Carl explained the facts to her. Not the local police; not if it was Jim Carson.
‘But he can’t have that much influence.’
‘Carson and Sergeant Delaney buy land together. Most of it is land that belonged to people who’ve been interned.’
‘Can’t that be proved?’
‘Around here, nothing can be proved. Carson’s the one who does the buying, but we know Delaney’s in it. Probably Lucas, too. So tell me — who do you go to for help when the police are corrupt?’
He related their father’s conflicts with Inspector Lucas, and the way he and Delaney behaved the night of the arrest. Maria had never known the details. She was shocked at the deceit, and the law that let a man be arrested on such a blatantly fraudulent pretext.
‘I bet we’d find,’ Carl said, ‘that Lucas knew about this. So he’d protect Carson, if we were silly enough to make a complaint.’
‘But we can’t let them get away with it. We just can’t.’
Maria felt a helpless rage. She wanted to galvanise her brother, shake him into some kind of action. ‘Calm down,’ he said.
‘I won’t calm down. Do something.’
‘I intend to. No police. There are other ways.’
‘How?’
‘Can you stay a few more days?’
Yes, she decided. Yes. Weeks, if she had to.
That night they went to visit Elizabeth in hospital. Her hair was beginning to grow back where it had been singed, and she said the burns on her body were starting to itch, where new skin was beginning to grow. Doctor Hardy was pleased with her progress, but refused to let her leave the hospital for at least another week. She was not yet able to face Stefan’s death. She held their hands, trying not to cry, but the tears ran down her cheeks.
Maria wanted to cry with her.
Instead she gently wiped her mother’s face, and started to recount the details of the meeting with Mr Tunstall, making Elizabeth unsure whether to laugh or continue crying, and then Carl began to tell her about the youth, and what they had found out from him, and what he intended to do.
Elizabeth Muller listened. Now she gazed at her two children, and felt a rush of love and pride.
‘Can you do it?’
‘Carl can do it,’ Maria assured her. ‘If anyone can, he can.’
The farmer saw them coming. He watched them get out of the sedan and he stopped his tractor. He recognised Carl. The young and pretty girl with him was so like Muller’s wife that she had to be the daughter. He wondered, warily, uneasily, why they were here?
‘Wolfgang Mannkopff?’
‘Yes. Who wants to know?’
‘I’m Carl Muller. This is my sister.’
The farmer nodded, tense, then mumbled his condolences. ‘Terrible thing. The vineyard…your father…dreadful.’ Carl appeared not to hear him. He looked at Maria.
‘They’re running late.’
‘Perhaps we’re early,’ she said.
‘What do you want?’
Mannkopff was becoming decidedly more nervous. ‘We’re meeting people here,’ Carl stated, almost casually. ‘What people?’
‘A reporter from the Adelaide Herald. And a photographer.’
‘Adelaide Herald?’ They could feel his slow bewilderment turn to alarm. ‘Why? I don’t know what you mean.’
‘They may be accompanied by a detective, but Mr Boothby, the editor, is trying to organise an interview before you’re questioned.’
‘Questioned? You’re stupid. This is private property. You get out or I’ll call …’
‘You won’t call the police,’ Carl said, and the chill in his voice silenced the older man. ‘You won’t do that, Mr Mannkopff.’
‘And there’s no point in calling Carson,’ Maria added, ‘we know about his involvement.’
The farmer stared from one to the other, a line of sweat starting to run down his face.
‘You were unwise to use your nephew, Mr Mannkopff. Your nephew Claus. He didn’t like it. He’s made a statement, about how you and the others, using your tractor, dug up and poisoned our vines. How you poured petrol into the storage shed, and lit a fuse, and burnt all that wine. Destroyed all that work. Years and years of it. And killed our father — and that makes it manslaughter.’
The dusty T-model pulled up alongside their own car, and two men jumped out. One of them carried his camera and a tripod. Carl and Maria tried not to show their relief. James Boothby had promised not to let them down, saying it was strictly against the law not to go first to the police, but in view of his affection for their mother, and the fact that it might be a considerable scoop for his newspaper, he would do his best to overlook the illegality.
The reporter greeted them, and told his photographer to start getting some pictures. Carl took a bulky envelope from his pocket. It was filled with blank pages, but Mannkopff did not know that.
‘There’s the nephew’s statement. Mr Boothby said he’ll run it on the front page.’
‘If there’s room,’ the reporter grinned. ‘I think this joker himself is going to take up most of pages one and two. What a story!’ He turned to the shocked farmer. ‘How do you spell your name? First thing we learn as cadet reporters, get the names spelt right.’
‘You can’t do this,’ Wolfgang Mannkopff said.
‘Mate, you’re already trussed and stuffed,’ the reporter said. ‘You’re a gone goose.’
‘Others were involved. Not only me.’
‘We know that. But you get first chance. My boss has done some deal with the Commissioner of Police in Adelaide. If you make a full statement, it seems you can plead guilty to a lesser charge.’
‘What charge?’
‘That’s for you and the police to work out. If I get a sworn statement of all the details — and names — particularly Carson and his local cop friends, you may not be accused of helping to kill this girl’s father. Though if I had my way, sport, you’d go in for the rest of your lousy life. So what’s it to be? Do you give us the story, or do we go to the next name on the list?’
‘Stand over there,’ the photographer said, and Carl and Maria watched as the dazed farmer walked slowly across to be photographed beside his tractor, which they knew would still have the evidence of vine leaves on its plough blades.
James Boorhby sat in the back of his chauffeur-driven car, as he passed through Gawler, saw the Mount Lofty Ranges and then the beginning of the valley, as they approached Lyndoch. It had been a unique few days.
He had taken immense risks on the word of a boy and his eighteen-year-old sister, named names in vivid headlines, received a threatening torrent of abuse from the Commissioner of Police, and then an abject apology, when it turned out the inspector and sergeant concerned were guilty of perjury, corruption, false arrest, conspiracy to pervert the course of justice, and accessory to the manslaughter of Stefan Muller. There was also, it appeared, the death of a naturalised Australian named Gerhardt Lippert, who had been beaten by members of the local militia, and died in police custody. This crime had been concealed by Inspector Lucas, together with a superintendent at police headquarters in Adelaide, and there would be more charges to follow.
Boothby’s car stopped outside the cottage hospital. It was a large bungalow with screened verandahs. A uniformed nurse showed him into the room where Elizabeth was the sole occupant. He leaned down and kissed her cheek.
‘You received all the newspapers I sent you?’
She nodded, and he sat on a chair beside the bed.
‘Carson should get twenty years. And Lucas is finished. He and Delaney will go to gaol. A nest of vipers, Elizabeth. I hope in years to come, people will regret the appalling things that were done under the pretence of patriotism.’
She shrugged, as if she somehow suspected it would all soon be forgotten. He looked at her with deep concern. She seemed so resigned and defeated. He could scarcely believe it. So much vivacity, so much fighting spirit; she appeared to have lost it all. He wished he knew what els
e to say.
‘One thing I’m going to tell you, before I have to go. Those two children of yours — as well as the one overseas — you should be very proud of them.’
‘Stefan was proud of them. I just love them,’ she said. ‘And now the one overseas is making me a grannie. Just imagine it.’ She smiled at last, and he knew then, with profound relief, that she was going to recover.
FORTY
‘We’re going to call him William,’ Kate said, and William looked proud and delighted.
Hannah who was more practical said, ‘But what if “William” is a girl?’
‘Then we’ll try again. We plan to have about four of them. But I feel the way the bun kicks and shuffies about, he’s William.’
‘Shouldn’t you be resting?’ William asked.
‘I rested all last week, when he was expected,’ Kate said. ‘The stubborn little chap decided he’d wait for your arrival. Not to mention the fact his dad is insulting senior officers, trying to get sent back as a nut case, now that they’ve refused his application for leave.’
‘How could they be so insensitive?’ Hannah wondered. ‘Easily. Harry says with leaders like ours, we haven’t a chance of winning the war. The only hope is if the Germans lose it.’
‘Sounds just like Harry.’
‘Trouble is, he had a month’s leave when we married, then two more weeks when we got the news about his father.’
There was a silence for a moment. William studied her.
‘How did he take it?’
‘Very badly. He’d wanted so much to go home and make peace with him. And for me to see the vineyard, and meet his dad.’
‘It was a terrible shock,’ Hannah said. ‘We were so worried about Elizabeth.’
‘Bloody unfair,’ William said. ‘After all he’d achieved, and what he’d been through.’
They linked arms with her, as they walked down Primrose Hill.
Above the tops of plane trees in Regents Park they could see the graceful line of the Nash Terraces. Everywhere there was spring blossom, new flowers and green leaves that seemed refreshed from the long winter. It was mid-April, and they had been in London only two days. They already loved it, and adored Kate.
Later it grew cooler, and there was a shower of rain. They found shelter in a tea shop near Lords Cricket Ground. ‘Convenient,’ Kate said. ‘The nursing home is just around the corner in St John’s Wood.’
She asked them about Elizabeth. What a relief she was out of hospital. She asked about Carl, working to restore the vineyard, and Maria, back at university. She wanted to know everything about them, as they were going to be her family when she and Harry came home.
‘You will come home?’
‘The minute the war ends, and Harry can get us on a ship.’
‘How about your music? You won’t give up the cello?’
‘Not on your life.’ Kate smiled. ‘But at the moment, nine months and one week pregnant, it’s a bit hard to reach the cello.’
William and Hannah were staying at Claridges. They took Kate back there for dinner. Halfway through the entree, she looked at Hannah with a wry smile, and suggested they might call a taxi.
‘The bun is on the move,’ she said, and when the maitre d’ came to enquire if the meal was not to their satisfaction, Kate said they were just off to have a baby — but might be back for the main course.
William David Patterson was born in the early hours of the next morning. Seven pounds ten ounces. As William said in a cable to his daughter: MOTHER AND SON WELL. HANNAH AND I EXHAUSTED.
In Sydney Maria also received a cable, and immediately telephoned David Brahm. A celebration dinner was arranged at the Brahm house for that evening. David suggested he collect her at her front gate after breakfast; they could take the university tram together, which would give them a chance to discuss the arrival of their joint nephew. He said it was a major responsibility, and required regular meetings for forward planning of the infant’s future. Did Maria agree? Maria said she would be at the gate, waiting for him. When she hung up, she was smiling.
So much had changed. She had been back at medical school for almost two months. The first day, after missing so many critical weeks, and edgy about the campaign of derision and harassment her male peers might well resume against her, she had walked into the lecture hall. It was to be a lecture on biology, and the professor, whose main teaching methods were ridicule and scorn, had not yet arrived. David was lounging on one of the benches, talking with her fellow students, which was a surprise, since he was in third year, and seniors regarded induction students as a lower species. They were grouped around him, flattered by his presence. When she walked in, braced for the fray, all eyes swivelled towards her. David rose and kissed her cheek.
‘You chaps know Maria, of course,’ he said casually. ‘Maria’s my sister-in-law.’
That was their first surprise. ‘A bit of a heroine,’ he added.
‘Heroine?’ someone asked, looking blank.
‘Don’t you read anything except medical books? She helped the South Australian police catch the bastards who killed her father.’
Once again, all eyes turned to her. Then the measured tread of footsteps on the stone cloister outside broke the silence.
‘Well, good luck. Here cometh the witchetty grub,’ David said, and departed amid laughter as Professor Wilson-Grubb strode past him to the podium, where he surveyed the class, and Maria in particular. She was without a seat, standing clutching her books.
‘Biology,’ he announced, ‘is the science of life. Primitive man would have experimented in human anatomy — and no doubt primitive woman, too.’ He stared at Maria. ‘Do you wish to remain standing, Miss Muller? If so, perhaps we could use you to discuss Darwin’s origin of the species.’
He paused for the expected laughter. There was none.
‘Over here, Maria.’ It was one of her former tormentors who spoke, making room for her.
‘I’ll lend Miss Muller my notes, Professor,’ another said, ‘so she can catch up.’
‘And where exactly has Miss Muller been, that she needs to catch up?’ The professor was at his most lethal when he was being corrosively polite.
‘Don’t you read the newspapers, sir?’ a third asked.
‘Not if I can help it.’ He turned back to Maria. ‘Miss Muller?’
‘Professor?’
‘Would it be asking too much to enlighten me where you’ve been? Taken a job — in a shop? Or decided to train as a nurse, after all? Do, pray, explain your failure to honour us with your presence.’
Maria stood up.
‘I’ve been burying my father, who was killed with the collusion of the local police,’ she said quietly, and saw his face change colour as his cheeks flamed. ‘Our vineyard was destroyed, and my mother was burnt in an explosion and seriously injured.’ She turned to her fellow students. ‘I’m glad to say she is now out of danger.’
There was a murmur around the lecture hall, a sound that she interpreted as relief and approval, then a complete silence as they all looked at the professor. The witchetty grub was a brilliant teacher, but regarded as an appalling man, who had never been known to apologise to anyone in his life. He gestured to her to be seated.
‘I’m terribly sorry,’ he said quietly. ‘Do please forgive me. We’ll continue with the lecture.’
From that moment on, she was just another student. No hostility or harassment. No innuendoes.
She waved as she saw David coming to collect her. She knew he had been in the lecture room deliberately that day; she had a great deal for which to thank him. She had become fond of him, but she was going to be a doctor, and nothing must prevent that. Besides, it would be too ridiculous, marrying — what on earth would he be? Her sister-in-law Kate’s brother? Her own brother Harry’s brother-in-law? She started to smile at the complexity of it.
‘When you smile,’ David said, as he arrived, ‘you remind me of your mother. In fact, most of the time you look like he
r.’
‘You only want to ride on the tram with me because I look like Mum. Harry said you were besotted with her.’
‘True,’ he said. ‘I was. Probably still am. But with you there’s one small difference.’
‘What’s that?’
‘You’re more my age.’
They saw the tram in the distance, and ran to catch it.
FORTY ONE
The sniper lay in a cleft on the ridge, outside of Saarburg. His grey uniform was ragged and stripped of all insignia. He was caked with mud, and the barrel of his rifle smeared with it so that he was almost invisible. He had been in the war for only a month, while his German comrades died around him, and his army had been driven out of Belgium and across France; Cambrai abandoned, Lille and Reims lost, Ghent retaken; the Argonne the scene of bloody carnage, and the enemy across the Moselle River.
The sniper was only nineteen years old.
He had been told his commander, Ludendorff, the legendary field-marshall, had resigned, the Kaiser had fled, and the war would come to an end this morning. In a few hours the firing would stop.
He had never killed anyone. Never really been a soldier. There were only a few hours left, in which to remedy that.
Harry Patterson was there by mistake. Weeks earlier, the last of the Australian brigades had thrust into the village of Montbrehain, and then been pulled back to rest. They had been fighting without respite all year, and were exhausted. Meanwhile, a squadron of American tanks had inadvertently crossed a minefield, and most of them had been blown to pieces. The mines had been laid by the French the previous year, the information lost or filed and forgotten, and had not been made available to General Pershing.
In the ensuing row between allies, some officers were assigned to liaise with the Americans. They were an improvised mix of Belgians, British, Canadians, and a few Australians. Harry, to his dismay, was one of them. And thus he was a few miles outside of Saarburg, on the morning of November 11th, 1918. He was shaving, having decided to wash his uniform and polish his Sam Browne. Anything that might help him jump the queue for a repatriation convoy back to England. He could barely wait to be free of this place. In less than two hours from now, the guns would stop, and the war would be over at last.
A Bitter Harvest Page 47
