The Secret Legacy: The perfect summer read for fans of Santa Montefiore, Victoria Hislop and Dinah Jeffries
back the carpet to his city, hooking me back into the place I’d longed to leave like no other. My heart curled into a tight fist.
‘I am under no illusion that the very reason you came to this city was as a gateway to America. Now, whilst I’m in no position to influence you, I must express that your help has been invaluable the last month. I should like to extend your time with us by one year, and, whatever the situation at that point, I will, of course, honor my promise to arrange your papers for America. As planned. I don’t need an answer today, of course. Tomorrow will be fine.’
He turned back to his desk. I nodded and left.
The click of the lock felt like I was shutting much more than a door behind me.
I tied a scarf around my head and left the house. My legs began marching downhill along Willow Road. I stormed past The White Bear, giving a perfunctory nod to the locals resting upon the wooden benches outside. I didn’t take the time to enjoy the Edwardian terraces this time, or the cluster of powdery colored homes, or the line stretching a little way down Flask Walk from the public baths where the poor families from the cottages on Streatley Place would take their weekly cleanse. Thoughts ricocheted in my mind, colliding for attention and answers. How on earth could I return home? It would be like an unfinished adventure, fleeing the dream that had brought me this far. I had become the third strand in the plait of this family’s drama. Perhaps it was the broken nights, the constant strain of having to cope with Adeline’s reliving of terrors only she could see, but I felt a sudden wave of claustrophobia followed by a great weight of tiredness, the like I hadn’t felt since my mother died.
I crossed East Heath Road and found Adeline’s muddy path toward the ponds. The mixed pond was in view now, intrepid swimmers gliding through the glassy green sending ripples across the surface. I was that net of duck weed, feeling the involuntary undulations rock me this way and that. The trees grew thicker and the trail wound deeper into the trees, narrowing through elder and yew. The trodden leafy paths were still cooked with summer, only the yellowing tinge to the tips of occasional leaves hinting at the relentless promise of autumn. What was the sense in defying the inevitable change? Would starting a new London life alone be surrendering to the diverted path or resisting it? Was this the freedom I’d been charmed by? An unknown world, unencumbered by family dramas, a newborn’s demands? Now might be the very crossroads I needed to find the courage to start again.
I bent down under a low-lying branch and sank onto a fallen trunk. For a moment my mind drew a misty silence. I heard the birds celebrate high up in the trees above me. Straws of light shafted onto my feet. I let the damp sunny air cocoon my restless mind. Could I admit to myself that I had fallen in love with someone else’s child? That in the month-long care of this helpless human I had been consumed by the desire that she survive? That the first time her eyes focused on mine I was filled with the thrill of being the first human she had connected with? That the helplessness I felt in the face of Adeline’s catastrophic decline was ploughed into making sure this motherless child was cared for? That I loved her on behalf of the Major, who I could see found it all too painful to express his feelings toward the tiny babe? Selfish perhaps, this decadent desire to save.
I was no one’s savior.
I was the help.
A month or two of going beyond my remit of service would not make me part of their family. And yet, if I could keep my head down for another year then true freedom would be mine. Giving a little more of myself to this tiny child would be a small sacrifice for what I would receive in return. I could survive one more year of gazing into those tiny eyes, each day opening wider, each day seeing the world smudge toward focus. Would I deny myself that unquestioning delight as when our eyes locked for the first time? For the mere second or two whilst it lasted, she saw me. Not Santina Guida, the help. Not someone’s abandoned daughter. The flicker of infinity that sparkled there moved me. A bright silence ignited that fleeting but unflinching gaze, a promise of renewal – where one dream dies, another, by necessity, is born.
What was a year in Positano compared to a lifetime in the New World?
On 2 October 1957 I accompanied the Crabtrees upon the Blue Star Line ship on a return to the Bay of Naples. I was a month shy of my twentieth birthday. The crystalline turquoise of my coast was not the salve I longed for after the relentless sea voyage. The water drew me back to the place I’d fought to escape for so much of my life; I was a hapless swimmer defeated by the undertow.
The Major and I had shared pitiful snatched sleep between us. Adeline received tranquilizing medication throughout the crossing from southern France, administered with precision by the Major, which, to our relief, appeared to have more effect than in London. It kept her frenetic outbursts at bay and dipped her into the waking sleep to which she had become accustomed. At least in this state the Major was able to keep her relaxed, or some appearance of such. He even managed to bring her out onto deck a couple of times for fresh air, though it wasn’t long before the amount of people unsettled her, and the Major was quick to retire back to their cabin before the situation grew out of hand.
My job was to stay with Elizabeth at all times. It would be an understatement to say I was nervous at the prospect. I had no experience of looking after a small child, let alone at sea, where the unpredictability of travel felt all the more dangerous. I tried to reassure myself that there were always doctors on board, and, most likely, experienced mothers who might help should I need it. I worked myself into such a silent state of panic that when Elizabeth was relaxed and slept the best she had since birth, it came as a great wave of relief. She adored the fresh air on deck, the hundreds of strange faces. Her tiny head twisted this way and that, trying to gather the details of everything around her, the different smells, sounds, and the musical soup of languages.
Some people passed me and flashed sympathetic smiles, thinking I was her mother perhaps. I’d be lying if I didn’t admit to feeling a prickle of pride as they did so. And though she was not my own, each time I lifted her close to me, and described in detail all the things around us, the girl became ever more a part of me, in spite of the sting of defeat that curdled in my stomach as we approached land.
The Blue Star Line ship eased into the wide bay. Shipping offices crowded the port. From the deck on this bright day I could see far into the bustling city, a mystical warren that was still a foreign land to me, and to the right, rising ancient and proud, the purple silhouette of Vesuvius. The wind caught the new tufts of Elizabeth’s strawberry blonde hair, her eyes blinked away the tears left by the sea breeze. My eyes glistened too as I pretended I didn’t feel like I was sinking back into my old life, retreating toward a familiar town at once unknown. Positano with an unpredictable Adeline would not be the town I left. Working for a family that might terminate my contract sooner than planned, like Mr Benn and Mr George had, would leave me more vulnerable than when I’d first fled. I wiped away my tears and with it smudged my roiling thoughts into silence.
The Major helped Adeline down the gangway, a patient arm hooked around hers, following her tentative lead. If she began to tense, he would stop, take her hand in his and kiss it gently, murmuring something in her ear that always seemed to soothe. I thought about all those nights I’d heard him with her. Once, I had been feeding Elizabeth in the nursery, and could hear him read poetry to Adeline until she relinquished to sleep. Those nights it seemed that his care was having great effect, for a day or two afterwards she would show small flickers of her old self, but then night would fall and the wakings and railings would flare up again. The doctors had repeated their insistent requests to place Adeline in an institution, to reinstate shock therapy, to treat her psychotic episode with the internment it required. He would hear none of it. One doctor had even suggested that the Major put up Elizabeth for adoption in the circumstances. That night I had seen the extent of the Major’s temper. I hoped I never would again.
All the images of the past fitful months floated into my periphery with each step along the sun-dipped gangway. After we shuffled through customs with the throng we were at long last welcomed by our taxi. The Major insisted I sit in the front seat with Elizabeth so that he could stay beside Adeline in the back. I saw her turn to him. A whisper of a