"Exits?"
"That she went out of the country, but looking so different that that butter-wouldn't-melt photograph didn't convey her at all."
"Why different?"
"Well, I don't suppose she was provided with a phoney passport, so she would presumably travel as his wife."
"Yes, of course. I took that for granted."
"And she couldn't do that looking as she does. But with her hair swept up and some make-up on, she would look quite different. You have no idea the difference sweeping-up hair-dressing makes to a woman. The first time I saw my wife with one I didn't recognise her. It made her so different, if you want to know, that I felt quite shy with her; and we'd been married twenty years."
"So that's what you think happened. I expect you're right," Robert said sadly.
"That's why I don't want to waste any more of your money, Mr. Blair. Looking for the girl in the photograph is not much use, because the girl we're looking for didn't look a bit like that. When she did look like that, people recognised her at first glance. At the cinemas and what not. We traced her easily enough during her time on her own in Larborough. But from then on it's a complete blank. Her photograph doesn't convey her to anyone who saw her after she left Larborough."
Robert sat doodling on Miss Tuff's nice fresh blotting-paper. A herring-bone pattern; very neat and decorative. "You see what this means, don't you? We are sunk."
"But you have this," Ramsden protested, indicating the printed scrap of paper that had come with the watch.