My Secret Sister: Jenny Lucas and Helen Edwards' Family Story (21 page)

‘I don’t believe it. John Jacobs wants a receptionist at his new golf centre!’ I exclaimed.

‘That’s just the job for you, pet,’ she laughed.

I rang up straightaway and got an interview.

So it was that I never had to pay for a lesson from Dr Golf. I got the job. It was wonderful to work on a golf-range and have a free practice whenever I liked – I would often go out at lunchtime or after work in the summer.

I had a twenty-eight handicap then, aged sixteen. When John came out on the range and saw me hitting balls for the first time, he stopped to watch. I was quite a powerful girl and I could hit the ball very hard. Golf builds up muscles, and I’d been hitting golf balls all my life.

John used to call me Shorty. ‘Come on, Shorty. Let’s see you hit this.’ He coached me and advised me on different ways to improve my swing. In the first five minutes he got me hitting the ball even harder than I had before! He was a brilliant teacher.

‘Do you know what I think?’ he said to me at the end of my first free lesson.

‘No.’

‘One day, young lady, you’ll play for England.’

I laughed out loud and said to myself, ‘This guy’s crazy! He doesn’t know what he’s on about.’ How could he make such a ridiculous prophecy when he hardly knew me?

When I told my mother what he’d said that night, she laughed and laughed, and I joined in. It seemed so absurd.

John often came out to give me tips and a bit of free coaching when I was out practising on the range. I hit thousands of balls under his watchful eye. He didn’t so much look at my swing as the flight of the ball, which told him what I needed to do to improve. He was a lovely man, and very compassionate. He became quite fatherly towards me, which I really appreciated. I’m sure his kindness helped me personally as much as his coaching helped my golf.

During the two years I worked at John’s golf range, I became quite friendly with a lot of the regular golfers who came to practise there. We often met up as a group in the restaurant at the range, or at the busy bar, which was quite a social hub, hosting quizzes, dances and film evenings. Nearly all the members who regularly attended these events were lovely people and we always enjoyed ourselves there.

One of these regulars was Richard, an attractive man and a keen golfer, a few years older than me, as most of them were. He was great fun and we played a lot of golf together, both at the range and with other friends at various golf clubs in the area. Playing so much with him really helped strengthen my game. In between we often spent evenings together amongst our golfing friends, so we all got to know each other very well. I knew Richard for a long time before he asked me out, by which time we were already firm friends, so it just seemed a natural next step.

Meanwhile, my golf continued to improve so much that, by the end of the two years I worked there, my handicap was down to four. I was winning tournaments and was well on my way to bigger things.

In between tournaments, I attended the local college and trained to be a hairdresser so that I could be more useful to my mother and take on some of her work whenever I could, which was a great comfort to her now that she was getting older and suffering from arthritis. What with college, work in my mother’s salon and golf, I didn’t have much time for joining in with the ‘swinging Sixties’ and I wasn’t much into music, but I did once go with some friends to see the Rolling Stones at the Newcastle City Hall. They had amazing energy as they blasted out their songs, filling the whole hall with a storm of sound. I can still hear them now!

Throughout these mid-to-late teenage years, the fact that I was adopted was always in my mind, subdued for my mother Connie’s sake. It felt like a continuous dull ache in the background, and at times turned into a shard of glass that pierced my consciousness and overshadowed everything I achieved.

I didn’t tell anyone I was adopted for another three or four years. I couldn’t say it. I hardly understood it myself.

I think the sports training I was involved in, the competitions and the way I had to learn to really focus when I was playing golf enabled me to move on, gradually. My determination helped too. Despite everything, I seemed to have an inner strength that carried me through and helped me slowly come to terms with what had happened. It also helped that through my growing successes in golf I was developing a greater sense of my own identity. Indeed, the whole situation might have played a part in strengthening my resolve to be my own person when I was competing – to do well, to show the world.

When I spoke to another cousin about my adoption years later, she admitted that everyone in the family had known from the beginning, but they’d all been sworn to silence. She told me that apparently it was the rule at the time of my birth in 1948 that my real mother had to keep me and feed me till I was six weeks old, and only then could I be given for adoption, which solved the mystery of my first six weeks. The health visitor who brought me to my adoptive parents when my real mother was finally allowed to relinquish me had managed to arrange it all because she was also the health visitor to my birth mother. How strange is that? The health visitor became my godmother.

‘You know,’ said my cousin, ‘I remember that whenever your mam was at our house when you were little and we were playing with you, my mother was persistently trying to persuade Connie to tell you. “When are you going to tell Jennifer about her adoption? You must tell her about it. She needs to know.” But Connie always refused. “I can’t talk about it,” she’d answer with her lips pursed. “And nor must you. I’m her mother. She doesn’t need anyone else.”’

Eventually, by the time I was a young adult, I had come to terms with my situation enough to tell new friends that I was adopted. I felt quite brave about it outwardly, but for many years could not shake off the feeling of being bereft, detached, a lost soul. And I still retained some of my original anger and resentment against my adoptive mother. It was something that never really left me, but I didn’t tell her how I felt. My father’s death when I was twelve had been a devastating loss, but to find out in that cruel way that I was adopted and wasn’t who I thought I was turned out to be the more acute and enduring bereavement.

I determined to find out one day who I really was. Maybe not while Connie was alive, but one day.

CHAPTER 18

Helen

Life on the Balcony

The talk in our house was suddenly all about emigration. The talk between my parents, that is. I wasn’t consulted, of course. They looked at various brochures and showed them to me. I didn’t know what to think, but I wasn’t too alarmed as I didn’t think it would really happen.

Their preference was for South Africa. I have no idea why, but as this came to seem like a serious possibility, the whole thing horrified me. It was the last place I wanted to go just then.

When you have a difficult home life, friendships are all the more important. My friends were more of a family to me than my parents. But that was the problem. My parents didn’t want me to have a life of my own, or have fun with my friends. It seemed that whenever I made a life for myself outside work and things were going well, they chose to remove me from it and exert their control over me.

They insisted I go on the bus with them to Newcastle to have an interview at the South African Immigration Department. I remember feeling both resentful and nervous that day. I was fuming inside – I didn’t want to be there; I didn’t want to go – but I was only sixteen and that meant I probably wouldn’t have much choice, unless I could persuade them somehow to leave me behind.

Partway through our family interview, I was just thinking about how I could achieve that when I heard my name. The immigration officer had turned to face me. They all looked expectant.

‘I’m sorry,’ I mumbled, red-faced. ‘Did you ask me a question? Could you repeat it, please?’

‘Yes, of course.’ There was kindness in his smile. ‘And what do you think about going to South Africa, Miss Lumsden. Are you excited about going?’

My father tightened his lips and clenched his fists as he stared at me, oozing menace should I dare to let him down. I knew that look and hesitated, trying desperately to think of something honest to say without angering him any more than necessary.

‘I’m . . .’ I paused, plucking up courage. ‘I don’t really want to go.’

In my peripheral vision, my father’s face reddened.

‘Why is that?’ asked the officer in surprise.

‘Because . . . I’m frightened of insects,’ I blurted out.

Immediately everyone relaxed and laughed together at my childish answer. I managed a weak smile, but inside I felt desperate.

Suddenly it was a reality. The application to emigrate to South Africa had been approved. All my hopes deserted me at that moment. My parents were now free to take me, against my will, to a foreign country where I knew no one.

By this stage, my boyfriend Simon and I were going steady. We’d been going out for six months now. We spent a lot of our time together and I couldn’t bear the thought of being parted from him. We loved each other and had plans for our future. How could I leave him to go so far away? What would happen to us? Would I ever see him again?

‘I don’t want to go to South Africa,’ I told my father one day when I thought he was in a good mood. ‘Can’t I stay behind? I could go and live with George and Joan, or maybe Uncle James and Auntie Gladys.’

‘No. You are coming with us. There’s nothing to stop you.’

‘Yes there is,’ I dared. ‘I don’t want to leave Simon.’

My father was dismissive. ‘Get rid of him!’ That’s what he said. That’s how little he cared about me.

I railed inwardly against this for several days and sleepless nights. I didn’t know what to do. I couldn’t cry or beg, because it would probably provoke a backlash. I considered running away, but I knew how risky that would be. I was sure I couldn’t finish with Simon. We were a couple. Nor could I tell him I had to leave him to go with my parents to live on another continent.

I finally mustered the courage to confront my parents. ‘I will not leave Simon behind,’ I began. ‘I will stay in England on my own if I have to. You can go to South Africa without me!’

This was the first time in my life that I had faced up to them. I stood firm and tried not to flinch, waiting for the explosion. I might be sixteen, but that wouldn’t stop my father’s wrath. He could be as violent now as he’d always been.

‘You can’t stay behind,’ my father said in a reasonable voice, a tone I was not used to hearing. ‘But I tell you what – invite this Simon round for tea so that we can meet him.’

I couldn’t believe it. My first feeling was of relief, but that was short-lived as things reordered themselves in my mind. Suspicion besieged me – I didn’t trust my father’s motives. I couldn’t. I had seen only bad things come out of this sort of situation in the past. I didn’t want Simon to see what my parents were like, but I had little choice, so I did as my father asked. This bizarre meeting was sure to be uncomfortable. Or worse.

The day came. Simon arrived and my father was charming. I believe I sat with my mouth wide open in amazement. Surely there would be a killer blow at the end of this tea party? But that didn’t happen. The whole thing was a happy occasion, carried along by my father’s bonhomie. I couldn’t understand it.

A day or two later, Dad announced his idea: ‘Your boyfriend will finish his mechanic’s apprenticeship next year. Then he can come out and join us in South Africa.’

It seemed such a simple plan. Not an easy one, I know, with a year’s separation in between, but it did seem to resolve the impasse between us. Simon and I discussed it later and realized it was probably the best solution I could have hoped for. My father agreed that Simon should come and live with us in South Africa and he would even find him a job for when he arrived.

Everyone was content with this proposal . . . apart from me. If only I was legally old enough to stay behind. My protests had gone unheeded and there was nothing I could do now but go along with it, for the sake of peace, though I continued to have nagging doubts.

The build-up to our departure depressed me more than I can say. Everything had to be sold or disposed of and I was allowed to take only one suitcase with me. I squeezed in as much as I could during the last few days. While I was out, my mother threw away all of my remaining possessions, including my one-eared teddy, which I had kept all these years – a cherished friend, now gone.

‘What about your savings account?’ asked my dad.

I had kept this account since I’d left school. There was £6 in it, which was a lot of money to me. It meant nothing to my father, who marched me off to the bank and stood over me while I withdrew my hard-earned savings.

‘Right, give it to me,’ he ordered. He took
my
money and I never saw a penny of it again.

Finally the day came. The day I would leave behind everything and everyone I knew. My brother George drove us to London, to Heathrow airport. It was a miserable journey for me and I didn’t speak the whole way there.

We said our goodbyes to George at the departures gate and were soon on board the twelve-hour flight to South Africa.

As we walked down the steps of the plane and across the tarmac, the dry summer heat smothered us in its rasping grip and the brilliance of the sunshine blinded us. It was a huge contrast to the cold, dark winter we’d left behind a few hours before.

My father had a job arranged as transport manager of a removals company in Pretoria, so the boss’s wife, Mrs Ashman, met us at Johannesburg’s Jan Smuts Airport and led us to her car. I couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw it – a huge, metallic blue Chevrolet station-wagon. It burbled like a monster as she drove us onto the main road. We had all the car windows open and the rich mix of scents, sounds and colours overwhelmed all my senses.

Mrs Ashman drove us the thirty miles to Pretoria, chatting away and pointing out some of the sights as we drove through the tree-lined streets, the trees dusted with lilac jacaranda blossom. Everything seemed particularly foreign to me, as I’d never left the north-east of England till now. There was one thing that surprised me more than anything else – I had never seen so many black people before, and they all seemed to be doing menial jobs. I didn’t understand why. I’d not yet heard of apartheid.