Edward Marston - Ticket to Oblivion

‘How do you feel, my dear?’ he asked with awkward tenderness.

‘Is there any news?’ she gasped.

‘Not as yet, I fear.’

‘It’s been hours and hours. Will our torment never end?’

‘Fretting about it will not help, Paulina.’

‘But I’m bound to fret. Any mother would do so in the circumstances — and any father as well. Don’t you fret, Marcus?’

‘I am naturally anxious,’ he told her, ‘but I’m schooling myself to remain calm and to allow for a modicum of optimism.’

‘Optimism?’ she echoed in surprise. ‘I see no cause for that.’

‘Hope is a better medicine than despondency.’

But his wife was well beyond the reach of hope, still less of optimism. From the moment she learnt of her daughter’s disappearance, she’d been plunged into an unrelieved misery. To her rheumy eyes, the situation was impossibly bleak.

‘She’s gone, Marcus. We have to accept it — Imogen has gone.’

‘I refuse even to countenance the thought,’ he said, decisively.

‘She was our one and only child — truly, a gift from God. Need I remind you of the difficulties attending her birth?’

‘This is no time to dwell on such matters, my dear.’

‘But the memories come flooding back to me.’

They were not memories that he chose to share. Complications arising from Imogen’s birth had meant that she would have no siblings. It was a bitter blow to a man who’d longed for a son to follow in his footsteps and preserve the traditions of the Burnhope dynasty. Imogen might have her mother’s exquisite beauty but she could never inherit her father’s baronetcy, join him as a Member of Parliament or take part in the manly country pursuits he enjoyed during occasional moments of leisure. A son would have been bursting with ambition to make his mark and achieve something of note; his daughter’s talents lay chiefly in being decorative.

Paulina was on the point of dozing off when she shook herself awake again.

‘What about poor Clive?’ she asked. ‘Have you told him?’

‘I sent a letter by courier.’

‘He’ll be desolate.’

‘Clive will do what I have done, my dear,’ said Sir Marcus, pompously. ‘He’ll substitute action for anguish. Instead of wallowing in despair, he’ll want to join the search for Imogen. Clive Tunnadine is a splendid fellow — that’s why I chose him as our prospective son-in-law.’

She heaved a sigh. ‘We’ve lost a daughter and he’s lost a wife.’ As her eyelids began to flutter, a thought made her fight off sleep. ‘You mentioned a detective to me. Has he arrived yet?’

‘Inspector Colbeck has come and gone,’ he said, shielding from her his disappointment with the visit. ‘He and his sergeant gathered information here before taking the train back to Oxford. For some reason, Colbeck felt that it would be valuable to speak to your sister and her husband.’ He gritted his teeth. ‘We can only pray that the so-called Railway Detective knows what he’s doing.’

When they reached the railway station in Worcester, the detectives were met by a happy coincidence. Not only could they catch an express train to Oxford, the locomotive that pulled it was Will Shakspere . According to the porter who’d put their luggage on the train, it was the self-same one that had taken Imogen and her maid off on their travels. Colbeck and Leeming were thus able to recreate their journey, very confident that they wouldn’t disappear into a void as the women had apparently done. The hectic dash to Shrub Hill in the cab had left little opportunity for reflection on what they’d so far discovered. In the privacy of a railway compartment, they were able to compare notes properly.

‘What did you make of Sir Marcus?’ asked Colbeck.

‘People like that always frighten me, sir.’

‘I don’t see why they should. You’re never frightened when you take on a ruffian armed with a cudgel or arrest an obstreperous drunk. When it comes to a brawl, you’re the most fearless person I’ve ever met.’

‘Sir Marcus is rich, he’s titled, he’s important. I’m none of those things.’

‘You’re rich in the things that matter, Victor. As for a title, “detective sergeant” is something of which to be proud when attached to your name. Then we come to importance,’ said Colbeck. ‘Answer me this. When someone’s daughter vanishes from the face of the earth, which is more important — her father or the man who helps to find her?’

‘I never thought of it that way,’ admitted Leeming with a chuckle. ‘Sir Marcus needs us. He may look down on us but we are the ones leading the chase.’

‘What did you learn at Burnhope Manor?’

‘I learnt that I don’t belong there, sir. I felt like an intruder. I was also in awe of that portrait of him over the fireplace. It made him look so … majestic.’

‘It flattered his vanity,’ said Colbeck, ‘which is why he paid the artist a large amount of money to give prominence to his better features while, at the same time, concealing the less appealing ones — and there were several of those. What struck me,’ he continued, ‘was how little he knew of his daughter’s life and movements. Evidently, she’s led an isolated existence under the aegis of Lady Burnhope.’

‘Why did you ask to see her bedchamber?’

‘I wanted some idea of what she’d taken on the trip.’

‘Your request really upset Sir Marcus.’

‘I was prepared for such a reaction. It’s a great pity. We could have learnt a lot from seeing what apparel she’d taken, but my principal interest was in her jewellery. Had she simply been going to stay at an Oxford college for a relatively short time, she wouldn’t have needed to take it. Academic institutions give a young lady little scope for display. If,’ Colbeck went on, ‘she nevertheless did take her most precious possessions, then a whole new line of enquiry opens up.’

‘Does it?’ Leeming was bewildered. ‘I fail to see it, sir.’

‘Remember what the coachman told us. He and the porter were each given a handsome tip. What does that tell you?’

‘The young lady was uncommonly kind-hearted.’

‘I prefer to think that she was excessively grateful.’

‘Yet all that they did was to put her on a train.’

‘Without realising it,’ said Colbeck, thinking it through, ‘they might have been doing a lot more than that. This was the first time that Lady Burnside’s daughter was travelling unsupervised. Imagine the sense of independence she must have felt.’ He looked across at the sergeant. ‘What else did the coachman tell us?’

‘He told us that he was sweet on Rhoda Wills. Not that he said it in so many words,’ Leeming recalled, ‘but I could read that fond smile of his. He was far less upset about the disappearance of Sir Marcus’s daughter than he was of her maid.’

‘He gave us a vital clue, Victor.’

‘Did he?’

‘Think hard.’

Face puckered in concentration, Leeming went through the meeting with Vernon Tolley in his mind. A smile slowly spread across his face and he snapped his fingers.

‘It was that valise,’ he said. ‘It went inside the carriage instead of on top of it.’

‘And why do you think that was?’

‘It contained something needed on the journey.’

‘Well done!’

Leeming’s smile froze. ‘But that still doesn’t explain how they disappeared.’

‘Perhaps they didn’t,’ said Colbeck.

‘Then where did they go?’

‘They stayed exactly where they were, Victor.’ He laughed at the sergeant’s expression of complete bafflement. ‘They got on the train at Worcester and left it at its terminus in Oxford.’

‘Then why didn’t Mrs Vaughan and her daughter see them?’