‘I loved her so much,’ I tell her. ‘She was so strong. She was the greatest person I ever knew.’
She smiles in faint sympathy. ‘I was a sad old thing in them days. Suffered my own heartache.’
She stares around the room. Someone switches on the TV. The opening credits of a show called A New Life in the Sun start to play. Then images of a couple inside their Spanish restaurant, the Blue Marlin, looking stressed as they rinse mussels in a pot.
When Mary’s face returns to mine she is pensive, almost trembling with thought. And then she tells me: ‘I met your daughter.’
It is so out of context that I don’t really understand what she has said.
‘What did you say?’
‘Your child, Marion.’
‘Marion?’
‘Quite recent. We were in hospital together.’
My mind is racing to understand. This is so often the way with life. You spend so much time waiting for something – a person, a feeling, a piece of information – that you can’t quite absorb it when it is in front of you. The hole is so used to being a hole it doesn’t know how to close itself.
‘What?’
‘The psychiatric hospital in Southall. I was a day patient, just a mad old bird crying in a chair. She was there all the time. I came to know her. I had left before she had been born, hadn’t I?’
‘So how did you know it was my daughter?’
She looks at me as if it is a silly question. ‘She told me. She told everyone. That was one of the reasons she was there in the first place. No one believed her of course. She was mad. That’s what they thought . . . She used to talk in French sometimes, and she sang a lot.’
‘What did she sing?’
‘Old songs. Old, old songs. She used to cry when she sang.’
‘Is she still there?’
She shakes her head. ‘She left. It was strange, how it happened—’
‘Strange? How do you mean?’
‘One night she just went. People who were there said there was a lot of noise and commotion . . . Then, when I came in the next day she was gone.’
‘Where? Where?’
Mary sighs. She takes a moment. Looks sad and confused as she thinks about it. ‘No one knew. No one said. They just told us she’d been discharged. But we never knew for sure. That sounds strange, but we didn’t always know what was going on. That was the nature of the place.’
I can’t let go. For so long I have been waiting for hope, and then hope has come along for ten seconds only to be dashed again. ‘Where would she have gone? Did she ever give you any clues as to where she might end up? She must have.’
‘I don’t know. Honestly, I just don’t know.’
‘Did she talk about places?’
‘She’d travelled. She talked about places she’d been. She’d been to Canada.’
‘Canada? Where? Toronto? I was in Toronto.’
‘I don’t know. I don’t think so. She’d also spent a lot of time in Scotland, I think. Her voice was very Scottish. I think she’d travelled around, though. Through Europe.’
‘Do you think she’s in London?’
‘I honestly don’t know.’
I sit back. Try to think. I am simultaneously relieved that Marion is still alive – or had been until recently – and worried for whatever torments she has known.
I wonder if the society has caught up with her. I wonder if someone has tried to silence her. I wonder if Hendrich knows about this and hasn’t told me. I wonder if someone has taken her. The institute in Berlin. Or someone else.
‘Listen, Mary,’ I say, before I leave, ‘I think it’s important that you don’t talk about the past any more. It may have been dangerous for Marion, and it is dangerous for you. You can think about it. But it’s dangerous to talk about your age.’
She winces at some invisible pain as she shifts, with careful effort, in her seat. A minute goes by. She is mulling my words, and dismissing them.
‘I loved someone once. A woman. I loved her madly. Do you understand? We were together, in secret, for nearly twenty years. And we were told we couldn’t talk about that love . . . because it was dangerous. It was dangerous to love.’
I nod. I understand.
‘There comes a time when the only way to start living is to tell the truth. To be who you really are, even if it is dangerous.’
I hold Mary’s hand. ‘You have helped me more than you know.’
One of the nurses comes over and asks if I want a cup of tea and I say I am fine.
And then I ask Mary, in a low voice, ‘Have you ever heard of the Albatross Society?’
‘No. Can’t say I have.’
‘Well, just be careful. Please, don’t talk about, you know . . .’
I look at the clock on the wall. It is a quarter to three. In three hours’ time I need to be on a plane to Dubai, en route to Sydney.
‘Be careful,’ I tell Mary.
She shakes her head. Closes her eyes. Her sigh sounds closer to a cat’s hiss. ‘I am too old to be scared any more. I am too old to lie.’ She leans forward in her chair, and clasps her walking stick until her knuckles whiten. ‘And so are you.’
I step outside and phone Hendrich.
‘Tom? How are things?’
‘Did you know she was alive?’
‘Who?’
‘Marion. Marion. Have you found her? Did you know?’
‘Tom, calm down. No, Tom. Have you got a lead?’
‘She is alive. She was at a hospital in Southall. And then she disappeared.’
‘Disappeared? As in, taken?’
‘I don’t know. She might’ve run away.’
‘From a hospital?’
‘It was a mental hospital.’
A postman trundles along the pavement. ‘I don’t know where she is,’ I whisper into the phone. ‘But I can’t go to Australia. I need to find her.’
‘If she has been taken . . .’
‘I don’t know that.’
‘If she has been taken you will not find her alone. Listen, listen. I will get Agnes to put her ear to the ground in Berlin. After Australia this will be our chief operation. We will find her. If she’s been taken she’ll probably be in Berlin, or Beijing, or Silicon Valley. You won’t find her alone. I mean, you’ve been in London and you haven’t found her.’
‘I haven’t been looking. I mean, I’ve been side-tracked.’
‘Yes, Tom. Yes. You finally see it. You’ve been side-tracked. That is exactly it. Now, we will sort this. But you have a flight to catch.’
‘I can’t. I can’t.’
‘If you want to find Marion, you need to focus again, Tom. You need to go and bring your friend in. Who knows? He himself might have information for us. You know how it is. Albas are the people to ask about albas. You need to get back on track, Tom. The truth is: you don’t know where Marion is. But we know where your friend is. And so does Berlin. Marion has survived for over four hundred years. She’ll still be alive for another week. Just do this in Australia and I swear – I swear – we will work together and we will find her. You have a lead, yes?’