Rosamund shook her head as she bit into a biscuit. ‘I officially retired a few years ago, although I’m still busy. I’m on the board of two charities and do the odd bit of writing, although the editors are all so young these days, no one really remembers me.’
‘I saw you on Newsnight.’
‘Ah, yes,’ she smiled. ‘Debating ageism in the media.’
‘I bet you like keeping busy,’ said Abby, looking at the older woman. Her brown eyes were bright and lively and her trim figure belonged to someone who was still active.
Rosamund nodded. ‘I think I would go stir-crazy if I wasn’t. I don’t have family, but I have plenty of friends.’
‘Did you ever marry?’
It was a personal question, but it felt like a natural one to ask.
‘Almost. A couple of times,’ she said frankly. ‘As you know, I was engaged to Dominic. There was someone else a few years later. He was a friend, a colleague at the Observer who became something more, but my heart wasn’t in it. My friends at the time thought I called it off because I didn’t believe in marriage. I don’t blame them; I was always railing against something when I was younger. The truth was, my heart belonged to Dom and there was never room for anyone else in it.’
She took the photo out of its envelope and went to prop it up on the mantelpiece.
‘I suppose Robinson wants a follow-up piece,’ she said, looking back at Abby.
‘Who’s Robinson?’
‘Elliot Hall’s editor. That’s why you’re here, I assume.’
‘No, I’m here to give you the photograph.’
‘I’m sorry. That sounded very ungrateful,’ said Rosamund with a soft laugh. ‘It’s just that my phone has been ringing off the hook about the story. Friends feigning interest in other lines of gossip, but they all got round to it in the end. My relationship with Dominic.’
She came and sat back down.
‘People have a fascination with the missing, don’t you think? Whether it’s Amelia Earhart or Madeleine McCann, these cases intrigue the world. I remember being dispatched to Cambodia in 1970, when Sean Flynn, Errol’s son, disappeared covering the war. The story ran and ran and people used to ask me about it at dinner parties for years afterwards.’
Abby pictured a different Rosamund Bailey to the old lady sitting opposite her now; she could quite easily imagine her flying out to war zones, brave and defiant.
‘What do you think happened to Dominic?’ she said finally.
‘Are you helping Mr Hall with a story?’
‘Yes,’ she replied honestly. ‘We thought we might be able to help you find out the truth.’
Rosamund looked sceptical. ‘I don’t suppose Elliot Hall has such altruistic motives.’
‘But I do,’ said Abby.
Rosamund’s look softened. ‘Don’t you think I did everything I could?’ she said, her voice tinged with sadness. ‘I spent two months in Peru trying to find Dominic. When you love someone and they leave you, you do whatever you can to bring them back.’
Abby felt a spike of guilt at her words.
‘Your exhibition showed the romance of exploration,’ continued Rosamund slowly. ‘But let me tell you, there is no romance in that damned place.’
‘How far into the jungle did you go with him?’ asked Abby.
‘On my first visit, when I went to send him off on his expedition, the visit when the photograph was taken, I just went to the fringes. But I went back a second time,’ she said, her voice tailing off into the past.
‘Dominic went missing two weeks after he set off. At first he used local tribesmen to relay messages back to Kutuba and he had a radio to keep in contact with Miguel, his expedition manager, who was based there. But after ten days, the messages just stopped. Miguel sent a party into the jungle to look for him, but the trail had gone cold.’
She took another sip of her tea and continued her story.
‘I hadn’t even arrived back in London by this point. Miguel got a message to my hotel in Lima when I was just about to leave for the airport. There was no doubt in my mind that I had to return to Kutuba and go and look for him. I hired a team, a small army really, and I helped them search every day for him.’