Father Unknown

by Lesley Pearse

  ‘No, he made no provisions for either of them, everything was to go to Ellen.’

  ‘That was a bit hard on Violet,’ Daisy said.

  ‘I think he trusted Ellen to make sure she was taken care of,’ Mr Briggs said. ‘He altered his will at the time there were allegations in the papers that he’d been cruel to Josie. He vowed then she would never set foot on his property again. I think the reason he left Violet nothing was all tied up with that, he said Josie could wind her mother round her finger and that Violet hadn’t got the sense to see it.’

  ‘Were Josie and Violet aware of this?’ she asked.

  ‘I doubt it. Albert wasn’t the sort to divulge his business to anyone.’

  ‘And the police didn’t find it suspicious that Ellen was the sole beneficiary?’

  ‘Why should they be? Firstly, that will was made many years before the fire. And everyone knew how Albert felt about his farm; it was common knowledge that Violet and Josie had no interest in it other than the money it would raise. He had always hoped that in the event of his death Ellen would want to farm it.’

  ‘But she let him down!’ Daisy said.

  ‘Yes, I suppose she did. But don’t judge her for that, Daisy. Think how hard it would be for anyone to settle in a scene of so much tragedy.’

  The weather improved again over the weekend, and Daisy spent it taking long walks with Fred and thinking over everything she had learned about her mother.

  She telephoned Joel on Sunday afternoon when she knew he’d be at home. He seemed delighted to hear from her at first, but as soon as she started trying to tell him what she’d found out about her mother so far, he seemed to clam up. She hadn’t really expected him to share her excitement, but she was dismayed when he began throwing up objections to her continuing the search.

  ‘If she’s had a mental breakdown, she could be very needy. I don’t think you could cope with someone leaning on you.’

  ‘Why do you have to be such a downer?’ she asked, intensely irritated that he didn’t want to know every little detail.

  ‘I’m not being a downer; I’m just trying to make you think things through before you rush off half cocked. Even if she isn’t in need, she might have married; she could even have other children now. She might not welcome you turning up out of the blue and exposing a past she’d never spoken of to anyone.’

  ‘I haven’t even found her yet,’ Daisy said, exasperated. ‘Can’t you just offer to help? Couldn’t you contact the police down here and see if they kept any tabs on her?’

  ‘No, I can’t,’ he said curtly. ‘Just because I’m a policeman doesn’t mean I can get access to files for my personal use.’

  ‘Well, stuff you,’ Daisy snapped, and flung the phone down.

  She was far too angry with Joel to phone back later, even though she could see he had a point about Ellen maybe not wanting her past churned up. The more she thought over their conversation, the more she read into it. He didn’t want her having anyone else in her life, in fact he didn’t want her to have a life of her own, he wanted to be the centre of her world.

  As she lay in bed that night listening to the sound of the waves on the harbour wall, she forced herself to remember other times when he’d objected to things she wanted to do. There were the parties for one thing, raves in old empty houses. She had loved them, it was fun having a party somewhere you shouldn’t really be. But he said he didn’t think it was much fun paying inflated prices for cans of beer and drinking them in a dirty old house with a mob of head-bangers.

  He objected to driving to Newquay in her Beetle for the annual Run to the Sun too. He said obsessive Beetle owners with surf-boards strapped to the roofs of their cars weren’t his kind of people.

  She had come round to his way of thinking because he was good at surprise outings like a booze cruise on the river, or a night away in a pretty country village. But that wasn’t the point – however good his ideas were, he stopped her making decisions. It was always him who decided what they were going to do on a night out: films, concerts, it was always his choice, and she’d gone along with it because she was easy-going.

  He’d even changed the way she dressed. When she first met him she used to wear outrageous clothes, tight skirts split to the thigh, low-cut tops, but although he never actually said he disapproved, she felt he did. So she changed, just to make him happy.

  Well, she vowed she wasn’t going to bow to his wishes any more. She wouldn’t phone him or go round to his place when she got back to London. He could get stuffed permanently.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Daisy left Cornwall on Thursday, a week after she’d been to Mawnan Smith, and arrived home in Chiswick in the evening for the Easter weekend.

  ‘Daisy!’ John Buchan shouted out joyfully as she walked through the door, and without even stopping to pat Fred he scooped her into a bear hug. ‘It seems like you’ve been gone for months. We’ve all missed you so much.’

  Over his shoulder Daisy could see into the sitting-room which was very untidy. She dreaded to think what the rest of the house was like.

  ‘It’s good to be home,’ she said, hugging him back, and despite her anxieties, it was good.

  Lucy and Tom came running down the stairs and their welcome was just as warm. They all fired questions at her at once. What was the cottage like? The weather? The scenery? But it was Lucy who asked if she’d found Ellen.

  ‘I’ve got a photograph and a solicitor’s address here in London, but that’s all,’ Daisy said, her voice shaking with emotion because she hadn’t expected such warmth from them all. ‘But you aren’t going to believe some of the stuff I learned about her and her family. It’s all too amazing.’

  The kitchen was a mess, with a fetid smell coming from the sink drain-hole. The dining-room table had got white rings on it and someone had yanked the curtains too hard in the sitting-room and partially pulled them off the rail. Yet none of that mattered to Daisy, for as Lucy and Tom hastily prepared a chicken salad for them all, Dad sat her down, made her a cup of tea and insisted she started right at the beginning of the story without missing anything out.

  Daisy was no stranger to being the centre of attention, but she couldn’t remember a time before when she had the whole family hanging on her every word. Their rapt faces spurred her on, and she put a lot of drama into parts of the story, embellishing the tale of her mad grandmother jumping off the cliff, her grandfather being a surly Worzel Gummidge, Violet the vicious stepmother, and her real father a smooth operator in a spangled suit. She could sense their excitement growing even greater as she told them that Josie became a famous model and later slid into drug-taking.

  But when she finally got to the part about the fire, and how they all died in it except Ellen, they looked completely stunned.

  ‘I don’t believe it, you’ve made it all up,’ Tom said, looking at her doubtfully. ‘Come on, Daisy! This is a wind-up, isn’t it?’

  Daisy shook her head. ‘I promise you it’s all absolutely true. That’s why I didn’t phone you while I was down there. I would have told you it all garbled, left bits out. So I thought I’d wait till I got back when I’d had time to put it all together properly.’

  ‘Good God, Daisy,’ her father sighed. ‘When you didn’t phone I thought you must have drawn a complete blank, then made some new friends and forgotten what you’d gone down there for. That would have been completely in character. We even laughed about it!’

  ‘I said you’d come back with a taste for rough cider, or maybe a mania for sailing,’ Tom admitted with a chuckle. ‘We really thought that you’d got into something else.’

  ‘I even thought you’d found a new man,’ Lucy said, and had the grace to look sheepish. ‘Sorry about that, but we were all glad you seemed to be having a good time.’

  ‘I did have a good time,’ Daisy grinned, ‘but nothing like you imagined. My head’s been whirling with all this information. It still is, and I’ve still got to find Ellen.’

  They
fell into silence for a while, Lucy staring at the photograph of Ellen and Tom gazing into space.

  John got up from the table and went out into the hall. He came back with the telephone book. ‘I wonder how many Pengellys there are in London?’ he said. ‘Anyone want to make a guess?’

  ‘More than fifty, I expect,’ Tom said. ‘Too many to try ringing them all. Besides, she might have changed her name.’

  Lucy looked up from the photograph. ‘You are like her,’ she said. ‘But she looks a bit serious and po-faced.’

  ‘She does, doesn’t she?’ Daisy agreed. ‘I’ve been told so much about her, but I still haven’t got a real fix on her. Everyone else, even Violet the wicked stepmother, seemed so vibrant, so real. But not Ellen. She sort of wafted in and out of the stories. A pleasant, do-righting kind of person, but a bit shadowy somehow.’

  ‘Maybe that’s just because she was the only survivor,’ Tom said, and patted Daisy’s hand. ‘People enjoy saying what they really thought about a person once they’re dead, good and bad. But it’s different when the person is still alive.’

  ‘She sounds a fine woman to me,’ John said. ‘I think that it was quite understandable that she severed all connections in Cornwall after the fire, too. I know I find it hard to talk to Lorna’s old friends and relations now. Of course I wouldn’t cut myself off from them, but then it’s different when you’ve got children.’

  ‘So you don’t think she went barmy then?’ Daisy asked. ‘I mean, if she did have suspicions her sister started the fire, that would prey on her mind, wouldn’t it?’

  John shook his head. ‘She might have floundered for a while, after such a terrible thing anyone would. But she must have been strong and in control of herself otherwise she couldn’t have made dramatic changes in her life like moving away. Maybe she suddenly couldn’t face the school any more, didn’t want her old friends to try and keep her there. You said she came up here quite often to see Josie, and for all we know she might have always had a yearning to live in London.’

  ‘I wonder if she was ever jealous of Josie,’ Lucy said.

  ‘I wonder that too,’ Daisy replied. She had been touched by Lucy’s enthusiasm and interest – for once she’d dropped her guard, there wasn’t a trace of ridicule in her voice and her eyes were thoughtful, not hard. ‘I think I would have been. But then I’m not the kind to make a career with handicapped children.’

  ‘And I’m too plump and plain to be a model,’ Lucy added with a giggle.

  ‘You’ve got too good a brain for that,’ Daisy said quickly. ‘Josie was quite thick by all accounts. But it made me think about how it is between me and you Lucy, too. We might not be blood sisters, but we’re all we’ve got, so let’s try to be nicer to each other, eh?’

  ‘I really missed you while you were away,’ Lucy admitted, blushing a little. ‘I even got to feeling sorry for the horrible things I’ve said in the past.’

  Daisy grinned. ‘Me too, so let’s just forget them and start again, shall we? I won’t bear a grudge if you won’t.’

  They moved on to talk about things that had happened while she’d been away, including the new cleaner who came once and never returned.

  ‘I’ve tried all the agencies,’ Dad said dolefully. ‘It seems good cleaners are like gold dust. I thought I’d put an ad in the local paper. Is there anyone around here that doesn’t think they are above a bit of charring?’

  ‘There’s me.’ Daisy laughed. ‘I’ll get stuck into it tomorrow.’

  Daisy was delighted that the evening had gone so well, and very relieved no one had mentioned Joel. But after the twins had gone up to their rooms, Dad suggested they went into the sitting-room and had a drink together. As he was pouring her a gin and tonic he asked what Joel had made of everything.

  ‘I didn’t really tell him much,’ she said, ‘we only spoke on the phone once.’ She paused.

  ‘What’s gone wrong?’ her father asked. ‘I know something has, there was a time when you brought his name up in every sentence but you haven’t mentioned it once tonight.’

  Daisy had no choice but to tell the truth. ‘He was so full of himself,’ she ended up. ‘Didn’t really want to know, didn’t want to help. Anyway, I think it has burned itself out. I don’t think we have a future together any more.’

  ‘Only you know whether that’s true or not,’ her father said. ‘But don’t make the assumption he didn’t want to know just because he threw up a few objections. I’d say that he was just worried about you getting in over your head.’

  ‘Why should he think that?’

  ‘Well, you are rather well known for rushing into things,’ he said with a grin. ‘I suppose Joel was afraid that the quest to find Ellen might take over your life, excluding him and all of us too. He has a very logical mind. I daresay he thinks if you met up with Ellen and she wasn’t exactly what you wanted her to be, you might be badly hurt.’

  ‘I don’t want her to be anything,’ Daisy said indignantly. ‘I’m quite happy to accept her as she is.’

  ‘I think Joel might be thinking you want another Lorna,’ John said gently. ‘I know when I think of another woman I want one in the same mould. It’s natural when you’ve lost someone to hope for a replacement.’

  ‘I don’t want that,’ Daisy retorted, and began to cry.

  John put his arm around her and drew her close to his chest. ‘I might not be your biological father, Dizzie, but I loved you from the moment I first held you in my arms. I know you pretty well. You are big on ideas, but less good at carrying them out. You are afraid of commitment. I think that’s why you want to sweep Joel out of your life.’

  ‘That’s stupid,’ she said heatedly. ‘It would be really harebrained to drift on with Joel under the pretence of commitment. He isn’t right for me, he’s too bossy, too opinionated.’

  ‘Is that so?’ John gave her a quizzical look. ‘Funny you never brought up those two objections until you wanted to do something he was trying to deter you from!’

  ‘I’ve felt for some time that things weren’t right. Going away gave me time to mull it over in my mind,’ she said. ‘He’s a control freak.’

  ‘I never saw him in that way.’ John stood up and moved away to the door. He paused for a second, looking back at her. ‘His objections sound rather more like caring to me. Think about it carefully before you do something irrevocable, that’s all I want to say. Finding Ellen will be like winning a prize in a tombola. You might be lucky and get the star prize. On the other hand, you might be left with the booby prize.’

  Chapter Twenty

  Straight after the Easter weekend, Daisy went to Shaw-cross and Hendle in Marylebone Road, the solicitors from whom Mr Briggs had received a request for a reference for Ellen.

  On the Tube ride there Daisy thought over the advice her father had given her, and decided he was right. If she said she was trying to find her mother, they were likely to be wary of giving her any information. So she planned to pretend she was Mr Briggs’s secretary, and that he needed to contact Ellen with regard to the family estate. Fortunately she had one of Mr Briggs’s office cards, and she hoped that and the letter would be enough to convince them.

  The offices were on the first floor of one of the more imposing old houses in Marylebone Road, close to Baker Street. Before going up the stairs she checked in the mirror in the hall and decided she did look like a secretary in her black suit, with her hair tied back, carrying Lucy’s leather briefcase.

  The reception area for the solicitors was very plush, with deep blue couches and oil paintings on the cream walls. It was manned by a plump, grey-haired lady in a navy blue suit, who smiled brightly as Daisy walked in. ‘How can I help you?’ she said.

  Daisy had always prided herself on being able to act out a part. She had used it to advantage in the past to get work, and to interest men. As she launched into her rehearsed story she felt she sounded perfectly plausible, and taking the letter to Mr Briggs out of her briefcase, she showed it to the w
oman.

  ‘After the estate was wound up, Miss Pengelly moved to London and we had no further contact with her. But now something has cropped up again, and we need to find her. Could you look in your files and see if you have her current address? It is a matter of some urgency.’

  Fortunately the woman didn’t seem the least bit suspicious, and asked Daisy to take a seat while she took a look. She went into an adjoining room which appeared to be a typing pool, and Daisy could hear her talking to someone else.

  Several minutes passed before she came back with a slim brown file in her hand.

  ‘I’m afraid we don’t have a home address for Miss Pengelly,’ she said. ‘We only represented her once in preparing a commercial lease, and all I have is that address.’

  Daisy stared blankly at the woman. She didn’t understand what she meant. ‘Commercial?’ she repeated.

  ‘Yes, a shop,’ the woman said. ‘Miss Pengelly took out a fifteen-year lease on it.’

  ‘Where is it?’ Daisy tried to sound casual, but having steeled herself for coming away with nothing she felt like grinning like a Cheshire Cat.

  ‘14 Heath Street, Hampstead,’ the woman said. ‘I’m sorry, but I don’t have a telephone number.’

  ‘That’s fine,’ Daisy said, forcing herself to keep calm, and jotted down the address. ‘Mr Briggs will write to her there. Thank you so much for your help.’

  Once back outside in Marylebone Road, Daisy was forced to light up a cigarette to calm herself down. She couldn’t believe it had been so easy. She had always been under the impression solicitors never gave out any verbal information about their clients.

  Her father had asked her to ring him if she had any news, but knowing if she told him this he’d tell her to go home and write a letter to Ellen, she decided against phoning him. She would go to Hampstead now, and just look in to see if Ellen was still there and what the shop was like. Then she’d speak to him.

  Daisy knew Hampstead fairly well. In her late teens she’d often gone to pubs there with her friends. There was a time when she’d day-dreamed of getting a flat there, she loved the quaint, arty feeling about the place, but sadly it was far too expensive for her.