Magda's Daughter (35 page)

Having had some professional experience of alcoholics, Ned knew just how little Anna's promise was worth, but he refrained from making a comment. ‘Did you also tell Anna that I had treated her?'

‘Yes.'

‘And that we want to see her?'

‘We?' Josef dropped the plate he was holding on to the tray. ‘I told Anna you wanted her to talk to Helena –'

‘I want to be there, too.'

Helena watched the argument bounce between Josef and Ned with increasing bewilderment. ‘What is going on between you two? I thought Anna was drunk and had an accident?'

‘She did and she has. She's cracked her ribs.' Josef slammed the sugar bowl on to the tray so hard that granules scattered.

‘Then why does she want to see me?'

‘Ask Ned.'

Helena turned to Ned. ‘Why should I see Anna?'

‘Anna will tell you.' Ned left the table. ‘Is she getting up?'

Josef picked up the tray. ‘I thought she should stay in bed today and rest.'

‘She can stay in bed if she insists, but not for more than one day. Sitting up in a chair in her room would be better, and sitting outside so she can breathe fresh air better still. I'll go up and check on her. Perhaps Helena can come up afterwards.'

‘You want me to sit here and wait until you call me?' Helena asked caustically.

Ned ignored her tone. ‘I won't be a moment.'

‘Does Anna want to throw us out?'

‘You know she does,' Ned answered.

‘And you want me to try and talk Anna into letting us stay until you can arrange for Norbert to pick us up?'

‘I'll be back in a moment.' Ned walked into the house.

Josef picked up the tray and followed him.

Chapter Nineteen

Ned knocked on the door of Anna's room. She called out some­ thing he didn't understand, and he entered tentatively to see her propped up on pillows in bed, an untouched tray of scrambled eggs and breakfast rolls alongside her on the mattress.

Ned waited for Josef to appear so he could translate for them. In the meantime, Anna looked anywhere but at him. He tried to smile to put her at her ease, but the smile died on his lips as he caught sight of Helena's photographs again. When he recalled how distraught Helena had been when she had discovered that Adam and Magda Janek weren't her parents, and that she had grown up believing lies, he couldn't forgive Anna for causing her such pain. It was a relief when Josef finally joined them.

‘Ask Anna how she is feeling?' Ned snapped without any preliminaries.

Josef spoke to Anna and translated her reply. ‘Very sorry for the trouble she has caused you, and embarrassed by her behaviour. She assures you that she will never drink again.'

‘I meant in a medical sense,' Ned explained. ‘Has she any pain from her ribs, or are any of the cuts on her arms and legs stinging more than the others?'

Josef spoke to her again, and Anna replied, looking at him, not Ned.

‘Anna says the pains are not so bad and she will be fine. She is grateful to you for looking after her and pumping her stomach. I told her about sitting up, and she said she'll probably get up later today.'

‘Ask her when Helena can come to talk to her.'

‘I spoke to her about that earlier. She said that no young girl, let alone one as intelligent and beautiful as Helena, would want a drunk as her mother. It would shatter her.'

‘Then Anna is her mother?'

‘She doesn't want Helena to know,' Josef answered.

Ned saw that he was torn between his feelings for the woman who had been as much of a mother to him as Magda had been to Helena, and Helena's right to know the truth about her birth. ‘Please, ask Anna if she thinks it better that Helena believes she was snatched from a loving home by the Nazis after they murdered her parents? Or that Helena goes through life, constantly searching for her real parents and suffering the torment of a fruitless quest? You've spent years searching for your brother without success so you know what it's like to look for someone you may never find. If Anna doesn't tell Helena who she is, she has no hope of discovering the truth.'

Josef translated, and Anna glared at Ned. He parried her look. After what felt like the longest two minutes of Ned's life, Anna finally dropped her gaze. She turned to Josef and spoke sharply to him.

Josef replied, and Ned could tell from his tone that he was pleading with Anna. Unable to understand what they were saying, or to stand the suspense, he went to the window seat. Someone – either Josef or Stefan – had cleared the makeshift bed and extra chairs, and tidied and swept the room. The corner where Josef had heaped the broken chair was clear, and the embroidered coverlet had been draped back on the bed.

‘Anna thinks it's best that Helena doesn't know the truth. She says it's her secret, and no one else's now that Magdalena Janek is dead,' Josef translated, clearly trying hard to keep his own emotions in check.

Ned looked at Anna. When she refused to meet his steady gaze, he moved closer, forcing her to look at him. She screwed her eyes shut, as though she were in pain.

‘It's not just your secret, Anna. It affects Helena, so it is her secret, too.'

Josef translated, and Anna replied rapidly, stumbling over her words.

‘She is afraid Helena will ask her questions about her father, and she doesn't want to tell Helena that she is illegitimate.' Josef met Ned's gaze.

‘Helena wouldn't care whether she was illegitimate or not. And any truth has to be better than the belief that she is the result of an SS breeding experiment.'

Josef spoke to Anna once more, but she continued to shake her head.

Ned played his last card. ‘If she continues to refuse to talk to Helena, I will go downstairs and tell Helena that Anna is her mother.' He moved towards the door.

Anna hadn't understood what Ned had said, but his sense of purpose was unmistakable. She grabbed Josef's arm and cried out hysterically.

Ned waited, his hand on the door.

Anna spoke urgently to Josef.

‘Well?' Ned asked when she fell silent.

Josef closed his hand reassuringly over Anna's. ‘You can bring Helena up, but Anna insists on seeing her alone.'

Ned hesitated.

‘It wouldn't make any difference if you were here, Ned. You wouldn't be able to understand what Anna was saying and Helena can tell you about it afterwards.'

Ned nodded and left the room.

Helena was still in the yard. She and Stefan were leaning over the wall of the pigsty. Stefan had lifted out one of the tiny piglets, and Helena was scratching it behind the ears.

Ned joined them. ‘I can see you wanting to exchange the bungalow for a farm when we return to Pontypridd.'

‘Much as I like animals, I think it would be too much hard work. Besides, I'd never be able to part with a single creature, especially if I knew they were going to be slaughtered.' She paused. ‘I've been talking to Stefan. He said something odd to me yesterday evening. “It's good that you have come here at last.Ë® Anna is my mother, isn't she?'

Ned took a deep breath and steeled himself for an outburst. ‘Yes.'

‘You knew all along and you didn't tell me?' Her eyes darkened in contempt. ‘How could you?'

‘I only began to suspect it last night when I went to Anna's bedroom after she fell. When you go up you'll see why. I didn't know for certain until a few minutes ago. Josef confirmed it.'

‘I thought we could tell one another everything.'

Emotions Ned had fought to keep in check since the day Magda had died finally erupted. ‘Like you tell me everything? I know something is dreadfully wrong between us, Helena, but I haven't a clue what it is, or what I can do about it. You stopped talking to me properly weeks ago. I've never felt so hopeless and useless. Sometimes, I can't help feeling that you don't even want me here …' He looked up, saw Josef watching them, and made an effort to control his temper. ‘As I said, I didn't find out until a few minutes ago, and now isn't the time or place to argue. Go and talk to Anna. We can sort out our problems later.'

‘I'm not so optimistic,' she snapped bitterly.

A lump rose in Ned's throat. Suddenly he felt certain that he was about to lose Helena, and was powerless to stop it. There was no way he could force her to stay with him. And even if he could, he wouldn't want to. Their relationship had been built on love, trust and respect. He had never loved her more, and loving her meant wanting what she wanted for herself. If her happiness depended on sacrificing all that they had been to one another and never seeing her again, that was his price to pay. He felt something move on his cheek, and realised that tears were falling from his eyes.

Josef pulled a bunch of keys from his pocket and unlocked the door to the bar. Stefan returned the piglet to the sty and went to help him.

‘I'll wait for you here.' Ned leaned on the wall and looked down at the pigs.

Helena didn't move and Ned didn't turn towards her. Still staring into the sty, he said, ‘Go through the kitchen into the inner hall and up the stairs. Anna's bedroom door is the second on the right. It will probably be open. And remember, Helena, I love you very much. That's why I insisted that Anna talk to you.'

Unlike Ned the night before, Helena had time to look around when she walked through the house. She saw the tins with English labels in the kitchen – and noted they were the brands Magda had favoured. A cardigan that was draped on the back of one of the kitchen chairs was identical in colour and style to one of Magda's. She even recalled her buying two a few Christmases ago, saying, ‘This shade of blue will suit my sister.'

She went to the foot of the stairs. The inside of the house was far grander than it appeared from the outside. The oak newel post and banisters were beautifully carved in a fruit and flower design, and the treads were highly polished, with a sheen that bore testimony to centuries of loving care. As Ned had said, one of the doors on the galleried landing was open. She walked up to it and knocked.

Anna called out, ‘Come in, Helena,' in a weak and tremulous voice. Helena went into Anna's bedroom and stared just as Ned had done, mesmerized by the display of photographs. ‘Please, won't you sit down?'

Helena walked across the room to the window seat, although she could have sat on a chair that was closer to the bed. Anna plumped up a pillow, moved it behind her head and sat up.

‘All those parcels – Magda sent them to you?' Helena felt it was a stupid way to begin a conversation, but she couldn't wait to have her suspicions confirmed.

‘Yes,' Anna admitted.

‘And that's why you didn't want Ned and me to stay here, because you were afraid that I would find out that you knew Magda and me …'

‘Ned and Josef want me to tell you about the past. I think some things are best left unsaid. It's better you believe the stories Magda told you.'

‘But they weren't the truth,' Helena protested.

‘Magda wrote to me every month. Her letters were all about you and your life together. She tried to be your mama in every way that she could, Helena, just as I tried to be Josef's.'

ʻI knew that you were my real mother before Ned told me, because of something Stefan said.'

‘Since the Germans beat him, my brother can't be trusted. God help him.' Anna crossed herself. ‘He has the mind of a child.'

‘You gave birth to me. You are my mother,' Helena pressed, needing to hear it from Anna.

‘I am a drunk, middle-aged woman with a dubious reputation, who runs a seedy village bar. You are an elegant young lady, a person of some importance, a teacher whose young man is a doctor. You wouldn't want to own me as your mother.'

‘I can't disown you when I don't know you, Anna. Please, I'd like to hear how I came to be with Magda.' Helena said angrily. ‘What happened to separate us? Did you give me up willingly? Do I have any brothers or sisters? Did you abandon me or give me to Magda? Who was my father? Did you love him? Did he love you?'

‘Too many questions.' Anna waved her hand as though she were physically pushing Helena's words aside.

‘The last thing I want to do is upset you by bringing up the past, but I have a right to know who I am,' Helena pleaded.

‘I will try, if you sit and listen quietly. When I have finished I will do my best to answer any questions you may have. But remember, this is your doing, not mine.'

‘May I ask just one question before you start? Do I have a name of my own?'

‘When you were two weeks old you were baptised Lena Matylda Leman, after my mother and my sister.' Anna sank back on to the pillows.

‘Lena … I like it and it's not so very different from Helena.'

‘That is what Magda said.'

‘Thank you for telling me, Anna. I won't ask any more questions until you have finished.'

‘And afterwards you will hate me.'

Helena didn't answer. Anna had stated a fact, not asked her a question. And she wasn't prepared to lie. Not before she heard Anna's story.

Helena leaned back against the wall. She drew up her knees, wrapped her arms around her legs and looked at Anna. The ivory cotton on the pillow behind the landlady's head was the same shade as her parchment-dry skin. Her bleached hair, which Helena had only seen swept up and caught in a French pleat, hung limp and unkempt below her shoulders, and her blue eyes were bloodshot and watery.

‘People say everyone believes their childhood days were golden,' Anna began hesitantly. ‘It's a lie. Josef was three years old when his mother was killed, and the bullet that ended her life ended his childhood. Before, I used to see him laughing as he ran and played around the village. When the old priest brought him to me the night of the massacre I knew that his laughter had died along with his mother. He woke screaming night after night for years afterwards, as he waited for the Nazis to return and murder me, the priest and him.'

Anna reached for the jug of water next to her bed and poured herself a glass. ‘But my childhood …' She smiled, and for the first time Helena caught a glimpse of the vibrant happy woman she could have been. ‘I don't just remember golden days; I lived them. I have no need of an imagination because nothing could better my memories. I could never make up my mind which season I loved the most. In the summer, as soon as school closed for the holidays, Magda, Weronika and I used to spend our days in the woods around the lake. We'd roam until it grew too hot to walk, then swim, pick berries and mushrooms, light fires and bake potatoes in the embers. We spent hours reading books aloud to one another, wrote stories and poems … Weronika and I were luckier than Magda. She never had as much free time as we did. She had to work on the farm, helping her mother in the dairy, or her brothers to clean out the pigs or the chickens. We were known as the three witches – in a good way – because we were always together.

‘Every autumn we helped bring in the harvest on every farm for miles around, because in return we'd be invited to the harvest suppers in the barns, and there was music, dancing and young men. Winter meant skating parties on the lakes, snowball fights and sleigh rides. My sisters and Stefan would always come with us. This was before Stefan went to the seminary. Wiktor, Adam and Magda's oldest brother Augustyn used to take us to town whenever they went to pick up stores for the farms.

Wiktor was the joker in those days. You could rely on him to make everyone laugh; sometimes at his expense, mostly at ours. He would tie our plaits to the back of the carts whenever he gave us a ride, just to hear us scream when we tried to climb off. He'd pull knotted string and bits of leather and fur from his pocket, tell us it was a dead rat, and chase us round the village. He was never nasty, not like he is now. He'd spend hours nursing an animal rather than kill it. Once he hid a runt in his bedroom and fed it from a baby's bottle when his father threatened to let it starve to death. His mother was furious when she saw the mess the piglet had made in his bed. And whenever we went anywhere he would take as many girls and boys from the village as wanted to go. Ten or twelve of us would cram into a cart or sleigh meant for four.'