did.
I think that, sometime in that first week, Laurie began to forgive herself for the primal sin-as she saw it-of losing faith in her own son, of doubting his innocence during the trial. You could see it in the way she began to loosen up around him. This was an internal struggle for her; she had nothing to reconcile with Jacob, since he never knew about her doubts, let alone that she had actually been afraid of him. Only Laurie could forgive herself. Personally, I did not see it as such a big deal. As betrayals go, this was a small one, and understandable in the circumstances. Maybe you have to be a mother to know why she took it so hard. All I can say is that, as Laurie began to feel better, our whole family began to return to its normal rhythm. Our family orbited around Laurie. Always had.
We quickly settled into a few routines, as people must, even in dreamworlds like Waves. My favorite ritual was to watch the sunset from the beach as a family. Every evening, we brought beers down with us and dragged three beach chairs to the water’s edge so we could sit with our feet in the water. Hope joined us to watch the sunset once, seating herself tactfully beside Laurie like a lady-in-waiting attending her queen. But generally it was just us three Barbers. Around us in the dimming light, little children would play in the sand and the shallow water, toddlers, even a few babies and their young parents. Gradually the beach would get quieter as the other guests left to get ready for dinner. The lifeguards would drag the empty beach chairs across the sand and stack them for the night, making a clatter, and finally the lifeguards themselves would leave, and only a few sunset gazers would linger on the beach. We would look out into the distance, where two arms of land reached out to encircle the little bay, and the horizon would burn yellow then red then indigo.
Looking back on it now, I picture my happy family of three sitting on that beach at sunset and I want to freeze the story there. We must have looked so normal, Laurie and Jacob and me, so much like all the other partyers and suburbanites at that resort. We must have seemed just like everyone else, which, when you get down to it, is all I ever really wanted.
Mr. Logiudice: And then?
Witness: And then-
Mr. Logiudice: Then what happened, Mr. Barber?
Witness: The girl disappeared.
40
Evening was coming on now. Outside, daylight was withdrawing, the sky going dull, the familiar sunless gray sky of a cold spring in New England. The grand-jury room, no longer flooded with clear sunlight, went yellow under the fluorescent lights.
The jurors’ attention had come and gone the last few hours, but now they sat up attentively. They knew what was coming.
I had been in the chair testifying all day. I must have looked a little haggard. Logiudice circled me excitedly, like a boxer sizing up a woozy opponent.
Mr. Logiudice: Do you have any information about what happened to Hope Connors?
Witness: No.
Mr. Logiudice: When did you learn she had vanished?
Witness: I don’t recall exactly. I remember how it began. We got a call in our room at the resort around dinnertime. It was Hope’s mother, asking if she was with Jacob. They had not heard from her all afternoon.
Mr. Logiudice: What did you tell her?
Witness: That we hadn’t seen her.
Mr. Logiudice: And Jacob? What did he say about it?
Witness: Jake was with us. I asked him if he knew where Hope was. He said no.
Mr. Logiudice: Was there anything unusual about Jacob’s reaction when you asked him that question?
Witness: No. He just shrugged. There was no reason to worry. We all figured she’d probably just gone off to explore. Probably she lost track of time. There was no cell phone reception there, so the kids were constantly disappearing. But the resort was very safe. It was completely fenced in. No one could get in to harm her. Hope’s mom wasn’t panicked either. I told her not to worry, Hope would probably be back any minute. Mr. Logiudice: But Hope Connors never did come back.
Witness: No.
Mr. Logiudice: In fact, her body was not found for several weeks, isn’t that right? Witness: Seven weeks. Mr. Logiudice: And when it was found? Witness: The body was washed up on the shore several miles away from the resort. She drowned, apparently. Mr. Logiudice: Apparently? Witness: When a body is in the water that long-It had deteriorated. My understanding is that it had also been fed on by marine life. I don’t know for certain; I was not privy to that investigation. Suffice it to say, the body did not yield much evidence. Mr. Logiudice: The case is considered an unsolved homicide? Witness: I don’t know. It shouldn’t be. There’s no evidence to support that. The evidence suggests only that she went swimming and drowned.
Mr. Logiudice: Well, that’s not quite true, is it? There is some evidence that Hope Connors’s windpipe was crushed before she went into the water.
Witness: That inference is not supported by the evidence. The body was badly degraded. The cops down there-there was so much pressure, so much media. That investigation was not conducted properly.
Mr. Logiudice: That happened quite a bit around Jacob, didn’t it? A murder, a botched investigation. He must have been the unluckiest boy.
Witness: Is that a question? Mr. Logiudice: We’ll move on. Your son’s name has been widely linked to the case, hasn’t it?
Witness: In the tabloids and some sleazy websites. They’ll say anything for money. There’s no profit in saying Jacob was innocent.
Mr. Logiudice: How did Jacob react to the girl’s disappearance? Witness: He was concerned, of course. Hope was someone he cared about.
Mr. Logiudice: And your wife?
Witness: She was also very, very concerned.
Mr. Logiudice: That’s all, “very, very concerned”?
Witness: Yes.
Mr. Logiudice: Isn’t it fair to say she concluded Jacob had something to do with that girl’s disappearance?
Witness: Yes.
Mr. Logiudice: Was there anything in particular that convinced her of this?
Witness: There was something that happened at the beach. It was the day the girl disappeared. Jacob got there-this was late afternoon, to watch the sunset-and he sat on my right. Laurie was on my left. We said, “Where’s Hope?” Jacob said, “With her family, I guess. I haven’t seen her.” So we made some kind of joke-I think it was Laurie who asked-if everything was all right between them, if they’d had a fight. He said no, he just hadn’t seen her for a few hours. I-
Mr. Logiudice: Andy? Are you all right?
Witness: Yeah. Sorry, yes. Jake-he had these spots on his bathing suit, these little red spots.
Mr. Logiudice: Describe the spots. Witness: They were spatters.
Mr. Logiudice: What color? Witness: Brownish red.
Mr. Logiudice: Blood spatters? Witness: I don’t know. I didn’t think so. I asked him what it was, what did he do to his bathing suit? He said he must have dripped something he’d been eating, ketchup or something.
Mr. Logiudice: And your wife? What did she think of the red spatters?
Witness: She didn’t think anything at the time. It was nothing, because we didn’t know the girl was missing yet. I told him to just go jump in the water and swim around until the bathing suit was clean.
Mr. Logiudice: And how did Jacob react?
