Where I Found You (37 page)

Judith’s voice was growing stronger as she dared to hope. ‘Do you really think he’ll let me back in?’

‘Yes, I do.’

Judith released a breath that might have been a laugh if she hadn’t been so tense. ‘I promise that if we can get through this then I won’t interfere. In fact, you have my permission to give me a not-so-gentle nudge if I ever step out of line.’

‘It’ll be my pleasure,’ Maggie said with a wicked smile.

The hug from Judith was unexpected and brought with it a sense of relief that lasted only until her mother-in-law pulled away. It was time to go.

‘You haven’t told Mrs Walters I’m coming with you, have you?’

‘No, not a word,’ Judith said. ‘But I still don’t understand why it’s me you’ve asked to take you. Not that I’m complaining,’ she added quickly.

‘You mean why didn’t I ask Kathy to take me to see her mum?’

‘I suppose she’ll be up to her eyes with the move right now,’ Judith said in answer to her own question.

‘And she doesn’t know either?’

‘No, I’ve done exactly as you’ve asked,’ Judith insisted. ‘Now, are you going to tell me what this is all about?’

Maggie inhaled deeply to steel herself. ‘Let’s set off first,’ she said, wanting to give Judith as little time as possible to talk her out of it.

‘I don’t know what to think,’ Judith said.

So far Maggie had done most of the talking as Judith drove, explaining not only the basic facts she had uncovered about Elsa’s life, but why a story told by an elderly woman with a tenuous grip on reality had been so persuasive. What Maggie failed to mention was what might have happened after the baby was born. That, she told Judith, was why she needed to speak to Anne Walters.

‘I have to be honest with you, Maggie,’ she added. ‘I do feel a bit awkward about not forewarning Anne. You think she has something to hide, don’t you?’

Maggie shrugged in response as she tried to reconcile the two images of Mrs Walters in her mind. One was a scheming and heartless woman who had falsified records and torn a newborn baby from its mother’s arms while the other was the wily octogenarian Maggie had admired from afar.

‘Anne might be getting on in years but she isn’t frail by any means,’ Judith warned. ‘She’s not someone you would want to cross.’

The comment only served to compound Maggie’s fears and her legs felt wobbly as she hauled herself out of the car with a little assistance.

‘Are you sure you want to do this?’ Judith asked.

‘I’ve come this far.’

Once they had closed the wrought iron gate behind them, the walk up the driveway to Anne Walters’s bungalow was surprisingly long. By comparison, the front door of Ted and Elsie’s home was only a couple of steps from the pavement. Maggie brushed against a tall hedge on her right and a little probing with her cane revealed a neat stone border beneath it. Under other circumstances she would have asked Judith to describe the house and its grounds but this was not a social call. Instead, she allowed herself the luxury of forming her own impressions as her imagination saw fit. This was an imposing house, spacious and well maintained. Anne Walters certainly knew how to look after herself: she had invested the profits from other people’s misery very well indeed.

Judith rang the bell but there was an interminable delay before the door opened.

‘You’re right on time, sweetheart. I’ve already put the kettle on. Oh, who’s this, Judith?’

‘This is my daughter-in-law, Maggie.’

Maggie could feel a wary pair of eyes scrutinising her. ‘Oh, hello,’ Anne said. ‘You’re my Kathy’s friend, aren’t you?’

‘Yes, that’s right.’

‘How lovely to meet you at last.’

Maggie was taken aback by the insincerity in Anne’s voice but then remembered who she was dealing with. Kathy must have mentioned Elsie in passing to her mum and Anne was sharp enough to quickly surmise the motives behind Maggie’s unexpected visit. Her guilt was showing and Maggie half expected the greengrocer’s niece to close the door in her face. She didn’t, but neither did she open it wide.

‘Can we come in?’ Judith ventured when no one else had made a move.

‘Yes, how rude of me – please do.’

The hallway was airy and the echo of their footsteps on the hardwood floor only served to reinforce Maggie’s assumptions that the bungalow was spacious. Beneath the welcoming aroma of home baking she detected the smell of fresh paint. Kathy had been preparing the place for renting out but Maggie would rather believe that Anne commanded pristine living conditions.

‘I thought you’d be overrun with removal crates by now,’ Judith said.

‘Oh, I’m not moving just yet. Kathy needs to settle into the new house first and apparently there’s dry rot in the granny flat that needs some attention.’

This was news to Maggie and a frown was creasing her brow when Anne turned to her and said, ‘I can’t believe we’ve never met before. I’ve heard a lot about you though.’ Her voice was soft and light with only a touch of graininess that gave away her age. From her light, slow footsteps as she led them into the living room, Maggie gauged that Anne was of slight build and the dipped projection of her voice suggested that she walked with a stoop. Maggie’s senses were forming the image of a harmless old lady – but her heart held on stubbornly to a more monstrous figure.

‘Yes, it is surprising, but then I don’t think you like coming over to Sedgefield, do you?’ It was the first shot across the bow.

Anne’s answer was succinct and to the point. ‘No, I don’t.’

‘Why don’t you two sit down and I’ll make the tea,’ Judith offered. ‘I know where everything is.’

Maggie took a seat on the edge of a wide armchair. Her hands gripped the plush Jacquard upholstery as a twinge pulled across her stomach. She ignored it, concentrating instead on where to start her interrogation. Nerves got the better of her though and she found herself saying, ‘This is a lovely house. I imagine it’s going to be a big upheaval when you do move.’

‘But a nice change too,’ corrected Anne. ‘I’ve been on my own for too long now and it will be good having family around. They are so very important to me, now more than ever.’

The deep breath Maggie took forced the next words from her mouth. ‘You know why I’m here, don’t you?’

‘I think I’d prefer you to tell me.’

Maggie cleared her throat. ‘I know I have no right to invade your privacy and demand answers, but I’ve recently become very close to someone who knew you in the fifties. Elsie, or Elsa as you would have known her, moved back to Sedgefield earlier this year. I think she wanted some kind of resolution after everything that had happened to her all those years ago when she stayed with your aunt, Flo Jackson.’

‘Wanted, not wants?’ Anne asked, pouncing immediately upon the weak point in Maggie’s prepared argument.

‘She has Alzheimer’s and we lose a little more of her every day, but there are still times when she remembers and times, too, when she thinks she’s back in 1953.’

The tinkle of china announced Judith’s return to the room. ‘Tea’s up,’ she said. ‘I can leave it here if you would rather talk to Maggie alone?’

‘No, please stay. You’re practically family anyway. So, where were we?’ Anne continued as Judith busied herself pouring the tea. ‘Ah, yes, Elsa was quite a character; what we would have called flighty in my day.’

‘She was a young woman who made one mistake,’ Maggie protested.

Upholstery creaked as Anne struggled to get comfortable in her chair. ‘I didn’t mean to sound so harsh,’ she offered, ‘but it was very different back in our day. Respectable girls didn’t go to dances at Burtonwood airbase and they certainly didn’t become unmarried mothers. Elsa would have been in her early twenties when we met but she was still very much a teenager. Although, when all’s said and done, it was hard not to like her.’

Maggie recognised something akin to genuine affection in Anne’s voice and she found herself smiling. ‘She complained a lot about working at the greengrocer’s.’

Anne allowed herself a smile too. ‘Yes, she tried to use her pregnancy to get out of work but my aunt was no fool.’

‘Now I know where you get it from,’ mumbled Judith as she passed Anne her cup.

‘Why did you help her?’ Maggie asked.

‘My husband was her sister’s GP and I was his receptionist so I knew Celia quite well. I was there when she dragged Elsa along to the surgery to confirm her suspicions.’

‘Gordon was a doctor?’ gasped Judith. ‘I never knew.’

‘Yes, that came as a surprise to me too,’ added Maggie. She was about to ask what had caused the dramatic change in career but Anne was eager to continue with her story.

‘The two sisters had a very strict Catholic upbringing and, unlike Elsa, Celia conformed to tradition. She married young and already had a brood. I think she would have taken Elsa’s baby as her own if she hadn’t been pregnant at the time. I felt sorry for them and mentioned my aunt’s guesthouse. Aunt Flo agreed to take her in until she had the baby on the condition that Elsa earned her keep.’

‘That took care of Elsa, but you also had plans for the baby, didn’t you?’

‘Here’s your tea, Maggie,’ Judith said.

Maggie’s hand wrapped around the warmth of the cup then gripped it a little tighter as a twinge tried to take away her breath. It was her third that morning or was it the fourth? She refused to be distracted.

Anne sniffed dismissively. ‘Elsa couldn’t have looked after a baby! She barely knew how to take care of herself.’

‘She did a good enough job only a few years later,’ remarked Maggie.

‘By all accounts she married and went on to lead a happy life and I’m glad – but when she was in Sedgefield, Elsa was completely on her own.’

Maggie was about to reply but Anne stole her thunder. ‘I suppose she told you all about Freddie,’ she said barely disguising the barbs in her voice. ‘The handsome Yank who was going to whisk her off on his white charger so they could live happily ever after?’

Maggie shrugged. ‘Maybe it did sound too much like a flight of fancy but there’s no denying it turned into her worst nightmare. Elsa lost Freddie; she didn’t deserve to lose Tess too.’

‘Tess? Oh, yes, that was the name she gave the baby. It was so desperately sad.’

‘What happened to her?’ Judith asked.

Maggie’s pulse raced as she waited for Anne to decide whether to set free the truth or continue with a sixty-year lie.

‘She was stillborn, I’m afraid.’

‘That’s not how Elsie recalls it,’ countered Maggie.

‘And how reliable is her memory again? If you would care to check her medical records, they will tell you all you need to know.’

‘And it was your husband who recorded those details.’

‘I don’t know what you’re inferring but you would be well advised not to smear my late husband’s name.’ The sweetness had disappeared from Anne’s voice. She was losing patience but then so was Maggie.

‘By suggesting he had falsified birth records, you mean?’ Maggie asked bluntly. ‘What happened to make him leave the medical profession?’

Anne’s breathing had become shallow and she swallowed before saying, ‘I don’t want to appear rude but I really don’t think there’s anything more I have to say on the matter.’

Maggie cursed herself for antagonising Anne. Although she could prove she was lying, Maggie had wanted Anne Walters to give the information freely. There seemed little chance of that now.

‘It must have been so awful for you.’

‘I’m sorry?’ Anne asked, as stunned by Judith’s comment as Maggie.

‘I was only thinking that you would have been pregnant with Kathy around the same time that Elsa lost the baby. This all happened in 1953, you said?’

Maggie couldn’t read Judith’s face but she could read her voice. It hadn’t been an innocent comment at all.

‘Yes, although I have to say, I always thought Kathy was born later. Up until recently that is …’ Maggie added but stopped herself from mentioning how she had come across Kathy’s date of birth. Flo Jackson’s will was the final piece of the puzzle and revealing it would come soon enough; Anne was leaving her no choice. ‘I’d assumed that because you went to school together you were the same age but you’re not, are you? I can’t believe she let us celebrate her sixtieth in the summer with paninis and a glass of wine.’

Judith laughed. ‘It wasn’t exactly a milestone Kathy wanted to celebrate and she would love people to think she was the younger one but she was a couple of years ahead of me at school.’

‘Elsie never mentioned that you were pregnant,’ Maggie said, turning her attention back to Anne. ‘In fact, she was under the impression that you couldn’t have children.’

‘It was a long time ago and even I’m struggling to remember things clearly,’ Anne said, feigning vulnerability. ‘I’m sorry, but all of these questions have worn me out. I can’t give you the answers you want, Maggie. History can’t be rewritten.’

‘No, I’m afraid it can’t and I would be doing Elsa a disservice by not finishing the job I came here to do.’ She let Judith take her half-empty cup and then fumbled around in her handbag. Her hands were shaking but she found the piece of paper that Jenny had typed out on her Braillewriter. ‘This is only an excerpt of your aunt’s will but I think it says it all. Shall I read it out?’

When Anne spoke, her tongue clicked against the roof of her dry mouth. ‘Can I stop you?’

As Maggie was about to begin, she felt a now-familiar pain pull across her abdomen. This time she checked her watch. She was going to have to stop calling them twinges and start timing her contractions. Her baby seemed determined to be as much a part of Elsa’s story as Tess and that somehow felt right. She took a moment and when she could speak, she said, ‘There’s one section that lists the estate but I think this is the important part. It says, “The property stated above shall remain in the possession of my niece Anne Walters and shall not be sold during her lifetime but passed in its entirety to her daughter, Katherine Margaret Walters. To Elsa Milton, nee O’Brien, I leave only my heartfelt apology. Wrongs have been done to you and for my sins I played my part. I can only hope that you eventually discover the door I have left open to the past and my dying wish is that one day you will be reunited with your daughter.”’