Page 35 of Nobody's Fool

Murmurs of agreement.

“Good point,” I say. I turn back to Polly and nod for her to continue.

“That’s the last image we have of Victoria Belmond,” she says. “No credible source remembers seeing her after this moment. Maybe she grabbed a taxi. Maybe she took a train or hitchhiked. Or maybe someone grabbed her right then and there. Nobody knows. Even now. Even today. There were no ATM withdrawals, no credit card transactions, nothing. It’s like Victoria Belmond was just swallowed whole.”

The room falls into silence for a moment.

Lenny breaks it. “When was Victoria first reported missing?”

“That was part of the problem,” Polly says. “No one realized she was missing at first. Her mother and father traveled that night to Chicago for a few days. Victoria has one brother—Thomas, age twenty-three at the time. He ended up at his girlfriend’s. The staff had the night off. In short, no one checked in on Victoria, so no one even knows if she came home that night or what. Same with the next day. And the next. No one was around. When the staff came back, they figured Victoria was staying with one of her high school friends. Even when her parents came back from Chicago, they wondered where she was but, given her independent streak, nobody was overly worried. Her friends had rented a few ski homes in Cornwall to welcome in the new year. Her family figured she was at one of the other ones.”

“So when were the police first contacted?”

“The night of January fifth. And even then, it wasn’t all that urgent. The father, Archie Belmond, seemed somewhat concerned, but the mother, her name is Talia, thought Victoria was probably hiding from them on purpose. They’d had a fight before she left for the party.”

“About?”

“College. Victoria had made Tufts University her early decision, mostly because her parents both went there and gave a ton of dough. Victoria wanted to travel instead, she said. Maybe not go to college at all. Her mother threw a fit, according to what we know.”

“Routine family argument,” Gary says.

“Which was the problem. No one was really worried about her. If there were clues, they were vanishing day by day. The other thing that made it all seem okay is that the family received texts from Victoria’s phone, purportedly from Victoria. The texts were vague.” The slide changes, and Polly reads the texts out loud. “One says, ‘Happy New Year.’ Another says, ‘I’m fine, I’ll be back soon.’ Another read, ‘With C’—like the letter—‘on a last sec trip, back in a week.’”

“Who’s C?” Lenny asks.

“Yet another part of the problem,” Polly replies. “No one knew for sure who C was. Victoria had two friends named Chloe, one Caroline, one Cora. It was Christmas break, and in these wealthy circles, I don’t know, I guess it didn’t ring any alarm bells.”

“Or the parents were negligent,” Gary adds.

“Right, could be,” Polly says. “I’m trying not to be judgmental right now. I’m just giving the facts as we have them.”

“And doing a good job,” I add, giving her a thumbs-up.

“Thank you.”

“Victoria didn’t send those messages,” Lenny says. “Her kidnapper did.”

“That’s now the most likely theory, yes. But the texts help add to the delay and confusion. In many ways, the kidnapping was the perfect crime. Everyone is distracted by the big celebration and the worry about Y2K. Her parents are away. Her brother is with his girlfriend. School is out, so no teacher would miss her. All in all, it took five days to report Victoria missing—and even then, for all the reasons we’ve gone over already, very few people took it seriously. Butas the days turned to weeks, everyone grew more and more worried until—”

Polly nods. The other Pink Panther clicks the remote and a blank slide comes up.

“—there was nothing.”

Polly pauses for effect, letting us stare at the blank screen. Then she starts speaking again. “No clues. No sighting. No witnesses. No leads. Not a trace of Victoria Belmond. Days turn to weeks. Then months. The legend grows. A true-crime documentary calledVanishing Victoriabecame a big hit.48 Hoursdid a two-hour special on the rich-girl Y2K vanishing.20/20. The ID network. Whenever something new aired, there’d be a lot of excitement and someone would claim that they saw Victoria in an airport or on a beach or something, but it never went anywhere. Time passes.”

They click to a slide reading:One Year.

Click to the next slide:Five Years.

Click to the next slide:Ten Years.

The Pink Panthers have a flair for the dramatic, but the effect is pretty devastating. The room falls into respectful silence. Polly stands there and watches our reactions.

Golfer Gary shakes his head. “I have daughters,” he says.

Lenny: “Can you imagine?”

Debbie: “That poor family.”

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