The Last Rose of Summer Read online

  DI MORRISSEY is one of Australia’s bestselling international novelists. She trained as a journalist with Australian Consolidated Press and became Women’s Editor for the Daily Mail Group in London and worked as a creative copywriter for Ogilvy and Mather Advertising. She had her own television program in the United States on CBS and was a regular presenter on Network 10 Australia. In addition to radio broadcasting, she has written for TV, film and theatre. Di has also directed and produced films, TV programs and commercials.

  Di lives and works in Byron Bay, in New South Wales, in between travelling to research her books.

  Di Morrissey can be visited at her website:

  www.dimorrissey.com

  Also by Di Morrissey

  Heart of the Dreaming

  Follow the Morning Star

  The Last Mile Home

  Tears of the Moon

  When the Singing Stops

  The Songmaster

  Scatter the Stars

  Blaze

  The Bay

  Kimberley Sun

  Barra Creek

  The Reef

  In association with

  Selwa Anthony

  First published 1992 by Pan Macmillan Publishers Australia

  This edition published 1995 by Pan Macmillan Australia Pty Limited

  1 Market Street, Sydney

  Reprinted 1992, 1994, 1995, 1996 (twice), 1997, 1998 (twice), 2000, 2001,

  2002, 2003, 2004 (twice), 2005, 2006

  Copyright © Di Morrissey 1992

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publisher.

  National Library of Australia

  cataloguing-in-publication data:

  Morrissey, Di.

  The last rose of summer.

  ISBN 0 330 27357 4

  I. Title.

  A823.3

  Typeset in 11/13 Andover by Post Typesetters

  Printed in Australia by McPherson’s Printing Group

  This is a work of fiction and all characters in this book are a creation of the author’s imagination.

  These electronic editions published in 1992 by Pan Macmillan Australia Pty Ltd

  1 Market Street, Sydney 2000

  The moral right of the author has been asserted.

  All rights reserved. This publication (or any part of it) may not be reproduced or transmitted, copied, stored, distributed or otherwise made available by any person or entity (including Google, Amazon or similar organisations), in any form (electronic, digital, optical, mechanical) or by any means (photocopying, recording, scanning or otherwise) without prior written permission from the publisher.

  The Last Rose of Summer

  Di Morrissey

  Adobe eReader format: 978-1-74197-051-7

  Online format: 978-1-74197-654-0

  EPUB format:978-1-74262-201-9

  Macmillan Digital Australia

  www.macmillandigital.com.au

  Visit www.panmacmillan.com.au to read more about all our books and to buy both print and ebooks online.

  You will also find features, author interviews and news of any author events.

  Contents

  Cover

  About Di Morrissey

  Also by Di Morrissey

  Title page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Acknowledgements

  Epigraphs

  PROLOGUE: The House On The River

  PART I: The Past — Kate, The Present — Odette

  CHAPTER ONE: Zanana 1899

  CHAPTER TWO: Kincade 1953

  CHAPTER THREE: Zanana 1899

  CHAPTER FOUR: Amberville 1956

  CHAPTER FIVE: Zanana 1901

  CHAPTER SIX: Amberville 1958

  CHAPTER SEVEN: Zanana 1901

  CHAPTER EIGHT: Amberville 1959

  PART II: Love Meets As Shadows Creep

  CHAPTER NINE: Zanana 1916

  CHAPTER TEN: Amberville 1959

  CHAPTER ELEVEN: Zanana 1917

  CHAPTER TWELVE: Sydney 1960

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN: Zanana 1918

  PART III: Echoes Call

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN: Zanana 1920

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN: Sydney 1965

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN: Zanana 1921

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN: Peace Valley 1966

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN: Zanana 1922

  CHAPTER NINETEEN: Sydney 1971

  CHAPTER TWENTY: Zanana 1923

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE: Sydney 1971

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO: Bangalow 1930–1940

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE: Sydney 1971

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR: Sydney 1972

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE: Sydney 1972

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX: Sydney 1972

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN: Zanana 1972

  EPILOGUE: The Last Rose

  To my uncle

  Jim Revitt

  For your love,

  For everything you’ve taught me

  And for all that you’ve done.

  Acknowledgments

  To my beautiful children and best friends, Gabrielle and Nicolas, for their love and encouragement.

  My mother, Kay (Roberts) Warbrook, for always being there.

  Dorothy and Bill Morrissey with love and thanks.

  The Hutchinson clan: Annette, Julie, John, Luke, Kim , Christine and Taylor, and in memory of Big John, Professor Emeritus John Hutchinson, UCLA.

  Nick and Hazel Tate for their love and support.

  Good friends — in Byron Bay, Brenda and Jim Anderson; in Sydney — Clarissa Mason.

  My friends at the Byron Bay and Ballina libraries for patiently finding answers to obscure questions.

  And especially for my angel whose love is sweeter than all the roses.

  ’Tis the last rose of summer

  Left blooming alone;

  All her lovely companions

  Are faded and gone.

  Thomas Moore 1779–1852

  When the petals drop from the

  last rose of summer, winter’s

  dark days descend.

  Despair not, for spring and

  hope soon bloom again . . .

  DM

  PROLOGUE

  The House On The River

  Kincaid 1953

  The river, a mile wide, flowed away from the city, slowly, glassy smooth, its surface gleaming like old pewter. Mangrove wetlands fringed its banks, screening suburban houses where backyards squelched into an odorous bog.

  It seemed a lonely stretch of the Parramatta River, but secreted in the tangle of roots and growth along its bank, migratory birds and waterfowl darted, fed and nested. Between high and low tide an army of soldier crabs dressed in blue and cream uniforms marched in scratching, crunching formation across the flats before disappearing into the slate coloured mud, buried beneath a cluster of neat grey balls.

  In the mid-afternoon stillness of grey clouds and leaden sky, no wind lifted leaves or skimmed the water. Then, from around a curving arm of the waterway, came the methodical splish splosh of oars as a small dinghy cleaved through the painted scene. The oars were stroked cleanly and firmly in and out, the drips from each paddle leaving a trail of rippling circles alongside the boat.

  The girl rowing was eleven years old. Odette Barber was tall for her age, dressed in faded red wool trousers, a hand-knitted green jumper, and thick leather sandals strapped across brown feet. Her skin was the colour of rich cream, her wide eyes a clear aquamarine blue. A cloud of red-gold curls sprang from her head in an unruly halo.

  She paused, the oars trailing in the water, and lif
ted her head inquisitively. To an observer she might have been listening to some silent song, but what had captured her attention was a drift of sweetness. A wafting, faint perfume, somehow familiar, came to her, then dissipated. She rowed slowly for a few more strokes, then stopped. This time the perfume was unmistakable: it lingered above the water, invisible but fragrant. Roses.

  Odette began to pull on the right oar, leaving the left one suspended in the air as she guided the boat closer to the bank. She aimed for a break in the mangroves where a solid green curtain of thick bamboo, leaning willows and whispering she-oaks stood apart from the unkempt, natural growth of the river bank. A jetty poked into the water, its turpentine piles shredding and spaced like crooked teeth. A once smart boathouse hunched at the shoreline, dilapidated and leaning tiredly.

  Undaunted, Odette pulled in, shipped the oars and stepped onto the shaky steps, looping the boat’s painter over the top of a pylon and knotting it in place. Somewhere in the tangle of hidden growth roses were blooming. Autumn was closing in; these had to be the last roses of summer. If she could find them what a lovely surprise they would be for her mother. Odette knew instinctively that no one lived here for the silence and neglect spoke of a place abandoned.

  She skipped with a clatter along the jetty, jumping the missing boards, and peered into the empty boathouse where the skeleton of a punt was suspended in cobwebby rafters. Following an old flagstone path she disappeared into the grove of bamboo. The hollow stems of the thick bamboo stood sentry-like, their delicate tips touching twenty feet above her. Odette paused in the airy green grove, listening to the singing sighs and musical creaks of the old bamboo. She felt she was in a protective underwater green shell.

  The bamboo grove which screened the wharf opened onto the bottom level of a terraced garden. Where she stood, shrubs and trees met a tangle of tropical plants partially hiding a rocky outcrop. Beside this was one of Sydney’s first swimming pools. Framed by sandstone blocks its gaping length was rank with the smell of rotting leaves in the ooze of dank slime on its bottom. At its far end perched two bathing pavilions which had once discreetly separated ladies and gentlemen bathers. Despite its odorous desolation Odette paused, visualising how casually elegant it must have once looked: pale pink sandstone and cool clear water, with one end shaded by trees screening it from the river. She imagined the laughter of a family or courting couples at play in a more gracious era.

  Around her, the lawns and garden beds were overgrown, but a flight of sandstone steps bordered by fat stone balustrades led up through the tiers of terraces.

  Odette followed the path past a sunken garden where a cherub choked on weeds and mildew. Some sort of overgrown pedestal stood to one side and, curious, she pulled apart the tangle of grasses to see it better.

  It was a sundial, its carved granite base covered in moss and lichen. Its bronze face was black and green with age as was the vertical triangular plate set in its centre which cast a sharp shadow towards the Roman numerals around the outside of the dial. Something was written in flowing script beneath the plate. Odette rubbed away the grime using the sleeve of her sweater until she could read the words.

  Shadows mark the flight of time,

  in ceaseless silence so sublime.

  A shiver ran through her as she stared at the beautiful clock which had silently marked the intangible but inevitable movement of the sun through the heavens. How long had it stood there marking moments? And what events had happened within that time? At that moment, Odette felt linked to a past she did not know, to a future which held she knew not what. In wonder she rested her hand on the smooth, warm surface of the sundial and fleetingly sensed the fragility of time and life.

  Ripples of light quivered across a marshy pond. Once water lilies bloomed here and a fountain of clear water had sparkled and splashed into the sea-green pool. Now it was a mere inch or two of caked brown sludge embalming the roots of the lilies. It was sadly beautiful and she turned away.

  Passing a stone wall the overwhelming perfume of roses swirled about her. She turned a corner and unexpectedly came upon the rose garden. She stood still, quite overwhelmed.

  More than a garden, it was a terrace of arbours and beds, and a sloping hillside, where roses cascaded uncontrolled, rose above it. What had once been delightfully pruned and espaliered, now tumbled willy nilly in a jumble of colours and species: damasks, musk, mosses, tea roses, albas, bourbons, gallicas, tiny banksias, baby roses, wild roses and rambling roses — all fought for light and space in happy profusion.

  Odette plunged into an untrammelled arbour, its dainty iron lace archway smothered in musk roses. She weaved through the tangle of white blooms, pausing to sniff the light refreshing perfume.

  Emerging from the laden archway she picked her way through the banks of old rosebeds burying their Victorian iron-border edges. In the centre of a thicket of roses, she could make out a small metal fence and floating above the wilderness of roses was a marble angel, its base obscured by the tangle of growth. Its wings spread protectively, it looked like a forlorn and lost figure sheltering some secret. The thorny rose bushes had woven their branches into an impenetrable barrier and Odette moved on.

  She found she was on the upper level where spreading oak trees and overgrown lawns of knee-high grass spread towards a mansion whose turrets and chimneys were visible above the greenery. Her sandals crunched on the gravel of the circular driveway as she went towards the front entrance of the decaying mansion. Although it appeared abandoned and dilapidated it was still impressive. She gazed up at the Italianate facade in awe. Carved above the wide double doors was ZANANA 1898.

  She tiptoed up the flight of sandstone steps to the tiled portico beneath the Corinthian columns, keeping her heels off the ground so as not to make a noise and disturb the ghosts and secrets within.

  She pushed a broken window shutter to one side and using her torn sweater to wipe a smeary patch on the dusty windowpane she pressed her nose to the glass. Peering into the gloom she could make out little, so she walked around the spacious verandah where the light fell in tiny patchwork squares through the lattice onto the marble tiles.

  Heavy sun-faded drapes obscured the French doors and windows, so she moved to the back of the house to where a conservatory followed the curve of the rear wall, turning at right angles to run along the far side of the house.

  It was a strange glass cylinder, partly made of square panes of purple glass, so it clung like a fat puce caterpillar around the building. A lattice door stood open and Odette stepped inside.

  Once it had housed the first Australian specimens of Saintpaulia, discovered by Baron von Saint Paul on the slopes of the Usambara mountains of Tanganyika. The tiny delicate flowers of this exotic little African violet had contrasted with the dramatic and showy orchids lining the length of the glasshouse.

  The plants were long gone, a few broken earthenware pots and tubs the sole remnants of a prized collection. The light filtering through the thick coloured glass turned the girl’s creamy skin a pale mauve and the long avenue into a violet-tinted world. Black and white tiles lined the floor and her footsteps echoed eerily.

  Odette tried to walk softly as she ventured through this strangely coloured world. Suddenly, as she approached the right-angle bend, she paused, her heart beginning to beat faster. Faintly she heard footsteps coming towards her. She was poised, ready to turn and flee, when the steps ceased. Had she imagined the noise? Two more steps would take her round the corner to confront whatever was there. The thought of turning back and running, being chased — by what or whom — seemed more frightening. Maybe she had just imagined it. She waited a second, took a deep breath and marched around the corner.

  Her gasp caught in her throat and her hands flew to her mouth as she came face to face with someone else tiptoeing cautiously down the conservatory passage.

  ‘Who are you?’

  ‘What are you doing here?’

  They spoke at once, then stepped back to observe each other.<
br />
  The boy saw two huge and frightened turquoise eyes, a pale face shadowed by the violet light with two small pink smudges on either cheek, a cloud of rusty curls springing free about her face. She reminded him of a startled doe ready to take flight.

  She saw a boy not much older than herself, with soft brown hair falling across his forehead, flecked hazel eyes, and freckles dotted over a small straight nose.

  Once over the shock of seeing another person, neither felt threatened by the other and curiosity replaced their surprise.

  ‘Why are you here?’ asked the boy.

  ‘Just looking around. Why are you here?’ demanded Odette, determined not to be intimidated.

  ‘I live here.’

  ‘Here! The place looks empty.’

  ‘Not in this house. My father and I live in one of the cottages at the back of the old dairy. He’s the caretaker.’

  ‘Oh.’ She didn’t like to comment that the place scarcely looked cared for.

  The boy smiled hesitantly. ‘I was just looking around too. I often come here to explore. It’s interesting, isn’t it?’

  ‘It’s different. I didn’t know it was here.’

  ‘How did you get here?’

  ‘I was rowing down the river and smelled the roses, so I pulled into the jetty. It looked so . . . inviting.’

  They turned and walked side by side through the conservatory.

  ‘It’s like that. There’s a special sort of . . .’ he fumbled for a word,’ . . . feeling about this place. Have you seen the Indian House yet?’

  Odette shook her head. As they emerged from the back door of the glass tunnel into daylight once more, the boy adopted the role of leader. ‘It’s all real Indian stuff. Follow me. We’ll go through the stables . . . they’re posher than our house. They must have had grand horses.’