Tears of the Moon - Di Morrissey [5]
The suitcase also contained dozens of photographs of Georgiana with friends and on her travels. She noticed one photograph was wrapped in tissue paper. Curious, she folded back the yellowed paper to reveal a sepia-tinted photo set in a small silver frame. Staring out at her was a handsome man in a white uniform, wearing a nautical hat set at a jaunty angle. Despite the formal pose there was a hint of a suppressed smile about the mouth and merry eyes. She’d never seen this man before and wondered for a moment if it was her father, then remembered that he’d been in the army. She opened the back of the frame and read in spidery writing on the back of the photo, ‘Broome, 1910’. He was too old to be an amour of her mother and, knowing Georgiana’s family had come from the west, there must obviously be a connection.
There were other photos taken at balls and dinners, and in gardens of unknown houses. There was one of a man in uniform who appeared in several photos which, judging by the car, she took to be in America. There were photos taken around the world, which featured Georgiana centre stage with elephants and castles, alongside laughing companions. There were photos of Lily taken on their holiday trips and some of her as a small child playing with a sailboat, on a merry-go-round or dressed to kill in bonnet, bows and Mary Janes—what Georgie called her ‘Shirley Temple shoes’.
But it was a record of Georgiana’s life only after she had left Australia. There was nothing that connected her to her own family, her childhood or her country. Nothing, except for this mysterious framed photograph of the man in Broome.
Lily had reached the bottom of the suitcase now and found a parcel. Inside was a letter and a cloth-wrapped package. She opened the letter, addressed to her in her mother’s writing, with trembling hands.
Lily dear,
I always intended to give you these but could never find the right time. I held back as I knew you would ask questions and I don’t have all the answers.
I had such an unsettled youth, I felt no interest in my past. And I preferred to stick to the old adage that what you don’t know won’t hurt you. Ever since the war, I suppose my philosophy has been to live for today.
Now these are yours, for they have been passed on to the women in our family for so very long. When my grandmother gave them to me she said, ‘Keep them close to your heart as I have done. If they are not cherished and cared for, like love they will turn to dust.’
Just know you have been my life and in my way I did my best for you. I didn’t need any family but you.
My love,
Mother
Lily wept as she read her mother’s words. It was the first time she could remember Georgie calling herself ‘Mother’.
‘Why didn’t you tell me this before! You were all I had, Georgie. My mother, yes, but I needed more.’
Lily sobbed with the pain of loss, for her mother and for the family she never knew, and for the woman she was and didn’t understand and for her own daughter to whom she could pass on so little of her past.
When she eventually stopped crying, but still shaking with emotion, she unwrapped the lumpy, cylindrical parcel.
In it was a blue velvet bag. She undid the drawstring and tipped out a strand of magnificent fat, glowing pearls. Lily gasped as she fingered them, but what caught her attention was the strangely carved mother-of-pearl pendant that hung from the centre of the pearl necklace. On it were carved parallel lines, a circle with smaller circles in it, and an X.
Impulsively she draped the rope of pearls around her neck and pressed her hands over the pendant. It felt smooth and cool and Lily shut her eyes as a wonderful feeling swept over her.
And then,