From the tornfabric of his mind, Morton thought that it sounded like some of his attackershad been caught in the blast. One thing he knew, they were making a hastyretreat back up the bank. Morton dragged himself further and further intothe enveloping woods.
Then he vomitedagain.
Then everythingwent dark.
Morton Farrier left the Conquest Hospitalshortly after one o’clock in the afternoon with the assistance of Juliette, whowas dressed in full superhero PCSO uniform. He climbed into the policevan holding his bandaged hands awkwardly out in front of him, partly to elicitsympathy from Juliette and partly because they were hurting like hell. That dastardly Paul from the Mini showroom had failed to warn him during hisspiel about the car’s many features that, by clinging onto the steering wheelat the moment of any possible collision, he would end up in a hospital withfirst-degree burns to his hands and wrists from the firing of the airbag. Aside from the burns, he had also suffered concussion and a three-inch gash tothe left side of his head, which required five stitches to seal the gap. As the nurse meticulously wove the black thread through his gaping skin, Mortonhoped that the cut would scar nice and visibly, giving him something of thehard edge of Daniel Dunk. The doctor wanted to make sure that Morton wasfully compos mentis and asked him the day of the week, which he wasunable to give and he was unable to satisfy the doctor that this had nothing todo with the head injury. He was finally released after correctlyanswering the ironic question as to who the Secretary of Defence was. Itwould have taken a full lobotomy for him to forget the name of PhilipWindsor-Sackville.
‘Right, to thestation, then,’ Juliette said rather fatalistically as she brought the throatypolice van to life, the same van that she had used to storm Charingsby a fewhours previously. Morton noticed that she had parked in a disabled bay andnot paid for parking. Oh the joys of being above the law.
‘We just needto do a quick detour first,’ Morton said.
‘Oh, for Christ’ssake, what now?’
Morton went toexplain when his mobile rang.
DrBaumgartner’s name flashed up onscreen.
The results.
Morton carefully carried the chunky redbox file towards the house. He had told Juliette to keep the van running– what he had to do would only take a moment. He banged loudly on thefront door of the imposing townhouse.
A rattling ofbolts then Soraya Benton appeared before him. She was dressed just thesame as the first day he’d met her in an oversized cream jumper and baggyjeans. Lacking now, however, was the sparkle in her eyes and thewelcoming smile. ‘Hi,’ Soraya said, ‘come in.’
Morton followedher into the lounge and sat himself down.
‘So what haveyou been up to, then?’ she asked, taking a seat opposite him. He couldsee her eyeing up the box file on his lap. ‘You look a bit worse forwear.’ She even managed a stinted, cracked attempt at laughter.
Mortonsmiled. ‘It’s over, Soraya,’ he said quietly.
‘What do youmean? Did you find what you needed?’
He paused toconsider the question. ‘Yes, I did. I also found a lot more than Ibargained for. Like your marriage to Daniel Dunk.’
‘What?’ shegasped, a look of terror flicking across her face. ‘I don't know whatyou're talking-’
‘It'sover. Stop pretending,’ he interjected.
Soraya's eyesfell as she waited for Morton to continue.
He tapped thered file with his knuckles and revealed the handwritten title, ‘Misc.Charingsby’ emblazoned on the spine. It sent shockwaves of pain throughhim but it was worth every moment to see the look of sheer horror on her face.
‘It’s funnyreally,’ he said, ‘there I was, flailing around in the archives of Charingsby,not a hope in hell of pulling all the records I needed out before being caught,then I discover this little red box which someone had painstakingly already puttogether.’
Soraya bit herlip and stared at him, the epitome of the rabbit trapped in theheadlights. Morton, with a good deal of concentration and pain, managedto prise open the box file. ‘Everything I needed, everything I’ve beensearching for these last two weeks is in here.’ He withdrew a pile ofpaper and provided a running commentary for each item. ‘The 1944admission register for St George’s Children’s Home, bank statements confirmingpayments to James Coldrick totalling hundreds of thousands of pounds, documentsunequivocally confirming Frederick and David Windsor-Sackville’s involvementwith the Nazis in the first half of World War Two, including vast,multi-million pound payments made to the family from Berlin …’ Morton put thepapers down. ‘I don’t really need to tell you about the rest of thefolder, do I, Soraya?’
She shook herhead.
‘I’d suspectedsomething was amiss for a while now. I became suspicious that day atPeter’s house when we went there together to search for his will and youmiraculously found the All About Sedlescombe book, which I knew hadn’tbeen there at the time of his death. You put it there, didn’t you?’
Soraya nodded.
‘Having firstfiltered the contents to suit your own needs?’
Another nod.
‘The day that Imet Peter he warned me not to trust anyone. He meant you. He knewyou were up to something.’ Morton held up the box file and pointed to theword on the spine. ‘Do you know what gave you away?’ Morton asked rhetorically. ‘It was the letter a. As soon as I spotted this on the shelf Iknew.’ He paused, allowing her the opportunity to say something indefence, but nothing was forthcoming. ‘You compiled thisfile.’ Another pause. ‘Which didn’t make sense to me. Why, Ithought, would she need me to research everything that she already knew? Then it clicked – the stuff in here might well bring down theWindsor-Sackvilles, but to what end? What would you gain from that? Then it came to me - you don't want to bring them down at all - you want to bepart of them, but you needed me to find something concrete to prove that yourson is heir to the vast Windsor-Sackville empire. You needed thegenealogical link that’s missing from this file. Well, I found you thelink to Finlay's family. A will arrived in the post this morning; I guessyou could call
