by Rachel Ennis
Without a word Tegan turned and went inside. Jess waited, not sure if she intended coming back. Then she reappeared holding a biro and an empty envelope and held them out in a gesture that said, your idea, you do it.
Resting the envelope against her thigh, Jess wrote quickly, thinking back to when her sons were this age. They’d had their difficult moments. But boys were much less complicated than girls. And they knew she loved them. Nor had they ever needed to make the decisions Tegan faced.
Leaving the note inside, Tegan closed the door and followed Jess.
‘This is much lighter than Nan’s,’ she said as they walked in.
‘I had the inside walls knocked down to make it open-plan.’ Jess switched on the kettle, watching Tegan browse the shelves of books, DVDs, and CDs.
‘Nan says you find people’s ancestors.’
‘That’s right.’
‘I think history’s boring.’
‘Actually, it isn’t. But a bad teacher can make any subject boring. History is people. Like you.’ Jess decided not to mention Tegan’s parents. ‘You’ve got two sets of grandparents, four sets of great-grandparents, and so on. I’ll show you.’ Fetching her chart, she unrolled it on the table, using her laptop to anchor the upper edge.
‘You can see why it’s called a family tree. The person or couple at the bottom leading to all those branches. I traced my mother’s family back to 1759. Have you ever watched Who Do You Think You Are on TV?’ Tegan shook her head. ‘Some of those were amazing. One BBC journalist discovered he was directly descended from six kings of England starting with William the Conqueror. Look, this is me.’
She pointed to her name near the bottom. Her two sons’ names were below it, and Helen’s name below those of Rob and Fiona. ‘In a few hundred years’ time, if one of my sons’ descendants decided to trace his family tree, my name will be up there in the middle, with all those people above and lots more below. Each name on the chart is a person who was born, grew up, worked at a job, got married, had children. They worried, laughed, loved, grieved. They were as real as you or me.’
Her interest caught, Tegan slid onto a chair as the kettle boiled.
‘Would you like tea or coffee?’
Tegan shuddered. ‘Not coffee. I can’t stand the smell of it now. Good job Nan doesn’t like it.’
‘I was the same when I was expecting the twins. But I couldn’t stomach ordinary tea either. So I started drinking herbal teas with a spoonful of honey.’
Tegan pulled a face. ‘I tried chamomile once. Awful it was. Like wet hay.’
‘The fruit ones are better, especially blackcurrant. Lemon and ginger is wonderful for settling a queasy stomach. My gran swore by raspberry leaf tea when she was pregnant. She put me on it as well.’
‘Why?’
‘It’s been used for hundreds of years to make labour easier.’
‘No, I mean why was your gran telling you what to do?’
‘My mum and dad were killed in a road accident when I was young. So I went to live with my gran and grampy.’ She put a cup of tea and a slice of cake on the table within reach. ‘I know you’re having a really hard time right now. But in one respect you’re as lucky as I was. You’ve got a nan who loves you and will stand by you no matter what.’
Tegan’s mouth trembled and tears spilled down her face. Jess ripped several sheets off the kitchen towel roll and handed them to her, gently squeezing her shoulder. Then she moved away to roll up the chart and give the girl space.
There was a brief knock then the door opened and Elsie came in. ‘I got your note.’
‘I popped round to see you, but Tegan said you’d gone to chapel. I thought she might like a change of scene.’
Elsie nodded and crossed to the table. ‘What’s wrong, my lovely?’ Tegan put her arms around Elsie’s waist and sobbed.
‘I’m sorry, Nan.’
‘Water under the bridge, my bird,’ Elsie crooned, gently rocking the girl. ‘Everything’s all right. C’mon on now. You don’t want they pretty eyes all puffed up.’ She looked up at Jess. ‘What did you want, bird?’
‘Only to ask if you’ll vouch for me with Olena Panchyk. I want to ask her about the Refugee Camp up on Beacon Hill. But she doesn’t know me and –’
‘’Course I will. I’ll phone her soon as I get in. She don’t get out much now so she’ll be glad to see a new face.’ She patted Tegan’s shoulder. ‘Come on, my lovely. Time we put the dinner on. We need our strength for they exercises in the book Annie brought.’
Tegan stood up, her wet face reflecting surprise and awe. ‘You’re going to –?’
‘Why not?’ Elsie tucked her arm through the girl’s. ‘Do me good it will. I’ll get fit and we’ll have a laugh. Now, how about some of that cold lamb joint with new potatoes and peas?’ She steered Tegan out, glancing over her shoulder with a grateful nod.
Tom was standing at the bar when Jess walked in. Most of the tables were full and people stood in groups at the bar. The open windows allowed fresh air to mingle with the yeasty smell of beer and the aroma of freshly cooked food.
‘Hello, stranger.’ Joe Sawle beamed at her from behind the bar. ‘Go all right up Liskeard, did it?’
‘Yes, thanks, Joe.’ Jess’s heart skipped a beat at the warmth in Tom’s eyes as he pulled her against him with an arm around her shoulders. Like most Cornishmen he was rarely demonstrative in public. The unexpected gesture revealed his relief that everything was all right between them.
‘Put her down, Peters,’ Joe said. ‘What you having, Jess?’
‘Half of shandy, please.’ She slid her fingers through Tom’s. ‘How did it go?’
‘All signed up.’ His hand tightened on hers. ‘They got a long weekend coming up in a fortnight. They’ll bring her down then. Sail if the weather’s OK, and by trailer if it isn’t.’
‘I’m so pleased for you.’ She thanked Joe as he placed her glass on a coaster. Tom paid and she lifted her drink. ‘Congratulations. With luck when they get back up-country they’ll be talking to other sailing friends about their plans to move to your yard.’
‘They’ve taken a few cards. I meant to tell you, Chris offered to update the yard website.’
‘He did?’ Jess swallowed, enjoying the clean, sharp taste.
‘At a price.’ Tom snorted a wry laugh. ‘Boy’s a born businessman.’
‘What does he want?’ Jess asked.
‘To move into the second bedroom. It’s bigger than the one he’s in. Yesterday him and Doug brought home a new roller and a tin of white emulsion, and he’s been up there all morning putting a coat on the ceiling and walls. Even remembered to put dust sheets down. When I go back I got to put up a length of worktop along one wall for his computer and all, with shelves up over. After that there’s a pile of paperwork waiting. I couldn’t settle to it last week.’ He drained his glass.
‘Want to come and have a bite with me?’
He grinned. ‘Now that’s the best offer I’ve –’
She nudged him. ‘The offer is a sandwich, a piece of cake and a cup of coffee. I’ve got to work as well.’
‘Gone off me, have you?’
‘Stop fishing. You know perfectly well I haven’t. We’ll catch up during the week.’
‘I’ll hold you to that.’
‘I’m counting on it.’ She swallowed the last of her shandy and put her glass on the bar. ‘Cheers, Joe. Give my best to Rena.’
The following morning Elsie knocked then put her head round the door. ‘I rang Kate Terrell –’ Seeing Jess’s blank look she explained. ‘Olena Panchyk’s daughter? You was asking –’
‘Yes, sorry, Elsie.’ Hearing the name Terrell had thrown her for a moment.
‘Kate married Alan Terrell. You know Alan, took over Polvellan Builders from his father? His nephew Colin did your roof. All right is it, the roof?’
‘Seems to be. You were saying?’
‘Yes, Alan and Kate bought the place next door to Olena’s and knocked the
two into one. Made it easier for Kate to look after her mother, and Olena didn’t have to leave her home. Ninety-two now, she is. Still sharp as a tack. She got trouble with her feet so she don’t go out much. Loves her knitting. I seen two shawls she made for her nieces’ daughters. Soft as a cloud they were. One was patterned like a spider web, the other like shells. Anyhow, Kate said for you to go round any afternoon.’
‘Thanks, Elsie. How’s Tegan today?’
‘Doing all right. You telling her all what you went through helped her see that other people have trouble and come through it. And tidn the end of the world, even if it do feel like it.’ A wry smile accompanied her eye-roll.
‘I’m glad.’
‘We’re going in town on the bus tomorrow. She didn’t want to go. But I told her I don’t know what colours she like. While we’re there I’ll pick up some curtain material. She said about getting this here internet.’
‘I can help –’
‘I know you would, my bird. But I don’t want it, not just now. See, Tegan have never wanted for things. Whatever her friends had, she had too. You should ’ve seen what that taxi brung over. Boxes of stuff she got up there. But ’tis like Annie told her, if she’s going to keep this baby, he or she got to come first. I’m hoping she might make friends with another young mum-to-be at the antenatal class.’
‘Will she have to go in to the Health Centre?’
‘No, there’s one in the village hall on a Thursday morning. I know there’ll be some laugh when I walk in. I don’t mind. Just so they see Tegan got family supporting her.’
‘Point taken, Elsie. About the internet, if you change your mind –’
‘I’ll come and ask you, bird.’
Chapter Ten
‘Hundreds, maybe thousands, of refugees came here to Cornwall.’ Olena’s accent was still strong though her English was fluent. ‘Jewish people from Germany, Holland and Belgium, and Poland. Spanish escaping from the Civil War. And others like us, from Ukraine. We were afraid of Communist Russia. At first I lived with my father at one of the camps near Falmouth.’
‘My grandmother didn’t survive the journey,’ Kate said quietly, answering the question Jess had not wanted to ask.
Jess, Kate, and Olena were sitting in the conservatory attached to the back of the property, looking out on to a well-kept and productive garden with a fruit cage, apple trees, a neat lawn, and colourful flower beds.
A pretty china teapot, cups, and saucers, sat on the glass coffee table. Matching plates held crumbs from the farmhouse cake Jess had baked after Elsie had left. The gift had surprised Kate.
‘I didn’t expect – you didn’t have to –’
‘I enjoy baking. And I appreciate your mother agreeing to talk to me.’
‘She’s been looking forward to it.’ In her mid-sixties and Jess’s height, Kate looked comfortable in a turquoise T-shirt and matching cotton trousers. Her thick, greying hair, cut short and brushed back, emphasised the high cheekbones she had inherited from her mother.
‘When the war was over, we had no homes to go back to,’ Olena said. ‘So we stayed here. Every day I give thanks. We were strangers who had nothing and people made us welcome.’
‘Do you mind me asking how you and your husband met?’ Though anxious for information, Jess didn’t want to appear intrusive.
‘Some of the men at Polvellan camp knew a little English. But Anton spoke it well. He was a teacher before the war. Because he was blind in one eye he was not called up to fight. At the camp he was official interpreter for the men and warders. Polvellan camp was only men. In Falmouth there were camps for men and one for women whose husbands had been killed and their children. Some like my father and me were lucky. A family took us into their home.’
‘How many men were at the Polvellan camp?’
‘Eighty, ten in each hut. There was a guardhouse by the entrance, another small hut that I think was an office, also a kitchen and a church.’
Jess’s brows rose.
‘Most of the men were Catholic,’ Kate explained. ‘They asked for permission to use one of the small Nissen huts. This was granted. Those who were good at woodwork built an altar. Some carved crosses and icons. Others who could draw painted the inside walls with religious images.’
Olena nodded. ‘Anton told me a Catholic priest used to come from town to conduct services.’
‘The non-Catholics were given permission to attend the Methodist chapel,’ Kate said. ‘They were deeply touched by their welcome from the villagers. It was one of the chapel congregation that arranged for Dad to have this cottage.’ She smiled. ‘Mind you, it didn’t look like this then. He told me it was small and dark. The window frames were rotten, so were some of the floorboards. But that was after the war when Dad had a paying job and could afford the rent.’
‘Did the men have to stay in camp all the time?’
Olena shook her head. ‘No. Staying always in the camp was boring. Better to work. But because they did not speak much English, the only work was farm labour.’
Jess felt hope surge.
‘DPs – displaced persons, that’s what Dad and the other refugees were called,’ Kate explained, ‘travelled by bus to farms and other jobs outside Polvellan. They were trusted, you see. German prisoners of war worked on farms around the village. Every day groups of them with guards were picked up by lorry and taken to whichever farm they were working at.’
Jess kept a tight lid on her bubbling excitement. ‘I know it’s a long time ago, but do you recall hearing anything about a POW going missing?’
Olena nodded. ‘Yes. Anton came in one day talking about trouble at the POW camp because one of the prisoners had disappeared. The officers were angry because they didn’t know the guards had been dropping the men off at the bottom of the lane instead of driving right to the farm. The lane was narrow. The lorries were wide, and there were gates to open and close. I suppose they didn’t want to be bothered. Anyway, the farmer told the guards the man had left at the usual time and walked down the lane to meet the lorry just like normal.’
‘I don’t suppose your husband happened to say which farm this German was working at?’
‘If he did, I don’t remember.’ Olena’s smile crinkled her eyes. ‘We had not been married long. I was more interested in Anton than in any German.’
‘Can you remember when this was?’
Olena thought. ‘We were married in 1946. I think maybe a year later?’
Back at home Jess logged into newspaper archives. After two hours she blinked sore eyes, arched her back, and rubbed her stiff neck. While she debated whether to get up and make herself a drink she caught sight of a short article about a POW, Dieter Flugge, absent without leave from the camp at Polvellan, last seen at Halvanna Farm.
Though it looked as if she had discovered the identity of the bones, she knew better than to jump to conclusions. She made herself a drink and a sandwich, soothed her tired eyes with cooling drops, then returned to the archives.
Searching weekly editions of both local newspapers for the following twelve months, she didn’t find any mention of his re-capture. It seemed likely that the bones were his. But that was only part of the story. If his death was accidental, why had his body been buried in the dung pile? And if it wasn’t, why had he been killed, and who was responsible?
The following morning, Jess resumed her research, looking in the BMD register for the marriage of Lawson Penrose’s daughter. Mary had married Elliot Stevens in March 1951. On the marriage certificate, beneath the names of both parents, Jess saw the word deceased.
Returning to the BMD register she searched for details of Lawson Penrose’s death. Finding the entry and checking the date in her notes, she saw he had taken his own life a month after the German POW was reported missing.
The possibility of a connection between the two events was impossible to ignore. She could simply hand over what she had discovered to Bev and let her follow it up. But she knew that would be leaving the job
only half done. She wanted to know the rest. That meant ringing Mary Stevens, nee Penrose, and asking if she would be willing to talk.
Jess paced the kitchen, rehearsing what to say. Obviously she needed to show respect, and explain that she had been asked to enquire, she wasn’t simply being nosy.
Mary was under no obligation to talk to her. Wiping her palm down her jeans and flexing her shoulders – any tension would show in her voice – she lifted the receiver, took a deep breath, and dialled.
After Jess said her piece there was a pause. Her hopes sank as she braced herself for a refusal.
‘You better come round,’ Mary said, resignation and relief shading her tone. ‘The police come a few days after the bones was found. You could tell they thought they was wasting their time. So I told them I didn’t know nothing. Then my daughter-in-law Val come back from the village and said you was talking to people trying to find out who they belonged to.’
‘I’m almost sure I know who he was,’ Jess said.
‘But you want to know how he got there,’ Mary said. ‘I heard about you. Val told me about you finding Morwenna Crocker’s family. Come and have a cuppa tea. I got something to show you.’
Surprised by Mary’s ready agreement, Jess blurted, ‘When? I mean, when would be convenient for you?’
‘Come up this afternoon if you want. I aren’t going nowhere.’
‘Thank you, Mrs Stevens. I appreciate it.’ Replacing the receiver, Jess sat back, thoughts buzzing. Wanting to know as much as possible about the family before she reached the farm, she returned to her research.
Mary and Elliot had two sons; Edward, born in 1952, and John, born in 1955. Both were married, and as the electoral roll gave their addresses as cottages on the farm, it was clearly thriving.
There wasn’t time to make a farmhouse cake, but Jess didn’t want to turn up empty-handed. She looked in her baking cupboard and saw the tin of cocoa powder. She switched on the oven and made a chocolate sponge.
By the time she’d had her lunch and washed up, the two halves of the cake had cooled. She spread one with chocolate butter icing and the other with apricot preserve and sandwiched them together. Sprinkling the top with icing sugar, she slid the cake onto a square of greaseproof, then lifted it carefully into a plastic container. She put the sealed container in her basket on top of a notebook and pen.