The Lost Empress Read Free Page A

share a cabin on the same deck?’
    ‘Who knows? Perhaps they had fallen out over something.’
    ‘Maybe,’ Tayte said, wondering at the reasons and drawing no obvious conclusion other than that this new piece of information had indeed deepened the mystery of Alice Stilwell’s life, as Girard had earlier supposed it might. Both Alice and Henry were recorded as ‘lost,’ and that set Tayte thinking about the likelihood of neither body being found.
    ‘Do you know how many bodies went unrecovered?’
    ‘A great many,’ Girard said. Then, as if knowing where Tayte’s question was leading, he answered it for him. ‘Nothing can really be drawn from the fact that neither of the Stilwells were found, Mr Tayte. Not when you consider that only around one-fifth of all those who died were identified. The statistics show that it was far more typical not to be found. Many bodies would have been carried out into the Atlantic, and many remained within the ship itself and are now buried beneath the silt on the riverbed.’
    Girard slid another piece of paper towards Tayte. ‘I don’t know if this will be of any interest to you, but I thought I’d show it to you just in case. It shows which cabin Henry Stilwell was travelling in. Perhaps more importantly, it shows whom he was sharing that cabin with.’
    Tayte scanned the information. ‘Albrecht, Mr W,’ he said, noting that the man was also listed as lost. The information meant little more to him than that Henry Stilwell had shared a cabin on that voyage with another man, with whom he may or may not have been acquainted. He suspected the former and wrote the details in his notebook.
    ‘That’s about everything I managed to find for you,’ Girard said. ‘I hope it has been of some use.’
    ‘I’m sure it has,’ Tayte said, considering that the trip had been very useful indeed.
    That Alice’s husband was in all probability aboard the ship with her, and in particular that he was sharing a cabin on a different deck with a man named Albrecht, led Tayte to suspect that it was of some importance to the reason why Alice had chosen to leave her old life behind when the opportunity presented itself. But there were other facts about Alice, about her family, that he just could not get past. The children pictured in the locket were Alice Stilwell’s children—of that he was certain. He had already identified the birth records of Chester and Charlotte Stilwell, who were born in Kent, England, in 1910 and 1912, respectively, the son and daughter of Alice and Henry. The thing he couldn’t get past—despite his own situation—was how any mother could wilfully choose to abandon her children. What could have happened in her young life that was so terrible that she felt she had no other choice? Having been abandoned by his own mother when he was just a few months old, Tayte’s need to understand the reasons made the assignment all the more personal to him.
    Turning to Girard, Tayte smiled and thanked him. He stood up and collected the records together. ‘Can I keep these?’
    ‘Of course,’ Girard said, rising from his seat with Tayte. ‘The copies are for you.’
    Tayte lifted his briefcase onto the desk and slid the records inside between his laptop and all the other information he’d gathered so far. They made for the door, and as Girard opened it, he paused.
    ‘I wonder whether perhaps you would contact me again once your assignment is finished. I should like to know how it all turns out.’
    ‘Sure. I’d be delighted to.’
    ‘And do you know where your investigation will take you next?’
    Tayte knew where he was going next long before he arrived in Canada. If he was to have any chance of unravelling the secret life of Alice Stilwell for his client, he had to go and talk to the family.
    ‘I’m booked on an overnight flight to England,’ he said, trying hard not to think about getting on another plane again so soon. Losing both of his adoptive parents in a plane