In Her Mothers' Shoes (53 page)

‘I can understand how he feels. It’s
just
like a detective story.’

‘Not so much a who-dunnit as a “where-is-he-now”?’

‘And is your birth father still alive?’ David asks, stepping back from the desk.

Returning to Rick’s email, I scroll down the screen. ‘Rick doesn’t know. The cemetery records for Wellington haven’t got him listed as deceased, but of course he might have left town long ago and be alive and well anywhere.’

‘What about the electoral rolls?’

The second attachment is a scan of several photocopied pages. I scroll down to W. ‘Yes, there he is.’ As I stop to read, David leans over my shoulder. ‘He was listed as a tramways worker until 1958 and after that it looks like he became a grocer at the top end of Willis Street somewhere. That’s all we know.’

‘It’s a pretty good start. Rick should have been an historian.’

‘It’s a pity Dad isn’t still around,’ I say, ‘he was passionate about history – especially family history. He would have known just where to look to see if Peter’s still alive.’

‘I’m not sure he’d want to find a second father for you. It might make him feel a bit redundant.’

‘It’s funny, you know, I’ve left it so long to even begin looking for him. But I’d be sad if he wasn’t around any more, if I’d left it too late.’

David goes to the doorway then turns back to me for a moment. ‘You’d better get a move-on then.’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘I’ll get dinner soon. James is already asking when it’s going to be ready.’

‘You should tell him to get it himself. Sitting about all day studying, he needs to get off his chuff. It’s not as if he can’t cook - he’s great when he puts his mind to it.’

‘He’s inherently lazy like me. It’s in the genes.’

‘Nonsense. He’s been learning by example. Genes are all about what your arse
looks
like, not whether you have the energy to
get off it
or not.’

David pats his bum and disappears.

Turning back to the keyboard, I Google my birth father’s name. Rick’s already done that, but I might be able to do better, using some of the investigative journalism tricks David’s taught me on the Companies Office website and the online databases accessed through the library.
Soon, I have a company file with a list of directors and one of them is Peter Raymond Williams. It’s a grocery importing and wholesaling company, which makes sense. If my father was a grocer, he could well have gone into grocery supplies. Tracking back through the company records, I see he could be comparatively elderly, which would fit; he was a founding director and the company has been around a long time. There is a real possibility it could be him – there can’t be too many Wellington tramways men from the 1950s with the same name, surely?

The company directory lists the directors’ addresses. His is in Miramar.

I Google-Map his house, but there are no photos along his street so I click on the satellite button and find him on Google Earth. I can’t help but smile to myself at the ease with which such sleuthing can be done now. Not all that long ago, I’d have to spend hours at the Companies Office then take a trip to Wellington and drive up and down his street for the same view I’m looking at in my own home now: a big single storey house with an orange-tiled roof perched high on a hill overlooking the sea. A steep cliff below the house drops down to a winding road and a rocky shoreline. He must have a spectacular view of the harbour, almost out to the heads to the south and all the way over to Eastbourne to the north. I move the arrow to see further along his street; his house is surrounded by equally sizeable homes, many with decks hanging out over bush-clad sections all facing out to sea.

I can just picture him in there with his wife, tall and slim, her greying hair cut short, spiked up on top of her head, dangling silver earrings, her flowing multi-coloured tunic hanging over black straight-leg pants, striding into the living room in black, low-heeled sandals, bringing plunger coffee and shortbread at ten. My father will be sitting at the window, his business papers on his knee, ignoring the work he should be doing, staring out the window at the ferry steaming by. His hair thick and white, his face lined and weather-beaten, he’ll have a far-away look in his eye, thinking of . . .

Not of me, that’s for sure.

On the nearby bookshelves will be framed photographs of sons and daughters in school uniform, at university graduation perhaps, grandchildren at the beach, playing sport, family gatherings at Christmas. 

The Google-Earth cliff-top house is comforting to visit; it makes me feel at home.

But it isn’t my home. I close the page to rid myself of the image. There are other emails waiting to be read.

I click on one from my daughter Amelia: ‘Got a promotion today after a good performance review. More money! Well, not that much, but every bit will help pay for the car to get its warrant. I’m going to be in charge of the customer relationship web campaign. Will look good on the CV next year in the UK.’ The rest is about all the stuff she’s selling on TradeMe to save money for the big OE and how her boyfriend is getting on studying for his Chartered Financial Analyst exams.

The remaining emails can wait, I decide. Returning to the one from Rick, I read it again and click back to the Companies Office website. Is there a phone number for my father? I scroll through the company’s information. There is a global email address: [email protected]. Perhaps if I try various iterations of Peter’s name, an email might get through:

From:
[email protected]

Sent:
Tuesday, November 15 2011. 5:30 p.m.

To:
Peter.Williams@capitalimports
;
[email protected]
;

[email protected]
; [email protected]

Subject:
Missing Pieces.

Dear Peter,

I was watching a programme on Prime TV called
Missing Pieces
about people searching for lost family. It has prompted me to write to you as it is possible you are the missing piece in my life.

On the other hand, I may have the wrong person and if so, I apologise for disturbing you.

I was born on March 17, 1951. My mother was Lizzie Hamilton.

I have led a fruitful and largely happy life and, if you are my birth father, I would like to thank you for giving my life to me. If you would be amenable to meeting me, I would like that very much and would welcome an email in return.

Yours sincerely

Felicity Price

~   ~  ~

I add my mobile phone number at the end, read it through several times then, before I change my mind, press ‘send’.

Beyond the laptop, a silver-framed photo of my mother and father on their sixtieth wedding anniversary makes me feel like I’m cheating on them. What would they think? Mum was keen for me to meet my brother and sister and the extended family beyond them but she died before it happened. She never knew the joy it brought, which I regret – because she would have revelled in that joy vicariously and taken it as her own.

She was wary of me meeting up with my birth mother, though, and I suspect she would feel the same about my birth father. What about Dad? What would he think? Dad would never be drawn on any of it, not with me anyway. His comments to James suggest he wouldn’t be worried.

But Mum and Dad aren’t around any more and some part of me, some stray piece of DNA looking for a home, still wants to find my birth father.

A deep-throated low-revving engine rumble and a split second later, another aftershock. For a few seconds, the house judders, the window rattles, my desk jolts away and back again. It ends with a slow roll. The light swings but doesn’t flicker.

‘Four point three,’ David yells from the kitchen.

‘No, a shallow four,’ James calls out from the lounge.

They’ll find out on Geonet in a few minutes.

It’s a measure of how accepting we are now of this seismic swarm that, instead of rushing for the doorway, we wager with each other over the magnitude – with increasing accuracy.

It’s a measure of how accepting I am of my new family – and they of me – that my brother and I join forces to track down the man who lured our mother into the Karori Pavilion almost exactly sixty years ago.

Unsettled by the aftershock, I stand up and go into the hall where there’s a line of family photos – Stewart family, Davidson family, Hamilton family. I beam from their midst, the ugly duckling in some, the swan in others. Where do I belong? Where do I fit in? 

It no longer matters. What matters is that, for a while, I have stood in the shoes of both my mothers and come to understand them a little better.

~   ~   ~

Rick’s not an effusive sort of guy. He saves his most expressive moments for the stage. I travel to Wellington for one of our increasingly frequent meetings – in Christchurch and in Wellington. When he introduces me to the bandmaster of his big band, I am expecting his usual reticence.

I’m listening to them play at the Front Room nightclub, enveloped with the crowd in the big brassy sound of multiple saxes, trumpets, trombones, amped up keyboards and guitar, when suddenly the encore is over and Rick is at my table looking for a drink.

‘It’s my shout,’ I say, ‘the least I can do after being so well entertained.’ I call the waiter over and order a beer.

He’s telling me about the band leader, how he writes most of the music, how people ask for his tunes by name, when the man himself comes over.

‘This is my older sister, Felicity.’ Rick is standing up, beaming.

‘I didn’t know you had two sisters,’ says the band leader.

I stand up too, shake his hand, congratulate him.

‘Aha, that’s because Felicity arrived fully formed as a sister just a few months ago.’

So of course we have to explain it. Then Rick says, ‘It was like we’ve always known each other, like we grew up together.’

The band leader is clearly impressed: he perches at our table and studies me. ‘Can she play the trombone?’ he asks then laughs.

‘The flute actually,’ Rick says.

‘You want to audition?’

‘You’re joking, right?’ I laugh and shake my head. ‘I haven’t played for years. I’ll leave it to the experts.’