Page 27 of Return Ticket

“I do, but I’d prefer to hear it from you. DC Hartridge will take notes while you talk, if that’s all right?”

She looked over at Hartridge, gave a nod, and settled down in the armchair she’d chosen. “She was coming home from work at the hospital. She’s on the late shift, and it was one of those nights we had the bad fog.” She waved her hand at the window. “Dark and gloomy all day, it was.”

James felt something in him stir. Percy, the little boy who lived opposite the site where the woman was left by the killer, had said it was foggy the night he saw the man with the wheelbarrow.

And Mr. Stanhope said there’d been a storm the night before they found the body in the ditch.

This killer used the weather to give himself cover. James made a mental note to check when the next fog or storm was predicted.

“And as far as you know, she left at the usual time and was coming straight home?” James asked.

Mrs. Jenkins gave a tight nod, her lips pinching under her teeth. “Spoke to the nursing sister myself, I did. She told me my Beth left at the usual time. Said she was looking forward to getting home out of the pea soup.”

“Can you tell us her usual route?” Hartridge asked, and James looked over at him with approval.

It was a good question.

Mrs. Jenkins told them the bus she took, and her usual route from the final stop to home.

“Does Beth have a dentist?” James asked.

Mrs. Jenkins made a sound, standing quickly, arms tight around her middle. “You’ve found someone? Someone dead?”

“We investigate suspicious deaths all the time,” James soothed her. “We’d just like to have her dentist’s name for the report in case we do think we’ve found her and need a method of identification.”

Suspicious, but unwilling to go down the road she’d started on any further, Mrs. Jenkins gave them the name of a local dentist. She let them look around Beth’s neat, spotless room and then saw them off from her doorstep, arms still tightly crossed, as if she might unravel if she let go.

“You think one of the bodies is Beth?” Hartridge asked as they walked toward the Wolseley.

“She didn’t run away. She has no reason to leave her mother to worry like that. Her room, the way her mother talks about her . . . they were close. And when we talk to the hospital where she worked, my guess is they’ll tell us Beth was never so much as late, let alone one to miss nearly two weeks of work.”

If she’d taken a few days to go off with a man she’d met, or off on a holiday she hadn’t told anyone about, she’d be back by now.

“If she’s not one of the three bodies we’ve already got,” James said, “then it’s because we haven’t found her yet.”

chaptertwelve

Gabriella slidthe second sourdough loaf in the oven, and dusted off her hands.

She started cleaning up Mr. Rodney’s kitchen, wiping down the kitchen table where she’d been kneading the dough. She always baked when she needed to calm her thoughts, and since she’d seen Ben that morning, her mind had been racing.

The front door opened on the murmur of voices, and she called out a greeting.

“Gabriella.” Solomon walked in, looking sharp enough to cut through steak.

“Hey there.” She smiled as she walked over to the the sink and rinsed out the cloth she’d been using.

“Smells good.” Mr. Rodney appeared in the doorway, head lifted a little as he breathed in the scent of the loaf cooling on a rack on the counter top. “You’ve spoiled me now. I can’t stand the mass produced supermarket rubbish anymore.”

Gabriella lifted her brows. “I should hope so. My bread bears no relationship to that dreck.”

“Smells like a good bakery in here.” George was the last one into the kitchen.

Gabriella’s smile widened. She liked George a lot, although she didn’t see him often. He was Solomon’s right hand man in whatever they did together, and she wasn’t talking about their jobs for British Rail.“Hi George. How’re things?”

They had all been out to dinner at the Calypso Club, and Gabriella could smell the scent of spices on them.

“Good, good.” He turned at the sound of a knock on the door and went off to answer it.

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