No More Secrets No More Lies

by Amos, Gina

  As we sat at a table by the window of the fancy tea shop in George Street, nestled between two high rise office buildings and the wide open space of Martin Place, I stared out onto the street and watched the passersby. I took another sip of the sweet, milky tea, and began my story.

  *****

  I was born Rose Patricia Evans but changed my family name to Phillips shortly after I met Isabelle Dwyer. I chose the name for no reason other than that I liked the sound of it and I wanted to cut all ties from my previous life. Meeting Isabelle Dwyer was either one of the best or the worst days of my life. There was no doubt in my mind that from the day I first met her, my life changed forever. On reflection, I thought it was for the better, but at times, I imagined that perhaps my life could have taken a more honest course if we had not met.

  *****

  Edward Baker had a concerned look on his face when he walked through the front door of the narrow shop front on Burke Street on a hot and humid, summer’s morning. It was eight am and the dressmaking repairs and alterations business owned by the Rainaldi sisters had just opened its doors for business. Carla and Rosa were out the back making coffee and the deep, rich aroma of Italian ground coffee beans wafted through to the front of the shop where I stood at the counter, preparing for the day’s business ahead. His eyes were wide and and he was handsome; in his early forties, he was tall and slim and I was immediately struck by the quality of his suit.

  The pair of pinstriped trousers which he pulled out from a paper bag he had tucked under his arm, had a small tear below the knee. He asked if I could mend the trousers as a matter of urgency as he needed them for a special occasion that afternoon. His demeanour relaxed when I said I would attend to it immediately. He turned and smiled at me as he left the shop, and smiled at me again when he returned later that afternoon.

  Edward began dropping by the shop on a regular basis after that day to have other clothing mended or altered. I had my suspicions that he bought suits or shirts a size too large just so he could get me to alter them for him. After a few months, with a friendship firmly formed, he had summoned enough courage to ask me out to the Saturday matinee at the local picture theatre. Edward lived with his mother and his maiden aunt and was respectful of women.

  I had a great deal of esteem and affection for Edward Baker and enjoyed his attentions and his company, but it was never a great love affair. His mother nagged him constantly to find a wife, to settle down and provide her with grandchildren. She didn’t consider me suitable, so he succumbed to her demands and moved on with his life and I moved on with mine. A month later, I discovered I was pregnant with his child.

  Mother and father tossed me out of home when they noticed my thickening waist. They guessed my secret long before I had thought of a way of telling them and in the years that followed when I looked back to that time, I consoled myself with the thought that their decision to evict me in such a cruel, heartless manner was done on impulse. We were a Catholic family living in a predominately Catholic neighbourhood and I don’t know how my parents explained my sudden departure and what they said to the neighbours when I never returned.

  I went to live in Dora Valentine’s boarding house, in a working class suburb in the inner city. The rent was within my means as I was always careful with my money right from the start and had a good head for figures. I still had my job with the Italian sisters and the shop was an easy walk from the boarding house, so I settled comfortably into my new life with Dora Valentine.

  The boarding house was in a narrow, treeless street. All the houses in the neighbourhood were similar and the shop fronts, like the houses, were narrow, crammed and butted hard up against one another. The front windows were flanked by tall and narrow shutters which were painted a pleasant shade of pea green. The terrace didn't have a verandah and the front door opened directly onto the street. The wash house and the fuel stoves were out the back.

  Dora didn't have children, there had been no time in her life for that, or at least, that is what she told me, so it wasn’t long before I became Dora’s family, and she mine.

  Dora Valentine was a practical, hard working woman who was blessed with a heart of gold. She wore her thick dark hair, peppered with grey streaks, in a tight bun at the back of her neck and being a solid woman, her strong arms and straight back, gave the impression that she was someone who was not to be fooled with. Her eyes were bright and blue.

  Dora pooled her life savings, converted the terrace into five bed sitters and as luck would have it, my son, Billy and I came to occupy two of the rooms. The main room, the smaller of the two, was a sitting room and the larger which served as our bedroom, was connected to it by a narrow opening. The sitting room was adorned with ornamental ceiling roses and was fourteen feet high. It was painted a soft shade of buttercup yellow, offset by a feature wall covered in wallpaper which was mottled with tiny sprays of white and yellow flowers. The wallpaper ran from the skirting boards to the picture rail and was neatly hung. The rooms were bright and cheerful, especially when the morning sun hit the window panes, throwing in rays of soft, warm light.

  As the owner of the boarding house, Dora was popular and well respected in our neighbourhood. Her hands were enormous and she wore a smile as wide as a cricket pitch. Dora Valentine was the only person to know the truth about Billy’s father, the handsome soldier who sat silently on my mantelpiece in the sitting room. I had decided to call him Douglas, Douglas Ernest Phillips. Dora often wondered where my lies would lead and what effect it would have on Billy when he eventually discovered the truth, as she knew he would one day. Fortunately, Dora never lived to witness the consequences of my deception and to see that things didn’t quite turn out the way I had expected. I should have realised that the lies and deceit I peddled with the aid of Isabelle Dwyer, would one day come back to haunt not only her but Billy and me as well.

  I had just had my thirtieth birthday when I walked back through the door of the Rainaldi sisters’ dressmaking shop with a baby in my arms and asked for my old job back. They never asked why I left so abruptly without adequate explanation, but it became clear to them when I introduced them to Billy. The sisters were kind-hearted women and assumed that Billy was Edward’s son. They cast no judgement on me and as Edward had married and moved away from the area, we never mentioned his name again. With no children of their own, their tears fell and I watched on silently as Carla’s nose reddened and the coral lipstick which was applied so generously, smudged against her upper lip as she blew her nose into a delicate lace handkerchief. Rosa, being the more practical of the two, walked over to the till and handed me a five pound note, took Billy from my arms and ordered me to start work immediately.

  *****

  It was a cloudless autumn day. It was late in the afternoon and the sun was losing the little warmth it had left. But there were still a few hours of sunlight remaining when I closed the front door to the shop behind me and took a detour home through a maze of quiet back streets. I knew that Dora wouldn't mind if I was home a little later than usual, she enjoyed looking after Billy on the days that I worked at the shop and a walk in the fresh air would do me the world of good. The street was silent apart from the crunching of dry leaves underfoot. The coppery, golden leaves had begun their annual pilgrimage and fell from the deciduous trees like shrouds, littering the footpaths and front yards of the small inner city blocks. An elderly couple complained to each other that the leaves were a nuisance and I smiled at them as I quickly walked on, eager to avoid the smoky trail of thin smoke which spiraled up from the gutter.

  My curiosity suddenly got the better of me and I turned and looked back over my shoulder at the woman wearing a blue checked apron and clutching at a long handled straw broom. She was sweeping bright piles of leaves into tidy mounds as her male companion sat quietly on his haunches, rocking backwards and forwards, humming to himself as he tendered the smoldering flames. The couple didn’t look at each other but their connection was plain to see, even to a stranger’s eyes. />
  The route I had chosen was not my usual way home and I soon became disoriented as I passed through a number of streets and dirty, rubbish filled back lanes. A group of school boys chasing a football and dressed in ill-fitting grey uniforms, jostled me as I turned the corner into Cunningham Street.

  The street was one-way and I tripped on an empty beer bottle as I stepped off the footpath into the deep sandstone gutter to cross to the other side of the street. I swore silently to myself as I looked down at the bottle’s amber neck poking out from a crumpled, paper bag. I clutched my handbag in one hand and straightened my stockings with the other; suddenly feeling foolish, I looked around to see if anyone had seen me stumble. I kicked the bottle to one side, annoyed by the carelessness of a thoughtless drunk.

  I regained my composure, raised my nose to the air and sniffed at the singed, burnt smell of freshly ironed shirts as it wafted and snaked its way towards me. It was a familiar scent, a scent which strangely comforted me and was a homely reminder of what I once had.

  A solidly built woman stood on the top of a set of worn sandstone steps in a doorway. Her hands were placed firmly on her hips as if she was about to scold. I expected her to ask if I had hurt myself and wondered why she looked at me in the manner in which she did. Perhaps she was not looking at me at all, but simply taking time to catch her breath, and to contemplate the task which lay ahead.

  Muscled, nut-brown arms poked out from her sleeveless shift and her limp hair was tied back with a red ribbon. When she noticed me looking at her, she turned away and returned to her work. With her body slumped over a large pile of clothes, she began to sort and empty drawstring bags. The contents spewed out onto the chessboard linoleum floor and I wondered if customers ever complained of lost articles of clothing.

  A hand painted sign on the glass window caught my eye. ‘Lucky’s Laundromat, Washes Whites Whiter With Rinso’ was painted in large, bold letters. I found myself smiling at the alliteration and wondered if Lucky was a person’s name or was a comment on the establishment’s prosperity. I walked on and left the comforting smells of domesticity behind me.

  The street veered sharply to the right and disappeared around a bend. I followed it on, past a disused clothing factory which was boarded up with a large ‘For Sale’ sign affixed to the front of the building. I stopped in the middle of the footpath. The way ahead was blocked by a large blackboard sign.

  ‘Foyle’s Bookstore-Books Bought and Sold’ was written carefully in white chalk on the board. There were flourishes in the writing and it was obvious that the scribe had taken great care with it. The book store reminded me of Dickens’ Old Curiosity Shop and I found myself strangely drawn to it, wondering what I would find behind its freshly painted door. I turned the brass knob and pushed firmly against it. A bell sounded above my head as I entered and a red headed young man dressed in a suit, and a middle aged woman wearing a pale complexion and bright red lips looked up from their books. An elderly man with a toothbrush moustache sat at the sales counter and nodded, the young man frowned, the woman smiled a wide smile and brushed away a strand of hair which had fallen across her cheek. The trio, having accepted my presence, returned to their books. The disruption I had caused, having been forgiven.

  The bookstore was dimly lit and it took a moment for my eyes to adjust to the room after the hazy, autumn sunlight outside. ‘Foyle’s on Cunningham’ was a small, airless bookstore but I felt safe within its walls. The smell of leather, ink and dusty books was strangely comforting and it was an ideal place to hide away from the world, if only for a short time on an autumn afternoon. I was quietly reassured by the store’s cosy silence and quickly decided on my purchases – a picture book for Billy and a romance novel for Dora. The clip to my purse clicked sharply between my thumb and forefinger as I checked to see if I had enough money for my purchases. A crumpled one pound note poked out from where I usually kept my loose coins and I sighed, relieved at the thought of money in my purse.

  My eyes wandered over the books. They were crammed into the ceiling high book shelves and fell at odd angles against each other, like rugby players in a packed scrum and I found myself softly touching their spines, studying their titles and the authors to see if, like old friends, I recognised any of them.

  Large piles of books and magazines sat precariously on the timber floor and despite their lack of order, I was impressed by their quality. Behind a row of shelves, I found a wicker basket filled with a collection of old photographs. My father had been a keen amateur photographer after he returned from The War. A large walk-in cupboard under the back stairs of our Ashton Street home had been transformed into a small darkroom and if he was in an agreeable mood and had not been drinking, he would allow me to slide the photo paper into the developer tray and slosh it around until an image magically appeared.

  With his Leica camera slung over his shoulder, on most Sundays after Church, father took the 362 bus into town. It was unusual for him to return before early evening and when he finally did arrive home, he disappeared into the cupboard under the stairs and reappeared only when Mother called him for tea.

  The photos he took were an exposé of people and their lives, all kinds of people and all kinds of lives. A nervous shudder brought me back to the present as I looked again towards the wicker basket, strangely drawn to its contents by memories from the past.

  A cardboard box overflowing with Captain Marvel comics sat next to the basket beneath a timber hatstand. A colourful sombrero sat on top of the hatstand and a black embroidered jacket was draped over one of the polished, brass hooks. A souvenir from someone's travels, I thought, or perhaps it was going to be part of a display on Spanish culture. Books on cacti and Spanish architecture were littered on the dark timbered sales counter and the elderly man, whom I presumed was the owner, sat perched on a stool. He was flicking through the pages of a book and looked irritated as if he was in search of some important fact which he was unable to locate. His steel rimmed glasses slipped and his eyes squinted as he attempted to push them back onto the bridge of his nose. He looked up at me from behind his book and studied me for a moment before he smiled. His eyes darted from me to the hatstand and back again. He moved the book to one side. ‘Do you know anything about Spain?’

  I was about to answer, but he didn’t wait for my reply.

  ‘I’m putting together a display, it’s a fascinating country. My nephew was there in thirty-eight, during the Civil war. After hearing about his experiences, I became obsessed, such a passionate people, such an interesting country.’ He placed his hand gently on the pile of books in front of him and shook his head. ‘Might as well read all I can because I doubt I’ll ever get there now, too old,’ he said, as he scratched the grey whiskers on his chin. ‘Let me know if you need any help,’ he said almost as an afterthought.

  I returned my thoughts and my attention to the wicker basket and the collection of old photos. I sorted through one familiar inner city street scene after another and then a number of construction photos of the Sydney Harbour Bridge. I put them all to one side and dug further into the basket and then I came across a photo of a soldier dressed in an Australian Army uniform. I held the photo in my hands. It was a professional portrait and the size was such that it allowed me to distinguish his features clearly. I was intrigued. What act had he been guilty of that would have him abandoned in such a way? Perhaps he had a falling out with his wife or lover. I examined the photo closely and held it up to the light filtering through the glass shop front. He was about my age and had an innocent look about him, which I found attractive. He looked vulnerable even though he was dressed in a soldier's uniform and, I imagined as I stared into his eyes, that I may have seen him before – passed him in a busy street or caught a glimpse of him as we boarded a train to a shared destination. His dark, wavy hair was neatly combed and parted in the middle, a lopsided grin revealed a perfect set of teeth. I liked that. I decided to take him home.

  Billy spent his childhood and part of his adult
life thinking his father was a hero. I gleaned all the information I needed from past newspapers I found at the library, studied them and recorded the details of a World War II battle in Europe in a small yellow spiral notebook I kept in the top drawer of my bedside table. By doing this, I invented a plausible time line for Douglas’s life, a fabrication based on part truths and my own imaginings of the man I dreamt could have been the father of my son, a father he would never know. I carefully placed the photo in a frame and put it on the timber mantelpiece above the small coke fireplace in the sitting room and called him Douglas, Douglas Ernest Phillips. It wasn’t long before I began to believe that he really was my husband and as time passed, I was surprised that Billy never asked about his father. He didn’t seem to notice that he bore no physical resemblance to the soldier whose photo sat next to the small, blue porcelain dinner bell on the mantelpiece. Billy told me later that as a child, he had felt his father's eyes follow him around the sitting room, passing quiet judgement on him. He ignored the soldier on the mantelpiece and attached little significance to the man I chose to be his father. I often wondered who he was, the soldier who I picked up from the bookstore that day and wove into the threads of my life.

  As the years moved on, so did my Billy. He was no longer Billy, but William and I was to refer to him as such, especially in company.

  He occasionally invited me to afternoon tea at our favourite tea shop in the city, not far from where he worked. As we sat drinking our tea in ivory coloured porcelain teacups with tiny pink roses around the rim and eating fluffy scones, covered in sticky jam and luscious cream, he said he wanted to do something for me. I didn’t pay much attention at the time - I couldn’t have known what he was thinking.