My Father's Mysterious Secret

As a little girl in the 1940's I was always very happy in my father's company. When I look back now I realise that I may well have been his favourite child. He married my mother relatively late in life and by the time I was born he was already 40 years old. By then I had an older brother who was my senior by 18 months. Life became secure and predictable until I was 5 and then things started to slowly unravel after that.

One day I was told that I was to be sent away to live with a family friend and her husband who had no children themselves. I had been attending infants school, but suddenly there was a different school for me to go to. Auntie Grace and Uncle Bill were kind and loving, but I missed my mum and dad and my older brother so much.

Then one day my dad came to collect me in his car to take me out for a drive with him. I was so happy to see him. I ran towards him and he scooped me up and held me tightly. "Oh daddy, I've missed you so much" I cried "have you come to take me home, but where is mummy?" "I have missed you too darling" my dad replied "I am taking you to see mummy and we have a lovely surprise for you".

I loved surprises and couldn't wait to see this one. We drove off together and after about 20 minutes we pulled up in front of a big house set back off the road, with a gravel driveway leading up to the front door. I held on to my daddy's hand tightly as we went inside. There were steep stairs in front of me and my shoes made clumping noises as I made my way up them. When we got to the top there was a door slightly ajar and my daddy pushed it open and took me inside. I was really surprised to see my mum sitting up in bed. She held out her arms to me and I jumped on the bed and nestled close to her. "Would you like a drink sweetheart?" she said. I nodded and she poured me a glass of squash from a bottle on the table next to her.

There was a big sideboard in the room with a large wicker basket on the top. I clambered down from the bed and stood on tiptoe to peep over the top. Inside there were two little babies snuggled up close together, fast asleep. "Meet your new twin brothers" my daddy said, with a smile in his voice.

After that, life changed a lot. My father was a travelling salesman so he was often away and my mum was left to look after us, pretty much on her own. Bringing up four children under the age of 7, including twin babies, took its toll at times. Mum didn't drive and my grandmother lived a fair distance away. I did have lots of aunties and uncles though as my mum was one of 8 children. We saw them frequently and I always loved their visits . However, my father's family was never talked about very much and we never saw any of his relatives until one day a lady appeared out of the blue.

She never came to our house , but my dad sometimes took me with him on his travels around town. On those occasions we met her at a local cafe and my dad introduced her to me as his sister Ruby. So she became my secret Auntie. My mum was never there and Ruby's visits were always fairly brief. I knew there was something mysterious going on and my dad never spoke about her to my mother.

The years passed by and I accepted that my dad's family were never going to be a part of our lives, they were invisible, never spoken about, and perhaps didn't even exist.

One day, soon after both my parents had died, a chance meeting changed all that. My eldest brother was out with friends, having a drink in a local pub. He overheard a conversation in which my father's surname was mentioned. He picked up on this and turned to the man who had just spoken. Incredibly this person turned out to be a distant relative of my father. A meeting was arranged so that more information could be shared in a private setting. Gradually the truth came out, revealing things my mother and her family never knew.

My father was hiding a secret which we may never have discovered had my brother not been in the right place at the right time. The mystery of my father's apparent lack of a family was revealed at long last. My mum had married a man who told her he was a bachelor. That was not the case. Some 20 years previously he had been married and had two young children, both boys. Sadly they both died in infancy.

Dad was a tram driver then and soon after he lost his sons, a young boy ran out in front of his tram and was killed. This tragedy tipped him over the edge. He divorced his wife and left his home town to start a new life elsewhere. He wanted to forget everything and begin again. This was where my mother came in. So at last the mystery was solved. Dad too was one of a large family, but he cut them all off, apart from his youngest sister, my secret Auntie.

The truth about my Dad was never made known to my mother or her family. I understand now completely why he tried to bury all the pain of what happened to him. I was his only daughter, and perhaps that's why he loved me so much that he allowed me to meet his sister, who was also privy to those things he wanted to keep locked away in his mysterious past.