by Louise Allan
I was still running, still crying, but they were drawing further and further away. They reached the main road. I kept running, trying to reach them, but my legs were slowing, and my cries were growing fainter. At the break in the traffic, they turned the corner and were gone.
They were gone.
I bent over, hands on my thighs, panting and heaving, shaking my head and crying. ‘No. No. Not our baby. Not our baby.’ I stood hunched in the middle of the road. My chest hurt and I couldn’t breathe. I wanted to fall down where I was and lie there and wait for a car or a truck or anything to drive right over the top of me and squash me flat.
Then Len was by my side, taking me in his arms and pulling me to him. I lowered my head to his.
‘I would have looked after her,’ I said. ‘I would have. I would have.’
‘I know you would have, Ide. I know.’ His voice was dry and raspy and he rubbed my back and kept rubbing it. He was there. I needed him and he was there.
We trudged back down the street. The grey clouds and the heavy air pressed down upon me, and my heart was so low in my chest, I could feel it in my belly. My head was aching and my eyes felt gritty. My arms hung by my sides and my feet were leaden as I walked along the footpath and climbed the steps into our house.
Nora was sitting in the chair beside Grace’s bed. She and Grace looked up as I entered. Grace’s eyes were ringed by smoky crescents, but they shone glistening green.
‘I’m sorry,’ she said. Then she turned to her mother. ‘I’ll make it up to you. To you both. I promise.’
Nora sat forward on the chair, her eyes steely. ‘Grace, look at me,’ she said. Grace turned. ‘You have nothing to make up for,’ she continued. ‘Just go and live your life. Do what you want to do. Then none of this, giving up the baby or…anything, none of it will have been in vain.’
That first night, I crept in to check on Grace a few times. The light from the hall gave her face a sheen. Her breaths were even and slow and her hair splayed across the pillow. She was still the same—still the baby I’d watched sleeping in the bassinette. She would always be the same to me. Because I loved her.
Grace stayed with us for a couple of days while she recovered, then she went home to Ben Craeg.
Each night when I lay in bed, I remembered how it had felt to hold the baby, to bathe her, to dress her. I would never forget her.
Chapter 33
Many times over the next few years, I thought of Grace’s baby. I wondered where she was, who might be caring for her and what she might be doing. Sometimes, I’d walk slowly past a schoolyard, searching for her. Or I’d scrutinise the kids on the bus, or a group of girls walking down the street. I kept looking out for her, hoping to see her, but I don’t know if I ever did. I never found out to whom she’d been given. I just hoped they loved her as much as we would have and that she had a good life.
Not long after that night, Ben said, ‘Let’s go fishing.’ Clara and Ted came, too. The night before, Ben and Len spent the evening making new flies and the next morning, we were up before the sun. They checked their tackle, and we packed the fishing rods and a hamper of sandwiches and scones and a thermos of tea. Then we set off for St Patrick’s River.
Len and Ben strapped on waders and made their way out into the middle of the river where the water eddied about Len’s middle, but only came up to Ben’s thighs. They held their rods in one hand and the web-like line in the other. They flicked the rods to and fro so the thread caught the light and landed in a wiggly line on the water.
The rest of us sat on the riverbank and watched as the two men waded up and down, their rods springing back and forth. Now and then, a fish broke the surface of the water gulping at one of the flies. Then Ben’s rod bent and he’d caught one. He pulled on his line and the fish flipped and writhed and splashed towards him.
‘That’s it, mate,’ called Len.
The fish twisted and jerked and glinted in the sun as Ben kept pulling it closer. He caught it in the net and lifted it out of the water, still flipping and splashing and trying to escape. It was shiny and silver. A trout.
I picked up the camera and took a shot of him in his waders with the water eddying around his legs. His rod was in the air, his mouth open, and he was laughing at the fish splashing in the net in front of him.
I sat back down and watched them fish and then I heard the thrum of a car. It was Nora and Grace in the Ford. They joined me on the rug and Nora had brought blackberry tart.
I took many pictures that day—of Len and Ben fishing; of Ted and Clara sitting together on the blanket, Ted’s hand brushing back one of her stray curls; and of Nora, looking all shy and waving me away.
As the sun began its descent, I photographed Grace. She’s facing the water, her hands hugging her knees. The light is falling on her face, just on her and nothing else. I called her, and as she turned I took another photo of her, sitting on the blanket with the river swirling about the rocks behind her. She’s not smiling but her hair’s still moving because she’s turning. She looks as natural as the breeze, but I can see the sadness in her eyes.
My favourite photo is one of all of them. Len’s in the middle, on tiptoes to make himself look taller. His arms are around Grace and Ben, and he’s grinning like a king. Ben’s holding up his trout, and Grace is standing tall and looking into the distance. Nora’s beside Grace, squinting and not smiling, her mouth pursed because she’s telling me to hurry up. Crouching in the front are Ted and Clara, their knees touching.
A few years later, I was in the waiting room at the doctor’s surgery when a young female doctor came out to call her next patient. I glanced up as a young woman stood to go with her and then looked back at the magazine on my lap. I felt the room still, so I raised my eyes again. The doctor was coming towards me.
‘Ida?’ she said.
I nodded and smiled. ‘Yes. I’m here to see Dr Williams.’
She tilted her head and smiled. ‘You don’t remember me?’
I racked my brain trying to place the fair face, the beautiful accent, the groomed appearance, but I couldn’t and shook my head.
‘I’m Mary. Mary Godfrey-Smith.’
My mouth fell open and I was speechless for a moment. ‘I can’t believe it. I can’t believe it,’ I kept saying. ‘After all these years. Fancy running into you.’
She’d returned to Tasmania with her husband and children because her parents were ageing and she wanted to be with them.
‘They’re enjoying having family around them again,’ she said, ‘especially their grandchildren.’
She leant down and took my hand. ‘You must visit.’
‘I will,’ I said.
‘It would mean the world to me,’ she said.
Ben, Ted and Clara still came for dinner every Monday night, even after Ted and Clara started their own family. They had a girl and then a boy. Len brought the bassinette out of the shed and I cleaned it up once more. It brought back memories, happy ones, of the babies that had slept in it over the years.
Once again our house was filled with the sounds of children. Nora started visiting more often, and each time she brought an exquisite gift—a smocked dress from England for Sophia or a soft toy for Alberto. She seemed to be enjoying this next generation in a way she couldn’t enjoy her own children, much like Mum had before her.
Nora stayed out at Ben Craeg, even after Gracie left. We spoke on the telephone every week, sometimes more. I asked her a few times if she wanted to move in with us, but each time she declined, which was probably good because I don’t know how Len would have coped. She liked being on her own, she said, and besides, they needed her at the church.
Ben finished his apprenticeship and bought a house in Richards Street, around the corner from us. When Stan retired, Ben took over his plumbing business and every day when he was between jobs, he popped in for a quick cup of tea.
We lost Len in 1984. He was all right when I climbed into bed that night, but when I woke a couple of hours later, h
e was making gurgling noises. I tried to rouse him, but his colour changed and his breathing slowed.
‘Len…Len…’ I shook him and kept shaking him, but I could see in his eyes that he knew he was going, so I told him what a good man he was and how much I loved him, and I kept on telling him as his breathing slowed.
‘You’re a good man, Len Bushell. You’re the best man a woman could have hoped for. I’ve not regretted a single minute of my time with you.’ I said it over and over because I wanted it to be the last thing he heard.
Then I waited for him to take another breath, but he didn’t.
We had forty-five good years together and I couldn’t have asked for better.
Epilogue
The doors are the same—glass and wood and polished chrome. Ben pushes one open and I step inside. The foyer is full of people. I turn to Ted and Clara behind us. ‘There’s a big crowd here. This is lovely.’
‘Yes, Aunty. It’s lovely.’ They smile at me and then at each other.
People are wearing fawn jackets and calf-length dresses, and some of the men don’t even have ties. ‘Once upon a time, people dressed up for a concert,’ I say, ‘in long gowns and furs, and men wore dinner suits. It was quite a palaver.’
We make our way through the crowd, across a carpeted floor. ‘The parquetry’s gone,’ I said. ‘It’s all changed since I was a girl.’
We reach the stairs and Ben grasps my elbow. He takes the steps one at a time with me.
‘You go on ahead,’ I insist.
‘I’m not in a hurry,’ he says.
As I step, I’m whisked back in time, back to when I was a young woman and came here with the Godfrey-Smiths. We saw—what was her name again? ‘I’ve forgotten the name of that singer,’ I say. ‘What was her name?’
Ben shrugs and shakes his head.
‘Dorothea Schwarzkopf. That was her name. She had a beautiful voice.’
He smiles.
It was a long time ago, but it’s still so vivid in my mind, as clear as one of Len’s photos. Her silver dress, her curls, her voice. The first time I’d ever heard magnificence.
We reach the halfway landing. There’s the circular hollow in the wall, and is that a vase of gladioli and hydrangeas? I blink and they’re gone. There’s no recess and no vase. It must have been a memory flitting by.
Ben holds open the heavy door to the theatre and I step inside. It’s the same—red seats, all in rows—but it smells different, of old wood and dust. ‘It used to smell of fresh paint and new carpet.’
We walk down the steps of the aisle and then along the front row to our seats. A couple stand to let us pass, and I smile and say, ‘Thank you.’
She’s already seated in the centre of the row and I sit down next to her and we kiss. Then I crane my neck and gawk around. My word, there are a lot of people. Every seat is filled. I lean over the balcony to look down into the stalls. Ben catches my arm and pulls me back.
‘It’s full,’ I say. ‘There isn’t an empty seat.’
He smiles at me again.
‘She must be very famous.’
Everyone’s chatting around us and they seem as excited as I am. I look up. The dome’s still there and the pressed tin’s still painted blue. There’s no gold on the leaves, though.
The orchestra’s already in the pit. They’re tuning up. ‘It’s a bit rich on my ears,’ I say, and Ben pats my arm.
The lights dim and the theatre quietens. The concertmaster plays a note—a single note, long and thin, and the musicians all tune to the sound. The conductor strides on, in tails—it’s nice to know some things don’t change. We clap, all of us, even the musicians.
Here she is. She’s walking onto the stage. My heart somersaults inside my chest. She’s wearing a deep green off-the-shoulder dress and her skin is the colour of milk. Her earrings dangle like chandeliers and the bracelet around her wrist shines, too. Oh my, she’s beautiful. Her hair is pulled back so it’s off her face. It’s loose at the back and spirals out like an auburn fan. She’s smiling and her face is open. That unblemished face.
She bows and the audience claps.
My Gracie.
She’s here. She’s been gone so long. Twenty, twenty-five years. I’ve forgotten. She was nineteen when she went to Melbourne and did her training. And then she went to London and lived there for a good many years. She was living in Germany for a while after that, then Italy. She’s even lived in America. All over the world.
When she left, she never said she was going for good, but I knew she was. I knew when we waved her off at the airport that the world was beckoning and she was leaving us. And so she should. Our children aren’t really ours. We like to think they are, but they’re not.
She comes home about once a year, whenever she has a gap in her schedule. She slips in and out on the quiet. And she writes. Every couple of weeks an aerogramme arrives from wherever she’s performing—London, Paris, Milan, Vienna, New York. An almost transparent sheet of paper crammed with tiny writing telling me all her news. And there’s always something about her in the papers. I’ve kept them all—all the articles, including that one in the Women’s Weekly. I keep them in the box on top of the wardrobe.
I have all her records, too. Ben bought me a record player—he loves his noisy gadgets—and I was hooked as soon as I listened. I even learnt how to work it so I could play her records over and over. A few years ago, he bought one of those compact disc players, but that was too much for me to learn and I leave that one for him to operate when he visits.
She’s started. She’s singing.
Ave Maria.
Oh, that voice! Soft and high and ever so gentle.
Ave. Ave. Ave Maria.
Ben takes my hand. It’s calloused from his work, but there’s a comfort in its roughness.
Sancta Maria. Sancta Maria.
Her voice rises. It’s full and resonant and fills this old theatre. I close my eyes so all I can hear is her.
Sancta Maria.
I can hear more than the melody and the music. There’s pain in her words, and pain in her voice. Her pain and my pain. Our pain. I can hear it. She’s singing for all of us.
Ave. Ave. Ave.
Her voice is higher now. This is the voice I’ve heard all of my life. It sang all through our house, throughout my childhood, and then it was lost, for many years. But here it is again. It’s come back.
It’s been a long time coming and there are things that could have been that will never be. Sacrifices made that can never be regained. I hear them, in the silences between her words.
But what’s here now is here. This sound. Her.
Finally, it’s all been worth it.
She finishes singing and the audience claps. Clara and Ted and Ben stand. They’re smiling and applauding. Everyone is standing and smiling and applauding.
I stay seated. Nora, beside me, takes my hand. Our gnarled old fingers wrap around each other’s. She smiles. She’s hearing her daughter sing, hearing her beauty, and her tears tell me she’s hearing her dream.
Nora and I stay seated, our hands still joined. I want to stand and clap, too, but I can’t move. All I can do is sit. For I can hear them all. They’re all back with me. Dad. Grandma and Mum. Alf. And Len. I’m not in the theatre anymore, but back in an old house filled with people and children and the tinkling notes of an old piano. I’m back by a kindly mountain, sitting on my father’s knee. I’m back and I can hear them again, all of their sounds, coming from the floor, the walls, the ceiling, and it’s not just Nora and me in this old theatre, but everyone is back with us and all is how it’s meant to be.
The audience have sat down again and she’s preparing to sing once more.
Bist du bei mir. If you are with me.
Geh ich mit Freuden. Then I will go gladly.
Zum Sterben und zu meiner Ruh. Unto death and to my rest.
Ach, wie vergnügt, wär so mein Ende. Ah, what pleasant end for me.
Es drückten deine shönen
Hände. If your dear hands will be the last I see.
Mir die getrauen Augen zu. Closing shut my faithful eyes to rest.
Notes
I have squandered many hours researching for this book. The delicious archives of ‘Trove’ educated me about many things, including: train journeys in northern Tasmania in the early part of the twentieth century, the design of the Queen Victoria Maternity Hospital in Launceston, Dame Nellie Melba’s concert tours and the winners of the vocal sections of the Launceston Eisteddfods in the 1930s.
In Chapter 8, I quoted from an article published in the Hobart Mercury on Thursday, 21 April, 1938. In the article, the adjudicator, Mr L. Curnow, criticised the Government for the paltry sum it had donated towards the running of the Eisteddfods. He is quoted as saying, ‘Governments also should realise that art is essential, as it lifts persons from the humdrum groove of existence.’ I was so impressed with this quote and that it still holds true eighty years hence, that I have quoted his words almost verbatim.
Apart from ‘Trove’, I also used a number of books as reference guides:
The quaint Handbook of Garden and Greenhouse Culture by J. Walch and Sons (Printed by John Davies, Hobart, 1870) gave me a gorgeous insight into old-fashioned gardening techniques.
The unique and personal anecdotes and stories in Tasmania’s North East—A comprehensive history of north eastern Tasmania and its people by Hon A.W. Loone (First published by The Examiner and Weekly Courier Offices, 1928; Republished 1981) gave me an insight into Tasmania’s regional history.