I do not hear from her directly but meet occasional people who know her. I think she prefers to forget she lived here, and I understand.
Whether she wants to hear from you I do not know, but her address is 223 Burswood St, Hawthorn.
Of Robert I have heard nothing for several years. He only worked for us for a month after you left. I don’t think he ever quite forgave himself for what happened to you. Perhaps he was much more attached to you than he admitted, but after you went away it was like a light in his life went out. He got morose and drank too much, and while he was still kind to the girls I knew he needed to go somewhere else to find himself again or whatever he had lost.
We remained friends and occasionally he would call and ring in the first year of two after he went. He always asked if I had heard from you.
However it is a long time since I have heard from him and I think this means he now lives in another place, far away, and sadly I do not know where.
However I have his mother’s address if this is of any assistance, not a street number but it is a small town and someone should be able to find her if you sent it to the post office with a cover note. She is Mrs Edwina Davies of Hill St, Warburton.
Please give my best regards to your lovely daughter, Catherine. I am sure she has grown to be a delightful young lady.
If you ever find your way to Melbourne again it would be lovely if you could come and visit.
Kindest regards.
Lavinia Lawson
So Lizzie wrote a further letter straight away that the man took with him. It was short and to the point. She did not know how to write it any other way. It read.
Dear Mrs Davies,
I doubt that Robert has ever mentioned my name, however I knew him for a time in Melbourne in 1964 when we became good friends. When I had to leave unexpectedly he made me promise to write to him, and I regret to say I have neglected to do so until this time.
I have kindly been given your address by Mrs Lavinia Lawson of St Kilda, for whom we both worked in that year. She has suggested that you may be able to assist me in contacting him.
I would love to hear from him again, and if you could provide me with his address or pass this letter on to him I would be very appreciative.
Yours sincerely
Lizzie Renford
This was placed inside a second envelope addressed to Warburton Post Office requesting their assistance in passing this letter on to Edwina Davies who lived in Hill St.
A month later she got a brief note from Mrs Davies.
Dear Lizzie,
Robbie has mentioned your name to me several times and despite the years that have passed I know he will be delighted hear from you. I have forwarded your letter and I am sure he will be in touch with you shortly.
I will leave him to tell you his news, you will find him changed but I hope this will not affect your friendship. He remembers you very fondly.
Edwina
A month went by and then another, while she continued to exchange letters with her mother, Elena and Julie. She heard nothing from Robbie. She thought of writing a longer letter to him and asking his mother to pass it on. But she knew that anything further was in his hands. Perhaps he had found someone else.
One day, in that mid afternoon time when people still are sitting around and telling stories, before starting activities in the evening cool, a distant noise was heard approaching, something like a car but with a different and higher note.
One of the older men nodded. “Mightabe motabike.” No one knew anyone with a motorbike so they continued to talk and listen as the sound increased. Now a cloud of dust was visible approaching from the north, and then it was there, a motorbike stopped bare yards away.
A man, wearing a helmet, with his body swaddled in leathers, climbed off. He walked towards them all. He had a visible limp; his right leg was twisted and moved in a funny way.
Lizzie realised this man was coming towards her, she just knew, and she knew him too. His helmet came off. Her legs took their own control, she found herself running towards him and flinging herself into his arms. “Whoa” he said, “balance not too good.” He shuffled to support them both with his good leg.
Lizzie did not care, she could feel tears streaming down her face and she did not care about that either. It was Robbie; he had come for her, he had travelled here to be with her. She buried her face in his chest, she managed to say, mostly in sobs “I am so glad you came, I have wanted and needed you for so long and I am just so, so glad you are here.”
He gave her his old smile, “And I am more than glad to see you too, though you picked the furthest, most desolate and most Godforsaken place to bring me to.”
As the weeks and months went by Lizzie could not believe how rapturously happy she was, they both were. They owned almost nothing. They lived here on the edge of the desert and they were a family and beyond this they needed nothing. Catherine loved her new Dad, he called her Cathy and she called him Dad, which she knew he loved. She told him with pride how she had told her Mummy to find him, she had said that he needed her Mummy but really she knew that, even more, her Mummy needed him.
Robbie laughed and said “I think we both needed each other just as much, but thank you for your help.”
Robbie was very handy; he had built them a house of bush timber and now was building a shelter for a school. He had also put up a tank so that they could pump water from the soak, and he had put in a wood fired water heater so they could all have a hot shower at least once a week. He also installed a Flying Doctor radio though as yet there was no airstrip nearby. Beyond that little had changed in this place or in their lives.
Robbie also fixed up her car which he seemed to have taken as his by right. After a month they drove into Halls Creek and went shopping, just simple stuff, new clothes for her and Cathy and some food and presents for other clan members.
They also used the telephone and she rang first her Mum, then Elena and then to Julie. After she had talked to each one she felt so emotional that she wanted to stop, but Robbie insisted that she did not stop until she had talked to them all, and Cathy had to say hello to each as well.
Then Robbie rang his own Mum and talked to her, saying Mum, “I am so happy and glad I came. Now I want you to say hello to Lizzie, the lady I have loved from the day I met her and soon am going to marry.”
With that introduction Lizzie was lost for words, but then this kind voice came down the line saying, “I have known since he first told me about you that you were the one. Then, when I got your letter, I knew it would be you for sure. Now I am so glad he really has found you, having lost you for so long. I know you will both be happy together.”
There wasn’t really much for Lizzie to say after that except that she was the lucky one. So she put Cathy on to say hello to her new Grandma, not that the marriage was formal yet but it felt just the same, they were even making plans for another baby of their own, and Lizzie suspected that one may come along very soon, there was no lack of trying.
Over these past months she had written and told her dear friends Elena and Julie, along with her mother, the full story about her life, and now that Robbie had come he also became part of the story. She was determined to hide nothing important. Each time she wrote a letter Cathy had also taken to writing her own news or doing a drawing to go in her letters, things like:
“Daddy building a windmill,
Mummy eating a snake, yuk! yuk!! Yuk!!!”
She felt surprise they were all even better friends and closer than when the year had started, but she had come to understand acceptance was part of the power of honesty.
She also got a letter back from Rebecca. It was a kind and polite letter, saying she was glad to hear from her, that Lizzie was braver than Rebecca felt she could be in telling others about her past life. She would really prefer that part of her own life was forgotten. She did invite Lizzie to visit if she came to Melbourne. She said she would like to see how Catherine had grown up and would lik
e Lizzie to see Andrew.
But Lizzie knew that any visit presupposed that the part of both their lives, when they became friends, was a closed subject. Perhaps she would visit, Becky was still her friend despite all, but she felt it would not have the strength of her other friendships.
Julie increasingly wrote her letters about the investigations she was pursuing, particularly into Newcastle Transport, Mr Martin Wallis and his friends, Mr Daniel Ashcroft and Mr William Brown. Julie had graduated with journalism and law degrees and she was now working for the Sydney Morning Herald.
She said she was gathering evidence to use against them, both for stories in the newspapers and hopefully in a criminal prosecution. She asked Lizzie to write all her memories and experiences of these people down and post them to her, sparing nothing. She then asked Lizzie for permission to turn this information into affidavits which in due course Lizzie would swear were true.
While Lizzie had moved beyond vengeance she knew this was a necessary part of keeping her own promise and for the giving of justice to others. Robbie gave her total support, he said nothing she had done was any cause of shame, and he was happy to stand up and tell the world both that she was the best person he knew and that he loved her all the more for her courage.
One day a message came asking her to be in Halls Creek the next day. She and Cathy sat alongside Robbie as he drove the ute and several of her aboriginal clan sat on the back. The message was vague about why they were needed.
In the town the publican explained that an aeroplane was expected in the next hour. It was bringing a film crew including both a journalist and photographer from the Sydney Morning Herald and two lawyers from the NSW Public Prosecutors Office. He knew because they had booked rooms at his hotel for the tonight. They were to fly on to Broome tomorrow.
He did not know what it was about. But they had specifically asked to see Lizzie Renford so he had sent the message out to her over the Flying Doctor radio.
Robbie booked a room for them in the hotel as well, and a separate room next door for Cathy, which she loved.
Then he borrowed the publican’s vehicle which had extra seats. They both drove to airport to collect any passengers that came. As they arrived a plane, a fast twin engine, was on final approach. A tall elegant lady with blond bleached hair stepped out first. Suddenly Lizzie realised this was Julie; she looked so grown up and sensationally elegant. Lizzie felt dowdy in her bush clothes. Then Julie spotted her and let out a scream of delight, and then they were dancing around like two school girls, giggling with excitement. Robbie and Julie also seemed to hit it off.
Julie joked, “He is way too good looking for you. I want to keep him myself.”
Robbie replied, “Ah but you haven’t seen her the way I have; this girl really knows how to keep a man happy. I travelled half way across the world to find her and now nothing will ever take me away.”
Lizzie blushed, glad it was no worse.
Then Julie pulled out a sheet of paper. In front of all, standing in beside the plane, she said. “It gives me great pleasure to present this certificate to Elizabeth Renford, Dux of Balmain High in the Intermediate Examination of 1963; sorry it has taken so long to get delivered.”
Chapter 21 - Julie’s Investigation
When Lizzie met Julie at school in the middle of 1964 and disappeared to have her baby Julie was left with an enduring sense of shame, with a hard edge of anger.
Her friend was one of those sparkling people who she found great company. Lizzie always thought of herself as Julie’s poor cousin, and looked up to her glamorous friend, but for Julie the reality was much more the opposite.
She knew Lizzie was cleverer than she could be, and was also much more hard working. But she was not worldly wise the way that Julie was, she did not mix with boys nor did she have money for clothes or fashion. But she had such vitality: passion and commitment were at her core, she set herself to do things and did them. And, even though she was not classically beautiful, she had something, a real look. The pointy chin, slightly uneven teeth, dark hair framing dark challenging eyes that looked into your soul and gave you their total attention. And when she smiled it lit up her face so totally that you basked in its sun-like intensity.
But at the same time, there was an innocence and old fashioned naivety to Lizzie. Julie really loved her friend, loved doing things with her and, as she thought of it, expanding her friend’s horizons. But Julie also sensed she had a special responsibility to be careful with Lizzie and her vulnerabilities, that deep hole from the early death of her father; her fraught and difficult relationship with her mother.
So she had been determined to show her a good time and help her have fun. But she realised now, looking back, that in doing so, a lot of it had been about advancing herself, showing off this charming and witty friend who had such an ability to captivate others.
In encouraging her friend to come out with her she had been reckless about protecting her and safeguarding her. She had pushed Lizzie to come to the beach that day as much to show the interesting circles she moved in to Carl and his friends, and thus advance her own status, as to provide an opportunity for Lizzie to experience something new and exciting.
And her almost forcing Lizzie to come to the party had been more of the same, plus a desire to try some sexual intimacy with Carl, in a place free of parental restraint, due to the cover that her friend could provide. In the end, despite Carl trying it on, she had said No! She decided she did not much like him anyway, rich but hollow was the way she now thought about him.
She had never trusted Martin, Will or Dan, but had just played along with their sexual innuendos and nasty jokes, as they were Carl’s friends. She had never given serious consideration to the danger they might pose to her friend, and how, with her friend’s naivety and alcohol, what such boys might seek to do to her in this condition.
But then, having brought her friend to the party, and having watched her become intoxicated, she should have gone and brought her into her circle, found her some water for her to drink. She should have given her cover from those creeps. Instead she had chosen to ignore what she saw while she played her own games. Then when Lizzie vanished, and these men returned with their self-satisfied smirks she had not really challenged their version of events, she had not gone looking.
At a minimum she should have caught a taxi and gone looking for Lizzie, checked she was safe home. Then, when she found a devastated Lizzie the next day looking, for all the world, like the many other rape victims she had seen since, she had blocked out this awful possibility, instead choosing to feel hurt at her friend’s rejection of her.
It was only months later, when she saw her friend’s thin gaunt face, her swollen belly, her quiet desperation, that she had come to her senses. Then she had been filled with a combination of burning rage and deep shame, which had endured over the years undiminished.
She made a promise to herself, on that day, that she would both do all she could in the future to help her friend, on whatever terms that help was needed. At the same time she would get even with those bastards.
That night she had written her own memory of everything that Lizzie had told her and signed and dated it, then asked another friend, who she trusted, to countersign and date it too. She did not ask her friend to read this record, but just to witness this writing had been done at this time and place. Even then her very limited knowledge of the law suggested that a contemporaneous record may have value.
Previously her idea of a career had been to finish school, and perhaps get a job in fashion or something else glamorous, a lawyer or doctor was also a possibility but it always had her at its centre with an elegant image.
After that she knew that her career would go down one of two paths, either as an investigative journalist who uncovered and brought to light stories such as what happened to Lizzie, or a prosecuting lawyer who sought to convict and jail these sorts of people, nasty abusive creeps.
She became focused on her studies
to get top marks. Then she went to University doing a combined Arts-Law Degree, with a journalism major. At University she became an advocate for women’s rights, protection against violence, protection of girls on campus, protection of street girls, rape support and counselling services. By the time she left University she had talked to innumerable rape and domestic violence victims. She was already starting to make her name with hard hitting articles in the University Magazine “Honi Soit” about women’s rights.
One downside of her experience and passion was that she found herself very distrustful of men. Every story she heard amplified her belief that men were inherently bastards. Since that early relationship with Carl, which had not gone beyond some heavy petting, she had become totally distrustful of men and their motives. Many at University tried it on but she had such devastating repartee and withering scorn that most retreated from first encounters. For those who did not get the hint she turned nasty with complaints about harassment and more. She knew there were jokes about her sexuality, like “the butch bitch”, but she did not care.
On graduation, at the age of 22, she found herself with a job as an investigative reporter at the Sydney Morning Herald focusing on women’s issues. Women were a large and growing part of the readership, bringing this desire for equality and liberation. She interviewed many leading edge feminists in Australia and internationally.
She crusaded against the idea that pregnant women should be obliged to leave work. Lizzie on that day standing before her seven months pregnant and having just had her employment terminated was her vision for this. She campaigned against forced adoption and lack of support for teenage pregnancy, the same Lizzie fleeing first to Melbourne and then on from there was burnt in her mind to motivate this. She campaigned for protection for street girls against violence, abuse and intimidation, Lizzie the call girl was her motivation for this.
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