‘She can come downstairs now and I’ll feed her,’ Juliette called up.
‘Shall we go and have some dinner?’ Morton said to Grace, in a strange, childlike voice which he reserved for dogs and infants. ‘Shall we? Go and see Mummy?’ He carried her down the stairs to the kitchen. ‘What’s on the menu, then?’ he asked.
Juliette lifted up a small blue pot containing some home-made concoction of hers. ‘Dover sole, butternut squash, apple and kale.’
‘Delicious,’ Morton enthused to Grace, as he sat her in the highchair. ‘Think I’ll give that one a miss, though. I meant what are we having?’
‘Whatever you’re making, darling,’ she said, pointedly.
‘Fish and chips?’ he suggested.
‘Perfect,’ Juliette answered, heating up the baby food on the hob.
‘Hello, by the way,’ Morton said, kissing her. ‘Did you have a productive day?’
She stared at him as though he had just asked the most ludicrous question in the world. ‘I haven’t even got around to getting dressed; that says it all.’
‘You’ll miss it when you go back to work on Wednesday, though.’
‘Of course I will, I’m absolutely dreading it,’ she answered. ‘The only good thing being—’ she placed her hands over Grace’s ears, ‘—that I’ll have adults to talk to.’ She removed her hands from Grace’s head, kissed her on the forehead and began to spoon some of the indistinguishable mush into her mouth.
‘Do I not count as an adult, then?’
Juliette’s look of incredulity answered the question for her.
‘Right, on that note,’ Morton began, ‘I’m heading out for a take-away. Any fish preference?’
‘Skate wing or plaice, if they’ve got it, thanks.’
‘See you in a few minutes,’ Morton called, heading back out the front door.
Pulling his coat tight, he sauntered up the cobbles of Mermaid Street, then down The Mint to Marino’s fish and chip shop. Come rain or shine, there was always a queue to be found here and today was no exception. But it was always worth the wait; they did the best fish and chips in Rye. Morton stood in line, scrolling through the camera roll on his mobile. Hundreds—thousands—of pictures of Grace over the last few months gave way to the images which he had just taken of Arthur Fothergill’s gold guinea. When he thought of this latest case, an edgy sensation rose in his stomach. What was it about it that bothered him so much? He still could not put his finger on the problem. Maybe it was just the anxiety of starting up another complex case. The ones, which he had taken on since Grace’s birth, had been standard, simple ones which had been completed with little fuss and little travel from home; this one felt as though—given his circumstances—he might have bitten off rather more than he could chew. How many records did he think existed between 1820 and 1827, anyway? He guessed he would find out tomorrow when he commenced work on the case.
The queue shifted, and Morton shuffled forwards, closer to the tantalising waft of hot batter. He slowly swiped through the images of Grace with a wide grin on his face. Time had implausibly vaulted since her birth and that helpless thing which they had brought home from the William Harvey Hospital now had her own discrete personality. The most recent photographs and videos of Grace were of her standing unaided. Incredible.
‘Hello?’ a voice said, not for the first time, Morton realised, pocketing his mobile.
‘Sorry,’ he said to the grinning man behind the counter. ‘Two portions of plaice and chips, please.’
‘Coming right up.’
After a short wait, Morton was presented with two open packets of food, which he doused in salt and vinegar, then began the short trek back home, all the while trying to resist the tormenting smell floating up from the take-away bag.
Arriving home, he didn’t want to make the same mistake as earlier, so he crept inside and noiselessly closed the front door behind him. Silence.
He popped his head around the lounge door and smiled. Juliette, mouth gaping wide, was fast asleep on the sofa and in her hand, she was clutching the baby video monitor, which meant that Grace was back in her cot asleep. Despite the fish and chips being ready to eat, he decided to let Juliette sleep, so he slowly snuck up the stairs to his study and quietly pushed the door closed.
Sitting down, he unravelled one of the packets and began to devour the food, as though he had not eaten in several weeks. As he ate, he looked at the four framed photographs which were perched on the edge of his desk; individual pictures that formed the portrait of his fragmented family. On the left was the first ever photo of Grace, taken just minutes after she had been born. She was in his arms wrapped tightly in a white knitted blanket, quietly staring at him, as tears streamed down his tired face.
Morton shoved a piece of fish into his mouth as his eyes moved on to the next photograph on his desk—his adoptive parents and adoptive brother, Jeremy. He sighed as he stared at them, recalling the day when, at sixteen years of age, the man whom he had called Dad, Peter, blurted out the truth: that he had been adopted. It had taken another twenty-three years for him to reveal finally the identity of his biological mother: Peter’s sister, Margaret, the person he had spent his entire life calling ‘Aunty’.
The adjacent photograph was the sole known image of Morton’s biological mother and father together. It had been taken on the 5th January 1974—the last day that the two of them would ever spend with one another. It was
