Wings of the Morning (23 page)

CONRAD AVELING — 1975

He climbed into his car and drove slowly towards the main gates of the Regimental headquarters. He was going home, but also leaving another, and doing so with a heavy heart.
Conrad had resigned his Commission at the required time before this June day. He was sure he had made the right decision but that didn’t make the point of departure easier. He returned a last
salute at the guardroom, and swung his car out onto the main road. He felt better. The challenge was awesome, but it was good to be underway.

He had a forty minute drive ahead, a meander through the country roads of Hampshire to the thatched house which he and Tepee had been excited to find within their budget. They were settled there
with the three children: Peter and Oscar, the twin boys of ten and their young sister Camilla, Conrad and Tepee’s child, rising three and spoiled by her two big brothers.

The journey provided him with a chance to reflect. He was happy with his memories, of which the best were of the two years spent in the Far East. He’d been anxious when his Qantas flight
had left him in Singapore, nervous at his first meeting with his fellow officers and soldiers, still more worried that his bloody actions in Bahrain would be revealed. But no word had ever been
spoken and he relaxed further when he got news that Alexa was safely in Sydney.

The work during those two years was always varied, always demanding, bloody at times and boring at others. The British Naval flag still flew and there were skirmishes and clandestine operations
in which the specially trained forces were involved: some tough soldiering and he had enjoyed every minute of it.

The day which had changed his life came in early June 1971. Conrad and his team had just finished an assignment in East Timor, attached to an Australian force, and they returned for a few days
leave in Singapore. Connie was trying to develop his watercolour painting. He was less than brilliant, but he did enjoy it and it was good for relaxation. That day, he took his box of brushes, his
easel and canvass and paints, and he set up a position at the edge of a small flower market just off Marine Parade. It was a pretty enough spot, always bustling with activity which actually made
for more privacy. If you wanted to be inconspicuous, it was best to get in amongst a crowd of people who had more pressing things to do than gawp.

He was working on a couple of outline sketches when he noticed a girl standing a few yards away. She was holding up her bicycle which had an enormous wicker basket attached to its front forks
and a sort of trailer hooked up through a gooseneck attachment to the saddle post. There were two small boys squatting in the little cart. The girl was giving him a quizzical look with the touch of
a smile playing around her mouth. He could see that she was slim and unusually tall for an Asian. She was very beautiful indeed. She was also a pain and a distraction. Conrad steeled himself to
start preparing his paints and palette. He knew she would be gone when he turned to look again. She was not. She was unmoved. But now she did brush a lock of her long black hair from her eye and
spoke to him across the small distance that separated them.

‘Good morning, Sir. You must think me very rude to be staring, and I am interrupting you which is even worse. I paint myself and it’s not a help to have onlookers. I’ll leave
you in peace, now. You’ve picked a good spot.’

She flashed a full smile at him and gathered her skirts as she prepared to mount her bike. Then Conrad committed a cardinal error: he talked back.

‘Ah well, if you’re a fellow artist, you better come and have a look.’

‘Maybe later, if you’re still here. I’ve got my hands full right now.’

Conrad found the determination to get absorbed in his creation, and was pretty pleased with the result: four hours later, he started the process of cleaning up. Suddenly, he was aware of the
girl’s reappearance, standing straight and tall beside him and staring intently at his day’s work. She took a pace back and puffed out her cheeks in concentration.

‘Not too bad,’ she delivered her verdict, ‘really not bad at all ... except perhaps you might want to try...’ and she went on with a clipped critique which implied that
she would have managed a superior job herself. But it was delivered in sunny tones, a little trace of accent which sounded European to Connie’s ear and delightfully mischievous.

‘I’m sure you’re right’, he said, ‘and I bet you’re as expert a porter as a painter. Would you like to help me carry some of this stuff?’

There it was. The start of a love affair which he was sure would last forever.

She was born Antoinette de Brue, the only child of a French Army officer and his Cambodian born wife. There might have been siblings to follow, but Major Pierre de Brue was on the staff of
General Navarre and he was one of the seven thousand Frenchmen who fell at the battle of Dien Bien Phu in 1954, when Antoinette was four years old.

Her mother, a gracious lady who could trace her origins amongst ancient Kampuchean nobility, took the child and returned to her native town of Kampong Som on the Bay of Thailand, better known as
Sihanoukville. She did not remarry but eked out a precarious existence funded by savings and some irregular income from fine needle work at which she was adept. Her brother helped by providing for
Antoinette’s education. Their life in this provincial town continued calm and quiet for twelve years until the tranquillity was shattered in 1965. By the time Conrad had come to know these
bare bones of early life, he and Antoinette had met on two occasions, once more in the flower market where they discussed painting, and once when they walked on the beach, accompanied by the little
boys.

Then Conrad returned to work and was fully occupied for ten straight days with preparations for a possible mission to Burma. On his first free day, a Sunday, he had gone looking for her and
finally found her in the market. This time she was alone and they went for cup of tea before going on to an early dinner. She was in no hurry and he assumed it was her day off.

Over dinner, Connie asked for her address and a phone number. He was pleased to recognise the name of her road and she jotted the numbers on a scrap of paper pulled from her bag along with her
keys. These were on a ring with a plain enamel badge marked with two initials entwined together but still clear as ‘TP’. He asked her about them and she paused in her writing to look at
him.

‘Oh, that’s my nom de plume, or my nickname as you would say. It came from my father. When I was little, I couldn’t say my own name. ‘Antoinette’ was too much for
me, so I used to say ‘Toiny’ and he converted that into ‘toni’. He would sit in the evening on our veranda while Mama was getting supper and he used to say it was our time
of day: Toni and Pierre together.’

‘I’ve got it,’ cut in Conrad, ‘and that became just TP. Yes?’

‘You’re right. TP. Since then I have lengthened it again and call myself Tepee, so everyone thinks I was born in a wigwam!’

She laughed at herself and blew him a little kiss as she went back to her writing. Conrad felt his heart turn over. Tepee finished her note and he asked her to continue with her story.

‘Normally I find all this pretty hard to speak about, Connie, but with you ... well it seems easier to talk: that’s because you’re quiet too and I think you keep a bit back,
just like me.’

She paused and looked at him, but Connie didn’t reply. Soon, she continued.

‘I’m lucky: I had a very happy childhood although there was sadness lingering in the background. That’s because of my father. My mother yearned for him the rest of her days and
she resented his death in a pointless cause. But she bottled that up and put everything into all that was left of him ... and that was me. I had a terrific relationship with my darling Mama. We
never had a cross word that I can remember, not even with me as a teenager. She was a marvellous woman, good fun and wise company, always immaculately turned out with a sort of serene poise. I
don’t know how we managed financially. I knew we weren’t rich but I wasn’t conscious of the strain on her and that got worse when my uncle died suddenly.

But even so, she somehow managed to make life secure and settled. I enjoyed growing up in Kampong Som and I loved our little house which Mama kept so perfectly. When I turned sixteen I was happy
with life: happy at High School, doing OK to good, lots to do, plenty of friends. They were girls mostly, some boys too, but not boyfriends. I was not exactly naive, but not experienced either. I
suppose it was a quiet and provincial life, but I was content.’

Tepee paused in reflection for a moment and Conrad saw her eyes mist over. Then she pulled herself more upright and shook her head briskly before going on.

‘One evening I was going home after school and then a netball game. I was a bit late and had to run for the bus. If I missed it, I knew there would be an hour’s delay so I cut
through a side street to save time. I had left the game in a rush so I was still in my shorts and a little blouse, with my long uniform skirt rolled up in my bag. That way I could run quicker and I
was always pretty quick. Long legs, you see. Racing down that street, I felt really good. I could have gone faster than the bus.’

She smiled at him, but there was painful memory in her expression as she continued.

‘I never made it to the bus stop. Suddenly, the door to a scruffy little bar opened right in front of me and figures were pouring out past the tables on the sidewalk. I didn’t dare
dodge into the road. Instead, I tried to dash between the tables and the wall of the bar. I didn’t try to stop, although I should have done. I’ve often thought about that since. Anyway,
I didn’t and that’s how I came to run straight into this man, knocking him into a table and falling headlong myself. The next bit is all confused for me but I know there were three guys
in this group, all European and all drunk. I’m pretty sure they were short stay visitors in our town. In those days, there were few holiday makers but sometimes workers on a break by the sea.
Always men, some pretty rowdy, probably down from one of the mines in Laos. These guys were rough and tough. They had drunk too much and were out on the town looking for more booze, for women and
for any sort of action. They must have thought they had found it all at once, and my struggles to get up and get away only made it worse for me. I don’t think I screamed once. Probably there
wouldn’t have been anyone to hear. It was a quiet street and they’d be no questions asked in that awful little bar. I was still fixed in my mind on getting to that bus. My silent
struggles excited them, my blouse tore right open and my shorts rode even further up. They became animals.’

There were tears streaming down Tepee’s face and she sat hunched over the table. Conrad registered that her language was harder. There was worse to come. She made a big effort to look him
in the eye as she went on and he was determined to hold her gaze.

‘The three of them picked me up and one clapped a great sweaty hand over my mouth and nose. I could hardly breathe. I was kicking and struggling. I knew where they were taking me. There
were plenty of unoccupied places in that part of our town. They kicked in the door of this house. The room was empty except for rubbish and a great roll of sacking on the floor. The guys were
shouting at each other and giggling with excitement. They dropped me on the floor. I was choking and gagging, just trying to get my breath back. When I did, I wished I hadn’t. It was gloomy
in there but not dark and I could see all three of them. They showed no hesitation and no mercy.’

Tepee broke off again and wiped her face with the back of her hand. Conrad stayed motionless and did not shift his gaze from her by one iota. He had to see this out with her.

‘They raped me, Connie. They chucked me on the ground and they raped me and used me and attacked every part of me for their gratification: all three in turn. I don’t know how many
times and I don’t know how long it went on for. Finally I was left alone on that sacking, bloody, bleeding and devastated. But also, I had aged about ten years in one nightmare. Less than an
hour before, I had been a schoolgirl, just growing up like a million others. Of course I knew about my body and that I was attractive to men. Of course I knew all the facts of life in theory. Of
course I laughed and joked about sex with my girlfriends. But I had only ever kissed a couple of boys who were more nervous than I was. I was a virgin. I had never even started to make love to
anyone. All that magic experience was still to come. And now three ugly strangers had stolen it from me. They fucked away the last of my childhood.’

Tepee’s head drooped. Tentatively, he stretched a hand out towards her, and the strength of her grip rewarded him. Connie was good at waiting and they sat together there in silence, hands
clasped across the table. Tepee moved first. She removed her hand from his and stood up, tall and graceful, beautiful even with her face ravaged by tears and her long black hair disordered. She
still managed her golden smile as she spoke softly.

‘I will go to the Ladies, and I may be quite a while. When I come back, could we go for a walk on the beach please?”