My daughter Annalise came to visit me today. She is beautiful like her mother and, I suppose, like my mother and, in a strange way, like me. It is some kind of genetic accident that I was born white, but this girl is undoubtedly mine. Mine and Laura’s. I still had the slimmest doubts right up until the moment I saw her. She has the same clear blue eyes and the sense of vibrancy and purpose that Laura had when I first met her, but her skin colour comes from my mother, via me.
It was awkward at first, but I used my old charm to put her at her ease until the atmosphere was at least cordial. I made enquiries about her son, my grandchild, and she showed me a photograph of a small boy, perhaps two years old, sitting in between her and her husband. He has a mischievous smile on his face and I can tell he is happy. I am glad. I asked her if she was happy, and she grinned quickly and ducked her blue eyes.
She sat opposite me, and I watched as she nervously buttoned and unbuttoned the cuffs of her expensive silk blouse, and I did not want to deny the truth to myself any longer.
I could, however, deny it to her.
I admitted that I knew Laura well, that we had dated in college and that we had spent a summer together in Bordeaux. I told Annalise that her mother was brave and beautiful and would have desperately wanted to keep her. I denied knowing that Laura was ever pregnant, and could not explain why she might have named me as the father. I said that there were some South African workers at the vineyard in the summer of 1973 and implied that Laura must have had a liaison with one of them. I recalled them as good, strong and cheerful boys but regretted I could not remember their names.
I told her that there would be no point in doing a DNA test. I told her all about my parents, Mary (née Murphy) and Francis Ryan, a priest at the time of my birth. I suspect Annalise must already have known of this detail. I even recalled for her my earliest memory: I am sitting on my father’s knee in a large garden while my laughing parents embrace each other on a bench. We are the only people in my world. My mother has red hair; she wears spectacles and lipstick. My smiling father is in a high-waisted suit. The bench is under a tree. One of the boughs of the tree hangs low and heavy with blossoms over my father’s head. My mother carries me over and puts me into a swing. There is a safety bar across it. She pushes me gently, and I laugh because I like the feeling of the air rushing through my stomach. I want her to push me a little higher, but she is afraid to do so. My father takes over the pushing and she goes back to the bench to sit down. My father pushes me higher and I am thrilled. After a little while, I use my feet as brakes. I feel the gravel and note a cloud of dust rising. I run over to my mum and jump into her lap. She hugs me close to her, and I know that my father is watching with pride. I am warm and safe.
I told Annalise about how my mother left us some years later, and how my father remarried a woman who did not want to raise me. I feigned upset. I said I didn’t like to talk about it. Annalise was sympathetic and did not press for details. I explained about how I was raised in a boarding school.
‘I’m afraid there is no mystery, and that you have had a wasted journey.’
I wished her luck with her continued search.
She seemed relieved, I think. Happy to know that, after all, her father was not the monster who sat before her. We shook hands. Her hand was warm in mine.
I have destroyed enough lives. She is better off not knowing. This, finally, is a secret I am proud of keeping. Protecting her is an act of unselfish generosity. I try to be good.
Acknowledgements
Heartfelt thanks to:
Marianne Gunn O’Connor, my agent, who deserves her excellent reputation for incredible support, and Vicky Satlow, for her determination on my behalf. Patricia Deevy, my editor, for gently helping me to shape my story as you now see it. Also, Michael McLoughlin, Cliona Lewis, Patricia McVeigh, Brian Walker and all of the team at Penguin Ireland. Keith Taylor, Lisa Simmonds and Holly Kate Donmall at Penguin UK, and copy-editor Caroline Pretty, for painstaking editing, proofing and production work. Alison Groom and Lesley Hodgson, for suitably sinister jacket design.
Sincere gratitude for expert research advice from: Mark Shriver Ph.D., Professor of Anthropology and Genetics at Pennsylvania State University; David MacHugh Ph.D., Associate Professor of Genomics at University College Dublin; and Kieran Gaffney, Charge Care Officer (retired) at the Central Mental Hospital.
Personal thanks to:
Alison Walsh and Clodagh Lynam, for excellent advice, and Kevin Reynolds, Clíodhna Ní Anlúain, Lorelei Harris, Jesper Bergmann and Cathryn Brennan, for broadcasting my early scribblings.
All of my beloved friends and family members, including in-laws, who were forced to read this multiple times. And especially to my dad, who passed on to me his love of literature.
My husband, Richard, for everything. I adore you. x