Her Sister's Child

by Alison James

  They drive back to Palmers Green in Johnny’s car. ‘You coming in for something to eat?’ Paula asks him.

  ‘Kids around?’

  She shakes her head. ‘Ben’s gone out with one of his friends and is going to sleep over. My mother-in-law collected Jess today, and she’s having her overnight.’

  Johnny grins. ‘I was kind of hoping you’d say that.’

  Paula takes off her coat and goes straight to the fridge, pulling out a bottle of vodka. ‘Don’t know about you, but I need a stiff drink.’ She puts it on a tray with glasses and tonic water, but instead of carrying it through to the living room, she heads for the stairs.

  ‘Where are you going with that?’ Johnny asks, surprised.

  She throws a smile over her shoulder, giving a little wiggle of her hips as she walks up the staircase. The high heels she’s still wearing add to the seductive effect. ‘I thought we might have it in the bedroom.’

  He grins, and follows her, tapping her playfully on her backside. ‘Thank God for that. I was worried you were never going to ask.’

  As they’re lying in bed afterwards, Paula is silent, her eyes turned to the ceiling.

  Johnny touches her arm. ‘You okay, Paul?’

  ‘I’m sorry, I can’t stop thinking about Lizzie’s baby. Wondering where she is now.’

  ‘Well, there’s nothing in that article about her being reunited with her mother, obviously. We already know her birth mother was dead, and it’s not like Marian Glynn could have claimed her. My guess is she must have been adopted.’

  Paula leans back on the pillows, covers her face with her hand. ‘So how do we find out what happened to her?’

  ‘I’ve no idea,’ Johnny says, sombrely. ‘But we’ll give it a go.’

  39

  Marian

  Now that it’s on the plate, the meal looks uninviting: a single lamb chop, and a couple of boiled potatoes. With some tinned vegetables, because that’s all Marian has in the flat. She makes as few trips to the supermarket as she can get away with, as grocery shopping for one is such a hollow experience. No one pays attention to a drab, slightly overweight fifty-seven-year-old woman; till assistants barely even make eye contact. She is invisible.

  Marian wonders whether to make gravy, and decides she can’t be bothered. She digs out an old, dried-up jar of mustard instead, places it on the tray and carries her lunch to the table in the living room’s large picture window. When she bought the flat, she sacrificed space for location, choosing a flat in an elegant mansion block close to Hove’s seafront. The magnificent sea views were what clinched it. But today, on a blustery November Saturday, sea and sky are one indistinguishable grey strip.

  As she eats the chop, she flicks through the Brighton Argus in an attempt to find something to do, something that will fill at least part of her weekend. She doesn’t enjoy her job, resents it even. From Monday to Friday it feels as though she does little but clock watch, waiting for the end of the working week to roll around. But on a Saturday, once she has enjoyed a modest lie-in and done some housework, the rest of the weekend stretches ahead like a prison sentence.

  Her experience as a social worker qualified her for the job as librarian in the social studies department of the local university. At least, her experience was sufficiently relevant for her to be picked out of what was an unimpressive shortlist of candidates. As librarian, she’s treated by her colleagues as separate; not quite a regular member of the department. Most of them are at least ten years younger than her anyway. Sometimes she overhears them talking about social events they’re planning: bar crawls and pub quizzes. If she’s within earshot they’ll make a token attempt at including her (‘Not sure it’s your thing, Marian, but of course you’re welcome to come along’). But she never goes. She knows they don’t want to be seen out and about with a dowdy, grey-haired matron. The label ‘spinster’ probably applies in their minds, though strictly speaking she’s a divorcee. There are a few people in the department who are around her age, but they all have families, grown-up children and even grandchildren. Which she does not. Without that shared ground, she has no value in their eyes.

  When she first arrived in Hove, with the vestiges of optimism still intact, Marian signed up for an online dating site. Meeting online didn’t have the common currency it enjoys now, sixteen years later, but it was starting to take off. Even though she was a lot younger then, the pickings were still slim. There was nobody Marian could remotely have fallen for, but a romantic connection was not her agenda. Her agenda was to try and become pregnant while she still could. Because, as Tom had been at pains to point out, it was his infertility that had left them childless, not hers. She still had two or three years in which she could conceive.

  After six months of unspeakably awkward dates, Marian met Clive. He worked in administration at a local insurance company, a dull, timid man in his late thirties who still lived with his mother. At Marian’s instigation they engaged in coitus a few times, back at her flat after what Clive liked to call ‘a meal out’. He was so inept in bed that she suspected he might even have been a virgin. After the last of these unsatisfactory couplings, her period was late. Convinced she was pregnant, Marian made the mistake of telling an appalled Clive. They never used contraception, but it seemed it had never occurred to him that at nearly forty-three, she could still conceive.

  Her period eventually arrived a week later, and her GP informed her in a dismissive fashion that this irregularity was probably the onset of perimenopause. Clive melted away into the ether, refusing to take her calls or answer her texts. Marian kept her profile on the matchmaking site for a further year and a half, but subsequent encounters never led to her kissing any of her dates, let alone sleeping with them. Eventually, as her forty-fifth birthday loomed, she accepted that pregnancy was no longer a possibility and deleted her online profile. Her waistline thickened further, her hair grew greyer and she remained alone.

  The Events page in the Argus has a feature on a folk art exhibition at the Wagner Hall. Marian is not much interested in folk art, but decides she may as well go. It will give her a reason to leave the flat, if nothing else. After she has cleared up her lunch things, she puts on her shapeless blue anorak and sets off into the town centre.

  ‘Oh my goodness, it is you! It is!’

  The woman that she sensed was following her around the exhibition plants herself in Marian’s path. The broad smiling face and braided grey hair do register in her memory, but it takes a split second for her mind to catch up.

  ‘Angela! Angela Dixon!’

  ‘Yes.’ Marian smiles back, trying to hide her discomfort. ‘Of course. It’s been a while; I wasn’t sure…’

  ‘Gosh, yes, ages. I remember hearing you’d moved down here. I would have got in touch when I decided to come to this exhibition, but obviously I didn’t have your address. How are you?’

  ‘Well, you know… fine.’

  ‘And are you enjoying this?’ Angela waves expansively at an arrangement of carved wooden figurines. ‘Wonderful, isn’t it? I’ve always had a passion for folk art.’

  ‘It’s certainly… interesting.’

  ‘Shall we head to the café and have a catch-up?’

  ‘Yes, all right then,’ agrees Marian, who has had enough of childlike pictures of farm animals and disembodied carousel horses. ‘A cup of tea would be great.’

  ‘So,’ Angela says comfortably, once they’re seated at a window table with a pot of tea between them. ‘Tell me all about life in Brighton.’

  ‘I live in Hove.’ Marian’s response is automatic.

  ‘How are you finding being away from London? Do you miss it? I must say I can’t imagine leaving the place, much as I moan about it. We all do.’

  ‘Are you still at Haringey Social Services?’ Marian asks, trying to remember how old Angela is.

  ‘Retired last year. Just as well, really; the place was even more chaotic than when you were there. You probably got out at the right time. Still working?�
��

  Marian tells her about her job at the university.

  ‘Great.’ Angela slurps her tea noisily. ‘New job, new start. Best thing after a divorce. I gather Tom has a new family now?’

  ‘I wouldn’t know.’ She stiffens. ‘Once I’d moved out of the old house, I only ever heard from him through his solicitors. No more direct contact. Which was my decision.’

  Angela lowers her cup slowly. ‘Oh, so you wouldn’t know about the adoption?’

  Marian’s heart rate speeds up, and she balls her paper napkin in her fist. ‘Like I said, we’ve had no contact.’

  ‘Oh my goodness… it was rather incredible, really. Do you remember that newborn baby that was left at the Whittington? It was in all the news, around the time you moved. A little girl. Well, we found a foster placement for her, and Tom and his new partner adopted her when she was about six months old…’ She pauses. ‘Marian, are you okay?’

  ‘Yes,’ she says faintly, as the blood drains from her face and her extremities begin to tingle. ‘I just had no idea… they’d adopted.’

  ‘They were lucky to get a baby as soon as they were approved. She already had a little girl, which probably helped: they were a ready-made family unit. Well, you don’t need me to tell you all this; you worked in the department long enough. Lovely little thing the baby was, really gorgeous. And a few years later they adopted again: a little boy.’

  Marian pushes her chair back and stumbles to her feet. ‘Sorry, Angela, I’ve got a headache coming on. I’ve got to go.’

  When she emerges from the building into Regency Road it’s growing dark. She turns right and heads for the seafront, barely noticing the chilly, horizontal drizzle blowing off the sea. With her hood obscuring her vision, she staggers like a drunk along Kingsway. Other walkers have to swerve to avoid her, but she is barely aware of her surroundings. One thought alone is repeating and repeating in her brain.

  He has Saffron. Tom has taken Saffron.

  40

  Paula

  ‘We’ve got to tell them. Surely we don’t have a choice now?’

  Paula and Johnny are sitting in her kitchen, surrounded by greasy cardboard boxes, finishing the dregs of a bottle of red wine. It’s Monday, and since she’s been at work all day, Johnny offered to treat her and the children to a pizza delivery. The children, replete with stuffed crust and fizzy drinks, are comatose on the sofa watching Netflix. They seem to like Johnny, for his easy-going manner as much as his generosity with takeaways.

  They haven’t told anyone about the newspaper article that Paula is convinced identifies her sister’s baby girl. She believes that now she’s raised the possibility of the dead baby being one of twins, she’s duty bound to share their discovery with the police.

  ‘If she was adopted, which we’re pretty sure has to be the case, then the police can easily access adoption records to find out. They’ll soon know if it checks out.’

  ‘That’s true.’ Johnny picks at a stray piece of pepperoni. ‘The thing is, though, Paul, they’re not going to share that information with us, are they? Even if they wanted to, they can’t. Adoption records from back then are almost always sealed. So it doesn’t help you, does it? You still won’t know where Lizzie’s kid is. You could only hope that when she’s eighteen and can access the information herself, she comes looking for her mother’s family.’

  Paula shrugs. ‘Looks like that will have to be good enough, then. At least it’s not that long to wait now.’

  ‘Assuming she does go looking. There’s no guarantee of that.’

  ‘So what, then?’ Paula looks at Johnny, raising an eyebrow. She knows him well enough by now to know when he’s plotting something. There’s a certain tilt of the head, a gleam in his eye.

  ‘I’ve got this mate, okay, from when I worked in the Specials. Used to be a cop, now works private security.’

  ‘Oh, yeah?’ Both Paula’s eyebrows go up now. ‘Why’s that?’

  ‘He got in a spot of bother. Bit of a misconduct issue.’ Johnny grins, his expression sheepish. ‘I know what you’re thinking, but Tony’s a good guy, honestly. And he just happens to know people. People who can access various official databases. Such as adoption records.’

  Paula sips her wine, shaking her head. ‘I think we should go straight to the police. I’d feel wrong if we didn’t tell them.’

  ‘How about we tell them after we’ve found out where your niece is? That way they can do their thing with their investigation, but it won’t matter that they can’t disclose adoption information because we’ll already know.’

  ‘I’m not sure, Johnny. I’m really not.’

  The following evening, Paula finds herself on the pavement outside a pub in Islington.

  ‘At least come in and meet him,’ Johnny urges. ‘It doesn’t commit us to anything.’

  ‘I still think it would be better to involve the law first, Johnny.’

  ‘Why, though?’

  ‘Because…’ She shrugs. ‘I’m scared, I suppose.’

  ‘What of?’

  ‘I don’t know, I just am.’ Because she’s wanted to find out where Lizzie’s daughter is for so long that she’s terrified of disappointment. Of reaching a dead end. Of this shadowy person becoming real at last. But she can’t explain this to Johnny. ‘I suppose it won’t do any harm just to talk.’

  ‘That’s my girl.’

  Johnny leads Paula inside and introduces her to his friend, Big Tony Barlow.

  Big Tony is – unsurprisingly – huge, with a missing front tooth and a neck as thick as his bald head. He drinks his way rhythmically through a pint of stout, his face expressionless, while the problem is explained to him.

  ‘So could you do it, Tone?’ Johnny asks. ‘If we wanted you to?’

  ‘Not personally, no. That kind of job needs a specialist. Adoption files and that. Especially if you don’t have exact names and dates.’

  ‘But you know someone, yeah?’

  Big Tony wipes a huge paw across his mouth, then belches. ‘Sure. I know someone.’

  Johnny looks over at Paula. ‘So… are we doing this?’

  She hesitates a few seconds. ‘Go on, then. I suppose we have to at least try and find out.’

  He reaches into the pocket of his velvet-collared covert coat and brings out a wad of notes, which he slides across the table. ‘There’s a ton there, and there’ll be more if your contact can come up with the goods.’

  ‘You have to pay him?’ Paula demands, looping her arm through his as they walk back up Upper Street to where Johnny has parked his car.

  ‘Sure,’ says Johnny, easily. ‘Think of it as a professional service, like a lawyer or an accountant. You pay them for their expertise, don’t you? This is the same thing.’

  ‘Hmm.’ Paula remains dubious. ‘It still feels dodgy to me. Still think we should have gone straight DI Stratton.’

  When Johnny appears at Paula’s house forty-eight hours later, brandishing a manila envelope, despite her misgivings she can’t avoid a frisson of excitement.

  ‘You ready for this?’ Then he lowers his voice. ‘Kids around?’

  ‘They’re with Dave… have you already looked?’

  Johnny shakes his head, following her into the living room. ‘I wanted you to be the first to know; it’s only fair.’

  Paula sits on the edge of the sofa and turns the envelope over and over between shaking fingers. She’s strangely nervous about opening it.

  ‘You do it,’ she says eventually, handing it to Johnny and walking over to the drinks cupboard to pour herself a brandy.

  He takes out two pieces of paper, running his eye briefly over the first one before handing it to Paula. It’s a confidential memo from an independent reviewing officer appointed by Haringey Council. The officer in question endorses an adoption order in the case of a female infant known only as ‘Saffron’, abandoned at Whittington Hospital on 16 September 2003 and believed to have been born on 18 July 2003.

  The second document is
salmon pink, a certified copy of an entry in the Adoptions Register, dated 22 February 2004. Paula’s eyes widen as she reads the entry out loud.

  ‘“Name and surname of child: Charlotte Saffron Glynn. Sex of child: Female. Name and surname: Thomas Michael Glynn, Vanessa Jane Glynn. Address: 35 Laurel Road, London N19. Occupation of parent(s): Architectural consultant, chartered architect.”’

  Johnny reaches for the certificate and stares at it. ‘Hold on a minute… Glynn. That’s the surname of the social worker who took the babies. The one from Ranmoor Road. Marian.’

  Paula nods. ‘And I’m sure Alice Evershott said her husband was called Tom.’

  Johnny presses his fingers against his temples. ‘Can’t be a coincidence, surely? One baby ends up dead in his garden, and he and his new missus adopt the other one? He had to have been in on the abduction.’

  Paula sips her brandy, her expression dazed. ‘No, I doubt that. If it was a bitter divorce, then why would she want him and the new wife to have one of the twins? And anyway, these records are legit. Adoptive parents don’t have any control over which baby they’re given. It’s all decided by a panel made up of third parties.’

  ‘Perhaps he coerced her somehow into handing over the female twin. Blackmailed her. Remember she worked for social services herself, an insider. Maybe she rigged the system somehow.’

  Paula shrugs.

  ‘However it happened, the evidence is here in black and white. The child that was stolen from your sister by Mrs Glynn has ended up a Glynn herself. I can hardly get my head around it.’

  ‘I know one thing,’ Paula says, grimly. ‘We have to tell the police now.’

  41

  Marian

  It isn’t too difficult to track down her ex-husband.