The Missing Man

Towards the end of a busy day, Inspector Walter Darriteau returns to his workstation. There was a neatly-written pink notelet on his desk. Please ring Mrs Susan Woodhams, and a local number. He picks up the phone and pokes in the digits. After three rings, a woman answers.

'There's something preying on my mind,' she says, 'and it has been for more than twenty years.'

'Go on,' says Walter, imagining it was something and nothing.

Towards the end of a busy day, Inspector Walter Darriteau returns to his workstation. There was a neatly-written pink notelet on his desk. Please ring Mrs Susan Woodhams, and a local number. He picks up the phone and pokes in the digits. After three rings, a woman answers.

'There's something preying on my mind,' she says, 'and it has been for more than twenty years.'

'Go on,' says Walter, imagining it was something and nothing.

'Almost a quarter of a century ago, I murdered my husband.'

There was a brief silence before she spoke again. She wanted Walter to call at her apartment at 10am the following morning and she'll tell him about it, but gives him a warning. 'Come alone or I won't say a thing.'

Walter warns her of the consequences of wasting police time, but seems satisfied and interested, and agrees to call.

She coughs up the address and abruptly rings off.

Could the woman be serious? Or maybe she's lonely and wants male company. Or could she be setting him up?

Either way, Walter will keep the appointment. Later on, he can't stop imagining how she might have done the deed. Poison in the tea? Knife in the back? Pushed him down the stairs. Run him over in the garage? Eaten him? Who knows? It wouldn't be the first time. There were plenty of choices, and whichever it was, it would be fun finding out.

The case of "The Missing Man" was open, an Inspector Walter Darriteau novella, and like all the others, set in and around the ancient city of Chester in the north-west of England.