‘That’s quite possible. It was a lot of money.’
They stopped walking beside a door to their right. The man knocked once, opened it, and set their bags down. Inside, the room was bright, predominantly white, with splashes of pale blue on the few items of furniture and on the blinds at the window, which looked out over a communal recreational garden in full summer bloom.
The bespectacled Johann Langner was sitting up in bed, wired to the electrocardiograph machine beside him, staring at his guests through the right-hand side of his glasses; the left lens was blacked out. He raised a wavering hand, crooked with arthritis, and brushed his wispy white hair back off his brow as Tayte and Jean approached. The man they had been following made the introductions.
‘Herr Langner, this is Mr Tayte, the American genealogist, and his associate, Professor Summer.’
Langner smiled, exaggerating the facial disfigurement around his cheekbones and jawline, revealing crooked teeth that were stained brown from old age and tobacco. ‘I lost it during the war,’ Langner said, clearly noticing that Tayte was staring at the blacked-out lens. In contrast to the man who had just shown them in, his German accent was decidedly pronounced.
Tayte returned Langner’s smile. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘I didn’t mean to stare.’
‘That’s quite all right,’ Langner said. ‘Most people do the first time, and believe me, you’d stare harder if I took my glasses off.’
The notion seemed to amuse Langner. He chuckled quietly to himself, then turned to the man by the door and said, ‘You can leave us now, Christoph.’
Christoph frowned. ‘Where’s Ingrid? Perhaps I should wait with you until she returns.’
‘Ingrid is my personal nurse,’ Langner said to Tayte and Jean. ‘This is my third heart attack and Ingrid has literally saved my life every time. She should return shortly.’ Langner reached for something beside the bed. He fumbled for a moment, and then he brought a cabled switch into view. ‘I’m not so old and weak that I’m incapable of pressing this button if I need help,’ he said to Christoph. ‘Besides, I’m sure I’m in good hands.’ He smiled at his guests again.
‘Very well,’ Christoph said, ‘but I must insist on waiting outside.’
‘Yes, yes. If you must,’ Langner said. Once Christoph was out of earshot, he added, ‘He means well, but he treats me like a child.’
Tayte just smiled, and realising that he was still holding his briefcase, he put it down by the side of the bed and pulled two chairs closer so that he and Jean could sit down. As he did so, he wondered why such chair manufacturers didn’t make them wider. Maybe then he wouldn’t have to push the arms down so hard just to get up again.
‘Now, Mr Tayte,’ Langner said once they had settled. ‘I feel I must apologise to you for not being able to see you sooner.’
‘That’s perfectly understandable,’ Tayte said. ‘I’m just glad to have the opportunity now.’
Tayte had first tried to meet with Johann Langner the year before, soon after he returned home to Washington, DC from a visit to London, but every time he’d tried to contact Langner he’d been informed that his health was in too poor a state for him to see anyone. That is, until recently.
‘Very well,’ Langner said. ‘Now you mentioned in your letter that you believe I can help you to find your birth parents.’
Tayte drew a deep breath and held on to it as he thought through the implications of that simple statement. For now at least, he felt that all the failed research he had conducted into his own family history over the years really came down to this man and what he may or may not be able to tell him. When the call he’d been waiting on throughout his previous assignment had at last come in, confirming that Langner was able to see him, he’d been all the more anxious to meet the man. He reached inside his jacket and pulled out the photograph his mother had left for him when she’d abandoned him in Mexico forty years ago, when he was just a few months old.
‘As I’m sure you know,’ Tayte said. ‘I trace people’s family history for a living. I’ve been trying to trace my own, so far without success, ever since I found out I was adopted.’
‘Really?’ Langner said. ‘A genealogist who knows nothing of his own family history. How painfully ironic that must be for you.’
‘You can say that again,’ Tayte said. ‘But it keeps me going. In a way I feel it drives me to be better at what I do, in the hope that I’ll someday be good enough to find the answers I’m looking for. I was told I’d been adopted soon after my adoptive parents died in a plane crash, when I was in my teens. They left me this.’ Tayte handed the photograph to Langner. ‘I believe the woman in the picture is my birth mother. I’m trying to find her, or at least find out who she is. The photo was taken in 1963.’