Who was Miss Elizabeth?

Why did she feel compelled to cut the letter into tiny squares, put them back inside the envelope and then hide them away inside the wall cavity for 53 years?

I held the pieces of the mystery in my hand, the letter now patched together by sellotape, and the smudged envelope with a simple address; Miss Elizabeth, c/o Ivy Hotel, York. The date on the letter was December 5th 1941. It had been hidden from the world for 63 years.

I discovered the letter while renovating the cellar in the house, it had been stuffed into a hole behind some bricks. At first I thought it was just some old bill or shopping list that had been discarded along with another families’ debris. Opening the envelope the pieces of the letter fluttered out like lazy butterflies. The first piece I picked up had intriguing words, half smudged but urgent. Words like abandon and consequence. Words that needed to be pieced back together.

The letter was on the table and I could now read a father’s plea.

Dear Lizzy

I hope you know what you are doing now be careful
The hard things that you and I have known must not make you decide otherwise
Lizzy your mother misses you and the bairn
Look after her and do not get into bother I know what you like when you go dancing Lizzy
You must not abandon your family so quickly Lizzy
The consequence of fooling about will get you more of the same
Write soon and be good
Look after the bairn Lizzy
Do not give Mrs Morgan reason to send you away Lizzy you are not on holiday this is the way things have to be
God bless you both
Your Father Edward

It was all one sentence. No punctuation, just thought upon thought. You could sense the tears that fell when the ink was drying and the tears that fell when the paper was torn.

I had no idea how the letter came to be in my house.

The life of Miss Elizabeth may have ended many years ago but the love of her father had not died. Somewhere they may now be looking on and reading back the letter to each other and adding the postscript they both deserved.