Rosa's Child (7 page)

Irene, sensing that her husband was downcast at the prospect of parting with his most prized possession, wondered if she might not be able to console him in some way. 'Is Alan taller than your father, Grace?' she asked the bride-to-be as she hung out the washing in her usual neat rows. Her mind on other things, Grace said she thought no, probably not. 'Good, good,' said her mother, aware that if there was little else to console him, here was a crumb of comfort for which the Reverend would be grateful.

In her own way Grace, too, sought to soften the blow for her father - not least because, if she went along with most of his wishes concerning the wedding, she felt he was less likely to engage in some last-minute manoeuvring calculated to prevent the wedding from taking place. Among his requests was to have a professional photograph of her before the fateful day. 'Grace, I want one last memory of you,' he explained solemnly, as if his daughter were about to disappear not just from his house but from the world. Even his wife remarked that it all seemed rather unnecessary. Nevertheless Grace agreed, and at the appointed time she presented herself in her father's study, dressed appropriately for the photographer. As it turned out, the session was a failure, for in her own words Grace looked 'strained, plump and matronly' To her great relief, the portrait never found a place on the Manns' mantelpiece.

To Alan Stocken, entering his in-laws' world was a strange experience. His view of his prospective father-in-law was no doubt coloured by the fact that the Reverend grew ever gloomier as the wedding day approached. But even so, 'Edward Mann was like an alien from the moon to me,' he later said.

He was a completely different sort of human being. I had no idea how to talk to him. His whole background was different to mine. He was steeped in the Church. Most of the discussion was based around marriages and deaths in his church - and I found the whole set-up difficult to deal with. In fact, on the occasions when we did visit there would be these huge rows, often with tears, all in this highly charged emotional atmosphere. I had no idea what it was about. Recriminations would fly this way and that, and I found it all most unsettling. I used to breathe the most almighty sigh of relief as we drove off. I'm someone who just likes a quiet life.

When Grace opened her eyes on the morning of her wedding day, io December 1966, she felt a vague excitement, but at the same time there weighed upon her a sense of oppression that she knew would lift only when she was on her way to London for her honeymoon. Later, as she descended the stairs wearing her bridal dress and with her hair arranged, the Reverend studied her without a word, and he remained silent as they were driven the short distance from the rectory to St Mary's Parish Church, East Leake, Nottinghamshire.

The Lord Bishop of Southwell, the Right Reverend Gordon D. Savage, was waiting at the church door to usher in the wedding party. As the Reverend Mann escorted his daughter down the aisle the organist played a hymn that to Grace, in her excitement and anxiety, seemed strangely inappropriate. She swallowed hard on seeing her sister but gathered all her resolve to see the ceremony through. Before long the bells were ringing out joyously to celebrate the joining in holy matrimony of Grace Elizabeth Mann and Alan Stocken. The bride had every reason to be proud, for not only did she look radiant in her white wedding dress but it was the first time in her life that she had felt officially free. She could not believe her good fortune as Alan stood devotedly beside her. She had escaped the brutality of Nazi Germany at the tender age of three. Now, twenty-seven years later, she had finally escaped another form of tyranny, one fuelled by a fierce love which had gone beyond all acceptable bounds and which had suffocated her for years. Finally Grace could breathe the fresh air of freedom. For all that, it was not a day that she or Alan cared to reminisce about as the years went by, for the strain on them, not to mention the Reverend Mann, had been very great.

When, some weeks later, the proofs of the wedding photographs arrived, one person stood out as rather miserable, looking as gloomy as the weather on that overcast Saturday afternoon. Not surprisingly, it was the bride's father.

Ten months later a baby boy was born. James Frederick Stocken, he was to be christened.

'Don't you think he looks like Alan's mother?' Grace asked her father. To her mind, the boy's faintly ginger hair and the shape of the chin certainly recalled his paternal grandmother.

'How could you say that, Grace,' the Reverend replied, 'when you realize that I am childless?' He then added one of his passing observations on humanity in general: 'Isn't it strange, Grace, how the wicked people in this world always seem to get what they want?' So preoccupied was the Reverend with his own thwarted paternity that it drove out all thought for Grace at what was for her a very special time.

For two days after giving birth, Grace remained in a state of joy. What she did not know during that brief euphoria was that she was heading for the most enormous fall. The truth was that she had not planned to have a baby. Indeed she had been informed that she would have the greatest difficulty in becoming pregnant at all. Yet Grace had conceived within a month of her wedding. For her, it had happened much too quickly. All she had wanted was a little time to savour her freedom, to begin to relax at last.

Friends showed little sympathy, feeling that Grace scarcely had cause for complaint. A fully qualified health-care professional dedicated to her work, she had a kind, considerate husband and a home of her own. And now, just a few weeks before Christmas, she had been blessed with the gift of a healthy baby boy. But Grace was unable to respond with the instinctive happiness of many new mothers, for the birth had touched off all of the painful feelings associated with her own childhood.

Although it was to be some years yet before she would articulate it, she was struggling not just for uncomplicated fatherly approval, which had eluded her for so long, but for her mother's love too, for that had likewise been denied her. Suddenly the traumas of the past seemed to seize hold of her. Now a mother herself, she began to ponder the fate of her real parents. And what was the truth about the Munich orphanage? Had it really been burned to the ground and all the records destroyed, as she had been told?

With her hormones propelling her into in ever deeper depression, so that she was unable even to hold her newborn son, she had the good sense to know that she was in urgent need of help. Within a few weeks of returning home with her baby, Grace asked to be admitted as a voluntary patient to Birmingham's Highcroft Hospital, which she thought might provide a refuge. Just as her father before her, she too found herself in hospital on the brink of collapse. No, Grace Stocken, it seemed, had not found her freedom after all.

FIVE

Searching

W
hen Grace resumed her role as mother and wife after a six-week spell in hospital, the more perceptive of her friends knew that the process of healing had still to run its course. They struggled to pinpoint the source of her malaise, for — despite Grace's protestations to the contrary - there was no doubt that all was far from well. As one of her friends observed:

There always seemed to me to be something about Grace. Something that wasn't quite right. She didn't talk about herself very readily. There was a sort of vacuum, I suppose.

If there was indeed a vacuum, then Grace chose to fill it very skilfully. It was not long before, settled into married life in the small Warwickshire town of Rugby, she returned to full-time nursing, as a casualty sister in the accident and emergency department of the town's St Cross hospital.

Denial was the name of the game, a game Grace had been playing and would continue to play for a good many years. It was all part of a strategy for appearing as normal as the next person while knowing she was not. Deep down within her she could sense an ominous message whose full significance would not become clear until much later. 'But you don't really know who you are,' it would repeatedly remind her. Her busy life helped her to brush aside this thought, but, assuming she wanted to, where would she start if she did embark on that quest? In any case, was it not inevitable that the Reverend Mann would frustrate her efforts if she tried to search out the truth about her origins, just as he had controlled almost every other aspect of her life? Might there not be dread reprisals in store if she incurred his wrath once more? This was certainly Grace's childlike fear.

Instead she became an expert in covering up the identity she knew still lived somewhere inside her.

Putting on a nurse's uniform was in effect putting on a mask. And I soon discovered that the mask of being a nurse was much more comfortable than having to be myself. In terms of mothering I didn't show much nurturing instinct; nor did I feel that I had found my feet as a wife. So nursing seemed to provide the answer for me. I just kept myself busy.

Within a few years, with her son away as a boarder at Southwell Minster Choir School in Nottinghamshire, and Alan working long days as a design engineer - on the luxury liner
QE2,
among other projects - Grace could devote most of her energies to nursing. She won praise from her superiors as a competent administrator and enjoyed a reputation for her highly conscientious approach to the job - so much so that in time she was promoted to the position of nursing sister.

The mask Grace had adopted did not slip for nearly two decades. However, during her thirties and forties this constant concealment was to exact a price: the gradual destruction of her mental and physical health until she was very fragile indeed. The mask was becoming less and less comfortable.

If Grace had long succeeded in shielding herself from her past, the sense of loss that this entailed was brought home to her most poignantly when she was thirty-five. For that is when Eunice died, at a Cheshire Home for young chronically ill patients, after bravely clinging to life for many years. With her sister's death went Grace's last link with a past that the Manns had striven to bury for decades. But, far from consigning her early years to oblivion, this loss fuelled the need that she felt growing ever more urgent within her to reclaim her roots.

In 1985, when she was forty-nine, Grace herself fell ill. A hysterectomy went smoothly enough, but psychologically the outcome was far from satisfactory. Grace's underlying depression, which her unstinting dedication to her work had kept at bay for so many years, returned with a vengeance, and once again she found herself plunging into a dark spiral of despair. Desperate for help and feeling that conventional medicine had little to offer beside pills, she turned first to meditation to bring relaxation, and then to prayer. Both provided moments of relief but failed to tackle the underlying problem. The answer lay within:

I finally realized that in order to recover and proceed with life I needed to know who I was. It was as simple as that. Not knowing was a dark cloud that hung over me and this affected the whole way I operated. Because not knowing who your real parents are means that you have nothing at all to hang on to. It's like being on a raft in the middle of the ocean - you are drifting, there is no anchor, you just don't know where you have come from. I always knew that one day I would have to face up to this. But I always managed to find an excuse to put that day off. It all seemed too exhausting. Could I settle for nothing at the end of a long search? It was a question I couldn't answer until I knew I was ready to face any consequences.

As if preparing herself for the great quest which over the next few years would come close to being an obsession, Grace suggested that a touring holiday in Europe with friends might assist her recovery. As they were driving through Munich in the summer of 1985, on an impulse she asked Alan to stop at a public phone booth. They were in the birthplace of her and her twin sister - and, she was chillingly aware, of the whole Nazi movement. Grace got out of the car and began scanning the local telephone directory for the name Bechhöfer, the surname she had been obliged to use on her exam papers some thirty years earlier.

Not a single person with that name was listed. This came as no surprise to Grace. But then, having grown up in a household where she was forbidden to read newspapers or magazines, where the radio was seldom turned on, and where discussion of the recent past was strenuously discouraged, she had remained largely ignorant of the destruction of Germany's Jews and indeed of the monstrous legacy of the Holocaust. The first spontaneous move in her quest had been fruitless, and two more years were to pass before it was truly under way.

Part of the reason for this delay was the fact that Grace had been told that all documentation relating to her origins had been destroyed. There was simply very little to go on. All she knew was that at the age of three she and Eunice had come to Britain from a Munich orphanage which had soon after burned down, with the loss of all its records. The risk of disappointment in delving into such a murky past also seemed too great. Finally, but by no means the least of her reasons for not embarking on her search, was the fact that Grace was still nervous about what the Reverend Mann's reaction might be on learning of her project. She may have reached middle age but her emotions were still in turmoil from having suffered for so long from one man's obsessive control of her.

When, in 1987, after nearly thirty years in the profession, Grace retired from nursing, she suddenly found time weighing heavily on her. There was no longer a hospital ward to run. Nor were there many domestic duties to attend to, for her son, who by this time preferred to be known by his middle name, Frederick, had won a place as an organ scholar at Cambridge. Aware of the need to occupy her mind, and keen to pursue her artistic impulses, Grace joined a creative writing class run by Rugby District Council. It was there that she became friendly with Hazel Bell, also a Rugby housewife, with whom Grace found she had something in common. Hazel Bell had problems of her own and one evening spoke at length about them to her new friend, for Grace had become an accomplished listener. But as they chatted into the small hours it became clear that Hazel expected Grace to reveal a little of herself in return. 'Why is it, Grace,' she asked, 'that I can't seem to get close to you? Why is it you put up so many barriers and don't seem prepared to let anyone in?'

Never before had Grace been challenged so directly. Alarm bells began to sound in her mind: the great secret, kept under wraps for so many years, was under attack. Unsure of just how much she should reveal to placate her friend, she told her that it was extremely difficult for her to communicate properly with people because she did not know much about her own identity. For this reason it had always been easier to listen than to talk.

But Hazel was clearly determined to draw her friend out. In reply, Grace explained that she and Eunice had come to Britain from an orphanage in Germany the day after their third birthday, but that she knew little more. Repeating a refrain familiar since her childhood, she described how the issue of her identity had always been shrouded in the greatest secrecy, hastily adding that she was quite unused to telling people about it. Even her husband knew precious little about her past. It had always seemed wiser to say nothing at all.

Hazel was intrigued; the creative writing course had never furnished such fascinating material. But Grace insisted that there was nothing else she could say: 'Because I simply don't know any more.'

As tenacious and clear-sighted as any lawyer cross-examining a defendant, Hazel persisted, eventually throwing down the gauntlet. 'Grace,' she said, ' why don't you see if you can find out who you are?'

Her own imagination now fired by the prospect of finding her real parents, Grace cast her remaining doubts aside. She knew she had exhausted all the excuses which had served her so faithfully over the years. Now the friendly helping hand of Hazel Bell was extended to her, and it was too good an offer to refuse. Nearly fifty years after her departure from Munich as a orphaned toddler, she had the green light.

After a few hours' sleep things looked rather different, however. Grace was still strongly motivated, yet in the cold light of day she felt she had not the faintest prospect of finding out anything about her natural parents, and thus her own identity. After all, the Munich orphanage, like the absence of Bechhöfers in the city, was surely a closed book.

On the other hand, Grace was lucky that the legislation on issues of adoption had been moving in her favour. The Children Act of 1975 had made important changes in the law relating to access to birth records. Adults who had been adopted were now able to apply to see the original documents. This was a radical shift from earlier government policy, for previously it had been judged best for an adopted child's break with the past to be total. One sentence from a leaflet published by Her Majesty's Stationery Office described the situation succinctly: 'It is now recognized that although adoption makes a child a full member of a new family, information about his origins may still be important to him.'

This development above all else helped dispel Grace's hesitation, for she realized that information about her birth was not just important - it was the key to her hidden past. The bit firmly between her teeth again, she told herself that many years had been wasted and there was no time to lose.

For those adopted before 12 November 1975, when the new legislation came into force, it had become obligatory to see a social worker trained in counselling. This consultation would help the adopted person to understand the many regulations and procedures surrounding adoption, as well as the possible results of his or her enquiries. Bureaucracy beckoned.

On 17 January 1988, Grace travelled to Warwick to meet Bert Cuff, a social worker whose open smile seem to convey what she had been hoping for. Although helpful and sympathetic, he was at first frankly sceptical about his client's chances of success. Aware that to raise false expectations was to risk doing great damage, he adopted a very cautious approach. 'Mrs Stocken,' he explained, 'it's been fifty years. After fifty years it really is very unlikely that you are going to get anywhere at all.'

'But I've really got to try,' Grace replied through her tears. 'I really feel as if this is something that I've got to do. And all the more so now because I've waited so long before trying to find out.'

Bert Cuff did not need much persuading. Sensing his client's determination and identifying with her plight, he soon became a true ally. He said he was sure that Grace was mature enough to proceed - for that was the judgement the law required him to make - and in addition promised he would do all in his power to help. 'Your first move must be to write to the District Registry of the High Court of Justice at Croydon County Court, in order to obtain your birth certificate,' he explained.

It was not until the twins were nineteen that the Manns had succeeded in adopting them, their formal adoption having taken place at the law courts in Croydon, Surrey. Until that time Grace and Eunice had been fostered. The Jewish Refugees Committee of the Central British Fund had ruled, at the time of their fostering, that before adoption took place each child must be at least eighteen years old and that it must be the wish of the adoptee.

Grace was ignorant of these conditions - she had always believed that she and Eunice had been adopted from the start. In fact, when Eunice was nineteen the Manns thought that her end could not be far away, because she was deteriorating fast. For the Reverend, who had always done his utmost to conceal everything related to the twins' past, it would have been unthinkable to bury his daughter as Lotte Bechhöfer, the name given to her at birth. This dread prospect explains his haste formally to adopt her.

The Chief Clerk at Croydon County Court came back to Grace with a disappointing reply: the court held no copies of any birth certificates, and so it would be necessary to enquire elsewhere. In fact, Grace was already busy writing and dispatching letters daily, including one to the German Consulate in London. As usual, she had outlined the few facts she knew about herself in the hope that these were enough to make a proper investigation possible.

Alan Stocken had his reservations about the wisdom of his wife's quest. Seldom did a day go by, he noticed, without Grace sending off a letter to this authority or that. She was spending more and more time alone in her study on the first floor of their house planning her strategy. Was there any real point, he wondered, in attempting to delve into the past? And most worrying of all, was it not extremely likely that his wife would be hurt and disappointed, and therefore even more damaged, as she pursued her single-minded goal? Suspecting that trying to uncover one's roots could prove a risky business, he was anxious to replace the lid on that particular Pandora's box. Not that his misgivings would have made the slightest difference, for Grace was now a woman who could not be diverted from her mission, as Alan would later explain: