The Lost Ancestor (3 page)

Did bibliotèque mean library?
 
Mary
wondered, struggling to recall her French lessons from school.  The idea
of even catching a glimpse of the wonderful, celebrated Blackfriars’ library
filled her with a joy that far outweighed the potential stupidity of her
decision to reach across and tentatively take the silver coffee pot. 
‘Biblotèque?’ she said softly.

Angry yellow teeth appeared between the
chef’s cracked lips.  ‘Oui, la bibliotèque,’ he said, slowly repeating
each word.  Spit flew from his mouth on the final word.

Mary gave a submissive nod of her head and
walked purposefully from the kitchen with the coffee pot.  ‘What a
disgusting creature!’ she mumbled to herself, entirely unsure of where she was
headed exactly.  Ahead of her a long, narrow corridor with plain,
whitewashed walls fed several closed doors.  She knew that she needed to
find a staircase which led to the east wing, having once caught sight of the grand
library during a summer fete.  As she reached the end of the corridor,
Mary shuddered from the cold, having left the reaches of the hot kitchen
ranges.  She found herself at a corridor which ran perpendicular to the
last.  Standing still, Mary closed her eyes and tried to imagine a birds’
eye view of Blackfriars.  If she was not mistaken, then she needed to take
a left turn into the bowels of the east wing, then search for a staircase to
the next floor.  The library should then be somewhere close by.

As Mary began to walk along the flag-stone
floor, she quickly spotted a staircase and smiled.  She climbed the steps
and, at the top, she pushed open a heavy-set wooden door, appearing in a grand,
decadent hallway which stole her breath away.  Mary’s eyes flitted and
danced across the huge family portraits that hung on beautifully elaborate ruby
and gold wallpaper, across pieces of ornate furniture, enormous porcelain and
pottery pieces, which would take up most of her tiny bedroom, and a gigantic
cascading chandelier.  Whilst her twin sister dreamed of
working
her life in a grand place such as this, Mary dreamed of living her life in it,
becoming
Lady Mary Rothborne and owning all of these precious things.  She knew
that it was an impossible fatuous dream, but it was one that had failed to
release its childhood grip on her ever since she had first met Cecil Mansfield,
heir to the Blackfriars estate, at a summer fête in 1902 to celebrate King
Edward’s coronation.  Although she was just nine years old at the time,
and he was thirteen years her senior, that moment cemented Mary’s infatuation
with him and his family.  The childish games that Edie had just mocked her
for, the annual family attendance at the Blackfriars fêtes, were always at
Mary’s initiation and insistence.  Her infatuation was knocked but not
diminished when Cecil became married to Philadelphia Carnarvon.

The sound of laughter jolted Mary from her
musings.  She cursed herself for her silly daydreams and fantasies—they
were always getting her into trouble.  She tucked herself against a large
stone pillar and peered to the side.  Two gentlemen whom she did not
recognise headed across the hallway, chatting animatedly as they went. 
They disappeared from sight and Mary quickly moved into the east wing of the
house.  Once there, the library was impossible to miss and, as she reached
the open doorway, she had to remind herself to move inside the room where she
would be out of sight, rather than stand dumbstruck at the sheer marvel of the
room.

Mary set the coffee pot down and took in
the splendour of the library.  An eerie grey light caused by the falling
snow fell through the tall, latticed windows.  Her eyes danced excitedly
around the room, unable to focus on any one aspect.  Thousands upon
thousands of books lined floor-to-ceiling shelving, set within intricately
carved walnut panels.  An open fire stacked with seasoned oak pumped life
and heat into the room; Mary knew that if she had been the lady of the house,
this
would have been the place that she would spend her days.  Mary, unlike her
twin, had an insatiable appetite for books of all kinds: she read about kings
and queens, nature, history, science, foreign countries and, on her father’s
instruction, she read the Bible.  Under Mary’s bed was a veritable
treasure trove of fiction books—stories which she read over and over, living
her life vicariously through the protagonists’ exciting lives.  However
dreary and unpalatable her life really was, Mary always knew she had a whole
different, more exciting and exotic world waiting under her bed.  Standing
here, in the Blackfriars grand library was better than anything that she could
have produced from her imagination.

Having taken in the scale and wonder of
the room, Mary moved to the nearest shelf and pored over the tomes before
her.  Her forefinger moved carefully over the coarse spines, tracing the
gold and black lettering, absorbing unfamiliar authors and titles.  To her
delight, Mary’s fingertip came to rest on
Four Sisters,
the most recent
novel by her favourite author, Alice Ashdown.  She delicately pulled the
book from the shelf then turned it over in her hands.

‘What are you doing?’ a voice whispered at
the open doorway, making Mary drop the book in fright.

‘Edward!  Don’t creep up on me like
that!’ Mary said.

Edward pushed the door closed. 
‘Mary, I’m serious.  What are you doing in here?’

‘Bringing up a coffee pot.  I
couldn’t find one of the dreadful servants, so I did it myself,’ she said
playfully.  ‘I shall be having coffee, luncheon, afternoon tea, dinner and
supper in here.’  Mary stooped down in an exaggerated fashion to pick up
the fallen book.  ‘See to it that I’m not disturbed, Mister Mercer.’

Edward shook his head.  ‘Mary, you’ll
get us both in big trouble if you’re found in here.’

‘Please address me as
Lady Mercer
,’
Mary said with her head held high, staring down her nose at her cousin, the
handsome Blackfriars footman.  She and Edward had both inherited their
grandfather’s fiery red hair, a simple familial resemblance, but which others
imbued with implications about shared personality traits.  It was true
that, as children, Edward was one of the few people who had really understood
her mischievous sense of adventure.  After Edie, Edward had always been
her favourite relative.

A small smile appeared on Edward’s
face.  ‘Mary, put that book back.  This coffee is for Lady Rothborne,
she’ll be in here at any moment.’

Mary flung her red hair to one side and
marched in an exaggeratedly indignant fashion to the tall windows.  ‘In
view of the impetuous snow we’re having of late, I shall enjoy my coffee on
this delightful window seat.  Fetch it over please, Mercer.’  Mary
sat bolt upright in the window
chaise longue
, the book placed in her
lap, with all the posture of an eminent lady.

Edward drew closer and stood in front of
her.  ‘
Lady
Mercer,’ he said exaggeratedly.  ‘Will you
please
get out of here!’  Edward gently placed his hand on her elbow and ran his
fingers up her arm and into her tousled hair.

His touch sent a wave of delight through
her, a feeling that shocked and surprised her.  She remembered what Edie
had just told her and whipped her head to one side so that his hand fell from
her.  She looked at the window and watched fat chunks of snow silently
colliding with the window, slowly transforming into droplets of water.

A moment’s silence was interrupted by the
sound of the door opening behind them, quickly followed by a mild gasp. 
Edward immediately side-stepped and stood up straight, knowing that he had been
caught.

‘What in
God’s
name
is happening
here?’ a grave, female voice bellowed across the library. 

Mary looked over at the doorway and there,
in an elegant coal-black dress which stretched to the floor, stood the
formidable Lady Rothborne, Dowager Countess of Blackfriars.  She allowed
her words to linger and echo among the book-laden walls like a reverberating
spell.  Despite her old age, she stood with perfect posture, staring at
the pair of them.

Edward stepped forward with a deferential
nod of his head.  ‘Your Ladyship, I was just showing Miss Mercer the way
out.  She got lost bringing your coffee up.  She was doing the chef a
favour.’

Lady Rothborne strode into the room and
stopped before Edward.  ‘Miss
Mercer
?’

‘Yes, Your Ladyship—she is my cousin.’

‘I can see the resemblance,’ Lady
Rothborne said, without so much as a glance towards Mary.  ‘What is your
cousin
doing assisting Monsieur Bastion?  I was not aware of any new scullery
maids at Blackfriars.  Where is her uniform?’

Edward’s eyes sank to the floor. 
‘She was just waiting here while her sister has an interview with Lady
Rothborne, Your Ladyship.  She has come for the job of third housemaid.’

Lady Rothborne raised an eyebrow, her
harsh features softening momentarily.  ‘Has she now?’  She glanced
across to Mary but addressed Edward.  ‘That will be all, Mercer.’

Edward looked uncertainly at Mary.

‘That will be all, Mercer,’ Lady Rothborne
reiterated in a louder, more severe tone.

‘Yes, my lady,’ Edward said.  With a
slight nod of the head, he hurried from the room, closing the door behind him.

Mary stared at Lady Rothborne, anxiously
waiting for her to speak; even to look at her directly.  Edie would be
mortified to know that she had been caught by Lady Rothborne holding a book
from the Blackfriars library.  Mary lowered the copy of
Four Sisters
and
slowly began to push it behind her back.

Without a flinch, Lady Rothborne turned
and snapped, ‘And what are you planning on doing with
that
?’

‘Well, I would love to borrow it,’ Mary
said.

Lady Rothborne could not hide a look of
puzzlement.  ‘You want to borrow a book from the Blackfriars library, Miss
Mercer?’

‘Only if you don’t mind.’

Lady Rothborne raised her eyebrows. 
‘I’m afraid there is no precedence for handing books out willy-nilly to the
public.’  She paused and smiled.  ‘For employees, on the hand, we
might make an exception.  May I ask, why you did not apply for the role of
third housemaid?’

Mary shrugged.  ‘I don’t have the
experience.  My sister, Edie has done it for years.’

Lady Rothborne smiled. 
‘Nonsense.  I’m sure you would pick it up in a flash.  Would you like
a job here?’

Mary’s eyes suddenly came alive, as her
imagination was reignited.  Books, cousin Edward, Lord Rothborne: little
consideration was required.  It wasn’t exactly what she had dreamed of but
it was a start.  A way in.  ‘Yes, I would like that very much.’

Morton
was sitting in his study, sipping a large cup of coffee and steadily sifting
through the wodge of paperwork provided by his new client, Ray Mercer. 
Having initially buzzed through the pile of papers in order to ascertain the
contents, he was now working through them systematically, creating a basic
genealogical chart for the Mercer family as he went.  So far, so ordinary. 
Nothing which would give rise to the disappearance of a seventeen year-old
girl.  He had so far been most intrigued by the note left on Edith’s grave
in 1962. 
I hope you are at peace.
  Morton had carefully
studied the script—the writer had beautiful flowing handwriting, like nothing
he had ever seen before.  Using skills learnt in his degree, Morton
analysed the pressure, stroke and letter size on the note then compared it to
the photocopy from the book, where Mary had inscribed her name and address in the
inside cover.  Without doubt, they belonged to the same person.  Only
once he was certain of this did Morton read the graphologist’s report, which
drew identical conclusions.  He was still perturbed by the wording of the
note. 
I hope you are at peace
was a mile away from
rest in
peace. 
Morton stared up at the wall of his study that he used when
working on a case.  At the very centre of the wall was the photo of Mary
and Edith, with various certificates, notes and census reports Blu-Tacked
around it.  He stuck the two samples of handwriting onto the wall then
turned back to the stack of papers given to him by Ray Mercer.  At the top
of the pile was a photocopy of the newspaper article featured in
The Sussex
Express
, dated Saturday 22
^nd
April 1911.

Missing
Local Girl

Readers
are being asked to keep a look-out for a Winchelsea girl, following her
mysterious disappearance.  Miss Mary Mercer, in the employ of the
Mansfield family of Blackfriars, had left her duties as usual for her half
day’s leave on Wednesday 12
^th
April, but failed to reach her home of
3 Friar’s Cottages.  Readers will be saddened to learn that, despite a
thorough searching of the locality on Saturday last, Miss Mercer’s whereabouts
still remain unknown.  Family and friends joined a fruitless search,
looking far and wide for the seventeen-year-old girl.  Sergeant Boxall of
the Sussex County Police is leading an investigation into Miss Mercer’s
disappearance.

Morton
looked at the dates mentioned in the article and noted down the date of Mary’s
disappearance.  The 1911 census, taken on the 2
^nd
April 1911,
would provide Morton with a tentative snapshot of those present in Mary’s life,
days prior to her disappearance.  Returning to the principle that
somebody
at the time must have known what had happened to her, he had drawn up three
lists of people close to Mary in April 1911: friends, family and work. 
Morton first turned his attention to the work list.  The copy taken from
the 1911 census showed Mary Mercer working as a live-in housemaid at
Blackfriars House in Winchelsea.  Above her name were written the names of
three other domestic servants, which Morton scribbled down.  The rest of
the household had not been given to him, being on a previous page.  Morton
fired up his laptop, logged onto the internet and accessed the 1911 census on
the Ancestry website.  Moments after typing in Mary’s full name and year
of birth, a scanned copy of the original census report appeared onscreen,
identical to that in his hands.  Morton clicked onto the page before to
see the full list of occupants of Blackfriars House.  Mary had been in the
employ of the Mansfield family.  Heading the family was Cecil Mansfield,
the Earl of Rothborne and his wife, Philadelphia, to whom he had been married
for six years.  The couple had no children.  His mother, Lady
Rothborne, a widow, was listed next, followed by Frederick Mansfield, cousin to
the head of the house, and a plethora of domestic staff.  As Morton
carefully noted down each person, his eyes landed on a familiar surname: Edward
James Mercer, unmarried, twenty-one years old, footman, born in Icklesham,
Sussex. 
What were the chances of there being an unrelated Mercer
working in the same house as Mary?
Morton wondered.  Not very high, he
reasoned, adding this name to the list of Mary’s family members; he would need
further research.  Morton printed the page then saved the file.  A
quick correlation of census reports and birth records on the Ancestry website
confirmed that Edward Mercer was Mary’s first cousin.  Edward now featured
on both the
family
and
work
lists.

Morton sat back, took a mouthful of the
warm coffee and stared at the list of names before him.  His eyes rested
on the family list.  Mary’s mum, dad and sister lived at number three,
Friar’s Cottages, the same place in which they had resided ten years
previously.  The eldest Mercer girl, Caroline, was absent from the family
home in 1911.  Morton typed ‘Caroline Ransom’ into the search box and
found her, just as Ray Mercer had said, living in Bristol.  She was
recorded as a widow having been married for two years with no children. 
Having printed the page out, Morton ran a yellow highlighter over Caroline’s
name.  If Mary was going to run away from home, then an elder sister in
Bristol seemed a good potential place to which to flee.

Morton stood up and wandered over to the
tiny window which gave onto the old, cobbled streets of Mermaid Street, Rye in
East Sussex.  He and Juliette, his long-term girlfriend, had lived here
for a few months now, his previous house having been destroyed in the pursuit
of a genealogical case.  It was a sixteenth century house, filled with all
the quirks and eccentricities of an ancient property, the first being the house
name:
The House with Two Doors
.  That alone had almost been enough
to stop Juliette from even setting foot in the place.  ‘Can’t we just live
somewhere normal, Morton?’ she had pleaded.  ‘Why do you feel the need to
live somewhere strange?  We don’t
have
to live in a windmill, or a
Martello tower, or a prison, or a converted Methodist chapel, we could just opt
for a modern house with modern things like central heating, double-glazing and
vertical walls and horizontal floors.  Is that
really
too much to
ask?’

‘Let’s just take a look,’ Morton had
replied, as they had approached the property.

‘I don’t even know which bloody door to
knock on,’ Juliette had mumbled. 

It was a fair point, Morton had had to
concede.  Both looked like front doors.  Both had gold knockers and
handles.  The right one had the extra feature of a letterbox, so he had
opted for that one.

It had taken Morton his first step inside
to fall in love with it; it had taken Juliette two full viewings of the house
and a detailed list of the pros and cons of living there before an offer was
finally made and accepted.  Now, eight months later, she loved it just as
much as he did.

Morton spotted a tourist pointing at his
front doors.  It was a daily occurrence, particularly at the height of summer,
when flocks of visitors would descend on Rye to spot Mermaid Street’s quirky
house names.  He pushed open the latticed window and breathed in air laden
with the outpourings of various nearby tearooms, and re-focussed his mind back
on the Mercer Case.
 
If Mary had indeed run away to her sister’s
house in Bristol, there would be few records to corroborate this; the 1911
census was the most recent to be made publicly available and electoral registers
did not extend to include women until 1918, and even then only if they were
aged over thirty and owned property.  Mary would be much more likely to
appear among unofficial sources, family folklore and faded photo albums than in
official records: Morton needed to find out if Caroline and William had any
living descendants through their daughter, Rebecca.

Returning to his laptop, he opened up a
search page on Ancestry for the birth of Rebecca Ransom with the mother’s
maiden name, Mercer.  One result.

‘December quarter of 1911.  Rebecca
Victoria Ransom, mother’s maiden name, Mercer.  District of Bristol. 
Volume 6a.  Page 103.’

Morton smiled.  His next step was to
ensure that Rebecca actually made it into adulthood, although from what Ray
Mercer had said about this side of the family’s not being very helpful, he
guessed that she had lived a full life.  On previous cases, Morton’s
exhilaration at this same point had been dashed when he had discovered that the
child had died soon after birth.  He typed Rebecca’s name into the
1916-2007 marriage index and found that she had married a Victor Reginald Catt
in 1935.  Putting her name into the death search index 1916 to 2007 gave
one result.

Name:
  Rebecca Victoria Catt

Birth
date:
1
^st
November 1911

Date
of Registration:
June
1993

Age
at death:
81

Registration
District:
Bristol

Inferred
County:
Gloucestershire

Register
Number:
13c

District
and Subdistrict:
3011I

Entry
number:
124

Morton
was pleased to see that Rebecca had married and lived a full life.  Now he
needed Rebecca to have left the standard paper trail of children and
grandchildren.  Switching back to the birth index, Morton found that
Victor and Rebecca had produced three children together: two boys and a girl,
all born in the Bristol area.  To save time, Morton prioritised his
searches with the two boys, Reginald and Douglas.

In the time that it took for Morton to
finish the final splashes of his coffee, he had undertaken searches into the
genealogical backgrounds of Reginald and Douglas Catt.  He had confirmed
that both men were still alive, both had their own wives and children and,
using an electoral roll website, he had an address and phone number for each
man.  He considered cold-calling them but only liked to do this in the
most urgent circumstances.  Before typing out a letter to each man, he
carried out a quick Google search of their names.

‘Bingo,’ Morton said, as he clicked his
cursor onto the website of ‘V. R. Catt and Sons, Ironmongers.’  According
to their website, Victor Reginald Catt had set up an ironmonger’s store in
Bristol in 1948, his two sons gradually taking over the business in the
1980s.  Morton saved a black and white photograph of Victor outside his
shop in 1950 and a colour image of him and his sons outside the shop celebrating
their fortieth anniversary in 1988.

Navigating back to their home page, Morton
clicked on the ‘Contact us’ tab and then set about typing a message into the
contact form.  ‘
Dear Douglas and Reginald, I hope you don’t mind my
emailing you out of the blue like this; I am a forensic genealogist who is
researching the Mercer family tree, to which I believe you belong.  In
particular, I am concentrating on trying to discover what became of Mary
Mercer, the sister of your grandmother, Caroline Ransom (née Mercer), who
disappeared without trace in 1911.  At this very early stage in my
investigations, I am considering that one avenue of possibility is that Mary
may have visited her sister Caroline at some point in or after 1911 and would
really welcome your thoughts on this.  I look forward to hearing from
you.  Kind regards, Morton Farrier
.’

Morton clicked the ‘Submit’ button and the
message vanished.  He now just needed to wait patiently and hope that they
would respond.  Morton returned to the three lists of people close to Mary
in 1911.  By far, the longest list was the staff of Blackfriars. 
Did
the household and staff accounts books still survive?
Morton
wondered.  A brief Google search told him that the property was in the
hands of the Mansfield family, the same family as in 1911 when Mary had
disappeared.  He had driven past the imposing property countless times,
Winchelsea being on the unavoidable route between his house in Rye and his
father’s in Hastings, yet, despite it having been open to the public since
1960, he had never actually set foot in it.  It was high time for a visit.

Morton
had trained to be a forensic genealogist in the time before family history had
exploded onto the internet.  He loved the immediacy and speed of such a
huge plethora of records being online, but for him, the biggest enjoyment came
from an immersion in history: holding ancient documents between his fingers,
analysing faded photographs and uncovering lichen-covered tombstones in the
search of an elusive ancestor.  He needed little convincing to step out of
his study for some hands-on research.

He had decided to park on Friar’s Road in
the summer shadows of the town church.  Grabbing his bag, he stepped out
into the early-afternoon sun, taking in the stillness of the small town. 
Winchelsea, being just three miles from his home, had always fascinated
him.  The casual visitor or holidaymaker often came here to see a quaint,
well-preserved English village; those unguided tourists left without the
knowledge that it was in fact a town, once envisaged by its founder, Edward I,
as one of the leading seaports in England.  Further confusion often came
by the unique design of the town using a grid pattern, something which often
confused visitors used to associating it with modern American cities.