Echoes of the Past by Deborah Mailer Read Free Book Online Page A

think she would have just gone off with someone for a weekend? Did she do things like that often?”
    “Good grief, no. Sue may have worked in a bar, but she was really a very quiet girl. The last few weeks she had been a bit secretive; we had joked with her that she had a fancy man, you know. She never denied it, nor did she tell us anything about him. We never saw her with him. But when we noticed the small case gone, we suspected that maybe he was married or prominent in some way and they had gone off in secret. When she never returned ... Well, I had always hoped they had run off and got married and were living a happy life somewhere. But I suppose in light of what the officer found, that seems highly improbable.”
    Tom’s ears pricked up. “What did the officer find?”
    Valerie looked over the brim of her teacup. “You don’t know?”
    “There seems to be some information missing from the file I have.”
    Valerie rose from her seat. “Can I ask to see your identification again please?” Tom fished his warrant card out of his pocket and handed it to her.
    “I can assure you, Val, I am a police officer.” He said, putting on his most charming and trustworthy smile. The woman looked at the identification; she knew very well that she would not be able to tell a fake from the real thing, cautiously she handed it back to him.
    “Can I ask, did you work at the bar as well?”
    “No, I worked at the post office. That’s where I met my husband, he was in the army. He was home after a tour of duty in Northern Ireland. That was about two years after Sue disappeared, not long after we met, we were married. I’m sorry, Mr Hunter, but I really can’t tell you any more than that.”
    Tom put his cup down and thanked her for the tea. She led him up the same narrow hallway and opened the door. He could sense the woman’s discomfort.
    “Oh, Mrs McKenzie, before I go, you never said what the last officer had found.”
    Valerie paused for a moment as if sizing him up. Obviously, she decided now that he was outside her front door she could let her guard back down.
    “I’m sure you could ask your predecessor about it; he found a picture of her with an older man. He believed it had been taken the night she disappeared.” Her voice became a little more sombre as she added, “He said he thought the man in the picture with her was a killer.”
    The woman stepped back in and closed the door. Tom knew that he could never ask his predecessor. He had been dead for a little over a year.
    Tom wandered down to the hotel. The business had changed hands many times over the years and no one there knew Susanna Wheeling. He crossed over the road and walked down a small lane to the cottage that Susanna had rented. It was unremarkable. Directly across from the cottage was a small grocer. An old man sat outside reading a paper. He was wrapped in a coat, scarf and hat.
    “Excuse me, can I ask, have you stayed round here long?”
    The old man looked up and turned slightly in his chair. “All ma life.”
    “Do you mind if I ask you a couple of questions?”
    “Copper are you?”
    “That obvious?” Tom smiled. “I am, I hope you wont hold it against me.” he joked. The man said nothing. “I’m looking for information on a young woman that lived here about forty-five years ago.” Tom pulled the picture of Susanna from his pocket and handed it to the old man.
    The old man ran his twig like fingers across the picture. “Suzie,” he whispered.
    “You know this woman?”
    The old man did not look up. “She was my friend. A lovely girl she was. So sweet.”
    “Were you close?”
    The old man looked up and handed the picture back. “Not in the way you think. We were just friends. When she vanished, the police said she had run off with some man. But Suzie wasn’t like that. But they didn’t want to know.”
    “What do you think happened?”
    The old man thought for a moment. “She had been excited for a couple of weeks. Some man