Cast into Doubt

ELEVEN

Shelby, in her robe and pajamas, went down to the kitchen. She glanced at the clock and realized that Rob and Jeremy might soon be on their way home from the movie theater. She ate some cheese and crackers and went back up to Molly’s room to try to find something distracting to watch on television in the meantime.

But even as she flipped through the channels with the remote she was thinking about Janice Pryor’s visit. Forget about it, she chided herself. Forget that Janice Pryor ever barged into your life. But it was no use. When Chloe disappeared from that ship, Shelby became a de facto member of the Overboard group – whether she cared to admit it or not. These were the people on this earth, she thought, with whom she now had the most in common. These were all people who had wished their loved ones a cheery ‘bon voyage’, or ‘good night’, or ‘enjoy your jog around the deck’, never to set eyes on them again. How could she expect herself to resist their stories?

Finally, she climbed off the bed, went to her computer notebook, and punched in the word ‘Overboard.’ The website sprang up before her eyes. In spite of her better judgment, she began to read. After about half an hour, she heard the front door open downstairs and the sound of Rob and Jeremy’s voices in the house.

Shelby stayed very still, listening to snippets of their conversation as they wondered aloud if she were asleep and debated about waking her. Rob finally prevailed upon Jeremy to brush his teeth and get ready for bed.

‘But Shep has her light on,’ Jeremy protested.

‘She probably fell asleep with the light on,’ Rob reasoned.

‘Can we turn it off?’ Jeremy asked.

‘No. We might disturb her. Let her sleep. Shep is very tired,’ said Rob.

Shelby wasn’t sure why she didn’t go to the door and call out to them. It wasn’t as if she didn’t want to see them or hear about the movie. But when she thought about it, she had to admit that she didn’t want to tear herself away from the website. She wanted to continue poring over every story recounted there. At the same time, she was a little bit reluctant for them to know what she was doing. So she stayed silent.

Their voices grew fainter as Jeremy, distracted from thoughts of his grandmother, enthusiastically recalled his favorite parts of the movie while Rob murmured in response.

Once she could no longer hear them, Shelby resumed her reading. The fascination she felt for these stories was akin to rubbernecking at the sight of an accident. In this case, Shelby felt as if she were both rubbernecker and victim.

If the people who told their stories on the site were planning a lawsuit, it was not evident from the testimonies they gave. Instead, their stories were filled with frustration, grief, and disbelief.

There were a couple of cases where, Shelby thought, people just did not want to face facts about the missing person. There were stories of people who went on cruises to try to alleviate depression, and ended up leaving all their belongings in their cabin in a neat pile topped with a note of farewell. There were other cases that seemed to cry out for a criminal investigation. One victim was a middle-aged woman who did not approve of her son’s wealthy, dissolute admirer. She accepted an invitation to go on the cruise with them, at the expense of said admirer, and disappeared from the boat, never to be seen again.

One of the strangest cases was, as it turned out, the disappearance of Elise Pryor. Rejecting the official version of events, Janice Pryor and her husband had updated the account repeatedly as they sought out, and found, answers. There was, indeed, a convicted sex offender working as a steward on Elise’s ship. His history linked him to previous assaults on teenage girls. After Janice’s husband brought this fact to the attention of the cruise line, the steward was eventually dismissed, and his cabin was searched. Wedged between his bunk and the wall they found a bikini swimsuit top that had belonged to Elise Pryor. The police investigated, but finally insisted that this was not enough evidence to bring charges against the man. The steward was fired from his job for lying on his application, and he was put off the ship in Miami. After that, he disappeared.

Reading this account, Shelby felt a mounting fury on the Pryors’ behalf. She also felt guilty for having dismissed the bereaved mother out of hand. No one could understand how the Pryors felt the way that Shelby did. She had suffered the same loss, and been told the same lie. Yes, Shelby thought. The same lie. Now that she thought back on those terrible days in St Thomas, it did seem as if their first concern was to make this problem of Chloe’s disappearance go away. How better to make that happen than to blame it on the victim? To say that she tripped and fell in a drunken stupor. It was possible that Chloe had met with foul play. A cruise line that had hired one sexual predator might have hired others.

Shelby felt adrenalin coursing through her veins. Stunned by the revelation of Chloe’s drinking, she had accepted what the officials told her. Now, she felt ashamed for having agreed, on so little information, to blame her own daughter for her own demise. No, she thought. I need to find out if there was something else going on. But how, she wondered? There was no use in trying to explain this all to the Philadelphia police. The police in St Thomas and the FBI were satisfied with the existing explanation. She couldn’t investigate it herself – she wouldn’t know where to begin. She needed someone else – someone who would know how to proceed.

The thought of trying to hire a private detective filled her with a sense of futility. All she knew about private eyes was what she had seen on television, or read about in mystery novels. In fiction they were always rumpled guys who smoked and had problems with women and were barely able to stay sober long enough to solve the crime. It was almost laughable to imagine paying someone like that to help. In real life she imagined they were much less colorful. But she had no personal experience to go on. What was she supposed to do, pick a name out of the phone book?

And then, feeling a little thrill of hope, another thought occurred to her. She did know a detective. She knew one very well. Perry Wilcox, the head of security for the Markson stores, was a soft-spoken man who had been, for fifteen years, a homicide detective for the city of Philadelphia. But his daughter became ill with severe diabetes and Perry was often needed at home. He was no longer able to put in late and irregular hours on the job. He signed up for a course on computer crimes and surveillance techniques and found that he was interested in these burgeoning areas of security. He decided to opt out of police work and take a job in the private sector. He was hired by Albert Markson and had worked in the Markson stores for eight years, making sure that the security system was state of the art.

Perry can tell me what to do, Shelby thought. If he can’t do it for me, he can tell me about someone who could. Someone I could trust. She quickly scanned her own list of contacts and found Perry’s email address. It took her a while to compose what she wanted to say in her message. No more than a few moments after she pressed ‘Send’, she had a reply and an appointment to meet Perry at his office on Monday morning. ‘I’m not sure if I can help you,’ he wrote, and Shelby could picture his grave, dignified expression, ‘but I will certainly try.’ It was enough for now, she thought, as she returned to the Overboard website, and began to surf its grim, hopeless pages. It was a start.

The next morning, Shelby was having coffee and reading the Philadelphia Inquirer at the dining room table when Rob and Jeremy returned home from church. Jeremy ran to her and buried his face against her side.

Shelby looked up at Rob, alarmed.

‘Lot of questions about his mom. People don’t mean to be rude,’ he said.

Shelby rubbed Jeremy’s back and murmured soothingly. ‘How was the movie last night?’ she asked, hoping to distract him.

Jeremy mumbled something unintelligible, his face buried in Shelby’s sweatshirt.

Rob poured himself a cup of coffee. ‘The kids enjoyed it. Molly was wishing she could come back home with us and stay over but I dropped them off at Sara’s house after the movie.’

Shelby heard the implication in his words; with her continued presence here she was getting in the way. Jeremy had pushed off from her and now interrupted her thoughts in loud voice. ‘We saw a kitten,’ he announced.

‘Really?’ Shelby asked. ‘Where?’

Jeremy nodded. ‘He ran between the houses. Out to the back.’

‘Maybe he’s out in the garden,’ Shelby says. ‘Why don’t you have a look?’

‘I’m gonna go have a look, Dad,’ Jeremy said to Rob.

‘OK. But stay in the garden.’

Jeremy headed to the back door, reached up and opened it. Shelby watched him head out into their tiny backyard. With Jeremy outside, it seemed an opportunity to mention her plans. ‘I’m going home to my apartment tonight. I have to go into work tomorrow,’ she said casually.

‘Really?’ he said, making no effort to conceal the fact that he welcomed this news. ‘Great.’

‘It’s just for tomorrow,’ said Shelby, carefully folding the paper. ‘Then I’m coming back. Can you find someone to watch Jeremy after school tomorrow?’

His face fell visibly, but he quickly recovered. ‘Sure,’ he said. ‘I’ll ask his teacher, Darcie. She offered to help any way she could.’

‘Good,’ said Shelby.

She studied him for a moment. She had no intention of telling him about her plans to have Perry Wilcox investigate Chloe’s disappearance. She didn’t want to think too hard about why she was avoiding that conversation. But she did feel that she had to mention the uneasiness between them. ‘Look, I know I’m probably wearing out my welcome here,’ she said. ‘But I don’t think Jeremy is quite ready for me to leave yet.’

Rob shrugged. ‘Whatever you think.’ He put down his coffee mug and picked up the paper.

Shelby stood up. ‘I think I’ll stay a while longer. I’d better go out and explain to him about tomorrow.’

Rob did not lower his paper. ‘If you say so,’ he said.