Page 204 of The Missing Sister

‘Yes, I’m fine, sweetheart. See you later.’

Up in my room, I took the family tree out of the file Katie had left for me. Taking it over to the bed, I studied the names on it. Even now, knowing that I wasn’t blood-related to any of them, I realised that the dreadful legacy of war and loss that Nuala had passed down had radically altered the course of my life.

Then I thought of Tiggy; how she had said that even though it had been hard sometimes to come to terms with the journeys she and her sisters had taken into the past, it had changed their lives for the better. I only prayed it would be the same for me, because every instinct in my body told me the answers to the questions I had lay down here in West Cork.

If only I knew wherehewas, then...

The hotel phone rang by my bed and I picked it up.

‘Hello?’ I said tentatively, doing a mental tally of the people who knew I was here.

‘Mary, my dear girl,’ came Ambrose’s clipped tones. ‘How are you finding being back in your homeplace, as they say down there?’

‘Grand altogether,’ I said, smiling into the receiver. ‘I’ve just been with Katie... oh Ambrose, it’s been so wonderful to see her.’

‘I’m happy for you, Mary. This call is simply to tell you I located the address you were after. And it was quite a surprise, let me tell you,’ Ambrose chuckled. ‘I posted your letter to him immediately. Let’s see if he replies.’

‘I... oh my goodness! Thank you, Ambrose, I can’t believe you found him!’

‘It’s the least I can do for you, Mary. Do let me know when you are returning to Dublin.’

‘Of course I will, Ambrose, and thank you. Bye.’

Putting the receiver down, my heart racing, I once again longed for Jock to be here beside me. But...

Why did you never tell him, Merry?

You saw him as second best, a safe haven...

In retrospect, I could see that I’d been too preoccupied hankering after a love I’d lost, a love that had been so passionate and exciting and forbidden that I truly believed there was nothing that could ever match up to it. And because ithadbeen lost, I’d built it up into some grandcoup de foudre...

I’d counselled and consoled both my children through their own various break-ups with people they’d believed were the love of their lives, but eventually they’d recovered and moved on.

When I’d been their age, no one had been there to counsel me – Ambrose had not been a person I could turn to on affairs of the heart. And as for Katie... I knew she and my family would never approve because of who he was. And because of what had subsequently happened, I’d had no ‘closure’, as the kids would say.

And all along there’d been Jock, who had loved me deeply and always protected me.

Now here I was, missing him so desperately that it physically hurt.

Well, I thought, the closure I’d always wanted might possibly be within my grasp...

Yet the truth was, it wasn’t true love forhimI’d discovered since I’d left New Zealand; it was for my husband.

‘Any news from Ireland?’ CeCe asked as Ally walked into the kitchen.

‘No, nothing. Merry, Mary-Kate and Jack all have the Atlantis number and our various mobile numbers, so the ball is in their court.’

‘But, Ally, you said we had to leave next Thursday morning at the latest to have any chance of getting down to Greece to lay Pa’s wreath next Saturday. Which means they all need to be in Nice by the middle of next week to join us on theTitan. Can’t we contact them?’ CeCe urged.

‘No,’ Ally replied firmly. ‘Tiggy said that there’s things both Merry and Mary-Kate need to find out, and we shouldn’t interfere.’

‘To be honest, I think we probably have to accept that we’re not going to have Mary-Kate with us,’ Maia sighed.

‘Besides, there’s only one person who can confirm it’s her and that’s Pa. And he’s dead.’ CeCe looked up at her older sisters’ faces and saw them cringe. ‘Sorry, but he is, and this cruise is all about us saying goodbye to him properly. I mean, Chrissie and I really liked Mary-Kate; she was lovely and the right age to be the missing sister. But she – and her family – never even knew him and... Hi, Ma,’ CeCe said as she walked in.

‘Hello, girls. I... oh dear, Claudia’s been called away to visit a sick relative. Christian’s taken her to Geneva on the speedboat. Which means we’ll have to cope here domestically without her.’

‘That shouldn’t be a problem, Ma,’ said Ally. ‘We’re all completely capable of cooking for ourselves these days.’