Tyringham Park

by Rosemary McLoughlin

  After eating Mrs Parker’s specialities – rare roast beef and horseradish sandwiches, pork ribs baked in her secret sauce, and rhubarb crumble with cream, Lochlann stretched out in the sun and fell asleep, giving Charlotte the opportunity to admire his features openly and avidly.

  How young he looks, she thought. And how old I feel.

  One look, exchanged in a corridor of the townhouse when she first saw him had altered her life’s course, and even now when she remembered that look it still sang in her consciousness and made her wonder at its power. Thousands of glances later, she knew she would never see that open, trusting gaze directed at her again. It’s not that he had become furtive. ‘Impervious’ would describe it better. She had no hold over him stronger than any human being’s hold over another. This thought returned again and again to torment her. He was tied to her by convention, not feeling. In his role as her doctor during her confinement, and even more so since its harrowing aftermath, she couldn’t fault his care and sympathy, but she had never felt at any moment that it was personal.

  Using a twig to flick off the ants that found their way on the tarpaulin, and her hand to keep away the flies from Lochlann’s face, Charlotte enjoyed the luxury of sitting close to her husband, and feeling the warmth of his forearm through her skirt against her thigh.

  She must have been over-stimulated. Conjuring up fantasies. A man with a face as wonderful as that, and an expression as innocent as that could not have entertained what she, in her madness, had thought he might be considering – murder or suicide, guiding her on to an overhang, and like the boy in Tramore, have the earth give way beneath her weight – or worse, jump himself, leaving her the victor, free to tell whatever story she chose.

  Had Wombat Churchill, the man she treated so badly, been her unwitting saviour?

  She must keep a tight rein on herself so she wouldn’t end up like other women she’d heard of who lost their minds after the death of a child.

  Lochlann woke, blinking and disorientated, and for a second looked at her with pleasure and smiled, and then the smile faded. It wasn’t of her he was dreaming – the fading smile said it more clearly than words.

  Lochlann kept his grieving face lowered as he gathered up and repacked the picnic basket, taking his time, folding the tarpaulin exactly. He stood for one last look into the chasm where the evening shadows were making patterns on the rocky mass on the far side and leaving all but the top of the falls in shade.

  Charlotte was the first to break the silence on the way home. “I know what you mean about this place taking you out of yourself. It’s done me the world of good. I’m feeling a lot better. Less gloomy. More energetic.”

  “Good. I’m glad.” Lochlann’s voice was dull and flat. “Because I want to talk about going back home as soon as you’re well enough to travel.”

  She was unprepared. “I don’t think I’m as well as that,” she flustered. “It could be a long time before I could face that long trip.”

  “You’ll be surprised at how quickly you’ll rally now that you’ve made the first steps. We’ve stayed away long enough to save your mother’s reputation. That was the agreement, remember? Besides, I want to enlist.”

  “But you can’t. Ireland’s neutral,” was the first objection that came to mind.

  “Thousands of Irish have joined up. Haven’t you been reading Harcourt’s letters?”

  She had, but she always skipped the war bits, searching instead for any hidden messages from Niamh being relayed through Harcourt to Lochlann.

  Did he consider her wifely claim on him now null and void, seeing there was no shared responsibility of a baby? Did he consider his vows to love, honour and obey until death were made under duress and were never morally binding? Did he dislike her? Or even hate her?

  She must pull herself together. All that staring and concentration he had engaged in at the falls – it was evolution he was thinking of, not hatred and death. He was looking at the rock formations exposed in the gorge, that’s all. His probing into evolutionary theories and his projections about how white Europeans would live in this mostly unsuitable hot dry land, apart from their intrinsic interest, saved him from having to talk about anything personal to her.

  A wallaby hopped across the road in front of them. Lochlann braked and the engine cut out while he waited for the mate to follow.

  “I must have another baby,” Charlotte found the courage to say while they were distracted watching the marsupials crossing. “Or else it was all for nothing.”

  Lochlann swung out of the driver’s seat and cranked the car with unnecessary force, before returning to take his seat beside Charlotte. Sneaking a look at his bleak expression, she wished she hadn’t blurted out what must have sounded to him like an ultimatum, ruining what on the surface had been a perfect day. Why didn’t she have the sense to wait for a more opportune moment? After he’d had a few drinks, for example, when he’d lowered his defences?

  He turned to look at her. Her plea for understanding remained unspoken when she confronted the calm hostility in his gaze.

  “It was all for nothing,” he said. “There’s no other way of looking at it, but that’s no excuse for continuing to make things worse.”

  That afternoon nine-year-old Sandy Turner, camping with his father, an itinerant rabbit trapper, was bitten by a tiger snake when he put down his hand to collect wood for the campfire and didn’t see the snake camouflaged amongst the sticks and grass. The father made a tourniquet for the boy’s upper arm from the rope he used as a belt, the first thing he could lay his hands on. He hobbled his son’s horse and left it at the camp, then put the boy in front of him on his own mount and held him tightly for the fifteen-mile ride to the town in the dark.

  “I’ll take him,” said Lochlann, reaching up when the pair finally arrived at his door, roused by the father calling out and rattling the gate with his foot.

  The father found it difficult to loosen his grasp as his arm had become stiff and numb. He handed down the slender boy, barefoot, suntanned and golden-haired, and Lochlann carried him into the surgery.

  “I got here as quick as I could,” said the thin man with the leather face and gnarled hands. He took off his hat, leaving an indent across his forehead and, blinking, came into the light.

  The doctor had his ear to the boy’s chest and his fingers on his neck. He had taken the tourniquet off the bloodless right arm.

  “Is he going to be all right, doctor?” asked the father. “Did I do the tourniquet properly?”

  “You did it perfectly. I couldn’t have done it better myself.”

  “Is he going to be all right?” the father repeated.

  When the doctor didn’t answer, the man looked down and saw tears dropping on to the boy’s chest.

  Word got out that the new doctor, just back from an outing with his wife to the Ober falls, had cried when young motherless Sandy Turner was brought in dead by his father.

  “He must have been reminded of his own loss to take it so hard,” said the town sage, who had never before heard of a doctor being so upset at the death of a patient.

  63

  Every indication that she wasn’t completely valueless came too late, Dixon reflected, sitting in the hotel garden in the shade of a wattle tree listening to the currawongs and kookaburras. How different her life would have been if she had known then that she was good-looking and clever, not ugly and stupid as she had been told.

  One day, at the age of sixteen back in England, she had been trusted to escort a twelve-year-old girl inmate to the dentist for an extraction. During that walk along the busy streets she noticed that both women and men were staring at her.

  As a child she had been convinced she had a freakish facial irregularity. There were no mirrors allowed inside the orphanage, vanity being considered a worse sin than blasphemy, whatever that was, so she’d only ever seen her image distorted in rippled glass or convex shiny surfaces. When prospective parents came to choose a girl for adoption the matron
, obviously to spare Dixon’s feelings, knowing she’d never be picked, hid her away until they’d left with some other more attractive child. Later, on her first excursions outside the orphanage, when she caught sight of her reflection in shop windows and once briefly in a mirror in a doctor’s surgery, she realised she looked quite normal and was left to wonder why Matron always hid her away.

  “Everyone’s looking at you,” said her young companion.

  “I can see that.” She couldn’t understand it. She dropped her head to hide her face in the folds of her scarf.

  If it was her feet that they were looking at she could understand it, as Matron had surpassed herself on this occasion by choosing from the second-hand store an even uglier pair of shoes for Dixon than she usually did. Already she could feel the pain of blisters forming on her heels as the backs of the ill-fitting shoes flapped up and down, scraping her flesh with every step she took.

  “I wish they’d stare at me,” the young girl continued. “But then I’m not beautiful like you.”

  Dixon tried to detect sarcasm in that remark but found none. It was the first time she’d had that word applied to herself and she wondered if the girl could be trusted to know what she was talking about.

  “Everyone wants to look like you. Even Matron. I heard her say it.”

  There was little bleeding when the young girl’s tooth was removed as it had long been disengaging from its socket. The dentist told her to come back when she was due to marry and he would remove her remaining twelve teeth and fit her with a nice set of dentures so she’d be no bother or expense to her husband.

  “How is it we haven’t seen you before?” he asked Dixon. “Let’s take a look while you’re here.” He examined the inside of her mouth. “Splendid,” he said. “You must have good heredity to survive the diet up at that place. Something worthwhile from your mother or father, though I presume you’ve little else to thank them for.” He tilted up her chin. “Even a face as beautiful as yours would be spoilt if you had gaps in your mouth. Mind you look after them.”

  It had taken sixteen years to discover she was beautiful and twenty-six to find out she was clever, in her ignorance missing out on adoption, education and marriage during that time. To think she could have had a home with a mother and father to love her if Matron hadn’t prevented her from being adopted; she could have gone to school and become a teacher or a writer; she could have married Manus and been the envy of all the females in Ballybrian and had beautiful children of her own. She could have been saved from working at the Park where she was hated by Charlotte and humiliated by Lily East, who had cast her out into the world with not one person to call her own.

  The women’s magazines that Dixon read advised people not to indulge in regrets as they were a waste of time and didn’t alter anything. Dixon didn’t agree. Her regrets were her constant and valued companions. They mightn’t change the past but they could flavour the future, spurring her on to revenge, the prospect of which comforted her. When the opportunity presented itself, she was making sure she would be ready by having a substantial amount of money in her bank accounts to give her the freedom and the power to wreak the havoc she so desired.

  64

  Four letters. One bulky one for Lochlann from his lawyer friend Pearse. Charlotte knew the handwriting. Would he be sly enough to enclose a secret letter from Niamh? She’d find out soon enough – Lochlann left his letters in his desk drawer and she read them when he was at work. So far, to her knowledge, Niamh and Lochlann hadn’t communicated. The only information about her had come through Harcourt, who said she had, after two months at home in County Mayo, joined the Medical Missionaries in Uganda for the agreed year, after which time she would decide what to do next.

  Waldron’s palpitations seemed to have disappeared, Edwina wrote, since that soldier, Thatcher, had taken over nursing him. She was losing her patience waiting to hear if the offer of a reward had flushed out the two women.

  Charlotte crumpled the letter, poked it into the fire and later replied to it, saying that neither Teresa Kelly nor Nurse Dixon had contacted her.

  Next morning she opened Lochlann’s desk drawer to read Pearse’s one-page letter.

  “I’ve done the research,” he began, “and it looks as if you have a strong case.” It went on to outline the grounds for obtaining a civil as well as a religious annulment that would prove the so-called marriage had been null and void from the beginning. Her frightened eyes flicked over the words consummation, coercion, intent, duress, maturity, freedom, mental incapacity. Tucked into a pigeonhole was a folded document that hadn’t been there the previous day. She took it out and saw that it was an application form for a civil annulment. That was what Pearse had enclosed, not a letter from Niamh, though she had a feeling that the two were connected.

  65

  A Red Cross dance was held to raise money for the overseas troops. The organisers chose a night with a full moon to make it easier for the townspeople to walk or cycle to the showground pavilion in the night light. People from outlying areas either rode or crowded into vehicles to make their way there. Everyone who could come did come.

  Lochlann thought the night out would do Charlotte good. It was now eight months since the birth and death of Benedict and one month since their anniversary outing which had lifted her out of her depression but plunged her into another form of gloom. “Not yet,” was her answer to any suggestion made by Lochlann or Mrs Parker to involve her in any outings. A day at the beach with only Lochlann for company was the one thing she fancied, but that wasn’t feasible seeing the car’s petrol use was restricted to official business. Not that anyone would begrudge his poor depressed wife a trip to the coast but he didn’t want to give himself a special dispensation.

  Lochlann was determined to leave for Dublin as soon as a replacement could be found. He wanted to enlist immediately after dropping Charlotte safely back at the townhouse and what happened after that he didn’t much care. His hopes rested on a doctor coming out of retirement for patriotic reasons. A practitioner in his nineties with failing eyesight and a shaky hand would be better than no doctor at all. Lochlann had sent his resignation to the Medical Board in Sydney, asking at the same time if it had any suitable candidate on its register, and had put a notice in the National Medical Journal.

  One trained nurse had to be on duty at the hospital on the night of the fundraiser. The young nurses expected Matron Grainger to put her own name down when she was doing the roster, seeing she must be thirty-five if she was a day and was a killjoy into the bargain, but the name of a younger nurse appeared on the notice board leaving Matron free to attend.

  “It’s not fair,” said the unlucky one who had been selected. “She’s a complete wowser and thinks dancing is an invention of the devil.”

  Lochlann had told Charlotte that if she was sure she hadn’t changed her mind he would put in an appearance to support the function but would return as soon as tactfully possible. He didn’t intend to drink as he expected his services to be needed before the night was out but, in line with local custom, brought along a bottle of whiskey to share around.

  “Just the one then,” he said, joining Dan Hogan and a group of men outside the pavilion in the moonlight. Dan went inside to have the Pride of Erin with his wife, then returned. It crossed Lochlann’s mind that he hoped dancing would be the only activity the Hogans would engage in that night – he didn’t want Nell crying in his surgery in a few weeks’ time with number eight on the way. The full moon, now high above the pine trees, was ravishing enough to put ideas into the minds of even the most inveterate cynics. He must remember to warn the incoming doctor to expect a rise in births in nine months’ time, and most of them “premature” babies.

  Lochlann reluctantly took leave of the men to enter the hall – one dance with Nell Hogan should be enough to fulfil his duty. The band, consisting of a fiddle, piano and drums, was playing the schottische. In the dim light coming from one central bulb in the ceiling, he saw the wo
men sitting in benches along the side walls talking to each other while keeping an eye on the few men standing around the door. He spotted Nell Hogan going into the side room to help prepare the supper, and asked her to dance. After they executed a few turns he noticed Matron – he had to look twice to make sure it was she – crossing the floor and standing in the spot vacated by Nell. It was a surprise to see her there as he knew she disapproved of dancing. She must have made an exception so she could support such a worthy cause as the Red Cross. He would have to have the second dance with her, and then he could leave, duty done. Placing herself where she did meant he wouldn’t have to search her out amongst the other women, all patients of his.

  One man standing at the door was Digger Flintoff from the west slope of the Plateau. He had been secretly in love with Matron ever since the day he had been admitted to hospital two years earlier, his right leg broken by the limb of a falling tree. Under her care for weeks, he had watched and admired her crisp manner and gentle touch and thought the sound of her voice sweeter than eucalyptus honey. But they came from different ends of the spectrum – he was afraid of her rules and strictures and didn’t think for a moment she would consider a drinker and a larrikin like himself. So he stood at the door, watching Dr Carmody escort Nell Hogan back to where he found her and continue to chat to her until the music started up again.

  Foxtrot. “Ladies’ Choice.” Matron was in position to ask Lochlann before the MC had completed the announcement and Nell was free to return to the supper room.

  “Not letting the grass grow,” someone whispered.

  Two young nurses nudged each other, and a few of the older women exchanged knowing glances.

  Digger was transfixed by Matron. She was dancing with grace and expertise, laughing up at the doctor, her hair swinging loose and the silky, chiffon skirt of her dress floating in time to the music. It was a revelation. No trace of starch anywhere. Perhaps he had misjudged her. As the Ladies’ Choice came to an end, he started to make his way across the floor so he would be in position to ask her for the next dance, all the while promising God he would become a saint if only she would look at him the way she was now looking at the young doctor.