Douglas Kennedy - A Special Relationship

I was so pleasantly stunned - and touched - by this out-of-nowhere transatlantic call that I mumbled a huge thank you, and asked her to come over for lunch as soon as she was back. Then I called Sandy in Boston and told her the news.

'That is amazing', she said, genuinely excited. 'I mean, the fact that she saw you at home with Jack is going to count for an enormous amount. And since it is her job to see how mothers are coping with their newborns, her opinion is going to carry a lot of professional weight. By the way, how did it go with Jack yesterday?'

Leave it to my sister to remember exactly when I had my supervised visit with Jack.

'He seems to recognize me now', I said. 'Or maybe I'm deluding myself'.

'No - babies do get a sense of who's around them'.

'Which means that Jack most certainly thinks of that woman as his mom'.

'He's only a few months old', Sandy said. 'He doesn't know who's who yet'.

'You're trying to humour me'.

'Yes. I am', she said. 'But the fact that he seems to know who you are... well, isn't that a great sign that you're bonding... ?'

Bonding. That word again.

'Yes, we're bonding all right... considering that we only have an hour a week to bond. Still Clarice - the woman who supervises the visits - seems pleased. So does Jessica Law - who's doing...'

'I know: the CAFCASS report for the court...'

'You do impress me'.

'Hey, I hang on to every detail you give me. But here's a question you should ask Ms Law the next time you see her: why hasn't Tony once contacted you?'

'That's a simple one', I said. 'Because he's a total coward'.

'Without question. But why you should ask Ms Law about it is because, as she's interviewing both parties in this case, she's probably in pretty regular contact with Tony. And if you sense she thinks you're all right... well, why not tell her that you're a little surprised not to have received any sort of communication from your husband? In the future you will have to be in close consultation about Jack's upbringing, no matter which one of you ends up getting residence. You see what I'm getting at here?'

I did - and so did Nigel Clapp. Without prompting from me, he raised exactly the same point the next day when I called him to congratulate him on tracking down Jane Sanjay.

'Oh, right', he said.

'But you must have spent so much time trying to figure out where she was. I mean, the legal assistant at Lawrence and Lambert didn't seem to have any luck whatsoever, since Jane was moving around Canada all the time'.

'Moving around? Really?' He sounded even more bemused. 'Because what she told me was that she had been working at the Jasper Park Lodge for the past four months. And, uhm, finding her was... well, it took two phone calls. The first to the Council. I explained who I was, and why I needed to speak with her. And although they didn't know where to find her, they said they'd call her mother on my behalf - since mothers usually know where to find their daughters. Which, uhm, turned out to be the case here. The Council gave Mrs Sanjay my number. She called me. We talked. She gave me her daughter's number in Canada. I called her. We talked. And she agreed to be a witness on your behalf at the Final Hearing. Oh, and... uhm... just in case she gets delayed in Canada or can't make it to the hearing on the day in question, I contacted the Law Society of Canada, and found the name of a solicitor in the town of Jasper, and spoke with him yesterday. He'll be taking a sworn affidavit from Ms Sanjay later in the week - which he'll also have notarized, to make certain it's admissible in an English court of law. But that's just a precautionary measure on my part'.

Then, with what almost seemed like a slight laugh, he said, 'I am just a bit on the cautious side'.

He also informed me that almost all the other people I had listed in my email had been interviewed by Mrs Keating.

'Who's Mrs Keating?' I asked.

'Oh, you don't know Mrs Keating?'

'Uh, no...', I said, stopping myself from adding: 'surely if I knew her, I wouldn't be asking you'.

'Maybe I didn't introduce you?'

'But where would I have met her?'

'At my office. You were here how many times?'

'Once'.

'Is that all?'

'Absolutely'.

'Rose Keating is my secretary'.

Well, that took some effort to get out of him.

'And she interviewed all the social services people?'

'Uh, yes. She's very good at that sort of thing'.

'I'm sure she is', I said. 'Are you happy with the new statements?'

'Happy?' he asked, as if he didn't understand the meaning of the word. 'I think they're fine, yes. But happy... ?'

There was a long existential pause on the telephone line as he pondered the semantic implications of 'happy'. God, this man was work. From our brief association to date, I could see that I would probably never understand him, let alone get to know him. After our initial meeting, all business was conducted by phone - and on the one or two occasions when I suggested I stop by and see him for a chat, he sounded almost horrified, telling me, 'No need to trouble yourself coming all the way to Balham'. I sensed he was very aware of his profound social awkwardness, his verbal hesitancy, his almost autistic inability to make even the most minor emotional connection with a client. But I now knew that he was very good at what he did - exceptionally thorough and considered. I was certain that, behind all the awkwardness, there was a private man of some emotional complexity and feeling - he did have a wife and kids, after all. But he would never let me (or probably any other client) be privy to that side of him. It wasn't as if he was one of those much doted-upon English eccentrics who played to the gallery when it came to their idiosyncrasies. No, Nigel Clapp wasn't quaint or quirky - he was downright strange. Unnervingly so... given that he was my one hope out of this nightmare.

And yet, little by little, I was beginning to trust him.

'Mr Clapp, are you still there?' I asked.

'I suppose so', he said. 'So there was something else to discuss, wasn't there?'

'I don't know, Mr Clapp', I said respectfully. 'You called me'.

'That's right, I did. Now... uhm... I think you should write a letter. You don't mind me saying that, do you?'

'No, if it is your professional opinion that I should write a letter that would be beneficial to my case, I'll write the letter. I just need to know to whom I should write the letter'.

'To your husband. I'd like to establish... uhm... that you want contact with him as regards your son's well-being in his new home... as regards how this Ms Dexter is treating him, and what his plans are for the future. I'd also like to suggest that you propose a face-to-face meeting... just the two of you... to discuss Jack's future'.

'But I really don't want to meet him right now, Mr Clapp. I don't think I could face him'.

'I can appreciate that. But... uhm... unless I am mistaken... and I could be mistaken, I have been mistaken in the past, I do make mistakes... uhm... I don't think he'll want to see you. Guilt, you see. He'll feel guilty. Unless I am wrong...'

'No', I said. 'I don't think you're wrong. In fact, my sister had a similar idea'.

'About what?' he asked. And I dropped the subject before things got more confused.

But that evening I did write the letter.

Dear Tony

I cannot begin to articulate the grief you have caused me. Nor can I fathom how you could have betrayed me and your son in such a ferocious, self-serving way. You used my illness - a temporary clinical condition, from which I am now largely recovered - as a means by which to snatch my son from me, and reinvent your life with a woman whom you were obviously seeing while I was pregnant with your son. The fact that you then manipulated the facts of my post-partum depression to claim that I was a danger to Jack is unspeakable both in its cunning and its cruelty.