Dead Astronauts by Patrick Whittaker

9:03 It was a compact room, cluttered yet tidy. Books and magazines standing to attention on the mantelpiece.

Scrapbooks and CDs in boxes under the bed. A set of blue pyjamas folded neatly on the pillow. It was a snapshot of a young girl’s mind, a movie frozen in time.

‘Please don’t touch anything,’ repeated Charles Lawford. Unable to bring himself to enter the room, he was on the landing with his back to the door.

A Betty Boop alarm clock sat on the bedside locker and I wondered in a vague way if it was worth anything.

‘I’ve seen enough,’ I said and we went down to the living room where Lawford poured us both a brandy.

‘Now you know what kind of a girl Jenny is,’ said Lawford. We sat in armchairs separated by a sofa. He was a squat man with narrow eyes and a red birthmark just visible beneath his thin, greasy hair. ‘That room hasn’t been touched since she disappeared. It’s exactly how she left it.’ His eyes were fixed on the grandfather clock in the corner of the room.

I allowed myself to be briefly hypnotized by the lazy swing of the pendulum, the relentless tick-tock of the clock’s mechanism. A small second hand with its own circle of numbers shuddered from one numeral to the next.

‘She’s a good girl,’ said Lawford. ‘Well-behaved, level-headed and sensible. She would never have run away.’

Although I was Lawford’s next door neighbour, I scarcely knew the man and was baffled as to why he had invited me into his house. It wasn’t for the company, I was sure of that - though he could hardly be blamed for not wanting to be alone. Two months had passed since his daughter had disappeared. There wasn’t much about it in the press – three column inches on page seven of a tabloid, a quarter page article with a fuzzy picture of Jenny in the local rag. The general consensus was that Jenny was just another teen runaway who was bound to turn up sooner or later.

For the first week or so, the police had made a show of concern. They’d sent someone each morning to ask if Jenny had returned and to assure the Lawfords they were still looking for her.

When the police stopped coming, the rows started. Night after night, sounds of anger, bitterness and recrimination found their way through the connecting wall into my living room. Mr and Mrs Lawford blamed each other for the disappearance of their daughter. Neither was willing to admit that some portion of the fault might be their own; neither seemed to consider that there might be no fault at all. Twice the police were called to calm things down.

It was a relief to the entire neighbourhood when Mrs Lawford packed her bags and left.

I polished off my brandy and got to my feet. ‘I really ought to be going.’

Charles Lawford was alarmed. ‘Five more minutes,’ he pleaded. ‘Have another brandy, Houghton. Just five minutes.’

As I sat back down, his gaze returned to the grandfather clock. Two minutes past nine.

‘The police don’t believe me,’ he said. ‘They think I’m mad. I need you as a witness.’

‘To what?’ I asked.

Lawford placed a finger to his lips. His left hand bobbed up and down in sympathy with the second hand of the grandfather clock. ‘Always three minutes past,’ he said. ‘Please say nothing. I don’t want you to scare her away.’

The second hand reached the perpendicular. 9.03. Lawford looked triumphant. ‘There! What did I tell you? Bang on time.’

He grabbed the telephone and placed it to his ear. ‘Yes, darling,’ he said after a few moments. ‘Daddy can hear you.’

He cocked his head as if straining to catch the words of his caller. I was aware of the ticking of the clock and the steady hum of the ring tone. ‘But where are you, darling? I know it’s dark but you must be able to tell if you’re inside or out. Please don’t cry. I’ll find you. Daddy will find you.’

Again he listened. Listened to the ring tone. Listened to an imaginary voice playing in his head. ‘Mummy loves you too but she’s had to go away... It’s not your fault. None of it is... No! Don’t go! Don’t hang up.’

9