Page 17 of Right Place, Right Time
‘No problem.’ I’m genuinely happy for him. ‘Is that why you don’t want to part with the books in the library? Because your mother would read them with you?’
Adam nods. ‘Yes, I have so few memories of her that those are special ones.’
‘I completely understand.’ I mean every word.
‘I can see that,’ Adam says, his gaze again lingering on me for just a moment longer than necessary.
‘Now, going back to your grandfather’s story,’ I say hurriedly, uncomfortable once more with this level of intimacy. ‘Do you know if your grandfather bought this house himself or did he inherit it?’
‘He inherited it from my great-grandfather, I believe,’ Adam says, and I get the feeling he’s happy to get back to the matter in hand too. ‘I don’t think my grandfather could have afforded to buy a house like this on his wages alone – he worked in banking, but he was only a bank manager, and my grandmother, Lily, she worked at one of the universities as a secretary if I remember rightly.’
‘Your grandmother passed away before you went to live with grandfather?’
‘Yes.’
I think for a moment. ‘Do you know what your great-grandfather did? He must have had a good job to have afforded a house like this.’
‘He was a professor at one of the universities. I think he worked at the Cavendish Laboratory for a while. When you said your assistant worked there, the name rang a bell. I’m pretty sure that’s where my great-grandfather worked too.’
‘The Cavendish Laboratory specialises in physics. He must have been a professor of physics at the university.’
‘Possibly, I’m afraid I don’t actually know. God, that’s awful, isn’t it?’
‘Most people couldn’t tell you what their great-grandparents did for a living.’
‘I bet you know what your great-grandparents did, don’t you?’ Adam smiles knowingly.
‘I do, actually. My maternal ones anyway. My great-grandmother, Dotty, was one of the first female engineers at RAF Duxford in the Second World War, and my great-grandfather, Harry, was a US serviceman, who was stationed here in Cambridge at the same time.’
‘Cool. Did they become sweethearts and get married after the war?’
‘Not exactly.’
‘What happened then? They must have stayed together or you wouldn’t be here now? Wait.’ Adam pretends to look shocked. ‘She didn’t get pregnant, did she, by a GI Joe?’
‘She did get pregnant before they were married,’ I tell him calmly, not rising to the bait. ‘But there was a wedding shortly afterwards – if it makes you feel better?’
Adam smiles. ‘Thank you, yes, it does.’
‘After the war, Harry left America and came to live here in the UK. He brought my grandmother, Sarah, up himself, with a little help from my great-aunt Amelia.’
‘What happened to Dotty?’
‘She died,’ I say quickly. ‘When my grandmother was very young.’
‘Oh, that’s very sad,’ Adam says, looking like he genuinely means it.
‘Yes, it was. Dotty went missing during the war. No one knows exactly what happened to her, but, eventually, when she didn’t return home, she was presumed dead.’
‘Christ, and she had a young child too?’
‘My grandmother, yes.’
‘And no one in your family ever found out exactly what happened to her?’ Adam seems genuinely interested, so I’m happy to talk about this with him.
‘No, she’s a bit of an enigma within the family. Some people think she might have just up and left, but others think she must have been killed.’
‘So, it’s a bit of a mystery then, what happened to her?’
