The Sins of the Fathers

Chapter Five

Interview Room One

The Rosen Foundation Bunker

The Rosen Estate

Sanibel Island

Florida

"You are Lady Philomena Middleton Forbes, also known as Sister 2430109?" Pan Deacon asked for the record, having first stated the time, the date and the location of the interview to the camera. It was just the two of them in the small windowless room, sitting at a small table on two upright chairs. Mena was wearing her dark red velvet gown once more. Deacon was in a clean, pressed suit and tie.

"Yes, Sir." She replied, and he smiled and nodded, trying to put her at her ease.

"Can you tell me how you came to be here, Lady Forbes?" It was a simple question; one he had been quite happy to prepare her for in advance, just to help her get going with an open goal. "You were...are...legally...a nun...of course?"

"I was transferred...eight days ago, I think...from a convent in London, I think...they don't always tell us where we are...to the Chapter House at Buckingham Palace."

"Can you tell me what a Chapter House is, Lady Forbes?"

"Convents serve hospitals...or care homes...and cathedrals...Chapter Houses are smaller and usually attached to churches, or chapels...to house small numbers of nuns close to where they are needed, Sir." Mena explained, and Deacon nodded, just trying to get her talking and used to answering his questions. He was not looking to catch her out, but his job was to get the truth out of her, so he needed to work her. But he also wanted to believe her, he realised as he checked his notes.

"Buckingham Palace is the President's London residence and provides office facilities for him and his senior ministers...I assume there is a chapel there, Lady Forbes?"

"Yes, Sir...quite a busy one...the ladies of the Presidential Court offer their devotions there most mornings and there are daily services, vigils..."

"You would have been familiar with it...from when you lived at the Palace with President Forbes, Lady Forbes?"

"Yes, Sir...no one had to tell me where I was that time, Sir." She said, and he smiled, liking her ability to joke about bad things. He was amazed that she was so together. Palmer had told him a little more about what she had suffered in the convents, and before that, her life with Alistair Forbes would not have been a bed of roses. Rather like Scarlet O'Hara, he thought all of a sudden, thinking of his mother. Mrs Deacon was only eight years or so older than Mena Forbes, he realised, checking his list of questions for the next one.

"How many Sisters serve at Buckingham Palace?"

"A dozen, Sir." Mena replied, minding her manners. In the communications room, Blake Grey commented on it, whilst making a note on his legal pad, thinking it an act.

"She was...is...a Daughter of Eve," Palmer said, making a note of his own. "She knows the interview is being recorded and will be watched by a lot of people...so, she is naturally behaving as she was taught to behave. It is automatic...doing otherwise requires an effort to overcome the brainwashing...this is hard for her?"

"You think Daughters of Eve are brainwashed?" Grey commented, raising an eyebrow in surprise. Palmer had background checks on Blake Grey as well, because the Foundation was covering all the bases, and the lawyer was known to be something of an anglophile. Not that he was alone in that, and it did not make him a Reformist, by any means. According to the file, Grey occasionally attended a Catholic church in New York, and he was not thought to have any strong faith. But he was a Republican, and thought to have right-wing views. Not so unusual for a Republican, but it did put him in the same intellectual space as the Christian Reformists within the party. Reformism was a bible-based philosophy, but you did not have to believe in God to support some or all of their policies. Not in America, anyway. Britain demanded conspicuous piety of all senior people and their families.