The Dead Ground (9 page)

Gerard gave a quizzical look at Paula, who was still shaking, dragging herself to her feet. He said, ‘OK. Thanks for your time, Mrs Croft.’

Paula stopped at the door. Her voice was trembling as much as her hands. ‘Alison Bates. Does that name mean anything to you?’

The woman’s face was blank as water. ‘I think everyone knows who Dr Bates is. Everyone who follows God’s way, that is.’

‘What does that mean?’

‘It means she’s evil. That woman kills children. The people of Ballyterrin don’t want her living among them, spreading her sin.’

‘Have you ever met her? Have you seen her recently?’

‘How would I ever meet a person like that?’ Magdalena Croft stood there, her face placid and unreadable.

Gerard caught Paula’s arm. ‘Come on, Maguire, let’s go. Thanks again, ma’am.’

‘You OK?’ Gerard looked at her curiously as he started the Jeep, wipers clearing a new fall of snow from the windscreen. A new car had arrived in the car park, inside it a young couple who seemed to be having a tearful row. More supplicants to Magdalena?

‘Yeah. Just cold.’

Gerard fiddled with the heater, letting stale hot air spew in, and drove out to the road. ‘You reckon there’s anything to it, what she does?’

‘Of course not. It’s tricks is all – the same as what fortune tellers do.’ That’s all it was. It was easy to see a pregnancy, wasn’t it, if you knew what to look for? Tess Brooking, Guy’s wife, had guessed it nearly a month ago, with her midwifery expertise.

‘I’d an aunt went to Croft once,’ Gerard was saying. ‘Auntie Louise. She was desperate for a wean – ten years married and nothing. This Magdalena gave her some kind of powder to put on her tongue. From the Virgin Mary, she said. Load of crap.’

‘And did she get pregnant?’

‘Oh. Well, she did, actually. But you hear that a lot, don’t you, when people believe it can happen.’

‘Yeah. It’s bollocks. She’s just a fraudster, like Guy – Inspector Brooking says.’

Gerard glanced at her again. ‘Why’d you ask that about Dr Bates? I thought we hadn’t put out yet that she’d gone missing.’

‘No. I know. But I remembered Croft mentioned her once, at one of her rallies or whatever they are. It was on YouTube. She basically denounced the doctor, said she was going to Hell.’

‘So did a lot of people, though. She was hardly flavour of the month in town.’

‘I know. Let’s just go, OK?’ Whether it was the cold or what had happened, Paula didn’t stop shaking all the way back to Ballyterrin.

When they arrived at the unit, it was clear something was different – that familiar tang in the air, activity and fear.

She still had her coat on when Guy came out of the office. He wore a black sweater over his shirt and tie. ‘Well?’

He was holding his phone.

‘That was Corry. We’re going to the town centre.’

‘Why?’

‘After you left, Magdalena Croft went into a trance. She’s told them exactly where to find Alek.’

‘And was she right?’

‘That’s what we’re going to see.’

Chapter Nine

Ballyterrin was full of churches. Catholic, Methodist, Presbyterian – there was one on nearly every street, and the largest was the cathedral, a gloomy Gothic structure in the heart of town, among the charity shops and discount stores that passed for a retail hub in these post-recession times. By the time they reached it, it was snowing so hard the building was nothing but a shadowy bulk.

‘You stay here,’ said Guy, pulling on his coat.

‘But—’

‘I mean it, Paula. Tactical Support are still in. It could be dangerous. I’ll send for you.’ And he was gone, wrenching the door open in the gale, so the breath of snow blew her hair round her face.

Inside Guy’s BMW was calm and warm, compared to the flurry of activity she could see up and down the steps of the building. Yellow coats flashed in the dark, obscured by a new veil of snow, falling like ashes in a nuclear winter and whirled against the car windows by a slicing wind. Tensed like a bow, Paula scrubbed at the patch of window to try to keep track of things. There was the cold blue light and thin wail of an ambulance illuminating the snow, and a rush of bodies. What was going on?

This was intolerable. Unable to stand the wait, she flung open the door, shielding her face against the onslaught of snow. The wind seemed to tear layers off her skin. At the door of the church, a bundled paramedic emerged with something pressed to their chest, and then sirens kicked up a howl as they raced to the ambulance. Was that Alek? Paula staggered up the steps of the cathedral, past several uniformed officers in huge jackets, unrecognisable beneath their layers. She shouted her name over the wind and hauled back the heavy door into the dark exterior. The sound dropped away.

In the dark, incense-scented aisle she stopped, suddenly afraid. What would she find? She’d been in all kinds of crime scenes, faced down sociopaths, even been taken hostage. But this. Babies. The soft warm place where the bones didn’t meet. No way to protect yourself.

She made herself walk towards the altar, where they were rigging up huge lights that made her blink, black spots swimming. The pews and naves were busy with techs and police officers, surely the oddest congregation the place had ever seen. High-vis jackets struck an incongruous note against the old stone. There was Helen Corry, already directing everything with her own brand of ruthless authority. She wore a grey coat with a black fur collar, like Julie Christie in
Dr Zhivago
. ‘Dr Maguire. We’re hoping you can shed some light on this.’ She looked up at the spot lamps. ‘No joke intended.’

‘Where was he?’ She was scanning the altar – tabernacle, candles, advent wreath with one candle lit for the first Sunday in December. Over to the side, a nativity scene with waist-high wooden figures of Mary and Joseph, plus assorted animal companions. It was charming in a primary-school way, and made Paula yearn for something she couldn’t quite name. No baby.

‘There.’ Corry pointed. ‘The blankets.’

‘In the crib?’

In the manger, where the Jesus figurine would be placed come Christmas Day, was a pile of white cot blankets, soft waffle knit. The kind with silky edges. The kind you wrap babies up in.

‘Taking the place of Our Lord himself,’ said Corry drily. ‘Apparently he’s fine. A wee bit cold but basically OK. He wasn’t here long, they say. The priest only left an hour back.’

‘He was exactly where she said,’ Guy said, his hands in the pockets of his long black coat. The snow in his hair made him look older, distinguished.

‘Um—’ Paula tried to focus. ‘So putting him in the manger, that could be one of two things. Either thumbing the nose at the police – a mockery sort of thing. Or some kind of delusion. And if he was well treated—’

‘Yes,’ said Corry. ‘The paramedics said the baby clothes were fresh, and he’d been given a bath. Nappy new on – also, he didn’t have those blankets when he was taken. Someone’s been looking after him.’

‘So that doesn’t really fit.’ Paula circled the altar, trying to get a sense of it. It was very cold inside the church, icy breezes catching you at odd angles, the spire vanishing up into gloom. The faces of the statues shrouded in darkness, the rack of devotional candles guttering in the draught, casting shadows that moved and wavered. She hugged her arms to herself over her coat. ‘Giving the baby back is very unusual. What you’d expect in this kind of case is you’d either hear nothing again – the child would grow up in a new family, or perhaps die, since this kind of abductor often doesn’t know how to care for them. Or else they’d be found through police work. But to voluntarily return him—’ She shook her head. ‘They don’t do that.’

‘I’m glad we bother making all those appeals asking them to then,’ said Corry. ‘Anything else?’

She was thinking. ‘Why a church? I mean, they needed somewhere safe and anonymous – back at the hospital would be the most obvious. It’s cold in here and there’s not much chance he’d be found by casual visitors.’

‘Is it left open all the time?’ Guy had a Londoner’s instinct for security.

‘Churches are supposed to be open at all times, Inspector. To offer a place for prayer.’ From Corry’s delivery, it was impossible to tell if she believed this herself.

‘Sanctuary,’ Paula murmured, thinking aloud. ‘Maybe it’s somewhere she feels safe. The abductor.’

‘
She
.’ Guy stressed. ‘You’re sure?’

‘Fairly. We had the CCTV too.’

‘It’s a woman,’ said Corry confidently.

‘How do you know?’ demanded Guy.

‘The nappy. How many men would have known to do that?’

Paula couldn’t help it. She let out a short, startled laugh and covered her mouth. Guy’s frown deepened. ‘Some of us have changed plenty of them, Chief Inspector. Anyway, what can the unit help with?’

Corry said, ‘We’re still doing interviews with hospital staff – so far no one remembers a thing. We had a sketch artist in with Damian Pachek, but same story there. It was so busy, anyone could have been through the place that day.’

Guy said, ‘Dr Maguire had some thoughts on interview techniques.’

‘Good.’ Corry nodded. ‘Have you anything to add to the offender profile, Doctor?’

Paula said, ‘I’d like to go over the literature further. There’s a lot of research on infant abduction and it might give us some idea where to focus inquiries.’

‘That’s what I like to hear.’

Paula had a terrible urge to please Helen Corry, like a strict schoolteacher. ‘I think—’ she hesitated. ‘The thing is, and we need to be aware of this – this person, they will have wanted a child. Unless possibly it was done for revenge, to hurt the family, but that seems so unlikely.’

‘They had no enemies, the father said, and I don’t buy this sectarian motive that’s been floated.’

‘So this person desperately wants a baby, enough to walk in and take one – but now, for whatever reason, they don’t have him any more. You see what I mean?’

‘I see.’ Corry’s mouth twisted. ‘It’s going to happen again.’

Chapter Ten

‘Saoirse?’ After another late night tying up ends on the Pachek case, Paula was back working at her desk the next morning. She was looking for other cases of abducted babies when the phone rang, her friend’s voice on the end. ‘What’s up?’

Saoirse said, ‘Don’t be cross. I’ve made you an appointment for today. They had a slot.’

She genuinely didn’t get it for a moment. ‘An appointment for what?’

Saoirse sighed. ‘
Paula
. Antenatal, of course.’

Paula felt as if the front half of her body was trying to run away from the back. ‘Oh, I can’t. We’re really swamped here, we just found Alek Pachek, and—’

Corry’s face hadn’t been off the news since Alek had been found safe and well the night before – she was taking all the credit, and as Guy hadn’t even wanted to call in the psychic in the first place, the unit hadn’t come off well. Paula was up to her eyes in research on child abduction and the phone was ringing off the hook with worried parents, wondering if the baby-snatcher might strike again, and journalists looking for a quote from a ‘child abduction expert’. She was not keen on that label. It sounded as if she gave lessons.

‘You’re going.’ Saoirse was stern. ‘No arguments.’

‘But I’m not ready. I don’t know what to do yet.’ Paula could hear the panic in her own voice. ‘There isn’t time!’

Saoirse spoke patiently, as if to a small child. ‘There isn’t time not to. It’s not going away. Either way, you have to see someone. So just go, and tell them the situation. If you’re going to have this baby you need taking care of.’

‘And what if I’m not?’

‘Then at least you’ll have all the information.’

Saoirse was always such a know-it-all. ‘I can’t . . . Will you come with me?’

A small pause. Was it too much to ask? ‘Call in and see me first. You’ll be grand.’

‘Seersh?’ Paula rapped on the door of the office and after a short delay, it was opened, not by her friend, but by Dave, Saoirse’s husband of five years. Six foot three and almost as wide. She stumbled over the words. ‘Oh, hiya. I didn’t – I was looking for Saoirse.’

‘She’s here. I’m just going, myself. Come in, Paula.’

She went in but stayed leaning against the door. With no experience of anything approximating a long-term relationship, she didn’t know how much Saoirse would have told Dave about her ‘situation’. ‘Erm – I’m just after a wee word with Saoirse. About a case.’ She caught her friend’s eye and Saoirse’s infinitesimal head-shake told her Dave didn’t know. She was relieved. One less person then.

Dave was putting on his coat, a navy one with reflective shoulder patches. ‘OK so. Nice to see you. If you’re talking to Aidan, tell him I’m up for that jar, any night but Thursday.’

‘We’re . . . not really talking.’

Dave looked embarrassed. He obviously hadn’t yet learned, as Saoirse had, to steer well away from the deep channels that ran between Paula and Aidan. ‘He’s busy, I’d say, with the paper and all that.’

‘Sure.’

Dave turned back to his wife, cupping her face in two big hands. ‘You’re OK, love?’

‘I will be.’

Paula looked away as they kissed, feeling like an intruder. When he went out Saoirse spun round in her chair. ‘So, no luck with the Pachek case?’

‘Nope. I mean it’s great we found him, but we still need to catch the person. The staff interviews have thrown up nothing, and we’ve no prints or traffic data, nothing useful at all. Looks like no one saw anything. And this doctor’s missing as well.’ Dr Bates had been officially announced as missing that morning, once the good news about Alek Pachek’s recovery had everyone busy. Corry always had an eye for the press and whether or not they’d show her department up as incompetent.

Saoirse took off her glasses and rubbed her eyes. ‘That’s bad. I mean, she wasn’t much liked in town, but the idea that someone would actually hurt her – it scares me, when people start going after doctors.’

‘We might find her safe. You never know.’

‘Hmm. Did you go to see that psychic?’

‘Croft? Yeah, I did. She’s . . . I can’t describe it. But I’m not surprised she can persuade people that her healing works.’