1990 Melbourne, Australia
A silver tray bearing glasses of champagne appeared at Kate’s elbow. She took one and set it down carefully beside her paperwork.
‘Thanks.’ She glanced up at the young nurse standing there, and checked the identification badge pinned to her shirt. Meg McCausland, it read. Temporary. ‘Are you from the agency?’
Meg nodded. ‘I was here a few months ago. I thought it’d be quieter over Christmas.’
Kate shook her head. ‘It’s our busiest time.’ She lowered her voice. ‘They tell their friends they’re going away for Christmas – and then come in here. By New Year, they’re ready to go home.’
Meg grinned. ‘Minus wrinkles and looking years younger! Not a bad plan, I suppose – if you can afford it.’
Kate smiled as she took a sip of champagne. Cold bubbles pricked her tongue, but the aftertaste was rich and smooth. She checked the time and returned to her notes.
Meg hovered nearby, refilling a burner with essential oil. Holding up a tiny bottle, she read out the label.
‘Bethlehem Frankincense – for Christmas.’ She sighed. ‘Every year I talk myself into doing this shift because of the pay. Then, when it comes round, I regret it.’ She turned to Kate. ‘What about you? Couldn’t you get out of it?’
‘It doesn’t bother me, working on Christmas Day.’ Kate kept on writing. ‘I’m not religious.’
‘But what about Christmas lunch?’ asked Meg. ‘Aren’t you missing out on family celebrations?’
Kate shook her head. She leaned to gather up some dead petals that had fallen onto the telephone.
‘Your parents aren’t in Melbourne, then?’ Meg continued.
‘No.’
‘Interstate, are they?’
Kate shuffled some files. She could feel Meg waiting for an answer.
‘They’re dead,’ Kate said abruptly. ‘They died in an accident years ago.’
Meg stared at her, shocked and embarrassed. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘I’m really sorry.’ There was a tense quiet. Somewhere in the building Christmas carols were being sung.
‘It’s all right,’ said Kate, taking pity on the woman, ‘you weren’t to know.’ She picked up a schedule and held it out. ‘You’d better get on with the rounds. Ms James is expecting her dressing to be removed. So is the lady in suite two. They don’t like to be kept waiting.’
‘I’ve noticed that!’ Meg looked relieved by the change of subject. ‘Honestly, I don’t know how you can put up with them, working here full-time. I know the pay’s good, but still …’
‘I like it here,’ Kate responded.
Meg raised her eyebrows. ‘You mean – all this?’ She looked around at the lavishly appointed room. At the Willoughby Centre for Aesthetic Surgery, no expense was spared. Even the Christmas tree matched the clinic’s colour scheme – it was beige, trimmed with gold cherubs and baby blue silk ribbons.
‘No,’ Kate said quickly, ‘it’s not that. I just like the fact that people want to be here. They come in by their own choice. It’s not like a real hospital. There are no emergencies. Everything is under control …’
‘Whatever made you go into nursing?’ Meg asked. ‘If that’s how you feel.’
Kate paused for a moment, then shrugged. ‘The usual story, I guess. Florence Nightingale …’
‘Ah,’ Meg nodded. ‘You mean the men in white jackets.’
Kate smiled and shook her head. She knew plenty of nurses who were hoping to catch themselves a doctor, but she was not one of them.
A call light flashed. Reluctantly, Meg wandered off in the direction of the wards.
Kate returned to her paperwork. She hurried, now, blurring her handwriting. By the time Meg returned, she decided, she would be gone. She’d had enough of the blunt questions and the easy assumption that answers would be forthcoming. Whatever made you go into nursing? Meg had asked. Kate smiled grimly to herself, wondering what the woman would think if she knew the real answer: that Kate had never meant to become a nurse. The choice had been made for her, when she was only fifteen years old; her path irrevocably set by a trick of fate …
Kate had been lounging on the lawn in the school gardens when she was summoned to the headmistress’s office. It was not uncommon for her to be asked to see Miss Parr. The Mission delegated most matters concerning her welfare to the school and she would be called in to discuss things ranging from birthday parties to new sports clothes. On this particular occasion, though, Kate felt uneasy. She was aware that Easter week was coming, and with it the unmentioned, uncelebrated anniversary of her arrival at the school. Kate Carrington – the young ward of the Mission. A scruffy girl with one suitcase, no family and no home; a foreigner who counted money in cents and shillings and kept slipping into Swahili …
Holding the secretary’s note tightly in her hand, Kate approached Miss Parr’s door. After pausing to smooth back her hair and check her skirt, she knocked.
‘Come,’ Miss Parr’s deep voice greeted her.
Entering the room, Kate found herself facing a tall man dressed in a navy-blue suit. She knew straightaway that he was not from the Mission – the Secretary and his colleagues always wore nylon safari suits or sportscoats and trousers. She took the man’s hand politely.
‘We’ve met before,’ he said. He bent over her as he spoke. There was a sadness in his voice that brought a twist of anxiety to Kate’s stomach.
‘Mr Marsden is a journalist,’ Miss Parr said briskly. ‘He interviewed you a few years ago, about what happened to your parents. Now he’d like to do a follow-up story. The Mission Secretary is in favour of it.’ She paused to give Kate a piercing look. ‘But it’s up to you, of course. You don’t have to.’
Kate felt a moment of relief. Miss Parr never said what she did not mean. If Kate asked her to, she would simply order this man away. But then Kate remembered what Miss Parr had said about the Mission Secretary – that he wanted her to do the interview. For years the Mission had provided everything for Kate – school, holidays, visits to the dentist, haircuts – even her pet cat. The organisation relied on donations for its funding, Kate knew, and she’d been told that after the first story about her had been printed, thousands of dollars had flowed in. The same thing would probably happen now.
‘I don’t mind,’ Kate said to the journalist. She managed to shape a smile.
The journalist asked questions about Kate’s friendships, her hobbies, her best school subjects. He made notes on his pad. Kate lingered over her answers, dreading all the time what the next question might be. She knew that the details of her everyday life were not what the man was really interested in. Sooner or later, he would come to the point. Was she happy? Had she been able to put the past behind her – or had the tragedy of Langali ruined her life? Panic formed a hard, cold lump inside her. Her words began to catch in her throat. But the straight questions didn’t come, and after a while Kate realised that the journalist didn’t have the nerve to put them to her. She began to relax. She looked over the man’s shoulder as she talked about her cat. In a tree outside the window, she could see a mother bird dangling a worm over a nest of jostling beaks.
At last, the journalist closed his notebook and nodded at Miss Parr – but then a final thought came to him. ‘And what do you intend doing when you finish school?’
Kate stared at him for a moment, then looked down at the floor. It was a simple question, a fair question, but she had no idea how to answer it. The future, when she tried to look into it, appeared as blank and cut-off from her as her past. Only the present seemed to have any shape, any meaning. But she felt sure that Miss Parr would not be pleased to hear this. At St John’s College, students were always being told of the importance of looking ahead, setting goals.
‘I’m going to be a nurse,’ she found herself saying. The words came out sounding surprisingly sure and strong. ‘I want to work in Africa, like my parents did.’
In the silence that followed, Kate listened to the sound of the man’s pencil as he scribbled down her words. Outside, the baby birds screamed for more food.
‘Thank you,’ the journalist beamed. ‘That’s wonderful.’
The story was published the following week. Though the question about Kate’s future plans had been a minor part of the interview, it formed the core of the article. The newspaper gave up space for a large photograph of Kate, holding her cat close to her face. Beneath it ran the headline in bold text:
Brave Daughter to Follow in Martyrs’ Footsteps
The article was widely read. In the weeks and months that followed, Kate was constantly congratulated for her courage and vision. After that, it seemed that her future was settled. Whenever she contemplated changing her plans, it felt like a betrayal of the memory of her parents. The Mission. God. Everything that mattered.
Kate parked in her usual spot, under the leafy shelter of a linden tree. As she walked up her front path she scanned the facade of the narrow Victorian terrace. There was a blank, closed-up feeling about the house. The front bedroom was empty and the curtains rarely drawn. The lone Christmas decoration – a small wreath on the front door – looked stranded, out of place.
The hallway was dim and quiet. Hanging up her clinic jacket and bag, Kate headed straight for the living room at the back of the house. There she unlocked a pair of tall French windows, and stepped out into her garden.
Afternoon shadows slanted across the yard, but the sun was still warm. Kate stood on her terrace, feeling its touch on her shoulders. She looked around her with a small smile of pleasure. Summer had come early after a wet spring and the blend of heat and moisture had produced a season of wild growth. Evergreens, perennials and annuals were all in bloom together. The box hedges were freshly clipped, the pathways scrubbed free of moss and weeds, and every inch of soil carefully covered with mulch. The little garden had never looked better.
Kate strolled slowly along the pathway inspecting each bed. She paused to examine the bud of an old-fashioned rose, touching the tightly wrapped petals, the damp velvet skin blushing a pale pink. She could almost sense the fragrance hidden inside.
A loud blast shattered the air. Kate froze, looking up. The noise was gone, but in the silence she could still hear it, replaying in her ears. Her heart raced. She knew that sound – the way it broke the air, leaving a ragged hole as if it were made not by one thing but many. There was no mistaking it. It was a shotgun, being fired at close range – and not far away.
Kate ran towards her side fence. Grasping the palings with her hands and standing on tiptoe, she could see over into the next-door property. At first, all appeared normal – the large, untended grounds, the mansion with its lowered blinds, the back door pinned open. Kate scanned the garden, pausing near the jacaranda tree, her eyes widening as she picked out the shape of a body sprawled on the ground. And a long-barrelled gun flattening the grass nearby.
Kate ran further down the fenceline. Somewhere, she knew, there was a place where three palings could be swung aside, and you could squeeze through. It took a little while to find them – almost hidden by a stand of hollyhocks. She pushed roughly past the plants, crushing their stalks. She was worried now. Perhaps she should have run inside first, and called an ambulance. Crouching down, she squeezed through the narrow gap. A nail caught on her uniform, tearing the skirt.
In the big garden, she broke into a run, ducking under branches and beating a pathway through matted weeds. As she drew nearer to the figure, she recognised her neighbour. The woman had only recently moved in next door, but Kate had seen her over the fence – a tall, solitary figure with wild grey hair piled up into an untidy bun.
Reaching her side, Kate looked for blood – a wound – but could see none. The woman just lay there, gasping.
‘Are you all right?’ Kate asked.
The head turned. Wide, grey-green eyes fixed on Kate – not a blank stare but a deep searching gaze. A long moment passed. Then the woman began trying to get up, steadying herself by grasping at the branches of the jacaranda. Kate hovered near, unsure how – or whether – to assist. There was an air of independence in the way the woman struggled to help herself. When she was upright, though still breathless, she turned to Kate and managed a shaky smile. Then she pointed with a look of triumph at a large black snake writhing, in two halves, under a shrub. Kate kept her distance as she looked down at the severed snake. The head, she knew, could still bite. She was surprised to see a snake here in Parkville. It must’ve come up from the creek, mistaking this wild garden for some kind of bushland haven.
‘Are you all right?’ Kate asked again. Her neighbour was still breathing with difficulty, clutching at the tree. Kate guessed that the kick of the powerful gun must have knocked her off balance and left her winded.
‘Yes, I will be, in a moment. I’m not so well, you see.’ The woman avoided Kate’s gaze, as if embarrassed by her state. Kate realised that in spite of the grey hair, she was not old. She could have been in her early fifties, perhaps. It was hard to tell. Her face had the toughened, timeless look of someone who has spent many years out in the sun.
The woman signalled that she’d like Kate to help her walk. Before taking her arm Kate picked up the heavy gun, automatically checking that the barrel was empty, even though she knew it had just been fired. The smell of gun oil rose up to her, bringing with it a memory – a picture dragged up from the past …
Hot sun on dry grass. A little girl taking slow, careful steps, quiet as a cat. No cracking twigs or rustling leaves. Her eyes fixed on her father’s hand. Stop! he signals. A frantic waving. He’s seen something. She freezes in half stride, wobbling. He crouches, takes aim – fires. Then the stillness is suddenly over. He grins. She laughs aloud. They will eat well tonight …
The cold weight of the gun dragged on Kate’s arm as she moved to stand next to her neighbour. She found the sudden closeness awkward. A strand of grey hair was touching her cheek, and she breathed a faint smell of sweat, backed by a musky perfume.
The two made their way towards the back verandah, heading for a wooden squatter’s chair. It was set a little out from the shelter, facing a circle of bricks that surrounded some half-burnt logs and a mound of smoking ashes.
Kate already knew about this outdoor fireplace. The woman had lit her first fire here the day after she’d moved in. When Kate had noticed the smoke, she’d assumed her new neighbour was burning off garden cuttings. But when she’d checked, peering covertly over the fence, she’d seen the grey-haired figure seated beside the bonfire, just staring into the flames. Hours later, the scene was unchanged. Then, at dusk, a billy and camp oven had appeared, and the woman had set about cooking …
‘Is there someone I could phone for you?’ Kate asked as they reached the chair.
‘No, no. I’ll be all right,’ was the reply. ‘I’m used to being on my own.’ The woman’s accent was placeless. It was neither Australian, nor British – though reminiscent of both, and overlaid with something else.
‘Well,’ Kate looked around, wondering what she should do. ‘Shall I get you a drink of water?’
‘Thank you.’ The woman smiled, her eyes crinkling at the corners. Kate thought suddenly that she must once have been very beautiful. She still was. Her hair, though grey, was thick and glossy; she had the strong bones that make a face age well, naturally. Kate noticed she was dressed in what looked like gardening clothes – a pair of worn-out khaki trousers and a creased linen shirt. It seemed she was not celebrating Christmas today, either.
‘You’ll find some fresh lime juice in the fridge.’ The woman pointed towards the back door. ‘There are two glasses on the shelf in the pantry.’
The back door opened straight into an old-fashioned kitchen. A wood stove was set against one wall and a bleached pine table stood in the middle of the floor. Apart from these, there was just the sink and a few built-in cupboards. There were no cups or bowls or saucepans lying around; no bottles or jars. No sign of food at all. Even considering that the woman had not been here long, the place was strangely empty.
Kate crossed the room and opened the fridge. It, too, was almost bare. There were a few carrots, an apple, a packet of butter – and a white china teapot. Kate shook her head. The woman is mad, she thought. She shoots snakes, cooks outside and keeps her teapot in the fridge. But when Kate took the lid off the teapot to check what was inside, the tang of fresh lime wafted into the air. Peering in, she could see thick green-skinned slices of the fruit bobbing in juice. Kate glanced across to the window. The woman was still sitting in the chair, where Kate had left her. She was not resting, though. She was sitting bolt upright, gazing at the back door, awaiting Kate’s return.
Kate poured two glasses of juice and carried them outside. She was directed to put them down on the ground near the fireplace, and then to bring a second chair across from the verandah. When she was seated, she took a small sip of her drink. It was cold and sour – only slightly sweetened – and very refreshing. There was a hint of some other flavour there. Kate drank a little more, slowly, trying to identify it.
‘Basil,’ said the woman.
‘Ah,’ Kate nodded.
They sat in silence, drinking and watching smoke curl into the air. Kate breathed the smell of the dying fire – the old ashes, reheated by the sun. It felt familiar to her, but distant, belonging to another world. The barbecue fires that she sat by each summer were lit and used, then tidied away. Fires like this one – campfires, homefires – were something else. Kept burning to ward off lions by night, and to cook food by day, they had a longer life. The layers of ash built up, marking each passing day, each meal, each birth, each death …
In the distance the sound of church bells could be heard. The two women met one another’s gaze – a thought shared, unspoken, between them. It was Christmas Day. And they were both alone.
‘My name is Jane.’
‘I’m Kate.’
Silence again. Kate noticed a tawny brown goat tethered to a fruit tree nearby. It chewed at a low shrub, thick lips probing the stalks for something new and tender.
‘She’ll keep the grass down,’ Jane said. ‘The garden’s got a bit overgrown.’
Kate nodded, smiling politely. It was something of an understatement. The mansion had stood empty for the last year and the backyard had grown completely wild. Kate watched the goat tearing off a mouthful of leaves. At the rate it was going, she observed, the whole place would be pruned in no time. She thought back to the fuss that had been caused by the goat’s arrival. Residents of the street had made urgent complaints to the real estate agent – but had learned, to their dismay, that this woman was not just another in the long line of tenants that had occupied the place; this was the owner, back from living overseas. If she wished to keep an animal in her garden, it was entirely her own affair. Before long, there were chickens in the garden as well – they were seen resting in the branches of trees. A rooster was heard crowing at dawn. And the smell of woodsmoke drifted constantly in the air. Residents began stopping Kate in the street to ask questions about her neighbour. Kate chose not to tell them how, since her arrival, the woman had virtually lived outside, sometimes even sleeping on the verandah. It was none of their business, she felt. And she was not interested in taking part in their gossip.
‘How long have you been there?’ Jane asked Kate, nodding towards the little terrace house.
‘Oh, a long time …’ Kate said vaguely. ‘Off and on.’
Jane looked at her for a second without speaking. ‘How did you know there was a way through the fence?’
Kate hesitated, but couldn’t see any reason why she should avoid the truth. ‘I made it. As a child I used to come into this garden to play. The house was empty.’ She let her gaze wander over the wide, deep garden. ‘It was like having a whole kingdom to explore.’
‘So you grew up here?’ Jane asked.
‘Not really. My family owned it; but we only ever lived here together for a couple of years.’ Kate looked around her for an excuse to change the subject.
‘I suppose you played “house” in there?’ Jane pointed across the garden to a gnarled old weeping cherry.
Kate turned to her in surprise. ‘Yes, I did.’
Jane smiled. The movement brightened her whole face, reviving an impression of youthful beauty. ‘In the summer, when the leaves were thick, you crept inside and you felt you were hidden from the world.’
Kate met her gaze. That was just what it had been like.
‘I played in this garden as a child, too, you see,’ Jane said. ‘This was my grandmother’s house.’
A cicada started buzzing in a nearby tree. Kate watched a chicken scratching near the back door. She felt no inclination to make further conversation. Neither, it seemed, did Jane. But the silence between them was not awkward. Sitting there, with her empty glass growing warm in her hand, Kate felt almost mesmerised by the peace of the late afternoon.
After a while, Jane leant across to a card table near her chair, drawing Kate’s attention to an old-fashioned record player that had been set up there. Its solid casing, covered with green leather, was battered and stained with use. Remnants of airline tags hung from one of the handles. As she lifted the lid, revealing the turntable and the shiny black needle arm, Kate felt a sharp stab of recognition. As a child, she had known a record player just like this. Only it had been new, unblemished – a sacred family treasure that she was not allowed to touch.
Crackled quiet gave way to the first notes of a grand aria. A woman’s voice carried across the garden, rich and strong, evoking a deep, nameless longing.
As she listened, Kate looked across to her house. Seeing it from this angle reminded her of how she used to sit here in her secret garden and study the place where she and her parents had lived. She liked to pretend to be a stranger. She would examine the signs of their occupancy – the curtains in the windows, the washing on the line – searching for anything that betrayed the fact that they were not ordinary Australians living a normal life. That they were, instead, a missionary family in disguise.
The Carringtons had lived here for almost two years while Kate’s parents undertook more study. Though they’d been homesick for Africa, the family’s new life had quickly become filled with the joys of being in Australia. With no Ordena or Tefa to help, they cooked, cleaned and shopped together. With no hospital to call Michael away in the evenings, they had time to play games and talk. They went out to films and ate meals in restaurants. A special closeness grew from this sharing of new family experiences.
In Kate’s memories, the interlude was enshrined as a golden era. She’d always been grateful that the Mission had arranged for the little house to be kept for her; and that when she’d finished school she’d been allowed to move back here. With great care, she’d eradicated any hint of the tenants who had lived there in the intervening years, soiling the place with their foreign memories.
Kate looked up from her thoughts to see Jane watching her. She smiled quickly, hoping her face had not betrayed her feelings.
‘I should go.’ She stood up, but Jane signed for her to wait until the end of the song.
The voice lingered over the last few notes, stretching them out, as though reluctant to let each moment go. Finally it dwindled into quiet, and Kate got to her feet again.
‘I’ll see myself out,’ she said. She motioned towards the gate that led to the front garden.
Jane seemed revived by the rest and insisted on walking a little distance with Kate. When she said goodbye, she touched Kate gently, tentatively, on the arm.
Kate didn’t look back as she walked away, but she sensed the woman watching her. She found herself trying to move gracefully, as she’d been taught as a small child – her ayah determined to banish the toddler’s clumsy gait.
Make your neck long. Loosen your arms. Think of a pot of water balanced on your head …
Opening the high wooden gate, set in a matching fence, Kate stepped out of the unkempt greenery into a neat Victorian garden. A handyman had been commissioned to keep this front space in order; dull shrubs and bushes stood in straight rows, matching the solid facade of the mansion. From the street, Kate reflected, you would never guess at the wild place that lay so close, yet hidden from view.
Back in her own garden, Kate turned her attention to the small pond she was about to build beside the back door. Using a tape measure, she began marking out the plan. There was so little space that the design had to be exactly right. She worked slowly, carefully, until the opening bars of a new song travelled across from the other side of the fence. Then she looked up in surprise. The tune was jumpy and bright, with a loud beat; a world away from the aria that had gone before. Kate recognised it from a sixties tape they played at the clinic. Puppet on a String, by Sandy Shaw. Jane was playing a hit from her youth, Kate realised – from the days when she would have been looking forward, full of bright hopes for her future. Was this what she had planned, Kate wondered? To end up living all alone … It occurred to Kate that this was what would happen to her. She would remain adrift, by herself. The thought was oddly comforting – the sense of being isolated from others, already so familiar.
She had first experienced this state when she was sent to boarding school in Dodoma. Back then, though, there had been Jesus, the ever-present friend; and her parents waiting at home. Langali was a long way from Dodoma – but you knew, in the end, you could get there. Langali and Dodoma, home and school, were parts of the same world.
By the time Kate had had to face the next boarding school, in Melbourne, everything was different. There she had been truly alone: her home gone forever; her family taken to be with Jesus. Great friend he turned out to be! But, somehow, she had managed to survive. Eventually, she had even come to value the freedom that went with being unattached. She had learned how to be alone, yet not feel lonely.
Looking up over the fence, Kate watched the thin plume of smoke that rose from the outdoor fire. It was strange to think that she and Jane were here, living side by side; each on their own. Two people, a generation apart and completely unconnected – except for the odd, meaningless coincidence that they had once played house in the same old weeping cherry.