As Nancy had foreshadowed, some of the scenes were written in close third person, as if Daniel Miller had listened to Nora speak about herself and then, rather than write down the interviews precisely as they’d occurred, with his questions followed by her answers, taken the next step of interpreting the memories, history, and personal feelings she’d shared,showingthe things she’d described. The resulting scenes spoke of many conversations, not just one or two; there were too many diverse details—some of which Jess recognized from Nora’s stories, others that were new to her—to have been gleaned in the formal setting of an initial interview.
Jess’s phone began to ring. She glanced down, saw that it was Polly, and even as her heart sank—frustrated, disappointed with herself—she switched the phone to silent, promising herself that she would call from the taxi on her way to the hospital. She didn’t have long before visiting hours and still needed to go back over Miller’s pages: she’d read them in one gulp, but there were a couple of scenes shewanted to look at with a closer eye to see whether they shed light on why Halcyon was back in Nora’s mind.
DM Notes: Nora Turner-Bridges
December 1959
The journey from Sydney had been dreadful, but it was a joy to be at Halcyon. When Thomas first announced that he’d bought the house and was moving himself and his new young bride and baby daughter halfway across the country, Nora had been devastated. She’d told herself it wouldn’t last. That it was just the latest in a long line of her brother’s madcap plans and adventures. That just as he had shifted and changed between so many other ideas, so too he would abandon this fancy.
But then she’d come to visit and, even as her spirits soared at the beauty of the place, she’d felt her hopes deflate. From the first, she’d understood the spell that Halcyon and its garden cast. She had been helpless to withstand it herself. The grand English-style country house in the middle of a verdant garden was an Eden. But that wasn’t what convinced Nora that her brother would never leave. She had seen beautiful houses and gardens before—she and Thomas had grown up in one on the eastern seaboard of Australia. What made Halcyon intoxicating, she knew, at least as far as Thomas was concerned, lay beyond the plush cushions and curtains of the grand house, the stone and marble and shiny brass fittings, the green lawn and the irrigated garden; it was the situation of the property, set as it was in the middle of the stark southern landscape.
The contrast between the formal garden and the native bushland was electric. It took Nora’s breath away to stand on the corner of the verandah as the setting sun darkened the clipped hedges to a lush deep green while simultaneouslybleaching the trunks of the candlebarks on the ridge beyond. The friction between the two was what Thomas craved. To possess an estate of unequaled civilization and comfort but know that it stood on the precipice of danger: therein lay the charge. Her brother had never found reassurance in the ordinary, the organized, the well-trodden path. That’s how Nora knew, from that first visit, as she watched the sun set like fire on the nearby hills and the moon rise to illuminate the gums, a line of ghosts carrying old stories of the ancient landscape, that Thomas would never give up this place.
Nora’s ambitions were comparatively modest. She’d grown up in a quiet house with cool, distant parents and a stream of stern nannies. Thomas had been her only light, and when he left—first for boarding school, and then for the war—Nora had suffered his absence like a death. Upon reaching adulthood, her greatest aspiration was not to be lonely. She planned to surround herself with love and laughter and lots of children, who would not be hidden away in a nursery and raised by strangers, but rather would bring their noise and clatter, their games and stories, into the heart of the home.
Soon after Thomas and Isabel left, Nora’s parents had died suddenly, leaving Darling House (and a mountain of debts) to Thomas. Immediately, he’d signed over ownership of their childhood home to Nora.
“I’ve been luckier than most,” he’d said with a shrug. “It’s your turn.”
Nora married the first man who asked her, the friend of a friend of her brother named Richard Bridges, and started work at once on creating her family. But things had not turned out the way she’d planned. Falling pregnant had not been the problem; it was keeping the baby safe until old enough to be born that proved impossible. On and on the trial went, a never-ending cycle of hope, excitement, anxiety, and then grief, over the courseof years. One doctor had spent an eternity leafing through her medical notes, before reclaiming his cigarette from the ashtray on his desk, leaning back in his leather swivel chair, and announcing—as she teetered nervously on the edge of her own far-less-comfortable seat—that some people just weren’t meant to procreate.
She had been determined to prove him wrong. Wrong about her, at any rate. And at last, she had. With the help of Dr. Bruce, her great miracle worker, she had not only fallen pregnant, but kept the little one safe and well into the third trimester. Success, though, had not come without cost: Nora had been cursed with “morning” sickness that lasted all day, for months.Hyperemesis gravidarumwas the official name, though knowing what to call it didn’t make a jot of difference. Still, she determined never to complain: to do so would have felt far too much like tempting fate.
Besides: “It’s a good sign,” the nurses had told her repeatedly, each offering a different variation on the theme.
“That’s a lovely strong baby you’ve got there, showing Mother who’s boss.”
“Get used to it—the baby’s just preparing you for the long slog ahead!”
Nora had heard this sentiment several times: that being a mother was a difficult and thankless task. She noted that it was generally the privileged position of people fortunate enough to call themselves parents. She smiled along when she heard it—those who said such things were generally well-meaning—but privately it strengthened her resolve. When she was lucky enough to be blessed with a child, she would never let it be a thankless task.
But seven months of daily nausea and deep weariness was not pleasant, and the prospect of spending the remaining six weeks of pregnancy at Halcyon with Isabel and the children was toogreat an opportunity to pass up. When the invitation came, Nora had steeled herself for the journey and banked on the restorative powers of the property, her family, and the company of her dearest confidante.
It had been worth it. From the first moment she arrived, Nora had felt a weight lift. She hadn’t realized until then how unsupported she’d felt at Darling House, how constrained. The ongoing cycle of pregnancy and loss had been grueling—and she’d grown increasingly desolate. Over time, her husband had started to waver in his allegiance to her vision of a household filled with children. Oh, he still wanted a child—an heir—very much, but he was happy to stop at one. Nora was confused at first, and then disappointed. She realized that she hadn’t seen him tested before. They hadn’t known one another well before they married, but what couple did? She started to perceive him as weak, lacking in commitment. She began to feel contempt when she looked at his satisfied face, his rounded shoulders, the crumb in his moustache at the other end of the breakfast table.
She had been thinking along such lines as she sat by the bedroom window on her first morning at Halcyon, watching the sun rise over the gums. Her baby had woken her early, as was becoming habit, with sharp kicks to the rib cage, and she’d been waiting for an acceptable time to go downstairs and take a walk among the roses. When she’d seen Isabel appear outside on the lawn, cup in hand, her muddy thoughts had lifted and she’d felt more energized than she had in months. She decided to join her sister-in-law.
“Good morning,” she said, crossing the lawn beneath the walnut tree.
Isabel turned and, seeing that the fellow early riser was Nora, smiled. “Hello, dearest. What a pretty smock. Did you sew it yourself?”
Nora said that she had. In fact, she’d sewn herself several pregnancy smocks many years before. It had been a great pleasure to dig them out from where they’d been stored.
“I was about to make myself a second cup,” Isabel continued. “Why don’t I make one for both of us and meet you at the chairs on the northern side?”
Nora walked a circuit of the rose garden while she waited, taking it slowly for the sake of her aching hips, stopping to smell the delicate fragrances as early sun warmed their petals. She arrived at the set of chairs at the same time as Isabel.
“How’s the little one today?” asked her sister-in-law, handing her a steaming cup.
“She’s a good girl,” Nora replied, rubbing the fabric that stretched across her taut belly. “I’m going to name her Polly.”
“A daughter,” Isabel said with a wry laugh. “Be careful what you wish for.” Perhaps Nora frowned, for she went on quickly, “Oh, don’t listen to me. I’m sure your daughter will be far more obedient than mine. Each is more pigheaded than the other lately. Never happier than when they’re managing to subvert my will.”
“A spirited girl is a joy to behold,” said Nora. “I’m sure someone wise once told me that.”
“Oh dear.” Isabel grimaced. “How one’s words come back to bite. It’s true, of course, but it certainly doesn’t make things easier when one is responsible for them.” Her mouth tightened ever so slightly as she added, “Solelyresponsible.”
Nora took a sip of tea. She was aware that Thomas had been away more than usual this year. Isabel hadn’t complained exactly, not in so many words, but she made occasional jibes that suggested she would have preferred him to do less of his business overseas. Nora never knew what to say in response. She had a fierce instinct to defend her brother, and yet she understood more than anyone how lonely was the experience of missing him.
