Crying in the Dark (24 page)

‘Doctor, thanks for coming,' I said, shaking his hand. ‘I can't tell you how relieved I am. I'll be honest: I'm starting to feel more than a little out of my depth on this case.'

I passed the file over, and he spent ten minutes poring over the reports, pictures and various other pieces of evidence I had accumulated over the month and a half I'd spent working with the boys.

‘This is really fascinating.'

‘Any thoughts?' Ben asked.

‘Simultaneous group hysteria, perhaps. I've read reports of abnormal psychic transference between close siblings. I've never encountered it in practice, but it's not unheard of. Some kind of collective unconscious communication? It could be any of those three things. Really fascinating. There's definitely the makings of a research paper here, that's for sure. Neither of you are writing one, are you?'

‘Not just at present, no,' Ben smiled.

‘Good, good.'

‘When can you start, doctor?'

He blinked at us behind his lenses. ‘Well, there's a waiting list of around a year in our department just at the moment. Cutbacks, you see.'

‘But in this instance, an exception will be made,' Ben said firmly.

‘Oh, certainly. We'll speed things along.'

‘I knew you would,' Ben grinned. ‘So when can we schedule the first appointment for the boys?'

Dr Kilshannon took a large, leather-bound diary from his briefcase and leafed through it.

‘The next available space, if I make some shuffles to accommodate you, will be in,' he took out a red pen and made some adjustments to his notes, ‘three months' time. November fifteenth.'

Ben and I looked at one another. I read in his eyes exactly what I knew he saw in mine.

‘Thank you for your help, doctor,' he said, standing up and extending his hand. ‘I think we'll just have to make our own arrangements. The need here is immediate.'

While Ben showed the bemused young psychologist out, I pulled over the file and looked again at the picture the boys had drawn during that first play session of the spectre they had seen. I looked at it for a long time. There was no help for us then. Three months was too long. The boys could not wait three months, and neither could I.

‘All right, Toddy,' I said to the picture. ‘You've come to us. It's our turn to go to you.'

Ben came back in and sat down opposite me.

‘Well, that was a waste of time,' he said. ‘I don't know why I build my hopes up every time, but I always do.'

‘It's okay,' I said, putting the picture back into the file. ‘I know what needs to be done.'

‘Do we have a cunning plan, then?'

‘We do,' I said, and told him.

‘We got your report on the visit to the Byrne house,' Bríd said to me over the phone. I had been about to leave the office to go and see Mina at the hospital when the call came. ‘It makes for unpleasant reading.'

‘Did you expect otherwise?'

‘I suppose not. I have passed a copy on to social services and to the police. I am told that a prosecution will almost certainly follow.'

‘Good.'

‘You may be asked to testify.'

‘I have no problem with that.'

‘Olwyn has asked for some time off on grounds of stress.'

‘That's probably for the best.'

‘Might it have been better to have brought one of the more experienced members of staff with you?'

‘No. She was the best person for the job.'

‘I'm afraid she may not return to us.'

‘Don't underestimate her, Bríd. She's already a good childcare worker. I think she's going to be a great one. You've read the report. You know what happened. She held up pretty well under the circumstances.'

‘Mmm.'

‘How are Larry and Francey doing?'

‘They are a little introverted, but none the worse for wear. Karena has been putting in some extra shifts, spending a lot of time with them.'

‘You've got a good team, Bríd. I hope you realize it.'

‘I do.'

‘I dare say Olwyn will be back with you in a day or two. Give her some time. You won't regret it.'

‘When will we be seeing you again?'

‘I'll be out tomorrow.'

Mina smiled when I came into her room. The doctor had told me that she'd been tested for HIV, gonorrhoea, syphilis and a battery of other sexually transmitted infections. The Henrys' money had ensured a rapid response to the tests, and the results, thankfully, had all come back clear. She wasn't pregnant either. The medical staff had treated her for pubic lice as a matter of course. Mina had suffered severe vaginal bruising and some internal lacerations, but they would heal.

I had brought her flowers, some teen magazines (which I normally don't approve of, but thought I could waive my distaste just this once) and a box of chocolates.

‘How are you doing, Mina?'

‘Okay. Mum and Dad have just gone home to change their clothes.'

‘Have they given you a hard time?'

‘No. They've been really great.'

‘That's good.'

‘They've said that me and Jacob can see each other whenever we want.' She sat up painfully and opened the sweets. ‘Want one?'

‘Thanks.' I popped a hazelnut whirl in my mouth. ‘Yeah, they told me about Jacob. That's really brilliant.'

‘I can't wait to tell him. They're going to bring me in my phone so I can ring him.'

‘I know he'll be dead chuffed to hear from you.'

‘He's the best,' she said, smiling at the thought of him.

‘So.' I had to bring up what had happened. ‘Does that mean no more wandering? Because I almost didn't find you this time.'

‘I know. I'm sorry, Shane. I didn't mean for it to go so wrong.'

‘What happened, Mina? I think you owe me an explanation.'

‘I don't want to talk about it. I'm tired.'

‘Honey, it was bad, but it could have been an awful lot worse. I'd like to know why you were there, in that awful room with those men, in the state you were in.'

She looked away from me, towards the wall, for a while. I knew she was trying to work out where to begin. There was so much that had to be said.

‘I love Jacob,' she said finally.

‘I know you do.'

‘But I didn't think I'd ever be allowed to be with him.

When I ran away first, I was trying to find where he lived. Dad had said once that Jacob's family lived in a poor part of town, so I walked until I found a place that seemed to be poor. And I asked a man I met if he knew where Jacob Benedict lived. He said he didn't, but asked if he could take me for a drink.'

‘Terence Fields.'

‘Yes. It was Terry.'

Sometimes fate steps in and goes out of its way to make matters considerably more messed up than they already are. I have often, when faced with the most ludicrous and unlucky coincidences that litter some of my cases, been flabbergasted at the perversity of fortune. Had Mina really just run into this predator by accident? It seemed more likely that Fields had spotted her, wandering alone by the docks, and followed until an opportunity to make contact presented itself. At any rate, this vulnerable young woman and this despicable man had, somehow, found one another in the side-streets of the city that night, and a chain of events had been set in motion.

‘Tell me about him.'

‘He was nice to me. He was old, and kind of ugly, and he didn't smell good, but he treated me like I was just the same as anyone else. He told me I was beautiful.
Desirable,
he said. We did things grown-ups do. We went for drinks in the pub, and to the pictures, and he let me sleep in his bed if I did … private … things with him.'

‘He shouldn't have made you do those things, Mina.'

‘I didn't mind, mostly. He made funny noises and shouted out my name, but he told me that this was what people who liked each other did. He said it was grown-up love. I needed to learn about it. Me and Jacob, we just kissed and hugged, but Terry did a lot more than that. It felt good.'

‘Mina, that's sex. It's not love.' This is a conversation I always hate having with kids. Trying to find the correct words, being honest without sounding patronizing is never easy. Combine that with the complex business of undoing the mischief done by a sex offender, and you have a potential minefield. ‘People who love one another do it, yeah, but – shit, Mina, it's complicated.' I gave up for now. She was still doped up and confused anyway.

‘I know about sex. I've read about it.'

‘You can catch things, and get pregnant.'

‘I know all that. Terry said you have to leave it in for seven minutes to get pregnant, though, and he was never even nearly that long.'

‘That's just not true. He should have been using condoms. Do you know what they are?'

‘He didn't like using condoms. He said something about taking a bath with your clothes on. I didn't understand that.'

‘It's just something men say. It doesn't mean anything.'

‘I liked Terry. He was sort of my boyfriend. Mum and Dad wouldn't let me be with Jacob, so when I got lonely, I'd go and see Terry. When I was with him, it was just as if I didn't look like this. I was a
woman
, not a retard. So, when I ran away that last time, I went straight to him, and told him I wanted to live in his place. He was so happy. He said we'd have a party, and invite some friends over. Except all his friends were men, and they weren't nice. They all wanted to touch me, and when I asked them to stop, they wouldn't. I asked him to make them leave me alone, and he told me not to be rude; these were our guests and I should make sure they had a good time.'

‘What did you do?'

‘I did what they wanted. And kept doing it. It hurt, after a while, and I started to cry. They gave me drink and pills to take, and that helped, 'cause it got so as I didn't really know what was happening. Then you were there, with that man. Was he a guard?'

‘No. He was a friend, someone who wanted to help.'

‘They were really frightened of him. It was like he had something behind his eyes that they saw, but I couldn't.'

‘I think he wanted them to see it.'

‘You saved me. You and him.'

‘I found you. Your mum and dad and Jacob – and you – will have to do the saving now.'

‘I thought they would kill me. I think they would have eventually.'

‘I don't know. It doesn't help to think of what might have happened. You should think of what
will
happen now. How to put things right. There will be times over the next while, maybe even for the rest of your life, when you'll suddenly think of what happened in that room with those men, and you'll get scared. But we'll organize someone to help you to cope with that, when it happens.'

‘I'm not scared any more. And I'm not lonely. Jacob and me, we're going to be together.'

‘Yes. But there's a lot of work still to do. Your mum and dad have had an awful fright too. Your relationship with them is going to change, but with change come new challenges. It isn't going to be all plain sailing.'

‘No, but it'll be
honest.
Up until now it's been about lies. They've wanted me to be what I wasn't, and I've wanted them to be what they weren't. Now we can see one another as we really are. Have another sweet.'

I took one, and we forgot about such difficult issues and munched through the box of chocolates and talked about funny things that had happened at the workshop, and who was number one in the Pop Charts, and that little cottage with its vegetable garden where she and Jacob might one day live if life got simpler and easier.

Olwyn was not surprised when I sat down beside her in the Internet café. She looked as if she hadn't been sleeping much.

‘Don't you have Internet access at home?' I asked her.

‘Yeah.'

‘So why do you do so much of your work here?'

‘Gets me out of the house.'

‘Isn't it expensive?'

‘I'm a member. Special rates.'

‘Does your mum know you're on stress leave?'

‘Jesus, no. She'd freak out completely.'

There was nothing to say to that. After my conversations with Mina about her relationship with her parents, I hadn't the heart to get into a similar exchange with Olwyn.

‘How've you been?'

‘Oh, brilliant. I've had time to really streamline the message boards on the sites. We were getting a load of spam, y'know?'

‘You know that wasn't what I meant.'

‘I've decided not to go back, Shane. I'm going to go into web design. I'm really good at it. I just need to think of a way to tell my mother … any advice on that?'

‘You did really well, at the house, Olwyn. It was tough. You held it together.'

‘Yeah, I know I did okay, but, see, since then, I keep having nightmares. I can't sleep, and I can't eat, and I can't stop thinking about that bedroom and that little cupboard with the shit all over the floor and the walls.'

The tone of her voice was getting more and more high-pitched, and I knew she was about to start hyperventilating. I shushed her and put an arm around her shoulders.

‘Hey, slow down. Breathe, just breathe for a second.'

She gradually got herself under control.

‘Sorry. Didn't mean to lose the run of myself. I'm kind of all over the place. I just … just can't get my head around what Larry and Francey told us. I mean, I've been to college and I've read case studies. I know about all the awful things people do to each other. But the sheer, abject
nastiness
of what those sick fucks did to their children … and they didn't do it for money or to get approval from anyone else. They weren't showing off to other sick fucks. They did it for no other reason than that they wanted to. And
that's
what's killing me. The twins' lives have been destroyed because their parents just … felt like doing it.'