Sadie(74)

WEST McCRAY: Jack Hersh.


AMANDA:

I didn’t understand it, but I managed to get in touch with his parents, Marcia and Tyler. They’d been estranged since Chris—Jack was eighteen. They came down and identified and claimed the body after the police released it and I was left with this … grief for a man I thought I knew and this utter shock of not really knowing him at all.


WEST McCRAY [STUDIO]: Before Jack Hersh was Keith, Darren or Christopher, he lived in Allensberg, Kansas. After high school, he moved on, like many often do. No one there ever saw him again. But they remembered.

Residents of Allensberg described Jack as a loner, creepy. His parents were devout Christians who often kept to themselves. There were rumors, though, that things weren’t great at home, that Jack’s father drank too much and had a temper.

His parents refuse to talk to me.

There was an incident when Jack was twelve; he exposed himself to a group of girls at the elementary school.

Marlee Singer was ten years old when her brother, Silas Baker, became best friends with Jack. They were both seventeen. It happened suddenly, seemingly without explanation.


MARLEE SINGER [PHONE]: I think it was that they probably recognized themselves in each other.


WEST McCRAY:

Marlee has finally agree to talk to me.


WEST McCRAY [PHONE]: You knew Jack long before you were romantically involved with him. You sent Sadie to your brother, to find this man, and you knew or at least suspected both of them shared the same predilection, didn’t you? So my only question for you now, Marlee, is why? Why did you send her to them and why did you lie to me?


MARLEE SINGER [PHONE]: Because if you’d seen the look in her eyes, you would’ve known absolutely nothing was going to stop her. And I never … I’ve never been able to stand against my brother. And I didn’t tell you, when you came, because I was afraid and I felt like I had something to lose.

[TODDLER CRYING IN BACKGROUND]


AMANDA:

When Jack died, my daughter—I had this thought she wasn’t upset enough about it but I reasoned that kids work through those kinds of things differently. Now I know.

She was relieved.


WEST McCRAY:

What happened after I came to your house?


AMANDA:

We called the police.


WEST McCRAY:

While we waited, I showed you a picture of Sadie, in case you had been in contact with her without realizing it.


AMANDA:

My daughter was there, between us, and she said, “I saw her.”


WEST McCRAY [STUDIO]: Amanda’s daughter told us that Sadie had appeared the same afternoon that Jack said he was mugged, as best as she could remember. What she related of their encounter was unsettling.


AMANDA:

My daughter said Sadie tried to … take her? She had my daughter’s arm, and wanted her to come with her and when my daughter wouldn’t, Sadie gave her money to buy books. My daughter was reading voraciously then, she was always down at the used bookstore. You said you think Sadie might have been trying to remove my daughter from the house. To save her.


WEST McCRAY:

That’s what I choose to believe.


AMANDA:

When I asked my daughter why she didn’t tell me about Sadie, she broke down. She said I had enough to worry about, that she didn’t want to upset me. I found out later that was something Jack said to her a lot, to keep her quiet. That if she came to me, and told me anything was wrong, that I would be furious with her …

I’m glad he’s dead.


WEST McCRAY [STUDIO]: Amanda’s daughter’s account put Sadie in the area at the time Jack Hersh was killed. I called Danny that night.


DANNY GILCHRIST [PHONE]: How are you doing?


WEST McCRAY [PHONE]: I just told a mother there was a high possibility her daughter was being sexually abused by the man she let into her house. She … screamed, Danny. I can’t even describe to you the sound.


DANNY GILCHRIST [PHONE]: I’m sorry, man.


WEST McCRAY [PHONE]: I’ve told the Farfield PD what I know. They want to review all my material—I’ve got copies, but …


DANNY GILCHRIST [PHONE]: Give them what they want, and take the time you need.


WEST McCRAY [PHONE]: I just—where is she, Danny? If they met, and he walked away from it—until it caught up with him, at least—where is she?


WEST McCRAY [STUDIO]: After I was interviewed by the Farfield PD, I headed back to Cold Creek to explain to May Beth and Claire all that had happened—what I knew, and everything I didn’t.


MAY BETH FOSTER:

Oh, Sadie. Oh, my girl.


CLAIRE SOUTHERN:

So where is she?


WEST McCRAY:

I don’t know, Claire.


CLAIRE SOUTHERN:

That’s not good enough.


WEST McCRAY:

I don’t know what happened to her after she arrived at Jack’s house. I don’t know where she went. Jack was there when she arrived. I think it’s safe to assume they met each other. I don’t know what happened after that. They must have left the house at some point. Jack returned. Sadie didn’t. Her car was found on a dirt road. He died. She’s still missing. The police are looking into it. That’s all I know.