Helpless (7 page)

“
O
KAY,” CELIA SAYS,
once the police fill her in. She releases her breath. They shouldn’t have said
missing.
Rachel isn’t missing, she just isn’t here; she isn’t back yet. Obviously she’d have gone running for help. Maybe the person she’s with is waiting for the phone lines to come back on.

“Celia…,” Mika says, coming to stand beside her. All she can see is the white towel he holds pressed to his head.

“Why did you go down there?” she asks.

He hesitates. She knows he’s only forming his thoughts but his silence goads her. “I don’t understand,” she says, her voice rising. “Why would you go down to the basement?”

“To…to…”

“To
what?”

“Get the lantern.”

“But you have
candles.
Up here. All those candles in the dining room.”

“I…I know. Celia…I’m…” He moves back to the sofa and sits. “I’m so…sorry.”

“You went down there in the pitch
dark.?”

“Rachel had the penlight. She was behind me, in the kitchen, guiding the way. Then the damn dogs…they…”

She stares at him, uncomprehending.

One of the officers is speaking. “What?” she says, turning around.

It’s the black officer. He has introduced himself as Constable Joe Bird. The name of the other officer—the young, lanky blond one—she has already forgotten.

“We’re checking hospital emergency rooms. But with the phones dead, information is slow in coming in.”

“Why are you checking emergency rooms?”

“There might have been an accident. She might have fallen, running around in near-zero visibility.”

“Oh, okay.” Celia can picture this: a fall, a broken arm or leg.

“At Mr. Ramstad’s suggestion”—Bird nods at Mika—“we’ve had officers around to Tom’s Video and the variety store.”

“Wong’s Variety,” the younger officer chips in.

“She hasn’t been to either place but we’re continuing to canvass stores and homes in the vicinity. What about her friends? Any of them live nearby?”

Celia shakes her head. “Only Leonard Wong.” Why didn’t Rachel go there? she wonders.

“No others in the neighbourhood?”

“Not nearby. I mean, they’re all in Cabbagetown. Her best friend, Lina, lives in Regent Park, but I think she’s away—”

“Do you have an address?”

Celia gives it to him and he uses his radio to pass the information to an officer outside. “Anyone else?”—turning to Celia again.

“From around here?”

“Anywhere. Someone she might have gone to if this Lina friend wasn’t home.”

“She has lots of friends from school. I don’t know where they all live, though.”

“We’ll get those names in a minute.” He sets his flashlight on the bookcase, pulls out a notebook, and holds it up to the beam. “Just to verify what Mr. Ramstad told us. Rachel is nine years old, small, thin build, light brown complexion, blue eyes, blond curly hair in a ponytail. Wearing a short white skirt and a red tank top.”

“And earrings. Pearl studs.” Why is she telling them this? Who’s going to notice her ears?

Bird, however, makes a note. “Any visible scars, medical conditions?”

“No. Just…”

He waits.

“She’s really pretty.”

“Okay.” But he doesn’t write it down, and Celia is aware of coming across as one of those mothers who enter their daughters in beauty pageants.

“I mean, that’s what people notice.”

“She’s an usually beautiful girl,” Mika offers quietly. Bird’s gaze shifts to him.

“Just a couple of weeks ago,” Celia says, “this guy from a modelling agency chased us up the street. He wanted her to take a course.”

“What agency?” Bird says alertly.

Celia tells him. “The guy’s name was Jason, I think. Yeah, Jason. He seemed all right.”

“Anyone else bothering her?”

“Not that she’s said.”

“Any strange phone calls?”

“No.”

Bird returns to his notes. “Father’s whereabouts unknown,” he reads.

“That’s right.”

“And there’s no other family—no cousins, aunts, no boyfriends or ex-boyfriends she’s close to.”

“Just us.” She glances at Mika, who is visible at the edge of Bird’s light. He has let go of the towel, and the bump on his temple is stunningly large. “God, Mika,” she says. “Shouldn’t you go to the hospital?”

“I’m fine,” he murmurs.

For a reason that isn’t clear to her or doesn’t seem worth pursuing, not right then, Mika has to wait out on the porch while she takes the officers through the house. They begin in her and Rachel’s apartment. Bird has instructed her to speak up if anything is missing or appears to have been disturbed. The cracked and toppled ceramic planter out on the deck, the unlocked screen door, the piles of books and sheet music scattered all over the carpet…is this how things were left? Celia admits that it is. In the scouring wash of the flashlights she’s seeing the handprints on her walls and the worn, shiny places on her upholstery. She opens her desk drawer and takes out the three photos of Rachel in her white lace dress. She hands them to the young officer. “This is her.”

“Whoa,” he says quietly. He passes them to Bird.

Bird studies each one.

“I keep meaning to get them framed,” Celia says.

“She’s a beautiful girl all right,” Bird says.

It’s a concession, an apology, and Celia feels free to press her earlier point: “People remember her.”

“When were these taken?”

“Last Christmas. For her school concert. Mika took them.”

“Is he a photographer?”

“Well, not a professional.”

“Has he taken any other pictures of her?”

“A few.” She wonders at his asking. “Over the years, you know.”

“Can we borrow these?”

“Okay…”

“We might want to start getting her face out there.”

“Really?”

“When the power’s back.”

But why doesn’t he imagine that Rachel will be found by then? They’ve only been searching…Celia peers at her watch: a quarter to eleven. “You’ve been here, what, half an hour?”

“About forty minutes,” the young officer says.

“Forty minutes,” she repeats, unable to gauge whether that’s a long time or no time at all.

A voice comes over Bird’s radio. “Go ahead,” he says and steps out of the room. Celia hears something about bringing in the canine unit.

“You guys sure are pulling out all the stops,” she says to the young officer.

“Dogs can be a big help in the dark.”

“Oh. Right.” She hadn’t thought of that. “So they’ll need to get her scent, won’t they?”

“If you could let us have some articles of clothing.” He clears his throat. “Unwashed articles, that would be great.”

She leads him back into her bedroom and rifles through the overflowing laundry basket. She gives him T-shirts and shorts, and he takes a large plastic bag out of one of his pockets and drops them in. “Lucky I’m not a clean freak,” she says.

“Don’t worry,” he says. “I’m not either.”

“It’s so clean in here,” she says as Bird rejoins them. A moment later she realizes she meant
hot,
it’s so hot.

In Rachel’s bedroom Bird sweeps his light over the dresser. “This is hers?” He’s pointing at the brush.

She says it is. Both men, she only now notices, are wearing latex gloves.

“Can we borrow it as well?”

She shrugs, helpless. “Go ahead.”

The young officer sets everything he’s holding on the bed. From a pocket he extracts another, smaller bag and slips the brush in.

“My prints might be on it,” Celia warns.

“That’s okay.”

Rachel’s toothbrush gets put into yet another plastic bag, and it occurs to Celia that they’re collecting DNA. “Is this routine?” she asks, indicating the bag. “Do you do this whenever you get a call about a…” She can’t bring herself to say
missing.
“About a child?”

Bird takes a few seconds to respond. “If the child is supposed be at a certain place and isn’t at that place, and there’s been a preliminary search, then it’s routine, yes, to start collecting evidence.”

She nods, though his back is to her. He’s a straightforward, careful man, and she appreciates that. She feels the
kindness in him. Somebody calls again on his radio and she tenses, but it’s only more news about the canine unit. She makes her way back to the living room, where the young officer is studying the snarl of computer wires behind her desk.

“I guess that’s an electrical hazard,” she says.

“We’ll probably be needing your hard drive,” he says. “Mr. Ramstad’s, as well. So we can go over the chat logs, see who she’s been talking to.” He looks up. “You never know, right? With kids?”

He seems scarcely more than a kid himself. She wonders about his mother, if his mother worries about his having such a dangerous job, and what it is she herself could be facing suddenly catches up with her. She takes a step, bashing her knee against the coffee table. “Shit,” she says. She hobbles toward the deck.

“Are you okay?” He guides her with his light.

“It’s just…why haven’t they found her?”

“Ninety-nine times out of a hundred, kids turn up safe and sound. Especially in cases like this, where there’s no sign of forced entry.”

The red flasher from a police car strobes the leaves of the horse chestnut. “God, maybe she got on a bus to get
me.”

“Is that a possibility?” asks Bird. He has come up behind the officer.

“No…no, she wouldn’t…”

“Does she normally take buses on her own?”

“She doesn’t go anywhere on her own.” Her attention has been caught by the scream of approaching sirens. “I should be out there looking.”

“No problem. We’ll just do a check of downstairs then.”

“Where are my shoes?” She glances around. The two
flashlights cross on the floor in front of her, and she stumbles sideways, hitting her leg again. “Shit,” she says. “Shit, shit, shit.” Horrible, nightmarish images are assaulting her: Rachel tied up, bleeding. Naked…

“Shit, shit.” She lurches toward the stairwell. Bird is saying something. She grasps the banister and staggers down to the landing, where she falls. An unearthly, rattling cry heaves out of her throat.

Bird kneels next to her. “Are you all right?” He helps her to her feet. “We’ll go in the squad car,” he says. “I’ll drive you, okay?”

“Okay,” she whispers.

“We’ll just do a quick check of downstairs—”

“No. Now.”

T
HE RINGING PHONE
drags Nancy out of sleep.

“I need you to come over right now.”

She sits up. “Is it Tasha?”

“Tasha’s fine.”

“What’s going on?”

“I’ll tell you when you get here.”

“What’s the time?”

“One thirty.”

“Okay, well, I just have to get dressed, if I can find the flashlight—”

“The power’s back.”

She tries her bedside lamp. “Oh. Right.”

“Hurry.”

B
ECAUSE OF
construction along Laird Avenue, Nancy is forced to backtrack down to Don Mills Road before heading north again. Never once in the three years that she and Ron have been together has he called her in the middle of the night, so she’s more than a little nervous. Has a wife he never told her about shown up? Has he shot an intruder?
Maybe he killed somebody by accident, a car accident. It’s no secret to her how much rye he puts away these days before getting behind the wheel. She turns on the radio for any reports of a hit and run, but the news is all about the generator failure and people spending hours stuck in elevators and subway cars.

The shop, when she arrives, is dark, the blinds closed. The door, though, is unlocked. She enters and pats along the wall for the light switch. Before she can reach it, a lamp comes on.

“What took you so long?”

He’s sitting behind the counter.

“You scared me.” She pushes a lawn mower out of her path. “Laird’s a mess. I ended up driving around in circles. So what’s going on?”

He just looks at her. His big shoulders heave with his breathing.

“Ron?”

“Do you love me?”

She swallows. It’s not a question he asks. “Of course I love you.”

“Would you do anything for me?”

“Of course I would.” She reaches across the counter to hold his hand. “What are you asking me for?”

“Rachel’s here.”

“Who?”

“Rachel. The little girl.”

“The one you’ve been following?”

“She’s downstairs.”

“What?”

“I was at her house. Parked across the street. I had this
feeling. She was out on the porch.” He’s muttering now, not meeting her eye. “The power goes off. She runs inside, then a minute later runs out again, hysterical, saying somebody fell or died. She’s not making any sense. So I got her in the car and brought her here.”

“What did you do that for?”

“I told you. She was hysterical.”

“If somebody died, shouldn’t the police—”

He pulls his hand free. “I don’t care if somebody died. It’s not my business. If the landlord died, good. I care about Rachel being safe.”

Nancy nods, distracted by his use of the girl’s name. “You haven’t ever talked to her, have you? Before?”

“What has that got to do with anything?”

“You just sound like you know her.”

“I know what she’s been going through.” His mouth twists. He grabs a ballpoint pen and begins to click the end.

“So—” Her leg is giving out. She upends the recycling box and sits. “So what are you going to do?”

He keeps on clicking. “I’m going to keep her.”

“What? Here?”

“Yep.”

“For how long?”

“As long as it takes.”

“As long as what takes?”

“As long as it takes for her to adapt.”

“Adapt?”

“To her new surroundings.”

The clicking is like a stopwatch, urging her to hurry up and understand. She needs a cigarette. She slides her purse off her shoulder but before she even has the pack out he says,
“I don’t want you smoking in the house anymore. It’s bad for her lungs.”

“Oh, sorry.” Rattled, she lets her purse fall to the floor. “I don’t know, Ron. I don’t know, I don’t know. This is, like, kidnapping.”

He balances the pen across a jar of paperclips. “Only if we get caught.”

“We?
What do you mean,
we?”

“If we stay cool and collected, everything will work out. After a while she’ll start to feel safe. She’ll want to stay because for the first time in her life she’ll understand what it is to live in a real home. We’ll be like parents to her. She’ll have both a mother—a good mother—and a father.”

A crack of longing opens in Nancy. “But she’ll
tell
people.”

“We’ll keep her down in the basement until we’re sure she won’t. That religious couple who took Elizabeth Smart.” He glances up. “In California.”

Nancy thinks she remembers something. “Yeah?”

“They talked her out of her parents in less than a week. Anyway, when we’ve gained her trust, even her love, and I’m hoping we can gain her love, we’ll cut her hair, dye it, maybe straighten it—I’ll let you look into all that—then we’ll close the shop and the three of us will drive to Florida. I’ll say to people here I’ve been offered a business opportunity. I’ll sell this place. There are ways you can do that long distance.”

Nancy comes to her feet, shakily, and goes around behind the counter. “Oh, Ron.” She drops her forehead on his shoulder. “I know you’re only trying to help her, keep her from abuse and all that, but you could go to jail for life. The police will be looking everywhere.”

“Not here they won’t.”

“How do you know?”

“Grid searches for missing children have a three-kilometre range. Four, tops. We’re outside of that. Anyway, nobody saw. It was dark, and she…she just came running up to me. It was like…”

“Like what?”

“Like it was ordained.”

“How do you mean?”

“Fated. Written in the stars.”

Nancy rubs her forehead on his shoulder. She had no idea he believed in that sort of thing. She wonders about the mother’s horoscope, what it said for today, and feels a wrench of sympathy. “But the poor mother.”

He scrapes back the stool. “The mother’s a pimp.” He goes to the basement door and quietly opens it.

Nancy grabs the stool and sits. “Do you hear anything?”

“No.” He shuts the door.

“Have you been checking on her?”

“I thought—” He turns. “I thought you could do that.”

“What? Are you kidding?”

“She’s still scared of me.”

Up until this moment Nancy has been imagining that the girl came with him willingly. “You didn’t tie her up or anything, did you?”

“I restrained her in the car. I had to.” He swipes an arm over his face. “Will you go down?”

“Ah, jeez. Then I’m an accessory.”

“I’m not asking for my sake.”

The girl will be hiding under the covers, hardly breathing. Nancy knows that kind of fear.

“Just see if she’s asleep,” Ron says. “If she isn’t, ask her if there’s anything she wants. You’re good with kids. Tell her she’s safe here.”

Nancy sighs. “Ah, jeez.”

“For
her.”

“Yeah, okay. Okay. But holy Christ, Ron. This is way too—”

“Hold on. She might be hungry.”

While he goes to the kitchen, she bends and flexes her leg. Could she ever do with a cigarette or, even better, a joint. She searches under the counter for a bottle. The one she finds is empty. When he returns she asks if he wouldn’t mind running back and pouring her a shot of rye.

“What for?” He has a glass of orange juice in one hand and in the other a banana and a can of Pringles.

“I need something for my nerves.”

“You’ll be fine. I don’t think either of us should drink until this is over. I don’t want you smoking your dope either. We have to stay clearheaded.” He gives her the food and juice. “The basement door is never to be left unlocked,” he says. “That’s the cardinal rule. So I’ll open it, then lock it behind you, then you knock when you want to come out. Turn the flashlights off. There are two of them. Turn the desk light on.”

F
ROM THE
door Nancy can tell that the bed is empty. “Sweetie,” she says. “Where are you, sweetie? Are you in the bathroom?”

She’s lying on the floor, huddled between the bed and wall.

Nancy sets the glass and food on the desk and crouches
down. The girl has blond curly hair and darkish skin. Funny…Nancy imagined stringy brown hair and pasty skin. She goes to stroke the hunched-up back but at her touch the girl lets out a petrified squeal.

“Okay,” Nancy says. “It’s okay. Did you fall out of bed?”

Silence.

A stuffed monkey is caught in the folds of the bed curtains. Nancy untangles it and lays it next to the girl’s right hand. “You know what? We should turn on a light. It’s so gloomy down here.” Forgetting Ron’s instructions, she leaves the flashlights going and switches on the light outside the bathroom. “That’s better, eh?”

The girl starts to shiver. For a moment Nancy can’t remember why this is happening. The mother, she tells herself. The mother drags her to bars and lets men molest her. The landlord molests her.

“I know you’re scared, sweetie,” she says, crouching again. “I’d be scared, too, eh? But nobody’s going to hurt you here. I promise. I cross my heart”—she crosses her heart—“and hope to die. Okay? Okay, sweetie?”

The girl turns her head.

Right away Nancy recognizes her. To cover her surprise she looks over at the desk. “I brought you a glass of orange juice. And a banana and potato chips.”

The girl murmurs something. Nancy twists back around. “What, sweetie? What did you say?”

“I want to go home. I want my mom.”

“I know you do,” Nancy says desperately. She can
see
the mother: that worried, friendly look she had. “But you can’t right now, okay?”

“Why?”

“Because…because somebody fell and hurt themselves, right? At your house?”

“Mika.”

It sounds like the name of a dog, or a baby. “Right. Mika fell…and it’s all crazy there, with the ambulances and everything.”

“Did he die?”

“What? No, no, he didn’t die. He’ll be fine. But you won’t be unless you get some sleep. Why don’t you climb back into bed? Aren’t you cold? The darned air conditioning’s turned up way too high.”

She touches the thin, bare arm. There’s no reaction, so she begins to rub it. After a moment she slides her hands under the ribcage and tries lifting. This, too, is allowed. Only now does the smell of urine reach her. She runs a hand over the girl’s bottom. “That’s okay,” she says. “We’ll get you cleaned up.”

In the bathroom she removes the damp skirt and underpants while confessing about wetting
her
pants once, in grade three. “Everybody in the whole school found out because the teacher made me change into my gym clothes.”

The girl seems dazed. If she remembers Nancy, she’s not letting on. She lets herself be wrapped in a towel and steered toward the bed. The bottom sheet is damp so Nancy keeps on nudging her, over to the sofa. “That a girl,” she says, hoisting her up. “Would you like your juice now?”

The girl nods.

“How about a bite of banana. No?” She brings the glass over. As the girl starts to drink there’s a noise outside—Ron
knocking against something or dropping something. The girl’s hands slide up the glass.

“Whoops,” Nancy says, retrieving it. “That’s just my dog, Tasha. You’ll meet her. She’s really cute. Part spaniel and part wiener dog.”

“I want to go home now.”

Nancy sets the glass on the side table. The noise outside has made her aware of Ron listening in the hall. “For Pete’s sakes, I haven’t even told you my name. I’m Nancy. What’s your name?” Pretending not to know.

“Rachel.”

“Rachel. That’s so pretty. Okay, Rachel, I’m going to strip the sheets and bring you some fresh ones and then maybe you can finally get some sleep. How’s that, eh?”

“And then can I go home?”

Nancy moves over to the bed. “We’ll see.”

The girl starts to cry. Nancy hurries back and kneels in front of her. She finds the cold feet. She kisses and rubs them while babbling she doesn’t know what: nobody’s going to hurt you here, we’re your friends, we’re going to help you, I promise, I promise.

At some point the sobs settle into whimpers and finally the girl drifts into sleep. Nancy goes on gazing at the beautiful tear-streaked face. What can Ron be thinking, she wonders. How in the world could anything so perfect ever belong to
them?

“I
S SHE
all right?” Ron whispers.

Nancy brushes by him with her armload of laundry. Up in the shop she drops the bundle, sits on the recycling box, and covers her face with her hands.

“What happened?” he says.

“I met her before. I met her mother.” She looks at him.

“Where?”

“At Angie’s. Remember last week I told you about my leg giving out and this woman catching me?”

Something hard slides into his eyes.

“Well, that was
her.
That was Rachel’s mother. And Ron, she was so
nice.”

“Is she awake?”

“Rachel? No, she’s asleep on the sofa. She wet the bed.”

“Hey!” he says suddenly.

It’s Tasha. She has gotten hold of Rachel’s skirt.

“Tasha, no!” Nancy cries. The dog is zigzagging around the lawn mowers. Nancy rushes over and snags her collar. She starts to yank the skirt away.

“Let me do it,” Ron says sharply.

Down on one knee, he forces open Tasha’s mouth.

“Bad girl,” Nancy says, frightened.

The skirt is caught on a tooth. Gently, gently, Ron works the material free.

“Is it okay?” Nancy asks.

“What?” He’s out of breath. He grabs the door frame to pull himself up.

“Did she rip it?”

“No.” But he hasn’t checked. He’s frowning down at Tasha, who is wagging her tail and looking up at him. “Rachel likes dogs,” he says. “Tasha could be good company for her.”

Nancy was braced to hear the opposite: Tasha has got to go. She was already feeling relief at the thought of taking Tasha home, getting away from here. But this also is relief.
She straightens, then freezes at the sound of a police siren. Ron cocks his head. The whooping grows louder before it starts to fade.

Nancy’s heart goes on hammering. She thinks of the terrorized little girl asleep on the sofa, and her eyes brim over. “We can’t keep her, Ron. We
can’t.
I’ll drive her back, okay? I’ll do it.”

He seems to realize that he’s still holding the skirt. He drops it on the counter.