The pavementrose and eventually veered to the right, terminating at St John’s Church, atypical sandstone-coloured building with a chancel, nave and tower. Without any serious attempt at studying the architecture, he guessed theearliest parts dated back to the fourteenth-century with other additions beingadded in the latter centuries. He cast his eyes across the churchyard atthe range of memorials in front of him. Very recent, polished marblegraves stood adjacent to ancient, lichen-covered headstones, the names of thedeceased occupants having been weathered into obscurity.
Three pristinewhite graves stood side by side in commemoration of the village’s fallen warheroes. Three brothers taken within weeks of each other in 1943. Hethought of his own brother fighting in a war-zone and a feeling of dread draggedinside him as he remembered that tonight was his leaving party. He turnedhis head from the graves and tried to shake his despondency.
Mortonrefocused his attention to the task in hand: he needed to find James and MaryColdrick’s grave. When told by Peter where his parents were buried,Morton found it very curious that a man with such unsettled beginnings in thevillage should want to be forever entombed within its parish boundaries. Given all that he had discovered since Tuesday, he now thought it absolutelyinexplicable that they were here.
Ordinarily, hewould have conducted a meticulous, thorough search of the churchyard, using arange of techniques to decipher even the most worn inscriptions. Today,however, he knew exactly where he was headed. Peter had told him that hisparents’ grave was to be found in the shadow of a yew tree in the south-westcorner of the churchyard. Morton spotted the ancient yew, with itsgnarled and contorted trunk pushing into a thick green canopy above, and madehis way towards it. The Coldrick headstone - polished black granite withgold, engraved lettering - stood innocuously among other modern graves underthe protective shade of the yew. In Loving Memory of Mary Coldrick1946-1987. A much loved mother and wife. Also, James Coldrick1944-2012. A much loved father.
‘Forevertrapped in the place of your unhappy childhood,’ Morton remarked to himself, ashe took a couple of shots of the grave on his iPhone.
‘Pardon?’ asprightly voice piped up, startling him. Morton was jarred from hisdaydream and turned to see an old-timer with a grey handle-bar moustache,expensive olive-green suit and maroon neckerchief limping towards him. Helooked to Morton like a retired colonel.
‘Sorry, justtalking to myself,’ Morton replied.
‘Lovely day.’
‘It is rather,’Morton said.
‘I’m just goingto open the church if you wanted to have a peek around.’
‘That would belovely, thank you.’
Morton followedthe old man inside the church. The temperature suddenly plunged to thesame arctic conditions as at East Sussex Archives. In the vestibule henoticed a burial plan of the churchyard. It was a crude, hand-drawn pieceof paper that someone had helpfully laminated. Morton quickly verifiedthat there were no other Coldricks buried in the church then wandered along thenave, stepping on worn marble tombstones dedicated to ancient clergy.
‘I haven’tseen you around here before, are you on holiday?’ the man asked, tidying astack of dishevelled hymn books.
‘Well, I’mactually researching a family tree - Coldrick – do you know the name at all?’Morton asked.
The old manfrowned, his preposterously lengthy eyebrows eclipsing his vision, as if hewere trying to recall a private members' club in Islington. ‘Doesn’t ringany bells. How do you spell it?’
Morton tookcare to enunciate each letter carefully.
‘No, I don’tthink so, old boy,’ he replied eventually. ‘Queer sort of name, wouldn’tyou say? Doesn’t sound very Sussex to me.’
‘No, I don’t supposeit does,’ Morton replied, not really sure what a ‘Sussex’ name was.
‘When did theylive in the village?’
‘Around 1944 –possibly earlier.’
‘Sorry, I can’thelp you there – I was on active service in Egypt at the time. There aren’tmany of us left who can recall much from that period with any clarity. Itcertainly isn’t a name I’ve seen in the parish records in my time as churchwarden.’
‘Not to worry –thank you anyway,’ Morton said. He took one last look around the church andmade his way out into the stark heat, where he was convinced that thetemperature had risen by at least five degrees. Morton slowly walked backto his car, allowing his mind to mull over the case. As he fired up thecar, Morton took one last look at the quiet, unassuming village. Itlooked so normal, so harmless. But that indefinable gut reaction, uponwhich he so heavily relied, told him that for James Coldrick, this villagehadn’t always been as normal and harmless as it now seemed.
Morton was lying prone on the bed, tellingJuliette about his day whilst she transformed herself from Police CommunitySupport Officer 8084 to Miss Juliette Meade, social butterfly. He washappy with either incarnation but, as she stood straightening her hair in a curvaceous,low-cut black dress, subtle make-up and killer heels, he was forced to admitthat she looked more stunningly beautiful than the drab black, monochromaticuniform of the police force would ever allow. He’d not bothered gettingdressed up for the occasion and was content in jeans and t-shirt. Sendingyour adopted brother off to his death hardly seemed an occasion that requiredone's best clothes.
‘It’s certainlyan intriguing one, isn’t it,’ Juliette said in response to his discoveries withthe Coldrick Case.
‘That’s anunderstatement.’
‘Doesn’t itmake you wonder about your own family?’
Morton’sinsides tightly recoiled at the prospect of having a conversation about his ownveiled past, a subject which he categorically avoided at the best of times. He sauntered over to the bedroom window and caught her reflection. Hereyes were narrowed and one hand rested defiantly on her hip. She wasn’tabout to let this one go.
‘It must makeyou wonder, though,’ she persisted. ‘Your real parents could be walkingpast our house right now for all we know.’ Morton glanced out of thewindow at the passersby. He felt sure that he would recognise someone inwhom he had once lived. ‘I mean, doesn’t it strike you as odd that youknow more about Norman Lamont’s family or any of the other celebrities on Celebri-Trees,than you do your own family?’
‘Hadn’t thoughtabout it and don’t care,’ he said, quickly regretting the virulence of hisresponse. Of course he’d thought about it; the question of his parentagewas like a plastic bottle forever
