“No—just her mother. They were very close.”
“So in your professional opinion, it would have been impossible for this child of Gretchen’s to be conceived in the ordinary way?”
“Quite impossible,” said Alice firmly.
Of course you would say that, thought Jean, who had still to decide how she rated Alice as a witness. She seemed an intelligent woman, but those dolls weighed heavily in the balance. She was never going to admit that it was perfectly feasible for a sick and vulnerable young girl to have gotten pregnant while under her care, but a really unscrupulous person would be looking for an alternative version that deflected blame elsewhere. Jean decided to test her.
“The obvious explanation is that Gretchen is lying and was already pregnant when she was admitted and has somehow falsified the dates.”
Alice shook her head. “I don’t accept that for one minute. She wasn’t that kind of girl.”
“But it’s the only logical solution.”
“Then you must start to consider illogical ones.”
“You are medically trained. You surely don’t believe in virgin birth?”
“It’s hard to imagine it here in Broadstairs.” She gave Jean a faint smile. “But I have seen so many strange things in my career—things that if not miraculous are certainly unexplained—that I have had to accept that there are limits to human understanding. My understanding, at least.”
“I prefer to think that the answers are out there to be discovered, if we try,” said Jean, realizing this about herself for the first time.
“Ah, but that’s because you’re still young,” said Alice. “You’ve got time.”
Jean laughed. At thirty-nine, it was quite some years since anyone had called her young. There were advantages to spending one’s time in the company of pensioners after all.
“I must get you that diary.” Alice rose to her feet with some effort. “I might need you to help me.”
Jean followed her along the hallway into a sparsely furnished bedroom overlooking the garden. It contained a single bed, desk and wooden chair with a tapestry seat, and a huge Victorian wardrobe that darkened one entire wall. Though tidy, it had the stale, neglected smell of a room seldom entered. Above the fireplace was a framed photograph of what appeared to be four generations of female Halfyards—ranging from a chubby toddler with flowing curls to a white-haired woman in an armchair. Jean thought she recognized Alice among them.
“My family,” said Alice, noticing the direction of Jean’s glance. “Before the war.”
Jean smiled. The last picture of her own family all together would have been taken at about the same time. But it wasn’t out on display, naturally.
“The diaries are in there,” said Alice, pointing to a green suitcase with a rope handle and metal hasps, wedged into the gap on top of the wardrobe between the carved cornice and the ceiling. “If you wouldn’t mind hopping up on the chair.”
Jean did as she was told, feeling a moment’s anxiety as the slender chair swayed and creaked under her weight. She pulled the suitcase down, steadying its bulk against her chest before lowering it gently onto the bed, toward Alice’s fluttering hands.
Nested inside was a smaller case; inside this yet another. This kernel seemed to be the receptacle for all manner of curious keepsakes—a shabbier, dustier version of Jean’s drawer of treasures. As Alice rummaged through the contents, Jean noticed an ear trumpet, a pair of lace gloves, a baby’s bonnet, a harmonica, a coil of brown hair tied up with ribbon, a cricket ball, a music box, snarled-up strings of pearls and chains. Once she had extracted from the core a cardboard box and from this a diary, one of many identical volumes, it took Alice no time to locate a reference to Gretchen Edel.
“Admitted June second, 1946. Discharged on September twenty-eighth of that year.”
Jean nodded. It was no surprise to her that the dates confirmed what Mrs. Tilbury had told her. Only a fool would lie about something so easily verified.
“What about the nuns that were here at the same time as Gretchen? Are they still in this area?”
“They went back to Ireland when St. Cecilia’s was sold. To Galway, I believe.”
“That’s a pity,” said Jean, dismissing this line of inquiry.
“Campkin!” exclaimed Alice, still browsing through the entries. “That was the name. Martha Campkin. They were tremendous chums. They’d have chattered all through the night if we’d let them. It often happens with patients stuck on a ward together—especially when they’re suffering from the same complaint.”