Lost Among the Living(66)

“Don’t interrupt,” Dottie snapped at him. “Alex is explaining.”

Alex turned his gaze to his uncle. “It was rough at first,” he said, “but I come from a good family, and I was valuable to them.”

“It makes sense, Papa,” Martin said. “Alex has German relatives, and he knows the language.”

“Yes,” Robert said, calculations moving swiftly behind his eyes. Despite how much he’d doubtless had to drink, he looked as sober right now as I felt. “I’m sure that was most useful.”

“It was best to wait it out,” Alex said. “There was no use trying to get home until after the war was over. There was a bureaucratic mix-up, and I wasn’t on any of the lists.” I felt him glance at me. He must know, then—he must know how I had begged the War Office and the Red Cross for any word. I sat numb, staring at my hands in my lap, unable to meet his eyes. Alex paused only briefly, and then continued. “After the Armistice, I got sick.”

“What happened?” Dottie asked.

“Influenza,” Alex replied. “I nearly died. They transported me to a hospital near the Polish border while I was feverish. En route, I was somehow stripped of my papers and my identity disks—I was unconscious at the time, and I have no idea what happened. But I woke up in a hospital east of Breslau, half delirious, with no identity. Eventually, as I slept, it was determined that I was a German, and they began the paperwork to keep me there.”

Influenza. I remembered lying alone in our bed in the Chalcot Road flat, my throat scraped raw, my every nerve and muscle alive with pain.

“My God, Alex,” Martin said softly. “What a mess. I’m amazed you lived through it.”

“When I started to recover,” Alex said, “I was told only that I was going to be sent home. It gave me great comfort for a while, until I realized I was to be kept in the wrong country. I had no papers, no proof of identity, and my German relatives fled the country at the beginning of the war. I had somehow been identified as a German airman who had gone missing three months before—they thought I had been taken captive by mistake. My RAF uniform was long gone by then, and I was in hospital clothes. I had to convince them that I wasn’t who they thought I was.”

“They didn’t notice when you told them they were wrong?” Robert asked.

“Of course they noticed.” If Alex was irked by Robert’s skepticism, he showed no sign. “I told them I was English. But I was speaking to them in fluent German, so how could they know I was telling the truth? The paperwork they had said otherwise. I was far from the consulate, which was already overwhelmed, and I had no money. You have no idea of the chaos in that part of the Continent in the aftermath of war. I eventually spoke to the right people and convinced them, but it took time.”

“Three years of time,” Robert said.

“Papa,” Martin chided.

“You’re home now,” Dottie said. “You’re back with family, where you belong. That’s what matters. I assume you were eventually taken up by the proper channels?”

“Yes,” Alex said. “It was the War Office that finally got me home. I traveled to London, but found that Jo was gone from our flat with no forwarding address. So I found myself a motorcar and came straight here. I didn’t wish to write first, or even to telephone. I thought you might know where Jo could be found, and I couldn’t wait.” He put a hand on mine, where it sat lifeless in my lap.

It was all I could do not to pull away. I made myself sit still, and if he noticed that my hand was cold beneath his warm one, he gave no sign. I stayed silent. In that moment, wild horses could not have dragged the first word from my lips.

It was lies. Alex’s own words confirmed it. The War Office sent me home. I had seen the file only weeks ago; there was no mention of influenza or lost papers. That fact made every word that had just come from my husband’s mouth untrue.

I risked a glance at Martin to see if he showed any sign that he knew. But Martin was sitting rapt, his elbows on his knees, watching Alex. Dottie had a gleam of admiration in her eye, and even Robert had subsided, propping an elbow on the back of Martin’s chair and listening with a half smile on his lips.

My heart was pounding in my chest. Alex, the Alex I had known and loved, was lying—to his family, to me. That was terrifying enough. But what stole the breath from me was the fact that still I did not know where my husband had been for three years. What kind of secret would he bury so deeply he would lie to everyone he loved? Had he worked for the enemy? Had he found another woman? The thought made me sick.

Alex had secrets—years of them. What if somehow Frances had found out? If she had innocently learned something he needed buried, what would he do about it? Would he beg special permission to visit Wych Elm House in private, then push his cousin from the roof? How far, exactly, would he go?

The family was still speaking—Dottie was saying something about limiting gossip about Alex in the village—but suddenly I couldn’t stand any more. I shook Alex’s hand from mine and stood. “I’m very tired,” I said. “I’m going to bed.”

“Are you all right, Cousin Jo?” Martin asked. “You’ve had quite a shock.”

My lips were numb and I could barely force myself to speak. “I’m tired,” I said again. “Good night.”