A MISSING PERSON
by Mary Rutter.
            They`d always played together, run together, fought together.
            They knew all the parks in Liverpool, spent hours walking the green paths, rowing on the brown-watered lakes.  The city had been their playground.   A penny on ‘The Sapphire’ ferry to Eastham would allow them to travel backwards and forwards all day, whatever the weather.
            Although the two girls looked alike, with small features, they were completely different.   Esme would assert herself more readily than Wyn who would approach things in a much more measured way.  Their relationship was close, depending as it did on compromise.
            Once, caught in a summer storm, they`d had an argument whether to run for it, or shelter under a tree.  They discussed the likelihood of being struck by lightning.  Wyn wanted to shelter but Esme thought running for it was the best option.
‘It`s alright for you, you`ve got a macintosh.’
‘Well it’s only rain’ Esme laughed.
            Finally they shared the coat between them and, crablike, scuttled back home, jumping over puddles.  Four legs and lots of giggles under a mac`. 
            Arriving back home, tired, wet and hungry, to the large elegant house, they would slip in  through the back passage.  Creep up the three flights of stairs to their room and leaning out of the window, stare across the garden of the square, at the descending dark of evening, unwilling to let go of the day.  The staccato sound of tiny high heels on wooden stairs chased after them. The dogs had heard them, as if they could tell the time.
‘Is that you girls?’
            Their mother called up the stair well.  No recriminations, just glad to have them back in the house.  They knew they were lucky to have such an easygoing, generous mother, other girls had to report back home long before them.  They hugged each other and leaning over the bannisters, called down.
            ‘Yep, we`re in’
            ‘Tea wont be long, go and tell your father.’
            Their father was a tailor and cutter. A habit maker, working from home.  He had the basement rooms, warm and cluttered, smelling of wool, always welcoming.   Bales of cloth lay on cutting tables, large irons sat on and around the firegrate, at the ready.         Dummies with suits at various stages of completion, pinned and chalked, stood silent sentinel around the walls.  The calmness of the room was suddenly disturbed, the still air broken as the two girls and four dogs flew into the room.  They flopped down on the bench that was a waiting area for clients and for the outworkers, who would sit patiently for stitching work when their father was busy. 
            ‘Mind those scissors, and get those dogs out of here’
            ‘Just come to say tea`s nearly ready.’
            ‘What about “Good evening”?’ their father grinned tolerantly at them.
            ‘Oh yes, and good evening.’ 
            ‘Tell your mother I`ll be along in a minute, I`ve got something to tell you all  ….and wash your hands’ he shouted at the closing door.
            The large windows, now dimming with the coming of evening, let in sufficient light to allow him a glance around the room at the work tables, the pleasing paperwork of new orders.
            A tall, slim man with a shock of white hair, he looked out at the steps leading up to street level and smiled with the anticipation of joining his family.  Tonight he would tell them about his plans, for a forthcoming visit to his old family home in Cockermouth.  He left the warm workroom, locking the outside, street door and mounted the stairs to the kitchen.
            ‘Did you wash your hands?’
            ‘Yes, yes, what are you going to tell us?’
            ‘Patience. After tea’
            The meal was soon over and three faces looked expectantly at him.  His normally calm wife, her Irish colouring of dark hair and pale skin, alight with expectation.  Wyn jumped up and down, skirt flying out, curls bouncing out from her head like a halo.  Esme, hair in plaits, sturdy legs in an old pair of her brothers` trousers, excited at the prospect.
            ‘Well?’
            ‘Well, I`ve been in touch with Grandma Eland and we`re going to visit’.
            ‘Whee!’ the girls shouted together.
            They loved Cockermouth.  Staying at the Eland family hotel was an annual treat.  They would explore the familiar old streets, the two rivers, the castle, the bridges.  And market day, when the hotel was full of the animal smell of farmers.  The raised voices recalling the days` dealings.  Country men hungry for the renowned food served at Elands.
            ‘Are we going on the train?’
            ‘Will we be there for market day?’
            ‘Yes, yes to both of you’
            ‘Ah! those wonderful dinners’ the girls mother nodded contentedly, ‘A holiday for two weeks’.
            Walter would look after the house.  He had been found wandering the city as a young boy, taken  in and adopted.  A street orphan with no family of his own, his chubby, prematurely aged, pale, face reflected his poor childhood health.  He had a job now, but still lived with the Elands and adored Wyn and Esme.
In a way he had replaced the memory of their older brother Stanley, who had left home when they were nine and ten. He`d been killed in the First World War.  They remembered Stanley  returning once from the front, covered with lice.
            ‘Don`t come near’ he`d held out his hand to ward off the girls rush of greeting ‘I`m covered with the little blighters’
            He`d gone out to the back area and stripped off his uniform.  Their father had heated his largest flat iron and ironed the seams of his uniform.  Stanley went away shortly after; they never saw him again. 
            So it was decided as soon as the girls had broken up from Grove street school, the family would set off on the train for Cockermouth.
            ‘Couldn`t we break up early this year?’ They laughed at Wyn, but she was only saying what they all thought.
                                                ***
            Arriving at the Grassmoor Hotel, locally called ‘Elands Temperance’, they jumped down from the omnibus that had brought them from the station and gazed up at the sign.  The solid, south facing, square house was a plain brick-built rectangular box on three floors.   The doorway was decorated with stone cladding, there were more stone dressings around the five rows of large sash windows.  They gleamed in the reflected afternoon sun.  A passageway, alongside the main door, led to the courtyard at the rear.
            ‘It looks as if it`s made of gold’
            ‘Nah! just golden’
            ‘Same thing’
            ‘Tisn`t, golden isn`t real’
            ‘Well it`s magic gold then’
            Democratically they settled for that, as they helped to carry bags through to the back door and the kitchen.  Leather soled feet clattered comfortingly on the flagged stone floor.
            ‘Go and wash your hands’
            ‘You always say that’
            ‘Go on with you, do as your father tells you’
            Their grandmother turned from the large range and gestured for them to go up the back stairs to their room.
                        ‘Water`s in the bowl, usual room’
            Slowly they mounted the stairs, not wanting to leave the warmth of the kitchen and the security of the sound of adult voices that followed them.
            On the train journey they`d met a man, had chattered uncontrollably and smiled with satisfaction when he`d agreed with them, “that ‘Elands’ had the best food in Cockermouth”.  Later, dinner was every bit as good as they`d expected and soon finished.
            ‘Please can we get down?’
            ‘Can we go out to play?’
            ‘Yes, but only for half an hour’
            Stepping out onto Main street, they gazed around them.
            ‘Where to?’
            ‘Down to the cattle market’ 
            ‘Why not up to the the bridge .. and the Derwent?’
            ‘Not enough time, maybe tomorrow’ Esme reasoned.
            ‘Righto! Let`s go’
            They crossed over the street and passed the ornate windows of the Black Bull, wrinkling their noses at the smell of smoke and ale that drifted out of the open door.  The noise of loud male laughter bounced of the walls of Challoner Went, as they continued down towards the market square. Here, in contrast to the Bull it was quiet and peaceful.  The echoes of bustling market days merely a memory in their minds.  Leaning on a fence, they watched the sun start to go down over the river Cocker.
            ‘I love it here’
            ‘Me too’
            ‘Two whole weeks’
            ‘Dare you to go into Old Hall yard this year?’
            ‘Maybe, but not in the dark’
            ‘You`re scared’
            ‘Not’
            ‘Are’
            ‘Wonder if that Billy Watts is still here’
            ‘Or Tom thingy, what’s his name he`d go into Old Hall yard’
            ‘Shut up, anyway bet you wont cross Cocker bridge wall’
            ‘That`s silly. You`ll fall in one day’
            Early evening sent them home, ready for bed and a whole fortnight of carefree adventures ahead.
                                                ***
            The teenage years had been an extension of their childhood; the two went everywhere together.  They were the most sought after girls in Bedford square.  Their laughter was contagious. All who met them smiled and felt better for being with them.  They sculled competitively, on the Dee, they rode in Sefton Park.  Played tennis at the Mersey Bowman club, winning singles and doubles year after year.  Everything was enjoyed to the full. They were inseparable.
            Wyn attended a secretarial school.  Her clothes became smart floral dresses and high heels, her hair, curly and well dressed.  Sometimes, for a dance, she wore it in on top of her head.  She started a job in Liverpool with Stewart & Lloyd as a secretary.
‘I love it, everyone`s so smart and well dressed in town’ she looked down at Esmes trousers.
                        Esme worked at a zoo in Aigburth.  Animals had always been her passion and the chance to care for them was an opportunity she grasped when it came.  She particularly liked to talk to Mickey the chimpanzee.
            He had belonged to a local garage, where he`d helped to move the tyres for repair and fitting. Becoming too strong, he was placed in the zoo.
            ‘Poor thing, he`s in such a small cage, I`m sure he can understand me when I talk to him’ 
            One day Mickey escaped, enraged by the constriction of his six feet by six feet cage.  He ran amok, Esme tried to reason with him.  He knocked her over.  She lay still, but he jumped on her back and badly bit her shoulder.  He then wandered off to the local school.  The schoolmaster hurried the children into the school house.  Mickey was shot, “good job too” people said “he was dangerous”.  Esme was distraught.
            She was able to wear the kind of clothes she liked at the zoo, tweed trousers and a shirt, hair scraped back off her face.  Nobody commented about her clothes there.  She met Harold, also an animal lover, who`d volunteered to look after some of the animals.  It was through this contact that Wyn was introduced to her future husband.  The three went everywhere together.  Harold, Wyn and Esme. Cycling to most of the Liverpool sports clubs or taking the train to Chester and the Dee.
                                                ***
            The Second World War started.  All three were involved with civil duties.   
            Harold and Wyn married, moved to Wavertree and quickly had two boys.  Sporting activities continued to be an important part of their life.  They joined a local tennis club, still won tournaments together.
            Esme, wanting to leave the family home, came to live with them.  She was the first in Liverpool to have an Eton crop.//////(Eton Crops came into fashion first in the Nineteen Twenties:  Ed.///////  It went well with her collar and tie.  She bought trousers and matching jacket.
            ‘What d`you think?’ she asked Wyn.
            ‘Don’t like it’ Wyn replied with a flat voice and pursed lips.              ‘Well, I do’
            ‘You look like a man’
            ‘Perhaps you should be a bit more open to new ideas’
            ‘New ideas, huh!  Everyone`ll stare at you’
            ‘So! Who wants to wear a dress all the time?’
            ‘I do! You look disgraceful’ the same flat voice.
            There would be no compromise this time. It was the first real disagreement they`d ever had.  It gave them both a shock.
The row was shortly after.  Terrific shouting some said.  Others said it was in consequence of the clothes.  Nobody knew exactly what caused it.  Harold was the nearest to what had happened, what had been said and he said very little.  Wyn never told anyone what had happened. Esme packed her bags without another word and left.
                                                ***
            She was gone, nobody knew where.  Wyn was sad, deep inside, she didn`t tell anyone of her emptiness. It had a huge effect on her. She missed her sister, they may never agree but they might learn to make concessions.   She hugged the thought to herself, willing her sister`s return.  Every morning she would look at Esme`s dry toothbrush, hating its reminder of her loss, maybe she`d left it on purpose and meant to come back.  She cleaned the room  Esme had used, remade the bed.  She knew there would never be the closeness of before, but secretly hoped Esme might come home.  She never did.
            Walter married a girl called Lilla. They lived in a tall narrow house in Oxford street.  Wyn visited them regularly.  Walter helped her to realise the finality of Esme’s disappearance but even he couldn`t find out what had happened between the two girls.                                                                                                    
***
            Many years later, in The John Bull magazine, there was a photograph and an article about Sergeant Eland, a member of the armed forces in charge of dog training.  She looked smart in uniform.  It described her duties of caring for the dogs.  Wyn cut the photo and article out.