She motioned at Sarah to sit. “You can just sit there, while the search is going on. How many rooms are in this house?”
Puzzled, she closed her eyes, as if counting before saying, “Thirteen.”
“Thirteen rooms?” Sarah nodded. “And how would you judge which room is which, like, for instance, which would you call the thirteenth room?”
“Oh my goodness, that would be the second maid’s quarters.”
“Second maid’s quarters.” She shook her head. “So room twelve would be the first maid’s quarters or something like that? Your maids live-in?”
“Yes, been with us for years.”
“So you’re hoping that you pay them enough to be loyal?”
She stiffened and glared at Kate. “There’s no reason to be insulting.”
“That depends on what you’ve been doing to your daughter,” she said.
“Nothing, absolutely nothing.”
“Meaning?”
“Everything we did is because we love her.”
“And yet you won’t even acknowledge where she is.”
“Because I don’t know,” she cried out passionately.
“And why do you not know?”
“Because I haven’t seen her lately.” She glanced nervously out of the kitchen toward the front entrance.
“You’re afraid your husband’s done something to her?”
Her eyes widened. “No, of course not.”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah.” Kate looked around the kitchen and noted a door on the side. “What’s in there?”
“Nothing, it just leads to the basement.”
“Right.” With one of the other cops walking in to assist Kate, she said, “Sit here with her, please, while I go check out the basement.”
“No, you can’t,” Sarah whined.
Kate turned, gave her a hard look. “Not only can I, but I will,” she snapped. “I’ve had quite enough of you two and your lies and your delays.” And, with that, she headed downstairs. Kate flipped on the light switch. She stopped and looked around at the main room in the basement, leading off to a lot of other rooms, smaller rooms. Kate called out, “Just what all is going on down here?”
“Nothing,” Sarah replied.
“Right.” Kate walked from one room to the next, checking each, while calling out, “Pamela, are you here?”
Only as she got to the other end of the basement did she hear a voice cry out. She opened the door to see a young woman of maybe fourteen. “Hi, who are you?”
“I’m here as maid,” she said in broken English.
Kate stared at her in shock.Surely she’s not the maid who has been here for years. “Are you alone here?”
She shook her head. “No, two more.”
“Great, and how long have you been here?”