Danielle Steel - Vanished

“I hope we'll have good news for you soon.”

“Do you know what it is they're doing?”

He didn't want to tell her they were turning the port upside down, looking for Teddy. “I think they're just looking into some final evidence before we close. It'll all be over tomorrow.”

“How's Charles taking it?”

“Actually…” Tom leaned back in his desk chair and smiled. She had a nice voice, and he liked talking to her. He liked everything he'd seen of her during the trial, but he hadn't let himself think about her before, except in relation to his client. “Actually, he's driving me crazy, to tell you the truth.”

“That sounds like Charles.' And then she grew serious again. “Is he very worried?”

“As worried as he should be. This new evidence may be of some help to him though. We're hoping so anyway. The FBI is checking it out for us. We'll let you know if we hear anything at all.”

“Thank you.” She wasn't supposed to be on their side, but there didn't seem to be sides anymore. There was just everyone searching for the truth…and for Teddy.

The next two days seemed endless to her with Malcolm away, and John Taylor gone to help with the investigation. Suddenly, she had no one to talk to, and with Malcolm gone, the house seemed unusually quiet. It made her start to think about what she would do when she moved out. She had nowhere to go, nothing to do, no family to turn to. In some ways it worried her, but she wasn't as frightened as she might have been years before. He didn't frighten her anymore. Suddenly, she didn't care about him at all. All he had done was hurt her.

Bea Ritter called her once too on the second day of the recess, but she didn't say what the investigation was about either. She pretended not to know, and she didn't admit that she had brought the tip to Tom Armour. She just called to say hello, and see if they had any more leads about Teddy.

“No, nothing. Have you seen Charles again?”

“A few days ago. He's incredibly tense since they're so close to going to the jury.” And she was praying they wouldn't have to.

But by midnight that night, nothing had changed. There were two more ships to go through, and one of them was refusing. It was German and they claimed they didn't have to submit. It took another eight hours to get a court order to force them. And at ten o'clock the next morning, as Judge Morrison called the court to order, John Taylor was boarding the last ship with the Coast Guard, the Port Authority, and the FBI, and he was sure they would find nothing. But if nothing else, he had to do it for Marielle. He called Tom Armour from the dock, just before he left for the courtroom.

“Well?”

“We got nothing. We came up empty. No Teddy, no more tips, no one will talk, no one knows anything. We touched base with every one of our informants. Nothing. And Louie the Lover's not answering his phone. I think he's scared. He may have run out on us.” Taylor had nothing but bad news for him.

“Shit. What am I supposed to do now?”

“You close your case, just like you were going to do two days ago.”

“But he didn't do it, dammit, man. You heard the man. Someone paid him fifty thousand big ones to plant the kid's pajamas.”

“Yeah, I know. But who's going to testify to that? You, or me? Hell, it's hearsay.”

“You can't do this to me!” Tom was practically in tears, but Taylor was too tired to care. He still had one last ship to tear apart, and he was almost too exhausted to do it.

“Fuckin' A, man, I haven't slept in two days and I've been all over every slimy rotten ship in this port,” and a few fancy ones too, but they all looked the same to him by now, “and I haven't turned up shit. I think your guy probably didn't do it, but I can't give you the goods to get him off with, and we don't have the kid. What more can I tell you?”

“I'll ask for a mistrial.” Tom's voice was shaking he was so upset. But so was Taylor. No matter how hard they pushed, no one was talking.

“A mistrial based on what?” Taylor asked tiredly as his men started boarding the German ship to look around, but their hearts weren't in it anymore. They knew they weren't going to find the boy. Either he was gone, so well hidden he would never be found, or he was dead and buried somewhere and wouldn't turn up for years. “How the hell are you going to get a mistrial?” Taylor repeated when Tom didn't answer.

“I don't know…give me time…can you give me any reason at all to ask for another recess?”

“None at all. And if Louie doesn't surface soon, the judge is going to have your ass and mine to replace him.”

“Yeah. I know that.”

“I'll send a message to you in court with one of my guys, after we check this ship, but don't get your hopes up.” Tom's hopes were already dashed and he dreaded telling Charles that Louie the Lover had vanished.

“He what?” Charles shouted when Tom told him.

“He's gone,” Tom whispered tersely as they walked into the courtroom.

“Son of a bitch. How could those assholes have let that happen?”

“Keep your voice down.” The judge was rapping his gavel. “He had a lot to lose. He could have gone to prison for what he did. And he's on parole with a rap sheet as long as your arm. It's a rotten thing to do, but you can't really blame him.”

“The hell I can't. They're going to execute me for this.” Tom's eyes were like rocks, and there was a pain in the pit of his stomach.

“I'm not going to let that happen to you.” Tom tried to sound confident but it was not what he felt as the judge asked him and Bill Palmer to approach the bench with a look of suspicion.

“Well, Counsellor? Your new evidence? Do we have a witness?”

“No, sir, we don't,” Tom Armour said grimly. “The FBI have been investigating this lead and several others for two days, and so far they've gotten nowhere.” He was brutally honest and the prosecutor looked pleased.

“And your informant?” the judge asked, looking displeased with Tom.

“Has vanished, Your Honor. For the moment.”

“I can't believe you've wasted two days of the court's and the taxpayers' time, Mr. Armour.” The judge was rapidly sliding from displeasure to fury.

“We had to check it out, sir. I was even hoping to ask for a further recess. But…”

“Don't even consider it, Counsellor.” He glared at both of them and waved them back to their seats. Bill Palmer was looking extremely happy, and he glanced at Malcolm sitting staunchly in the courtroom, with Marielle next to him, very still and quiet. They never spoke in court. The judge rapped his gavel again, and told Bill Palmer to make his closing statement.

Tom Armour couldn't believe this was happening. They had almost had the key to it in their hands, and they had lost it. Charles looked as though he was near tears, and Bea Ritter was frantically wondering what had happened, but there was no one to tell her.

In his closing arguments, all of Bill Palmer's statements were predictable, and ugly. He reminded the jurors of every ugly thing Charles had ever done, every stupidity, every weakness, every threat, every drunken binge, every minor, or major, act of violence. His attack on Marielle, his wanton destruction years ago, at nineteen, of a neighborhood bar in Paris. All of these were the early signs, according to Bill Palmer, of a lack of control, a self-indulgence, a tendency to violence that would eventually lead him to kidnap and kill little Teddy. His violence at war, his thirst for killing which had led him to the Great War at fifteen…His leaning to Communism, which had taken him to Spain…and the threats he had made in Central Park, which had been carried out only thirty-six brief hours later. And the little red pajama suit found in his basement, a sign that he indeed had kidnapped Teddy. The man was a kidnapper, the prosecutor raged across the courtroom, and he had almost certainly killed this helpless baby. And as he said the words, and looked at the jury, and then around the courtroom, there was a small flutter, and brief thumping sound. Finally, after all that had come before, it had been too much for her. Marielle Patterson had fainted.

As she came to, there was a terrible hum of noise, and blurred lights overhead, a feeling of something cold and damp on her forehead. She opened her eyes, and after a few moments, Marielle realized she had been carried into the judge's chambers. His secretary was standing over her with a damp cloth, and a doctor had been called, but she insisted that she was all right. She tried to sit up, but she felt weak, and then she saw that both attorneys were there, and her husband. Someone was pressing something cool against the in-sides of her wrists, and someone else handed her a glass of water. It was Bea Ritter. She had pressed right through the crush of photographers and literally climbed over them to get to Marielle, and it was Bea who had called for help as she knelt next to her on the floor, not Malcolm. He only looked annoyed and embarrassed, and not one whit sympathetic.