The Secrets She Keeps, page 35
“How?”
“By winning her trust,” says Cyrus. “It may help if you refer to the baby as Rory rather than Ben, because that’s who he is to Agatha. She has looked after him ever since he was born. Giving him up will be hard.”
“Do I ask her about the gun?”
“No.”
“What if she doesn’t want to give him up?”
“Encourage her, gently. Ask about the baby—how is he sleeping and feeding? Tell her she’s done a great job.”
I nod.
“The police will have marksmen training their weapons on Agatha. If they get a clear shot and they see her become agitated, they may decide to take her down. You cannot interfere with this.”
“I don’t want anyone getting shot.”
“Which is why you have to keep her calm.”
“What if she won’t give him to the policewoman? What if it has to be me?”
“DCS MacAteer will have to make that call. At some point, Ben has to be handed over. That’s the most crucial moment. Either Agatha’s resolve will crumble or she’ll fight back.”
“Will she hurt him?” asks Jack.
Cyrus shakes his head. “But she will die for him.”
* * *
The police car pulls up on Lambeth Road. A constable opens the door for me and holds an umbrella over my head. A police helicopter is hovering above us, visible between the bare branches of the trees. I hear a megaphone telling people that the museum is closed and to move away from the area.
We are taken along a path and up a short set of stairs, between two enormous guns that are pointing north towards the Thames. DCS MacAteer is waiting in the marbled foyer. I look past him into a vast room where old-fashioned warplanes are suspended from the ceiling as though frozen in midflight. I recognize the V-1 and V-2 rockets, as well as a Spitfire, which swoops overhead as though ready to strafe unwanted visitors. The interconnecting halls rise a hundred feet to a domed ceiling that is flanked by staircases that turn back and forth up to the higher levels.
I am taken into an anteroom and then an administration office, which has become the control room. Cyrus is talking to a woman with hair similar to mine who has been dressed in a skirt, blouse, and overcoat. She is about my size with the same complexion, but nobody would ever mistake us.
“She’s not going to fool anyone,” I tell MacAteer when he breaks from a huddle of plainclothes detectives.
“The officer is a trained negotiator.”
“What if you make her angry?”
“I know what I’m doing.”
MacAteer reaches into a box and produces a bulletproof vest.
“Is that necessary?”
“Everyone has to wear one.”
The vest is lighter than I expect. I pull it over my blouse and he clips the straps, pulling them tight.
“Can you breathe?”
I nod. “Won’t Agatha see all the police cars and the helicopter?”
“I can’t risk putting people in danger.”
“What if she runs?”
“We’re sealing off the area.”
A man approaches. Dressed in black overalls, he’s so laden with body armor that I doubt he can swing his arms. Through an open doorway, I notice at least eight more men in identical clothes. They are moving out, some taking the stairs, which zigzag back and forth as they climb to the higher levels of the museum. Others take up positions behind pillars or against walls.
The SWAT leader briefs MacAteer.
“I have one team covering the main doors from the cloakroom. Another is covering the foyer and main hall.”
“What about outside?”
“We have firearms officers on the roof and others deployed in the grounds, dressed as gardeners and council workers. Their default aiming position is the upper torso—center of mass—but we can go for a head shot if she’s carrying the baby across her chest.”
Without thinking, I cry, “Please don’t shoot anyone!”
The men turn. “Go back to your husband, Mrs. Shaughnessy,” says MacAteer.
“Let me talk to her,” I plead. “Nobody has to get hurt.”
“We have this under control.”
Lisa-Jayne is told to escort me back to the anteroom office, where I argue with Jack. He doesn’t seem to care what happens to Agatha.
Before any of this happened, before Ben was taken and the harsh media spotlight lit up our small corner of the world, my life had been comfortable and untroubled; a well-worn middle-class progression that felt like a dream run but could have been a rut. How dare I complain. I was born in the right time and right place to the right family. I met a man and we built a life together. Yet sometimes even the most charmed existence can change in the blink of an eye, or turn on the length of an eyelash. One moment of indecision. A cancer cell. A rogue gene. A wrong turn. A red light. A drunk driver. A cruel piece of misfortune.
Each time I close my eyes, I picture Agatha walking towards the museum, aware that she’s being watched. She is carrying my baby in a sling across her chest. The foyer is empty. She sees a woman who looks a little like me from a distance but soon becomes someone else. They argue. My surrogate tells Agatha to calm down. Agatha calls my name. She wraps her arms tightly around Ben. A red dot appears on her cheek and moves up her nose and onto her forehead.
In a fleeting puff of blood and vapor she spins and falls, carried down by gravity, striking her head on the marble floor. I see the blood covering Ben’s face. I don’t hear him crying.
My eyes open. The clock doesn’t seem to have moved. I am sweating beneath the bulletproof vest. Lisa-Jayne brings me a glass of water, but I cannot swallow.
Minutes pass slowly: 11:04 . . . 11:05 . . . 11:06. Where is she? There have been no sightings of Agatha from the officers outside.
MacAteer has spoken twice to the police commissioner, who wants to know how long the operation is going to last. He takes another call. I only hear one side of the conversation, which involves a lot of cursing and threats.
“What’s happened?” asks Jack when the call ends.
“Hayden Cole jumped out of the police car on Fulham Palace Road forty-five minutes ago.”
AGATHA
* * *
The carriage is full of men in suits and women in dark overcoats and winter boots. Day shifts and night shifts are blended together. Fresh faces and tired faces. The showered and the soiled. A boy opposite me is wearing an England shirt and paint-speckled jeans. He slouches lower with man-spread knees, his head rocking from side to side as he gently snores.
I look out the window, aware of how drab the world has become, how gray and turgid and run-of-the-mill. It carries on blithely ignoring my plight because I have no weight or consequence. How do people do it—keep going—why do they make the effort?
I hold Rory on my lap, letting him sleep in the crook of my left arm. My right hand is in the pocket of my coat, where I’ve put the gun. I’m sweating in the overheated carriage but I will not take off my coat because I do not trust the police to do as I’ve asked.
The creature is awake.
Foolish girl, foolish girl, foolish girl.
I’m doing the right thing.
By giving up.
I’m not his mother.
You’re the only mother he’s ever known.
He’s not mine.
He could be. Turn around. Run.
Where?
Most of the commuters get off at Canary Wharf and Heron Quays. Only the tourists and sightseers remain by the time we cross under the Thames. The train slows again. Stops. I loop the colorful cotton sling around my neck and hold Rory close to my chest as I step onto a crowded platform and ride the long escalator up into the daylight.
Rain is falling. I don’t have an umbrella. Tilting my face, I feel a thousand tiny spines of raindrops melting on my cheeks, clinging to my hair and eyelashes. I wrap one side of my overcoat around Rory and keep moving, weaving between shoulders, head down, hood up.
As I walk along the avenue of trees, I notice how the branches almost meet in the middle of the road. Across the gravel forecourt, I glimpse the Maritime Museum through the railing fence. The cream-and-pink stucco façade has been darkened by the day, looking gloomy rather than grand. Just visible through the colonnades, the Royal Observatory is etched sharply against the gray. Hayden once took a photograph of me straddling the Prime Meridian line, the meeting point of east and west. He told me I was standing at the center of time.
Where are the police, I wonder. I expected them to be waiting. Maybe they’re hiding. I imagine SWAT teams behind the darkened windows and sharpshooters on the rooftops.
Shortly after eleven I walk through the main doors, past the information desk and the cloakroom. There are parties of schoolchildren queuing up, dressed in blazers and boater hats and brightly polished shoes. Heads must be counted. Names must be crossed off. The officious-looking head teacher is a sour-faced woman in a black flared skirt and thick stockings. She treats them like prisoners instead of students.
I stop and look around me. Nobody seems to be watching me. I glance at Rory, who is sucking his thumb.
“Why am I giving you back?” I whisper. “They’re not even here.”
Exhausted, I take a seat on one of the island benches and turn on my phone, calling Meghan’s number.
She answers nervously.
“Where are you?” I ask.
“Waiting.”
“So am I.”
There is a pause. She asks me to hold on. I can hear her walking and opening a door. Closing it. Whispering.
“Are you at the Imperial War Museum?”
“No. I’m in Greenwich . . . at the National Maritime Museum.”
Meghan is flustered now. “We thought . . . you were supposed . . . we’ve been waiting . . .”
Why would Hayden send them to the wrong place?
“I’ve been here all along,” I tell her.
“Please, please, I’m coming,” she says. “Don’t go anywhere. Where will you be?”
“There’s a painting I love. It’s in the Special Exhibitions Gallery.”
At that moment I hear a voice behind me and I end the call.
“Hello, Aggy.”
I turn slowly, reaching into my pocket for the gun.
“What are you doing here?”
Nerves are sparking in Hayden’s eyes. He’s dressed in jeans, a leather jacket, and a baseball cap with the price tag still attached. Unshaven and red-eyed, he looks as though he hasn’t slept. Glancing down, he sees the top of Rory’s head, just visible behind the folds of my coat.
“How is he?”
“Getting better.”
“That’s good.”
“Why are you here?”
“Can we go for a walk?” he asks.
“Why? I don’t understand.”
“Please, Aggy, I’ll explain outside. You go first.”
Doing as he asks, I retrace my steps up the stairs and out the main doors, and turn left along the asphalt path. Glancing over my shoulder, I see him walking twenty yards behind me, his hands deep in his pockets and collar turned up.
I wait for him under a canopy of bare branches. Hayden steps closer and cups my head in his hands. I flinch, thinking he might be angry, but he leans closer and kisses me gently, holding his lips on mine until I breathe in his sigh. His arms slip around me and I press my head against his chest.
“What are you doing here?”
“I came to help.”
Stepping back, he unbuttons my coat, reaching inside until he brushes his thumb over Rory’s cheek. His fingers are cold. Rory’s eyes open momentarily and close again.
“I’m going to miss him,” says Hayden, his voice thick with emotion.
“Are the police going to charge you?”
He shrugs.
“I’ll tell them it wasn’t your fault.”
“It doesn’t matter.”
“Please tell your parents that I’m sorry.”
“You gave them a grandchild. You gave me a son.”
“And now I’m giving him back.”
“That’s why I’m here.”
“I don’t understand.”
He looks nervously over his shoulder, studying the entrance to the park and the surrounding streets. “We don’t have much time. I sent the police to the wrong museum, but it won’t take them long to realize.”
He slides his hands behind my neck and loosens the knot on the sling.
“What are you doing?”
“I’m taking Rory.”
“Why would you do that?”
“So you can run.”
“Run where?”
“You can get away.” He pulls a bundle of cash out of his pocket. “This is five thousand pounds. It’s all I have.” He holds out the money, wanting me to take it.
“I can’t run. My face will be on every TV screen and newspaper. They’ll be watching the ports and airports.”
“I have a navy mate who’s on the same ship as me but won’t be home until mid-January. I have the keys to his flat in Portsmouth. You can hide there for a few weeks. I can bring you food.”
“A few weeks isn’t long enough.”
“It’ll give us time to think of another plan.”
“They’ll find me eventually.”
Hayden’s face twists. “I’m trying to help you, Aggy. I know what you did was wrong—but you’re giving Rory back. He’s fine. You don’t deserve to be punished for this.”
“But I do.”
“No, no. You were hurting. Lonely. The police told me about your teenage pregnancy and the adoption. That wasn’t your fault.”
“I’ve done other things.”
Hayden raises his face to the rain and groans, as though wanting to scream in frustration.
“I took another woman’s baby,” I whisper. “You weren’t to blame. I tricked you. I’m sorry. Now I’m giving him back.”
“OK, but let me do it for you,” he says, pleading with me.
“This is not your mistake.”
“I love you, Aggy. I didn’t want to fall in love, but I couldn’t help myself. I know you think it was just because of Rory and becoming a father, but that’s only part of it. I fell in love with you.”
I try to say something, but he doesn’t give me the chance.
“Why do you think I kept quiet about your mother not being at the birth when the police asked? When I couldn’t contact the midwife, I knew what you’d done. I knew that Rory wasn’t ours, but I didn’t want to give him up. I wish you’d told me earlier, but then he got sick and we didn’t have a choice. When you ran off from the surgery, I tried to stop Dr. Schur calling the police. I vouched for you. I said that I’d seen you breast-feeding . . . and that we had a proper birth certificate. I lied for you. I lied for us. But I couldn’t stop him.”
His voice cracks. “They’re going to send you to prison, Aggy. You don’t deserve that. Take the money. Run. Go to my mate’s place. In a few weeks, I’ll find somewhere else for you to go.”
“I can’t run,” I whisper.
“Of course you can. People run all the time. They disappear. I can keep you hidden. We’re going to lose your little boy, Aggy, but we don’t have to lose each other.”
Hayden pauses, searching for the right words. Reaching for them. Coming up empty. He tries again. “This doesn’t have to be the end. We’ll give the baby back. You can plead guilty; tell the jury you were obsessed, mad with desire for a baby. The judge will show mercy. At most you’ll serve two, maybe three years, and then you’ll be free. We’re still young. We can get married and have our own baby.”
I reach out and brush his unshaven cheek, calling him a silly boy. “I can’t have children.”
“Right. OK. But we could adopt a baby. I don’t mind. Rory isn’t mine, but I still love him.”
“Nobody will ever let me adopt a baby—not after what I’ve done.”
Hayden rocks from side to side, pulling at his ears, desperately searching for answers. I’m the cause of his pain.
“Go home, my love. They’ll be here soon.”
“But nobody knows where you are.”
“I told them.”
“What?”
“I called Meg. I told her they were at the wrong place.”
Hayden looks over his shoulder again, with more urgency now.
“Quick! Give me Rory. We can still do this.”
“No.”
Ignoring me, he takes his right arm from the sleeve of his jacket and holds Rory against his chest before refastening the buttons, concealing the baby completely.
“They’ll think you were involved,” I say, trying to stop him. “The police will lay charges. You’ll lose your commission. Your career . . . I’ve hurt you enough already.”
“I don’t care. I’m leaving the navy. None of it matters.”
“Yes, it does.”
Hayden’s eyes are swimming. “Please, Aggy, why won’t you run?”
“This is my mistake, not yours. I won’t let you risk everything for me.”
He isn’t listening. He doesn’t understand what I’ve done—what happened to the other babies, or what I did to Nicky. The lives I’ve ruined. I grab his arm, clasping the empty leather sleeve of his jacket. He flicks me away. I reach out again, calling Rory’s name.
“Give him back!” I yell.
“Let me help you.”
“Nobody can help me.”
The creature uncoils.
Stupid, stupid, stupid girl! He’s stealing him.
He’d never do that.
He wants Rory for himself.
He loves me.
He’s lying.
My fingers have found the pistol. I pull it free. My vision is fractured by tears and I can barely recognize my own voice, which rises from the depths of my chest, shaking with disappointment or grief.
“GIVE HIM BACK TO ME!”
Hayden hesitates, staring at the gun. “Don’t do this, Aggy.”
Shoot him!
He loves me.
Nobody could ever love you.
You’re wrong.
Hayden hands Rory over without saying another word. He turns and walks away, wiping something from his eyes.
