Thank you, everyone, for your support for my writing! My blog this week includes an excerpt from A Thousand Kisses. Hélène had recently been married, was expecting her and Walter’s first child in a few months, and had successfully escaped from Russia just weeks before the 1917 October Revolution – it must have been one of the happiest times in her life. She had finally achieved everything she had hoped for: a father for her daughter, Lili, a new life in England, and a baby on the way.
From Petrograd, she travelled to Norway, where she rested for a month, then sailed across the North Sea to Aberdeen, Scotland, and by train to her final destination of Hull, England. She had written to her husband’s parents, and although she hadn’t received a response, she was expecting they would be as excited to meet her as she was to meet them.
Here is the excerpt:
‘Hélène was a little surprised that no one was there to meet the train when she arrived the next afternoon in Hull; she had written several times to Walter’s parents with the exact arrival date and time, and she knew Walter had as well. She pulled the address from her purse with a sinking feeling, even though she had memorized it already. Thinking they might have been held up for some reason, she waited for an hour, anxiously searching the faces of the people in the station, looking for anyone who resembled her beloved Walter. She finally gave up and hired a cab, found the address, and knocked on the front door.
After a long, stressful wait (she had already begun to plan her next move in case no one was at home), an elderly man slowly opened the door.
“Hello, it's Hélène,” she said, holding out her hand, “your new daughter-in-law, Hélène Scoffield.” Then, since she was receiving neither recognition nor welcome, “Walter’s wife.” Still nothing. “Are you Thomas Scoffield?”
He looked as if he would rather have denied his identify and shut the door on her, when a female voice from within yelled out “Who is it, Duck? Is it Helen?” The voice let that hang for a few seconds while Hélène stared at the man who must be her father-in-law. He continued to stand in the doorway. “I suppose you’d better let her in. Don’t let the neighbours see her just standing there outside,” the woman’s voice said with a heavy sigh that was audible even from this distance.
‘Mon Dieu, what a fine welcome this is!’ Hélène was on the verge of not just thinking it, but saying it. She could feel her anger rising. ‘Who do they think they are? I'm their son’s wife!’
She was finally granted reluctant entry into the house, only as far as two steps inside the front door, mind you. Her and her father-in-law both stood waiting in the hallway, looking upstairs, where the voice was coming from, waiting for further instructions.
The woman spoke again from the second floor, “Hello Helen. We've heard all about you. French, are you? And pregnant?” The accusations were hurled down the stairs like the opening volley in a battle.
‘Well, Madame Scoffield certainly gets right to the point,’ Hélène thought, but was determined not to let this unfriendly pair get the better of her. She was also Madame Scoffield, she thought indignantly, and should be shown some respect.
“Oui, bonjour, madame,” she said with a French imperiousness that would have impressed the Russian court. “Je viens d'arriver, et je suis enceinte avec votre petit-enfant.” As she said petit-enfant, grandchild, Hélène softened and relented, not wanting the relationship with her new mother-in-law to go further astray.
“Please, madame,” she started again in English, “I've come to Hull to see you while my husband, your son, is away. Please, I would like to meet you properly, stay with you until Walter returns and he and I can set up our own house together in Hull. And yes, your son and I are going to present you with a grandchild.” Hélène was aware her English wasn’t perfect, but she hoped that Madame Scoffield would get the gist of it and hear her conciliatory tone.
To this, there was no reply from madame, but monsieur condescended to lead her down a dingy hallway to the kitchen at the back of the house where there was tea on the hob. She took note of the meager furnishings, paint peeling from the walls, and in the kitchen, the well-used table and chair set. She sat in the single soft chair.
They drank their tea in silence, without Mr Scoffield offering any words of welcome or explanation for Mrs Scoffield's lack of appearance. After tea (with no biscuits or toast), the full weight of her predicament hit Hélène hard. She asked her father-in-law if there was a room where she could rest. He was not a verbose man, she thought wryly, and hadn't said more than five words to her since she had arrived; now he simply pointed to the stairs. She barely had the strength to wearily put one foot in front of the other and climb up to the spare bedroom. She supposed the other door further down the hall led to the bedroom where her mother-in-law must be, but decided not to pursue that any further for the moment. Her trunk was following in the morning, so she just removed her dress and sank wearily into the bed, not even bothering to check if the sheets were clean. As she floated off to sleep, her last thought was that this room must have been where Walter and his five siblings slept when he was growing up, and felt cheered by this.’
The photo shows the interior of the Hull train station, where Hélène arrived over 100 years ago.