A/N: The train trip here is itself fictional although based on certain Amtrack-ish realities. I supplied a better-appointed train, with nicer amenities, more elbow room, and an itinerary with many fewer stops.

The Vanishing Woman

If you miss the train, those on the train will also miss something because every person has the potential to change the fate of every person they come across.

― Mehmet Murat İldan

Chapter Two: Missing Woman, Moving Train

"Sure," Chuck said, then realizing that he was in his pajamas, his feet bare.

"Give me just a second." He pushed the door closed and quickly opened his suitcase. He had a blue linen robe but he had not expected to need it until morning.

He threw it over his pajamas, belted it, and grabbed a pair of Converse tennis shoes he had stowed inside his suitcase. They were untied and he slipped them on, tying them hurriedly, clumsily. His watch was still on his wrist; he'd worn it to bed. He put his phone in one of his robe pockets.

Breathless, he pulled the door open. "I'm ready. Should we start at her cabin? Should we find the conductor?" The questions tumbled out of Chuck as he stepped to the door, still trying to wake up to the situation.

Sarah glanced around. The narrow hallway was empty, the windows opposite the cabins revealing only passing darkness.

"No, at least, not yet." Sarah took a breath. "Carina's family, the Millers, they're, well," Sarah lowered her voice, "they're not just rich, they're mega-rich. Like — the family yearly spends more than the entire budget of a not-so-small country; they're the one-percenters among the one-percenters. But they are also private, absolutely, deathly media-phobic. — Have you ever heard of them?"

Chuck shook his head. Sarah nodded, her point made.

"Right, but they're one of the richest families in the world. — So, I'd like to keep this between us unless we have to involve the conductor or anyone official. What do they say, keep the circle small? At least for now?" She tried to smile but with mixed results. "Who knows? Maybe she ran into someone, maybe another friend, and lost track of the time."

Chuck flicked an eyebrow. "Is that the kind of thing she does?"

Sarah's head dropped. "No, it's not. Not anymore, anyway. And I'm not sure she has any friends other than me now. And Mugs."

"Have you checked the dining cars? There's the one we were in — back there," Chuck nodded in that direction, "and there's one — toward the front," he nodded again in the other direction.

She nodded in answer, not indicating direction. "I peeked into the car you and I ate in, but I didn't see her, didn't see anyone. It was closed, no service until six a.m. — it's four fifty a.m. now. Damn," Sarah said softly but bitterly, "why did I go to sleep, sleep so long?"

"Where is Carina's cabin?" Chuck asked, hoping to keep Sarah from blaming herself.

"It's 304. Next to mine, 302. It's the next car on the way to the dining room." Sarah answered firmly but seemed on the verge of tears.

Chuck reached out and took her hand, gave it a gentle squeeze, then let it go.

"Don't worry, we'll find her. Problem-solving is sort of my thing." Chuck had said the same thing a couple of weeks before in an interview, but then it had seemed only an autobiographical comment, now it felt like a promise.

She lifted her chin a bit at that and gave him a weak smile. "Ok, come on. I'll show you her cabin. Maybe she'll be there when we get there."

The hope in her voice sounded forced.

Chuck stood in the middle of Carina's cabin, his hands in the pockets of his robe, looking carefully at everything. She was not there.

He had not yet touched anything. As Sarah said, Carina's phone was on the bathroom counter. A small foldout tray stood in the seat on one side of the room, silver covers over the plates. On the other side of the room was a closed leather suitcase — beautifully made — with the initials C. R. M. gold-embossed near the handle. A pair of expensive sunglasses sat atop the suitcase, as did a matching leather purse.

Sarah was watching Chuck as he rotated in place, scouring the details.

"So, Sarah, you have a keycard to the cabin, since you just opened it."

"Yes, she gave it to me. Carina is lousy at keeping up with the small stuff. That's part of the reason I was — am — traveling with her, to keep up with it. Also, she wasn't planning to leave her cabin without me, or so she said."

"And did you move anything in here when you came in?"

"I picked up the tray covers, to see if Carina had eaten. She hadn't."

Chuck stepped to the tray and lifted one of the covers himself. It was surprisingly heavy. Beneath it was a steak sandwich, untouched. Returning the first to its original position, he lifted the other to reveal a salad. It also looked unmolested.

He put the cover down and frowned, looking at his watch. "When did she last eat anything?"

"Yesterday at breakfast. A single piece of avocado toast. Nothing since that as far as I know."

"Do you by any chance know the password to her phone?"

Sarah gave Chuck a look. "Well, she's never told me — "

"But you might have an educated guess?"

"Yes, I might."

"We'll hold off on that for now. She might not take kindly to us invading her phone if this all turns out to be some kind of misunderstanding. Is anything missing that should be here?"

Sarah took a turn scouring the room, opening the narrow closet, empty. She stopped suddenly, staring into the emptiness. "Her coat. Carina had on a khaki mid-length woman's trench coat. She's had it for years, she said. It's her favorite. Coach, her version of Target. I liked it and mentioned it one day a while ago, and she bought me one for the trip, but in red. Mine's in my cabin, hanging up. She had hers on, around her shoulders, when we boarded."

"What was she wearing, other than the coat?"

"A yellow-gold silk blouse, dark brown slacks. Brown flats."

"Jewelry?"

Sarah concentrated, and despite everything, it registered on Chuck how lovely she was as she did. "Small topaz earrings, I think. A gold chain with a cross. Her gold Rolex."

Chuck nodded slowly, memorizing the list. Memorization had always been one of his strengths, effortless. Sometimes he remembered too much.

"Did you help her pack?"

"Yes."

"Okay, take a minute and look inside her suitcase and tell me if anything is missing from it."

Sarah walked to the suitcase and bent over, moving the sunglasses and purse, turning the suitcase a bit so that it faced her more squarely, then she unzipped it and opened it. The clothes inside were crisply folded, held in place with straps internal to the suitcase.

Chuck let Sarah rummage through it, while he went into the bathroom and turned on the faucet, the hot water.

"Everything's here, Chuck, including her jewelry bag; all her jewelry is there."

"Okay," Chuck said as he stared at the mirror above the sink.

Sarah stepped beside him and looked inside at the running water, the rising steam. "What are you doing?"

Chuck shrugged, feeling a bit silly. "I just wondered if maybe she'd left a message on the mirror that we would need steam to see?"

Sarah looked at him, then again at the mirror. "I don't see anything."

"Me, either," Chuck said with a shrug. He turned off the water. "Can you check her purse?"

Sarah stepped back to the seat and picked up the purse. It was small; it only took her a moment to look through it. "Wallet, tickets, compact, lipstick…condoms." Sarah's inflection changed on the last item. She stared into the purse as if it had become a well.

"Are those not something she carries?"

"No, I never knew her to carry…those. But maybe, since her breakup…" Sarah looked at him, uncertainty in her eyes.

"Anything else?"

"A small bottle of aspirin. That's all. Normal stuff, except for…"

"Right."

Chuck stepped out of the cabin and looked down the hallway in both directions. It was still too early to expect people to be up and about. He saw no one. He stepped back inside.

"Give her phone a try. You say you guess her password?"

"Yes, but the condoms make me less confident. Maybe she was keeping secrets from me."

Sarah reached into the bathroom and retrieved Carina's phone. It was an iPhone with a leather case. She touched the screen, inhaled, and then entered a series of letters.

She held the phone out, screen toward Chuck. It was lit up; Sarah had opened it.

Chuck whistled quietly, impressed. "Ok, we won't go spelunking, invading her privacy. Just check her texts and phone calls, the most recent. Is there anything odd?"

Sarah turned the phone to face her, and she scrolled, saying "Texts", studying the screen, and kept scrolling, saying, "Calls", and again studying the screen. She finished and gave Chuck a slight shrug. "I don't see anything. A call from before we boarded — from her father. I was with her when she took that. No outgoing calls. No incoming texts, other than one from her ex, asking if they can talk. She did not respond to him by text or phone. No surprise there," Sarah added. "There are no outgoing texts that I can see."

She slipped the phone into her pocket and frowned at Chuck. "Don't like going through her things."

"No, I know, but this is all very strange. Worrisome. She'd understand."

"Should we go and search?" Sarah asked.

"Yeah, let's go to the dining car where we were last night. It's the last public car, so we can start there and work our way forward. Be systematic. The dining car will open soon-ish. Maybe someone will already be there, setting up, and we can ask if anyone's seen Carina, ask who delivered her food."

Chuck stepped out of the cabin and Sarah followed, closing the door and checking to see that it was locked.

They hurried to the dining car.

They passed a man standing outside his cabin, knocking softly on the door and whispering angrily, wearing only a t-shirt and gym shorts, black dress socks fallen loose around his ankles, "Thelma, Thelma, please…"

They slipped past the man, leaving him waiting for a response from Thelma.

As they reached the dining car, Sarah pointed, excited. "There's a light. It was dark earlier."

They knocked on the door and eventually, a man wearing a white waiter's jacket, unbuttoned, came reluctantly to the door. "We open at six!" he yelled through it, holding up six fingers as a visual aid. "Come back later!"

Chuck shook his head. "We aren't here for breakfast. We need to ask you a question about a passenger."

The man hesitated, then he opened the door from the inside. He did not step out to them; he spoke to them through the opening. "A passenger?"

"Yes, has anyone else come here early, looking for breakfast?"

"Not that I know. I come in half an hour ago, doing the morning prep. No one's been here — well, no one 'cept this guy, Louis. His wife locked him out of the cabin and he come and begged me for a coffee. Gave him one for strength. He stood where you are, drank it, then went back to face the little woman."

Chuck glanced at Sarah. She was suppressing a grin but she became solemn quickly. "The woman we are looking for would be memorable. Attractive. Tall, willowy, auburn hair. She was wearing a yellow blouse. Blue eyes."

Chuck glanced at Sarah, at Sarah's blue eyes, the bluest he had ever seen. The waiter seemed taken with Sarah too. His impatient hostility had died away, and he was staring into Sarah's face with involuntary absorption.

Sarah went on, not noticing the shift in the quality of the waiter's attention. "She's fast, moves fast, talks fast, tends to be…sardonic."

"Sardonic? Like the devil?"

This time Chuck suppressed a smile.

"No, not Satanic," Sarah said carefully, "Sardonic. Biting, caustic, stinging."

"I ain't seen her, but it sounds like I'd remember."

"We ordered a meal for her last night at dinner and it was delivered. Who would have taken it to her cabin?" Chuck asked.

The man shrugged. "I don't know who worked here last night. I was working the Cafe Car up front."

"How can we find out who took it to her?"

"Come back in after we open. Ask for Pete."

Chuck saw an order pad sticking out of the man's jacket pocket. "Can I have a piece of paper and a pen?"

He handed the pad to Chuck and Chuck wrote his phone number on it beneath his name, tore the page off the pad, and handed it to the waiter. "Call me if you see her or hear of her?"

"Sure." He turned to Sarah. "Gonna gimme your number too?" His eyes slipped down to her legs below her robe.

Sarah reddened, making the blue of her eyes glow like a welder's flame. "No, but you can reach me by calling him." She stepped closer to Chuck, indicating him by her movement.

The man's eyes showed he was not pleased with her answer but he kept his face composed. "So, you two lost a woman — on a train? We ain't stopped since LA. She has to be on board. If she got off, she woulda jumped." He made a squishing sound.

Sarah blanched. Chuck nodded and spoke quickly. "Please call me."

The man waved the page with Chuck's name and number. "I'll remember," he said to Chuck but he was staring at Sarah, her bare legs again.

Sarah was staring at the floor.

The waiter returned to the dining car and Chuck faced Sarah.

He had kept the pad and pen without thinking about it, and he decided not to call the waiter back. He put them both in the pocket of his robe.

He cleared his throat and Sarah lifted her head, upset.

Chuck spoke carefully. "He's right about stops. The train hasn't stopped. It only stops in Denver and Chicago, and, of course, New York." He paused, looking kindly into Sarah's eyes. "You don't think Carina was so distraught that she — "

"No, no." Sarah shook her head hard. "She wasn't eating much. She sighed a lot. Cried a little. But that? Suicide? No. No way. I know her, Chuck. She was heartbroken, but she was also an actress of sorts, herself, you know, a drama queen. I'm not minimizing her pain, but you shouldn't maximize it. She was going to recover, was recovering. Remember the condoms. Carina's the sort to rally, not retreat."

Chuck put his hand on Sarah's shoulder. "Then we will reject that hypothesis altogether. And that means we're going to work with the hypothesis that she's on the train — somewhere. We only have to figure out where."

They walked back into the next car, a sleeping car.

Louis was no longer in the hallway, entreating Thelma. A couple of kids, boys, and their mother were there, the mother trying to corral the running boys and return them to their cabin, a few doors down from Thelma's door.

On the other side of the dining car, but not publicly accessible, was a sleeper for the train staff. The cabins in the car they were in were all numbered in the two hundreds. Chuck had actually studied the train online when he bought his ticket, a train nerd mesmerized by the details. The first-class dining car was the one-hundred car, this car the two-hundred car, Sarah and Carina's car the three-hundred car, and his car the four-hundreds, his cabin, 408. Beyond his cabin was the First Class coach car, and a Sightseer Lounge, normally reserved for two-level superliners but newly designed for the Viewliner, evidently supplied with huge windows. Past the Sightseer Lounge was a Cafe Car and three regular coach cars. The last cars before the engine were Baggage/Storage Cars and an employee sleeper, but, none of them was accessible to passengers.

Chuck smiled at the kids as they ran toward him and Sarah, circling them and then running back, dodging their mother's effort to collar them. The woman watched the kids run back into her cabin, and she quickly shut the door on them. She blew out a breath and then smiled at Chuck and Sarah.

"Hi," Chuck said, "we're looking for a friend of ours. Tall, with auburn hair, pretty. She was wearing a yellow blouse?"

The woman shook her head. "Sorry, I've not seen her. I was in the cabin all night until the boys burst out the door. I haven't seen anyone but that poor guy begging his wife to let him back in the cabin." She nodded to Thelma's door.

"Okay, well, my name's Chuck and this is Sarah. If you see our friend, tell her we're looking for her, please."

"Okay," the woman gave them a surprisingly exhausted smile — for a morning smile. She squared up in front of her door, exhaling. "Time to face them again. Please pray for me." She opened the door and slid inside, not opening it enough for the boys to escape.

Chuck was glad to see that the incident had shifted Sarah's focus. "Let's take a walk through the train. Maybe she's in the Sightseer Lounge?"

"Not much to see in the dark," Sarah noted with a glance at a window.

"True, but maybe she felt claustrophobic. And the horizon is starting to brighten."

Sarah stared out the window for a second, then nodded, and they started toward the front of the train.

Carina was not in the Sightseer Lounge.

No one was except a few Christmas decorations.

They did not see her on the way to the Lounge. Chuck checked his watch. It was almost six, time for the dining cars. He wanted some coffee and hoped that it would distract Sarah. She sat across a small table from him in the Lounge, staring out at the sunrise, still mostly grey but turning orange, and drummed her fingers. He watched them drum, mainly because he was trying not to look at Sarah's legs, crossed, left uncovered by her robe. It occurred to him for the first time that her toenails and fingernails were not painted.

In his imagination, they had been red, but no, they were unpainted.

She noticed his eyes on her fingertips, misunderstanding the point of his look. "Sorry, that sound must be annoying. I'm just so anxious. I keep telling myself it's all some massive misunderstanding, some mistake, that we'll find her and then laugh about it, but…"

"But you're having a hard time keeping the faith."

She nodded, her expression dismal for a second.

"Look," he continued, trying to sound like he was only making a suggestion, not trying to divert her from her anxiety, "how about we go back to our cabins and change, put on some clothes. We can meet again in the dining car and see if we have any new ideas. And we can get some coffee, some breakfast. I don't know about you, but I need my coffee in the morning — and a pastry, if I can find one.."

She smiled tightly, recognizing and appreciative of his effort. "Me too. Okay, let's go change. I would feel more comfortable if I were dressed, I mean, normally dressed."

Chuck thought he would too — if Sarah were normally dressed. Keeping his eyes off her was proving impossible. Her legs were so bare and so perfect, longer than the train.

She fished in her robe's pocket and took out her phone. She peered at it for a moment, touching the screen, then she looked up at Chuck. "Why don't you give me your number?"

Chuck rattled it off and Sarah put it into her phone. Then she texted him her number.

"Now, we're electronically tethered." She grinned. "I'll let you know if she's back in her cabin. If you don't hear from me, just come to my cabin when you're dressed."

Chuck cleaned up quickly and dressed and left his cabin.

He walked quickly toward Sarah's cabin. As he did, he bumped into the Tom Hanks conductor of the night before.

The man tipped his cap, smiled a friendly smile, and went on.

Chuck turned to watch him go. The man could believably be Hank's father.

He unsettled Chuck — but for no good reason Chuck that could name except the man's look-alike features.

Or maybe it was because his presence made Chuck feel he was the boy from Polar Express, but grown now and on a much later train. Grinning at himself, he tried to shake the thought from his mind.

As he approached Sarah's door, he forgot the conductor. Or rather thoughts of Sarah caused him to forget. He knew he ought to be focused on Carina, on the mystery of her disappearance, and he was. But his focus was split, and not evenly.

Getting to know Sarah a little had allowed her to claim even more of his focus. She was in his head, pirouetting in that red dress. He felt jittery as he knocked.

When she opened the door, his mind blanked for a moment, and he forgot more than the conductor — he forgot who he was.

She opened the door in a blue sweater and jeans and she stole his breath, his thoughts, stole everything. Pilfered.

Gone.

For a moment, he was nothing but disembodied sight — though he saw, he had no knowledge that he had eyes. He was all vision before a vision.

Behind his back, visible through the window, was the sunrise, now much brighter, but facing Sarah in that dress, her golden hair down and shining, Chuck thought he was facing the sky.

Sarah smiled at Chuck's boggle. "Are you okay, Chuck?"

"Yeah, yeah. Sorry, just a little punchy. I need coffee. I take it that nothing's changed?" He nodded toward Carina's cabin.

"No, I checked it again a minute ago. Nothing's changed. I put her phone back on a charger in her cabin. Should we take it with us?"

"No, leave it. If she returns, she'll call you, I'm sure."

Sarah gestured for Chuck to step into her cabin. Her perfume tinctured the air of the small room and it made Chuck dizzy. Sarah sat down on the end of the bed. "Close the door, okay?" she asked softly, reluctantly. Worried, Chuck did.

"Look, Chuck, I should tell you something about Carina. Back before I knew her, before her engagement, she was…wild. All that changed when she met Brent, her ex, but before him, she was an unpublicized Paris Hilton. She's tried to live all that down, and she really did change when she fell for Brent, like a one-eighty-change, complete about-face. But the breakup has been hard on her, and I've been wondering about those condoms…"

"Oh, that's why you said not anymore when I asked if she might have found a friend and lost track of time."

Sarah nodded. "Yes, it's not beyond the realm of possibility that she — "

"Reverted to her pre-engagement ways?"

Sarah nodded. "I hope that's not it. Not because I'm a prude about, you know, that, but because, from what Carina told me about how she was then, I don't think I would have liked her much."

"Well, I doubt anyone can lose track of time for the whole trip. Eventually, if that's what's going on, they'll have to come up for air."

Sarah looked doubtful. "Maybe. Or maybe she brought me on here to watch her things while she kept herself occupied in other ways."

"She didn't say anything about knowing anyone on the train? Give you any sense that she was looking for someone? Maybe she'd planned a rendezvous?"

Sarah smiled despite the worried look on her face. "Rendezvous?"

"It was the word that came to mind."

"No, she didn't give me any sense she had something planned, but maybe she wanted it to be spur of the moment, a stranger."

"A revenge rendezvous? Wash that man right out of her hair?"

"You're a curious man, Chuck. Let's go get some coffee and talk to that man, Pete. I want to find Carina, end this. It's like a torturous, grown-up version of hide-and-seek. The suspense is killing me."

Chuck nodded through a frown and Sarah caught his expression.

"One good thing has come of it, though," she added softly.

"What's that?"

She held his eyes with hers. "Spending more time with you."

She stood up and for a second he thought she was going to kiss him and he braced for it, his heart suddenly chugging, but she only adjusted her sweater and picked up her purse.

My God, she is beautiful.

He bit his unfulfilled lips, ignored his heart, and opened the cabin door.

Lots of people were up by this time. They had to weave through the narrow hallways, stopping and starting. By the time they reached the dining car, it was almost full. There was one table still open.

They sat down and the waiter from earlier, now buttoned up, came to the table. "Welcome back. Any luck finding your friend."

He spoke only to Sarah, letting his eyes linger on her blue sweater, the way she filled it.

"No," Chuck said, more curtly than he intended. "No, not yet," he softened his tone. "Is Pete here?"

"Yeah, I asked him about last night and he said he'd look at the paperwork. I'll send him out. Order?"

"Coffee and donut for me," Chuck said, "Sarah?"

"The same."

The waiter studied her face for a moment and then nodded and left the table.

They chatted softly about the whole affair, starting over with Sarah's return to her room. But neither had any new ideas.

"Maybe, if she's just with someone, she'll show up soon. Folks don't usually manage to sleep late on a train," Chuck offered after a shared, thoughtful silence.

"But maybe they aren't sleeping," Sarah said, her tone partly joking, partly serious. "The beds in the First Class cabins are surprisingly roomy." Her eyes captured his as she said that.

He knew he was blushing and could not stop it.

She smiled at him, a generous smile.

Their order arrived — but not in the hands of the waiter. Another man was holding the tray, thin, sallow, with black hair. Middle-aged. "Here're your orders. I'm Pete; I manage the dining car. You wanted to talk to me about room service delivery?"

Sarah answered. "Yes, my friend, Carina Miller was — is — in 304. I ordered some food for her last night and it was delivered. But we can't find her. The food was there but not her. Can you tell us who delivered it?"

Pete smiled but then corrected his expression, neutralizing it. "Um, that would be our new guy, Jasper. That was his final delivery of the evening, end of shift for him…" He paused as if unsure how or whether to continue.

"And?" Sarah said, prompting him.

"He's a tall, handsome young man, and, from his own account, quite a…hand…with the ladies. He shared a bit about his history with me during a smoke break on the back of the dining car."

Sarah glanced at Chuck. "When does…Jasper…work again?"

"I believe he's due to work in the Cafe Car starting at noon. Perhaps your friend will reappear then too?"

"Can a passenger be in the employee sleeper?" Chuck asked.

"Not unaccompanied. And the company frowns on it, of course, but it sometimes happens. If it's urgent, I can spare someone, send him forward, and have him…wake Jasper."

Chuck looked at Sarah. He could see her thinking. "No, that's okay. We'll have our breakfast and wait for…him to wake up."

"Very good."

Chuck lifted an eyebrow and Sarah shrugged; Chuck could not tell if her obvious embarrassment was for herself, her friend or both. Probably both.

He shrugged too. "Paris Hilton returns, it seems."

Sarah turned to look out the window at the passing scenery, the risen sun, nodding at his comment but not at him.

Feeling relieved and awkward at the same time, Chuck thought, then picked up his donut and broke it into pieces.

He kept the final one in his hand, poised it above his coffee, and asked Sarah (she had turned to watch): "Has anyone ever taught you to dunk?"

She stared at him for a moment and then grinned, grinning away her mood and picking up her donut, breaking it in imitation of him. "It Happened One Night?"

Chuck shrugged again. "So it seems."

The train sped on.

A/N: More next Sunday. Hey, drop me a line of review; don't be stingy with a Christmas story!