and I, we’re very alike. We think the same way on this. We have to know how the final chapter ends. We just have to, Ben.’
‘So your grandmother was left alone in 1945 with a small baby she must have had to bring up on her own.’
‘Not for long. She found another man. In fact, my mother’s maiden name was Rccs. She took the name of her stepfather, Kenneth Rees.’
‘Your grandmother remarried?’
‘How could she? Her husband hadn’t ever been declared dead. She didn’t actually consider him to be dead. But she needed a man to support her, to help her raise my mother. That’s the way it was back then. And Kenneth Rees wras a good man. He
never questioned it, my mother savs. I remember him very well,
i ‘ j j j ‘
though he died fifteen years ago.’
245
Irritatingly, Cooper found himself longing for a way he could ask Alison for a photograph of Kenneth Rces. He had an urge to compare one to the photos of Danny McTcaguc.
‘Where was Recs from?’
‘Newcastle upon Tyne. He was a structural engineer who came to Canada to build bridges.’
‘Would he have been about the same age as your real grandfather?’ ‘About.’ “I suppose your grandmother had known him for a while? Or did she meet him after your grandfather went missing?’
Cooper found he was walking on his own. Alison Morrissey was no longer alongside him. He turned and saw that she had stopped a few feet behind him. Her lips were apart, and her breath came in angry spurts. She had shoved her hands into the pockets of her coat again in the way that he had last seen outside Walter Rowland’s house. Her posture was angry, but defensive. Stubborn, vet awfullv vulnerable.
‘ V ^
‘You think Kenneth Rees was my real grandfather using a
different name,’ she said. ‘Why should he have married my grandmother — they were alreadv married. He couldn’t let
O y ^
anybody know who he was, because he was a deserter. He would have been sent to prison.’
‘I didn’t mean that.’
‘Kenneth Rees was a Geordie engineer. He had red hair. He was only five foot eight. His accent was impossible to understand.’
‘You say he’s dead now?’
‘Yes, but 1 can have his details faxed to you, if you want. A photograph, too.’
Cooper desperately wanted to say it wouldn’t be necessary, but he knew he needed to see the evidence himself, for his own peace of mind. Alison simply nodded, understanding his lack of response. I’ll phone my mother and get her to do it later today,’ she said. ‘So you’ll have them first thing Monday morning. Is that soon enough for you?’
‘Of course.’
‘Do you have email?’
2+6
‘A fax will be fine.’
Morrissey looked across the road at the hotel. She seemed disappointed, but she had proved herself to be resilient so far, and he knew it would pass. He certainly hoped it would pass.
‘Thanks for the lunch,’ she said.
‘You paid for it yourself,’ said Cooper. ‘I didn’t do anything.’
‘So you didn’t.’
Cooper watched Morrissey pass the iron railings and go back into the hotel. He knew there was something wrong about what she had told him. And it wasn’t just his wild suspicion about the Geordie, Kenneth Rccs. Alison Morrisscv’s story wasn’t the
J J
whole truth.
247
22
JJiane Fry was waiting tor Ben Cooper outside his Oat in Wclbeck Street, her arms folded as she leaned on her car parked at the kerb. Mrs Shelley’s curtain next door was twitching anxiously.
‘Dianc? Another visit?’
‘Where have you been?’ she said.
‘It’s my day off.’
‘You haven’t been answering my calls again,’ she said. “I need you.’
Cooper saw a blond head in the passenger seat of Pry’s car.
‘But you’ve got Gavin,’ he said.
‘Yes, I know I’ve got bloody Gavin. But I need jou.’ She hustled Cooper towards the car. ‘Gavin, get in the back,’ she said.
Murtin stumbled out, and a shower of plastic wrappers fell around his feet on to the snow. Cooper could have
