Cleo was anxious to find Edith, but calling the police was the
first step to take. She left that to Dorothy Price, who explained that she was
a close friend of the family and gave them a description of Edith whilst
skirting round the inevitable question as to why the husband had not seen fit
to report his wife’s disappearance yet.
“He might not have noticed,” she improvised.
“Did you ask him where she might be?”
“Mr Parsnip thought she had gone shopping early this morning,”
said Dorothy quite truthfully. “But I think that’s unlikely with five sons to make
breakfast for and all the usual duties of a vicar’s wife and mother. The vicar
is a bit vague at times.”
They told her they would look into the matter, noted her phone
number and rang off. Dorothy went home and put her feet up. There was nothing
else she could do except wait.
Cleo had several ideas for taking up the search, but had preferred
not to not to confide in Dorothy too soon. She realized that the police might
wait too long before they did anything constructive. She would try to discover
when and how Edith had left Upper Grumpsfield. She must have had taken a cab or
hitch-hiked. Cleo could only hope Edith had not hitched a ride with a
disreputable person who had left her to rot in a ditch somewhere.
Cleo drew a blank at the one-man taxi service in Upper
Grumpsfield. He had not transported anyone at all the previous night so his cab
would have been available. If Edith had hitched a lift with a stranger,
anything could have happened. That did not bear thinking about. Cleo set off at
a brisk pace for the organist’s little flat above the newsagent’s. She needed
to know if the little guy knew anything that might help.
Mr Davies was standing disgruntled between the doorway of his shop
and the flight of stairs leading to Mr Morgan’s flat above. He was cheered by
the approach of Cleo Hartley, though this might have been in anticipation of
selling something. Mr Davies did not care much for humanity except as paying
customers.
“Nice to see you, Miss Hartley. Come to pay for your papers?”
Cleo thought Mr Davies was awful. When she had first came to
live in Upper Grumpsfield he had treated her with open antipathy and she would
certainly have gone elsewhere for her papers had there been a choice locally.
“I’m here to see Mr Morgan,” she told him as she tried to
squeeze past to the front door. “Saturday is the day I pay for my papers. Move
to one side, please!”
Mr Davies was generally unpopular, she had learnt as time went
on. Dishonest, as well. You had to watch carefully while he added up your
deliveries. He was not averse to slipping in the charge for a magazine or two
that you had neither ordered nor received. Cleo had long since taken to working
out what she was going to have to pay before going there.
“It isn’t nearly the day for paying, Mr Davies, . When that
day comes I’ll bring my list and we can double check that I’m paying the right
amount, can’t we?”
That was not to Mr Davies’s liking, but he had no basis for
protest and anyway, there were enough other customers who didn’t notice his
little frauds. He thought Cleo Hartley might cotton on to some of his other
ruses given enough rope, and that would be most inconvenient. It was therefore
prudent to go along with her suggestion.
“Don’t talk to me about Mr Morgan,” he said. “He’s been
nothing but trouble, coming and going as he pleases and never buying anything
from me. He leaves his lights on till well after midnight and even parks his
rubbishy old car in my drive when he has the chance. Good riddance to bad
rubbish, I say. I can’t wait for him to take himself off elsewhere.”
“I’m sure he pays for his electricity, Mr Davies, and it’s up
to him where he does his shopping.”
Just then a customer turned up, so Mr Davies merely shrugged
his shoulders and followed him inside, leaving the stairway free. The newsagent
never left anyone alone in his emporium. They might help themselves.
Cleo rang Mr Morgan’s doorbell and the scurrying on the stairs
warned her of his imminent appearance. Why hadn’t he let her in? Did he have
something to hide?
“Oh, it’s you, Miss Hartley. I’m on the way to my new flat
with a load of books and music. I can’t waste time standing here.”
He seemed a lot more flustered than someone moving house
would.
“Is anything wrong, Mr Morgan?”
Cleo wondered how someone would react who was sheltering a
missing person. Not letting her into his flat might be an indication that there
was someone there who shouldn’t be.
“It’s Edith,” he blurted out. “She has disappeared.”
The full significance of the situation had just hit him since
he had blurted out a secret to the first available listener. No way could he
have been that upset if he knew Edith Parsnip’s whereabouts, given that he probably
still had romantic feelings for her. Cleo decided he was genuinely distraught.
“She probably went shopping, Mr Morgan.”
“That’s not what Dorothy told me, Cleo. And when I phoned the vicar,
first he told me she had gone shopping and then he changed his mind and said
she’d gone to Austria. Just like that.”
“When did you talk to Mr Parsnip? Was it after Dorothy’s visit
to the church?”
“‘How do you know about that, Cleo?”
“I have my methods, Mr Morgan.”
“The vicar phoned me and asked me would I please take the
sing-along with the pensioner group during Mrs Parsnip’s absence.”
Cleo told Mr Morgan that he was putting two and two together and
making five, advising him not to interpret Mrs Parsnip’s outing as a
disappearance. There was, she reflected, nothing to be gained from encouraging
someone as melodramatic as Mr Morgan to think the worst.
But she was puzzled. Hadn’t the vicar wanted to keep his
wife’s disappearance a secret? Why talk about it with Mr Morgan, of all people,
and even ask him to take over one of Edith’s chores? Was Mr Parsnip shrewder
than she thought? Did he suspect Mr Morgan of harbouring her?
Cleo was now sure that Mr Morgan knew nothing about Edith’s
whereabouts. After assuring him that everything would be just fine and telling
him he should not discuss the situation with anyone else since Edith might be
angry with him, she left him to ponder on his chances of a relationship with
Edith based on her not being angry with him and made her way to Upper
Grumpsfield station.
***
No night buses left Upper Grumpsfield, so if Edith had gone
anywhere it would have to be by train, unless she had hitched a lift in desperation.
Surely Edith would have had more sense. It was on the cards that she had hung
around at the station and caught the first available train, unless she was
wandering around Upper Grumpsfield and district and would eventually be picked
up by the police, dead or alive.
“There was a woman sitting in the waiting room half the night,”
the station master told her, “but I wasn’t on night duty so I didn’t see her.”
That was a good start.
“So how do you know about her?”
“From my colleague, Miss. He wrote it down, as a matter of fact.
We always record anything unusual in our log book and also note the time.”
“A good idea. Did he ask her what she wanted?”
“He wouldn’t do that, Miss. We station masters don’t ask
questions unless someone is making trouble. She was just sitting there, harmless
like. Night duty is very boring, so we usually have a little nap between
trains. The last passenger train to stop here is a short one at about midnight
going through to Middlethumpton and she was here after that. She might have
left on the milk train at four thirty, but my colleague didn’t see her board
the train because he was too busy checking the loading. Or she might have just gone
away.”
That was a very long speech that had answered nearly all her
questions.
“So she was gone after the milk train left?”
“Well, my colleague didn’t see her after that and the
colleague this morning didn’t write anything in the log book. Would you like to
see for yourself, Miss?”
The report repeated what he had just told her. No description
of the woman had been noted. Cleo was about to take her leave when the station
master who had written it appeared.
“Here he is, Miss. Just coming on night duty. You can ask him
anything else you want to know.”
“Do you have 3 shifts?” Cleo asked.
“That’s right. Night from 10 till 6. Day from 6 till 2 and
afternoon from 2 till 10.”
“So you are on the afternoon shift, are you?”
“That’s right.”
“It sounds like a reasonable arrangement.”
“We swop times no and again and sometimes a colleague from
Middlethumpton takes over so that we can get organized Miss. Isn’t it like that
where you come from?”
“I expect it is, Station Master, but I live here now, so I’m
interested in what happens here.”
The afternoon station master going off duty explained to his night
colleague that Cleo was looking for the woman who had been waiting at the
station the previous night.
“Did you get a good look at her?” Cleo asked.
“Well, not really, just in passing.”
“Can you describe her?”
“Thin. A bit tired looking. Anxious.”
“What colour was her hair?”
“Darkish.”
“What was she wearing?”
“A jacket, I think.”
“What colour was it?”
“Darkish. Navy blue or black.”
Did she buy a ticket?”
“No. But that doesn’t mean she didn’t get on a train. You can
buy tickets on trains these days.”
“Did she have any luggage?”
“Funny you should ask that. A very small suitcase on wheels.
Can’t have been much in it. Funny for a woman. They usually have cases they
can’t lift by themselves. I’m always having to heave them onto trains with my
bad back. I’ve got neuralgia or a slipped disk.”
Cleo didn’t have time to listen to a bad back saga especially
as it sounded as if the guy had never been to a doctor and found out what it
was. She was now concerned about the luggage Edith had taken with her, since
the description of the woman fitted rather well. Edith had obviously intended
to stay away rather than do away with herself. Cleo would have to ask Mr
Parsnip if they had a small suitcase on wheels and if so, was it missing? There
was no time to waste since disappearances can mean anything. Cleo would have to
point out to Mr Parsnip that the bishop would find out about Edith’s
disappearance sooner or later. What the bishop thought was of no consequence
given the possibility that Edith might be in serious danger.
***
The psychologist at the hospital in Dover hoped that a good
night’s sleep would restore Edith’s memory. If it didn’t, she would undergo
medical tests to determine what had caused the memory loss and judge if it had
a physical cause and was possibly permanent. Waiting till next day would also give
the Dover police time to follow up any reports of a missing woman, late
thirties and tired-looking, which might match the patient.
Edith woke to the sound of breakfast being served to the young
woman who was sharing her ward. She did not recognize her surroundings.
“Where am I? Am I in a hospital?”
“Don’t worry, you’re safe here,” the nurse told Edith as she
helped the young woman into a comfortable position.
“Safe from what?”
“Well, you were wandering around at the station, so they
brought you here. You may have run away from something or somebody.”
“What station?”
“Dover.”
“Dover? Why was I at Dover station?”
“Were you on your way somewhere? To visit a friend or a
relative?”
“I don’t know. No, wait. I got on a train somewhere.”
“Do you remember your name as well Mrs?” said the girl in the
bed opposite.
“Edith. I’m Edith. I remember that now, but I don’t know why
I’m in Dover.”
“You’ve done very well to remember your first name, Edith.
I’ll get you your breakfast.”
The nurse moved swiftly down the corridor to ring the
psychologist and tell him about the progress she had made (disregarding the
fact that the other patient had actually asked the vital question). It was
really remarkable how people remembered things if they weren’t under pressure.
She had been a psychiatric nurse for many years and seen some extraordinary
cases. Edith’s was typical. She was probably trying to escape from something.
The nurse tipped on some kind of family drama.
***
Cleo had to be at the library in Middlethumpton all day, so
she would not be able to do anything constructive about finding Edith. All she
had time for before catching the bus was to make a quick phone-call to Dorothy
to tell her what she had found out at the station.
Cleo had discussed the situation with Robert until well after
midnight. She was anxious to know what made Edith the way she was. Robert had
wanted to know what way that would be.
“Morose, thoughtful, sad, Robert,” Cleo had said. “As if she
has no fun at all.”
“I don’t suppose that living with that vicar is much fun,
Cleo.”
“Meaning she might have left him,” said Cleo.
“You can’t rule that out, can you?”
Robert had known the Parsnips for ages and saw nothing
exceptional in their lives. He liked Edith and wondered why she stuck with Mr
Parsnip. Cleo thought that was amazingly astute for Robert. He told her that he
could never fall for Edith because she was way out of his range of people he
could get on with. On her part, Cleo wondered what it must be like to be
married to the vicar. She thought Edith might have had a hard time supporting
him selflessly for years on end. Robert thought it embarrassed Edith when the vicar
got too het up about what he was preaching. He didn’t think she was actually
unhappy, but certainly in a state of resignation.
“It’s good to talk like this,” said Cleo. “You are a great
help, Robert.”
“I’m not Dorothy, but I try.”
“I would not want to live with Dorothy, Robert.”
Cleo was sure that any passion the vicar felt was reserved for
his religious convictions. If Edith was emotionally starved, that would explain
why she had a soft spot for Mr Morgan, who was anything but the answer to a
maiden’s prayer, but at least showed interest in her. Robert laughed, but then
another thought occurred to him.
“Some days Mrs Parsnip seems totally exhausted when she comes
into the shop, Cleo. She often has no idea what she wants, as if she’s in a
different world. Quite the opposite to her sister. Clare has temperament. She’s
efficient and always knows exactly what she wants.”
Cleo said that Clare had proved a great help at the library.
She was friendly and organized and had good ideas for encouraging young
readers. It was inconvenient that she had chosen this or indeed any other week
to go off to Austria, and the situation was even more drastic now Edith had disappeared.
Cleo had the impression that Clare always did she wanted while Edith did what
everyone else wanted. Thankless and thoughtless Mr Parsnip was more concerned
about his imagined pagan African souls than his family.
“So we agree that Edith might have walked out, don’t we?” Robert
said.
“I wouldn’t be surprised. A year of Frederick Parsnip must
have seemed like a century.”
Robert had been quite fond of the vicar ever since he had so
gamely joined in with his wedding announcement, but now he was starting to feel
uneasy. Appearances can be deceptive.
“Of course, it’s a police job to look for missing persons, Cleo.
You could call them and find out how much progress they’ve made.”
“Good idea. I’ll call from the library when things are quiet,
but I should ring Dorothy first since she told the police. She may have heard
something by then.”
“Remember that no news is good news, Cleo. If she’d been lying
in a ditch somewhere they’d probably have found her by now and the news would
have spread like wildfire.”
“Perish the thought,” said Cleo.
***
Frederick Parsnip was finding out the hard way what it’s like
to deal with five boisterous kids on a school morning since his method of
child-rearing was to stay well out of the way. He’d only just shooed them out
of the back door when the phone rang.
“Parsnip speaking. Oh, it’s you, Beatrice.”
“Who were you expecting, Frederick?”
“Well, I thought...”
“Don’t think, Frederick! Just give me Edith!”
Frederick’s sister was two years older than him and had always
bossed him around, mainly because he had been as indecisive and ponderous as a
child as he was now.
“Edith’s out at the moment.”
“Out? Where has she gone?”
Before Mr Parsnip could stop himself he had told his sister
that he didn’t know for sure.
“You don’t know? Has she walked out on you?”
“I don’t know, Beatrice, honestly I don’t. She might have gone
to Austria.”
“Might have? This is a very odd state of affairs and I’m
coming over directly. Edith would never leave her children even if she is fed
up with you.”
Beatrice had always been blunt. She had a sharp tongue which
tended to stop people from taking her on in an argument. She invariably won
whether she was in the right or not. She simply shouted people down if she felt
they were encroaching on her authority. Her forceful character had got her as
far as becoming the head mistress of a large senior school, and later she
progressed even beyond that and become a schools inspector, which meant she that
had plenty of free time and could lay the law down at pretty well any time she chose.
“I’ll be over as soon as I can get there, Frederick.”
Mr Parsnip would dearly have liked to tell his sister not to
come, but in the circumstances he had no choice.
“All right, Beatrice. I could use your help.”
Those were words Mr Parsnip never thought would cross his
lips. Beatrice’s idea of help was a total takeover but, he reflected, her being
there would make things easier all round in this case.
“Where’s Clare? Can’t she help?”
“Gone to Austria.”
“Typical.”
“She doesn’t know Edith has disappeared I mean gone to Austria.”
“Why would she go to Austria, Frederick?”
“To be with Clare, I suppose.” The vicar was starting to
believe that really was the case.
Now he has said ‘disappeared’, he felt even worse. He didn’t
even know when she had left, let alone why.
Beatrice was too busy mentally reorganizing her schedule to react to
what the vicar had said. She was already making contingency plans.
“I’ll delegate this week’s school visits and be over by
lunchtime,” she said,” but I think it would be a good idea to find Edith before
I get there.”
With those words, Beatrice slammed the phone down and Mr
Parsnip was left holding the handset and wondering what had hit him. Beatrice
had read between the lines and chosen that way of putting him firmly in his
place. He was not sure who he feared more: his sister or the bishop. He felt
about eight years old, a stammering little lad in short, grey flannel trousers
being tagged along by his big sister to wherever she was going to get him from
under the grownups’ feet. Fortunately for him, Beatrice had later refused to
take him anywhere because it made her feel silly.
A bit later, when Dorothy phoned the vicarage to ask if there
was any news, the vicar was still in the distraught state in which the
conversation with Beatrice had left him, partly because he knew she would be as
insufferable as she always had been and partly because he still didn’t have the
faintest idea why Edith had left and where she could be.
Dorothy wanted to know if the police had called.
“Police?”
“They had to be told, Frederick. You can’t just wait until Edith
turns up because she might not.”
Mr Parsnip thought Dorothy had jumped the guns and said so.
“Rubbish, Frederick, and you know it! What have you told
Beatrice?’”
“Just that Edith might have gone to Austria with Clare and
that I wasn’t coping too well.”
He did not mention that Beatrice had probably not believed a
word he’d said and what was worse, he had let it slip that he thought Edith had
disappeared.
“Wasn’t that a little foolish, Frederick? She’ll guess the
truth immediately. You know how astute she is.”
Frederick had to admit that he was an open book for her. He
had never been good at telling untruths and now he had entered the realm of
wild speculation.
“What would you have done, Dorothy?”
“Goodness only knows. I wouldn’t have got myself into such a
mess in the first place.”
“What mess?”
“Telling lies, Frederick.”
“You’re quite right. But we can’t turn the clock back, can we?”
Dorothy did not relish a confrontation with Beatrice, who
would ask her all sorts of questions she would either not want to answer, or
couldn’t. Not that Beatrice took much notice of what anyone else said to her.
She was better at jumping to conclusions than anyone else Dorothy knew.
“I’ll be over in about an hour, Frederick. Do you want me to
get you any shopping?”
“That’s all right, Dorothy. Mrs Cagney will be glad to help
out with the shopping.”
“I’ll come anyway, Frederick,” said Dorothy.
“If you insist.”
“I do!”
Mrs Cagney was one of those women you can find anywhere.
Middle-aged, with grown-up children and a lay-about husband who never did
anything unless it was in his own interest. She had resigned herself to earning
a pittance cleaning for people with big houses and big incomes and keeping up
with her own chores when most people had chomped through their TV dinners and
put their feet up for the rest of the day.
Mr Cagney never noticed what she was doing because when she
left the house in the morning he was still in bed asleep and by the time she
returned he had swallowed copious amounts of alcohol fetched from the
off-license and usually paid for with the housekeeping, and was too drunk to
notice anything. Mrs Cagney didn’t actively encourage his drinking by replenishing
his supply of alcohol – walking to and from the off-license was the only
exercise he got - but she did rather hope it would shorten his lifespan.
Mrs Cagney went on the bus to Middlethumpton Roman Catholic
church every Sunday to appease her feeling that she should be religious but had
no reason the be thankful and every reason to see herself as one of the
forgotten. She had found a soul mate in Edith Parsnip, who seemed to have her
own insurmountable marital problems. Mrs Parsnip was nice though she was, in
Mrs Cagney’s view, from a much higher class. Edith Parsnip did not act like
royalty, but treated her like a lady, something Mrs Cagney appreciated, not
having enjoyed much courtesy or anything else in her life. She had gone from
chubby school-girl to canteen assistant, from bride to drudge. She was rather
short, rather fat and rather plain, but her face lit up and her reddened eyes
sparkled when Edith invited her to drink coffee and eat some homemade cake.
Helping Edith was one of her high spots in an otherwise hard, drab life..
As usual, soon after nine o’clock Mrs Cagney made her way
eagerly around the back of the vicarage to the kitchen door. She looked forward
to hearing the latest about the boys and how Edith was coping with life. She
was shocked to find Mr Parsnip making himself a pot of tea and the kitchen in an
unholy mess.
“My wife isn’t here,” he said. “Can you do some shopping?”
“Where is she?”
“I’m asking myself that, Mrs Cagney.”
Mrs Cagney was alarmed by Edith’s absence and the state of the
kitchen, but she did not ask any more questions. The vicar was a person of
respect in her eyes, though she knew that he was anything but perfect. Mrs
Cagney remembered the yearning in Edith’s voice when she spoke of getting away
from it all, but she made no comment. She helped Mr Parsnip to make a list of
necessities, some of which she could get delivered by Mr Bontemps, the grocer’s
assistant who was willing to deliver heavy shopping to your door at a price.
Mrs Cagney’s answer to lack of companionship was to regale
everyone with tales of this and that, so the impromptu visit to the butcher’s
was a welcome opportunity to hint – in confidence - that something might be
amiss at the vicarage, as she ordered a dozen sausages and ten pork chops. Robert,
who was not averse to a little gossip, either, as long as it did not get too intimate,
responded that it would not at all fitting for a vicar’s wife to have left
under mysterious circumstances, and immediately regretted it. He tried to cover
up his blunder by joking that ladies often had secrets. Why, even Cleo…. then
stopped in his tracks. What if Edith had been subjected to the kind of cruelty
Cleo had experienced? He had heard terrible stories about men of the cloth.
Mr Bontemps showed little surprise at the sizeable order Mrs
Cagney placed with him a few minutes later. He had avoided engaging her in
chit-chat ever since the day he had repeated a chunk of her gossip to all and
sundry only to discover that she had made it all up. Mr Bontemps didn’t mind
embarrassing certain of his customers, but had been mortified when Laura Finch,
one of his favourites and victim of the rumour, had marched into the shop and
told him in a loud voice to mind his own bloody business and then marched out
again without buying anything. The ensuing estrangement had taken several
months of slimy diplomacy and real French Camembert to overcome.
Mrs Cagney didn’t appear to register what Robert had said, but
she had committed it all to memory. By the time she had been to all the other
village shops, a good hour had passed during which she had spread the news that
something was amiss at the vicarage and might involve Mrs Parsnip’s sudden
disappearance. When she finally got back to the vicarage, Dorothy was already
installed in the kitchen washing a huge pile of dishes, some left from the
previous day. What had got into Edith to make her drop everything and leave? Mrs
Cagney was tempted to ask Dorothy precisely that question, but thought better
of it.
“You’d better see what the rest of the house looks like,” she
told Mrs Cagney, who said she was sorry she had taken so long with the shopping.
She would do the beds and tidy up. They were tasks which she reckoned could be
spun out and perhaps provide her with more inside information, for example if
someone phoned.
Or maybe Mrs Parsnip would turn up again. Dorothy made it
quite clear that she was not going to discuss the situation with Mrs Cagney and
Mrs Cagney should not discuss it with anyone else. Little did Dorothy know that
the whole village had already been informed. She busied herself putting the
shopping away until Mrs Cagney had gone upstairs, then made coffee for herself
and the vicar. No way was she going to invite gossipy Mrs Cagney to share the belated
elevenses.
Mr Parsnip was sitting at his desk in the office. He looked
worried. The seriousness of the situation had finally hit him. His pencil box
was empty. All the pencils had points like needles at both ends. That was a
sure sign of disorientation.
“Well, Frederick, have you worked out what could have happened
to Edith?”
“No. It’s terrible. The bishop phoned. He’s coming to the
Voluntary Ladies’ annual dinner on Saturday. He confirmed that he will attend
the Sunday service, so he’ll want to stay the night and stay for Sunday lunch.
What am I going to do?”
So that was what was on his mind. Dorothy thought he was being
extremely selfish thinking of himself when anything could have happened to
Edith. She felt bound to point that out.
“Have you considered the possibility that Edith might be dead,
Frederick?”
Mr Parsnip spun round on his swivelling chair, spilling his
coffee in the process.
“Edith is dead?”
“I said she might be dead, Frederick. You weren’t paying
attention.”
“I don’t want anything bad to happen to her, Dorothy, even if she
does not want to live with us anymore.”
“I should jolly well hope not, Frederick. You’ll have to think
over what might have made her leave.”
“I’ve thought and thought, Dorothy, and I’ve no explanation.
I’m very angry that she could be so thoughtless.”
Dorothy was about to give him a piece of her mind for that
last comment when the vicar’s phone rang. It was Middlethumpton police. They
had located a woman who fitted the description of Edith Parsnip and would he go
to the police station and identify the photograph they had received from Dover.
The police officer explained the procedure and Mr Parsnip said he would send
someone right away as he had to be at home all day.
“Could you go for me, Dorothy? I’ll have to be here when
Beatrice arrives or there’ll be hell to pay.”
Dorothy agreed. No point in arguing. though she could just as
easily have been at the vicarage for Beatrice’s arrival. Mr Parsnip was looking
after his own interests again. She was disgusted with him. Without further ado,
she sped down the road, caught the next bus into Middlethumpton and marched into
Police Headquarters.
To Dorothy’s relief, the woman on the photo turned out to be
Edith.
“Where is she? Did you say Dover on the phone?”
“We can’t tell you any details,” the officer explained. “We
don’t know if the lady wants it to be known where she is.”
That seemed reasonable.
“It’s just that once she’s been identified we can close the
missing persons case,” he explained.
“Well, it’s definitely Edith Parsnip, unless it’s her twin
sister, of course, but she’s in Austria,” Dorothy told him. “Could I have a
copy of the photograph to show Edith’s husband? He didn’t have time to come
here himself.”
The police officer thought it strange that the husband of a
missing person would send someone else to identify her, but you couldn’t tell
by appearances, and vicars were only human, after all. The woman on the photo
looked a bit confused. But it wasn’t his problem, either. They would deal with
her in Dover.
“Just one thing, Miss Price,” the officer added. “This person
on the photo is apparently suffering from amnesia. Someone will have to go to
Dover and fetch her home. That’s always assuming she’s willing to come back, of
course. People don’t get amnesia for the fun of it. Something serious must have
happened to make her lose her memory. We’ll pop round and have a little talk
with that vicar of yours, just in case.”
In case what? Dorothy had plenty of food for thought as she
made her way from HQ to the library. She would show Cleo Edith’s photo straightaway
and Cleo could call the vicarage with the good news – if indeed Frederick
Parsnip thought the news was good. At least Edith was alive and that really was
the most important thing as far as her five boys were concerned.
By noon the vicarage was tidy and Mrs Cagney, who had worked
even more slowly than usual, had left even later than usual via the back door.
She was sorry her elongated stay had not produced any more information on the
domestic situation at the vicarage, but she had another house to clean and
could not possibly hang on any longer.
Mr Parsnip was extremely nervous about his
sister’s arrival. Beatrice would ask him awkward questions and he would not
know any answers. The Sunday sermon was unwritten and the bishop’s visit was
hanging over him like the sword of Damocles. In desperation, Mr Parsnip
sharpened a whole box of new pencils, allowing the chippings to fall on the
floor. He was so absorbed in this activity that he didn’t even hear Beatrice
enter the study.
“So that’s where you are,” she bawled, and the vicar nearly
jumped out of his skin.
“How did you get in, Beatrice?”
“Through the back door, Frederick. Someone very kindly left it
ajar.”
“That would be Mrs Cagney. She’s the household help.”
“Very nice, I’m sure. So why are you making all that mess on
the floor, Frederick? Have you found Edith?”
You could not accuse Beatrice of prevarication.
“Answer me, Fredrick,” she repeated, raising her voice to a
shut. “Have you found her or not?”
As if on cue, the phone rang and Mr Parsnip snatched it and
pressed it to his ear.
“Yes?”
“This is Cleo Hartley again. Dorothy was able to identify the
missing woman on a police photo as Edith.”
“Good.”
“The police will probably be around soon to tell you officially.”
“That won’t be necessary. Thank you.”
“The police will decide what is necessary, Vicar. Thank you for
what?”
“Hmmm… Thank goodness they’ve found her.”
“Do you want to know where they found her, Mr Parsnip?”
“Where?”
“In Dover.”
“Dover? Ah, yes...... Dover.”
The vicar did some very quick thinking aloud entirely for Beatrice’s
benefit.
“I remember now. Thank you, Cleo. Must get on. Goodbye.”
“She’s in Dover, Beatrice. As I said, she’s on the way to
Austria. Satisfied?”
Beatrice was not satisfied. She did not believe that Edith
would have gone on a trip without notice and without making sure that the five
boys were being cared for. Frederick did not give her the impression that he
had everything under control, either. On the contrary, he had been a nervous
wreck on the phone earlier that day and he was still in a bad state. What is
more, the phone call two minutes ago had been more evidence of her brother
being out of touch with reality. She decided to play along, however. She
intended to get at the truth and she was sure that Frederick either couldn’t,
or wouldn’t tell her everything of his own free will.
“Are you going to fetch her home, Frederick?”
“Of course not, Beatrice. She’s getting a ferry to Calais
later today.” Mr Parsnip was surprised how easily the lies came to him. “It was
all planned ages ago.”
“Funny that Edith didn’t tell anyone and even funnier still
that it took her two days to get to Dover, Frederick.”
“She called on an old school chum on the way there.”
Mr Parsnip was starting to believe what he was inventing.
Beatrice decided not to pursue her current train of thought.
She would have to talk to Dorothy and the Hartley woman. They would be sure to
know more. As soon as Frederick had gone back to his study to make a start on
his sermon, or so he said, Beatrice phoned Cleo and then checked her story with
Dorothy’s. Their accounts of what they knew about Edith so far were identical
and did not coincide with Mr Parsnip’s version.
Mr Parsnip was genuinely relieved to know that Edith was safe.
He would have to talk to the police, but he didn’t want them coming to the vicarage
and certainly didn’t want Beatrice listening in. He would find an excuse to go
out – a visit to a parishioner would serve the purpose. It wouldn’t even have to
be an untruth.
He would cycle to Dorothy’s cottage immediately and phone
Middlethumpton from there to tell them not to bother calling in at the vicarage.
Leaving Beatrice to look after things, he hooked his bicycle clips round the
bottoms of his trouser legs, found his bicycle and set off at a fair pace down
the drive. He felt better already.
But as luck would have it, Mr Parsnip’s departure on his
rickety old bike coincided with the police car’s arrival. The vicar hurtled out
of the drive straight into it. He later said his guardian angel had saved his
life. The police did not find the incident amusing. The vicar’s front wheel had
made a deep dent in the side of their patrol car. Luckily, the perpetrator of
the crash got away with a few cuts and bruises, having been thrown into a
convenient hedge.
“You all right, Sir?”
Mr Parsnip thought about it for a minute then decided he was.
He straightened his dog collar, brushed the dust and leaves off his jacket, and
scrambled to his feet. The old bicycle was just a heap of scrap metal.
“Oh dear, I’ll have to walk,” he told the officer who, to do
him credit, was looking quite concerned. “Don’t bother going to the house.
There’s no one in.”
Mr Parsnip was getting more practice at being mendacious.
“You sure, Sir? We were going to give you the good news about
your wife being found.”
“I already know.”
“I expect you do if Miss Price got in touch, but it’s normal
procedure to inform next of kin personally.”
“Well, you’ve done that now, haven’t you?”
The officer thought the vicar was acting strangely.
“Are you sure you’re all right, Sir?”
“Positive. You must have better things to do than hang around
here.”
The officer dropped his caring voice and assumed the officious
one.
”I’ll have to report this accident and the damage to the
police car, Sir, and your insurance will have to pay for the repairs.”
“Oh that. Well I could come to the police station and arrange
something.”
“Not a bad idea, Sir. In fact, if you’ve got an hour to spare,
we’ll drive you there now and take you to where you want to go to when we’ve
finished the report.”
Mr Parsnip rightly perceived that the police officer’s
suggestion was in fact an order. And so it came about that Beatrice, who had noticed
the police car parked in front of the drive while she was airing the upstairs
rooms, ran out intending to ask the police what they thought they were doing
parking there. She was just in time to see Frederick Parsnip being bundled onto
the rear seat and driven off.
Despite having been reassured about Edith’s safety by Cleo’s
phone call, Beatrice’s first thought was that something fishy was going on. Her
second, third and fourth thoughts all went in the same direction. Perhaps the
woman on the photo was Clare. What if Frederick had buried Edith in the vicarage
grounds? Up to now, she had never associated her brother with violence, but in
the face of Edith’s untimely disappearance she was forced to reconsider. She
would have to make a thorough examination of the garden to see whether any bits
looked freshly dug.
Luckily, a close inspection produced no clues. Beatrice was a
bit put out, as if she would have preferred to discover Edith’s corpse. What if
Edith really was in Dover? What if Frederick was telling the truth, after all?
The phone rang. It was Mr Morgan. It occurred to Beatrice that
she could call her brother’s bluff, if it was one, by getting Mr Morgan to
offer to collect Edith in Dover and bring her home. Ridiculous, going off to
Austria without rhyme or reason. And if she wasn’t going there, why was she in Dover,
and if she wasn’t in Dover, did Mr Morgan know something she should be informed
about.
Mr Morgan was disconcerted by Beatrice’s friendliness. It
didn’t take her long to persuade him to drive to Dover. He would check with the
vicar that it was all right and he would drive next day so that he could be
back for the Sunday service. After all, he didn’t want to let the bishop down.
The bishop had been a fan of his since the eisteddfod.
Beatrice went into the kitchen to do something about food for
the boys, who would be home from school very soon. Two minutes later the phone
rang yet again. It was Clare calling from Austria to say that she had arrived in
Vienna safely. Clare was understandably astonished that Beatrice was at the vicarage.
She wanted to speak to Edith.
So the woman on the photo can’t have been Clare.
“We’d all like to speak to Edith, but she isn’t here.”
“What do you mean, Beatrice? Edith is always home at this
hour.”
“Not today she isn’t. Nor yesterday.”
“Where is she? Stop beating about the bush!”
“The police say she is in Dover. Dorothy Price identified her
from a photo.”
“Dover?”
“In hospital. She is apparently suffering from amnesia.”
There was a long silence on the Austrian end of the phone.
Beatrice spoke first.
“I thought it might be you, Clare, and that Edith had been
murdered.”
“I’d better come home.”
“I think you should.”
“I’ll talk to Karl. I can definitely be in Dover by Friday
morning.”
“Mr Morgan said he would drive down to collect her,” said
Beatrice.
“Mr Morgan is a twit, Beatrice. Knowing Mr Morgan’s car, I
should think I’ll be there before him even if he sets off now. Tell him to stay
at home. He’d only add to the general confusion.”
Actually, Clare was
thinking that infatuated as he was with her or Edith he would be more of an
embarrassment than anything else.
“He can’t leave till tomorrow morning at the earliest, anyway,
Clare.”
“Ah yes, his choir rehearsal. He wouldn’t miss that, even for
Edith. That’s settled then. Tell him to stay in Upper Grumpsfield and I’ll
collect Edith. Which hospital, Beatrice?”
Beatrice was baffled by Clare’s comment. Even for Edith....? Was
Edith.....? Surely not. Not with that ridiculous little organist. He was in
Upper Grumpsfield, so he had had nothing to do with Edith leaving home.
“What?” Beatrice had stopped listening while she conjectured. “Oh,
I don’t know. Call me later about that. They’ll apparently have to find out
first if she wants to be collected.”
“They’ll let me in, especially when they see who I am. Being
an identical twin has its uses. If necessary I’ll try all the hospitals till I
find the right one.”
“The boys are upset, Clare, and Frederick has been acting
strangely. He seems relieved that Edith has gone.”
Clare did not want to ruffle Beatrice’s feathers any further.
Poor Frederick having a sister like Beatrice.
“There’s probably a simple explanation, Beatrice. I must ring
off now. I’ll let you know how I get on.”
Beatrice speculated on what would happen when a look-alike
Edith turned up in Dover to collect her sister. Clare might be a nuisance most
of the time, but she was good to have in an emergency, whatever her failings.
Edith and Clare were devoted to one another.
However, Clare had left her in a state of curiosity. What had
she meant by ‘even for Edith’? Was something really going on between her and Mr
Morgan? Was that the reason Edith had left home? Surely not. She had met Mr
Morgan and found his manner insufferable. The feeling had been mutual. Beatrice
was the kind of overpowering female who frightened him to death. She made him
feel as if a herd of buffalo was trampling all over him. She reminded him of
his mother, actually.
Clare was frustrated. She had wanted to spend a quiet, happy few
days with Karl, and now she was going to have to dash back and straighten
things out for Edith instead. Edith might complain sometimes, but she had never
given any hint of wanting to run away. Clare had no idea what could have made
her do that.
Karl was understanding, but disappointed. Of course she must go
back, but not until next day. He had opera tickets for that evening. Edith was
to all intents and purposes alone in the world. She had cut herself off from
her familiar surroundings and gone all the way to Dover, losing her memory in
the process. Karl would sort things out at the office and drive to Upper
Grumpsfield as soon as he could get away. They would talk things over at
leisure after Edith had been taken care of.
So Clare left Vienna with mixed feelings. She would drive
until dark then find a motel and get a few hours' sleep before driving to
Calais and getting on the first Eurostar. She preferred boats, but the train
was faster.
By Friday morning, Beatrice had everything at the vicarage
under control. The boys went to school as usual and Mr Parsnip did his best to
carry on with his duties, which on Fridays included visiting the elderly and
frail in the parish. Since the news had got around about Edith’s disappearance,
he was greeted with concerned questioning everywhere he went. When would Edith
be back? Was she ill? Where had she gone? Mr Parsnip told people a revised
version of the original fairy tale. Edith had been on her way to Austria, but
had changed her mind and was on the way home.
***
Mr Morgan spent Friday morning moving the last of his
possessions into Robert’s upstairs flat. Most of his enthusiasm for what he had
hoped would be the start of a new era in which he would intensify his efforts
to find a wife had abated. With Edith gone, his utopian idea of persuading her
to leave her vicarage life for a new one at his side was thwarted. Edith would
not have gone away if she had wanted to be with him. And since Clare had gone
to Austria to meet up with Karl, there was no point in continuing to speculate
in that direction, either.
Gareth was just unloading the last of his crockery from the
boot of his car when he was startled by the loud voice of Delilah Browne. After
getting back from Scotland, where her pub tour had ended in jubilation, she had
come to the butcher’s for something tasty and been surprised to see that Mr
Morgan was actually moving in.
“Can I help you with that?” she shouted, causing him to jump
and hit his head on the lid of the car boot. “Oh, sorry. Did I startle you?”
Mr Morgan rubbed his head vigorously to spread the pain out.
“Yes I did, didn’t I?” said Delilah. “Shall I rub the spot?”
“I’d rather you didn’t,” stammered Gareth.
Delilah snatched the box of china from the car boot and
marched into the shop.
“Where does this go?”’ she demanded of Robert, who looked
startled and indicated upstairs with a gesture that told her he would have
nothing to do with the clown who was moving in.
Delilah had enjoyed what she called her ‘European tour’ with a
club act. She had been delighted to get back on ‘the boards’ after ‘resting’
for longer than she cared to admit. It made no difference that the boards were
only pubs and clubs anywhere in Scotland where a sufficiently appreciative
audience could be drummed up. Delilah had been the soloist, blessed with a
voice so loud and raucous that it could shout down the most boisterous pub
caterwauling. European capitals were a far cry from the venues she had graced,
but it was their loss, not hers.
Cleo was glad Delilah was back. They had plenty to talk about
and chatting to her on the phone was a relief after all the bother with Edith
and the events surrounding her romance. Cleo’s life had indeed been turned
upside down since they’d last met. Delilah was utterly amazed about the whole
situation, given that she had herself tried to encourage Robert to modernize
himself and stop smelling like mothballs and had soon given him up as a lost
cause. Her only worry was that Cleo had set herself up with a boring guy, but
that was her problem.
Delilah entertained Cleo with her own tale of a Scottish pub
owner who had wooed her intensively. Yes, she had been sorely tempted, but then
it became clear that what he was really looking for was a cook and barmaid. The
last straw was when the previous barmaid, who had left in a hurry, turned out
to be his wife. As Delilah pointed out, it’s one thing singing popular songs in
the pub and quite another slaving over a hot stove there.
Since the pub tour had been organized more or less as the
group went along, no one had known how long it would last. Its overwhelming
success was attributed by Delilah to the surge in karaoke. They usually fitted
their acts between sing-along sessions to a captive audience and quite often
Delilah had found herself judging a karaoke contest, helped along by a dishy
technician named Mitch who could have become the object of her affections had
he not been a decade younger.
Delilah had enjoyed herself so much that when the tour finally
ended she decided to open her own karaoke bar. Upper Grumpsfield village pub
had closed down when the owner died and left Delilah high and dry. The premises
were still vacant. Delilah Browne had high hopes of reopening it. She thought karaoke
might even appeal to older generations. She had mentioned it to Mitch, but he
had already been booked elsewhere.
Robert told Delilah Browne to go upstairs to see what was now
going to be Gareth Morgan’s flat. It was chaotic there, so she immediately set
about tidying up. Mr Morgan was delighted. Suddenly he saw Delilah in quite a
new light.
Delilah took the opportunity to see what the flat had to
offer. It would be quite nice once everything was in place. Mr Morgan had
inherited all the bedroom furniture and a fitted kitchen. His old sofa looked
rather uncomfortable, but the rest of his stuff (that was actually Robert’s) was
in fairly good condition and she could see herself standing at the Hammond
organ practising to Mr Morgan’s accompaniment, but with no strings attached, of
course. Delilah did not think Mr Morgan was much of a catch.
The organ was still wrapped up, having only just been
delivered on a tractor by two farmworkers. Delilah removed the blanket, which
smelt a bit like a farmyard, and draped it artistically over the sofa. Mr
Morgan was so taken with Delilah’s good taste that he sat down at the organ and
struck up a few chords.
Soon, Robert was amazed to hear strains of ‘Oh I do like to be
beside the seaside’ wafting into the shop as the two music-makers upstairs got
into the spirit of things. Robert could remember trips to Blackpool as a child.
They had gone to the tower and listened to the ballroom organ and he had always
joined in if he knew the tune. Not that Upper Grumpsfield was near the sea, but
you could imagine being there when you heard that particular song. Robert
wondered if Cleo had ever been to Blackpool. Would that be a suitable target
for a honeymoon?
