‘Oh yes, it’s quite possible … some GIs weren’t demobbed until well into 1946,’ Maggie assured her. ‘And we may be able to find out more from his army records.’

‘Is it really possible to do that?’ Grace asked, thinking about Jimmy too. She would like to find out how he had met his fate, as a mark of respect to honour the sacrifice he had made.

‘Yes. I can certainly try.’

‘And Ellis is extremely excited.’ Larry dipped into the conversation. ‘He’s now convinced that Giovanni is the artist who painted the pictures we found in the unit, plus the ones discovered in the attic of the house in …’

‘Repository Road in Woolwich!’ Grace exclaimed in unison with Larry.

‘And if he was an American GI, then that could explain the other paintings that surfaced in America – Ellis told me about them too. Maybe Mr Donato painted them before he came over to England during the Second World War,’ she said, processing all the pieces to see if they fitted together, and so far they certainly seemed to. It was too much of a coincidence for the address in Woolwich near the army barracks to crop up twice with a link to the paintings.

‘Well, it’s certainly an exciting mystery … like something out of one of those true-crime documentaries on the telly,’ Betty chimed.

‘I certainly hope not!’ Larry puffed. ‘Nobody has died.’

‘Apart from Connie, that we know of,’ Jamie chipped in, stating the obvious.

‘And Jimmy. And his mother too, she died in the Blitz,’ Grace added, remembering the poignant passage that she had read in Connie’s diary, written when she had first arrived back in London to work in the factory.