Then if it wasn't Patrick, who was it?
Round and round went her mind, swooping and whirling.
"You will be the best judge," Mr. Sandal had said. "Of those now living you are the one who knew the boy best."
"There is Simon," she had said.
"But Simon was a boy at the time and boys forget, don't they? You were grown up."
So the onus was being put upon her. But how was she to know? She who had loved Patrick but now could hardly remember what he looked like at thirteen. What test would there be?
Or would she know at once when she saw him that he was Patrick? Or that he-wasn't?
And if he wasn't and yet insisted that he was, what would happen? Would he bring a claim? Make a court action of it? Drag them all through the publicity of the daily Press?
And if he was Patrick, what of Simon? How would he take the resurrection of a brother he had not seen for eight years? The loss of a fortune. Would he be glad about it, fortune or no, or would he hate his brother?
The coming-of-age celebrations would have to be postponed, that was clear. They were much too close now for anything to be decided by that time. What excuse should they make?