The committee have decided to declassifyMarlene Koldrich
Date: 27 May 1940
Morton reread the entry. Fromcategory A to declassified in one week. How did that happen? The more he thought of it, the more likely it seemed to him that someonein high authority had pulled the right strings. Someone in government,perhaps. He doubted that Marlene had ever even made it to LingfieldInternment Camp in the intervening week.
Morton left thearchives, carefully clutching his two printouts, his head in a tailspin. What on earth could have possessed the Regional Advisory Committee to take suchaction? After a grovelling apology to Quiet Brian for using his mobile,Morton asked if there were any other records that might help him, but QuietBrian seemed quite certain that there were none that had survived. Mortonhad briefly considered calling up street directories or electoral registers forSedlescombe in 1940, but remembered that they weren’t produced duringwartime. There was also no 1941 census taken. National security andall that.
As he crossedthe car park towards the Mini, Morton pulled out the torn corner of a newspaperfrom his back pocket on which Dr Baumgartner had scribbled the phone number ofProfessor Geoffrey Daniels. The phone rang for several seconds before agruff, disgruntled voice answered. When Morton explained that he was avery good friend of Gerald Baumgartner the voice swiftly softened.
Someone had evidently noticed that thewaiting room at the Conquest Hospital wasn’t a particularly great advert forthe place. The blue plastic chairs had been wiped, the payphone mendedand a colourful set of three posters now adorned the walls. Morton gazedacross the glossy attempts to educate and inform the ill and injuredpublic. The first one showed four Russian Matryoshka nesting dollsstanding beside one another, painted as a father, mother, son anddaughter. Above the family a tagline read ‘Diabetes often runs in families.’ The next featured a middle-aged distorted face with accompanying strokeadvice. The last poster gave frank information on the symptoms of bowelcancer.
He carried thecup of tea, requested by his father, to the Atkinson Ward and placed it on thecabinet beside him, receiving an appreciative nod from him.
‘How’s work?’his father asked in a raspy, weak voice. Jeremy had said on the phonethat their father was doing well but Morton had seen no evidence of it sofar. He looked pasty and sallow, a haunted version of his pre-operativestate. Morton still couldn’t quite believe that he wasn’t at death’sdoor.
‘Very busy,’Morton said.
His fathernodded. ‘I suppose that’s why you haven’t been here much.’ It was arhetorical question; Morton didn’t need to answer it. Actually, it wasbait and Morton did answer it.
‘I was herelast night, actually.’
‘I know,’ heanswered airily.
How could heknow? Mortonwondered. Had Jeremy or one of the nurses told him that Morton had kept astoic bedside vigil? Or had his father heard every word of his extensivetirade? He didn’t want to ask. He just wanted to know whatever itwas that his father’s cracked and sore lips were struggling to say.
With whatseemed the greatest effort in the world, his father lifted his hand and placedit on Morton’s. He gripped Morton’s four fingers tightly. ‘I’ve gotsomething to tell you,’ his sandpapery voice said, his eyes meeting Morton’searnestly for the first time. Morton knew that he was about to be told somethingbig, something life-changing. ‘It’s about your past. It’s time youknew.’
Chapter Eighteen
Wednesday
Well, the kitchen table of the Farrierresidence sure was an uncomfortable place to be. Morton, Juliette, Jeremyand Guy sat half-heartedly eating their way through the pile of toast in thecentre of the table, an awkward silence lingering over the cafetière that satbetween them. Morton felt sorry for Jeremy and Juliette; he knew thattheir brains were being eaten alive with questions that they wanted answeringbut that neither of them could quite articulate. Questions that hehimself had asked his father last night. He felt most sorry, though, forthe bewildered-looking Guy, trying - and failing - to make the three stunned,voiceless people at the table engage in small talk. The poor chap hadeven resorted to commenting on the weather. He’d only arrived momentsbefore breakfast and hadn’t been privy to the long and emotionally intensenight that had followed Morton’s arrival back from the Conquest Hospital. In fact, the three of them had only gone to bed four hours ago and even thenMorton hadn’t slept a wink. He’d left the hospital in a state of shock:every fragment of his childhood had been pulverised and mashed up beyond allrecognition by that one, short conversation with his father; as far as he wasconcerned, he had no past. That small box in his brain where he storedpainful memories or parts of his life that he’d rather forget had exploded withmore force than had his own house. Only this time, there were nosalvageable trinkets or trophies.
Morton had lefthis father's bedside with the intention of driving straight home to clear hishead but when he saw that The Harrow pub was open, he parked up and wentinside. He felt like a walking cliché as he downed two doublewhiskeys. But what he really sought from the pub was to be a facelessblur in the corner, giving the news and the alcohol time to sink in. Ithad been many years since he’d last drunk in there and so he sat, incognito,stewing over what he had just been told. ‘Your biological mother wasraped at the age of sixteen,’ his father had said, matter-of-factly. ‘Andin those days you didn’t just pop a
