The Last Night in London by Karen White (reading list .TXT) 📕

when I’d first met him, how something about his face reminded me of someone who wasn’t Colin. That something else had kept tugging on my memory, and I still couldn’t place it. Not quite.

“Maddie?” I turned toward Penelope, realizing she’d been speaking to me.

“I’m so sorry—what did you say?”

“I was saying that Precious is asleep again, but the nurse has promised to let us know the minute she awakens. Did you bring the dolphin?”

“Yes, I’ve got it.”

“Splendid. And I have the photograph of Graham you were asking about. The one of him in his uniform. Precious did bring it to the hospital—she was holding it when they brought her in.” She picked up her purse and pulled out a small sandwich baggie. “One of the nurses was kind enough to keep it safe until we arrived.”

Reluctantly, I turned my back on James. “Thanks.” I carefully removed the photo from the bag, then held it in the palm of my hand.

“Well, Colin, I daresay it’s your doppelgänger.” Hyacinth Ponsonby put her hand on my arm to lower it so she could see better. “The resemblance is really quite remarkable.”

“I still don’t see it.” Colin frowned. “He’d be my . . .”

“Great-uncle,” Hyacinth finished. “Your paternal grandmother’s brother. I’ve gone over your family tree and records enough times that I feel as if I’m part of the family!” She laughed—“tittered” would be more accurate—and turned her attention back to the photograph. “I’m always amazed by family genetics. But what a fine-looking man. And in uniform, too. I can see why your Precious would have been enamored with him. And why she has such a fondness for Colin.”

“Oh, no, Precious and Graham . . . ,” Penelope began, then stopped, considering Hyacinth’s words.

I did, too, as I turned the photograph over and looked at the writing on the back. Sweet dreams, darling. I met Colin’s gaze and knew he was remembering Precious saying those exact words. But many people said that—including my own mother. And Eva had lived with Precious, had probably copied many of her little sayings, enough to feel comfortable writing one on the back of a photograph. When I’d roomed with Arabella, it had taken me less than a month to begin using words like “loo” and “brolly” and putting milk in my cup before I poured my coffee. And yet . . .

As if reading my mind, Colin reached for my backpack and pulled out the bundle of Sophia’s letters. A small note, separated from the others, sat on top. It was the single letter we had from Eva, the correspondence she’d sent to Sophia in 1939 after she’d left her purse behind at a dinner party. I remembered the first time I’d seen the handwriting, how I’d thought it looked like a child had been practicing her penmanship.

Colin carefully slid the note out of its envelope and moved to stand next to me. I held the back of the photo next to it, looked at one and then at the other, letting the implications sink in, allowing them to reverberate in the place in my brain that made clowns out of clouds, and boogeymen out of shadows. The place where the improbable became possible.

“It might not mean anything,” I said out loud, “but this might.”

I pulled out one of the letters written by Precious in Paris and sent to Sophia in the decades after the war, and placed it next to the note and the back of the photograph.

Colin’s eyebrows knitted together. “I’m not a handwriting expert, but it looks to me as if all of these were written by the same person.” He pointed to the signature at the bottom of the note about the purse. “By Eva Harlow.” He slid one of the Paris letters closer. “Or by Precious Dubose?”

“Except Eva Harlow doesn’t appear to have existed, according to the archives,” Hyacinth said. “We have exhausted all our resources. The name does appear in various records, but none in Devon and certainly none who would be the right age.”

James cleared his throat. “Although you did find something new to show us, Hyacinth?”

She tittered again. “About your Graham! I’d completely forgotten in all this excitement. I feel as if I’m the one with mummy brain and not my daughter. Although comparatively, Jessica is much more clearheaded than I am right now.” She grinned at Penelope and James, then slid her gaze over to Colin. “You’ll understand just as soon as you hold your first grandchild, I can assure you,” she said, pulling her purse straps off her shoulder.

“Let me get that for you,” James said, placing her large yet efficient purse on the table, exposing the organized sections inside, filled with all sorts of papers and office supplies, as well as a stuffed blue giraffe and a pacifier neatly tucked inside a pocket next to an iPad.

I opened my mouth to say something, my words forgotten as I saw James’s profile turned away from me, a smile creasing the side of his face. I stopped breathing for a moment, forgetting all politeness and simply staring at him. “Well, burn my biscuits!”

Everyone turned to look at me. Hands trembling with excitement, I dug into my backpack and pulled out a cluster of the cut photographs. I pointed to the one of a woman sitting on a park bench, her hat in her lap, her face turned so that we saw her profile and the entire expanse of perfect skin on the left side of her neck. “Look,” I said, indicating her nose. “Do you see this slight curve at the bridge? It saves her nose from being perfect, but it makes her more interesting. She’s still a beautiful woman, so people don’t really notice it.”

“True,” said Colin.

“Hang on,” I said. “I’m not done.” I reached inside the backpack again and pulled out the framed photograph of the woman stepping from the car, her face also in profile, and then one of the more current photos I’d taken of Precious in her flat. “These two women are the