it was gone

[thomas615]

Is this sentence OK? Is there a better way to say it?

She forgot to retrieve her luggage from the rental car and when she went back to look for it, it was gone.

[Rover_KE]

It's fine.

A lot of people would say '...it had gone'.

[Grumpy]

Regardless of "had" or "was", the difficulty remains that, as written, it's not clear whether her luggage had gone - or whether the car itself had gone [with her luggage in it!].

Better to say "She forgot to retrieve her luggage from the rental car, and when she went back to look for it, found that her bags [or the car] had gone".