Heart of the Cross

by Emily Madden

  ‘You forgot about them? Tom, they’re divorce papers!’

  He held up his hands, palms facing her. ‘I know. I apologise.’

  Rosie blinked. Tom had apologised only once to her in their time together and not long after he had tried to kill her. She was wary for a reason.

  He sighed. ‘Rosie, why don’t you sit? I think we need to talk about this.’ He tapped the envelope and she felt her stomach drop to her knees. Something told her that he hadn’t signed the papers. Not yet.

  ‘I’ll get us some coffee.’

  She returned a few moments later, and placed the cups on the table before sliding into the booth across from him.

  ‘Thanks,’ he said, taking a sip. ‘Not bad.’

  ‘It’s good coffee,’ Rosie added with a hint of defensiveness as she raised her own cup to her lips and regarded him with a great deal of suspicion. He was being pleasant. Making small talk. She didn’t trust him.

  He chuckled and shook his head. ‘I’m agreeing with you, Rosie.’ He paused and regarded her, his eyes roaming her face. ‘You look good, Rosie. The years have treated you well.’

  Ice skittled down her spine. ‘I am well. Jack and I are happy.’

  ‘I didn’t come here to make trouble. I don’t have a problem with you and Jack being together.’

  ‘You don’t?’ she said, unable to mask her astonishment.

  ‘I’m gathering that you want to marry.’

  Rosie felt her head spin. Were they really having this discussion? ‘Does that mean you’ve signed the divorce papers, Tom?’ she asked hopefully.

  ‘Not quite. I need something from you in return.’

  Her heart missed a beat. ‘What?’ she asked, not even sure she wanted to know. Had he found out about Rosie’s House? Did he want a cut? There was always going to be a risk that he would find out about it.

  ‘I want to see Jimmy.’

  ‘Jimmy?’

  ‘Our son. I want to see him. I want to have a relationship with him.’

  ‘Well … I must say, Tom, I’m surprised. For the most part, you didn’t seem all that interested in being a father. Or a husband, for that matter.’

  ‘I’m not going to deny it, Rosie. I married you for all the wrong reasons. I was quite fond of you, I will tell you that. And I certainly wasn’t cut out to be a father. The years on my own have given me a lot of time to reflect. When I first came to Australia … I’ll admit, it wasn’t what I expected. I was sold a dream and what I found was a nightmare. Jobs were there, but the lifestyle … it was too easy to fall into the trap of booze, women and gambling. It was everywhere and soon I was using all three to numb my pain and somehow, they became the norm. By the time you and Jimmy were ready to come here, I resented the fact that I had a wife and kid. Back then I thought you a hindrance, but I know now it was me that was the problem.

  ‘I’m not telling you this so you can feel sorry for me, but the work on the Snowy, it’s tough. My first few months were spent underground and when you come back up all you want to do is sleep. But after a while, it becomes routine, and as we worked on building that first dam, I felt as if I was rebuilding my life.’

  ‘You’re right. I don’t feel sorry for you.’ But she did, in some small way, appreciate his honesty. It was apparent by the staggering amount of debt that Tom had racked up over a three-year period, just how much trouble he’d been in. ‘So what has this all got to do with Jimmy?’

  ‘I want Jimmy to come stay with me.’

  ‘Absolutely not!’ she fired back immediately.

  ‘Rosie, I’ve been sober and off drugs for years now and I’ve not seen the inside of a pub since they hauled me out of the Piccadilly. I’m not the man I was when you and Jimmy first came here. The people I’m with down at the Snowy, they’re some of the hardest-working people I’ve met in my life.’

  He undoubtedly seemed clearer-eyed, she couldn’t deny that, but she couldn’t allow herself to be swayed. It was his charm that had got her in the first instance, but if Tom thought she was the same naïve girl he’d met all those years ago, he had another think coming.

  ‘I still don’t feel comfortable with sending Jimmy with you, for weeks on end to a place, God knows where. And …’

  ‘And what?’

  ‘I’ll be brutally honest, Tom, I’m not sure Jimmy would want to see you.’

  Tom sighed and stroked his beard. ‘I can’t say I’m surprised. But he is my son, and I want to get to know him. I want this, Rosie, just as much as you want this divorce.’

  ‘Are you saying that unless I allow you to see Jimmy, you won’t sign those papers? I don’t like being threatened. I’m done being threatened by you.’

  ‘It’s not blackmail, Rosie. Give me a chance. Let me meet with him, just once. You can even stay for the whole time.’

  She hated that she was even considering his request seriously.

  ‘Give it some thought, Rosie. I’m staying at a boarding house in Surry Hills.’ He produced a bit of paper and scribbled down a number. ‘I’m there until Sunday and then I head back. Either way, let me know before then what you decide.’ He slid the paper across the table then stood to leave. ‘Thank you for the coffee.’

  She sat there for the longest of whiles staring at the number. Thinking. Considering. He did seem different, but did he even deserve a second chance?

  The diner was filling up, and as she stood to help out, she noticed the envelope.

  Damn you, Tom.

  It was either an honest mistake, or his way of making a point. But knowing Tom, there was nothing honest about it. So why was she contemplating letting him see Jimmy?

  Because he was Jimmy’s father, and she didn’t want her son to resent her. It always had been Jimmy at the top of her concerns, so she would leave the decision to him.

  * * *

  Three days later, Rosie sat on the couch next to Jimmy as they waited for Tom to arrive.

  ‘It’s not too late to stop this,’ Jack whispered and Rosie hoped that Jimmy hadn’t heard.

  She squeezed his hand. ‘It’ll be okay.’

  He shot her a doubtful look. She knew Jack was not happy with Jimmy’s decision, but they both had agreed to ask him, certain the answer would be no.

  A knock on the door heralded Tom’s arrival and Rosie’s heart thumped into overdrive. She stood by Jimmy as Jack answered the door.

  ‘Jack,’ Tom offered his hand and Rosie held her breath as Jack stared at it for a while before finally shaking it.

  ‘Jimmy my boy.’ Tom opened his arms and waited. Jimmy looked at her, silently requesting permission. When she gave a small nod, Jimmy took a few tentative steps forward and stuck out his hand.

  ‘Hello, sir,’ he said hesitantly.

  ‘Sir?’ Tom laughed loudly as he shook Jimmy’s hand. ‘Come here, boy, I’m your father.’ With that Tom pulled him into a bear hug and Rosie watched as Jimmy’s stiff body relaxed a little, and only then did she allow herself to exhale.

  Her gaze skittered towards Jack’s stony expression. He didn’t trust Tom, and as much as she wanted to agree with him, there was a small part of her which was hopeful that Tom was being genuine.

  After spending the afternoon with Tom, it was Jimmy who asked to see his father again, drawn to Tom’s stories about the Snowy Mountains of rugged bushland and grass as far as the eye could see. With school holidays approaching, Jimmy wanted to know if he could go and stay with Tom in Tumut.

  ‘It’s just a week,’ Rosie reasoned. ‘Tom will pick him up and then drive him back at the end of it.’

  ‘I don’t like it, Rosie. This is the man who almost killed you,’ Jack countered.

  ‘I don’t forget that for one second, but he seems different now, doesn’t he?’ She really wanted to believe her own words.

  ‘Where does it end? First a week and then what?’

  ‘I’d like to get to know him.’

  Jimmy’s voice had them both turning around.

  ‘Jimmy, you were too youn
g to remember—’ Jack was halted by Jimmy holding up his hand.

  ‘I remember,’ he said solemnly, his eyes flicking from Jack to Rosie. ‘Jack, I know you’ve always been here for Mum and me, but sometimes I wonder about … him.’

  When Tom was first put away, Rosie waited for the right moment to tell Jimmy that his father would no longer be around. At first she wasn’t sure how to tell him or even how much to tell him. And then one day, she overheard a conversation between Jimmy and Jack.

  ‘Jack, will you ever leave us?’

  ‘Never in a million years, buddy.’

  ‘Good, because I really like that you’re kind to my mummy and that you take care of her.’

  ‘I love you both, Jimmy, and I’ll be here taking care of both of you forever.’

  ‘Promise, Jack?’

  ‘You betcha, Jimmy.’

  And that was it. Jimmy never asked about Tom again, and until now, Rosie hadn’t been sure just how much he remembered.

  ‘Let’s take it one step at a time,’ Rosie pleaded, grasping Jack’s hands and holding them against her chest. ‘I’ll tell Tom that we need to set some boundaries, and before he leaves with Jimmy, I’ll ensure he signs the divorce papers. After all, we’ve given him what he wanted; it’s time he gives us something, too.’

  Jack harshly expelled his breath. ‘One week, but after the week, we set the rules and he abides by them. But before all of this, we ask him to provide someone that could possibly vouch that he is indeed a changed man.’

  When Rosie asked Tom for a referee, she expected him to push back or accuse her of not trusting him, but instead, Tom simply nodded and jotted down a number and handed it to Jack.

  ‘This better check out, Fuller,’ Jack warned.

  ‘It will,’ Tom said confidently.

  Jack snatched the paper and called the number, and just as Tom had stated, the man on the other end of the line, Tom’s current landlord, spoke glowingly of him.

  On a sunny morning in July, Rosie packed a small suitcase, the very same one they had arrived with in Australia, and bid farewell to an excited Jimmy and jovial Tom. One week. Jimmy would return the following Sunday. Despite requesting Tom to sign the papers, he insisted he would do so when he returned Jimmy.

  ‘I was straight about the referee and I’m straight about this. I’ll sign them next week, you have my word.’

  But as dusk settled on the day of Jimmy’s return with no sign of her son, Rosie’s mother’s intuition told her something was amiss. By nightfall, Rosie was bereft, and at midnight she and Jack set out on the road and headed south to Tumut.

  Twenty-three

  Rosie

  Snowy Mountains, New South Wales, July 1967

  They followed the Snowy Mountains Highway from Tathra through Nimmitabel and Cooma, which saw them traverse through some of the most mountainous country in Australia.

  Rosie shivered, pulling her light cardigan tightly around her, rubbing her hands for warmth. They had driven straight through the night, leaving with only the clothes on their backs. Her body was running on fear-filled adrenaline that now was sapping away quickly. On a few occasions, her lids would droop and she would fall into an uneasy slumber only to be jolted wide awake by a bump in the road or her head hitting the side of the car.

  Before they left, Jack had made a few phone calls, checking to see if there had been any accidents and a man and young boy brought in. When he exhausted all possible emergency rooms between Sydney and Cooma, there was only one option. Tom had fled with Jimmy. Jack had wanted to call the police then and there, but Rosie hadn’t wanted to admit that they’d been fooled. Jack made a futile call to the landlord—there was no answer. She knew that Jack wasn’t happy to leave without something concrete, but even now as they were hurtling down the highway, there was a small sliver of hope that there was a plausible explanation for it all.

  ‘Maybe he got the dates mixed up,’ she mused.

  Jack kept his eyes trained on the road, expelling an audible breath. ‘Rosie,’ he warned. All week there had been an underlying tension between them. If Rosie was being honest, the tension had started the day Tom arrived. When Tom and Jimmy had failed to return and Rosie’s panic had set in, Jack’s eyes said it all. He knew Tom was capable of this—he had warned Rosie. Even when she had floated the idea of looking for Tom, he hadn’t liked it.

  She should’ve listened.

  She rubbed her gritty eyes, stifling a yawn.

  ‘We should rest first,’ said Jack as they approached the bridge over Wambrook Creek.

  ‘No. I want to go straight there. It’ll be daylight soon and I want to find Jimmy and take him home.’

  Please, God, let me take my boy home.

  It’d been years since she had prayed. Even when she’d lost the baby, Rosie didn’t feel like she’d needed God, but now, she felt helpless. Lost. The thought of not knowing where Jimmy was—it was killing her.

  ‘Rosie, I think—Jesus Christ!’ The car fishtailed, swerving from left to right as it lost traction. Jack slammed on the brakes, gripping the steering wheel.

  ‘Jack!’ she yelled in a panic as she white-knuckled the edge of her seat.

  ‘Hold on!’ he yelled over the noise of screeching tyres.

  The sight of a tree, dead ahead, had white spots blurring her vision.

  Please, God, don’t let it end like this.

  Her heart hammered as Jack veered right, narrowly missing the tree, the car coming to a stop a few feet later.

  ‘Are you alright?’ Jack wheezed, his breath as ragged as her own.

  ‘I think so,’ she managed, waiting for her breathlessness to settle before asking, ‘What happened?’

  ‘The best I can tell, it was black ice.’

  ‘Black ice?’ She remembered just how dangerous clear ice was on the roads. ‘But it looks like it hasn’t been snowing.’ In the distance, she spotted rugged mountain ranges dotted with smatterings of white. It looked so beautiful, so picturesque, and somewhere in that beauty was an evil that had her son.

  ‘We’re almost there. We just need to take it easy the rest of the way.’

  Jack drove carefully for the remainder of the trip, and when Rosie’s eyes drooped, he tried to convince her once again to stop and rest.

  ‘No.’ She was adamant. ‘I want to go straight to Tom’s.’

  ‘Alright,’ he said quietly, but she knew what he was thinking. Chances were that if Tom hadn’t shown up in Sydney, he wasn’t in Tumut either, but they had to start somewhere.

  They pulled up in front of a white fibro house about half an hour later. Even though it was relatively newly built, it looked desolate and drab. Barren trees seemed to barricade the house from every direction, giving Rosie the impression that perhaps in the height of summer, they would be bursting with lush green foliage. She spotted a couple of citrus trees—orange and lemon bare save for a couple of sad and lonely fruit. The grass, or what was left of it, was the colour of wet hay, but it was mostly dirt patches that were covered in sludge.

  Rosie went straight up the porch steps, knocking obstreperously while Jack peered in the windows. ‘It’s empty, Rosie,’ he declared, grimly rendering her thumping redundant.

  ‘What do you mean?’ She shivered, her breath forming white puffs of clouds as she spoke.

  ‘I mean there is no sign of life.’

  Not wanting to believe him, she rattled the doorhandle, but it didn’t budge. Her mind was spinning, not knowing what else to do, so she ran around to the back of the house. ‘Jimmy! Tom!’ she screamed like a banshee, shaking off Jack’s attempts to stop her.

  ‘Eh!’ came a voice from the other side of the wooden fence. A moment later a man appeared, his head covered in a brown beanie. ‘Why screaming?’ By his dark-olive skin and accent, Rosie hazarded that he was either Greek or Italian.

  ‘I’m looking for my son, Jimmy.’

  ‘Jimmy?’ The man looked at her, confused. ‘No Jimmy. Tom here before. Now he gone.’

 
; His English wasn’t very good and her Greek virtually non-existent, despite Spiro’s various attempts to teach her. She was able to grasp Italian, so she hoped against all hope that this man spoke it.

  ‘Are you Italian?’

  ‘Sì, parlo italiano?’ he asked hopefully.

  ‘Parlo po’di italiano,’ she replied, stressing the ‘some Italian’ and crossed her fingers he wouldn’t launch into rapid conversation. ‘Sono Rosie Hart, e sto cerando mio figlio, Jimmy,’ she said slowly, trying to pronounce clearly. ‘He was here with his father, Tom Fuller.’

  ‘No Jimmy. Tom fosse qui, ma ora ha sparito.’

  Tom was here, but now has gone. Where did he go and what did this man mean no Jimmy?

  ‘Dov’e Tom?’ Jack asked.

  ‘Ha lasciato qualche settimana fa. Cooma. New job.’

  Cooma? Tom was in Cooma? He left a couple of weeks ago for a new job? A couple of weeks ago he was in Sydney. Did this mean he never came back? Terror tore through her. She turned to Jack, who flicked his gaze towards her. There was no mistaking the panic in his eyes. He reached out to grab her hand and Rosie clung to him. ‘They could be anywhere.’ Her lips felt like ice, her fingers numb, but heat pumped through her, making her ears pound.

  ‘We’ll find him, Rosie,’ he said quietly, before turning back to the man. ‘Do you know where in Cooma?’

  He shrugged. ‘Mi dispiace. Sorry. I not know more.’

  ‘Molte grazie.’ Rosie managed a tight smile. He had given them something—she just had to pray Tom had been telling this man the truth.

  His name was Luigi Silvani, recently arrived from Venice, Italy, to work on the Snowy Hydro Scheme. His wife, Maria, and their children, Enzo, Ilaria and baby Carlo, were still in Italy. At least that’s what they discovered as Jack made small talk and Rosie tried the back door. When that didn’t budge, she peered through the window for any sign of Jimmy. A toy, a piece of clothing. Anything.

  ‘He has a key.’ Jack came up from behind. Rosie spun around to face him, eyes wide in anticipation.

  ‘What?’

  ‘I explained that Tom had taken Jimmy without permission.’ Not the complete truth, but Rosie was desperate. She wanted to kiss Jack for his quick thinking.