Understandably, the Irish became a close-knit community, to help each other survive the new life. My grandmother said they prayed and drank and worked together when they could, forming a militant church that fought not only for their souls, but for their human rights. My grandfathers were cousins and they took any jobs they could and, for the reasons I have explained, the work was always what the Americans disdained as beneath them, fit only for slaves and servants. For this reason, the black population resented and hated the Irish newcomers, feeling they took work that could have been theirs, and the feeling was mutual. You would have thought the Irish and the black people would have joined together in a common purpose, wouldn’t you, Mr McGuigan, and hated their oppressors, rather than each other? But that was not the case. Such is human nature, I fear.
I know my grandparents were terribly bitter about having competed with African Americans, who were freed slaves, for the most menial jobs and poorest housing, and they instilled their hatred in their children. Many Irish immigrants at that time were driven to despair and drink and crime, but my paternal and maternal grandparents stuck together. They were determined they would not sink under the morass of intemperance and degradation that prevailed, and they did not. Together, after some years, they moved south and bought some land. They built a fine plantation, with their blood, sweat and tears, and they rose in the world. But their past had moulded their characters and their outlook on life. They were four of the most hard, unforgiving, bitter people I have ever met, and cruel. Terribly cruel to their black workers. I think even my parents were terrified of them. I know us children were.
And now I must speak of my sister, Ruth.
Esther’s eyes were full of tears. ‘I’m frightened to read on,’ she whispered. It had been a bitter blow to find out that her mother was dead, but what else was she going to discover? And yet she needed to know. She had lain awake so many nights thinking about the part of her that was shrouded in mystery, and this woman who was her aunt could provide the answers.
Caleb drew her to him and kissed her. ‘I know, love. That’s why I wanted to give you this when I could be with you all the time, holding you, loving you, being here.’ He’d had so little to go on when he’d begun the search, just a name, and the fact that the family might have lived in Cincinnati or Albany, and that Ruth’s father had been a member of the Democratic Party and possibly elected to the city council; that was all Esther had known. But then he’d uncovered all this, and he’d wondered if he should ever have started.
Esther read on:
There were four of us: two older brothers, me, then Ruth. She was born to my mother late in life. I think if my parents loved anyone, it was Ruth, so it made it all the more unthinkable for them when they discovered she was expecting a baby at the age of fifteen. A dreadful time followed. Ruth admitted that the father of her baby was Michael – one of our plantation workers – and I think my father lost his mind for a while. That is the only excuse I can give for what happened.
Ruth was sent away to have her baby, as you know, and Michael disappeared the same night. The story was that he had run away, but I fear I don’t believe that. He would never have left Ruth. My father and my brothers disposed of him, I am sure of it, and I think my mother knew it. Certainly it was what Ruth suspected when she came home; and from the day she walked through the door, she simply faded away. Within three months she had died. One of my brothers was killed in a riding accident shortly afterwards, and the other one died in his fifties without having married, as I have not. I believe a curse was put on our family the night Michael disappeared, although some would say that is fanciful.
Before she died, Ruth gave me the enclosed letter, in the hope that one day her daughter would read it. That is the story, Mr McGuigan, and I am glad that out of it all, my poor sister’s child is alive and well. I fear I am in ill health myself and suffering from a heart condition, but if Ruth’s daughter can find it in her heart to forgive our family, I would dearly like to hear from her.
With very best wishes,
Catherine Flaggerty
Esther sat for a moment, staring at the smaller envelope. There was no writing on it. She turned it over. Her mother had touched it; her fingers had caressed the paper, and she had been thinking of her daughter when she had sealed the envelope.
‘All right, darling?’ Caleb put his arm round her and she leaned against him for a moment, unable to speak because her throat was blocked and aching.
After a long, shuddering sigh, she straightened. Gently, almost reverently, she slipped the tip of a nail under the edge of the envelope. The old paper gave without protest immediately, the ancient glue so brittle it had no hold.
Esther unfolded the two sheets of notepaper within, but she had to wipe her eyes again before she could focus on the words:
My darling beautiful baby girl,
It is my prayer you will read this some day and know how precious and infinitely special you are. I don’t know what you will be told about me and your father. It is true that our love conceived you out of wedlock, but it was love, my darling. Believe that. Your father was the most sweet-tempered, tender, wonderful man in the world, a giant among men, even at the age of eighteen. He would have made a difference in the world, if he had been allowed to live, I know that. But I am going to be reunited with him and so I cannot be sad, except for the fact that I would have so loved us to be a family together.
Your father’s name was Michael, and his grandparents were brought to America in shackles in the hold of a slave ship – torn from their village and peaceful way of life by men who were brutal and without mercy. The slaves on our plantation are allowed no surname, but Michael’s parents have told him his is Bamogi, and that his grandfather was a chief in his own country and greatly respected for his wisdom and compassion. His spirit lives on in his grandson, or did before other men with white skin, equally brutal and without mercy, took his life. But you are his daughter, my darling, and I believe he lives on in you.
We love you, my sweet baby, your father and I. We will always love you. Death cannot quench love. I believe that from the bottom of my heart, and in the last few days I have felt your father very close, as my time on this earthly vale draws to a close. Men would say we committed a sin in our coming together, but only God is the true judge, and I am content to put my trust in Him.
I did not want to give you up, but I knew Harriet would be a loving and good mother and would protect you when I could not. There has not been a moment since you were born when you haven’t filled my heart and soul, and I pray that God will give you a good and long life with much happiness and joy – like your name. I pray also that you will see a time when man’s inhumanity to man will be a thing of the past, and each man, woman and child will stand on who they are, and not on the colour of their skin or the culture from which they have sprung. Michael believed that would happen one day, and because he believed it, I have to believe it too.
My sister, Catherine, is the only one I can trust with this letter. I am virtually a prisoner in my room, and nothing I have is sacrosanct, as far as the rest of my family is concerned, but I know she will keep it safe for you. My arms ache to hold you and tell you how much you are loved. Always remember that. Be strong, my darling.
I love you, so much.
Your Mama xxxxx
It was more than she could have hoped for, and yet at the same time the sense of loss was so acute that it was unbearable. When Caleb drew her close, Esther’s body shook them both with the force of her weeping, and she cried for some minutes. But when at last she straightened, taking the handkerchief he gave her and mopping her eyes, a sense of peace had stolen over her, without her being aware of it.
‘She loved me,’ she whispered, turning to look at him. ‘And I was right; they are together somewhere.’
Caleb’s response to this was not to speak, but to put his hand gently to her cheeks and stroke away the last of her tears. He hadn’t wanted to spoil their wedding night, and h
e hadn’t known how Esther would deal with hearing from this aunt, but he felt that to keep the letter – especially the one from her mother – from her for one more day was wrong. He’d known she would be upset, and that was why he hadn’t given her the letter before their wedding day. As he had said to her, he could be with her twenty-four hours a day now, talk through anything that needed to be talked through and make sure she was all right. They had both left their jobs after Christmas, to prepare for their marriage and begin planning for the future and the huge project of the home.
‘Thank you for finding her.’ Esther smiled shakily. ‘I don’t know how you did it, but thank you. You will never know what it means to have my mother’s letter. It’s a dream come true, Caleb.’
‘No more tears, sweetheart.’ He pulled her to him again. ‘I didn’t want to make you cry, especially on this night of all nights.’
‘I needed to know,’ she whispered, brushing away the tears. ‘And they’re happy tears, in a way. I knew in my heart they were good people and that they cared about me, but this puts all the pieces together. It’s just hard to hear they were treated so cruelly. And they died so young.’
‘But they live on in you, and in Joy, and any bairns we might have.’
‘That’s true, but I want them here, now, seeing it all.’ She shook her head. ‘I want it all and I know I can’t have that, but I’d give ten years of my life to feel my mother’s arms around me and for her to kiss me.’
‘You’ll have to make do with me,’ he said softly, ‘and all the other people who love you.’
‘My mother did the only thing she could, in giving me to Harriet, I see that; and Harriet did love me as her own child. It can’t have been easy for her, married to Theobald . . . ’
They talked on in the quiet of the room, the snow falling outside the window and the world hushed and silent. And later, in the early hours of the morning, they made love, and Caleb’s fears were laid to rest.
They settled into married life as ten-foot drifts of snow transformed the landscape, turning the countryside into a huge, white maze, and as the cold tightened its grip in London the River Thames froze over. Non-stop blizzards crippled the roads and railways as effectively as Hitler’s bombs had done, but this time it was the whole country that was hit. Almost no coal got through to power stations, factories and homes, and major roads became impassable, cutting off the north of England from the south.
The crisis soon meant that the forces of winter succeeded where the Nazis had failed, invading the British Isles and holding it in an iron grip. By the end of the first week of February, when Emanuel Shinwell, the Minister of Fuel and Power, was forced to announce drastic measures and declare that power to industries was to be cut off altogether, and householders had periods of being without electricity for hours on end, Caleb had stockpiled a huge mountain of logs from trees that he’d cut down in the area of woodland on their property. Hundreds of coal trains were unable to battle their way through the twenty-foot-high snowdrifts that had developed as the weather had worsened, which meant that many homes had no heating at all. Not only that, but shipping in the Channel had stopped, creating a new threat to food supplies, and in some villages whole families were literally starving in their cold, dark homes.
Snow fell every day and Esther felt guilty that, far from finding the isolation and difficulties that the winter had caused untenable, as so many people did, she was enjoying the time cut off from the outside world with her new husband; and Joy was as happy as a bug in a rug. Fanny Kennedy and her sister still managed to provide hot food, courtesy of Caleb’s logs in the range and, after he’d made himself a toboggan to fetch supplies from the town, they wanted for little. With no electricity most of the time, they relied on candlelight once it grew dark, and to save burning too many candles they went early to bed and rose when it was light. This meant many warm hours snuggled up to Caleb in the privacy of their big bed, the logs crackling in the small fireplace and sending flickering shadows on the walls of the bedroom, as they made leisurely love and explored each other’s bodies. They talked for hours, getting to know each other intimately in a short time, which could never have happened in the usual way. Together they drew up plans for the alterations to turn the house into a children’s home. It was a magical interlude.
At present Fanny and her sister occupied the old servants’ quarters, situated off the kitchen and scullery at the back of the house. These were very comfortable, having recently been modernized by the previous owner. There were five bedrooms, a large communal sitting room, and a bathroom and a separate toilet. Esther thought Prudence and her children could have the remaining three bedrooms. Fanny and her sister were motherly sort of women, and she felt Prudence and her little ones would settle in well there. A small cottage in the grounds, which had been the home of the previous gardener and his family, was designated by Esther and Caleb for Priscilla and Kenny. It only had two bedrooms at present, but an extension would take care of that and would also enlarge the living space downstairs.
The main house already had fourteen bedrooms, and they intended to knock down walls to make two large boys’ dormitories and two for girls, with separate bathrooms and toilets. Each dormitory would sleep eight, and a separate bedroom-cum-sitting-room at the head of the rooms would house a permanent member of staff, of which there would be nine, besides Priscilla, Kenny and Prudence. Downstairs, a sitting room, games room, dining room and library would be for the older children, while in the east wing babies and children up to the age of six would have their own bedrooms, nursery, play area and dining facilities, with attendant staff. The west wing would be a separate entity with its own front door – a house within a house. This would be Esther and Caleb’s family home, comprising a kitchen and three rooms downstairs, and four bedrooms and two bathrooms upstairs.
It was an ambitious undertaking, involving a lot of building work, but that was fine. Officialdom would need to be consulted and a hundred and one obstacles overcome, but Esther knew it was the right thing to do. She had never been more sure of anything in her life. The home would be just that – a home; not an institution, but a place where children would grow up loved, and knowing they were part of a big family, with grown-ups who cared about them.
With inches of snow every night, even Esther was glad when at long last, on the ides of March, the thaw began. But the ice and snow melted into torrents, the rivers overflowed and a great storm in the middle of March spread the floodwaters far and wide. The small, tinkling stream that ran through the grounds near the woodland area turned into a vast lake, which flowed right to the steps of the house, but mercifully not inside it, although Caleb sat up all one night making sandbags in case things became dire. A harsh winter had been followed by a cruel spring, but by the time food rations were cut in June, as the government warned of a new economy drive, a gloriously hot summer brought some relief to Britain’s beleaguered citizens.
All over the country, with the housing shortage now acute, it was a time of reconstruction, as the government attempted to put a roof over the heads of those made homeless by the Luftwaffe. Caleb and Esther’s plans for the home were approved by the powers that be, and with the production of prefabricated houses taking precedence everywhere, they eventually found a small building firm to take on the work, with Esther and Caleb helping out where they could. Even Joy had her own tiny wheel-barrow and did her bit. Stanley and Eliza, Prudence and her sisters and their families came at weekends to lend a hand, and as they all took a break in the hot sunshine, Fanny and her sister would bring out a picnic lunch for everyone. For the first time in her life Esther felt she was experiencing what real family life was like, and it made even the hardest, most exhausting days wonderful.
By the third week of November, when Princess Elizabeth, the heir-presumptive to the throne, married Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh, at Westminster Abbey in a glittering ceremony such as the nation had not seen for decades, the work at ‘Blessings’ – as Esther had decided to
call the home – was all but finished.
Prudence and her children moved into their quarters at the beginning of December, after Prudence had worked her notice at the hospital, and immediately settled in well with Fanny and her sister. Priscilla and Kenny were installed in the cottage in the grounds the same week, although any work to extend their accommodation would not begin until spring the following year. Kenny was already proving a huge asset in his role of manager, taking the load off Esther and Caleb’s shoulders whenever he could. And, as Priscilla confided to Esther when they had a quiet moment alone, he seemed to have grown a few inches in the process. Priscilla was the home’s secretary and in charge of the office; over the summer she had learned to type and even take shorthand.
At the end of the autumn Esther and Caleb had advertised for the other staff required to run the home, when it opened its doors officially in the New Year. They had chosen those applicants who, although not necessarily the highest qualified, would fit in best with the relaxed family atmosphere that already prevailed.
A few days before Christmas the dormitories and nursery had been painted in warm colours and the brightly patterned bedspreads and curtains were in place. Wall-to-wall carpeting covered the floor, rather than the linoleum that was usual in most establishments of this nature; but, as Esther had said, she didn’t want little feet to get cold, and who cared about practicality anyway. The east wing’s playroom was full of toys and books and cuddly teddy bears, and the games room for the older children was equally stocked with items appropriate for their age, including table tennis, dartboards and board games.
The Colours of Love Page 35