The police operator told Nora not to return.
She gave the address, Adrian’s name, and the time printed on the clearance notice.
An officer would contact her.
Leah’s brother called next. He told them the same thing.
Stay where you are. Preserve everything.
Nora intended to listen.
Then Adrian sent a photograph of the entrance hall.
The doorbell panel had been pulled from the wall.
Behind it was a shallow wooden recess.
Empty.
Nora stared.
A second photograph arrived.
A cream envelope held between Adrian’s fingers.
We can settle this before anyone else gets involved.
Leah looked at the screen.
“He wants you there.”
“I know.”
“Then don’t go.”
Nora enlarged the photograph.
There was writing across the envelope.
A solicitor’s name. A date.
And a dark crescent-shaped stain near one corner.
She went back through the blue folder.
One of Ruth’s handwritten complaints described an incident in the office.
Mr Voss took my post again. Said anything delivered to his building belonged to him.
Attached was a carbon copy of a letter.
Nora read the first line.
Then the second.
“Leah.”
“What?”
“The envelope isn’t the evidence.”
They reached Bell Street at six thirty-five.
Leah remained outside, speaking to the police operator, while Nora stood beneath the security camera of the convenience shop opposite Wren House.
She called Adrian.
“I’m here.”
He appeared inside the building’s glass entrance.
“Come in.”
“No.”
He looked past her toward Leah.
“You’ve brought someone.”
“I’ve told someone.”
Adrian held up the envelope.
“Then I suppose this doesn’t matter.”
“It matters. Just less than you think.”
He opened the door a few inches.
For the first time, Nora noticed how tired he looked.
“My father’s dead,” he said. “Your mother’s dead. What exactly are you hoping to achieve?”
“I want my name.”
“You have a name.”
“The one my mother gave me.”
His expression tightened.
“Your mother gave you Eleanor.”
Nora did not answer.
He looked at the envelope.
“It’s a letter arranging a meeting. That’s all. No confession. No great revelation.”
“You’ve read it, then.”
“Of course.”
“Read the last paragraph.”
He hesitated.
Nora already knew it from the carbon copy in the folder. Ruth had written it in a follow-up complaint after her solicitor’s reply disappeared.
As requested, my colleague has retained the duplicate recording. Should you be unable to attend, please telephone to rearrange.
Adrian lowered the envelope.
“Thirty years ago.”
“Yes.”
“You think some solicitor kept a tape for thirty years?”
“I don’t know.”
It was the truth.
She had the firm’s name now. Leah’s brother was tracing its successor.
For the first time that morning, Adrian had no answer prepared.
Nora took a step closer, staying on the pavement.
“What happened to Ruth?”
His eyes flicked toward Leah.
“Ask your mother.”
“I heard her.”
“Then you heard a woman explain why she stole a child.”
Nora felt the words land.
She let them.
“Yes,” she said. “I did.”
Adrian looked surprised.
“She still carried me out,” Nora continued. “What did you carry out?”
He opened his mouth.
Closed it.
Behind him, a worker appeared in the corridor.
“Mr Voss? Are we starting downstairs?”
“Wait.”
“We’ve already got—”
“I said wait.”
Adrian turned back.
Nora kept her voice low.
“Were you holding the phone?”
His face changed.
Just a little.
But she saw the nineteen-year-old from the newspaper cutting pass across it.
“My father said she’d fallen.”
“Did you believe him?”
“He said an ambulance wouldn’t help.”
“Did you believe that?”
Adrian gripped the edge of the door.
For a moment she thought he would close it.
Instead, he said, “I was going to call.”
Nora heard Leah stop speaking behind her.
“I had the receiver in my hand.”
A vehicle slowed at the end of the street.
Adrian saw it.
His eyes went to the envelope.
Then to Nora.
“I didn’t know he was going to burn it.”
The police car stopped beside the kerb.
Adrian stepped backward.
Nora thought he might run.
But the worker was behind him, and the corridor beyond was crowded with tools.
He stood in the doorway, still holding the letter.
When the officer approached, Adrian said the same thing again.
This time much more quietly.
“I didn’t know about the fire.”