The Art of Forgetting Read Online Free PDF Page B

know Linda’s full name, shall I do a bit of digging? May as well do something with all this time on my hands.”
    “You will get another job, you know,” says Kelly, picking up on the bitterness in her sister’s voice. “But yes, until you do, if you have time ...”
    So it is decided, between the two of them. They don’t talk to Robin and Beth, they don’t talk to Patrick, they don’t even talk to each other in any detail. It isn’t a big deal. All Laura is going to do is try to find out if Linda Lucaretti had ever returned; if she is still alive. If she is, that will be the end of it, and if she isn’t, well there probably won’t be much they can do about that either. That is what Laura thinks as she waves Kelly goodbye and lets herself in, and she is glad of the little surge of excitement and pleasure in her stomach. That has been missing for a while.
    The next day, Laura forces herself to do useful things for at least an hour after she gets back from the school run. The novelty of this little routine wore off quite quickly after she stopped working, and there has never been much charm in housework and washing, but she feels this must come first. Naturally, Patrick has been nothing but supportive, but she still feels terribly guilty about being at home whilst he is at work, and keeping the house running is one way of abating that guilt. She knows it is useful that she has time to work on sorting out Mum’s house, but that is something she finds very difficult to do on her own and she often finds herself inventing reasons not to go. Perhaps she will go later, she thinks.
    Her laptop is on the dining room table, and that is the obvious place to start the search for Linda. So, as soon as she has tidied up a bit, filled the dishwasher and the washing machine and opened the post, she makes herself a coffee and sits down. Linda Lucaretti. There is nothing relevant on the first two pages of search results, with that or any other spelling she tries, and most of the hits are American anyway. So that is a dead end and a further couple of hours are equally fruitless. By the time she has grabbed a bite to eat, it is time to think about dinner and then there is the school run again. It isn’t until quite late in the evening that she is able to give it any more thought.
    “Do newspapers keep all their old back copies?” she asks Patrick, who is half-watching something on the sports channel whilst flicking through the local paper.
    “I guess so, though I can’t imagine why anyone would want to read this in the future,” he says, dropping the paper onto the floor beside him. “Any particular reason?”
    “It’s just that thing that Mum wrote, you remember, that I showed you. I wonder if that girl’s disappearance was covered at the time.”
    “Hmm, could’ve been. But I wouldn’t worry about it anyway. Like I said, it was a long time ago.”
    She can see he is already back with the sport, so she spends an hour searching for the names of the local papers. She narrows them down to one, which had been in existence throughout the time but changed its name, and another which has been absorbed by a larger concern. At least she has something to work on and the fact that Patrick is not interested is probably a bonus.
    The next day she spends the best part of the morning on the phone before establishing that she will have to go to The Kent Messenger office in Maidstone to stand any chance of reading back copies from that period. They are all stored on microfilm, but members of the public can access them by appointment. She decides to go on Thursday, when the kids have after-school clubs, in case she is delayed getting back. Now there is nothing else she can do but she texts Kelly to let her know, half-hoping she may not be working that day and will offer to come with her. However, Kelly’s reply puts paid to that.
     
    That’s great, well done! I’ll call after school to see what you’ve got!
     
    By Thursday, Laura