A Second Chance (44 page)

‘Russell!’ Jimmy looked stunned on hearing
the name of the tiny seaside settlement. ‘I can’t go and live in
Russell! Good Lord, I’m not sure I even know where it is.’

‘You certainly can’t continue to live in
Auckland. Unless prison appeals, that is. And I’ll see that you
find your way to Russell, you need have no fear on that score. It’s
quite a distance north, but a boat goes there occasionally. I
understand a good deal of fish is shipped out of Russell—I believe
it’s the only real activity in the area these days—so it’s possible
the boat may be somewhat odiferous, but that can’t be helped.’

‘And what am I supposed to do in a place
like that?’

‘Oh, Russell has several advantages as a
place to dispose of you. There’s a position vacant that Miss Sarah
can use contacts she has in Customs to get you into. Nothing
demanding—in fact it’s the sort of job that might normally go to a
retired civil servant from one of the lower rungs of the public
service. You’re to act as customs agent there, for the occasional
boat that might require such offices. I understand there aren’t a
great number, so you’ll have a good deal of free time to consider
how matters came to such a pass. It’s better than prison, Jimmy.
Some might say a good deal better than you deserve. Your daughter
is a merciful young woman.’

‘My daughter is a spoiled little bitch.’

‘There’s even a house that goes with the
position. Well, when I say a house… I understand there’s an office
with a room behind it as living quarters. That should do you
nicely. The remuneration is, of course, very small. But then I
don’t suppose you’ll find much to spend it on in Russell.’

‘I… I won’t put up with it. What sort of
place is that for a man such as myself?’

‘A quiet one. You’ll need to accustom
yourself to a rather retired style of life from now on. But I
imagine there are some pleasant walks, and perhaps you could take
up fishing.’

‘Fishing! I hardly think so.’

‘Gardening then, if you prefer. It’s good
exercise.’ Henry put the last few files still on his desk away.
‘You must excuse me, Jimmy, Constance will be thinking about
serving dinner soon. I’ll need you to call in again tomorrow to
finalise the arrangements.’

‘Ah, Henry… I don’t quite know where I’m
staying tonight. I thought it might be best if I left Charlotte
alone to calm down, and, well…’

‘Oh yes, I’d forgotten Charlotte planned to
evict you. Can’t you stay at the club?

‘I’d sooner not go to the club just at the
moment.’

Henry studied his expression. ‘I take it
that means I can expect to see the club on your list of creditors?’
There was no response beyond a quick grimace. Henry sighed. ‘Oh, I
suppose you can come and—’

He stopped abruptly. ‘No, I’m afraid you
can’t come home with me. In fact I don’t believe I want you in my
house again. I have Laura to think of.’

Jimmy looked puzzled, then indignant. ‘What
are you suggesting? Good Lord, Laura’s my niece!’

‘Yes, exactly.’ Henry opened a drawer of his
desk and withdrew a card. ‘Here’s the address of a boarding house
we sometimes recommend to clients who find themselves in sudden
difficulties. The terms are most reasonable. I believe it’s very
clean, though of course rather basic.’

‘A boarding house!’ Jimmy said in disgust.
‘One of those places with a hatchet-faced landlady, and everything
smelling of cabbage?’

‘I haven’t met the lady in question, so I
can’t comment on her physiognomy. And perhaps you could request a
vegetable other than cabbage, though it’s wholesome enough. If it
doesn’t match up to your standards, you can always find yourself a
hotel.’

‘Well, that might not be possible just at
the moment,’ Jimmy said, avoiding his eyes.

‘No, and I’m certainly not paying for you to
stay in one. If the boarding house is beyond your means, I don’t
mind helping out. I can hardly have you sleeping on a bench in the
park—you’d only get picked up as a vagrant.’ He took ten shillings
from his pocketbook and passed it to Jimmy. ‘Don’t book in for too
long, we need to get matters settled soon. I don’t want to try Miss
Sarah’s patience.’

‘Russell,’ Jimmy muttered. ‘I don’t know
about that. I’ll go and see Charlotte again tomorrow,’ he said,
brightening visibly. ‘She was upset today—that’s understandable,
after the way Sarah spoke to her. She’ll calm down overnight. I’m
not sure you’ll need to take this Russell nonsense any further,
Henry—I expect I’ll be leaving for Melbourne soon.’

Henry raised his eyebrows at Jimmy’s
seemingly boundless capacity for self-deception, but made no
answer. He strongly suspected that Jimmy would find the door of
Charlotte’s house closed against him, with no response beyond being
told that the mistress was “out”, but he would let Jimmy discover
that for himself.

He watched as Jimmy left the office.
Organising the details of his exile to Russell was demanding a fair
degree of time and trouble, but Henry considered it thoroughly
worthwhile if it meant he would soon never have to see Jimmy
again.

Late in January, Amy had a letter from Sarah
that was as cheerful as she could have wished. Sarah wrote of
tennis parties and of croquet on the lawn; of sailing on the
harbour, and afternoon tea with friends. She mentioned in passing
many of the people Amy had met while at Sarah’s. Mr Kendall, she
said, had been particularly helpful recently. After her long
silence on the subject, Sarah renewed her invitation for Amy to
come to Auckland again, preferably to settle there this time, and
pressed her to name a date. There would be concerts and plays, she
reminded Amy. A new bookstore had opened, and Sarah was looking
forward to taking Amy there.

Do say you’ll come, and soon,
Sarah
wrote.
Surely you need have no qualms about leaving David now
that he has a wife to look after him?

Towards the end of the letter Sarah added,
as if it were a matter of no great consequence,

You may be interested to hear that Mrs
Leith’s brother, Mr Taylor, has left Auckland. He has chosen to
settle in a secluded area, quite some distance north of here. I’ve
heard it surmised that his health has obliged him to seek a retired
life. It’s understood that Mrs Taylor has returned to Melbourne,
and is paying an extended visit to her family. Neither of them is
expected to return to Auckland.

Amy laid down the letter and pondered what
might be behind Sarah’s words. Jimmy had looked well enough just a
few months before, and she could not believe he would willingly
choose isolation. However it had come about, Auckland seemed a more
inviting place with the knowledge that it no longer held Jimmy.

Inviting, but for the moment quite
unattainable. In the privacy of her room, Amy took up pen and paper
and began her reply.

Of course I’d love to come and see you
again, my darling,
she wrote.
And I will as soon as I can.
But I don’t know when that’s likely to be
. She paused, and
chose her words with care.
Beth’s rather poorly, you see, and I
don’t feel able to leave her just now. Once she’s well again I can
think about going away. But that won’t be for a while, I’m afraid.
Not for a few months
.

Amy’s hand hovered over the page as she
debated how much she should say. Her reference to Beth’s being
“poorly” would probably mean little to Sarah. Should she tell her
about the baby? Which was worse: to risk overstepping the bounds of
propriety by telling an unmarried woman that Beth was with child,
or to have Sarah think that perhaps Amy was making excuses to stay
away from her?

The answer was obvious.
There’s to be a
baby, you see. We’re all very excited about it, but things aren’t
going quite as well as they could. Beth needs me here just now.
Once it’s all over and I know she’s able to manage on her own, then
I can think about coming back to you. I promise I will, my darling,
just as soon as I can
.

She set the letter aside to give the ink
time to dry, and left the room. She did not like to leave Beth by
herself for too long, to make herself more frightened than ever by
dwelling on what was to come.

*

With March almost over, Amy knew that Beth
could go into labour at any time. She watched her closely for any
sign of it. A day came when Beth was clearly even more restless and
uncomfortable than usual. Amy went to bed that night fully
expecting to be woken before many hours had passed.

A sharp rap on her door roused her from a
fitful slumber. It was pitch dark; Amy guessed that it was probably
some time past midnight. ‘Ma?’ she heard David call, the
anxiousness in his voice clear even through the muffling of the
wood. ‘Beth thinks it’s started.’

Amy was out of bed and had her dressing gown
pulled on over her nightdress in moments. She followed David
through the cottage to where Beth was sitting up against the
pillows, her eyes wide and frightened in the light of the candle at
her side.

‘What should I do, Ma?’ David asked. ‘Shall
I go and get Richard? It’s pretty dark out there, but I’ll go as
fast as I can. Or should I do something here first? What can I
do?’

When Amy managed to silence him for long
enough to allow Beth to speak, she found that what had sent David
running through the house in his nightshirt was Beth’s report of a
single, sharp pain.

‘No, Dave, there’s no need to go out in the
middle of the night,’ Amy said. ‘It’s much too soon—nothing’s going
to happen for a long while yet.’

‘But how will we know when he should go?’
Beth asked.

‘You’ll start getting pains closer
together.’ There was no need to tell her that they would also be a
good deal stronger. ‘Don’t worry, Beth, I’ll know when it’s time.’
She studied Beth’s expression. It was important, she knew, to keep
her as calm as possible. ‘Would you like me to stay in here with
you?’

‘Yes, please,’ Beth said in a small
voice.

‘But what can I
do
?’ David
persisted.

‘The best thing you could do is try and get
back to sleep,’ Amy said. ‘We’ll need you to run all the messages
in the morning.’

David insisted that he would not be able to
sleep, but he lay down on top of the covers and rolled over to face
Beth. Amy lit a lamp and turned it down as low as it would go, blew
out the candle, and settled into a chair close to Beth’s side.

‘Aunt Amy?’ Beth said a few minutes
later.

‘Mmm? Have you had another pain?’

‘No, just that aching in my back I’ve had
since this morning. I’m sorry I’m such a nuisance, making you sit
there all night.’

‘Of course you’re not a nuisance! I don’t
mind—I often used to sit here of an evening, getting your Uncle
Charlie off to sleep when he was having trouble settling.’

David’s breathing soon told them both that
despite his protestations he had nodded off. Beth’s contractions
seemed mild so far; they were frequent enough to prevent her from
sleeping, but when they came she made no noise beyond a faint
whimper. There was little risk that Amy might fall asleep, sitting
upright in a none-too-comfortable chair. She and Beth spoke in
whispers, careful not to disturb David, though he showed no sign of
waking.

In the grey light of dawn Amy stood up, and
was abruptly made aware of how stiff she was. She went around to
the other side of the bed and placed a hand on the dark mound that
was David. ‘Time to get up, Davie.’

He sat up at once. ‘Should I go and get
Richard now?’

‘No, not just yet. You can do your milking
first, but don’t take too long over it. Run next door and ask Uncle
John to take your milk to the factory—I don’t want you too far away
from the house.’

Amy went to her own room to get dressed,
leaving David to get himself ready for the day. He took some
convincing that the birth was not imminent before Amy managed to
shoo him out of the house. She made Beth as comfortable as she
could before she set to work in the kitchen, popping into the
bedroom every few minutes in between getting breakfast
underway.

When David had come back from milking and
gulped down a hasty breakfast, Amy judged it was time to let him go
into town; more because his increasing agitation was likely to
upset Beth than from any imminent need for Richard.

‘There’s no need to gallop,’ she told him as
he pulled on his boots. ‘We don’t want you to end up in a ditch.
And let Aunt Lizzie know what’s going on—you can leave that until
you’re on your way back,’ she added, seeing the protest on his
lips. ‘I know you want to get on.’

She persuaded Beth to have a slice or two of
bread, along with a glass of water, knowing it was best not to
offer her heavier food. The contractions were stronger now, making
Beth cry out with the worst of them.

‘I’m sorry for making such a fuss,’ Beth
said after a particularly bad one.

‘No, don’t say that—you make as much noise
as you want to. I’m sure I did when I was having the children.’

‘Will it get really bad later?’

Amy set aside the old sheet she was ripping
up to add to her pile of clean rags, and brushed a strand of hair
away from Beth’s forehead. ‘Not so very bad, no. Richard will give
you something to make you go to sleep before the worst of it.’

Beth seemed to shrink against the pillows.
‘I wish I didn’t have to have Richard,’ she murmured. Amy suspected
she was almost as fearful of that as of the birth itself. ‘No, I
know I have to,’ she said before Amy could speak. ‘It’s no use
being silly about it.’

David returned rather sooner than Amy would
have thought possible without some hard riding, and with the news
that Richard was on the way.

‘He said he’d bring the nurse,’ David
added.