In the nursery Teddy said bedtime prayers as usual, Agatha’s absence regular enough, Archie’s agitation far removed. Outside, night had fallen but still policemen spread out, along with volunteers from the town, scouring and searching all over the countryside. Bodies of water glimmered ominously. By now everyone in Berkshire and Surrey was developing a theory about where Agatha might have gone, what might have happened. Not one of them anywhere close to the truth.
I didn’t have a telephone in my flat but there was a call box on the corner. In the evening I walked out to it, pressed the A button, deposited my pennies, and waited for Archie to answer.
‘How are you?’ I asked, speaking in a low voice, as if the passers-by might hear. ‘Is there any word?’
‘No.’ If I hadn’t known it was him, I’m not sure I would have recognized his voice. There was a tremor, an uncertainty that seemed wholly out of character. ‘The police are involved, Nan. They are highly involved.’
‘Well, that’s good, isn’t it? They’re serious about finding her.’
‘Frightfully serious. They mean to find her as quickly as possible. She’ll be mortified when she finds out about all this fuss.’
I nodded, imagining it, the crack in her dignity. It did seem alarming that she wouldn’t rush back immediately to prevent exactly that. I could tell from Archie’s voice, it terrified him. He’d take more comfort if the police had dismissed the whole thing as nonsense.
‘I’ve been searching through her papers,’ he said. ‘There’s a story about you, I think.’
‘Is there?’
‘Yes. I’m quite sure it’s you. An adulteress. The main character pushes her over a cliff in the end.’
I drew in a breath that was half inhale, half laugh. Perhaps Agatha really had gone mad. Though one could argue her wanting to kill me was perfectly reasonable.
‘Perhaps I should be looking over my shoulder.’ I made my voice sound light, but Archie had already moved on to other worries.
‘Oh, Nan. Why did I have to be so callous with her? You were right. I should have waited.’
‘No,’ I said. ‘There never would have been a right time.’ It was disconcerting to hear him so distraught, his voice strangled by what seemed to be real grief. ‘She’ll turn up. She’s just upset. The moment she realizes what a fuss has started she’ll run right home.’
But cheering up didn’t seem to be what Archie wanted. I could hear someone come into the room and he told me he needed to ring off. Quickly, I asked what he’d told Teddy about Agatha’s whereabouts.
‘I said she went to Ashfield to see after her mother’s things.’
‘Might she really be there?’
‘The Torquay police have already looked into it. She’s not there. She’s not anywhere.’
I didn’t know how to reply.
‘Look,’ he said, his voice hardening. ‘Better if we don’t communicate till this is all sorted out. We don’t want your name in all this.’
‘No,’ I agreed, ‘we don’t.’
He rang off without saying goodbye.
I placed the earpiece back on its rung and opened the door to the box, stepping out onto the street. The sky had gone dark, streaked with the last colours of a sunset I’d managed to miss. My breath tumbled out, visible in the frigid air, and I didn’t realize until I’d walked halfway home that I’d been examining the face of every woman, to see if it was Agatha.
She would be all right. I felt sure of it. She was far more practical than I. And it wasn’t as though she were a desperate young girl, with no resources or place to go. The whole world stood with its arms out, holding a net to catch her once she fell. She might be distraught but I knew she would never commit suicide. Nor would she endure discomfort, the way I did, walking a while instead of returning straight home, past the point of shivering, without gloves, teeth beginning to chatter.