by Tory Hayward
‘No.’ I didn’t want to sit down. I didn’t want to listen to him use his charm and charisma to talk me back into being a good daughter, one who did everything she was asked and made no demands in return.
‘I should have told you what happened with your mother years ago. But you were too young at the time, and then … and then it was so hard. I didn’t know how to bring it up and—’ He dipped his head and looked at his hands. ‘I was afraid it would do terrible damage to you.’
‘What, more damage than being abandoned?’ I’d meant to scoff, to hurl the words at him as an accusation, but they came out sad and empty.
Dad looked up. Tears shimmered in his eyes. ‘Your mother was bipolar, Merry. She had problems that were so deep, so fundamental, that at times, nobody could reach her.’
I felt like the earth had shifted on its axis. A giddy, sick feeling of losing my bearings. I took steps on stiff legs to the chair, set it upright and sat.
‘Bipolar.’
‘No one knew. We didn’t want anyone to know.’
‘But she was drunk, when the car crashed. When she—’
Dad nodded. ‘Yes. And off her medication. She refused to take it most of the time. It made her put on weight and she loathed to be fat. Was afraid I would leave her if she was fat.’ He snorted in a sad laugh. ‘I could never make her understand that I wouldn’t have cared if she was three hundred pounds. I should have. I failed her in so many ways.’
‘I wish you’d told me,’ I said quietly. ‘It explains so much.’
‘I was afraid you’d think you’d be bipolar too. That you’d believe you’d inherited it from her. That her story and her struggles would be yours. I thought that if you knew when you were young it would influence you. Make you see illness in yourself where there was none.’
‘I’m not bipolar, or anything else,’ I said.
‘It wouldn’t have mattered if you were,’ said Dad. ‘But I kept an eye on you, for any sign of a problem. There never was.’
‘You ran away though, didn’t you.’ There was a note of accusation in my voice, how could he have ‘kept an eye’ on me? He’d never been there.
‘It was easier to be away. You were happy with your life. Your school was delightful and you had Lib and a good team around you. I was just in the way, upsetting the routine, and the business took so much time.’ His words faded and he shifted on his chair, squirming at his own words, guilt and misery in his face.
His reasons were pathetic, but I kept quiet. No, he hadn’t been around when I was a kid. But I understood why now. It wasn’t that he was callous and uncaring about his wife or the situation at home, it was that he couldn’t handle it. He’d run away, spent all his time tracking down artefacts and expanding a business that had become a household name.
‘It must have been difficult living with her?’ I grasped for empathy and sympathy, trying to make him see that I understood.
‘On good days our marriage was everything I could have ever wished for. On bad days it was pure hell. We had some happy times, Merry. We loved each other and we loved you. Don’t think it was all terrible, because it wasn’t.’
‘I’m glad.’ I felt tired, drained. Like I’d been pulled tight and someone had just cut the rope. I switched off the phone. It was nice to be able to hide in the darkness, not see Dad’s face and know what he was thinking.
‘There’s a grate under Buddha against the wall there. I was trying to get to it before you came in.’
‘They won’t leave us here; we can’t get out for now, but they’ll be back.’
‘So we just wait?’
‘Yes.’ He spoke quietly. ‘We wait.’
Chapter Twenty-Six
Time moves slowly in the pitch-dark. I checked my phone regularly, watching the minutes drift past at a snail’s pace. It was close to midnight when, without warning, the heavy wood door slid open.
I scrambled up from where I’d been curled on the floor. Trying to get some sleep.
‘Forgive the delay,’ said Smith. ‘It has taken longer than I anticipated to verify the authenticity of the jewels.’
‘I don’t believe we’ve been introduced properly. Tell me who you really are, Mr Smith.’ I glared into the torch he shone in my face.
‘They call me Aba,’ he said. ‘It’s Burmese for father.’
‘Well, Aba, if you are happy with the jewels, then perhaps it’s time to take my father and me back to the airport and send us on our way.’
I saw his negative response in the slight shake of his head, but he said, ‘The airport is closed until the morning, and I have been a terrible host. We shall go to where you can freshen up, be safe and secure.’
‘Just let us go,’ said Dad wearily. ‘We can fend for ourselves.’
‘I cannot countenance that. Come along.’
We were ushered out of the magnificent golden temple and into the courtyard beyond. I glanced back at it over my shoulder; the building gleamed, even in the darkness. I was glad to leave it. Being in that pitch-black room with no way out was going to haunt me for a while.
I scanned the courtyard for a sign of Jack. But the place was deserted. Anyway, he couldn’t find us. If he had any sense he’d have headed back to his home, in England.
A movement in the shadows of one of the nearby temples caught my eye, and the attention of Aba and his accomplices. I caught my breath and had to force myself not to react as a figure stumbled out of the shadows.
Blond hair standing on end, bleary-eyed, scruffy, his jeans and a t-shirt dusty and travel-worn, he looked like a lost, stoned backpacker.
But it was Jack. He’d found me. A mixture of delight and apprehension tingled over me.
‘I need some help,’ he said. ‘I’ve go no money. Can I get a lift?’
Aba glanced at his companions. ‘Get him.’
I expected Jack to defend himself, to start swinging some punches and get us all out of there. I dropped my stance a little, so I could provide backup. But instead Jack held up his hands and said, ‘I don’t want any trouble. Fell asleep in one of the temples …’
The accomplices hesitated.
‘Oh, do give it a rest, Jack Jones,’ said Aba.
Jack grinned, cocky and arrogant. ‘I was wondering if you’d remember me.’
‘Forget the man who snatched the Nanjing jades from beneath my nose? Hardly.’ A sneer of dislike lifted Aba’s upper lip.
Jack’s grin turned smug. ‘Right time, right place. Early bird catches the worm, etcetera.’
‘What do you want with the jewels?’ Aba tipped his head back, his words dripping disdain. ‘I assume you are here for them.’
‘I’m here for something more precious than the jewels.’ Jack slid a glance at me and gave me a cheesy wink.
‘How mysterious. I can not even begin to guess what that might mean.’ Aba glanced at one of his accomplices, who scanned the darkness behind Jack. ‘Perhaps you are after the pagoda itself?’ He waved a hand vaguely in the direction of the golden temple. ‘Perhaps you are going to ship it off to some obscure Australian town.’
‘I take it you have a buyer, for the jewels? They’re yours now, you won this time. You could at least tell me how much you are getting. I would not know where to begin to put a price on them. How much did you get?’
Aba took a step towards Jack, shoulders back and a swagger in the way he stood. I thought I heard a sound, like a footfall and a chink of metal in the darkness behind one of the other smaller temples in the compound. Aba, focused only on Jack, missed it. But his accomplices exchanged a wary look. I caught my father’s eye and he gave the faintest nod, he’d heard it too.
‘Unlike you, I believe that these precious artefacts are not to be bought and sold to the highest bidder. They belong to the people. They are treasures for all humankind.’
‘So you mean to keep them for yourself?’ There was a taunting note in Jack’s voice, as if he was egging Aba on, distracting him and delaying him.
‘You are no
t listening, Jack Jones. Or is it that you do not understand anything that is altruistic, as you are motivated only by dollars? The jewels belong to the people. I will personally restore them to the Dalai Lama.’
‘Ah, I get it. Thereby earning yourself the favour of one of the most powerful religious leaders in the world.’
‘You just don’t get it, do you? I’m doing it because it is the right thing to do.’ Aba’s voice rang with self-righteousness.
‘Are you saying you kept me captive for over fifty days, threatened me and my daughter, dragged me all they way here to Myanmar, all because the jewels belong to the people?’ interrupted Dad, incredulity ringing in his tone.
Aba turned to Max Taylor, and Jack took the opportunity to look left and right. He raised his left hand as if giving someone a signal.
I realised I was holding my breath, and let it out. I knit my fingers together and wondered how Aba could not feel the mounting tension in the group. But he seemed oblivious. More intent on convincing everyone he was a man of the people, and that he wanted the jewels for purely honourable reasons.
I could see that he was completely unyielding. The man reeked of an agenda.
I realised, in a chillingly cold way, it was likely Aba was taking me and Dad to be killed. Or maybe not killed, but left in the jungle somewhere; it would have the same effect.
The distraction of being shut in the temple, and the heart-wrenching conversation about Mum, had shifted my focus from the reality of the situation.
I fixed my eyes on Jack, who shot me a look that seethed with a mix of worry and desire, triggering an answering thud of emotion that nearly made me sigh out loud.
I’d known Jack would find me, that no matter what happened, he’d be there for me. It hadn’t been a conscious thought. I’d quite honestly told myself that it was unlikely he’d be able to track me once we were separated. So much could go wrong.
But deep inside, I’d known he’d stop at nothing to get to me. That he’d protect me and make sure I was safe, at any cost to himself.
As I held his gaze, I unknit my fingers and pressed one hand to my mouth, holding back the mix of shock and euphoria.
The answer was obvious.
Jack Jones had fallen in love with me.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Jack nodded. Just the slightest inclination of his head, as if he’d read my mind and agreed with my thoughts.
He couldn’t have, of course. That’d be insane. The whole idea was insane.
What if it was true?
I thought of the night we’d spent together. We could do that, every day. If somehow it was true. If he loved me.
And I loved him.
I liked the idea. It sat warm in my heart and didn’t make me feel vulnerable and terrified.
‘Hey. Get back here.’ Aba jerked me from my thoughts. He’d been droning on at my father about Buddhism.
As his two accomplices disappeared into the darkness at a flat sprint, his attention had been dragged away from convincing everyone he had no agenda with the jewels.
A shuffle of movement came from the moonlit darkness, the chink of metal and then the chilling click of a safety clip being taken off a gun.
A man’s voice shouted a ringing command, in a language I could not understand. But if I had to guess it would’ve been, ‘Don’t move,’ or something similar, in Burmese.
With a crackle and a hiss, then a dull explosion, a flare, so bright I couldn’t look at it, went off above us, bathing the scene in a flat white light.
Men dressed in dark blue uniforms surrounded us, they could’ve been police or army, I didn’t know enough about the authorities in Myanmar to know.
The sight of them caused Aba to yelp in an unsettlingly high-pitched way and clutch his chest as if he was about to have a heart attack. Clearly there was a very guilty conscience beneath that hand.
Dad held up his hands in an ‘I surrender’ gesture, and I did the same. Not that anyone seemed to be taking much notice of us. The leader of the group of uniformed men ignored us completely, his attention was focused only on Aba.
Questions rattled back and forth and eventually he gestured to his men, who advanced on Aba, pulled him into a pair of handcuffs and marched him away. Aba protested loudly in a combination of English and Burmese. Everyone, according to him, had made a terrible, terrible mistake, didn’t understand and if they’d just wait he would explain.
‘We’ve been after him for nearly three years,’ said the group leader to Jack. His perfect English had a distinct American lilt. ‘You can put your hands down now.’ He glanced at me and Dad.
‘It’s over then?’ I asked. ‘We’re all safe?’ My legs felt strange, like I’d been standing for too long.
‘Yes.’ Jack watched me with a warm expression that made me forget about strange legs, and made my father glance from one to the other of us with a surprised cough. ‘It’s over.’
‘I have no idea what is going on,’ said Dad.
‘Well, Max, these fine Burmese policemen have just rescued you from one of the most notorious black marketeers in this corner of Asia.’ Jack had a hint of satisfaction in his voice.
‘I think black marketeer is a bit generous,’ the policeman said with a sneer of contempt. ‘He mostly dealt in selling badly faked artefacts to wealthy gullible tourists for massive amounts of money, and for a bit of variety he’d take a try at raiding temples, robbing graves and selling the proceeds to “collectors”, who didn’t know stolen goods when they saw them.’
‘Nice,’ I murmured.
The policeman shook his head. ‘No. I’m being unfair. He is an expert. But everything he did was tainted. And he ripped a lot of people off.’
‘He must have thought his ship had come in when he got hold of the jewels.’ There was a hint of mockery in Dad’s voice.
‘What will happen to him?’ Despite everything I detected a hint of concern in Jack’s words. Burmese prison would be hell. I wouldn’t wish that on anyone.
‘Technically, when he got hold of the jewels he received stolen goods.’
‘Received them from me—’ My relief ebbed away.
‘There are many in Yangon, and our capital city, Naypyidaw, who have a bone to pick with Aba,’ interrupted the policeman. ‘As we have no idea who he received the jewels from, there is little we can do to trace the culprits. Also, if the culprit is out of the country by the time we interview Aba tomorrow, then there is little we can do to her.’ He glanced at me, looking pleased.
‘How disappointing for you,’ said Dad sympathetically. ‘To not know the culprits.’
‘The airport opens at 6 am.’ The policeman gestured to a black beat-up car that had pulled up close by. ‘Come to my place, you can wait there.’
‘What will happen to the jewels?’ I had to know.
The policeman’s teeth showed white against his dark skin in the fading light of the flare. ‘They will go home. Back to Piprahwa where they belong. So pilgrims can make the journey to visit them, just as they have for hundreds of years.’
‘A delegation of monks has already left India to come and get them.’ He glanced at Jack. ‘But I’ll let Jack tell you. It’s he who arranged it all.’
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Twelve hours later Jack, Dad and me stood in the cool expanse of the Yangon International Airport, side by side staring at the departures board.
‘Where do you want to go, Lioness?’ asked Jack.
I looked sideways at him as the question hung in the air. There’d been no time to talk. No chance to say words about love and want and need.
I lifted my chin. Time to lay my cards on the table. ‘That depends on where you’re going.’
It was as if someone had cut a tight wire inside him. His shoulders dropped an inch as he relaxed.
‘Really?’ he asked, light in his eyes. ‘You want to come too?’
I nodded.
With that he slung an arm around my shoulder, tipped me backwards and kissed me,
gently but persistently.
It was only a slightly scandalised harrump coming from the direction of Dad that pulled us apart.
‘What on earth are you doing to my daughter?’ He sounded pained when we were upright again. Nobody made eye contact with anyone else for a moment.
I said the words that were in my heart. ‘He’s making me see that love is important, that it’s not something to be afraid of.’
‘Was I?’ Jack looked pleased.
‘Were you afraid of it?’ Dad ignored Jack, and reached out and grabbed my hand. Guilt and regret hovered in his eyes. ‘Because of me and your mother?’
‘Yes,’ I said honestly.
‘I’m so sorry. So very sorry. I’ve made so many mistakes.’
‘It was me too,’ I said. ‘Not just you. I didn’t have to see the world that way, people tried to tell me otherwise, like Lib, but I didn’t listen.’
Dad shook his head. ‘Some days I could barely look at you. You look so like her. Your hair. Those eyes. If only I hadn’t run away from it all.’
‘Will you come back now? Come home,’ I asked.
Dad’s eyes slid to the departures board.
I looked down at my hands. He didn’t want to stay. Nothing had changed.
‘I love you, Dad.’ I raised my eyes. ‘I do. You go and chase whatever it is you just thought of when you looked at those departures. It’s okay to go.’
‘No, no.’ His face creased into a frown. ‘I’ll go back to Sydney. We can—’ he paused. ‘Do things together. Bond.’
I thought of all the other times he’d come home. The chaos. The interference. The accounts department in tears. All of them. The archivist, who had catalogued our entire collection for forty years, having a screaming match with him over an ancient Papua New Guinean shawl and quitting.
‘Tell me when you are coming back, that’s all I ask,’ I said.
‘What?’ He looked confused.
‘I never ask you when you’ll be home. I never know from one day to the next where you are and when you’ll be back. How about we start the new father-daughter relationship with you checking in from time to time? And come home for New Year.’