Elizabeth is Missing

Maud is having a meal with Helen at an Italian restaurant. Seeing summer squash on the menu reminds her of how she first met Elizabeth. Maud reminisces about having soup and sandwiches with Elizabeth after working together at the charity shop. Maud wonders why she hasn’t heard from Elizabeth for so long and worries that Elizabeth may have fallen, and no one had told her.

Maud realizes that Helen gets frustrated with her. She notices Helen rolling her eyes and sighing when she thinks Maud’s not looking. Maud, feeling angry that no one listens to her, becomes agitated and breaks a black plate.

The broken plate reminds Maud of finding broken records in her backyard as a child. Maud cleaned off the broken pieces and fit them back together. When she read the titles, she realized they were the ones Sukey always asked their lodger, Douglas, to play. When Maud returned to the house, she saw Douglas standing at his window, looking at something outside. A woman emerged from the bushes and ran away.

The narrative returns to the present time where Maud is eating ice cream with her daughter. On the way home, Maud realizes that she needs to use the bathroom and exits the car at a stop, alarming Helen. Although Maud rushes to her house, she doesn’t make it to the bathroom. This leaves Maud humiliated and in tears.

Maud heads out in search of Elizabeth. When she rings Elizabeth’s doorbell, there’s no answer. She peers through the net curtains and sees the “ugly” ceramics Elizabeth collects but sees no sign of her friend.

Walking by the bandstand, Maud recalls passing it as a girl on her way to the movies. She remembers how they often had music there during the war and how her sister Sukey would smile at the soldiers. Maud slips on a step and falls. Thinking about the bruises she’ll have the next day reminds her of the bruises she had as a girl.

One memory that is particularly vivid for Maud is a trip to the shop to pick up a tin of peaches and her mother’s rations. At the shop, she encountered the neighborhood “mad woman” who had a mental breakdown after losing her daughter to a bus accident. The woman hit Maud with an umbrella repeatedly. Maud’s mother told her that the woman probably attacked Maud because she reminded her of her dead daughter. Maud wondered if the mad woman only wanted Maud’s rations. Maud clearly remembers the bruise the woman left behind, the same color as the woman’s umbrella.

Afraid that she’s seriously injured, Maud calls her doctor. Helen tells Maud that she must stop calling the doctor about every little thing. When Maud’s handsome, young doctor arrives for a house call, he impatiently confirms that Maud has called him 12 times in the past two weeks. Maud is sure this is a mistake. She mentions that her friend Elizabeth is missing, but her daughter dismisses this idea. The doctor tells Helen that she might want to arrange a “faculties assessment” (33) for Maud.

The doctor leaves, and Helen asks Maud to stop calling him and to stop obsessing over Elizabeth’s whereabouts. However, Helen notices Maud’s bruises and apologizes for not believing her. When Helen asks Maud how she got the bruises, Maud, confusing the past and the present, tells her “[i]t was an umbrella” (34).

When Helen holds Maud’s hand, Maud tells her that she sat and held her mother’s hand when her mother was dying. Helen tells Maud she’s not dying. Maud’s mother died without knowing what happened to Sukey; Maud wants to find Elizabeth because she doesn’t want to die like her own mother did.

Later, Maud is shopping with Helen and her granddaughter Katy. Maud is looking for the perfect sweater but having no luck, and Helen is growing increasingly exasperated. When Katy teases Maud about how picky she’s being, Maud is pleased: “I can’t help smiling; it’s nice, being teased. Elizabeth often teases me, too. It makes me feel human. At least someone assumes I’m intelligent enough to get a joke” (36).

Maud remembers that Sukey gave her a velvet bolero that Maud wore the last time she saw Sukey. Sukey had come home to have fish and chips with her parents and Maud. Douglas flirted with Sukey, and Maud asked if something had happened between Sukey and Sukey’s husband, Frank. Sukey left a mark with her red lipstick when she kissed Maud goodbye. Douglas teased Maud about it later, and Maud noted that Douglas knew the exact shade of Sukey’s lipstick: Victory Red.

The narrative shifts to the present. Maud is in a large department store with Helen and Katy. When Maud asks the woman at the cosmetics counter for a Victory Red lipstick, the woman tells her she doesn’t have it and that it’s “a bit old-fashioned” (41).

Maud becomes disoriented and accidentally smashes a Waterford crystal vase. A store clerk asks Maud who she’s with, but Maud can’t remember. When Helen finally finds her, she’s exasperated. Maud remembers how Helen would run away as a child, and Maud observes, “Funny how things are reversed” (44).