The Twisted Thread (10 page)

Ali clicked off his phone, shook his head, and did something deft with some pita. “Any progress?” he asked, and Madeline could see that the detective knew better than to answer right away. What Ali was really doing was preparing to tell him what he himself thought about the events of the last couple of days. Reporters were all over the place, Ali said. They'd even tried to interview him, but he wasn't going to have any of it. “I'm legal, man, but I don't want them anywhere near me.” Ali's papers were indeed legitimate, Matt told Madeline. “I know. I had to check them myself.”

Ali smiled bitterly. “The Patriot Act. But I got lucky.” He had had the astonishing fortune of receiving a green card in the lottery. “First and last thing I ever won,” he said as he ripped a length of tinfoil from a roll mounted on the wall. “I didn't even have to bribe anybody. No one could believe it. My family's known for never winning anything.”

It struck Madeline for the first time that people beyond the academy would be affected by Claire's death and her baby's disappearance. They were acts with a far wider echo than she would have suspected. She had purposely not read newspapers or looked at the television; this kind of event would instantly reach those media, and their creators would milk the ugliness for only the most sensational of details. It was an entirely different thing to live through it, to have known the person involved, to be implicated. Ali looked chastened, bewildered almost that this small town could manage to produce something so unabashedly final and violent. Students had stopped coming and, of course, faculty, Ali added. He thought, however, that the girl who died had been in sometime the last month. “No way I would have known the poor thing was having a baby.” It had rained all of April, so she would have been in some big poncho. “Anyway, if she's who I think she is, she was skinny, sickly. But all those girls: they look exactly alike, like they're about to die from hunger. Impossible to tell them apart.” Ali gave them their sandwiches, accepted their money, returned their change, then slid two wet bottles of lemonade over the counter. “Drinks on the house tonight. You two look tired.”

They thanked him and went outside. The chemical tang of fabric softener wasn't pleasant layered with chickpeas. Thunder growled, but the rain hadn't yet arrived. On the bench in front of the plate-glass window, they dug into their sandwiches for a moment, and then Matt said, “Well, I should probably ask you what you were doing the night before Claire died. And I know you've got things you'd like to say. Just let me finish this bite and get my pencil out.”

“Your pencil?” Madeline asked.

“I know,” Matt said. “My partner thinks it's weird, too. But writing makes me think more clearly. Typing puts me to sleep. And I'm the only one who can decipher my own penmanship. Keeps information out of the wrong hands.” He looked at her again and said, “I knew I recognized you. You run around town in the morning. You don't tie your hair back.”

“Yes,” she said and thought she would have to stop wearing those baggy shorts. She had no idea anybody had noticed her.

“You don't look at anything but the road when you're out there. You run like it's necessary to you.” His eyes were very deeply brown.

“Well, if you taught up there, you'd need something that was totally your own for a few minutes a day, too,” Madeline said, and then she took another enormous taste of lamb.

He reached into a pocket and opened his notebook. Madeline had had a long night on Sunday, she admitted. She wasn't on duty, hadn't heard or seen anything unusual in the dorm, though she had remembered thinking the girls were abnormally quiet. Between midnight and one, she had finished correcting some papers about Emily Dickinson and then confessed that between one and one thirty she wrote but didn't send an e-mail to a man who was probably her ex but who at one time had agreed to be her boyfriend. And then, she said, “I basically passed out until the alarm rang.”

Matt noted then he was only thirty-three but past the age when he could get by on four hours a night day after day. She could tell he wanted to tell her that that kind of bounce didn't last, but he restrained himself. “So,” she said, “I've got no way to prove where I was between midnight and dawn, since I didn't even send an e-mail or make a phone call.” But just as she started out on her run a little after six, she'd nearly been run over by the Barfmobile. She'd been listening to music on her headphones, a little too loudly, and she was sleepy.

“Excuse me, the Barfmobile?” Matt said, pencil raised above the pad.

“Oh, of course you wouldn't know about that,” Madeline said. “That's what we, I mean Fred Naylor and I, call Betsy Lowery's car. She has these four kids who get sick in their station wagon all the time, and it's just not the best idea to get too close to it. Or get run over by it, either.”

“Do you have any idea where she was going?” Matt asked then, clearly still digesting the idea of the Barfmobile.

“No,” said Madeline, chewing a piece of her hair, something she did only when she found someone attractive. “Maybe she was heading up to the CVS to get some milk or Benadryl. She looked totally out of it, honestly. Maybe it had been a late night for her, too.”

Matt made a note and asked, “And then?”

And then she'd come back from her run and Grace had found her at about 6:50 and she'd learned what happened. That was when Sally Jansen had flipped out and she had actually seen Claire. Matt said, “So you're the person who realized that Claire had had a baby.”

“Oh, that,” Madeline said, flushing. “Well, it was her breasts. My sister, Kate, she had them, too, I mean of course Kate has breasts, she's a woman, but what I mean,” she said, growing more and more flustered, “was she'd just given birth, too, and her nipples spread like Claire's. So that's how I knew. Oh no, I am just going to shut up right now.”

But she didn't and for the next ten minutes kept talking between bites of her sandwich. It was tonic to discuss what she'd been thinking, to share impressions of her colleagues and students. About Claire she said, “She sort of terrified me. I mean, she lived part of the year in Paris. She was seventeen and spoke perfect French. And I'll say this, too, because I'm sure it's not something you're going to hear from most people, that although Claire was beautiful and intelligent, she was not someone I would ever describe as kind or even pleasant.” Not, Madeline added, that that would justify someone wanting to hurt her or take her child. Madeline told Matt then about the evening that Lee and her friends had spent with her and discussed Claire's role as Robespierre and her apparent transgression in including people like Sally as her secret keepers. Matt wrote all the while she spoke but didn't appear overly taken aback.

“Did you already know about this?” Madeline asked, slightly disappointed. The thunder was coming closer and the sky was darkening.

“No,” he answered, looking up at the clouds. “But that group was around when I was at the academy. I'm not surprised it's still operating or that Claire was involved. She was the type of kid who always ran it. I've already talked to the girls you mentioned, but it's complicated. Many of them are minors, and most of them have their parents with them. They're reluctant to discuss anything.” Sally, in particular, he said, had a ring of doctors and lawyers around her it might take weeks to break through.

Madeline nearly choked on a piece of cucumber. “You went there? I had no idea.”

Matt smiled and said, “Yes, I went there.”

She tried to mask her reaction by taking a big sip of lemonade, but she thought it was pretty clear the next thought darting across her brain was, And you're a cop? She watched him notice that, too. “And then I went to Penn, and no, I know it doesn't make sense to take an education from Armitage and head into the seamy world of police work. But it's what happened.”

“Well, you probably had your reasons,” Madeline tried to say as gamely as possible, but then she realized something else. “You're the one who must have told them to search the forts.” Out in the woods, students had for years built makeshift clubhouses in which to drink and smoke, and they tried mightily to keep the locations secret. Even if all that was out there in the swampy reaches of the forest was a few pieces of plywood, they considered them sacred. “Well, that was a great idea, though the kids were upset. As far as they're concerned, the forts are their property.”

“We did, I mean, I did, too,” Matt said.

“Oh, and there's another thing,” she said and nearly spilled the last of her lemonade. She told him then about Harvey Fuller, about how he had been on the third floor and, even more strangely, how he had appeared to be in pain. She had been on the second floor, she admitted shamefacedly, because she'd run out of shampoo and the girls had left a lot of it behind.

“Harvey Fuller was up there? When?” This alarmed him, she saw. This was something he hadn't actually known. He began to shift on the bench, to crumple the remains of his meal and look around for a trash bin. She watched as he altered in front of her from a kind of confidant to a police officer. It was time for him to go.

She stood as well, but before he left, she had something she wanted to ask him. “Mr. Corelli, this isn't about the investigation, but it's something that really worries me. I just feel so bad that I didn't know about Claire. That I wasn't there to help.” A few fat drops of rain began to spatter the hot sidewalk. They both noticed, but Matt slowed down for a moment, and neither of them moved to seek shelter. It actually felt refreshing, Madeline thought.

“It's not that unusual for people not to notice,” he told her. “Which might be hard to believe, but it's true. It's a pretty well-documented phenomenon, a mixture of something like that being exceptional for a certain community and the person actively trying to deceive that community.”

“It's true, I guess,” Madeline admitted. “She went to sort of unimaginable lengths to hide it. And for some reason, she wanted to stay at school. That's what I can't figure out.” Still, Madeline continued, you'd think an outsider, one of these curriculum consultants they were always hiring, someone, might have noticed. “Or,” she finished, “one of us who was actually there, who might have been even a tiny bit more observant or brave.”

“Madeline, it happens all the time. In smaller ways, usually. But people just don't see what they don't want to.” The rain was gathering force, and they could no longer pretend to ignore it. She wanted, she realized, to ask another hundred questions about everything from his time at the academy to the case. Then the biggest worry won out, even as the shower began to turn into a cloudburst. She blurted, “The baby. I keep thinking about that baby. Do you think he's still alive?”

Matt held the door open for her, and they entered the steamy warmth of the laundromat again. They put their trash in a barrel loaded with empty packets of Tide, and although Matt was clearly impatient to get going, the rain was so intense it seemed wise to wait for a moment in front of the window.

“I don't know,” he said. “I really hope so,” he added. His phone beeped, and he made himself busy for a moment examining the text. The storm pounded the storefront. Finished with his message, Matt asked, “Do you need a ride?” and she said, “No thanks, Mr. Corelli. I've got my car.”

“You can call me Matt, Madeline,” he said, and he gave her his card. “Please phone anytime.”

“Thank you,” she said, and together they waved good-bye to Ali, busy now with a new customer, and dashed into the heavy rain. Matt ran toward his car, and Madeline darted in the other direction. She was soaked in seconds and sat breathing heavily in the driver's seat, letting water sluice off her body before she fully grasped what was on her dashboard. There was a note, written in scarlet ink on white paper, that said, “You have the right to use terror to crush the enemies of liberty.” On it was a spool, an old-fashioned, wooden kind, and the thread that was wrapped around it glinted red, even in the low, gray light of the storm.

CHAPTER 10

K
ayla was never late, Jim thought, but today she was behind
by fifteen minutes. Maybe it was the rain. It was Wednesday afternoon, and it was still pouring. The rain that had started the evening before had yet to let up. Fortunately, Angela had lain down after lunch and was taking her time getting ready. Jim sat waiting on the porch, looking for Kayla's car down the neat street. Over the years, this area of Greenville had slowly grown more respectable. People who aspired to Armitage but couldn't quite afford it—newlyweds and young professionals fleeing Boston's impossible prices—had moved to this section of town with its large bungalows and big maples and begun to make it an area where people prided themselves on the neatness of their hedges and the freshness of their paint jobs. Angela accused them of boosting taxes. Jim sighed. At least property values were increasing. He even liked the new neighbors. They put in native species; they didn't use pesticides; they picked up after their dogs. In the winter, the young couple next door often shoveled Angela's steps before he could and were smart enough to always call her Mrs. French instead of Angela.

Kayla wasn't from this part of Greenville. She and her large family lived in what was still known, with literal and figurative exactness, as the other side of the tracks. Jim had never seen her house or met her mother. He'd met the father, however, a Cape Verdean who worked in one of the old cotton mills converted now into a factory for fabric spun from recycled soda bottles. Kayla's mother was Brazilian, and they spoke Portuguese at home. He'd found all this out from the guidance counselor at Revere, an old friend he'd approached when he wanted to find someone to spend time with Angela in the afternoons. “I need someone extremely reliable,” he'd said, and the counselor had joked wearily, “And you want to hire a teenager?” But she'd immediately suggested Kayla Teixaido. Old beyond her years. Smart and ambitious. “We're going to try to get her a scholarship. But in the meantime, she needs the cash. And a chance to get away from home.”

When the girl came to interview for the job, her father drove her. Jim had been impressed. This was parenting he understood, a father wanting to know the people his daughter worked for. Making sure his girl was safe. The father's English was a little uncertain, but he wore a very clean polo shirt and drove an old, spotless Chevy that Kayla said her brothers waxed every week. How many brothers do you have? Angela asked. Six, she said, but she was the oldest and the only girl. Jim and Angela had exchanged a brief glance and hired her on the spot.

She dressed in tight jeans and T-shirts, but nothing too revealing. She pulled her long brown hair back into a neat ponytail and wore discreet jewelry. She was respectful with Angela and even read the books that she gave her, reporting her opinions as soon as she finished.
Pride and Prejudice
was too long. And you knew they were going to end up together. She liked
The Great Gatsby
a little better; it confirmed her suspicions about rich people, who always turned out bad as far as she could tell. When Jim asked Kayla what she wanted to be, she said, “A lawyer. My dad says no one's better at winning arguments than I am, and at least I should make money at it.” Jim laughed. Angela was wasting her time on literature with Kayla. In blunt contrast to most teenage girls, Kayla was immune to romance and stories. She was someone attuned to and deeply capable of handling practicalities. He had assured the girl's loyalty with raises given every two months. She now earned twelve dollars an hour, more than twice what he told Angela he was paying. His mother's sense of the minimum wage was frozen somewhere around 1980.

Kayla had rewarded his generosity: she brought Angela books she thought his mother would like, found her a cheaper and better hairstylist, and even convinced her to get her toenails painted. It had been in February, during a grim two-week stretch of sleet that kept the skies gray and the roads slick. Angela had been broody and cantankerous. But one evening, Jim had returned from work to find his mother and Kayla listening to Tommy Dorsey records and drinking tea. “What's the occasion?” he asked as the crooner's voice swayed around the living room. “Look,” Kayla crowed. And Angela had shyly revealed her feet, which were gnarled and blue with old veins and fresh, shiny dollops of coral polish on the nails. “Now put your socks on,” Kayla scolded, “you'll get cold,” then she bent down to pull the warm red socks, her Christmas present to Angela, over his mother's newly sparkling toes.

At dinner that night, he said, “You got your toes painted, Ma.” He was touched by Kayla's obvious affection, but still surprised Angela had been coaxed into such an indulgence. Angela had for so long frowned on such fripperies. When his own daughters got their ears pierced at thirteen, she had been horrified. “We're not in the old country anymore, Angela,” Jim's ex-wife had said. It had not been a wise comment to make, though it would have been hard to repair the relationship between Carla and his mother at that point.

“Kayla said her friend ran the salon. She said she would clean the footbath for me personally. With bleach. And she did.” Angela had eaten some green beans and stared at some indeterminate point over Jim's shoulder. “She's a good girl, Jimmie. I like that girl.” Every two weeks since then, Angela and Kayla had made a stop at the nail salon. Sometimes, they even went to Starbucks afterward and got lattes. “Lattes, Ma?” Angela waved her hands and said, “Low-fat, Jimmie, low-fat.” Kayla, in short, had been a godsend. He was glad she was only a junior. They would get to have her with them for another year before she went off to college.

Today was a pedicure day, which made it even more unusual that Kayla was late. Angela was getting ready for the outing, finding a pair of earrings that would match a new shade of polish she wanted to try. Jim checked his phone to see if the girl had called and he hadn't gotten the message. He usually wasn't here on a Wednesday but had felt the need to check in with his mother. The last few days had been so unsettling, and he wanted to be sure certain routines were in place. Finally, he saw Kayla's old Nissan come around the top of the block. Her wipers were set a notch higher than they needed to be, which gave him the impression that although her car was going as slowly as usual, she was holding herself back from going fast. “I'm so sorry I'm late, Mr. French,” she called up to him through her window the moment she parked in front of the house. She opened the car door, large handbag on one shoulder, ring of keys in her hand. Darting through the rain, she said, “One of my brothers was sick this afternoon, and I had to help my mom get him to the doctor.”

Jim dealt with teenagers on a regular basis; he'd raised two girls, and he saw and talked to all those kids at Armitage. He was almost certain Kayla was lying. Her hair was damp, too, as if she'd just jumped out of the shower, though she might merely have been caught in the downpour.

“That's okay, Kayla. I hope he's all right.”

“Oh, he'll be fine,” she said and shoved the keys in her bag. “How's Mrs. French?” Jim sensed that the change of subject was calculated. She was doing her best to scramble to safer ground as fast as possible.

“Doing well,” he answered slowly, wondering if he should say something to the girl. A direct approach certainly wouldn't work, but maybe he could try something oblique. “She's looking forward to getting her toes done.”

“Is she ready? Should I go and help her?” Again, Jim got a sharp feeling that she wanted to get away from him quickly. From his occasional visits during the afternoon, Jim knew the routine was well established. Kayla would either wait on the porch or in the living room until Angela was fully prepared for her outing, the understanding being that Angela didn't require actual assistance getting ready, that Kayla was merely a companion and not a helper.

“No, she's in good shape. She'll be down in a minute. She napped today, and she said her hair was a mess.” They both smiled. Angela was terribly proud of her still glossy hair, which she had set in fat, abundant curls every week. It had to obtain absolute smoothness before she'd let herself be seen in public. Kayla sat nervously in one of the rockers on the porch, her hands in a lump on her lap, her bag in a lump on the floor. They could hear Angela singing to herself, probably some Sinatra. Looking at Kayla, Jim realized just how young she was. Her skin was a light coffee color, absolutely flawless.

“Maybe you could get her to listen to something a little more current, like the Beatles or Simon and Garfunkel,” Jim joked. “You can get her to do anything.”

Kayla's shoulders grew a little less tense. “I'll try, Mr. French.” She probably would, too, thought Jim. She had a fairly literal mind and took all her responsibilities seriously.

“Just no hip-hop,” he added. “It might not be good for her heart. And I don't think I'm ready for it, either.”

The girl smiled and seemed herself for the first time since she'd arrived. There was a long pause, and then, all of a sudden, Kayla leaned forward and said, “Hey, Mr. French, what's it like up there?” And she tilted her head in the general direction of the academy. It wasn't an idle question, which didn't surprise Jim. There was nothing idle about Kayla. He didn't even think she was asking about the murder. She'd meant the question more generally.

He took a breath to start to answer her, but she interrupted him. “I mean, what are the kids like. Are they, I don't know, nice? Are they stuck-up?”

What was the honest answer? Many of them were indeed stuck-up. It was the very word he used himself to describe them, though he supposed the more sanitized term would be
entitled.
Sure of themselves, cocky, spoiled. Those were also words that could label them. But some of them, even some of the richest, weren't that way at all. Some of them were genuinely polite, well brought up, and intelligent. Others, despite wealth and privilege, were sad, lost, even deprived, not so much of material support but of parents who knew anything about them. But what should he say to Kayla? Was she looking for some connection that allowed them, from Greenville, to look down on the snobs? Or was she genuinely curious? He felt protective of the academy, especially when it was so exposed. Then he decided Kayla deserved as close to the truth as he could get.

“Sometimes,” he said. “Some of them don't deserve the education they're getting. They think things will always go easily for them. That they'll always get their way. Some of them have a lot of money, but they don't have much more than that, especially parents who think twice about them. And some of them are nice kids, smart kids. I don't know, Kayla. They're a mixed bag, like people everywhere.”

She was listening hard. They could hear Angela making her slow, careful way down the stairs. It was one of the only ways you really noticed her age: the slight warble to her voice and this, the hesitation in dealing with steps.

“But they get into trouble just like everybody else,” said Kayla and hoisted her bag to her shoulder. “Mr. French, please take off half an hour of my pay this week. I was late, and I shouldn't have been.”

“Okay, Kayla,” he said, “if that's what you want.” Once before, there'd been confusion over her schedule, and that time, too, she had been scrupulous about the money to be docked from her weekly salary. He had tried to add it on anyway, and she had noticed and returned it.

As she went to greet Angela, Jim got the distinct impression Kayla hadn't been talking just about Claire. There'd been no judgment in her voice, just a sad confirmation of news she already knew.