Paper Dolls (16 page)

I stepped beside her, trying to assemble words in my mind, words to say to her.

“Meet you at the church.” She whispered the words without looking up and stepped away quickly.

I lost her in the crowd. Mom had my arm, guiding me. We moved with the tide of people until we were outside in the street. Cameras and microphones were thrust in my face. People shouted words and questions, but I couldn’t focus on any of them.

“No comment.” My mother waved them away.

Aisha’s parents had their arms around her, steering her towards us.

“We need to get the girls away from these reporters,” cried Mrs. Dumaj. “Don’t they have any sense of decency?”

“Mom,” I said quietly, “Molly is here. She wants to meet up. Can we go?”

Aisha’s eyes widened. “You saw Molly?”

I nodded. “Yeah.”

“I want to see her.”

“I know.” I smiled at Aisha as my eyes misted. “She said she’ll be at the church.”

Mrs. Dumaj frowned. “There’s two churches close by. Which one? We’ll come too.”

Detective Kalassi made his way over to us. “Molly wanted to speak with the girls alone, and I’m allowing her that,” he said to the Dumajs and mom. “That’s if it’s okay with you. They’ll be safe—I have plainclothes police watching her every move, and also that of Aisha and Cassie.”

Aisha’s mother gave a brittle nod, a tear squeezing from her eye. “Okay girls. We’ll go grab a coffee at the café across the road.” She indicated towards mom and Aisha’s dad. “But girls, you must not be long.”

Aisha and I hurried away from the throng of people—but not before we heard the prosecution, Mr. Lydon, announce to the media that Ethan had confessed to being Henry’s accomplice. I knew the press would be whipped into a frenzy over that, rushing away to do the news stories and articles.

Aisha and I slipped away unnoticed to the end of the street and around the corner. An old church with a soaring spire stood in the square. Signs around the church forbid anyone to enter as it was having renovations.

“Can’t be this one,” said Aisha. “I know of a big church a little further down.”

We wound our way through the thick workday streams of people. The ceaseless sounds of traffic filled the air. Cars and vans surged in all directions, skyscrapers bore down on us. Aisha led me across a park lined with old, gnarled fig trees. The church sat directly opposite—gothic and imposing, the morning sun only accentuating the deep crevices in the sandstone façade. The sign said,
St Mary’s Cathedral
.

Inside the church the air was cooler, scented with fresh flowers and furniture polish. The figure in the green scarf sat patiently on a pew. We’d rushed all the way here, but now we stepped hesitantly towards Molly—as though it couldn’t really be her sitting there and we’d see someone else when we’d reached her.

She turned, her cheeks pink beneath fiery tendrils of red hair, her eyes a soft green. Her skin was still pale but a translucent pale—nothing like the chalky white it had been in the underground.

“You found a way out, Calliope,” she smiled. “How can I thank you?”

“You kept me sane every day I was there,” I replied. “I can never thank you enough for that.”

She gazed at Aisha. “And Angeline… I can’t believe the three of us are here.”

She rose and we hugged, our heads bent towards each other’s. I breathed deeply, perhaps for the first time that day.

Molly tucked in a stray lock of red hair from her scarf. “I thought a church might the safest place to meet. I knew no reporter would dare follow you in here. My mother loved this church—she brought me here quite a few times when I was little. Detective Kalassi told me he explained things a little. I’m so sorry that you weren’t told… about me.”

“I couldn’t believe it,” said Aisha. “Just couldn’t believe it…. ” She cried openly.

“I was in a coma for months.” Molly shook her head softly. “But I’m here. I made it.”

“You have to stay safe now, Molly,” I told her. “Detective Kalassi said you were in danger—something from your past.”

“Yes, I have to remain hidden.” Molly exhaled softly. “I have to stay dead, basically. It was a risk coming here today. But I wanted to—I know this is extra-rough on you both, seeing as your friend is on trial.”

“I am not his friend, not now,” said Aisha. “I don’t know how I ever gave myself to him. And poor Cassie had to witness his betrayal. Maybe it would have been better if he’d died in the underground.”

“Don’t say that,” said Molly quickly.

I nodded at Molly grimly. None of us deserved the fate of dying in that place. “Molly, what’s happening? Why do you need to stay hidden?”

Her blonde eyelashes drifted down. “I’ll tell you. I’ll tell you the story of my life when I was a kid…” Her chest lifted in a silent sigh. “When I was seven, my mother suicided. I still remember her—she had red hair like me. She tried to be happy and give me a happy childhood, but when she was sad she’d cry for days. I was sent to live with my uncle Devlin and his girlfriend after she died. There was no one else. My uncle had been involved in a string of petty crimes but nothing major. They weren’t nice people. They were cold to me most of the time, and when they’d been drinking—which was most of the time—they’d hit me… lock me up in a wardrobe… or make me drink too and think it hilarious a little kid was drunk.”

She gazed into the multi-colored light streaming from the stained-glass windows. “One night, around four in the morning, I couldn’t sleep. At the time I had a stray cat hidden away in the garage—a cat that had just had kittens. They were the only good things in my life. I went out to check on her and the kittens. My uncle drove in with some strange man, and pulled guns and bags of money from the van. He saw me, and I ran. I hid in neighbors’ lawns, watching the headlights of his car as he searched the streets for me. I was too terrified to go back to the house. I made it to the police station hours later."

She stopped and sighed—the sigh of a person relating a painful memory. “For a while there, I thought the police were going to send me back to Uncle Devlin. I didn’t come across like a sweet, innocent kid. I was almost thirteen, and I talked rough, because that’s all I’d known for years. And I dressed like a little punk street kid. They thought I must have heard the news report about two security guards being shot dead the night before and that I’d decided to make up a story about my uncle. But Detective Kalassi took over… and he believed me. He put me into a witness protection program and I was placed with a foster family. Stupidly, I ran away. I couldn’t relate to my new family. I think I was just too damaged at the time. I kept running, all the way to the mountains. And you know the rest….”

“Did your uncle Devlin go to jail? Is he in jail now?” Aisha’s hand reached over her mouth.

Molly gave a taut, wry smile. “The police didn’t find the cash or guns when they went to his house. And without my testimony, they couldn’t arrest him. If he finds out I’m alive, he might kill me.”

My throat tightened. “No… we can’t get you back just to lose you again…”

A light flickered in the air before us. I stared up into the tall arched windows. Lights of all colors flooded through softly, but nothing like the light in front of my eyes. Molly cupped the light with her hands. It shone in the space between her fingers, then moved away towards the vaulted walls.

“I think it wants us to follow….” Molly hung back, uncertain. “What am I saying?”

The light disappeared next to a set of iron gates and was extinguished under the bright lamps there.

“I don’t like this.” Aisha looked at us with huge aqua eyes.

A man stepped up behind us. “Are you girls interested in seeing what’s beyond the gates?” He was dressed in a somber grey suit. “I’m from visitor information. Ask me anything you would like to know about the church.” His voice was cultured, refined.

Molly pointed to the black gates. “Where does that go?”

The man handed her a brochure. “To the crypt. It’s very worth seeing. Building began early last century, drawing on inspiration from the Cathedral of Sienna from the 1300s and the Book of Kells from around 800 AD. It’s five dollars per person to see.”

Molly drew a purse from her handbag and paid for three admissions. The man unlocked the gates.

“I don’t think this is a good idea.” I shook my head.

“Don’t let the thought of a crypt put you off.” The man smiled. “It’s very beautiful and not to be missed.”

Molly hesitated. “Would you come with us?”

“I am sorry, I need to return the information booth. But I assure you it is quite safe.” He nodded a curt goodbye and walked off towards the front of the church.

Molly took a long breath. “I need to see what this is. I sense… something. Perhaps when you’ve been around a ghost as long as I have, you know when there is a presence.”

“Jessamine?” Aisha asked bitterly.

“I don’t think so. Not her.” Molly took faltering steps to the open gates.

Aisha and I exchanged anxious glances.

“Molly, let’s just go.” I gazed around at the empty church interior. I knew there were police somewhere outside keeping watch, but they wouldn’t be expecting us to head down into a crypt.

Molly stopped, her back straightening. “In the underground, I was sure I’d die not knowing why any of us been taken there, never understanding how the serpent could even exist. And all I know now is that the questions are like knives in my back—knives that twist every night. I know… I know it isn’t over. I can’t just pretend none of it happened. I understand you girls staying up here, but I’m going….” She disappeared down the curved stairs.

I shot Aisha a grim look. We either had to follow Molly or let her go down there alone. Together, Aisha and I stepped after Molly. The air cooled as I traced my hand down the heavy wooden bannister.

The gate swung shut behind us. Aisha sprang back up the stair to push at it. She rattled the gate but it didn’t budge. She turned around to me with terrified eyes.

“Let’s get Molly.” My throat was dry and my words barely audible.

We ran down the rest of the way to the wide, ornate crypt that spread out in all directions. A mosaic floor held intricate inlaid Celtic patterns.

Molly stood tracing her fingers along one of the myriad sandstone columns. “It’s beautiful down here. My mother would have loved to see this.”

“Anywhere we’re trapped is not beautiful,” said Aisha bluntly. “The gate locked behind us. We have to get out of here now.”

My heart began racing at the sight of all the dark spaces—spaces where we could disappear into and never see the light of day again.”

A sound echoed and bounced from the walls and columns. A sound I’d heard over and over. The sound of children singing a nursery song. And then I knew who had brought us down here.

“Prudence,” I whispered.

Molly clutched my hands. “Do you see her?”

“I sense her,” I said.

“This is freaking me.” Aisha’s breaths came fast and shallow.

Molly took the map from her pocket and unfolded it. “What does she want us to see down here? So, the graves of the archbishops are over there. And the graves of the first priests of the church are over here. I don’t know what we’re meant to do.”

I wandered over to the tombs. Between the tombs, seven medallions were inlaid—each displaying a Christian virtue. There was a medallion of Prudence depicting a woman holding an instrument of measure.

Molly looked over my shoulder. “I think… maybe… she wanted us just to think of her.”

We moved into a circle, closing our hands around each other’s. I could only imagine Prudence the ghost. I hadn’t known the real-life Prudence as Molly had. And Aisha had only seen her drawings and poetry.

In a dark recess between a column and the wall, the flickering light returned. The light expanded vertically, until a girl stood in its place—a girl in a yellow, blood-stained dress.

Aisha gasped.

Prudence raised her arm—her fingers tracing a line in the air. A thin smear of light remained. She was drawing something. She traced another straight line beside the first, then wavy lines radiating out from a center point. A tree. She drew in roots below the tree that were a mirror image of the tree above.

The mirrored tree hung before us while Prudence grew filmy, translucent.

“No!” I held out a hand toward her.

Prudence gently raised her hand and stretched it out towards me. But her expression saddened. The space that had been Prudence became empty air.

“She doesn’t have the strength to stay with us.” A single tear streaked down Molly’s face.

Detective Kalassi and his wife Nina poured mom and Aisha’s parents glasses of wine. Far below the hotel balcony, the lights of Sydney streaked red, blue and yellow across the dark harbor.

“No one was expecting that from Ethan—least of all me.” Martin Kalassi shook his head.

“That boy—he always seemed to have hidden depths,” said Mr. Dumaj. “And now he’s admitted to his crimes—he can be put away.”

“There will be another trial, Mr. Dumaj,” said the detective. “The court won’t automatically accept Ethan’s guilty plea. And Henry Fiveash is still at large. We need to find where he is and bring him in.”

“You’ve been working seven days a week on this.” Nina shot her husband a sympathetic gaze. “No wonder you look burnt out, my poor love.”

Molly brought her knees up to her chin and stared at the harbor, seemingly transfixed by the steady stream of ferries and boats. “You two can’t keep me forever. I know that. Martin, you need to find Henry. And Nina, you need to return to work.”

“Honey, we’ll do whatever it takes to keep you safe.” Nina touched Molly’s knee. “You don’t know what it means to Martin and me to have you here, alive and well. He drove himself crazy— following every possible lead after you disappeared in the forest. He cursed himself every day that he couldn’t find you. We thought your uncle Devlin must have followed you and hurt you, or even killed you. Martin felt responsible—being the one who had placed you with the foster family.”

Molly squeezed her eyes shut for a moment. “I was pretty messed up.” She gave a short, humorless laugh. “And now look at me. I’m a dollhouse abductee. From the frying pan into the fire, that’s where I went. I’m a walking disaster zone.”