Lucy rolled her eyes. She hadn’t finished explaining everything to Tom. How could she explain herself to Big as well? She glanced over her shoulder at the painted wall but the picture had closed to her. She put her face in her hands and groaned. The magic had drained away. There was no going back.
‘Lucy! How did this happen?’ demanded Big. ‘Why didn’t you tell me?’
‘I didn’t know how to tell you. I didn’t think you’d believe me. I didn’t believe it myself. The first time, I thought it was a weird dream. But it’s not, is it? Not if you remember it too.’
Big shook her head. ‘I’m such an old fool. I can’t believe I didn’t see it. These past few days something about you has been puzzling me, but I couldn’t put my finger on it. I’ve spent the whole of my life worrying about that little girl, wondering what became of the other Lucy McKenzie. She saved my life. She saved this house. I’ve watched you grow up, but I never once suspected there could be a connection. The fact that you shared her name just seemed like a coincidence. Until now.’
‘Didn’t Tom tell you that I could walk through walls? That the Lucy McKenzie you knew when you were little was a time-traveller?’
‘Tom! You were with our Tom.’
‘I was with him just a moment ago, on the other side of the painting, on the other side of time. I was trying to show him how it works. But the picture closed over when I came through.’
Big looked stunned. She closed her eyes, as if fighting back tears.
‘It was the year of the flood, wasn’t it? Three times we met and then you were gone – I never saw you again after that visit. Tom said he took you back to your family early in the morning the day after the floods. I cried all day. I never had the chance to say goodbye to you.’
‘What happened to Tom? Did he die in the war?’
Big slammed her hands down on the table.
‘It’s not Tom that we should be worrying about right now. It’s Claire. Your mother telephoned from Paris an hour ago. She said she was sitting beside Claire in hospital, our poor darling girl, when Claire spoke for the very first time since the accident.’
Big leaned forward and grasped Lucy’s hands, drawing her closer.
Lucy felt her whole brain seize up. Was this good news or bad?
‘The thing is, Claire cried out your name, Lucy. We should be very grateful. It’s a small breakthrough. But your mother was worried. She said it was as if Claire was having a nightmare; she called out “Lucy! Save her!” ’
Lucy felt her eyes sting with tears.
‘It’s been a terrible time for your mother. She didn’t want me to wake you, but she asked me to look in on you, to reassure her that you were all right. I couldn’t bear to tell her you weren’t in your bed. I told her you were sleeping and prayed to God you were somewhere in the valley. I’ve been out of my mind with worry, staring out the window, wondering where you’d gone. I was about to call the police when you stepped through the wall.’
‘You don’t have to worry about me now. You’re right, it’s Claire we have to worry about. Can we phone Mum back?’
‘Not now. She’ll be on the Metro on her way back to her apartment. But I promised I’d get you to a computer, so I’m taking you into town tomorrow. You’re going to Skype your mother. She says she needs to see you. Right now, you’re going to go straight back to bed and get a good night’s sleep. I don’t want your mother seeing you looking bedraggled and exhausted. She’s got enough to worry about.’
‘But we still need to talk about Tom!’ said Lucy. ‘And everything that happened in the past.’
Big winced. ‘The past is over and done with. I can’t talk about it with you now. We have to live in the present, and you have to go to bed right this minute.’
Lucy thought she wouldn’t be able to sleep, that she would lie awake all night worrying about Claire and Tom, but she woke late in the morning to the sound of Big banging pots and pans in the kitchen.
They drove into town in Big’s old jeep, and Lucy felt as if every bone in her body was shaken loose by the bumpy ride. The road up the hillside seemed even more rutted than it had when she’d driven down it with Dad. Or maybe it was because there was no suspension in Big’s jeep and a rusty hole in the cabin floor, through which she could see the ground rushing by beneath.
The town of Broken River sat on a ridge with a single main street running its length. A couple of small roads ran off to one side, like loose threads on a frayed blanket. The main street was wide and empty, and as Big pulled into a parking bay, the only other vehicle in sight was a motorised wheelchair that an old man was driving along the pavement. The windows on half the shops were boarded up, though the corner cafe looked cheerful. A few people sat at outside tables in the sunshine.
‘Tourists,’ said Big, frowning. ‘Only thing that keeps the town from breathing its last gasp.’
Big led Lucy into the tiny local library inside the old council buildings. It wasn’t much bigger than the family room at Lucy’s house. A long, gleaming polished-wood table sat in the middle of the room, and there was an old fireplace on one wall with bookshelves stretching up either side of it. In a far corner, inside a little glass booth, was a bank of computers. While Big chatted to the elderly librarian, Lucy made her way over to a computer. She touched the keyboard with her fingertips and felt a little flicker of pleasure.
Lucy waited for Big to join her and then she logged into her Skype account. Big frowned.
‘Your mother keeps saying I should get a computer at Avendale; tells me it will change my life.’
‘I could teach you how to use it. It would make your life better, Big.’
‘But I like my life the way it is. And what would I use it for?’
‘You could use it to Skype me!’ said Lucy. ‘We’ve got a lot to catch up on.’
‘Lucy McKenzie,’ said Big, her voice soft with laughter. She gently pinched Lucy’s cheek, as if she couldn’t believe her eyes. ‘There’s no doubt you and I share a lot of history.’
They sat side by side as Lucy opened her contacts and clicked on her mum’s username.
Seeing Mum’s face on the screen made tears spring to Lucy’s eyes. There was a tiny lapse when she could see her but her voice wasn’t coming through. It was as if she was frozen in time, as if those tiny pixelated images travelling across the globe were held for a moment, held in the river of time, the same way Lucy had been held inside the paintings.
‘Lucy, darling,’ said Mum. ‘So good to see you. You and Big.’ She gave a little wave that was fast and blurry. Lucy could see how tired she was, with shadowy blue smudges beneath each eye.
‘How’s Claire?’ asked Lucy. ‘Tell me about Claire?’
Mum sighed. ‘They’re going to stop the drugs that were meant to be keeping her in the coma. The doctors said it was a wonderful sign that she called your name. Some time in the next few days, she’s going to wake up properly. And then we’ll know how she is.’
‘But that must be good news, that they think she’s going to be okay?’ said Lucy.
Mum put her face in her hands and then looked up again. ‘We just have to hope and pray, Lucy. We can’t know until she wakes. The fall may have done permanent damage. I’m sorry to tell you that, but I don’t want to give you false hope. You know that whatever happens, we’ll all pull together.’
Lucy felt a lump form in her throat and swallowed hard. ‘Does that mean she won’t sing any more?’
‘We can’t know yet, Lucy. Let’s not talk about what might be. Tell me about Broken River; tell me what’s been happening. I’d love to hear some news of home. Tell me the best thing about being there.’
Big and Lucy looked at each other. How could Lucy possibly tell her mother what she’d been doing?
‘I’m learning to paint and draw,’ said Lucy. ‘Big is teaching me.’
Lucy realised as she spoke that it was true. Learning about how to make pictures and their secret power really was one of the best thing about being
at Avendale. ‘Painting is magic,’ said Lucy. She turned to Big and grinned.
Big let out a shout of laughter and the librarian glared at them through the glass.
Mum’s face relaxed, as if that one little piece of news along with Lucy’s smile and Big’s laugh had lifted a weight from her shoulders.
They chatted some more, about Paris and what Dad was up to in North Queensland, and Jack in New York. Right at the end of the conversation, they talked about Christmas.
‘I’m putting together a Christmas parcel for you and Big,’ said Mum, obviously trying to make it sound exciting. ‘And Dad might even be able to get down to Avendale for the day.’
Lucy imagined the three of them, Big, Dad and herself – a fragment of their family – sitting at one end of the dining-room table in the outside–inside room. On the other side of the paintings, Christmas at that other Avendale would be loud with the voices of a family and music and laughter. But those days were over. Did Big spend every December longing for those Christmases past? Was Lucy destined to feel sad about Christmas for the rest of her life?
That evening, Lucy and Big sat out on the verandah and watched the moon rise up over the river. They rubbed insect repellent all over their arms and drank long glasses of icy lemonade.
‘Are you sure you didn’t see me again, after the day of the floods?’ asked Lucy.
‘No, not until you were a little baby and I came to see you at the hospital in Sydney.’
‘But you didn’t know it was me, did you?’
‘No,’ said Big. ‘There was always something about you, something familiar, but I thought it was just that you looked like your grandmother. Until I saw you step out of that painting, I had no idea.’
‘I don’t look like Lulu. Claire looks exactly like her. I look like you. Don’t you remember that we played being twins up in your Empire? And then you wound up being the big twin and I was the little one.’
‘How could I forget? That was why Tom and Jimmy started calling me Big, why everyone started to call me Big.’
‘But why didn’t you marry Jimmy?’
‘He never asked. He was completely in love with Lulu by the time she was sixteen. And I was happy for them. I had a different dream. I wanted to paint. It was hard to have both things back then. You had a family or you had your work. You couldn’t really have both.’
‘That’s silly,’ said Lucy. ‘My mum has both.’
‘The world has changed,’ said Big.
‘But did you ever go to Paris, like you said you were going to, even for a visit?’
Big sighed and stared out at the landscape. ‘I didn’t get to art school until a long time after the war was over. When I finished studying in Sydney, I worked and saved and eventually had enough to go to London. Back then, hardly anybody flew. I went by ship. But by the time I got to London there was a telegram waiting for me. My mother, your great-grandmother, had died. My father, he was devastated. I took the next boat home.’
‘And Tom? What happened to Tom?’
Big looked away, as if it was too hard to talk about Tom. ‘His plane was shot down over New Guinea.’
‘I should go back and warn him! I saved you. I saved Jimmy Tiger – and we wouldn’t be here now if I hadn’t. Maybe I’m meant to save Tom too. If I can only make him believe me.’
Big took Lucy’s hand and squeezed it tightly. ‘I want you to promise me something, Lucy. One thing that you absolutely must promise. You won’t go back through those paintings again. I never forgot you, Lucy. Everything you did made our family the way it is now. But Tom died and I don’t believe there was any way you could have saved him. If you did come to visit a fourth time, I never saw you. So don’t try it. You can’t change the past. It was set before you were born. You were destined to come back to save me twice. But you mustn’t try changing anything else. When I think of what might have happened to you! It’s too dangerous. Dangerous magic.’
Lucy drew her knees up to her chest and stared at the beautiful, still, dark valley. Blue-black bush edged the water. The river glowed silver in the moonlight. In a few short days she had seen the valley in so many different moods, in so many different times. Winter was the only painting she hadn’t passed through. Perhaps winter would never open itself up to her. Perhaps.
‘Do you promise?’ asked Big.
Lucy hesitated. ‘I promise.’
Breaking Promises
It was too hot to sleep. Even with the window open, the heat was unbearable. Lucy padded down the hallway and opened the front door. The moonlit river lay like a white swathe through the valley. Lucy sat down on the cane lounge on the verandah and shut her eyes. If only a breeze would come to move the still night air. She’d been lying awake for hours, her head spinning, thinking of Tom, of Claire, of all the things that you could and couldn’t change.
A mosquito buzzed near her ear and she swatted it away. Sighing with irritation she went back inside. She was determined not to look into the painted room, but as she passed the doorway she felt a cool breeze wafting through. It made her skin tingle with pleasure. She stepped into the room.
If only Autumn would come to life again, she could go back to the day of the flood, the day she should have convinced Tom to not sign up for the war. But the picture of autumn, though beautiful, was still and lifeless. On that hot summer night it was Winter that was alive with light and colour. Lucy could smell the wattle in bloom on the other side of time.
On either side of the fireplace the painted valley shone brightly. Golden wattle blazed in the gullies and along the river’s edge. One giant wattle overhung the mantelpiece, green acacia leaves and splashes of bright yellow blossoms exploding over the fireplace.
Lucy steeled herself. She shouldn’t go back. She knew too much. What if she changed the past and ruined her own future?
She paced up and down in front of the painting of winter, trying not to look at the sunlight on the wattle. If there was even the tiniest chance that she could change things for Tom, if there was some way she could save him, surely she should try?
Then she heard someone laugh. A girl was running up the hill inside the painting, her fair hair streaming out behind her. Lulu. Lucy’s grandmother. Her namesake. In the branches of the wattle tree Lucy saw a flash of red hair. Jimmy Tiger. He was so close to her, she could almost reach out and touch him.
Lucy ran from the room, back to the heat of her bedroom. She lay on her bed, resisting the lure of the cool wind and the temptation of joining the children in the wattle tree. She had promised Big she wouldn’t go back, but the painting must have come alive for a reason. If she were careful, surely she could risk one last visit. She could even try to change things for Claire as well as Tom. If she told April about Claire and made April promise to warn her, to stop her from going to Paris, things would work out differently for their whole family. Everyone would be safe.
Though her mind was churning with excitement, Lucy dressed herself carefully, pulling on a pair of blue jeans, a long-sleeved t-shirt, a cardigan and her leather sandals. Then, before she could change her mind, she tiptoed across the hall into the outside–inside room.
Her fingertips tingled as they met the bracing cold air on the other side of time. Her hands out before her, she stepped into the wintery landscape.
The trees in the orchard were bare, the grass pale yellow, cut short and tufty, brown in the furrows. The poplars that lined the road down to the creek were stripped of leaves, twiggy against the pale-blue winter sky. The river lay tea brown and soft gold in the winter sunlight, while gumtree shadows cast a grey sheen on its surface. A crisp, cool breeze swept up from the river and enveloped Lucy.
Standing on the hillside with golden wattle blooming around her like a giant halo was Lulu. She was taller than the last time Lucy had seen her, and looked somehow forlorn.
Lucy saw a flash of movement up in the wattle and then Jimmy Tiger leapt down to the ground, his arms full of yellow blossom. But when he saw Lucy, he dropped the flow
ers.
‘She’s back! Saint Lit of the Fire and Flood!’ he yelled, and ran up the hillside to greet her.
‘Hello, stranger,’ he said. Up close, Jimmy was much bigger than the last time they’d met. He was a teenager now, and stood a good head and shoulders taller than Lucy. ‘How did you get here? You know, we wondered if you weren’t some sort of angel, after you turned up last year and saved me and April in the flood.’
‘Last year?’ echoed Lucy.
‘Yes,’ he said, looking at her as if she were a little odd. ‘You remember, it was the autumn before last.’
‘A lot can happen in a year,’ said Lucy, almost to herself. ‘Where’s Tom?’
Lulu had raced up the hill in time to hear Lucy’s question. ‘Tom? He’s home from North Queensland, but his leave is almost over. He has to go back this afternoon.’
‘So they haven’t sent him to New Guinea yet?’ asked Lucy. ‘I have to talk to him. It’s urgent. I have to warn him.’
‘Warn him? Why would Tom need you to warn him about anything? He’s a man, a grown-up pilot in the RAAF. What could a little girl possibly tell him that he didn’t already know?’ asked Lulu.
‘Can you please just tell me where he is?’ said Lucy.
‘I thought you were April’s friend,’ said Lulu. ‘Why don’t you ask after her?’
‘Oh all right,’ said Lucy. ‘Where’s April, then!’ Even if Lulu was her grandmother, she was very annoying. ‘Well, she’s not here. Tom’s going to visit her tonight, when he gets to Sydney. She’s gone away to boarding school. After she nearly drowned in the river last year, Dad and Mummy decided she needed to go to a proper school and stop being such a tomboy.’
‘Why didn’t they send you too?’ asked Lucy.
‘I’m going to be a singer. When I’m big enough, I might go to the Sydney Conservatory of Music.’
‘I know,’ said Lucy.
‘How can you know that? I haven’t even told anyone I was thinking about it.’ Lulu put her hands on her hips and glared at Lucy. ‘I’m not sure about this girl, Jimbo.’
The Four Seasons of Lucy McKenzie Page 10