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Lyse Champagne
Searching For Thomasina Baker

"Don't talk to strangers," Maman said. As if I'd be lucky enough to meet a stranger on the Buckham's Bay Road. "And don't cut through those woods."

It was hot. The kind of hot that made me want to lie perfectly still, like a lizard, not crawl along a hot dusty road with no shade. So I took the path through the woods, like I always did, hoping I wouldn't run into Mr. Campbell walking his dog. He was the one who must've told Maman I was cutting through the woods. It certainly wasn't the hermit. The hermit's cabin was right on the path but closer to the Ménard cottage than ours. Sometimes I looked in the window but mostly I didn't. As much as I wanted to see the guy, I was scared to meet him face to face. This time there was a watermelon on the bench beside the door and seeds on the ground where he'd spit them out. The seeds still wet - like I'd just missed him. The Ménards had probably left the watermelon, they were always bringing him food. I followed the path until it joined the road again beside the Ménard cottage. Madame Ménard was watering her petunias, still in her nightie at four in the afternoon. I waved at her but she didn't wave back. Mr. Campbell was shucking corn in front of his place and his dog Buster came running up to me with cornsilk hanging on his nose. I waved at Mr. Campbell and at Mr. Avery who was cleaning his latest catch. Madame Lapensée was hanging laundry but she stopped long enough to grin at me, the clothespins in her mouth like giant buckteeth. When I reached the store, Mr. O'Toole was dozing on the screened porch so I grabbed a movie magazine and flipped through it quickly. "And what can I do for you, young lady?" he asked, pulling the magazine out of my hands before I could find out whose heart Troy Donahue was breaking.

"A quart of milk and the newspaper, please."

"Tell your mother she's lucky I saved a paper for her today. Everyone's been coming in to buy a copy. On account of that poor little girl."

I wanted to ask which poor little girl but I didn't want to get Mr. O'Toole going. He could melt the wax in your ears if you let him. "I guess I'll be seeing your mother when she comes in to use the phone tonight." Maman hated to use the phone at the store because Mr. O'Toole leaned over the counter and listened to every word, even when people were waiting to be served. When I got back, Maman was sitting at the picnic table, rolling cigarettes. I dropped the newspaper on the bench and went inside to put the milk in the ice box, to press my hot face against the big block of ice.

"Madame Ménard is watering her flowers in her nightie," I told Maman when I returned. She didn't hear me. She was looking at the paper and shaking her head. "What are you reading, Maman?" "About the little girl who disappeared yesterday." "What little girl?" "The one who climbed into a stranger's car and hasn't been seen since. Here, you can read about it yourself, Véronique. I have to make the potato salad."

Driver Lures Girl Into Car Alliston, Ont. (CP) - Thomasina Baker, 10, of Beeton, Ontario, clad only in a swimsuit, was abducted yesterday while playing by the Nottawasaga River, and a police hunt is under way. Police said a man lured the girl away from her three year old brother Allen and drove away with her in his car about 4 p.m. Twelve radio-equipped mobile army units, involving between 40 and 50 soldiers, were enlisted for the search from nearby Camp Borden.

I went into the kitchen. "Papa's at Camp Borden isn't he?" "Yes," Maman said, peeling a skin off a hot potato. "So he'll be out looking for that little girl?" "Non, chouette. He's there on a training course." "But he could volunteer, couldn't he?" "I suppose he could." "Can you ask when you call him tonight? "If he did, I won't have to. He'll tell me first." I went back outside to read the rest of the article.

Police said Thomasina and her brother had been swimming and were on their way home through a field on their farm. A man drew abreast of them on an adjoining road. Following a short conversation, the girl got into the car and it drove away. The brother went home and told his parents who called Provincial Police.

After supper, when Maman walked down to the store to call Papa, I watched my younger brother and sister wash in the river. They were splashing more than washing but I didn't bug them about it. My mind was on Thomasina. Maybe the stranger was driving a convertible. Maybe the girl just wanted to see how the vinyl roof opened and closed. Like I did when I went for a ride in monOncle Paul's convertible. So when the stranger started the car, she wasn't scared. And as he drove faster and faster, she laughed, the wind lifting her hair like she was going down a hill on her bike. She closed her eyes. The car didn't rattle like her father's pick up, she didn't feel like she was in a car at all. When she opened her eyes again, the man was still driving. She asked him to take her back. He laughed but it was a mean laugh, with sharp bits in it.

My sister tugged at my shorts. "Maman's coming." Adèle and Alain raced each other to the cottage, dragging their wet towels behind them. I walked towards Maman's bobbing flashlight. "So, did Papa volunteer to look for the girl -" "Oui, ma grande. He volunteered." "I knew it! Wouldn't it be great if he was the one who found her -" "I don't think so, Véronique. The girl might be -" The girl might be what? I hated it when Maman didn't finish her sentences. Why wouldn't it be great if Papa found her? He might even get his name in the paper.

***

The next day, everybody on the Buckham's Bay Road was talking about Thomasina Baker. Thanks to Mr. O'Toole, they knew Papa was out looking for the girl and dropped by to discuss it with Maman. "Dreadful. Just dreadful. When you're not even safe on your own farm," Madame Lapensée was saying when I took off down the road. As I cut through the woods, my mind was on Thomasina and not the hermit so I didn't stop to see if he was home. I sat down under a birch tree near the Ménard cottage. Stripped off a piece of bark and played with it, curling it around my little finger. After a while, I heard something. I wasn't sure what it was, a baby crying or an animal. When I heard it again, I realized it wasn't coming from the woods but from the Ménard cottage and that it was a woman crying, not a baby. Crying loudly like Grand-Maman did when Grand-Papa died. I heard a branch snap somewhere behind me, someone swishing through the old leaves. I held my breath and hoped it was Mr. Campbell coming back from our cottage. The swishing got closer. I saw the feet first, bare and dirty. Watched them as they made their way to the back of the Ménard cottage. It had to be the hermit. I stood up so I could see the rest of him. He was wearing overalls and a t-shirt, both dirty. His hair was long like a girl. He was peering in one of the windows so I couldn't see his face. I heard a car on the road. The hermit did too and took off. I sneaked down to the road through the trees. There was an ambulance in front of the Ménard cottage. Two men came out with Madame Ménard on a stretcher. She was half crying, half screaming. Monsieur Ménard was hurrying beside her, trying to console her. Since when do you take someone away in an ambulance for crying? When I got back to our cottage, Maman was talking to Mrs. Campbell. I told them about the ambulance but they already knew about it. The newspaper was on the picnic table so I figured Mrs. Campbell had brought it. There was a picture of Thomasina on the front page. She was smiling like you smile when someone is taking your picture. She was cute, with long hair pulled back behind her ears, her bangs trimmed just above her eyebrows, the way Maman trimmed mine. Searchers Fear Kidnapped girl No Longer Alive

Beeton, Ont. (CP) - The fear that 10-year old Thomasina Baker may be dead has been voiced by police and other searchers hunting for her through the farmlands surrounding this community 50 miles north of Toronto.

Last night Mrs. Thomas Baker, the girl's mother, broadcast a radio appeal she hoped would reach the abductor.

"Thomasina, please phone daddy and mommy," Edith Baker said. "We won't spank you but please come home."

Spank her? Why would they want to spank her? How was she supposed to know the man would just keep driving? And why did the police think Thomasina was dead? Did they think the stranger had an accident with the car?

That night I took the front section of the newspaper off the woodpile and hid it under my bed. I couldn't bear the thought of Thomasina's face burning in the stove while Maman cooked our eggs.

***

When I went to the store the next afternoon, the Averys were there, the Campbells, even Madame Lapensée.

"Is Mrs. Ménard going to be alright?"

"I don't know," Mr. O'Toole said.

"Did her husband tell you what happened?"

"He said she was upset about the Baker girl. That they had a little girl who was lured away by a stranger."

There were sharp intakes of breath.

"Did they ever find her?" asked Mrs. Campbell.

"Nope. Not a trace."

"And how old was the lass?"

"Five."

"Five? Oh, just a wee lass," Mrs. Campbell said.

"Do you know how it happened, Brian?"

I didn't know Mr. O'Toole's name was Brian.

"Apparently, he was in the barn and the wife was in the kitchen making lunch. She heard a truck pull up and looked out the window. She didn't recognize the truck or the driver but she wasn't worried. Figured it was some guy looking for work.

She stepped out onto the verandah just as her daughter climbed into the truck. By the time she reached the road, all she could see was the dust the truck had stirred up. She never saw the girl again."

I went out to the dock and sat down beside the gas pump. There was a patch of oil on the water and I stirred up the blue and red stains with my foot. Pauvre Madame Ménard. I could see her little girl, her face pressed against the window of the truck.

I went back in to buy the paper. Hopes For Girl Fading

Beeton, Ont. (CP) - The number of searchers grew to about 500 today as the hunt continued for 10-year old Thomasina Baker, abducted from her farm home Sunday.

A child's crumpled red sock found at the edge of a swamp Tuesday was the only result of a search by 200 men of every field, culvert, bridge and ditch within 200 square miles surrounding this community.

Thomas Baker, the girl's father, recalled that he spoke Saturday to a man of about 36, dressed in a blue suit and driving a foreign car who asked permission to take measurements of a road in front of his farm.

"What's a foreign car?" I asked when I got back.

"A car made in another country," Maman answered.

What did that have to do with anything?

***

When they called off the search for Thomasina a few days later, I couldn't believe it.

"But how can they just stop looking, Maman? She's still lost."

"They've run out of places to look, ma grande."

"By the time she jumped out of the car, she was probably miles from home."

"It's not that easy to jump out of a moving car."

"You have to wait for the car to slow down. Then you open the door and jump out."

"And how many moving cars have you jumped out of?"

She was washing the dishes and not looking at me.

"I just know you can do it, that's all."

Maman wiped her hands on her apron. Came over to put her arm around me. "It's hard to understand, isn't it? How someone could take a child away from her family like that. All we can do is pray for her soul."

I didn't want to pray for her soul. I wanted her to still be alive. If I could jump out of a moving car, monOncle Paul's car, why couldn't Thomasina jump too?

***

The day after they stopped looking for Thomasina, I saw the hermit again. Sitting on the step in front of his cabin, eating blueberries from a pail. His face wasn't scary, even with his big bushy beard.

"What's your name?" I asked him, still on the path.

He didn't answer. Ate another mouthful of berries.

"Mine's Véronique. And I'm twelve."

He looked at me. There were blueberries stuck to his beard.

"Don't you get lonely living here by yourself?"

He shook his head. Slowly, like he wasn't sure.

"Madame Ménard went into hospital, you know."

He frowned.

"The woman who was crying the other day. In the cottage," I pointed in the direction of the Ménard place.

I heard a dog bark. It was probably Buster, which meant Mr. Campbell was on the path somewhere. The hermit must've heard the dog too because he went into his cabin and closed the door. Opened it again to reach for the pail of blueberries. I ran home through the woods, without knowing if Mr. Campbell had seen me talking to the hermit or not.

When I got to the cottage, Maman was livid. "How many times have I told you not to talk to strangers, eh? Have you already forgotten what happened to the Baker girl?"

"But the hermit isn't a stranger, he's a neighbour."

"He's a crazy man. God knows what he could've done to you."

"He didn't come near me."

"Only because Mr. Campbell scared him off."

"But -"

***

I spent the next day helping my father close up the cottage.

"What was it like, Papa? When you were searching for Thomasina?"

He put down one of the shutters. Pushed his hat back. His hair was wet with sweat.

"It was noisy. There were lots of people and the dogs kept barking. You couldn't hear yourself think. We started at the farm and went in all directions from there. We walked and walked but never found a trace of her."

"Except the red sock."

"What red sock?"

"The one they talked about in the paper."

"Well, it wasn't hers. She was just wearing a blue swimsuit and a pair of old runners. And she had a towel. Never found that either."

"Did you see her parents?"

"I saw the father when he came to thank the men."

"Did he shake your hand?"

"As a matter of fact, he did."

"Let me see your hand."

He wiped his hand on his pant leg before showing it to me. It was raw and red from all the work he'd been doing that day. I placed my fingers on the palm of his hand and rubbed it gently. He pulled it away, laughing. Picked up the shutter again.

I went into the cottage. Into the bedroom I shared with Adèle. I took Thomasina's picture out of the book under my bed. Rubbed her face and her hair with my fingers.

We came so close to touching each other, Thomasina.

So very, very close.

Note:

Newspaper excerpts are from the Ottawa Citizen, August 20, 21 and 22, 1962. Paragraphs and sentences have been omitted.