The Silent Girls (17 page)
Authors: Eric Rickstad
R
ATH LAY AWAKE
in bed, the wind shrieking under the eaves like a succubus in throes, icy air leaking into the bedroom through the ancient window casings. An idea sifted through his sleepy mind. He needed to write it down. But sleep overtook him as the first blue light of dawn bled into the room.
Rath was startled awake by a loud sharp
crack,
like a rifle shot, as a maple tree crashed through his bedroom window. Glass shards scattered on his bed. He leapt up and stood on the cold floor as the icy wind swam around his feet and flapped the hem of his pajamas.
He remembered his last thought before sleep had claimed him. He called Grout, who was short with him. Distant.
“I want to check all the girls’ phone records,” Rath said.
“Larkin did that.”
“I want to check again.”
“There are no common numbers between them.”
“It may not be a single matching number.”
“Fine. I’ll e-mail the records to you. You
can
open files on your dial- up, right?”
Rath hung up and stared out his broken window toward the clouds darkening the morning sky. “We’re in for it,” he said to no one in particular.
I
T WAS 10:30 P.M.,
and the rake of the wind at the windows more insistent as Rath leaned back in his chair. He could hear the flapping sound from his bedroom, where he’d stapled plastic over the broken window. A man had come earlier and cut the tree up with a chain saw while Rath worked on his theory.
Rath stretched, his back catching with pain. He could not wait to get injected and end this torment. All day and into the evening he’d scoured the records of each girl’s home and cell phones from the months before the girls had gone missing. In search of a single common number, he’d camped at his desk, gnawing on jerky and drinking from a liter jug of ginger ale that went warm and flat, stopping only to piss off the back porch. He’d not found a phone number that connected the girls. But, he had found something when checking each number against switchboard.com. To make certain what he’d found was accurate, he dialed a number on his cell phone.
A computerized voice answered, “Dr. Stephens’s office is not open at the moment—”
Rath hung up and dialed again.
“Northeast Vermont Pediatrics is currently closed—”
He hung up and dialed again. “Dr. Linda Bullock’s office is closed for the day—”
Rath wiped his palm over his dry mouth and dialed a fourth number.
“You’ve reached Monadnock Health Services, we’re currently—”
Rath dialed one last number.
“Dr. Langevine’s office is closed. Our office hours are Monday and Wednesday through Friday, nine to five. Please leave a clear message at the tone, and we will get back to you during office hours. If this is an emergency, please dial 911.”
“Dr. Langevine. This is Frank Rath. Please call me as soon as possible, anytime day or night.” He left his home and cell numbers.
“W
ELL?”
G
ROUT
SAID
the next morning at 8
A.M
. He seemed in a better mood, eating a cider donut as he leaned against the vending machine in the cramped, so-called squad room. It was a reach to call a staff of five, including the chief, a squad. The room was home to a beat-up farm table and a countertop the length of an ironing board, on which were crammed a relic coffeemaker, a microwave, and a minifridge.
“Where’s Sonja? She ought to hear this,” Rath said.
“She’s got downed trees blocking her drive,” Grout said.
“Each girl called a doctor of some kind, at least three times in the month before her disappearance,” Rath said. “And each girl called a Family Matters.
Different
ones because of where they lived, so the numbers didn’t match.”
The fluorescent light flickered as the wind outside grew wild and shook the building by its lapels.
“That’s not coincidence,” Grout said, begrudgingly, finishing his donut and licking his fingers.
“We need to interview each doctor. Maybe the girls were referred by a single person, which links them. Or their respective doctors referred them to a single person or entity that links them. Something.”
“Or is on staff at a Family Matters.”
“It’s there somewhere.”
“So, someone, somehow, knew these girls were pregnant and sought them out to, what?” Grout licked sugar from his fingertips, one by one.
“You tell me.”
“How would a guy like George Waters get such info?” Grout said.
“It lessens the odds its him. But maybe he had a girl from the AA meetings, like you said,” Rath said.
“Or a girl who went searching for victims at these Family Matters meetings.”
“What meetings?” Rath said.
“Family Matters has support groups for girls.” Grout reached in the bag for another donut. “They have to keep lists of attendees. Being a non-profit 501(c)(3). I’ll get Sonja on all the lists from Family Matters in the greater region. You and I need to talk to some doctors.”
O
UTSIDE
D
R.
S
TEPHENS’S
office, his second visit on his list, Rath checked his messages as he processed what he’d learned. His phone showed no messages from Langevine. He called again. The receptionist had a young girl’s voice, jittery and apologetic. “I don’t know why he hasn’t called. I gave him the messages. I’m sure he will.”
Rath ended his call, and his cell phone buzzed immediately. He picked up.
“Both my girls were pregnant,” Grout said.
“Five to seven weeks along?”
“So, yours too,” Grout said. “That makes two in Vermont: Saint Johnsbury and Montpelier; and two across the river: in Littleton and Concord.”
“We don’t know if Mandy was.”
“All these girls though. And all called a Family Matters? I’ll see if Sonja’s gotten anywhere with lists,” Grout said.
Rath hung up, staring out the windshield into the dark night, feeling hopeful. He brought Rachel’s text up on his phone to buoy him.
I’m sorry to be so lame. I’ve just been swamped. I’ll call you soon. I promise. Love you, Rachel
A nagging feeling overcame him again. There was—
His cell buzzed: Dr. Langevine.
Rath answered. “Yes.”
“Mr. Rath. My sincerest apologies in not getting back in a timely manner. It’s been quite the day. I understand you wish to speak to me about something rather pressing.”
“Right away. It’s Ms. Wilks. In person would be best. Right away. Where do you live?”
“I’m the last place at the end of Ravens Way, but I’m in my office. A hike for you.”
“I’m on my way,” Rath said.
Ravens Way,
Rath thought as he drove. It was a private community atop Canaan Ridge, the only one of its kind in the Kingdom, and hopefully the last. Against militant local protest, six 20-acre plots had been clear-cut to make room for custom homes ten times the size of the average local home. Granite countertops, heated indoor pools, tennis courts, wine cellars, and lanais had replaced wintering deeryards and a wetland that had included trophy brook trout beaver ponds. Swaths of forest had been leveled to afford the homes an emperor’s view of the valley. The folks below who had looked up at the ridge for generations to witness the year’s first snow or turning of the leaves now were treated to a view of gargantuan trophy homes dropped into treeless voids, two-story windows reflecting glints of sunlight in an obnoxious wink. Dr. Langevine’s place, at the end of the road, likely commanded the grandest view. Rath was glad he did not have to stomach a visit to the place.
T
HE PAST WEEK,
Sonja had been too busy to run, and her muscles had come to feel like mud, her mood as edgy as a serrated knife.
She needed to
run,
felt the pang to work her body hard. She’d planned on, finally, a run this afternoon. But the case demanded she sit in place and pore over lists of hundreds of names from Family Matters, going back twenty-two months. Searching for a single name to stand out. A link. She’d built spreadsheets until her eyes bled.
She leaned back from her desk and gazed out the window of her home office at the fields, shadowed in dusk, tornadoes of snow dancing along the edge of the woods. Claude had recognized she needed space, so he’d taken the kids, home for an in-service day, to the Village Picture Shows for a movie.
She’d gone down through the lists, searching for the names of the missing girls. With her heart sinking into her stomach, she’d found them: Sally, Rebecca, and Fiona, and circled each with a tug of regret. Now, she circled yet another name: Julia Pearl.
The name of each of the missing girls was on the lists. Except Mandy’s. So far. But she’d find it, she would. Whoever had done this to Julia and possibly others would get theirs. It was a matter of time now. Of momentum.
No
M. Wilks.
No
Mandy W.
No
M.W.
Nothing.
The lists were short, five names on average, though the number of attendants did spike to as many as seventeen names for a few dates. She felt a dull ache in the hollow of her belly, the type that followed the annual indignity of her gynecological exam. She shivered.
She drank water and ate a handful of pumpkin seeds as she searched, her fingertips humming with excitement to see the girls’ circled names. But no Mandy. Why?
Sonja laid the lists out on the floor. More than a hundred of them. She walked among them, looking for a Mandy or an M. Wilks or W. The girls were supposed to use their real last names, but that did not mean they did. Certainly, rights to privacy superseded some sort of protocol for tax regulations and grant allocations.
She stepped among the lists, bowed over with her fingers locked behind her back. Her eye caught on a name. Not the name exactly, but the penmanship. She stopped cold. She’d seen it on another list—she swore it. She crouched, her eyes leaping from one list to the next. There. She picked up the list and compared the writing. Yes, it was the same. The graphologist Canaan Police used would confirm it. Her synapses snapped and sizzled, a string of lit firecrackers. The endorphins flowed. There it was again: that same odd handwriting.
In ten minutes, she’d found a dozen lists with the same penmanship. There was no doubt it was from the same person. What was peculiar was that the names appeared on lists not just from all four different locales, but appeared over the course of twenty-two months, about every four months or so. What jolted Sonja most was that on each list where the odd handwriting appeared, the name of one of the missing girls also appeared. Except for Mandy. Mandy, nor anyone with her combination of initials, appeared anywhere.
Sonja’s endorphins screamed through her now, her pulse a frantic staccato throb.
Perhaps there was a better rush than running.
R
ATH WAS BREATHING
hard from jogging down the long corridors of the office building as he entered Langevine’s office.
Langevine was seated in a chair in the waiting room, his hands folded on the knee of one leg, which was tossed over the other leg. A bottle of springwater and two Dixie cups sat on the table in front of him. He stood to welcome Rath, shook his hand primly, and asked if he cared for a water.
Rath shook his head, catching his breath. “We’ve had a breakthrough,” he said. “With Miss Wilks.”
“Good, good. I hope, anyway,” Dr. Langevine said. “Sit, at least, please. You look wiped.”
“Just out of shape,” Rath said. He did not take a seat. Langevine remained standing. He was a slight man, and the sweater he wore was loose on him.
Rath wiped sweat at his temple. “We’ve found that the missing girls—”
“
Girls?
Plural?” Langevine stiffened with surprise. “However do you mean?”
“We were investigating several other girls who’ve gone missing in the region the past two years. We believe the disappearances are connected.”
“That’s ghastly,” Langevine said. He shook his head with dismay.
“Each girl was pregnant at the time of her disappearance,” Rath said.
“I don’t understand. How can I help?”
“I want you to think very hard about Mandy’s behavior or what she might have said. You mentioned she was nervous.”
“No more so than usual. And more shy.”
“Did she mention a boyfriend or any man, or did she, was her nervousness perhaps brought on by, did she seem pressured maybe. It’s
very
important.”
“She seemed normal. But. No mention of a boyfriend or man. Nothing. I wish I could help. But.” He shrugged, his bulky sweater rippling like the flab of a seal’s neck over his birdlike shoulders.
Rath reached in his jacket and took out the photos of the girls. “Have you ever seen any of these girls?”
Langevine considered each photo with meticulous intent. After several minutes of serious contemplation, he said, with disappointment, “No.” He handed the folder back. “Many girls find themselves in trouble. I suppose they always have. But if these girls went missing so far apart in time, do you think perhaps each left on her own? To have the baby, or run away, or what have you?”
“No,” Rath said, thinking of the body of Julia Pearl.
“You sound certain.”
Rath nodded grimly.
“These situations”—the doctor sighed, shaking his head—“are the saddest I can think of. A monstrous business.”
He offered a gracious smile.
Outside, Rath scooped a handful of fresh snow from the Scout’s hood and pressed it to his face and throat.
As he drove the Scout, his cell vibrated. He’d missed two texts and three voice-mail messages. All from Sonja. All with the same urgent tone.
Call me immediately.
Come straight to the Bee Hive.
He did both.
“W
HAT DO YOU
see?” Sonja said.
Rath and Grout huddled over the table at the back booth at the Bee Hive, looking at the lists as Sonja sat back with an air of unrestrained satisfaction, nibbling a carrot stick from a smuggled Ziploc.
Rath smoothed his palm over a crack in the metallic, red, vinyl seat that sparkled like Dorothy’s slippers and tucked a puff of foam back inside the cushion.
“The same handwriting,” Grout said.
“Bingo,” Sonja said. “You get to pick the small stuffed animal of your choice.”
“We need verification,” Grout said.
“I scanned and e-mailed it to our graphologist earlier.” Sonja snapped a carrot stick in her teeth. “It’s verified.”
Grout shifted uncomfortably.
A waitress placed a piece of apple pie with vanilla ice cream in front of Rath and Grout with a balletic flourish that made her gingham check skirt puff up, then settle against her gymnast thighs. “Pie’s hot. Ice cream’s cold. Dig in.” She caught sight of Sonja’s carrot stick. “Don’t let the owner see you with that,” she said, and swooshed away.
“The handwriting is from the same person, even though the names are different,” Sonja said, animated, fidgeting with excitement. “
And.
Look at the dates.”
Rath, feeling the wave building, knowing soon they’d have enough energy and power to ride to a conclusion, said, “Someone
is
scouting for victims.”
“This confirms it,” Grout added.
“As you thought,” Rath said, tossing Grout a bone. He clanked his spoon on his plate. And froze. Stunned. “Wait,” he said. “Wait wait wait.” He took a list and spun it around. “I
know
this handwriting. This makes
no
sense. This handwriting.” Rath fished around in his wallet and set the Post-it note on the table. “It’s
Mandy’s.
”
Sonja and Grout stared at him, spellbound as he compared the note to the list. “Same weird ‘g’ and ‘e’ and ‘m.’ Same everything.”
“How do you know the Post-it is hers?” Sonja said.
“I found it in her bathroom. I couldn’t figure out what it said for the longest time, until I got the idea to compare it to other handwriting samples of hers. Duh. I got a note from her roommate. The word on the Post-it is
erythromycin.
”
“Erythro what?” Grout said.
“
Mycin,
” Rath said.
“It’s used, among many other things, to prevent infection in women after abortions,” Sonja said.
A fly crawled across the table as they sat trapped in a bubble of silence. Rath considered smashing the fly with his palm. Instead, he swiped a hand at it, scaring it into dizzy flight.
“
Mandy
is our girl?” Grout said, breaking the silence. “
Mandy’s
the link?”
“She’s the
suspect,
” Sonja said.
“No. I don’t believe that,” Grout said. “That’s fucked. She’s missing just like the rest of them.”
“We don’t know that,” Sonja said. “She could have fled. Or wanted it to look like she was abducted.”
“No,” Grout said. “That’s bullshit.”
“Listen,” Sonja said, “I know she’s family, but—
“No,” Grout spat. “You choose Mandy over any evil dog torturer with no alibi. A flesh carver. And you want to pin it on a pretty young—”
“So we’re basing guilt on looks now?” Sonja shot.
“She didn’t kill Julia, torture her, and whatever else. You can’t possibly believe that. What possible reason could she have?”
“That’s our job to find out,” Sonja said.
“I won’t waste my time going down this road. And tell me this. How’d she get to all those meetings two years ago when she was fourteen?” Grout said.
“I don’t know,” Sonja said.
“Exactly.”
“Maybe an accomplice. Like Rath was saying, it may take two. Or like you were saying, maybe it’s some kinky thing she and another guy—”
Grout shook his head, steaming. “I don’t want you wasting resources on this.”
“We’ll see about that,” Sonja said.
“What the fuck is that supposed—”
“It
is
her handwriting,” Rath interjected.
Grout shook his head and pushed pie plate away so hard, the ice cream slid off the table onto the floor.
“Maybe we should get into these Family Matters meetings somehow,” Sonja said.
“You’re too old to fit in with the teenage girls there,” Grout said, taking a deep breath.
“Well, I’m going to get with the women who run them, somehow,” Sonja said. “Oh. And that cabin near where Julia was found. Clean. No physical evidence whatsoever that Julia was held there, or anyone had been in the cabin in years for any reason.”