Page 20 of The Midnight Carousel

Events spiralled so quickly that Maisie is still coming to terms with being named as the chief suspect in the disappearance of a young girl.

The Crew sprang into action first, hunting through Silver Kingdom for Mary Pickford’s missing niece, Clementine, ahead of anyone else, galvanizing the Ride Jocks and Jointees to help.

It felt all too similar to the dreadful afternoon Billy had vanished.

Fruitless searching turned hope into panic.

The police arrived and a loop of questions followed.

One week later, Maisie was brought to this place, the lock-up, for a more extensive interrogation.

It isn’t prison, just somewhere to hold you until you’ve been properly questioned, it was explained.

She was also given the choice of which visitors to receive.

Ashamed of causing so much trouble, Maisie has point-blank refused to see any of the servants or Sir Malcolm or Mrs Papadopoulos, with the last arriving at the front desk every morning in the hope of being admitted, only to be turned away on Maisie’s instructions.

The sole person granted access from the outside world is the lawyer that Sir Malcolm engaged.

Mr Peabody has sat by her side in a mildew-scented interview room four times in the past three days, while two agents from the Bureau of Investigation have grilled her.

Reopening Billy’s case, they have questioned everyone who was known to be present when both he and Clementine went missing– the staff, Sir Malcolm, Nancy.

While everyone else has an alibi for the little girl’s disappearance, there are several crucial minutes between Madame Rose speaking to Maisie near the Randolphs’ car and her return to the carousel when no one saw her.

The agents want to know Maisie’s motives for pushing for the original party four years ago and the opening of Silver Kingdom.

They dissect second-by-second accounts of her movements around the time Billy vanished, and Clementine Pickford was last seen.

Worryingly, no one knows where exactly the tailor and his family now live, which means Mrs Wadham is unable to verify Maisie’s story that the two were speaking at the moment when the little boy disappeared into thin air.

It feels like everything is stacked against her.

‘Two children going missing under similar circumstances isn’t normal, and all the signs point to you,’ one of them said.

It is abnormal. And horrific, and presses the question– what has happened to those poor children?

For now, though, the racket of hundreds of women held here on suspicion of other crimes keeps her awake.

They scream, laugh, fight. Curled up on the floor of a ten-by-ten-foot cell containing three narrow beds and eleven other inmates, she hears someone urinating into the bucket right next to her, smells the waste.

This is a cage for animals, she thinks. She has no idea when she might be released, but it can’t happen soon enough.

The scuffle spreads, and someone’s foot knocks over the bucket of effluent.

The foul-smelling discharge spreads across the floor like a menacing shadow, engulfing Maisie’s toes, the hem of her canvas shift.

She will have to disinfect her skin at home. If she ever gets home.

A commotion in the cell makes Maisie tense. Three women have squared up to each other. ‘Irish bitch,’ one of them spits at a redhead with a scar on her neck. ‘Black trash,’ is the immediate response.

Keep still, keep quiet , she tells herself.

Without warning, the trio turn on Maisie.

They drag her to the centre of the floor.

The space erupts into cheers, and prisoners in other cells join in as the biggest inmate lands a punch on Maisie’s face.

And punches again. The shock numbs the pain for a moment.

Then a throbbing sensation begins at her temples, radiating outwards.

She can feel her pretty shoes being whisked off her feet.

From the corner of her bruised eye, Maisie spots a guard saunter over.

He stands watching for a moment before banging his baton on the bars until the attack stops.

Maisie crawls back to her usual corner, nursing her wounds.

This awful place has echoes of her time on Canvey Island, she soon discovered.

The dirt and grime, rats lurking under the beds and nipping her toes at night, fighting for scraps of food, the wrench of an empty stomach.

But surviving is in Maisie’s bones, and she’s determined to get through this ordeal.

Yet, by the fifth day, the hunger begins to eat away at her thoughts.

Perhaps she really is guilty of some crime.

Wasn’t she talking with Billy before he disappeared?

Is it possible she also spoke to Clementine without even remembering?

She struggles to think that far back. If she confesses to something, they may release her for a time.

Then again, she could be imprisoned here forever.

No one questioned Maisie yesterday. Perhaps they’ve forgotten all about her.

She’s beginning to all but give up on ever tasting freedom when a rough-shaven guard comes for her.

‘Interview time, Marlowe.’

She looks down at the filthy, prison-issue canvas shift, touches the knotted mass of her hair.

‘No one gives a damn how you look… or smell,’ the guard laughs as though her thoughts are transparent.

As he escorts Maisie down the corridor, dozens of hands stretch out through crowded enclosures. ‘Pretty, pretty,’ a voice cackles. ‘She’s mine,’ a second voice barks. Flinching, Maisie keeps her distance.

Finally, he stops outside the usual interrogation room.

Expecting to greet the same agents, Maisie is surprised to find a completely different gentleman sitting there.

He is fiddling with a piece of paper, deep in concentration.

As she enters, he lays the paper on the table.

Rather than lying flat, it stands upright, folded into the distinctive shape of a heron.

The gentleman rises to his feet, tall and angular.

‘Thank you for seeing me, mademoiselle,’ he says in an accent Maisie cannot place, his grey eyes searching in hers for an answer.

‘Detective Laurent Bisset at your service.’