The telegram arrived at noon on Friday to say that Papa was in bed with a chest complaint. It didn’t sound urgent, but Belle planned to leave for Binburra in the morning, just in case. The influenza had been bad this year.
Eddie insisted on coming along. He’d been unpredictable lately: one day charming and the next, a grump. This was one of his charming days. He’d imported a car from America, a shiny red Oldsmobile Runabout, and she guessed he wanted to test out his new toy.
‘Top speed is over twenty miles per hour,’ he said. ‘Quicker than waiting for the train tomorrow. We could leave after lunch and be there by tonight.’ His face was eager, expectant. This was the first time all year he’d offered to return with her to Hills End.
Belle wasn’t sure. The Runabout’s leather roof, which came as a separate accessory, had not yet arrived. However, the weather looked fine and she was curious herself to try out the new car, the first they’d ever owned.
‘All right then, Eddie. I’ll pack two bags.’
An hour later she was ready. Eddie stood in the driveway beside his new car, waiting for her. He looked quite dashing. Peaked hat. Goggles pushed high on his forehead. Stylish driving coat of the finest tweed, hanging a little loosely perhaps. He’d lost some weight, and it suited him.
Belle climbed in beside him. He turned the side crank a few times and the motor roared to life. With a loud bang they were off through the streets of Battery Point. People turned to stare as they went by, and Eddie tooted the horn and doffed his hat. She felt sorry for horses sharing the road. They shied, or even bolted away. Eddie took to stopping the car so they could pass by safely.
He gave her a turn at driving once they left Hobart. She loved the spring sunshine on her face, the wind in her hair, and how the car magically powered along at a steady speed, as fast as a horse could gallop. It took a while for her to master the steering, which was via a central tiller. When she ran into a ditch, they laughed and worked together to push the car back onto the road. He took over the driving again, and Belle settled back for the ride. It was hard to believe they were actually having fun. She snatched glimpses of the old Eddie, her best friend from years ago.
Their relationship had improved over the last year, and it was all thanks to that day in Melbourne at Alice Tyler’s house. The day Belle had vowed to reclaim her power. On returning to Hobart she’d begun teaching at Campbell College next door to Coomalong, her family’s Hobart home. Where she and Luke met as children twenty-five years earlier. Now she was principal. Teaching provided her with the purpose she’d been so desperately craving.
Edward had forbidden it, of course, and refused to help, but she forged ahead despite his resistance. The first teacher she hired was Becky Tyler, shamelessly poached from Ruyton and a willing truant. They’d become friends, although she kept their relationship from her husband. These days Belle had more in common with Becky than with Grace, whom she’d known all her life. They shared so many interests, but she still couldn’t penetrate a certain reserve Becky showed when talking about Luke.
Although Eddie had railed against the school in the beginning, times were changing and he’d eventually come round. Society was becoming more tolerant of working wives, especially when their work involved charitable pursuits, which were viewed as fashionable. Belle also liked to think that Eddie respected her for standing up to him.
He still worked too hard. Often he came home dog-tired and went straight to his room. He still spent nights at the club, but he vehemently denied the rumours about other women. In the absence of firm evidence, Belle had decided to give him the benefit of the doubt. Sometimes he came home full of energy and enthusiasm for his family. Clara and Anne loved those times. If Belle was honest, she loved them too. Intimacy was returning to their marriage.
Eddie swerved wildly to dodge a sow and piglets dashing across the road, and they both shrieked with laughter. He laid a proprietorial hand on her knee, and she let it stay. Why couldn’t he be like this all the time?
Three hours into their journey, and the sun disappeared. The breeze stiffened and shifted southerly. Belle shivered and pulled her wrap around her shoulders. Clouds were scudding in from the west.
As the day grew darker, so did Eddie’s mood. He cursed as bone-jarring corrugations rattled the car. He swore as they slid into potholes. When they hit an especially deep rut in the road, he slammed on the brake and jumped out. ‘I need a piss.’
Belle needed a toilet stop too, but not here. They should have stopped in New Norfolk. Here there was nothing but bare sheep paddocks. No trees to hide behind. She wished she was a man. How very convenient were trousers and standing up to pee.
It started to rain. Belle reached for her jacket on the seat beside her. Something fell from the folds, a small cut-glass bottle with a silver top, full of a dark liquid. She picked it up. No label. She unscrewed the lid and wrinkled her nose in distaste at the distinct, pungent smell of laudanum. Belle’s breathing grew shallow. It was as if someone were tightening a vice in her chest. She could see her husband standing with his back to the road, searching through his coat.
Eddie was chasing the dragon.
It explained so much. His frequent tiredness and lack of appetite. The mood swings and erratic behaviour. What a fool she’d been. Mistaking his bouts of energy and enthusiasm for a renewed interest in their marriage. It cast everything she believed about him into doubt.
Belle stared at the pretty little bottle, remembering Luke’s brief brush with laudanum after the mine accident. He’d once begged her to bring him some, lying about Dr Lovejoy prescribing it. Her father’s words echoed in her ears. ‘Drug-takers are all liars and cheats, Belle, without exception. While in the grip of their addiction they may never be trusted, no matter who they are or what they say.’
Eddie was swearing again, and turning out his pockets. Kicking at a fence post. A sudden fear rippled through her, a fear of what he might do if she confronted him in this lonely place. Belle tossed the bottle into the long grass beside the road.
Eddie got back in the car and they drove on without a word. The rain pelted harder. Belle pulled her hat down and fastened the veil across her eyes. Nothing for it but to endure the ride. When she reached Binburra, Papa would know what to do.
Belle stood in the parlour, her chin trembling. She covered her ears. ‘Oh, Mama, no. Don’t tell me. I don’t believe you.’
The rawness of Papa’s death was etched into her mother’s face, a face haggard and contorted with grief. It showed in her eyes, red from weeping, set in dark hollows that hadn’t been there before. Sounded in her tremulous voice, so hoarse and weak that Belle could barely hear her. She seemed to have aged a lifetime.
Dr Lovejoy led Belle over to a chair and sat her down. ‘If it’s any comfort, your father’s death was painless. When the pneumonia really took hold he lapsed into unconsciousness and slipped peacefully away in his sleep.’ His voice broke with emotion. ‘A dignified end to a remarkable life.’
Belle opened her mouth to speak, but no words came. Edward moved to comfort her and she ducked away. Her feelings didn’t make sense; they made her ashamed. Anger instead of sorrow. Anger that Papa had left her so unexpectedly, without a word. Resentment instead of sympathy for her mother. Mama had lived a charmed life with the cleverest, kindest, most generous man in the world, a man who’d loved her wholeheartedly and beyond measure. Nothing to pity there. Belle wanted that too. The contrast with her own marriage had never been more stark.
‘I want to see Papa.’
The doctor glanced over at Elizabeth, then he led Belle upstairs to the main bedroom. Her father might have been asleep. She shook his shoulder to be sure. Kissed his cheek and touched his hair, startled by how stiff and cold he was. She pulled the blanket higher to keep him warm. Perversely, he looked more peaceful now than the last time she’d seen him. Death had smoothed all the care from his face.
‘Papa?’ Belle blinked back tears as the truth hit home. The body in the bed looked like her father, but it wasn’t him. The character and spirit that made him was gone, lost forever.
She turned to find Eddie beside her. ‘I’m sorry, Belle. He was a good man and a fine father. I used to secretly wish he was my father. I envied you.’
A few hours ago, his heartfelt words would have meant a lot. They would have had the power to comfort, but now they left her numb. She’d needed Papa to help her decide what to do about Eddie. She’d needed to talk to him. There was nobody else in the world that she trusted as much, not even her mother.
For one terrible moment, she wished she hadn’t thrown the pretty little bottle away.