possibility of her father’s old passport providing clues. If her father had a hand in spiriting the Stevens away, then he might well have visited their destination around the time of them moving. Elena thought it worth pursuing, but the only problem was that her father’s belongings were still stored at her mother’s, and Elena didn’t want to visit her: especially not for this purpose. She’d had little or no contact with her mother while her father was alive, and with Elena not turning up for her father’s funeral five years ago, things had become even more strained between them: they’d only spoken briefly once on the phone since, when Uncle Christos informed Elena that she was ill.
So it was Uncle Christos to the rescue again, phoning her mother with an excuse about trying to find some old business papers. ‘I’ll pick the trunks up and have them back to you within a few days.’ Then straight after he phoned Elena back and she jumped on a train to London to start her search.
She received a call from Barbara Edelston the day after her heart to heart with Gordon, and halfway through a predictable dressing down about her being desperately out of order to still be interfering, ‘Especially given your background,’ she finally blew and gave Edelston a piece of her mind. ‘One day you’ll wake up the fact that Ryall is a control freak, and a dangerous one at that. He’s been controlling young Lorena for years. He controlled Nadine’s enquiry by taping our meeting, me by getting a secret report done, and you by sending you both the tape and the report. And just like the mug he hoped you’d be, you fell for it all and responded strictly by the rule book. If all of that doesn’t look the tiniest bit suspicious to you — then I’m afraid I can’t help you.’ She slammed down the phone before Edelston could respond, and dialled straight out to Shelley McGurran. Shelley too would no doubt have received Ryall’s poisonous file, and she didn’t want Shelley to have to phone first to get an explanation.
After a strained half-hour on line with a condensed version of her soul-baring to Gordon, and Shelley voicing her sore disappointment that Elena hadn’t felt they were close enough to be able to share this earlier — Shelley finally rallied behind her. ‘I agree. You have to find him, Elena.
Elena was close to tears when she came off the phone from Shelley: her ready understanding made it all the harder. Another who’d so loved and trusted her, and her repayment to them had been so poor over the years; so lacking in trust.
And it was those close to her, like Gordon and Shelley, that were now firing her up into action: after twelve days of searching with Megan and Terry that ended nowhere, and Ryall rallying half of Chelborne against her and sending his damning report, she’d all but given up, felt she had nothing left to give. Until her father’s two trunks were in front of her. Then suddenly she was on overdrive again, frantically sifting through: dusty plans for their old house, GCE results for her and Andreos, her communion prayer book, her first school photo, Andreos at nineteen standing proudly by a new Suzuki bike he’d just bought, the family all together raising glasses in a Cyprus beach bar when she was just nine.
She’d found her father’s passport covering 1970 near the bottom of the first trunk, but still she kept going. Poignant nostalgia of the years she was there, the family all together, plus filling the gaps on the years she wasn’t. She was totally absorbed, found it impossible to break away. It was strange: looking through photos of herself and Andreos as children and some old birthday cards, one from her to her father at the age of seven with a pressed flower inside, it was as if a softly nostalgic, vulnerable side to her father had been exposed which she’d never witnessed while he was alive. When she’d aired that thought to Uncle Christos, he mentioned that her mother too had packed away some old family memorabilia in the same trunks. So again her father remained an enigma: she couldn’t be sure of a chink in his emotional armour.
The agreement had been that as soon as she found her father’s passport, Uncle Christos would book a table for them at ‘Beotys’, his favourite Cypriot restaurant: a small celebration. There were five entry stamps in the few months either side of the Stevens disappearing; hopefully one of them would prove fruitful.
She made the excuse of continuing her search in case there were other papers which might give some clue, but when over an hour later Uncle Christos found her still on her knees busily raking through, now half covered in dust from the trunks’ contents, he became concerned. He reminded her that time could be tight for the restaurant, but she was sure his main worry was that she was getting too wrapped up in the trunks’ contents: some of it might be too emotionally painful for her.
So when he returned with coffee, she immediately stood up and dusted down, took a few rushed gulps before showering, knocked back the rest straight after — and within fifteen minutes they were in a taxi wending through the remnants of rush hour traffic between Queensway and the West End. Street-lamp light bars playing across one arm.
The face across for her now, thirty years on, wasn’t far different to her father’s: the resemblance was mainly around the eyes and nose and with the same thick hair which had turned from black to stone grey in their early fifties; but it was a slightly more rounded face, with a readier, easier smile, the edges softer. The clownish, compassionate foil to her father’s stern, all-business manner. It was no wonder that she’d warmed more to Uncle Christos as a child; and before she was old enough to discover if she might break the barrier of how she felt about her father, somewhere between cool remoteness and open fear, the rest had been written in abortion blood and sealed with court adoption papers. Never to be reversed.
‘You don’t rate Athens, Hamburg or Rome too highly, do you?’ Uncle Christos commented.
‘No, I don’t.’ Three of the five stamps in her father’s passport around the time of the Stephanou’s disappearance. ‘I think their names being anglicised and then them turning up somewhere where those names would stand out would be pointless. Whereas in Chicago the name Stevens would be commonplace, and almost half of Montreal’s population is anglophile.’
‘You’re working on the assumption that your father had it all planned out.’
‘Do you know of any time that he didn’t plan everything to the last?’
Uncle Christos shrugged a tame accord, and they sat silently for a second.
‘Anyway, we’ll know soon enough,’ she said. They’d used Terry to put in trace requests with both the American and Canadian embassies for visa or emigration applications in the name of Stevens or Stephanou around the time the family disappeared. Terry had been asked to call back the next day.
Uncle Christos merely nodded. She could tell that something else was on his mind, and finally he turned to her, his expression slightly drawn, concerned.
‘Elena. You really should see her some time. I know with picking up the trunks it could have been difficult — she might have asked too many questions. But before you leave London, you should make the effort. Maybe when I return the trunks tomorrow, you could come along at the same time.’
‘No, no… it would be too painful — for
Uncle Christos grimaced with reluctant understanding and turned to stare blankly ahead again. Night-time London rolled by their taxi windows, the lights from an oncoming car making his profile shadow more pronounced for a second. She could practically read his mind: always an excuse. Whenever he broached the subject, she’d usually raise how her mother had always taken her father’s side, was practically a silent conspirator: she found that difficult to forgive. Or, last time, that it was too close to her not showing up at her father’s funeral: her mother wouldn’t have forgiven her yet. Now it was the search for her son.
‘You know, she’s not getting any younger, Elena.’
‘I know.’ Elena bit lightly at her lip, guilt worming deeper. Then after a second: ‘She’s not ill again is she?’
‘No, she’s not.’ Christos shot her a look of tired reproach. ‘But that shouldn’t be the only reason you feel you must make contact again — because you fear she might be on her deathbed. Besides…’ His eyes flickered down slightly; direct eye contact was suddenly difficult. ‘Has it ever struck you that she was equally as afraid of your father. That alone, apart from the fact that she’s your mother, is something you have in common: you were both
