by Lynn Austin
The family proceeded into the dining room for dinner, then politely discussed unimportant things while they ate. Audrey’s mind raced, searching for a way out as if she were trapped in the dark ATS training shed again, the room slowly filling with gas. The question the vicar had asked four years ago sprang to mind, unbidden. “What might God be asking you to do?” It was a much bigger question than where she would live or how she would survive. It meant finding a greater purpose in life than pleasing other people. It was what Robert would have wanted for her, as well.
“You said you had something you wanted to discuss?” Audrey’s uncle asked after dinner. He led her into his stately library while the others retired to the sitting room for brandy.
Audrey drew a steadying breath and got right to the point. “Father is selling Wellingford Hall.”
“My goodness. Why?”
Audrey debated whether or not to tell him the truth and decided not to. If her uncle didn’t already know that Alfred Clarkson wasn’t her real father, she wouldn’t tarnish Mother’s memory by telling him. Some secrets were better left hidden. “Father is moving up north. But my son and I won’t be going with him.”
“Do you plan to resettle here in London?”
“That seems to be my best option.”
“Your aunt and I will be happy to introduce you to the right social circles. I believe you’ll do very well here once you find your place.”
Audrey could only nod, fighting tears as she remembered how bleak and pointless her life had seemed before the war. Before Robert.
“The first step will be to hire an estate agent and get you settled in a flat. Did your father say what your annual allowance will be for living expenses?”
“Father won’t be providing anything.”
“My dear! If you two have had a row, I urge you to reconcile as swiftly as possible. It costs a great deal to live in London these days.”
“I’m afraid a reconciliation isn’t possible. But Father did mention that Mother had a trust fund. I was hoping you might know something about it.”
“Our family’s banker will know. But I doubt if there’s much left. Rosamunde did enjoy the finer things, you know.”
Audrey swallowed the last of her pride. “Might you be able to help us get on our feet?”
He sighed and looked away. “I wish I were in a position to help, but I’m not. However, I will be happy to speak with your father on your behalf. Surely he can—”
“No. Please don’t.” Audrey’s cheeks burned with shame. “Just let me know about the trust fund.”
“Of course. I’ll look into it.”
“Thank you, Uncle Roger.” She rose, longing to flee to her room, yet good manners required her to return to the sitting room and visit with the others.
“I have one further thought,” her uncle said before Audrey reached the door. “In the event that the trust is depleted, as I’m guessing it is, might your husband’s American family offer some support?”
“Perhaps.” The thought had occurred to Audrey before she’d come to London, but she had quickly dismissed it. She had refused the Barretts’ offer after Robert died, and they hadn’t contacted her since. How dare she ask them for help now?
As she drove home to Wellingford the following day, Audrey had time to consider her dwindling options. And to pray. She hadn’t prayed in a while. “What might God be asking you to do?” She still had no idea, but the visit with her uncle had convinced her that she didn’t want to return to a cold, loveless life with the gentry. She would use whatever funds remained in the trust to live in London on her own. After all, Eve had once taught her to cook and run a household without servants.
Uncle Roger telephoned a few days later. “I’m afraid I have bad news, Audrey. Barely five hundred pounds remain in the trust account—not nearly enough to provide interest for a monthly allowance. I’m so sorry.”
Audrey couldn’t speak, couldn’t think.
“Are you still there?” her uncle asked when she didn’t reply.
“Yes, I’m here.”
“Are you certain you don’t want me to speak with your father?”
“No. Thank you, but no.” She and Bobby would be disgraced if all of London society learned the truth about her birth. “I will contact my husband’s family in America.” She thanked him again and rang off.
It had been difficult enough to ask Uncle Roger for help, but how did one go about asking American strangers for support? Not by mail, certainly. She would seem grasping and conniving if she contacted them after all this time simply to ask for money. What if she used the five hundred pounds to go to America and ask them in person? If they met Bobby, surely they would want to help, wouldn’t they?
Audrey sat on the bench in the front hall, unmoving, for so long that Robbins approached and asked if she was feeling all right. “Yes, I’m fine. Thank you.” He and the other servants needed someplace to go, too, and had asked her for references. Father had turned all of their lives upside down. Going to America was Audrey’s only option. “Will you kindly fetch my steamer trunk from the storage room, Robbins? My husband’s family in America have never met their grandson, and I believe Bobby is old enough now to learn more about his father.”
“How long do you plan to stay, Miss Audrey?”
“I’m not sure . . .”
A shiver of fear washed through Audrey as she tucked her son into bed that night. They were going to America, alone. She had spent the afternoon looking at travel timetables and ticket costs and deciding what to pack, what to leave behind. Desperation fueled her courage. She had no idea what to expect in America, or what sort of welcome she would receive, but she would try to give her son the life Robert wanted him to have.
No matter what her future might be, Audrey would make certain that her son knew he was loved, every single day of his life.
28
USA, 1950
Eve unfolded two webbed lawn chairs for herself and Audrey, and they sat together in the bungalow’s back garden. “This grass needs to be cut again,” Eve mumbled—as if cutting it would transform the barren space. “I wish George was here to help me.”
“Wellingford’s gardener?”
“He was a genius with hedge clippers. He could turn this place into a paradise. He set a standard I can never live up to.”
A cricket chirped nearby. Fireflies blinked in the bushes—a mating ritual, Tom had told her. A lawn sprinkler whirred in a neighbor’s garden. A dog barked. “Is it always this hot here?” Audrey asked, breaking the silence.
“In the summertime, yes. It could get even hotter next month.” Eve didn’t want to talk about the weather. The boys were asleep, and she and Audrey needed to have it out with each other. Neither of them seemed to know where to begin. Ever since breakfast with Tom and his parents, Eve’s mind had raced with feverish plans and outrageous schemes for solving this crisis. Clearly Audrey wasn’t leaving. She had no place to go. Everything Eve and her son had benefited from these past few years—the house, the car, the income, the grandparents—belonged to Audrey.
Eve knew she couldn’t face the people she’d deceived once they learned the truth. That left her with only one option: she had to disappear. She would rather run away and start all over again in a different city than confess the truth and face the people she’d grown to love. She would have to create a new life, just as she’d been forced to do in the past. And she could think of only one person who might help her. She inhaled the sweet, grassy air, then let out her breath.
“Listen, Audrey . . . I think I know how to fix this ‘mess,’ as you called it. But I’m going to need a little more time. I promise I’ll go away and give everything back to you, but first I have to find a job and a place to live and—”
“I would never turn you out with no place to go, Eve. There’s no need for you to vanish in the middle of the night, is there?”
“You said yourself that what I’ve done is monstrous—lying to everyone and stealing your name
and your money. A lot of people will agree with you. I could never show my face in this town again. I certainly can’t count on help from the people I’ve deceived.”
“Maybe if we explain—”
“No. They’ll see the same thing you see—an immoral woman with a fatherless son who lied and committed fraud and took advantage of them for the past four years.”
“Eve—”
“Just listen.” She swatted at a mosquito. “I think I know someone who’ll help me, but I’ll need to drive to a different town.”
“Who?”
Eve didn’t want Audrey to know. “Will you stay here tomorrow and watch Robbie for me until I get back? And if anyone calls or comes to the house, please don’t tell them who you are. I just need a little more time to get settled someplace new.”
“If that’s what you want, Eve. But—”
“Thanks. That is what I want.”
Eve fixed her hair and applied her makeup very carefully the next day, then dressed in a red-and-white polka-dot sundress and a string of pearls that her mother-in-law had bought for her. Eve loved shopping with Mrs. Barrett, who lavished her and Robbie with everything they could possibly want. “I’ve always wished for a daughter to take on shopping trips,” Mrs. Barrett said the day they’d bought the dress—and matching shoes and hat and purse, of course. Today would be the last day Eve would wear these clothes. They belonged to Audrey, the real daughter-in-law.
Eve kissed her son goodbye and promised to buy a half gallon of chocolate ice cream on the way home. She used the map in the glove compartment of her car to find the city, thirty miles away, where Louis lived. She would tell him about their son, Robbie. Harry. His real name is Harry, after my father. She would show Louis his picture, ask him to help her find a typist’s job and a place to live and someone to watch Robbie during the day while she worked. She wouldn’t ask for money, just for help to disappear.
The knot in Eve’s stomach twisted tighter as she drove. When she reached Louis’s town, she stopped at a telephone box and checked the advertising section in the directory for the Dubois family’s insurance company. An older gentleman walking his dog gave her directions to the street where the office building was located. Eve found it without any trouble, a prosperous-looking business in an affluent area of town. The sight of Louis’s name painted on the glass window in black-and-gold letters made her heart hammer painfully. She sat in the sweltering car for several minutes, unable to move, her insides writhing. If she sat here much longer, her clothes would be drenched with sweat. Get ahold of yourself, Eve. This is for your son. Louis will want to help his son.
She walked to the door on wobbling legs. An attractive young receptionist greeted her inside, guarding Louis’s office from behind an enormous desk with a typewriter and a telephone. Eve could easily do that girl’s job or one like it—answering the telephone, typing letters. The girl smiled prettily. “Good morning. May I help you?”
Eve battled to control her shaking voice. “Is it possible to see Mr. Dubois for a few minutes? It won’t take long.”
“May I tell him what it’s about?”
Eve’s heart hadn’t hammered this hard since the endless nights of the London Blitz. “I knew him when he was stationed in England during the war. My . . . um . . . my husband and I were friends of his. I happened to be in town today, so I thought . . . well, I just wanted to say hello. Should I have made an appointment?”
“No, no. Mr. Dubois is with a client, but he shouldn’t be much longer.” The girl checked her appointment book. “He has a few minutes before lunch. May I tell him your name?”
She would have to lie. Louis would run straight out the back door if he knew Eve was here. “Yes. Mrs. Robert Barrett.” The name rolled easily from her tongue.
“You’re welcome to wait here, Mrs. Barrett, or there’s a nice little café next door.”
“Thank you. I’ll wait here.”
“Would you like a cup of coffee?”
“No thank you.” The thought of it made her writhing stomach burn. She couldn’t stand American coffee, but she rarely requested tea because no one in America knew how to brew a decent pot of it. Tea steadied her nerves rather than leaving them jangled like tangled lengths of barbed wire the way coffee did. As for walking to the café, Eve’s heart was racing so fast she wasn’t sure she could walk anywhere.
She chided herself for behaving like a frightened rabbit. She’d faced bombs and infernos and much, much worse, so surely she could face her child’s father, the man she’d once loved. It seemed like a lifetime ago.
Watching the receptionist at work helped calm her nerves. Eve remembered her days as a typist, sitting at her desk for hours and hours until her back and shoulders ached. When she first arrived in America, she’d planned to work to support herself and Robbie. But after meeting the country-club wives, she quickly realized that the Barretts would never allow their daughter-in-law to work, especially as a typist.
At last, a door opened and an older gentleman came out. The receptionist pressed a button on her intercom. “Mr. Dubois, you have a visitor who would like to say hello. Mrs. Robert Barrett, from England.”
Louis was at the door a moment later, a broad smile on his face, his eyes alight with anticipation. Then he saw Eve and the blood drained from his face as if she’d slit one of his arteries. “Eve? What . . . ?”
She rose and hurried toward him to prevent him from saying more. “Hello, Louis. I was in town and thought I would stop by and say hello.” Her voice shook like an old woman’s. She thought she’d been prepared to see him, but he took her breath away in his dark tailored suit and tie, his ginger hair parted and neatly combed. His smile still gleamed like an advertisement for tooth powder. Eve felt as badly shaken as he looked. Guilt and longing waged war as she stared at him. She remembered their times together. His warmth and gentle strength. His love.
It had been a mistake to come.
Eve still loved him. And it was wrong to love him. She would never forgive herself for what she’d done. And God certainly couldn’t forgive her, either. That’s why she and her son were being punished. She fought to hold back her tears. She wouldn’t cry. She wouldn’t.
Louis recovered before she did. “What a surprise! Um . . . let’s talk in my office.” He held the door until she entered, then closed it behind them. For a moment, they simply stared at each other. Then he reached for her and pulled her close. How long had it been since she’d felt his embrace? Any man’s embrace? She was back in Louis’s arms again, but it wouldn’t last—couldn’t last. The battle between guilt and longing raged like the fires in the East End. Did he sense the battle, too? For Eve, guilt would always win.
He released her a moment later and walked behind his desk to sit down as if hiding behind a fortress. Thank goodness he hadn’t kissed her. She would have come undone if he had, just as she had the first time he’d kissed her on that terrible, wonderful night after the V-1 nearly killed her and Audrey. He gestured to a chair in front of his desk. “Have a seat, Eve. I . . . um . . . I thought my receptionist said you were Audrey Barrett. I . . . You surprised me. I mean . . . this is a shock!”
“I’m sorry. I was afraid you would bolt out the back door if I gave my real name.” She clung to the back of the chair for support but didn’t sit in it, fearing her knees would never allow her to stand again if she did.
“No, of course I wouldn’t bolt. You’re the one who left that day. You said it was over between us.”
“It was the right decision. The only decision.”
He looked unconvinced. “It’s wonderful to see you, Eve.”
“You haven’t changed a bit.” It was a silly thing to say after nearly five years, but she couldn’t string her thoughts and words together into coherent sentences.
It was enough to see him one more time. Now she needed to leave. Asking for his help was a terrible idea. They were still drawn to each other with a power that neither of them had been able to control. She didn’t da
re become entangled with Louis again. They would hurt too many people. Eve couldn’t tell him why she had come. She would have to find another way out of her dilemma.
“Did you come to America to visit Audrey?” Louis asked. “I heard she and her son moved here a few years ago. I’ve been meaning to get over there to see her, but . . . the truth is, I was afraid that seeing her would remind me of you.”
Eve nodded and struggled to shake off her confusion. She was Audrey. But Louis didn’t know that. She cleared her throat and tried to corral her thoughts. “Louis, I can’t stay more than a minute or two. I didn’t come here to interrupt your life. I just wanted to see you again and to say that . . . that I hope you and your wife are very happy. Your daughter must be getting big.”
“Karen’s eight years old already. And we have another daughter now.” He turned a framed picture around on his desk to show two ginger-haired girls holding a lamb. Eve barely noticed his daughters. The sight of the lamb stunned her—an unwelcome reminder of the Good Shepherd. The Shepherd who had abandoned her. Or was she the one at fault? Had she wandered away from Him? The photograph of Louis’s daughters made the answer painfully clear.
“Are you raising sheep now, Louis?” she asked with a nervous laugh.
“That picture was taken last Easter. The lamb belonged to the photographer. Although the girls begged Jean to bring it home.” A long silence fell at the mention of Jean’s name. Then they both spoke at the same time.
“I should—”