Walter returned home from work to the sound of his young son crying. Coming out of the garage, he found his wife Abby in the kitchen, visibly upset. ‘How long has he been crying?’ he asked, putting his arm around her shoulders. Through her tears, Abby replied, ‘I’ve tried everything — feeding him, changing his nappy, bathing him, burping him, even checking his temperature — but nothing helps! He just won’t stop crying!’
Since becoming parents a month ago, their lives had been turned upside down by Logan’s incessant crying. For Walter, there was nothing more painful than hearing his son cry. Deciding to help, he brought Abby to Logan’s room. When he approached the cot, he was struck not by the familiar sight of a sleeping child, but by a tape recorder and a note lying there. When he pressed the ‘stop’ button on the device, the crying stopped abruptly.
‘What did you do?’ Abby called out, but Walter was already deep in thought, reading the note. It read:
“I warned you that you would regret being rude to me.
If you want to see your child again, leave £200,000 in the luggage storage room near the pier.
If you go to the police, you will never see him again.”
Abby’s sigh broke the silence. ‘Oh my God! What does this mean? Was I rude to someone? Who could have kidnapped Logan?’
Suddenly, fragments of memories came flooding back — Walter remembered the cleaner at the maternity hospital, whom he had treated badly. Once, the cleaner had brought Abby a cute bear-shaped pot, but it broke when Walter tripped over his broom. In anger, Walter hurled terrible names at him and warned ominously, ‘You’ll regret this!’
‘Maybe it’s him,’ Walter muttered. ‘We should go to the police.’ But Abby’s voice trembled: ‘The note says that if we go to the police, we’ll never see Logan again. We have to pay the ransom.’
Reluctantly, Walter reasoned, ‘I don’t know if paying will bring him back, but the cleaner works at the hospital — maybe we can catch him if we report it to the police.’ Abby agreed, and they drove to the police station. Just as they were about to get out of the car, Walter’s phone buzzed with a message:
‘This is your first and last warning. If you enter this police station, your child will be sent to the compartment. Bring the money to the location below.’
Abby’s eyes widened in horror as Walter scanned the crowded scene and realised that the only way to save Logan was to pay the ransom. As Abby’s condition worsened — she was nauseous and on the verge of vomiting — Walter decided it was better to take her home than risk further suffering.
‘Don’t hate me for this, darling, but you need to rest,’ he said gently. Abby, bursting into tears, managed to say, ‘But Walter… does this kidnapper even know how to care for a newborn?’ Her words tormented him as he drove her home, and dark thoughts filled his mind. He imagined Logan locked in a dark room, crying for help that never came.
Summoning all his strength, Walter finally pulled himself together and drove to the bank. Then he went to the storage facility mentioned in the note and deposited the money. Among the noisy crowd, he noticed the cleaner from the maternity hospital standing near the storage lockers. The man was wearing a bright shirt that made him stand out from the eclectic crowd. Walter followed him, but a group of tourists soon blocked his view. A few minutes later, the cleaner reappeared, and Walter seized the moment to bump into him near another row of lockers.
‘Where’s my son?’ Walter demanded, pushing the cleaner towards the lockers. The cleaner hissed, ‘Listen, I was paid £100 to pick up the bag and bring it here… I don’t know anything about your son!’
In a rage, Walter shouted, ‘Don’t you dare lie! I followed all the instructions.’ However, when Walter opened the locker, he found it empty — there was a hole cut in the back wall, hidden by a loose steel plate.
Despair and horror overwhelmed him, and he rushed home, checking every room. Abby was nowhere to be found; her things had disappeared from their bedroom. At first, Walter suspected she had been kidnapped and called out to her frantically, but there was no answer. Then a terrible thought struck him: it was Abby who had insisted on paying the ransom. Could she be involved in this? Could she and an accomplice have orchestrated Logan’s disappearance?
Although Walter’s heart ached at the possibility, he found some small comfort in the knowledge that the ransom money was counterfeit. He decided he would find a way to save his son. Desperate for answers, he drove to the maternity hospital where Logan was born. He met a doctor near a vending machine. ‘I need your help,’ Walter pleaded. ‘Please call my wife.’ The doctor, after carefully examining Walter and listening to his difficult situation, and hesitating because of the discreet display of cash, agreed.