Gifts of the Peramangk

by Dean Mayes

  Sonya paused once more and breathed in before delivering her next piece of information.

  “She died—a broken woman, some time in the 1960s.”

  The revelation assailed Virginia with an emotional force almost too much to bear. She brought her hand to her mouth and closed her eyes. Ruby went to her grandmother and put her arms around her as Virginia’s hand began to shake.

  Belle set Minty down so that she could reach across and take Virginia’s hand. Virginia smiled at her, reassuring them silently that she was okay before looking back to Sonya.

  “What about my father?” Virginia queried hopefully, her voice quivering.

  Sonya raised her brow then and she held up her finger.

  “It seems you had mentioned to Agatha once that your father was in the military,” she said.

  Virginia nodded slowly, as an old memory coalesced from deep within. She smiled absently at the face of her father.

  “I did…” she remembered wistfully. “He served in Korea. But I never knew what happened to him.”

  Sonya lifted a new document out from the pile and offered it to Virginia.

  It was an Army Service Record, complete with an accompanying photograph of a young, uniformed Aboriginal man with neatly groomed and parted hair, broad shoulders and handsome face.

  Virginia felt the air being sucked from her lungs. At first, it seemed to be the face of a stranger but as she kept looking at it, the disparate memories of her father began to draw into focus—for the first time in decades.

  A young girl, balancing on top of a man’s shoulders. A strong, yet tender voice, telling her dream time stories from memory, singing an old Peramangk lullaby to her…

  Virginia touched a finger to the cheek of the man in the photograph.

  “Archibald Crammond,” Sonya read from the service record. “Private in the Australian Expeditionary Force to Korea, 1951—your father.”

  Ruby craned to see the photograph in Virginia’s hand and gently tilted the document so she could see it.

  “He was part of the multinational defence of the Kapyong Valley when Chinese forces attempted to push into South Korea,” Sonya continued. “Against considerable odds, the Australian troops, along with soldiers from the Canadian Infantry, managed to halt the Chinese advance and turned the tide of the battle in their favour. But—it wasn’t without cost. 53 Australians were recorded as being wounded and there were…32 casualties…of which your father was one.”

  Andy reached down into the briefcase this time, lifting a small square box from inside and passing it to Sonya who placed it down in front of Virginia.

  “Though Aboriginal personnel were generally not recognised for their service,” Sonya explained. “Your father was singled out by the command for several acts of courage under fire during that battle. He saved the lives of several of his comrades before being fatally wounded by the Chinese. His commanding officer advocated on behalf of your father, that he should be recognised.”

  Sonya opened the box for Virginia, who gazed down upon two shining medals pinned side by side to a green fabric cushion underneath.

  “Archie Crammond was cited for bravery and awarded a special citation posthumously. Agatha was able to obtain these medals with the support of your father’s commanding officer, who was still alive in the mid 1970s—after she moved from Adelaide to Melbourne. That was where she met her second husband—my grandfather.”

  Virginia sat completely still. It was as though a thick veil had been lifted, a veil which had kept secrets for decades, everything that Virginia had ever known about where she had come from. Her very identity, her very being.

  Ruby gazed in wonderment at the medals in the little case and a copy of the photograph of her great-grandfather that had been mounted inside the lid. Jeremy and Asher got up from their seats and crowded on either side of her and Khalili so they too could see the medals and photograph.

  “He was a hero?” Jeremy asked.

  “Yes,” Sonya answered with a smile. “Very much so.”

  Virginia reached into her apron again, grasping a tissue and wiping at her good eye.

  “We can take a moment if you like,” Sonya offered with concern and turned to Andy who nodded in agreement.

  “No, no,” Virginia. “It’s alright. I’m alright—please, go on.”

  Hesitating, Sonya closed over the service record and placed it to one side. She leaned forward slightly, steeping her fingers together in front of her as she considered her next words carefully.

  “Now…there is something else which I’ve discovered only recently—since I saw Ruby on the television.”

  Reaching into the briefcase once more, Sonya lifted out another old folder and placed this new one on the table.

  “My grandmother was an astute financial mind who made some very fortuitous investments during her lifetime,” Sonya said, putting her glasses on once more. “Several years before Agatha left her first husband, during the period in which the farm prospered, she invested a small amount of money in a trust fund without her husband’s knowledge.”

  Opening the folder, Sonya placed her finger on the first document there.

  “This fund was designed to mature over the long term so once Agatha set it up, she filed all the documentation away and it was basically forgotten. It was never mentioned in her will, nor was my grandfather even aware of it. He never took much notice of Agatha’s chest after she died, though it remained in his possession. When I opened the chest, the original documents for the trust fund were in there.”

  Lifting the document from the folder, Sonya glanced at Andy then turned it over and handed it to Virginia.

  Virginia took it slowly and studied it carefully for several moments, scanning the document with her eyes, mouthing the words as she read them.

  “Trust fund in the name of…Virginia Crammond,” she murmured.

  Virginia glanced over the top of the document at Sonya.

  “I was able to retrieve the details from the institution where it is still held,” Sonya said. “…Including its current value.”

  Virginia felt her heart quicken. Her mouth went dry and her hand began to shake more visibly than before. Beside her, Ruby listened intently. She had been sipping her lemonade but now she had stopped and was looking from Virginia to Sonya and back again.

  “As at close of business today, there will be just short of $85,000 in the fund.”

  Belle, Ruby and Asher gasped in unison while Khalili put his hand to his mouth. Jeremy dropped his glass of lemonade, spilling it all over the table in front of him while Virginia sat perfectly still, her expression registering complete shock.

  “It’s yours, Virginia,” Sonya said solemnly, her own voice now quivering with emotion. “Agatha Penschey was never able to reconcile her guilt in having been an accessory to your displacement and servitude. She wanted to provide for your future—to hopefully get you off the farm and into a boarding school that could give you the kind of musical education she so wished for you…as well as the opportunity for a better life.”

  Sonya’s voice caught in her throat. Her eyes began to mist.

  “Until the day she died, she never forgot—she remembered you, Virginia.”

  Virginia slumped back in her seat, trying to absorb the enormity of everything that Sonya had laid bare in such a short time. The missing pieces of Virginia’s life that had been so cruelly taken away from her. Sonya Llewellyn, Agatha Penschey’s granddaughter had returned them now—finishing the journey of the only true friend Virginia had ever known.

  And now this gift, a gift she never could have dreamed of. Suddenly, she felt a wave of panic and she shook her head.

  “I-I can’t accept this,” she said in a shaking whisper. “It’s…too much. This is far too much.”

  Sonya shook her head now, her eyes full of empathy. She reached across the table and took Virginia’s hands in hers. In that moment, in Sonya’s touch, Virginia felt the familiar hands of Agatha Penschey, reaching out acro
ss time, from the tranquillity of the parlour of the homestead.

  The memory of those hands—which had taught her to hold the instrument, to play it and learn it…

  “Virginia, it is her legacy. Her apology to you,” Sonya said as Andy put his arm around her gently. “Agatha died carrying the burden of her failure. She wished she could have found you, given you back your past and provided for your future. I am here now to finish what she started.”

  Sonya placed the documents before Virginia and took a pen from her purse. Looking across at Ruby first, then Asher, Jeremy and Minty, Sonya nodded to them.

  “You can give your grandchildren that future,” Sonya ventured.

  Virginia hesitated, blinking through her tears as she focused on the documents. Her hand hovered over the pen.

  Belle squeezed Virginia gently, her own tears falling as she too looked lovingly across at the children.

  “Do it, Mum,” she whispered. “Do it for the children…for their future.”

  And then Virginia wept openly, letting the flood of memories and emotions spill forth. All the long years of trauma and hurt, the accumulated experience of her dislocation from her beloved Peramangk country, her ordeal at the hands of the Pastoralist and her feelings of abandonment by Agatha—the only person who ever mattered to her. The memories of her childhood were freed from the place deep inside where she had buried them in order to protect herself.

  And finally, she was free.

  Virginia lifted the pen and signed her name to the paper.

  Ruby, Asher, Jeremy and Minty all gathered around her and enfolded her in their arms, squeezing her tight and planting kisses on her cheeks.

  And through her tears of joy and love, Virginia reached out across the table and took Sonya’s hand once again. They smiled at one another.

  “Thank you,” Virginia whispered silently.

  Khalili’s blue Mercedes pulled into the entrance of the grand, tree-lined boulevard and proceeded slowly inward toward a grand Victorian building that was surrounded by leafy trees.

  Ruby craned her neck to see through the windscreen and take in the austere building whilst, behind her, Virginia herself scanned their surroundings reverentially.

  The Lavery School was indeed as pretty as had been described in the prospectus but being here, in its presence, its beauty was something else entirely. Perfectly manicured lawns, pretty garden beds that were filled with colour. Students meandered casually on the lawns or sat in groups under the shade of the foliage. For a fleeting moment, Virginia was reminded of the orphanage, but the building they were approaching here and now held nothing of the sense of dread or oppression that Virginia associated with that other place. She could only sense warmth.

  Khalili brought the car to a stop at the bottom of a set of stairs leading up to the administration building and turned off the engine. He looked across at Ruby who sat still, pensive in her crisp, new uniform. Sporting a burgundy blazer with the emblem of the school on its right breast pocket, a matching tartan skirt, shining leather shoes, Ruby looked very much the young lady, ready to face her new journey.

  Yet he could see the worry etched into her face.

  “Whatever is the matter, my child?” Khalili scolded gently, glancing over his shoulder at Virginia.

  Ruby gulped and gripped the brim of her hat tightly.

  “I dunno,” she shrugged nervously. “Scared I guess.”

  Virginia leaned forward from her seat and placed her hand on Ruby’s shoulder.

  “You’ve got nothing to be scared of, love. This will be a wonderful experience for you—where you’ll be able to do everything that you love and go farther than you’ve ever dreamed of.”

  Ruby peered out through the glass at the building again then looked down into her lap.

  “But you won’t be there, Nana…” she glanced at Khalili. “Or you, Prof.”

  Khalili smiled empathetically and patted her shoulder.

  “Of course we’ll be with you,” he assured her. “We’ll always be with you—at the end of the telephone, on weekend visits…any time you need us, we’ll be here for you.”

  Ruby turned the corner of her lip upward and played with her hat in her hands.

  “And we are with you in the gift you bring to this place,” Virginia said impishly. “Take your palti in there and share it with them.”

  My palti, Ruby thought, smiling as she remembered what her grandmother had taught her.

  “My song,” she said quietly.

  Ruby pushed down the handle of the car door and stepped out onto the pavement.

  Khalili assisted Virginia to exit the car then retrieved Ruby’s bags from the trunk.

  Ruby went to Khalili and hugged him before he even had the chance to let go of her bags.

  “Thank you, Professor Khalili…for everything,” she said.

  “You are…most welcome. And thank you—for giving me the gift of teaching…one last time.”

  Ruby stepped back from Khalili and wiped away fresh tears, before turning to Virginia.

  Grandmother and granddaughter stood before one another now, too moved to speak. Both reached out and took each other’s hands and held them.

  “I’m…s-so very proud of you,” Virginia said, gazing into her granddaughter’s worldly eyes. “Go and catch your future now…okay?”

  Ruby nodded, struggling to hold back her tears. She embraced Virginia and held her tightly, not wanting to let go.

  “I love you, Nana,” she wept.

  Virginia smiled, a radiant smile.

  “I love you too, my child of the Peramangk.”

  Ruby let the warmth of her grandmother’s words nourish her for a long moment. Then, she stood back and stood tall, looking proudly upon Virginia and Khalili.

  Placing her hat on her head, Ruby hefted her back pack onto one shoulder. Ensuring that her Vrassidaun violin was secure in the front pocket of her travelling case, she turned and climbed up the stairs, to the entrance of The Lavery School.

  At the top, Ruby stopped and turned one final time to smile down at Virginia and Khalili.

  And in that moment she felt the connection to her grandmother, as strong and as vital as it had always been.

  And she knew she would never be alone.

  Epilogue

  12 years later

  A breeze wafted through the boughs of a willow tree and touched the surface of the water hole, creating a rippling pattern that arced outward from its centre and dissipated gently upon the craggy shore.

  Light from the sun danced over the water—a silent ballet of light that reflected in the eyes of the young woman who stood alone under the willow tree, quietly waiting.

  She is tall, lithe and beautiful; with long raven hair that falls like silk half way down her back. Her flawless skin; the colour of coffee. Her eyes; filled with wisdom despite her relative youth. Her presence; confident and assured—yet she projects a calm serenity.

  She stood in meditation, listening to the sounds all around her. The wind through the trees, the rippling of the water, the chirping of the birds somewhere in the sky above, the cattle in the field nearby. She closed her eyes and listened. To her, it was music—an opera in and of itself—a performance of nature that was for her and her alone to savour.

  She was at home here in Peramangk country.

  The sound of an approaching vehicle gently shakes her from her reverie and she opened her eyes slowly and turned to see the new arrival.

  The blue and white police sedan slowed to a stop just down from the rise upon which she stood, under the canopy of the willow tree. It idled for a moment, then the driver extinguished the engine.

  The front and back passenger side doors opened first revealing both a young woman dressed incongruously in the uniform of a chef and a teenaged boy dressed in a school uniform and blazer. Sighting the lone figure standing under the tree by the shore of the water hole, they smiled up at her.

  “Ruby!” Minty called out, waving happily.

 
Setting down the small urn she was holding, Ruby turned and smiled warmly as her cousins skipped up the hillock and embraced her.

  “Sorry we’re late,” Asher apologised before thumbing at the police car behind her. “Blame Jem. He was busy playing hero again.”

  Ruby planted a kiss on Minty’s cheek and glanced over his shoulder as the driver’s side door finally opened and Jeremy climbed out.

  He smiled as he took off his hat. He was dressed in the crisp uniform of a police constable.

  He was taller now, broad shouldered and carried a quiet air of confidence. So different to the boy he once had been.

  Rising up to the top of the shore where Ruby stood now, he hugged her and kissed her cheek.

  “How are you, Rube?”

  “I’m good…better now you’re here.”

  “You won’t be late, will you?”

  Checking her watch, Ruby shook her head.

  “My flight’s not until five, so I have a few hours yet.”

  Asher clapped her hands excitedly.

  “Who would have thought, eh? London. You must be so thrilled.”

  Ruby smiled softly.

  “Yeah. It’s…I still can’t quite believe it.”

  Jeremy glanced down at the urn beside Ruby’s feet and regarded it with sadness.

  “It’s small,” he said. “Smaller than I expected.”

  Ruby bent down and picked it up in her hands carefully. She held it out toward the others and they gathered around in a circle. Jeremy reached out and laid his hands over Ruby’s. Asher followed suit and finally Minty.

  They closed their eyes and fell silent, allowing the sounds of the water hole, the trees and the birds to take over for a moment.

  “Nana said that this water hole was one of her favourite places,” Ruby spoke softly. “She played with her friends. She fished here with her dad and she had picnics here with her mum. She said…she was happiest when she was here.”