“I know. I saw it myself, this morning.”

Boyd nods. “Horrible, right? Abbie had been through something similar herself, back in the rehab unit Tim put her in. But while she’d accepted it for herself, she couldn’t bear the thought of Danny suffering like that.”

“But…” You stop. In the last few hours all your assumptions about Abbie have been turned upside down. Not a bad mother, but a devoted one. Not a party animal, but a parent caught in an impossible position.

“The thing is, I was torn,” Boyd adds. “I could see why she hated that place. But it didn’t seem to me she’d properly thought through the alternative. They were just going to take off and start a new life somewhere, she claimed, like it was easy. But when I pressed her, she didn’t know where or how, or what the arrangements for Danny’s education would be. He’s a vulnerable child. I couldn’t ignore what she was telling me—I could lose my license to practice. I thought if I flagged an issue, at least the police would get an educational psychologist to take a look at Meadowbank and assess whether it really was the right place for Danny.”

“But they didn’t.”

He shakes his head. “The report still hadn’t been acted on by the time she disappeared.”

“So what happened?”

He spreads his hands. “I’m as much in the dark as anyone. Maybe her plans changed. They were pretty vague, after all.”

You wonder if that’s true. The website had walked her through how to set up a new identity, how to live off-grid—

Tell no one what you plan to do, it had instructed. Not even those you trust the most.

“I think she knew exactly where she was going to take Danny,” you say slowly. “She just didn’t want to tell you. It was safer that way.”

Piers Boyd looks hurt, then nods as he sees the sense in what you’re saying. “But if that’s the case, why is Danny still at Meadowbank? And where’s Abbie? What went wrong?”

You shake your head. “That’s what I still don’t understand. But I intend to find out.”

62

Charles Carter comes to his door wearing an old gray cardigan. You weren’t surprised to find him home: He’d said he worked from there. Mergers and acquisitions, mostly.

“Come on in,” he says. He seems genuinely pleased to see you.

You follow him through the house to an office overlooking the beach. There are three computer screens on his desk, arranged like mirrors on a dressing table. One displays a stock-trading screen. A second is for Skype. The largest, the one in the middle, displays what looks like a contract he’s drafting. But it’s the picture on the wall behind the screens your eye is drawn to. It shows the view of the ocean from the boardwalk below, painted in a vibrant, almost street-art style, the waves reduced to abstract, clashing triangles of energy. In one corner you can just make out his boat, the Maggie.

Like the mural in Tim’s office, you think. You go over and look for the looping, flamboyant signature. Abbie Cullen-Scott.

“It’s good to see you again,” Charles Carter says. “There aren’t many people around at this time of year. I won’t deny it does get somewhat lonely out here.”

You indicate the painting. “Was that how she paid you?”

“Abbie?” He looks amused. “Why would she need to pay me?”

“For setting up a corporation.”

Carter takes off his reading glasses and twirls them in his hand, looking at you thoughtfully.

“That was the part she’d have needed help with,” you add. “Most of the instructions she was trying to follow were straightforward—leave your phone on a bus, stop using credit cards, that kind of stuff. The tricky bit was setting up a legal entity that could rent a house and sign up for utilities and so on, without her name being attached to it. I’m guessing she came to you for that.”

Charles Carter raises his eyebrows. You outwait him.

“That’s conjecture,” he says at last.

“I’m extremely good at conjecture. Intuitive thinking is what I was built for.”

“It’s always good to have a purpose,” he murmurs. “And indeed, to know what that purpose is.”

“For a while back there, I thought you might have been sleeping with her,” you add. “But now I think I was falling into the trap of looking at everything the way Tim does. I’m guessing you simply liked each other. Two lonely people who, in their different ways, had each lost the person they loved most in this world…And as you said yourself, you owed her a favor, for sorting out the leases here with Tim.”

“If I owed Abbie a favor, there’d have been no need to pay me with a painting, would there?” he points out.

“But she gave you one anyway.” You think for a moment. “Not as payment, then. As something to remember her by.”

His eyes travel to the painting. “Abbie Cullen was one of the kindest, sweetest people I ever met,” he says quietly. “Sure—she struggled when Danny regressed like that. But more to the point, she had to decide where her loyalties lay. She’d been able to live with her husband when he was the only demanding man in her life. When there were two demanding men…”

You see the way his expression softens as his eyes drop to the signature, and you’re sure now you have it right.

“If I did have any professional dealings with Abbie, they’d be privileged,” he adds. “But I will say this. I think she made the right decision.”

* * *

—

“I need you to look for emails from a man called Charles Carter,” you tell Nathan. “Or anything on the iPad suggesting he helped Abbie set up a corporation.”

You’ve dropped by the phone shop on your way home. Nathan looked surprised to see you. But not so surprised that he didn’t immediately go and lock the street door.

“Come in the back,” he says.

Once there, you endure the now-familiar routine of him plugging a cable into your hip.

“Here,” he adds, handing you a printout. It’s thinner than the last one—only two sheets. “This is what I’ve unscrambled since yesterday. It’s part of her search history.”

Quickly you scan the page.

μ Treatments for autism

μ Do B14 injections help autism?

? autism special diet X?? chelation therapy

Anxiety autism

Heller syndrome organic diet

€?

Can stem cell infusions cure autism

Positive Autism

#Positive Autism Dr. Eliot P. Laurence

Dr. Eliot P. Laurence Contact

“She was looking for a cure,” you say. “That’s hardly surprising.”

“Uh-huh,” Nathan says, his eyes on his screen.

“What’s this? Positive Autism?”

“Beats me,” he murmurs.

“Look it up.” When he doesn’t react, you say impatiently, “Look it up on the internet now, or I’m disconnecting.”

“No—wait.” Nathan opens a browser and types Positive Autism wiki, then turns the screen so you can see.

Positive Autism is an approach to autism and other developmental disabilities developed by Dr. Eliot P. Laurence, PhD.[1] Parents and facilitators are taught to see autistic behaviors not as aberrant or “wrong,” but as necessary coping mechanisms for an overstimulating world.[2]

Using a combination of proven healing interventions, including qigong massage, art therapy, toxin-free diets, and sensory integration techniques, Dr. Laurence’s seminars, books, and the many charitable foundations that use his methods have helped thousands of people with this condition to increased quality of life.[3]

The external links include a website. “Click on that,” you tell Nathan.

The page that comes up shows a picture of a ranch. Kids—clearly with learning disabilities, but smiling—are riding horses, hiking, and having massages. At the top it says:

Our goal is not to make people “less autistic”; it is to make the world less troubling for people with autism.

You scan the page quickly. “Now click on CONTACT.”

Sighing, Nathan does as you ask. “And that’s it,” he adds sulkily as you memorize the details. “You’ve had your turn.”

While he peers at the code flowing across his screen, occasionally scribbling a note, you think about what you’ve just read. It seems clear now that Danny’s diagnosis opened up a hidden fault line in Tim and Abbie’s marriage. You can imagine her showing him the Wikipedia article you’ve just read, and what his response would have been. If this stuff really worked, don’t you think someone would have peer-reviewed it by now? Successful treatments for autism aren’t so common they get ignored. If there’s no clinical trial, it’s bullshit. Nice-sounding bullshit, admittedly—but it won’t make our son any better.

On the other hand, at least this Dr. Laurence isn’t giving his students electric shocks. Is reducing the appearance of stress really such a good thing, if the student is actually terrified? Just what do people mean when they talk about “treating” autism anyway?

These must be the exact same questions that went through Abbie’s mind five years ago, you realize.

“Beautiful,” Nathan murmurs. His fingers tap the keyboard, and there’s a shutter-closing sound. He’s taken a screenshot.

“That’s enough,” you tell him sharply. “Time’s up.”

63