Jane’s head jerked up from studying the coaster. “What are you talking about? We have to call the police and let them know about Nick!”
“At almost midnight? I don’t think so.”
“First thing in the morning then. Come on, let’s get to bed. We have a lot to do.”
“Aren’t you going to finish your wine?”
“I need sleep more.”
Chapter Twenty-Six
AND THEN IT snowed. Detouring over to the window on my way back from the bathroom at dawn, I saw that the world had been outlined in white by a fine pen—tree limbs, the curves of wrought-iron gates, the tops of shop signs. The snow had left a white line along the edges of half-timbered buildings. Yet it did not plunge me into any fantasy about the world looking this way in Shakespeare’s time. I fretted that the snow would not stop falling, and we would never be able to get home.
“DCI Sampson probably doesn’t even work on Saturdays,” I grumbled to Jane an hour later. She had leaped out of bed and was doing morning stretches.
“You know what? You’re suffering from post-traumatic stress. How are you feeling anyway? Physically, I mean.”
“Oh, I’m okay.” I moved my neck experimentally, and felt an unwelcome twinge that radiated down my back. When I swallowed I found that some soreness lingered. “I guess I’ll live.”
“You need coffee. And oatmeal. Wouldn’t oatmeal with brown sugar taste good on a snowy day?”
“I said I’ll live.”
“Good. Then get dressed. We have a lot to do and the police station opens early.”
“WE KNOW WHO attacked my mother.” Jane had picked up the reins of the investigation, rescued them from my lifeless hands, and gotten us through breakfast and back to the police station.
We were sitting in DCI Sampson’s own office, a comfortingly efficient space with no Christmas decorations, a relief after the blinking colors and artificial garlands everywhere else. The prints on the walls were of fine-textured fish, so detailed that they might have come from an old zoology text. With each successive visit, Sampson let us a little further into his world, like a shy furry animal gradually inviting us into his lair. Next he would be taking us home for tea.
“He contacted you again?”
“No. We talked to an actress last night who knew Priscilla Waters. She said Priscilla had a son, Nick Clancy.”
“She said he does street theater and has a Shakespeare mask,” I added.
Sampson looked as surprised as he probably ever did. “I’d forgotten about the boys. Different last name, of course.”
“Do you know Nick Clancy?”
“Let’s just say he’s no stranger to the Stratford constabulary. I remember the hit-and-run too. No one ever came forward, and it was closed as an accident by persons unknown.”
I leaned forward. “Marian Baycroft—the actress—thought Nick had been very affected by his mother’s death.”
“Perhaps he was. But that was years ago.” His pursed lips under the small mustache indicated that holding on to grief for so long was unseemly, that Nick should have manned up long ago and gotten on with his life.
“How can we find him? We need to talk to him.”
“Mom!”
“I wouldn’t advise that, Ms. Laine.”
“And what would you advise?” Perhaps I was too used to making demands of Long Island policemen, but I was not letting this drop. “I need to know why he attacked me and what he knows. If I promise not to press charges, do you think he’d talk to me?”
Sampson sat back in his chair regarding us. “I’ll bring him in. You can talk to him here. We were going to question him anyway.” I must have looked skeptical, because he added, “The vendors at the fair couldn’t identify him because he was wearing the mask. But we’re familiar with the high-pitched voice you mentioned.”
In America they would have already had him in a cell. I wondered how the British could afford to be so leisurely and still solve any crimes.
“You won’t leave us alone with him, will you?” Jane worried.
“Jane, he’s not Hannibal Lecter.”
“He tried to kill you!”
“Nick’s a wildcard,” Sampson said. “I want to hear what he has to say and have a look at that mask. If you damaged it the way you say you did—”
“Maybe he’s already left town.” Jane sounded as if he had fled to South America.
“Nick? Your original bad penny? He has nowhere else to go and he’s too arrogant to think he’d ever get caught.” He pushed back from his desk. “Come back in an hour. We’ll have him here.”
“I DON’T THINK he’s taking the attack on you seriously enough,” Jane complained, as we sat in a shop on the main street, having coffee. “If he knew who did it, why hadn’t he arrested Nick already?”
The Merrie Tea Cosy was fully given over to the holidays, with ropes of fragrant evergreens stretching from corner to corner, Santas and felt elves on every shelf. A topiary ball near the fireplace was covered with tiny scarlet bows. Even the shortbread bars we ordered were dusted with red and green sprinkles.
“Well, he didn’t see me right after it happened. I guess I don’t look that bruised now.”
“But still. And what was all that about not pressing charges?”
“If it’s like it is at home, if you don’t press charges, it doesn’t stick. Unless there’s serious damage maybe. But if there’s a dust-up and a victim refuses to testify, there’s not much they can do.”
“But why wouldn’t you?”
Once again I felt Will’s forearm cruelly crushing my throat, my fight to take a breath. “I want to know what he knows. If he won’t talk to me, I will press charges.”
“He’s a monster! He needs to be locked up for a long time. And Sampson is right. He should have gotten a life years ago.”
DCI SAMPSON LED us into the interrogation room where we had met with him—was it just yesterday? Even though we were at a police station, even though a detective was with us, I couldn’t tamp down my apprehension. What if Nick leaped up from the chair and thrust a knife into my chest? He’d be arrested, but I’d be dead. I had said he was no Hannibal Lecter, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t move fast. Two months ago a friend of mine had almost died from such a knife wound.
“Just here, Ms. Laine.”
And then I was sitting across from a slight figure in a sweatshirt who glared at me but stayed rooted to his chair. When he was viciously pressing me against him, trying to choke away my breath, he had felt immense, unstoppable.
Now I wondered if it was the same person. Splayed across a straight wooden chair, wearing a leather jacket with the hood of a gray sweatshirt sticking out the back, he looked more like a supermarket bagger than a killer. He was good-looking enough without his mask, his black hair in loose curls, cheeks still rosy from the cold. Only the resentful twist of his mouth and eyes half closed as if in boredom, spoiled the image.
Still, the air around us crackled. It was like being put in a cage with a lion that was supposedly trained not to attack humans. But the only human he had had contact with was his trainer—so who knew? I thought I could feel Jane’s tension as she stood behind me clutching my chair back.
DCI Sampson spoke to us over Nick’s head. “I’ve explained to Mr. Clancy that you may decline to press charges if he gives you proper answers and never approaches you again. This interview is not being recorded.”
Nick sprang to life. “Who the hell says I did anything to her,” he flared. “I wasn’t even at the market Thursday night.”
I jumped. It was the same nasal voice, a high-pitched whine that would have been fatal to an actor aspiring to play Shakespearean drama.
“Ah, but we know different, laddie. George of Musica Anciens identified your voice. He’s got a good ear, though you were wearing
that mask and tried to fool him.”
Nick pressed his hands against the table. “You believe that fucking pouf?”
“I’m sure we’ll find that broken mask in your digs,” DCI Sampson went on.
“I’m sure you won’t. I—” He stopped, giving his head a furious shake.
“Why did you attack me?” I asked.
“I didn’t attack you. Just gave you a hug.” He smirked like a junior high felon in the principal’s office. “It was all in fun. I saw your poster and thought I’d wind you up a bit.”
“I don’t believe that. You knew exactly who I was. You’re Priscilla Waters’s son.”
His head gave a small, shocked jerk, and he pressed his lips in a stubborn line.
“Your mother kidnapped my child. I’m the one who should have attacked you.” I’d decided on an offensive approach, treating the assumption as a fact. If he denied it, he might still say something damaging. “She dressed up like a nanny and stole my daughter from the park.”
“You know what? You’re daft. That’s why I was playing wit’ you. I saw your broadsheet and thought, That’s one crazy lady!”
In a move as efficient as any other he had made, DCI Sampson reached out and grasped his hoodie, tightening it until Nick gagged. His arms jerked upward like marionettes, flailing around to free himself. “You’re wasting my time.”
Although I watched my share of BBC mysteries and saw physical persuasion often enough when no tape recorder was running, I was surprised.
Sampson loosened his grip and nodded at me to go on.
“I have a photo of your mother in the park on the day she took my daughter,” I said. “I never knew who she was until I came back and saw the story about the accident. I’m sorry she was killed—I shouldn’t have said what I did—but why blame me?”
Nick jerked his head back at Sampson. “I want a solicitor!”
“Right you are. I’ll have one delivered to your cell.” He made it sound as if Nick had ordered a fish and chips dinner. “Right after Ms. Laine signs the complaint forms and we formally charge you.”
“What do you call attempted murder here?” Jane asked him over my head.
“Just that. Or attempt to cause grievous bodily injury. When the victim and the attacker are strangers, it’s a more serious charge. The perpetrator can be put away for years.”
Nick started.
“Okay, laddie, come along.”
“No! Are you going to believe her lies? It’s her word over mine.”
“Ah, but the publican saw you running away,” Sampson told him. “His wife and other people. You’re no kiddie either. Thirty-one, are you?”
“Thirty.”
“Thirty.” DCI Sampson considered that. “You’ll be a lot older than that when you’re on your own again. But maybe they can teach you a useful trade inside so you won’t have to stand around on street corners bothering tourists.” He reached out and yanked on the shoulder of Nick’s leather jacket. “On your feet.”
I wanted to protest. I didn’t want to press charges if it meant I would learn nothing from Nick. Surely we could wear him down if we stayed in that room long enough.
Nick glared at me with enough hate to put us back in the alley. “My mother didn’t kidnap your brat.”
“I have the photos,” I said. “And an eyewitness.” No need to tell him the eyewitness was Jane. “I just didn’t know who your mother was.”
“She wasn’t a kidnapper. It was only supposed to teach you a lesson.” He looked up at Sampson. “I’m talking to her, okay?”
Sampson released the leather jacket. “Start at the beginning.”
It was a command impossible to resist if you were afraid of spending the next few years in jail.
I SAT IN the overheated room, a windowless pale green chamber with nothing on the walls but the fire evacuation plan, and listened to a story I could not have imagined.
Priscilla Waters had been approached one night after a performance of A Midsummer Night’s Dream and offered a role in a very exclusive production: She would be playing a nanny and would be coached on exactly what to say and do.
“How much did they offer her?” DCI Sampson asked.
“Who cares? It doesn’t matter.”
“It matters.”
“I don’t know exactly. She thought it was a lot. All she had to do was take this kid, to teach this mum a lesson, to make her watch her kids better.”
“So it was a prank?”
“Yeah. She thought it was.”
My heart began banging around my chest so crazily that I pressed my hands against it to keep it from exploding into the room. I ordered myself to breathe. Had I had been such a terrible mother that someone felt compelled to teach me a lesson? Had one of the English people I thought were so friendly despised me all along? I felt washed by a deep, dark red shame—the kind I had felt only once in my life when my father had come upon me sprawled on my bed doing something Christian girls weren’t supposed to know about.
How could I have been so unaware that people around me were staring and pointing fingers? I’d blithely gone my own way, toting a jumble of picture books, diapers, juice boxes, and extra binkies. I hadn’t bothered with damp washcloths for cleanup, or carrot and celery sticks for healthy snacks. The ice cream wagon had been the highlight of the afternoon. We headed for the same bench every day and set up tribal headquarters. Jane always reminded me to bring the bread to feed the ducks and swans. I remembered warning the girls that swans could be mean and to not get too close.
But that didn’t make you a good mother. No. Some days I would get so absorbed in the book I was reading that too long would go by before I checked on what the girls were up to. Other days I would be busy taking photos, the way I had been on that last day.
Indicted. I hated to imagine what DCI Sampson was thinking of me now as well as Jane. A colossally bad mother. The worst the English had ever seen.
Except—it didn’t make sense. Why would someone pay so much money just to scare me into being more responsible? Why not confront me directly—yell and lecture, and read me the British version of the riot act? Besides, Celia Banks had said I was a good mother. Well, at least she hadn’t scolded me for being a bad one.
“You’re admitting your mum snatched this little girl,” DCI Sampson said. “What happened next?”
Nick slumped in his chair as if he had been tricked into the revelation. “She brought her back to our flat and waited for the people to pick her up. They said that after they had scared the mum enough, they would give the baby back. But the kid was there all night. In the morning my mother got a call and took her somewhere.”
“Where?”
“How should I know? I wasn’t even up. Micah told me.”
“Wait,” Jane demanded from behind me. She sounded out of breath. “She was at your house? My sister stayed at your house that night? What did she look like?”
Nick seemed impatient at this intrusion, as if talking to her had not been part of the deal. “I dunno. Like a kid. Like your flyer. She was cute—at first—my mum gave her stuff to play with, but then she started screaming and crying for her ‘mama.’ ” He glared at me as if it were my fault. “Wouldn’t shut it and Mum was afraid people would hear. Summer and all, the windows were open. So she gave her some sleeping powder to knock her out.” He seemed to be remembering something he had not thought of in a long time. “Yeah, she was afraid she’d given her too much. She sat up all night to make sure the kid kept breathing.” He raised his head then and gave me another scornful look. “See? She wouldn’t have worried like that if she was such a bad person.”
From behind I felt Jane put her arms around my neck and hug me hard. My still-aching muscles screamed, but I reached up and stroked her arm. I couldn’t take it in. The image of Caitlin screaming for me was the onl
y thing that made it real. I made myself spell it out. Here was proof that Caitlin had never been near the water that day. My little girl had not drowned in the Avon River. If they had dredged every bit of river and hung it out to dry, they would not have found her body.
That—or Nick was playing with me again, this time in the cruelest way possible.
“When did your mother realize it was no prank?” Sampson asked.
“There was all this stuff in the paper about the kid drowning. We knew she hadn’t drowned. My mother finally figured out they never planned to give her back. She’d been gulled.”
“So your mum realized she had been tricked,” DCI Sampson said.
“Yeah.”
“Did she go to the police then?” I asked. I knew she hadn’t. I said it to point out that it was what she should have done.
“She did. She wrote a note saying that she saw a woman walking out of the park that day with a kid that looked like the Fitzhugh kid.”
The shocks just kept coming. I stared up at DCI Sampson, openmouthed.
“We get a lot of anonymous tips,” he said evenly. “Most of them come to nothing.”
“You mean you didn’t even follow up?”
He moved a hand impatiently above Nick’s head. “If she didn’t sign her name how could we? We’d already interviewed everyone who came forward to say they’d been in the park. No one told us they’d seen anything like that.” He peered down at Nick. “I can guess what happened next. She hit them up for more money, didn’t she?”
“Blackmail,” Jane said censoriously.
“They owed her big-time! They’d used her to kidnap a kid. It wasn’t just some silly prank, they’d made her part of a crime. She could have gotten in big trouble.”
Either Priscilla Waters had been dimmer than a night-light or fundamentally twisted. You didn’t abduct a toddler from a park and hide her in your apartment overnight while her parents went out of their heads thinking she had drowned. How many hours did it take you to realize it was no “prank”? So she had sent the police a vague note without any real details for them to follow up on—Nick thought that made her St. Teresa?
A Photographic Death Page 13