The Disappearance of Laura Crawford

Photo by Louis Droege on Unsplash

The Disappearance of Laura Crawford

A Short Mystery By F. Haywood Glenn

My partner Ken had a bad feeling about this case from the very beginning. Ronald Crawford, an old teammate from Ken’s high school football days, showed up at our office on a blustery day in late October. He was disheveled and bleary-eyed, looking like he hadn’t slept in a few days. He was so distraught that we could hardly understand what he was trying to tell us. What we were able to make out of his incoherent blubbering was that Laura, his wife of ten years was missing.

I had never met the Crawfords but according to Ken, the Crawfords were a loving couple and the owners of a well-known Center City Bistro. Since Ken and Ron had been high school buddies, I thought it best to let Ken handle the initial interview. I took a seat, prepared to listen. Ronald took the seat opposite Ken.

“When did she go missing?”

“I’m not sure.”

“When did you first suspect that she was missing?”

He reacted to this question, fidgeting in his chair and wringing his hands. “I think that she didn’t come home from the restaurant.”

“When Ronald? When did Laura not come home from the restaurant?’

He was hesitant, but he whispered, “A couple of days ago, I think.”

“Had the two of you been fighting”

“No!” He said emphatically.

This was all sounding very suspicious to me. I watched Ronald closely. He was nervous. His hands had a slight tremble and he was unable to make eye contact with Ken as he spoke. Every time Ken addressed him directly, he either looked down or looked away. What was he not telling us, I wondered.

I could see that Ken was becoming frustrated. “Ronald, you’re not giving me much information to go on here. I need to know how long Laura has been missing.”

“I told you!” He raised his voice in annoyance. “A couple of days ago.”

“Have you called the police?”

“Yeah, but they said she hasn’t been gone long enough for her absence to be considered a crime, plus she is an adult woman. It isn’t a crime for a woman to leave her husband.” Tears began to well in his eyes.

“Is that what happened Ron? Did Laura leave you?”

He lifted his head now, looking directly at Ken. “Laura loves me! She would never leave me.” Several seconds of silence passed before Ron could speak again. “Laura would never leave me,” he said again. “That’s why you have to find her.”

I was even more suspicious now. Ronald Crawford wanted us to believe that his loving wife and successful business partner just suddenly walked away from her life with no explanation. It just didn’t make sense. 

Ken needed to end this meeting if we were going to begin any kind of investigation. I quietly left Ken’s office and went to my own. Finally, after another thirty minutes of whining, I heard Ken say, “We will look into this as soon as possible. I need you to let me know if you are contacted or if Laura comes back. I want to be notified if anyone contacts you, including the PPD. Go home now Ron. Get some rest and I will call you when I have something to report.”

Later that afternoon when Ken and I were alone I asked, “So what do you think? This really is an unbelievable story.”

“I don’t know Laura very well but I do know that Ron is a bit emotional. Let’s dig into both of them and just see what we find.”

“I agree. He was a little too quick to say that they hadn’t been fighting. Something is going on that he just wasn’t willing to tell us. I will look into Laura and you see what you can find  out about your weeping friend.”

The next morning I began my investigation with Laura’s social media of which she had a very active presence. The one thing that stood out right away was the amount of posts. I learned that she was an amateur photographer and an avid yogi. There were hundreds of photographs of people in all walks of life. The Crawfords appeared to be a young couple and co-owners of one of the most popular eateries in Philadelphia. Numerous photos of the couple on lavish vacations, working together in their restaurant, and moving into their new home. However, since the beginning of this year, Laura has begun to post less and less. She went from posting daily to posting two or three times a week. Recently, she hadn’t posted anything. It had been three weeks since her last post. Whatever happened to Laura, happened in the last three weeks.

Ken and I visited the Crawford Bistro that afternoon. It was packed, filled to capacity. The hostess informed us that if we expected a table, we would have to wait the better part of an hour. “If you have a minute, I wonder if you would answer a few questions?” I asked. She looked skeptical. I plunged on. “Is Mr. Crawford here?”

“Oh no,” she said. “He hasn’t been here all week.”

“Is the manager available?”

“Mr. Thomas, yes.” She hurried off to get the manager and Ken and I sat as if waiting for a table.

In a few minutes, a very harried Mr. Thomas appeared. “Hi. I’m Mr. Thomas. How can I help you?”

I introduced Ken and myself and informed him that we were private investigators looking into the disappearance of Laura Crawford. He looked as if he had taken a punch.

“Disappearance!” He repeated

“Yes,” I said. “Tell me when you last saw Mrs. Crawford.”

“She hasn’t been here for a couple of weeks but we all thought that she just took some time off. The last time she was in, she wasn’t feeling well. She went home early and hasn’t been back.”

Ken and I looked at each other “Thank you for your time, Mr. Thomas.” We quickly left the restaurant.

From there we went to Laura’s favorite yoga studio to ask a few questions. The yoga instructor told us the same thing. Laura who was once attended regularly had not been in for a couple of weeks.

Back in the office, I reached out to a friend in the Police Department who had no reports of missing persons matching Laura Crawford’s description. However, my friend did share that there had been several calls from the Crawford home about prowlers and break-ins but the police found no evidence of either.

That bit of information prompted us to visit the home. It was nearly four in the afternoon when we arrived and the sun was just beginning to go down. The Crawfords lived on a quiet, tree-lined row home in the city. The front yard was overgrown with weeds and dry leaves. The porch was full of unopened mail and advertisements. The front door was ajar. Ken approached, calling Ron’s name through the door. There was no answer. He slowly pushed the door open and we quietly entered. The inside of the house was in no better condition.

Ronald was passed out, face down on the floor. An empty bottle of Jack Daniels was cradled in the bend of his arm. Ken tried to revive his friend. With considerable effort, he got Ron to sit up with his back against the sofa. Ken went to the kitchen to make some coffee, hoping to help sober Ron. In Ron’s drunken haze, he mumbled something that caught my attention.

He whispered, “She isn’t coming back.”

“Why isn’t she coming back, Ron?” I asked.

He shook his head again before falling over on the floor. While Ken tried to sober Ron, I used the opportunity to look around. I spotted a laptop on a writing table in a corner of the dining room. Fortunately, it was not password-protected. In just a few seconds I learned that it was Laura’s computer. The one piece of information that would shut this investigation down was staring at me. Laura had been seeing an Oncologist regularly. Her last appointment was three weeks ago. 

 

I shut the computer down and stepped outside to call the doctor’s office. I was informed that Laura had been diagnosed with stage 4 metastatic breast cancer more than six months ago. Laura fought for her life for the last six months and passed away two weeks ago. 

At this point, I wasn’t sure if Ron knew that his wife had passed away. I was beginning to think that he must have suffered some mental health issues resulting from the death of his wife. There was no evidence of a funeral in the house but I did find the address and phone number of Laura’s family in Arlington, Virginia.

Ken was still trying to help Ron sober up.

I made the call to Laura’s mother. Mrs. Wright, in a very calm voice, explained that Laura’s passing was expected because she had been ill for so long. Her body was shipped to her home in Virginia where the funeral had been held weeks ago. For reasons she could not explain, her husband did not attend and in fact, had not been heard from since the day they left him at the hospital. I apologized for disturbing her and thanked her for the information.

Now, what do we do about Ron?

When I went back into the house, Ken was able to get Ron to sit at the kitchen table. He seemed to have come around but his eyes still looked as if he wasn’t really there.  I sat down at the table across from Ron. “Are you feeling better Mr. Crawford?” 

He turned his blank stare on me. Even as he shook his head left and right to say, “Yes,” I could see that he was not all right.

“You were right, Mr. Crawford, when you whispered to me earlier.”

Now, his eyes stretched open wide in wonder. He didn’t know what I was talking about. “I heard you when you said that Laura isn’t coming back.” I waited a second to make sure he was listening. “You were right,” I said again. “Tell me how you knew that she wasn’t coming back.”

He bolted from the chair. “You said you were going to find her!” He screamed. With the swipe of his arm, he threw everything from the table. Dishes and silverware took flight. Ken lurched forward to grab Ron but he flung him across the room like a rag doll.

“We did fine her, Ron. If you would calm yourself and sit down, I will tell you where we found her.” At that moment I thought that on some level he knew. His face contorted and he began to cry and scream and throw things around the room.

“Where did you find her?” Ken whispered.

“She passed some weeks ago. Her body was taken to her family’s home in Arlington, Virginia.”

“You can’t tell him this now. He really can’t hear you, Lydia. He is just too distraught.”

“I know but we can’t leave him like this.”

While Ronald continued to rant, I called the police for an emergency mental health evaluation. He was still ranting and crying when the police arrived and they calmly took him into custody. 

Ken and I locked up his house and left.

Two weeks later Ken got a call from Ronald Crawford. He had been released from the hospital and explained to his friend that the trauma of losing his wife and his alcohol addiction had been the cause of his nervous breakdown. He thanked Ken for his help.

Another case was solved by Lydia James Detective Agency though this has got to rank as one of the weirdest cases we have come across since I opened the agency.

THE END

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