Ring Around Rosie (16 page)

As he and Martha wandered the streets
looking for number fifty-five, Ted realised that if it hadn’t been for Martha
he never would have walked back to that café and seen the photograph. He’d been
too busy scoffing at her obsessive methods and had walked straight past the
window. He could have missed this chance to find his sister all because of his
arrogance. He wanted to punch himself and give Martha a huge hug in gratitude
but felt too shy and thought she’d probably slap him for being too friendly
anyway, so he made a mental note to be
really
grateful once they found
Rosie.

They found a number fifty-five and an old
lady answered the door clothed in a large pink dress and green wellies – not
the typical outfit for a trafficker, Ted figured, but each to their own.
Clearly thinking Ted was her gardener she told him it was not his usual day to
call and to come back when it was. Ted stifled a laugh and asked her if there
was any other number fifty-fives in the area. The old woman looked at him
pityingly and then directed them towards a block of flats in the opposite
direction.

Ted didn’t have any grandparents that were
still alive so he wasn’t sure how to ‘handle’ old people, so he quickly and
politely thanked her and promised to return to do her garden another day.

“Should have driven the car up here,” said
Martha as they walked down the same stretch of road for the third time.

“Where did she say it was?” asked Ted
looking around him. “Are you sure we haven’t passed it already?”

“Don’t think so. She did say it was set
back off the road a bit. It can’t be far from the café we were at earlier.
Rosie had to have been able to see the café from where she was to know that she
could leave the photo there,” Martha muttered.

“Eh?” chuckled Ted, still amused by the old
lady.

Martha stopped in front of the café and
looked over the road. Ted pulled up alongside and looked in the same direction.
There it was, a block of flats set back from the road with hidden access in
through the back. It seemed a likely place as any for traffickers to operate
from, and Ted had completely missed it the first time. He hated himself for
being so blind, and wondered what the hell else he’d missed.

There was a large metal gate joining a wall
that enclosed what looked like the rear entrance to the flats. The gate was
padlocked, so they walked around in an attempt to access the building from a
different side.

Finding another entrance, they climbed
tentatively up some stairs, unsure of what to expect, Ted again wondering if he
was walking a path already trodden by Rosie. It felt almost like she had
dropped bits of her essence along the way and it was still clinging to places
she’d been; he could almost feel it hanging there like cobwebs.

They both stood outside number fifty-five,
each waiting for the other to make the first move. Ted leant forward and
knocked. There was no answer. Ted knocked again, louder. Gradually the door
opened and an eye peeped through the crack. Both Ted and Martha stood back, not
sure what to expect, but the eye looked afraid rather than threatening, and
Martha stepped forward and introduced herself. The eye darted from Martha to
Ted, and back again, and when Martha mentioned Rosie’s name the eye looked
down.

 “Look, if you know where my sister is you
better say now or I’m gonna smash down the door, followed by your head!”
shouted Ted.

Martha looked up at him in surprise, then
tried to recover the situation as the door started to close.

“Look, please let us in, we just want to
talk. My friend won’t do anything; I won’t let him. He’s just desperate to find
his little sister.”

But Ted couldn’t stand it, he was sick of
tiptoeing around everyone, and everything was suddenly taking far too long; he
could almost feel Rosie nearby. So barging past Martha he forced the door open,
sending the man flying backwards against the wall. As the man fell, his legs
landed in front of Ted’s so that he had to jump to clear them. Ted noticed that
on his large, flailing feet were a pair of mustard-coloured cowboy boots. Not
from around here, he decided.  

He heard Martha’s gasp of horror behind him
as he marched along the corridor and charged through the first door he came to.
It was a small kitchen, empty except for old pizza boxes and takeaway cartons.
He moved on to the next door; it was locked. He stood back and threw his weight
against it, not waiting for it to be opened for him. He felt unstoppable as if
his limbs and mind had been taken over and were being controlled from
elsewhere. This was totally out of character for him but every ounce of anguish
and desperation he’d felt over the past weeks was surging through him.

A vile smell hit him like a wall; a mixture
of rotting food and stale air laced with despair took his breath away. Scattered
over the floor were four mattresses, some ragged blankets and a few clothes. A
tray of old food was festering in the corner, and huddled on the opposite side
of the room, fear colouring his eyes black, was a small boy.

Ted felt Martha run into him and he barely
spoke louder than a whisper, through teeth that refused to unclench, “Call the
police.”

He then turned to speak to the man but he
was gone. Ted roared through the house like a tornado, throwing open all the
doors and calling Rosie’s name, but the place was empty.

Suddenly there was a shout from Martha. Ted
followed her voice and found her holding the boy who was struggling in her
arms.

“He got upset when you started shouting, I
don’t think he speaks much English.”

The boy was squeaking in her arms and
Martha spoke in a gentle, soothing voice as she tried to calm him.

“I know Rosie was here, I can feel her.
Where can she be now?” said Ted desperately.

The boy started struggling again, and then
he spoke.

“Worsie.”

It was a strange pronunciation but it was
definitely her name. Ted knelt down opposite him.

“Did… you… say… Rosie?” he asked slowly.

The boy nodded.

“She here?”

The boy shook his head.

“Gone,” said the boy.

“Where?” asked Ted.

But the boy just shook his head and started
crying.

By the time the police arrived, Ted was
sitting with his head in his hands, chastising himself for losing it and
letting the man get away. They now had a boy who could barely speak English and
was probably too traumatised to communicate with anyone anyway, and an empty
flat with no clues as to where Rosie had been taken. The police seemed unamused
at Ted’s gung-ho approach and scolded him for not calling them first. Ted
wanted to say that at least he was actively doing something instead of
procrastinating like they had been, but thought getting himself arrested was
not in Rosie’s best interest.

Martha came over and sat next to Ted on the
steps.

“I’ve given the police a description of the
man, and they’ve handed the boy over to Social Services where they hope to get
some information out of him. I don’t fancy their chances; the kid’s a complete
mess. They’re now finger-printing the place, and all the usual stuff, and will
let us know what they come up with.”

Ted shrugged. “Sure they will. So we’re
back where we started then?”

“Not necessarily, the cops may come up with
something. They think there have been other children here, and that there are
likely to be more men involved, especially as the one we saw didn’t seem quite
all there,” Martha said, tapping her forehead.

“I can’t believe I let him go! I was just
so sure Rosie was there that she was my only thought. And I figured once we had
her she could tell us about the men who had captured her and they would be
found. I’m such an idiot!”

Martha put her hand gently on his knee and
Ted felt tears sting the backs of his eyes.

“You can’t blame yourself, you’re doing the
best you can. You’re doing more than most brothers would. The police have a
description of the man that was here and he’s quite unusual looking too, so he won’t
be too hard to trace I’m sure.”

Ted jumped up and leant over the balcony.
Martha’s kind and reassuring words were making him want to blub and he had to
get a grip. He looked down at the empty carpark and watched a group of
teenagers walk across it, laughing and jostling each other. It felt so long ago
that he had been like that with his mates. In fact he hadn’t heard from Midge
and Plank in ages. They’d deserted long before Dillon had. Ted was amazed at
how easily people gave up.

Martha was at his side again, leaning into
him reassuringly. Her hand found his and squeezed it. Ted looked down into her
concerned green eyes and found himself leaning down and resting his forehead on
hers. All the anguish and pain he’d felt seemed to seep from him down into her,
and for a moment it felt like everything was right with the world. 

Suddenly, out of the corner of his eye, Ted
saw a car pulled up on the other side of the metal gate. He slowly lifted his
heavy, pounding head to see who it could be, but no one got out. Then there was
a screeching of tyres and the car reversed fast and then sped away.

“That was them! It must have been,” said
Ted, pointing to where the car had left smoke in its wake. Quick, get the
nearest cop,” he said to Martha, as he leant over to see which direction it was
going in.

He relayed what he’d seen to the policeman;
the colour of the car and the make he thought it was, as well as the direction
it was headed. The officer got on the radio straight away and rallied all
available cars.

“They must have seen the police cars, and
us up here,” Ted said to Martha, excitedly.

Martha nodded, grinning. “See, there’s
still hope.”

Just then Ted heard the familiar voices of
his parents and suddenly they were standing in front of him, and it was so good
to see them. Ted flung his arms around them both.

“The police called us,” said his mum, in
what sounded like a slightly accusatory tone.

“Sorry,” said Ted. It had crossed his mind
to call them but he’d felt so ashamed that he’d let Rosie, and the man keeping
her, slip through his fingers because of his temper, that he hadn’t wanted to
be the one to tell them.

Ted hurriedly introduced his parents to
Martha in an attempt to change the subject, and they thanked her profusely for
all she’d done so far. No mention was made of the mistaken identity saga,
although Martha seemed apologetic in her acceptance of their praise.

After his parents had been briefed by the
police, they were told they could all leave, so Ted suggested the four of them
get a drink before heading home.

Ted watched Martha and his mum chatting
like old friends, his dad raising an eyebrow whenever Martha put a gesturing
hand on Ted as she told them the story of how they’d discovered the flat.

It was strange having a girl there that
wasn’t Rosie, it made Ted check himself every time he started to relax into it.
It almost felt like old times with them all laughing together, and although Ted
felt guilty, like he was betraying Rosie, it was good to laugh. And Martha was
so great with his mum and dad; funny, intelligent, reassuring, and Ted couldn’t
seem to look anywhere else but at her infectious smile and her long delicate
fingers as they rested on his arm. He barely even heard what she said but it
must have been amusing, as his face began to ache from the ridiculous grin that
had made its home there.

There was much hugging, and a few tears
from his mum when they parted company a short time later. And as Ted and Martha
walked back through the park to the car, Martha was full of praise for his
parents’ courage and said she hoped to be as strong and amazing a parent as
they seemed one day.

“You want kids then?” asked Ted.

“Of course, don’t you?”

“I don’t know anymore. I mean; is it fair
to bring children into this world the state it’s in? How does a parent cope
with knowing their child is suffering like Rosie is right now? Why would you
want to risk exposing a child to that? It could happen to anyone, right? If it
happened to Rosie in the one of the remotest places in the country.”

Martha stopped beside him and Ted turned to
face her.

“But if everyone had that attitude no one
would have kids and the human race would die out.”

“Well, would that be such a bad thing? It
seems we aren’t doing a very good job if we let our own children be raped,
beaten, hurt…” Ted slumped down on a bench.

Martha’s phone rang.

Ted looked across the walkway to the
aviary. The birds seemed very quiet; there was no flapping or squawking. Ted
strained to see if they were eating or asleep but they all seemed to be sitting
on their perches looking in the same direction. Ted saw movement behind one of
the cages and realised a man was sitting on the ground looking up at the birds.
He was part hidden but Ted could see his mouth moving like he was talking to
someone: the birds? One of the parrots seemed particularly interested in the
man; it was sitting right in front of him its head cocked to one side as if
listening intently to whatever he was saying.