“When the police came to investigate her disappearance, they photographed everything in the cabin. And everything outside of the cabin.”
“I know,” Carrie nods. “I remember.”
“So, you remember that they took pictures inside the trash containers of all the cabins,” I note.
“No,” she says. “Actually, I didn't realize they took pictures of the trash. Why would they do that?”
“Being thorough,” I say. “Covering all the bases. So, I was looking at all of the pictures and I noticed the bowl of strawberry tops on the kitchen table of the cabin where you were staying.”
“Yes,” she says. “I just told you I had strawberries on my oatmeal. Travis did, too.”
“He described them as sliced strawberries. Does that sound familiar to you?” I ask.
“They were probably sliced,” she notes. “Why does it matter?
“The bowl of strawberries on the table in the cabin was just of the tops of the berries. As though it wasn't a serving bowl, but a bowl to collect the discards. But if you look really closely, you can see that there are a couple of whole berries in there as well. Now, when the investigators took pictures of the trash at all the cabins, how many places do you think had strawberries in them?”
“I don't know,” she says. “Strawberries are popular. So, a lot of them?” she asks.
I shake my head. “One. And it wasn't yours. The cabin next door to yours had two strawberries in it. The thing is, Adrian Slatton had just gotten to the campground and was actually bringing the trash out when he heard the scream he told the police about. It wasn't long after that when you got to his cabin to tell him that Violet was missing.”
"Okay. I'm not following," she says.
“The strawberries were on the bottom of the trash container. They're visible in the picture, but it's very clear they went in before the trash. But nobody had been staying in that cabin for days, and the strawberries were fresh. And there was something interesting about them. You know what that was?” I ask.
“I'm done playing this game,” Carrie says, starting to turn around.
“Teeth marks,” I say, making her stop. She leaves her back to me, but I continue. “The strawberries in the bowl were sliced cleanly. But the two in the trash container had been bitten. It's as if they were eaten outside and then tossed away. Obviously, they were not preserved so there can't be any DNA testing. But if there was, what do you think it would say?”
Cary's shoulders drop and she slowly turns around to face me.
“She never understood why she wasn't allowed to eat strawberries. You see them in every movie, every TV show. Every cereal commercial, there they are. They’re such a normal part of life. And she was so little, she just couldn't really understand it. But she was good about not eating things when I told her not to. But then Travis tried to give her berries at breakfast. I stopped him before he did, but it caused a little bit of an argument. Not that that was really unusual.”
“Things weren't good between you two?” I ask.
“No,” Carrie says. “That's not it. As I told you, we were happy. There were just challenges. Some parts of our relationship were harder than others. Violet was one of those parts.
“When we got to the cabin after going to the lake, Travis went out to get things ready to make lunch. I was rinsing the suits and keeping an eye on Violet in the mirror. She was playing, then a second later, she wasn't there. It literally was the amount of time it took me to look down and rinse one of the suits, then look up again.”
“She went out the back door,” I say.
Carry nods. “That was one of the features of the cabin my parents loved so much. Not all of them have back doors. My father was adamant about fire safety and wouldn't stay in a place with no back door. We honestly didn't use it that summer so I doubt Travis remembers it, but she knew where it was. That wasn't the first thing I thought of. I went out to the front to check and see if she was with Travis. I figured maybe he opened the door and gestured for her to join him. Or called to her and I just didn't hear it over the water. But she wasn't out there.
“I didn't even see Travis. He was getting wood for the fire. That's when I went to the back of the cabin. I found Violet on the ground, holding those two strawberries. I already knew. I didn't even have to get close to her. I knew. That scream Adrian heard? That was me.”
“Walk me through your thoughts. What did you do?” I ask.
“Not what I should have done,” Carrie says. “I should have reached out to the rangers. Figured out a way to call the police. But when I saw her, something clicked in me. She was gone by the time I got there. There was nothing I could do about that. But maybe I could use this to bring Travis and me closer together. I figured if our daughter was missing, it would be just the two of us, and we’d bond. It would strengthen our relationship. A lot of good that did me, huh?”
“What did you do?” I ask.
"I wasn't even thinking,” she says. “I know that sounds crazy, but I wasn't. I just went into this instinctive mode. I started acting before I knew exactly what was going on. I threw away the strawberries. I didn't want them in our trash, and I didn't think for a second about Adrian. I tossed them in and hurried to tuck Violet out of sight.
I had to move her around a few times before taking her to the cavern. I obviously didn't want anybody to find her. But, finally, it was time, and I was able to bring her
