Elianne (11 page)

‘Thank you, sir.’

James stood to one side while Elianne and Pavi exchanged faithful promises to write to one another. Then he waited patiently while Elianne comforted young Simone, who had become suddenly tearful at the prospect of missing her. James was in no hurry. It would not be seemly to bed his new wife during daylight hours anyway.

Darkness was falling when the bride and groom finally retired to the guesthouse, which had been prepared for them. The oil lamps had been lit and, beneath mosquito netting, a cold supper had been set out on the table.

James swept her up into his arms and carried her over the threshold as if she weighed no more than a feather, and Elianne laughed with delight at the sheer romance of the gesture.

By unspoken mutual consent, they ignored the supper, Elianne retiring to the spare room where her nightgown and toiletries had been laid out. There was also freshly folded bed linen and a second nightgown, together with a pitcher of warm water and a basin on the wash-stand. All was in readiness. Nothing had been overlooked by André’s highly practical housekeeper, who served also as midwife to the local workers’ families.

In the master bedroom, James stripped himself naked. Then he dimmed the lamps to a minimal glow, pulled the light coverlet over himself and lay waiting for her.

Elianne prepared herself. She was not afraid. She longed for James to make love to her. She longed to discover the mystery of sex. But despite her partiality for romance, she was not naïve in her expectations. She had been witness to the brutality of both sex and birth, she had seen animals mating and she had helped deliver calves, she did not delude herself. There would be pain this first time, she knew it, but she had determined she would not cry out.

In her nightgown, her body washed and perfumed, her hair freshly brushed, she crossed the hallway to the master bedroom opposite. She was aware of his eyes upon her as in the semi-gloom of the room she made her way to the bed. She slipped beneath the coverlet. Aware instantly that his body was ready for her, she steeled herself for the moment, expecting first to feel the touch of his lips on hers or the caress of his fingers on her body, something tender by way of preparation. But there was no such touch, no such caress. Instead, hands hauled up her nightdress and within seconds he was forcing his way into her.

The pain was intense. With each thrust she felt she was being ripped apart, but true to the promise she had made to herself, she did not cry out.

How long it lasted, Elianne could not possibly say, but finally, thankfully, it was over and he pulled away from her, sated, to lie on his back, his chest still heaving from the force of his own passion.

When he’d regained his breath, he turned to face her. ‘I am sorry that I hurt you,’ he said. ‘You’re a brave girl, Ellie, not to cry out.’

‘I had expected pain,’ she said, trying hard not to show her disappointment, and wondering if perhaps this had been a deliberate test of her strength. ‘My mother had warned me that the first time is painful.’ She rose from the bed. ‘I must wash myself and fetch fresh linen.’

She went into the spare room where she stripped off her bloodied nightgown. It will be better next time, she told herself as she poured water into the basin and washed the blood from her body.

Behind her across the hallway, she saw through the slit in the door that the lamps of the master bedroom had been turned up.

She donned the fresh nightgown and returned to discover him standing naked by the bed looking down at the bloodstained linen, and in that moment he appeared to Elianne like a victor after a kill. Where is the tenderness? she wondered. There is no tenderness. There is only triumph.

Then his hands were about her waist and she felt herself lifted off her feet.

‘Oh Ellie,’ he said, ‘oh my own Ellie, how I shall love you!’ He held her up before him like a goddess. ‘What a life we shall have, my dearest.’

Yes, she decided, he had been testing her strength. He loved her. He worshipped her. It will be better next time, she told herself.

I have now been married for three months, and no longer am I Elianne – that name belongs to a grand estate. I am simply ‘Ellie’, which, strangely enough, I find endearing. My nickname is perhaps the one tender element in the whole of my marriage and I cling to it.

Kate read on, her eyes riveted to the page, her mind teeming with images, she could see this girl, she could hear her voice. Elianne Desmarais had ceased to be a remote ancestor, or even a younger version of Grandmother Ellie as conjured up by the romantically inclined Hilda Durham. She was just Ellie, eighteen years old: the same age as Kate.

I do not doubt my husband’s love for one moment; indeed the very force of it can be terrifying. My husband would not hesitate to kill any who threatened me and were it necessary he would lay down his own life in the process. These are grave responsibilities to bear and I find myself treading warily.

Jim often asks me what I’m scribbling about and I usually say ‘My scribblings are about us, dearest. I scribble about you and me and our love.’ That makes him happy. He does love me, of course he does, but in the only way he knows how, which is not a love I recognise as such. I am a possession to Jim – he owns me. Our coupling remains devoid of tenderness. He takes me in triumph, like a prize he has worked hard to win and has a right to lay claim to . . .

Kate was amazed, not only by the naked candour of Ellie’s writing, but the fact that the relationship between husband and wife appeared to differ so completely from the great love supposedly shared between Grandmother Ellie and Big Jim. Were the stories she had been fed over the years born purely of her mother’s need for romance? But then she recalled the vague childhood images of Grandmother Ellie. Elegant, serene, she’d seemed a woman with a love that had sustained her through tragic times, and her support for her husband was known by all to have been absolute. Surely, Kate thought, these early writings were the result of a young woman’s loneliness, perhaps fed by disillusionment. Perhaps, like Hilda, Ellie had been overly romantic in her expectations, both of her husband and the new country to which she had been transported. Surely she must have adjusted over time.

And there was certainly a great deal to adjust to, Kate thought, listing the discoveries she had made herself in this one short hour of reading. If Ellie was right, Big Jim had cancelled her father’s debt in order to buy her. He’d been a blackbirder in his youth, or so Ellie had been told. He’d ruthlessly killed a man in cold blood, and Ellie had witnessed the event.

Kate found it difficult to comprehend. This was the Durham patriarch whom everyone revered, indeed considered a hero. This was the very man upon whom her father had modelled himself. She was confused. Who was she to believe? The legends passed down over three generations or the scribbles of a young woman nearly eighty years ago?

She checked her watch. A special lunch was planned at The Big House, a farewell in her honour, as she was leaving for Sydney early the next morning; she could not afford to be late. Ten more minutes, she told herself, just ten more minutes. But she would not read on from where she had left off, barely a quarter of the way through the first ledger. She could not reveal findings such as these to her mother. She would flick through the final ledger and discover the matriarch Ellie had become, the woman whom Hilda Durham had so worshipped. Then she would feel confident in telling her mother of her find, and she would promise to translate the writings of Grandmother Ellie, or at least a selection of them.

Kate opened the last of the ledgers. In sorting the books into sequential order, she had noted that the first entry in each was dated, after which Ellie rarely recorded a date unless it marked a specific event. The books were not diaries as such: there was no particular form to them and the entries were sporadic, random thoughts for the most part. Indeed Ellie’s ‘scribblings’ as she called them.

The opening date in the final ledger served a dual purpose, for it did most certainly record a specific event. Kate felt the faintest shiver run down her spine as she read of the birth of her father.

1
^er
septembre 1914

What a momentous occasion! Bartholomew’s dear wife, Mary, has borne him a son, Stanley James Durham. Jim is so overjoyed that his first grandchild has proved a male, one would swear he had fathered the boy himself. He struts about like the proudest of peacocks, while Bartholomew and I look on with amusement.

It pleases me that my gentle Bartholomew appears finally to have done something right in his father’s eyes. Jim has always been such a hard taskmaster. For my part, I hope the arrival of baby Stanley will prove a distraction from what lies ahead. I know Jim is proud Edward and George have signed up, he boasts of his sons fighting for King and Country and says he wishes he could go himself. But although it will be some time before they leave for the front, surely he too must worry about the possible outcome. Even now while my boys are safely at training camp, the horrors of war play on my mind and I am filled with trepidation.

Oh dear, Kate thought. She knew all too well the next specific event that would be recorded. Edward and George had met their deaths side by side on the beach at Gallipoli. Along with hundreds of others, they had been mown down during the initial landings on 25 April 1915, the day that was to become forever known as Anzac Day.

She moved on a dozen or so pages and there it was. The entry had been made two weeks after the family had received notification.

Jim is inconsolable. His grief is frightening to behold. My own heart breaks as I think of my darling boys dying in that Godforsaken place. My heart breaks for all our darling boys; the whole country is in shock, but I must somehow stay strong. Jim needs me as he has never needed me before. I am all that stands between him and insanity . . .

Kate stopped reading. She would address this harrowing material with the respect it deserved at a later date, she decided, but here clearly was an example of the love and support that epitomised the relationship between Grandmother Ellie and Big Jim. She felt more secure now in telling her mother about her discovery of Ellie’s writings. Hilda Durham would weep to hear such words from the woman she so admired.

Another quick check of her watch told her she should be going, but unable to resist the compulsion, she flicked on still further.

The birth of Bartholomew’s daughter in 1917 was clearly a salve to Ellie.

Our dearest Mary has given birth to a daughter, Julia May Durham. To have a little girl join the ranks of our family is to me a great joy, particularly after losing baby Beatrice all those years ago. How I longed for a daughter.

Julia’s arrival offers little comfort to Jim, however. Perhaps if our second grandchild had been another boy, things might be different – male heirs are all-important to Jim, and grief continues to weigh upon him immeasurably . . .

Kate was saddened for them both, for Jim still burdened by grief two years after the death of his sons, and most particularly for Ellie, who had apparently lost a baby daughter. How strange that none of us knew that, she thought. Ellie must have kept the fact a secret even from her own children, for no member of the family had ever spoken of it. Hilda would certainly have recounted such a tragic event had it been general knowledge, and Bartholomew had never made any mention of losing a sister.

She turned to the last several pages of the ledger. There were no dates marked in the final entries, but she didn’t get to the last one in any event. She was halted by the first paragraph she read, abrupt and shocking.

I intend to stop my scribblings shortly. They no longer serve a purpose. What is the point in being honest to oneself when one’s whole life has been a lie? Better surely to live the lie. And that is what I shall do. I tell everyone lies. Why not myself? I lie to my husband and to my son, and even to my grandchildren. It is simpler to tell them what they wish to hear. I believe it is healthier too. Let Jim believe I love the monster that he is, and has always been. Let Stanley believe his grandfather is the hero he presumes him to be. Let Julia believe in the great mythical love shared by her grandparents. My lies protect my family . . .

Kate read no further. She closed the book, aghast, a lifetime’s illusions shattered in one instant. A sense of panic engulfed her and she glanced about guiltily, fearful that someone might find her with this betrayal of all that her family had held sacred. One of her brothers might appear at any minute, having been sent to fetch her.

Fortunately there was no one in sight, and as she gathered up the ledgers she tried to reason with herself, to make sense of what she had just read. This outburst of cynicism was uncharacteristic, Ellie’s ‘scribblings’ were just random thoughts and feelings, she told herself, these views were the reflection of a passing mood, no more than that . . .

But as she carried the armload of books to the car no attempt at logic could stop her mind reeling with unanswerable questions. Had her great-grandfather been a monster to be feared, as Ellie had openly stated? Had Ellie spent her whole life protecting her family from the man she’d married? Had she elevated Big Jim to hero status and created a mythical love in order to do so? Kate was in turmoil. What should she do? Who should she tell?

She piled the ledgers into the boot, and just as she did so she spied Alan walking up the track. He gave her a wave.

‘You’ve been summoned,’ he yelled. ‘We’re all waiting, and we’re all starving.’

She slammed the boot shut. ‘Yes, sorry, I got a bit carried away,’ she called back.

He arrived beside her.

‘Come and give me a hand,’ she said, leading the way to the storage area, ‘there’s a pile of Grandmother Ellie’s books that I want to take back to Sydney.’

‘Right you are.’

He followed her amiably and held out his arms as she loaded him up with the assortment of novels she’d chosen.