‘My marriage doesn’t need protection.’
‘But my reputation does,’ Sylvia replies, coolly. ‘I’m trying to handle a highly charged situation and need to use every avenue at my disposal to encourage the media to concentrate only on Marcus. But I keep being broadsided by journalists with other angles.’
‘What angles?’
‘Your relationship with Eric Walker.’ She drops his name like a grenade and waits for Amanda to reply.
‘He’s my work colleague. Who dares to suggest otherwise?’
‘Lucy Knight, for one.’
‘She’s a gossipmonger. No one pays any attention to the rubbish she writes for that rag.’
‘You’re part of the media, Amanda. I don’t have to explain how it works. All I need is confirmation that you’ve told me the truth about the afternoon Marcus disappeared.’
‘Absolutely.’ Her voice rings with confidence. Each time she repeats the lie, it becomes more solidified. Soon, it will morph into a fragile truth. ‘I’ve no reason to lie to you or anyone else.’
In the distance, a ferry moves imperceptibly across the horizon. Seagulls screech as they swoop downwards to feast on festering scraps. Sylvia buttons her coat as the wind scurries leaves across the terrace. Russet and yellow, they lie in deep drifts that Marcus loves to toss. Amanda has a savage impulse to throw back her head and howl. An indulgence. She needs to be in control as she prepares for the press conference.
The last time she attended such a conference, she was on the other side of the green baize table. The Lawson parents were in a trance of fear as they struggled to articulate their message: help us – please help us… and all the time their daughter was dead. She won’t go there, can’t go there; she must concentrate on one thing only. Plead, beg, implore the Shroffs to deliver her son safely back to her.
Cameras on tripods, on shoulders, clicking, flashing, rolling. The sound is as deafening as ball bearings rattling; so familiar that Amanda has never noticed it until now. Even the journalists are using their mobile phones to photograph her as she takes her seat in front of them. The atmosphere is taut with anticipation. This is no ordinary disappearance. This is a celebrity story and rumours about a criminal link have given it an extra edge.
She sits beside Lar, their hands clasped. Amanda is flanked by Sylvia Thornton, who will fend off dangerous questions, and a superintendent, whose name she’s already forgotten. Lar stays on script and speaks directly to the camera. She must do the same. As media people, they understand the importance of the message. Hands are raised. Questions are directed at the superintendent. The Shroff link? Is it fact? Have the members of the Dublin gang taken in for questioning revealed anything that will help the search? The superintendent fobs off their questions. The press refuse to drop that angle. How many ways can the same question be asked, Amanda wonders, the same answer given.
A journalist, whom she doesn’t recognise, asks if she made an enemy of Billy Shroff by once writing an opinion piece for Capital Eye about his daughter’s wedding dress? Barbara Nelson weighs in with a reminder that Amanda once doorstepped Killer Shroff after his daughter’s First Communion service and asked if the gifts of money she would receive from her relatives were drug-tainted. And wasn’t that question asked in front of the little girl and her school friends?
Before she can reply, Sylvia smoothly intervenes. ‘This conference was organised to help us find Marcus and make an appeal for his safe return. Will you please respect the wishes of his parents and confine your questions to that end?’
Delia Wright raises her hand. She is an influential blogger who, having reared and home-schooled her four children, uses her blog to encourage mothers to shun the workplace. The Wright Path has an enormous readership, who either like or loathe her.
‘On behalf of the assembled media, I’d like to offer Mr and Mrs Richardson our support at this difficult time,’ she says. ‘Our sincerest hope is that their son will soon be returned to them and their horrifying ordeal brought to an end.’ She pauses to allow her sympathy to be noted, then adds, ‘If I could address a question to Mrs Richardson?’
Amanda notes the emphasis on her marital status and braces herself. Delia’s sweetness disguises a steely intolerance. ‘If you had collected your son from school on Monday, as you’d promised to do, isn’t it highly probable that he would have been holding your hand as you walked down Rockfield Road?’
How is she supposed to answer that question? The blogger might as well punch Amanda in the face and be done with it. She tries to respond but the words are trapped in guilt. ‘Marcus likes to run ahead—’
‘Not when you collect him.’ Delia will not tolerate vagueness. ‘And that’s only once a week. A novelty for him and he was looking forward to being with his mother instead of being foisted on a childminder at short notice.’
‘That’s an absolutely disgraceful assumption to make!’ Lynn Masterson, an old-school feminist, jumps to her feet. Sixty plus and still battling stereotypes, Lynn glares at the younger woman. ‘What happened to Marcus has nothing to do with the fact that his mother was delayed at work.’
‘My point is that this tragedy could have been avoided.’ Delia’s reasoned tone never wavers. ‘The demands made on today’s working mothers are putting our schoolchildren at risk—’
‘No one is denying a mother the right to remain at home and rear her family,’ Lynn shouts back. ‘But women must be allowed that same tolerance when they make a different choice!’
Two opinionated women have taken over the press conference. They are so certain, so assured that their particular view is the right one, the right path… why did Marcus stray from the right path and disappear into thin air… thin air doesn’t exist – can’t exist – not a feasible explanation, but what explanation is there? Sylvia interrupts the journalists and forces them into silence. The cameras click relentlessly as the superintendent draws the conference to a close and they file wearily from the hotel room.
She tenses as Sylvia accidentally brushes against her arm. It is becoming more difficult, almost impossible, to be so close to her. They drive directly from the hotel to the search centre but, even there, Amanda is approached by reporters demanding to know how she feels.
How do they think she feels? Does she have to shriek the answer at them? My heart is rent in two.