Keep Her Safe

by Sophie Hannah

  4

  October 10, 2017

  I just don’t get it.” I look up from the iPad. “This all happened—the bit I’ve read so far—before anyone declared Melody officially dead. How can this Bonnie woman suggest Melody’s parents are murderers on live TV and get away with it?”

  I’m at Swallowtail’s Mountain View Cocktail Bar with Tarin and Zellie Fry, sitting at a table on the terrace. It’s going to be a while before I can think of them as anything but Badass Mom and Highbrow Daughter. Tarin is the mother. Zellie is short for Giselia. As we sat down, Tarin told me, “You can say what you like in front of Zellie. Don’t think of her as any kind of child. She’d seen every episode of Dexter by the time she was thirteen.”

  She’s sixteen now and should be at school but isn’t because, according to her mother: “What’s the point? No one in that sorry-ass establishment teaches her anything worth missing a vacation for. She’ll learn more reading on her own. Her father disapproves, so I left him at home. If you’re married to a whiner, you’ve gotta come down hard, soon as he starts to complain.”

  “Like you wouldn’t have found some excuse to leave him at home anyway,” Zellie muttered.

  “Welcome to American justice,” Tarin says now with a grin. She seems to be enjoying the situation and my bewilderment in particular, as if it’s all precisely what she’d hoped for as an accompaniment to her holiday.

  “You mean this is all normal and . . . allowed?” I take a sip of my latest mocktail—a blue one this time, with some purple toward the bottom—and wonder if I’ll end up having dinner with these two strangers. I want and need to talk to someone about everything that’s happened, but a whole meal together feels like a big commitment to people I don’t know.

  “NFA—normal for America.” Tarin chuckles.

  “How can it be normal?” I say. “If anything goes to trial, the jury’ll be massively biased, having heard all this on a . . . daily justice show, or whatever it is.”

  “Oh, it goes to trial—just not the trial anyone was expecting,” says Tarin. “You know it’s Melody’s parents who are in jail for murder, not Kristie Reville?”

  “Yeah. And from what I’ve read so far, that makes no sense.”

  “You need to read the rest. We Americans were lucky: we got the story spread out over years by the time the trial happened. Bonnie Juno was obsessed that whole time. She kept finding new people to interview—anyone who’d ever met Naldo Chapa at a conference, anyone who’d ever sold Annette Chapa a sandwich—she’d have them on the show and ask for their decades-old impressions, as if that was going to tell anyone anything. You weren’t lying, huh? None of this reached you over in England?”

  “Nothing. I’d never heard of Melody Chapa until today.”

  “Lucky you.”

  I don’t feel lucky. What am I supposed to do if the resort manager won’t take me seriously? Should I ring the local police myself? How? I don’t know the names of the two detectives who were here, and I’ve no reason to think anyone would listen to me any more than they listened to Mrs. McNair. Why should they? As the internet reminds me every time I check, Melody Chapa is dead.

  “The bloodstained sock . . .” At this rate I’ll soon be as obsessed as Bonnie Juno. “I mean, everything Nate Appleyard said on Justice with Bonnie about what he saw in Kristie Reville’s car . . . it’s like the whole trial—evidence, arguments—is happening on TV instead of in court.”

  “You’re right.” Tarin nods. “Whole system’s fucked. It’s not justice, it’s a farce. Google ‘Melody Chapa justice farce’—you’ll find a hundred long analyses of how twisted it all got.”

  “So there’s really no rule over here about not publicly saying anything that might bias jurors?”

  “Nope. Appalling, right? I’m telling you, you’d be horrified.”

  “I am.”

  “We’ve got it all in the good ol’ US of A: jurors signing up to sell their stories before the trial’s even started and facing no sanctions whatsoever, bereaved family members banned from courtrooms because the psycho that sliced up their loved one managed to convince a judge that he finds their presence in court traumatic. Yeah, right. More like: the jury’s less likely to convict if they can’t see his victim’s sobbing family members. And don’t get me started on the doctoring of crime scenes.”

  “Tell us how to get you stopped,” says Zellie.

  Tarin, in full flow, ignores her. “You won’t believe this, Cara. Sometimes juries are taken on tours of the crime scene, so they can get a real feel for things. Great idea, huh? Except wouldn’t you think the court’d impose some kind of obligation for the crime scene to be kept as it was immediately after the crime was committed? Wouldn’t you think a defense attorney’d face a fine—or, better still, contempt charges—if he had all the blood and brain matter cleaned away so the place was spotless, and hung framed photos of the wife and kids his sicko client killed all the way up the stairs, as if they’d been there all along—as if the killer ever gave a shit about them enough to bother?”

  “The longest rhetorical question in the world,” Zellie murmurs. She picks up her mother’s glass and takes a sip of Campari and soda, giving me a look that clearly says, “Say one word and you’re dead.” Tarin doesn’t notice. It’s turning into a beautiful night; I can already see a sprinkling of stars. Camelback Mountain looks stunning: a black outline against a deep blue sky.

  I scroll down on the iPad, scanning the text for the words I’m looking for. “I can’t find the bit I saw before, about Melody’s head. The girl I met last night didn’t stop rubbing the top of her head. I wondered about it at the time.”

  “That’s right. Melody had a mark in front of her hairline.” Tarin points to her own head. “Here, right?”

  I nod. Exactly where the girl rubbed, same spot.

  “It’s a big, dark brown circle, like an oversized freckle—about as big as a quarter. Americans know it intimately. Bonnie Juno had photos of it on her show for months, enlarged, zoomed in. . . . It came up in court at the Chapas’ trial. Melody had cradle cap as a baby. You’re not supposed to pick it off, though it’s tempting—like picking at a scab. Everyone warns you: scraping off cradle cap can lead to infection and/or scarring for life. Annette Chapa admitted in court that she’d picked off a large scaly patch of skin from Melody’s head—she couldn’t resist. Course, that gave the rabid Bonnie Juno an opportunity to do a whole show around ‘What kind of terrible, abusive mother would do such a thing against official medical advice?’ Do me a favor!” Tarin snorts. “I did all kinds of stuff I wasn’t supposed to do when Zellie was a baby. Once I gave her a jar of anchovy paste instead of baby food—I was so goddamned tired of that stinky mush you’re supposed to give them. She was sick everywhere.”

  Zellie reaches for the Campari again. This time Tarin notices and slaps her hand away. “Cut that out!” Turning to me, she says, “Annette Chapa didn’t heed the warnings. She picked off the cradle cap and it left a brown spot. As Melody’s head increased in size, so did the spot. That doesn’t make Annette Chapa a murderer.”

  “So how did she and her husband end up in prison for killing Melody?”

  Tarin nods at the iPad. “Read on. I’m guessing you haven’t gotten to the part about Mallory Tondini?”

  “No.”

  “Well, you will.”

  “The girl I saw must have been Melody. Why else would she do that rubbing thing? She didn’t know I’d never heard of Melody Chapa. She was scared I’d see the brown mark on her head and recognize her.”

  Zellie makes a dismissive noise. “You’re talking as if she isn’t dead. She’s dead.”

  “How do you know?” Tarin asks.

  “What, you actually believe this crap?” Zellie turns to me. “I’m not accusing you of lying, okay? But come on. Melody Chapa’s long dead. Any girl can have a weird fixation and name her soft toy Poggy and rub her head for, like, a wide variety of possible reasons.”

  “They never found her
body,” says Tarin. “Plus, they found her bag with Poggy not in it.”

  “Yes, and that means the body and the toy could be literally anywhere. The schoolbag they found had Melody’s hair in it, and tests showed arsenic poisoning. And there were flies in the bag—the kind that only show up if someone’s dead.”

  “I know.” Tarin is unperturbed. “Still no body, though.”

  “Mother, a court decided she was dead.” Zellie rolls her eyes. “Her parents are in prison, and they’re never coming out. It’s so typical of you to think you know better.”

  “Is your job something to do with the law?” I ask Tarin.

  “Ha! Go on, Mother, tell Cara what you do. District attorney, is it? Supreme Court justice? Oh, wait, no, it’s neither of those two things.”

  Tarin’s grinning. I have the impression Zellie has said this or similar to her before. “I’m a florist. Got my own shop in Lawrence, Kansas. So fucking what, right? Doesn’t stop me thinking.”

  “It’s only fair you know this, Cara. My mother is totally biased. She wants you to have seen Melody Chapa, and she wants Melody to be not dead. You know why? Because then Bonnie Juno’d look like the biggest moron that ever lived, and she hates Bonnie Juno.”

  “That is true,” Tarin confirmed. “All civilized Americans hate Juno. She’s a hypocrite, or an idiot, or both. Probably both. When she was a prosecutor, everyone was guilty. Especially the people she prosecuted—they were the guiltiest of all, naturally. Then she switches careers and becomes a legal commentator on TV, and suddenly everyone’s being callously and cynically framed, according to her. The cops are always wrong, prosecutors always wrong, defendants always innocent. It’s like something happened to turn Juno against her former profession and push her into the arms of the other side, the darker side. Melody Chapa disappears and Kristie Reville looks guilty as hell, and the cops think she’s responsible? Juno makes a point of declaring her blameless. No one suspects the parents? Oh, wait, someone does! Bonnie Juno does, mainly because the police don’t. She’d say anything to be contrary. I swear to God, if the cops had pointed the finger at Melody’s parents from the start, Juno would have protested their innocence like her own life depended on it. Narcissism—that’s what it is. She’s a narcissist. Those accused of crimes are guilty or innocent to suit the needs of her ego at any given time.”

  “If Melody’s parents are in jail for her murder, that might mean . . .” I don’t finish the sentence.

  “That Bonnie Juno got it right this time?” Tarin made a derisory hissing noise. “Cara, you’re the one who saw Melody. Here, at Swallowtail. Alive. Or rather—keeping an open mind—you saw a girl who might be Melody. I suppose it’s possible the girl you saw was someone else with a toy called Poggy—a tribute to Melody’s Poggy—and it’s possible this girl happened to have an itchy head last night. Or—better idea!—her thing, her shtick, is pretending she’s Melody. Maybe she was worried you’d see no brown mark on her head and break the spell by yelling, ‘Wait a second—you’re not Melody!’” Tarin laughs, sticks her arm up in the air and yells, “Another Campari and soda over here.”

  The nearest waiter hurries away to do her bidding.

  “Don’t bother asking if we want anything,” says Zellie.

  “I think you saw her,” Tarin tells me, paying no attention to her daughter. “Real her, and real Poggy. Mrs. McNair seems pretty nuts—so when I heard her blabbering on about seeing Melody Chapa, I paid no attention. But you? You’re sane.”

  “How can you tell?” asks Zellie.

  They both stare at me.

  “Easy,” says Tarin. “Crazy people—as in, deluded—make shit up. They’re imaginative. Cara, when you mentioned the girl saying she’d spilled Coke on Poggy and Doodle Dandy, I’ll admit that I thought, ‘Here we go! Doodle Dandy—that’s a red-flag crazy alert, this woman’s invented a new character toy for a dead girl.’ Then I realized: you’re not that imaginative, are you? Don’t take that as an insult. Not everyone has to be imaginative.”

  “What do you mean? I mentioned Doodle Dandy because she did—the girl.”

  “Right. That’s my point. I believe you. I don’t think you’ve got the imagination to dream up a new toy and name it.”

  I can’t help bristling at this. “Actually, I’ve named plenty of toys. When my children—”

  “Please!” Tarin waves my words away. “You named stuffed toys you had to name, because your babies were too young to do it themselves. I bet you called the white ones Snowy and the black ones . . .” She stops and frowns. “Shit, my mind’s gone blank. What’s black?”

  “Nelson Mandela,” says Zellie in a bored drawl. “Maybe he’s not really dead, either. I swear I saw him in our bathtub this morning.”

  “My point is, Cara, if you were making up a bunch of crap, you wouldn’t need to give Melody any other toy but Poggy. He’s all you’d need for a convincing Melody encounter. I don’t think you’d make up a second cuddly thing. If you did, being British, I don’t think you’d call it Doodle Dandy, which is an abbreviation of Yankee Doodle Dandy.”

  I’m getting tired of hearing about myself from this woman who knows nothing about me. I want to have dinner alone. Not that I’m at all hungry.

  “When Mrs. McNair was being an asshole before, by the pool, you moved. An imaginative person would have found a way to make her move. And you’re here on your own. Why? You’re not here for business.”

  “How do you know?”

  “You don’t move briskly enough. You seem kind of lost and unfocused, and you’re not with friends or family. If I had to guess—”

  “You don’t, though,” Zellie advises. “You could mind your own business for the first time ever.”

  “. . . I’d say you have a problem of some kind and you don’t know how to solve it. Which proves you’re unimaginative. There must be a way to deal with it. If I knew the problem, I’d give you the solution. Not that I’m prying. But, yeah . . .” Tarin nods at me as the waiter puts a new Campari and soda down on the table in front of her. “I believe you saw and heard what you say you saw and heard. Which means—maybe, probably—that for once Mrs. McNair’s right: Melody and her male chaperone ran away last night.”

  “Because of me. Because, since I barged in on them, they think I’m a threat. They weren’t packed or anything. They were asleep, with their stuff all over the bathroom: razors, a swimming cap, hair clips. Nothing I saw indicated that they were planning to go anywhere last night.”

  I sit forward in my chair. “The room! We can find out who’s supposed to be in that room, or the police can, if we call them—what name it’s booked in, whether anyone’s in it. Shit!”

  “What?” Tarin grabs my arm. “Have you remembered something else?”

  “The opposite. I can’t remember what number room it was. It was on the third floor, but beyond that—”

  “Don’t worry about that. There’ll be a record in the system.” She stands up and throws the rest of her drink down her throat, spilling some down her neck in the process.

  “Mother!” Zellie protests. “Manners.”

  Tarin snaps her fingers. “Club car!” she calls over her shoulder. Then, to pacify Zellie, “If you please.”

  Melody Chapa—the Full Story

  An Overview

  The Murder of Melody Chapa: Part 2—A Surprise Alibi

  The media vilification of Bonnie Juno continued for the two months that she was away from her show. During this time also—unknown to the public—one of the officers involved in the Melody Chapa case was starting to have grave doubts about Kristie and Jeff Reville’s guilt. Detective Larry Beadman had been contacted by a man named Victor Soutar who described himself as a massage therapist. Soutar claimed that Kristie Reville had spent the whole day with him on March 2, 2010. She arrived at his apartment at nine that morning, he said, which would have given her just enough time to get there in the heavy morning traffic if she’d dropped Melody at school at the usual time, and she stayed unti
l three thirty in the afternoon: the exact time at which she would have needed to leave in order to pick up her husband after work at 4:30 P.M.

  Soutar told Larry Beadman he had thought twice about coming forward, hence the delay. He had been following the case in the news as most of the country had, and he had taken Kristie Reville’s failure to produce him as an alibi to mean that she would rather risk a murder conviction than have the truth come out. Soutar said that personally he couldn’t see why she would be so ashamed of the truth, but if she was, that was her business. Asked why, in that case, he had come forward, Soutar replied, “I don’t know. I guess it’s not just about Kristie. It’s about the little girl, too. Whoever killed her could get away with it. I don’t want that on my conscience.”

  Soutar turned out to be no ordinary massage therapist. He was “a charmer” with impeccable manners and presentation, and he specialized in erotic massage specifically for women with fertility problems. Kristie Reville had responded to an ad he posted on Craigslist.

  When Detective Beadman looked closely at Soutar’s operation, he soon discovered him to be “a fraud with a lot of extremely gullible clients.” These included Kristie Reville, who had said nothing to her husband about her regular sessions with Soutar at his apartment. She subsequently admitted, “Deep down, I knew the line Vic was spinning me was pure fantasy, but I didn’t want to admit it to myself because I needed to believe something might work, and Jeff and I had tried everything else. We were so desperate for a baby—Jeff, too, though I think I was probably worse than him. I would’ve done anything, paid any money, even for something I didn’t really believe in.”