Disappeared: MANTEQUERO BOOK 2 (3 page)

“She’ll know exactly where June went and when she was due back. She’s like a daughter to her. More so than to her own mother, I’d say.” She gave a loud sniff.

Alison brightened up. “Can you get in touch with her?”

“Easier for you than me, dear. She goes to Graystones,”

Of course she did. Miss Blacker had said so. In the juniors. In fact, she seemed to remember her saying she regularly looked after the child after school.

“I’ll find her. She’ll be in the juniors. You don’t happen to know her surname, do you?”

“Well, I only know her as Patsy. I imagine it’s short for Patricia. And her surname is – just a minute –.” She stood for a moment with her eyes closed. “Owen – like the war poet.”

“Thank you” Alison beamed at the old lady. “I’ll find out what I can and ring you tomorrow.”

“Thank you, my dear.” The old lady’s eyes were very bright. “I’ve been so worried.”

II

The little cat was a great success.

Alison had experienced a few qualms on the way home. It had not occurred to her to ask her mother how she felt about it before agreeing to take care of the little animal. But she need not have worried. Before she could launch into protestations about keeping her in her room and dealing with everything herself, her mother had opened the cat box and snatched up Jessica.

“What a lovely little cat!” she exclaimed, pressing Jessica to her bosom. “Wherever did you get her?”
“How do you know she’s a girl?” Alison laughed, partly with relief.

“She’s
far
too pretty to be a boy, aren’t you, Sweetie?” Mum nuzzled her face into Jessica’s fur.

“Well, you’re right, as it happens. She’s called Jessica. But don’t get too carried away. I’m just looking after her for a friend.”

Alison put the kettle on and made the tea while she filled her mother in on the events of the day.

Her mother tutted at the unreasonable attitude of the Weasel, drew in her breath sharply at Alison’s rebellious speech, said “Good for you,” when Alison told her how she’d tracked down Miss Blacker’s address and then looked completely baffled at her colleague’s disappearance.

“But
why
would she stay in Spain?” she asked, putting Jessica down, who was beginning to struggle. “It doesn’t make any sense.”

“No,” Alison said, with a sigh, “it doesn’t. It doesn’t make any sense at all. I’m going to try and find out more tomorrow. But I can’t help feeling something has happened to her.”

She spent the rest of the evening catching up with her marking, but she kept being distracted by thoughts of Miss Blacker, and by the little cat, who was putting on a marvellous performance for her parents – jumping up and pirouetting in the air after the length of wool her mother was dangling for her, chasing all over the room after a piece of screwed-up paper. Alison felt a stab of jealousy, but Jessica paused and looked at her with a slightly worried expression, as if to say, “Am I doing all right? Is this what you want me to do?” and Alison laughed aloud and went back to her books.

By the time she finally got through the pile it was way past her bedtime and her parents had gone upstairs over an hour before. She stretched and got up from the table, and packed her books away in her briefcase. She hated leaving anything in a mess.

Then she went into the kitchen and checked the cat’s food bowls. There were some biscuits, but no meat left. And that had been the last tin. Frowning, she went to the cupboard to see if she could find anything suitable and, amazingly, there was the last tin still sitting on the shelf. So what had her mother fed her with earlier? Intrigued, she had a look in the kitchen bin. There, right on top, was an empty tin of best salmon.
Aha!
So that was how the land lay.

“Well, Jessica,” she said aloud to the little cat, who had followed her into the room. “It looks like you’re in danger of being spoilt.
But never mind.” She bent down to pick her up and she nuzzled against her neck. “It’ll make up for being lonely for so long.”

She filled the bowl with the contents of the last tin and put the cat down in front of it. Jessica looked up and beamed at her before getting stuck in.

“I can’t believe how much you eat. You’re so tiny. Where do you put it all?”
 

Later, when she had cleaned her teeth and was comfortably settled in bed, Jessica came up to join her and nestled beside her on the pillow. Alison was sure this was inappropriate behaviour but, of course, she didn’t know what her normal routine was with Miss Blacker. If she usually slept with her mistress, it would be unkind to throw her out now. And anyway she felt a certain smugness that Jessica had chosen to sleep with her rather than her parents.

****

The next morning Alison found it quite a wrench to leave the little cat behind with her mother.
God, it’s like falling in love,
she thought. Who would have imagined she could form such an attachment so quickly? It was going to be so hard to give her up when Miss Blacker came back . . .
if
Miss Blacker came back.

That lunchtime she went on the hunt for Miss Blacker’s favourite niece, the child prodigy, Patsy Owen. The teacher on duty in the juniors’ yard was Jean Harris, the same one Miss Wetherspoon had contacted the day before.

“Oh, hello,” she said, smiling. “Mavis rang me and told me you would be round today looking for Patsy.” She waved to a small, rather podgy child sitting on the wall by herself. “There she is.” Then, raising her voice, “Patsy, I’ve got Miss Metcalfe here to see you.”

The child looked up and gave a huge grin, which suddenly transformed her from a rather ordinary plump little girl into something approaching a beauty, then got up and trotted towards them.

“I’m so pleased to meet you, Miss Metcalfe,” she said, proffering her hand in an oddly formal gesture. “My Auntie June told me all about you.”

Alison accepted the proffered hand and smiled back.

“Actually it’s your Auntie June I wanted to see you about,” she said. “Has she contacted you at all?”
“Well,” Patsy looked down at her shoes and then up again. “Not for a few days. She sent me a postcard every day for the first week but the last one was postmarked the thirtieth of December. Mind you, that could be the Christmas post, don’t you think?” Her voice held such a pleading note that Alison rushed to reassure her.
“Of course it could. I’m sure that’s it. She didn’t say anything in it about being delayed, did she?”

“No.” Patsy looked really disconsolate. “I thought she was coming back this Saturday.” Then, as an afterthought. “Mummy’s furious.”

“Oh.” Alison chewed her lip. “You don’t happen to know where she was going, do you?”

“She was going to the Alpujarras, wasn’t she?”
Alison, taken aback by the child’s perfect pronunciation of the difficult Spanish word, took a moment to respond. “That’s what I thought, but I don’t know exactly where. I thought I might try to track her and find out whether there’s any obvious reason why she’s delayed.”
“You think something’s happened to her, don’t you?” The child was looking really distressed now, her eyes bright with unshed tears.

Alison squatted down to bring herself level with the child. She didn’t believe in lying to children. It made them lose faith in grown-ups. “I think something
may
have happened to her,” she said, “but there may be a perfectly reasonable explanation and if I can find out just where she went I might be able to find out and put all our minds at rest.”

Patsy screwed her face up. “I don’t know, she didn’t tell me the exact details. Just a village in the Alpujarras.
” Then her face brightened. “But the lady at the travel agents will know, won’t she?”

Alison and Jean exchanged a look.

“The travel agent?”
“You know, the one on the high street, next door to the bank. The one with the big blue sign outside. Auntie June always books her school trips there. She likes the lady in there.” Patsy paused for a moment. “Heather, she’s called. Auntie June likes her because,” Patsy’s face creased into a smile, “she’s the only person she’s ever met who is nearly as fat as her.” Unable to contain herself any longer, she laughed out loud, holding one hand guiltily in front of her mouth.

Alison and Jean exchanged another glance. They were both smiling at the child’s words.
“Thank you, Patsy,” Alison said, getting back to her feet.  She looked at her watch. “I’ll go along there now.”

As she left the yard, the child called after her. “Miss Metcalfe?”

Alison stopped and turned around. “If you find out, will you tell me?”
“Of course. You’ll be the first person I’ll tell.”

****

The Travel Agent did indeed have a big blue sign. It read ‘BLUE HORIZONS’.

The window was brightly-lit and filled with pictures of people skiing down snowy slopes, relaxing on white beaches under palm trees, standing on the decks of cruise ships looking out to sea. Alison felt a sudden desire to get away from it all, leave the thin mists and drizzle of England and go to the sun. All the people in the posters looked so happy.

Mentally she shook herself and pushed open the door.

The shop was much busier than she had imagined it would be on a Tuesday lunchtime in January. She spotted Heather straight away. She was unmistakeable – a mountain of a woman – but she had a lovely smile and was surprisingly pretty, despite her great bulk. She was sitting behind the counter talking to a small thin chap. The two of them were looking at an array of brochures laid out between them. She must have sensed Alison looking at her, for she looked up and smiled across the room, giving a little hand gesture that clearly conveyed the message,
I’ll be with you in a minute.

Alison smiled back and then turned her attention to the posters on the walls. One of them featured Spain and she picked up a leaflet from the box underneath and began idly leafing through it, listening with half an ear to the conversation at the counter.

“I think maybe the best thing, Mr Timms, would be if you took some of these home and discussed it with your wife. It’s a special holiday and you want to make sure it’s exactly what you both want.”

“Well, I don’t know,” the thin man was shaking his head and looking at the array of brochures in a bewildered fashion.

“I tell you what. I’ll get a bag for you and you can take them all.” She got up from the counter with a great surge, went to a bank of drawers in the wall behind and pulled out a sturdy carrier bag with ‘BLUE HORIZONS’ emblazoned on the side. Then she swept all the brochures into the bag, and handed it to the indecisive Mr Timms with a beaming smile. “There you are. You can go through them this evening and bring them back to me tomorrow.”

Mr Timms stood up, still shaking his head, but obediently made his way to the door and shuffled outside.

“Now,” Heather said, transferring her smile to Alison, who was torn between laughter and open admiration at the woman’s adroit handling of  Mr Timms.

“I’m a friend of Miss June Blacker,” Alison began, then stopped, not sure what to say next.

“Yes?” Heather was still smiling.

“Well, she went on holiday to Spain for Christmas and she hasn’t come back. I thought it was likely she booked it here and you might be able to help.”
As she spoke, Heather’s expression changed from bright, artificial smile to one of concern.

“Not come back?”

She went back behind her desk and sat down abruptly, the chair squeaking in protest. Then she leaned forward and tapped rapidly on her keyboard whilst scrutinising the screen.

“I can’t see why there should be a problem.” She frowned, still looking at the screen. “As far as I can see everything went the way it should. The flights were on time. I’ve had no messages from the car hire place or the house agent. What could have gone wrong?” She turned back to Alison. “Are you absolutely sure she hasn’t returned?”

Alison sat down in the opposite chair.

“She didn’t turn up at school yesterday. I went round to her house. She has a neighbour keeping an eye on the place. She hasn’t come back.”

Heather leaned across the counter and patted Alison’s hand. “Look, I’ll get cracking on this straight away. Can you come back later?”

“Of course,” Alison said. “But if you find out anything, can you text me on this number?” She scribbled her mobile number on a pad on the desk. “I can’t take phone calls while I’m teaching, but I always switch my phone on in the break.”

Heather nodded. “I’ll do that. But whatever can have happened?” she asked, speaking more to herself than Alison.

****

There was no text from Blue Horizons that afternoon, so at four o’ clock Alison picked up her briefcase and made her way out of the building. As she passed the school gates she saw the child, Patsy, leaning against the wall, looking thoroughly miserable. She gave her a cheery wave and the child waved back with rather less enthusiasm.

Blue Horizons was not quite as busy as it had been at lunchtime. No doubt it was still too early for the office workers. Heather looked up as the bell over the door rang, and waved her over to the counter.
“Have you found anything out yet?”

Heather shook her head. “It’s all negative, I’m afraid. The airline confirmed she was on the passenger list both ways. But we knew that anyway. All it tells us is she didn’t cancel. And why would she? You don’t get your money back.

The lady from the rental agency, Sofia, says she’ll check with the owner of the house and see whether she arrived and left as expected but she hasn’t got back to me yet. And I left a message with the hire car company but they’ve not got back yet either.”

Alison felt vaguely depressed. She wanted to go in all guns blazing and find out what was going on, but she seemed to be sinking in a welter of red tape.
Heather looked at her kindly. “They’re not very good at the quick response in Spain,” she said. “I expect they’ll get back to us in the morning. Oh, wait a minute-” she broke off, “There’s an email just coming through from the rental company.” She scanned the  screen.