Lotti opened her eyes. On the canal bank, a little bent, lay Molly’s bicycle, with Frank beside it almost smiling. And on the roof of the Secret Starling, waving and cheering, stood Jim and Molly, with a clean and splendidly naked baby Philip in her arms.

There was no sign of Albert Skinner.

Chapter Fifteen

The Sparrowhawk was moored behind the Secret Starling. Both crews, Molly, the baby and the dogs sat on the bank beside her, drinking tea. Molly—with grazed elbows and knees, and impressive bruises coming up on her shins—had given a breathless account of her encounter with Albert Skinner. Jim had told the story of how Albert called out to the Starling as she emerged from the tunnel, asking if they’d seen a narrowboat called the Sparrowhawk crewed by a lad on his own with a black and white dog, and how he, Jim, had pretended to think about it and then said no, he hadn’t. Lotti had thanked everyone rapturously, and Ben had thanked them more quietly, and the dogs had caught the general excitement and capered madly about. But now the dogs were asleep, and the baby too, and a not very comfortable silence had fallen because Frank, eyes glinting again as they had in the tunnel, had just said to Lotti, “Right, Charlie. Explain.”

Lotti looked at Ben, trying to ask just with her eyes how much she should say. Ben shrugged back that he didn’t know.

“I’m not sure where to start,” Lotti hedged.

Frank gave her a hard stare.

“Start with your dad,” said Jim. “Nathan. How come he’s not here?”

Lotti swallowed and began.

“Nathan’s not my dad,” she said. “He was Ben’s, but then he died.”

She told them everything. She spoke of a lovely house and a big garden, of a charmed life and an airplane crash, of unkind relatives and the loneliness of boarding school. She spoke of beatings and sewing mistresses, of caged dogs and diamonds, of the farm hand sent to kill Federico and of Clara Primrose’s wonderful lessons, of cutting off her hair so nobody would ever pull it again.

As Lotti spoke, Molly’s and Jim’s eyes grew rounder. Frank’s frown, deeper.

Ben took over and, more diffidently, spoke of orphanages and the kindness of strangers, of a childhood spent on the water and the coming of war, of a brother wounded and a father gone to comfort him, of bombs falling on hospitals and letters to the War Office, of believed killed not being actually killed, of their plan to go to France.

“France …” sighed Molly, and her imagination soared.

“France!” grinned Jim, and anything was possible.

“France,” growled Frank, and reality landed with a thump.

“We know it won’t be easy,” Lotti acknowledged. “With the copper, and the Channel and the Sparrowhawk built for canals, but …”