Walk Like You

by Linda Coles

  “First off, I need to make a copy of this,” she said, pointing to the USB drive and beginning to do so while she was talking. “And then we need to get it back to the information desk because DS Davies will probably be sending someone down to collect it, and then I think we get on a ferry ourselves.”

  Julie glanced at Chrissy and asked, “She’s gone to Calais, but how on earth can we find out where she went from there? She is an anonymous person travelling at the moment.” She sounded like she was ready to give up.

  “Look, as you’ve seen she’s travelling without any luggage, only a handbag, so she’s got to get some belongings somehow and she’s going to need a bed for the night, because by the time she gets over to Calais it’s early evening. She’d be looking for somewhere local to rest. That’s what I’d do anyway. She’s been in a train crash, remember.”

  “Okay, so if I was on the run and I’d got no money – and we have to assume she doesn’t have much – and no baggage, I’m not going to be staying in the environment I’m accustomed to. She won’t be checking into a nice hotel, now, will she?”

  “Definitely not. No, she is more likely to be doing this on the cheap and that means backpackers’ accommodation, wouldn’t you agree?”

  “Totally,” said Julie. “So let’s go over there and we’ll google backpackers’ places on the way.”

  “Sounds like a plan,” said Chrissy. “There can’t be that many in the town, and we’ve got a photograph of her so we do the old-fashioned thing and show it around, see if she’s been there. And if she has been and since gone, we need to figure out where, because if she is headed to Paris, we’ll never find her in that jungle.”

  “Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that,” said Julie. “Let’s hope that someone does recognise her and can at least give us a name.”

  Chapter Forty-Seven

  By the time the two women had bought their ferry tickets it was around the same time of day that Susan herself had passed through the ferry terminal. All Julie and Chrissy could do was recreate her journey, go through her steps and follow that way. This wasn’t a James Bond movie where things slotted neatly into place. 007 wasn’t going to conveniently find a waiting boat, with the motor running, that was powerful enough to chase after the bad guys. In reality, it was hard and laborious work using plain, old-fashioned shoe leather to solve the case of a missing person. Particularly if they didn’t want to be found. There was no digital footprint to be followed, and the tracker that Marcus had installed was of no use if Susan’s phone wasn’t with her and switched on.

  With two tickets purchased and the envelope back at the information desk – Chrissy had feigned surprise that there wasn’t another small package awaiting collection – they made their way through the documentation process and on to the ferry. It seemed Kevin McCallister couldn’t have squeezed himself Home Alone style through passport control. Things had tightened up somewhat since his escapade. The women took their seats and Julie pulled out a glossy magazine, her perfect nose instantly buried among the pages. Chrissy took a moment to check her own emails; Susan Smith wasn’t her only case. There was one from the college she’d been working with. They’d had another incident and were asking if she could call.

  “Damn it,” she cursed to herself, wondering how she was going to manage the added workload, particularly since she was leaving the country.

  “I’m peckish. Do you want something to eat or drink?” Chrissy asked the top of a blonde head.

  “Water, please.”

  Chrissy headed towards the café, leaving Julie to her fantasy world for a while. Having Julie tag along on the trip had not been what she’d envisaged but, since Susan was her friend, how could she have said no? Still, she’d been useful so far and she could well be further on. A young man smiled brightly as she approached the counter and ordered coffee, a muffin and a bottle of water.

  “Sure thing. Coming up,” he said, pressing ground coffee down with a tamper and clipping the full arm into the machine. The aroma filled her nostrils and she watched him work as he forced steam into a jug of milk. Whatever happened to instant coffee? she wondered. Did they even make it any more? She dipped inside her bag and pulled out the photo of Susan.

  “I know you probably see hundreds of people every day,” she started, “but do you remember seeing this woman recently? Three days ago, perhaps?” Chrissy held it up for him and watched his reaction as he looked. Nothing appeared to register, though she let his eyes linger. Maybe there was something circulating in the back of his head.

  “I couldn’t be sure,” he said, the words creeping slowly out of his mouth. “She sort of looks familiar.”

  “Oh? How so?”

  “Well, I can’t be a hundred per cent, but I did notice a woman a bit like her sat over there, on her own,” he said, pointing to a quiet spot away from the majority of travellers. She caught my attention because I noticed quite a bruise here,” he said, pointing to his brow and eye. And there was a stain on her shirt. I assumed maybe blood, like she’d had a nosebleed. Or been in a fight. Then she seemed to sleep a while so I kind of kept an eye on her but didn’t speak to her. She looked a lot like the lady in your photo though.”

  Chrissy’s pulse spiked. Another clue. “Did anyone speak to her that you know of? Only, she’s missing. And my sister and I,” Chrissy said pointing to Julie across the way, “are looking for her.” The young man smiled in the direction of Julie. He had the perfect vantage point from where he worked to notice a great deal, Chrissy thought.

  “No, she didn’t speak to anyone that I’m aware of. Thinking back, she seemed sad maybe. You know, you can just feel a vibe from someone sometimes. I like to think I’m in tune like that.”

  “How about luggage, did she have a bag with her?”

  “Not that I saw, no. But day trippers often don’t.” He clipped a lid on her coffee cup and smiled, her order complete.

  “You’ve been helpful, thanks,” she said and handed over her card to pay. She gathered her order and balanced the three items as best she could while walking back to Julie, who was still engrossed in her magazine. A perfectly moisturised and manicured hand slipped out to receive the bottle of water and Chrissy rolled her eyes at her sister.

  “Hey,” she said, somewhat excitedly. “The guy at the coffee shop over there reckons he saw Susan,” she said, pointing. Julie looked across at the still-smiling man and obliged him with a smile in return. He was likely smiling at Julie. She ploughed on, “And get this, he said she had a bruise above her eye and had maybe had a nosebleed, which would fit with the crash. Oh, and he said he sensed she was sad.”

  “Interesting. And on her own, I assume?”

  “Yes. A bit banged up but on her own. And no luggage.”

  “Great, that description should jog memories when we get to Calais.”

  Chrissy sat down next to her and pulled out her phone. “I’ve got some work to do for my other client. Can you look up the backpackers’ places for when we get there?”

  “Hmm?” Her head was submerged in glossy pages.

  “Julie, I have other clients. Can you do the search, please?”

  With an exaggerated sigh, Julie laid the magazine down and did as she was told. As Chrissy watched her obvious displeasure at being given an order, she remembered why she’d been reticent at letting Julie tag along. With more important things on her mind, she dialled the college.

  There’d been another incident. It was not the perfect time to be heading to France.

  Chapter Forty-Eight

  There were around eight different places that Susan Smith could have headed that fitted the bill: backpacker or cheap hotel. Chrissy looked at each one individually, figuring which one she would have gone to if it was her on foot. Particularly if she was feeling a little banged up after the accident. She wouldn’t want to be walking far or wasting money on anything other than a bus into the town. On arrival, the two women headed straight over to the bus station and the courtesy bus that took touris
ts into Calais itself. From there they’d simply start with the first possible location on the list. Julie’s bag soon became a problem, its wheels not enjoying the cracks in the pavement, and Chrissy was getting tired of her moaning at the exertion of keeping her it under control.

  “We probably should have left that at the terminal in left luggage,” Chrissy said, though not helpfully.

  Julie, not one for criticising, was tempted to say something snarky but refrained; it wasn’t in her demeanour. “Where can we leave it now, then?” she questioned, somewhat whiney.

  “The only thing we can do is check into somewhere we’ll stay ourselves and leave it there, because we won’t be headed back home tonight.”

  Julie nodded.

  “Let’s just check in at this next one,” Chrissy said, pointing in the distance. “Then we can leave the bag and have a quick look around to see what’s what before having dinner.”

  “Okay,” Julie agreed, sounding relieved her struggle was almost over.

  Chrissy could see a small family-run hotel or motel not far ahead. “There is as good a place,” she said. “It might not be up to your usual standards, Julie, I warn you now. But at least it will have a shower and a bed and we can get something to eat. And leave the bag, more importantly.” Looking at Julie’s face, Chrissy took pity on her and took the bag handle herself. She dropped her own sports bag on the top of it and used the main bag to transport her own. “Let me take over then,” Chrissy said, and Julie smiled her appreciation.

  “Thank you,” she conceded in the demurest way she could. Chrissy was tempted to roll her eyes. She often marvelled at how different the two of them were and had joked at times that she was the milkman’s daughter. But when you placed Julie next to their mother it was most likely that Chrissy was the odd one out.

  Five minutes later they found themselves in the reception area of a cheap hotel. It smelled of fake pine air freshener, and judging by the deep-green, swirling-patterned carpet that was laid, it hadn’t seen a decorator in at least twenty years. Chrissy hoped the bath would be clean and there’d be no stray hairs in the beds, pubic or otherwise. If she was thinking those things, she knew damn well that Julie would be. Once checked in, Chrissy carried the bag up two flights of stairs, opened the door and watched as Julie flopped down on one of the beds – a single. The room was as tired as the reception had been and as tired as they both felt. Pulling the bedclothes back for a closer inspection she could see the sheets were in fact clean and devoid of any hairs. After a quick scan of the bathroom, she was satisfied that, even for a tired place such as this, the cleanliness standards were up to scratch.

  “Why don’t you go and have a shower?” Chrissy encouraged. “You might feel livelier when you’re cleaned-up and have changed.”

  “I think I will, if you don’t mind,” she said and prised herself back up off the bed and moved towards her bag.

  “Here,” Chrissy said. “Let me lift it for you,” and she put it on top of the old luggage rack, opening it so that Julie could find her toiletries and whatever else she needed. A moment or two later Chrissy could hear the shower running and she called through the door that she was popping back downstairs. Armed with a photograph, she figured she may as well make a start in the hotel where they were staying. The stairs creaked as she went down the two flights and at the reception she pinged the old brass bell and waited. The middle-aged woman smiled at her return and in almost perfect English she asked, “Is everything okay?”

  “Great, thanks,” said Chrissy, “but I wonder if you might help me?”

  “I will if I can,” she said. “What do you need?”

  Chrissy showed her the photo of Susan Smith. “We’re looking for a friend. We know she came through Calais a couple of days ago. I wonder, have you seen her at all? Maybe she stayed here?”

  The woman looked but it wasn’t the result Chrissy had hoped for. “Sorry no,” she said, shaking her head rather too quickly for Chrissy’s liking.

  “Please, take another look, she may be in danger,” she urged, and the woman took another look.

  “I would have remembered her, she is a good-looking lady, but no, we’ve only had families and couples this week. I don’t think we’ve had any single people to stay at all this month, and I don’t recognise her, I’m sorry. I do hope you find her though.”

  Chrissy said her thanks and wandered off back upstairs for a shower of her own. One hotel down, a few more to go. Maybe later on or tomorrow they’d have better luck. If they didn’t, Chrissy really was at a loss of what to do next without a name.

  Chapter Forty-Nine

  By the time DS Alan Davies had finished his burger and was viewing the relevant time frames of passport-control CCTV, he reasoned he was only going to see what his gut already knew: the woman on the footage was Susan Smith and she was using Tabitha Child’s passport. The burning question was why. The next question was, did the two women know one another, had they planned it all along, whatever it was? He sat back in his chair and looked at the freeze-frame on his screen. There was no mistaking Susan Smith. The younger-looking Tabitha Child replica was headed to France and maybe beyond, but at least now he had a name to work with. But unless the woman used credit cards or anything else in Tabitha’s name she would still leave no trail for him to follow. He bet that was the idea.

  The other, real Tabitha Child was lying in a cold fridge, while Susan had taken over her identity. With the involvement of a chief superintendent to add to the discovery of the tattoo on the real Tabitha Child, Alan really did have concerns for Susan’s safety. He wondered if Susan knew what she had got herself into.

  Wiping his mouth on a napkin, he debated his next move. Maybe he needed to go back and search through the luggage and find Susan Smith’s overnight bag as well as look for Tabitha Child’s handbag and her own overnight bag. Maybe either of those could give him some clues, though he wouldn’t be surprised if he found them both empty, a ruse all part of some elaborate plan. He checked his watch; it was almost 7 pm. There was no way anybody would still be back at the hangar. Or would they? He picked up his phone and dialled the contact that he’d spoken to before, but there was no reply. It looked like he was going to have to wait until the morning.

  He wondered about Chrissy and her sister on their way to France and how they were doing. He doubted they would catch up with their friend Susan, but if they did, he’d be interested in talking to her himself. He also wondered if they knew her now-assumed name that she was travelling under. He’d agreed that if he found anything out, he’d let the two women know, but so far, he hadn’t done. Should he tell them? It would save them a wild-goose chase, knowing that their friend had in fact passed through Calais travelling as Tabitha Child. But where to, nobody knew.

  “Oh, sod it,” he said and picked his phone, calling the number he had.

  “Hello,” Julie purred.

  Alan smiled at his internal overreaction again. Not many women had an effect on him, but this one seemed to. “Detective Alan Davies here,” he said, trying to be formal and put some authority into his voice.

  “I know,” said Julie. “I recognise your number. Do you have some news?”

  “I do actually.”

  “Then I’ll put you on speaker for Chrissy.”

  “Hello again DS Davies,” Chrissy chimed in. “What do you have?”

  “Hi Chrissy. Well, it seems your friend Susan did go through passport control at Dover, though she is not travelling on her own passport. Now, I can’t tell you what name she is travelling under because it possibly links to another case, but I can tell you that your friend is alive and well, and is travelling alone or appears to be travelling alone. I just thought you should know.”

  “Oh, that is good news,” said Julie, trying to put on some level of surprise. Having already seen the CCTV footage herself, she was doing her best. “So what happens now?” she asked.

  “Well, nothing really, I’m afraid, from a police point of view. If your friend wants t
o run off, she is quite entitled to do so and there’s not much else I can do.”

  “Oh, that doesn’t seem fair,” purred Julie again. “There must be something? Can you please tell us the name she is travelling under? Maybe we can trace her that way.”

  “Not at this point, I’m afraid, but at least you know your friend is alive.”

  “Well, thanks for calling,” Chrissy finished, somewhat abruptly, and hung up.

  Alan slumped back in his chair wondering if he’d done the right thing. Maybe he should have said what name she was travelling under; it would have made their job a bit easier and maybe his own in turn. But with links to another case, his decision not to tell them would have to stand. If Susan Smith travelling as Tabitha Child was about to run into trouble, he didn’t want anyone else ending up in a similar situation. No, tomorrow he’d go and check the contents of their luggage, though knowing that Susan was now travelling as Tabitha Child, he wasn’t expecting to find that particular handbag or its personal contents. Susan Smith already had those. But their overnight bags could tell a different story.

  He’d better ring Marcus Smith and let him know of his discovery, that he could confirm she was alive, there was no doubt of it now. At least he’d be pleased – Alan assumed.

  Chapter Fifty

  Marcus Smith was bleary-eyed having been woken around 1 am. While he was often up late, his jet-lagged body clock had sent him to bed earlier than usual in an attempt to get back on an even kilter. The deep-sleep disturbance had perturbed the man and he answered his ringing phone with all the finesse of a dragon with a sore tooth.

  “Who the hell can’t wait until a reasonable hour?” he screamed by way of greeting the caller.