by Isla Evans
Your loving mother.
Kate stared at the letter, hoping fervently that poor Bessie had been a dog or a cat and not one of Jean Tapscott’s numerous daughters. The threatening tone of the last sentence was also slightly disturbing. I do not want to be forced to contact the Padre again. She tried matching it to the sepia portrait that had sat by her father’s bed, with her grandmother staring balefully at the world with tight, narrow features, and found that it fitted. Perhaps it was just as well the woman had not lived long enough to pen some of these missives to either her or Angie. Therapy had not been widely available during her childhood.
Kate laid the two letters down and fanned out the other papers across the coffee table, searching for more of the same. But it seemed that her uncle had only kept these two letters from his mother. Could these possibly have been the pick of the bunch? But, more to the question, where had he been? Twice his mother mentioned him ‘getting out’ from somewhere, which, if Kate didn’t know her uncle better, she would have thought suggested incarceration. But that was patently ridiculous.
Leaning forward, Kate collected a handful of documents and dropped them in her lap before going through them. These were mainly certificates. Angie’s birth, her baptism, various school certificates and a marriage certificate. Between Francis Vivian Painter (b. 1935) and Sophie Marie Wharton (b. 1940) on 3 March 1958. Kate’s eyes flew over the bride’s name one more time and then she scrabbled by her side for her grandmother’s letters again. She quickly scanned through the second, pausing when she came to Thomas and his engagement – to Sophie Wharton. It had to be the same girl. So it seemed that Sophie had been engaged to somebody else before she had married Uncle Frank. And that someone had been well known to the family; perhaps, judging by his seeming familiarity to Auntie Val, even a relative.
Progress at last. Kate smiled with satisfaction and, putting the pile of certificates by her side, took another handful. These were odds and ends. Small white-framed photos of smiling men in shades of grey, broad-hatted women, one of a baby she thought might be Angie propped against a wooden walker and smiling broadly at the camera. Kate flipped through them and laid them aside. But the last one caught her attention. It showed her uncle as a young man, wearing some type of coveralls and standing in front of a high concreted wall, the top of which was made up of circles of barbed wire.
Kate stared at it, her smile now gone. It had to be an institution of some type, most likely a jail. Which, together with the letters, meant that her uncle most probably had been incarcerated. This was what he needed to ‘get out’ from, and this was where his mother had written, receiving no answers. Until she had been forced to write to the padre. And this was why Kate’s own father, James, had returned from Mt Isa to help out. It was almost unbelievable. Uncle Frank just didn’t seem the type. Certainly he had been a bit of a reprobate at times, but jail?
Angie was going to be devastated. Still holding the small, incriminating photo, Kate leant back and stared up at the ceiling, imagining how it must have been for Frank’s parents, and for his brother James. A son, a brother, a criminal. But maybe the crime had been relatively minor. Like running over poor Bessie, or one of her sisters. Maybe he had even been innocent. People were wrongfully convicted, after all. Sometimes. Whatever it was, it can’t have been too bad because soon afterwards Sophie Wharton had thrown over her fiancé and married Francis Painter instead.
Kate sat up again and, after one last look, dropped the photo and then pushed everything off her lap onto the couch. Then she set to the remainder of the papers with a vengeance. Somewhere there had to be an explanation, maybe even a summary of charges or a sentencing report. But after twenty minutes of searching Kate was forced to admit defeat. There were other photos and letters, some scribbled notes, a couple of postcards, even a valentine’s card from someone called Margie – but there was nothing else that referred to Frank’s sojourn inside, or even to Sophie Wharton.
Carefully, Kate replaced all of the papers into the shoebox and, pressing the split edge in, fitted the lid back on tightly. It looked like it had never been touched. But she reasoned that it was even more important to continue the research now, for Angie’s sake. Find some answers. Kate got up and crossed over to the armchair, picking up the dull-gold envelope containing her father’s certificates and then sliding them out. As expected there was her own birth certificate and her mother’s death certificate, together with a certificate registering the business name of Painter Bros. Fruit & Vegetables, a roadworthy certificate for a long-deceased Bedford truck, and her parents’ marriage certificate. This document was considerably less decorative than her uncle’s, but Kate read the names with even greater fondness: James Edward Painter (b. 1934) and Rose Anne Kimber (b. 1938), joined together in matrimony on 21 January 1960.
It took Kate a few moments of staring at the certificate with the niggling feeling that something wasn’t quite right before the penny dropped. Her parents were married on 21 January 1960, and she was born on 30 April the same year. Three months, one week and two days later. It was a shotgun wedding, and a rather sluggish shotgun at that.
Kate sat down on the armrest of the chair slowly. She had been brought up on stories of love at first sight at a local dance, and a joyful white wedding, and how they had hoped for a baby as soon as possible. Well, it seemed that the latter had certainly come true. No wonder they had married at the courthouse. After procrastinating for several months, there had clearly been no time for anything else. And no wonder her mother was clutching those enormous lilies, they hid the swelling evidence of their inability to contain themselves. Kate read the certificate through again, but the date remained the same.
She slid all the certificates back into the envelope while she tried to work out why she was so upset. It wasn’t like she and Sam hadn’t jumped the gun with their own premarital activities. Or even that those particular premarital activities were the first she had ever indulged in. But the issue wasn’t really about her parents having hit third base prior to their marriage, or even a reluctance to marry at all, it was more about the wondrous tales her father had told her while she was growing up. Where her mother was like a beautiful princess whom Kate had always imagined in Cinderella-at-the-ball type clothes: silver-edged, snow-white chiffon floating as she danced. And then there was her father, young and handsome, and determined to woo her and win her despite the odds.
How did one reconcile that with the image of the two of them, huffing and panting in the back seat of some old car, with the chiffon dress hiked up and the windows cloudy with the rapidity of their breathing? It was probably that Bedford truck, which wouldn’t even have had a back seat. Just an ancient suspension being put to the test.
So if he was able to turn that story into something that sounded wonderfully romantic, then what else might have received similar treatment? What else wasn’t quite what it seemed? What else, of him, had she never known? And, worst of all, how was she ever to find the answers now that he wasn’t even around to ask?
TWELVE
Dear Dad, remember when I was trying to save up for those rollerskates and I asked you to buy them for me and I’d pay them off? But you just gave me this big lecture on ‘deferred gratification’. Well, that seems a little hypocritical now, doesn’t it? I must admit when I found out yesterday I was pretty floored, but I’ve slept on it now and it doesn’t seem quite so earth-shaking. Maybe it just makes you both seem more human. Fallible. Although I do find it hard to imagine you being so rash – maybe my mother was more the impulsive type and you went along for the ride (no pun intended). And what’s all this with Uncle Frank being in jail? Then pinching someone else’s fiancée? Talk about the swinging sixties. And what about your mother? If she got so nasty over a few missed letters, what did she have to say about all these shenanigans?
PS: I’m thinking now that I might write the book as an investigation. Maybe with flashes of Sophie breaking through as the story unfolds. It’s less personal then, and I won’t
feel as much like a usurper. That sounds better, doesn’t it?
‘I’m off now.’ Angie picked up her handbag from the dining room table. ‘Any ideas what you’d like for dinner tonight?’
Kate shrugged. ‘Whatever. I’m not fussed.’
‘Okay then. How about Indian? I love pappadams!’ Angie put up a hand. ‘And before you start going on about my diet, it’s under control. See, it’s not so much what you eat, as the portion sizes. That’s the key.’
‘Sounds fair.’
Angie looked at her cousin searchingly. ‘Are you okay? You were very quiet last night and you don’t seem much better this morning.’
‘I’m fine.’ Kate wrapped her hands around her coffee mug and tried to appear relatively normal. ‘I’m just a bit frustrated, that’s all.’
‘And here was I thinking Friday night put paid to that little problem.’
‘Ha, ha. I meant with the writing.’
Angie grinned. ‘I know. Just trying to inject a little levity. Tell you what, I’ll bring heaps of Indian food home with me and we’ll talk about your writer’s block all evening. Come up with some solutions. How does that sound?’
‘That’s fine,’ said Kate quickly. ‘I’m sure I’ll think of something today.’
‘Okay, I’ll keep my fingers crossed.’ Angie held up two crossed fingers as a demonstration. ‘But I’ll still bring lots of Indian home just in case.’
Kate mustered up a smile as she nodded. Then she watched her cousin bounce out of the room and, shortly afterwards, the front door slammed behind her. It was true that she had been rather quiet the previous evening but that had not been so much to do with what she had discovered, as the inability to discuss it. As long as she could remember, they had discussed anything and everything. No secrets. So to hoard these incredible nuggets of information, and not be able to show them, was very difficult.
Kate finished her coffee and went upstairs to shower and dress before it was time to head next door. It was now even more important that she get some answers from Mrs Jarvis’s poker cronies because, instead of answers, all she had succeeded so far was to collect more questions. Like who was Thomas? Why had Sophie Wharton thrown him over? When, where and why had her uncle spent time in jail? Had her parents even known each other before their little roll in the hay, or the vegetable patch, or the Bedford? Had there even been any love at first sight involved?
Forty minutes later Kate was freshly showered and dressed casually in khaki-green pedal pushers and a sleeveless shirt. After a warm night the temperature outside was already in the low thirties, promising a very hot, humid day. Kate shut the door behind her and walked along the edge of the driveway over to the next door unit. The front door was already open and she could see through the screen door, which was made up of swirls of white iron-work and matching mesh. She pressed the door-bell and listened to the sounds of Edelweiss play out from within. Footsteps could be heard approaching and the screen door swung open.
‘Kate! Come in! I was hoping you hadn’t forgotten, dear.’
‘Not a chance.’ Kate smiled at Mrs Jarvis and moved inside. The unit was similar to Angie’s, with a tiled entry and carpeted stairs leading up to the second floor. The décor, however, was very different. Where Angie had opted for relatively neutral tones, Mrs Jarvis had gone with the predominant theme of orange. A lot of it. A burnt-orange couch with brown vinyl armrests, a sturdy orange-tiled coffee table, mission-brown curtains flecked with orange, a walnut standard lamp with an orange shade. Even the three ducks flying diagonally up the wall had bright orange beaks.
Kate followed her host into the dining room, where an extension table surrounded by many chairs filled the room and a low overhead light glowed through orange glass, casting fiery highlights even into the corners that had managed to escape the colour scheme. Three elderly ladies were already sitting at the table and they looked up curiously as Kate entered.
‘And here’s the reason I asked you three to come early,’ announced Mrs Jarvis, waving a hand proudly towards Kate. ‘This is Kate. She is A Writer.’
‘Well, sort of,’ said Kate, feeling awkward under their impressed gaze.
‘And she has some questions to ask you. For her Next Book.’
‘Are we going to be interviewed?’ asked one of the ladies, who was wearing a transparent lime-green visor.
‘And is there any payment involved?’ asked another, much shorter one, clearly sizing Kate up for potential profit.
‘I’m afraid not,’ replied Kate apologetically. ‘But I’ll definitely put you in the acknowledgements.’
The short mercenary one looked unimpressed with this offer. She pursed her lips. ‘What about a free book?’
‘Just ignore her,’ suggested the third lady, who appeared younger than the others, but that may have been because she was also the plumpest, and her wrinkles were more padded.
‘Kate’s writing a book about a lady who used to live in the area,’ explained Mrs Jarvis in a proprietorial tone. ‘And she needs people who lived here way back then.’
‘Well, that’s us!’ laughed the plump lady. ‘Way back then is our speciality!’
‘What was her name?’ asked the one with the visor curiously.
‘Sophie Wharton.’ Kate held her breath, but all three looked back at her blankly and then at each other.
‘Does that ring a bell with either of you two?’ asked the plump one of the others. ‘You’ve both been here since birth, whereas I only came as a teenager.’
The mercenary one frowned pensively. ‘Well, do you know what year she was born?’
‘Nineteen forty,’ replied Kate.
‘Hmm, I don’t recall her. Is that her married name?’
‘No, she married a man called Frank Painter.’
‘Frank Painter!’
While Sophie’s name had brought not a flicker of recognition, Frank’s met with a variety of reactions. The plump lady started laughing, one hand across her ample bosom, while the visored one turned to the mercenary one with a grin. ‘Well, Bev, do you know Frank Painter?’
‘I know of him.’
‘That’s terrific!’ Kate smiled with relief. ‘Then you’d have also known his wife, Sophie?’
The plump one nudged her mercenary companion. ‘Not as well as she knew Frank. Would that be right, Bev?’
Bev pursed her lips. ‘She was a bit before my time.’
‘Just as well!’ chortled the visored lady, wiping her eyes.
Kate looked from one to the other and realisation dawned. With it came the unwelcome visualisation of her much-loved uncle and this short, rather sharp-featured, fiscally-focused elderly lady. She held her grimace within and tried to look sympathetic. ‘I gather you, um, saw him sometimes.’
‘Sometimes,’ she answered reluctantly, steadfastly ignoring the amusement on either side of her. She pursed her lips again. ‘But that was a while after his wife left.’
‘So you never knew her then?’
‘Not really. Saw her around of course, but that was about it. So it’s Sophie Painter you’re writing about then.’ She paused, thinking. ‘She wasn’t raised here, you know. Only came when she married Frank.’ She turned to the visored lady. ‘Do you remember the scandal, Margie?’
‘Margie?’ repeated Kate, staring at the visored lady with surprise as she recalled the Valentine’s Day card that had been tucked in her uncle’s shoebox. Surely it couldn’t be this Margie?
The lady in question smiled at her and then turned back to Bev. ‘Didn’t she run off with an old boyfriend?’ She looked around the table as she continued. ‘Left her baby behind as well. A little girl.’
‘How terrible!’ said Mrs Jarvis, clearly shocked.
‘And was never heard from again,’ added Bev rather melodramatically.
Margie took off her visor and polished the perspex with her sleeve. ‘Poor Frank.’
Mrs Jarvis frowned. ‘Are you sure it wasn’t a case of . . . Foul Play?’
‘Or may
be even vampires?’ asked the plump lady, with a sidelong look at Mrs Jarvis. ‘That seems fairly logical.’
‘Nonbeliever,’ scoffed Mrs Jarvis with a smile. ‘You wait. You just wait.’
‘I went to primary school with Frank,’ said Bev, staring off towards the orange island bench. ‘Lord, he was a handful then. A real little daredevil.’
Margie refitted her visor and smiled. ‘Yes, I remember. I was in the next grade up with his brother. What was his name?’
Kate’s breath caught. Although she wasn’t sure why she was so surprised. If these ladies knew Frank, then it was only to be expected that they also knew her own father.
‘James,’ said Bev with certainty. ‘James Painter. Jimmy. He went out with my sister a few times. But then he went up to Mt Isa to work in the mines and she married Fred Armstrong instead. I don’t think they were serious.’
‘Then why did she marry him?’ asked the plump lady, looking confused.
Bev sighed crossly. ‘Not Fred, you numbskull. James.’
‘I think he died last year.’ Margie turned to Bev. ‘Did you tell me that?’
Bev frowned pensively. ‘Mmm. I think there was some sort of tragedy about it. Can’t quite remember.’ She paused for a moment. ‘He married the Kimber girl.’
‘You’re right. So he did.’
Kate felt her throat constrict and she coughed to clear it. ‘Um, what was she like? Rose Kimber, I mean.’
‘Good lord,’ said Margie flatly.
‘They say never speak ill of the dead,’ added Bev, pursing her lips piously.
Kate frowned, trying to make sense of this. Edelweiss suddenly sounded out from the front door and Mrs Jarvis hurried off. The plump lady picked up a pack of cards and started shuffling them with an anticipatory smile.
‘Horrid woman,’ said Margie with a grimace. ‘Couldn’t stand her.’