All the Lost Girls

by Bilinda P Sheehan

  "And where is your mother now?"

  "Mam and dad are in bed. I didn't want to wake them..."

  I nodded. "We will need to talk to them about this," I said, setting the picture down on the table with the others. "We need to know if they saw anyone. The pictures, is that you and Clara?"

  It was a guess but it was the only thing that made any kind of sense. For some reason, the killer was using Clara and Alice to communicate with us. First through the use of Clara's clothes and the inscription on her locket and now this. There was no denying that Clara McCarthy's disappearance was the key to unravelling the mystery.

  Unless the killer was jerking our chain...

  Why would they? It's not as though drawing particular attention to the McCarthy case was going to throw us off course. We had no other leads. I'd gone through the interviews with the other missing girl's family members. There was nothing.

  No one had seen anything. No one except Alice.

  "Yeah," Alice said. "I was getting my first communion. Really thought I looked like a princess."

  "Doesn't every little girl?" I gave her a small smile.

  "Do you want coffee?" Her gaze was flat as she turned away to the kettle.

  "Four sugars," Ronan quipped up, unzipping his jacket and dropping onto one of the wooden kitchen chairs.

  He tugged on a pair of gloves carefully. From the corner of my eye, I watched as he began to sift through the images stacked on the table. The pages were a little damp, the edges of the pages ragged.

  "Where did the pictures come from?" I asked, turning my attention back to Alice. She stood with her back to the kitchen, her gaze trained on the window.

  In the harsh light from the overhead lights, the glass had become a mirror, throwing back her reflection. Yet she kept staring. Was she hoping for some inspiration?

  "Alice?" I kept my voice deliberately soft, mindful of the fact she'd said her parents were asleep upstairs. The last thing I wanted was a repeat of the other day's events.

  I needed to speak with Alice and something told me she would be far more comfortable, willing even, to talk with us in familiar surroundings. Bringing people down the station often had the opposite effect on them, making it so they clammed up entirely.

  I needed her to open up to me. I needed the truth.

  "I came home and found them in the garden," she said. "The wind had blown them all around the place. It took me ages to pick them all up."

  She turned back to face me once more with a rueful smile. "I must have missed one."

  "When you got home, did you see anyone else in the garden?"

  She shook her head. "There was no one..." Her hesitation told me there was something she holding back.

  "There's something you're not telling me?"

  "Sorry," she said. "You asked was there anyone there and I said no but if I'm honest I was too shocked by the pictures to think of looking for anyone."

  It was an honest answer at least. Most people would forget to check their surroundings when suffering a shock.

  I nodded. "That's understandable." Sucking in a deep breath, I decided to plunge in headfirst.

  "When we got here and I asked you what this was all about, you said, 'Alice in Wonderland,' can you tell me what made you say that?"

  "The quote, it's from Alice in Wonderland. I recognised it."

  "And that's it?"

  She swallowed hard and moved over to the fridge. The door hid her from view and when she emerged a moment later, her eyes were red rimmed.

  "Alice, you need to tell us what you know. No matter how small or unimportant it might seem to you."

  "Alice in Wonderland was my favourite story when I was a kid. Clara knew it. I used to make her watch the Disney movie with me over and over."

  "Does anyone else know this?"

  She shrugged. "Everybody knew. I wasn't exactly discreet about my interests."

  I opened my mouth to ask another question but she silenced me with a shake of her head. "That's not all. There's this."

  From the counter next to the kettle, she picked up a small white rabbit. He held a pocket watch aloft. I remembered the same rabbit being on the table in the living room when we'd come to speak to Alice and her parents. The tick had been out of sync with the other clocks in the house. I remembered because the sound had jarred me.

  Now, it was silent.

  "It's the white rabbit," she said.

  "Excuse me?"

  Ronan had set the pictures down and had turned his full attention to the two of us.

  "The white rabbit from Alice in Wonderland. She follows it down the rabbit hole and ends up in Wonderland." Alice carried the rabbit over to the table and set it down between us.

  "It's mine," she said before I could ask her. "It went missing years ago and then the day after I got home, it turned up on the doorstep..."

  "What?" Ronan didn't bother to hide the note of irritation from his voice.

  "Clara bought it for me, when she was going away to camp one year. I kept it in my bedroom and before Clara disappeared. The white rabbit went missing from my room."

  "And you didn't think you should bring this to our attention when it turned up on your doorstep?" Ronan asked, picking the rabbit up and turning it over carefully in his hands.

  "I didn't think it was important."

  "But now you do?" I kept my voice even. There was no point in losing my temper. What was done was done. Getting angry wasn't going to change anything.

  "It's too weird," she said, gesturing between the rabbit and the pictures. "The photos come from my old album."

  "Let me guess, that went missing too?"

  She nodded, her face pale. "It's like they tried to erase Clara from the pictures completely."

  I snapped on a pair of gloves myself and began to go through the photographs one by one. They were all the same. Each time Clara appeared in one with her sister, her face was missing. Of the few pictures where she appeared alone, her eyes were gone.

  It was definitely a message of some sort but it was beyond my understanding.

  "You don't know anyone who would want to send you something like this?"

  Alice looked at me in horror. "You're asking if I know a sick fuck capable of this? Whatever in hell this is?" Her voice rose.

  "I have to ask, Alice."

  She shook her head.

  "Who would have access to the pictures?"

  She shrugged. "I guess anyone who came to the house. My friends, Clara's friends, Liam..." she trailed off.

  "Was Clara seeing anyone else at the time of her disappearance?"

  Alice's head snapped up so fast, I worried she would give herself whiplash.

  "What has he told you?"

  "Who?" Ronan prompted.

  "Liam of course," she said. "Who else? Nobody else would suggest Clara was dating another guy. She loved him and he treated her like shit."

  "What exactly do you mean, he treated her badly?"

  "The night she disappeared when she came to pick me up from the disco she was upset and her shirt was ripped."

  "You think he laid hands on her?" It was dangerous territory. I couldn't put words in her mouth but I needed her to be as specific as she could about the situation. If Liam had assaulted his pregnant girlfriend and he hadn't told us, then what else hadn't he told us?

  "It wouldn't have been the first time. Clara came home a couple of times with bruises. I saw them and tried to ask her about them but she never wanted to talk about it. She would always brush it off like it meant nothing."

  "Did you tell anyone else at the time?"

  "I threatened to tell Mam and Dad but Clara nearly lost her mind. Screamed at me to mind my own business and to stay out of hers. That I didn't know what the hell I was talking about."

  "Is it possible that she could have been seeing someone else at the time? Someone she didn't tell you about?"

  Alice buried her face in her hands and silence flowed into the kitchen. I waited for her for what felt
like forever and when she finally raised her face once more, her expression was grim.

  "She could have been seeing someone else. I can't say she wasn't. There's one person who would have known for sure though."

  "Who?"

  "Sarah Coughlan, her best friend. They were always together. Clara told her everything. If there was someone else, it would be Sarah she told about it."

  I nodded and pulled my notepad from inside my jacket. "We'll be talking to Sarah about this. See if she has anything to add."

  As I sat at the edge of the table, I could tell there was something she wanted to say, something she was holding back.

  Ronan pulled a couple of plastic evidence bags from his back pocket and proceeded to slide the pictures inside carefully. They were still damp, the least thing would tear them and a misstep like that could cost us evidence. Not that I really thought we were going to get anything from the images. The killer had been clever. Too clever to leave us anything.

  But it was still something to go on. For some reason the killer felt an affinity with Alice.

  "The night Clara was taken, you said in your original statement that you barely got away. How did you get away?"

  Alice swallowed hard and turned her face back to the kitchen window, as though the answers she was seeking would somehow appear on the glass.

  "He tried to bundle Clara into the van and then he came looking for me. He grabbed me by the hair," she said, gesturing to the front of her scalp. "He was behind me and I couldn't see him. I thought he was going to rip my head clean off. And then he was dragging me." She sucked in a deep breath and squared her shoulders. "I tried to fight him. I could feel his fingernails digging into my scalp and—”

  "Did anyone ever look at your scalp?" I asked, interrupting her. "You know, did a doctor look you over?"

  She shook her head. "They didn't believe me. Said I was drunk, that I was making it up." There was no denying the bitterness in her voice. I couldn't begin to imagine the anger she felt. To have something so traumatic happen and for those around you—the people you were supposed to turn to for protection—just dismiss you and think you made it up.

  "Clara got out of the van, I don't know how and she kicked him in the nuts." The ghost of a smile played on Alice's face. "She'd taken some self-defence classes the year before as part of transition year in school. Clara loved all that kind of stuff."

  "When she kicked him, what happened then?"

  "He let me go and we ran. I was holding her hand when we went down the embankment at the side of the road and I let her go." Alice closed her eyes. "I thought she was right behind me. I could hear her running. Or at least I thought I could. I found out later when I looked it up that trauma can do that to you; make you imagine things that weren’t real. The fight or flight response kicks in. It kicked in with me and I couldn't hear shit over the sound of my own heartbeat."

  "When did you realise Clara wasn't behind you?"

  "I fell in the river," Alice said. "I nearly drowned. I don't know how I managed to drag myself out. I don't remember it. I just remember waking up on the bank and I couldn't find Clara."

  "What time was this?"

  She shrugged. "I don't remember. I fell asleep for a while and when I woke up it was getting light out."

  "And that's when you headed back toward the road?" Ronan prompted.

  Alice closed her eyes. "I was so cold. I thought I was going to die out there, freeze to death or something. I thought Clara was getting help..."

  "Did you see or hear anything else, Alice?" I halted my pen, afraid the scratching of the ballpoint on the surface of the paper would disturb her.

  "There was something," she said finally. "I heard someone call my name, I thought it was Clara. That was why I thought she'd gone for help."

  "Could it have been Clara?" I leaned a little closer.

  Alice shrugged and opened her eyes. "I don't know. I wasn't even thinking straight. I couldn't feel my hands or my feet. They were so numb with the cold. I'm not even sure now if I heard something or not."

  "Try," I said gently. "Even if you think it's not important. It might be important to the case..."

  Alice's brow furrowed in consternation. "I told you, I can't remember." Every word was tipped with frustration. Not that I could blame her. I knew what it was like to have elusive memories. So close you could almost taste them but still so utterly and completely out of reach so as to be useless.

  "If anything comes to you," I said, pushing up onto my feet. There was no use pushing her further. The harder she tried, the less she would remember. "Give us a ring. I'll send Ronan around in the morning to have a chat with your parents about the pictures and—"

  "Please don't," Alice said softly. "Things are hard enough around here already."

  "We have to," I said firmly. "We need to know if they heard anyone, or saw anything unusual."

  She nodded and buried her face in her hands once more. "I'm sorry, it's just with everything..."

  I touched her shoulder briefly and she looked up at me. The dark circles beneath her eyes were getting deeper. Clearly, I wasn't the only one around here that sleep was eluding.

  "Will she ever be found, do you think?" There was a vulnerability in Alice's voice as she spoke.

  "I hope so," I said. "I know I'm going to do my best to bring her home to you."

  She nodded. "I know you will."

  "We'll take these with us and get them analysed," Ronan said, breaking the moment. "I'll need to take some fingerprints when I come round tomorrow. You know, to eliminate everyone here."

  Alice nodded again. "I'm familiar with procedure."

  We moved toward the door and I paused. "I heard about what you did over in England."

  Alice's eyes darted to the side as he lips twisted up into a grimace.

  "I just did my job," she said.

  "No. It was more than your job. You saved that kid. Not everyone would put themselves between a gun and an innocent like that. Your parents must be very proud of you."

  "I haven't told them." Her voice was flat, as though she were telling me the weather.

  "How come?"

  "I don't want to worry them unnecessarily."

  I bit down on my tongue. There was more to it but she clearly wasn't willing to tell me.

  The creak of a floorboard told me we weren't alone anymore. The kitchen door slapped open to reveal Ita McCarthy standing there in her dressing gown.

  "What's going on here?" Her voice was strained, her face pale as she took in the scene in the kitchen.

  "We were just leaving," I said, moving out into the hall past her.

  "Alice, what is this? Is there news on Clara? Have you found my daughter?"

  "No." I slipped my jacket back on. "We don't have any new information on Clara. I'm sorry. Alice needed to speak with us."

  "Mam, I—" She was floundering. I could see it in her face, the panic reflected in her eyes as she glanced from her mother and back to us.

  "Speak to you? Whatever for. Alice, what is this?" There was an edge to Mrs McCarthy's voice. I recognised it as the same edge she'd had in her voice the last time we'd paid a visit.

  "We'll go now." I gestured for Ronan to follow me. Perhaps if I gave Alice space, she would find a way to explain the new developments to her mother without further upset.

  "I'll be around in the morning," Ronan said gently, keeping the pictures out of sight as he followed me to the front door.

  "How could you bring them into the house again, after everything? How could you bring them back here? How does this help your sister?"

  I slipped out the front door, unwilling to listen to the burgeoning argument.

  Standing out on the drive, I listened to the voices as they rose on the other side of the door and closed my eyes. The soft mist that had started to fall while we were inside quickly covered my face and hair.

  "Should we have just left like that?" Ronan asked, standing next to the car, uncertainty visible in every line of hi
s body.

  “Strictly speaking, no,” I said. “But staying would only have made it worse. They need time together. Time to pull themselves into some kind of unit and we'd just get in the way right now. There'll be time enough in the morning for the practical things like fingerprints and statements.”

  He nodded but his expression suggested he was still somewhat unconvinced.

  "I feel bad too, you know." I gestured back toward the house as I joined him at the car and climbed into the passenger seat. "But we can't fix this."

  "Is there anything we can fix?" He raised an eyebrow at me as he gave me a wilted smile.

  I shook my head. "In these kinds of cases," I said. "The best we can hope for is some closure."

  "And if we fail at that?"

  "Then we keep trying until we stop failing."

  I took the packet of photographs from where Ronan had thrown it onto the dashboard. The plastic was dotted with droplets of water and the gloom of the car somewhat obscured the images inside. But that didn't stop me from feeling the oddly penetrating gaze of the young women in the photographs. It was strange. Whoever had defaced the images, it was as though they were trying to steal something from Clara. As though her eyes staring up at them from the photograph could condemn them somehow.

  Did they feel guilt?

  Or was it simply the case that kidnapping her wasn't enough? That whatever they had done to her, whatever horror they had visited upon her, hadn't been enough to satisfy them? And now they needed more?

  There were far too many questions and not enough answers. And the more I delved into the case, the more questions I found myself faced with.

  But I had the sinking feeling that I was never going to have all the answers I needed. That whoever was doing this would do everything in their power to keep me at arms length, leaving them free to go on killing.

  48

  Being that close to her was thrilling. I could still smell the tantalising scent of her strawberry shampoo, even now, hours later. Was it the same shampoo she had used back then? It certainly smelled similar.

  It had been so long since I'd been within touching distance of her. And the urges rising inside me had almost been my undoing.

  It had taken every ounce of my willpower not to take her there and then.