Effie's War, page 23
Italy is in a very bad way. Hardly anyone has work and everything is in short supply. However, I am united with my entire family again now that my brother Luca has finally returned. My two sisters never left home, and so although we are poor, we are happy to be together. We’ve always been close – typical Italians, you might say!
I have told them that you are the girl I intend to marry. They are all so eager to meet you and send their best wishes to Scotland . . .
Effie didn’t finish, and instead pulled out another envelope about halfway down the pile. The correspondence appeared to have been filed neatly in date order. She discovered that Toni had written every year on her birthday. The third letter she read was full of news about his success as a cabinetmaker and how he was now an uncle several times over. His brother and sisters lived near by and their family was closer than ever.
He asked lots of questions about her life and what she was doing, enquiring what was happening on Kirk Farm. He still sent his love and repeated that until she released him from his promise, he would continue to wait for the girl he loved.
Effie was going to select another envelope just a little further along the timeline, when some instinct made her pull out what she assumed was the last letter. She had to fight back her sobs when she noticed the handwriting was different.
2 February 1994
Dear Auntie Effie,
I have grown up hearing Uncle Toni talk about the girl he fell in love with while in the Highlands of Scotland. Although we have never met, you have been so real to all of us that we consider you to be part of our family. I know he wrote regularly and you were always in his heart and thoughts. I am very sorry to say that our lovely uncle died recently after a short illness. His health never fully recovered following the injury he received while a prisoner of war.
Uncle Toni was a man who loved life and people. He was extremely popular yet never married, although there were many women who would have walked down the aisle with him. I want you to know that he was greatly loved and an integral part of our lives. He was a second father to my cousins and me (I am the daughter of his brother, Luca) and a grand-father figure to the next generation.
I do not know where the years are going. My eldest daughter is twenty-two. She was a particular favourite of Uncle Toni. I hope you do not mind, but I called her Effie, in memory of the woman that my uncle loved so much. It pleased him greatly.
Shortly before he died, he asked if I would send my contact details. If my letter should arrive where his have not, I want you to know that you have a family here in Termoli, who will welcome you warmly into our homes . . . you are already in our hearts.
With love from all of the Mario family,
Cristina
44
Hugh and his wife, Anne, stood at the entrance to the kirk and welcomed people as they arrived for Ina’s funeral. The building was almost full when they joined their family, who sat in the front two pews. He kept the seat next to him free for Effie. So far there had been no sign of her.
The day before, Hugh had sat on the wall by the kitchen for a long time. However, after that one heart-wrenching scream the house had been quiet and he had finally returned to his own home, although he kept looking out of the window for any sign of his sister. It was late evening when he noticed that her car was no longer there. He had walked back to the farmhouse. Effie and the sewing box had gone, and the rooms felt even emptier than they had when Ina died.
He became aware of Anne nudging him, and he turned to find someone sitting in the empty seat next to him. Effie looked pale and tired, as if she hadn’t slept at all. Neither of them spoke. Instead, she reached over and took hold of his hand. He couldn’t stop the tears streaming down his face.
*
Effie had sat in the kitchen for hours the previous afternoon, reading and rereading the letters, crying, remembering, realising that she could have had a completely different life if Ina had only let her know that Toni was still alive. What had prevented her sister from writing or calling?
Over the years there had been other men and Effie had even loved a couple. Yet whenever Effie compared those feelings to what she and Toni had known, they had faded into insignificance. Now she was no longer concerned about such matters.
Ina’s coffin was plain, with a simple wreath of red roses on the top. It was difficult to imagine her sister lying within those planks of wood. Ina had been such a beautiful, vibrant young woman.
As they waited for the service to begin, Effie couldn’t help analysing her life. Funerals did that to people, particularly if they were of a certain age. She feared that so much time had been spent living in loneliness; it had swamped her during those first years after leaving Kirk Farm. From Tain railway station she had taken one train after another, with no particular plan other than to head south and as far away from the Highlands as possible.
Eventually, she ended up in London, where she got a job at a hospital. There, she buried herself in work and the misery of others so as to hold at bay the despair that threatened to overwhelm her. There was plenty of misery in the capital during the last year and a half of the war in Europe. However, when the fighting ended, she no longer had the energy to keep going. The depression she had staved off ate her up.
Then one day she saw an advertisement for a children’s short story competition. It stirred distant memories of producing plays for Hugh. She felt as though it was beckoning her not only to write, but also to return to the living. She sat down that evening and a few days later sent off her entry. Along with winning first prize, a published article and a cheque for five pounds, Effie had found a new hope and purpose.
She created a pseudonym and threw all of her passion and energy into writing. As the decades went by, she had become an established novelist and writer of short stories – the most popular being about a group of children growing up on a farm during the war. But her loneliness had always been there, like a shadow she couldn’t escape no matter how fast or how far she ran. Finally she had accepted it as an unwelcome, though familiar, companion.
Her thoughts returned to the present at the sight of the minister. He looked far too young; he couldn’t possibly have gained the experiences required to provide guidance to others. So many professionals looked too young these days.
Seeing him standing in the same pulpit the Reverend Smith had used for Sunday services brought memories flooding back. Sometimes she couldn’t prevent an image playing out in her mind: the steel blade pushed inch by inch into his withering body, the minister begging her to stop, calling out her name until he went limp and could call no more.
‘We have gathered here today to celebrate the life of someone who was known and loved widely within the community.’ The young minister had a good, gentle voice and an appealing manner. ‘Ina Ross dedicated her life to teaching. Many of you will have spent some of your school days in her class and benefited from her enormous enthusiasm and amazing ability to instil in others a desire to learn.’
Effie listened to the stranger give a history of her sister’s life and it felt as though she too was a stranger. It seemed wrong that other people should have knowledge and experiences of her immediate family that she did not have herself. She had been robbed of something precious that could never be returned.
‘Ina loved Kirk Farm and the surrounding area. She lived here for the whole of her life, never travelling far away. Ina dedicated her life to helping those who needed it. She became a prominent figure in several local organisations and enjoyed playing the kirk’s organ and leading its choir.’
Effie thought that Ina’s life seemed dull. She wondered if Ina had sought solace by staying close to those she knew, choosing a ‘safe’ career, being heavily involved in religion and the community. As a young woman, Ina had had the potential to go out into the world and be anything she wanted.
But then what had Effie done? She had travelled a great deal, yes, but she was forever moving on, never settling anywhere long enough to make friends – at least not real friends who she could turn to for help. She had certainly never found anywhere that felt like ‘home’. On the surface, she was a highly successful woman, in great demand for book festivals and literary events. But when the front door was locked and she settled down for yet another evening alone, the demons would be waiting patiently. You had to hand it to them, they were always patient.
Effie and Hugh followed the coffin out of the church still holding hands, everyone else giving them a little extra space, as though the brother and sister were walking a path that no one else had the right to tread. Slowly, the congregation emerged into the bright summer sunshine and made its way respectfully to the freshly dug earth. Here, Hugh had to let go of Effie’s hand, as he and his sons each took the end of a cord to help lower the coffin.
Oh Ina, what have we done to each other?
When the coffin was in the ground and the ceremony over, Hugh led Effie to the grave of their parents.
‘Edward Ross . . . nineteen sixty-one . . . Martha Ross . . . nineteen seventy,’ said Effie, reading out the inscription on the headstone. ‘Father would have been sixty-eight and mother seventy-five.’
‘Father was found lying dead in the top field,’ Hugh explained. ‘It was a heart attack, completely out of the blue. Mother was ill for many months. Nothing was ever diagnosed for certain. She just seemed to fade away until there was nothing left to fade. I’m sorry you were never told when they died.’
They stood in silence for a while. The cemetery was empty and quiet, apart from the birds singing in nearby trees.
‘None of us were ever the same after those few weeks,’ Hugh said. ‘Duncan’s death, followed so soon by Christopher’s . . . and then you leaving. We were drowning in grief and simply didn’t know how to deal with it. I guess we were lost souls, particularly Father. He felt the betrayal by Walter Smith very deeply. It was ages before another minister was appointed, but Father was never close to him or any of those who followed.’
‘When did you return to Kirk Farm?’
‘It was the May of 1944. Having initially been so eager not to leave, we found coming home worse than living away. Every corner of the place was full of memories. It was after we returned that Father started saying he hadn’t intended for you to go forever. He regretted it terribly, Fee. I think the pain had simply overwhelmed him. He needed someone to blame and you were too convenient . . . too close.’
Effie nodded. ‘I couldn’t write to let you know where I was. I fell into a black hole and it took years . . . and a writing competition . . . to find my way out. I wrote to Ina then, but I never heard back.’
‘She didn’t tell any of us that you had made contact.’
‘All these years, she kept it a secret that Toni was still alive.’
‘Yes.’
‘For about six months, before he was sent back to Italy, we were both in London. Can you believe that we might have been only a few miles apart, maybe just around the corner from each other? If fate had only made one of us walk around that corner.’
‘I don’t know what prevented Ina from replying,’ admitted Hugh with a sigh. ‘Perhaps, because she didn’t reply straight away, it just got harder as time passed.’
‘So many people died that night, including many of those who walked away,’ said Effie.
‘Afterwards, I pestered everyone for ages about where you had gone and why,’ said Hugh. ‘Nobody would tell me anything. I eventually stopped asking.’
‘You were only a child.’
‘When I turned twenty-one, Ina asked me what I wanted for my “special” birthday. I said I would like to know why you had gone.’
‘Did she tell you?’
‘Well, probably not everything. However, it was enough for me to put most of the pieces together. Fee, there’s something that I want you to see.’
She followed him to an older part of the cemetery. The last time she had been there was when they had all visited Duncan, the afternoon of that fateful day. They stopped at a well-tended grave with fresh flowers by the headstone.
‘Christopher!’
‘When he died there was only his mother left. He had told her a lot about the girl in the Highlands he had fallen in love with. His mother said that her son should be buried near Ina. Ina came here every single day, regardless of whether it was snowing or blowing a gale.’
‘That’s why she never moved away . . . Christopher was here.’
‘She didn’t feel the need to go anywhere else. Everyone and everything she loved was around Kirk Farm. There was only one person who wasn’t.’
‘I don’t think I was on her list of people to love,’ said Effie sadly.
‘No, Fee, you’re wrong. She never forgave you, not until the last few weeks of her life, but she always loved you. That was Ina’s dilemma. It was part of the conflict she carried within her.’
They remained silent, each lost in their own thoughts.
‘Hugh, did you know Toni and I killed the minister in a fight? We pushed his own knife into him. It was horrible. In the end he was begging us to stop, but we kept on until he went silent. The sound of his voice haunts me. The last thing I did with the man I loved was kill another human being.’
Hugh looked at her in surprise. ‘Fee, you didn’t kill him.’
‘What? He didn’t die?’
‘Not from being stabbed.’
‘I don’t understand.’
‘Several of Christopher’s fellow officers attended his funeral, including a huge guy who Ina had met before. She pleaded with him to tell her about the person who murdered her fiancé. He must have seen how much she needed to know, because he agreed to come back. I’m sure he broke an entire regiment of regulations, but he kept his promise and returned several weeks later.
‘The official version was that Captain Armstrong and the Reverend Smith were murdered by a deranged Italian POW who had escaped from a nearby camp and who was himself killed soon afterwards by an army patrol. I think the authorities considered it would be bad for public morale if it came out that the enemy had infiltrated British society so completely that you couldn’t even trust your minister.’
‘So no one knew he was a spy?’
‘Nobody ever had reason to suspect that things weren’t exactly as they appeared to be. His real name was Walter Möller and he was a proper minister. In fact, most of what he told people was true. His mother was Dutch, as he claimed. It was his father who was German, and it was with Germany that his loyalties lay.
‘In the dark and confusion of that night the U-boat sent to pick up Möller escaped, but he was taken to a military hospital and recovered well enough to be interrogated. When the authorities thought they had learnt everything they could, they put Möller against a wall and shot him.’
Effie almost collapsed against the headstone in relief. Hugh quickly stepped forward and, for the first time, took his sister in his arms. She buried her head in his chest and wept.
‘All these years I believed I had been responsible for killing someone . . . all these years.’
‘Forget about the spy. He got what he deserved. People died because of him and those who survived have all been punished enough. Anyway, you’re wrong . . . the last thing you did with the man you loved was try to save Christopher.’
‘Oh, Hugh . . . I would give so much to have peace of mind.’
‘Ina once said that to me, one evening when we were sitting alone by the fire. She didn’t often talk about her feelings. It was a rare glimpse into her innermost thoughts.’
‘Did Ina really forgive me?’
‘Yes. When she knew the end was near. By doing so, I think she finally found a contentment of sorts.’
They stood beside Christopher’s grave, reflecting on what had been said.
‘Fee . . . do you think it would help to be at Kirk Farm?’
Effie pulled back in surprise and looked up at him.
‘You mean, to live at Kirk Farm?’
‘The house is empty and it’s mine to do what I want with it. I don’t need a decision anytime soon. I just want you to consider it. You have a family here and I know they would all love you as I do.’
‘I don’t know what to say.’
‘Well, say nothing then,’ he reached out and squeezed her hand. ‘Take as long as you need to consider it. Come on, let’s go to the reception and rescue poor Anne from having to be the host.’
45
For more than sixty years, Effie had feared that if she ever returned to the Tarbat peninsula people would be hostile towards her. She was the girl who had slept with the enemy only days after her brother’s funeral. She was the girl whose actions had almost led to Germany learning one of the country’s greatest secrets, which would have resulted in the death of thousands of Allied troops. She was someone never to be forgiven.
But no one outside of her family knew that she had loved Toni. Anyone who remembered the minister believed he had been killed by an escaped POW. Christopher had died in the line of duty, and the friends and neighbours who knew of his betrothal to Ina considered his death just another tragedy of the war. Effie wasn’t thought of as the scarlet woman, the would-be traitor, the disgraced daughter who had destroyed a good local family. She was simply Hugh’s older sister who left during the war and never came back. It wasn’t that unusual a story.
Those she met were keen to introduce themselves and express their sympathy for her loss. Effie even came across a few of her old classmates. Now they were grandmothers and grandfathers. She was surprised to find that she enjoyed speaking to them. Some of her happier childhood memories came back and she was interested to hear what had happened to old friends and neighbours, and to learn about the new generations.
Nobody knew she was a writer. When people asked about her career, Effie simply said that she always seemed to end up having to do lots of typing, the faintest echo of her old, mischievous character creeping into her words. Everyone assumed she had been some sort of secretary and didn’t ask any more.
