Page 30 of The Secret Bookshop in Ireland

‘No,’ Ciara agreed. ‘But maybe it was about that sister? She went to England during the war. God knows what happened to her.’

‘But who was the father of her baby?’ Maureen asked.

‘That’s not mentioned,’ Ciara replied. ‘Another thing we have to try to find out.’ She pushed away the box. ‘I’ve had enough of this. Let’s go for a drive down to Enniskerry. We can leave Brian in the back garden. He’ll be happy there, lying in the grass in the sunshine. Won’t you, Brian?’ she asked the dog, who wagged his tail in agreement.

‘He always wags his tail when you talk to him,’ Maureen said.

‘He understands more than you think,’ Ciara argued. She got up from the chair. ‘He’ll mind the house while we’re out. Come on, Ma, let’s get out of here.’

‘Just a minute,’ Maureen said and picked up the photo that Ciara had left on the table. ‘There’s something about that girl that looks familiar.’

‘Like what?’ Ciara asked.

‘I don’t know,’ Maureen mumbled, her eyes on the photo. ‘Something about that face makes me think that perhaps…’ She shook her head. ‘It’s such a long shot.’

‘Come on, tell me,’ Ciara urged, startled by Maureen’s words.

‘I recognise that face,’ Maureen said, looking suddenly pale. ‘I think I know the connection now.’

Ciara stared at her mother. ‘What do you mean?’

Maureen held out the photo to Ciara. ‘Look at the face of the older girl. Does it remind you of anyone? That square jaw and the dimple in the middle of the chin…’

Ciara studied the face of the girl called Madge. ‘Well, Dad had a dimple just like that.’

‘And so do you,’ Maureen said.

‘So do a lot of people,’ Ciara argued.

‘Of course, but…’ Maureen paused. ‘You didn’t know your father when he was a young man. His face was softer then. So when I saw her face, it clicked with me.’ Maureen put her hand on Ciara’s arm. ‘Don’t get upset when I say this, but I wonder if maybe Madge was actually your grandmother.’

Ciara gasped. ‘What do you mean? Was Dad adopted?’

Maureen nodded. ‘He was.’

‘Why didn’t he tell me?’ Ciara frowned, feeling let down by this news. Her father had been adopted, which would have been an important part of his story, which he chose to keep secret from his own daughter. ‘Why?’ she asked again.

‘He didn’t want anyone to know,’ Maureen explained. ‘He found out when he was in his twenties. His adoptive mother revealed it when he was applying for a passport and looked up his birth certificate. It was a huge shock to him. I have a feeling he was somehow ashamed of that. He guessed he was the result of some kind of illicit love affair and that was something he couldn’t get over. Don’t forget that it was the early sixties and such things were considered shameful in those days.’

‘Oh,’ Ciara said, still reeling. ‘Hard to understand now, but I suppose it would have been different when he was young.’

‘Yes,’ Maureen agreed. ‘Things were very different then. In any case, he told me later that he had always wondered why he had dark hair and blue eyes when both his parents were fair with hazel eyes. They were wonderful parents, he told me, and he understood why they hadn’t told him he was adopted.’

Ciara kept looking at the young girl in the photo. ‘So then it must be true,’ she said slowly. ‘Madge was my biological grandmother who gave her baby up for adoption.’

‘I think you’re right.’ Maureen looked back at Ciara. ‘You look a little like that young woman in the photo.’

‘Do I?’ Ciara looked at the photo again and saw that her mother might be right. The black hair and those light eyes, the colour of which was not discernible in a black-and-white photo, except that they were light. ‘But how did Martha know where to find me?’

‘I don’t know,’ Maureen said. ‘Could be that those nuns who helped Madge when she gave birth knew who the Doyles were and then Martha might have asked about the people who adopted her little nephew.’

‘But wouldn’t it have been against the law to reveal their names?’ Ciara protested.

‘Of course, but I’m sure the nuns didn’t worry about that. Martha had been the one to get her sister to that little convent, where she might have been in hiding until the baby – Frank – was born. She was lucky to have landed in a place where there was compassion and kindness instead of judgement and talk of sin. There were places that…’ Maureen stopped.

‘I know what you’re trying to say. I’ve heard about the Magdalene laundries,’ Ciara said with a shudder. ‘Martha saved her sister and that little baby from all that misery.’ Ciara covered her face with her hands. ‘Oh, how sad she must have been. And how upset Dad must have been to find out he was adopted.’

‘It was a shock,’ Maureen agreed. ‘He didn’t tell me for a long time. But then, when you were born, he told me. He was so happy we had our own child at last. We’d been trying and hoping and praying for so long.’