another town, many miles away. Hope knew nothing about it.’
Justin said nothing, only stared hard at Primo. It was Evie who exclaimed in horror at what she’d just heard.
‘Yes, it was wicked,’ Primo said, looking at her warmly. ‘Hope grieved for her “dead” child, but she grieved a thousand times more to think that he was alive and living apart from her, perhaps thinking she had abandoned him.’
Justin gave a small, convulsive jerk, but he didn’t speak.
‘How did she find out?’ Evie asked.
‘The aunt died. At the end she sent for Hope and tried to tell her what had happened, but she was too near the end to make much sense. Hope understood that her child had lived, had been stolen, and nothing else. She didn’t even have the name of the town, because the aunt had gone to a place where she wasn’t known. Apart from that, all she had was the date of his birth. This.’
He pushed a scrap of paper across the table. The date written on it was exactly two weeks before the date on Justin’s official birth certificate.
‘I began looking for him fifteen years ago,’ Primo resumed. ‘It took years to find the place where a baby boy had been abandoned soon after this date. At last my investigators narrowed it down to one possibility. Then I thought the search was over because this boy had been adopted by a couple called Strassne.’
There was silence in the room for a moment. Justin did not speak, but his grip on Evie’s hand became painful.
‘For several years he lived with them as Peter Strassne,’ Primo said. ‘But he assumed a new identity twenty years ago, and that was when the trail went cold. The deed poll said that Peter Strassne had become Frank Davis, but nobody ever heard of Frank Davis after that.’
Because he’d changed his name again, Evie thought sadly. And then again and again. And every time the trail grew a little colder. By the time he became Justin Dane there was nothing left to link him with his earlier identities.
‘Once he’d seemingly vanished into thin air,’ Primo resumed, ‘my only hope was if he too was searching, and I might pick up his search. That is why I am here. I think I already know the answer, but will you tell me if your name was ever Peter Strassne?’
Slowly Justin nodded his head. Then he pushed the file of papers across the table. Primo examined it briefly, and nodded.
‘I am satisfied,’ he said.
‘As easy as that?’ Justin asked hoarsely. ‘What can a few papers prove?’
‘I told you I already knew the answer. I knew as soon as I saw you. Your resemblance to your mother is remarkable. There are tests that can establish your blood tie once and for all, but there is no doubt in my mind that you are Hope Rinucci’s firstborn son.’
Chapter Nine
THE London to Naples flight left early, so the three of them spent the previous night in the airport hotel.
‘Uncle Toni knows why I’m here,’ Primo said as they sat over dinner the night before. ‘But I didn’t say anything to Mamma before I left, for fear of raising her hopes. But now I’ve called him and told him everything, and he’s going to prepare her gently. She’s dreamed of this for so long that the reality is going to come as a shock to her.’
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