Page 19 of The Little Island Flower Stall
‘My grandad was adopted. He never really talked much about it. I think he’d always had the attitude that his mother had a very good reason for giving him up and that he’d cause trouble if he tried to contact her, so he never did. He died recently. I was helping my parents clear his house, and we came across some things we didn’t even know he’d kept his entire life.’
‘What sort of things? I mean…I’m sorry…’ Bella flushed. ‘Ignore me – none of my business. I was always too nosy for my own good.’
He regarded her quietly for a moment and then smiled. ‘The funny thing is, I don’t mind you asking at all. I don’t know what it is, but…’ He gave a vague shrug. ‘I suppose some people are naturally easy to talk to, and I feel as if you’re one of those. And it’s not like I’ve been keeping it a secret. I’ve already asked one or two people locally to see if they could help.’
Bella remembered Dolly’s visit to the stall. She thought about telling him she’d already heard as much but decided knowing he was the subject of rampant gossip might put him off, and her curiosity was piqued. ‘I try to be a good listener. Don’t suppose I always manage it. But you don’t have to tell me anything you don’t want to.’
He reached into his rucksack and took out a plastic wallet. He then produced some yellowed pages and a photograph fromwithin it and handed them to Bella. She looked over the pages – one a handwritten letter and another a newspaper clipping.
‘I can’t read them.’
‘The clipping is in Polish. I had it translated – it’s a story from a wartime prisoner who was kept here on Jersey doing forced labour after his plane was shot down by the Nazis during the war. He’s telling the story of his escape from the tunnels where he was kept prisoner. It’s quite a read, actually. Looks as if an enemy soldier helped him.’
‘That sounds like it ought to be a film.’
‘Doesn’t it? The other page is a mystery. I can’t read it, and nobody seems to know what language it is.’
‘I think I might,’ Bella said slowly. ‘It looks like French, but it’s not. Could be Jèrriais.’
‘What’s that?’
‘Jersey French. It’s a very old language – not many use it now. My great-aunt speaks it; she’s pretty old. In fact, she was a girl during the occupation.’
He sat up, his ice cream forgotten as he stared at Bella. ‘Do you think she could translate it for me?’
‘I could ask her. What do you think it might be?’
‘It was with the photograph. We’re all assuming that the photo was taken shortly after my grandad’s birth and that’s his mother – his birth mother. We think it’s all connected – the photo, the letter and the clipping.’
‘So you think the prisoner of war might be your grandad’s father?’
‘It seems to make sense. I’m sure if I could find out what the letter says I’d have a better idea.’
‘Can I take the letter to Celestine? My great-aunt, I mean. We could ask her to translate it, if she doesn’t mind.’
‘That would be amazing!’
Bella pondered the photograph. It was in black and white, slightly out of focus, but the girl sitting up in the hospital bed with a tiny newborn in her arms barely looked older than her teens. ‘I wonder why she gave him up. I suppose in those days she had to.’ She looked up at Rory. ‘I’m assuming she wasn’t married to the father?’
‘I don’t know, but I think it’s another safe bet. From the hundreds of internet threads about this sort of thing, it seems quite a common occurrence during the war years. A lot of unwanted babies came from affairs with American soldiers, but there must have been plenty of other situations too. The mums were too ashamed to keep them, or else they were pressured by their families to give them up when the soldiers went home and left them high and dry.’
‘And I suppose some of them simply didn’t survive the war.’
‘That too, of course.’
‘You think that’s what happened here?’
‘Maybe.’
‘You said you were going to see an elderly relative. So she’s something to do with this?’
‘I think she’s the girl in the photo. Violette Le Saux. My great-grandmother. She’s really old, of course, in a home now, but…’
Bella stared at him. ‘Violette?’
‘Yes…why do you look so shocked?’
‘It’s just…I’ve heard that name mentioned since I arrived. Actually, I heard that name for the first time in my life just yesterday, and here you are, saying it again. How weird is that? I mean, it might not be the same woman, but…’
