Beneath the Willow Read online

  To find out more about this book

  including the paperback edition, please visit:

  www.vividpublishing.com.au/beneaththewillow

  Copyright © 2018 Michael J Murphy

  ISBN: 978-1-925846-22-5 (eBook)

  Published by Vivid Publishing

  P.O. Box 948, Fremantle Western Australia 6959

  www.vividpublishing.com.au

  eBook conversion and distribution by Fontaine Publishing Group, Australia

  www.fontaine.com.au

  Version 1.0. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, printing, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the copyright owner.

  “Murphy captures the brutal reality of conflict, entering the minds of soldiers faced with the unthinkable. His attention to detail regarding historical and military events is faultless.”

  – Gary McKay, Author & Historian

  For my wife Tracy

  Contents

  Acknowledgements

  Prologue

  Part One

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Part Two

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty One

  Chapter Twenty Two

  Chapter Twenty Three

  Chapter Twenty Four

  Chapter Twenty Five

  Chapter Twenty Six

  Part Three

  Chapter Twenty Seven

  Chapter Twenty Eight

  Chapter Twenty Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty One

  Chapter Thirty Two

  Chapter Thirty Three

  Chapter Thirty Four

  Part Four

  Chapter Thirty Five

  Chapter Thirty Six

  Epilogue

  Acknowledgments

  I was motivated to write this story after discovering a letter by my grandfather. He had written to my grandmother before departing for the Middle-East in 1940 with the 2nd Australian Imperial Force (AIF). While Beneath the Willow is a work of fiction, with historical facts interwoven into the characters’ lives, I hope this story illustrates the lasting impact of war on the families of Australian men and women who served their country.

  Many people and institutions helped me see this project through: not least my wife, Tracy, whose support and encouragement inspired me from day one. My parents, Rex and Jane, have been pillars of strength through the good and the tough times. I am also fortunate to have a large extended family who each played a part in the creation of this novel.

  Retired Lieutenant-Colonel Gary McKay mentored me through the process of writing a book. A successful author himself, Gary’s advice was much appreciated when I needed a push in the right direction.

  I would also like to extend a most sincere thank you to the people at Vivid Publishing: in particular, Jason, Nicola-Jane and Christina who have worked tirelessly in the production of my book.

  Although this story is fictional, the historical aspects required extensive research. I would like to acknowledge the many wonderful institutions that allow public access to archived records, including the publications by Australian author-historians that I have referred to.

  The Battle of Fromelle by Roger Lee, Fromelles by Patrick Lindsay and The Story of the Australian Fifth Division by Capt. A.D. Ellis were each invaluable, both individually and collectively, in understanding the worst day in Australia’s military history.

  The seemingly endless amount of information that is provided by the Australian War Memorial, through its unit war diaries and various other records, is a credit to this country.

  The National Library of Australia and The National Archives of Australia are great wellsprings of information. Accessing digitised newspapers through Trove allowed me to gain a sense of the public’s mood in a given time.

  Most importantly, I would like to acknowledge the sacrifice made by all Australians who have served in defence of their nation.

  Prologue

  Denman Hill, July 1953

  Judith saw the headlights dance against the lounge room wall long before she heard the engine of the Ford utility. The motor roared and then subsided, as the vehicle ducked and weaved along the gravel road. She stood up and gently placed the novel she held on the sofa, and then made her way to the kitchen to boil the kettle.

  Outside, the vehicle came to a sudden halt as it collided with the hardwood post of the garage. Two Kelpies barked at the intrusion to the peaceful night, while the headlights of the Ford illuminated Aunt Alice’s cottage.

  ‘What was that, Aunty?’ asked Elizabeth, alarmed. She huddled closer to the much-loved woman. Alice allowed the well-worn copy of Robinson Crusoe to rest on the quilt that covered her lap.

  ‘Sounded like Father’s Ford,’ said William.

  ‘Wait here, children. I will go and investigate.’

  Alice climbed out of her queen-sized bed. She took a deep breath, and then calmly put on her robe. David, the eldest of the children, watched his aunt leave the room as he sat on a chair at the end of the bed. He enjoyed his Aunty’s stories but felt a little too old to be snuggled up under the quilt with his younger brother and sister. He silently wished his father had stayed where he was or found somewhere to sleep it off.

  Alice made her way through the kitchen and opened the front door of the cottage. Instantly she took a step back and shielded her eyes from the blaze of headlights. She squinted to see her nephew Reg stumbling along the path between the house and where she stood. She sighed and then glanced to her left. She saw Judith through their kitchen window. The mother of three stood at the kitchen sink with a grim expression, prepared for the worst. Alice felt a tug on her gown and turned to see little Elizabeth, who wanted an explanation for all the commotion.

  ‘Back to bed little one, you too, William. Your father bumped his car into the shed… that’s all.’ Alice tried to sound flippant, but felt exasperated.

  ‘Bumped, sounded like an earthquake,’ said William under his breath.

  ‘David, will you continue to read while I get some more cocoa off your Mother.’

  ‘Yes, Aunt Alice,’ replied David. He had seen this scenario played out more than once, so he escorted his brother and sister back to the bedroom without any fuss so as not to cause them alarm.

  ‘Everything all right, Reg?’ Enquired Alice from her cottage door­step, her arms wrapped around herself to ward off the cold night air.

  ‘All right, why wouldn’t it be!’ replied Reg, with drunken contempt. ‘Go back inside and mind your own business.’

  ‘I have been reading to the children,’ Alice said softly. She tried in vain to suggest that maybe he should act a little more dignified.

  ‘Well good then, go and do it.’

  Alice turned and made her way back to the cottage while Reginald floundered his way towards the side door of the house. Alice had just stepped through her doorway when she heard a loud crash and a pathetic yelp. She darted back outside to see Reg on the ground. He had fallen and had attempted to stand, but like a new born foal he had fallen again.

  ‘Jesus flamin’ Christ, who left the wheelbarrow here?’ snar
led Reg. He clasped at his head as he eventually steadied on his feet. His mood had swung from arrogant and pigheaded to furious.

  Judith heard the noise and opened the side door, while Alice watched on under a shower of light from the headlamps.

  ‘What happened, Reg,’ asked Judith, ‘are you all right?’

  ‘What happened… what happened? Stupid woman,’ growled Reg, his temper white-hot. ‘What happened! That lazy little bastard William left the wheelbarrow out. Could have broke me neck.’

  Judith stood in the doorway, not sure what to say. She could easily say the wrong thing and escalate the situation, but she had to say something—he expected her too.

  ‘Are you hurt, dear?’

  ‘Where is the little brat, I’ll give him what for,’ snarled Reg through gritted teeth. ‘In with Alice, is he?’

  ‘Come inside and have something to eat, dear,’ pleaded Judith. She moved down the step and placed a hand on her husband’s arm.

  Reg pushed his wife to the ground and then roared for William, as he strode towards the cottage.

  ‘He’s asleep!’ cried Alice.

  ‘William, outside now!’

  In the warmth of Alice’s bed, the room had abruptly turned cold with fear. William stared towards the kitchen. He expected his father to burst in at any moment, and he was ashen in colour. Hypnotised by the sounds outside, he didn’t notice David stand and leave the bedroom.

  ‘William, I’m warning you!’

  ‘Reginald Miller, stop this craziness, you have scared the children,’ shrieked Alice.

  ‘It was me,’ said a soft but resolute voice. David stood at the threshold of the cottage, scared but steadfast in the defence of his brother.

  The voice didn’t register with Reg, and full of anger, he continued his tirade.

  ‘William, last chance. Outside now!’

  ‘It wasn’t William, it was me,’ said David, more firmly.

  ‘You… you left the wheelbarrow where I could fall over it,’ said Reg, his intoxicated mind calculating the information. ‘You should know better.’

  Alice’s frantic gaze darted between David and his father. Her mind was tormented by what Reg would do next; her gut wrenched, as she thought of the selflessness David had shown, trying to protect William. She took a short sharp breath and felt sickened by Reg’s cowardly display.

  With the taste of hard liquor in his throat, Reginald Miller’s head burned with rage and confusion. Like a wild boar that charged through the low scrub, he had no compass, discretion, empathy or justification, and like a twig stepped on by that wild boar, he snapped. Reg pulled his right hand back and brought it down on his eldest son’s face. The blow knocked him to the ground.

  Alice screamed, and Judith stood motionless in the shadows, paralysed by shock. She loathed the man that she had exchanged vows with at the altar of St Andrews.

  The act delivered, Reg continued, committed to the sin without hope of being released from its soul-destroying grip. He took off his belt and thrashed at his boy’s back. Alice fell to her knees and sobbed, while David convulsed and whimpered with each violent blow. In the bedroom, with the blankets tight around his head, William cried. The father, fuelled by grog and events long ago, raised his arm again and then saw blackness. The clunk of timber on skull reverberated through the still night air.

  The brave young man slowly lifted his head. He looked for confirmation that the ordeal was over. He saw his father face down in the dirt, unconscious. He appeared to be dead. David’s head thumped with a pain that made him feel nauseous, and his back screamed as if burnt. The welts and cuts from his father’s abuse reacted to the slightest movement. He took a moment before he rose to his feet. He glanced at his mother. Her eyes were dull and glazed over, and she swayed gently where she stood. She still held the piece of wood that had incapacitated her husband.

  David looked down at his feet and was suddenly engulfed by shame. Alice rushed towards him, but he limped away into the darkness that surrounded their farm before she could reach him.

  ‘David, come back… David!’ Cried Alice. Her voice was swallowed by the cold, sombre air.

  ‘What happened to Davo?’ asked William from behind the screen door. Elizabeth clung to his side; they both stared at their unconscious father. ‘What happened to Davo?’ repeated William. He knew what had happened, but his innocent mind wanted the question asked so it could be denied, making it a fiction, or at least, a misunderstanding.

  Lost for words, Alice opened the door and bent down to hug both children. Judith, woken from her trance, joined them. She pressed her lips hard against her babies’ cheeks and stroked their hair.

  Part One

  ONE

  Balmain, May 1915

  The letter leaned on a vase full of wilted flowers perched on the mantle of the open fire. Grace Miller had not given it a second look after she placed it there; she didn’t need to. Its image glared behind her eyes—as big as a silent movie screen. Its presence commanded an overbearing sense of anguish towards what may lie within the well-travelled envelope.

  One of the many postmarks read Cairo in blurred ink, the writer’s hand unmistakable. Her eldest son, like so many sons, had bounded off to war, full of patriotism and energies that could not be swayed. She had kissed her young Archie on the cheek, while she clung desperately to her husband’s forearm—himself a veteran of the campaign in Sudan. Her son had then turned and boarded the ship for a land too foreign and distant to comprehend. Archie had been encased in a wave of masculine pride and had remained oblivious to his mother’s torment.

  As Grace reminisced and scrubbed pots in her kitchen, she felt a tidal wave of dread wash into Beattie Street Balmain.

  * * *

  Clarence Miller walked briskly along Darling Street on his way home from his job as a cadet journalist at the Balmain Observer. He felt good, and whistled the bouncy tune, ‘Good Morning, Mr Zip Zip Zip’. He liked his job. It wasn’t common in working class Sydney for a young man of eighteen to have a position like his, full of promise and potential advancement. The work excited him and appealed to his curious nature and sharp intellect. His mother, Grace, said it was the perfect job for him. If you are going to ask questions all day—she would say with a smirk—you may as well get paid for it.

  A lot of Clarence’s mates, as well as his father and younger brother Frank, had jobs on Cockatoo Island; his father Albert was a boilermaker, Frank a first-year apprentice. A totally decent and respectable way to make a living, Clarence would say to himself—just not for me.

  Clarence noticed young George Baker on the corner of Darling Street and Birchgrove Road, a fresh bundle of afternoon edition Observers under his arm.

  ‘Anzacs doing us proud at Gallipoli, read all about.’

  ‘Hello, George.’

  ‘G’day, Clarrie. Anzacs batter the poor old Turk,’ continued George. He did not want to risk a sale on chit-chat.

  The boy’s exclamations immediately made him think of his older brother Archie, halfway around the world. Clarence was faced with the news of war all day in his work as a cadet journalist, but somehow, hearing it yelled out in the middle of Darling Street made it all the more real, all the more confronting.

  ‘I’ll take one of those, George.’

  ‘It’ll cost you a penny, no freebies here.’

  ‘Naturally, wouldn’t have it any other way.’ Clarence smiled and handed over his penny.

  ‘Why didn’t you swipe one from work?’

  ‘Forgot, see you tomorrow, George.’

  ‘Yep. Anzacs, AIF do us proud,’ rolled on the young salesman.

  Clarence left George to ply his trade and then paused after a few steps. He leaned against the shopfront of Hickman’s Butchers to look at the front page, with its scaled map of the Gallipoli peninsula, and detailed reports of the campaign so far. His thoughts drifted once again to his brother, who was amongst those George heralded. Without a letter from Archie in almost six weeks, the Miller household
was in a constant state of worry. From reports filtering into his workplace, Archie’s 1st Battalion was a part of the second and third waves of the initial landing.

  Maybe that was good. Maybe it was safer, Clarence said to himself, though his editor, Mr Blake, had not filled him with confidence that morning, when he simply said, ‘poor bastards,’ as he reviewed the copy before it went to print.

  Clarence folded the paper under his arm and began the walk home. Suddenly the scent of freshly baked bread invaded his senses. ‘Ah, bread. Almost forgot.’ He turned left and entered Reynolds’s Bakery to the sound of a chattering bell.

  ‘Can I help you, sir?’ enquired a young lady from behind the counter.

  Clarence forgot about the war, forgot about bread and had to remind himself to breathe. He was in love.

  ***

  A warm loaf under his right arm, Clarence glided along Beattie Street, his newspaper, an avenue for his emotions, casually tapped the tops of the picket fence that lined the pavement. Near the front gate of his family home, Clarence paused and watched two men unload kegs of beer from a lorry into the cellar of the Exchange Hotel, a quarter of a mile down the road. His senses were heightened after his encounter at the bakery, and he could faintly make out their mumbled curses as they toiled. He could tell they yearned for knock-off time and a cool ale of their own.

  Clarence gazed at the workers and pondered. How strange it is… his thoughts were interrupted by the bakery girl’s voice inside his head, warm and soft but firm and capable, alluring yet intimidating. How strange it is, his thoughts now clearer, that men, living in the same environment, going to work, collecting their pay, clearing their debts, can do so, living much the same as each other. And then, by the most mundane act—like the exchange of threepence for a loaf of bread—change their lives to the point that it will never be the same.

  What could I call her? he wondered, as the man who lowered the kegs into the cellar swore at his offsider. Beautiful, obviously, but if I were to say beautiful, then what would I say of God’s other marvellous creations; the dolphin escorting a Bondi wave or a stallion patrolling a grassy plain.