Noonday and Night

‘Near enough, although we think it had been moved. Anyway, after the passengers had hung about and made all sorts of enquiries, one of them – most improperly, of course – drove the coach back to the hotel. He then made a report which, when the driver did not show up that evening, the management relayed to us.’

‘And your second man?’

‘Daigh got himself and his coach spirited away during a long coffee-stop in Dantwylch. This was on a trip from Tenby to visit Dantwylch Cathedral and the ruins of the bishop’s palace.’

‘A long coffee-stop? How long?’

‘About an hour and a half. The coach pulled up at a spot convenient to the sightseers and then went off to the local carpark. The arrangement was that it would return for the passengers at a given time to take them on to Fishguard for lunch, but, of course, it never arrived.’

‘So what happened then?’

‘Some of the passengers went to the car park and found that the coach had been there, but had only stayed a very short time., They returned to the others and they all hung about until a policeman told them they were obstructing the footway. They informed him of what had happened. The upshot was that a local coach was laid on and the day’s outing proceeded according to plan, except that the passengers arrived extremely late for lunch. Eventually the coach was traced to Swansea. We sent up another driver as soon as we got a ’phone call from the manager of the hotel at Tenby after the passengers had been taken back there for the night, and the police soon traced our own coach, so that was all right so far, except that they haven’t traced Daigh.’

‘It seems a most mysterious business. Can you supply me with a list of the passengers who took these two tours and give me their addresses?’

‘Yes, of course. Honfleur’s desk-clerks will know. I’ll call him. They’ll have all the details at his office.’

‘And can I possibly find out which of the passengers have travelled with you before? I understand from Mr Honfleur that the majority of your clients, having sampled the amenities you offer, are inclined very much to book with you again.’

‘Again and again, most of them. It’s very gratifying. I will certainly obtain the information you require and will let you have it at the earliest possible moment. I am so grateful that you are prepared to help us. I am not at all in agreement with Honfleur that it is a waste of time. The police will do their best, but I think a private enquiry may obtain quicker results.’

CHAPTER 3

Hulliwell Hall

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Dame Beatrice spent the whole of the following day studying the lists of names and addresses she had been given so that she could make her choice of witnesses. She was working entirely in the dark, for Basil Honfleur could give her no further information. He had met none of the passengers. There were thirty names on the Derbyshire list and twenty-eight people had taken the Welsh tour.

The ideal procedure, she supposed, would have been to interview each and every passenger, as the police had done, but she felt that time was important, so for the Derbyshire witness she chose Vernon Tedworthy. He had a telephone number, which expedited matters, so she called him up and asked whether she might visit him.

Vernon Tedworthy was a retired schoolmaster. A pencilled note on the Derbyshire list informed Dame Beatrice that his only previous experience of touring with County Motors had been in 1971, when he had travelled with his wife on a trip to Yorkshire.

When he and Dame Beatrice met, he told her that he had intended to stay at his school (where he was deputy headmaster) until his sixty-fifth birthday, but two things had caused him to change his mind and retire at the optional age of sixty years. One was the death of his wife when he was fifty-nine; the other was that his school, a good, well-run, trouble-free Secondary Modern establishment of three hundred and fifty boys, each of them known by name to the headmaster and his staff of ten picked and dedicated men, was to be turned into a two-thousand strong, mixed Comprehensive.

It was much less than certain that Vernon Tedworthy’s headmaster would be offered the captaincy of this gargantuan hydra, and even less certain that Tedworthy would retain his post as deputy head. That would go to some young man with a university degree to flourish, a young man who, as like as not, would do little classroom teaching, but who would be employed mostly in an administrative capacity only, with plenty of paper-work to fill up his time, but with little or no contact with the real life of the school as personified by its couple of thousand boys and girls.

‘Not for me,’ said Tedworthy. He had given in his notice of retirement to take effect at the end of the Easter term following his sixtieth birthday. ‘Why on earth they want to muck up perfectly good schools, whether they’re Sec. Mod. or grammar schools, to satisfy the sacred cow of Equality of Opportunity, I don’t know. I know it sounds all right, but some animals will always be more equal than others, don’t you think?’

After his retirement he had sold his house and lived for a time with his daughter and her husband and family, but in the following spring he had bought a small bungalow in Dorset and lived alone there except for occasional visits from relatives and friends. He ran a small car, but when it came to holidays he decided that he would try another coach tour. It was not good to lead too solitary a life.

He remembered that on their previous trip he and his wife had enjoyed themselves and had made many temporary friends – temporary in the sense that, although addresses had been exchanged and promises made of keeping in touch, nothing had come of what had been merely an expression of holiday enthusiasm and euphoria.

He picked up a brochure at his local coach station and decided upon a tour of the Peak District. It was a part of the country which he had not visited and which had no associations with his wife. He thought, too, that six days would be enough to show him whether it was the kind of holiday he could still enjoy, or whether perhaps a fishing holiday of a solitary kind would be preferable in the future.

There were only five people at the start of the tour; a few others were picked up along the route and the main body joined the coach at Canonbury. Up to that point he had had the seat to himself, but he realised that this was