Coming on top of all the other revelations, this knocked the wind out of Val. Her mother was alive, but might not be for long. What was wrong with her? She tried to calculate how old she must be: much younger than her father, so probably only in her sixties. Far too young to die.

It seemed unlikely that Ha Suran would be able to come to Australia, so Val decided there and then that she and Nicole would have to go to her. She couldn’t let her mother die without seeing her again and asking all the questions she had been unable to ask her father. But the only way she could afford it would be by getting her hands on her father’s inheritance—money that should be hers by right.

Chapter 21

MR. TROTMAN LOOKED THROUGH THE PAPERS VAL had brought, his expression giving little away. There was a valuation of the antiques she had taken to the dealer, including the old camera and the Russian icons; statements from three bank accounts containing almost a hundred thousand dollars among them; half a dozen stock certificates; and, among everything else, a receipt for a safe deposit box in a city-center bank.

“Do you know what was kept there?” he asked Val.

She glanced at it and shook her head. “No idea.”

“Perhaps you should ask. It doesn’t look as though your husband has got around to checking it. Have you been in contact with him?”

“I let him see his daughter for a supervised visit,” Val said. “We made the arrangements by phone.”

“And he was happy for you to take these documents? These are originals, not copies.” He frowned. “He’ll need them to finish winding up the estate.”

“It’s my money, though, isn’t it?” Val asked. “My father left his belongings to me, not Tony. He couldn’t stand Tony and tried to talk me out of marrying him. I should have listened . . .”

Mr. Trotman was emotionless. “As a married couple, any inheritance is jointly owned.”

“Really?” She screwed her mouth to one side defiantly. “So does that mean I own half of the Croydon Park house?”

The solicitor inhaled slowly. “It depends whose name the title deeds are in. Is there a mortgage on the property?”

Val didn’t know.

“Did you sign any papers when the house was purchased?”

She couldn’t remember. Tony was always putting documents in front of her and demanding a signature. He took care of the finances and she took care of the house. “So what happens now?”

“As I explained last time, you can’t divorce your husband without his consent, or without fault being proved. That situation hasn’t changed, so I suggest you sit down with him and work out a sensible settlement. I’m sure he won’t let his”—he hesitated, checked the paper in front of him before finishing the sentence—“daughter starve.”