“Vic, forgive me,” she said, her voice calm but somehow different—new. “I couldn’t do it any other way.”
“This is impossible! You’ve lost your mind, Gloria!” Victor threw his keys onto the table, where they clattered against a ceramic biscuit jar. “Margaret would never do this! She’d have called, at the very least!”
“And what do you think I’ve been telling you?!” Gloria shot up from the sofa, her scarf slipping from her silver hair. “Last night, she went to the chemist for your blood pressure pills and—poof! Vanished! I didn’t sleep a wink, phoned every hospital, even filed a report at the police station!”
Victor sank into his favourite armchair, rubbing his face. His sister-in-law had always been high-strung, but now she looked truly ragged—eyes red from sleeplessness, hands trembling.
“Gloria, calm down. Maybe she stopped by a friend’s? Remember last month when Beverly’s grandson fell ill, and Margaret stayed over to help?”
“I’ve called everyone!” Gloria sniffled. “Beverly, Nina from the next building, even Linda from work. No one’s seen her! Victor, she never just disappears without a word!”
It was true. Margaret, Victor’s sister, lived a predictable life. Breakfast at seven, then off to the children’s clinic where she’d worked as a nurse for twenty years. Evenings were for shopping, cooking, telly. Weekends—cleaning, laundry, occasionally tea with Gloria to gossip about the neighbours.
“Did you check the chemist?” Victor stood, walking to the window. Children played outside, and for some reason, it felt wrong. How could they laugh when Margaret was missing?
“Of course I checked! Emma, the pharmacist, saw her around eight. She bought your pills and something for a cough. And then…” Gloria spread her hands helplessly. “No one saw her after that.”
Victor fell silent, replaying last night. He’d eaten alone because Margaret had dashed out for the chemist. She’d thrown on her blue coat—the one she’d snagged on sale last year—grabbed her handbag and keys.
“Back soon, Vic,” she’d called from the hallway. “Mind the stew doesn’t burn.”
Those were her last words in that flat.
Victor waited until nine. Then ten. He turned off the stew himself, ate a cold dinner, watched the news. By half-ten, worry gnawed at him, but he reasoned she’d got chatting with a friend. Rare, but not unheard of.
Morning brought Gloria’s frantic call.
“Vic, did Margaret stay at yours last night?”
“What? She lives here,” he’d mumbled, confused.
“Well, she never came home! Bed’s untouched, her documents still here. I thought maybe she dropped by yours late and stayed over…”
That’s when Victor knew something was wrong.
“Listen, Gloria… could she have… met someone?” he ventured. “Margaret’s only forty-seven. She’s still young.”
Gloria scoffed. “Oh, come off it! Your sister hasn’t glanced at a man since she divorced Simon. How many times have I nudged her—‘Go to the community dance, meet someone decent’? But no, always ‘too busy, too tired’.”
“People don’t just vanish, Gloria!” A knot of dread tightened in his chest. “Something must’ve happened.”
“Exactly my point!” Gloria grabbed his sleeve. “What if she was robbed? Attacked? Remember last month when that girl from number eight had her bag snatched?”
“Then she’d be in hospital or at the station. You said you checked everywhere.”
“I did! And you know what they told me? ‘Adults can go where they please!’ They won’t even file a missing persons report for three days! Three days, Vic! What if—”
She didn’t finish, but Victor knew. They were both thinking the worst.
The doorbell rang. Gloria lunged for it, hope flashing across her face.
“Margaret?” she cried, fumbling with the lock.
On the doorstep stood Mrs. Clarke from downstairs, clutching a shopping bag. “Gloria, love, what’s all the commotion? Heard you crying last night, and now—”
“Margaret’s missing,” Gloria said flatly. “Went out last evening and never came back.”
Mrs. Clarke gasped, setting her bag down. “Good heavens! But I saw her yesterday! Half-seven, she was heading out. Said she was off to the chemist.”
“And that’s all? Nothing else?”
“Nothing stood out. Though…” Mrs. Clarke frowned, thinking. “She seemed… different. Not sad, not happy, just… resolved. You know, like she’d made up her mind about something?”
Victor and Gloria exchanged glances. What could Margaret have decided? She wasn’t impulsive—every choice was weighed ten times over.
“Maybe it’s work?” Mrs. Clarke suggested. “Heard there might be layoffs at the clinic.”
Gloria shook her head. “Margaret’s been there twenty years—she’d be the last they’d let go. Besides, she mentioned just last week they’d hired a new nurse, some young thing she was training.”
Victor recalled his sister speaking about the girl—Emily, fresh out of nursing school.
“Bright girl,” Margaret had said, “but in such a hurry. Wants everything at once—career, marriage, babies. I keep telling her, life’s long. There’s time.”
Now those words tasted bitter.
Mrs. Clarke left, promising to ask around. Alone, Gloria sagged.
“Let’s check her flat,” Victor said. “Maybe there’s a note, numbers we’ve missed…”
“I’ve turned the place upside down!” Gloria waved a hand. “Nothing unusual. Just her usual tidy self—everything in its place.”
But Victor insisted. Margaret’s flat was in the next building. Gloria unlocked the door—they’d swapped spare keys years ago.
The flat was silent, immaculate. Shoes lined up neatly, coat on the rack. On the windowsill, violets thrived—Margaret’s pride and joy.
“See?” Gloria gestured to the desk. “Passport, savings book, even her purse. There was twenty quid in it, but still…”
Victor opened a drawer, pulling out Margaret’s address book. Numbers for colleagues, doctors, friends—ordinary contacts of an ordinary woman.
“What’s this?” He pointed to a slip of paper under the phone directory.
Gloria unfolded it—a travel agency flyer. “Cotswolds Tours. Coach trips through historic villages.”
“Since when does Margaret travel? She never goes further than Aunt Ethel’s in Devon!”
“Maybe someone gave it to her?”
“Look, there’s writing.” On the margin, pencilled: “Stow-on-the-Wold—15 May.”
“That’s tomorrow,” Gloria whispered. “Vic, d’you think she…?”
“I don’t know what to think,” Victor admitted. “But why wouldn’t she tell anyone?”
In the kitchen, two plates sat on the table—one clean, one with breakfast crumbs. Beside them, a newspaper open to the classifieds.
“She ate here,” Gloria noted. “Read the paper. Same as always.”
Victor skimmed the ads. Flats for sale, job listings, personals… Wait. One ad was circled in red: “Gentleman, 52, widower, seeks kindhearted lady for companionship. Values honesty, warmth, shared interests.”
“Gloria, look.”
“No chance,” Gloria said. “Margaret wouldn’t. Always said she’d rather be alone than settle.”
“Then why circle it?”
“Maybe for someone else? Beverly lost her husband last year—maybe for her?”
Victor tucked the paper away. Something wasn’t adding up.
That evening, he called the travel agency.
“Yes, we’ve a tour to Stow tomorrow,” the clerk confirmed. “But it’s fully booked. Last ticket sold yesterday evening.”
“Can you say who bought it?”
“Sorry, confidential. Cash purchase, though.”
“Remember a woman in her forties? Average height, dark hair, blue coat?”
“Sir, we get dozens daily. Why, is something wrong?”
Victor hung up.
Next morning, he lurked outside the agency, watching passengers board the coach. Margaret wasn’t among them.
“All aboard?” asked the guide, a bloke in a neon jacket.
“One missing,” the clerk said. “Paid but didn’t show.”
The coach left without Margaret.
The police finally took a report. The officer, a weary-eyed veteran, noted the details.
“Family elsewhere?”
“Aunt Ethel in Devon,” Victor said. “Margaret visits sometimes.”
“Address?”
The officer promised to follow up.
A week passed. No Margaret. At the clinic, young Emily covered her duties. Gloria grew gaunt; Victor barely slept.
“D’you think she left on purpose?” Gloria asked one evening. “Got fed up?”
“With what?”
“Everything! The grind, the loneliness… Maybe she wanted a fresh start
