False Mermaid

Nora ached to let it all go—to tell her mother about Cormac, about Frank Cordova and the postmortem this morning, about Natalie Russo and the riverbank and the image of Tríona she had seen in that Lowertown window. How wrenching it had been to see Elizabeth so grown up today, and how fearful, witnessing that less-than-benign fatherly hand upon her. There are things you don’t know, Nora. She could not speak about any of that. Instead, she reached for the hand that rested on the faded chambray, feeling the bones beneath her mother’s beautifully translucent skin. “Was that what you wanted to tell me, Mam?”

Eleanor shook her head. “I wanted to say that I know why you’ve come home—”

Nora closed her eyes. Here it comes, she thought, the whole list of reasons why she ought not to be dredging everything up all over again. She could almost hear her father’s voice, trying to talk sense into her. Her mother continued: “What I mean to say, Nora, is that I understand why you’ve come back. And I want to help you—I need to help, whatever way I can. I can’t carry on anymore as I have been, doing nothing, feeling nothing. There’s only one thing I can do, and must do—and that is to find out what happened to my child—to both of my beautiful children.”

“Oh, Mam—”

“Wait, let me finish. I have to know if there’s anything you haven’t told me. Anything you know about what happened, that you couldn’t share with your father and me, anything you felt you had to spare us. You’ve got to tell me now—please.”

There were so many things she had tried to spare them. Nora took a deep breath, and dived in: “Frank Cordova brought me along to an autopsy this morning. A young woman found three days ago at the river. Her name was Natalie Russo. Does that name mean anything to you?” Eleanor shook her head, and Nora continued. “She disappeared six weeks before Tríona died, and was buried all this time in a seepage swamp at Hidden Falls—” The rising dread in her mother’s eyes made Nora feel dizzy.

“What’s she got to do with Tríona? Tell me.”

“Their injuries were identical. Her face was destroyed, just like Tríona’s.”

“What are you saying? You think Peter murdered her as well?”

As well. Proof that the last doubts about Peter Hallett’s guilt had finally given way.

16

By the time the clock downstairs struck ten, Nora had told her mother everything. Every sordid detail. It came in a flood, all the knowledge she had held back so long. When she finished, her mother looked hollowed out.

“I knew there was much more than you were willing to tell,” Eleanor said at last. “Oh Nora, how can you ever forgive us?”

“I don’t blame you for not wanting to see what was happening, not wanting to believe. It’s all too horrible.”

“But you saw it, Nora. You believed. I just can’t understand—if Tríona was in such desperate trouble, why didn’t she come to us? Why wouldn’t she let us help her?”

“Maybe fear of what Peter would do. And shame. From what she said on the phone, I think she was afraid that she’d somehow let us all down—you and Daddy, me, Elizabeth—all of us. God knows what he put into her mind.”

“It doesn’t seem possible, Nora. That we could have been so utterly deceived—”

“He knows exactly what he’s doing, Mam. I’m convinced of it. That’s what makes him so dangerous.”

“But she loved him. I know she did. What is wrong with him, Nora? What’s missing in that man to make him turn against her?”

“I don’t know, Mam. How can we ever know? It’s the one riddle we’re probably never going to crack.”

After considering this fact for a moment, Eleanor took a deep breath and set her shoulders, as if trying to shake off despair. “So what can we do, right now? Tell me, I’ll do it.”

“I’ve been thinking—our first priority is keeping Elizabeth safe. In order to do that, we’ve got to get her away from Peter.”

“But she’s staying with us, Nora. While Peter and Miranda are in Ireland. It’s all worked out. We’re supposed to collect her tomorrow evening.”

“And are you prepared to take her away, Mam? Someplace far away, where he won’t find her, where he won’t even think to look? You have to be ready to do it right away, tomorrow. Can you do that?”

Eleanor put a hand on Tríona’s faded chambray shirt. “I’ve been making inquiries. Anticipating, I suppose. There’s an amazing network if you know the right people to ask.”

“It could mean living on the run, for weeks or even months, hiding from the police. Are you sure you’re prepared for all that, Mam?”

“I know you may not believe me, but it’s all I’ve been thinking about for the past five years. If it comes down to a choice between losing all this and protecting Elizabeth, which do you think I’d choose?”