A Mortal Sin (2 page)

He stewed over the matter of his birth for a couple of hours. A letter. Somewhere there was a letter that would clear up everything. He would go out of his mind hanging around waiting for his father’s return. He would find the letter himself, even if it meant tearing the whole place apart. Where would the old man keep it? The safe in his study most probably.

* * *

Paul made his way to the study. The blood pumped through his veins at break neck speed, and even his breathing became rapid, like a gladiator on his way to the coliseum. As always, the keys were left in the top right hand desk drawer. Bloody careless, but without a twinge of conscience he lifted them out.

As an inquisitive child he often used to watch from behind the long drapes as his father opened the safe. To those who did not know, there was only a paneled wall, but he used his fingertips to touch the hidden spring. A door sprang back to display the safe, and he grinned at his easy success. Maybe he should have been a safe cracker, but there again, he hadn’t done a half bad job negotiating with the unions, either. He believed in mediation, whereas his father was into blatant confrontation.

Several bundles of notes, contracts and titles concerning the mill and numerous other properties they owned were neatly stacked side by side. Not a damn thing of a personal nature. Frantically he reached further back, stretching his arm out full length. His fingertips touched dry, brittle paper. He drew out an envelope, dirty and crumpled, and dear God, could that be blood? A dark, brown splotch covered the back of the envelope. His hands shook as he turned it over.

He could not decipher the name or battalion but read, ‘First Australian Division - France.’ He hesitated before turning the envelope again. The old man had served in France during the war, but why the hell would he keep a souvenir like this? He took the letter out. No address, just the name Dixon’s Siding and the date, March thirtieth 1916.

Darling Tommy, he skimmed over the lines quickly. They were bright and loving, penned in a neat schoolgirl hand. Scarcely taking any of this in, he stopped and stared at the vital lines. The words leapt out at him with such force they almost knocked him over.

Paul is starting to toddle now, I’ll have to do as you suggested and invent a long lost relative with dark hair. It’s uncanny Tommy, he’s a little miniature of Phillip Ashfield.

 A violent spasm surged through his body. He gritted his teeth, fighting to get himself under control. Finally, he recovered enough to scan the letter for more information but drew a blank. How the hell did the old man come by it?

Who was this Tommy? Allison’s husband? A brother? I must have been four or five when the old man brought me to England, he deduced. Sir Phillip had been seriously wounded in France a few days before the Armistice, so it would have to be 1919 or even 1920 before he could get to Australia to claim me.

He dashed to the library and grabbed up an atlas. Frantically he thumbed through it until he found a map of Australia. Damn it all, Dixon’s Siding must be too small to warrant a mention. Dixon’s Siding, he repeated it over in his head a couple of times, but it didn’t ring any bells. I must have lived there once. He closed his eyes in an endeavor to remember, desperately trying to grapple with facts that eluded him.

 I’m going over there and to hell with the old man. If he doesn’t like it he can disinherit me, but I’m searching for my mother. I want to find out why she abandoned me. Maybe then I can fill in the strange emptiness and feelings of loss that have haunted my dreams for years.

 When Sir Phillip arrived back from his visit to the mill, he went on the attack immediately. “What is the meaning of closing the factory down for the day? I don’t pay workers to loaf around at my expense.”

“I had to do something,” Paul shot back. “You didn’t invite any of them to your celebratory soiree, and they’re the ones who do all the bloody work and bring in the money. Anyway, to hell with the mill. I want to know more about my mother.”

“Forget about her.”

“I’m going out to Australia to find Allison.” He watched the color bleach from his father’s face, leaving his skin grey and sickly.

“I forbid it.”

“Too bad, I’m going anyway, and you can’t stop me.”

“I’m warning you,” Sir Phillip snarled. “Defy me ...”

“And you’ll what?” Paul cut in furiously. “Disown me? Cut me off without a penny?”

“For God’s sake, let the past rest. There’s going to be a war. Hitler wants to conquer Europe, and you want to go gallivanting to the other side of the world. You have a responsibility to me, a duty to your country.”

“And what about your duty, Father? We were asked to billet some of those children being evacuated from London, and you refused.”

“They’re not staying here,” Sir Phillip snarled.

“How would it affect you?” he shot back. “You spend most of your time in London.”

“I won’t have snotty-nosed cockney brats swarming all over the place, whether I’m here or not.”

* * *

The Australian sun scorched down from a sky so blue it hurt Paul’s eyes, but none of the populace seemed to be worrying. No-one seemed particularly bothered by the fact England and France had signed the Munich Accord, either. Peace at any price the newspapers claimed. His father and some of his war-mongering cronies would have a field day lambasting Chamberlain for this perceived treachery. Appeasement had to be better than plunging the world into war with Nazi Germany.

There had been no pressing urgency, so he’d enjoyed himself on the ship coming out, but now he had arrived in the land of his birth, he felt a quickening of excitement. His feelings towards Allison had softened somewhat, she sounded very young in the letter, and no doubt his father would have brought considerable pressure to bear in prying their son from her.

Dixon’s Siding was a small town in North Eastern Victoria, according to the map he held in his hand. Smithers, from the Australian office, had met him on arrival, taken him to a hotel and provided a car. Everything had fallen into place effortlessly, the Melbourne office obviously ran on well oiled wheels, but Sir Phillip would expect nothing less from his employees.

Now, as he prepared to commence his early morning journey of discovery, Paul’s heartbeat quickened. He felt like an Olympic runner, primed and ready, waiting for the starting man’s pistol.

The Australian girls were pretty, tanned, and as leggy as young colts he noted, running an appreciative eye over the laughing group passing on the sidewalk as he reached his vehicle. Later, he would look up one of his pals from school who now lived in Melbourne, and ask to be introduced around.

As he drove towards Dixon’s Siding, his initial excitement became tempered by wariness. Was he doing the right thing? He didn’t want to cause any trouble for Allison if she had started up a new life, but he couldn’t live with himself if he didn’t at least try to find out about her.

His father had refused point blank to tell him anything about Allison. He winced when he recalled the vicious words they’d flung at each other and his own ultimatum. Let him go to Australia to represent the business and try to track down Allison, or he would travel to Australia under his own steam and disappear. Rather than risk losing his only son completely, the man had finally, reluctantly, arranged for Paul to visit Australia as a representative of the company.

Now he passed miles of remarkably similar country, tall eucalypts and other scrubby plants, even a kangaroo or two flashed by. Birds in a multitude of gaudy colors flew about, not in the least worried by the dust rising from the wheels of his yellow Buick.

On arrival in a town called Euroa, he found a hotel that offered a lunch menu. It was a single storied red brick place surrounded by a wide verandah. The roast lamb tasted good even on such a hot day, but the cold beer proved a lifesaver he thought, licking the froth from his lips.

“Bloody stupid pommies.”

His hackles rose, at the insult to his fellow Englishmen. He clenched his fist under the table to stop himself from getting up and punching this uncouth slob in the mouth.

“They’re issuing everyone with bloody gas masks.” The man chortled. “Much good that will do if Herr Hitler bombs the place.”

Paul swallowed the last of his beer in one angry gulp and slammed out of the place.

* * *

Mid-afternoon, he arrived at the small settlement of Dixon’s Siding. One winding main street with a few empty, verandah covered shops. It had the appearance of a ghost town, run down, deserted, somehow sad. An old dog, resting outside the dusty general store, eyed him with indifference as he hesitated in the doorway.

If Allison refused to acknowledge him, could he take rejection from her yet again? Worse still, what if he didn’t like her? What if she turned out to be low and coarse? His hands started sweating and his heart pounded with a fearful anticipation. He could still leave, and no one would ever be the wiser. I’ve come all this way he thought, steeling himself, and I won’t take the cowardly option of running away. Taking a deep breath he pushed the door open and strode to where an old man waited behind the counter.

“Excuse me.”

“Yes?” Faded eyes in a wrinkled-up face, peered from behind gold-rimmed spectacles.

“I’m looking for a girl named Allison who lived here in 1916.”

“Don’t know anyone of that name. Hang on, there was little Allison Waverley who married the Calvert boy. He got killed in the war. Her brother did too, I think. My memory’s not so good now.”

“Do you know where she lives?” Paul clenched his hand in his pocket. The search was already over and it had been surprisingly easy.

“No, left town kind of sudden years ago.”

“You remember the little boy?”

“Yes, a fine little fellow. Very close those two. Without fail he always got a penny worth of boiled sweets, even though she could scarcely afford it most times. Governments don’t worry much about soldiers or their widows once a war is finished.”

“What happened to them?” Paul asked, trying to quell his excitement.

“I think she went to Melbourne. Never saw the boy again, but she came back with the girl baby…”

He cut the old man’s flow of words off with an imperious wave of his hand. He wasn’t interested in this other baby; it only confirmed his worst suspicions.

Her husband was dead, yet she had another baby. He felt somehow cheated, because he had started building Allison Calvert up as some innocent young girl seduced by an experienced older man.

“Would anyone else know their whereabouts?”

“No, I’m the last of the originals left now. A fire went through here in the twenties and just about wiped everything out.”

“Can you tell me where they used to live?”

The man gave him directions, and Paul returned to the car feeling let down. Calvert. Paul Calvert. It didn’t sound familiar. Had he once answered to that name?”

When he arrived at the house, it appeared derelict and over-grown with creepers, the garden an absolute jungle. He parked under the shade of a huge tree and dubiously walked up the broken path. The verandah sagged, and most of the floorboards were missing or broken. The door hung crazily on one rusty hinge, and judging by the odor emanating from within, animals lived here now.

He wandered around the back. The windows, strangely enough, were intact but filthy. Something drew him to a large peppercorn tree, and yes, there it was, much the worse for wear, but still recognizable. A swing.

A memory started stirring. “Higher, I want to go higher.” No mistaking it, the feeling proved to be so strong, he knew for certain he had spent time here.

He explored for half an hour or so, picking his way amongst the tumble down outbuildings until he came to an old orchard. Pictures flitted through his mind, but they were misty and unattainable, no matter how hard he grappled to remember.

His journey into the past had come to an abrupt halt, yet he wasn’t sorry for starting it. Maybe Sir Phillip had been right after all; leave the past buried where it belonged.

He didn’t doubt for a moment that he could find Allison if he really tried, not with the resources at his fingertips. Could hire a private investigator, pay someone to trawl through government records but he wouldn’t. Allison had obviously started a new life for herself somewhere else. Who was he to interfere with it after all these years?

* * *

On impulse he decided to look up some family friends in Sydney. He flew there, and after only a few days, regretted it. Things never changed. Once the society women knew he was Sir Phillip Ashfield’s son, they threw their daughters at him, inviting him to every imaginable function. If he went to another presentation ball he would surely be ill. As for the Saturday afternoon tea dances. He almost burst out laughing when someone described them as being respectable but slightly decadent. Good manners forced him to tolerate it, instead of telling them all to leave him alone.

Ian Jamieson proved to be a lifeline, and with almost indecent haste and apologizing profusely for having to hurry away because of some business emergency, Paul headed back to Melbourne to visit his friend. Ian, an architect, lived in a double storey terrace house in the inner suburb of Parkville.

Attired in casual slacks and an old shirt with the sleeves rolled up to the elbow, Ian greeted him cheerfully. “Heard you were in Sydney, old boy. Did you have a good time with the society ladies?”

“They were boring as hell.” Paul grinned at his friend. The third son of wealthy parents, Ian had nevertheless kicked over the traces of his social background. Pity I can’t do the same thing. Being an only son, he did have certain responsibilities, even if he sometimes found them onerous.

“Why don’t you temporarily delete Ashfield from your name, and use your second one, Thomas, isn’t it? It would keep the Melbourne society matrons off your back and give you plenty of freedom,” Ian suggested with a grin. “You might as well enjoy your time out here in Australia. I bet Sir Phillip has already got some blue blood lined up for you to marry.”