He wasn’t going anywhere near that one. ‘Hearsay. Never stand up in court.’
What had Jim Marks said? Jerry-building. Bribery…
Finally, she got hold of Woodcock’s number and phoned him. Only, at the last minute, to put the phone down before anyone could answer. What was the point? He’d deny everything; very likely laugh at her.
Instead she contacted the best security firm in the area and instructed them to send guards to patrol all the company’s major sites.
Harley Woodcock, she thought. He’d got away with it this time but she wouldn’t forget. And one day, she promised herself, there’d be a reckoning.
Needing some emotional support and because she thought he ought to know, she phoned Hal and told him what had happened.
‘I’ll come up this weekend.’
‘That would be wonderful. But don’t you have a clinic for your constituents?’
‘I’ll cancel it. You’re my wife,’ he said. ‘You’re more important than any constituents.’
It was good to hear him say so but that wasn’t why he’d been elected.
‘Just this once, then.’
He came, and it was lovely. After that he came once a month.
He was a brave yachtsman and had been a brave soldier, yet in some ways he was touchingly naive. Shannon knew next to nothing about politics but assumed that, like business, it was an occupation requiring pragmatism rather than idealism, so she was interested to find out how he would react to the realities of political life.
During his first visits he didn’t say much but, as the months went by, she saw that his enthusiasm was growing as brittle as biscuits. Nevertheless it wasn’t until halfway through his first year that he was willing to admit things were not as he had expected. Or at least had hoped.
‘It’s the endless political manoeuvring, the fact that most members couldn’t care less about voters’ concerns but only their own careers.’
What did you expect? Shannon thought. But said nothing.
‘At election time they pretend to care,’ he said, ‘but for the rest of the time they don’t give a damn.’
‘And the public servants?’
‘They’re the worst of the lot,’ he said.
Six months later he said there’d been some talk of his being made an assistant minister but nothing had come of it, and Shannon thought that secretly he was glad. To have any sort of ministerial role would be to accept responsibility for the shambles that was government and that he didn’t want. ‘I’ll look after my constituents,’ he said. ‘That’ll do me.’
Andrew
Andrew had turned out to be exceptionally good at maths and was of a factual disposition, quick-witted and good at making money. He’d had three paper rounds by the time he was fourteen, two of which he’d hired out to other boys, keeping half their earnings. The third he’d kept for himself.
By the time Andrew was seventeen he knew exactly what he planned to do with his life and made no secret of it. He still kept most of his opinions to himself but when it came to his future he was a man of conviction: he would go to university and then into business, the family business for preference. Given the opportunity, that was a tree he intended to climb to the very top.
He got hold of his aunt. Not the easiest of tasks: she always seemed to be up to her ears in some project or other. That, though, was what he found exciting: the potential to become involved, like her, in the expansion of a business, to develop it to the limits of his strength, to find fulfilment.
‘You want to be rich,’ Shannon said. ‘Rich and powerful.’
Yes, because without wealth and power you couldn’t do anything. But not as ends in themselves. It was so hard to find the words, to capture the challenge of limitless growth taking shape inside him, becoming enormous, spanning the world, his world. He would have discussed it with his mum, but she had an artist’s view of things and wouldn’t have understood.
Aunt Shannon understood very well. ‘We’re cut from the same cloth,’ she said. ‘So listen to me, because I know what I’m talking about. It’s a tough road you’ve chosen. Without ambition you’ll never get anywhere, but it can be a hard taskmaster. It takes you over, so you end up being the slave of a vision you can’t even define. But, if that is your vision, you’ll have to follow it because it’ll give you no rest until you do.’
Jess
Jess was thankful she’d had Andrew to herself while he was growing up. She even came to believe that Brandon’s departure had been a blessing because, had he stayed, she would have fought to keep Andrew out of his orbit, to shut him out of what she thought was her own territory. That might have been even more unpleasant than what had happened.
As for the work… That was a challenge, too, but she gloried in it and in the confidence that came from knowing that the restaurant, her restaurant, was already the coast’s premier destination for those who valued good food.
DECEMBER 1970–FEBRUARY 1971
Lydia
Lydia had been married fifteen months and things hadn’t worked out at all as she’d expected.
First of all there was Logan. She hadn’t planned on having a baby so soon but something had gone wrong with the contraception gadget the doctor had provided, or perhaps she’d forgotten to use it – Lyle could be so imperious, so demanding – but whatever the reason there he was, a squalling bundle of trouble now two months old.
The physical process of giving birth had been more of an ordeal than she could have imagined and she was in no hurry to experience another one. Maybe down the track, but not now. Most definitely not now. Other things apart, a small baby was such an inconvenience, even with the nanny she’d insisted on having, but there was no help for it.
It wouldn’t have done to say such things in public, of course. She told her Foreign Office friends how delighted they’d been at Logan’s early arrival and what a joy he was, an opinion that her tender nipples didn’t share.
Something else that was a problem: the posting to Paris or Madrid had not materialised, and although Lyle was still saying any day now it hadn’t happened.
It wasn’t good enough. As when she’d been in netball and hockey teams, winning was what mattered, and Lydia was in this game to win. Lyle had been brought up to be a gentleman. Some gentlemen were as tough as teak but others, like Lyle, had grown up believing that pushing themselves forwards was not what gentlemen did. Instead they were unfailingly polite and waited like upper class serfs for others to decide their futures for them. Well, that had never been Lydia’s way. She had enough push to level a mountain, if needs be, and was proud of it.
‘I’m an Aussie,’ she told her reflection in the bathroom mirror. ‘And Aussies don’t lie down. Grandpa Maitland made a fortune because he was tough; Grandpa Harcourt lost his land in the Depression but was tough enough to survive anyway. And Mother’s tough, too, and making a fortune because of it. Now it’s my turn,’ she said. ‘And I’ll be the toughest of them all.’
Father-in-law George Curtis was not a minister or, according to his son, ever likely to be, but he represented the government in a key marginal seat and was therefore an important man. He also knew other important men and that was why Lydia went to see him on a cold winter Sunday with frost sparkling on the hedgerows and lawns in the district where George Curtis lived.
She went alone, which was the way she’d planned it, excusing Lyle’s absence by pretending that something unexpected had come up and he’d been called into the office to handle it.
She had learnt how to be attractive to men and knew how to dress for maximum effect. Now she’d set her sights on the foreign secretary, no less, and thought George would be the best way of getting to him. The first step was to impress George, not as his daughter-in-law, but as a woman.
It wasn’t hard, given widower George’s susceptibility to good-looking and highly presentable young women. What was more, the stars were aligned in her favour, because an election was pending in the new year and ministers
were being trotted out to strengthen the party’s support in marginal constituencies. The foreign secretary would be speaking on George’s behalf in the second week of January.
‘You should have a reception for him,’ Lydia said.
‘I haven’t gone in for that sort of thing since my wife died,’ George said.
‘He’s one of the most important members of the government,’ she said. ‘Of course we must put on a do for him.’
One thing Lydia knew: important men liked to be flattered. ‘You need a hostess? I’ll be happy to help out.’
Not simply happy; it was what she’d been planning all along.
It worked, too; she made it her business to wow the minister: very gently, to be sure, but she wowed him all the same, and made sure husband Lyle did as well.
‘Let him know you’re fluent in both French and Spanish,’ she instructed him, ‘and that you’re up to speed with the culture of both countries.’
He looked uncomfortable.
‘For heaven’s sake,’ she said. ‘You look like a lily on a dustbin. That won’t get you anywhere. You want to get ahead, make sure he knows how good you are. Tell him, if you have to, and keep on telling him.’
Orchestrated by Lydia, the minister spared Lyle five minutes, then five minutes more.
Six weeks later Lyle’s posting came through. To Madrid.
‘You beauty!’ Lydia said.
SEPTEMBER 1971
Shannon
A week before their silver wedding anniversary, Hal asked Shannon whether there was anything special she wanted to do to mark the occasion.
‘Let’s take a week off,’ she said.
‘And do what?’
‘Waterfall Bay,’ she said. ‘You remember? We went there on our honeymoon. I remember thinking it had to be one of the most beautiful places on earth.’
‘That was because of me, girl,’ Hal said.
‘Because of us,’ Shannon said. ‘But it would be good to go there again, wouldn’t it?’
‘Sailing up the coast,’ Hal said. ‘It’s a while since we’ve done that.’
Time had tightened its grip on them as the years passed. They were both busy and never wanted to be anything else, but sometimes, in the middle of yet another meeting, Shannon found herself wondering whether they weren’t missing out on what mattered in life.
‘Waterfall Bay,’ she said. ‘How many times have we said we must go back there? I think we should stop talking about it and just go.’
Let them live a little while they could.
Morning Star was a thirty-foot sloop they’d had for six years. They’d never been able to use her as much as they’d planned, although Shannon made it a point of honour to take her out once or twice every month.
These were holy moments in Shannon’s life: a calm sea with the horizon an unbroken circle enclosing the world, the yacht the one point that promised security, a sense of being herself.
She watched the coast eagerly as they sailed north. She remembered lying with Hal, naked on the sand; she remembered, too, how the stream had fallen a hundred feet or more to a rock shelf, how it had gleamed like diamonds in the sunlight. She had thought it paradise, a place set aside by God.
Her heart was beating fast as she saw the bay opening up. Then, after all the breath-held expectation…
Waterfall Bay was gone.
Not in physical fact but in essence. In place of the serenity and peace that had brought coolness to her soul, there was the mutilation of bitumen, of takeaway stores and fluorescent lights, and rows of identical fibro houses. Where the dunes had been, concrete parking lots now edged the water.
An extensive down-market development had ripped the heart from the place that Shannon had compared with paradise.
To cap it all, according to the many signboards offering property for sale, the developer was Woodcock Construction.
Shannon had found out a lot more about Harley Woodcock since the episode at the school site. She had learnt he specialised in down-market building in places of outstanding natural beauty where the view enabled him to charge top dollar for inferior construction. Even flood plains were not exempt and if houses built in those areas ended up underwater, it wasn’t Woodcock’s problem.
She’d also heard more stories of alleged violence associated with his operation: although never with any evidence to back them up.
Fortunately, by working double and at times treble shifts, they’d been able to complete the school project on time and avoid penalties, but she’d never forgotten the man she was privately convinced had been behind the attack on her two mates.
She’d also not forgotten what had happened to a man she’d known called Kevin Garford, a foolish but decent man whom Woodcock had persuaded to guarantee the overdraft of one of Woodcock’s companies that, mysteriously, had later been milked of all its assets and gone broke, leaving Garford to honour his half-million-dollar guarantee to an unforgiving bank.
‘I’ve lost everything,’ he’d told her.
Indeed he had: home, business, family. Because Woodcock had cheated him. She remembered his stricken face. His tears. He was dead now, having crashed his car, some said deliberately, into the side of a speeding cattle transporter.
To Shannon, quite simply, Harley Woodcock was poison. Now he had desecrated what twenty-five years before she had regarded as one of the most beautiful places on earth.
‘Let’s get out of here,’ she said.
A sad anniversary, indeed, although they made up for it later, the self-steering vane earning its keep while husband and wife lay together on one of the cabin berths.
NOVEMBER 1971
Andrew
Jess’s son had grown up in a tangle of emotions that had turned him into an adult before he’d left childhood.
He knew he was special and had been born to special things. From the moment he’d been introduced to the study of maths in high school he’d recognised his destiny, as did others who knew they would be professional footballers or mountaineers or explorers, or become a name widely known across the land as an actor or politician or someone out of the rut of ordinary life.
Andrew, with a mind like an abacus, impatient to get into the world of business, would go to university to read commerce and accounting. There was wonder in the world of figures, as though they contained within them the secrets of the universe.
He passed his final high school year with top marks and won a place at university. But first he needed to find out something about the world, thinking that if he did this he might find out something about himself.
He sought and obtained permission from the university. He packed a bag and, with his mum’s blessing but no clear idea where he was heading, he flew out.
To Europe.
1972–73
Shannon
Thinking the way he did, Shannon had expected Hal to say he would not stand for re-election, but when the time came he renominated anyway.
‘You never know,’ he said, ‘things might improve.’
She saw he did not really believe it but would stay because to walk away would be to admit defeat and that was a word that, with the exception of Wavecrest, their first high-rise building, had never formed part of Hal’s vocabulary. Yet later he confided to her that he had accepted the re-nomination out of the sense of guilt that had never left him since the war. He had fought on the side of the angels against a barbarous enemy whose purpose had been to enslave those it conquered, yet he had discovered that to kill another human being demanded a price that not only destroyed innocence but left a lasting legacy of guilt. He had fought on the side of the angels, yes, but what angels? Too often it seemed to him he had been enslaved by the angel of death and that the only way he could purge his guilt was by giving what service he could to the community he had been elected to represent.
She saw how good he was at his job, selfless in the demands he made on himself, seeking out those most in need of his assistance, victims of poverty and injustice, and doing
what he could to help them. In humility he saw himself as the champion of the disadvantaged and dispossessed, a voice for those who otherwise would have had no voice.
Naive he might be but she knew he was a fine man, a good man, and she was proud to be his wife.
Lydia
She’d always known that Madrid was only a stepping stone, but this did not stop her making the most of it.
She had the knack of making friends in useful places, and it wasn’t long before she was on first-name terms with the first secretary’s wife. She treated Lady Sturgeon, the ambassador’s aristocratic and arrogant consort, with the deference that was expected, and scored points there, too.
Everyone said she was an asset to her husband’s career and so she was. Lyle had turned out to be a bit of a plodder, but Lady Sturgeon herself had said that a wife could make or mar any husband’s career and that she, Lydia Curtis, despite being an Australian – such a sweet smile! – was an asset to the entire diplomatic service.
The only disappointment in Lydia’s life, and that a minor one, was that things in the bedroom had turned out less exciting than she’d hoped. The thrilling experience on the fringes of Wimbledon Common had been rarely repeated, especially in recent years, but if sexual frustration was the price she had to pay for the advancement of what she had long come to think of as their career, so be it.
Her endeavours – all those functions when she had exercised her charms like an extra set of muscles, all those smiles so wide and so sincere that had left her night after night with an aching jaw – paid off when in 1973 Lyle was promoted to a post in Buenos Aires.
‘I’ve always wanted to see the Argentine,’ she told her friends.
Her wish was granted on 23 September, the same day that the formerly ousted Juan Perón was re-elected president of his country.
Andrew
When he got back to Australia, Andrew’s first impression was that everything was smaller than it had been when he left. Not that he regretted returning; on the contrary, he was happy to be home, so happy, and his adventure had filled him not only with memories but with an ongoing awareness of the world and of Australia’s place in it, a sense of scale he’d never had before.
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