by Nunn, Judy
Necessity, it was true, had dictated Bartholomew’s devotion to duty, but he was also without doubt assuaging his guilt. Here was a way of proving his worth, to himself and perhaps also to his father. It was an ethic that was to remain with him throughout the whole of his life.
During the slack season that followed, Ellie continued to tolerate Big Jim’s maudlin moods and his lengthy bouts at the Burnett Club, but as the months passed and the crushing once again drew near she decided it was time to rectify the situation. Bartholomew could not be expected to work a second time at such a pace and under such pressure.
‘It’s well over a year now since the boys died,’ she said meaningfully as the two of them lingered over the breakfast table. Mary was upstairs feeding the baby and Bartholomew had gone into town to purchase fresh hardware supplies from Wyper Brothers.
‘So?’
‘So I think it’s time you returned to work,’ she said crisply. ‘The mill needs you.’
He gave an uninterested shrug. ‘The mill appears to be managing quite adequately without me.’
‘Only because of Bartholomew,’ she said, curbing her irritation. ‘Without Bartholomew it might well have ceased functioning at all last season – he kept Elianne alive for you, Jim.’
‘And so he should,’ Big Jim sneered. ‘He owes me that much.’
Ellie felt an uncontrollable surge of rage. She could no longer bear her husband’s self-pity, nor his contempt and the way he spoke as if Bartholomew was personally responsible for the deaths of his brothers.
‘What, would you have all three of them dead?’ she demanded loudly, almost to the point of yelling, her eyes gleaming angrily. ‘You have a son, for God’s sake! You have a son and a grandson – can you not see that? You have a family! You have a reason for living!’
Big Jim stared back at her. He was shocked, stirred from his apathy. Ellie never raised her voice, Ellie never displayed anger.
Ellie was thankful that she appeared finally to have broken through his wall of self-pity. ‘You must resume the mantle of responsibility, Jim,’ she said. ‘You must do your duty by your family. If you cannot love your son, then love your grandson, but do your duty by your family or you will lose us all.’
Lose us all? Was that what she’d said? Lose us all? But he dared not lose Ellie. He could cope with the loss of his sons, he could live without them, but Ellie, never; he could not live without Ellie. He would kill anyone who threatened to take her. Why, he would kill Ellie herself if she were ever to leave him. Ellie was his life.
Big Jim had been shaken back to reality and from that moment on his attitude changed. He even admitted his gratitude to Bartholomew, albeit begrudgingly.
‘I appreciate all you have done over the past year,’ he said stiffly when his son had returned from town. ‘Your mother has impressed upon me how hard you have worked to keep the mill going in these difficult times.’
‘I was doing no more than my duty, Father, my duty to both the family and the nation.’
Bartholomew’s surprise at the change in his father’s attitude was evident, and he glanced at his mother, wondering what had brought it about, but Ellie’s face betrayed nothing. ‘Sugar is vital to our men at the front,’ he continued. ‘The government has urged the mills to keep up production, despite the shortage of labour and fuel.’
‘Quite, quite,’ Big Jim said, ‘and your dedication to duty has been most appreciated. We shall work as a team from now on, you and I.’
They did work as a team, father and son, but work was the only true connection they shared. Big Jim could not warm to Bartholomew, who remained in his eyes ‘the runt of the litter’ and a constant reminder of his loss.
He did, however, warm to Bartholomew’s son. Heeding Ellie’s advice he took an interest in his grandson and, as the years passed, young Stan filled the void in Big Jim’s life. Here indeed was a worthy heir to the Durham throne. And little Julia too, pretty and beguiling. Ellie had been right, Jim realised. He had a family and a reason for living. But most of all he had Stan. Stan was Edward and George reborn.
Ellie watched with trepidation as Big Jim took over Bartholomew’s son. She watched as Stan grew to idolise his grandfather – what boy wouldn’t? A figure so much larger than life. Bartholomew could not have competed even had he wanted to, but then true to his nature Bartholomew did not try.
She felt somewhat to blame for her husband’s preoccupation with his grandson, remembering the advice she’d so sternly given that morning years ago. ‘If you cannot love your son, then love your grandson,’ those had been her very words. But Big Jim would never have grown to love his son. As things were now, with his affection focused upon the boy, perhaps his son would be spared his contempt.
Ellie knew only too well that Big Jim could destroy Bartholomew, and she had no doubt that if he wished to do so, he would. It remained her mission in life, as always, to protect her family from her husband.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Following Neil’s wake, the Durham family with the exception of Bartholomew proceeded to get drunk all four in their own particular way.
Hilda displayed no visible effects of the several healthy nips of medicinal brandy she downed in order to help her sleep, but without them sleep would certainly have evaded her.
Stanley Durham was discovered by Max slumped over the desk in his study, a near-empty bottle of Scotch before him. Upon being awoken, he did not appear overly affected and waved Max away, offended by his offer of assistance, but there was a distinct unsteadiness in his gait as he took himself off to bed.
Kate and Alan practised no restraint whatsoever, setting out openly and unashamedly to get drunk. After raiding their father’s liquor supply, they sat at the table in the breakfast room swigging back Scotch and talking about Neil.
A half an hour and two swift Scotches later, Kate wisely decided to tell Alan about Yen before the alcohol took its effect. She recounted faithfully and in detail everything Neil had told her, concluding with her promise that she would look after his wife should anything happen to him.
Alan listened in silent and utter amazement, bottle forgotten, empty glass unheeded on the table, astounded to hear of his brother’s marriage.
‘I’m sorry I couldn’t tell you before, Al,’ she said finally, ‘but Neil swore me to secrecy. He didn’t want anyone to know until the end of the war when he could bring her home to Australia. I think he was worried that word might get back to the army.’
‘And it would have for sure,’ Alan replied, ‘if Dad had ever heard about it.’
‘Exactly. Which is why we must keep this strictly between ourselves until we can bring Yen to Elianne as I promised. What do you say?’
‘You’re on.’ He poured them a third hefty Scotch and they clinked glasses.
‘I want to show you something.’ She stood. ‘Don’t go away, won’t be a tick.’
She disappeared to return a minute or so later with an envelope that she handed him.
He recognised the writing immediately. ‘It’s from Neil,’ he said.
‘Yes. His last letter to me. Read it.’
Alan read the letter slowly, drinking in its every word. He was moved, hearing so clearly the voice of his brother.
When he finished he looked up at her. ‘Neil never wrote to me like that.’
‘He never wrote to anyone like that,’ Kate said and her eyes welled with tears.
She’s crying, Alan thought. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d seen Kate openly cry. Even at the funeral she’d shown a restraint that most others hadn’t. ‘It proves how much he loved you, Kitty-Kat.’
‘Yes. Yes, it does.’ The tears spilled out to course down her cheeks and she did nothing to stop them.
The Scotch started to kick in very quickly after that. They told stories and wept together, the two of them, stories of Neil and stories of their childhood, on and on, until several hours later, exhausted and all cried out, they seemed to have drunk themselves sober, or they
felt they had.
Kate studied the half-empty tumbler on the table before her, closing one eye and then the other, checking her vision, wondering if she was starting to see double. ‘That was a terrible thing Dad said this afternoon.’ She’d wanted to somehow make amends for the hurt her father’s vicious comment must have caused, but she hadn’t known when or how to bring up the subject. Now seemed a rather good time, she thought and a reference to the diaries seemed a rather good opening. ‘He’s not the same as Big Jim, Al. It was just grief speaking; he didn’t mean it.’
‘Course he did.’ Although the words were a little slurred Alan’s reply was brutally honest, he was not prepared to be fobbed off. ‘Sure, Dad’s not the same as Big Jim, he’s not a bad man, but he can be bloody hurtful.’ He gave one of those shrugs that Kate knew was never as careless as it was intended to appear. ‘You can put things down to grief as much as you like, Kate,’ he said, ‘but Dad’s sentiment is the same as Big Jim’s. If he had a choice between who should have copped it, you can bet your bottom dollar it’d be me. People can’t help having favourites. It’s only natural.’
‘Maybe it is, but people don’t have to make things that obvious, do they?’ she replied harshly.
As he gave another supposedly nonchalant shrug and topped up their glasses from the last of the bottle Kate felt a sudden and intense desire to punish her father.
‘Let’s get back at him, Al,’ she said. ‘We can you know. We can give him the diaries first thing tomorrow.’
‘Nah,’ Alan shook his head, aware it was the drink that was talking, ‘we can’t do that, not now. One day, sure, he has to know the truth. But not now – he’s too bloody vulnerable.’
Kate studied her brother with affection. ‘How funny,’ she said, ‘I used to think that Neil was the big softie and that you were the tough one.’
‘I am, always have been,’ he said with a smile.
A half an hour later they weaved their way off to their respective bedrooms.
Alan stayed on at Elianne for a further month. There were plans he needed to set in place, having decided his future must now take a different path. He had secret and lengthy discussions with the three older Fiorelli brothers and he took mysterious trips into town, where he visited a number of businessmen and looked at properties for sale. He told only Paola of his plans. Apart from the brothers no one else knew, certainly no one in the family, not even Kate. The household was in mourning and it was no time to discuss his personal future.
Christmas came and went without anyone noticing. Cook observed tradition and prepared the customary feast, but no one was hungry. It was a sombre affair.
Alan returned to Brisbane in the New Year, presumably to resume his apprenticeship and his studies, but in actuality to tie up his affairs there.
Kate, however, did not return to Sydney. She’d passed her final year with honours (1st class) and had applied for a Vet Science PhD scholarship funded by Vesteys, the large meat-producing company that, among its many international interests, owned cattle stations in northern Australia. While waiting to learn if her application was successful, she decided to stay at Elianne in order to provide some added comfort for her mother, and most particularly to be with her grandfather.
Bartholomew was dying. It was generally agreed that the shock of Neil’s death had pushed him over the edge. That and the physical trip to and from town for the funeral, but in any event the past two months had seen a rapid decline. He was skeletal now, confined to his bed, even his favourite armchair in the corner by the window tantalisingly out of bounds.
Stan had employed a live-in nurse who specialised in palliative care to look after his father during the last weeks of the old man’s life, but he took no personal interest himself, making the occasional token visit to Bartholomew’s quarters with his wife simply in order to appease Hilda, who insisted it was proper. Stan didn’t consider it proper at all. Why should one bother with the elderly and infirm when one had lost a healthy son in the prime of his life? Stan was functioning these days, but with difficulty. He spent a great deal of time at the Burnett Club, where the combination of men’s sympathy and the downing of Scotch afforded some level of escape if not comfort.
Bartholomew was quite ready to die. In fact Bartholomew considered death long overdue. Seventy-nine this year, he thought, good heavens am I really that old? And over seven years since Mary went. It’s certainly time I joined her.
They’d shifted his bed so that it faced the windows, affording him the view he’d so treasured from his armchair. He never tired of the sight. Unfolding before his eyes was the endless expanse of cane that had been his life. He was looking at the past, the present and the future all in one.
Bartholomew loved the timelessness of sugar cane. Over the years he’d seen many changes with the introduction of mechanisation and new methods of production and there would no doubt be many more, but the cane itself remained constant, re-generating itself with a hardy persistence he found admirable. Even after the normal four-year growth period when a field was ploughed and left briefly fallow, it was not long before the freshly-planted cane emerged to grow tall and strong, starting the process all over again. The cycle of life itself, Bartholomew thought contentedly. Cane was so reliable, so predictable, a most satisfying crop.
Kate sat with her grandfather most afternoons. Very often he was sleeping and she would sit holding his hand, staring out at the beauty of the view, and when he awoke, he would smile and squeeze her hand gently with the little strength he had left. Sometimes she would chatter about inconsequential things and he would nod, appearing interested in her every word. And other times they would sit in silence, sharing the panorama of the cane fields.
The experience for Kate was never in the least upsetting. Her grandfather was at peace. He made no complaint and appeared to be suffering no undue pain, except when the nurse moved him, rather brutally at times, in order to correct his posture in the bed and straighten his spine. He winced then, Kate noticed. It’s probably murder when she bathes him and changes his pyjamas and rolls him around to put fresh linen on the bed. Poor Grandpa, she thought.
When she’d offered her assistance, however, the nurse had politely but brusquely refused.
‘Thank you, Miss Durham, but this is what your father pays me to do, this is my job –’
‘I just thought that perhaps with the two of us –’
‘No, no, it’s better this way, believe me.’ Norma Pendlebury was a professional to her fingertips. Family members had a habit of interfering with her routine and she needed no assistance from amateurs, however well meaning.
Kate could only presume that Nurse Pendlebury, highly qualified as she was, must be right, but she was a difficult woman to warm to, big and bossy and seemingly insensitive. All of which no doubt comes with the territory, Kate thought.
Then, early one Saturday afternoon, the most remarkable thing happened.
Kate was sitting in the bedside chair looking out at the view and holding Bartholomew’s hand as he slept. She was feeling rather sleepy herself. The sun through the open shutters and the gentle stirring of air from the ceiling fan formed a soporific combination and she was close to dozing off when all of a sudden she could swear she heard her grandfather’s voice. At first she couldn’t believe it. She’d not heard her grandfather speak for years, no one had, and she turned to stare down at him, presuming her imagination was playing tricks that surely the voice belonged only in her mind. But no, although his eyes remained closed his lips were moving. He’s talking in his sleep, she thought. Leaning close, she tried to make out the words, but there seemed to be none: the sounds were unintelligible, no more than a gentle murmur.
She stayed watching and listening intently, holding his hand, hardly daring to breathe. The murmurs became intermittent, stopping and then starting again as if he was having some sort of conversation, and Kate strained to discern any meaning in what he was saying. Then finally on the gentle exhalation of his breath, she heard
the words, quiet, barely audible, but to Kate, listening with such care as she was, quite distinct. ‘Not long now,’ he said in little more than a whisper, ‘not long.’
He went quiet after that and minutes later the nurse bustled in with his medication. She was about to wake him, but Kate stopped her.
‘Nurse Pendlebury . . .’ Gently releasing Bartholomew’s hand, careful not to disturb him, Kate rose to her feet. ‘He spoke,’ she said. ‘My grandfather spoke.’
‘Oh yes,’ Norma Pendlebury replied, ‘he speaks quite a lot in his sleep, just gobbledy-gook, no sense to it –’
‘But he hasn’t spoken for years, not since the stroke he suffered after my grandmother’s death.’
‘Of course, Miss Durham, I’m fully aware of your grandfather’s medical history,’ the nurse replied pleasantly enough, but in her usual brisk manner. ‘Who can tell what the brain does in these final days, the strangest things happen, believe me they do. But I wouldn’t read too much into it if I were you, they’re just sounds he’s making, no more than that.’
Oh no, you’re wrong, Kate thought, you’re very, very wrong, they’re not sounds at all, he’s speaking. She did not correct Nurse Pendlebury, however. Instead she stepped to one side and watched as Bartholomew was awoken and propped up higher in the bed in order to be fed his medication, which had been ground up and mixed with water for ease of swallowing.
‘There we are, Mr Durham.’ Nurse Pendlebury handed him the glass of fruit juice she always brought to wash away any after-taste. ‘Now I’ll leave you two to yourselves,’ she said checking her watch, ‘and I’ll be back with your afternoon tea in three quarters of an hour.’
Bartholomew nodded his thanks, he was always most courteous to Nurse Pendlebury, and he smiled up at Kate, pleased to see her. He had no idea she’d been sitting holding his hand for the past forty minutes.
Kate waited until the nurse had left and the bedroom door was closed before once again sitting beside her grandfather. Bartholomew handed her the glass automatically; he didn’t want the fruit juice, he never did, but fruit juice following medication was part of Nurse Pendlebury’s routine. Kate placed the glass on the bedside table and took his hand.