Page 24 of Return Ticket

Ben looked them over, making notes on a pad beside him as he worked through them, noting all the details. Eventually he lifted his head. “This looks rock solid.” He tipped back in his chair, gazing up at the ceiling. “This is something that I’ll have to run past my senior, because it will draw attention. I can’t do anything under the radar.” His chair landed back on the floor with a clatter.

She didn’t ask what he would do if his senior refused to allow him to work on this. They’d cross that bridge when they came to it. “What’s the next step, after you’ve spoken to him?” she asked.

He shook his head. “I don’t know. I’ll research it if he gives me the green light but isn’t interested in advising me. If he is interested, he’ll know the tricks better than me.”

She nodded, scooped up the papers, and carefully replaced them in her bag. “Thanks, Ben. You know everything I make that I don’t need to live on gets put aside to pay for this search, so please bill me for your time.”

He rose as she did, and studied her. “If I have expenses, I’ll pass them on, but this is for friendship, Gabs. Don’t insult me by insisting.”

She hesitated. Gave a nod. “All your expenses,” she said.

He put out his hand, and she shook. “Thank you.”

He walked her out, not just off his floor, but all the way out of the building.

“How did you get those reports? They’re from the Home Office,” he said.

“You know the friend I made during that business in the summer?” She glanced at him. “She did something hush hush in the war.”

Ben’s eyes widened. “She has contacts?”

“It seems like she has a lot of favors owing, and she wasn’t shy calling them in to help me.” She still couldn’t believe how much Ruby had done for her.

“Well, she got you iron-clad proof.” Ben suddenly grinned. “This is going to raise my profile, that’s for sure.”

She gave him a quick hug. “Hope that’s a good thing. I’ll see you on Saturday.”

She walked back toward the embankment and got onto the bus. As she sat down near the back she tried to identify the hot, tight feeling in her chest.

Anxiety, she decided. And fear. And trepidation.

No one was going to be happy with her once this was set in motion. Other than Gino, who wanted to marry her mother.

Now that she’d discovered her father wasn’t dead, just a bigamist, she didn’t think her mother would be happy at all. She didn’t believe in divorce, although surely the Church would give her an annulment for the bigamy?

She shrugged.

She had set out to find her father and she had.

But she didn’t fool herself that there wouldn’t be a lot of drama in her future.

And once it was all done, what would be her next step?

She had originally thought she would find him, or find out what had happened to him, and return to Melbourne.

That wasn’t so clear, any more.

The bus passed New Scotland Yard on its way back.

Not clear at all.

chaptereleven

The morgueat the hospital was deserted.

James sent Hartridge back up the stairs to enquire where the pathologist could be, while he paged through the book at an empty reception desk for any sign of when the body he was looking for had been admitted.

The victim had been found just under a week before, so he only had to go back one page, and he found her, logged in at 11 am the morning the allotment farmers had called the police.