by Alex Barclay
‘Of course,’ said Anna. ‘He would tell us. He’s devastated. He would say something.’
‘I know,’ said Martha. ‘I’m sorry. I had to…’
‘It’s OK.’
Martha smiled again, then went into the kitchen to make more tea.
Anna sat back on the sofa and breathed in deeply. There was nothing about Katie to make her believe she’d ever run away. She wasn’t the type of girl who looked for her next hit of adventure, she was content enough not to want to escape.
The phone rang. Martha dropped the tray with the teapot, splashing hot tea up her legs. She ignored it and ran for the phone. Anna could hear her speaking slowly.
‘No. Definitely jeans, Frank. Those wide ones. Yes, the rest is right, yes.’
She hung up and came back into the living room, deflated.
‘Someone saw a girl in a pink hoodie, hitching the Sunday after, but she had track pants on and they wanted to check if I could have got it wrong, what she was wearing.’ She sat down. ‘I suppose I don’t mind them calling for things like that, but it’s just, you know, every time the phone rings, I nearly have a heart attack.’
Anna looked down at the splashes on Martha’s legs.
‘Oh, I’m fine,’ said Martha. ‘You know, my mother used to be able to put her hands into boiling water to take the eggs out. And she’d stick her hand under the grill to get the sausages. Strong women in my family.’
Suddenly she started to cry. Anna brought her a tissue and sat on the edge of the armchair. She laid her hand gently on Martha’s shoulder.
‘It’s funny how you don’t know people,’ said Martha, wiping her nose. ‘Have you met John Miller yet? He used to be in my class. He was a lovely lad, sweet, charming. Would do anything for you. Anyway, I went away to London after school, came back several years later and I heard he had moved to Australia. Now I hear his wife kicked him out…because he beat her. And it was his mother who told me, whispered it like a confession in the supermarket. I had known Mae Miller all my life as a very private woman. She never spoke about her business. Then she starts telling me, a casual acquaintance, about something that personal?’ She shook her head. ‘So you never know with people. Anyone can surprise you.’
Shame pulsed through Anna. That she could have been so intimate with a man who went on to beat women repulsed her. A long-buried image of him pinning her hands above her head flashed into her mind. It repulsed her, because in it, she could see the smile across her face.
‘Ohmygod,’ said Ali, running down the stairs into Shaun’s bedroom. ‘Katie owes me big time.’
‘Why?’ said Shaun.
‘For a totally puckering experience. That guy in charge, the D.I.? Came to my house for a chat. Which was fine. Then he goes, “I know you smoke dope.” I nearly puked.’
‘Wow. What did you say?’
‘I’m, like, fair enough. But it’s not like I’ve run out of veins or something, I’m shooting into my groin in a phone booth. Jesus.’
Shaun shook his head. ‘Man, that’s unreal.’
‘I think they thought Katie was involved in some sort of shady gangland stuff. Bizarre. I’d laugh if I wasn’t so shitting it. He was asking about online freaks as well.’ She shook her head. ‘I mean, it’s an arboretum.’
‘What?’ said Robert.
‘Of wrong trees they’re barking up.’ She threw herself on the sofa and groaned. ‘Where are you, Katie, you bad, bad, girl?’
Joe knocked lightly on the door and came down the stairs.
‘Who’s winning?’ he asked.
‘Everyone except Rob,’ said Shaun.
‘Hi, Mr Lucchesi,’ said Ali, smiling wide. She leaned up on her elbows.
‘Hi, Ali. Like the hair.’
‘Blue-black,’ she said.
Joe sat down on the edge of the bed. ‘So how you all doing?’ he said.
‘Not bad,’ said Robert. ‘It’s been really hard on everyone.’ He made a face towards Shaun. ‘We’re all a bit in shock. We don’t know what Katie’s up to.’
Shaun put down the controls and left the room.
‘God,’ said Robert. ‘I didn’t mean to—’
‘Don’t worry,’ said Joe. ‘It’s not your fault.’ Then, ‘So where were you guys that night, when Katie…’
Ali spoke first. ‘I hate to say it, but I was at home doing my homework. On a Friday night.’ She shook her head.
‘Robert?’ said Joe.
‘Uh, at the harbour.’
‘Oh. With Katie and Shaun.’
‘No. Just with the others, Kevin and Finn. I think we were, like, down near the lifeboat launch and Katie and Shaun were up the other end.’
‘Right. And you didn’t see them leave—’
‘See who leave?’ said Shaun, standing in the doorway with a bag of tortillas.
‘You and Katie. That night,’ said Robert quickly.
‘Just thinking out loud,’ said Joe.
‘Interrogating out loud,’ Shaun muttered.
Joe stood up. Something caught his eye.
‘What’s that scratch on your hand, there, Robert?’
Robert blushed. ‘Aw, football. I’m crap. I crashed into the goalpost.’
Joe nodded. Anger flashed in Shaun’s eyes.
‘We’re trying to play a game here, Dad.’ When Joe didn’t move, Shaun snarled an ‘OK?’
‘Sure,’ said Joe, getting up to leave.
Duke Rawlins wandered around the small roadside grocer’s, picking up products, reading the labels and putting them back down again. Two teenage girls watched him from behind the counter. He walked up to them.
‘Ladies. What d’y’all like eatin’ over here?’
They glanced at each other and giggled. ‘What do you mean?’ said one of them.
‘You know, like, what would you recommend? What’s your favourite dinner?’
‘Oh,’ they said at the same time. ‘Pasta.’
‘Both of you?’
‘Yeah. Everyone likes pasta. I’ll get you the nice ones,’ said the other.
She walked over to the freezer, took out two bags of tomato and garlic penne.
‘Here. Catch,’ she said, throwing one to him. He missed.
‘Sorry,’ she said, giggling, walking over and handing him the second.
He put them on the counter. ‘And two bottles of Coke,’ he said. ‘And a bottle of red wine.’
‘Are you going to tell her you cooked it all yourself?’
He laughed.
‘Aw, shit,’ he said suddenly. ‘I don’t have a cooker.’
The girls exchanged glances. ‘Bizarre,’ said one of them. ‘Well, you can give them a blast in that microwave over there and I’ll wrap them in foil for you after.’
‘Thanks,’ he said.
‘But you do know, your cover will be blown,’ she said.
He smiled.
O’Connor stood in Frank’s office with his hands in his pockets staring out at the harbour.
‘Ali Danaher,’ he said.
‘Ah,’ said Frank.
‘I tell you, it wasn’t like that in my day,’ said O’Connor, turning around and smiling. Frank noticed his eyes looked clear for the first time. O’Connor shook his head. ‘There’d have been serious trouble if I spoke to an adult like that.’
‘Did you have an eye infection?’ asked Frank.
‘What?’ said O’Connor. ‘Oh. The red eyes? No. Contacts. She’s a bit of a smart arse, Ali, isn’t she? Anyway, she blew everything out of the water. Reckons no to drink, drugs, the Internet possibility, no to everything.’
‘I tried to tell you,’ said Frank. ‘There’s no point trying to fit modern theories to an old-fashioned girl like Katie. I suppose like me wearing contacts,’ he said, holding up his magnifying glasses.
Joe focused on the wrinkled tourist map of Mountcannon spread out in front of him. It showed the harbour, the church, the bars, two restaurants and the coffee shop, along with the scenic coastal drive past the li
ghthouse and two other roads out of the village, one a dead end, the other leading to Waterford. With a black pen, he marked the harbour and Katie’s house. Ignoring the scenic coastal drive, which would have brought Katie further away from home, he concentrated on the two other roads – the Upper Road and Church Road, both of which curved around to be connected by the straight Manor Road to form an uneven semi-circle. He wrote notes along the narrow white borders and stuffed the map into the inside pocket of his jacket. He took his car and parked it outside the school, walking the short distance to the T-junction at the edge of the village. Left would take him to Katie’s house, up the hill, along her regular route home. Right could also take him there, a longer walk down Church Road towards Mariner’s Strand and the Waterford Road. If, however, she took a left at the church, she would walk until she met the Upper Road, then take a left to her house.
Joe chose the first route, scanning the ground as he walked, taking everything in. He rounded the bend that brought him to the Grants’ house where Petey lived with his mother. Then he moved on towards Katie’s. He turned around before he reached the house and walked back to the T. This time he went the other way, taking a right down the steep and narrow footpath at the top of Church Road. He was protected from a sharp drop to Mariner’s Strand by a low crooked wall. He looked down at the water, slate grey, rolling diagonally towards the narrow shore in shallow waves. He looked left, across the road to the old stone church and its quaint, cluttered cemetery. Then he stopped, knowing at that moment exactly what he needed to find.
O’Connor came out from the small kitchen in the station with two mugs of coffee. He put one on Frank’s desk and walked back over to the window.
He took a mouthful of coffee. ‘I’m just wondering, Frank, could you be too close to all these kids?’
‘What?’
‘Obviously,’ he said, turning around, ‘your input is a great help, because you know the area, the people involved etc. But do you think your judgment could be clouded at all?’
‘No,’ said Frank, quietly preserving his dignity.
The iron gate to the cemetery was held closed with a loose length of dirty tow-rope. Joe pulled at it until it gave way. Every footstep crunched across the gravel as he moved along the rows between graves, then silence as he walked up the grassy slope to a modest, well-kept plot. MATTHEW LAWSON 1952–1997, BELOVED HUSBAND TO MARTHA, DEVOTED FATHER TO KATIE
And on the grave was a dead white rose.
Frank stood up to let O’Connor know it was time to leave. There was a charge in the room that he didn’t have the energy to take on. He understood what O’Connor said would have crossed anyone’s mind in the same situation. He was just surprised he felt the need to say it out loud.
As Joe walked back through the village, his relief at finding evidence of Katie’s route was overtaken by dread. What if the rose on the grave was not about her father? Maybe it was a statement. Her father was dead, she was planning…Joe shook his head. No-one was safe from the depths of his negativity.
O’Connor sat in his car and watched Frank cross the road to Danaher’s, his head bowed, his hands in his pockets. O’Connor knew he had probably lived up to whatever Frank was expecting from the youngest D.I. in the country. But he tried to convince himself he had said what he had to say.
Joe slid onto the bench beside Frank, opening the map of Mountcannon on the table in Danaher’s.
‘OK,’ he said. ‘Here’s where they were in the village. And here are the possible routes out of town from there.’ Frank frowned.
Richie came back from the mensroom.
‘Is this guy serious? What is this?’
‘Richie,’ said Frank.
‘I’m just looking at where Katie could have gone that Friday night,’ said Joe.
‘Why?’ asked Richie.
‘Because I think I know.’
‘You know nothing,’ said Richie. ‘First of all, flip over that map and look at the date on the back. 1984. That map is ancient. Half the things—’
‘I’ve drawn in or crossed out accordingly,’ said Joe. Richie glanced down at the map, then did a double-take at the neat print in block caps at the edges of the page. He shot Joe a bemused look.
‘Either way, none of this has anything to do with you,’ he said. ‘We’re having a private meeting here. Do you mind?’
‘If you’ll just look for a second. You think she went this way—’
‘The only reason you know anything about what we think is because you’re friends with Martha Lawson. What she does or doesn’t say to you is none of my business. What is my business is you thinking that all this makes you part of the investigation. So you used to be a detective in New York. I used to work in a bar. But you don’t see me pulling pints in here, do you?’
‘Richie, a young girl is missing,’ said Joe.
‘Yes, your son’s girlfriend, I know that. So you should be grateful that every part of the investigation will follow procedure.’
‘I just want to help out here…’
‘You arrogant Yanks think you can save the world,’ said Richie.
TEN
Stinger’s Creek, North Central Texas, 1982
‘I think my baby’s gonna kick some butt, today,’ said Wanda. ‘The first Rawlins family jock.’ Duke rolled his eyes.
Wanda climbed out of the pickup and smoothed the legs of her wrinkled jeans down to her yellow high heels. She looked at her son, dressed from the waist down in his football gear.
‘You look real cute, honey,’ she said.
He shrugged and pulled the rest of his gear from the floor of the cab. He slid the shoulder pads and jersey over his head.
‘Cougars. Number fifty-eight,’ said Wanda. It was the first time she’d seen it. ‘What do you have to do, then? What did I pay my thirty dollars for?’
‘I throw the ball back between my legs and make sure the nose guard from the other team doesn’t tackle the quarterback.’
‘Well, that’s wonderful, honey. I’ll be lookin’ out for you,’ she said, pointing at his chest.
Duke’s eyes wandered past her to another family, dressed for church, the father standing behind his son, pressing strong hands on to his shoulders, smiling.
‘Honey, look at all the pretty little cheerleaders!’ said Wanda.
In a corner of the parking lot, a group of teenage girls in dark blue shorts and cropped tops stamped with a white cougar stood in a circle, practising their cheers. Beside them, a slim blonde stood on one leg, while she pulled the other behind her until it almost touched her shoulder. Others were jumping or doing splits, their faces set in wide, static smiles. Duke turned to his mother with the same eerie grin. Wanda frowned.
‘Stop that, honey,’ she said, smacking his arm.
Two men stood in a cloud of cigarette smoke by the entrance to the stadium, laughing loud and hard.
‘Or Wanda Blowjob?’
‘Wanda Cum-in-my-Face?’
‘All I get from Gloria is Wanda Be Held.’ They hooted. One slapped the other’s back. They stopped laughing when Duke walked between them, pushing a small, firm hand into each man’s stomach and continuing into the stadium.
‘Hey, buddies,’ he spat.
The men looked at each other.
‘Twelve years old,’ said one, shaking his head. ‘A genuine son of a bitch.’
Duke went to the weigh-in area, then sat with his mother and Geoff Riggs for the last few minutes of the PeeWee game. Donnie jogged off the field, his face red and shiny. His hair was limp with sweat.
‘You shoulda seen him out there today,’ said Geoff. ‘Ran his skinny little legs off catchin’ that ball.’ Geoff rubbed a thick hand across his shaved head, showing the sweat patches on his tank top, letting loose a blast of foul air.
Wanda leaned away. ‘Good for you, Donnie,’ she said. ‘The Midget hero.’
‘Donnie’s in the PeeWees,’ said Duke. ‘I’m Midgets.’
Wanda smiled at Geoff. ‘Duke’s gonna sco
re a touchdown today, aren’t you, baby?’
Duke rolled his eyes. ‘Yeah, Mom…if I turn into a quarterback.’ Donnie laughed.
‘We gotta go,’ said Geoff. ‘Good luck, Duke.’
‘Thanks.’
Duke grabbed his helmet and left his mother alone in the stands. Five rows in front of her, separated by an aisle, groups of parents chatted and laughed, pointing out their kids on the sidelines. Wanda focused on her feet, rubbing the dull pink marks that scarred them. She tilted her ankles and examined the fresh red scabs at her heels. Reaching down, she hooked a nail under the hard, dry flesh and picked one free. Crystal Buchanan walked by her, stiff blonde hair, painted like a stewardess, with a flask of coffee and two plastic cups hanging from her little finger. She sat down beside her.
‘Hi Wanda,’ she said, smiling. ‘Duke playing today?’
Wanda looked at her, curious. ‘I know you’re a good Catholic…’ she said.
Crystal’s smile froze.
‘…but I’m not your Mary Goddamn Magdalene.’
‘I was trying to be nice,’ said Crystal.
‘Nope. Not buyin’ it,’ said Wanda, staring straight ahead. ‘You were lookin’ to rescue the downtrodden. Old folks, handicapped babies and whores. Crystal Buchanan, our Lord and Saviour.’
Crystal stood to leave. ‘You’re truly beyond help.’
‘Well, that’s Crystal clear,’ said Wanda. ‘Oh – and say hi to Mr Buchanan.’ Wanda had never met Mr Buchanan, but she liked the way she could make a good woman flinch.
She turned back to the field, watching as the Braves’ centre started play. He snapped the ball to the quarterback, then blocked the nose guard pushing towards him. The quarterback sprinted, but was tackled to the ground by a chunky defender and the ball popped loose. The referee blew the whistle. The game continued with players piling onto the ball, untangling, piling, untangling.
At half-time, Wanda looked at the scoreboard. The Cougars were in the lead by one point. She watched as Duke straddled his legs and bent over the ball. The players lined up on either side of him. ‘On hut two!’ yelled the quarterback. ‘Blue! Red! Hut! Hut!’ Duke snapped the ball between his legs. In seconds, the nose guard had pushed him aside and tackled the quarterback. The quarterback fumbled the ball and the nose guard recovered it. Everybody dived. The whistle blew. The quarterback turned to Duke. ‘Good job…you fuckin’ retard.’ But Duke’s eyes were on the retreating back of the nose guard as he jogged to the huddle. Duke moved quickly behind him, leading with his helmet, charging low into his kidneys.