“Now I want you to see things in your mind. Are you ready?”
She nodded.
“You’re in a big meadow. It’s morning and the sun is shining. The rays warm the skin of your face, and there’s a smell of grass and flowers. You’re walking and you’re barefoot: you can feel the cool of the earth under your feet. And there’s the sound of a stream calling to you. You walk over to it and lean down to the bank. You plunge your hands into the water, and then bring it to your mouth to drink it. It’s very good.”
The image was not chosen at random: Boris had evoked those sensations to take control of all of Mila’s senses. That way it would be easier to bring her back in her memory to the exact moment when she was crossing the area outside the motel.
“Now that you’ve quenched your thirst, there’s something I’d like you to do for me. Go back to a few evenings ago…”
“All right,” she replied.
“It’s night, and a car has just brought you back to the motel…”
“It’s cold,” she said suddenly. Goran thought he saw her shiver.
“And what else?”
“The officer who drove me back nods good-bye, then reverses. And I’m left alone in that space outside the motel.”
“What’s it like? Describe it to me.”
“There isn’t much light. Only the neon sign, creaking in the wind. In front of me are the various bungalows, but the windows are in darkness. I’m the only guest tonight. Behind the bungalows there’s a strip of very tall, swaying trees. There’s gravel on the ground.”
“Go on walking…”
“I can only hear my own footsteps.”
She almost thought she could hear the sound of the gravel.
“Where are you now?”
“I’m heading towards my room, walking past the porter’s office. There’s no one there, but the TV is switched on. I’m carrying a paper bag containing two cheese toasted sandwiches: it’s my dinner. My breath is condensing in the chilly air, so I quicken my pace. My footsteps on the gravel are the only sound I can hear. My bungalow is the last one in the row.”
“You’re doing very well.”
“Only another few yards and I’m concentrating on my thoughts. There’s a little hole in the ground, I don’t see it and I trip…And I hear him.”
Goran wasn’t aware that he was doing it, but he instinctively lunged towards Mila’s bed as if he could join her in that gravel square, protecting her from the threat that she faced.
“What did you hear?”
“A footstep on the gravel, behind me. Someone is copying my steps. He wants to approach me without me noticing. But he lost the rhythm of my footsteps.”
“And what are you doing now?”
“I’m trying to stay calm, but I’m scared. I continue towards the bungalow at the same pace, even though I’d like to start running. And at the same time I’m thinking.”
“What are you thinking?”
“That there’s no point taking out my gun, because if he’s armed he will have plenty of time to shoot first. I’m also thinking about the television that’s switched on in the porter’s office, and telling myself that he’s already killed him. Now it’s my turn…the panic is mounting.”
“Yes, but you manage to stay in control.”
“I’m rummaging in my pocket for my key, because my only chance is to get to my room…as long as he lets me.”
“You’re concentrating on that door: you’re just a few yards away now, yes?”
“Yes. That’s all there is in my field of vision, everything else around me has disappeared.”
“But now you’ve got to make it come back…”
“I’m trying…”
“The blood is thundering through your veins, the adrenaline is pumping, your senses are on the alert. I want you to describe the taste…”
“My mouth is dry, but I can smell the acid smell of saliva.”
“Touch…”
“The cold of the key to my room in my sweaty hand.”
“Smell…”
“The wind carries a nasty smell of rotting rubbish. The bins are on my right. And pine needles, and resin.”
“Sight…”
“I see my shadow stretching across the square.”
“And then?”
“I see the door to the bungalow, it’s yellow and the paint’s flaking. I see the three steps leading to the porch.”
Boris had deliberately left the most important sense to last, because Mila’s only perception of her pursuer had involved sound.
“Hearing…”
“I can’t hear anything except my footsteps.”
“Listen more carefully.”
Goran saw a frown appearing on Mila’s face, right between her ears, as she struggled to remember.
“I can hear him! Now I can make out his footsteps as well!”
“Excellent. But I want you to concentrate even harder…”
Mila obeyed. Then she said, “What was that?”
“I don’t know,” Boris replied. “You’re alone there, I didn’t hear anything.”
“But there was something!”
“What?”
“That sound…”
“What sound?”
“Something…metal. Yes! Something metal falling! Falling on the ground, on the gravel!”
“Try to be more precise.”
“I don’t know…”
“Come on…”
“It’s…a coin!”
“A coin, are you sure?”
“Yes! A small coin! He’s dropped it and he hasn’t noticed!”
It was an unexpected trail. If they found the coin in the middle of the gravel square, and took prints from it, that might take them to Mila’s pursuer. The hope was that this was Albert.
Mila kept her eyes closed, but she couldn’t stop repeating: “A coin! A coin!”
Boris took control again. “That’s fine, Mila. Now I’ll have to wake you up. I’ll count to five, then I’ll clap my hands and you will reopen your eyes.” He slowly began to articulate: “One, two, three, four…and five!”
Mila opened her eyes wide. She looked confused, bewildered. She tried to stand up, but Boris gently sat her back down by resting a hand on her shoulder.
“Not yet,” he said. “Your head might spin.”
“Did it work?” she asked him, blinking at him.
Boris smiled: “It seems we may have a clue.”
You absolutely have to find it, she said to herself as she swept the gravel in the square with her hand. My credibility depends on it…my credibility and my life.
That was why she was being so careful. But she had to get a move on. There wasn’t much time.
She only had a few yards to search. The distance separating her from her bungalow, as it had done that night. She was on her hands and knees, unworried about getting her jeans dirty. She plunged her hands into the little white stones, and on her knuckles she already had the bleeding marks of little cuts peeping through the dust that covered them. But the pain didn’t bother her; in fact, it helped her concentration.
“The coin,” she went on repeating to herself. “How could I not have noticed?”
It would have been very easy for someone to find her. A guest, or even the porter.
She had come to the motel before the others, because there was no longer anyone she could trust. And she had the feeling that her colleagues didn’t trust her anymore either.
“I’ve got to hurry!”
She moved the stones by throwing them over her shoulder, biting her lip. She was nervous. She was angry with herself, and with the world at large. She breathed in and out a number of times, trying to overcome her agitation.
For some reason she found herself remembering something that had happened when she was a raw recruit at police academy. Even then it had been apparent that she had a very reserved character and found it difficult to make contact with other people. They had put her on patrol with an older colleague who couldn’t sta
nd her. They were chasing a suspect down the alleyways of Chinatown. He was too fast and they hadn’t managed to catch him, but her colleague had thought that as they passed the rear of a restaurant the suspect had thrown something into a vat of oysters. So he forced her to climb up to her knees in that stagnant water, and rummage around the rotting mollusks. Obviously there was nothing there. And he had probably only wanted to teach her something a recruit has to learn. She had never eaten another oyster since. But she had learned an important lesson.
And the rough stones that she was throwing aside with such intensity were a test as well.
Something to demonstrate to herself that she was still capable of getting the best out of things. It had been a gift of hers for a long time. But just as she was beginning to feel pleased with herself, a thought ran through her head. Like her older colleague that other time, someone was making fun of her now.
There wasn’t really a coin. It had just been a trick.
Just as Sarah Rosa reached this realization, she raised her head and saw Mila approaching. Unmasked and powerless, her rage fled at the sight of her younger colleague and her eyes filled with tears.
“He has your daughter, hasn’t he? She’s number six.”
34.
H er mother is in the dream.
She is speaking with her “magical” smile—that’s what she calls it, because it’s lovely when she isn’t angry, and becomes the loveliest person in the world, but it now happens less and less.
In the dream her mother is telling her about herself, and also about her father. Now her parents are getting on better, and have stopped arguing. Her mother is telling her what they are doing, about work and life and home in her absence, and she even lists the films that they’ve been watching on the video recorder. Not her favorites, though. They’ll wait for those. She likes to hear it said. She’d like to ask her when she can come back. But in the dream her mother can’t hear her. It’s as if she’s talking to her through a screen. However much she tries, nothing changes. And the smile on her mother’s face now seems almost ruthless.
A caress slides gently through her hair, and she wakes up.
The little hand goes up and down from her head to the pillow, and a tender voice murmurs a song.
“It’s you!”
Such is her joy that she forgets where she is. What matters now is that she didn’t imagine the little girl.
“I’ve been waiting for you for so long,” she says to her.
“I know, but I couldn’t come before.”
“Weren’t you allowed?”
The little girl looks at her with big, serious eyes: “No, I was busy.”
She doesn’t know what tasks could have kept her so busy that she couldn’t come and see her. But for now it doesn’t matter. She has a thousand questions for her. And she starts with the one closest to her heart.
“What are we doing here?”
She takes it for granted that the little girl is a prisoner too. Even if she’s the only one tied to the bed, while the other one is apparently free to wander at will around the belly of the monster.
“This is my house.”
The answer takes her aback. “What about me? Why am I here?”
The little girl says nothing and concentrates on her hair again. She understands that the girl is avoiding the question and doesn’t insist—the moment will come for that as well.
“What’s your name?”
The little girl smiles at her: “Gloria.”
She takes a closer look at her. “No…”
“‘No’ what?”
“I know you…your name isn’t Gloria…”
“Yes it is.”
She struggles to remember. She’s seen her before, she’s seen her before, she’s sure of it.
“You were on the milk carton!”
The little girl still doesn’t understand. “I only came here recently. Four weeks at the most.”
“No! It’s at least three years.”
She doesn’t believe her. “It’s not true.”
“Yes it is, and your parents made an appeal on television!”
“My parents are dead.”
“No, they’re alive! And your name is…Linda! Your name is Linda Brown!”
The girl stiffens: “My name is Gloria! And the Linda you’re talking about is someone else. You’re getting mixed up.”
Hearing her voice crack like that, she decides not to press the point: she doesn’t want the girl to go away and leave her on her own again. “All right, Gloria. Whatever you like. I must have made a mistake. Sorry.”
The girl nods contentedly. Then, as if nothing had happened, she goes on combing her hair with her fingers again, and singing to herself.
Then she tries something else. “I feel terrible, Gloria. I can’t move my arm. I have a fever all the time. And often I faint… ”
“You’ll be better soon.”
“I need a doctor.”
“Doctors just mess things up.”
The phrase sounds false on her lips. It’s as if she has heard someone else saying it, so often that over time it has entered her own vocabulary. And now she’s repeating it for her benefit.
“I’m dying, I can feel it.”
Two huge tears fall from her eyes. Gloria stops and collects them from her cheeks. Then she starts staring at her fingers, ignoring her.
“Did you understand what I said to you, Gloria? I’ll die if you don’t help me.”
“Steve said you’d get better.”
“Who’s Steve?”
The little girl is distracted, but she answers anyway. “Steve, the one who brought you here.”
“Who kidnapped us, you mean!”
The little girl stares at her again. “Steve didn’t kidnap you.”
Even though she’s afraid of making her angry again, she can’t compromise on this point: her survival depends on it. “Yes he did, and he did the same to you. I’m sure of it.”
“You’re wrong. He rescued us.”
She doesn’t want to lose her temper, but the question is too much for her. “What the hell are you saying? Rescued us from what?”
Gloria hesitates. She can see her eyes draining, making way for a strange fear. Gloria takes a step back, but she manages to grab her wrist. She tries to escape, tries to break away, but she isn’t going to let her go without an answer.
“From who?”
“From Frankie.”
Gloria bites her lips. She didn’t want to say it. But she did.
“Who is Frankie?”
Gloria manages to wrench herself free, she’s too weak to stop her.
“We’ll see each other again, won’t we?”
Gloria walks away.
“No, wait. Don’t go!”
“You need to rest now.”
“No, please! You won’t come back!”
“I will: I’ll be back.”
The girl leaves. She bursts into tears. A bitter lump of desperation rises into her throat. And it spreads to her chest. She is racked with sobs, her voice breaks as she cries into the darkness.
“Please! Who is Frankie?”
But there is no reply.
35.
Her name is Sandra.”
Terence Mosca wrote it at the top of his notepad. Then he looked back up at Sarah Rosa.
“When was she kidnapped?”
The woman rearranged herself on the chair before replying, trying to get her ideas in order. “Forty-seven days have passed by now.”
Mila was right: Sandra had been taken before the other five. And then Albert had used her to attract Debby Gordon, her blood sister.
The two girls had met one afternoon in the park, watching the horses at the riding stables. They had exchanged a few words and a rapport had immediately been established. Debby felt low because she was so far from home. Sandra because she was separated from her parents. United by their respective sadnesses, they had immediately become friends.
They had both been g
iven free horse rides. It was no coincidence. It was Albert who had brought them together.
“How was Sandra kidnapped?”
“It was while she was on the way to school,” Rosa replied.
Mila and Goran saw Mosca nodding. They were all there—including Stern and Boris—in the big archive room on the first floor of the Federal Police building. The captain had chosen this unusual place to avoid the news getting out, and to keep the conversation from seeming like an interrogation.
The room was deserted at that time of day. Long corridors of shelves full of files spread out from the place where they were assembled. The only light came from the consulting table that they were all sitting around. Sounds and voices were lost in the echoing darkness.
“What can you tell us about Albert?”
“I’ve never seen or heard him. I don’t know who he is.”
“Obviously…” observed Terence Mosca, as if this must be an aggravating circumstance for her.
Sarah Rosa still hadn’t been put in any kind of custody. But soon she would be charged with complicity in abduction and the murder of children.
It was Mila who had identified her when investigating the kidnapping of Sabine at the merry-go-round. She had thought that Albert might have used a woman so that the abduction passed unobserved in front of everyone. Not just any accomplice, though, but one who could be blackmailed. The mother of child number six, for example.
Mila had received confirmation of this incredible hypothesis when going through the photographs from that evening at the fair on her laptop. In the background of a snapshot taken by a father, she had noticed a mass of hair and a foreshortened profile that had provoked an intense tickle at the base of her neck, followed by an unmistakable name: Sarah Rosa!
“Why Sabine?” Mosca asked.
“I don’t know,” said Rosa. “He let me have a photograph of her and let me know where I would find her, that’s all.”
“And no one noticed a thing.”
In the Thinking Room, Rosa had said, Everyone was looking only at their own child. People don’t give a damn, that’s the truth of it. And Mila had remembered. Mosca went on: “Then he knew the families’ movements.”
“I suppose so. His instructions to me always seemed very accurate.”
The Whisperer Page 36