It didn’t make sense. Nightingale had never suspected that Bill and Irene Nightingale weren’t his real parents. Even the phrase ‘real parents’ sounded wrong. Of course they were his real parents. In every childhood memory he had, they were there – his mum teaching him the alphabet, his father helping him ride his bike for the first time, clapping as he blew out birthday candles, the pride on their faces when he’d told them he’d been accepted by King’s College, London. There had been tears in his father’s eyes when he’d told Nightingale that he was the first member of the family ever to go to university. Nightingale was sure that if he really had been adopted, his parents would have said something.
Nightingale took deep breaths to steady himself, then put the car into first gear and headed off. To the right there was a field that had been recently ploughed, to the left a six-foot-high stone wall. Ahead, he saw a break in it and a large circular metal mirror attached to a tree. He slowed the car. He saw metal gates and a sign: Gosling Manor. He pulled up alongside the gates and climbed out of the MGB. On the other side of them a narrow paved road curved to the right through thick woodland, mainly deciduous trees that had lost most of their leaves, their bare branches outlined like skeletons against the grey November sky. A thick chain linked the gates, with a brass padlock. Nightingale took out the keys Turtledove had given him. One fitted the padlock. He unravelled the chain, pushed open the gates and got back into his car.
He drove slowly as the road curved to the right, then to the left. When the trees thinned he saw the house and brought the car to a halt. It was a stunning mansion, the sort of grand house you’d see on the cover of Country Life magazine or on a box of chocolates you’d give to an elderly relative at Christmas. The main part of the house was built of sandstone with upper facades of weathered bricks. It was two-storeys high, topped with a steepled tiled roof that was almost the same colour as the bricks, and four towering chimney stacks, which gave it the impression of an ocean-going liner. Vibrant green ivy had been trained to climb the walls, reaching from the ground to the roof, the main vines as thick as a man’s wrist. The entrance, too, was shrouded in ivy, a massive oak door with ornate black hinges. The window-frames were painted white, and to the left of the main building there was a brick garage with four doors, also painted white, and a matching tiled roof. To the left of the house, a magnificent conservatory and, beyond it, another wing seemed to have been added as an afterthought. The house appeared somehow to have grown out of the ground rather than having being built, as if it had pushed itself out of the earth as a living, breathing entity.
Nightingale drove slowly towards it. The paved road merged into a parking area large enough for several dozen vehicles, now littered with dead leaves, and in the middle stood a massive stone fountain, whose centrepiece was a weathered stone mermaid surrounded by dolphins and fish. There was no water in it. He parked the MGB and climbed out. He looked back down the road that disappeared into the woodland. There was no sign of the main road, no sound other than birdsong and the occasional bark of a far-off dog. He turned back to the house. ‘And it’s mine, all mine,’ he muttered to himself. When Turtledove had given him the keys Nightingale had assumed there had been some mistake, but as he stood looking at the grand house he realised such mistakes didn’t happen – people weren’t accidentally handed multimillion-pound mansions. Checks would have been carried out, assurances given, and the only way that the house could be his was if Ainsley Gosling really had been his father.
The thought that his parents had lied to him so completely made his head spin. If he really had been adopted, they couldn’t have kept the secret to themselves, surely. Other members of the family must have known – babies didn’t just appear from nowhere. He took out his mobile phone, scrolled through his address book and called his uncle Tommy. He hadn’t spoken to him since the previous Christmas when he’d driven up to Altrincham to spend the day with him and his aunt.
His aunt answered the phone. ‘Auntie Linda? It’s Jack.’
There was a moment’s hesitation as if she wasn’t sure who Jack was, then she almost yelped: ‘Jack!’
‘Hi, how’s things?’
‘Jack, it’s so good to hear from you. Is everything okay?’
‘Everything’s fine. And Uncle Tommy, how is he?’ He looked around as he talked, and frowned when he saw a CCTV camera half hidden in the ivy over the front door.
‘He’s taken the dog out for a walk. He’ll be so sorry that he missed you. How’s work? Are you married yet?’
‘No, I’m not married yet.’ Jack laughed. ‘Look, I know this is a strange thing to ask out of the blue, but do you by any chance know if I was adopted?’ He spotted another CCTV camera on the side of one of the chimneys, and a third atop the conservatory. There was a long silence and Nightingale thought for a moment he’d lost the connection. ‘Aunty Linda, did you hear me?’
‘What a question, Jack. We don’t hear from you for almost a year and you ask a question like that.’
‘I know, I’m sorry, but something very strange has happened. You’d know, wouldn’t you? You’d know if I was adopted?’
‘Jack, I can’t…’
‘You can’t what, Aunty Linda?’
There was another long silence.
‘Aunty Linda?’
‘Jack, this is really something you’d have to talk to your uncle about.’
‘Why can’t you tell me?’
‘Because Uncle Tommy was your father’s brother – he’s blood. I’m just Tommy’s wife. You have to talk to him.’
‘Aunty Linda?’
‘I have to go, Jack. I’ll get your uncle to call you. Goodbye now.’ The line went dead.
Nightingale put away the phone. She’d sounded nervous, scared even, and he’d never known his aunt to be scared of anything before. He stood back and scrutinised the front of the house. He spotted another three CCTV cameras. He took out the keys Turtledove had given him and walked up to the door. There were two locks, which opened with the same key. The door creaked as he pushed it open. He stepped into a hallway with wood-panelled walls and a marble floor, dominated by a massive chandelier hanging from the ceiling. He looked around for a burglar-alarm console but couldn’t see one and there was no beeping to suggest that a system was working. There was no furniture and no pictures or mirrors on the wall. The house had been cleared but he had no way of knowing if professional burglars or a removal firm had taken everything away. There was a light switch by the door but nothing happened when Nightingale flicked it. He walked across the hallway, his black leather shoes squeaking on the marble, and tried another switch but that didn’t work either.
Three oak doors led off the hallway. Nightingale pushed one open and stepped into a room the size of a basketball court with a vaulted ceiling and a massive white marble fireplace. The room was also devoid of furniture and the carpets had been taken up to reveal oak floorboards. Patches of underlay were stuck to them, like flaking skin, and around the edge, close to the skirting-board, he noted the metal tacks that had been used to keep the carpet in place. Whoever had lifted the carpets had simply ripped them up.
Along one wall a line of windows looked over ornamental gardens with bushes that had been trained into the shapes of exotic animals. Nightingale saw a giraffe, an elephant and a line of horses, and beyond them what looked like a hedge maze. The curtains had been removed but the brass rods from which they had hung were still in place. Nightingale frowned when he saw a small CCTV camera in one corner of the room, aimed at the windows. He could understand the need for security on the exterior of the building but having them inside seemed like overkill.