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Franklin?’ He put a hand to his forehead. ‘My memory just isn’t what it was.’
    ‘You don’t know what the house is worth?’
    The solicitor looked over the rims of his glasses at Nightingale. ‘I’m just the middle man, I haven’t seen the house. I was just told that it’s substantial.’
    ‘Mr Turtledove, this is all very unusual, isn’t it?’
    ‘Mr Nightingale,’ said the solicitor, ‘I’ve never had a case like it.’

5
    N ightingale drove slowly down the narrow country road. The sky had darkened while he had been in the solicitor’s office, and it was starting to rain. He switched on the wipers, which swished back and forth leaving greasy streaks on the glass. He glanced down at the map Turtledove had given him. When he looked up he saw a tractor pulling out in front of him and jammed on the brakes. The tyres couldn’t grip the wet road and the car slid to the right. Nightingale took his foot off the brake pedal, then pumped it and brought the skid under control, managing to stop just inches from the back of the tractor. The driver was wearing headphones, his head bobbing up and down in time to whatever music he was listening to, totally oblivious to how close he’d come to killing Nightingale. As Nightingale sat with his hands on the steering-wheel, heart pounding, the tractor roared off, leaving a plume of black smoke behind it. His mind hadn’t been on the road, he realised. He’d been too busy thinking about his meeting with the solicitor.
    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 façades 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