Perfect Victim (8 page)

Her favourite junior and teen novels by Margaret Clark remained on her bookshelf. I pulled
Diary of a Street Kid
off in case the police got the wrong idea. And I hid the unfinished manuscript I’d encouraged her to write.

‘It’ll have swear words in it, Mum … I’ll write it like a Margaret Clark.’

‘Go for it,’ I’d said, thinking, anything to make her brain do a daily workout.

She stripped the room bare. Packed childhood belongings into boxes and stored them in the cupboard under the stairs. Manni ripped up the carpet, under her instructions. She gave Wally, her baby-blue soft toy whale, to Manni. Special Teddy, Nutmeg, and Yellow Teddy remained on her bookcase, with a sequined clown, make-up, dance shoes and Manni mementos. Wooden-sculptured flying machines stayed suspended from the ceiling.

Rachel had lifted her op shop mirror, a metre in diameter, off the wall and onto the floor beside her mattress, so that she could study her feet while dancing. The
Revoke
, a print of naughty fairies and koala bears; the glass-framed Giselle which Rachel had painted out with bright pink lipstick during her ‘I hate ballet’ stage; the photograph Nanny Joy took of us all at a dance concert in September 1998; and the ‘Rachel loves Manni’ collage – these remained on her walls.

She asked me if I’d take her to Ikea, whose furniture offered the young adult look she was after. During Rachel’s disappearance my mother lay staring at Rachel’s night sky, the luminous stars decorating her ceiling, wondering where our Rachel Star was.

On the Thursday night at the dance school we found an old pair of pants in the lost property box, the same design as Rachel’s new pants. Vicki suggested we take these to the police so they could see what she was last seen wearing. We thought we’d go to the Malvern shop, a few doors from my work, Books In Print, where I had bought the little blue top she was wearing.

On our way to the dress shop we put up more posters. Mike had it in mind to place a poster at the dance school Rachel had attended for six years but I was apprehensive about this. Rachel would cringe if we hung a poster there. There had been a time when Rachel had admired and felt close to her teacher at that school, but Rachel had left with unhappy memories.

Rachel received counselling after she left that dance school and when she joined her new school, its artistic director Dulcie was probably the one whose advice helped her the most to move forward. She told Rachel that regardless of how she felt about her teacher now, she was an excellent teacher. If it hadn’t been for her, Rachel probably would not have been so technically good – so graceful a dancer. Rachel had a lot to thank her for.

It was necessary, said Dulcie, for Rachel to resume classical training, even though the dance school’s emphasis was predominantly training for stage musicals. Classical classes were the basis for all professional dancing. In the fourteen months that Rachel attended her new dance school, she regained her self confidence and was beginning to acknowledge her love of classical dance as well.

On the way to Malvern, Mike noticed a young girl standing at a bus stop. She stepped aboard a bus and the bus drove away.

‘Did you see that girl?’ said Mike urgently.

The girl was wearing black dance pants, a blue top and carried what appeared to be the same dance bag Rachel had. She wore her hair like Rachel’s and was about the same height.

‘Follow the bus,’ said Mike.

Silly, really. We followed this bus from the corner of Malvern Road and Orrong Road through to Caulfield North, the inner suburban areas. Every time we got near the bus we would get caught by a traffic light or the bus would take off. Eventually Mike ran after the bus, banging on the side to catch the driver’s attention. I saw Mike talking to the driver and was surprised Mike was permitted to go and check. It was not Rachel. I could see the disappointment on his face.

I was unlucky at the dress shop in Malvern but they did say their factory outlet in Bridge Road, Richmond, of all places, might have the top I was after. I went back to Books In Print to speak to my work colleagues, only to discover Mike was there, frantically trying to locate me. He’d had a call from the police, at our house, to say they had found a possible runaway note in Rachel’s bedroom. Could we meet them at the station in about half an hour?

I was stunned. Total disbelief, relief, denial … what now?

My mother had not liked the attitude of the detectives, but I think at first they were annoyed by our absence. Mike’s parents were just leaving when they arrived and the police asked where we were. ‘Where you’d expect them to be,’ answered my mother-in-law, Rose. ‘Out searching for Rachel.’

Apparently they spent a long time in Rachel’s room, coming out once to ask about a bottle of tablets they’d discovered. My mother explained they were hers – she was sleeping in Rachel’s room.

We drove to the police station with apprehension.

‘Michael, I don’t believe this.’

‘I’m finding it difficult to grapple with too,’ answered Mike. ‘But maybe it’s what we should hope for. Even if we don’t want to believe it. It gives us hope she’s still alive.’

The detective senior sergeant was not there on our arrival.

We waited.

Eventually the glass security door opened and we were asked to follow him upstairs.

The detectives had found what they considered were two notes written by Rachel, indicating that she had planned to run away.

The first said, ‘Station, Go to Manni, $50-$80, 3 special things.’

The second said, ‘Running Away.’

‘Where did you find these notes?’ I asked.

On the back of stapled sheets relating to her modelling course back in November, we were told.

‘They’re four months old,’ I said. Not believing this furphy for a moment.

This did not convince the detectives.

Mike explained that while Rachel had attended the two-week modelling course she had arranged for Manni to collect her because of her uneasiness about public transport. They would travel to Richmond together on a tram which departed from Flinders Street. Staff at the modelling school could confirm this as Manni often waited for Rachel to finish. They thought he was lovely. And Mike explained that before Christmas Rachel had wanted to buy Manni three special things and had asked Mike to take her to the Reject Shop to see what ‘special things’ her money could buy.

I told the police I had explained to Rachel we would only be able to spend approximately $50 to $80 on her for Christmas because of the cost of the full-time dancing fees. This she had understood.

We were asked about the words ‘running away’.

I didn’t have an answer for this just then. But there would have to be a reasonable explanation.

Can you really blame the police for the position they were taking? At the time I could. I was angry. I felt helpless. But on reflection, and looking at the available hard evidence and the statistics for this age group of missing persons, I know the odds were really stacked against Rachel.

The police were looking for a close. They had searched Rachel’s room in the belief that she was a runaway. That’s how it appeared to us. Again the detective mentioned the police sighting reported the day before.

‘But we asked every shop down the Punt Road end of Bridge Road,’ I said. ‘No one recognised Rachel and no one remembered seeing a girl counting out coins to a blond-haired man.’

The detective said it had happened between 8 and 8.15 a.m.

‘Ah, yes,’ said Mike. ‘But I spoke to workmen who’d been in the street since 7 a.m. and Liz spoke to the milk bar owner.’

A gesture of hands was the detective’s reply. There was enough evidence to suggest Rachel had disappeared of her own free will. She had said she was going with an
old female friend
. There were no sightings of foul play. There was the detective’s identification. It was obvious – they had discovered things that even
we
did not know about our own daughter. Clearly she had a secretive nature.

I could not believe what I was hearing.

His advice to us was to go home to our ‘obviously’ two smaller children and seek special counselling. He put the stress on the ‘obviously’.

Seek special counselling, I thought. So that’s it. I started to cry. Not because for one moment I believed Rachel was a runaway, but because I knew she was in trouble and could see the police investigation coming to an end.

Calming down, I said, ‘I’ve brought you these dance pants. They’re the same type Rachel was wearing. I thought you might need them.’

The detective shook his head.

Michael stood up and shook hands with the detectives. He especially thanked the woman detective because he felt that regardless of her opinion, she had always been caring.

We left the station with Mike surprisingly good-tempered. He told the detectives we would still continue with our search and put up more posters.

The detective senior sergeant smiled. He said he would be off duty over the weekend but if we needed a detective there would still be some on duty.

Where to now? Where to now? Everything had come to a standstill. Maybe there
would
be detectives available over the weekend, but we felt as if we, family and friends, were on our own. Mike’s father had offered us $3000 to pay for a private detective but we still thought this shouldn’t be necessary. We would take up the offer only when no further help was forthcoming from police. A friend suggested we ask the police what they planned to do in the next twenty-four, forty-eight and seventy-two hour periods. We never did. The police would think I was being too much trouble. Maybe we could hire a skywriter and have RACHEL drawn into the sky. At least she’d know we were still searching for her, that we wouldn’t give up until we found her.

On leaving the police station we decided to visit Dulcie from the dance school, who lived near by.

‘Dulcie,’ I said. ‘Please think back to last Monday. Was there
anything
?’

‘She was positive all day … The body language of Rachel that day was not that of a teenager contemplating running away. I should know. I work with kids all the time.’

‘What … then?’ asked Mike.

‘I feel she’s been taken,’ answered Dulcie.

‘Then why don’t the police …’

‘Because it’s only our gut feeling,’ said Mike, interrupting me. ‘There’s no
evidence
of foul play.’

‘He’s right, Elizabeth,’ said Dulcie. ‘The police don’t know Rachel.’

True, I thought. To them she’s just another fifteen-year-old girl.

I asked Dulcie what she thought about Mike’s need to hang a poster at Rachel’s previous dance school. She felt it an excellent idea because she knew their studios were leased to other dance groups.

Then Mike told Dulcie about a problem I had had with a male friend of ours. Mike was becoming concerned that this man might have been involved in Rachel’s disappearance, although I thought it highly unlikely.

Dulcie was amazed we hadn’t reported him already. To an outsider it seemed a very reasonable possibility.

‘I’ll think about it,’ I said.

‘Elizabeth! You’ll only
think
about it?’ Dulcie cried.

We went home late in the afternoon.

School friends of Rachel’s were calling in to collect posters. Other friends had begun to drop in casseroles, coffee and cake.

My cousin Ian had phoned. A work colleague’s husband was an inspector in the police force. He suggested I write in an exercise book the events of Rachel’s disappearance and he would hand it on.

James, my 44-year-old cousin, came to help where he could. He grabbed a large cardboard box of odd socks to match, discovering only one pair. It was the sock box from Rachel’s play-group days: odd socks were brilliant for hand puppets.

News was spreading fast. Letters of support were arriving. The phone rang constantly. My mother was tiring from the responsibility of answering the phone. My Aunt Babe, ravaged by emphysema, gave my mother respite, and answered the phone with authority.

Ashleigh-Rose was calmer, having spent the day at Montrose Library with my stepmother Susan. She had shelved and covered books. Susan recalled Ashleigh-Rose saying, ‘I had to get out of the house. Mum and Dad are crying all the time, and Nanny Joy cries, too. Then I cry because I can’t stand to see Mum and Dad crying.’ Ashleigh-Rose told her about going in to see her father and being frightened by his hard grasp. ‘Daddy said, “I don’t want to lose you, too. I’ve already lost Rachel. I’ve let Rachel down …” ’

Robbie had reported that Heather was having a lovely time. Robbie’s friend Dianne took Heather fishing and Heather caught her first fish. When Heather heard that Rachel had not been found she’d said, ‘Good, that means I can stay with Auntie Robbie and go fishing again.’ But then added, ‘You know I don’t mean that.’

My brother Drew rang to say he would be down on Sunday to take over the phone. He’d always been a very distant brother. But tragedy is a catalyst. It was the catalyst that brought sister and brother closer. It was the catalyst that brought a separated family together. My mother, father and stepmother put differences aside. I felt completely at ease in the company of all three: I’d been working on that for twenty-five years. We all had one focus: to bring Rachel home. At the end of this first week it was beginning to feel as though it was becoming ‘bring Rachel home, dead or alive’.

We were so exhausted but sleep was still not a possibility. The ‘ifs, why dids, what fors’ consumed us. We were Rachel’s parents. We were responsible for Rachel. We had let her down. We were guilty. Tragedy had swept fifteen years of loving, fifteen years of energy, fifteen years of Rachel into a cavity, unseen, unfound.

Mike said he knew she was dead. He was looking for a body. The doctor, who considered Mike to be suffering from shock, had said, ‘Mike has begun the grieving process already because he believes Rachel is dead.’ But still I couldn’t believe that Mike felt this. Why would he continue to search for her in areas where she could still be alive? We were making little sense as our tortured minds battled fatigue and denial. I either didn’t
feel
she was dead or didn’t want to admit it. No one who knew Rachel would want to harm her. The other possibility that she had been grabbed, drugged, and raped was, in my despair, becoming more likely.