“She has to be here. There was nothing sinister at all about her disappearance,” I rambled on to myself. “Unless she’s hiding, or else she’s in another country; I didn’t look into other countries.”

“OK, Sandy, why don’t you just take a seat now? I think you’re burning up,” Helena interrupted.

“I’m not burning up.” I swatted her hand away. “No, she’s not hiding and she can’t be in another country. She’s my age now.” I looked to Joan and everything was clear. “You have to find Jenny-May Butler, tell everyone that she’s my age. She’s thirty-four years old. She’s been here since she was ten, I know it.”

Joan nodded her head quickly, almost afraid to say no. Helena held out her hands toward me, afraid to touch me yet afraid to move away. I noticed the faces of the two women as they watched me. Worried. I quickly sat down and drank from a glass of water Helena had thrust into my hands.

“Is she OK?” I heard Joan ask Helena as they moved away.

“She’s fine,” Helena said calmly. “She just really wanted Jenny-May for the play. Let’s do our best to find her, shall we?”

“I don’t think she’s here,” Joan whispered.

“Let’s look anyway.”

“Can I ask why I was given a list of thirty to find? How does Sandy know they can act? When I contacted them all, they were very surprised. Most of them have never been involved in amateur dramatics. What about all the others who are interested in taking part? They’re still allowed to audition, aren’t they?”

“Of course, everyone’s allowed.” Helena pawned her off. “The people on the list were just special, that’s all.”

Of the two thousand people reported missing in Ireland every year, between five and fifteen will never be found. The thirty people I had chosen were the ones I had spent my entire working life obsessed with finding. Others I had found, others I could give up looking for, knowing something sinister was involved, that harm had sadly come to them or that they’d merely walked away of their own accord. But these thirty on the list, they were the ones who had disappeared without a trace and without reason. These were the thirty who haunted me, the thirty without a crime scene to examine or witnesses to question.

I thought of all their relatives and of how I’d promised I’d find their loved ones. I thought of Jack Ruttle, of how only last week I had made that promise. I thought of how I had failed to show up at our meeting in Glin and how now I had once again failed.

Because according to the list, Donal Ruttle wasn’t here.

24

On Tuesday morning, exactly two days since Sandy’s no-show, Jack, who had not long returned home with Sandy’s file on Donal, stepped out into the fresh July morning air and closed the door to the cottage quietly behind him. Around the town, preparations were being made for the pending Irish Coffee Festival; banners were rolled up beside telegraph poles ready to be hung and the back of a truck had been opened up as a makeshift stage for the outdoor trad-band performances. The town was quiet now, though, everybody still in the comfort of their beds, dreaming of other worlds. Jack started his engine, the noise of it loud enough in the quiet square to wake the entire town, and he made his way into Limerick city where, hopefully, he would meet Sandy at Donal’s friend Alan’s home. He also wanted to pay a visit to his sister Judith.

Judith was the closest of his siblings. Married with five kids, she was a mother from the moment she arrived kicking and screaming into this world. Eight years older than Jack, she had practiced her skills of obedience training and nurturing on every doll and every child that lived nearby. The common joke on the street was that there wasn’t a doll in the city that didn’t sit up straight and shut up when Judith was around. As soon as Jack was born, she turned her attention to him, a real baby whom she could mother and often smother from that day until now. She was still the one he ran to for advice and she still always found time between school runs, diaper changing, and breastfeeding to lend an ear.

As he pulled up outside her terraced house, the front door opened and the wail of a thousand banshees flew past his ears, almost blowing his hair.

“Daaa-deee,” a banshee yelled.

The banshee’s father appeared at the door in an off-white creased shirt with an open top button and a loosened tie in an uneven knot. He held in one hand a mug that he clung to for dear life and gulped on with bulging eyes. His other hand gripped a tattered briefcase while the banshee with white-blond hair, Power Rangers pajamas, and Kermit the Frog slippers clung to his leg.

“Dooon’t gooooo,” she yelled, wrapping her limbs around one of his legs as though her life depended on his staying.

“I have to go, sweetie. Daddy has to work.”

“Nooooooo.”

An arm appeared from inside the door, thrusting a slice of toast in Willie’s direction. “Eat,” said Judith’s voice over more wails from a second source.

Willie took a bite, slugged down some more coffee, and gently shook Katie from his leg. His head disappeared from the doorway, kissed the owner of the arm, shouted, “Bye, kids!” and the door was slammed. The screams were still audible, yet Willie kept a smile on his face. It was eight A.M. and he’d already been through an hour or two of what Jack would consider pure torture. Yet he smiled.

“Hiya, Jack.” His moon-shaped face beamed.

“Good morning Willie,” Jack said, noticing how his shirt buttons strained at his gut, a coffee stain decorated his shirt pocket, and there was toothpaste on his paisley tie.

“Sorry. Can’t talk. Escaping,” he said with chuckle, patting Jack on the back and squeezing into his car. The tailpipe let out a bang and off he sped.

Jack looked around the housing estate of tightly packed gray houses and noticed a similar scene occurring on each doorstep.

He opened the door tentatively, hoping the madhouse wouldn’t swallow him whole. He stepped inside and saw fifteen-month-old Nathan running off down the hall, with a bottle hanging from his lips and naked but for a bulging diaper. Jack followed him. Four-year-old Katie, who only seconds ago had clung to her father as though her world was going to end, was sitting a foot away from the television, cross-legged on the floor, a bowl of cereal spilling onto the already stained carpet, completely captivated by dancing bugs singing about the rainforest.

“Nathan!” Judith called pleasantly from the kitchen, “I have to change your diaper. Come back in here, please!”

She had the patience of a saint, while around her, chaos ensued. Toys cluttered every surface, scribbles and drawings were either pinned to the walls or directly on the walls. There were baskets of dirty clothes, baskets of clean clothes, clotheshorses with drying clothes lining the walls. The television was blaring, a baby was wailing, pots and pans were being banged. It was a human zoo; three girls and two boys, a ten-year-old, an eight-year-old, a four-year-old, a fifteen-month-old, and a three-month-old, all running riot and demanding attention, while Judith sat at the kitchen table, dressed in her stained robe, hair wild and unwashed, things just everywhere, cluttering every surface, and her face a picture of serenity.

“Hi, Jack.” She looked up in surprise. “How did you get in here?”

“The door was open, and I followed your doorman in.” He nodded at Nathan, who had taken his position on the floor, stinky diaper and all, and had resumed banging pots with a wooden spoon. Three-month-old Rachel was shocked into silence, her eyes widened and her lips parted, ready to release bubbles. “Don’t get up.” Jack leaned over Rachel in her cot to kiss Judith.

“Nathan, honey, I told you not to unlock the door without Mammy saying so,” Judith explained calmly. “He keeps turning the lock,” she explained to Jack.