sooner he gets everything off his chest, the sooner I can get on with things, and the sooner I can get my little girl back into the ground. The world is definitely fucked up when the goal of the day is to bury your daughter.

‘What happened after Bruce’s mother died? What happened

to Sidney?’

‘What?’ He looks shocked.

‘His mother. Ten years ago, when she died, what were things

like?’

He breathes out heavily, reinforcing just how much of an

ordeal it is to have me here.

it was the same thing, I guess. It was like one day he was alive, the next day he wasn’t. Though it wasn’t even really that. It’s not like he was dead. He just became … lost. They both did.’

And?’

And what? People become lost when that kind of thing happens.

Come on, Theo, of all people you don’t need an explanation on

that. Sometimes people never recover, or they recover in the

wrong way. And some people are lost in a way you can’t ever put your finger on.’

I think of Sidney Alderman digging up my dead daughter.

I can safely say I could put my finger on dozens of different reasons why the old man is more fucked up than he is lost.

‘Did either of them ever give you a confession?’

‘Come on, Theo, you know I can’t answer that.’

‘There were four of them in that lake, Father. So far the police have identified only two. Soon they’ll know all four.’

‘Four girls,’ he says. ‘What a waste of young lives.’

‘Well, now’s your opportunity …’

Suddenly it hits me. Father Julian’s anger can’t all be directed at me. It must also be directed at himself.

‘Yesterday I said there could be others in the coffins, but

I never said they were all girls. Or that they were young.’

He starts to say something—probably to protest that somehow

he heard or that he guessed — but he gives up the pretence and says nothing.

‘Jesus, you knew! You fucking knew!’

‘Theo!’ he yells, banging his fist down on the table. ‘Enough!

How dare you use …’

‘How dare me?’ Now it’s my turn to bang my fist down on the

table. “How dare you! You knew all along and did nothing? You

did nothing? How can that be?’

He doesn’t answer, and the silence that falls between us then is unexpected, as if we’re both too aware that what we say next may damage irrevocably whatever relationship we have.

‘What was I to do, Theo?’ he asks, almost in a whisper now,

and the question seems genuine, as if he really wants me to come up with other options when there are none. ‘You know the rules.

You can argue them, and you can hate them and you can rant and rave about the injustice of it all, but you know, Theo, you know the deal.’

‘One of the Aldermans confessed to you. One of them killed

those girls!’

“That’s not what I said, and that’s not what happened!’

I stand up and open the envelope and tip it up in the same

manner I did when I found it. The articles spill out in the

same way. I brush my hand over them, fanning them out like a

deck of cards. Father Julian’s eyes are pulled to them.

‘You already knew the girls were in there. You knew they were

dead.’

‘Sit back down, Theo.’

‘These are the girls we could have saved. What was it you said to me yesterday when I told you why this case was important

to me? You said it wasn’t my fault. You were right and you were wrong. See, I thought it was completely my fault. But not now.

Now I share that burden with you.’

He reaches out and touches the articles, picking some of them

up. I watch his eyes, but they don’t scan over any of the words.

The more he shifts the clippings around, the more dust floats

up in the air. I’m not sure what he’s looking for. None of the disappearances made the front pages. There are no huge headlines or by-lines. Maybe if one of them had been a rock star or the

mayor’s daughter, things would have been different. Though

that’s about to change. Tomorrow Rachel Tyler is going to be all over the news. And the other girls too. People other than their friends and family are going to care. People are going to look at the names and faces and wonder how the hell their city became

a breeding ground for the kind of violence needed to take these

young women away, and for the kind of ignorance to let it happen without asking why.

it’s so easy for you, isn’t it, Theo? It always has been. Guys like you think they can just come in here and get what they want.’

I’m not sure what he means by guys like me. ‘You have these

great expectations that all you have to do is ask and I’ll break the confessional seal and tell all. You don’t think it hurts? Huh? You don’t think that hearing all the poison coming from these people takes its toll? Don’t you think I want to be able to pick up the phone and make the world a better place?’

‘Then why don’t you? These girls, you could have saved

them.’

At what cost? You still don’t get it, do you? You think if this was just about me I wouldn’t do it? If it was just a matter of getting fired and losing my church, I’d pull the pin for the greater good. But this isn’t about me, Theo. It’s not about you either. It’s not about those girls out there. It’s about God. About our faith.

It’s about not breaking one of the oldest rules in the church.’

There are so many angles from which to attack his argument,

but for what point? He’s right and I’m right and we both know

it. And there’s nothing we can do. He has to stand by his beliefs, and I have to stand by my anger with him for not having done

something to prevent all of this.

‘That’s how you knew Bruce was innocent. He wasn’t the one

who confessed.’

‘We can’t go down this road.’

‘What road?’

‘The one where you start twisting all the boundaries, where

you ask who didn’t confess so you can narrow down your suspect pool.’ He runs both hands through his hair, then wipes them

down the front of his cassock.

“I think I’ve already narrowed it down,’ I say, and I start to scoop the articles back up.

it wasn’t Sidney Alderman.’

Part of me wants to lean forward and pick him up by his

collar and shake him until all that I need from him falls from that locked vault inside of him where he keeps secrets. Another part is thankful. He won’t give up these secrets, and he’ll never give up mine either.

‘You’re letting a murderer get away’ There is no conviction

behind my words. It’s a last-ditch effort, and one that I don’t expect to get me anywhere.

He seems to know this, it haunts me.’

If I tell him what Sidney Alderman has done to my daughter,

will it change his views? I don’t think it will. The priest’s ideas about what Sidney Alderman is like are all outdated. He built up a friendship with the guy thirty or forty years ago, and that’s how he still sees him. I wonder what it would take — whether there is a limit to how much pain there is — for Father Julian to accept that his faith and his convictions simply aren’t worth it. Is there a number? A dozen dead girls? A hundred?

‘Sidney Alderman. Tell me where he is.’

“I don’t know’

‘Did he kill those girls?’

“I want you to go now, Theo. And I want you to remember

your promise.’

‘But you can tell me about him, right? You can at least give me some history there.’

‘Sidney Alderman is a very sad man, Theo. Like you, he has

lost his family. Surely you remember how you felt the day Emily died. Surely you can empathise.’

Of course I remember. But I didn’t go around digging up

graves.

‘What happened to him two years ago?’

“I don’t follow’

I finish putting the articles into the envelope. One of them said he retired two years ago. Is that enough? People become killers when there is a trigger. When there’s a defining moment that makes somebody snap. I figure it’s more likely Sidney Alderman would’ve snapped ten years ago when his wife died, not two years ago when he retired.