River Song, page 1
About River Song
THE 30TH NOVEL FROM AUSTRALIA’S FAVOURITE STORYTELLER DI MORRISSEY – A STORY ABOUT FRIENDSHIP AND WHAT HAPPENS WHEN DREAMS COME TRUE . . .
The arrival of a hotshot New York composer brings a rare touch of glamour and excitement to the peaceful country town of Fig Tree River. For Leonie, Madison, Sarita and Chrissie, four women involved in the local musical theatre, it’s a welcome distraction from the pressures of daily life.
Then a lottery ticket, bought together on impulse, changes everything.
The winnings, shared between the four friends, are all they ever hoped for . . . and all they ever feared, bringing dreams, dilemmas and disaster.
When their new lives start to fall apart, will the women have the strength to find the song inside their hearts once more?
Also by Di Morrissey
In order of publication
Heart of the Dreaming
The Last Rose of Summer
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
The Valley
Monsoon
The Islands
The Silent Country
The Plantation
The Opal Desert
The Golden Land
The Winter Sea
The Road Back
Rain Music
A Distant Journey
The Red Coast
Arcadia
The Last Paradise
Before the Storm
The Night Tide
Contents
Cover
About River Song
Also by Di Morrissey
Title page
Contents
Dedication
Acknowledgements
Prologue
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
Epilogue
Author’s Note
On the River
About Di Morrissey
Copyright page
Newsletter
Dedicated to my darling Boris . . . 25 happy years together. I miss you.
Acknowledgements
The love and support of my children, Gabrielle and Nick, and grandkids, Sonoma, Everton, Bodhi and Ulani, has so helped me through a hard year.
Thank you also to editor and great dear friend Liz Adams, who has shared the journey.
Ross Gibb, Praveen Naidoo, Ingrid Ohlsson, Bernadette Foley, Alex Lloyd, Tracey Cheetham, Clare Keighery, Katie Crawford, Lily Cameron, Belinda Huang, Brianne Collins, the super sales team and all at Pan Macmillan, now and then . . . it’s been a happy 30-book marriage!
So many have thrown in their advice, ideas, wishes and information for this book – including the lady in a newsagency who was buying a lottery ticket. When I asked what she’d do if she won, she said, ‘I’ve actually never thought about it . . . but yes, I know . . . I wouldn’t tell my kids!’
Thanks for input from Gayle Cameron, Greta Gertler, Usha and Reg Harris, Missy Higgins, Jenny Huxley, Nawal Maharaj, Gabrielle Morrissey PhD and Di Rayson PhD. And thank you, Goldheist (the lovely Hester Fraser) for ‘River Song/On the River’ (see the QR code at the end of the book to hear the song).
Prologue
Leonie sat on the western verandah, an empty chair across from her and a solitary glass on the small side table.
She wished she could paint. The spread of sky, all gold and rose, had melted over the clouds now the sun had set. Each evening was different. She had always enjoyed sitting with Tony to watch the sunset. They would have so much to talk about or laugh over, or they’d just sit together quietly as the sky changed from pink and orange to black. She closed her eyes, the familiar pain clutching at her.
‘Are you all right, Mum?’
Her twelve-year-old son Corby, his hair tousled from soccer training and his cheeks pink, came out onto the verandah.
‘Oh, hi, darling. Yes, I’m fine, thanks. Just missing Dad. You okay? Done your homework?’
‘Just about to start.’
She smiled and reached for her son’s hand.
‘I miss him too.’ Corby leaned into her and Leonie wrapped her arms around him. ‘I’m scared I’ll forget him. That I won’t turn out good enough,’ he said.
‘Not possible, my love. He’ll always be a part of you. And you know, you look so like him. He would want you to just be you: Corby Foster!’
He pulled away with a wry smile.
Leonie reached up and held his face in her hands. ‘Darling, no matter what you do, he’d be proud of you. I know I am. To me you’re the world champion of cheering people up, just like your dad. That’s a big deal.’
Corby straightened up, giving her a small grin. ‘Yeah, I know.’
‘Go do your homework, I’ll be in shortly.’
‘What’s for dinner?’
‘Moussaka,’ she called to his back. ‘You’ll like it.’
*
Night was tiptoeing towards the window where the figure of the young woman was silhouetted at the piano.
Her hands were attacking the yellowing keys, shoulders hunched, her sweet voice trilling, as if calling to be set free and rush into the shadowed clouds. She sang and played as emotions, feelings, laughter and tears exploded from her body, soul and heart.
Above the glorious music came a hammering at her door.
‘For goodness’ sake, Maddie! Keep it down. Dinner is ready!’
She closed her eyes and lifted her hands. The last notes reverberated around the room, sliding through the open window to sail into the last light of the fading sun.
‘All right. I’m coming.’
The young woman leaned forward, her forehead hitting the keys in a discordant clash of sound.
‘Aaargh. Almost there, it’s almost there.’ She sat up and glared in frustration at the piano keys. Then she rose and slammed the piano lid shut as if trying to keep the last notes from escaping.
*
Chrissie lay still, her face pressed into her pillow.
He gave her a playful slap on her naked hip and got up, his feet padding across the floor.
She did not move at the sounds of the shower running, the footsteps, the opening of a drawer.
Soon a door slammed and a car drove from their driveway.
She raised her head, the chill of the early evening making her shiver, but then let it fall again. She lay still and silent, lost in time, until she heard another car arrive, doors slam and children’s voices calling.
‘Mummy, we’re home.’
Chrissie sat up, pulling on her clothes. ‘Be right there . . .’ The TV went on, and she could hear the fridge door opening. Smoothing her hair, she went out to greet them.
‘Hi, kids. Did you have fun at Nana’s house?’
‘Yes. Where’s Daddy?’
‘He’s gone out with friends.’
‘What’s for dinner?’
Sighing, she glanced out the window, where the darkness of night had crept in unnoticed.
*
Sarita peered into the wardrobe in the back bedroom. It was her sewing cupboard, jammed with leftover fabrics, a basket of buttons, ribbons, pins, needles and zips, a tape measure and packets of beads. There were hatboxes and shoeboxes filled with trimmings and accessories she’d accumulated from her years of sewing costumes for the Riverside Players theatre group. Some unfinished, abandoned costumes drooped from hangers. Her gaze fell on a small box at the bottom of the closet. She stared at it, wondering what she’d put in there.
Sarita pulled it out and opened the lid. Inside was a favourite doll she’d carried with her when her father brought her to Australia after the death of her mother in Fiji. And beneath it, folded neatly, was the dress her mother had stitched so carefully for three-year-old Sarita.
Lifting it out, Sarita fingered the neat rows of stitches. Was this where her love of sewing had come from, she wondered.
She carefully refolded the dress and put it back in the box. Maybe one day she’d have a granddaughter to give it to.
The daylight had gone from the room, and she realised she’d forgotten what she’d been looking for in the first place. Quietly she left, shutting the door behind her.
*
The trees were still, the surface of the river glassy. Cows were statues. Birds fell silent, settling to roost. Here and there, in the town and dotted across the hills, along the river and gullies, lights came on one by one as dusk brushed over the families of Fig Tree River, ushering in the night.
For each of these women, evenings were ever thus. Did they ever pause to wonder what tomorrow might bring? No, they were busy, distracted, following the pattern of their lives.
But for these four women, life was about to change.
1
The building dwarfed her as
Fleur Livingston stepped close to read the plaque on the side of the building.
THE FORMER AEOLIAN BUILDING
689 FIFTH AVENUE
She walked into the foyer and headed up in the elevator to the eighteenth floor, where a woman was waiting for her.
‘Thank you for agreeing to meet me,’ said Fleur.
‘Happy to help. How was your trip to White Plains?’
‘The old Grainger home is very, very interesting. Now I’m keen to go to Melbourne and see the museum there.’
‘Yes. Quite. Well, fortunately the office space you asked about is free at the moment, so we have permission to look around.’ The young woman led her along a corridor and opened a door.
‘Oh. It’s very modern, isn’t it!’ Fleur said. ‘I guess my head is still back in the twenties.’
‘Well, since the remodelling it’s all very different, of course. That’s the window where it happened, over there. I couldn’t do what she did.’
Fleur glanced around, trying to imagine a heavy desk and armchairs, maybe a lounge; perhaps a framed concert poster on the wall, a vase of flowers or a pot plant. She went to the window and caught her breath.
‘It’s terribly high.’ She peered down, then said quietly, ‘It must have taken a lot of guts to jump.’
‘Or desperation. She landed on the roof of the building thirteen storeys down.’
‘Horrible for them to deal with. Percy and his mother were very . . . close. I don’t know any particular details, though,’ Fleur added hastily.
‘Apparently Mr Grainger’s manager had left the room to get her some medication. When she came back, Mrs Grainger was gone. But it’s hard to know what really happened – it was so long ago.’
‘1922,’ said Fleur.
‘I doubt many people would even remember them now,’ said the younger woman. ‘Is there anything else I can help you with?’
‘Well, I was wondering if all the pianos have gone. It was such an impressive showroom in its day, I believe. A shame really,’ Fleur said, and sighed.
‘Oh yes, long gone. Piano recitals aren’t such a big deal now as they were in the roaring twenties! That dance, what was it called?’
‘The Charleston? I don’t think it was Percy’s thing. He loved folk music, classical, and of course his own compositions.’
The young woman shrugged. ‘Is there anything else?’
‘No. And thank you for your time.’
‘You’re welcome, Ms Livingston. Safe travels to Australia.’
*
A few weeks later, Fleur drove down a narrow road, and at the turning she spotted a jacaranda tree splayed over the entrance to a short dirt lane with white double gates at the end. Both sides of the lane were bordered by fences across the back gardens of houses. One side was screened by trees, the other by clumping bamboo, so she had no clue what the homes might be like.
Fleur was suddenly concerned that the cottage she’d rented from a couple she’d met in Melbourne might not be as the online photos represented, but there was nothing for it now but to press on. She stopped at the big white gates and saw the garage to one side. She eased the car into its dusty dimness.
When she opened the side door of the garage, she stepped into a charming garden and discovered that the house was built on a rise. She walked around to the front.
A white wooden fence framed the garden like a painting, and beyond it a sprawl of trees leaned over to see their reflection in the smooth wide river. From one advantageous branch, a fat rope swung above the water. Older trees, gnarled and throwing deep shade, rose up the hill from the opposite bank. Beyond the river fringe were distant paddocks dotted with fat brown cows, the whole scene roofed in warm blue and fluffs of white clouds.
Fleur turned and studied the small white cottage, happy that a verandah faced this tranquil picture.
She turned the house key, charmed by the front door’s old glass panel featuring a delicate painting of a kookaburra and native flowers.
Stepping inside, straight away she drew a deep slow breath. Everything would be just fine. She walked through the wooden house, admiring the surprisingly large, airy rooms, the stained-glass windows, the old polished wooden floors. She felt sure this was a place of comfortable, warm and happy memories.
It was simply furnished, with white walls, so it was clean and bright. A thoughtful bunch of white daisies sprang from a jug on the kitchen counter beside a spare set of keys and a note from the real estate agent with details of services and contact numbers.
Fleur thanked her lucky stars that she had fortuitously met the owners and they’d offered to rent their house to her for the rest of her stay in Australia, however brief it might be.
She looked through the sliding glass doors that opened onto the verandah, with the river view beyond, and drew a deep breath.
Manhattan was a long way from this New South Wales country town.
*
Leonie drove towards home as dusk was spreading like golden honey across the sky, burnishing the underbelly of the clouds. It was calming.
Flocks of birds speared through the air alongside her, swooping to the river and then on, to roost in The Scrub – the main attraction for tourists stopping here on their way from the coast.
She smiled as she drove past the side road that led to The Scrub. It was not the Big Scrub – a rainforest being saved and restored further north – but this small remnant rainforest was close to the wide meandering river, old trees screening the native vegetation from the mown lawns of the riverside picnic area. Ancient littoral rainforest remained in this pocket of roughly ten hectares – an isolated island where her husband’s parents and grandparents had played.
It had been overgrown then, the giant fig trees that gave her town its name slowly being swallowed by voracious creeping tangles of blackberry and cat’s claw vines. But thanks to a dedicated local horticulture group, The Scrub had been rescued and revived before it was smothered.
She turned at the town roundabout, known as the sewer lid, a boring cement circle at the bottom of the main street. She had always visualised an antique lamppost with twin arms holding electrified old-fashioned lanterns in the centre of a flowerbed, but the local council had no such ideas. A sewer lid was maintenance free.
On a whim, Leonie drove to the top of the street and pulled up in the car park next to the Riverside Playhouse. Turning off the engine, she peered out at the silhouette of the grand old theatre, which stood against the skyline in the now fading sunlight. It could have passed as a weatherboard church save for the wide façade and entrance.
It had started life as the town hall, then became a theatre and music hall, and in the 1950s was converted into a cinema. In the seventies a large cinema chain with more comfortable seats moved into the main town, across the river, and eclipsed the Playhouse. The old building had come perilously close to being demolished until a small group stepped in, helped by the energetic Country Women’s Association, who lobbied to save it and have it somewhat ‘tarted up’ as a multipurpose theatre, though the council considered it ‘restored’.
And so it had become home to the Riverside Players, and much to the community’s surprise and delight they turned out a production each year of quite professional quality. Leonie, as the theatre’s director, was the driving force, and had made it her goal to find hidden talent in the community and produce top-notch productions. She was proud that the shows always sold out.
A ping from her phone announced a notification, and she saw a message from Corby saying his soccer coach was driving him home so she didn’t have to collect him after all. With that reprieve, she allowed herself another moment to gaze at the theatre that meant so much to her. Having recently turned forty, widowed for five years, the theatre productions had filled a vast gap. They were her one passion and interest outside managing Wilde Wood, her husband’s family property, and, if she were honest, the one thing – along with her son – that had made her life feel fulfilled after her husband’s death. She recalled with concern the rumours she’d been hearing since their last production that the council might have other plans for the glorious old theatre. Nothing had come of them, though, so she hoped that was all it was – just talk.
