Page 108 of The Stranger in Room Six
‘That’s a question your mother and I discussed constantly. She thought that we should but I was scared that you’d feel deceived. And then the war broke out. The world became so uncertain that we did not want to put you through any more distress.’
‘Did you love Annabel more than me?’ asked Mabel, staring up at him with fear in her heart.
‘Of course not. We loved you both the same. Blood does not need to be an essential factor of parenthood, or indeed childhood. Your little baby will find that out. He will be loved too, God willing, by his adoptive parents.’
Mabel flinched. ‘But that means he will never know me.’
His face tightened. ‘Your aunt was very wicked to take him away from you. I hope she pays for it one day.’
‘Where is she now?’
‘In the library. She instructed that when you were back, she wished to speak to you.’
Her hand shaking on the door handle, Mabel went in.
‘Ah,’ said her aunt – it was impossible to think of her as her mother. ‘There you are.’ She spoke coolly, as though this day was like any other.
‘No doubt you think badly of me,’ she said, blowing out a wisp of smoke from the cigarette in the ebony holder. ‘However, I hope you will understand from your own experience that these things happen. Sometimes one gets – how can I put it? – swept away by the waves of passion.’
‘But at least you had the opportunity to watch me growing up,’ retorted Mabel. ‘I cannot do that with my child.’
‘Trust me,’ said Clarissa. Her voice sounded cracked now.‘That is harder. Do you not understand how agonizing it was for me? It’s why I couldn’t bear to visit you in London. Time and time again I wanted to tell you the truth, but I’d promised your parents that I wouldn’t. It was part of our agreement. They felt it would break you. Eventually I kept my distance, until the war changed everything and you had to come here. It’s been agonizing to see my lovely daughter every day and realize how much I had missed.’
Lovely?‘If it was “agonizing”, as you put it, why have you always been so horrible to me?’
‘It was my way of dealing with it,’ said Clarissa wistfully. ‘If I had allowed myself to be a kind, loving aunt, it would have been all too easy for me to have told you how much I love you as a mother.’
‘Doyou love me?’ Mabel asked, taken aback.
Clarissa moved towards her, wrapping her arms around her briefly before stepping back as if shocked by her own actions. Mabel was shocked too.
‘Of course I do,’ she said quietly, red spots on both cheeks. ‘You are my daughter. Jonty was proud of you as well. Again and again we spoke about what might have been.’
‘Why didn’t you just get married when you knew you were expecting me?’
‘Jonty’s parents wouldn’t allow it,’ she said. ‘They wanted what they called “a more suitable match”. Her lips tightened. ‘They said they would cut him off without a penny.’
‘But you’re a Lady? Wasn’t that enough for them?’
‘A titled Lady without much money,’ said Clarissa drily.
Mabel was still confused. ‘But I was told that the Colonel was a bachelor.’
Clarissa laughed bitterly. ‘His fiancée died from pneumonia before the wedding. By then, I had given you away to my sister.’
‘Why didn’t Jonty ever marry? Why didn’t you? Why didn’t you marry each other when you were older and could do what you wanted?’
‘We discussed it. Perhaps it was the guilt of giving you away that stopped us. I do not know. And then this awful war started. We all got so busy and, well …’
Then she turned away. ‘It doesn’t matter now. It is all in the past. Jonty is dead. You, my daughter, quite rightly hate me because I gave you away. And I have now given awayyourchild. Perhaps it was wrong of me. But now it is all too late.’
There was no answer to that.
When Mabel went back to find the man who was no longer her father, she found him ready to depart again. ‘I have to rejoin my troop,’ he said, cupping her face with his hands.
Mabel stepped back.
‘My darling daughter, please do not be like this.’
