Read A Photographic Death Online
Authors: Judi Culbertson
I
T WAS BARELY
7 a.m. the next morning when I finished my coffee and headed for the Book Barn. The last remnants of the snowstorm had retreated, crouching under the bushes like a defeated army. The exposed ground was muddy, the sky still sunless overhead. Worse than snow, worse than frigid temperatures with bright blue skies, were these overcast days when the world seemed small and without interest.
Since Christmas, book orders had been slow. I dragged myself to the barn and kept listing more anyway. Sometimes even the act of uploading books to the Internet sparked interest, though not necessarily in the new books.
Looking around cautiously as usual, I unlocked the barn door, then downloaded my mail from the night before. Besides the AbeBooks notification of orders, the usual BookEm.com messages, Hannah’s daily dose of cute animals, and advertisements from Amazon and B&N, there was an e-mail from the New England Youth Ski Club.
They identified the girl in the photograph as Elisa Crosley. They wrote that she was now a student at St. Brennan’s College outside Boston and that they would forward the e-mail about the award to the family as soon as they could locate their address.
Elisa Crosley.
It sounded rude and intrusive that anyone would dare to call my child by that strange name. That she would grow up thinking her name was Elisa, not Caitlin. Colin’s words that she’d had a life all this time came rushing back. Though I hadn’t admitted it to myself, I had imagined her in a kind of suspended animation, waiting for us to rescue her so that her real life could begin—as if she had been granted only one, her life as our daughter.
Instead, all this time, she had been having her own experiences as someone named Elisa. Perhaps, since they were twins, her experiences had even intersected with Hannah’s: dressing up as the same fairy princess for Halloween, loving Care Bears, learning Spanish as her foreign language in school. The skiing was what was different; why had she done that? But why shouldn’t she? She had not been on an extended vacation, waiting to come back to us and tell us what she had found. She had been living the only life she knew. A life that she might not want to leave.
That thought was so bitter that I sat back in my chair, barely able to take the next breath. That day in Stratford, she had died to us as surely as if she
had
slipped into the river. Why would she want to know us after all this time? We weren’t the family of anyone’s dreams. Perhaps she would feel like Hannah, that her life was settled and she did not need any further complications.
In a lifetime of reading I had come across stories about people who had gone through life feeling incomplete, as if they had a twin somewhere from whom they had been separated. Sometimes they found out that there had been another baby in the pregnancy, a baby miscarried or not fully formed in the womb. But if that were true, then why didn’t Hannah feel any lack? She had lived with her twin for two and a half years. Would Caitlin feel the same way?
I was so focused on Caitlin growing up as someone called Elisa that I didn’t at first think of her last name, Crosley.
And then I did. Suddenly I was hot and cold at the same moment, my face frozen and then burning up with fever. As if I had been picked up and thrown back into another time, I was in Stratford, on the back patio with the other young archeological families, the cries of our children mingling with the plinking chirps of crickets and evening insects. We adults were deep into our own conversations. The children were there but it was
our
time.
Ethan and Sheila Crosley, Colin’s best friends, were not part of this group. Because they had so much money and no children, they were staying at a nearby inn instead of being crammed into “family rooms” at the residence like everyone else. They went out to dinner in Stratford or Warwick or Birmingham and skipped the hostel food the rest of us complained about. Colin sometimes went out with them to eat, though I was never invited. As he pointed out, he and Ethan had a lot to talk about.
I hadn’t like Sheila very much anyway. Nobody had. In contrast to our cotton summer clothes, she was usually turned out in expensive jeans, black blazer and chunky real gold jewelry. The other wives had speculated that the reason that Sheila with her artfully cut black bangs and model’s face was always unsmiling, always aggrieved, was because she hadn’t been able to get pregnant.
That was the accepted wisdom:
They have the money, but
we
have the kids.
Sheila must have known how we felt about her, but she acted indifferent. Yet inside she must have been burning. How obsessed was she with wanting a child? Enough to steal their best friend’s?
Impossible.
I couldn’t get my head around it. No wonder they had dropped us as soon as the tragedy happened. Not, as Colin had speculated, because we were unforgivably careless. They had to stay far away if they had Caitlin.
I sat at my worktable, chin in hands, the enormity of it breaking over me. Still, there were parts that did not fit. Ethan Crosley was a respected archeologist, not a kidnapper and killer. If it
had
been them, how had they gotten Caitlin back into this country without a passport? Priscilla Waters had been run down in September, long after Ethan’s teaching responsibilities in California had started up. He could not have been driving the hit-and-run car and standing in front of a class of students at the same time. I had a foggy memory of Sheila refusing to drive on the “wrong” side of the road. Cross with the English, as if they had changed their driving habits to annoy her.
She would never have stayed on alone in England and handled it all by herself.
Call someone. Colin. Jane. Bruce.
Find Caitlin before they get the message from the ski club and spirit her away forever
.
S
OMEHOW
I
MANA
GED
to answer two book order e-mails, lock the barn, and get back to the house in less than five minutes. Out of breath, I changed into my most conservative clothes: my black velvet blazer, a classic white shirt I had found discarded in Jane’s closet, and dark pants. A silk scarf for color, and my hair pulled back in a twist. It would look incongruous with my dark green winter parka, but that was the warmest jacket I had.
All I cared about was seeing Caitlin. I couldn’t be in the same world with my child and not see her. I wouldn’t approach her. I wouldn’t spring any terrible surprises on her:
Before you go to your history class, let me introduce myself.
I would look at Caitlin/Elisa from a distance, take her picture, then discuss it with the others. We would figure out the best way to approach her and do it the right way.
With this plan firmly in mind, I couldn’t explain to myself why I stopped in the living room where the Del Monte cartons of mementos had been stored since Thanksgiving and took out Sheepie, Caitlin’s favorite toy. Why I sifted frantically through the secretary drawer and found the latest photograph of all five of us at Jason’s high school graduation and slipped it inside a manila envelope and into my bag with the lamb. Another thought: Back to the carton of photo albums for the snapshot of Hannah and Caitlin at the top of the slide.
The ferry dock was only five minutes away. When I drove down Harbor Street, the large maw of the boat was up in the air and the last of the cars were driving on. The man by the guardhouse with the clipboard, a veteran ferryman I knew by sight, waved me on and I drove into the dark metal bowels of the 8 a.m. ferry. Behind me I heard the start-up of the gears to retract the gangplank. And then they stopped.
As I climbed out of the van, I turned to look. A man in a black Ford sedan was leaning out of the driver’s window, arguing vehemently with the clipboard holder, who was shaking his head no. Suddenly the driver pulled himself in and the car skidded toward the ferry as if he would force himself on. The ferryman swept up his arm in a signal to
go
and the wide metal plate started to lift again. As if realizing he would be driving into the water, the man in the Ford wheeled abruptly and squealed onto Harbor Street.
I watched him go. He could have been anybody who needed to catch that ferry and was angry when he did not get on. I was surprised that they hadn’t let him; the vehicle area was less than half full. The driver could have been an innocent commuter—or he could have been the man who left Caitlin’s shirt on the doorstep. Perhaps he had had me under surveillance and been caught off-guard when I left the house so suddenly.
Was I being cautious—or paranoid? I didn’t know, but I couldn’t shake the image of him driving around to Connecticut instead, taking the long way to Boston but getting there nonetheless. Yet he wouldn’t have to do that. He could notify the Crosleys where I was headed and they could whisk Caitlin away.
Was this the race of my life?
I climbed the metal stairs to the main cabin, a large room with booths and vinyl benches, and realized I had had nothing so far but espresso. I wasn’t hungry, but I needed food as fuel. Going through the small cafeteria line, I picked up a small crumb cake, a carton of orange juice, and more coffee.
The cabin was sparsely populated on this weekday morning and I was able to find an empty booth. I ate my breakfast and stared out the window at Long Island Sound, watching the small whitecaps beat against the gray water like tiny protests. I needed to call everyone, but I wasn’t sure I’d get reception out here, even with the iPhone. Instead I planned my strategy.
Three hours to Boston. Siri would help me find the college. I would go first to the admissions office. They would surely have Caitlin’s class schedule and I’d try to get them to tell me where she was living. I hoped fervently that Ethan was still teaching in California, that even if the ski club mailed the Crosleys this morning they would not have time to get her.
Another person I needed to speak to urgently was DCI Sampson. Again I doubted that I could get through, but while I was sitting here I needed to try.
After a few false starts trying to find the right code sequence, the phone was miraculously ringing in the Stratford police station. I calculated the time difference. DCI Sampson should be just having his tea.
I had hoped to speak to Constable Bradford, but didn’t recognize the voice that answered the phone. When he asked who was calling, I told him, “Delhi Laine from New York. It’s important.”
And then Sampson himself was on the line.
“Good afternoon, Ms. Laine.”
No time for small talk. “Did you have a chance to get a list of car rental names?”
“A very long list.” Reproof in his voice.
He actually had the names! “Do you have dates too?”
“I have dates.” Now he sounded amused. No doubt I was easier to take an ocean away.
“Is there an Ethan Crosley?”
“It will take a minute to check. If you can hold on.”
“As long as it takes.”
The sound of the phone being laid on the desk and the rustling of papers.
If the records showed that Ethan and Sheila had turned in the car at the end of August, the last name would be just a coincidence. It would mean that Priscilla Waters had demanded more money from someone else named Crosley, some other people who were responsible for her death. Ethan and Sheila could have had confederates, but I doubted it. They were strangers in the country: Where would a law-abiding American academic find someone to commit murder for him? Just how much money did he have? I knew Ethan’s father had owned a farm machinery company in Pennsylvania that had done well. I just didn’t know how well.
And there was still the issue of the passport. They would have had no birth certificate to apply for a new one. At home they could have gotten forged documents more easily. That had to be harder to do in England. Harder, but not impossible. If you had enough money, you could get convincing forgeries of anything.
I realized I was still hoping that it was not them, that I would not have to tell Colin his best friend had betrayed him, when DCI Sampson came back on the line.
“Are you talking about Ethan L. and Sheila M. Crosley? They rented a Mercedes from July 12, 1995, to September 27, 1995. Are you going to tell me why you picked out those names?”
The news was so chilling that for a moment I assumed that the ferry was unheated.
Colin’s best friend. Colin’s best friend stole his little girl.
S
T.
B
RENN
AN’S
C
OLLEGE
was outside the city in Chestnut Hill and, thanks to Siri, I found the campus with no trouble. I had driven like the wind. I parked in the Beacon Street Garage and ran past the stadium. There was more snow on the ground here than at home though the walkways were clear. Even the majestic bronze eagle I passed looked cold. The students going in and out of the tan brick buildings were dressed for the weather.
Somehow I convinced the young woman in the records office that I was Elisa’s West Coast aunt, passing through Boston with a few hours’ layover. I saw her look at the ID photo in the folder and then at me. There must have been enough of a family resemblance to convince her to photocopy a class schedule for Elisa Crosley and explain that she was living in a residence hall half a mile from campus. I wrote down the directions.
Elisa was in an advanced literature seminar until noon. The fact that she was majoring in English was reassuring.
This was my girl.
If the paper in my hand had declared her major to be applied mathematics, I would have accepted it but had a moment of doubt.
This was her last class of the day. Would she go back to her room now or to the library to study? I had no idea, but decided to station myself in front of her classroom and hope that she did not slip out a back exit.
Even so, there were complications. Her seminar met in a tan stone building with a beautiful steeple—and a door at each end. For a while, I stood on the paving between doors, unable to get a close enough look at either. As I stood there, the open-work iron clock moving slowly toward noon, the sun passed behind the clouds, making the day even colder and bleaker. I wished I had Jane there to guard one of the exits. She would have also helped to calm the anxiety bubbling through me and threatening to run over.
Caitlin. My daughter.
After nineteen years I was going to see my precious girl again.
Or not.
I did not know if she was even attending class today, although it was still the beginning of the semester. Reluctantly I moved to the door on my right where I had a clear view of whoever came out. There was an equal chance that I would miss her, but I couldn’t think what else to do. If I didn’t see her I would drive straight to her residence and wait for her to come home.
A little before twelve, students in sweatpants and ski jackets began pushing through the doors in search of lunch. They moved into the gusty wind, a wind that brought more doubts. Even if I had picked the right door, would I be able to recognize Caitlin? Suppose her hair and face were shielded by a parka hood? Would she have gained weight the way Hannah had? Would someone see me taking photos with my iPhone and have me arrested?
I reminded myself that these students were already considered adults. They could vote, drive cars, and kill people in foreign countries. I was no predator lurking outside a playground at dismissal time, but I shivered inside my jacket anyway.
And then I thought I saw her. She was wearing a navy parka with a white insignia on one pocket. Her hair was the dark golden blond of Hannah’s, but her head was turned away from me, and she was laughing up at two young men. I took the photo anyway. I was about to click the button a second time when she turned and looked directly into my face. Quizzical, as if someone had asked her to do something she wasn’t sure about, such as, “Why don’t you give your sister a turn?” A look of hers I would know anywhere.
I smiled and quickly refocused the camera phone on the statue of a holy man, hand outstretched, declaiming a theological point. I was just an innocent tourist, just the parent of a prospective student documenting the scene.
She moved past me.
I lowered the iPhone, the hand that was holding it trembling. I made myself stand like the statues in the quad around me, though every cell was screaming at me to run after her, to grab her and hold her forever. Surely, from some deep place within, she would know who I was.
I let her go.
Although it was lunchtime, my stomach was clenching and unclenching too painfully to consider food. Yet what if she’d gone into Magdalene Hall where I had seen a cafeteria? I circled around, searching for a girl in a navy parka and bought a tuna salad wrap and bottled water that I might need later. No Caitlin. I ran all the way to my van, then pushed inside and turned on the heater to get warm. I couldn’t keep from looking at the photos any longer. The first was a blur that could have been any blond college student. The second picture, Caitlin gazing startled into the camera, was perfect. She and Hannah didn’t look exactly alike, I realized. Caitlin’s face was narrower and she had the white scar on her chin like a comma.
The scar didn’t surprise me. Even at two she had been a daredevil, anxious to try everything new. She had been widely admired among other parents for her outgoing charm. Had that been her downfall, the tipping point that made the Crosleys decide they
had
to have her?
Now I had to get to Caitlin’s residence before she did. Wishing that I were driving an anonymous dark sedan instead of a dented white van with “Got Books?” on the side, I gave Siri the address and listened to her guide me to Gin Factory Street. I turned onto it and found a parking space four cars back on the same side.
I just have to see her one more time.
I had promised Colin I would not spring anything on Caitlin and I wouldn’t, but things felt too unfinished now to drive home. I couldn’t turn my back on Caitlin, not after all these years. But as soon as I saw her again, I would leave.
Meanwhile there were things I had to do. From the iPhone I sent the better photo to Colin, to Jane, to Hannah, and as an e-mail to Bruce, with a simple caption: “I Found Her.” Then, exhausted, I leaned back into the driver’s seat, unwrapped the sandwich, and unscrewed the water. My stomach felt hollowed out, still unsettled from the ferry crossing. I took a bite anyway, and my phone beeped, indicating a text. And then a second. And a third.
Jane: OMG she looks just like I imagined! I cant believe it. What did she say?
Colin: Delhi, where R you?
Bruce: She looks like you. And Colin. Well done!
Hannah was probably in a class or lab.
I made myself eat more before I answered any of them. Then I sent the same message to everyone: “She’s at St. Brennan’s College, I found out this morning and took the ferry as soon as I knew. I wasn’t going to lose her again, but I won’t approach her now.”
I just need one more look.