Quite an Investigation

Disclaimer: I don't own anything but the idea. And the commissioners.

The day after the disappearance, the police began interviewing all of the witnesses of the accident that had preceded the vanishing, including two children and one rather eccentric old man. The old man offered no help, but the children seemed to know something they were hiding. The police investigator made a note to remember to try to get more information from them.

A week after the disappearance, the investigation intensified with the news that the missing man's wife was also gone. The commissioner decided to talk to the children again to see if they would offer any additional information. They offered several obviously evasive answers. The detective was determined to get to the bottom of what they might know.

A month after the disappearance, the children held the only remaining key to the whereabouts of the couple. The examiner returned to the boy's home to interview him yet again. His aunt answered the door instead of the maid today. "Now, see here, sir, I believe you have been bothering my nephew for quite long enough! His mother has just recovered from a long illness, and he would naturally like to spend some time with her."

"Ma'am, I must speak to him. He is one of two who could know about what happened to the missing gentleman and lady."

"Then I suggest you go speak to the other who might know something. Good day, sir." The woman closed the door in his face. The investigator stood for a moment, absorbing the lady's rudeness, before walking to the house next door. He knocked and the girl's mother answered. "Hel- Oh. You again."

"Yes, ma'am. I need to speak with your daughter again, if it's not too much trouble."

"It wouldn't be if she was home. She's with one of her friends, that Kirke boy."

"Digory Kirke, ma'am?"

"Yes, I believe so. Do you know him?"

"I should say so," he murmured. "Thank you anyway, ma'am." He walked away and arrived at his office a few minutes later. He placed his head in his hands. "A man, an exotic, insane woman, and a horse disappear after the cab the man was driving is wrecked. At the same time, the cabbie's wife also goes missing from inside her home. There, there were no signs of a struggle that told that she had been kidnapped. The only evidence I have is the word of those children, who will not tell me the full truth."

A year after the disappearance, the investigator was the only one who was still looking into this case. However, he had had new demands on his time and had not been able to devote much time to the search. He resolved to interview the children one last time before the case was filed away as one that would never be solved. He decided to visit the Plummers first and talk to their daughter Polly. She didn't offer any new insights, but she did inform him that her friend Digory had moved to the country a few months before and that he wouldn't find him at the home he had gone to before. The case was placed aside for good.

Forty-nine after the disappearance, the former commissioner, now retired and living near Cambridge, was visited by the new commissioner, his grandson. "I thought you were coming yesterday."

"I was going to, but there was a situation in London."

"What kind of situation?"

"A train wrecked. Nearly everyone on it was killed."

"Oh my."

"Yes, and I had to try to track down people who could identify the victims. There were two in particular that didn't have any close relatives left. Finally, a young woman who had identified her entire family managed to recognize them as old family friends. Their names were… Digory Kirke and Polly Plummer."

"Digory Kirke and Polly Plummer, eh?"

"Yes, why? Did you know them, Grandfather?"

"You could say that," he said, remembering two children who were never fully honest in the testimony. "You could say that."