Tess keeps reading, unaware of Georgia’s reaction.

I am sure that you will have many questions, and I look forward to having the opportunity to explain further. I would like you to meet Olivia, but would prefer to see you privately first to discuss the rather sensitive circumstances of this revelation.

Please be assured that I would not be contacting you after seventeen years if it were not absolutely essential.

If I might be so bold, this is a matter of some urgency, for reasons I will explain in person. I will call on Friday at three o’clock.

Yours sincerely,

Beatrice Sidcup (Mrs)

‘This sounds important.’ Tess looks up to find Georgia lost in thought, staring out of the window right up to the far end of the garden where the fruit on the plum tree is starting to ripen. She waits until Georgia has gathered herself back together and hands her the letter carefully, worried she might drop it.

‘Olivia was my mother,’ Georgia says quietly. All trace of yesterday’s furious indignation about a strawberry tea has gone. She pauses as she attempts to make sense of the details. ‘She was a lodger in this house, just like you. She met my father at university here in Edinburgh and they lived here too. They were mathematicians, and they worked for some important government department in London during the Second World War. I was just a toddler then, and I stayed here with Annie and Keith because it meant my parents could both contribute to the war effort.’ She unfolds the letter. ‘I have no memory of them at all. Of course, there are photographs. But I can’t remember them ever kissing me goodnight, or reading me a story, nothing like that. They were killed in the Blitz.’ Georgia sighs. ‘In the Primary One school report I looked at this morning, the teacher describes me as “strong”, but I don’t think I was. Keith and Annie looked after me, and I was never allowed to think I wasn’t loved. Not for a minute.’

Georgia reads Beatrice Sidcup’s letter from start to finish for herself, then reads it again.

Tess tries to pull the threads together. ‘So, Finlay is . . .’

‘Finlay is my grandfather,’ says Georgia softly. She walks over to the dresser and picks up the photograph of the young man in his soldier’s uniform.

‘Finlay Black is my grandfather, and I do belong in this house after all.’

Chapter 66

August 2011