She cannot take a photograph because her camera is on her phone, and it lies smashed to bits in Edinburgh, but she doesn’t feel the need anyway. She opens her daysack and removes an envelope from the inside pocket. Her grandmother’s neat handwriting is easy to read in the bright sunlight. Georgia holds the still-sealed letter close to her heart. ‘This is your secret, Beatrice, not mine, so I’m not going to read what you have written. I’ll put it back in the box with the other things when I get home, just as it is.’ She puts it back into her bag and looks again at the long rows of white headstones. ‘I don’t think you are here, Grandpa,’ she whispers. ‘I think you would have spoken to me, if you were.’

*

On the way back into the village the cars swoop past, taking their owners home for lunch. They kick up little stones that sting her legs; her sandals are covered in road dust. She walks right through the centre of the village, ignoring the bistro offering two courses and a glass of wine for a dozen euros, and past the sweet, sticky temptations of the boulangerie. She looks at the map and heads for her second destination.

At the gate there is a different sign.

Cimitière Militaire Allemand

Instead of the rows of pure white stones, there are lines of simple black crosses stretching out in front of her. There is no central monument pointing up into the sky. It feels different, she thinks. There is so much space here.

She walks among the crosses, and is aware of a quite different arrangement from the straight paths she had seen an hour earlier. Each cross has two names, and two sets of dates on its horizontal limbs. And on the reverse, there are two more names. ‘Four graves for one cross,’ she says softly. ‘And no unknown soldiers. Or not here, anyway.’

Georgia walks slowly, reading the names, and recognising their youth as she goes. Near the boundary wall ahead of her is a slab of carved stone, set into the ground.

IN EINEM GEMEINSAMEN GRABE RUHEN HIER

Below is the word SOLDATEN, and some numbers. She dredges up the German she learned at university in her twenties and nods to herself.

IN A SHARED GRAVE HERE LIE . . .

This is the explanation. The unidentified soldiers are buried together beside a low wall at the edge of the cemetery.

She looks back towards the gate, and at the trees which make dappled shade in places. ‘So different, and yet the same,’ she whispers. ‘I know you are not here either, Grandpa. But I don’t think you would mind if you were in this place, beside these men.’

Chapter 73

September 2011

The house is quiet. Tess wanders around, tidying books, dusting mantelpieces. ‘I’ve forgotten what it’s like to live alone,’ she says to the silent rooms.