‘So she was heading back to London?’

‘Yes.’

‘You went to fetch her from Clandon Spa Hotel five miles away, but you only dropped her back at the local bus stop. That’s four or five miles away from Clandon station.’

He was silent for a moment. ‘Actually, I didn’t drop her. She walked out to the main road where the bus stop is. It’s only two hundred yards.’

‘What time was that?’

‘Just before eleven.’

‘Are there bus services at that time of night on a Sunday?’

‘I don’t know.’

Gillard didn’t want to press too hard at this point. There were obvious question marks over Singer’s account, but he would rather apply pressure when he was in a position to make notes.

‘Did you contact her to make sure that she had got home all right?’

‘Not until the next day. And she didn’t reply. I think she’s upset with me.’

‘Why would that be?’

‘We had an argument. I think she misunderstood my intentions.’

Or understood them too well, Gillard thought.

‘Do you have any idea where she might have gone?’

‘None whatever.’

He arranged to visit Singer in the evening, and then hung up.

The man had volunteered a great deal of information, including some that did not put him in a great light. But it was equally likely he hadn’t told the complete truth.

Rob Townsend was waiting by Gillard’s desk, like a dog expecting dinner. The officer, whose fresh face and short gingery hair made him look younger than his twenty-six years, could never hide his excitement when he thought he had made a case breakthrough.

‘Sir, we’ve got a good clear trace on Beatrice’s phone. It shows her in Clandon, then later in Westmeare until eleven, when it was turned off. It remained off for all of Monday and a bit of Tuesday. On Tuesday afternoon she headed up to London, according to the cell site analysis. She lights up all the towers from Clandon to Waterloo. The speed and path fits with a train journey, with further traces within London during the evening. There’s another trip, seemingly by road, towards Brentford this morning.’

Gillard blew a sigh of relief. ‘Hopefully she’s not missing at all then. What about texts and emails?’

‘There’s dozens incoming, only a few in the other direction. I’ve just sent an electronic copy of the warrant to the service provider, so we should be able to see the full contents today.’

‘Did you call in any CCTV?’

‘Well, I thought maybe we didn’t need to. It would be hard to know where to start.’

‘Not Waterloo obviously, unless you want to send Carl Hoskins mad scanning a million people emerging from trains. You obviously start at the quietest place, where she would be easy to spot. Clandon station, I suppose. Does that fit the trace?’

‘Yes, that seems to be where she got on.’

‘Did you ring Network Rail to check whether it has CCTV there?’

Townsend looked flustered. ‘Not yet, sir.’ It was easy to see what he was thinking. She’s obviously alive and kicking, so why would we bother?