Don’t Tell Mummy: A True Story of the Ultimate Betrayal. Toni Maguire

water buckets, collecting kindling for the stove and searching for eggs. Unwilling to use the coops provided, the free-range chickens hid their nests in far corners, some in our yard, others tucked away under bushes in the adjoining fields. The deep litter barn housed the majority of them, and every day baskets would be filled ready for the grocer’s twice-weekly visits, when he bought our eggs and provided us with groceries.

      Each morning I was sent to the local farmer to collect milk that came in metal cans; those were the days before people worried about pasteurization. Each day the farmer’s wife would invite me into her warm kitchen and give me milky tea and warm soda bread before I headed home.

      During the days I was too busy to worry about the changing atmosphere in our home. The apprehension I’d felt a year ago had become a reality. My mother’s happiness was controlled by her husband’s moods. Without public transport, with no control over money and not even a public phone within walking distance, the happy woman who once sat laughing in Kent teashops seemed a distant memory. Only Judy and a very tattered Jumbo remained as reminders of those days.

      Once dusk fell I would sit reading my books in the orange light of the Tilly lamps, while my mother waited for my father to come home. I would sit quietly, hoping that quietness made me invisible.

      Some evenings before I went to bed his car could be heard as it drove into our gravel yard. Then she would leap up, placing the kettle on the stove, putting his previously prepared dinner on a plate and a smile of welcome on her face. Butterflies would knot my stomach as I wondered which father would appear at the door. Would it be the cheerful jovial one flourishing a box of chocolates for my mother and chucking me under the chin? Or the scowling man I’d first seen in the lane and who had appeared more and more frequently after that?

      The former could change into the latter at any imaginary slight. My mere presence, I knew, annoyed him. I could feel his gaze on me as I kept my eyes glued to my book, feeling the silent tension build up.

      ‘Can you not help your mother more?’ was a question he would put to me repeatedly.

      ‘What are you reading now?’ was another.

      My mother, still in love with the handsome man who had met us at the docks, was oblivious to my plight. If I put any questions to her in the daytime, as to why my father was often so angry with me, she just told me to try and please him more.

      On the nights when the car had not returned before I went to bed my mother’s brightness would fade and I would be awoken in the middle of the night by raised voices. The arguing would continue until his drunken shouts finally subdued her. The mornings following these nights would be strained as my mother silently went about the house and I made any excuse to leave it. Those nights were frequently followed by the return of the jovial father the next day, bringing sweets home for me and asking how his ‘wee girl’ was. He would hand flowers or chocolates to my mother, kissing her on the cheek, bringing her momentary happiness.

      I came to dread weekends. Every Friday my mother would wait for her husband, who seldom appeared, and I would be awakened by their rows, indistinguishable words of anger invading my room, fear binding me to my bed as I burrowed under the blankets, trying to escape the ugly sounds.

      Every Saturday morning, lying in bed with a self-inflicted headache, he would command my mother to send me into his room with cups of tea. Tight lipped, she would obey, restricting me to staying near the house. Visits to the farmhouse to collect the milk were now monitored; no more cups of milky tea and warm buttered bread with the friendly farmer’s wife.

      I seemed to be a magnet for his anger. After one of my visits to the farm I returned with a bantam hen.

      ‘You can take that back, my girl,’ were his first words on seeing her.

      For once my mother took my side.

      ‘Oh, let her keep her, Paddy,’ she cajoled, using her pet name for him. ‘She can go outside with the other hens, and Antoinette can have her eggs.’

      He snorted but said no more and ‘June’ the little bantam became my pet. She seemed to know she was special for nearly every morning she came inside to lay my breakfast egg.

      Easter gave my father time off from work, and my mother, I know, was hoping for a day out in the car. We sat on Easter Friday waiting for him, me with nervous flutters in my stomach and my mother with a look of hope on her face. When she heard the scrunch of gravel her face lit up. The jovial father entered, and kissed her on the cheek. A box containing an Easter egg was given to me, a box of assorted chocolates for her.

      ‘I’ve made a special meal,’ she told him. ‘I’ll just lock up the chickens and then I’ll serve it up.’

      Humming happily under her breath she left the room, leaving us together.

      Knowing his mood swings I glanced warily in his direction, but for once he was smiling.

      ‘Come here Antoinette,’ he commanded, patting the cushion beside him.

      His arm encircled my waist, drawing me onto the settee. Then I felt his arm around my shoulder as he pulled me closer. Craving his affection I snuggled up to him. Could it be, I wondered hopefully, that he has stopped being angry with me?

      Sensations of being protected and safe swept over me as I cuddled closer, feeling so happy that his affection towards me had at last reappeared. He stroked my hair.

      ‘You’re my pretty little girl, Antoinette,’ he murmured as his other hand started caressing my back. Like a small animal I snuggled even closer. ‘Do you love your daddy?’

      All memories of his temper left me as, for the first time in months, I felt loved by him. I nodded happily. The hand on my back slid lower, then moved gently to the top of my legs. It ran down to the hem of my skirt and I felt the same calloused palm that only a year ago had spanked me viciously, sliding over my knee. My body stiffened. One hand tightened on top of my head so I couldn’t move, while the other slid across my face and gripped my chin. His mouth came down on mine. His tongue forced its way through my lips. I felt slobber run down my chin and the smell of stale whiskey and cigarette breath filled my nostrils. My feelings of safety left me for ever, replaced by revulsion and fear. He released me abruptly, held me by the shoulders and glared into my face.

      ‘Don’t tell Mummy,’ he said, giving me a slight shake. ‘This is our secret, Antoinette, do you hear me?’

      ‘Yes, Daddy,’ I whispered. ‘I won’t tell.’

      But I did. I felt secure in my mother’s love. I loved her and she, I knew, loved me. She would tell him to stop.

      She didn’t.

       Chapter Five

      My eyes blinked as I forced my brain back into the present and into the hospice. I unscrewed the flask once more, poured myself the last of the vodka and lit another cigarette.

      ‘Now do you remember?’ Antoinette whispered. ‘Do you really believe your mother loved you?’

      ‘She did,’ I protested weakly.

      ‘But she loved him more,’ came the reply.

      Trying to dam the floodgates as the memories struggled to get through, I took a deep swallow of vodka and inhaled my nicotine sedative.

      Through the haze Antoinette held up an unwanted picture; the focus was too sharp for me to be able to force it away with pure willpower.

      As though it were yesterday, I saw the room inside the thatched house with two people in it. A woman was sitting on a chintz-covered settee with a small child standing, facing her. With clenched fists and imploring eyes the child drew on all her reserves for the confrontation and searched for the words to describe an adult act.

      It was the week after that kiss. Antoinette had waited until her father had returned to work and she and her mother were alone. I saw her still trusting in that mother’s love but fumbling for the right words to