Published: Thursday, 15th January, 2009 9:00am

Help find Jonathan

by Newsdesk

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HOW can a 15-year-old schoolboy apparently disappear without trace or explanation?

The fact that more than 200,000 missing persons reports are filed in Britain every year would suggest the answer to that question is that it is not all that difficult.

But that does not make the disappearance of Jonathan Marques any less baffling, and we can barely imagine the torment and self-doubt being suffered by his parents as they endure the agonising nightmare which began on Monday last week.

Through it all the Marques, and the police and others involved in the ever-widening search for Jonathan, must retain their optimism that all will end well; that suddenly the front door will open and the teenager will walk in, sheepishly apologetic, to be welcomed home in the style of the prodigal.

Equally, however, the thoughts of the police and Berkshire residents of long-standing must surely have turned, if only fleetingly, to the names of Lester Chapman and Mark Tildesley, who both disappeared in similarly puzzling circumstances, the former in 1978 and the latter some six years later.

Suffice to say that the conclusion to both cases was a tragic one and, while Mark's was horrifically sinister, their families will know exactly what Arcanja and Menino Marques have been going through since their son failed to show up at school for the first day of term.

In a week when we also report that the child protection services in both Reading and Wokingham boroughs are officially rated as "inadequate", memories of Lester and Mark are a reminder, if one were needed, that we live in a world which can be evil and ugly. It should also remind us that the lives of children from Aya-Jayne Soliman, born three months prematurely and miraculously kept alive by doctors after her mother's death, and Jonathan himself, are utterly priceless.

The Chronicle has thrown its full support behind the Marques family in the effort to find Jonathan and see him returned to their loving arms, and we pray that their torture will soon be brought to a joyful end.