Chapter Two
It had been years since I’d set foot in my grandmother’s attic.
The last time was probably before Mom died, when I still considered it an adventure to climb the creaky stairs with Grampa Jack and make a private clubhouse out of sheets draped over old pieces of furniture and stacks of boxes.
I’d beg him to tell me ghost stories until I screamed and ran back down the ladder.
There was always something wonderfully haunting about Gram’s attic.
Maybe it was the cobwebs and dead houseflies on the windowsill.
Or the way the wind howled through the eaves, and the entire house seemed to creak like an old ship at sea.
Or maybe it was the smell of the place—the damp wood and boxes of musty old photo albums that contained pictures of people who were long gone from this world.
Gram’s attic was exactly how I remembered it—with exposed wooden beams overhead and sunlight filtering in through cracks in the walls, although the space seemed much smaller now.
The old wicker rocking chair still stood under the window.
I recalled, as if it were only yesterday, how I used to tie a string to the leg and pretend that a ghost was rocking it back and forth. Anything to scare Grampa Jack.
“I came up here yesterday,” Dad said, “thinking I’d add some insulation because they say it’s going to be a rough winter, but then I got caught up in some of the memorabilia.”
I glanced toward the large trunk that contained Gram’s wedding dress from her first marriage—a gorgeous Gatsby-inspired gown of silk chiffon with Chantilly lace.
I used to try it on when I was young, and Gram never seemed to mind.
The same trunk contained Grampa’s brown leather flying jacket from the war and all his medals for bravery, as well as a shabby old stuffed bear that belonged to my father when he was a child. The bear’s name was Teddy.
There were other dilapidated cardboard boxes on tables.
They were full of books, magazines, and photo albums. Some had a few rare photos from Gram’s life with her first husband in England at the start of the war.
But most of the albums contained pictures from her postwar existence here in America, with Grampa Jack.
Dad pointed at the smaller antique sea chest on a shelf in the corner.
It was always locked, but I knew what was inside because Gram had opened it for me when I was twelve.
She also showed me where she kept the key—in a drawer in her bedroom.
She never said a word when I snuck into her room and borrowed the key, then played dress up in the attic with the jewelry inside that special chest.
My mother had whispered to me once that they were gifts from Gram’s first husband, the Englishman, and that she would have felt guilty wearing them after she married Grampa Jack.
I’d asked Mom if Gram’s first husband was the true love of her life. Mom said she had no idea because Gram never liked to talk about him.
“It’s in the past now,” Gram always said and skillfully changed the subject to something far removed from the war, like plans for whatever holiday season was approaching.
I met my father’s fretful gaze in the attic and felt a rush of unease as I crossed the loose floorboards toward the small chest, which stood on a shelf by the rocking chair.
Fingering the brass plate with an engraved figure of a lady in a Regency gown, I said, “I already know what’s in here. It’s full of jewelry from her first marriage. She always kept it locked, but she showed me where the key was when I was little. She kept it in her bedroom.”
“She showed you?” He seemed surprised. “Well, she must have been up here recently, because she left the key in the lock. I have it right here.” He reached into his pocket and produced it, then unlocked the chest and raised the lid to reveal pearl and gemstone necklaces, bracelets, and a velvet ring box, all sitting in a tangled pile on a bed of rose-colored satin. “I assume this is what you know about?”
“Yes. I used to call it the treasure chest. Mom said all of this was given to Gram by your real father.”
I couldn’t understand why this was such a disturbing discovery for my dad. Shouldn’t he be happy about it? Not just for sentimental reasons, but because it was probably worth a fortune. His real father was the son of an earl, after all.
“I know about that,” he replied, “but there’s something else in here that I don’t think anyone knows about. I doubt Grampa Jack ever knew.”
I regarded him with interest. “What is it?”
He indicated a satin-covered button at the bottom of the chest and pushed it sideways with his thumb, which took some effort. Suddenly, there was a clicking sound, and a secret drawer popped open.
“Wow,” I said, taken aback. “I never noticed that before.”
The drawer was disguised by the brass fittings along the exterior of the chest. I moved to examine it and pulled it fully open, but it was empty.
“There’s nothing in it,” I said.
“Look again.”
I ran my finger along the smooth wooden interior and found a ribbon that lifted a false bottom. There, beneath it, were some black-and-white photographs. I withdrew them and frowned, understanding at last why my father was so troubled by this finding.
“Is this Gram?” I asked. “And how in the world did you discover this?”
“I don’t know. I guess I always had a funny feeling about this little chest when I was growing up—something about the way she was so protective of it. And then, when I saw the key in the lock yesterday… I couldn’t help myself. I was curious, so I fiddled around with it.”
I flipped through all four photographs of my sweet, loving grandmother in her younger days, looking vibrant, blonde, and beautiful, like a 1940s movie star. She appeared to be blissfully happy with a handsome young officer from the war.
But this man was no ordinary officer. Nor was he my English grandfather, Theodore, who had worked with Winston Churchill in London. This man was a German Nazi, and clearly, they were in love.
My eyes lifted, and I stared at my father with confusion. “Who is this guy?”
“I don’t know. But flip the pictures over.”
I did as he asked and saw what appeared to be my grandmother’s handwriting on the backs of each one. They all said the same thing:
April in Berlin, 1940.
“That’s just after the war started, wasn’t it?” I asked.
“Yes. Germany invaded Poland in September of ’39, and then Britain declared war immediately.”
I felt a sickening knot of dread in my belly, because I knew what my father was thinking.
“Dad…” I shook my head. “I’m sure that this man isn’t…” I couldn’t even bring myself to say it.
“My real father?” he finished for me.
I swallowed uneasily. “Of course he isn’t. Gram was married to that English aristocrat. We have pictures of them together, and I’m sure I’ve seen that old marriage certificate at some point. And you spent the first few years of your life at their country estate in England. You have memories of it.”
“I do remember it, but…where is that marriage certificate?” He moved to the larger trunk that contained Gram’s wedding dress and Grampa Jack’s medals.
Dad raised the heavy lid and withdrew a large envelope with all sorts of musty-smelling documents from the war years—ration cards and Gram’s identity card and a pamphlet titled “Make Do and Mend.” He carefully unfolded an extremely delicate, yellowed piece of paper and handed it to me.
“See?” I said. “This says Vivian Hughes and Theodore Gibbons were married in England in November of 1939.”
He pointed at the photographs. “Then what was she doing in Berlin the following April with a German Nazi? Just look at those pictures. Whatever was going on between them wasn’t platonic. You can see it as plain as day.”
I moved to the window to study the pictures more carefully in the light.
In one of them, Gram and the German officer were seated together in an art deco–style nightclub with an orchestra playing on the stage in the background.
The German’s arm rested along the back of Gram’s chair, and he lounged comfortably, with one shiny black boot crossed over his thigh.
Gram looked glamorous and radiant in a white gown with sequins, her shoulder-length blonde hair curled in a fashionable wartime style.
The German wore a slate-gray officer’s uniform and appeared to be a highly decorated officer with Nazi medals and various insignia.
I couldn’t deny that he had been a strikingly handsome man with fair hair and pale blue eyes.
My dad also had fair hair and blue eyes.
But so did Gram.
In another photo, they posed next to a shiny black Mercedes convertible with flags on the front grill, which suggested the vehicle was assigned to someone with a very high rank.
They were gazing into each other’s eyes and smiling.
Again, the German was in uniform, his black boots polished and gleaming.
The most disturbing photo of all, however, was one of my grandmother lying on her belly on an unmade bed, a half-empty bottle of whiskey in her hand.
She was gazing into the camera with a playful, seductive glimmer in her eyes and no makeup, her hair in disarray.
She wore nothing but a white chemise with one strap falling off her shoulder.
The morning sun shone brightly through white sheer curtains, creating a square patch of sunlight on the foot of the bed, washing out that section of the photograph.
In the last one, they sat on a horse in a meadow of wildflowers.
There were snow-capped mountains in the background.
The officer wore plain clothes—a plaid shirt and denims. I wondered, with more than a little fascination, who had taken the picture.
What sort of day had it been? Was this before the war?
There was nothing written on the back of that particular picture.
Was there laughter and joy? They certainly appeared to be happy together.
“How can this be?” my father asked, interrupting my thoughts. “What was she doing in Berlin, having a love affair with a German Nazi, when she was supposed to be married to my father in England? And the date…you can’t pretend it’s not suspicious.”
I flipped one of the other pictures over and did the math in my head. April 1940. My father was born in March 1941, eleven months later.
“This doesn’t mean he’s your father,” I said. “We don’t know where she was at the nine-month mark.”
“But it’s clear that she was with this man and in love with him shortly before I was conceived.
I don’t know why or how that was possible when Britain and Germany were at war, but there it is in black and white.
And what makes it hard to stomach is that she’s been hiding this secret all these years, and even Jack couldn’t have known the truth.
Otherwise, those pictures wouldn’t be hidden in a secret compartment in a locked chest in the attic.
” Dad cupped his forehead in a hand. “Oh God, this means I could be the son of a Nazi. Lord knows what crimes he committed. What if he was in charge of an extermination camp and ordered the deaths of thousands of Jews? I might have his blood running through my veins. And how could Gram have loved such a man?” He gestured toward the pictures.
“It’s clear that she did love him. You can see it in her eyes. It makes me feel sick.”
I moved closer and laid my hand on my father’s shoulder. “We don’t know anything for sure, and even if he was your father, you have nothing to do with any of this. You’re a good man, and you weren’t part of whatever happened back then.”
“But if we’re related,” he argued, “and my own mother…how could she have kept this from me? Was she ashamed? Because she must have known what he did, what he represented, what side he was on. If not at the time, then at the end of the war when it all came out. And she was married to another man. That alone is enough to change everything I ever believed about her. You know what I’m talking about, Gill, after what Malcolm just did to you.
How is it possible I never knew any of this?
How could she have hidden this from all of us?
Grampa Jack especially?” His face was flushing with color. I wished he would calm down.
“Maybe it’s not what it looks like,” I suggested. “I take it you haven’t asked her about it?”
“No. I just can’t believe it, because she was like a saint as a mother, and Jack was a hero in the war, risking his life to fight Hitler. I can’t imagine what he would have done if he’d found these pictures.”
I worked hard to speak in a relaxed tone. “We still don’t know what this is. Maybe there’s some other explanation, like…maybe she was a spy, and her husband sent her to Berlin to seduce this man. I mean…who has a chest like this with a secret compartment? It’s very James Bond.”
“Now you’re making fun.”
“No, I’m not, because that kind of stuff really happened, you know. There were lots of female spies during the war.”
He looked up. “I know there were, but not my mother. She would have told me about that.”
I took a step back, not wanting to remind him that he’d just finished saying that maybe it wasn’t possible to know everything about a person—even someone you loved. Maybe good people are just better at keeping secrets.
Dad checked his watch. “We should get going. I have to pick her up at the nursing home.”
“I’ll come with you,” I replied, “and then we can ask her about this.”
Dad shook his head, as if he dreaded the idea of bringing it up. “I don’t know how we’re going to do that.”
“We’ll just show her the pictures,” I replied, “and see what she has to say about them.”