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‘The family business?’
‘Stolen art.’
‘You mean Sarah, Ray, and Nate stole—?’
‘Of course not!’
Lili breathed a sigh of relief. For a moment, she wondered what she’d got Alex involved in.
‘I’m talking about Joseph and Otto. I mean George.’
As they stepped into the old wooden summerhouse, Lili turned to Elspeth. ‘Who is Otto?’
Elspeth quickly shook her head. ‘Forget I said that. It was a mistake.’
Lili eyed her. She was hiding something.
Elspeth stood in the room, gazing around the cabin.
Lili could hear the children playing upstairs on the mezzanine. She glanced at Elspeth, and said, ‘I know about Corfu.’
Elspeth shot her a look. ‘What are you talking about?’
‘Sarah told me that Joseph and his parents, who were artists, were visiting friends on the island of Corfu when they were caught up in the Nazi invasion of the Ionian Islands. She said her grandfather and father escaped the island. Joseph never went into detail about how they escaped or what happened to his mother – Sarah’s paternal grandmother.’
Lili took a breath before continuing, ‘Apparently, he wouldn’t speak of it. After the war, they returned to England. With no friends and family who had survived the war, and their London home turned to rubble, they had nothing left but the old, abandoned summerhouse in Suffolk where, eventually, Sarah’s grandfather built another house in the grounds.’
Lili chewed her fingernail, avoiding eye contact while she was telling Elspeth all this. There was something else on Lili’s mind – the two gravestones she’d stumbled across in the British Cemetery on Corfu. She still couldn’t make sense of it.
There was only one obvious explanation: the two people who returned from Corfu after the war to live in the summerhouse were not Joseph and George. Did Elspeth know the truth?
‘Are you all right?’ Elspeth asked Lili. ‘You’ve gone awfully quiet.’
Lili stared at her, wondering how much she knew. And if she had no clue, then how would she tell her that her ex-husband and father-in-law had stolen identities and had been living under assumed names for decades? She didn’t know who they were, but she knew who they weren’t.
Elspeth sat down on the leather sofa beside the fireplace.
Lili joined her. Before she’d brought that up, there had been something else, something more pressing, on her mind. She cut to the chase. ‘Can you tell me who Alena is?’
‘Alena?’ Elspeth blurted. ‘How do you know that name?’
‘Joseph was in hospital suffering from delirium.’
Elspeth nodded. ‘Yes, Sarah told me.’
‘He called me Alena. I must look a lot like her. Please tell me what you know.’ Lili reached into her pocket. ‘I think I have some connection to Joseph, to your family, but I don’t know what it is.’ Lili told her all about being found wandering alone on a beach in Corfu when she was little, her parents’ fatal trip to another Greek island, and her mother’s apparent estrangement from her family.
‘Ray was helping me trace my relatives, but if you know something … anything …’ Lili trailed off. ‘I can’t make sense of it. But I found this.’ Lili handed Elspeth the old photo. If she couldn’t ask Joseph, then perhaps his ex-wife might know something.
Elspeth took the photograph.
‘That’s me with my mother. This photo was taken upstairs in the mezzanine. I have a fleeting memory of this place, but I don’t know this man.’ She pointed.
Elspeth stared at her, speechless. When she found her voice, she said, ‘You are this child in the photograph?’
Lili nodded. ‘Yes, that’s me.’ Hanging around the toddler’s neck was a necklace with a ring on the end. Lili showed Elspeth her the pendant with the Hebrew wedding band. My mother died not long after this photo was taken. I never knew either of my parents. I’ve only just learned about them.’
‘And it led you back here?’
