I let his words hang in the big echoing room. Outside, a cloud moved across the sun, temporarily dimming the room, then passed over. A beam of sunshine fell on the back of the dog at my feet. She stirred, then settled back to sleep.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I didn’t know anything about it, and I might have been too young to change what happened. But I’m still sorry. For you. For Adam.”
He twisted his lips into half a smile. “Believe it or not, that actually means a lot to me.”
“If it’s any consolation, my mother might have behaved just as badly if you’d been a girl.”
“It’s no consolation. And I think you’re wrong.”
I considered this. “Yeah. Maybe I am.” Even though I hadn’t been the one to stand between Adam and Anton, I still felt sickeningly guilty. “But you know what? I’m really glad Adam had you, even if it was for a short time. I’m glad he got to have a mad love affair. I’m glad he got to taste some of that kind of life. He never stopped thinking of you. He had a huge print of the Falls hanging on the wall of his bedroom. It was the first thing he saw when he woke up in the morning, the last thing he saw before he went to sleep at night.”
This time a full smile came over Anton’s face. He was incredibly handsome, just the kind of gorgeous creature my brother deserved. “That’s lovely.”
“You’ve got to remember,” I continued, “towards the end, he was never sure if he would wake up. So, maybe you offered him comfort in other ways.”
“I’d like to think that.”
“Here,” I said, reaching into my handbag to retrieve the photograph of the two of them. “You should have this.”
He took it from me and gazed at it a long time, his eyes misting over. Then he looked up at me and said, “Will you talk to your mother and father about this?”
“My word, yes.”
* * *
Mum didn’t answer her phone, so poor Dad felt the full weight of my fury.
“You’ve got to understand,” he protested, when I drew breath for a moment, “your mother thought it was for the best.”
“And you? I never had you picked for a bigot.”
“I’m not. I’m just . . . your mum is very persuasive. In a way she was right. It’s hard to be different, and Adam had chosen maybe one of the most difficult ways to be different.”
“He didn’t choose, Dad. He was what he was. You and Mum, you broke two hearts. You denied two people happiness.”
“We were just focused on keeping Adam alive.”
“A life without love. It wasn’t your call to make. How did you stop Adam from contacting Anton?”
There was a brief silence. Dad was probably battling with his conscience, with his fear of what Mum would say. Then he said, simply, “He asked us to call Anton every day. We said we had, and that Anton had decided his illness was too much trouble. We knew the relationship had only been short—less than a year. We thought it was kinder that way, for both of them. You’ll forgive us, won’t you?”
I sighed in exasperation. “I am so angry with you both, right now. Tell Mum not to call me for a while.”
“Now, don’t be cruel. You know how she worries.”
“Tell her I lost my virginity on the third date. To a divorced man. Tell her I’m in love with him and there’s nothing she can do to stop me.” Then I hung up, my heart beating hard. I didn’t feel as good as I thought I would after unleashing my anger. I just felt sad.
* * *
Tomas kept me busy. Work kept me busy. Anton and Peyton invited us over for dinner one night, and Tomas revealed himself to be a soft touch when it came to dogs. It was just one more reason to love him. Without the yoke of my mother’s endless calls, I started to feel different. More me, somehow. I felt an incredible freedom, possibilities beckoning to me. Tomas talked of me coming to Denmark with him when he returned for six months, “just to see.” It no longer seemed like an outlandish idea, something that only an irresponsible person would do. Why shouldn’t I go to Denmark? Why shouldn’t I go “just to see” if Tomas and I were meant to be together?
Eight days after her operation, Lizzie Tait came home. The last time I’d visited her in hospital, she’d been sure she’d have at least a further week to stay, so it was a surprise when she knocked on my door.
“Lizzie!” I cried, folding her in a hug. “You’re back. How do you feel? Come in. Can I make you a cup of tea?”
“I’ve been back since last night,” she said. “They finally let me go, and my children have headed off to their various destinations. No, I won’t have a cup of tea. I’m going to enjoy my solitude. I just wanted to drop by and say thanks for visiting. It meant a lot to me.”
“It was my pleasure,” I said.
“Genevieve told me I got all mixed up one time, and talked to you as though you were her. Is that right?”
I chose my words carefully. “You were a bit high. It looked as though you were off with the fairies. I didn’t pay much mind to what you said.”
“Well, I’m sorry if I embarrassed you. I just—” She stopped, her eyes fixing on something over my shoulder in the kitchen. I turned to see what she was looking at. It was the sketch of Violet Armstrong, which I’d stuck to the fridge.
“Where did you . . .” She trailed off, pushing past me. She moved into the kitchen and stood, frozen to the spot, in front of the picture. Her face was pale, but I couldn’t tell if that was from seeing the picture or from her stay in hospital.
“Are you all right?” I asked.
“Where did you get that?”
“It’s a long story. Is everything okay? You look as though you’ve seen a ghost.”
“That woman,” she said, pointing at the portrait. “That’s my mother.”
Cold electricity ran through me. “Your mother?” And then realization dawned. “Oh, God, Lizzie. I know who your father is.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
1926
“Flora?” Tony moved closer with the lantern.
Reality warped. She stood in a house of mirrors. “He’s so cold,” she said.
“Oh my God,” Tony said, then raced to the door, calling, “Sweetie! Sweetie! Get down here!”
“We need to get him somewhere warm,” Flora said.
“No. Flora. He’s—”
“The kitchen. That stove will still be burning. If we can just get him somewhere warm.”
“Florrie. Florrie. He’s dead.”
“No, he’s just cold.” She put her ear to his chest and listened for a heartbeat, but her own pulse was deafening her.
Sweetie appeared at the door. “What’s going on?” Then he saw the scene within and drew in his breath sharply.
Flora turned. Why were they not acting? Why were they standing around gasping? “I said, Get him to the kitchen!” she shrieked.
“It won’t make any—”
“Please, Tony, please.”
Tony looked at Sweetie, and Sweetie back at Tony, and at once they seemed to decide they would do this, if just to calm her down. Tony scooped Sam up in his arms and Sweetie grabbed his legs.
“Be gentle with him,” Flora said, following them out of the room and downstairs. “He bruises easily.”
Neither of the men said a word. Down the stairs, then along the corridor to the empty kitchen.
“Put him by the stove,” Flora said, going to the woodpile and seizing an armful of extra logs. She opened the stove door and threw them in, watching her own hands move as though everything were normal, when she knew, deep down, that nothing was normal.
Sam lay on the stone floor in front of the stove. Tony and Sweetie stood back, arms folded. Flora kneeled next to Sam, framing his face in her hands. “Sam,” she said. “Sam, you have to wake up now.”
Nothing. But his warmth was coming back. Wasn’t it? He was just cold, that was all. Cold and sleeping.
“Sam?” she said again, and her own voice frightened her because an edge of hysteria touched it. Beyond that edge was a sp
inning void that she couldn’t allow herself to fall into. She gently slapped his face. “Please, Sam. Please.”
Tony knelt next to her, took her hand, and placed it on Sam’s ribs. She tried to pull her hand away, but he held it there hard. Moments passed in horrified silence.
Sam’s chest wasn’t moving. No breaths in or out.
“He’s not breathing,” Flora said.
“He’s dead,” Tony replied.
“No, he’s just not—”
“Yes. Yes, Flora. He’s dead.”
Flora pulled her hand from Tony’s grasp and fell on Sam, an animal howl escaping her lungs. He seemed so small beneath her, like a child. She could barely cry, could only say, “No, no, no,” over and over. Behind her, Tony and Sweetie lit cigarettes and discussed what to do next, as dispassionately as if it were a business deal. They kept saying “the body” and Flora thought this might make her scream and never stop. Speaking in whispers that were not quiet enough, as men did, they said it over and over. “We can’t have the body simply lying in a room here.” “If we put the body in the bathing pool, then it might appear to be a drowning.” “But when they examine the body they’ll find no water in the lungs.” And so on. All the while Flora, locked in the grim prison of her mind, unable to comprehend anything since she discovered the poor, pale remains, shivered against the icy breeze that licked through the open door and stalked the tall eucalypts that lined the dark valley.
“If the old man gets wind of this,” Tony said, punctuating his observation with a short puff of his cigarette, “he’ll slam that bank vault shut and Flora here won’t get a thing.”
She wanted to say she didn’t care about the money, that death had never seemed so vast and present and final than in this moment, standing by the remains of a real person who only yesterday breathed and cried. Her lips moved, but no sound emerged.
“What do you want to do, Florrie?” Sweetie asked her.
“No point speaking to her,” Tony said, shaking his head in the low light of the hurricane lamp. “She’s going to need a few belts of whiskey to snap her out of it. Look, the only thing we’re certain about is that people can’t know. It must seem to have been an accident. A fall while out walking the bush track.”
“In the snow? Will anybody believe that?”
“Ask yourself what this person’s reputation has been,” he said, and—oh, dear God—he pushed the toe of his patent-leather wing tip gently against the body so that it lifted then sagged back onto the floor. “Not really a solid citizen.” Tony seemed to realize Flora was listening and checked himself. “Apologies, Florrie. I’m just being practical. You have to trust us.”
Flora nodded, in shock, unable to make sense of the situation.
“How far shall we take it, then?” Sweetie asked.
“As close as we can get to the Falls.”
Sweetie nodded and reached down to lift the limp legs in his meaty hands. Flora moved to help, but Tony pushed her away, gently but firmly.
“You wait here. You’re no use to us as you are, and it’s murderously cold. I don’t want two bodies on my hands.” He flicked his cigarette butt out the door ahead of him and it arced into the snow, a brief ember soon extinguished.
Flora watched them go. They lumbered into the dark and the cold, until they became small figures at the boundary of the garden, then disappeared down the stone steps that led into the valley. Rain had begun to fall, fat drops from the swirling night sky landing silently on the snow. She stood at the door, her fingers turning numb, and watched for their return.
The rain would wash their heavy footprints out of the snow, along with the possible track of limp, dead arms that dragged between them. But the rain would also wash over the body, a wet shroud, a sodden burial. Flora put her head in her hands and wept, for her shock and her disappointment and her loss and for the horrors that were no doubt to come. Poor Violet, she said over and over in her mind. Poor, poor Violet.
And poor Sam. Will had been wrong: the withdrawal had killed him after all. If she’d known that was possible, she would never have let things get so bad. Her knees began to shake. She couldn’t stand here and wait in the cold. She needed to lie down. Flora took herself up the stairs to Sam’s room, closed the door, and lay on Sam’s bed, breathing deeply the smell of his hair and skin from his pillow, and sobbed and sobbed and sobbed.
* * *
Violet finished the last sandwich on the tray and poured herself another cup of tea. “It’s not really enough, is it?” she said. “Sandwiches for dinner.” She sat on the unmade bed opposite Clive’s. He had returned to bed as she commanded, and she was glad. His cough wasn’t any better.
“I’ll get the flying fox working tomorrow,” he said. “This rain will melt a lot of the snow and soon it will be business as usual. Eggs and fresh milk and bacon up from the valley.”
“As much as I love bacon,” Violet said, “I don’t think you’ll be well enough to be out working in the cold tomorrow. Besides, who knows what’s happening with the farms below?”
“Perhaps you’re right.”
“Just wait for Miss Zander to be up and about. She’ll restore order. Everyone’s reverted to savagery, despite what Lord Powell says. Look at us—dining in your bedroom, no less.”
He laughed, then tilted his head and examined her. “You seem very merry tonight, Violet.”
“I do feel a certain lightness of mood,” she replied.
“It’s nice to see you smile. Yesterday, you seemed quite hopeless.”
“Where there’s life there’s hope,” she said, lightly. “Here, you relax. I’ll take this tray up.”
“You should get some rest, too.”
“I’m fine. Being busy is good. I don’t dwell.” She offered him a tight smile, took the tray, and left.
She was up the stairs and almost at the kitchen when she smelled cigarette smoke. It could only be Tony or Sweetie, who had both started smoking in the past two days. She hesitated in the hallway. Why were they in the kitchen? She heard low voices, and inched closer to the door, her shoulder against the wall, to listen.
“Is Flora going to tell people the truth, though?” Sweetie was saying. She recognized his unctuous voice from his recent insults.
“Florrie’s a practical lass. If Father finds out Sam died from opium, there will be no money.”
Violet’s blood chilled.
“You want her money?”
“No. Never have. I want her name. Frankly, that’s the only thing about her that interests me. I’d rather it wasn’t tainted by the stupid death of a stupid boy who didn’t know when to stop.”
Violet tried to wrap her mind around what they were saying. Surely they were speaking hypothetically. Sam wasn’t dead. Sam was better. She had made him better. She leaned against the wall, unsure whether to march in and demand clarification, or keep listening for the explanation that undid it all, that made sense of the previous frightening conversation.
“So, if they find his body . . .”
“Will they? It’s down in the valley somewhere, a long way down. Past all the bush tracks. Nobody’s going to find it.”
“Oh, God,” she murmured. “Oh, God, no.” She hadn’t got the medicine to him in time. It was Flora’s fault! She should have let Violet in! She should have got him help earlier!
“So we’ve dumped his body and now he just disappears?”
“It’s better . . . easier that way. We’ll say he went out walking and just didn’t come back. Flora will be happier, too, in the long run, though she may not know it yet. She was very fond of the lad. I’ve never seen her so distressed.”
Violet began to shake, unable to control her limbs. The tea tray jumped from her hands and smashed onto the floor. The sound seemed deafening. Hurried footsteps. Tony and Sweetie.
“How much did you hear?” Tony began to shout.
“Is Sam dead?” she asked him. “Please, tell me he’s not dead.” Hot panic flooded her, made it hard to see or think.
>
“How much did she hear?” Sweetie said, grabbing her around the waist and half lifting, half dragging her into the kitchen.
Fear kicked at her heart. “I didn’t hear anything,” she protested. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Oh for God’s sake, she knows now, Tony.”
“I don’t know anything.”
Tony had his head in his hands. “What an enormous inconvenience.”
Sweetie hitched Violet up, over his shoulder. She pounded on his back, frightened of falling forward on her head, but even more terrified of what he might do to her. “I’ll take care of it,” he said. “You go be with Flora.”
“Don’t do anything—”
“Just go. I’ll take care of it.”
Then Violet was bouncing around over Sweetie’s shoulder, out the kitchen door and into the cold.
“Do you know how to shut up?” he said to her over his shoulder.
“I swear I won’t say anything.”
“I doubt that’s true. You were in love with him, weren’t you?”
“Is he really dead?”
“As a doornail, dollface.” Thump, thump, thump, over the snowy ground, while rain misted around them. The light of the hurricane lamp in the kitchen retreated into the distance. She heard a creak of metal on metal, and tried to turn her head to see where they were. He had one burly arm locked over the backs of her knees.
The flying fox. He had the door of the flying fox open and was trying to wrestle her into the tiny space.
“No!” she screamed.
“Shut up!” he shouted back, smacking her across the jaw and gathering her in his arms. He shoved her. Her limbs scraped over the metal edges around the door. She pushed back, but he pushed harder, his meaty arms no match for hers.
“Please!” she cried. “Please don’t do this.”
“Stay here till we figure out what to do with you.”
He thumped the door shut and she heard the rusty latch slam into place. Desperately, she hammered against the door, screaming until her throat was raw. It was a few minutes before she realized he was gone, back to the kitchen—to the end of the pulley.
Slowly, creaking on the frozen cables, the box began to move out over the valley.