Chapter 46 Section five

It took Catherine an hour and a half to eat a meal without taste.Even so, it was not half past eight when she returned to Lon Nol.But Tom was already waiting for her, sitting on one of the lime steps outside her cabin.The afterglow of the setting sun surrounded him.He was pale, and Catherine felt suddenly sad.She has never felt that he is already an old man, he is always hale and hearty and full of energy.However, he drove all day today, and he may not even have dinner. Seeing her, he said, "Thank goodness you're back. We need to sit down and talk." "How is George?" she asked him, letting him in, "what's a drink?"

"Is there any whiskey?" "Irish whiskey only," she pointed to the closet, "I'll pour a glass of red wine." She went to the kitchen and opened a bottle of red wine.The tumbler in Tom's hand was almost empty of Bushmere whiskey when he came back. "How's George?" she asked again, ready to hear the worst. "He's awake. I was with him by his bedside when his eyes were open." "Are you with him? How did you get in?" Tom sighed. "What do you think? I lied. He obviously can't talk yet. He seems to recognize me, though. I told Anne I'd go back tomorrow and maybe I could talk to him then. "

"I don't think this is the time to talk about Scardale and Alison." Tom gave her a cool look.After all these years, his eyes were still sharp; Catherine felt like a butterfly on the tip of a needle. "You're saying you want him to forget that he ever asked you to stop the whole thing." "No," she denied, "I think if something about Scardale really caused him to have this heart attack, he probably wouldn't talk about it." Tom shrugged. "I suppose it's up to George, and I won't make him. But I won't stop him if he wants to. It's better for him to tell me what's on his mind than for him to keep it all in. Maybe that would give him another heart attack." He said stubbornly, "When we were talking about it, we ran into Paul, and he introduced me to his fiancée. We have to talk." He said hard Said, picked up the half glass of whiskey left in his hand and took another big gulp. "Let's look at those documents again."

Catherine turned on the computer, and Tom paced back and forth in the small living room.As soon as she opened the first copy of the ID on the screen, he came to her. "Let me look at Helen's birth certificate again," he said.She pressed the key and Helen's details appeared on the screen. "My God!" he roared.He turned and went to the fire, with his arms on the mantelpiece, and his head bowed. Catherine rocked to and fro in her chair. "Tom, tell me what comes to your mind, will you?" Tom straightened his shoulders and turned to look at her.If he didn't say it, she would have guessed what was going on.That way, he had at least some control over what she already knew and what she intended to do about it. "You've seen Helen, haven't you?" he said lazily.

Catherine nodded. "We first met last year, in Brussels." "Don't you think she looks like a person?" "It's really interesting, I really feel like I've seen her somewhere. Now, I understand, she has something to do with the Scardale people. I think it's the Cuttle family genetics at work." Tom sighed again. "Oh, there's something about it. Kind of like her mother. More like her father, though." She frowned. "What the hell do you mean, Tom? When did you meet Samuel and Dorothy Wainwright?" Tom sank heavily on the chair. "I've never met any of them. I'm not talking about Winwhite. I'm talking about Philip Hawking."

"Hawking?" Catherine repeated, completely lost. "Her eyes are too similar to Philip Hawking, and she also inherited his skin color. You may not be able to see it from the photo, but you can tell when you look at Helen's skin, it is really similar." "You're mistaken," she objected. "How is it possible that George doesn't see the resemblance?" "Maybe he didn't connect them until his marriage to Scardale was right in front of him. Also, you said that Paul told you that George was disturbed before they went to Scardale." "It could still be a coincidence," insisted Catherine stubbornly.If she were to write the story, she would have to maintain that every fact was believable, so she had her case in place long before she had to convince an editor.She can also use Tom's experience to make her argument more plausible.

"Look at this birth certificate," he said. "Her name is Helen Ruth. I know Ruth is a very common name, but looking back, it's not uncommon to have a child's middle name, but it's usually the grandparents." surname. You put that together with other information we have here that Helen's middle name is 'Ruth,' which is a bit of an odd coincidence." Catherine lit a cigarette to put the irritating question aside for a while. "So, if Philip Hawking is Helen's father ... who is her mother?" "Not his wife, that's for sure. Ruth Carter hadn't had a baby in June 1964—she was at her husband's trial at the time, and we saw her at least once a week in the run-up to the trial, when she Not pregnant."

"Some women don't see changes during pregnancy," she explains, "just look a little fatter." He shook his head. "Catherine, when we first met Ruth, she was a stocky farmer's wife. But when Hawking was on trial, it seemed that the wind from Scardale to the Dundee Valley could knock her down. June 1964 There is no way she could have given birth to a daughter." "Who was it then?" Catherine pressed on. "I don't think we took into account the fact that he might have had a wild affair with Dorothy Wainwright." "I think it's possible," said Tom. "Dorothy was only in her thirties. But if Hawking had had sex with her, I think he would have said it in court and shown that he was just a normal Sexy man, but not the sort of girl rape thing. We always thought he married Ruth because he was a normal man - so if he was accused of harassing Alison, he would be like every Just like a normal man, use the fact of his marriage to deny that charge. Besides, there is no evidence that he was with Wing White. However, if we insist that the woman who claims to be Janice Wing White is really Alison, then We found this woman of childbearing age, she lived in Wing White's house, and she had a clear relationship with Hawking. We know from the photo evidence that she was raped by Hawking." His words were resounding.

"Alison Carter is Helen Markowitz's mother, her maiden name was Winwhite." Catherine shouted, and Tom's evasive words were cleared up by her. "Philip Hawking is his father." She looked at Tom and Tom stared at him.In the face of solid facts, everything has a reasonable explanation, and everything else seems pale and powerless.However, this answer involved too many questions, and Catherine didn't know where to start. She took a deep breath and said he knew what Tom was thinking. "So, George Bennett is going to be the father-in-law of the daughter of the man who murdered her mother and it was George who sent him to the gallows. Unless Helen wasn't there when his father was supposed to have murdered her mother Birth." In that case, she thought, the story of Oedipus seemed to happen every day.

"It looks like that," said Tom.He finished his glass and reached for the bottle on the closet. "I know it sounds absurd...but it's like Ruth and Alison combined to send Philip to prison." Tom slowly poured another glass of wine.He took a sip.Looking directly at Catherine, he put down his glass and said, "At least that's it, Catherine, at least." She took a long sip of the red wine in the glass.She saw her hands shaking.This isn't the best story to happen to pick up - it's a tragedy, spanning thirty-five years, and one that hurts the lives of the next generation, who had no idea their history had been so dramatic Content.She is really sad and happy now.She didn't think she was fully entitled to the information she had now; she was glad that Tom was here and he could put a brake on her wild instincts.

"so what to do now?" "Good question," said Tom. "I always ask good questions." "There's only one option, I think. I think we have to walk away now and forget about it. Let Alison Carter - if it's really her - live in peace. Let Helen and Paul marry and let no more clouds over everything." "Impossible," said Catherine firmly. "I cannot remain indifferent. This is one of the most important cases in all the years since the war. It overturns an important legal provision." "Don't tell me that, Catherine," Tom yelled angrily, "you don't care what the law is. All you see is a once-in-a-lifetime scoop and the money you can make from it. Don't you understand How many lives would it ruin if this were made public? You would ruin George's reputation. You would ruin Paul's and Helen's futures, not to mention Helen's life completely. If she knew her sister was actually How would she feel if it was her mother, and the man she thought was her mother was part of a plot to put her dad in jail? And Janice, or Alison, or whatever you want to call her. You subject her to possible prosecution for being an accomplice to murder. Does this mean fleeting fame to you?" He broke out, his voice echoing across the room, and Catherine was almost out of breath. Swallowing hard, she said, "So I was just wondering, do I write off six months of my life? I'm having a hard time, too, Tom. You've been talking to me about justice. Did you leave the police station?" Because you think you can't get justice there and now you say, fuck justice, fuck truth. Do I have to cover up if I want to defend my reputation? Doesn't that mean me and my boss put an innocent Has anyone been hanged?" She was as angry as he was now. Tom put the whiskey back on the table, trying to suppress his anger. "It's not for me, Catherine. It's for a good man and his innocent family. Their lives shouldn't be ruined by someone who died thirty-five years ago. Listen, you didn't waste those six months .You still publish your book, but don't mention what we have discovered now." "But George will. He's more upright than you, Tom. He won't let me get this book out because it's not the truth." Tom shook his head. "He was impulsive. When he's had time to think it over, he'll see that he should let it go." "You mean you're going to convince him," Catherine said aggressively, "that's not going to work. I can delete the e-mail from my computer, but I can't get the facts out of my head. I've got to find out, actually , you can't stop me at all." There was a long silence.Tom felt that his hand was clenched into a fist, and he straightened his fingers with all his might.Finally, with a sigh of relief, he said, "I may not be able to stop you. But once your book comes out, I'm going to mess with you. I'm going to tell the publishing house how you take advantage of a man on ventilator. I Will say you purposely used George Bennett because he had a disagreement with his family. If I deal with you like this, you will never be a saint fighting for justice again, I guarantee it. By then, you Just rubbish like Philip Hawking." They didn't move, like two dogs facing each other.Finally, Catherine spoke. "George isn't here, and neither of us said anything," she said, trying to sound calm. "I don't even know if we're right. We'll have to talk to Alison before we take any further action." Cartel talk." Tom looked away from her and looked at the pictures on the wall.Alison Carter, George Bennett, Ruth Carter, Philip Hawking.He knew in his heart that she was right.They cannot make decisions alone.Such an important choice cannot be made in a daze. "Okay! Tomorrow we'll go to Scardale to find out."