“He was wounded in late spring of 1918, and he went to a clinic in Bedfordshire. I saw him there, and he seemed to be excited about what he’d done in the war. He was eager to go back. He admired the Ghurkas. Those dark little men from Nepal. He wrote that they were the best at what they did, which was killing people. He would have liked to be a Ghurka officer. They had English officers, didn’t they? He stayed in France for six months after the Armistice. When he did come back it wasn’t to Minton. He was searching for his nurse from the Bedfordshire clinic. It was closed, of course, the remaining men sent elsewhere, and no one knew just where she was. Such a pretty girl. I was happy for him, I hoped he would find her. That was in 1919. And after that, there has been nothing. It was as if he’d vanished. I reported it to the police in Buildwas. They asked me if I suspected foul play, but of course I had no reason to think any such thing. He was just missing. They were polite and kind, but they did nothing.”

“Perhaps he found his nurse and together they left England.”

“He’d have told me, wouldn’t he? He’d have wanted me to be happy for him.” Her eyes filled. “I was beginning to think he could be dead. People sometimes aren’t identified straightaway, are they?”

Rutledge said gently, “We make every effort to find a name. Do you have a photograph of him? It would help.”

“He didn’t like being photographed. There’s one with my mother, but he was only a year old.” She smiled shakily. “You wouldn’t be able to tell what he was like as a man, would you? And I’d rather not part with it anyway, I don’t have many photographs of her.”

Rutledge cast about for a better way to broach his next question, but there was no way to soften it.

“I’m curious. Did your brother harbor any hard feelings toward his schoolmates in Eastfield? Did he talk about them or wish he could—um—punish them for the way he’d been treated? Or didn’t it matter, after he’d grown used to another life?”

“I asked him that, once. He told me it was all right, that he’d cursed them. I suppose it made him feel better, but of course that’s all it did. Their lives went on, and I doubt they’ve given him a thought in all these years. He didn’t matter as much to them as they did to him, you see. You’ll keep looking for him, won’t you? I’m to be married soon. My father’s dead. It would be lovely if my brother could give me away.”

He promised to do his best, and left.