Madeleine McCann - cast not the first stone

Madeleine McCann

We have four children.

Some years ago, when my son was just three years old, we had a frightening experience.

Both Mrs C and I work. Dearly though we love them all, an evening meal with four boisterous young children is hard work. When, finally, the stories have been red, the “can I have a glass of water” ritual been done, and they are all asleep in bed, there is a sense of release, a sense of relaxation. The upstairs of our house is secure and, once the children were asleep, we were not in the habit of rushing upstairs to check them every two minutes.

I should explain that our house is on a road that can be busy, and there is a small river at the bottom of the garden. One evening, an hour after the children had settled, I was sitting at my desk paying bills. Mrs C was in the kitchen and at one stage took a couple of rubbish bags out to the bin. This involves walking round the house and so the back door was open and unattended for a couple of minutes. When she came back, because it was summer, and humid, she left the back door open. It stayed open for half an hour, maybe more, and during that time she was wandering round the house.

She went upstairs to get something and, because she was upstairs, she checked the children. Michael, our three year old, was missing. I can’t say we were over concerned at first. We searched his room, all the other bedrooms, the downstairs rooms and the garage. We could not find him. We were still affecting light-heartedness. This is too silly for words. He cannot have gone far. And yet, underneath there was a gnawing feeling of incredulity and fear. We searched the garden. The gate to the river was closed and it was unlikely that a three year old could have opened it. Unlikely. I walked a few yards down the road in both directions at the front of the house. Nothing.

I looked at my wife and said “We’d better call the police” knowing that she would say Don’t be silly, don’t be melodramatic, he is obviously somewhere in the house. She just nodded. “What number do I dail? Should I look up the number of the local police station?” She shook her head. I dialled 999.

The response was staggering. I heard the sirens with in minutes. Suddenly, there were two police cars outside the house, and a third arrived shortly after. There were police officers searching outside the house, back and front, and a female police officer with us repeating the search inside. There was a police dog handler on the way. The policewoman found Michael. He was curled up fast asleep under and behind the legs of the dining room table.

We should, I suppose, have been embarrassed but the feeling of relief was so overwhelming that there was no room for other emotion. The police were wonderful. They were as relieved as we were.

How often should you check on children who are asleep? I don’t know the answer to that. None of our children had gone wandering, or sleep walking, before or since but I accept that we should not have left the back door open and unattended. It was an error of judgment which, thankfully, did not result in a tragedy. We never left the door open again.

Were we at fault? Possibly. Probably. But however careful you are bringing up a large family of small children you make mistakes.

At what age can children go to the park by themselves? Or get a bus to school by themselves? Or go on a train? Or go into the centre of town? You feel your way. You talk to other parents. You first child pushes back the boundaries. The subsequent children get more freedom sooner, much to the oldest child’s irritation. “You never let me do that at his age”

I have been taken aback by many of the comments made about Madeleine McCann apparently being left alone for a short period of time. I do not know all the facts and I suspect that none of the commentators do either. Maybe there was an error of judgment. There but for the grace of God - see Mums for Madeleine

I do not know if there was an error of judgment and, frankly, I do not care. It is not relevant.

The task in hand is to find Madeleine McCann.

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