Lost Girls (16 page)

She coughed out a laugh. “I’m sure you don’t get called every time some young woman is found floating in the Caribbean, which means there is already something I don’t know. Something about her triggered a reaction. Something more than a body found in the sea prompted the inspector to call you. You know something I don’t. All of you.”

She sighed, looked around, meeting all of their eyes. “Don’t you?”

“We were taking a very long shot, Mrs. Bishop,” Sherry said.

Carol wasn’t listening. She was still concentrating on Sherry’s face. “It’s the tattoo, isn’t it? That’s what was different about her. The tattoo means something special to you. Isn’t that right, Inspector George?”

She turned to him. “Look how my poor daughter was beaten. Just look at her body. What happened to her before you found her? Why was she beaten before they dumped her in the water?”

Bishop sat back, a weary look on her face.

My God, Sherry thought. She doesn’t know yet how her daughter died. She is probably under the assumption her daughter had spent many days in the sea.

Sherry looked at Inspector George. “You will be speaking to Mrs. Bishop, I assume? Officially, I mean.”

“We haven’t talked at all, Miss Moore. There is much to cover.”

Carol Bishop looked at them, first at Sherry, then at Brigham, last at Inspector George. “What? What is it? What do we have to cover?”

“Do you mind?” Sherry asked the inspector. “If I tell her?”

“No, ma’am,” the inspector said politely. “If you are sure?”

“Mr. Brigham, would you mind waiting outside with the inspector for a few minutes?” Sherry reached out to tug his sleeve. “Please, Mr. Brigham,” she said.

Brigham stood reluctantly, George with him, and a moment later the door was closed.

“Mrs. Bishop, I will be frank with you, but I will not share things told me in confidence. I know you have waited a long time for this, to learn what happened to your daughter, and I think you should know sooner than later. But I warn you it will be hard to hear. You must be sure you are ready for this now. Would you like me to call one of the doctors? Perhaps to give you something.”

Carol, hands clasped tightly together, rocked back and forth in her chair, “Now,” she said. “Please tell me what you know now.”

“Your daughter did not die of a beating, Mrs. Bishop. Nor was she found floating in the water as the news reported. She was seen falling from the door of an airplane off the coast of Jamaica. Inspector George himself witnessed your daughter’s death.”

Bishop made a sound that Sherry had never heard before, animal-like, a cry of intense pain.

Then Carol tried to stand, but doubled over as if she had been punched in the solar plexus. She went to her knees.

“Mrs. Bishop!” Sherry came off her chair, reaching for her. “Mrs. Bishop, are you all right?” She tried to put her arms around the woman, but the wailing turned to a moan and Sherry heard her body hit the floor. She lay down next to her, holding her, rocking her back and forth.

Carol Bishop, she knew, was still processing the words, was no doubt conjuring images, and the horrible marks on her daughter’s body would suddenly be making sense.

“Can you understand, Mrs. Bishop, why I might not be able to help you?”

Carol took a full minute, but then slowly nodded; she was still unable to get complete words out. The noises she made were inaudible.

Sherry waited. Waited until Carol finally turned and she felt the stale hot breath as Carol’s face came near.

“Please go see my daughter. Please.”

“Mrs. Bishop…” But then she stopped midsentence. The woman was right. She had come all this way. There was no good reason to deny her.

“I’ll do it,” Sherry said. “I’ll do it, Mrs. Bishop.”

Sherry helped the woman up off the floor and then to a seat. She rapped on the door and the inspector walked in, thinking Carol Bishop looked catatonic.

“I’d like to see Mrs. Bishop’s daughter,” she said. “Can you take me while Mr. Brigham looks after Mrs. Bishop?”

The inspector hesitated. “Mrs. Bishop?”

“Yes,” she said. “Take her. Take her to my daughter please.”

“Of course,” he said.

Sherry knew what Brigham would be thinking. That they should have gotten out of here before this turned into something else. Inspector George could hardly be expected to lie when the FBI began to inquire about who had been near the body before they examined it. But there was no leaving this woman without an answer. For Carol Bishop the pain was in not knowing what happened to her daughter.

“Right this way, Miss Moore.”

The inspector led Sherry down the hall, opened doors, and guided her to a room.

“She is not well,” the inspector said.

“She’s not going to be well anytime soon.” Sherry shook her head.

“Is there anything I can do to prepare you?”

“Just a chair,” Sherry said. “I’d like to sit next to her.”

“A moment,” he said, excusing himself, and seconds later returned with a straight-back wooden chair.

“Do you want me to stay with you?” the inspector asked.

Sherry shook her head. “I’ll be fine alone.”

“I’ll be right outside then.” The inspector backed out the door.

When he was gone Sherry found the edge of the table and sat. It was a stainless-steel table, the cadaver lying level with her face.

She took a moment to be silent, to clear her head. She could still hear Carol Bishop’s primal wail; it was not a sound you forgot. Not ever.

It mattered not how many morgues she’d sat in over the years, how many autopsy tables she’d rested her arm against, the sensations, the smells, the apparent sameness was anything but. Every hand was like the first hand she ever picked up. They all had a place in her mind, every one. They all brought a different memory to surface—the little boy in Luray, Virginia, the little girl in Norwalk, Connecticut. Their hands were as different as their faces would have looked. They formed a league of souls in her mind, and the memories of those souls included many of the monsters she held at bay in her cerebral zoo.

She reached across the table, fingers grazing the cool skin of the girl’s hip, found a thumb, picked up the hand, and squeezed like Carol Bishop had done in the waiting room.

Then she settled in the chair and waited…….
a middle-aged black man, he was sitting cross-legged on the floor, a machine gun on his lap. He was wearing a dirty black T-shirt and grinning to expose a gold tooth; she saw a field of sparkling lights, she was reaching out to touch them, arms extended, palms open, a warm green wind in her face; she was sitting in front of a cake full of candles, a woman stood behind her, hand on her shoulder; a black cat balled up on a bed; a dome-shaped yellow car; a black man standing over her, he had one brown eye and one white eye that was lifeless; a dark-haired Caucasian woman, she was gaunt, her eyes sunken, hair tangled on her shoulders. She had a tattoo on her face, of a grinning skull wearing a top hat; an olive-skinned woman in a white blouse and gold-trimmed capris, a van, it was pink and full of clothing; the spires of a stone building, a castle-like building…in a jungle…

Sherry dropped the hand and jerked back in her seat. “Oh, my God,” she whispered.

She put her hands on her knees and bent over, taking deep breaths, the image of the castle foremost in her mind. She was there. Jill Bishop was there. That was the building. That was where Sergio Mendoza had seen the woman in the red room.

There was more, Sherry knew, more of Jill Bishop’s memory to see. For the first time in her life, she didn’t want to go on with it. She was afraid of what lay before her.

Minutes passed; her heart began to steady, at last, but ever so slowly she reached for Jill Bishop’s hand. And took it again….

…a tabletop bar, a pretty young woman facing her, pink drinks with plastic palm trees, a gleaming white ship, a sandy-haired woman in a hammock; bright sunlight, the black man with the gold tooth is crouching now, waving his machine gun at her, she can see blue sky next to him, they are in an airplane, she rises, she is walking toward the man, she steps out into the light and reaches for the dazzling green glitter, something small and white, it is a boat rolling gently in the tide, rushing up to meet her…

Carol Bishop spent a final hour with her daughter, sitting in the same straight-back wooden chair, holding the same cold hand that Sherry had held. She cried until she could cry no more.

She had been thinking about what Sherry Moore had told her.

It was unfathomable that her daughter could have willingly stepped out of an airplane. The only thing left to imagine now was, what had those men done to her to make her want to die? What had they made her do that was so awful she couldn’t hang on another day?

Carol put her head in her hands, nails digging into the soft skin of her temples. She groaned again and then the groan turned into a growl.

She wondered what Sherry Moore could do with what she learned from her daughter. The FBI would give no credence to what Sherry claimed she saw. No one would attempt to identify the men her daughter saw or the dark-haired girl with a tattoo just like Jill’s. And what about the castle in the jungle? The Bishops had traveled the world over with their children when the girls were growing up. Carol didn’t recall ever seeing such a place. Certainly she would have remembered such a building herself, so the memory had to be fresh. Had to be her daughter’s alone.

Sherry Moore and the inspector knew more than they were letting on. Carol was certain it was the reason Sherry was brought here. They knew something about that tattoo, but there was something else, something even more troubling to Carol. Sherry seemed different after she walked back into the waiting room. Something had happened in that room with her daughter. Sherry Moore had seen more than she wanted to.

Built of white marble, the Crystal House sat in stark contrast to the dark mountain jungles surrounding Port Antonio. It was a favorite of Europeans, who preferred its austere elegance to all-inclusive resorts full of screaming children and lotion-lathered tourists come to burn in the sun.

Guards stood by the gates at its entrance. It had a spiked iron fence around its perimeter, mostly hidden by jungle from the guests, who today were mostly German. From what Brigham could gather, they were entirely uninterested in the three Americans and their Jamaican friend at a breakfast table.

A blinking green lizard skittered across the dark slate floor, disappearing into the shadows under a heavy window drape. The hotel was dark inside and elegantly furnished. There was a distinct lack of emotion in the dining room, waiters almost mechanically serving breakfasts, busboys in starched jackets moving quietly between tables, silently removing dishes.

The sky had gone gray, clouds forming over the humid jungle on Green Mountain. Brief morning showers were typical before clouds moved offshore and evaporated over the sea, before Jamaica saw another dazzling Caribbean day.

Beyond the front gates Highway A-4 snaked along the jagged coastline, separating jungle from the cliffs that overlooked the green Caribbean. This side of the island was not heavily traveled. It was why the inspector chose the hotel for them to spend the night. It was unlikely that anyone would recognize either Sherry Moore or Carol Bishop.

“Orange juice for the gentleman?”

Inspector George shook his head, deferring to Brigham, who waved away the waiter.

Strands of daylight invaded the teakwood blinds, illuminating sterling pitchers of cream for the coffee and pewter bowls filled with brown sugar cubes. Carol Bishop sat at the table with her face pressed into her open hands. She had spoken little since they left Kingston last night.

Brigham had seen the victims of terrible trauma before and Carol Bishop had all the signs. He thought that she was quite aware of her mental state and was just trying to keep it together long enough to get through this ordeal.

The logical step would be to finish breakfast and part ways with Carol Bishop and Inspector George. Brigham and Sherry would take the hotel’s van to Port Antonio and fly back to Philadelphia. They would be home before the dinner hour.

Carol and the inspector would drive back to Kingston, where they would call the FBI and then announce her daughter’s identification. Carol would likely hold a press conference and a flare of media excitement would ensue.

Except that Carol did not want to do that, and Sherry, who had called Helmut Dantzler this morning, knew it. Knew it and sympathized.

Brigham looked at Sherry Moore. He knew what Sherry had seen last night in the morgue. Brigham knew that Sherry could not leave it alone. She wasn’t made up that way. Her thoughts were on a body lying eighty miles off the coast of Jamaica in Haiti. She was thinking there were three more days before the voudon man was buried. Before they entombed him with his own last memories of Jill Bishop, and the place she had been held.

A waiter came for the check. The dining room had all but cleared. Busboys were silently crumbing the tables, removing linens. A ray of sunlight pierced the dark room, slicing it neatly in half.

“This thing you know about my daughter,” Carol Bishop said. She was looking directly at Inspector George. “I’ve not pushed you, not any of you, but you’ve never talked about the tattoo after I mentioned it. You called Miss Moore to come down here because of it, didn’t you? So what does it mean, Inspector George? Who put that on her face? Do you know?”

She turned to Brigham. “Are there others out there like her? Is that why you brought Miss Moore here? Do you know where they are?”

No one answered.

Carol scratched at the skin on the back of one hand. “You were hoping to learn something from Sherry Moore, something only my daughter could know. You were hoping she could tell you where she had been, hoping she could describe something familiar. You would only have done that if you already had an idea where to look. If you already had an idea where to start.”

Carol looked around the table, regarding each of their faces. “Once the FBI gets here you will be barred from investigating her death any further. I know how things work. I know that my daughter wasn’t in Jamaica when she died. She was in international waters and I know that the rest of the Caribbean could care less about some missing girl from Chicago. So how long can you wait for the next girl to fall out of the sky, Inspector George? How many more girls have to die before you get another chance like this? Before some other mother’s daughter ends up in a morgue with the devil’s tattoo?”

Brigham knew what Sherry was thinking. That the man in the airplane with the gun was sitting down when Jill Bishop walked out that door. He didn’t push her out the door. She jumped of her own free will.

The kidnappers weren’t supposed to let that happen; they had made a mistake, and it was only because of that mistake that they found Jill’s body. If they hadn’t, Jill would be God knows where right now and no one would ever have seen her again. Not to mention that if Inspector George hadn’t been the policeman who found her, no one would have known to call Helmut Dantzler at Interpol, who in turn knew what the World Freedom aid worker heard in Haiti last week. Call it what you will, coincidence or divine intervention, it was an opportunity and Sherry would not pass up an opportunity. Not like this one.

“Sherry,” Brigham said sternly. He saw it on her face. She was getting ready to leap. “Sherry…”

Sherry put a hand on his arm and patted gently to silence him. She turned to Carol. “Mrs. Bishop. Could I ask you to excuse us for a few moments? We’ll meet you up on the veranda as soon as we’re done.”

Bishop looked at the three of them intently. Then she pushed back her chair and stood.

“Do the right thing,” she said. Then she left the room.

Rolly King George picked up a fork and began to turn it over with his big hands. A minute lapsed and no one spoke.

“She sees it on your face,” Inspector George said, without looking up.

Sherry looked at him. “I’m sorry?” she said.

“Ever since you saw the Bishop girl you have been preoccupied, something’s been bothering you. Something you didn’t expect to see. Perhaps even something that terrifies you.”

George laid the fork down and folded his hands. “Helmut Dantzler didn’t tell me the whole story either, did he? He knew more about the death’s-head tattoo than he is willing to share and that is why he sent you here. So, Miss Moore. Do you intend to leave me here with Mrs. Bishop and her daughter and no answers as well?”

Sherry took a deep breath and shook her head. “No, Inspector, I don’t. Mr. Dantzler asked me to come here because of something I saw a month ago. A man died in a mountain climbing accident in Alaska; at the time a lot of climbers were caught on the summit in a storm. It was believed there were survivors, but there was no way to know where they were, and I was asked to go there and try to help. When I took the dead climber’s hand I saw a castle in a tropical jungle. The same castle I saw last night through Jill Bishop’s eyes. I saw other things too, a woman being tortured. She had a tattoo on her face. The same tattoo that Jill Bishop wears.”

“Why didn’t Dantzler tell me this?”

Sherry ignored the question. “At the time I didn’t know more than the dead man’s name, Sergio Mendoza, a common enough Latino name though we presumed he was a citizen of the United States. The memory of a castle I witnessed when I took his hand could have been a memory from most anywhere in the world. I didn’t know who to tell or where to start. Mr. Brigham has friends in our government so I asked him to look into it further. Just to make sure the dead man on the mountain wasn’t connected to something they already knew about.”

Sherry folded her hands. “It turned out the dead man on the mountain was the son of Thiago Mendoza, Inspector George.”

“
The
Thiago Mendoza?”

Sherry nodded. “Mr. Dantzler called me shortly after he talked to you. You can see why, of course. I don’t think men like Helmut Dantzler necessarily believe in people like me; it was more out of respect to Mr. Brigham that he did so, but he called nonetheless. But Dantzler knew something else,” she said. “Something that made my story plausible. Interpol has come to believe the building I described is in Haiti, Inspector George.”

“Why didn’t he tell me?”

“He is protecting a source.”

“A source,” Inspector George repeated, his face contorting. He clenched his fists. “Some blackhearted snitch matters more to Interpol than a dead girl?”

“There was a very good reason, Inspector George.” Sherry tried to soothe him. “The source is quite well known; the consequence of revealing it would put countless others in harm’s way. If he were to rely on the source’s word alone it would even outweigh the good we could do by saving these women. I spoke with Mr. Dantzler last night and told him about Mrs. Bishop’s identification. You can imagine his surprise. I also told him what I saw in your morgue. He quickly voiced his desire that we allow Interpol and the FBI to take the investigation from here. But,” she said emphatically, “I convinced him there is an imminent threat to anyone still alive in that castle and an opportunity before the FBI gets involved to locate it. The moment the FBI or Interpol approaches the Haitian government with this information, it will leak to the traffickers and any opportunity to save these women will be lost. I told him it is Carol Bishop’s desire not to contact the FBI if there is something we can do to help first.”

“Tell me,” the inspector said curtly.

“A child in Haiti overheard her father talking about a place where women were being caged in the cellar of a building, women bearing the tattoo of Baron Samedi on their faces. This child told a humanitarian aid worker, who in turn contacted Interpol. You understand the ramifications of such contact from a nongovernmental organization.”

George nodded, watching her.

“Two days later the child’s father was killed and dumped in his village. A piece of paper was found in his mouth, a name was written on it. The child had no idea where her father was working, and Haiti is a big country.”

Inspector George sighed, looked at the ceiling, eyes fixed.

“You can see Helmut Dantzler’s dilemma, Inspector. When the FBI comes here, they cannot be told about this dead man in Haiti. To do so would be to compromise the nongovernmental humanitarians, one of Interpol’s most valuable sources. Even if the FBI knew and believed the story, they have already tried and been denied access to Haiti to search for Jill Bishop.”

“And what do you propose we do, Miss Moore?”

“The body in Haiti has not yet been interred, Inspector George. If you could stall identification of Jill Bishop another day, I could go to Haiti and attempt to reach this man before he is buried. If I could spend only a minute with him, we might learn where these girls had been. If we can cite a location, the government of Haiti could no longer ignore us. They would have to act because we could hold them accountable in front of the world.”

The inspector laughed. “The whole world is going to listen because a blind woman told them so?”

“No, Inspector George.” Sherry leaned forward. “Because Carol Bishop told them so.”

The inspector looked at Brigham, then back at Sherry. “Explain?”

“Can you think of anyone in the Caribbean who can attract more international reporters at a press conference than Carol Bishop? The world would focus entirely on what she said and on what Haiti’s new president was going to do about it. They will barely care about how she came across the information. Once she says she was in Haiti and received information about this castle, they will be committed to act under international scrutiny.”