The Rosie Project (Don Tillman #1)(47)

Charlie again! This was ridiculous.

‘The DNA,’ I said, forcefully. ‘I need the sample.’

Lefebvre laughed as though I had made the biggest joke of all time. There were tears running down his face. Actual tears.

‘You’ve made my day.’

He grabbed a tissue from a box on the reception desk, wiped his face, blew his nose and tossed the used tissue in the bin as he left with my proposal.

I walked to the bin and retrieved the tissue.





20


I sat with a newspaper in the University Club reading room for the third day in succession. I wanted this to look accidental. From my position, I could observe the queue at the counter where Rosie sometimes purchased her lunch, even though she was not qualified to be a member. Gene had given me this information, reluctantly.

‘Don, I think it’s time to leave this one alone. You’re going to get hurt.’

I disagreed. I am very good at dealing with emotions. I was prepared for rejection.

Rosie walked in and joined the queue. I got up and slipped in behind her.

‘Don,’ she said. ‘What a coincidence.’

‘I have news on the project.’

‘There’s no project. I’m sorry about … last time you saw me. Shit! You embarrass me and I say sorry.’

‘Apology accepted,’ I said. ‘I need you to come to New York with me.’

‘What? No. No, Don. Absolutely not.’

We had reached the cash register and failed to select any food and had to return to the tail of the queue. By the time we sat down, I had explained the Asperger’s research project. ‘I had to invent an entire proposal – three hundred and seventy-one pages – for this one professor. I’m now an expert on the Savant phenomenon.’

It was difficult to decode Rosie’s reaction but she appeared to be more amazed than impressed.

‘An unemployed expert if you get caught,’ she said. ‘I gather he’s not my father.’

‘Correct.’ I had been relieved when Lefebvre’s sample had tested negative, even after the considerable effort that had been required to obtain it. I had already made plans, and a positive test would have disrupted them.

‘There are now only three possibilities left. Two are in New York, and both refused to participate in the study. Hence, I have categorised them as difficult, and hence I need you to come to New York with me.’

‘New York! Don, no. No, no, no, no. You’re not going to New York and neither am I.’

I had considered the possibility that Rosie would refuse. But Daphne’s legacy had been sufficient to purchase two tickets.

‘If necessary I will go alone. But I’m not confident I can handle the social aspects of the collection.’

Rosie shook her head. ‘This is seriously crazy.’

‘You don’t want to know who they are?’ I said. ‘Two of the three men who may be your father?’

‘Go on.’

‘Isaac Esler. Psychiatrist.’

I could see Rosie digging deep into her memory.

‘Maybe. Isaac. I think so. Maybe a friend of someone. Shit, it’s so long ago.’ She paused. ‘And?’

‘Solomon Freyberg. Surgeon.’

‘No relation to Max Freyberg?’

‘Maxwell is his middle name.’

‘Shit. Max Freyberg. He’s gone to New York now? No way. You’re saying I’ve got one chance in three of being his daughter. And two chances in three of being Jewish.’

‘Assuming your mother told the truth.’

‘My mother wouldn’t have lied.’

‘How old were you when she died?’

‘Ten. I know what you’re thinking. But I know I’m right.’

It was obviously not possible to discuss this issue rationally. I moved to her other statement.

‘Is there a problem with being Jewish?’

‘Jewish is fine. Freyberg is not fine. But if it’s Freyberg it would explain why my mother kept mum. No pun intended. You’ve never heard of him?’

‘Only as a result of this project.’

‘If you followed football you would have.’

‘He was a footballer?’

‘A club president. And well-known jerk. What about the third person?’

‘Geoffrey Case.’

‘Oh my God.’ Rosie went white. ‘He died.’

‘Correct.’

‘Mum talked about him a lot. He had an accident. Or some illness – maybe cancer. Something bad, obviously. But I didn’t think he was in her year.’

It struck me now that we had been extremely careless in the way we had addressed the project, primarily because of the misunderstandings that had led to temporary abandonments followed by restarts. If we had worked through the names at the outset, such obvious possibilities would not have been overlooked.

‘Do you know any more about him?’

‘No. Mum was really sad about what happened to him. Shit. It makes total sense, doesn’t it? Why she wouldn’t tell me.’

It made no sense to me.

‘He was from the country,’ Rosie said. ‘I think his father had a practice out in the sticks.’

The website had provided the information that Geoffrey Case was from Moree in northern New South Wales, but this hardly explained why Rosie’s mother would have hidden his identity if he was the father. His only other distinguishing feature was that he was dead, so perhaps it was this to which Rosie was referring – her mother not wanting to tell her that her father had died. But surely Phil could have been given this information to pass on when Rosie was old enough to deal with it.