Magda's Daughter (8 page)

‘If she did, she never told me about it, and I never asked. Everyone in the camps wanted to go somewhere in those days. And with the roads and railways bombed, and hardly anyone having any papers to prove who they were, and Nazi big nobs hiding among the camp inmates and prisoners, it was a nightmare. But after I asked your mother to marry me, the question of her returning to Poland didn't come up. I applied for permission to marry her and, eventually, after a lot of argy-bargy, it was approved. She was placed on the list of refugees waiting to be given travel warrants to come to Britain.'

‘You were formally engaged to my mother?' Helena couldn't have been more stunned. After all Magda had said about her husband being the one great love of her life, to discover that she had considered marrying someone else was devastating.

‘I suppose we were. I gave her a ring; swapped a couple of tins of ham for it. I often wondered what would have happened if I'd asked for permission to marry Magda in Germany. That would have been more difficult. You had to prove special circumstances, and I never found out what they were. Officers were different. They knew people who could pull strings. A lieutenant married an Estonian girl who lived in Magda's barracks. The girls organised a bit of a do for them. But even if we had married in Germany, Magda wouldn't have been able to come home to Wales with me when I was demobbed. It would have been done and dusted, though. Mam wouldn't have been able to argue with a wedding certificate, would she?'

When neither Ned nor Helena commented, Bob continued. ‘Well, it's all water down the Taff now. I came back, started courting Betty. We'd been married a week when your mother turned up on the doorstep with you in her arms. Mam wouldn't let her in the house, so I took her into town –'

‘Pontypridd?' Helena asked.

‘Mam's house was in Trallwn so we didn't have far to walk. I carried you and Magda's suitcase. I couldn't swear to it, of course, but I think you remembered me and the chocolate I'd given you in the camp. I took your mother to Ronconi's – the restaurant, not the cafe. It cost more, but Magda had come all that way and I wanted to give her a treat, so I bought her fish and chips. While she was eating them, I told her that I was sorry but I couldn't do anything for her. She didn't take it too well, but as luck would have it I had my Post Office book in my pocket. So I nipped out and drew out a fiver – that was a lot of money in those days – and gave it to Magda. Next time I saw her she was working in Charlie's shop. She nodded to me but we never spoke another word.' He shook his head at the memory. ‘I often wondered what would have happened if she hadn't had you. But when Mam kicked up a fuss about bringing another man's kid in the house I knew there was no point asking Magda to leave you in the camp or have you adopted. She wouldn't have done it. She thought the world of you back then. And looking at you now, I don't doubt until her dying day.'

Helena was too dumbfounded to speak.

Bob left the table. ‘Betty, my missus, doesn't know I'm here. She thinks I've nipped down the billiards hall for a game with the boys. She knows about me and your mother because she opened the door to Magda all those years ago. What little she didn't guess or know for sure, Mam told her. Betty didn't like it, and she didn't like Magda staying on in Ponty. In fact, she never went near Charlie's shop after your mam started running it. Even crossed the road to avoid walking past the door. But I felt I had to pay my respects and explain what happened. I was never sure what your mother told you about me, so I wanted to give you my side of the story. It wasn't my fault that Magda didn't get my letter telling her not to leave the Displaced Persons' camp. I did all I could for her when she turned up. Gave her a fiver, bought her a meal. If I could have done more at the time I would have. Oh – I almost forgot.' He slipped his hand into the inside pocket of his suit and brought out an envelope. ‘I kept the photographs Magda gave me in Germany, as well as the ones she sent me after I came home. My missus would crucify me if she knew I'd hung on to them. I told her I burned them years ago. But there's no point in my keeping them now.' He laid the envelope on the table; Helena took it.

‘Mr Parsons?'

‘Bob.' He smiled.

Ned reflected that if Bob Parsons knew Helena better he might have been put off by the stony expression in her eyes.

‘Did you love my mother?'

‘I suppose I did – at least, I thought so back in Germany. I got her that ring – and a tin of ham could buy a lot in those days. And I gave two for it. But it's funny how time makes you see things more clearly. Magda and I were chalk and cheese. She was ambitious Always talking about making a better life, especially for you. And she did that all right, working her way up until she became manageress of a shop. Me, I like the quiet life. I do enough work to bring home a wage that keeps me and the missus, and buys us a couple of drinks down the club on a weekend and a fortnight in Porthcawl every end of July and beginning of August. And that suits me and Betty fine.' He rammed his hat on his head and gazed at Helena for a moment. ‘Course, it might have been different if I'd had kids to think about and plan for. Me and Betty never had any. And you were a lovely little nipper. Two years old, and so quick to learn. Magda had plans to teach you all languages – Polish, German, French, Russian. Do you speak them now?'

‘Polish, French and German, not Russian,' she said shortly.

‘Clever girl. I can just about manage English. Good spread, by the way.'

‘Pardon?' Helena asked in confusion.

‘Good spread.' He waved his arm in the direction of the buffet table. ‘You did Magda proud and saw her off in style, fair play.'

‘Mr Parsons, can I ask you a question?'

‘You can ask,' he said warily, ‘but I don't have to answer it.'

‘It's nothing personal,' Helena said. ‘Did my mother pay you back the five pounds you gave her?'

‘Oh aye. I received a postal order from her a month after I drew it out of the bank. She paid it back all right. In full, and the money it had cost me to pay her fare here.' He hesitated and smiled. ‘Betty never found out that I took that fiver from the bank.' He placed his cap on his head. ‘I'm sorry about Magda. I really am.'

Ned slipped his hand around Helena's shoulders and, for the first time since Magda's death, she didn't move away. They watched Robert Parsons walk out of the hall.

‘Magda never told you that she came to Wales expecting to marry a British soldier?'

Helena shook her head.

For all his protestations to the contrary, it was obvious that Robert Parsons had treated Magda shabbily. Ned could understand Magda not wanting to tell anyone that she had travelled halfway across Europe only to be jilted at the other end. But he couldn't help wondering if there were any other secrets that Magda had kept from her daughter.

‘I knew your mother had come to Pontypridd to marry a British soldier who changed his mind when she arrived. But she never mentioned his name, and I never asked who he was.' Alma set fresh cups of tea on the table in front of Helena and Ned.

The wake was coming to an end, the church ladies were packing away the remaining cakes – there were no savouries left – and the clatter of dishes being washed in the kitchen could be heard in the background above the conversation of the remaining mourners.

‘Do you know Robert Parsons?' Ned passed Alma the milk jug.

‘I never even heard the name.' Alma looked up as Ronnie Ronconi pulled a chair out from their table.

‘Alma told me what happened. Do you mind if I join you?'

‘Not at all. Did you know Robert Parsons, Mr Ronconi?'

‘No, Helena,' Ronnie answered.

Helena laid out the photographs Robert Parsons had given her. They were a series of snapshots, some blurred. Most were just of her and her mother, but there were other women and servicemen in some of them, none of whom she recognised. ‘I simply don't understand how Robert Parsons could have asked my mother to marry him, made all the arrangements for us to come to this country after the war, and then changed his mind.'

‘It's difficult to explain wartime to people who didn't live through it,' Alma mused. ‘It's back to the old cliché – live for today, for tomorrow you may die. Every week we seemed to hear news of someone, family or friend, who'd been killed. Most of us honestly believed that we didn't have a tomorrow, so we did all sorts of crazy things we never would have considered under normal circumstances.'

‘I'll agree with you there,' Ronnie echoed.

‘But the war was over when Robert Parsons met my mother,' Helena emphasized.

‘Only just, from what he told you,' Alma reminded her. ‘And he was overseas, far from home. The fighting had stopped, and with it the excitement. He was probably lonely, most certainly bored, and your mother was a beautiful young woman who had been treated appallingly while mourning the loss of her husband, her home and her country. He paid her attention and I imagine she was glad to receive it. I know she had you, but it's difficult to have a meaningful conversation with a baby.'

‘How did you meet Magda?' Ned asked Alma and Ronnie.

‘I met her in the restaurant.' Ronnie poured milk into his tea. ‘Peter and I had come into town on business for the garage and stopped for a meal. One perk of being family, probably the only one, is free food in the Ronconi restaurant and cafes. Magda was sitting at a table with you.' He smiled at Helena. ‘Being a sucker for children, something that happens when you're the oldest of eleven – and you were gorgeous, not that you aren't now – I started playing with you. Then Peter realised Magda was crying. She told us that she'd arrived in London docks that morning expecting her fiancé to meet her boat. When he didn't turn up, she asked a Red Cross official for advice. As she had her fiancé's address in Pontypridd, he arranged an instant loan from the hardship fund so that she could buy train tickets to Pontypridd.'

‘That much I know, because as soon as Magda had saved enough money from her shop wages, she went to the library to find out the address of the Red Cross in London so she could send them a postal order to repay the loan,' Alma confirmed.

‘That's my mother,' Helena commented, thinking of the money she had sent Bob Parsons.

‘When Magda arrived at Pontypridd station she showed someone her fiancé's address. They directed her to the house, and his wife opened the door. It must have been a dreadful shock. When your mother told me and Peter what had happened, we decided that, as the man was already married and in no position to do anything for your mother or you, it wasn't worth looking for him.'

‘A wise decision,' Alma endorsed. ‘Given your temper and attitude towards men who mistreat women and children, Ronnie, you probably would have thumped him.'

She picked up the story. ‘As luck would have it, I was visiting the Pontypridd shop that day, and Peter fetched me. Liza was managing the shop at the time, but she was pregnant and I was looking for someone to help her. Peter and Liza gave Magda a room in their house, and one of the young girls in the shop looked after you,' she nodded to Helena, ‘during the busy times. I realised Magda was capable of running the shop by herself the first week she worked there. So, when Liza gave up work to have her baby, your mother took over. When the flat upstairs became vacant, you and Magda moved in, and the rest you know.'

‘One of my earliest memories is of moving into the flat above the shop, although I can't remember Peter's house,' Helena said slowly. ‘I remembering carrying my doll up the stairs and following Mama around the rooms. She was so happy, especially with the furniture. She kept on repeating, “Look, Helena, our very first home.Ë®'

‘I often wondered how you and Magda ended up in Pontypridd. But I never liked to ask,' Ned pushed his empty cup away from him.

‘Why didn't you tell me that my mother had come here to marry someone?' Helena asked Alma and Ronnie.

‘Because if anyone should have told you it was Magda. And before you blame her for not telling you, consider how she must have felt. To have travelled halfway across Europe carrying a small child and all her worldly possessions in one small bag, only to discover that her fiancé had married someone else. She must have been mortified. When I first set eyes on her in the restaurant she was devastated. She honestly believed her entire future had been taken away. She thought you would both be sent back to the Displaced Persons' camp.' Ronnie pushed his chair back from the table.

‘She was lucky to have found you.' Helena looked from Ronnie to Alma. ‘Why did you help us?'

‘Because we – all of us – Peter, Ronnie, me – felt sorry for your mother. And because she'd been forced to leave her country during the war, just as Peter had. It was obvious that she was afraid to go back there. Something Peter understood only too well.'

Helena looked across the hall to where Peter Raschenko, his white-blond hair shining like a beacon, was sitting, surrounded by his wife and four daughters.

‘Peter has made a good life for himself in Pontypridd, just as your mother did. But like his father – and this is something I found difficult to accept when I was living with Charlie …' Alma fell silent for a moment as she searched for the right words to express her feelings. ‘You only ever get to know a part of them,' she said finally. ‘People who have been forced to leave their homeland – and I don't count you among them, Ronnie, because you left Italy of your own free will – seem to leave something of themselves behind. And I don't mean material things. A side to their nature that, no matter how much you love them, or think you know them, you can't begin to understand.'

‘Shared memories of childhood,' Ned suggested.