Beneath the Southern Cross (19 page)

Charles was not aware of her lips upon his skin. He, too, had enjoyed their lovemaking; it had been more than a mere release, there had been an added dimension. His thoughts of Anne perhaps? Interesting that she should have been so much in his mind. Protectiveness of course. And the fact that he was only just now coming to know his sister, previously a shadow in his life. He must look after Anne. He owed it to her. They were kin after all; they shared the Kendle blood. He rolled over to go to sleep.

‘Charles,' Amy whispered.

‘Mmm?'

‘About Susan's wedding …' She stroked his back lightly with the tips of her fingernails. ‘I do so wish you would allow meto oversee the arrangements, my darling.' She kept stroking his back and her voice was gentle. ‘After all, she is my daughter.'

Charles tried to curb his irritation. He was tired, the last thing he wanted was conversation. ‘You're arranging the gowns, my dear, the bridesmaids and the flower girls, surely—'

‘But Anne is in charge of everything else.' Aslight whinge had crept into her voice, Charles loathed it when she whinged. She waited for a response but there was none. ‘Well, it's not right, Charles, surely you must see that.' She stopped stroking his back and leant up on one elbow. ‘It is not right that Anne should be responsible for Susan's wedding. Anne is not her mother. I am.'

The repetition of his sister's name further irritated Charles.

‘Concentrate upon the gowns, Amy,' he snapped. ‘It's where your talent lies. Now go to sleep, for God's sake.'

He knew she was crying as she rolled away from him but he couldn't be bothered mollifying her. The image of Anne was in his mind as he drifted off to sleep.

 

The day before James Kendle's seventy-third birthday, a visitor arrived at Kendle Lodge. Old Spike Monroe let her in through the garden side gate. If she'd arrived at the front door, the butler would never have admitted her, and even at the servants' entrance she would have been turned away by Mrs Marett, the housekeeper. But Spike was a strange fellow. Despite the fact that he was head gardener, and as such a very important member of the Kendle staff, he never saw himself as a figure of authority.

So when the Aboriginal woman called to him through the ornate iron gate, it didn't occur to him to order her away.

‘Hey there, mister,' she said, and he crossed to the gates.

She was not a beggar, Spike could tell that immediately. She was quite a nice-looking woman, he thought, in her mid-thirties perhaps, and her smile was pleasant, ifalittle nervous.

‘Mr James Kendle, he lives here, don't he?'

‘Yep. He does.' Spike was surprised that she should know of James Kendle, the old man had kept to himself for years now.

‘Can I see him? Mr Kendle?'

‘I don't know,' Spike shrugged. ‘He's sick, keeps to his bed.'

‘Please,' the woman begged, and there was an urgency in her eyes, ‘please can I see him?'

‘Not up to me,' Spike said, ‘I'm only the gardener.' But he felt sorry for the woman, there was a desperation about her. ‘Come in,' he said and opened the gate. ‘Come in and we'll ask.'

She followed him through the gardens and across the tiled verandah, standing respectfully behind him as he approached the main back doors. Spike was about to knock for Mrs Marett but, even as he raised his hand, the door opened and the master's sister stood there, dressed in a bonnet and cape.

‘Oh.' Anne was startled to open the door and find the gardener and an Aboriginal woman standing before her.

‘Begging your pardon, ma'am,' Spike removed his cloth cap, ‘but there's a person here wants to see Mr Kendle.'

‘My name's Milly, missus,' the woman stepped forward and bobbed a sort of curtsy. ‘And I'm not begging, I swear.' Anne, too, could see the desperation in her. ‘Can I see him? Can I see Mr Kendle?'

‘I shall enquire for you,' Anne said, ‘but you must understand, he is a very busy man.' She hoped that Charles would be civilto the woman. ‘Wait here one moment.'

Spike had been about to correct her. ‘It's the old Mr Kendle she wants to see,' he'd been about to say, but Anne was gone. ‘Well, I'll leave you to it,' he said to the woman. The master would be none too happy that he'd let a stranger in through the side gate, and Spike didn't want to be around to cop a reprimand.

‘Thank you,' the woman said as he left. And she stood, nervously twisting her small cloth handbag.

‘I'm so sorry, but my brother Charles is busy,' Anne said upon her return. It had been just as she had expected. ‘What do I want to see a black for?' Charles had snapped. ‘She'll only be after money, send her away.' It was better like this, Anne supposed. At least this way the woman wasn't being insulted to her face.

‘No.' The woman shook her head. ‘The old master, that's who I want to see. Mr James Kendle.'

‘I'm sorry, but he is not well, he is bedridden.'

‘Please, missus,' the woman implored, clearly agitated, twisting the bag in her hands. ‘Please.'

‘May I ask what business you feel you have with my father?' Anne enquired gently. She felt sorry for the woman.

Milly stared at her mutilated handbag and wondered how she could tell this neat woman in her bonnet and cape and dainty gown.

‘We are kin,' she finally mumbled.

‘I beg your pardon?' Anne wasn't sure if she had heard correctly.

‘We are kin.' She said it louder thistime. The words were out and she felt bolder now. ‘My name is Milly,' she looked directly into Anne's eyes. ‘Milly Kendle.'

Anne felt a shock of outrage. It was a blasphemous thing for the woman to have said. Outrageous. Unbelievable. Preposterous.

Milly could see the shock and incredulity; she hadn't wanted to
tell anyone but the old man. ‘Please, missus, please let me see him. Old Mr James is the only one who will know. He is the only one who can help me.' There were tears in her eyes. She tried to fight them back, not wanting to lose control.

‘What exactly is it you want from him?' Anne managed to ask.

‘They are going to take my babies.' Milly couldn't help it, there was no stemming the tears now. ‘They say I can't look after my babies.' She sniffed and wiped at her face with her cloth handbag. ‘The Protection Board isgoing to take my two babies. They are going to take them far away and change their names and put them with a white family and I'll never see them again.'

Milly wiped her runny nose with the back of her hand, the tears under control now. ‘If I show the Protection Board that I can look after my babies, then they'll let them stay with me on the reservation.'

‘So it is money you're after.' Anne's voice was hard and cold. Charles had been right, she thought.

The missus was going to send her away, Milly knew it. She was very calm now. ‘My father's name was Jackie Kendle,' she said. ‘His mother was called Murrumuru and his father was called Richard Kendle.'

At the mention of her grandfather's name, Anne felt a fresh sense of shock. But it was the shock of plausibility. How could the woman know of Richard Kendle? How could she invent such a preposterous lie? At the sametime Anne recognised that the woman was not an Aborigine of full blood, her skin was too light, her features too European. It was suddenly imperative to Anne that she find out the truth.

‘Come with me,' she said.

Inside the house, Milly stood on the huge Persian carpet, feeling it plush beneath the thin, worn soles of her shoes, and stared up at the moulded ceiling high above, the gleaming crystal chandelier hanging from its centre. She had never dreamed a house could be so grand. There were gold-framed paintings on the walls, and a statue in the corner, and a massive fireplace set intiles with a carved wooden mantelpiece over the top. And a piano. Milly had never seen a piano, not a real one, only a picture of one in the newspaper.

Anne beckoned Milly to follow her up the grand staircase. It
was as well Amy and Susan were at the dressmaker for a final wedding gown fitting, she thought. Her eyes darted to Charles's study which led off from the downstairs sitting room. The door was ajar and she prayed that he wouldn't appear.

When they reached upstairs she breathed a sigh of relief. But as she walked along the landing to her father's bedroom, she was startled by a voice behind her.

‘Excuse me, ma'am.' Anne turned, as did Milly, to confront Mrs Marett, who had stepped out from one of the bedrooms. ‘May I be of any assistance?'

‘Thank you no, Mrs Marett.' Anne could see the censure in the housekeeper's eyes.

‘My father has a visitor,' Anne replied as boldly as she could. ‘We will be brief, and you do not need to informmy brother, I shall do so myself.'

‘Very good, ma'am.'

Anne ushered Milly into the bedroom.

It was a large room, with French windows which, if opened, would have permitted the grandest view from the balcony across Woolloomooloo Bay to the city skyline. But the windows were not open now, the red velvet drapes were drawn and the room was gloomy. So gloomy that Milly barely noticed the person asleep in the four-poster bed to her right.

Anne crossed to the windows and drew open the heavy curtains. Mrs Marett would have closed them, she thought with irritation. She had asked the woman not to do so, but then Charles's housekeeper never listened to a word she said. She opened the French windows, and the afternoon sun shone through the lace curtains.

James stirred from his drowsiness. ‘Anne?' he murmured.

‘Yes, Father, I'm here. And you have a visitor. Come along now, let's sit you up.' She took the spare pillows from the cupboard and propped them behind him, then she poured water from the jug into the porcelain bowl on the marble washstand beside the bed and bathed his face with a flannel. ‘Pull the chair to the bed where he can see you,' she instructed Milly.

Milly did as she was told and then sat wondering what to do next. The old man looked so frail.

‘Tell him everything, exactly as you told me,' Anne said, squeezing the flannel dry and draping it over the side of the basin.

‘My name is Milly, sir,' she said.

‘Milly, that's nice.' The voice was frail too. Everything about the old man was frail, from the waxlike skin of his thin, thin face, to the fragile claw of his hand which rested gently on the bedcover. ‘A visitor,' James said, ‘we don't have many visitors, do we, Anne? How very pleasant.'

‘That's right, Father, and Milly has something to tell you. Something which is very important, so you must listen carefully.' She sat on the bed and took the clawlike fingers in her hand. ‘Go on,' she said to Milly, ‘everything, just as you told me.'

Milly took a deep breath. ‘My name is Milly, sir. Milly Kendle. And my father was Jackie Kendle—'

‘Kendle,' the old man interrupted, smiling delightedly, ‘Kendle, that is my name.' He turned to his daughter. ‘That is our name, Anne, Milly shares our name. Is that not extraordinary?'

Milly halted, confused.

‘Go on,' Anne said.

‘Jackie Kendle's mother was called Murrumuru. And his father was called Richard Kendle.'

‘Richard Kendle.' James seemed even more delighted. ‘My father's name, extraordinary, quite extraordinary.' His voice quivered with excitement, he would start to ramble any minute now, Anne thought. ‘How charming you should visitus. Will the tea be long, Anne? How charming, I do so like having visitors, although visitors are few and far between these days, are they not, Anne?'

‘Yes, Father, we have few visitors, but Milly is trying to tell you that she is more than a visitor. She believes she is a Kendle, you see.'

‘A Kendle? Well, yes, she is, she is. She says she is.' James smiled, it was nice to have a visitor. Someone other than Anne. Albeita native. Nice to have a visitor.

‘No, Father, she is telling you that she iskin, or so she believes.'

‘Kin?' James looked bewildered. ‘Kin?'

‘Yes, Father. She believes that she isfamily.'

‘But how can she be family?' He looked from Milly to Anne, then back to Milly. ‘How can she be family? She is black.'

‘Yes. And she is saying that Grandfather Richard sired a child by an Aboriginal woman, a woman called Murrumuru.' The baldness of the statement sounded brutal, but she needed to shock him, to keep his concentration focused.

‘Murrumuru … Murrumuru …' James murmured the name, savouring the sound. Vaguely he remembered it from somewhere. ‘Murrumuru. Murrumuru.' It reminded him of the gentle, haunting sounds the black men made through their long wooden pipes. Murrumuru. Suddenly he remembered. Of course. Murrumuru cooked eels. At Parramatta, in the camp beside the river, he had watched her cook eels. She was the mother of his friend. The boy to whom he had given his hat. What was the boy's name?

‘You remember Murrumuru do you, Father?' The old man was nodding as he murmured the name. He nodded again and Anne knew she must be direct, there was no time to spare, soon he would disappear once more into histwilight world. ‘Did Murrumuru bear achild by Richard Kendle?' she asked firmly.

Turumbah, that was the boy's name, James recalled. Turumbah. Turumbah and Gran'sun James, they had been such friends. Turumbah had taught him to swim. Ah, those were the days. The days of freedom, secret and forbidden. The freedom of swimming naked and alone amongst the mangroves. The old man smiled at the memory.

‘Please try and concentrate, Father. Did Murrumuru and Richard Kendle have a child? Please, Father. Try.'

Anne was gently and methodically squeezing his hand, James realised. She only did that when she wanted him to concentrate. James tried. He tried hard. He would do anything for Anne.

‘Murrumuru and Richard Kendle,' he whispered.

‘Yes, Father, well done. Murrumuru and Richard Kendle, did they have a child?'