Bish didn’t know why he was surprised that she’d tried to find Bashir Nasrallah.

‘I was too late by six months. I didn’t think it would affect me so badly, but of course it wasn’t just about his death. It brought up everything. My mother, my brother. Leaving Alexandria. Growing up with Aunt Margaret. So I did what the Worthingtons do so well, I drank. It’s easy to hide how much you’re drinking when you have the expat’s lifestyle. Brunch, followed by a long lunch, followed by cocktails and then pre-dinner and post-dinner drinks. Different guests each time. No one picked up that I had a problem. Then I’d try desperately to pull myself together for your school holidays, and I failed at that.’

In the silence Bish wanted to say the right thing. Something that would make sense to them both.

‘Six days without a drink.’

‘Thirty-three years.’

‘So it gets easier?’

‘Not at all, darling. Stevie’s death made me almost give in about a thousand times a day. And if it wasn’t for visiting those kids in Buckland, I would have had one for sure these past weeks.’

Demons, she had called them.

‘No more secrets, Mum,’ he said. ‘They make us lonely.’

‘Do you want to hear some good news coming out of this whole bombing mess?’ she asked.

‘Please.’

‘My nephew found me. My half-sister’s son. Out of respect for my father’s second wife, they waited until she died to search for me. It was what our father wanted – that one day, all his children would be reunited. They got as far as knowing that my surname was Ortley and that my brother had died, then they hit a roadblock. Until my nephew saw us on Al Jazeera – you and I talking outside Buckland hospital. The French ran the story and identified you as Bashir Ortley.’

Bish turned at the sound of a car and watched as a sedan pulled up and an older man stepped out. John Conlon.

‘I’ll take you there, Mum. To Alexandria. Bee can come too. Right now I’ve got to go, but I’ll ring you later.’

Grazier was there to greet Conlon and they embraced. Eddie and Violette walked out of the Visitors’ Centre and stood close together. They looked so vulnerable. Bish went over to join them and the atmosphere was strained.

‘Can you introduce me, Eddie?’ Bish asked.

The kid did a mumbled pointing and naming. ‘Have you been feeding my fish?’ he asked his father.

Conlon nodded. He seemed not to know what to say. Wasn’t that Noor’s fear? That all the talking would have stopped now Anna was dead?

‘Am I going to live with them?’ Eddie asked his father. ‘With Violette?’

Conlon flinched as if someone had struck him. ‘Don’t be silly, Eddie. You belong with me.’

Eddie was gripping his sister’s hand. ‘I belong with my dad, Violette.’

And she was trying not to cry and nodding at the same time. ‘Yeah, that’s what my mum said.’