A Woman of Courage (52 page)

Martha was crying too. ‘She was like a mother to me too.'

‘
Towkay neo
,' Sara said, remembering the nickname Martha had given her.

‘Oh yes. Always the big boss. But she had a good heart also.'

It was as good a summary of Hilary's life as you were likely to get, Sara thought. ‘She did, didn't she?'

It was obvious that Jennifer should be allowed to have her say but Sara was not sure of the wisdom of discussing funeral arrangements with her at this late stage of her pregnancy. She took a chance, phoned anyway and spoke to Martin.

‘As we feared. It seems they died together, which I suppose is something. The thing is, can you break the news to Jennifer? She must be told, obviously, but with the baby due so soon… How is she, anyway?'

‘She's fine. Worried, of course, and sick to death of lugging that ton weight around –'

‘Who wouldn't be?'

‘Exactly. But I'll try and break it to her gently.'

‘I'm afraid the media is likely to be on it pretty soon. You may get phone calls.'

‘That's easy. I'll leave the phone off the hook. Are you having her brought back?'

‘No. I thought we could have a memorial service for her here when Jennifer is out and about again but they'll be buried together in the Protestant cemetery in Penang. They were happy there and it was their home.'

‘Jennifer won't like that.'

‘I know. And I am sorry it won't be possible for her to fly up for the funeral but this isn't about Jennifer or me or anybody else. It is what Hilary would have wanted.'

‘When is the funeral?'

‘The day after tomorrow.'

‘So soon?'

‘It's the tropics, Martin. We can't hang about.'

‘Will you be going?'

‘I shall.'

‘I shall be sorry to miss it myself,' Martin said. ‘But in the circumstances –'

‘I understand. And I want you to do something for me.'

‘Name it.'

‘I want a painting of Hilary for the boardroom. So that people who sit there in the years to come will have something to remember her by.'

‘Continuity,' Martin said. ‘I think that's a wonderful idea.'

‘You'll be having some continuity of your own in the near future,' Sara said.

‘The company and the family and the future,' Martin said.

‘And your paintings,' Sara said. ‘With all that going for us how can our future be anything but bright?'

ONWARDS AND UPWARDS

The cemetery was old, with many ancient trees shading the stone monuments to the dead. Francis Light, founder of the British colony of Penang, was buried there. Traffic roared beyond the perimeter fence but beneath the trees it was still, the dead undisturbed. The air breathed reverence and Sara thought it a fitting place for Hilary Brand who, like Light, had done so much in her life and died prematurely. It was the right place for Hilary and the man she had loved, together in death as in life.

Sara had been unsure how many would turn up but the funeral at the Anglican church in Lebuh Farquhar was heavy with brass. She gave a brief eulogy. Vivienne Archer was in the congregation; in their absence they had left Robert Clarke and Desmond Bragg to mind the shop; Desmond had already set his gremlins to work on preparing a documentary on Hilary's life. Martha Tan had flown in from Hong Kong, the Australian High Commissioner from Kuala Lumpur. A representative of the Malaysian government was present, bringing a message from the prime minister that Sara read to the congregation. The manager of the Penang Children's Society and several of the children were there too, along with the many friends Craig Laurie had made over his years on the island.

The reception was at the E & O Hotel, which had plenty of experience in catering for both the living and the dead.

Afterwards Sara went back alone to Rumah Kelapa. In his will Craig had left everything to Hilary. Hilary's major assets – shares in Brand, her interest in a huge portfolio of properties around the globe – were tied up in various family trusts, but after several bequests to friends, retainers and charities, especially the Penang Children's Society, her personal assets were divided between the two girls: the Perth house and other properties to Jennifer, Cadogan Place to Sara. Because she hadn't known Craig's intentions regarding Rumah Kelapa it was not mentioned in her will but Sara had fallen in love with it at first sight and was determined to hang on to it, if necessary paying Jennifer more than its value to do so.

Now, as she climbed the steps and walked into the wooden house, it was like walking into her mother's heart. Here, withdrawn from the world, Hilary had spent the last months of her life with the man she loved. She had loved Craig Laurie for years; it had been her conscious decision to wait before joining him as it had been her conscious decision, when she felt the time was right, to walk away from the business world and what until then had been her life. What had prompted that decision Sara discovered only when she went through her mother's papers and came across a note from a Dr Chang at Singapore's Mount Elizabeth Hospital. Heart trouble… Sara would never have known it. Yet even then Hilary had managed her life; never had she been a woman who permitted life to manage her. No, to the end she had been in charge.

‘I shall miss her,' she told the silent house. ‘How I shall miss her.'

One by one she went through the rooms. The living room, large and welcoming, golden in the sunlight shining through the windows; the bedrooms; the modern kitchen and bathrooms: she felt Hilary's presence everywhere, sensed her moving through the shadows.

She walked out on to the deck and looked out at the beach, the sea beyond. At night she would see her walking on the sand with Craig Laurie beside her, the imprint of their feet erased by waves foaming creamy-white in the darkness.

The home to which Hilary had returned over the years; the home in which she had found safe haven at last, united with her love. Yes, it was good they were buried there on the island, side by side in the silent earth.

It would be a haven to which Sara would return from time to time. She felt good there, at home there. But not yet. Now there were challenges to overcome, opportunities to seize, the excitement of measuring herself against the future. The next day she would appoint an agent to look after Rumah Kelapa in her absence. She would ask Vivienne to take over the management of the children's charity; as soon as she had done these things she would return to the world she knew and valued, to the fullness of life and its challenges. She was booked on a plane heading south the next afternoon: to Singapore, first of all, then on the airbus to Sydney. In the meantime she had documents in the briefcase she had brought with her that she must read, decisions that she must make. Towkay neo, she thought. The job for which destiny had schooled her.

‘Onwards and upwards,' she told the ocean. ‘I can't wait.'

She turned from her contemplation of the sea and walked into the house.

As with my earlier books,
A Woman of Courage
is a work of fiction, and the characters and the incidents it contains are the product of the author's imagination. However, Hilary's childhood story is based on historical fact. For many years the British authorities sent children to Australia and Canada, with smaller numbers going to the then Rhodesia and to New Zealand. In many cases the authorities lied to both children and parents, claiming the parents were dead or the children had been adopted in the United Kingdom. In many cases children arriving in Australia were abused unmercifully by those to whom they were assigned. This disgraceful process continued in diminishing numbers until the 1960s.

The homes named in the text both in England and Australia existed although the administrators mentioned are fictitious. At the age of fifteen most girls in the homes were, as happens to Hilary, sent as domestic help to various parts of the country.

The only known Opie portrait of Lachlan Macquarie is in the State Library of New South Wales. The one mentioned in the text is invented for this story.

Myxomatosis did not reach the Pattinsons' area until after Hilary had moved on.

The property boom in Western Australia took place much as described.

The stock exchange crash of 1987 proved the downfall of many entrepreneurs and others.

Premier is an imaginary company, but China purchased large quantities of heavy earthmoving equipment at the time this story is set.

The hongs of the Andaman coast exist as described.

As is well known, the Boxing Day tsunami killed hundreds of thousands of people, including several thousand on the Andaman coast of southern Thailand. The fictitious character of Sylvia Mudge is based on a real child with some knowledge of the tsunami phenomenon, who warned of the coming disaster and by so doing succeeded in saving many lives.

I am pleased to acknowledge the invaluable advice given me by Ian Thwaites, Assistant Director (Services) of the Child's Migrant Trust, during my research into the conditions to which migrant children like Hilary Brand were exposed during the 1940s and 1950s.

As always, it gives me huge pleasure to thank Selwa Anthony, my agent and friend, for the unstinting help and encouragement she has given me over the years and whose contribution to the present work has been monumental.

I am also grateful to my editors and the magnificent team at Harlequin.

Thank you.

J.H. Fletcher is the prize-winning author of seventeen novels, published to both critical and popular acclaim in Australia, Germany and the UK, as well as numerous short stories and plays for radio and television. He was educated in England and France and travelled and worked in Europe, Asia and Africa before emigrating to Australia in 1991. Home is a house on the edge of the Western Tier Mountains in northern Tasmania.

THE GOVERNOR'S HOUSE

J.H. Fletcher

The story of two remarkable women, united by blood but separated by time – from the author of
Dust of the Land

Born in poverty, transported for theft, and in love with a charismatic but dangerous man – for Cat Haggard the Tasmanian Governor's House is not merely a beautiful building but a symbol of all she hopes to obtain in life. From convict, bushranger and accused pirate, Cat transforms herself into an entrepreneur and pillar of colonial Tasmanian society. But how is she connected to a missing ship? And could she be involved in the disappearance of a priceless treasure that, one hundred and three years after her death, will be claimed not only by a foreign government but by unscrupulous men determined to use it for their own ends?

Joanne, dean of history at the university and Cat's descendant, is assigned the task of locating the missing artefact. Joanne believes the key may lie in a coded notebook she has inherited along with Cat's other mysteries. But will she be able to decipher the message and put a century-old secret to rest? And will she survive to join her true love in the Governor's House – a house that has come to mean as much to her as it did to her long-dead ancestor?

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