Free Folly's Child by Janet Tanner Page A

It’s Mom we’re talking about – not a stranger in a sensational newspaper item – and there are too many unanswered questions about her death – or her disappearance. If Greg Martin is alive then perhaps he is the only person in the world who can supply the answers.’
    â€˜But Harriet, it sounds as if he has gone into hiding again. If the police can’t find him what makes you think you could? And if they have picked him up he’ll in in custody. They’d never let you see him.’
    Her mouth set in a stubborn line he knew so well.
    â€˜You may be right. But I have to try. Perhaps you don’t want to know the truth – that’s how it looks from where I’m standing. But I want to know. I want to find out what happened. Damn it – I’m going to find out!’
    He shook his head. ‘What good do you think will come from it, Harriet? If she is alive and you find her – do you think that would mean you’d have your Mom back? Of course it wouldn’t. But I honestly believe she is dead. I have thought so for a very long time.’
    â€˜If that is so then it is all the more important to find out the truth,’ she said quietly.
    â€˜Why? What difference can it make now?’
    â€˜Because it seems as though Greg arranged the accident in order to fake his own death. That’s what the woman alleged and what you have said confirms it is quite likely. But when he sailed Mom was with him – no dispute about that is there? So if he survived and Mom died then – don’t you see? He murdered her.’
    â€˜Harriet – for God’s sake!’
    â€˜I’m sorry, Dad, but it’s true. It has to be a possibility. And that is why I’ll see Greg Martin if it’s the last thing I do.’
    His eyes were distant. He looked like an old man suddenly and she realised how he had aged since she had seen him last. Aged since yesterday, perhaps? Never a big man, overnight his frame seemed to have become almost frail and the sinews in his neck were raised and stringy above the cotton roll-neck. She put her arms around him.
    â€˜I don’t want to upset you, Dad, but I have to do it. You must see that …’ She stopped speaking as the buzzer on his desk interrupted her. He broke away, depressing the button.
    â€˜Yes, Nancy? What is it?’
    â€˜I’m sorry to disturb you, Mr Varna, but I have a Mr O’Neill here who says he is from the British and Cosmopolitan Assurance Company. He insists on seeing you.’
    â€˜The man who more or less forced his way into my flat last night!’ Harriet said grimly. ‘ What is he doing in New York?’
    â€˜Come to see me, obviously,’ Hugo returned drily. But his smile was strained and Harriet was alarmed by how drawn and old he suddenly looked.
    â€˜Leave him to me, Dad. I’ll deal with him.’
    Tom O’Neill was in the outer office looking at one of the pictures that lines the walls – Rena, Hugo’s favourite house model, wearing a loose cut trench coat over a tailored shirt and doe-skin pants.
    â€˜Mr O’Neill, I really would prefer it if you didn’t bother my father just now. There is nothing he can tell you beyond what I already have – that as far as we are concerned my mother has been dead for more than twenty years.’
    â€˜Perhaps.’ Today, in the half daylight, half white neon of the office, his eyes managed to look bluer and sharper than ever, like the ice-cold waters of a sunlit fiord. ‘Nevertheless I am afraid I must insist on seeing him, Miss Varna.’
    â€˜Look – he’s in no fit state …’ Harriet argued. ‘Why don’t you go to Australia and talk to the Vincenti woman before you start bothering us?’
    â€˜That is my next port of call,’ he said easily. ‘But right now I am here. So if you would kindly tell your father …’
    â€˜Mr O’Neill,