‘And I think Abigail would be nothing like me.’
MEIER: ‘In my mind, she is exactly like you – troublesome, beautiful, strong and vulnerable – and I wouldn’t want her any other way.’
NICOLE: ‘He’s only saying that because I’m sitting here. Really, he imagines her as a concert pianist, an astronaut, a gifted entrepreneur able to turn her hand to anything.’
MEIER: ‘And by the time she’s twenty-five, I expect her to have sorted out the world.’
Nicole laughed, closed her eyes and seemed to fill up withemotion. There were tears in her voice as she continued to speak.
NICOLE: ‘We always know where they are, but at the same time, we don’t know at all, and that’s our greatest punishment.’
As the sadness and loss washed over her, Cristy allowed several moments to pass, recording only the natural sounds around them, while thinking of her own children, so close to the twins in age. How fortunate she’d been to have had them every day of their lives to love and cherish and watch grow into adults. It compounded her sadness for Nicole and made her wish she could do more to help her through what lay ahead.
Feeling Meier’s eyes on her she turned to him and realized he was probably aware of what was going through her mind.
Addressing him she began again.
CRISTY: ‘It must be hard for you right now, knowing you’re going to be sentenced soon. Has your lawyer given you an indication of how long you might have to serve?
MEIER: ‘We’re hoping the sentences, whatever they are, will run concurrently. If not, I could receive up to ten years for the charge of Assisting an Offender, and they think maybe five years for Perverting the Course of Justice. That can carry a life sentence, but no one is expecting it to be so harsh. I just hope they’re right.’
CRISTY: ‘So the worst-case scenario is fifteen years in total – or a maximum of ten if they run concurrently?’
MEIER: ‘That’s right.Donc,une éternité, but by the end of it, hopefully society, at least, will feel that we haveboth paid for what happened to our children and how we kept it hidden from the world.’
NICOLE: ‘It’s a shame that locking us up won’t ever bring them back. I just wish we’d been sent away at the same time; then we wouldn’t have to be parted again.’
As Nicole’s voice turned husky, Meier dropped his head against hers. He spoke so softly that it wasn’t possible to hear what he was saying, but when she turned to him, the way her eyes scanned his face was a clear search for reassurance. He pressed a kiss to her forehead and pulled her in closer.
Cristy glanced at Connor, not sure whether they should continue. Their questions, their very presence was starting to feel like such an intrusion.
MEIER: ‘Would you like to ask anything else?’
CRISTY: ‘If you’re sure you don’t mind.’
MEIER: ‘Please. We wouldn’t have invited you here if we didn’t want to speak.’
Cristy turned to Connor again and was relieved when he took his cue.
CONNOR: ‘Nicole, are you planning to be in court when Claude is sentenced?’
NICOLE: ‘Yes, of course. I can’t let him go through it without me.’
MEIER: ‘I have asked her not to come, but she is determined. My brother also intends to be there, as does Maeve, so she won’t be alone. Will you be there?’
CONNOR: ‘Yes. Obviously, we won’t be recording, butafterwards, we’ll precis the hearing for the end of the episode.’
Meier nodded slowly, thoughtfully and as his eyes came to Cristy’s, she could sense the quiet, immutable inner strength that was going to get him through this, no matter how hard he might find it, but it wasn’t going to be easy – not easy at all.
Very quietly he said, ‘If anyone can perform miracles, now would be a good time.’
Much later, as Cristy and Connor drove back to Bristol, they were silent for a long time. It was hard to put into words everything they were thinking and feeling, the lasting and deepening effect the visit was having on them both. In her mind’s eye, Cristy was seeing Meier and Nicole as if they were ghosts, no longer real as they haunted the Bryn Helyg hillside, the churchyard and even the future. For one awful moment, she wondered if they were devising a suicide pact with instructions to bury them with their children.
Would they? Really?
It would mean they wouldn’t be parted again.
Turning to Connor, she said, ‘Tell me what you’re thinking.’
