Willow Tree Bend

by Kaye Dobbie

  ‘Legal advice’ sounded good, although scary, too. For someone who liked to micromanage every detail of her life, letting others make decisions wasn’t going to be easy.

  Lily stepped back, a frown drawing familiar wrinkles on her forehead. She glanced at her granddaughter. ‘Sam is feeling very upset,’ she scolded, ‘but she won’t talk about it with me. She thinks I’m too old and feeble.’

  ‘I do not think that,’ Sam butted in. ‘You were going to have a rest, weren’t you? I think you should, and then Hope and I can have that “little talk” she mentioned.’

  ‘I’d better stay,’ Lily said firmly. ‘Where’s the girl with the pink hair?’ She looked towards the window. ‘Will I ask her in?’

  ‘Prue’s gone into town for a latte.’

  During the car journey Prue had spoken to her from the heart, revealing that she was adopted and still searching for her birth parents. Samantha, she’d informed Hope, was lucky because her biological parents were not a mystery. Prue seemed to think that it was important to tell the truth—a truth Hope had been avoiding for most of her life.

  Lily gave her a nudge. ‘Go on, then.’

  ‘Samantha,’ Hope began in a bracing voice. ‘I’m so sorry about what happened. Looking Back … well, they’re being unbelievably crass. And not just that, so unprofessional. I’ll certainly be making complaints. I wonder if I could sue them?’

  ‘Well there’s a thought,’ Sam murmured, but Hope could see she was unimpressed. ‘Just tell me one thing. No prevaricating, no fobbing me off. Are you my mother?’

  Direct, straight to the point, just like Faith.

  ‘Well, technically I suppose I am, but in every other way Faith is your mother. From the moment she held you in her arms, you were hers.’

  Sam was nodding, but her face looked pale and stony, and there was the glitter of angry tears in her eyes. ‘You should have told me. Someone should have told me. Tacked it on to the talk when I was twelve, about boys and periods. “Oh, by the way, Sam, there’s something else you need to know …”’ She swallowed, trying to gain control of her voice and not quite managing it. ‘Why didn’t you tell me?’

  ‘Samantha …’

  But she’d gone; a whirl of her skirt, and she’d taken herself out of the room. Somewhere a door slammed.

  Lily raised her eyebrows. ‘Good start,’ she said.

  Hope looked at her mother. ‘I think I need to sit down.’

  ‘I’ll make the tea,’ Lily announced, and her eyes were wise and kind. ‘You’d better go after her. She’ll be crying her heart out in there.’

  Picturing Sam’s face, Hope wondered if that was true. And then she remembered the other night, when she had held her daughter in her arms, properly held her, for the first time since she was born. She hadn’t thought of her as her daughter then. She was Samantha Cantani, her niece. She hadn’t been her daughter since that early October day in nineteen seventy, and surely that was a good thing all round?

  What she’d just said to Sam was the absolute truth. Technically she was her mother, but in all other ways it was Faith who deserved the title.

  Sam was in her bedroom. At least, Hope thought with relief, she hadn’t run off across the paddock. She really wasn’t up to traipsing down to the creek in her Miu Miu sandals.

  ‘Samantha?’ She opened the door.

  Sam sat up on the messy bed as if she didn’t want to be caught at a disadvantage. Hope didn’t think she was ‘crying her heart out’, as Lily had said, although her reddened eyes and flushed cheeks suggested she was certainly emotional.

  Sam glanced up and then away again, as if she couldn’t bear to look at her. That hurt. They had, thought Hope, been getting on so well.

  ‘You always call me Samantha,’ Sam said in a small wooden voice. It was a statement of fact.

  Hope smiled. ‘I do, don’t I? Faith teases me about that. I don’t know why I do it. Maybe a shrink could tell me. I named you, so maybe that’s it. To me you will always be that baby called Samantha.’

  ‘My father …?’

  ‘You know who he was. Pete. So, you’re still a Taylor and a Cantani, just not the same Taylor and Cantani.’

  Sam nodded, and she suspected her daughter found comfort in that. Her family was still her family, her home still her home. The ground might have shifted, but not too much.

  ‘Why did you give me away?’ There was no resentment in her voice now, or sorrow, no accusations and drama. Just a genuine curiosity.

  Relieved, Hope sat down on the end of the bed, far enough away that she wasn’t encroaching on Sam’s space, yet close enough so that she didn’t have to raise her voice.

  ‘I was sixteen … seventeen by the time you were born. Pete had been killed in South Vietnam. And Faith and Joe wanted you so much. That was the perfect reason for me to hand you over. I felt safe doing so, and I suppose in a way I was relieved. I had plans for my life and I wasn’t ready to be a mother without Pete there to be a father.’

  Sam thought about that. ‘Did he know?’

  ‘That’s the million-dollar question.’ She looked into Sam’s blue eyes. Pete’s blue eyes. ‘I wrote to him and told him, but I don’t know if he read the letter before he died. His mother told Joe it was unopened, although she would say that. Anyway, it doesn’t really matter if he read it or not. He was going to marry me as soon as his two years of National Service was up.’

  She had her handbag with her, and reached down into it, finding the carefully wrapped parcel.

  ‘I have his letters,’ she said. ‘His to me. Mine to him were sent home to his mother after his death, and I’m pretty sure she would have destroyed them. I was never part of her plan for her favourite son.’

  Sam looked at the small sheaf of letters, tied together with string and wrapped in plastic. Hope knew they didn’t look very romantic. No ribbons or bows. But they were exactly how they had been when Pete died—she’d hidden them under her bed in an old school book—and she’d never been able to bring herself to change that.

  She held them out. ‘Here. You should read them. I know what people say, that he had lots of girlfriends and I wasn’t special, that he’d never have married me. Perhaps these will change your mind, but if not …’ She shrugged. ‘Doesn’t matter. I know the truth.’

  After a moment Sam took the letters, but she didn’t undo the string and read any of them. More questions, thought Hope, and braced herself.

  ‘After he was killed …?’

  ‘Faith found out about … you. She took charge. Faith’s good at that, but then you probably know that yourself.’

  Sam managed a flicker of a smile, gone in an instant. ‘Does Gran know?’

  ‘Yes, she does.’

  ‘God, I feel like I’m surrounded by ASIO spies feeding me false information. Everything I thought was true was a lie!’

  ‘It wasn’t like that,’ Hope said urgently. ‘Really it wasn’t.’

  Sam took a breath, fighting for control, and then she nodded. ‘Go on,’ she whispered. ‘Faith took charge.’

  ‘She told Mum, who was actually more supportive than I had imagined, once she was over the shock. I knew she believed it was another Rex situation, and that somehow she was to blame by passing on genes that rendered me vulnerable to men who were only after one thing. Faith and I had a good laugh about that. I insisted on telling Mrs Cantani myself, but by then she already knew. She wasn’t happy and she refused to believe you were Pete’s, so that was the end of that.

  ‘I was booked into a private hospital called Curtis House, and at the same time Faith announced she was pregnant. She pretended to be having “difficulties”, and I had to go with her down to Melbourne for a few months. To help. Actually, it was a relief to get away from the gossips and the people who knew me. I enjoyed my time in Melbourne, and it rekindled my dreams of being an actress. It gave me a future to plan for.’

  ‘Well, you wouldn’t want to be a mother, would you?’ Sam asked, with a surprising lack of sarca
sm.

  ‘I doubt I would have made a very good one. Faith was much better at it than me. You dodged a bullet there, Samantha.’

  She made a sound that was almost a laugh, and looked down at the letters, but Hope could see she wasn’t finished yet. There were more questions to come.

  Hope decided to jump in first this time. ‘When you were born, Faith and Joe were there, and I handed you over to them. They were … incredibly happy. I believed, and I still believe, it was the best thing I have ever done.’

  Sam went to speak when her gaze flickered past Hope to the door. Her face lit up. ‘Mum,’ she whispered, only for the joy to drain out of her. It was heartbreaking to see.

  Hope turned around.

  It was Faith. She was standing in the doorway, and she was wearing shorts and a shirt that wouldn’t have been out of place in Hawaii. Her fair hair was pulled up into a ponytail beneath a baseball cap and there were bright pink Jellies on her feet. She looked like a seventeen-year-old.

  It was only as she blinked the mist from her eyes that Hope could see her sister wasn’t a teenager anymore. There were weary lines around her eyes and mouth, and shadows in the hollows of her cheeks. She had obviously been through a difficult time, and yet … Hope noticed there was a soft glow about her. The sort of glow that a deep sense of contentment brings.

  ‘You’ve made a terrible mess of this, Hope,’ she scolded in typical Faith fashion.

  Hope managed to laugh. She made her face repentant. ‘I know. I needed you to sort it out. You’re better at that than me.’

  Faith smiled and then her gaze slid past her sister. ‘Hello, Sam,’ she said, and opened her arms.

  Just for an instant Sam held back, but the next moment she had flown off the bed and was hugging her mother as if her life depended upon it.

  Hope was certain they didn’t even notice as she crept out of the room.

  She told herself she wasn’t jealous, that she had made her decision long ago. Honestly, she wasn’t certain what she was feeling. Perhaps some sadness, and a lot of happiness, and the usual mountain of doubts you get when looking backwards at the choices you’d made. Crossroads. Would you do the same if you had the moment again? What would have happened if you hadn’t done this, or done that?

  ‘Sit down, Hope.’ Lily was busy pouring tea into a cup with one hand. ‘You look done in.’

  Hope managed a soft laugh and flopped down onto the chair without her usual elegance. ‘Exhausted.’

  ‘But not sorry?’

  She thought about it and then shook her head. ‘No, not sorry.’

  ‘That’s the main thing, then.’

  Hope sipped her tea. She thought about the past, and Pete. She thought about Sam. She even thought about Prue and her quest to find her parents, and the sudden decision she had made on the trip up here to help the girl, and those like her. Some sort of charity, perhaps. The silence drew on, but it was comfortable, and she didn’t feel the need to fill it. She realised that her mother knew her so well, knew her inside and out, and that was comforting too.

  ‘Do you think they’ll be all right?’ she asked, hearing the murmur coming from Sam’s room.

  Lily nodded. ‘I’m sure they will.’

  ‘Good.’ Hope smiled, and meant it. ‘That’s good.’

  FAITH

  17 January 2000, Golden Gully

  She hadn’t planned what she was going to say when she got there. She’d just been so desperate to get home, taking the first available flight into Melbourne, and then the taxi—who cared that it cost a fortune? Faith knew she needed to be here, where she belonged.

  Her trip north had taught her that lesson at least. She belonged here, with her family, and not in the past.

  Sam was blowing her nose. They’d both had a good cry, but despite what she’d said about Hope making a mess of it, her sister seemed to have laid the groundwork very well. Now it was up to Faith to do the rest.

  ‘I’m sorry I told you not to come home,’ was the first thing Sam had said, when she was able to speak.

  ‘Oh, Sam, I knew you didn’t mean it! Do you remember what I said?’

  ‘When you first held me in your arms it felt like a miracle.’ Her lip wobbled.

  ‘That was true. It did feel like that. It was a miracle. Joe and I couldn’t have children and then suddenly there you were. There were other emotions, oh lots of them, but that was the biggie.’

  ‘The man you went to see,’ Sam said, giving her a sideways glance. ‘Was it Bert Dalzell?’

  Faith felt shock rippling through her. When she shook her head, she felt the muscles in her neck tense and jerky. ‘No, nothing to do with him. Why did you think that?’

  Sam tucked her hair behind her ears and cleared her throat. ‘A couple of things. There was a story in the Express. I was looking at back issues, trying to find out …’ She shrugged. ‘Anyway, I saw the photograph of you at the Angel, with Kitty, and Dalzell was there. He lived in Golden Gully, too, and …’ She paused, seemed to change her mind, and ended with, ‘He went to Queensland, too.’

  ‘So, you put three and two together and made twenty-one,’ Faith guessed. ‘No, it was someone else I went to see. He was also in that photo. Ray Bartel.’

  ‘Let me guess.’ Sam closed her eyes, and when she opened them she was smiling with triumph. ‘Shaggy hair and dark glasses?’

  Faith’s laugh was husky, as if she hadn’t been laughing much recently. ‘That sounds like Ray. He was a singer, a musician, working at the Angel. I fell in love with him, but in hindsight that was probably due to a combination of things. I’d loved his songs and then to meet him in person … And he seemed so nice, genuinely nice. Charming. He broke my heart, or at least I thought so, but in hindsight I’m not so sure he did. He did shake me up, stopped me from making a terrible mistake, and maybe it was just as well.’

  Sam was thinking it over. ‘Maybe it was the gene Hope was talking about—Lily’s Vulnerability to Charming Men gene,’ she explained, when Faith looked puzzled. ‘Gran believed she’d passed it on.’

  ‘You mean because of my father?’ Faith asked. ‘Now there’s a thought. My advice, stay away from charming musicians, Sam.’

  Sam’s expression underwent a series of alterations. ‘Yeah, well … So why did you go all that way to see Ray? If you never really loved him?’

  Faith pulled off her baseball cap and tossed it onto the bed. Without the cap her hair looked greasy, as if she hadn’t been able to wash it properly for days.

  ‘Ray rang me. He’d seen that photo they printed when they knew Hope was coming home. Me, Hope, Joe, Mum and you. You were about three at the time. Ray saw it and thought you were his daughter.’

  Sam searched her eyes. ‘Any reason he should have thought that?’

  ‘There was a reason, but that’s something for later. Okay?’

  She thought Sam might insist on knowing it all right now, and was glad when she appeared to accept that there were details she might need to wait for.

  Faith continued on. ‘When we broke up he was focused on his career. He walked away from me, which was a good thing, because your father was waiting, but I was pretty upset at the time. I hadn’t thought of him in years, so when he rang it was a bit of a surprise …’

  At first she had been seriously shaken. She’d tried to explain that Sam wasn’t his and let him down gently. It was all so long ago, and over the years the pain she had felt had faded. She hadn’t thought of him for ages. But it wasn’t the same for Ray and she soon realised that for some reason he had fixated on Sam. She was his daughter and he refused to believe otherwise. Instead of being sensible, he’d started making threats.

  You can’t get away with this. I want to see her and if you stop me then I’m going to the press!

  He’d hung up and she’d stood there in her shop, staring at the phone, her happy, ordered life in shreds around her. What would happen if Ray went public? The only way to counteract his story was to tell the truth, and therefore cause pai
n to all of those she loved. The truth must be told, she knew that now, and she blamed herself for being too complacent to do it before. And what about Joe? Joe, who had always been her rock. She couldn’t bear to have Joe hurt by this hand grenade from her past. This was all her fault and she had to fix it.

  She’d set off, and all the way north she had been driven by her determination to make Ray accept the truth and agree to leave them alone. It was only when she arrived that she’d understood that not everything was black and white, and not everything could be fixed …

  ‘Life hadn’t been kind to Ray. He’d had disappointments. In the last few years he’d ended up alone, and with too much time to think. The crowd he got in with, the ones he thought would look after his interests, they didn’t. Well, there was a lot of baggage he wanted to unload. The main reason I couldn’t come home straight away was that he’d just had a medical diagnosis and it wasn’t good.’

  Ray was dying. Despite all that passed between them in nineteen sixty-nine, she had found herself pitying him. For a while after they broke up, she’d hated him, and then forgotten him, although she’d never forgotten that awful trip with Kitty to the ‘doctor’. That was the reason—after a serious infection and another operation—she hadn’t been able to have any more children. And now, thirty years later, Ray was telling her that he’d seen the photo of Sam, and demanding to be allowed to play a part in her life.

  She couldn’t forgive his threats, but at least now she understood why he had made them. He was frightened. The trip north that she’d thought would only take a couple of days, maybe a week, had suddenly changed completely.

  ‘It wasn’t until I got there that I realised what sort of state Ray was in.’

  The grotty little cottage above the inlet, where the mangroves grew, the lack of sanitation, and Ray spending his days drinking booze and eating whatever was left from his weekly foray into the nearby town. Ray Bartel, former pop star, had turned into a cliché.

  ‘But you stayed?’

  ‘He didn’t want me to go. Even when I told him you weren’t his, he clung to the idea that I wasn’t telling him the whole truth. He got quite upset.’ Aggressive. Swearing, sobbing, spittle running down his chin.