The Girl In the Painting

by Téa Cooper

‘I think you’ve made a conquest. I don’t suppose she told you her name?’

  He lowered the fragile bag of bones to the floor. ‘Not a word.’

  ‘I’m not sure she’s all there.’ Miss Finbright tapped the side of her head. ‘Sometimes the shock of being left is more than they can stand. She’s old enough to speak. Must be nearing five.’ She reached out and lifted the girl’s hand over her head and tugged her fingers down towards her ear.

  The little mite let out a wail.

  ‘You’re hurting her.’

  ‘No, no I’m not. It’s the only way to tell in cases like this. Lizzie, can you touch your ear?’

  Lizzie lifted her hand over the top of her head, her fingers grazing her ear.

  ‘See. We know Lizzie’s turned five and there’s no mistaking it. It works a treat. Length of the arm in relation to the size of the head. That and their teeth.’

  Michael groaned. She might have been talking of a horse.

  ‘Come on, Lizzie. Let’s go’ She held out her hand and Lizzie happily took hold of it and threw him a wave. Girlie just stood there gazing up at him.

  ‘Off you go. I’ll see you next time.’ The words were out of his mouth before he’d thought too much about it. Chances were slim. Next time, he and Lizzie’d be heading down to the docks.

  Michael tossed the telegram aside. So much for memories. He’d been over it a thousand times, seeking a minute scrap he may have missed over the years. Time to attack the problem head on. Procrastination was not a virtue, no matter how one camouflaged it.

  There was only one person who could help and she might well be dead.

  He picked up the Waterman fountain pen Elizabeth had given him for Christmas, sent all the way from New York, and pulled a piece of paper from the drawer of his desk. His hand hovered over the page as he admired the embossed address at the top of the paper and the sophisticated styling—more of Elizabeth’s handiwork. She had become so much a part of his existence he couldn’t bear to imagine life without her.

  With a sigh, he unscrewed the cap.

  Dear Miss Finbright

  Please do not think me forward in writing but I would like to lay at your feet a conundrum that has plagued me for many years.

  Michael twisted the pen in his fingers. He was evading the issue. If he sent a letter framed thus it would prolong the entire matter.

  A blot of ink fell from his nib, spread before it soaked into the cartridge paper, a replica of the stain on his heart.

  I hope you will not consider this letter a liberty, particularly as it is many years since we last met and I doubt you will remember me.

  He’d been a scrap of a lad; might have thought he was a man at fifteen but his decisions had been those of a child. Holy Mother of God, what if the woman was dead? He had no idea how old she might be.

  More procrastination. He couldn’t be having it. He must put the guilt behind him. He could change nothing.

  And this is where I must humbly request your tolerance and assistance.

  Why? He still couldn’t face what he had done nor could he control the shaking of his hand. If only he could talk to her face to face.

  I am planning a trip to England …

  Was he? Why yes, of course he was. It would be the perfect way to introduce Elizabeth to the truth. A trip to Liverpool. London, even. He rocked back in the chair and thought a little longer.

  And it came to him. Bath. They would take a trip to Bath. Elizabeth was forever speaking of the place. Over the years she had developed a passion for the novels of Jane Austen and spoke constantly of the city. They would travel to London as well, attend the opera, visit the British Museum, stay at the Ritz; it had only recently been refurbished in keeping with the Ritz in Paris. Yes! Paris. They would travel there too. It would do them both good. A change of scene. Jane was more than capable of running the business, and the auctioneering skills of the manager, John, far surpassed his own these days. Ever since he’d contracted the ridiculous ailment the previous winter he’d felt under the weather, lacking energy and suffering pains.

  … and would very much like the opportunity to meet with you. I have often wondered about the little girl Lizzie befriended.

  Yours most sincerely,

  Michael Ó’Cuinn.

  Michael poured himself another generous slug of whiskey. He would send the letter care of the workhouse and ask them to forward it, then he’d make enquiries about travel and book tickets. When that was done, he would tell Elizabeth of his plans.

  Jane wheeled her bicycle around the back of the auction house and leant it against the shed. The cancellation of the meeting with the Benevolent Society was the only good thing to have come out of Elizabeth’s turn. Jane hadn’t argued when Elizabeth mentioned the society’s lack of funds for their moonlight concert, but she knew it wasn’t correct, and Elizabeth never made mistakes.

  She let herself in through the back door of the auction house and skipped upstairs to the room she’d taken over as her office some months earlier.

  In the early days, when Elizabeth and Michael first arrived in Maitland, they’d lived above the auction house and the homely simplicity of the rooms pleased her. Plain painted walls and scrubbed wooden furniture. The table had become her desk; it gave her space to order her thoughts, spread herself out, unlike the little desk in her bedroom. No matter who tried to encourage her to be neat she couldn’t comply. She needed space to think.

  Ever since Michael had become involved in the Labor party, he’d spent more and more time in Sydney or in his study at home, and rarely used his former bedroom overlooking the street. Elizabeth’s old room they used as a storeroom, and, much like its onetime occupant, it remained ordered and perfectly neat, the boxes of records and accounts stacked against the back wall.

  Jane liked the privacy and the peace. Settling into the wooden chair, she opened the drawer in the middle of the table and took out Elizabeth’s abacus.

  Learning to use the abacus was one of the first things Elizabeth had insisted upon when Jane moved into the house on Church Street. During the Christmas holidays, with the weather unbearably hot, the back verandah provided the coolest place in the house and she’d been sitting pondering the percentage chance of her being accepted by the toffee-nosed girls at St Joseph’s when school reconvened. Elizabeth, in that way she had, must have noticed something about her behaviour because she’d drawn up a chair and produced this frame supporting a series of beads. She sat with it on her lap, her hands smoothing the worn timber, and explained how it worked. At first Jane had taken it as an insult, thought perhaps Elizabeth didn’t share Michael’s belief in her mathematical ability—the only characteristic she’d been remotely proud of. It had taken only a moment for the simplicity of the abacus to thrill her, and as the summer progressed she’d come to understand its capabilities. Since then she’d used it almost daily. Elizabeth had never actually given it to her, but she seemed happy enough to leave it with her.

  Jane retrieved the manila folder containing the bank statements for the Benevolent Society and untied the pale blue ribbon: blue indicated the completed work, green marked unfinished business. She opened the folder and ran her finger down the entries. She couldn’t make any alterations without Elizabeth’s signature but she could check the original statements. The sooner she put her mind to rest, the sooner she could fit in her trip to the library to research the diprotodon.

  Her fingers flew with satisfying ease, the clink-clank of the beads bumping against each other soothing her disquiet. In a matter of moments she’d located the problem. Somehow Elizabeth had transposed a set of figures. Seven hundred and ten pounds had become one hundred and seventy pounds. Carefully she re-totalled the column in the ledger, neatly inscribing her initials against the corrections. No wonder Elizabeth thought they had insufficient funds. What an embarrassment!

  Once everything was rectified, Jane slammed the ledger shut and tucked it under her arm. Sadly, she’d have to mention it to Elizabeth and have her
initial the corrections before she went to the library. Elizabeth was a stickler for accountability.

  With a glance up at the clock, Jane closed the door behind her and clattered down the stairs. Monday was her day to check the tills and at the same time issue receipts for the cash. While she was here it would be best to get it out of the way.

  Only an hour later, Jane pushed open the kitchen door and bumped into Bessie.

  ‘Mind your feet. I’ve washed the floor.’

  She tiptoed across the linoleum. Such a waste of time washing the floor every day with the number of people who came in and out.

  ‘Where’s the bread?’

  Jane ground to a halt. Damn and blast, she’d forgotten all about it. ‘I’ll go back and get it later. I’ve got to go and see Aunt Elizabeth.’

  ‘I suppose I’ll have to send Lucy.’ Bessie let out a huff of annoyance.

  ‘This is more important. I’m sorry.’

  At this time of day, Elizabeth would be at her desk in the sitting room, overlooking the garden. Jane pushed open the door.

  ‘There’s a problem with the accounts for the Benevolent Society. I need your signature on the corrections I’ve made.’

  She marched across the carpet and came to a halt in the middle of the empty room.

  How strange.

  Leaving the ledger on the desk, she ran up the stairs and knocked on Elizabeth’s bedroom door. Receiving no response, she peered inside. Where was she? Surely she hadn’t had another turn? Jane stepped out onto the verandah and glanced down into the garden, breathing a sigh of relief when she spotted Elizabeth sitting on the bench seat under the apple tree staring at nothing, at least nothing Jane could see. Most peculiar. She wasn’t even reading.

  Two minutes later, with the ledger tucked under her arm, Jane approached Elizabeth. ‘How are you feeling?’

  ‘For goodness sake. Is there nothing anyone can say without requiring a minute description of my demeanour? What have you got there?’ She untwisted a piece of red thread from her finger and gathered it into the palm of her hand.

  ‘The Benevolent Society ledger. I found a mistake.’

  ‘Balderdash!’

  ‘I reworked the statements and found the error.’

  ‘Give it to me.’ Elizabeth pulled the ledger from her hand and settled it on her lap, flicking through the pages. ‘And sit down.’ She ran her finger down the columns and stopped short at Jane’s initials. ‘Why did you make these changes?’

  ‘The numbers were transposed. That’s why you thought they hadn’t sufficient funds to stage their moonlight concert.’

  ‘Numbers don’t lie.’

  Unless they were incorrectly entered. And Elizabeth had entered the numbers. ‘It’s an easy mistake.’

  ‘I don’t make mistakes.’

  ‘Are the payments up to date? Because if they are, it’s not going to cover July. If you moved the excess from June and take the earnings from May it all should balance nicely.’

  ‘Where are the statements?’

  ‘I’ve checked the statements and made the corrections. I need you to sign off on them.’

  The ledger and all the papers fell to the ground as Elizabeth jumped to her feet. ‘Do not contradict me, young lady.’ With her face the colour of Bessie’s famed plum jam, Elizabeth marched back into the house, the screen door banging behind her.

  Jane sat for a moment, clasping her shaking hands. Elizabeth never, never lost her temper. She’d never seen her so adrift.

  Sixteen

  Hill End, 1871

  Time passed in a flurry of people, some arriving, some leaving, some striking it rich and others losing their all. Elizabeth hardly spent any time in the little weatherboard house with the neat white fence and the shingle roof. Once her ankle healed and she returned to school, Jing met her at the gate and, after a lunch of clear soup and tasty little dumplings, they’d get to work on the auction-house accounts, keeping track of Michael’s expenses—making sure he left something for them to live on and didn’t give everything away. Jing would work on the ledgers for some of the other businesses in town. No matter how often she tried to tempt him away from the desk, he remained disciplined as he patiently completed long columns of figures.

  Every Saturday afternoon they’d raise the flag outside the auction house and on the dot of two o’clock, Jing would ring the bell and the warehouse would fill. Plenty of the new arrivals had money and happily spent it on second-hand tools and materials, and every week the rent on the rooms above the warehouse came in. Elizabeth promised Michael right at the outset she wouldn’t venture up the stairs, and she kept her word until one day her curiosity drew her to the door with no handle. She didn’t get far; Jing appeared by her side, stealthy as the resident cat, and led her away from the strangely exotic smell that permeated the entire building.

  Elizabeth pulled the suanpan towards her now and ran her fingers over the smoothly rounded beads. The simplicity of it still thrilled her. She could add and reckon faster than most, but with the aid of the beads it took only a fraction of the time. It was so simple, painfully logical. Beautiful in fact.

  It hadn’t taken her long to master Jing’s beads. Every day he made her practise. He’d throw random numbers and questions at her, and shriek with pleasure when she came up with the answer.

  Questions like: How many minutes between the twenty-first of February and eleventh of November?

  And when she’d ask if it was a leap year or not he’d look askance. Of course, it made a difference, why would anyone forget that?

  But one afternoon everything changed. When Elizabeth sat down, Jing produced a list of questions and challenged her.

  ‘We race.’ He pushed a smoothed paper bag and the stub of a pencil across to her. ‘On your marks, are you ready? Let’s go.’

  She’d flown through the equations without any trouble and sat back in the chair before she’d looked up at him. When she did he was sitting, arms crossed, a neat list of numbers, no workings, and the answers neatly inscribed on his paper bag. He’d even written them twice, once in Chinese and once in Arabic numerals.

  His smug smile said it all.

  No one ever beat Elizabeth at school. She pushed back the chair, wishing she could storm out. No. It would be bad manners. Although she might be good with numbers, her manners left a lot to be desired, or so Michael liked to remind her. He believed Jing’s manners were exceptional.

  ‘Mr Whittaker says there’s no more school for you,’ said Jing.

  ‘What do you mean no more school? I like school.’

  ‘He says you’ve finished, nothing he can teach you. You can learn more here with me.’

  As much as Elizabeth enjoyed Jing’s company, she also liked the routine of school, even if she did spend most of the day helping the younger children. The auction business had grown so much in the last few years. She hardly saw anything of Michael; even though he no longer did the run to Sydney, he was forever in Bathurst, and Kitty had to come and stay on the evenings he was away. If Elizabeth could do more in the auction house then he might have more time to spend at home—truth be told, more time with her.

  ‘Do you want soup?’ Without waiting for a response Jing ladled some soup into two small bowls and slid one across the work bench to her. He pointed with his spoon. ‘Eat.’

  Small pieces of chicken drifted between white cabbage and carrots. The steam and the sweet spice of ginger and sesame filled the air between them, making Elizabeth’s mouth water. Sometimes Jing brought dumplings—lovely dewy dough filled with spicy red pork, or little tiny parcels wrapped in the finest skin. Perhaps they were her favourite; they usually ate those earlier in the day with a cup of jasmine tea.

  ‘What do you think Michael will say?’ she asked, sipping the broth—everything she knew it would be, fragrant and delicious.

  Jing made a sucking noise and lifted his head from the bowl. ‘Mr Michael told me to see Mr Whittaker. Tell him you’re busy working with me.’

 
; A swirl of anger displaced the warmth of the soup in her belly. Why hadn’t Michael spoken to her? ‘He didn’t ask me.’

  ‘Mr Michael, he’s the boss.’ Jing’s chopsticks clattered against the bowl, neatly capturing a floating piece of chicken.

  Nevertheless, he might at least have mentioned it. He could hardly claim she was a child now, especially if he thought she should leave school. ‘When will Michael be back from Bathurst?’

  ‘Not until tomorrow afternoon. Kitty will stay with you tonight.’

  There it was again—this constant need for someone to watch over her, all arranged without her knowledge.

  Elizabeth picked up her bowl and drank the last bit of broth. ‘Thank you, that was delicious.’

  She slipped off the stool and wandered to the door. Bright shafts of sunlight slatted down across the new timber floor and the sound of raucous jeering drifted down the dusty street.

  A boot came flying through the door and landed at her feet with a thud. She bent and picked it up in time to see a young boy skidding up the road, waving his hands and screaming at the two much larger laughing boys who were taunting him.

  ‘I’ve got it here.’ Elizabeth held the worn boot up by its laces and waved it in the air.

  The boy’s head dropped and he shuffled to a halt, standing like a forlorn rag in the middle of the road.

  ‘Come on, quickly, there’s a dray behind you.’

  Without bothering to look he limped across to the warehouse.

  ‘Here it is.’ She knelt and loosened the laces so he could slip his foot inside. ‘Lift your foot up.’

  She tipped his chin, saw the tears trickling down his face. ‘What’s your name?’

  He sniffed. ‘Song.’

  There were few Chinese children in Hill End. Mostly men came in search of gold, leaving their families behind. They were a familiar sight, working together on alluvial diggings, creating water races, panning to extract the ore; diligent, hardworking and tireless, willing to work the tailings left by other miners. They kept to themselves and lived in the Chinese camp, a crowded mass of tents below Red Hill.