Page 124 of The Stranger in Room Six

Of course, the man in the wheelchair is her son, rather than her old lover, Mabel tells herself after hearing Isabella’s story. She had been confused on the phone when she’d asked her great-granddaughter how Antonio was, because both father and son had the same names.

‘My grandfather – or nonno as we say – has dementia,’ Isabella says. ‘He understands things sometimes, but not often.’

Mabel swallows the lump in her throat. How cruel that they should find each other too late.

Isabella is sitting by her chair, holding her hand. ‘I have been trying to help Nonno to trace his family for years. When he reached twenty-one, his parents told him he was adopted. He contacted the adoption society but some of their records had been destroyed in a flood.’

‘I tried to find him too,’ Mabel says quietly. ‘I didn’t know which society Clarissa had used.’

‘Who was Clarissa?’

Mabel feels her jaw clench. ‘My mother, who I’d thought was my aunt. She made me give away your grandfather.’

‘I’m so sorry.’ She feels the woman’s slim hand take hers; the warmth heats her. ‘Shall I go on?’

‘Please.’

‘My grandfather left for Italy to try and find his father. The authorities had the name of the village he came from.’

‘I remember putting that on the letter I gave the adoption man,’ says Mabel, ‘along with the lace.’

The girl beams. ‘I brought it with me.’ She opens her haversack and brings out the strip the lacemaker had given Mabel all those years ago.

‘Look,’ cries Mabel, ‘I still have my half!’ She opens her bedside drawer and pulls it out.

‘They match,’ breathes Harry.

Antonio, she notices, seems to be watching her every move without saying anything. Her heart wants to break. Her poor sweet boy.

Her great-granddaughter continues. ‘When my grandfather went to Italy to find out more about his roots, he discovered that the village had been destroyed by the Germans.’

‘Yes. It was the same when I went to try and find him after the war.’

‘But in Nonno’s day, they were beginning to rebuild it. His relatives had come back to help with the restoration and welcomed him as if he had been born there. He married my grandmother – a local girl.’

‘But what about my Antonio – your great-grandfather?’ asks Mabel urgently. ‘Did anyone find out what had happened to him?’

Isabella’s gaze falls to the ground. ‘I’m afraid he was drowned on his way back to Italy after the war ended. The boat struck a drifting German mine in the English Channel, even though peace had officially been declared.’

Mabel closes her eyes. So Antonio had died. Not recently but nearly eighty years ago. Wasted years that she’d spent hoping that one day he would come back.

‘After his death, the British authorities sent some of his possessions back to his parents. They included the letters that you had written to him but which he had never received. We think they were sent to a different camp from the one he was in.’

‘So he never knew he had a son,’ chokes Mabel.

‘I’m worried this is too much for my sister,’ cuts in Harry.

‘No,’ says Mabel sharply. ‘I need to know everything. Don’t you see?’

Easing herself up on her stick, she gently rests her cheek against Antonio’s. ‘My darling son. I have thought of you and your father every day of my life.’

He does not move or speak, but she can feel his cheeks are wet.

‘He is crying,’ whispers Isabella. ‘Don’t weep, Nonno. It is all right. At last, we have found your mama and my bisnonna. We are all together.’

Then she looks pleadingly at Mabel. ‘I know this is a lot to ask at your age but, please, will you come back to Italy with us for a visit? My mother, she wants you to. She thinks that in his own environment, Nonno might show us some of the clearer moments he had before.’

‘Yes,’ says Mabel without even needing to think about it. ‘Of course I will.’

Isabella claps her hands joyfully. ‘You can also meet my six younger sisters! We joke that our parents had kept trying for a boy but my papa says he is blessed to have so many women around him. My next two sisters down each have four children but I am single. I have not yet found the right person. My mama says I am right to wait because marriage can last a long time.’

She says all this with a lilt to her voice and a sparkle in her eyes.

Mabel gasps. ‘So I have great-great-grandchildren as well!’ Sad as she is about her son and his father, she feels a burst of excitement too.

Harry looks both relieved and sad. ‘I’ll miss you,’ he says, kneeling at her level, and putting his arms around her. ‘But I think you might be safer there until things have died down a bit.’

‘Are you ready?’ Mabel asks Polly who is perched in the basket of her wheelchair. ‘We are going on a big adventure!’