The Roots of the Tree

by Amanda Roberts

  ‘I think I’ll move the whole cabinet into the hallway,’ she said. ‘I would feel as if I was removing memories of your grandmother if I got rid of all those.’

  Annie started sorting through the clothes, linen and towels, dividing everything into piles: one for the charity shop, one to keep and one for the bin. Gradually, the two of them emptied cupboards, drawers, cabinets and the contents of the wardrobe. At the back of the wardrobe, Annie found an old cardboard shoebox packed with paperwork and photographs. Reaching into the top of the shoebox, Suzie found a bundle of envelopes with her own handwriting on them. ‘That must be the letters I wrote to them while I was away at college,’ she said. ‘They kept them all!’ Swallowing a lump in her throat, she said, ‘I’m going to make some tea and get some biscuits. Have a sit down, Mum, and see if there’s anything important in there.’

  Suzie brewed tea and found an unopened packet of bourbon biscuits in the back of a cupboard. She put them on a tray and carried them back through to the lounge where Annie was sitting on the sofa staring at a piece of paper in her hand. Her face was white and her hand was shaking as she looked up at Suzie with a confused expression on her face. Suzie put down the tray.

  ‘What is it?’ she asked.

  Annie simply pushed the piece of paper towards her. Suzie looked at the aged, yellowing piece of paper. ‘It’s their marriage certificate,’ she realised. ‘But I don’t understand. What’s the problem?’

  ‘Look at the date,’ Annie whispered.

  ‘February fifth, 1943,’ Suzie read from the certificate, frowning. She reached for the fiftieth wedding anniversary photograph and double-checked the date that was set like a plaque at the base of the frame. It clearly said 1989, which would have meant they had married in 1939, but the marriage certificate could not be wrong, so they must have lied about the date they married. But why?

  ‘I was born in August 1940,’ Annie managed to say in a shaky voice.

  ‘Well, that’s not so much of a problem, surely. I bet there were a lot of couples who didn’t wait to walk down the aisle first during the war. They had to make the most of their time together and today nobody thinks anything of it. But why lie about it?’

  ‘No, you don’t understand,’ insisted Annie. ‘Your grandad did not go away to fight. He was a miner, which was a reserved occupation, so he was not conscripted. He joined the Home Guard, but there would have been no need for them to not be married when they knew she was pregnant; plus he was far too honourable. In those days nice girls just did not get pregnant without being married and he would never have let your gran go through that – all the neighbours whispering and the shame it would have brought on her. And why wait, just to get married four years later? It doesn’t make any sense. Unless…’ Annie’s voice faded, her thoughts left hanging in the air, as if by not giving them substance they could be untrue.

  ‘What are you thinking, Mum?’

  ‘He can’t have been my father.’

  ‘Wait a moment,’ said Suzie. ‘That’s quite a conclusion to jump to, isn’t it? There has to be another explanation.’

  Annie and Suzie sat in silence for several minutes, trying to work out another possible interpretation of the discovery they had just made.

  ‘I’m sixty-three years old and I don’t know who I am,’ Annie said eventually. ‘It’s all been a lie. All those years when I thought I knew who I was and who my parents were, my secure childhood, everything, all lies.’

  ‘How can it be possible, though?’ Suzie wondered out loud. ‘What about your birth certificate, Mum? What does that say?’

  Annie thought for a moment. ‘I’m sure it gives my name as Annie Barratt – your grandad’s surname,’ she said. ‘It’s a long time since I’ve looked at it. I’m not even sure where it is, to be honest, but if it had said anything other than that I would have questioned it years ago.’

  Suzie thought for a moment, twisting a thick strand of hair around her index finger, a habit she’d had since childhood when concentrating, and then realised there was probably one person who would know the truth.

  ‘We have to talk to Aunt Emily,’ she said.

  Emily Cooper was Elsie’s youngest sister. She was also the last surviving member of that generation of the family, which had once boasted five sisters and three brothers. She was now seventy years old but possessed the mental attitude and energy of someone much younger. Suzie picked up the phone and calmly dialled her number. Emily answered immediately.

  ‘Hi, Aunt Emily. It’s Suzie,’ she said.

  ‘Suzie, how lovely to hear from you. How are you all? I had coffee with your mum a few days ago. She seems to be coping okay.’

  ‘Well, she was,’ replied Suzie, looking across to Annie who was sitting with her arms wrapped tightly around herself, shaking slightly and staring into space, her tea untouched by her side. ‘But now I’m not so sure. We started sorting out the annex earlier and I’m afraid we’ve found something that has given us both a bit of a shock.’

  There was silence on the other end of the line. Suzie could imagine Emily sitting in her comfortable lounge, a large and contented cat – one of several residents – no doubt curled up by her feet or on her lap.

  ‘Aunt Emily, who is my real grandad?’ Suzie eventually blurted out.

  There was silence on the other end of the line. Suzie could imagine Aunt Emily’s mouth opening and closing as she tried to think of an answer.

  ‘We started to sort out Grandma and Grandad’s rooms,’ Suzie felt she needed to explain. ‘We found some paperwork –’

  ‘I think I had better come over to you,’ Emily said briskly. ‘I will be there within the hour.’

  Suzie hung up and turned to Annie.

  ‘Come on, let’s leave this for today. Aunt Emily’s coming over here, so she obviously knows something. We’ll wait for her at home.’

  Switching the lights off, the fifty-year wedding anniversary photo was the last thing Suzie noticed as she closed the door, locking it behind her.

  ‘David Henderson,’ said David, answering the phone on its third ring. Suzie pictured him leaning back in his worn and comfortable leather armchair, looking out of his small office window that provided a surprisingly good view over the river, with its picturesque bridge and beyond, the church spire. David was a solicitor with a small practice in the local market town of Barminster.

  ‘David, it’s me,’ said Suzie. ‘Can you collect Daniel from school this afternoon and then come over to Mum’s with him? We’ve got a bit of a family crisis going on.’ She explained what they had discovered and the conclusion Annie had immediately drawn.

  ‘Of course,’ David replied. ‘But I’m sure there will be a perfectly sensible explanation for it. All sorts of things happened during the war years and records may have been incomplete or just not registered properly.’

  ‘Maybe,’ said Suzie doubtfully. ‘Anyway, Aunt Emily’s on her way over and I’m hoping she may know something.’

  ‘My dears, first of all you have to remember that I was not very old,’ Emily began, looking uncomfortable in Annie’s immaculate living room with her hair untidy from the garden and her hastily scrubbed fingernails still bearing evidence of the flower beds they were until recently immersed in. ‘Your gran was ten years older than me. I was only seven when you were born; that’s why in some ways you and I were more like sisters than aunt and niece.’ Emily watched Annie carefully as she spoke, twisting her plain gold wedding band with the thumb and index finger of her right hand as she did. ‘Some of what I am about to tell you is my impression at the time and some is what I worked out later, when I was old enough to understand.

  ‘I think I was about five when I realised there was something different about Elsie. She had always been quite strict with me, more like a mother than a big sister in lots of ways – more so obviously after our parents died. But at the time, it suddenly seemed as if I could get away with a lot more around the house. She didn’t nag me to tidy my toys the way she normally
did; she seemed to hardly notice them in fact. I would come in from playing in the garden and she would not insist I wash my hands before eating. I didn’t think anything of it at the time, just thought she was mellowing, but then Elizabeth and Edith started teasing her, saying she was courting. I did not know what that meant. Eventually, I worked out it involved a boy.

  ‘She was working in the factory at the time, doing her bit for the war effort. It used to make cutlery and domestic appliances from stainless steel, but it was quickly requisitioned for munitions. I think he used to meet her after work. She would be late getting home some afternoons and when she did get home she would be smiling to herself as if she had a secret joke that nobody else could understand. I didn’t realise at the time, but she was obviously in love. She was only fifteen. He must have been her first boyfriend.’

  ‘Did you know who he was?’ asked Suzie.

  Emily shook her head. ‘No,’ she said. ‘I don’t think any of us kids did. As far as I know he never came to the house or was introduced to Mum or Dad. She kept it all very secret. I’m not even sure they knew she had a boyfriend until much later. Dad was not well by then so Mum was struggling to cope with all of us plus him to look after. And of course we had just gone to war with Germany. We were all having to learn to live by new rules; the world was changing around us and we didn’t look at things or notice things the same. However, we did have an idea where he worked. Elizabeth had seen them together leaving the factory one day on her way home from school and he was in uniform – not a soldier’s uniform, but like a livery. We think he worked at the big house.’

  ‘The big house?’ repeated Suzie, frowning slightly.

  ‘Chaddington Manor at Upper Chaddington,’ Emily explained. ‘It was privately owned still in those days and lived in by the de Lacey family. They kept a large household of staff. We think he was a chauffeur.

  ‘Anyway, I do not know how long the relationship went on for. At that age you have no concept of time. Time is simply a measure of how long between meals, or how long you have to stay at school before you can return home. Weeks, months, years, mean nothing. Then, one day, just before Christmas, Elsie came home clearly very upset. Her eyes were red and she had obviously been crying. She went straight to her room and would not come out. I found out later from Edith that whoever the boyfriend was he had joined the army. He was going away to fight.’

  Annie had remained silent throughout this account. Suzie glanced across at her, curled up on the sofa, her eyes fixed firmly on Emily. ‘What happened next?’ she asked.

  ‘I don’t think she saw him again. Letters kept arriving for her and she would take them up to her room or down to the river to read in private. Then I started to realise something else was wrong. I heard her in the mornings in the bathroom. Elizabeth and Edith were talking and even Freddie had noticed. She was withdrawn. Eventually, she went to Mum, told her she was pregnant. Dad was no use. He was bedridden by then and barely conscious most of the time. It was another problem for Mum to handle, but there was not much she could do. Elsie still kept her secrets. She either did not know or would not tell where he lived or who his family were. Even if she had told, Mum could hardly go marching around to their front door making demands – that was the man’s responsibility, but Dad was too ill and Freddie and Joe were too young.

  ‘Obviously the family stood by her and she was still receiving and presumably sending letters, although I never saw her writing any. I do not know if she ever told him she was pregnant or if she was waiting to give him the news that he was a father when he came back from the war, but he did not come back.’

  Emily turned to Annie. ‘You were a beautiful baby. I know babies always are, but you truly were, head full of blonde curls and a very sweet temperament. And there were always plenty of us around willing to play with you and entertain you, so you never wanted for attention. Elsie went back to work as soon as she could – the family needed the money – and Mum looked after you during the day along with the rest of us. Then the letters stopped arriving. Every day, Elsie would watch for the post. It was impossible to predict when a letter would arrive, but as the days stretched into weeks and months and still no new letter, she was starting to get anxious. It was clear that she had fully expected him to return to her and they would get married and be a perfect little family, but it began to seem as if that might not happen. I think the not knowing was the worst. She was not his next of kin, she did not know his family and as far as we knew, his family did not know about her, so if he had been killed or was listed as missing in action, presumed dead, she had no way of knowing.

  ‘I’m a bit vague on the exact timings again at this point. We all settled down to our own routines. It may have been wartime, but life went on. We had to go to school or work; we had jobs to do around the house; we had to eat and sleep. Elsie was still agitated and alternated between being withdrawn and angry. She was not all that nice to have around. She gradually stopped watching for the post. She seemed resigned that he was not coming back – whether he was dead, missing or had just fallen out of love, I do not know.

  ‘Then I guess you must have been about two years old,’ Emily once again turned to Annie. ‘You were walking and into everything. We couldn’t take our eyes off you for even a few seconds without you getting into mischief of some sort. Elizabeth and Edith started talking about this new boy that was hanging around. We knew his family, so he was not exactly new and nor was he was a boy. He was older than any of us, and the youngest child, so we did not really know him or his siblings. His name was Frank Barratt. He was in his twenties already according to the others and very handsome. It soon became obvious that it was Elsie he was interested in. If he was on the right shift – he worked at the colliery as a miner – he would wait for her and walk with her to work and then meet her afterwards and bring her home.

  ‘Frank was completely different to, you know, him. He wanted to get to know us all. There was no hiding. We soon knew all about his family, his brother, George, who was a fighter pilot, his sisters, Irene, who was married already with several children, and Mary who, already in her mid-thirties, seemed to be a confirmed spinster and lived at home looking after their elderly parents. Obviously he knew you were Elsie’s daughter, but it didn’t seem to bother him like it would have done most men in those days. Even today I suppose, men think twice before agreeing to bring up another man’s child, but Frank seemed to welcome it – a readymade family. It was not long before he spoke to mother as the head of the family and asked for permission to speak to Elsie and ask her to marry him.

  ‘I do not know whether Elsie loved him then. He certainly loved her. But I think she was grateful to him for offering her a respectable future and a chance to make her own home. She accepted him, of course, but there were conditions.’

  At this point in the narrative, Emily paused and took a deep breath, her eyes focused on her hands as she continued to twist her wedding band. ‘This is where it gets difficult,’ she said. ‘Frank was offering Elsie and you a home and a future with a “normal” family: i.e. with a mother and a father both sharing the responsibility of bringing up the child. This was what he wanted. He insisted on bringing you up as his own child and he was very determined that no one would tell you otherwise. He made us all promise never to break that faith and tell you the truth. After all, he argued, what good would it do to have you grow up not knowing who your father was and he was there and promised to be a good father to you and a good husband to Elsie. He was so fierce and passionate and absolutely immovable on this point. And the war was splitting so many families apart; children were growing up not knowing who their fathers were, or even losing both parents and becoming orphans. Frank’s way seemed a better way than the alternatives, so we all agreed; well, I didn’t really have much say in the matter, but I did understand that you, Elsie and Frank were going to become a proper family.

  ‘The wedding took place very quickly. You didn’t wait and plan and save for a long time in those days.
We didn’t know what Hitler might have in store for us, so everyone lived for the moment. It was a small and quiet wedding, just the immediate families, a few close friends and a reception in the local pub. After the wedding Elsie and you moved from the family home at Upper Chaddington and into your own house with Frank. It was one of the terraced cottages owned by the National Coal Board here in Lower Chaddington. Frank paid rent but it was a low rent because they were houses that were kept for the workers. They did not have it to themselves for long though, because Mum died a few years later and Edith, Freddie, Joe and I had to move in with them as there was no one else to look after us. Elizabeth was newly married and living with her husband’s family and had a baby on the way, so she couldn’t help. Frank and Elsie were like parents to us and they always did their best for all of us. We were a family and it may seem strange today, but in those days Lower Chaddington and Upper Chaddington could have been a thousand miles apart. There was no gossip about who your real father might be; Frank was accepted as your true father by the community and we never discussed it.

  That’s all I know really. As the years went by and no more children arrived the question of whether anyone should tell you the truth or not gradually faded away. Frank was a great father to you, kind and supportive. By the time you were old enough to handle the truth, who would have been so cruel? You and Frank were so close; you had such a wonderful father-daughter relationship that there seemed nothing to be gained by telling you the truth.’

  ‘Except he wasn’t my father, so that very special father-daughter relationship wasn’t that at all, was it?’ Annie interrupted. Even to her own ears her voice sounded strange. She felt as though she was having to force herself to be heard through layers of cotton wool or insulation foam that was threatening to stifle her. ‘It was all built on lies. Lies that everybody knew about except me. I feel so stupid.’