Sorry' For a brief second it was all too clear that she was still only a seventeen-year-old girl.
Nigel made a note of all she said, doing a brief genealogical sketch of Dominic. Adopted by a wealthy East End brewer. Tracking him might be possible. Yet there was little he could do from the barren wilderness of Utah.
'Take me home,' Leonie said abruptly.
'England?' Heather asked.
'No. Back to Liberty. That's my home. You can drop me on the outskirts of town.'
'Don't you want to know what happens to Gary? Go back there and we won't be able to let you know any news.'
She shrugged. 'I will ask the Lord. He will let me know.
I must go back.'
Heather's look was one of disbelief. 'But why? Come home, Leon
'Because my son is back there and nothing could make me leave him.'
15
Foster made the connection before Heather called him.
As he drove to the places where he thought Gary might be, the words he'd read on the TCF website played and replayed in his mind:
Thou shalt seek and never cease to seek to avenge the blood of our Prophets on this nation, including the blood of my servant Orson P. Walker, and you will teach this to your children and your children's children unto the fourth generation.
The fourth generation. He went back in his mind over what he knew of Sarah and Horton Rowley's descendants. The guy who was missing - the kid who'd been adopted because his mother lived in fear of them coming to avenge their ancestors' sins -- wasn't he fourth generation? He dialled Heather and got her breathless voice.
She told him about Leon
'Have you got her?'
No, came the reply, and the reasons why. Foster punched the dashboard, not so much in anger -- he knew there was no lawful reason for them to keep her. It was frustration, lack of sleep. It was the dilemma over what he would tell Gary when the boy asked about his sister. If Gary was still alive.
Heather told Foster about Dominic, and Nigel's theory about him being Anthony Chapman. In turn, Foster mentioned the full text of the revelation on the Church's website.
What shall we do now?' she asked.
'Sit tight. Not sure there is much more you can do on your own. Let me speak to Harris. First of all, though, put me on to Nigel.'
She handed the phone to Barnes. The two men exchanged greetings.
'Listen, mate, there's not much you can do from there.
But I can be your researcher here. We need to track down this Dominic from what we know. You pull the levers, I'll be the puppet.'
Nigel paused. Well, we have half a name, no address, no occupation and the major building block we do have, his birth certificate, is irrelevant because he was adopted without a paper trail.'
Foster smiled for the first time in what seemed an age.
'And the good news?'
We know his adoptive father was a brewer. There won't have been many in that parish.'
'Certainly not in the past fifty years or so. Small, independent brewers have been decimated. I've had someone get hold of a list of the current congregation of St Matthew's from the present vicar -- some of them might have been involved for a long time and they'll be worth talking to. We know the adoptive parents were wealthy. Round here, they would have stuck out like a wine merchant in a working men's club. Even if they weren't regular churchgoers, people might of known of them. Where should I start the paper trail?'
'You sure you want to get lost in the world of genealogy?'
'I'm
up for it. I've had a good teacher.'
Foster's first stop was the London Metropolitan Archives where the parish registers for most of the London churches were held. On Nigel's advice, he went through every single marriage held at St Matthew's since the end of the Second World War -- nineteen years before the birth of Anthony Chapman. Two marriages struck him in particular. Henrietta Llewellyn Oakley and Kathryn Llewellyn Oakley were sisters who married three years apart, 1957 and 1960. Their father was Henry Oakley, the grooms were Samuel Heathcote Smythe and Edward St John Ashbourne.
He looked at the names and the chip on his shoulder told him there was money here. Closer inspection revealed his hunch was right. Henry Oakley was local, a brewer.
One of Hardwicke, Oakley and Parsons, known universally as Hops, a small London brewery that passed away in the early 1980s after being bought by a national brewer.
Henry Oakley was the last of the family to run the business; in fact, his retirement was the catalyst for it being floated on the stock market.
Foster fed the information back to Nigel, who told him to head to the National Archives to check out the Oakley children. He was getting nearer. He could sense it and he was enjoying the feeling.
Henrietta Oakley bore five children, all girls. Her elder brother was Henry junior. Childless, it appeared. He did not marry either. Foster went to the death indexes; in 1962
Henry junior died of pneumonia. He returned to the birth indexes, this time in search of the offspring of Kathryn Ashbourne, nee Oakley, who married in 1960.
Her first child was born in 1969. She went on to have three, after nine years of childlessness. Anthony Chapman was adopted in 1964. Would four years have been enough time for the family to have panicked? The brewery was still in their hands. The firstborn was dead, the only male.
Their elder daughter was giving birth to a string of females.
The younger was in her fourth year of marriage, no child.
Obviously the anxiety would be most keenly felt by Kathryn, who would want a child of her own. But wouldn't the lack of a male heir to a family business increase the pressure, persuade the family to take drastic action?
There was no reference to Kathryn Ashbourne in the death indexes. She was still alive.
Next was the National Newspaper Library at Colindale. The Times had run a detailed obituary of Henry Oakley. At the end it mentioned nine grandchildren. The BMD
indexes confirmed eight. He cross-referenced his information with an old copy of Who's Who, which also said nine grandchildren.
One was unaccounted for.
Foster hurtled along the M40, on his way to Clifton Hampden and the home of Kathryn Ashbourne.
He turned up a gravel drive that led to the old vicarage, which had been the family's home for the past twenty-five years. The electoral register told him the Ashbournes lived there alone, the children long gone. As he got out of the car, Foster noticed the silence. A dog barked way in the distance, but apart from that nothing. It always made him feel edgy. He was a city boy -- he needed the background thrum of the city, and the lack of noise made him feel uneasy.
He went to the side of the house and saw a portico entrance. He rang the doorbell. No answer. He rang again.
Please let them be in, thought Foster. Just as he was about to give up he heard the sound of footsteps. A latch was dropped and the wooden door swung open, revealing a tall, proud and still-handsome woman in her late sixties.
'Mrs Ashbourne?'
