I let out a long breath and look out across the lake towards the mountains sketched lightly against the late summer sky. To think she’s been there, all that time. She was breathing the same London air as me when I found out Mum had died, when I went to give blood with Dad eighteen months later, and when I got the DNA results. She was there, shopping on Oxford Street, seeing a show in the West End, commuting to work on the tube. Have I stood next to her? Have I seen her face and not known her?

‘She’s happy?’

‘Yes. She’s done well. She has a good job, a nice husband. Their son is three years old now.’

I watch her face as she says it and see she’s proud, and a gentle swell of jealousy rolls over me like the wake from a paddle steamer on the lake. But it’s not because of the perfect picture of her life that I’ve just built in my head. It’s because Hedi still has her mother here to be proud of her. A mother who clearly loves her so much, even though she’s not her biological daughter.

‘I’m glad,’ I say, and I realise I mean it. I’m glad Hedi has a happy life, that she has parents who love her, just as I’ve had. I think of Dad, at home, not knowing I’m doing this today. Did he ever suspect, just as Daniel did?

‘You said Daniel didn’t love Hedi any less when he found out,’ I start. I’m scared of what I’m asking.

Anna shakes her head, wipes her eyes.

‘Are you sure?’ I turn to look at her as tears burn at the back of my skull. ‘Because I’ve been so worried, since I found out, that maybe Dad would… love me less now. That maybe Mum wouldn’t have… if she’d known.’ My voice breaks.

Anna squeezes my hand tight and stares at the ground below the bench. I suddenly realise she hasn’t told me everything yet, that’s there’s more to know. ‘What?’ I say. ‘What is it?’

She looks up at me. ‘She did,’ she says, and my stomach plunges. ‘She still loved you just as much, and so I know your father will too.’

‘How do you know?’ I whisper.

‘Because she knew. I told Sylvia twenty years ago.’

OCTOBER 1976 London, UK

SYLVIA