By the Pricking of My Thumbs - Agatha Christie [70]
‘I suppose it might be. Where was this?’
‘Hospital at Market Basing, I think it said. They wanted to know more about her, I gather. I just wondered–well, I know it’s awfully silly, there must be quantities of people called Cowley and quantities of people called Prudence. But I thought I’d just ring up and find out. Make sure, I mean, that Mother was at home and all right and all that.’
‘I see,’ said Tommy. ‘Yes, I see.’
‘Well, go on, Pop, is she at home?’
‘No,’ said Tommy, ‘she isn’t at home and I don’t know either whether she is all right or not.’
‘What do you mean?’ said Deborah. ‘What’s Mother been doing? I suppose you’ve been up in London with that hush-hush utterly secret idiotic survival from past days, jawing with all the old boys.’
‘You’re quite right,’ said Tommy. ‘I got back from that yesterday evening.’
‘And you found Mother away–or did you know she was away? Come on, Pop, tell me about it. You’re worried. I know when you’re worried well enough. What’s Mother been doing? She’s been up to something, hasn’t she? I wish at her age she’d learn to sit quiet and not do things.’
‘She’s been worried,’ said Tommy. ‘Worried about something that happened in connection with your Great-aunt Ada’s death.’
‘What sort of thing?’
‘Well, something that one of the patients at the nursing home said to her. She got worried about this old lady. She started talking a good deal and your mother was worried about some of the things she said. And so, when we went to look through Aunt Ada’s things we suggested talking to this old lady and it seems she’d left rather suddenly.’
‘Well, that seems quite natural, doesn’t it?’
‘Some of her relatives came and fetched her away.’
‘It still seems quite natural,’ said Deborah. ‘Why did Mother get the wind up?’
‘She got it into her head,’ said Tommy, ‘that something might have happened to this old lady.’
‘I see.’
‘Not to put too fine a point on it, as the saying goes, she seems to have disappeared. All in quite a natural way. I mean, vouched for by lawyers and banks and all that. Only–we haven’t been able to find out where she is.’
‘You mean Mother’s gone off to look for her somewhere?’
‘Yes. And she didn’t come back when she said she was coming back, two days ago.’
‘And haven’t you heard from her?’
‘No.’
‘I wish to goodness you could look after Mother properly,’ said Deborah, severely.
‘None of us have ever been able to look after her properly,’ said Tommy. ‘Not you either, Deborah, if it comes to that. It’s the same way she went off in the war and did a lot of things that she’d no business to be doing.’
‘But it’s different now. I mean, she’s quite old. She ought to sit at home and take care of herself. I suppose she’s been getting bored. That’s at the bottom of it all.’
‘Market Basing Hospital, did you say?’ said Tommy.
‘Melfordshire. It’s about an hour or an hour and a half from London, I think, by train.’
‘That’s it,’ said Tommy. ‘And there’s a village near Market Basing called Sutton Chancellor.’
‘What’s that got to do with it?’ said Deborah.
‘It’s too long to go into now,’ said Tommy. ‘It has to do with a picture painted of a house near a bridge by a canal.’
‘I don’t think I can hear you very well,’ said Deborah. ‘What are you talking about?’
‘Never mind,’ said Tommy. ‘I’m going to ring up Market Basing Hospital and find out a few things. I’ve a feeling that it’s your mother, all right. People, if they’ve had concussion, you know, often remember things first that happened when they were a child, and only get slowly to the present. She’s gone back to her maiden name. She may have been in a car accident, but I shouldn’t be surprised if somebody hadn’t given her a conk on the head. It’s the sort of thing that happens to your mother. She gets into things. I’ll let you know what I find out.’
Forty minutes later, Tommy Beresford glanced at his wrist watch and breathed a sigh of utter weariness, as he replaced the receiver with a final clang on the telephone rest. Albert made an appearance.
‘What about your dinner, sir?’ he demanded. ‘You haven’t eaten a thing, and I