“You can’t tell me that she didn’t love her father’s wealth. She made the most of it. She wore exclusive clothes – ”
“Today she’s dressed in jeans and a shirt,” he said, taking Gabriella by the shoulders and turning her towards Fiona. “Have you ever seen her looking happier?”
“No,” she conceded.
CHAPTER 11
Stefan was unable to obliterate the scene in Fiona’s unit from his memory. When her twin had arrived Fiona had been transfixed. He had no idea how long he had stood staring at them. His presence had been irrelevant. The stillness of the twins had not been broken by the few words that passed between them.
Eventually Fiona’s twin had said, “Come back to Queensland.”
“Yes,” had been Fiona’s reply. Then she had smiled.
Her radiance had sent quivers down his spine. Feeling like an interloper, Stefan had left. As he drove back to his flat he wondered if they had been aware of his departure, but suspected that they had immediately forgotten him.
Now he felt trapped. If he told Catriona he had been to see Fiona, she would think he had betrayed her. But if he didn’t tell her, Fiona might. Even if she had gone straight to Queensland she could write a letter.
‘If I tell her father, would he believe my motive?’ He mulled over the best way to mention it. ‘When you told me that May was Fiona, I was worried about it so I went to see her.’ He shook his head. ‘That’s no bloody good. But it’s why I went to see her. No, that was the excuse.’
He tried to concentrate on his students’ essays written on the theme of What If. So far most of them had been imaginative. A couple were so preposterous they made him laugh. He picked up the next essay, entitled World War Zero. Notwithstanding the compelling writing about Gavrillo Princep being killed in a brawl before he could shoot Archduke Franz Ferdinand, Stefan’s mind drifted to Fiona. Hoping a walk would help him find a solution, he left his flat and went across the road to the AlbertParkLake. The late afternoon was cool, but the slanting sun was bright. A few people were walking their dogs and a child floated a toy yacht on the water. By the time he had strolled around the lake he realized he had more problems. Everything was nearly ready for his wedding to Catriona in September and to call it off would be devastating. He castigated himself for his preoccupation with someone he scarcely knew. Before he had met Catriona he had been infuriated by virgins who thought their modesty was incomparable, and her earthiness was refreshing. She was honest about her sexuality and had not pretended to be a virgin. Stefan disliked promiscuity, but felt that sex completed a serious relationship. He remembered the first time they had made love. It was six months after they had started going out together. Overcome with passion they had stopped their horses in the forest. The current joke had been that, when a man went to bed for the first time with an English girl, the first thing she would say afterwards was, ‘Like a cup of tea?’ A Russian girl would say, ‘You have conquered my body, but not my soul,’ while the Australian girl, years behind in the sexual revolution, would burst into tears and say, ‘Now you’ll think I’m awful!’
Catriona had laughed and said, “Don’t fret. I still respect you.”
He had looked forward to the exhilaration of being married to an intelligent woman with ambitions. Ultimately, Catriona and Kim wanted to start their own veterinary surgery. His new teaching position at the local high school would commence at the beginning of the school year in February. Holidays and weekends would be spent horse riding. Catriona was tidy and efficient and never kept him waiting. Combined with her common sense was a romantic streak. When she cooked for him she put flowers on the table and lit candles in the winter. Before he had met Fiona the prospect of marrying Catriona had been so appealing. Now he wanted to postpone it.
‘Why?’ he thought. ‘Tree’s the sort of woman I admire. She’s got a tremendous personality and we have fun together. We want children, but that’s not the reason for the marriage. We spend hours just talking. Fiona’s got nothing compared to Tree. She’s abrasive, insulting and misunderstood. Oh hell, hell. I bet she hasn’t thought of me once.’
***
When Alex and Virginia arrived back from New Zealand they saw, on the hall table, the pile of mail that had been collected by their neighbour. Virginia took the smaller cases into their bedroom. Alex flicked through the mail to see if there was anything important. He saw the letter from Fiona and wondered why it was addressed only to Virginia. Then he saw the Queensland postmark. With a feeling of trepidation he ripped it open.
Eumeralla
24th April 1972
Virginia,
I’ll never call you Mum again. You never loved me. You wanted a baby for yourself and you didn’t care that you ravaged my soul with your lies. Why did you tell me that I would have grown up in a slum if it hadn’t been for you? Eumeralla’s not a slum and you knew it. Eleanor’s not an alcoholic, and you knew that too. How could you say something so appalling about a friend who gave you her baby because you couldn’t have one of your own?
I never want to see you or speak to you again, but I will on family occasions, for Dad’s sake. In spite of what you’ve done, I don’t want Margot to crow over you. For the first time in my life I’m happy. I’ve found what I’ve been looking for.
Fiona.
He saw Virginia coming out of their bedroom. “What’s –?”
“Fiona’s on Eumeralla,” he said, giving her the letter. He put his arm around her while she read it. He could feel her trembling.
“She blames me,” Virginia whimpered. “I knew she would. You’ve escaped. You’re still her saintly father.”
“Darling, we’ll sort this out.”
“How?”
He saw there was another letter from Fiona. It was addressed to him.
Dear Dad,
Some of this must be your fault, but unlike Virginia you loved me and compensated for some of the unhappiness I suffered. Did you know she told me my real mother was an alcoholic? I have to go back to Melbourne at some stage to sort out my unit and job. I haven’t decided what to do yet. Can I see you in Melbourne? I’ll ring you when I arrive. Don’t try and make the peace between Virginia and me. If she comes with you I’ll refuse to see either of you.
Fiona.
He handed her the letter. “I’ll go and see her. Today – if I can get a flight to Brisbane.”
“I’ll come too.”
“No, Virginia. Stay here. Leave her alone for a while.”
“I’m coming with you!”
“You’ll make things worse. For God’s sake, for once in your life, listen to me. If you’d listened to me years ago we wouldn’t be going through all this now.”
She dropped the letter. “And we would have lost her then.”
“Not if you’d done it the way I wanted. What could an eight year old do – walk all the way to Queensland?”
“Knowing Fiona she probably would have tried.”
“Virginia, I’m going to Eumeralla and you’re staying here, and that’s an end to it.” He looked through the rest of the mail. At the bottom was the letter from Greg and Eleanor. “We just missed it,” he said when he read it.
“If we’d known we could have ...” She went into the bedroom and sat on the bed. “I’ve lost her,” she moaned. “She hates me.”
Alex sat beside her and took her hand. “You know how melodramatic she is. She feels betrayed, but she’ll get over it.”
She shook her head. “I doubt it. And she’s right. I did tell lies. Terrible and damaging lies.”
“You were frightened. I’ll tell her why. She won’t relent immediately, but she will in the end.” He squeezed her hand. “Trust me, Darling.”
The phone rang. It was Ruth. “Alex, thank God you’re back. Fiona’s gone to Queensland, she’s – ”
“I know,” he said. “She wrote to us from Eumeralla. I’m going to see if I can get a flight to Brisbane today.”
“Wait till tomorrow and I’ll come with you.
I’m on night duty tonight, but I’ve got the next four days off. I’ll try and get an early flight to Sydney tomorrow. I’ll ring you back to let you know what time, and you can book a flight to Brisbane for both of us.”
Gabriella met Alex and Ruth at Brisbane airport.
“This is very good of you, Gabby,” said Alex. “This is my sister Ruth.”
“Hello, Miss Lancaster.”
“Hello, Gabriella, and please call me Ruth.”
They walked out to the car park. “Do you want to go straight to Eumeralla, Uncle Alex?”
“I reckon that’d be best.”
“Keith rang them this morning and spoke to Eleanor.” She prayed he wouldn’t ask how Fiona had found out about June. She dreaded telling him the part she and Keith had played. “How’s Aunty Virginia?”
“Distraught,” he said. “Gabby, how much do you know about all this? Have you seen Fiona since she went to Eumeralla?”
She wanted to avoid the first question. “Yes, we saw her last week. She told us that June had arrived at her unit.”
“How did June find out?”
“Keith and I saw her and thought she was Fiona,” she said, hoping Alex would assume they’d seen June in CecilPlains.
“Where did you see her?”
Gabriella felt uncomfortable. “Eumeralla.”
“Why did you go there?”
Hearing the accusation in his tone, she blushed. “When we were sorting out Mum’s belongings we found out that Uncle Johnny had been married to Eleanor, so we went to see her. Sorry, Uncle Alex.”
“Sometimes it’s better to leave things alone, Gabby,” he said.
To Gabriella’s surprise Ruth said, “And sometimes it’s not.”
The exterior of the house on Eumeralla and the lush garden was much as Alex remembered, so he was unprepared for the shabbiness inside. He and Virginia had their own house painted and redecorated regularly and he was shocked by the way the Mitchells had neglected to re-upholster the lounge suite, paint the flaking walls and replace the worn linoleum. Eleanor’s lined face and greying hair were an even greater shock. She looked twenty years older than Virginia.
After the reunions and introductions, Greg put some apples in a paper bag, gave them to Fiona and said, “Take your father for a walk to the paddocks. We’ll have lunch when you come back.”
As Alex and Fiona walked through the garden, he noted the stubborn set of her lips. When they had arrived at Eumeralla she had been waiting on the verandah with June. Until she had run down the steps to greet him, he hadn’t been able to tell which twin was which. Her eyes had lost the haunted look that had been her hallmark. Now she looked tranquil.
‘We destroyed her spirit,’ he thought. ‘And I’m more guilty than anyone. If I’d agreed to go to an adoption agency Virginia would have been happy and some unwanted baby could have had a good life with us. Instead we put a little girl through hell. And just two weeks here has wiped away her unhappiness.’
Fiona opened the gate and Alex deliberated how to begin. Although he and Ruth had discussed the best way to approach Fiona, he felt muddled. The change in her made him hopeful that she would be more understanding.
“It’s good to see you, Dad.”
“Your mother wanted to come too.”
“I’m glad she didn’t.” She shut the gate and they walked towards the paddock.
“She’s wretched about all this. She didn’t mean – ”
“It’s no good, Dad. I can’t forgive her and I can’t call her Mum ever again,” she said, throwing an apple up in the air and catching it.
“But you forgive me?”
“You didn’t tell me my real mother was an alcoholic.”
“I didn’t tell you she wasn’t either.”
“Why did she lie?”
“She was frightened of losing you.”
“Then why didn’t she tell me my real mother was dead? That wouldn’t have been as bad as me thinking she was an alcoholic.”
“You would still have been angry when you found out the truth.”
“Not as angry as I am now.”
They reached the paddock and Fiona leant on the fence and called the horses. “Here they come.” She gave Alex an apple.
He broke it in half. “Now who are you?” he asked the horse taking the apple.
“Monty. He’s the greediest one. Come on, Flicker, there’s plenty for you too.”
“Fiona, your mother loves you.”
“She can’t have. She would have known that telling me my real mother was a drunk would have had a bad effect on me. She should have – ”
“Should have – would have – could have. Fiona, the world’s full of people who should have, would have, could have but didn’t. I should have told you the truth – I could have, but I didn’t. Virginia tried to make you happy. Remember Marmalade getting cat flu when you were seven?”
Fiona nodded.
“Who stayed up all night spooning medicine into him, forcing water down his throat so he wouldn’t get dehydrated? Who cleaned up his vomit and diarrhoea? Who saved his life?”
“She did,” Fiona admitted.
“Yes. Because she couldn’t bear your unhappiness if he’d died.” He looked into her eyes, hoping to see a sign that she was softening. Encouraged by the uncertainty he saw, he continued. “I hope you never have to suffer the agony of wanting a baby and not being able to have one. It was even worse in those days. Married women didn’t usually work and your mother had time to brood. Her friends and neighbours were having babies and she was surrounded by serene mothers. Virginia wanted to adopt, but I didn’t want a baby whose background I didn’t know. She wanted to get a job and I wouldn’t let her.”
“Why not?”
He stroked Monty’s muzzle. “After work I wanted to come home to a tidy, clean house and a nice dinner. I didn’t want an exhausted wife too tired to talk to me – ”
Fiona nudged him. “Too tired to do the housework, you mean.”
“Yes. Call me a chauvinist, but that’s how it was in those days. In my opinion it was better – look at all the divorces there are now.”
“Women can look after themselves financially now. They don’t have to put up with men bossing them around. But stop making excuses for her, Dad. I can’t forgive her.”
“Do you expect people to forgive you?”
“Tree and Kim never forgave me when they thought I’d stolen their boyfriends.”
‘There’s no answer to that,’ Alex thought.
“Dad, I’m so happy here. Virginia would scoff at the house – ”
“No she wouldn’t.”
“She would, because it’s not filled with antiques and silver and crystal.”
He put his hand on her arm. “Virginia and Eleanor were friends,” he said firmly. “Their parents were friends and they grew up together. She’s never scoffed at Eumeralla.”
“But all my life she’s drummed into me the code for gracious living and I was so shallow I went along with it. But all the beautiful clothes and furniture and stuff I bought for my unit didn’t bring me happiness. Oh, I enjoyed buying them and showing them off. When I had dinner parties for the people from work or the tennis club, they’d admire everything and envy me, but now I see that it meant nothing. A fork is just a fork and the food tastes the same whether it’s eaten with silver or stainless steel.
“Juju’s the only person who’s ever been in my unit and not commented on how beautiful it was. To her it was a unit in a cold and crowded city. She was impatient to get back here. It doesn’t matter what the inside of the house is like if when you wake in the morning you look out of the window and see trees and birds and horses. One morning I heard a kookaburra. I jumped out of bed and ran to the window, and it was sitting in the gum tree. It filled me with such joy. All these years I’ve valued material things. Is Tree’s wedding still on?”
The abrupt change of subject disconcerted him. “Yes. Why?”
“Stefan came to see me. He
’s just like the others.”
Alex frowned. “He seemed a decent sort. Poor Tree.”
“He was in my unit when Juju turned up.”
“So he knows,” said Alex thoughtfully. “I don’t think he’s told Tree.”
Fiona grunted. “I hope he never does. They’ll accuse me of causing another broken engagement. It’s not my fault Tree and Kim are attracted to philanderers. Dad, I didn’t know that Eleanor and Aunty Ruth knew each other.”
“No, I don’t suppose you did. We’ve had to keep lots of things secret.”
“They don’t like each other, do they?”
“Yes they do. They were good friends. Ruth was looking forward to seeing Eleanor again.”
“Eleanor seems hostile towards Ruth. They must have had a row or something. Eleanor’s my real mother and Aunty Ruth’s my favourite aunt, and I don’t want them to be enemies.”
“Darling, they’re hardly enemies.”
“They might not have been once, but they are now,” she said.
When Keith arrived home from work that afternoon, Gabriella was sitting on the verandah waiting for him.
“Keith, I’m going to Sydney tomorrow to see Aunty Virginia.”
“Good idea.” He opened the front door and they went into the kitchen. “What’s Ruth like?” he asked, filling the kettle.
“You’ll find out soon, she’s coming here for dinner tonight. She wants to give Alex and Fiona plenty of time together and she doesn’t want to impose.” She put a shopping bag on the table. “I’ve bought lamb chops and I thought I’d make a trifle for dessert.”
“When’s she coming?”
“I said I’d go and pick her up later. She can stay the night with me and we’ll go to the airport together. She’s nice.”
Eumeralla - Secrets, Tragedy and Love Page 16