Patricia turned back to Rachel. ‘I want to tell you this. Aboriginal people judge you most on what you do. If you keep working for what you honestly think is the best thing for our community, they will come to respect you for that and you will gain acceptance when you have proven yourself in that way. So don’t be disheartened by the fact that many will be a bit standoffish. While we don’t bring the welcome mat out easily, we don’t close the door on those who have done the hard yards. We give them respect, albeit begrudgingly sometimes.’
‘That means a lot to me, to hear you say that,’ Rachel said earnestly, sincerely.
Rachel marvelled at Patricia’s face. The high cheeks, the barely lined skin - except around the eyes - and the large, almond-shaped brown eyes. Classically beautiful.
‘But look, Rachel, that isn’t the only reason I invited you over.’ She gave the wry smile again and looked at Rachel firmly for some time, long enough for Rachel to become nervous.
‘I’ve heard the rumours about you and Tony.’
Rachel flushed pink.
‘I don’t want to say anything about that. I didn’t bring you over here to judge you or dress you down. I only want to say something to you. Because you are young. And you are bright. And you are part of our community.’
Patricia paused, lighting another cigarette.
‘What I want to say to you is that you do not need the approval of other people to be Aboriginal. Don’t let others make you feel that you are, as they usually say, “not Aboriginal enough” or “a coconut” - you know, brown on the outside and white on the inside.’
‘Yes, I have heard that,’ Rachel said grimly.
‘Don’t let anyone tell you that because you are educated, because you are middle class, because you were adopted out or because you do not know who your father is that you are not Aboriginal. It’s an insidious, unkind way of trying to bring our own people down. It’s behaviour I detest.’
Rachel could feel the tingling welling of tears in her eyes. She willed herself not to cry with the humiliation of knowing that people were aware that she was having an affair. Here, with Patricia Tyndale, someone she so admired, she felt naked, ashamed.
‘And I detest it because it can make young people feel insecure. Make them feel as though they need to prove themselves in ways that no Aboriginal person should have to. And they can make misguided choices. I’ve seen it too many times. I didn’t sit in that Tent Embassy and get myself beaten up by coppers so that we could all stay uneducated and poor, dependent on government handouts.’
Rachel was lost for words.
‘As I said, I’m not judging you, Rachel. I just wanted to give you this advice. You can take it or ignore it as you choose. What you do with your life is none of my business. But ours is a small community, one where some of us make matters that are none of our business, our business. And as you will find out about me, I am nothing if not a woman with a lot of opinions which I like to wrap up as advice.’
The days were getting longer, it was still warm and, while the walk home would take about an hour and a half, Rachel had a lot to think about.
Just after she started working at the Aboriginal Legal Service, Robynne, who had continued to work to help her to find her birth family, rang to say that she had good news. She had found Rachel’s aunt. Thelma Ryan. She lived in the western suburbs and was willing to meet with Rachel.
She took the long drive there with Robynne. The address was for a light-green weatherboard house, no gardens but a wire fence and two kitchen chairs on the concrete verandah. Inside smelt of poverty and stale cigarette smoke.
Aunt Thelma was a rotund woman with a chubby face, sad dark eyes and large moles on her upper cheeks. She lived with Bill, a skinny, pale man who had a thick caramel beard and fading tattoos on his arms and his knuckles, and a tattooed tear drop on his outer eye.
Aunt Thelma opened the door. She took the flowers and chocolates that Rachel had brought and ushered her in. ‘I’m so nervous. I need a drink.’
Thelma drank straight from the beer bottle. She offered one to Rachel and to Robynne but both declined. It was only ten in the morning.
‘S’pose you want me to tell you about your mother. You look like her. In the eyes and the mouth. And that long dark hair. She was very vain about her hair. I remember once when we was in the home and the sister cut it off because she had lice. Broke her heart. She cried and cried.’
Thelma took another sip of her beer. ‘She was a drinker, like me, your mother. But she only came to love the booze after she lost you. She was living out at Coonamble then.’
‘Can you tell me much about where our family is from?’ Rachel had asked.
‘Well,’ replied her aunt, looking into the distance, ‘we weren’t much interested in that. Only brought me grief, being an Abo. Do you think you would have been taken from your mother if you’d been white?’
‘Were you all from Coonamble?’
‘No. We were from out Gilgandra way. We lived by the riverbank. Dad used to follow the fruit picking and then we would come back to Gilgandra when the season was over. He was a hard man. Always giving us a good hiding. And giving Mum one, too.’ Thelma took another swig.
‘When she died, we went to live with our Uncle Joe at Cobar. It was the first time I lived in a house but we became too wild for him. He was old and not too well so we quickly got out of hand.’
‘Do you know anything about my father?’
‘Nope. Can’t tell you nothin’ about that. Your mother never said. She went to work in Sydney for a while and she came back to see me. Bill and I was in Peak Hill then ’cause he was driving the trucks. When she arrived she was already knocked up with you. And she never said. She always looked real sad when she was asked, and you know us, we always ask what we want to know, not shy about that.’ She started laughing with a hearty croak that cracked into a deep coughing fit. When Thelma recovered herself, she took another big gulp of beer.
‘She would say, “This child has no father, only God. He’ll take care of her.” Don’t know why she believed that ’cause God sure didn’t seem to be around much when we were young, especially not when we were living with our dad. And I have to say, I haven’t seen a lot of God since then either. Mind you, Bill has been a blessing to me, haven’t you, love?’
Bill, who hadn’t said a word, just shrugged his shoulders.
‘And he got this for you. Show her, love.’
Bill pushed a paper envelope across the table. Rachel opened it and saw it was a photo of a young woman with long black hair, a bright smile and a short dress.
‘That’s your mother. Bill got it copied down at the shop. See, he’s real thoughtful.’ Bill just shrugged and averted his gaze.
‘Oh thank you. Thank you, Bill. Thank you, Thelma. I can’t tell you what this means to me,’ cried Rachel as she cradled the photograph in her hands.
When it was time for Rachel to leave, she stood to give Thelma a hug. Thelma was a little unsteady on her feet and slurred a little as she spoke, ‘You come back here and visit your aunty. And bring some photos of you when you was a baby. I’d love to see that.’
‘Sure. Of course. Anything I can do for you, you only need to ask.’
‘Have you got a twenty for your aunty?’
Rachel looked in her purse. She had been to the bank before she had come.
‘I’m sorry. I only have a fifty.’
‘That’ll do.’ Rachel did not know how to say no.
She also did not know how to explain to Robynne why she could not stop crying the whole way home. She had not expected a happy ending. And her aunt had been welcoming even though she clearly had her own problems. But rather than feeling as though something had been discovered, the void within her seemed larger and rawer than ever before.
Before the encounter with her aunt, Rachel hadn’t intended for anything to happen between her and Tony. She had thought it best that the chemistry that charged the air between them should remain unexplored.
<
br /> She had wanted to belong, had wanted to feel like she had found her place, where she fitted in, and been jealous of the ease at which someone like Simone could say ‘I’m Tony Harlowe’s daughter’ and everyone would know who she was, where she came from, who she was related to. How envious she was of people who could confirm their identity, their place in the network of kinship.
She was often asked by her clients, ‘Who are your mob?’ She could only vaguely answer and it always made her feel like they looked at her with a little more suspicion, as though she was not one of them. And for reasons she couldn’t explain, being with Tony Harlowe made her feel closer to this world she so badly wanted to find her place in.
29
Tony felt an urgency to find Beth Ann. He walked through the hallway, to the kitchen where she was most often to be found this time of the evening. He hadn’t rung to say he would be home early, and in the last months there had been few nights when that was the case. No wonder she had not started dinner. But he could hear her in the house, could tell she was there. He smiled warmly to himself as he walked towards the laundry.
She had her back to him and was standing over the ironing board folding clothes. He stood still, watching her deftly work. She had been the heart of his family, he thought. She had brought everything together. She had made him strong. She, and no one else, had helped him leave behind his past, especially the events of that awful night - and had helped him become who he was. Not a perfect man, he knew. But he was, despite all his flaws, the best man he could be because of Beth Ann’s love.
‘Hello, you,’ he said as he moved closer to her, moving to wrap his arms around her, to hold her close.
Beth Ann shrugged Tony’s arms off. ‘Don’t,’ she said in a voice so low it barely sounded like hers.
‘What’s wrong, love?’ he had asked her, surprised. Beth Ann had never pulled away from him.
‘I’m done,’ she growled in the same low tone.
Tony looked at her, confused. He had never seen her like this. There was a hardness to her face. It seemed greyish. There was no light.
‘What’s wrong?’ he asked, his tone attempting to be soothing.
‘You know what’s wrong,’ she replied.
And he did. He could read it. He knew it from the acid burn in his stomach and the slow heat coming to his temples. Had Simone said something, let something slip? He panicked. How much could Beth Ann know? Deny it, he told himself. Whatever she’d been told, he could argue his way out of it.
‘I’m not a mind reader,’ he said.
‘You’ve been seeing someone else. You’re having an affair.’
And there it was, hanging in the air between them.
‘No.’ He could hear the hollowness in his voice.
‘Don’t treat me like an idiot.’ Her voice was now sharp, the flash of fire in it.
‘Who told you? What did they say?’ Tony demanded.
‘I can’t live like this anymore.’
‘Wait, Beth Ann. Come on. Don’t I get a chance to defend myself?’ he pleaded.
‘Well?’ she demanded. ‘Defend yourself then.’
Tony was thrown.
‘There is no one else. Of course people talk. There’s always gossip. You know how it is. But that doesn’t mean it’s true. Whatever has been said to you, tell me what it is and who said it because I can promise you there’s no basis for it. There’s always some false rumour or other about somebody but they’re usually baseless. Of course people are jealous of me. There are lots of malicious things said. But it’s gossip. It doesn’t mean it’s true.’
‘You really do think that I’m stupid, don’t you?’
‘I don’t. I love you most in the world. Just tell me what was said and who said it and I’ll sort it out.’ He’d been practising what he’d say if Simone had said something, had planned how he would explain.
‘No one told me anything. I rang the hotel when you were in Lightning Ridge and when I asked for your room the operator said that “Mr and Mrs Harlowe” were not answering.’
Tony felt a blessed hint of relief. Maybe, he thought, he could win this.
‘Beth Ann, there was no one else in my room. Clearly this woman on the front desk made a mistake. How can you possibly think that I would do something like that to you? The woman who put you through to my room must have been an idiot. She obviously got it wrong. It could easily happen that she would make a mistake like that. Love, I can’t believe that you would take that as proof that I was with someone else.’
Beth Ann stood glaring at him. ‘Well, if all you say is true, what is your explanation for this?’ Beth Ann picked up a bra - black and lacy - from where it had been thrown to the floor.
He could feel the colour drain from his face.
‘It’s Simone’s,’ he said.
‘Then explain why it’s not her size and why I found it in your overnight bag, the one you took to Lightning Ridge.’
Tony had no answer. The burning acid feeling was consuming his whole body. He’d been caught out. There was no explanation. On the spot, he couldn’t think of a plausible one.
Something else stopped him. It was in Beth Ann’s face, her eyes. There was something different about her, something resolved, hard.
‘Enough, Tony. Enough,’ she said quietly, handing the incriminating evidence to him. ‘Go,’ she said. ‘Go to her now. I don’t want you near me.’ And then, more softly, ‘I can’t stand to look at you.’
Tony grabbed his overnight bag. He tossed in a few belongings - his toiletries and some clothes. Exactly what he would have taken if he was leaving for one of his regular trips away. Except he left saying nothing to Beth Ann. She was still at the back of the house. He was glad. He could not bear to see her face.
Beth Ann walked down the hallway and put the chain on the door. She unplugged the phone. She wasn’t hungry but made herself eat some avocado and tomato on toast and poured a large glass of wine. She drew a long bath and put on her best nightdress.
She changed the sheets before she slipped into bed. Clean sheets would mean no Tony Harlowe in her bed. No hair, no skin left behind.
While she waited in the dark for sleep to come, she replayed the events that had unfolded that afternoon. How quickly he had surrendered. How swiftly he had acted on her command to leave.
Beth Ann was not hysterical, not even sad. She’d probably feel more fragile in the morning when she woke up alone, she thought. Then the floodgates would open and she would weep.
She planned to make an appointment tomorrow with a solicitor. She wanted the house sold and she would take half of the assets they had accumulated over their life together. She would move swiftly because she knew she should get matters finalised while Tony was in the throes of new love, while he was planning his own new life. Each step she took towards her own independence would make the one she took after it that much easier.
30
THE OLD MISSION
The heat seems to stretch time in this town. Its plumes drift up from the bubbling tarred roads. In the generous yards with modest homes, the grass is parched brown.
I’ve been here a week, staying in my grandmother’s weatherboard house on the old mission. The rooms have the musty smell of dust resting on a lifetime of possessions and there is a constant click-click-click of the fan. Nan keeps the radio on and it twangs country music most of the day. She sits on her chair in the noon-time heat. She has shown me how to make real lemonade and we sit and sip from long, chipped glasses.
‘This is nice, Nan, Spending time with you.’
‘Well, I would come and see you more but it is harder the older I get. I need to be near my things. And I don’t like the bus. I feel like a sardine in a tin - with a whole load of white sardines.’
I laugh. I wonder why I have never been here before.
‘Why does Dad never come home?’
She eyes me warily. ‘That’s something you will have to ask him about. Always filled with the questions, aren’t you?�
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Suddenly the front door opens and a small whirlwind in the form of my cousin Melanie enters the room. Her younger sister Amanda slips in quietly behind her. They are not technically my cousins. My grandmother and their grandfather were brother and sister but this is a tight-knit community. I’d never met them until I came out to visit this time. My mother would send them the clothes I grew out of as a child and Nan sent some pictures once of the girls prancing around in the ill-fitting garments. ‘Did you bring us any stuff?’ had been Melanie’s greeting when we first met.
‘I’ve had a gutful of this fucking heat.’ Melanie flops herself down in a chair. ‘I can’t believe I have to work tonight but at least there is air-conditioning there.’
Amanda has a baby with her and she has unfolded a blanket on the ground at Nan’s feet and rests the baby on it. The baby is Melanie’s but Amanda quietly, uncomplainingly, seems to do all the work.
‘Where do you work? ’ I ask politely.
‘In the nursing home on the other side of town.’
I suppress a laugh. I could imagine Melanie telling a resident who wanted something to ‘go get it your fucking self’. But the baby is her fourth child and I admire her determination to provide for them. Like many people with brash exteriors, she has a good heart.
‘How’s that father of yours?’ Nan asks the girls.
‘He was in a right mood this morning,’ Melanie chuckles. ‘He says that if the Housing Department don’t fix the plumbing this week he is going to burn the whole place down.’
A smile creeps across Nan’s face. ‘It’s those bureaucrats from Sydney. They come out here on the plane, all clean clothes and shiny hair and a year later they leave on a plane, looking shabbier and a whole lot less shiny. Problems here ain’t so easy to fix with lots of fine talk. We need to pay doctors and teachers more or they ain’t gonna come out here for the long haul. And we need some money to fix that school hall.’
Melanie and Amanda nod in agreement so Nan continues. ‘And by the time they get to know who is who, who to talk to and who to ignore, they are packing their gear and heading back to the city. Just when we have finally got them trained. This last one that came out from the Aboriginal Affairs Department reminded me of the mission manager we had here when I was a girl. We used to call him gawu.’
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