katie Monroe or her family. The late Mrs. Cutty hired her just weeks before she died so she doesn’t have much family history to draw on. She said the boys were sweet, but holy terrors around the house.”

  “What about the Cutty sexual abuse thing?” Streeter had asked.

  “No inkling, or so she claimed,” Rusk said. “Soon as Kaninsky moved in, Cutty fired her and hired a cleaning service. As you know, we’ve already checked them out. Before you ask, yes, the Babcock woman has an airtight alibi.”

  “What about the kid’s teacher?”

  “Vera Patches. The woman’s never been north of the Florida state line. She’s clueless about the Cutty domestic scene, but quite concerned about the boys.”

  “So if Cutty arranged to take Katie Monroe’s kids, he went to his grave without disclosing where he put them.”

  “Shit, Streeter those little girls are probably dead. You know the odds. Going on five days without a trace?”

  “They get in a car five miles from Grandma’s with a white woman who looks like anybody’s aunt or neighbor, and they disappear without a trace. God, let the statistics here not hold true.”

  “You’re sure you’ll be okay,” Susan asked before leaving Katie that evening. “I am optimistic that Jackie will recover, but when I cannot say.”

  “I’ll be okay, and thank you, Susan. We appreciate you driving Mom home.”

  On her way out the door, Lucy studied the sketch one more time. “No, I surely don’t recognize her,” she said. You sure that nobody in your family knows her, Scott?”

  Scott shrugged. “The FBI has shown her face to all of them, even Dad at the Mayo Clinic.”

  “How’s your dad doing?” Lucy asked. “With what’s happened here, I’ve neglected to ask.”

  “The heart valve replacement went well, but he can’t travel. Bobby was going to fly here from Rome, but I asked if he’d go to Minnesota to be with Dad. You know how close Dad has always been to the girls. What’s happened can’t be good for his recovery.”

  Lucy nodded. Scott and Katie had been one of those lucky couples whose families got along well. Lucy had a particular fondness for Bobby, Scott’s brother the priest, stationed in Rome.

  When the psychiatrist and her mother left, Katie placed a kiss on Jackie’s forehead. “She hasn’t moved,” Katie whispered, adjusting the angle of the plastic bag of fluid hanging from a pole. For a while, Katie sat next to Scott, caressing his hand, as they both spoke in soft, soothing voices to their little girl. Jackie lay on her back against snow-white sheets, her head propped by a thin pillow. Her dark hair was brushed back, tucked behind her ears. Her skin looked lighter than usual and her eyes remained closed and her chest rose and fell rhythmically. They told her how much they loved her, how much they just wanted to see her beautiful smile.

  Lucy had brought sweatsuits for Katie and Scott to sleep in. When they’d both changed, Scott kissed Katie gently on the cheek, said good night, and pulled the covers over his face. From beneath the covers, s
he could hear him sobbing. Falling apart would not help Jackie, but Katie could not stop her own leaking tears. Occasionally, she blew her nose quietly into a Kleenex as did Scott. What else could they do?

  Katie knew that she needed sleep, that she was physically and emotionally drained, but when she closed her eyes, the horrors of what might be happening to her daughters burned her retina. And if she did close her eyes, she would miss Jackie, should she awaken.

  When she thought that Scott had drifted off to sleep, Katie climbed out of bed, knelt, and prayed. She prayed that she and Scott would be strong no matter what happened. She prayed for Sammie and Alex, and she prayed that Jackie would emerge from this catatonia. Conversion disorder was a psychological diagnosis, made when there was no physical disorder but great psychological stress. She knew that it used to be called “hysterical paralysis” and that it was rare in kids younger than ten. What happened was that anxiety was converted to physical symptoms. There was no cure other than suggestive, supportive, psychosocial therapy, and sometimes hypnosis. All she could do was to keep Jackie surrounded by love and calm.

  But in doing so, Katie felt as if she were caught in a trap, locked up in the hospital. But she didn’t dare leave Jackie. Over and over, her mind cycled: who had taken her other two daughters? And why? Three distinct faces kept flashing from one to the other: Maxwell Cutty, Norman Watkins, Keith Franklin, plus a phantom face of whoever had sent that ransom demand. What if the kidnapper was Cutty, and he had been the only person on earth who knew the location of her daughters? Sammie and Alex could starve to death or die of thirst before anyone found them.

  Katie crawled back into bed and tried to get the faces to stop flashing, and sometime in the middle of the night, she fell into a restless sleep.

  CHAPTER 31

  Monroe Kidnapping: Going into Fifth Day. Experts On Odds of Finding Sammie and Alex.