I Spy

by Claire Kendal

  I strain to listen. Zac does nothing to alert the police that I am here, but I know I have a couple of minutes at best before the house is swarming with detectives.

  I try to look at the room as Eliza would. The first thing I notice is that the collage of photographs from her dressing table is gone. One of her precious things, and she seems to have taken it, despite Zac saying she didn’t pack before leaving last night. There is nothing interesting or personal in her drawers, which are filled with cashmere and silk.

  At the bottom of her wardrobe is a small, fireproof deed box. I heave it onto her bed. It’s locked, but it’s the kind of flimsy thing meant to stop it from popping open in a fire rather than to deter thieves or a husband. I grab the battery-operated lock pick gun from my bag. After a few seconds of vibrating buzz, I have the lock open.

  When I lift the lid, the first thing I am faced with is a photograph of Zac holding Alice. She is about six months old, and Zac is looking sideways at her, solemnly, while she giggles at the photographer. Alice is so like the newborn picture of my baby. My baby, wrapped in Milly’s blanket, with her copper hair and its beautiful streak of white. If they used age progression technology on the photo I have of her and stopped at six months, it would be identical to this one. I slip the photo into my bag. I will cut Zac out later.

  The other thing in the deed box is an A4-sized plastic wallet. It is labelled ‘Alice – Important Identity Documents’. It isn’t Zac’s writing, so it must be Eliza’s. I stash the folder in my bag, too. As I do, something makes me turn towards the bedroom door.

  Standing in the opening is a man. ‘Hello, Holly,’ he says.

  He is slight of build and a little below average height, with metal-framed glasses he probably doesn’t need and nondescript brown hair. He is wearing dark trousers, a white shirt, and a navy tie with white dots. You would not notice him in a crowd. He blends in like a serial killer.

  ‘Hello, Martin,’ I say.

  ‘Your message reached me. Well played. You certainly caught my attention.’ He waits, as if expecting me to thank him for the compliment. When I say nothing, he goes on. ‘I’d planned to talk to you today, but not quite so soon.’ He is looking at my bag. He smiles. ‘I will need to take the item you just placed in there.’

  ‘No.’ I lift my toes and begin to rock, then stop myself.

  He looks stunned, clearly not used to hearing that word. ‘What?’

  ‘I need it.’

  ‘My preference would be for you and me to handle this alone.’

  ‘I don’t see how a folder of notes about a small child can be relevant to Jane’s death.’ I stare at him with a coolness that would make even Maxine proud.

  ‘Maxine didn’t want to play your final interview the way we did, you know. My playbook, not hers. I thought you’d hold up better, but Maxine predicted that little vulnerability of yours.’

  I have always blamed Maxine for that interview in the white room with the glass table.

  He goes on. ‘When we learned you were living with Hunter, she didn’t want to recruit you, said we’d messed your life up enough already. I forced the issue.’

  I have always blamed Maxine for everything.

  ‘She was even more insistent on getting you out of there when she discovered you were pregnant.’

  I have always thought he was for me, and she was not.

  ‘We needed you to copy his hard drive. She didn’t want you to, but once we learned about that micro SD card slipping through our fingers …’

  I’d got it the wrong way round.

  ‘I pressed it, said you were tough, that it was what you’d wanted, that she wouldn’t be doing you a favour to cut you loose. Was I right?’

  He is so casual. For two whole years I have hated Maxine for what happened, for putting me in that position and keeping me there. But it was never her. It was this man. Always, every step, it was him.

  ‘You were not right.’ I say this with a blankness I do not feel. Maxine’s gift.

  ‘That’s surprising. Well, I was sorry to hear how it played out for you.’

  How many times has he used the word play? The expression played out? Playbook too. As if all this is a game to him.

  He comes closer. ‘I’ll have that document wallet now, Holly.’

  There is no choice but to take it from my bag and hold it out.

  He flicks through the contents quickly. ‘Tedious.’ He tosses it onto the bed. ‘Irrelevant, as you said.’

  My eyes follow it, though I don’t move even a millimetre. Is he going to ask for the photograph too? Perhaps I’d slipped it into my bag before he arrived, so he didn’t see.

  ‘You were right about how Jane Miller died, by the way. Smothering, you told Maxine and Tess. Well done.’

  Well done?

  ‘There was bruising on her chest and upper extremities. Looks as though he crouched on her upper body, with his knees digging in and his feet splayed out over her arms. Probably held them against the sides of her torso so she couldn’t fight him off while he pressed a pillow against her face. Afterwards, he arranged her in that pose.’

  As if he didn’t have the courage to look at her while he did it. There is something un-Zac-like about that. He prefers to watch, so he can study the effects of what he does to you, and how you respond. He likes to see your face move between pain and pleasure and fear. I swallow hard. ‘Was she raped?’

  ‘Sexual intercourse took place before she died. I’m told there was no vaginal bruising or bleeding, but you can’t infer force from the presence of those signs, or infer that there wasn’t force from a lack of them.’

  Is Martin glad Jane is dead? And that she died so horribly? This supposed traitor they have chased for years? If he is sorry, it is probably because he didn’t manage to get his hands on her first.

  He goes on. ‘There’s more in the forensic pathologist’s report, but that’s the gist of it – Maxine can let you have a look. And I gather our friend George has been briefing you.’

  ‘When can I see the report?’

  ‘Maxine will talk to you. Good to run into you, Holly. I’m sure we’ll meet again.’ And he walks out of the room.

  I grab the document wallet, slide it into my bag for the second time, and hurry down the stairs. Zac is gone. Martin is talking quietly to the same tall detective with dark hair and dark-rimmed glasses who stood outside the cordon of the house where Jane died. He looks exactly as he did then. The prince of death in a dark suit. Martin puts a light hand on the man’s arm, to stop him from questioning me. I head straight through the open front door. When I crunch across the gravel drive, I see that Horton Hatches the Egg is gone.

  Then The Memory Box

  One year and eleven months earlier

  * * *

  Cornwall, Late May 2017

  Somebody has taken my baby out, but I find her in a little basket by my bed, and though she is bone-white and made of plastic, though she is only a doll, there is a zipper at the bottom of my belly, so I slide it open and put my baby back inside, then seal it up again so I can keep her safe. Now she will turn soft once more, and she will pink up and grow, so the next time she comes out she will be ready.

  I opened my eyes. I was in a tight white bed in a small white room with a needle on top of each hand, kept in place with tape that had tubes snaking out from beneath it. Bags of fluid floated above metal posts like deflating balloons.

  I crept a hand under the sheet. My skin burned with the tug of the needle. I let my hand hover above my belly, and told myself this was a nightmare and I would wake up. I lowered my hand. My belly wobbled like jelly. The firm bump was gone. Lower down, my skin was covered in papery fabric that I couldn’t pull away.

  I opened my mouth to cry out. No sound came. But then I tried again, and when I started to scream, and I saw that Zac was sleeping in the chair, and he jumped up as nurses rushed in, I knew it wasn’t a nightmare at all. And I screamed and screamed, and tried to tear the needles from my arm, and shouted
at them to give me my baby. I kicked and thrashed and tried to stand, but they were holding me down and stabbing something into the top of my arm, and I fell back, crying softly, begging them to tell me where she was as my eyes closed again.

  I was in the same white room, in the tight white bed. Peggy was sitting by my side in the hard chair where Zac used to be. She leaned over and smoothed my hair from my face. There were tears running down her cheeks.

  ‘Why are you crying, Peggy?’

  ‘Because you have been so ill, and we thought we’d lose you. You bled so much you nearly died.’

  ‘How long have I been here?’

  ‘A week.’ She hesitated. ‘Do you – do you want to see Zac?’

  I closed my eyes. I shook my head.

  ‘He was desperate for me to ask you. They’ve told him to stay away – it upsets you too much, when he’s near.’

  ‘I want my baby.’

  She took my hand in hers. ‘Holly, you’ve said goodbye to her.’

  ‘Bring her.’

  She opened her mouth to speak, but nothing came out. She tried again. ‘Your baby is with the angels. She’s grown wings.’

  ‘No.’ I took in several shuddering breaths. ‘No. She’s not. No.’

  ‘You held her, my darling. You said goodbye. She’s gone.’

  ‘No. No. I didn’t.’

  She pushed my hair from my forehead. ‘Your baby died. I know you don’t want to remember. She’s a little angel, now.’

  ‘Stop saying that about angels. It isn’t true. I want my baby.’

  ‘Holly, my love. I am so sorry. But it is true.’

  ‘Make them bring her.’

  ‘I need you not to go far away from me, even though you want to.’ She reached down, and came up with a pale pink box decorated with white butterflies. ‘Do you remember? We talked about the memory box.’

  I stared at the white sheets. There was a spot of dried blood at the top.

  Peggy moved to the edge of the bed, helped me to sit up, put an arm over my shoulder, let my weight fall sideways onto her soft, solid body. She lifted the lid of the box and pulled a photograph out. ‘We’ll look together.’

  She was wrapped in a pale pink blanket, and surrounded by white lace pillows. On each side of her was a matching stuffed teddy bear, ivory and no bigger than my own hand. ‘See how beautiful she is,’ Peggy said.

  ‘Why haven’t they dressed her? Why isn’t she wearing proper baby clothes?’

  ‘I asked them about that. They said they didn’t have anything small enough to fit. She – her growth wasn’t what it should have been, they think for the last couple weeks. I brought the blanket in for her, while you were still in the intensive care unit. It was Milly’s.’

  Her eyes were closed. Her mouth was a perfect rosebud in her pale face. She had so much hair, for someone so tiny. I imagined myself brushing that hair. It was the same copper as mine, but it was light, almost white, in the centre.

  There was a cry coming from somewhere, a sob that repeated again and again, and at first I thought it was a baby. I wasn’t sure how long the noise had gone on before I realised that the sound was coming out of me.

  And then I understood the important thing. My mouth shaped itself into a smile, though it was tremulous, uncertain as a child’s when they couldn’t decide if they should be happy or sad. ‘It’s okay. Peggy, it’s okay. It isn’t true. She’s not dead. She’s sleeping.’

  ‘Holly,’ she said. ‘Zac told me – the nurse told him – when you, when you kissed her, you said your kisses would make her warm again. It didn’t work, my love. They told him you became so distressed, when it didn’t work. They wanted to take her away then, but you wouldn’t let them. You had her with you for hours. You kept refusing to let them take her away. You had her with you for as long as you could. You’re such a good mum.’

  ‘That never happened. Zac is lying. Did you see her yourself?’

  ‘I wanted to, but she’d been out for as long as she could. Even Zac barely had time with her. He felt that time – her, her being out – needed to be yours.’

  ‘Why not longer? What do you mean, as long as she could?’

  Peggy didn’t answer. ‘I – I tried to get a cuddle cot, but the hospital doesn’t have them yet.’

  ‘What’s a cuddle cot?’

  She took a deep breath. ‘It keeps baby cool, so they can stay with you for longer. I was phoning everywhere, trying to get one. But I couldn’t. I’m so sorry.’

  There was a cry, thin and insistent, coming from somewhere nearby.

  ‘I can hear her. Listen, please listen. Don’t you hear? She needs me.’

  Peggy was crying too. ‘It’s someone else’s baby.’

  ‘Make them bring me mine. Please make them.’

  Peggy was sobbing so hard she was choking. ‘I’m so sorry. Milly made me promise not to do this.’ She gulped water. ‘You’ve had a trauma, Holly. That’s why you don’t remember. There are so many people who love you. We’re going to get you all the help you need.’

  ‘The help I need is to see her. I want her with me.’

  ‘Holly my love, it’s been too many days. After you cuddled her, they had to take her away. Do you understand?’

  ‘No. No. No I don’t.’

  She reached into the pale pink box. She retrieved a tiny white teddy bear and held it up. It was identical to the ones in the photo. ‘This is for you to keep. The other one stayed with her – the two were made as a pair.’

  I did not answer. I did not move. At last, I said, ‘I don’t want a stuffed toy. I want my baby.’

  Peggy returned the teddy bear to the box, but pulled out something else. ‘The nurses took her footprint for you. They used a special ink, so they could wipe it off, afterwards. Look.’ She offered it to me. When I refused to take it, she laid a framed display card on top of the bedclothes.

  The foot that made that print was no bigger than a doll’s. I was shaking my head again. ‘That isn’t hers. That could be any baby’s.’

  Peggy took the paper as if it were something holy and returned it to the box.

  ‘I want to take care of her.’ I pushed the bedclothes away. ‘I want to show her how much I love her.’

  ‘It will be too upsetting for you. She – her little body – it deteriorates. You had her with you as long as you could.’

  ‘No.’ I was on my feet, starting for the door, and I was screaming, and though Peggy’s arms went around me, I couldn’t stop screaming. My screams were interspersed with Zac’s name, and the word bastard, then he was in the room too, pushing Peggy out of the way, begging me to lie down, telling me the wound would open and I was going to hurt myself and the lines were being torn out, trying to guide me back to the bed but not daring to apply force, managing to pull the red triangle and set off the lights and alarms while I pounded on his chest, telling him that I hated him, that I would hate him forever, that he killed my baby and I would kill him, and that I wanted to die. All the while, his voice was overpowering mine, telling Peggy and the nurses that I didn’t mean it, that we loved each other and it was his job to take care of me, and he was crying, too. I thought of the thing I could say that would hurt him most, the one thing I could think of that would make him hate me as much as I hated him, so he would leave me alone, so I screamed that the baby wasn’t his anyway, but he only said, ‘There is no doubt that she was mine, Holly,’ and then I screamed some more.

  It was a severe placental abruption. The placenta was the organ that my body made to nourish her, to give her oxygen, to keep her blood clean and protect her from infection. The placenta was what attached the two of us. The placenta was what tore us apart, ripping away from the wall of my uterus and at the same time ripping my world into shreds.

  They said it wasn’t my fault, but I know it was. I hurled myself at Zac and grabbed for the keys and fell forward, straight onto my belly, smacking it against the edge of that marble table. A blow, even weeks earlier, even months, can cause it.
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  They had no choice, they said, but to do a hysterectomy and multiple blood transfusions. They said I would have died if they hadn’t, and I said I wished they’d let me and not dragged me back and forced the lost blood into my body. They said, as if they had performed a miracle, that they managed to save my ovaries, so I would still make eggs, and I wouldn’t need hormone treatment. But what good did that do when there was nowhere for those eggs to go, and mere indifference on my part to the fact that they existed at all?

  The things that I learned, and did, and had done to me, were a blur. It was so hard to put them in the right order. I knew that I’d lost time, but I wasn’t sure how much. Peggy acted as my translator, mediating between me and the world of the living, which no longer made any sense to me.

  Two weeks. That was how long I’d been in the hospital, Peggy told me, coming every day and trying to help me count. They would not let me leave, because of secondary complications. An infection that I needed intravenous antibiotics for. Severe anaemia due to blood loss – evidenced by lab reports and by the bruises in varying shades of red and blue and purple and yellow and green that covered my body.

  Peggy asked me if I wanted them to do a post-mortem.

  ‘Why? We still can’t be sure she is dead.’ As I said this, I thought of a tombstone in the graveyard where my parents were buried. The birth and death dates on it were the same. Born sleeping. I had a habit of pausing over it.

  ‘Oh, Holly.’ Peggy looked so stricken.

  So I said that I did not want them to cut her open, and it was pointless, since we knew why it happened, since she was perfect except for the fact that she had a mother who failed her. This made Peggy cry and say I was wrong, but I knew I was not. And then I said, But am I a mother, Peggy? And she said yes, you are, nothing can change that, and she cried some more.

  There was talk about cremation, the hospital arranging it to make things easier, and promising it could be done individually instead of with other babies, and I said yes to that, because I couldn’t manage it myself, and the less I had to discuss with Zac, the better. Peggy told me we would get the baby’s ashes back, and we could bury them or scatter them or even make them into jewellery that I could wear every day.