‘I know you will be asking yourselves: why didn’t we call an ambulance, why were we behaving as if she was guilty when we didn’t believe that she was? There are many things that can be said or doubted or condemnedin hindsight, I am only able to tell you what happened. I wish it was different – of course I do; everyone does – but it is not possible to change the past or the terrible mistakes I made that day.
‘Naturally, as I was not there when my friends went into the house, I can only repeat what they told me later. As soon as they realized it was too late to save the twins, they wrapped them up and carried them out to the car. One of them called me, and I gave instructions of where they must go from there. Then I rang Nicole to tell her to return to the house.
‘The shock of finding them gone, even though she’d known they would be, sent her over the edge again. I insisted she must ring her mother, using the landline, then she must somehow get rid of her mobile phone before anyone else came into the house – and that if the police ever asked about it, she should say she didn’t have one. I had to ring off then to make more calls. I told her I loved her, that everything would be all right and that I would be there very soon.’
CRISTY: ‘Did she know the friends you sent?’
MEIER: ‘Yes, but she didn’t see them, and I’ve never told her who came, only that she can be sure the twins were treated well at the end.’
He pressed his fingers to his eyes, and it was plain to see that exhaustion and shame were coming over him in waves. Perhaps a certain amount of disbelief too, that this nightmare really had happened and that he was still living it all these years later on a remote Welsh hillside.
MEIER: ‘I called my grandmother, here at the farm, hoping she would help. If you’d known her, you’d understand why I turned to her, but her character, theway she saw the world, is for another time. She told me that if I could be certain the twins were mine, she would see to things. If not, then they must be taken care of by their father. So I ordered a paternity test to be delivered to the farm and booked myself on a flight.
‘The test arrived, I provided samples, and then I drove over to the house, hoping to see Nicole. The place was surrounded by press and police … I found Lauren in the crowd, but we had no time to talk before a detective called her over. I realized that by being there, I could end up making things worse for Nicole and for myself, so I returned to the airport and flew back to Switzerland. I’d been gone for less than twenty-four hours.
‘A week later, my grandmother received confirmation that I was – I am – the twin’s father. It was she who decided that we should bury them with her husband, my step-grandfather. He had passed not so long before that, so she thought it shouldn’t be difficult to dig a little way into his grave. She waited for me to return to Wales, and between us we created a small casket for the bodies, then we brought them here to the church late one night to lay them to rest.’
His eyes were swimming in tears, and grief was tearing at his voice, stealing it into bouts of silence. The guilt, the shame he felt for his actions was almost palpable, and Cristy was so appalled by the scenes he was conjuring that she herself was beyond words.
A long time passed with only the chirping of birds puncturing the awful quiet, along with the distant bleating of sheep.
MEIER: ‘To be sure they weren’t disturbed when my grandmother’s time came, her body was cremated so that only her ashes were put into the grave. And thesmall plaque that is there now, attached to the foot of the headstone … I added it after I took the farm over. As far as I know, no one has ever noticed it. Certainly no one has ever asked.’
The grave would have to be opened up quite soon, and Cristy wondered if he’d already prepared himself for it, if anyone could ever prepare for something like that. She strongly doubted it.
When it was clear he wasn’t going to speak again, she said:
CRISTY: ‘Did you have any contact with Nicole at all after her arrest?’
He didn’t answer right away, simply shook his head, seeming to fail to take a breath when he tried.
MEIER: ‘I fully expected her to tell them what had really happened. I was bracing myself for it the whole time, almost wishing it would happen, but it didn’t. I found out later that she had got it stuck in her head that the twins really had been taken. It’s a dissociative disorder, often brought on by PTSD, where a person cannot let go of a belief that protects them from a devastating truth. Of course theyhadbeen taken, if you want to look at it that way, but it was not an abduction.
‘So when she was charged with their murder, she just kept saying that someone had come into the house and taken them away.
‘We – I – had created an impossible situation that I couldn’t see a way out of, but I was certain, if it came to it, that a jury wouldn’t – couldn’t – find her guilty when there was no evidence to prove she’d harmed the twins.I was wrong, of course, because they did. That was the worst day of both our lives – apart from losing the twins, obviously.’
CRISTY: ‘So why didn’t you admit it then? Surely whatever came next would have been better than her being sent to prison for a crime she hadn’t committed?’
MEIER: ‘You are right, but although I might have been believed about the cover up, I had not been there when they died, so how could I be certain she hadn’t done it on purpose? I’m sure it’s what Maggi believes, but I know differently, because I know Nicole. The lies, the concealment, the use of others to carry out the most terrible crime of taking the twins away … The case against her would become more damning than ever, and with no way of proving the truth of what had really happened, combined with the fact that I’d made everything so much worse for her …
‘I should have spoken up anyway, and to hell with what they did to me, but then I would have been in one prison, she in another, and she needed me. Perhaps that doesn’t sound important to you, but it was to her, and to me. There was nothing we could do to bring our children back, and nor could we – or I – see a way to get her released. So all I could do was try to be there for her in every way I could.’
CRISTY: ‘You mean by visiting her regularly?’
MEIER: ‘It wouldn’t have been possible if I’d been locked away too.’
CRISTY: ‘Does she know now that you’re the twins’ father?’
MEIER: ‘Yes, she does.’
CRISTY: ‘And does she still, after all this time, believe they were stolen that day?’
MEIER: ‘Occasionally. Other times, she’ll tell you she killed them, so she deserves her sentence. She has said this many times over the years, but no one in authority has taken the time to believe or even to listen to her. They think she is guilty anyway, so they simply ignore her changing stories, putting them down to an unbalanced mind.’
CRISTY: ‘Has she had mental health assessments during her time in prison?’
MEIER: ‘I believe so, but I have no access to them. What I can tell you is that she spoke about herself so viciously at times that it has made me afraid for what she might do to herself. I’ve talked to her mother about it, and Maeve voiced her concerns to the prison authorities, so there were times when Nicole was on suicide watch.’
