I was utterly dumbfounded. Gradually, I reached the awful realisation that Douglas simply had not been who he said he was. That suspicion was confirmed when Archie contacted the Dean of Oxford University and learned that there had never been a student named Douglas Llewellyn. Ah Ling, that man had lied about everything. He was a fraudster and a fake.
Years had passed, but the grief of his lies and infidelity hit me again, and I wept. I wept for the naive young girl I had been, so easily taken in by his charm and smooth talking, and I wept for Noel, to have such a man for a father. Perhaps it was fortunate that he was no longer alive to influence the little boy.
It was a terrible shock, but there was a silver lining: Noel would stay with me, with us. I felt uncomfortable about it at first, aware that he might still have paternal grandparents who were alive and would love to take care of him. Would he be better off with blood relatives? I agonised over it for some time andArchie promised to make further enquiries when we reached London, but he didn’t hold much hope. Without knowing Douglas’s real name, it would be like looking for a needle in a haystack. But worse than that, it was a haystack that had been set alight. During the war years, many public record offices had been damaged and documents destroyed. I felt duty bound to at least try, but to be honest I felt more than a little half-hearted. Ultimately, I had become Noel’s mother and he was my son, and our separation would break my heart.
London was a sorry sight when we arrived there by train a couple of days later. Efforts to repair and rebuild were well under way, but it would take years to recover from the aftermath of the war. How strange it was to be back there after being away for so long. Not only had the city changed, but I had changed. Despite Archie’s careful dietary plan for us to slowly regain the weight we had lost, we were still horribly thin. We looked so different, with our tanned skin and skeletal frames, and drew curious glances wherever we went.
Archie’s first stop was to visit an old friend and colleague, who kindly gave us a loan to tide us over for a while. We took a room in a small guest house near Waterloo Station and planned to spend the next few days making enquiries, organising paperwork and contacting loved ones. For my part, I wasnext to useless as the cold English weather got the better of my tired, weakened body. I woke on the first morning with a horrible cold and ended up bed bound for a couple of days. I was so exhausted and floated about between sleep and wakefulness, gripped by fever. Archie was completely wonderful. Not only did he take care of me in his usual gentle, loving way, but he arranged for the guest house manager, a war widow called Mrs Sutton, to watch Noel when he needed to go out. I was in such a daze that I didn’t follow what Archie was up to. All I knew was that he was my rock and I thanked God for him.
On our third morning in London I awoke feeling so much better, my fever had broken and the pounding in my head had eased. Around mid-morning, Mrs Sutton brought me tea and toast and reassured me that Noel was behaving himself, playing with her son who was a few years older than him. She was so kind. She told me that Archie had returned from his appointments and was in the sitting room downstairs with a ‘very handsome feller’ in tow. Still a little dazed, I didn’t follow what she was talking about, but a few minutes after she left, there was a knock on the door and Archie came in.
‘Hello, darling, I’m so glad you’re looking a bit brighter. I’ve brought someone to see you.’ He smiled at me and stood back as anotherman entered the bedroom. I worried that I was having a relapse as I could not believe my eyes: it was Thomas! My darling brother was alive and was standing there in front of me, a big grin on his face.
‘Hi, sis! Long time no see!’ He chuckled. Then, before I knew it, he was sitting beside me on the bed, wrapping his arms around me. How I had missed him! I had needed him so much over the last few years, through my ordeal with Douglas, the deaths of our parents, then three and a half years of prison hell.
Laughter and tears flowed freely as we caught up, a mixture of relief and joy and a release of all the pain we had been through. I had lost many loved ones and feared that I may have lost Thomas, too. I looked up at Archie, my wonderful husband, still standing by the door and smiling at me with such love in his eyes, and thanked him for finding my brother.
Mrs Sutton kindly offered us the sitting room for our private use and, swept along by our happiness, joined us with a plate of sandwiches and pot of tea for lunch. Post-war rationing continued to make catering a challenge, but the fish paste sandwiches and tea with powdered milk made for the finest meal I could remember.
It was the most wonderful reunion and my heart felt fit to burst when my brother introduced himself to Noel as his Uncle Thomas.The little boy took to him immediately and the pair were soon on the floor, playing with the building blocks that Mrs Sutton’s son had kindly given him.
We shared our news from the past few years and tears were shed when I described our parents’ funerals. Thomas shared his wartime tales, including a brief stay in a German prisoner-of-war camp followed by a death-defying escape that had our hearts racing. He told us all about his new job at Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children and how he was engaged to be married to a lovely girl called Marie. She worked as a curator at the nearby British Museum and was the sister of one of his new medical colleagues.
I felt the need to come clean to my brother and explain Noel’s origin. Thomas must have been able to calculate that the dates didn’t allow for Archie to be his father. But something rather wonderful happened that stopped me. Noel reached his arms up to Archie to be picked up and called him ‘Daddy’. Maybe it was because Mrs Sutton had often referred to Archie as Noel’s daddy that the little boy had picked up on it, but from that moment on, the deal was sealed. Archie smiled fondly as he picked him up and kissed the top of his head. Then he gave me a wink and a silent pact was made, we both felt it would be easier that way.
And so our little family was formed. Archie had been busy while I was unwell and,with the emergency papers that we had been issued in Singapore, together with our new marriage certificate, he had managed to get new identity documents for us. We were now officially Dr and Mrs Arthur Penrose. I hadn’t realised until that moment that Archie was not his official name, but I liked Arthur, it sounded so distinguished and it suited him well.
The clerk had taken pity on Archie, given our rather exceptional circumstances, and helpfully stretched a few rules to process Noel’s adoption and change of name at the same time. It felt only right and proper that, with our new start, he should take Archie’s family name and that we both shed Douglas’s fabricated one.
On that note, Archie had also been to visit the Head Office of McKinley’s Rubber to enquire about Douglas Llewellyn. Explaining that his wife was the daughter of one of their former senior managers in Singapore had opened doors, but yet again the trail ran cold. The company secretary was able to share a copy of Douglas’s application to the company several years earlier, plus a form containing the details from his passport. But all the paperwork was in the only name we knew: Douglas James Llewellyn. We realised then that it was time to draw a line and give up; we would never find out where Douglas’s parents were, or who indeed the real Douglas had been.
Our final visit before we left London was one that filled me with the greatest joy. On Sunday afternoon we caught the underground train out to Putney Bridge and walked along the river, past Fulham Palace and the football ground at Craven Cottage, as I had done so many times in my former life. It was all so familiar but, scarred by the war, it all looked so different.
We turned into Queensmill Road and I was overcome with emotion. There I was, back in my old neighbourhood for the first time in seven long years. Curious faces pressed up against the bay window as we walked up the path to the black front door of number twenty-six. Daisy opened the door with the brightest of smiles and I fell into her welcoming arms. We held each other for a good few minutes, sobbing tears of joy and relief, while our husbands and children made their introductions around us.
It was the happiest of afternoons, being reunited with my friend and meeting her loved ones. Daisy’s mother, Averil, kept us supplied with pots of tea and trays of sandwiches and home-baked cakes, all made from hard-saved ration coupons. It was so wonderful to see Averil and she sat listening to every detail as Daisy and I talked nineteen to the dozen about the past few years.
Daisy’s husband, Bert, was quite the life and soul of the party and delighted Noel with various games and magic tricks. Theirchildren, Vera and Eddie, were mini versions of them; Vera having Daisy’s kind and thoughtful manner, and Eddie being another born entertainer. Both were so good with Noel, whom everyone assumed was my and Archie’s son.
It turned out that Daisy had not received the letters I had sent her from the prisoner-of-war camp. It was hardly surprising, given the conditions at the time, but it made things easier when it came to explaining my new family. We were starting a new life and both Archie and I felt that, for the sake of the child, it would be easier to let people believe what they already assumed; that we had married after Douglas died and I’d given birth to Noel soon after. Although it felt wrong to let my oldest friend believe a falsehood, we wanted to start afresh and I had Noel’s best interest in mind.
The afternoon wrapped up in its usual fashion, with a good old sing-song around the piano. Daisy played as beautifully as ever and we worked our way through a medley of wartime songs and Vera Lynn classics, singing with gusto as we belted out that there would always be an England and we would meet again.
The lyrics were apt as we made promises to keep in touch and to visit the next time we were in London. And Archie, who had got on like a house on fire with Bert, invited them to visit us in Cornwall. When the time arrivedto say farewell, there were tears in our eyes. Daisy pulled me close in a warm hug.
‘I can’t tell you how glad I am that you made it back here in one piece! I was so dreadfully worried about you.’ Then she stepped back and looked me up and down, her forehead furrowing as she took in my thin frame. ‘Truth be told, I’m still worried about you – please promise me you’ll eat up and put some weight on! I know that Archie will take care of you, he’s such a lovely man and you just seem so natural together, like you were made for each other. I’m so happy you met him!’
My heart was full as we left Queensmill Road and walked back along the night-time streets to the tube station. I felt safe with my hand tucked in my husband’s, while he carried the sleeping Noel in his other arm. I looked up at him and smiled; I, too, was so happy that I had met him.
The next morning, a damp and chilly Monday in late September, we caught the train from Paddington Station to Cornwall and arrived at Bodmin Parkway as the sun was setting. Noel was fascinated by the changing scenery, leaving behind the suburban sprawl of London and passing through picturesque meadows, pretty villages, leafy green woods and finally the rugged beauty of Bodmin Moor.
We stayed a couple of nights in Bodmin to visit Archie’s father in his nursing home.The poor man was in his early eighties and suffering from senile dementia. After the death of his mother, a couple of years before he had left for Singapore, Archie had found a tenant to take over the running of the family farm and had arranged for his father to move to a nursing home in Bodmin.
It was a bittersweet reunion between father and son. There was a flicker of recognition in Mr Penrose senior’s eyes, but he could not remember his son’s name, nor that he even was his son. He was a pleasant, cheerful old man and very good with Noel, but his conversation was extremely limited. He made repetitive comments about the weather and told us how busy he’d been on the farm during the recent harvest. We smiled and nodded along, but I could tell it pained Archie not to be known by his father. It wasn’t until we were leaving that he addressed his son by name.
‘Goodbye, Arthur. Tell your mother that I’ll be home soon.’
Archie’s eyes misted over as we left and I squeezed his hand in mine. So often Archie had supported me and it pleased me to be able to offer him comfort when he needed it.
