The Night Ferry

1

In the nights since the twins were born I have drowned countless times, twitching and kicking at the bedclothes. I see tiny bodies floating in fields of kelp or washed up on beaches. My lungs give out before I can reach them, leaving me choking and numb with an obscure anguish. I wonder if there’s such a thing as a swollen heart?

Samira is also awake. She walks through the house at 3:00 a.m. moving as though her feet have an agreement with the ground that she will always tread lightly in return for never encountering another path that is too steep.

It has been five days since the twins went missing. Pearl has soaked through the cracks of the world and vanished. We know how he got off the ferry. A CCTV camera on Deck 3 picked up a man in a hard hat and reflective jacket who couldn’t be identified as one of the crew. The footage didn’t show his face clearly but he was seen carrying a pet traveling cage. The square gray plastic box was supposed to contain two Siamese cats but they were found wandering in a stairwell.

Another camera in the Customs area picked up the clearest images of the unidentified man. In the foreground trucks are being scanned with heat-seeking equipment designed to find illegals. But in the background, at the edge of the frame, a pumpkin-shaped caravan attached to an early-model Range Rover can be seen. Mr. and Mrs. Jones of Cardiff are seen repacking their duty-frees and souvenirs after being searched. As the car and caravan pull away, a square gray pet cage is visible on the tarmac next to where they were parked.

The Welsh couple were pulled over a little after midday Sunday on the M4 just east of Reading. The caravan was empty but Pearl’s fingerprints were lifted from the table and the aluminum door. The couple had stopped for petrol at a motorway service center on the M25. A cashier remembered Pearl buying bottles and baby formula. Shortly afterward, at 10:42 a.m., a car was reported stolen from an adjacent parking area. It still hasn’t been found.

Forbes is running the investigation, liaising with Spijker in Amsterdam, combining resources, pitting their wills against the problem. They are cross-checking names from the IVF clinic with the U.K. immigration records.

There has been a news blackout about the missing twins. DI Forbes made the decision. Stolen children make dramatic headlines and he wants to avoid creating panic. A year ago a newborn was snatched from a hospital in Harrogate and there were 1,200 alleged sightings in the first two days. Mothers were accosted in the street and treated like kidnappers. Homes were raided needlessly. Innocent families suffered.

The only public statement has been about Pearl, who has a warrant out for his arrest. Another one. I have taken to carrying my gun again. As long as he’s out there, I’m going to keep it with me. I am not going to lose Samira again.

She has been staying with me since leaving hospital on Wednesday. Hari has moved out of the spare room and is sleeping downstairs on a sofa bed. He seems quite taken by our lodger. He has started wearing a shirt around the house because he senses that she disapproves.

I am to face a Police Disciplinary Tribunal. Neglect of duty, deliberate falsehood and abuse of authority are just three of the charges. Failing to show up at Hendon is the least of my worries. Barnaby Elliot has accused me of harassment and arson. The investigation is being supervised by the Police Complaints Authority. I am guilty until proven innocent.

A toilet flushes along the hallway. A light switch clicks off. A few minutes later comes the hum of a machine and the rhythmic suction of a breast pump. Samira’s milk has come in and she has to express every six hours. The sound of the pump is strangely soporific. I close my eyes again.

She hasn’t said anything about the twins. I keep wondering when she is going to crack, fragmented by the loss. Even when she identified Hassan’s body at Westminster Mortuary she held it all inside.

“It’s OK to cry,” I told her.

“That is why Allah gave us tears,” she answered.

“You think God played a part in this?”

“He would not give me this suffering if he did not think I could endure it.”

How can she be so wise, yet so accepting? Can she really believe this is part of some grand master plan or that Allah would test her so cruelly?

Such faith seems positively medieval, yet she has an appetite for learning. Things that I take for granted she finds fascinating, like central heating, dual flush toilets and my washer/dryer. In Kabul she had to carry water upstairs to their flat and the power failed almost daily. London has lights along every street, burning through the night. Samira asked me if perhaps we British are scared of the dark. She didn’t understand why I laughed.

I took her shopping for clothes at Canary Wharf yesterday. “There is not so much glass in all of Afghanistan,” she said, pointing to the office towers that shone in the morning sun. I could see her studying the office workers queuing for coffee and “skinny” muffins: the women dressed in narrow skirts, tight tops and jackets, flicking their short hair, chatting on mobile phones.

The clothing boutiques intimidated her. The shop assistants were dressed like mourners and the shops felt like funeral parlors. I told Samira there was a better place to find clothes. We left and went to Commercial Road where garments were crammed on racks and spilling from bins. She chose two skirts, a long-sleeved blouse and a cardigan. It came to less than sixty pounds.

She studied the twenty-pound notes.

“Is this your Queen?”

“Yes.”

“She looks like she has been dipped in plaster.”

I laughed. “I guess she does.”

The Christmas decorations were up. Even the bagel bakery and halal butcher had fairy lights and fake snow. Samira stopped and peered into a lobster tank in the window of a restaurant.

“I am never going to swim in the sea.”

“Why?”

“I don’t want to meet one of them.”

I think she had visions of lobsters crawling over one another in the same density as in the tank.

“This must be like science fiction to you.”

“Science? Fiction?”

“It means like a fantasy. Unreal.”

“Yes, unreal.”

Seeing London through Samira’s eyes has given me a different perspective on the city. Even the most mundane scene takes on a new life. When I took her underground to catch the Tube, she clutched my hand as an approaching train roared through the tunnel, sounding like a “monster in a cave” she said.

The casual wealth on display is embarrassing. There are more vets in the East End than there were doctors in Kabul. And the animals are better fed than the orphans.

The breast pump has stopped. She had turned on Hari’s TV and is flicking between channels. Slipping out of bed, I tiptoe along the hall and knock on her door. She’s wearing my old dressing gown, the one with an owl sewn onto the pocket.

“Can’t you sleep?”

“No.”

“I’ll make us a sleeping potion.”

Her eyes widen.

She follows me down the stairs, along the hall into the kitchen. I close the door and take a bottle of milk from the fridge, pouring it into mugs. Two minutes in the microwave and they’re steaming. Breaking up pieces of dark chocolate, I drop them in the liquid, watching them melt. Samira uses a spoon to catch the melting shards, licking it clean.

“Tell me about your family.”

“Most of them are dead.”

She licks the spoon. I break off more pieces of chocolate and add them to her mug.

“Did you have a big family?”

“Not so big. In Afghanistan people exaggerate what their family has done. Mine is no different. One of my ancestors traveled to China with Marco Polo they say, but I don’t believe it. I think he was a smuggler, who brought the black powder from India to Afghanistan. The king heard of the magic and asked to see a demonstration. According to my father, a thousand rockets streamed back and forth across the sky. Bamboo castles dripped with fire. Fireworks became our family business. The formulas were passed down from father to son—and to me.”

I remember the photograph among Hassan’s possessions showing a factory with workers lined up outside, most of them missing limbs or eyes, or incomplete in other ways. Hassan had burn scars on his arms.

“It must have been dangerous work.”

Samira holds up her hands, showing her fingers. “I am one of the lucky ones.” She sounds almost disappointed. “My father lost both his thumbs when a shell exploded. Uncle Yousuf lost his right arm and his wife lost her left arm. They helped each other to cook and sew and drive a car. My aunt changed gears and my uncle steered. My father’s other brother, Fahad, lost his fingers during a display. He was a very good gambler but he began to lose when he couldn’t shuffle the cards.

“I didn’t meet my grandfather. He was killed in a factory explosion before I was born. Twelve others died in the same fire, including two of his brothers. My father said it was a sacrifice that only our family could make. One hand is enough to sin, he said. One hand is enough to save.”

She glances at the dark square of the window. “It was our calling—to paint the sky. My father believed that one day our family would make a rocket that would light the way to Heaven. In the meantime, we would make rockets that drew the gaze of Allah in the hope that he would bless our family and bring us happiness and good health.” She pauses and considers the irony of such a statement. Perfectly still, she is canted forward over the table, firm yet fragile. Her stare seems to originate at the back of her eyes.

“What happened to the factory?”

“The Talibs closed it down. Fireworks were sinful, they said. People celebrated when they arrived. They were going to stop the warlords and end the corruption. Things changed but not in a good way. Girls could not go to school. Windows were painted over so women could not be seen. There was no music or TV or videos, no card games or kites. I was ten years old and they made me wear a burka. I could not buy things from male shopkeepers. I could not talk to men. I could not laugh in public. Women had to be ordinary. Invisible. Ignorant. My mother educated us in secret. Books were hidden each night and homework had to be destroyed.

“Men with beards and black turbans patrolled the streets, listening for music and videos. They beat people with whips soaked in water and with chains. Some were taken away and didn’t come back.

“My father took us to Pakistan. We lived in a camp. My mother died there and my father blamed himself. One day he announced that we were going home. He said he would rather starve in Kabul than live like a beggar.”

She falls silent, shifting in her chair. The motor of the refrigerator rattles to life and I feel the same shudder pass through me.

“The Americans dropped leaflets from the sky saying they were coming to liberate us but there was nothing left to free us from. Still we cheered because the Talibs were gone, running, like frightened dogs. But the Northern Alliance was not so different. We had learned not to expect too much. In Afghanistan we sleep with the thorns and not the flowers.”

The effort of remembering has made her sleepy. I wash the mugs and follow her upstairs. She pauses at my door, wanting to ask me something.

“I am not used to the quiet.”

“You think London is quiet?”

She hesitates. “Would it be all right if I slept in your room?”

“Is there something wrong? Is it the bed?”

“No.”

“Are you frightened?”

“No.”

“What is it then?”

“At the orphanage we slept on the floor in the same room. I am not used to being alone.”

My heart twists. “You should have said something earlier. Of course you can sleep with me.”

She collects a blanket and spreads it on the floor beside my wardrobe.

“My bed is big enough. We can share.”

“No, this is better.”

She curls up on the floor and breathes so quietly that I want to make sure she’s still there.

“Good night,” I whisper. “May you sleep amid the flowers, not the thorns.”

DI Forbes arrives in the morning, early as usual. Dressed in a charcoal suit and yellow tie, he is ready to front a news conference. The media blackout is being lifted. He needs help to find the twins.

I show him to the kitchen. “Your cold sounds better.”

“I can’t stomach another bloody banana.”

Hari is with Samira in the sitting room. He is showing her his old Xbox and trying to explain what it does.

“You can shoot people.”

“Why?”

“For fun.”

“Why would you shoot people for fun?”

I can almost hear Hari’s heart sinking. Poor boy. The two of them have something in common. Hari is studying chemical engineering and Samira knows more about chemical reactions than any of his lecturers, he says.

“She’s an odd little thing,” says Forbes, whispering.

“How do you mean?”

“She doesn’t say much.”

“Most people talk too much and have nothing to say.”

“What is she going to do?” he asks.

“I don’t know.”

What would I do in her shoes? I have never been without friends or family or stranded in a foreign country (unless you count Wolver-hampton, which is pretty bloody foreign).

Hari walks into the kitchen looking pleased with himself.

“Samira is going teach me to make fireworks,” he announces, taking a biscuit from Forbes’s plate.

“So you can blow yourself up,” I say.

“I’m very careful.”

“Oh yes. Like the time you filled that copper pipe with black powder and blew a hole in the wooden siding.”

“I was fifteen.”

“Old enough to know better.”

“Sunday is Guy Fawkes Night. We’re going to make a whistling chaser.”

“Which is?”

“A rocket that whistles and has white-and-red stars with a salute at the end.”

“A salute?”

“A big bang.”

Hari has already compiled a list of ingredients: potassium nitrate, sulfur, barium chlorate and copper powder. I have no idea what this stuff does but I can almost see the fireworks exploding in his eyes.

Forbes looks at the list. “Is this stuff legal?”

“We’re only making three-inch shells.”

It doesn’t answer the question but the detective lets it pass.

Although Samira doesn’t mention the twins, I know she must think about them, just as I do. Rarely does a minute pass when my mind doesn’t drift back to them. I can feel their skin against my lips and see their narrow rib cages moving with each breath. The baby girl had trouble breathing. Perhaps her lungs weren’t fully developed. We have to find her.

Forbes has opened the car door and waits for Samira to sit in the rear seat. She is wearing her new clothes—a long woolen skirt and white blouse. She looks so composed. Still. There is a landscape inside her that I will never reach.

“You won’t have to answer questions,” the DI explains. “I’ll help you prepare a statement.”

He drives hunched over the wheel, frowning at the road, as if he hates city traffic. At the same time he talks. With the help of Spijker, he has managed to trace five asylum seekers impregnated at the fertility clinic in Amsterdam who subsequently turned up in the U.K.

“All admit to giving birth and claim the babies were taken from them. They were each given £500 and told their debt had been repaid.”

“Where did they give birth?”

“A private address. They couldn’t give an exact location. They were taken there in the back of a transit van with blacked-out windows. Two of them talked of planes coming in to land.”

“It’s under a flight path?”

“That’s what I figure.”

“Births have to be registered. Surely we can find the babies that way.”

“It’s not as easy as you think. Normally, the hospital or health authority informs the registrar of a birth but not when it happens in a private home or outside of the NHS. Then it’s up to the parents. And how’s this? Mum and Dad don’t even have to turn up at the registry office. They can send along someone else—a witness to the birth or even just the owner of the house.”

“Is that it? What about doctor’s certificates or medical records?”

“Don’t need them. You need more paperwork to register a car than a baby.”

We’re passing the Royal Chelsea Hospital on the Embankment before turning left over Albert Bridge and circling Battersea Park.

“What about Dr. Banerjee?”

“He admits to providing Cate Beaumont with her surplus embryos but claims to have no knowledge of the surrogacy plan. She told him she was transferring to a different fertility clinic with a higher success rate.”

“And you believe him?”

Forbes shrugs. “The embryos belonged to her. She had every right to take them.”

This still doesn’t explain why Banerjee lied to me. Or why he turned up at my father’s birthday party.

“What about Paul Donavon?”

“He did two tours of Afghanistan and six months in Iraq. Won the Queen’s Gallantry Medal. The guy is a bona fide fucking hero.”

Samira hasn’t said a word. Sometimes I feel as if she has turned off or tuned out, or is listening to different voices.

“We are contacting the orphanage in Kabul as well as one in Albania and another in Russia,” says Forbes. “Hopefully they can give us more than just a nickname.”

The conference room is a stark, windowless place, with vinyl chairs and globe lights full of scorched moths. This used to be the old National Criminal Intelligence Service building, now refitted and re-branded to suit the new crime-fighting agency with new initials. Despite the headlines and high-tech equipment, SOCA still strikes me as being rather more Loch Ness than Eliot Ness—chasing shadowy monsters who live in dark places.

Radio reporters have taken up the front row, taping their station logos to the microphones. Press reporters slouch in the middle rows and their TV counterparts are at the rear with whiter teeth and better clothes.

When I did my detective training at Bramshill they sent us in groups to see an autopsy. I watched a pathologist working on the body of a hiker who had been dead for a fortnight.

Holding up a jar, he said, “This little fellow is a sarcophagid fly, but I like to refer to him as a crime reporter. Notice the red boozer eyes and his gray-checked abdomen, which is perfect for hiding food stains. More important, he’s always first to find a corpse…”

Forbes looks at his watch. It’s eleven o’clock. He straightens his tie and tugs at the sleeves of his suit.

“You ready?”

Samira nods.

Flashguns explode and render me blind as I follow Samira to the conference table. Photographers are fighting for position, holding cameras above their heads in a strange jiggling dance.

Forbes holds a chair for Samira, then reaches across the table to a jug of water and pours her a glass. His slightly pockmarked face is bleached by the brightness of the TV lights.

Clearing his throat he begins. “We are investigating the abduction of two newborn babies, a twin boy and girl, born in the early hours of Sunday morning on board a ferry between the Hook of Holland and Harwich. The Stena Britannica docked at 3:36 a.m. GMT and the babies were last seen thirty minutes earlier.”

Flashguns fire in his eyes.

Forbes makes no mention of baby broking or illegal surrogacy. Instead he concentrates on the details of the voyage and abduction. An image of Brendan Pearl is projected onto the screen behind him, along with a detailed description.

“DC Barba was returning from a short stay in Amsterdam when she stumbled upon a people-trafficking operation. She helped deliver the twins but was unable to prevent the babies being taken.

“I want to stress that this is not a domestic dispute and Brendan Pearl is not related to the missing infants. Pearl is on parole after being released as a result of the Good Friday Agreement. He is considered dangerous. We are advising people not to approach him under any circumstances and to call the police if they know his whereabouts. Miss Khan will now make a brief statement.”

He slides the microphone toward Samira. She looks at it suspiciously and unfolds a piece of paper. The flashguns create a wall of light and she stumbles over the first words. Someone shouts for her to speak up. She begins again.

“I wish to thank everyone who has looked after me these past few days, especially Miss Barba for helping me on the ferry when I was having the babies. I am also grateful to the police for all they have done. I ask the man who took the twins to give them back. They are very small and need medical care. Please take them to a hospital or leave them somewhere safe.”

Samira looks up from the page. She’s departing from the script. “I forgive you for this but I do not forgive you for Zala. For this I hope you will suffer eternal agony for every second of every day for the rest of your life.”

Forbes cups his hand over the microphone, trying to stop her. Samira stands to leave. Questions are yelled from the floor.

“Who is Zala?”

“Did you know Brendan Pearl?”

“Why did he take your babies?”

The story has more holes than a Florida ballot card. The reporters sense a bigger story. Decorum breaks down.

“Has there been a ransom demand?”

“How did Pearl get off the ferry with the twins?”

“Do you believe they’re still alive?”

Samira flinches. She’s almost at the door.

“What about names?”

She turns to the questioner, blinking into the flashguns. “A maiden can leave things nameless; a mother must name her children.”

The answer silences the room. People look at one another, wondering what she means. Mothers. Maidens. What does that have to do with anything?

Forbes’s shoulders are knotted with rage.

“That was a fucking disaster,” he mutters as I chase him down the corridor.

“It wasn’t so bad.”

“God knows what they’re going to write tomorrow.”

“They’re going to write about the twins. That’s what we want. We’re going to find them.”

He suddenly stops and turns. “That’s only the beginning.”

“What do you mean?”

“I want you to meet someone.”

“When?”

“Now.”

“The funerals are today.”

“It won’t take long.” He glances ahead of us. Samira is waiting near the lift. “I’ll make sure she gets home.”

Twenty minutes later we pull up outside a Victorian mansion block in Battersea, overlooking the park. Twisting branches of Wisteria, naked and gray, frame the downstairs windows. The main door is open. An empty pram is poised, ready for an excursion. I can hear the mother coming down the stairs. She is attractive, in her early forties. A baby—too old to be one of the twins—rests on her hip.

“Excuse me, Mrs. Piper.”

“Yes?”

“I’m Detective Inspector Forbes. This is DC Barba.”

The woman’s smile fades. Almost imperceptibly she tightens her hold on the child. A boy.

“How old is he?” I ask.

“Eight months.”

“Aren’t you beautiful.” I lean forward. The mother leans away.

“What’s his name?”

“Jack.”

“He looks like you.”

“He’s more like his father.”

Forbes interrupts. “We were hoping to have a brief word.”

“I’m just going out. I have to meet someone.”

“It won’t take long.”

Her gaze flicks from his face to mine. “I think I should call my husband.” Pointedly she adds, “He works for the Home Office.”

“Where did you have your baby?” Forbes asks.

She stutters nervously. “It was a home birth. I’m going upstairs to ring my husband.”

“Why?” asks Forbes. “We haven’t even told you why we’re here, yet you’re anxious about something. Why do you need your husband’s permission to talk to us?”

There is a flaw in the moment, a ripple of disquiet.

Forbes continues: “Have you ever been to Amsterdam, Mrs. Piper? Did you visit a fertility clinic there?”

Backing away toward the stairs, she shakes her head, less in denial than in the vain hope that he’ll stop asking her questions. She is on the stairs. Forbes moves toward her. He’s holding a business card. She won’t take it from him. Instead he leaves it in the pram.

“Please ask you husband to phone me.”

I can hear myself apologizing for bothering her. At the same time I want to know if she paid for a baby. Who did she pay? Who arranged it? Forbes has hold of my arm, leading me down the steps. I imagine Mrs. Piper upstairs on the phone, the tears and the turmoil.

“Their names came up among the files Spijker sent me,” Forbes explains. “They used a surrogate. A girl from Bosnia.”

“Then it’s not their baby.”

“How do we prove that? You saw the kid. Paternity tests, DNA tests, blood samples—every one of them will show that young Jack belongs to the Pipers. And there isn’t a judge in this country who would give us permission to take samples in the first place.”

“We can prove they visited an IVF clinic in the Netherlands. We can prove their embryos were implanted in a surrogate. We can prove that it resulted in a pregnancy and a successful birth. Surely that’s enough.”

“It doesn’t prove that money changed hands. We need one of these couples to give evidence.”

He hands me a list of names and addresses:

Robert Helena PiperAlan Jessica CaseTrevor Toni JuryAnaan Lola SinghNicholas Karin Pederson

“I have interviewed the other four couples. In each case they have called a lawyer and stuck to their story. None of them are going to cooperate—not if it means losing their child.”

“They broke the law!”

“Maybe you’re right, but how many juries are going to convict? If that was your friend back there, holding her baby, would you take it away from her?”