Chapter 8
“Who’s that kid on the porch with May?” Carey said.
“Her name is Katie Barnes, the girl I’m thinking of hiring to help me with May. I’m paying her for two days so May and I can get to know her better.”
Carey looked out the window at the girl.
She was in the rocking chair holding May in a sling and talking to her, apparently about a rubber ring toy she held up.
Their faces were about eighteen inches apart and they appeared to be both talking at once, although May was far too young for that to be true. “How old is she?” he said.
“Old enough. She was the eldest daughter in a big family, so she got years of meaningful experience at baby care. Much more than I had when May was born.”
“When I asked, I was thinking about a numerical age. You know, a number of candles on a birthday cake. Something between one and say, sixteen.”
“Sixteen,” Jane said. “Good eye.”
“I do take patients of all ages. Is it even legal to employ a sixteen-year-old?” Carey said.
“Yes. I looked it up. The New York State Department of Labor says no more than six days a week, eight hours a day, between 6:00 A.M. and midnight. We would never come close to having a kid do anything like that. Oh yeah, and we’re required to post her schedule where she can read it.”
“When I suggested you hire a helper, I was thinking of somebody more like a wise grandma, not a teenager.”
“Okay. Got one? Me either. Also, no PhDs in child development, no registered nurses, or retired teachers.” Jane faced him.
“You know, maybe we should just skip this. I’m fine with raising our child by ourselves.
We can save the money for later, to pay for orthodontists, driver training, martial arts, piano lessons. ”
“And med school, yes. I’m just trying to get used to the idea,” Carey said.
Jane went to the refrigerator, took a sheet of paper that was held there by a magnet, and handed it to Carey. He looked it over. “Be available from four P.M. to six P.M.”
“That’s when I shop and cook dinner.”
“How did you arrive at fifteen dollars an hour?”
“I didn’t. That’s the minimum wage in this part of New York State. We’ll pay her more, but we have to look as though we know what we’re doing, or the authorities will feel like they have to explain everything. We’ll also provide meals and a bedroom.”
He put the sheet back on the refrigerator. “If she’s okay with you she’s fine with me, but I don’t need to tell you that if you start to feel any doubt about the decision, I want to know about it right away.”
“Of course.”
“What about school?” Carey looked out the window and saw Katie playing peekaboo with May on a blanket. “Doesn’t she go to school?”
“She’s enrolled in a mostly online GED program to finish high school, but I’ll be trying to persuade her to enroll in the regular in-person version, at least. That takes us until about the time when May will be ready for preschool.
By then Katie will be ready for a new start herself. Maybe college.”
“What about her family?”
“A dismal story followed by a few failed placements in foster care. I promised I’d respect her privacy about the specifics.” She leaned close to Carey and whispered, “I don’t know how much is accurate, but I sense the truth is worse rather than better.”
“Okay,” he said. “Let me know what I should do.”
“You’ll figure out the right thing, as you always do. Come on out and get introduced.”
They went out the kitchen door, and Jane said, “How are you two doing, Katie?”
“May and I are playing,” she said. “She seems to like it.”
“This is my husband, Dr. McKinnon.”
“Carey,” he said to her. “Pleased to meet you, Katie. Welcome to our home.”
That night Jane spent an hour at her computer checking details of Clare’s story—the bus schedules and fare from St. Louis to Buffalo, the obituary of Dorothy Woods, the name Clare Markham on the list of enrolled members of the Seneca tribe in Oklahoma.
When she found the Google map showing the bus station in St. Louis, she traced her way along the street until she found a movie theater.
The next morning, Jane began constructing a new person.
She started with a blank birth certificate which she filled in with the name Katherine Marie Barnes, and called to report the name to one of the two women she knew who worked in the Cook County, Illinois, records office.
Years ago, they had given her the present of fifty blank certificates and the promise that they would insert corresponding certificates into the official record for her as long as they worked there.
The certificate listed Katherine’s place of birth as Chicago.
Then she moved to school records. Jane had a list of accredited private schools all over the country that had gone bankrupt or been combined with others to make larger schools.
Jane picked one that had gone under when Katherine Barnes would have been about ten, and began to fill in her grades on printed forms. There were registration records, certificates for making the honor roll, belonging to clubs, taking part in plays, choruses, teams. Jane was able to use the computer to alter some genuine group photographs to include Katie Barnes.
There were health forms in which she was certified as having had annual physical exams and immunizations.
Jane had a good supply of forms and folders and envelopes.
She had performed this process before for other runners.
There were early childhood addresses that corresponded with the school’s locations, three of them from her list of addresses that used to be residential but weren’t anything now because of things like highway widening and a new stadium.
The information gathering had been made much easier by the computer-flooded information banks now available, and printing forms with the computer on thick, high rag content paper made them all look more professional and legitimate.
Much of the value was not only that anyone would see it, but the runner could look at it and memorize it, and have a detailed false history.
The project took about a week. Katie Barnes’s history had to resemble Clare’s more and more closely as the records purported to be more recent.
She had to be certified as good at mathematics, because that was Clare’s biggest academic strength, and she would probably get chances to prove it later.
Her math might also get her admitted to more selective science classes.
Clare was very good at Spanish, so Katie was good at Spanish.
Everything had to fit, and each item had to provide Katie with an advantage.
The grades were all good—mostly A’s—because what high grades signified in real-life schools was that the student was not troublesome and had regular attendance.
During the days when Jane and Clare were working on building Katie and talking about what she should be like, they went out walking with May and made her part of the conversation.
There was much knowledge that Jane had to pass on to Katie Barnes about constructing a new life and living as a new person.
She knew how tricky and frightening it could be to a sixteen-year-old.
She was afraid that Katie would get caught in a mistake, and the mistake would be something that Jane had known and hadn’t had the time to teach her.
Jane was helping assemble the information that formed the basis of a new identity.
The identification documents had to start with the sort of information that Jane had prepared, so that all the names, dates, addresses, parents’ names, and so on agreed.
But nobody except a pro could move on to the next step, obtaining or producing the government-controlled certifications—driver’s license, social security card, and ultimately, passport.
She let the time pass, observing Clare every day, and making no quick decisions.
After a few more days, Jane had a new conversation with Clare.
She said, “I’ve been watching you, and I think you’ve figured out what the hardest part of this is.
When Katie is completed and you make her come to life, Clare is supposed to disappear.
That doesn’t have to happen. If you decide to go back and face the legal jeopardy and the risk, I’ll do what I can to help.
I’ll hire you the best lawyers, and that sometimes is enough to win.
Sometimes a jurisdiction that has been sloppy about evaluating potential cases will mysteriously change their minds as soon as they hear who the other side is going to be.
Good lawyers also win on appeal more often.
“If you believe that your last, best hope is to step out of the life of Clare and become Katie, then I’ll help you do that instead.
If you do that, you will pay a different terrible price.
It will never be safe to go back or to communicate with any member of your family again, or any old friend.
The police will be watching them, very closely at first, then less closely, but they will never give up.
A murder case is never closed. By now they know that your best friend disappeared for a couple of days about the time you left, so she’s already under suspicion and being watched and maybe interrogated.
All the people you love and the places you know are off limits.
You are good, brave, and smart. You have what it takes to do this. But you have to want to.”
“What do you think I should do?”
“For now, you should let the things that have happened sink in. Allow your mind to wander over your past life and the life you would like to have. Take your time. You’re safe and you can stay here with us as long as it takes.
If you want to talk, I’ll listen. I’ll answer any question I can.
Right now, I’m going to go out for a while to get us some groceries.
If you feel up to it, I’ll leave May with you. ”
“Sure,” Clare said. “We’ll get along fine, won’t we, May?”
May knew she was being addressed and seemed to like it.
Jane said, “I pumped a while ago, and there’s a fresh bottle in the fridge.
” She walked into the kitchen, picked up her purse, and kept going out the door to prevent May from thinking about it too much.
She went down the path to the garage and drove her car down the driveway and along the road to the Fosters’ house.
The Fosters both worked and their boys were both away in college, so she knew they wouldn’t be at home on a normal weekday.
She parked far back in their driveway and used her cell phone to look at the images from the security cameras in the McKinnon house.
Jane watched Clare and May behaving as they usually did.
Clare picked May up and carried her around the house showing her things that were kept at adult height and talking about them.
May cried and Clare changed her, and then carried her around some more.
She had a conversation with May that seemed to keep her amused.
Jane waited for them to be on the other side of the house, and started her car.
Clare was smart enough to know that the best time to make a private phone call was when Jane had just left, so she wouldn’t come back and catch her at it.
Clare had never gone near the telephones.
All that it proved, really, was that the girl wasn’t stupid.
Jane had already known that much, but it was also comforting to see how good Clare was with May.
After a few minutes Jane admitted to herself that maybe she wasn’t quite as pleased that May liked someone else too.
Jane did the family’s grocery shopping and added several treats and snacks that she guessed Clare would like.