October 1941
Resting. All the time, resting. I’ve not listened to the wireless much of late. I knew it was bad about Russia. It makes me sick to think that we’re not really helping them. Halifax has put his foot in it again by telling the Americans and Hitler that we can’t invade at the moment. This war is far from over; it will almost certainly outlive me.
That was Doris Sloan’s final diary entry. Morton’s assumption that she had died at the end of 1941 was confirmed in the national death index.
He looked at the time: he still had a few hours left until his meeting with Tamara Forsdyke, but there was little else that he could do here; it was time to leave. He gathered his things, stood and quickly searched the room: no sign of Miss Latimer, thankfully. He hurried into the lobby, cleared out his locker and quick-marched through the double doors and out into the waiting sunshine. He reached his Mini, elated to have escaped without seeing her again and turned to open the car door.
‘Oh, do be careful,’ a familiar voice warned from behind.
It was her. He turned. ‘Pardon?’
‘I said to be careful,’ Miss Latimer repeated. ‘They’ve punctured your tyres and put a tracker under your bonnet.’
Morton was horrified. He jumped back from his car, as if he were about to be electrocuted. ‘Who did?’
‘Men with guns,’ she replied, her eyes wide, as she walked towards The Keep entrance.
He crouched to examine the front tyre, running his fingers carefully around the rim then hammering it with his fist. It looked okay. He moved to the rear tyre. That too seemed undamaged. ‘What did you see them doing to my car, exactly?’ he shouted.
Miss Latimer stopped and turned with a frown. ‘Who?’
Morton stood impatiently. ‘The men—the men with the guns.’
Miss Latimer almost smiled. ‘Oh, I didn’t really see anything, but that’s just what usually happens when you come here, isn’t it?’
Morton wasn’t in the mood. Without giving her the satisfaction of a response, he climbed into the Mini and sped from the car park like a teenager on a joyride.
One day he might just win a battle against her. Might.
Total darkness was still minutes away, but, on Capel-le-Ferne’s unlit back streets, Morton was struggling to get his bearings. With little traffic on the road—and none at all behind him—Morton slowed the Mini to a virtual crawl, the headlights slicing through the cool duskiness. Cliff House was hiding in the shadows, like some timid Edwardian aunt.
He realised, too late, that he had driven past the side road that he needed. He brought the car to a gentle stop, reversed past the entrance, then turned up the hill.
The gate was open and he slowly wound his way down the long drive.
The headlights plucked the house from the darkness. He drew to a halt in the car park and killed the engine, wondering if he had arrived on the correct evening. There was not a single light on anywhere in the house or grounds. He realised that he was seeing it exactly as it would have been during the war: blacked out and melding seamlessly into its environment, cowering under the enemy above.
Morton stepped from the Mini, an uneasiness beginning to prickle him inside. Spooky, was how Juliette had described the house. And that was in daylight.
He didn’t budge, just stood beside his car, staring at the house.
Then, in his peripheral vision, there was movement. He glanced up and saw something—no, someone—at one of the windows. He could just make out the ghosted face of the person. Man or woman, he couldn’t tell; they were standing back, trying not to be seen.
He smiled, trying to act normally. But something didn’t feel right. He shuddered, took a cursory glance all around him, then walked towards the house.
He tapped the door lightly, almost hoping that it went unanswered, and turned his back so that he was facing outwards.
At last, light! Instantly, Morton’s fears abated as the door opened, bathing him in a warm yellow glow.
‘Morton, do come in.’ It was Tamara, he recognised her voice immediately. She was smiling, extending her hand.
He shook it, smiled, and followed her through a large opulent hallway to the lounge.
‘Take a seat,’ she directed. ‘Can I get you a drink before we begin? I’m on Pinot Grigio.’
‘That would be lovely, thank you. Just a small glass, though.’
Morton sat at one of the three large sofas and took the opportunity of absorbing his surroundings. This was the place that Elsie Finch had come to for a month in July 1940, before returning to have the baby here in May 1941. Now, it was simple and elegantly designed with soft grey walls, pale curtains, wooden floors and cream leather sofas. He pictured a drabber version, a wartime sanctuary for young women who had got into trouble.
‘Here you go,’ Tamara said, handing him a glass filled almost to the brim. ‘Mother will be down in a minute—she’s your best bet for anything war-related.’ Tamara sat in one of the armchairs and curled her legs up under herself. ‘I’m afraid I didn’t come along until after the war was all done and dusted, and we didn’t really keep in touch with that side of the family, so I won’t be of much use.’
‘I need to apologise to your mother, actually,’ Morton said with a grimace. ‘I came here the other day and think I might have scared her, taking pictures of the house.’
‘Oh, that was you, was it?’ Tamara laughed. She grinned and lowered her voice. ‘I wouldn’t mention it if I were you—besides which, she probably won’t even remember.’
Right on cue, the old lady that had threatened Morton shuffled into the room. She seemed oblivious to him, staring at her pink slippers as they moved across the floor intent on what was evidently her armchair. She slumped down with a sigh and released the footrest from beneath the chair, which emerged with a lightning jolt. Another sigh, then she faced Morton.
‘Who’s this?’ she asked, scowling at Tamara.
‘He’s come to ask some questions about Laurie and Elsie,’ Tamara answered.
‘Why?’ the old lady demanded.
A bubble of silence in the conversation, which Morton presumed Tamara would fill with the reason for his visit, stretched uncomfortably; Kath’s irritated glances bounced from her daughter to Morton, as she waited for an explanation.
‘I…er…I’m working for someone—doing some genealogical investigations,’ Morton stammered.
‘Can I ask,’ Tamara began, ‘who it is you’re working for, exactly?’
‘Paul and Rose,’ Morton lied.
Tamara grunted and rolled her eyes.
‘So, anything you can tell me about Elsie and her time during the war would be great.’
‘Well, that’s down to Mum,’ Tamara replied. ‘Ask away.’
‘Okay,’ Morton started, turning his attention to Kath, and raising his voice. ‘Do you remember your sister-in-law, Elsie, coming to stay here just after she joined the Women’s Auxiliary Air Force in 1940?’
Kath nodded. ‘Yes, I do. She was based up at Hawkinge—near the aerodrome. She didn’t stay long—a month or two, I should think, then she upped and left.’
Morton made notes on his pad, then asked, ‘Do you know where she went after that?’
Kath thought for a moment. ‘West Kingsdown, I believe. All the WAAF girls went—too dangerous here for the poor things apparently. Never mind us lot living in Hellfire Corner—we managed to carry on alright.’
Morton wrote West Kingsdown on his pad and underlined it. ‘Do you know much about her job in the WAAF?’
Kath pulled a face that seemed a strange mixture of a sneer and a shrug. ‘She was a bit hoity-toity about her work up there. She used to remind us on a daily basis that she’d signed the Official Secrets Act, so she couldn’t tell us what was going on.’
‘Wasn’t it something to do with listening in to German aircraft?’ Tamara questioned.
‘Well, something of that ilk, yes,’ Kath agreed.
‘And then she came back here again, in Ma
y 1941?’ Morton asked, catching a quick passing glance between mother and daughter.
‘Oh, I forget when it was, exactly,’ Kath said.
‘But she did come back?’ Morton pushed. ‘To have the baby?’
Another look passed between the two women.
‘Yes,’ Tamara confirmed. ‘The baby wasn’t my Uncle Laurie’s, though, so she had it adopted.’
‘Do you know anything about the real father of the baby?’ Morton said.
Tamara shook her head.
Kath blew out some air, as if it were an effort to think. ‘His name was William Smith, I believe. He was a pilot, killed in the Battle of Britain.’
Morton nodded. ‘Do you know any more about him? Where he came from? What he did before the war? Any brothers or sisters?’
Kath shook her head vehemently. ‘No. Never met him. From what I can gather, it was a one-off mishap. It happened a lot in wartime—people behaved differently back then.’
Morton made more notes on his pad, aware that the two women were waiting for his next question, which he wasn’t sure exactly how to frame. ‘Elsie wasn’t the only pregnant girl here during the war, was she?’ he started cautiously. ‘I’ve done a bit of research and it seems your mother, Agnes, along with another lady, Mrs Potter, set up a kind of refuge here for women in a similar situation.’
The question, as he had expected, had caused a low tremor of disturbance; Kath scowled and twitched and Tamara shifted her weight in the chair.
Finally, after a short pause, it was Tamara who spoke. ‘I don’t think it was quite the refuge you paint it to be. My grandmother just took in one or two women who needed somewhere to stay for a short time—that was all.’
‘That was very good of her,’ Morton said.
Kath raised her shoulders indifferently. ‘As I said, it happened a lot in wartime.’
‘Do you remember Mrs Potter?’ Morton persisted, addressing the question directly to Kath.
She shook her head again. ‘The name rings a bell…but I can’t place her, now.’
‘I think that’s understandable, Mum,’ Tamara said. ‘Sometimes I can’t remember what I did last week, never mind seventy-something years ago.’
‘I’m the same,’ Morton said, smiling. He drank some wine then asked, ‘Do you know what happened to Elsie after she gave birth?’
‘I think she returned to her duties at West Kingsdown,’ Kath recalled. ‘It’s such a long time ago now, I can’t remember rightly.’
‘Then my Uncle Laurie came home from war,’ Tamara added. ‘And life returned to normal in their house in Nutley. Two children came along and-’
‘-Horrible kids they were,’ Kath cut in. ‘Paul and Rose.’
‘Mum!’ Tamara chastised lightly. She tipped her head towards Morton and lowered her voice. ‘We didn’t really see much of them growing up.’
‘Thank goodness,’ Kath chimed in.
Tamara rolled her eyes, sipped her wine and seemed to ponder for a moment. ‘I think the war changed my Uncle Laurie—well, it would, wouldn’t it—being in a prisoner-of-war camp for five years? You just can’t imagine it, can you?’
‘No,’ Morton answered, still mulling over the comment about Paul and Rose. He couldn’t align the idea of the pleasant adults, whom he had met with, being horrible children. It didn’t add up.
‘Is there anything else you can remember about Elsie during the war? Was she happy? Did she have friends? Hobbies?’
Kath laughed. ‘No time for hobbies. I think she was happy enough from what I can recall. I think she enjoyed her job. She worked hard for them—long hours. As for her friends—they were the other WAAF girls, who we didn’t get to see.’ Kath thought for a moment, then added, ‘She just flitted in and out of our lives like a lot of people at that time.’
Kath’s knowledge of her own sister-in-law seemed oddly vague to Morton, as if she had been nothing more than a passing acquaintance.
‘Anything else you can remember of Elsie’s war?’
A long silence was ended with Kath saying ‘No, nothing else. Her war was no different to anyone else’s.’
Morton looked at his notepad and finished his wine. But for Elsie working in West Kingsdown, he had learnt nothing new by coming here. That wasn’t especially unusual—it was common for people to struggle to recall events so far away in the past. But Elsie wasn’t just some WAAF girl who had drifted in and out of their lives—she was Kath’s sister-in-law. He felt certain that there was something amiss. Something that they weren’t telling him. Time was running out.
‘Well—thank you very much for your time,’ he said, rising from his chair. ‘It was lovely to meet you both’—he turned to face Kath—‘if you should remember anything else, give me a call.’
Kath nodded but said nothing.
‘Could I just use your toilet before the drive back home?’ Morton asked.
‘Yes, of course,’ Tamara said. ‘It’s a little way back to Rye. The bathroom’s upstairs, first right.’
Morton thanked her and headed from the room, pretending not to have seen the split-second hesitation that had occurred when Tamara had revealed that she knew where Morton lived. He had never given her that information. But he already knew that she was on to him. The very second that she had opened the front door to him, he had known that he’d been invited here under false pretences. He had recognised her immediately. She had followed them—not very discreetly—from the National Memorial to the Few. At the time, he had thought nothing of it. Then, when he had looked back over the photographs that he had taken outside Cliff House, he had zoomed in and seen Tamara eyeing him darkly from an upstairs window.
Morton took the stairs two at a time, then paused at the top to ensure that he was alone. He could hear garbled conversation continuing between the two women downstairs. The corridor fed six closed doors. He pushed open the first door on the right—just as he had been told, it was the bathroom. The door opposite was a simply-furnished bedroom—a guestroom by the looks of it. The next two were further bedrooms, one he judged from the décor and photographs on the walls to be Kath’s. Directly opposite was a small shower room. There were two doors remaining. The room second to last was the one that he had hoped to find: an office. He stepped inside and gently pushed the door shut behind him and switched on the light. Unlike the rest of the house, it was a dimly lit room. The walls—much like his own office at home—were almost entirely covered in floor-to-ceiling bookshelves. He ignored the rows of books and headed over to a shelf containing box files. As he moved across the room, he passed a large desk and suddenly stopped. Something had caught his attention. It was a fawn-coloured wallet. Old. With a type-written label that read The Spyglass File. 1912.
Morton picked up the folder and opened it. Empty. Beside it was another file, identical, but for the label. The Spyglass File. 1940. That too was empty. The next was 1941—the year of Barbara’s birth. Empty. The files continued, one per year, right up until 1975.
He began to pluck randomly at the long run of folders, to try and get an understanding of what they might have once contained. The Spyglass File. 1944. Empty. 1946. Empty. 1949. Empty.
All of them appeared to have been emptied.
Time was running out.
He decided to abandon his search, and turned instead to the open laptop, praying that it was not password-protected. He wiggled the mouse and it opened on a webpage with flight details from Heathrow to Beijing. Minimising the page, he ran a search under the word Spyglass. One result—an email. Morton clicked to view it. It was to Tamara Forsdyke, from somebody by the name of Shaohao Chen. The message was simple and short. Computer wiped. Destroy The Spyglass File.
Morton took a photo of the email on his mobile, then closed the search page and returned the screen to how he had found it. Then he hurried back downstairs.
‘We were going to send out a search party for you,’ Kath exclaimed.
‘Mum!’ Tamara chastised.
Morton smiled. ‘Sorry,�
�� he said, rubbing his stomach. ‘I felt a little queasy and thought I might be sick.’
Tamara looked concerned. ‘Oh dear—can I get you anything?’
‘No, but I will head home now. Thank you again for your help.’
‘You’re welcome,’ Tamara said, ushering him towards the front door. ‘Good luck with your searches. Bye.’
‘Bye,’ he said, stepping out into the pitch darkness.
He climbed into his car, pondering what he had just discovered. He started the engine, looked in his rear-view mirror and saw the man sit up behind him in the back seat.
Chapter Fourteen
14th November 1940, West Kingsdown, Kent
Violet Christmas swung around from the gramophone and held a theatrical pose in the centre of the sitting room. Wearing only her bra and knickers, she straightened her right arm, extending it towards the floor and looked moodily along its length. In the splayed fingers of her upheld left hand she held a tumbler of gin and tonic.
The gramophone needle struck its first dramatic note and the tango record belted out into the air.
‘Can we have a break now, Violet,’ Rosemary pleaded from the armchair. ‘You’ll get us shot. The neighbours already hate us.’
Violet pouted and pushed closed the wooden doors beneath the gramophone, slightly muffling the volume. ‘Happy now?’ she mouthed, downing the last dregs of her drink, before making a flouncy exit.
Rosemary lowered her Britannia and Eve magazine and scowled at Elsie.
‘She only does it to wind you up,’ Elsie said. ‘You know what she’s like.’
‘That’s your answer to everything she does,’ Rosemary snapped. ‘‘You know what she’s like.’’
‘Join in,’ Elsie retorted. ‘Have some fun. Live a little.’
‘I don’t want to behave like…that,’ Rosemary said. ‘Considering her upbringing, she’s got absolutely no morals. I mean, bringing that married soldier back here the other day…I despair, I really do. Besides, I don’t see you joining in.’
The Spyglass File (The Forensic Genealogist Book 5) Page 17