Tamar (28 page)

Tamar watched him go, then turned and walked up the path to the front door, rang the bell and waited. She could hear footsteps hurrying down the hall inside and braced herself to confront whomever would open the door.

It was Eliza. She looked Tamar quickly up and down and said, ‘Go away. We don’t give ter beggars,’ and shut the door in her face.

Tamar took her hat off and rang again. Eliza answered immediately. ‘Look, piss orf, I said!’ she snapped. ‘Go on! Bugger orf!’

‘Eliza, it’s me. Tamar Deane.’

Eliza stared for a second then raised her hands to her mouth and screamed. She turned and ran inside, leaving the front door wide open. ‘Miss Myrna! Miss Myrna, come quick! It’s Tamar and somethin’ terrible’s ’appened ter her face!’

Myrna appeared immediately from her office and hurried towards the door. When she saw Tamar she stopped dead then lunged forward again, her arms out, as recognition dawned on her. ‘Oh ma
God
! Ye poor wee lassie, what’s happened te ye?’

‘I’ve come home,’ said Tamar, as she burst into tears yet again.

C
HAPTER
F
OURTEEN

July 1881

T
amar sat in Myrna’s garden, a woollen rug over her knees, the weak winter sun failing to keep the chill from her bones. She wondered if she would ever feel warm again. Cabbage lay quietly at her feet, as if sensing she needed company but not entertainment.

The spot where she’d placed her chair was protected from the breeze by a trellis covered with rampant honeysuckle, but she had a peaceful view of the shrubs and flowerbeds Myrna had planted. The garden would be beautiful in another twelve months, a quiet haven from the comings and goings inside the house.

Tamar heard the faint clatter of a horse’s hooves along Dilworth Terrace and tensed, wondering whether the horse was being ridden by someone looking for her, relaxing only when the horse continued down the street.

Myrna emerged from the house followed by Eliza carrying a laden tea tray. She pulled a garden chair next to Tamar and sat down, lighting a cigarette, while Eliza poured two cups of steaming hot tea. After Eliza had gone, Myrna asked, ‘How are ye feeling this morning, lassie?’

Tamar did not reply immediately, her gaze captured by the sight of a small mauve butterfly flitting from leaf to leaf on the
honeysuckle. Cabbage took a half-hearted snap at it but missed, his head flopping limply back onto his outstretched paws. Somewhere a lone bee buzzed lazily.

‘Tired,’ she said eventually. ‘Very tired.’

‘Aye, it’s a ghastly experience ye’ve had,’ responded Myrna. Her heart ached for this pale young girl with the grotesque scar on her face and an even more ragged one on her soul. ‘Ye slept well?’

‘Not really. I dreamt he came after me.’

‘Peter?’ Myrna was not surprised; Tamar’s fear and pain hung about her like heavy, black fog. ‘I dinnae think he will. He’s no’ the guts.’

Tamar did not respond and they sat together in silence. Myrna was extremely upset, cursing herself over whether she could or should have done more to prevent Tamar’s disastrous marriage. She’d almost had a heart attack when Tamar appeared on her doorstep, skinny as a garden rake and her face horribly disfigured. In her private parlour, Tamar collapsed on the sofa, looking dumbly at Myrna, her face distorted by pain and despair and unable to speak. The girls had hovered, visibly bewildered and stunned, but Myrna sent them back to work with a flap of her hand and shut the door.

Tamar had eventually stammered something about a lost baby and Peter trying to kill her, but her sobbing rendered her almost incoherent. Together Myrna and Eliza helped her up to Myrna’s room and put her to bed with a large glass of brandy to calm her. Clearly exhausted, she had not woken until this morning when, considerably more composed, she told Myrna what had happened.

Myrna had known all was not right with Tamar’s marriage, had in fact always suspected Peter would turn out to be trouble, but she had not been fully aware of the extent of his alcohol dependence and how inextricably enmeshed Tamar had become in his misery.
Now she wondered who this man was who had seduced her and ultimately caused her such pain. ‘D’ye love this Kepa?’

Tamar shrugged. ‘I don’t know if you’d call it love, I’m not sure I know what the word means any more. But I know I felt safer and more alive with him than I have at any other time in my life. I
had
to be with him. He was what my mam said he would be, the man who would come along and turn me inside out.’

‘D’ye have a future wi’ him?’

‘No,’ replied Tamar bluntly.

‘Is that what’s grieving ye so badly?’

Tamar inhaled deeply then let her breath out very slowly before she said, honestly, ‘No, it isn’t. I think that’s partly why I did it.’

‘Aye, well, ye cannae be blamed for following your heart. Or the rest o’ your body, if it comes to that. Is it what Peter did to ye, then?’

‘No, Peter’s sick, I understand that. I hurt him badly and yes, I
am
worried he’ll come after me. But it’s the child, my baby. I can’t even remember what he looks like!’ Tamar’s voice cracked with emotion. ‘I only had him for a few hours and I didn’t even name him. I was going to call him Nolan, after my da.’ She looked up at Myrna. ‘I feel so
stripped
of him. I’ll never see him again, and that hurts my very
soul
.’

She put both hands over her mouth and half cried out, half sobbed. Myrna reached out and touched her gently. ‘Aye, losing a bairn is perhaps the hardest thing a woman has to face,’ she commiserated gently.

Tamar wiped her nose inelegantly on the back of her hand. ‘I’ll never have the chance to tell him not to eat snails or say it’s all right when he wets his pants. I’ll never tuck him into bed or make him a birthday cake or get jealous when he grows up and falls in love with some woman who isn’t me.’ She lapsed into silence. Myrna waited patiently, knowing there was more to come. ‘I’ve been such a fool. A stubborn, arrogant, childish fool.’

Myrna shook her head. ‘No, ye havnae, lassie. Ye made a mistake, that’s all.’

‘
No
, I did
not
make a mistake,’ Tamar snapped. Anger surged through her, directed mostly at herself. ‘I did it deliberately. Marrying Peter, sleeping with Kepa,
all
of it! I knew what I was doing but I wouldn’t let myself see what was happening to Peter, and I wouldn’t let myself see what was happening to
me
. Who am I, Myrna? I don’t know any more. How could I have done this?’

‘Well,’ answered Myrna carefully, ‘ye’re certainly no’ the wee lassie I met on the
Rebecca Jane.
’

‘No, I’m not. I feel so dreadful, so
detached
, as if this is all happening to someone else. What’s
wrong
with me?’

‘Och, it’ll be the shock. In time ye’ll marry again and have more bairns, I’m sure.’

‘No, Riria said that, but I don’t think so,’ said Tamar, shaking her head sadly. ‘I would have died if she hadn’t been there. And it was my fault she was almost killed too. God, how could I have been so blind and
stupid
!’ she spat vehemently.

Privately, Myrna had wondered the same thing. But, alarmed at the ire in Tamar’s voice, she said instead, ‘Well, maybe ye’ve grown up a little. I’d be verra surprised if ye hadnae, after all that.’

‘And what if Peter comes for me? I never want to see him again.’

‘Is he likely to, d’ye think?’

‘No doubt he hates me, but that could be the very thing to bring him here. He was very vindictive and angry during those last few months.’

‘Well, we’ll worry about that
if
it happens and no’ before.’

Myrna poured them both more tea and changed the subject. ‘I sent a message to John Adams last night. He can take a look at your face when he gets here.’

‘Oh Lord, I hurt him terribly as well, didn’t I?’ Tamar groaned. ‘My mam would turn in her grave if she knew how selfish I’ve been.’

Myrna suddenly leaned over and roughly grasped Tamar’s elbow. The cup of tea balanced on her knees sloshed over into its saucer. ‘Look, lassie,’ Myrna said, ‘I ken ye’ve been badly hurt and ye’ve lost your bairn, but I cannae
abide
self-pity. Ye made a mistake, now
learn
from it! Put it behind ye and look ahead. It will all have been for nothing if ye spend the rest o’ your life feeling sorry for yeself. If
I’d
gone around dragging ma arse every time I made a mistake, I’d’ve worn it off by now! And clearly I havnae,’ she added tersely, pointing at her ample buttocks.

Startled, Tamar could do nothing but stare at her friend.

‘I mean it,’ continued Myrna. ‘Pull yeself together, lassie, or ye’ll be doomed. Ye’ve your whole life, ye’re only nineteen, so
make
something o’ yeself. That’s what ye started out to do, so
do
it! Dinnae let any o’ this stop ye!’

She glared at Tamar who dropped her eyes and fiddled with the teaspoon in her flooded saucer. She’s right, Tamar thought. I have to put my life into some sort of order. But it’s so much easier to flounder pathetically in pain and self-pity and blame. So black and seductive and soothing, so much less frightening than facing tomorrow. And so gutless. Shifting uncomfortably, she pulled at the waistband of the dress Bronwyn had lent her; she’d not yet recovered her figure and her stomach was soft and extended. God, she cursed silently — I’m a physical and mental ruin. But, despite her misery, she knew she had choices; she could rebuild her life, or she could give up now. She grimaced inwardly. The acceptance of this realisation, this knowledge that she could take control of her life angered her because now she knew it, she could not un-know it. The knowledge gave her a splinter of hope.

She looked slowly around her; at Myrna, at odiferous little Cabbage, at the trees behind the house, and the shrubs and scattered winter flowers in the new garden. ‘If those are yellow,’ she said finally, her voice unsteady as she pointed to a bed of leafless
rose bushes, ‘they’ll look lovely in that vase in the salon. Can I stay here, Myrna?’

‘That’s ma girl,’ said Myrna, smiling broadly and thinking, thank Christ for that; she’s made a decision. ‘O’ course ye can. And when John comes, ye’ll hold your head up and greet him like the long lost friend he is.’

Tamar nodded and closed her eyes. For the first time in months she felt she was regaining some control. She would stay with Myrna and heal physically and mentally, and when she was strong, well, she would worry about tomorrow when tomorrow came.

John arrived in the early afternoon, just before Myrna opened for business. He was appalled by Tamar’s condition. He examined her scarred face in silence, his lips compressed and white with fury. When he had finished, he said, ‘You’ve been very lucky, Tamar. The scar indicates the infection was very deep. You could have died.’

He sat down abruptly and repeated angrily, ‘You could have
died
, Tamar! Why did you not get away from him before it came to this? How could you let this happen to yourself? God Al
mighty
.’

Myrna said harshly, ‘That’s enough, John! She feels bad enough as it is wi’out
you
carping on.’

Tamar thought of a thousand things she could say to justify why she had stayed with Peter, why she tolerated, excused and even condoned his drinking and his behaviour, but now they sounded like weak, pathetic excuses. She felt deeply ashamed; the truth was she had stayed because she thought she would be better off, and had been willing to trade her self-respect for a warped and shallow illusion of security. In her own way she had been just as sick as Peter, and the realisation shocked her. Taking a deep breath, she decided it would be best if she told John everything. ‘I also had a child,’ she said quietly.

John stared at her, then opened his mouth to say something.

Tamar held up her hand. ‘No, let me finish. I gave birth to him just over two weeks ago, but …’

‘A child! Where is it?’ exclaimed John, unable to help himself.

‘He’s been taken home to his people.’

‘What?’ said John, completely confused.

‘If you’ll just shut up for a minute, I’ll explain!’ snapped Tamar. ‘His father is a Maori.’

There was a dreadful silence as John absorbed Tamar’s words. ‘A Maori?’ he parroted stupidly.

‘Yes, a
Maori
,’ Tamar reiterated sharply. ‘From the East Coast. A coastal trader. I met him, we had a liaison and I had his child.’

John looked at her briefly, then lowered his eyes in embarrassment. ‘I see.’

‘No, you
don’t
,’ insisted Tamar, stamping her foot. ‘He
moved
me, John. It’s as simple as that, and I’ll never regret it,’ she added defiantly.

John nodded towards Tamar’s face. ‘Did Peter do that when he found out?’

‘Yes, after the baby was born and it was obvious he wasn’t the father. He was drunk. We had to flee to my housegirl Riria’s village.’

‘Your marriage is over, then?’

‘It is as far as I’m concerned.’

‘What are you going to do?’

‘I’m staying here for the foreseeable future. After that, I don’t know.’

‘Will you look for the child?’

‘No, she will
not
,’ interjected Myrna. ‘She’ll leave him to be raised by his own folk, where he belongs.’

John looked to Tamar for confirmation and she nodded. He stood and walked over to her again and lifted her damaged eyelid gently with his thumb. He squinted and pursed his lips thoughtfully as he manipulated her ragged eyebrow, then stood
back and contemplated her. ‘I could fix that,’ he said after a minute. ‘Or at least make it tidier.’

‘My face?’ asked Tamar.

‘Yes. I could remove some of the scar tissue in a month or so when it’s settled down, then realign and restitch the wound so it isn’t so obvious. You’d need ether, I’d have to knock you right out. That can be dangerous,’ he warned.

Tamar shrugged as if the prospect wasn’t a concern.