A Grand Passion

by Anne De Lisle

  I’m more grateful to Ian than I can express, and grateful to Baddow House, for being part of my life and making this possible.

  The Maryborough Awards Night arrives. Baddow House wins four awards. Benji for intrepid painting, Brian White for his artful joinery, Pud for his amazing plastering, and Ian and I receive a special ‘Award of Excellence’ in appreciation for all the work done to save Baddow House.

  Ian wants to say a few words, but there are rules to keep the microphone away from the general public, even award recipients, otherwise the night drags on too long, putting the good burghers of Maryborough to sleep over their pudding. Every time Ian gets near the stage and within grabbing distance of the mike, he’s thwarted.

  The night is almost over, and Ian’s on the verge of rugby tackling unsuspecting MC Syd Collins when Mayoress Barbara Hovard steps in and lets him have a turn.

  He duly thanks everyone involved in our project, the town, the mayor, the tradesmen, expressing how fortunate we are to have found so much talent and experience in Maryborough. He goes on to say how lucky we were to find the house, to be the ones to have the opportunity of restoring it, and how amazing it is to be able to call Baddow House home. ‘I had the pride,’ he says, ‘Anne had the passion.’

  The night is over.

  Georgie and Tom have an engagement party. With Dinie’s thirtieth also on the agenda, Georgie and Tom’s wedding in May, as well as our own wedding to plan, it seems to be the time for parties.

  I arrive at Georgie and Tom’s engagement party stripped of confidence. I haven’t seen Ian’s children for a few months, not since I started wearing their father’s ring, and haven’t spoken to any of them since the day Georgie called. I have no idea how they will react to me.

  Georgie is glowing and beautiful in a little black dress and high, high heels. Her face is radiant with her Tom at her side and I just want to pick her up and hug her tight. I wish the timing was otherwise, that differences had been resolved before the magic of this night for her.

  Sipping my drink, making small talk, gravitating to the few familiar faces in the crowd, I think about what she said to me over the phone and worry that I should have talked more with Ian’s children, been more open. When I’m miserable I tend to clam up into silent reserve. Some might see this as haughty, aloof and unbending. And so it is an immense relief when, first Annabel congratulates me, then David comes up halfway through the party, apologises for not having acknowledged our engagement earlier, and tells me how pleased he is for us. He tells me how much his father means to him – that to see his father happy is more important than anything in the world. He tells me that he is right behind us.

  It’s a start, a brilliant one. I’m walking on air, and so is Ian when I share this with him. Which I do immediately. It’s a weight gone from our shoulders as we step forward, move on, skip through the other celebrations until it’s time for our own.

  We are to marry in St Paul’s Anglican Church, site of Maria Aldridge’s belltower. Long ago we decided that we didn’t want a circus. We want it short, quiet and sweet. ‘Just us,’ we say to Father Ian Trainor, resident vicar of St Paul’s.

  ‘You will have to have two witnesses,’ he tells us.

  ‘Okay,’ we say. ‘Just us, plus two.’

  Ian, as a widower, is seen as a sinless victim of circumstance, welcome in any church. As a divorcée, I get a bit of a grilling. Father Ian is very kind and tactful, but he does have a duty to carry out. I’m to be made to understand about commitment and the sanctity of marriage. Permission has to be gained from the Bishop to allow me to be married on consecrated ground.

  Permission is given with all the grace and speed we could have hoped for. We fix our date – exactly five and a half years after our first nerve-racking date.

  A week before the wedding, I read an article in the paper about the new Omen movie, a remake of Gregory Peck’s 1976 classic. This is a story about the coming of the Antichrist, born into this world as a human child. In the first movie, Gregory Peck and wife unwittingly raise this child, believing him to be their son, until all hell breaks loose, evil things happen thick and fast, and Peck has to kill the child to thwart Satan’s Plan. This devil child has a birthmark on his head in the form of 666. Triple six, we learn, is the number of ‘the Beast’.

  My newspaper reports that many women around the world with babies due this year on the Sixth of June are begging their doctors to induce them early. For this year, it will be more than just the sixth day of the sixth month. This year, the date will the sixth of the sixth of the sixth. 666. This all rings a bell in my head. Suddenly I realise this is our wedding day. I rush to tell Ian.

  The funny side strikes us pretty much straightaway. Let them induce their babies early. Let them stockpile food and crucifixes, hang garlic and wave incense. Let them build their survival domes in the United States. We have a wedding to attend.

  Ian’s sister Ann and her husband Ted drive all the way from Miles to be our two witnesses. They arrive mid-afternoon and laugh to discover that Ian and I have already hacked into the wedding cake Kerry Lyons, a friend from Montville, made for us.

  Throughout the day the contents of the Maryborough florist shop transfer themselves bunch by bunch into our house, including a bouquet from Ian’s children. The deliveryman starts to get a bit sick of Topsy and Lottie who rush out at him every time he arrives, then try to savage the tyres of his van when he drives away. But we don’t try to stop them. Topsy, it seems, is learning important lessons.

  We are touched that so many people are thinking of us and wishing us well. All the children ring, mine and Ian’s, as well as friends from both ends of the planet. The phone starts ringing at dawn and doesn’t stop all day, so what else is there to do, really, but eat cake?

  We hack into it again with Ann and Ted, and drink tea before showering and changing.

  I wear a black skirt and short purple suede jacket. Ian is far more flamboyant in his father’s kilt and sporran. It’s a bit moth-eaten, but luckily the moth holes aren’t in any dangerous places. He buttons up the silver studs on his waistcoat and tucks his skean dhu into one ancient tartan sock. At the last minute I panic that I’m unbride-like, so grab a pink lisianthus from one of the bouquets filling the house.

  Ted is smart in his St Andrew’s tie and Ian and Ann’s father’s tartan waistcoat – also moth-eaten. Ann is very glamorous in all black except for her mother’s red velvet-trimmed jacket and the heirloom necklace she wore to her own wedding.

  It’s almost dusk when Ted drives us to church. He won’t let Ian sit in the back with me. ‘Not until you’re married,’ he says.

  Ian and I are pathetically nervous. We can’t blame stage fright, as we have an audience of just two. We decide the momentousness of the occasion has finally caught up with us.

  Father Ian greets us and introduces us to his wife, Maureen, who is going to take some photos, then we all troop to the small Warriors’ Chapel at the side of the church. My Ian is pretty excited to be getting married in the Warriors’ Chapel. There’s an extra swish to his kilt as he approaches the altar and the skean dhu glints in the candlelight.

  Ann and Ted flank us as we say our lines. Sweaty hands clasped, my ring goes on, and all of a sudden we are man and wife. Maureen’s camera clicks away and, arm in arm, we walk down the aisle.

  As we exit the church, there’s a wonderful pealing of bells from Maria’s tower. Mayoress, Barbara Hovard, in an incredibly kind and thoughtful gesture, has arranged for the bell ringers to come on our night. We stand outside the tower, awash with emotion and the poignancy of the moment as Maria’s music peals across town.

  Barbara appears out of the twilight. She has tears in her eyes and, as she walks away, calls out, ‘Maryborough is so glad you came here!’

  ‘And we’re so glad we came to Maryborough!’ shouts Ian.

  EPILOGUE

  OUR RENOVATIONS MIGHT be complete but, all of a sudden, life is getting busy again. We are inundated with people w
anting to know our story. The Maryborough Herald covers us with photos on a six page spread. The Fraser Coast Chronicle is next, then Wide Bay’s Revive magazine, which focuses on my writing of Baddow’s story. A Queensland Heritage publication features us, and so does Country Style with a feature written by a talented young journalist, Kate Johns.

  I seem to spend a lot of time primping the house for photographers, which is easier said than done. We are far too big for the sort of quick cosmetic job I used to do on my previous house when visitors were due. The best I can manage here is to arrange a few flowers and disguise the worst of the mess in a very sweep-it-all-under-the-carpet sort of a way. Beyond that, visitors have to take us as they find us.

  A few days after the wedding, my three children come up for the weekend and we create a wedding feast to consume in our festive-coloured dining room. Some very special champagne slides down our throats, a gift from Ian’s nephew, and we eat our favourites: roast pork in honour of Ian, cherry tart in honour of me. The children are full of questions: Are you going to be Anne Russell now?

  ‘Well yes,’ I say, ‘I suppose I am.’ I never did return to my maiden name after my divorce, and it would seem inappropriate to use the name of my first husband when I’m married to my second. It feels a bit strange to carry a different name to my children, but something I know I’ll get used to.

  Two weeks later, Ian and I are working in the back garden when we hear a car tooting, then another. Lottie and Topsy rush like snarling cannonballs to the front of the house. We follow, expecting to find raffle ticket sellers or Jehovah’s Witnesses, but it is Ian’s children, along with Georgie’s husband, Tom, and David’s girlfriend, Courtenay.

  ‘We’ve come to take you out to lunch,’ they say.

  It’s a total, wonderful surprise, planned by Georgie, and I can read the emotion and relief on Ian’s face. We go to Muddy Waters, where our waitress, noting the air of excitement and happiness at our table, asks what we’re celebrating.

  ‘Oh, various things,’ I say, and we all clink our glasses.

  A few weeks later we are nominated for the Queensland National Trust Awards, and travel to Brisbane for the night.

  The Queensland Governor, Quentin Bryce, is there to present the awards, and looks fiercely skinny, yet elegant in her suit and immaculate make-up. There are drinks and nibbles and quite a crowd. I’m surprised to find myself a bit nervous as we take our seats to watch the presentations.

  Our names are called. We’ve won an award and suddenly we’re on our feet heading for the stage. The Governor shakes our hands, presents our certificate and Ian reaches for the microphone. He speaks briefly, then wraps up by saying ‘Carrying out such a big renovation job can be a stressful exercise, put pressure on relationships, cause arguments.’ He pauses for effect, playing the crowd. ‘Not so with us. We went into this as financial partners and came out as man and wife.’

  The crowd love it.

  ‘We were rather more than “financial partners”,’ I hiss as we take our seats.

  Ian shrugs. ‘Who cares? It was a good line.’

  And it was.

  Never would we have imagined generating so much attention when we first sighted the grim-looking house with Trevor three years ago. It’s wonderful to be patted on the head and told well done, but the biggest prize for us is our sense of achievement, our memories of the work and the delight we now share in our home and each other.

  But though we are pleased with ourselves and our efforts, we never forget it was Edgar and Maria Aldridge’s dream that started it all.

  When we get home from the National Trust Awards, we go to the upstairs verandah. It’s a beautiful winter night, the air is soft and calm with a gentle breeze to keep the mozzies away. The moon is full, a perfect white orb reflecting on the river, flooding our domain with its translucent light. We can see the garden clearly, the dog house, the flower borders, the bougainvillea cascading thornily over the upstairs balustrading. I can even make out my second-year seedling pansies and snapdragons in Charlie’s circular bed.

  Across the river there’s a sparse ribbon of lights: houses on the other side where once there would have been total darkness. I can only imagine what it must have been like all those years ago, the great distance that separated this spot from the known world: an isolation that must have been as exhilarating as it was daunting.

  I wonder if Edgar was able to find any pleasure in standing here, once his Maria was taken from him. I hope so, even if his own time left was short. I know that others must have done so: Harry and his Lappie, their children, Esse, May, Daniel and Harry Junior. Hugh and Alice Biddles before illness and injury struck them down.

  Only now can I come to grips with the love these people must have had for Baddow House. Like a relationship between a man and woman, my early passion has settled into a warm, enduring feeling that seems unshakable, as theirs must have been. I suspect Esse felt this more keenly than most, but these days it’s her many happy years that sit with me, not her tragic moment of eviction. I’ve lost all my fear. As we love the house, I know the house loves us. I believe it’s breathing easy now, saved from extinction. I believe Baddow House will continue to return the favour and look after us as it has indeed been my muse and, together with Ian, my inspiration and my cure. And I’m grateful. Deeply, abidingly grateful.

  I find myself wishing Baddow could really be the Ghost House of its reputation. The thought of seeing the bearded Edgar stroll into the office or passing the beautiful Esse on the stairs warms me. I want to believe they are with us because, suddenly, I am very sure I want to share all this with them.

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  I AM INDEBTED to so many people for the making of this book. Starting at the very beginning: Edgar Aldridge, thank you for having the courage to leave your safe home in Essex, England and take a chance on a new life in Australia. Thank you also for being astute and determined enough to prosper, to fulfil your dreams and build Baddow House.

  Thank you Maryborough, and to all those who helped you blossom through your first century, thank you for luring Ian and me here with your astonishing bounty of old and beautiful buildings.

  Thanks also to Trevor Spohr, for knowing that Ian and I would find Baddow House irresistible despite its frightening state of dilapidation. Without you, none of this would have happened.

  To all our helpers: Ron Monteverde for the underpinning; architects Marian Graham and John Nash; David McLeod for engineering; Calvin Hannam for electrics; Tony ‘Benji’ Benecke for intrepid painting; Peter Polley for floor sanding; Graham Morrison for the gates; Mike Johns and John Sama for making the restoration of the verandahs happen against such immense odds; Peter Olds for his reproduction of the balustrading; Brian White for his timber joinery; Neville ‘Pud’ Cockburn for his skilful and ingenious plastering; Brad Weiss for the kitchen; Paul Fairlie for tiling; Wayne Linthwaite for the roof; Charlie Hurcombe for creative paving; Russell Donovan; Greg Dennis for his loyalty and being our jack-of-all-trades; and, of course, Cyril Streat for solving a thousand impossible problems; thank you does not seem sufficient praise.

  To my test audience, those who read the manuscript and told me not to change a word, thank you so much. You gave me confidence, courage and peace of mind.

  Thanks also to my agent, Lyn Tranter, for your belief and support, and for quashing the but who would want to read about me? doubts.

  To everyone at Random House, a big thank you, especially to Katie Stackhouse who worked tirelessly to make this book happen, even when she was supposed to be enjoying an overseas family holiday.

  And lastly but most importantly, Ian, who lived every moment of these pages with me, and who shared the excitement of our story coming to life, thank you for supporting me through thick and thin, in good times and in bad, thank you for being exactly who you are.

  LOCHINVAR

  O, young Lochinvar is come out of the west,

  Through all the wide Border his steed was the best,

  A
nd save his good broad-sword he weapons had none;

  He rode all unarmed, and he rode all alone.

  So faithful in love, and so dauntless in war,

  There never was knight like the young Lochinvar.

  He stayed not for brake, and he stopped not for stone,

  He swam the Eske river where ford there was none;

  But, ere he alighted at Netherby gate;

  The bride had consented, the gallant came late:

  For a laggard in love, and a dastard in war,

  Was to wed the fair Ellen of brave Lochinvar.

  So boldly he entered the Netherby hall,

  Among bride’s-men and kinsmen, and brothers and all.

  Then spoke the bride’s father, his hand on his sword,

  (For the poor craven bridegroom said never a word,)

  ‘O come ye in peace here, or come ye in war,

  Or to dance at our bridal, young Lord Lochinvar?’

  ‘I long wooed your daughter, my suit you denied; –

  Love swells like the Solway, but ebbs like its tide –

  And now I am come, with this lost love of mine

  To lead but one measure, drink one cup of wine.

  There are maidens in Scotland more lovely by far,

  That would gladly be bride to the young Lochinvar.

  The bride kissed the goblet: the knight took it up,

  He quaffed off the wine, and he threw down the cup,

  She looked down to blush, and she looked up to sigh.

  With a smile on her lips and a tear in her eye.