by Lisa Tuttle
“What about your boyfriend?” I asked.
“That had been over for months. He was living with someone else.”
“Did he know you were pregnant?”
“He would have known it wasn't his.”
Her dry tone forbade me to pry.
“Everybody thought I was crazy to be having a baby on my own. Like I'd planned it! Even my parents, who are rabidly antiabortion, practically disowned me. You'd have thought from them that I'd done it just to make them look bad and hurt my good married sister, who'd been trying for years to get pregnant.”
Polly didn't question Laura's morality or her sanity, did nothing to erode her shaky confidence, and was at all times supportive and kind. Besides emotional support, she gave practical help. After Peri's birth she'd been better than family, positively heroic. When Laura had to go back to work, far too soon (maternity leave, even unpaid, was practically unknown in Texas at that time), Polly had switched to the night shift at Kinko's so she could babysit while Laura was at work. For the first few months of her life, Peri had the loving attention of two mothers.
But this seemingly idyllic state had not lasted long. Laura's voice faltered slightly when she described how one night while Polly was out at work, she'd hastily packed everything she could fit into her Volkswagen Rabbit, strapped the baby into her car seat, and fled off down the highway.
“I was crazy,” she said. “Actually crazy. Suffering from postnatal paranoia, although I didn't know it at the time. I was so strung out from lack of sleep that I'd started hallucinating. I thought everyone was conspiring against me; I had nightmares about Peri being stolen from me, and because I wasn't coping so well, it seemed a real possibility that I would lose my baby, either through carelessness or because someone from social services would step in and decide I wasn't qualified to keep her.” She paused to take a drink of wine.
“And it wasn't just inside my head. My mother started calling. At first I was grateful, thinking she wanted to make up, but then I realized she wanted me to give my baby to my sister. She said it was the only sensible thing to do: I was single, I had to work, I could barely support myself, let alone a baby, whereas my sister was married, her husband made enough money for her to stay home and be a full-time mom, and they were good, churchgoing Christians who'd raise her right.”
Finishing the last of the pizza, I shook my head in wonder. “Whew. I can see why you'd want to run away from them.”
“But not Polly. She was the best friend I'd ever had, then I turned against her. See, she was alone with my baby all day while I was out at work. Polly took her out for walks, and in the car to run errands, all that stuff. For all I knew, she might be telling people Peri was hers and they'd believe her. Why would Polly do what she was doing, for no pay, if not for love? And what if she decided she didn't want to share anymore? If she ran away with my baby, I'd never get her back. As soon as I'd thought of it, I was sure it would happen. And that the only thing I could do was run away with Peri myself, before Polly could.”
Laura had driven down to Houston, where she'd had a vital bit of luck, getting a job with a company that offered subsidized day care on the premises. Peri's sleeping patterns changed, and as she began to sleep through the night, Laura's psychological symptoms eased.
By the time Peri was two years old, Laura had her new life on firm foundations and, after another year, felt secure enough to revisit her past. She repaired the broken relationship with her family—it was made easier by the fact that her older sister was by then pregnant—and tried to get in touch with Polly.
But Polly was no longer at the old address in Dallas, or working at Kinko's, and Laura couldn't track down anyone who knew what had become of her. She didn't spend very long trying.
“I knew she had a sister called Rebecca who lived somewhere around Jacksboro, and maybe I could have found her, but . . .” She shrugged uncomfortably. “I guess I still felt guilty, and it was easier just to let it go.”
“Until she found you?”
“Yes. That was a long time later—nearly eighteen years.”
“After Peri had vanished, or before?”
“The same week.”
A chill ran through me. “You didn't think that was strange?”
“It was a coincidence,” she said, her jaw set stubbornly. “A good one. I was so grateful—without her, I don't think I would have survived.”
“Wait, wait, wait.” I waved my hands. “Go back. How did Polly get in touch with you—phone? E-mail? And when exactly?”
“A couple of days after Peri disappeared. Christmas Eve, she turned up on my doorstep.”
“And you just accepted that? It didn't occur to you that the two things might be connected?” I reached for my glass, but it was empty. I poured the rest of the bottle into it, baffled by Laura's puzzled frown. Was it really possible she had never suspected her old “friend” could be involved?
“How could they be connected?”
“Well, let's see. Once upon a time you imagined that Polly wanted to steal your daughter, so you ran away from her. Eighteen years later your daughter disappears, and, surprise, Polly turns out to be close by. She turns up on your doorstep. How'd she manage to find you, did she say?”
“She ran into somebody I knew in Houston, and when she mentioned she was going to London for Christmas, this person gave her my address.” Laura glared at me. “Polly is not a suspect! She's been a wonderful friend. Really, she saved my life, twice.”
“You didn't always think so.”
“I told you I was crazy then. Paranoid.”
“Even paranoids have enemies.”
“Oh, honestly!” Laura pushed her plate away although most of her second slice was still untouched, and sighed. “Look, there's a huge difference between stealing a baby and deciding to kidnap a grown woman! How could she do it? And why would she even want to try? Revenge? It's like the plot of a bad movie.”
“I don't know. And I'm not saying Polly kidnapped Peri. Just that I'd be surprised if she wasn't involved in some way.”
“How?”
“That I don't know. But she knows something. We need to find her.”
Laura shook her head unhappily. I could see that my suspicions had affected her, despite her determination that her old friend was a candidate for sainthood. “I guess you ought to talk to her yourself.”
“Where's she living now?”
“Northwest Texas. She and her sister have a ranch out near Jacksboro. I can give you her e-mail address.”
“I might have to go out there,” I warned. Lying is too easy by e-mail, and you can't learn enough through a phone call. When you're suspicious, a face-to-face interview is the only way to go. “I know it might seem like a big expense, but . . .”
“If you think it's necessary. But I just can't believe Polly had anything to do with it. She stayed with me for nearly a month after Peri disappeared. If she had something to hide, wouldn't she have talked me out of hiring a private eye? Why would she send me to you?”
I grimaced at my empty plate. “The unflattering reason could be she thinks I'm useless.”
Laura got up. “You're wrong about Polly, that's all. Come on, let's clear this stuff away and watch the movie.”
Washing up didn't take long, and we were soon settled on the couch in front of the TV.
The opening image was the one I'd already seen: the young woman gazing at something off-screen, a faint half smile on her face. She was luminously, timelessly beautiful—this time, I thought of one of Botticelli's goddesses.
On the sound track, the plaintive sound of a single flute. As if she'd heard, the girl slowly turned her head to look directly, wide-eyed, into the camera—and again, even though I'd been expecting it, I felt the same sense that she was looking at me, personally, and I couldn't help a fearful, delighted shudder.
The image froze there, and the title came up over her softly smiling face.
THE FLOWER-FACED GIRL
A FILM
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BY
HUGH BELL-RIVERS
The scene changed to a party: loud music, young people talking, laughing, and thrashing about in a crowded room. The camera work was jerky and frantic in that contemporary way I dislike, drawing attention to itself, all odd angles and weird perspectives, the zoom function seemingly completely out of control. No particular shot mattered more than any other, the focus was all over the place, and yet—drifting through the chaos, appearing in practically every scene although visible only briefly, was a beautiful blond girl, all the more compelling for being so unknowable.
“That's not Peri?”
“No. A young actress called Alyx Meterie. Hugh picked her because she looked so much like Peri.”
Gradually a sense of story emerged. Alyx was playing a London schoolgirl dabbling in drugs. She became addicted and left her mother's house to move in with her pusher (an improbably sleek, handsome, sinister-looking young man). Intercut with this bleak, modern tale was the myth of Demeter and Persephone. These sections were in black and white, with the same grainy, old-fashioned quality as the opening sequence, and I thought that Peri was playing the part of Persephone until Laura pointed out the way the camera moved from a close-up of Peri's face—the same close-up, mostly—to a longer shot of the actress who was her near double. Hugh had filmed Peri at the start of their courtship in the summer; later, I learned that almost all of that filming had been done in the very same communal garden I'd found so attractive on my walk through West Hampstead. It backed onto the house where Hugh's mother, and also at that time Hugh, lived. It didn't add up to a lot of film, and there was no narrative, just scenes of Peri looking pensive, or smiling, or picking flowers, or, in the longest sequence, stretching out to lie on her back on the grass, half-shaded by a bush.
Hugh had used this material for the Persephone sequences, weaving glimpses of Peri into the dramatic scenes performed by Alyx so painstakingly that it would be impossible for anyone who didn't know to pick out the splices. The careful construction gave the Persephone segments a strange, slow, ritualistic pace that seemed to belong to another age, and invested the story with an even greater sense of mystery. The modern story was backed with a track of alternative rock music—all unfamiliar to me—but in the mythic sequence the only music was brief snatches of flute-playing; otherwise, the sound track consisted of a woman's voice whispering in classical Greek, lines from the Homeric Hymn to Demeter.
We saw Hades tricking the unwary Persephone into eating a pomegranate seed before he sent her back to her mother, knowing this would force her to return to his realm. Then, the same scene from a different angle, and this time instead of force or trickery we saw compliance, as the girl exchanged a sexually charged look with her rapist/lover, slyly thrusting out her tongue to accept the seed he offered.
In the modern drama, the girl is just saved from death by overdose and returns, repentant, to her mother's house. Then, in the dead of night, she creeps outside, into the same iron-fenced garden where Persephone had been sitting in daylight amid flowers; there she meets her dealer-boyfriend, offering him her arm, upturned and fisted, for the needle. The camera moves to catch the dreamy ecstasy on the modern girl's face. Gradually, that face blurs to mere shadows. When it comes back into focus, it's Peri's face, and her smile gradually fades, replaced by a look of utter blankness. Even the light in her eyes seems to be extinguished, a split second before the image freezes.
The hairs rose on the back of my neck. I felt as if I'd seen Peri at the moment of her death, and the horror and sadness of it was overwhelming.
The screen went black. Credits scrolled slowly, white words against a black background, against silence.
I turned to Laura and saw tears rolling down her cheeks. Her breathing was a little ragged, but otherwise she made no sound, gave no sign that she was weeping.
I felt like crying, too. I wished I had the right to put my arms around her and kiss her tears away. Instead, I got up and went across the room to the counter, where there was a box of tissues, and brought it back to her.
Laura took a tissue and gently blotted her face. “She must be alive. She was alive six months after she left. And she said she was happy then. She sounded all right.”
I could think of nothing useful to say, so I said nothing.
Laura sighed, crumpling the tissue in her hand. She didn't look at me. “It's getting late. Maybe you should go.”
“When will I see you again?” That came out more ambiguously than I'd intended. I added quickly, “I've still got some questions . . . and we need to talk about, um, a contract, expenses, stuff like that—now's not a good time.”
She nodded. “Tomorrow. I could meet you for lunch. Somewhere near my office?”
“Sure.”
“There's a bistro place—look, I'll e-mail you the details. I'll send you Polly's address, too.” She was brisk, almost recovered, the businesswoman dealing efficiently with practicalities.
“Good.” I picked up my briefcase, much lighter without the bottle, and started for the door.
“Ian.”
I turned. She was staring at me, intent on the truth. “That other case of yours, the one you didn't want to tell me about? Just tell me one thing.”
I waited for it.
“Did you find her? And was she all right?”
I met her eyes and fixed on them, a wide, unblinking gaze meant to convince. It was, I knew, the body language employed by liars, but I couldn't seem to stop myself.
“Yes,” I said. “I found her, and everything was OK.” I could feel a flush rising above my collar and was eager to get away. “See you tomorrow.”
What I'd said was the truth, so why did I feel like a liar?
17. Mary
Mary Campbell married John Nelson, a young goldsmith of Aberdeen, in the early 1800s, and they were a happy couple until the time came for her to be delivered of her first child. At midnight, the household heard a loud and terrible noise, and all the candles blew out. The midwife and friends attending Mary fell into a panic, and it was some time before they managed to recover their wits, restore light to the room, and return their attention to her—to find a corpse in the bed.
Many people attended the wake, among them one Reverend Mr. Dobb, who took one look at the body and proclaimed it fake: “Mrs. Nelson must have been carried away by the fairies, who left this stock in her place so all would think her dead.”
But he was unable to convince them, even though he adamantly refused to attend the funeral, and so the thing from the bed was buried, and John Nelson and all of Mary's friends and relations deeply mourned her loss.
Sometime later, John Nelson was riding in his fields one evening when he heard music, which seemed to be coming from the little grassy knoll that they called in that part of Scotland a “knowe” or “moat.” As he went toward it, he saw a veiled figure in white. He greeted the woman kindly. She threw back her veil and burst into tears and, with a shock, he recognized his wife.
“In the name of God, what has disturbed you?” he cried. “And what has caused you to appear at this hour?”
“I am not dead,” she replied. “Although you think me buried, there is but a stick of wood in my grave. I was carried away with our newborn child. I hope you may save me, but I fear I cannot bring our child away, for it has three nurses who attend it always. The greatest hope I have is in my brother Robert.”
Robert Campbell was a sailor, whose ship was due to arrive in Aberdeen within a fortnight. Mary told her husband he would find a letter addressed to her brother on his desk the following Sunday, and that he should give it to Robert Campbell when he came home.
“Do not attempt to win me away, or I shall be lost forever,” she cautioned. “Only Robert can do it.”
With that, she vanished.
John Nelson quickly rode back to town, where he found Mr. Dodd and told him what had happened. The Reverend Dodd accompanied him home and stayed with him until the following Sunday, when a letter appear
ed as Mary had promised. A few days later, Robert Campbell arrived, and John gave him the letter at once.
In the letter, Mary asked her brother to go, on the first night after he received it, to the moat where she'd been seen. “Let nothing daunt you, but stand in the center of the moat at the hour of twelve at night, and call me, when I, with several others, will surround you; I shall have on the whitest dress of any in the company; then take hold of me and do not forsake me; all the frightful methods they shall use, let it not surprise you, but keep your hold, suppose they continue till cockcrow, when they shall vanish all of a sudden, and I shall be safe . . .”
Robert Campbell vowed he should rescue his sister and her child that very night. He set out by himself at ten o'clock, and almost immediately was confronted by a great roaring lion. He lashed out with his sword and the lion vanished. This cheered him enormously, for now he felt certain that all the threats he'd meet would only be illusions.
Arriving at the moat, he saw a white handkerchief spread on the top of it. He went and stood on it and called for his sister. At once he was surrounded by a company of ladies, all in white clothes, and the one who shone the whitest was unmistakably his sister.
Taking hold of her right hand, he announced, “By the help of God, I will preserve you from all these infernal imps!”