The Last Rose of Summer

by Di Morrissey

  ‘Some sort of battle shock I suppose.’

  ‘Anyway, he’s gone back to his mob. They reckon Hector’s some sort of hero though. They think he brought in two wounded men — you and the other bloke. I’ll set them straight soon enough.’

  ‘Ah, forget it, Harold,’ said Ben in a tired voice.

  ‘Hey, Ben, you’d better not lose your souvenir. Look at this.’ Grinning, Harold handed Ben his helmet. A bullet had pierced the top, slashing open the helmet, missing Ben’s skull by a hair’s breadth but knocking him unconscious.

  Ben gasped, ‘Cripes,’ and reached up to touch his bandaged head, wincing with pain as he discovered he’d taken a bullet in the shoulder. ‘Good thing I’ve got a thick skull, eh?’

  Harold chuckled and rested his hand on the boy’s arm. ‘We’re all proud of you, Ben. I’d best get back. Take it easy. Don’t try that fancy stuff too often. They might begin to notice you.’

  Ben grinned and lifted his hand in salute as Harold scurried back along the trench known as Martin Place.

  Later, rations were distributed along with mail from Australia. Harold sat in his little burrow rereading his letters. Slowly he unfolded the painting Kate had done of the garden at Zanana. He sat motionless, oblivious to the misery about him, his eyes roaming over every brush stroke, every delicate wash of soft colour. The little picture broke through his reserves of emotional strength and tears burned his eyes. He could smell the roses, feel a soft breeze against his cheek, hear Kate and Gladys chattering in the kitchen, and see the river sliding lazily past the grand mansion and its grounds.

  In the following forty-eight hours Wally and Harold were part of an intense battle that raged over a wide section of the front line. Shells were hurled in a nonstop thundering eruption of artillery fire that took death into every trench.

  Like many around him, Wally was numb, exhausted by the tension of the battle that continued relentlessly round the clock. They were all immune to the horror about them, it had become so commonplace. A man next to him took a direct hit. Warm flesh and bone splattered Wally as a human being disintegrated.

  There were frequent infantry assaults on the Australian lines. When ordered to the parapet to repulse the Germans, the men fired, reloaded and fired, operating in a robot fashion, some in-built instinct driving them on despite the exhaustion, the cold and the hunger. Some of the younger men showed signs of cracking up and Harold spent as much time giving them encouragement as firing at the enemy.

  When their relief finally arrived, the men fell back and slumped into the bays along the support trenches. They ate their sodden bread and bully beef; the water tasted foul and chemical but they cared little. Their faces were covered in grime, blood and mud, making the whites of their eyes glare in grey faces which had seen inside the gates of hell — the full horror of a heavy bombardment by thousands of guns.

  Wally moved down to Harold’s position but found he was dozing, his head slumped forward on his chest. His face was haggard and he looked frail and old. Wally took his small knapsack and eased it behind Harold’s neck, lifting his head against it, saying softly, ‘Here ya go, mate, have a pillow.’

  In a few short hours they were back on the battlefield pushing forward towards a slowly retreating but still defiant enemy.

  At Zanana, Kate stirred in her bed, suddenly awake. It was the early hours of the morning, moonlight streamed through the window, a slight breeze lifted the lace curtain.

  Downstairs, Gladys Butterworth turned in her bed, instinctively reaching for the comforting bulk of her husband, but found only a cold and empty space.

  The gardens of Zanana were dipped in silver light, frozen for a moment in time, a place of serenity, beauty and peace, the dream of Robert MacIntyre captured like an ethereal painting.

  In France, in a rain-drenched and muddy field, Harold Butterworth fell forward, his face hitting the sludge, and in that instant he saw the moonlit gardens of Zanana.

  Wally, fighting near to him, was swiftly at his side. He rolled him over, cradling his head where a single bullet had hit his temple. ‘Oh, mate. Oh, mate. Jesus, Harry . . . Christ, mate . . . not after all this . . .’

  Tears blurred Wally’s eyes as the rain mingled the grey mud and bright blood to an ochre paste on Harold’s face.

  ‘Leave him, soldier. Keep moving, or you’ll be next.’

  Gently Wally laid Harold back on the squelching ground, pulled his identification tag from him and grabbed the papers and wallet he carried inside his jacket. He stuffed them inside his own jacket and, picking up his rifle, stumbled forward, his mind numb with grief.

  It wasn’t until much later when he sat to write the hardest letter of his life that Wally looked at the papers he’d taken from Harold. There was a letter from Gladys and a photograph of her as a young bride, and another years later in the garden with Kate. Unfolding a bulky paper he found an unfinished letter to Gladys and the watercolour picture Kate had painted of Zanana’s garden. The colours had cried slightly with the rain, but Wally knew this was where Harold was; not out there in a foreign field, one of the anonymous ‘known only to God’, but here, at home and at peace.

  It was Hock Lee who broke the news to Gladys Butterworth and Kate. Mrs Butterworth was stoic. ‘I knew. I felt it the night it happened.’

  But Kate was desolate. She had lost a father she had never known and now the man she had loved as a father had been cruelly taken from her. She ran to the rose garden and flung herself in the grass, sobbing. Hock Lee found her and lifted her in his arms and held her tightly. When her sobs subsided they sat in silence looking at the drooping heads of the roses.

  Finally Hock Lee spoke softly. ‘There is an old Chinese belief that the spirit flies to its true home in death. I think Harold is here, in the place he loved, with those he loved. He’ll always be close to you, Kate.’

  She drew a little solace from this and slowly nodded. ‘Yes, I think so, too. He’s come home. Here to Zanana.’

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Sydney 1960

  Odette swore she’d never forget her first day as a cadet reporter at Australian Incorporated Newspapers.

  It had been a day she’d longed for through the last few weeks of packing, sorting, saying goodbyes. Aunt Harriet had waved her off on the night train going south after a supper at the Golden Dragon Chinese Restaurant. She helped Odette stow her suitcase in her sleeper and surprised both of them by hugging her goodbye with brimming eyes.

  ‘Do be careful down there, Odette. You are still very young to be venturing out into the world like this.’

  ‘I’ll be fine, Aunt Harriet. The YWCA is clean and safe and I’m sure the people at the Gazette will help me get settled.’

  ‘Look up Mrs Bramble as soon as you can. I’ve written and told her your news.’

  ‘Thanks, Aunt Harriet . . . er . . . don’t you think you’d better wait on the platform?’

  Odette pushed up the train window and leaned out for a final exchange.

  ‘Lock the compartment door, Odette. The train gets in at seven tomorrow morning so have a good night’s rest.’

  ‘I will. I’ll write to you with all the news as soon as I can.’

  ‘You could telephone. If it’s important, reverse the charges.’

  ‘Don’t worry, Aunt Harriet.’ To her relief the station master blew his whistle and with a hiss of steam and clashing of metal wheels, the train began to inch forward. Harriet raised a gloved hand, ‘Good luck, Odette’.

  Odette waved back at the tall straight-backed lady in a grey worsted suit, hair smoothed into a French roll, wearing high heels and stockings; a lone figure on the platform looking as she had the first time Odette had seen her.

  ‘I’ll miss you, Odette.’ But Harriet’s last words were lost in a hiss of steam as the Southern Mail steamed away from Amberville Station.

  Odette slammed the window closed, reached up and took down the decanter of water suspended in a metal loop above the window, and poured herself a glass of
tepid water. She raised her glass to the window where, outside in the passing darkness, citizens on the outskirts of Amberville were preparing for bed. She toasted her reflection in the lighted carriage. ‘Here’s to the big smoke . . . and my new life!’

  Odette didn’t sleep well despite the companionable clicketty clack of the wheels and the soothing sway of the train carriage. Nerves and excitement kept her mind buzzing.

  At one minute past seven the next morning, she sleepily pulled her bag down onto the bustling platform at Central Railway Station where several country and interstate trains had arrived at once.

  She looked around the cavernous concourse and watched for a moment a neon sign for Penfolds wine where a blinking bunch of purple grapes dripped into a wine glass. Seeing the exit sign, she headed for the luxury of a taxi ride to the Young Women’s Christian Association in the city.

  She settled into the YWCA, but discovered the next morning that the young women were not quite as Christian as the organisation’s image suggested — her purse had been stolen from her handbag. At first she’d felt a moment of panic, then anger when she realised her money had gone. There was no time to bother with reporting the theft. Her savings had been deposited in a bank account, so the loss was not too great. Odette refused to be put out of sorts on this her first day in the city. She was on her way to fame, fortune and glory. The loss of a few pounds, inconvenient as it was, wasn’t going to stop her.

  She found some loose change in her coat pocket and jumped on a bus to the city. She’d memorised the address, but there was no mistaking the tall building taking up a whole corner block. The main entrance had double glass doors with gold lettering listing the names of the publications under the masthead of Australian Incorporated Newspapers.

  She hesitated outside rather grand and daunting portals. Maybe there was a staff entrance. Odette hurried round the corner where a large loading bay was noisy with activity as trucks backed in and bundles of newspapers were thrown about by tough-looking men in shorts and singlets.

  She called up to one of them on the back of a truck. ‘Excuse me, how do I get into the building?’ she asked somewhat selfconsciously, then added with forced boldness, ‘I’m a new staffer.’

  ‘Main entrance is round the front . . . but it’s quicker to go through there.’ He pointed to the service lift at the back of the loading bay.

  Odette thanked him and ran for the lift. She punched a button, a bell rang and a large iron cage rattled down in front of her. The grille doors were weighty and she had to push hard to slide them apart.

  ‘Hold those doors!’ A large, solid man hurried from the parking section of the loading bay area and stepped into the lift beside her. He was elderly and wore thick dark glasses.

  ‘Push nine for me.’

  Odette pushed the little white buttons for nine and five. She turned to her co-passenger. ‘You work here too?’

  He was very tall and he looked down at the young girl. ‘Yes. Do you?’

  ‘My first day.’

  ‘As what?’

  ‘A cadet,’ she said proudly.

  ‘Mmm,’ was all he said as he looked up to the ceiling of the lift.

  As the lift bumped to a stop at the fifth floor, Odette grasped the metal handle to pull the door open, only to find her hand smothered by his great paw.

  ‘Here, I’ll do that.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  Odette stepped out and looked around her. The lift rattled upwards. She was in a corridor, and the gold letters on a glass door opposite proclaimed Art Department. She opened the door slowly and peered around it. A man whose face was covered in hair but whose head was bald and shiny looked up at her over his rimless glasses. He was bent over a sloping table which had large sheets of white paper on it.

  ‘Who’re you looking for, luv?’

  ‘The editor, Mr Mendholssen.’

  The artist pointed a pencil further down the corridor. ‘Second on the right round the corner.’

  It was a rabbit warren of corridors and stairs but finally she found George Mendholssen’s office. A secretary’s desk by his door was empty so she tapped at the heavy panelled door, which signalled a more imposing affair than Fitz’s cubicle.

  ‘Come in.’

  Odette was aware of dark wood, leather, framed front pages of newspapers around the walls, and a very large desk. The editor was in his early fifties, silver-tipped hair smoothed in place and a neat white moustache. He wore a dark navy, pin-stripe suit and very white shirt with a dark tie. He looked pointedly at his watch. He prided himself on keeping contact with all levels of the organisation and the welcoming interview with each cadet was a ritual, though he might never speak to them again.

  ‘Not a good start, Miss Barber. Punctuality is good manners but for a reporter it is also imperative. In fact, be early, it often pays off.’

  ‘I’m really sorry, Mr Mendholssen, but . . .’

  ‘I’m sure you have a very good reason, Miss Barber, cadets always do.’ Odette nodded and opened her mouth to explain, but Mr Mendholssen lifted a hand and continued, ‘But I don’t wish to hear it, thank you’.

  Odette closed her mouth and sat in silence.

  ‘Firstly, I like to welcome all the cadets personally and wish you well. You will be assessed along the way and if you are not showing that you have what it takes, you go no further. Understood?’

  Odette nodded.

  ‘You have been assigned to the Women’s Gazette. You will be directly under the supervision of Mrs Kay Metcalf. How good is your shorthand?’

  ‘Er . . . not too good, I’m afraid. I’m self taught.’ She didn’t add she hadn’t actually got around to teaching herself any of Mr Pitman’s mysterious hieroglyphics. She’d taken one look at the book Fitz had given her and promptly left it in her desk drawer.

  ‘You type, I take it?’

  ‘Yes. Of course.’

  ‘You will have to attend shorthand classes with the other cadets. You will spend several months in various sections of the magazine and if you show a facility for a certain field or direction, in your last year you will specialise in that area. If you get to the last year. There is a big drop-out rate. This is not the glamorous job it might appear.’

  ‘I’ve never considered journalism a glamour job,’ interrupted Odette.

  ‘Indeed? How do you see it then?’

  ‘As a means of communicating with people, bringing people together. Providing them with information and entertainment about people and places and events they might otherwise never know. Bringing home the truth.’

  ‘An idealist, huh?’

  ‘My former editor taught me reporters have a code of ethics, a moral obligation — like doctors.’

  ‘That sounds like Fitzpatrick. How is he doing out there in never-never land . . . ? Where is that bush paper of his again?’

  ‘Amberville. The Clarion. He’s well, still tilting at windmills.’

  ‘Good on him. Never understood him going bush, he was a city man through and through I thought.’

  ‘I think he likes being his own boss and running his own race,’ said Odette quietly.

  ‘Yes . . . um. The girl outside will show you down to the Gazette.’

  He stood and reached across to shake her hand. ‘Good luck, Miss Barber.’

  ‘Thank you. I’m grateful for this opportunity. I’ll be there at the end of the day, Mr Mendholssen.’ She flashed him a wide smile, daring him to contradict her this time.

  He nodded, thinking, ‘This one just might be there at the end of the day, too’.

  Kay Metcalf was a short attractive woman in her forties with cropped grey hair streaked with blonde. She wore bright lipstick and was fashionably dressed in a permanently pleated Terylene white skirt and lilac blouse with a stand-up collar. Her manner was warm and welcoming and Odette liked her immediately.

  They sat and talked at length, the older woman gently probing to find out as much as she could of Odette’s background. She then showed her the de
sk tucked in the corner of her office.

  The small wooden desk looked like it had been shoved into the corner as an afterthought. It butted against Mrs Metcalf’s desk, which was cluttered with trays, strips of galley proofs, and several spikes spearing wads of notes. On Odette’s desk there sat a squat old-fashioned Remington typewriter, in- and out-trays, a box of copy paper and a desk calendar.

  Mrs Metcalf waved to Odette’s desk. ‘This is yours, Odette. Sorry about the ancient Remington; you’ll develop strong arms like the rest of us from banging away on it. Although you’re in here with me, I’m chief sub-editor at present and relief chief of staff for Nancy Corrigan. Nancy will give you assignments and I’ll sort of shepherd you through them.’

  ‘I’m glad I’ll be working with you, Mrs Metcalf. It’s all a bit overwhelming. It’s nice to get a warm welcome.’

  ‘Nonsense. I can be tough as old boots, too — you’ll see. But my bark is worse than my bite, so take no notice. I’m here to help you, so ask any questions at all. As long as you work hard I’ll back you up. Try and pull the wool over my eyes and I’ll eat you alive.’

  Another two desks were jammed into the tiny room. Odette would share the office with the editorial secretary, Elaine, and Aunty Bea, who wrote answers to letters sent in by readers. Her replies advised everyone from love-struck teenagers — Heartsick, Parramatta — to the elderly — Forgotten Gran, Sutherland.

  A plywood partition went halfway to the fluorescent-lit ceiling, and was topped by glass. Across the corridor were similar nests of desks and activity. A typewriter sat on every desk. A shelf underneath the far windows was piled with back issues of all the company’s publications. The windows overlooked a dull section of the city — a Greek church, a disposal store and a dreary building filled with boxy offices of solicitors and accountants.

  Throughout the floor, suspended several feet below the dark stained ceiling, ran a fat pipe which was connected at various points to down tubes and a catchment drop box. Through this air-pressured artery rushed and whizzed padded cylinders carrying still-wet typeset copy from the composing room in the bowels below. With a clunk, they’d drop into the various outlets in each editorial section. It was the task of the copy boy or girl on hearing the banging thwack and thud of the cylinder’s arrival, to pull out the rolled galley proof and rush it to its appropriate sub-editor.