Page 162 of Slack Tide Kill

Pike was already searching, suddenly pale. "A correspondence code. Stanley filed private letters by drawer and number."

Liam was on his feet, lifting papers, careful and frantic at once.

Sally stayed seated, staring at the card.

No police.

Girl removed.

Reverend Pritchard.

C.R. had to be Cyril Rook, Reg's father. So this was a family matter? But also a church matter. A grave matter that required 'the girl' to be removed. A terrible feeling began building in her chest.

"It's not here," Liam said, finishing with his pile and splitting Pike's.

Sally began searching the remainder of the papers in her lap. It did not take long. There was no A/17. No further mention of Reginald Rook anywhere. She looked up at Liam, now double-checking his own pile.

Sally felt the reality settling over her. "It's lost."

"It seems so," Pike said. "And this is everything I have, I'm afraid. Perhaps in an attic somewhere, Stanley's full records remain? The school may have it. Although, I rather think those were destroyed when he passed."

The feeling swelled in Sally's chest. She searched Pike's eyes, then handed him the card. "Tell me, Edwin. Does this note mean what I think it means?"

Pike took the card and studied it for several moments. Then he nodded. "I fear it does. To my shame, I made records like it several times, over the years."

Sally's voice shook. "Girl removed. What does that mean?"

"Most likely, it's a forced adoption." His voice tremored. "It was common, back then. As I said, these were different times. Adoptions like these, they…" he trailed off. "They continued until the mid-1970s. Across the country. Unmarried mothers, often young. It was a grievous injustice. A gross national shame. The mothers were punished. The babies were placed. Hundreds of thousands of children…"

Sally felt her gorge rising. She checked the figures in her head. Reg Rook had been 72 when he died, three years ago. His birth year was 1951. In 1965, he would have been 14 years old.

"We've been looking for someone close to Reg," Sally said. Her voice sounded strange and distant. "Someone outside his circle, but trusted implicitly." She raised the card. "What if it's this person right here?"

Nobody spoke. Perhaps a minute passed. Outside, the rain suddenly began pelting the window with a violent drumbeat. The air darkened as gray clouds swallowed the sky.

"Born 1965," Liam breathed. "Maybe 66. The child would be around 61 now."

"Exactly what the Fates predicted."

"And ready built with a foundational wound," Liam said. "Forced apart from their parents at birth."

Sally slumped back in the sofa as the rain crashed down.

61 years old now. 31 when Tom Richter died. Reg Rook's secret son or daughter, swept away to another family via forced adoption, until the Gray Lady brought them back in on the tide. Traumatized on the very day of their birth.

Not some hired hitman.

The fifth Rook was actually a Rook. They were family.

68 FIRSTBORN

Sally photographed the Reg Rook document, Liam bagged it in a clear plastic wallet, then they thanked Edwin Pike and ran from his door to the squad car. Rain crashed off the roof. Liam started the engine, set the wipers slashing back and forth and started away.

"Reg Rook's firstborn," he said. "We need to find that child. Set the team chasing up local registry offices, as well as parish and diocese records for the adoption certificate. We can try the GRO, General Register Office, but if all this went through some local church, they may have nothing."

Sally barely heard, picturing the hours after the birth. Rook's girlfriend, likely just as young as he was, going through the hardest moments of her young life. The pain of childbirth, the joy, then to have her baby snatched away by those meant to be safeguarding her. Cyril Rook. The reverend. Her teacher…

Then imprisoned. Humiliated. Injury upon injury.