The Lost Ancestor (33 page)

The photograph taken on Empire Day in 1911
caught his eye and he remembered how Mrs Cuff had distanced herself from the
other servants.  Morton was sure that she had learned the truth about what
had taken place all those years ago and was surreptitiously sharing her
feelings with history.

Morton looked at his watch: 1:46
a.m.  He still didn’t feel tired but knew he needed to give up soon and at
least
try
and get some rest.  Just before he stopped for the night,
Morton decided to bring the Mercer Case right up to date and so he set about
printing and sticking to the wall all his recent discoveries.  Up went the
photo of Jack Maslow and Edward Mercer, as did the information from the vicar
of Winchelsea and the Voter’s Lists showing Martha Stone.  He considered
again that Martha had vanished between 1960 and 1965.  One key event
occurred in that period: Edith’s death.  He knew from Ray Mercer that she
had returned for her twin’s funeral in 1962.  Maybe she stayed. 
Morton ran a death search for Martha Stone in the British death indexes and
found her.  She died in the same quarter of the same year, and in the same
registration district as Edith.  Morton ordered her death certificate on a
priority service.

As he switched off his laptop and turned
out the study light to make his way back down to bed, Morton considered that it
was almost time to arrange a meeting with Ray Mercer.

18
^th
December 1925

Edith
Leyden quickly finished dressing in the dim light of her bedside lamp. 
With a fleeting glance in the mirror, she placed her red cloche hat on her head
and buttoned up her matching red coat.  A burning nervousness and
excitement inside her overcame the chill of the early morning.  She had
taken the room for one night in the tiny terraced boarding house on the
outskirts of Liverpool city centre.  The cab that she had ordered was due
in a matter of minutes.

Having made a quick final check of the
stark room, Edith picked up her small suitcase and made her way down the dark
stairs.  She had settled her bill last night and had no need to disturb
anyone this morning therefore.  She quietly closed the front door behind
her and stepped down onto the cobbled pavement.

The streets were black, peppered with the
muted amber hue coming from the gas-lamps dotted at regular intervals.  In
the distance, tall chimneys pumped grey tendrils of smoke into the night
sky.  Edith drew in a long, steady breath and considered what she was
about to undertake.  After years of searching as to the whereabouts of her
twin sister, the answer had been close by all along.  And now, in just
seven days’ time, the twins would be reunited.

Two round white lights suddenly appeared
at the end of the street, growing in size as the vehicle appeared from the
gloom.  A blue and black Austin Seven drew alongside Edith and, leaving
the engine running, a man popped out from the driver’s door.  ‘Morning,
madam!’ he chirped in a thick Liverpudlian accent.  ‘Off to the
waterfront?’

Edith nodded.  ‘Yes, yes please.’

The driver scuttled round and opened the
passenger door for her, allowing her to step inside before shutting it tight
behind her.

Edith’s excitement grew as the cab pulled
away into the quiet street; it was her very first ride in a motor cab and
somehow it made her adventure seem all the more important.

‘Where you off to, then, love?’ the driver
asked.

‘Canada.  I’m going to see my
sister,’ Edith answered.

‘Ah, that’ll be lovely, that will,’ he
said.  ‘Has she been out there long?’

‘Fourteen years,’ Edith said. 
Fourteen long horrible years.  Not a single day had passed when she hadn’t
thought about her.  She pulled out a small piece of white paper handed to
her a few days ago by the private investigator, whom she had hired to search
for Mary.  She unfolded it and read.  It simply said, ‘4 West Street,
Halifax.’  She had read the address a dozen times and had no need to bring
the piece of paper, but it made it all the more real for her.  That was
where her sister was now residing, having taken the name of her long-dead
school friend, Martha Stone. 

As Edith looked out of the cab window at
the rows and rows of terraced housing, she thought about how she had searched
high and low for Mary.  She had tried every conceivable avenue, never
accepting, but always expecting failure.  She would have saved a fortune
in money and precious time with her sister if she had known that the answer was
under her nose all along.  The answer was spat at her by her drunken
husband when they were in the midst of an angry row.  Joshua had known
what had happened to Mary ever since the day that she had disappeared in
1911.  A secret that he had harboured for fourteen years.

Almost four weeks ago, Joshua had arrived
home at gone-midnight, having spent the evening drinking with Lord
Rothborne.  The abhorrent sight of her husband drunk had been one that she
was growing increasingly accustomed to seeing.  She despised the total
shift in his personality when he was drunk: he would leave their home at Peace
Cottage as the man she had fallen in love with all those years ago but he would
return a foul, spiteful man with an unpredictable temperament.

When he had arrived home that night, Edith
had been knitting in front of the glimmering fire in the sitting-room. 
She had learned from painful experience that pretending to be asleep when he
arrived home often resulted in him forcing himself upon her.  Much better
was to defuse the situation and pack him off to bed first.

‘You waited up again,’ Joshua had said
jovially as he closed the front door.

Edith had seen instantly that he was drunk
to the point of being unable to stand properly.  ‘Yes, I waited,’ she had
said, mustering a false smile.  ‘I think you need to get to bed, Joshua.’

Joshua’s smile had turned into a tiger’s
snarl.  ‘Why?  You think I’m bloody silly, don’t you, Edie?’

Edith had set her knitting down into her
lap.  ‘No, Joshua, I don’t think you’re silly; I think you’re tired and
need to get to bed.’

‘Come on, then, let’s go to bed,’ Joshua
had challenged.

‘You go, I’ll be up in a minute,’ Edith
had answered, trying to hide her nervousness about where this conversation was
headed.

‘No, you come now!’ Joshua had shouted.

‘Shhh, you’ll wake Charles,’ Edith had said.

‘Oh, your poor son,’ Joshua had
replied.  ‘Let him live a little.  You protect him like he’s a
porcelain doll.  You parcel him off to bed like he’s a baby.  Cecil
lets Georgie stay up with us.’

Edith had looked mortified.  ‘Not
drinking and gambling, surely?  He’s only fourteen.’

Joshua had rolled his eyes
scornfully.  ‘He’s a grown-up lad—more of a man than your wet Charlie
upstairs,’ he mocked, before mumbling, ‘which is odd.’

‘Why’s it odd?’ Edith had retorted. 
‘I look after my boy.’

‘They’ve got the same blood, though,’ he
said.

Edith had stared at him, wondering at his
last remark. 
Had he just said that her son, Charlie, had the same
blood as George Mansfield? 
‘What do you mean by that?’

‘Are you really that bloody stupid and
naïve?’ Joshua had whispered, moving closer to her face.  ‘They’re
cousins!  Mary had a little lamb.’

‘You’re lying!’ Edith had snapped.

Joshua had laughed and made his way
upstairs.

Edith had wanted to call after her
husband, but knew there would be no point.  The next morning would be like
every other following his drinking; he would remember nothing of it. 
Edith had intended to keep it that way.  She knew that if she wanted to
ever see Mary again, she needed to be clever about it.  It had become her
secret.  Her mystery to solve.

‘Here we are then, love,’ the cab driver
said, bringing the car to a sudden stop.  ‘The Aquitania Pier.’

Edith lurched back to reality.  The
driver opened the door and she stepped out into another world.  Despite
the subdued dawn light, Edith could see a hive of industry taking place with
everything revolving around the magnificent ship which loomed large in the
background.  She suddenly became aware of her immediate
surroundings.  More cars and horse-drawn carriages than she had ever seen
in one place were lined up at the edge of the road, spilling people and luggage
onto the slipway beside them.  People, seemingly of all nationalities,
bustled around chatting and carrying cases towards the big ship.  Edith
was mesmerised.  She quickly settled up with the cab driver and stood
clutching her case, staring at the liner.  RMS Celtic II.  Her home
for the next seven days.

‘Come on, Miss, move along!’ an
American-sounding voice called from behind her.  ‘She’ll sail without you!’

Edith turned to see a slender lady,
elegantly dressed, with a cigarette holder pressed tightly between her
lips.  She puffed out a long thread of smoke.  ‘Sorry,’ Edith
apologised.

‘I was just kidding,’ the lady said with a
wink.  ‘She’s quite something, wouldn’t you say?’

‘Truly amazing,’ Edith replied, quite
taken with the enigmatic woman.

‘Seven hundred feet long,’ the American
said.  ‘Twenty-thousand tons.  You can see why it’s one of the White
Star Line’s ‘Big Four’.’

‘Yes,’ Edith answered.  ‘Where are
you going?’

‘Back home to New York,’ the woman
replied.  ‘And you?’

‘Halifax,’ Edith replied, her gaze
shifting from the boat to the American.  She was savouring the few moments
that she had with this enchanting woman, for she knew that as soon as they
boarded, their differently classed tickets would ensure that they never got to
meet again on the voyage.  ‘I’m going to see my twin sister who lives
there.’

The American drew in a long drag of air
through the cigarette, then raised her head and expelled it slowly.  ‘How
delightful to have a twin.  Well, it was lovely to meet you. 
Bon
voyage!’
she said, and marched passed Edith.  Seconds later, she was
absorbed into the growing crowds beginning to cross the narrow gangplank onto
the ship. 

It was time to go.

Edith picked up her suitcase, found the
correct boarding gate for her class and joined the noisy procession of
passengers about to enter the magnificent boat.  Without her husband’s
knowledge, Edith had withdrawn a substantial amount from their joint savings
account to purchase a single-berth room in second class for herself.

‘Tickets!’ a friendly steward cried from
the mouth of the gate.  ‘Have your tickets ready, please, ladies and
gentlemen!’

Edith removed her ticket from her handbag
and held it aloft for the steward’s inspection.

‘Lovely, thank you, madam.  Enjoy
your trip.’

Edith smiled and followed a family of four
up the gangplank, listening to their excited chatter, then, with some
apprehension, stepped onto the boat.  It was really going to happen.

Edith knew her room number off by
heart—202—but she double-checked her ticket just to be sure.  She could
easily have asked for directions to her room, but she preferred the idea of
exploring the boat independently.

She crossed through a warren of corridors
and interconnecting doors, feeling certain that in seven days she would never
get to explore all the hidden nooks and crannies that a ship of this size must
hold.  Despite the extravagant amount that she had spent on the voyage,
Edith’s ticket did not afford her the luxury of a window; her cabin was buried
far below deck, somewhere near the centre of the ship.  But Edith was
happy with it.  The room was very comfortable, comprising a single bed, a
settee and, between the two, a washstand and make-up mirror.

Fifty-five minutes later, the deep
thundering moan of the ship’s horn resounded in Edith’s cabin, announcing
imminent departure.  Edith decided to wait until the ship was sailing
before she braved the decks, which right now would be heaving with a sea of
faces watching as their loved ones slowly disappeared from view. 
Inexplicably, Edith couldn’t bring herself to join them.  It made her
think of Mary taking a similar voyage, with nobody there to wave her off. 
Nobody to care about her.

Edith waited until the ship had been
sailing for an hour until she left her cabin for the first time.  The
thronging decks had thinned out and she found a quiet spot on the port side
where she could be alone.  Looking out to sea, there was nothing but a
gently rolling ocean.  No land behind her.  No land in front of
her.  Her thoughts turned to Joshua.  She had left him with no
uncertainty that their marriage was over.  She had been betrayed and,
despite his begging and pleading, nothing that he could ever do would repair
the damage.  Edith stared at the ring on her left hand.  After
raising a son as a single mother and having been rejected by her family for it,
she had hoped that her marriage to Joshua Leyden would be forever.  With a
heavy heart, Edith removed her ring and held it between her thumb and
forefinger.  Everything it symbolised was gone.  Drawing back her
hand, Edith launched the ring into the sea; its insignificance not even
creating a visible splash on the ocean surface.

Edith fumbled at the collar of her coat
and withdrew the silver locket that was hanging around her neck.  She held
it tightly and stared into the horizon.