Prologue

I stand on the empty platform under the heat of the midmorning sun. The station is on the edge of a small town, and the surrounding fields are full of golden wheat waiting to be harvested. The huge sky stretches wide and cloudless, a clear, hard blue above the patchwork of green and yellow fields. From the station bridge, a few cows can be seen grazing, flicking away flies with their tails. A hand-printed sign advertises PICK YOUR OWN STRAWBERRIES. High above me, a starling spins his chatty song.

Very soon these familiar fields and lanes will be combed by police and volunteers. Bodies beating back the wheat, peering under the hedgerows, crawling across the land with their maps and torches, hoping to be the ones who can shed light on the local girl’s disappearance, yet dreading what they may discover. Hundreds of statements will be taken, residents’ questionnaires studied and analyzed, and of course the missing girl will be seen everywhere: riding a bus in Manchester, buying a packet of cigarettes in Norwich, working in a shoe shop in Hampshire. Local people will dream of her and wonder if their dreams have meaning. Committees will be formed, money raised, fingers pointed, hopes dashed again and again.

Of course it isn’t me they’ll be looking for. It’s Lucy.

Right now, there is little breeze, and I can feel beads of perspiration forming on my forehead. My knee throbs under the blood-soaked handkerchief. I adjust the brim of my straw hat and glance up at the station clock. The anxiety curls itself into a tight ball in my chest, almost causing me to forget my grazed hands, my bloody knee, and scraped shin. I’ll be back before you know it, she’d said. I take a deep breath, trying to calm myself. She’ll be here. She has to be.

The station is empty. The stationmaster is probably further along the track in the signal box.

He is not only stationmaster but porter, clerk, ticket inspector, and signalman. The station is used far less frequently than it was when my father was a young man and only the wealthy could own a motorcar. These days, there is no need for station staff; only a handful of trains pass through in a day and, unbeknownst to me now, in twelve years’ time the station will close completely. The station house will be converted into a private residence, the signal box left derelict, the track either lifted or forgotten, the long grass and tangled weeds making it difficult to see where it was once laid. But this is all far off in the future, a future I am unable to envisage, a future I don’t know will be forever changed by this day.

I shift my weight from one foot to the other, willing Lucy to hurry. The platform shimmers in the heat. Using my hand as a visor, I squint into the sun, looking at the long, narrow road that leads to the station. I expect to see her there, pedaling furiously, her hair tied back with her scarf, her skirt flapping around her knees. But there is nothing, just the empty road.

Come on.

My tweed skirt makes my bare legs itch and my feet feel hot inside my brown lace-ups, but I needed to bring them; they are the best things I own, and better to wear them than to carry them. My small brown suitcase is at my feet. I packed as much as I could, but I know it won’t be enough. Never mind, we’ll manage. As long as we’re together. As long as we’re far away from here.

The hands of the clock are edging toward five to eleven, and I can feel a sickness rising in my throat. She has to be here. She has to come back.

An awful thought dawns on me: what if she’s changed her mind? Decided she wants to stay? But she was here, I remind myself. She was here and now she isn’t, and it’s all my fault.

She said it wouldn’t take long. She promised she’d be back.

I reach into my pocket, checking for our tickets, the smooth paper slipping through my fingers. Then I see it: a black speck on the horizon growing steadily larger. A cloud of white steam.

I can hear it now too, the train’s panting approach, the gentle chug chug as the familiar scent of the sweet oily smoke fills my nostrils. I watch as the small hand of the station clock shifts over to eleven and the train whistles its arrival. My chest hitches and I make no attempt to wipe my eyes, pricking with tears.

Where is she?

1

2018

I first see Lucy Theddle standing outside the post office on Tuesday afternoon. Looking exactly the same as she did in 1951.

I am on my way in when a young man accosts me, carrying a tray and wearing a paper hat.

Free sweets, he says, pushing the tray under my nose.

Free sweets?

It’s our open day, he explains, gesturing to the small shop squashed between the post office and Sandy’s Shoes. The shop used to be a key-cutting place. Before that, it sold sports equipment and school uniforms. The sign over the door now reads RETRO SWEETS. ALL YOUR CHILDHOOD FAVORITES.

No, thank you.

Oh, go on. One won’t hurt. He nudges the tray toward me.

I peer down and there they are: Parma Violets. I reach for them. I can’t help myself. These used to be my favorites, I murmur, but the man isn’t listening. He has spotted another customer and has dashed off. "Free sweets!"

I unwrap the tube and pop one of the tiny disks in my mouth. The taste is sweet and soapy. They remind me of spring flowers and warm days, of cycling down to the sea with the sun on my face, of secret whispers and kept promises.

That’s when I see Lucy. She’s standing next to the postbox, wearing white ankle socks and the school uniform we used to wear: a green pleated tunic over a blouse. Her hair is in two neat plaits; she’s carrying her satchel and her violin case.

Oh, hello, Lucy, I say.

A woman in a blue coat is coming out of Sandy’s Shoes. She gives me a sympathetic smile. It’s a look I am familiar with, one I don’t like. When I glance back at the postbox, Lucy has vanished. I blink then crunch the sweet down, swallowing hard. A chill runs through me and I shake my head, trying to push the image of her from my mind; she’s nothing to do with me anymore.

I quickly shove the rest of the Parma Violets into the pocket of my mackintosh raincoat and enter the post office, shuffling forward past the stationery and up to the counter.

Ah, good morning, Edie.

Hello, Sanjeev. I am pleased to have remembered Sanjeev’s name, pleased it had been there for me instead of that awful void that exists, more often now, where a familiar word should sit.

And what can we do for you? Sanjeev smiles as his good-sized wife busily pastes labels onto packages behind him.

What is it I came in for?

I’ll have twelve stamps, please.

Perhaps I came for stamps. Everyone can always use a few extra stamps.

Keeping well, are we, Edie?

Sanjeev speaks loudly, probably because of the glass partition. I can tell by the way he leans forward that he wants his voice to carry.

Very well indeed, I reply, trying to match his loudness.

Autumn now, he says.

Leaves everywhere, I offer.

He slides the stamps to me under the glass and I pay for them. I notice the collection box and the tray of red paper poppies with their green plastic stems. It must be that time of year again, the time for remembering. I slide a pound into the collection box, then fix a poppy to my buttonhole.

Take care now, Edie, Sanjeev says cheerfully.

When I exit the post office, the boy with the sweet tray is offering a drumstick lolly to a man on a mobility scooter. I look around cautiously but can see no further sign of Lucy. Above me, the clouds are gathering; there is a gust of wind and I shiver, pulling at my coat.

As I pass the newsagents and the rack of papers outside, a headline catches my eye: Local School to Close. The words mean something to me, only I can’t think what. I lean in, peering at the photograph of a gray, imposing building. Then I remember—it’s Daniel’s school. The secondary school where he works as the deputy headmaster. Daniel says the school isn’t closing but merging. Another school is getting a big development and all the children from Daniel’s school are joining that one. Daniel could work there, but he doesn’t want to. I frown, unable to remember why.

At home, I pick a bill up from the doormat, edge my coat off, and place my shoes on the rack Josie recently insisted I buy. When you reach my age, everything becomes a trip hazard.

I go straight through to the kitchen to put the kettle on. Ordinarily I’d wait for Josie, but the events of the morning, seeing Lucy, require a cup of tea before Josie’s arrival. Whatever happened to her? I feel I should remember but I can’t. I roll her name around in my mind. Lucy Theddle, Lucy Theddle. It feels strange, forbidden, and I bite my lip trying to quell the unease that squirms in my stomach.

Josie finds me, fifteen minutes later, sitting in my chair in the living room, sipping from the mug Daniel bought me last Christmas. It has a sketch of a cityscape and the word Stockholm written in a delicate script. A gift from his latest city break.

Hello, Edie, Josie bellows at me from the hallway. Have you been out? She pokes her head round the living room door and peers in at me.

The post office, I say.

What for?

Stamps.

Josie frowns while shaking her coat off. She’s holding a tiny collapsed umbrella and it gets caught in her sleeve. I could have done that when I go to the shops tomorrow.

I attempt a shrug but find my shoulders don’t obey. My joints, nowadays, often ignore my instructions.

Not got the telly on? she asks, looking at me suspiciously. Josie cannot understand how anybody would want to sit in a living room and not have the television on.

No, I say. I was thinking.

Thinking? Josie repeats the word with some wonderment. Well, that would be nice, wouldn’t it?

Not waiting for my reply, she scoots off to the kitchen, then returns wearing my apron. I’ll just do this bit of washing up, Edie, take the rubbish out for you. Then I’ll make us a cuppa. Oh. I see you’ve already made one.

I’ll have another.

She nods, disappears. I can hear her rattling around, turning on the tap, the sound of the cupboard door opening and closing. She’s probably looking for the marigolds.

Josie comes for two hours, four days a week. Expensive. But worth it. It was Daniel’s idea, and I was most against it at first, but I’ve got used to her now. I enjoy the way she bustles around, making sure she earns her nine pounds an hour—a perfectly reasonable rate, Daniel tells me. She isn’t my carer, just to clarify. She helps out with the household chores. Daniel insisted on hiring her and I went along with it. Of course, I’d never let Josie go now I have her. She’s a single mother, you see. She needs the extra income.

Josie was reluctant, at first, to sit down and have a cup of tea with me, during working hours as she calls them. She soon changed her mind when I persisted, although she often stands, leaning against the doorframe, or else she perches on the sofa arm, as if she isn’t really stopping, only pausing. People don’t like to take breaks anymore, I’ve noticed. They have to keep busy, as if something terrible will happen to them if they stop.

I push myself up from the chair and move unsteadily into the hallway. My kitchen, these days, is very beige and very clean (Josie is fond of bleach).

She’s at the sink with her back to me, her shoulders slightly rounded, her dark hair tied with a thin red band.

I saw Lucy Theddle today.

Josie jumps and turns around. Oh, Edie. I thought you were in the living room. She recovers herself and continues rinsing a fork under the tap. Who’s Lucy Theddle then?

She disappeared in 1951. As I say the words aloud I feel surprised that this is something I know, and by my certainty.

Mm. Josie puts a plate on the drying rack. Perhaps she moved away? Did you eat an egg last night? She holds up my blue and white striped eggcup.

Did I eat an egg last night? Perhaps I did. My mother always used to overdo them, cook them until they were dry and rubbery.

I can see my mother now, sitting at the kitchen table, her rollers in, cigarette in hand, the toast still warm in the rack, looking at the front page of the Ludthorpe Leader. She’s got the wireless radio on and Eddie Fisher sings Anytime You’re Feeling Lonely. It must be a Saturday because the BBC Light Programme doesn’t usually start until I’m at school. I’ve got a boiled egg on my plate—a real one, which means the weather is warm. We mostly have powdered egg in winter, although my mother swaps tinned egg for nylons, not strictly legal, but many people swap rations. You wouldn’t think we actually won the war, my mother is fond of saying. The egg is probably supposed to be a treat, although it’s overdone and I don’t want it. My mother doesn’t eat much as she worries about her figure. She blows her cigarette smoke out of the side of her mouth so it avoids me, glances down at the front page of the paper, at Lucy’s picture: I do hope they’re doing all they can to find her.

Of course, my mother knows all about Lucy. Lucy is in my year at school. Not only that, she’s the mayor’s daughter. Our town has talked of nothing else all week.

I’m looking at the paper, at the grainy photograph of Lucy standing in her back garden, rose bushes behind her. Her younger brother has been cut from the picture, but I can see his small fingers curled around hers. They’d been dressed in their Sunday best, told to stand still for the photograph. Lucy is wearing a white dress with a lace collar.

Edie, are you okay?

Josie is staring at me. Eddie Fisher’s voice fades.

Yes. I’m fine.

She peels off the marigolds and drapes them over the sink. Well, go and sit down. I’ll bring some biscuits through, shall I?

We don’t have any. I’ve run out.

Nonsense. Josie opens the cupboard. She waves a packet of custard creams at me. I told you I bought these last Tuesday and put them in here for you.

"Oh, those biscuits, I say, pretending I hadn’t forgotten about them. Yes, let’s have those biscuits then."

I pause next to my calendar. It’s National Geographic. I’m in October—the Taj Mahal—although I’ll be able to change it to November next week. Daniel is coming over on Friday; I’ve written Daniel 5pm. Fish and Chips.

I take a pen and write in today’s square Saw Lucy Theddle outside Post Office.

In the living room, I pick up the crossword, intending to give it another go. I’m not very adept at them but I like to try. Daniel tells me they are good for my brain, like oily fish and walnuts, neither of which I am fond of. I usually end up getting stuck on the crossword and asking someone else if they have any ideas. Sometimes I just can’t think quickly enough. It was much easier with Arthur. Arthur was always good at the crossword.

Josie finally appears with the mugs, the custard creams tucked under her arm. The tea is too hot but she takes quick, tiny sips. No doubt there is somewhere else she needs to be before she collects her small scabby-kneed son from school. I always forget his name. It’s something silly like Tree or Sky.

So who’s Lucy Theddle?

Josie is talking to me but looking at the screen of her phone, perhaps thinking about something she needs to do. She’s trying to be in two places at once. I know how she feels, although I never try to be in two places at once, it just happens. The problem is, when you’ve got so much past behind you, it creeps into the present.

I realize Josie is no longer looking at her phone. She’s watching me, waiting for an answer. I put the crossword down on the coffee table.

Lucy was in my year at school.

Well, you’re bound to bump into people, Edie. You’ve lived here your whole life. She takes a final gulp of tea, slips her coat on. Gosh, it’s almost three. I’ve got to get off. I need to nip to the shop before I collect Ocean. I don’t know where the afternoons go. I’ll see you tomorrow, Edie, get you a few bits from the Co-op.

I’ll make a list, I say.

Josie looks doubtful. Well, all right then.

After she’s gone, I stand by the window, lift the net curtain, and look out over the street. The sun is slowly moving around to the front of the house. Soon it will be spilling its light across the carpet where I stand now. The kitchen gets the sun in the morning. My mother’s kitchen got it in the morning, too. She’d stand at the sink, washing the dishes in a shaft of sunlight, dust particles drifting in the air. She scrubbed the dishes until they sparkled. She scrubbed them as if they could never be clean enough.

I drop the curtain. I can hear the clock ticking on my mantelpiece, the rustling of the browning leaves belonging to the horse chestnut across the road. You wouldn’t know it had rained earlier; the sky is as blue as a button, the clouds as fluffy as freshly whipped egg whites. I decide to take a walk.

I need to speak to Lucy.

2

2018

I pull my coat down from the peg rail, the waxy fabric slipping through my fingers, then fasten the large shiny tortoiseshell buttons. Keys. I find them in my pocket. I’m supposed to put them in the little wooden bowl on the hall table—one of Arthur’s creations—but I must have forgotten.

I set off along the road. It’s only a five-minute walk to the High Street. I take Willow Avenue then Beech Close, avoiding Sycamore Street. I always avoid Sycamore Street.

Ludthorpe is an average-size town. There’s the post office, the newsagents, The Tea Tree, a hairdresser’s, and a hardware shop, where you can buy all sorts. What else? The bakery, of course, and the British Red Cross charity shop. Oh, and there’s Exquisite Fashion, which used to be the greengrocer’s where my mother once worked. Everything used to be something else. Except for the post office, which has always been the post office.

The town center is busiest on Thursdays—market day, but today isn’t a Thursday. At least I don’t think it is. I used to love market day when I was a girl. All the veg piled up. The smell of fresh fish reminding me of the seaside; the meat man in his blue and white apron calling out his offers. The jams and the marmalades, the cheeses and chutneys. The knitted baby clothes and silky handbags. I find it all a bit confusing now. Everything looks different on market day. I can no longer see the postbox, the war memorial, all the familiar landmarks that let me know where I am.

I’ve reached the end of the High Street. It’s further than I usually go but I’m enjoying the warm autumn sunshine, the cool air on my cheeks, the sensation of moving forward with purpose. I pass the library and find myself on Alderbury Road.

The sign in front of me, fixed to the brick wall, reads THE GABLES. I peer through the black iron gates. The house hasn’t changed much. New windows, and the front door is white instead of red, but otherwise it’s the same. It’s the sort of house you’d see on a Christmas card, or inside a snow globe; twin chimneys, redbrick, three rows of elegantly proportioned windows. As pretty as a picture, my mother would have said, and perhaps once did. The circular driveway has gone, though. There used to be a large round patch of bright green grass. And there’s a different car parked outside now. One of those large silver things, not the black shiny Austin Somerset that Richard Theddle once drove.

I push against the black iron gates and they open more easily than I’d imagined. A large red leaf lies on the driveway. I slowly bend down to pick it up, tracing my finger along its veins like lines on a map, then put it safely in my pocket.

My finger poised above the bell, I pause. Wasn’t I here before? And aren’t I supposed to be terribly worried about something? It’s there at the back of my mind, a persistent, anxious flutter, like a moth trapped under glass: there is something I should know, something I need to remember.

I press the bell but there’s no answer, so I go for the knocker, banging it as hard as I can, more desperate now. After a few minutes, a man opens the door. He’s wearing a sweatshirt, tracksuit trousers, glasses, and those funny rubbery shoes—the ones with the holes in and no backs. Daniel has a pair he keeps by the door in his kitchen.

Is Lucy in? I ask.

The man frowns. Sorry. You must have the wrong house. There’s no Lucy here.

I shake my head and notice my hand has scrunched itself into a fist. I may not have been right about the biscuits, but I know Lucy lives here.

I haven’t got the wrong house, I say, a slight tremor in my voice.

The man looks around as if searching for help. His face softens.

I’m sorry, he repeats kindly. There’s no one called Lucy at this address. Are you on your own?

This is a question I know how to answer. I’ve heard it so many times over the years. Edie’s on her own now. Yes, I say. My husband is dead.

The man looks taken aback. I’m sorry, he says, staring at me.

That’s all right. Now I feel confused. This wasn’t about Arthur. It was about Lucy.

The man continues to stare at me. He rubs his chin.

Look, he says, stepping forward, are you able to get home? Do you want me to call someone?

No, I say quickly, thinking about how cross Daniel will be if he has to leave school. I can get home.

Well, okay then. He’s shutting the door.

Wait! I say, not wanting him to go. Will you tell me if you see her? Lucy, I mean. She disappeared and everyone’s looking for her.

The man studies me for a moment. Yes, he says. Yes, I’ll do that. He smiles sadly. You take care now. He shuts the door slowly but firmly.

I make my way down the drive. I should be pleased, but I feel I’ve got it all wrong. A huge current of worry is swirling inside me, making me sway a little from side to side. I lean against the gate. A memory slips into my mind. It’s a warm spring evening and we’re outside the village hall, the sun blinking behind the trees on the green. Laughter. The sound of the band. The sweet, plummy taste of fruit punch. Lucy is wearing a yellow dress, heeled shoes, her mother’s earrings. She lights a cigarette, and I can see her face, anxious and flushed. Her hand on my arm. It’s my secret. You mustn’t tell anyone, Edie.

I kept your secret, Lucy, I tell her silently, as if she might be able to hear me. I’ve kept it for more than sixty years.

I just wish I knew what it was.

3

1951

It’s a chilly afternoon early in March. A few hopeful daffodils proudly display their trumpets in neat front gardens; tiny white blackthorn buds are beginning to appear in the hedgerows. I am walking home from school, cutting up Cucumber Lane, running through my French verbs in my mind ahead of next week’s test, almost halfway home, when I stop by the church, suddenly remembering the tin.

It’s an old Lipton tea tin belonging to my mother. This morning in domestic science, we’d made scones and I’d put the scones in the tin and left them in the classroom, intending to collect them after school. Of course, I’ve forgotten all about them. It’s not the scones I’m concerned about; they’re terrible, and I know my mother will declare them completely inedible as soon as she sees them (As hard as rocks, Edie! I should never have given you the sugar!). No, it’s the tea tin I’m worried about. My mother had been reluctant to let me borrow it in the first place, and now I’ve gone and left it up in Mrs. Beecham’s classroom. I can just imagine the scene when I return home: I knew you’d forget to bring that tin home. Honestly, Edie, you’d forget your head. I expect I’ve lost it forever now. And it was such a useful one.

Being forgetful is one of many entries on my mother’s long list of Edie’s Regrettable Personality Traits. They include shyness, a tendency to avoid eye contact in most kinds of social situations, and what my mother calls a lack of womanly intuition. Forgetfulness is probably up there somewhere alongside my inability to walk without slumping my shoulders, or to manage to get through a single day without staining my pinafore.

And so I turn around, head back toward school. There doesn’t seem to be any rush now, not that I am ever in a particular rush to go anywhere, dawdling being another of my deficiencies. I enjoy the light breeze, the promise of the spring blossom, the soft, satisfying slapping noise my brown shoes make on the pavement.

The school gates are open but the playground is deserted. I skirt the edge of the art block. Inside one of the classrooms, a white-haired lady wearing a blue apron is mopping the floor, her movements slow and rhythmic. I picture my tin where I left it before break, sitting on the side by the window, and hurry on past the gymnasium and the two hastily erected prefabricated huts, used as extra classrooms, which is when I see them.

Mr. Wheaton, our history teacher, is inside his classroom, only he isn’t alone. Lucy Theddle is there with him. They are standing very close, too close, and as I stop, trying to take in what I am seeing, Mr. Wheaton reaches forward and strokes Lucy’s hair. I realize they are kissing, that I am watching Lucy Theddle and Mr. Wheaton kissing. Mr. Wheaton, with his bristly beard and stripy socks, Mr. Wheaton who paces backward and forward in front of the board when he speaks and who keeps pieces of chalk behind his ears;