Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 122, Nos. 3 & 4. Whole Nos. 745 & 746, September/October 2003

“I wish it was a better photograph...” She returned obsessively to her theme. “Dick has quite an arrogant look sometimes. Raises his chin and looks out at the world as if he thinks he’s a lot better than other people. I don’t suppose?... No. It’s just impression, isn’t it, not fact. It’s fact you need. Little Anton Parker has a mole on his hip. Malcolm has nothing. She can just pull his pants down and check, whereas I’ll have nothing, if I ever see him again. Can you believe it? Nothing to distinguish him from thousands and thousands of other boys of his age... Sometimes I think it’s hopeless. Sometimes I think I might just as well give up.”

“I know you’re not serious about that, Mrs. Randall.”

“No... It’s just a mood. I’ll never give up.”

“Nor should you.”

“I sometimes wonder whether Dick won’t come back of his own accord and we can all three be together like we used to be.”

“I don’t think you should bank on that. But there is going to come a crunch point, and it might come soon. He can’t go on running forever. Where did he ring you from?”

“From Leeds. I can’t believe Dick would be so cruel. Just one word...”

“The last sighting we had of them that was pretty firm was North Wales. Eventually he’s going to run out of money.”

There was a pause. Then Mr. Mitcham saw Selena Randall’s shoulders stiffen as she made a decision.

“I don’t think he will.”

“Why not? What do you mean?” He saw the shoulders slacken slightly and he said urgently: “Tell me.”

Then it all came out. When she had told her tale, he asked her, already knowing the answer, “Have you told the police this?”

“No. I thought it might get Dick into trouble.”

This time Mr. Mitcham’s sigh was audible. Sometimes he despaired of fathoming the mysteries of people’s hearts.

At the cash desk of The Merry Cook, Dick Randall asked if they had a room vacant. The chain of roadside eateries had at some of their establishments a few overnight rooms — inexpensive, simple, anonymous. It was their anonymity that appealed, because it seemed to spread to the rooms’ users. He had a name thought up if he had been asked for one: Tony Wilmslow. He enjoyed thinking up names while he was driving, and sometimes thought he could people a whole novel with the characters he’d invented — though of course it would be an all-male novel, and the idea of that didn’t appeal to him. The girl behind the counter nodded, rang up GBP32.50 on the till, and handed over a key when he paid in cash. Dick’s credit card had been unused since he had snatched Malcolm from the front garden of the house he had once shared with his wife.

“Number three,” said the girl, then turned her eyes to the next customer in the line, totting up the price of the plates and polystyrene cup on her tray.

I’m not even thought worthy of a second glance, thought Dick wryly, but with an underlying satisfaction. He went out to the car where Malcolm was still strapped in and parked it outside number three.

“Home for the night,” he said. “Come along, Captain.”

They’d eaten at midday, so they had no use of the cheap and cheerful meals at The Merry Cook. Dick took from the backseat a slice of cold pizza in a plastic bag — something left over from Malcolm’s lunch — and a carton of milk. For himself he had bought a sandwich. He never ate much when he had something on, though he was one of those people who burned up calories and never was other than slim. Still, eating made him feel bulkier.

They ate companionably on the bed, then played the cat’s cradle game Dick had himself always loved when a child, and had taught his son. Malcolm could undress himself for bed, and loved to do it, his face always rapt with concentration. Dick sat him on the lavatory, then chose one of the five or six stories Malcolm always insisted on when he was being read to sleep.

“Remember,” Dick said, as he always did, “if you wake in the night and I’m not here, I won’t be far away, and I’ll soon be back. Just turn over and go to sleep again.”

Malcolm nodded, and lay there waiting for Postman Pat. Dick wished he could wean him on to a wider choice of stories, but thought that familiarity must be settling to a child’s mind at a time when so much of what he was experiencing was unfamiliar. After a page or so, the little head nodded. Dick turned off the light, then lay on the bed beside him, fully clothed.

Dick had marked out the bungalow as they’d driven through the March darkness on the approaches to The Merry Cook. Old, substantial, without alarm, and with token lights obviously switched on by a neighbour. At shortly before midnight, Malcolm sleeping soundly, Dick got carefully off the bed, took the gloves and torch from the little bedside table where he’d left them, collected his old canvas bag from the spindly armchair, and then slipped out of the motel room.