Sinclair's Retreat

CHAPTER 1

Turning off the expressway into the sleepy side-street was a step back in time.

One moment a high-speed cruise through an impersonal countryside, where trees and homesteads merged into one amorphous image and only the distant scene was in focus; the next a snail’s-pace crawl along twisting laneways, where each corner brought its new vista and every shrub had its purpose. Only a couple of hundred metres, yet I was in a world where detail re-assumed its rightful place in the scheme of things, where the smallest bulb thrusting upwards in expectation of spring was of as much consequence as the halo of emerging leaves on the proud oaks which lined my route.

Suddenly the world was real. More importantly I too was real again. Subconsciously my foot lessened its pressure on the accelerator as though it, of its own volition, wished to keep pace with the tempo of its surroundings. I wound down the window and filled my lungs with the smell of it all. The intriguing, lingering smells of winter, the faint mustiness of decaying leaves, the earthy aroma of damp soil warming in the sun, the tang of wood-smoke from the previous evening’s fires hanging suspended in the still morning air. Smells which took me back to my childhood, to family nights by an open fire, a time before television and reverse-cycle air-conditioning.

It was an area in the mellow twilight of its days, faded, a little rundown, but comfortable and very gracious. The Highlands had long since come to terms with itself. It was no longer what it had been in its hey-day, during the Twenties and before the War when ‘taking the air’ in the mountains was an essential part of the Society Calendar.

Then guest-houses and tea-rooms had flourished and motels and Take-Away Food Shops weren’t even a bad dream. One golfed in ‘Plus-fours’, met for Devonshire Teas and regaled each other with tedious replays of the day’s round, or graphic accounts of how ‘The Motor’ had boiled ascending the horrendous climb up the Razorback near Picton. You met ‘nice’ people in the Highlands. Everyone conformed to the unwritten code of behaviour and all the niceties of etiquette were religiously observed.

Whoever could afford it bought a week-ender there. Not one of the beach-shacks so popular with those in trade which proliferated along that awful Central Coast, hideous excrescences of fibro and galvanized iron, all full of sand and sea-salt-begrimed windows which stuck. No, not one of those! It had to be an elegant English-style cottage, set amongst glorious trees on a minimum of one acre, more if possible and one could run to a gardener. Gardens were obligatory. Not your everyday city plot but an extravagant, large-scale reproduction of a European garden which would respond magnificently to the temperate climate with its gentle mists, rich soil and reliable rainfall.

In those days one entertained with lavish house-parties. Guests made an expedition of it, ‘up from town for the week-end’, and hostesses laughed deprecatingly at ‘having to rough it in the country’ and ‘how utterly desperate’ it was trying to find ‘suitable help’. Everyone ate and drank too much, played golf in the drizzle, sang around the Pianola in the evenings and dozed in front of the log-fire next morning until it was time to leave and face ‘that awful trek back to the city’. Ah well, at least it was downhill!

The war, with its austerity and petrol-rationing, had taken its toll. That and the lack of able-bodied men. Slowly the estates had become shabby and fallen into disrepair. The invasion of weeds into cherished gardens was more dire than the incursions of the Japanese to the north. Infinitely more destructive had been the down-turn in fortunes of many of the old families and the new wage structure brought about by changing times. Men who had fought and killed and risked life and limb were no longer content to sweat out their guts, tug their forelocks and be at someone’s beck and call, for ten shillings and sixpence a day.

Gradually the little cluster of poor railway dwellings which had always been an evil, if never acknowledged, adjunct to the town were bought up by young couples as affordable homes. Then the developers descended, hyenas slavering at the remains of the carcass, lured by the prospect of cheap land. Soon the fringes of the town were ablaze with ‘For Sale’ signs and the Press bore enticing advertisements which screamed ‘Exciting New Land Release in Southern Highlands, Low-Deposit, Low-Interest Terms’. It was cheap, in city terms, and it did bring people to a certain extent. But young people, short of money, hadn’t the resources to create beautiful gardens and the rot set in.

Lovely established homes had their grounds split up and brash new ‘ranch-style’ edifices rubbed overly-familiar shoulders with mellow, creeper-clad stone cottages in a way that caused the old-timers to lament the ‘good-old-days’.

Still, throughout all these upheavals, the oaks and maples and conifers and ashes prospered and grew tall; the willows wept ever more eloquently along the creek banks and nature restored the beauty which man had tried so hard to spoil.

Eventually the day came when the district was rediscovered by a new generation of doctors and other professional men, retired couples, farmers who had grown old and sold up ‘out west’, garden-lovers, artists, craft-folk, and those who merely wished to live at peace with their surroundings, far from the hustle and bustle of the city. They had cared for it well, these late-comers so resented by the old guard, replanting the gardens and faithfully doing-up the homesteads, until once more it achieved the serene splendour of earlier days.

Be that as it may, overall there still lingered an aura of ‘days past’.

*****

I was entering the main street of the little township of Bowral, a curious blend of rusty shop-awnings and faded fascia signs bearing legends which read ‘Mercer & Draper’, ‘Purveyor of Fresh Meats’ or other such delightfully antiquated titles. Mixed in were pseudo antique-shops whose spurious wares were liberally displayed outside on tables for the benefit of tourists determined to find a ‘genuine bargain’. Every other shop appeared to be either a Real-Estate Agency or else a Coffee Lounge. Even if business wasn’t exactly booming for the agents they certainly had a variety of places to lunch.

Scattered amongst the peeling paint and brass-rimmed display windows was the occasional gem, an old building which had been painstakingly and authentically restored. Inevitably it bore a polished brass plate with the owner’s name and underneath ‘Solicitor’, or ‘M.D.’ or even ‘Architect’. One suspected it was city money which had wrought the metamorphosis, it was difficult to envisage many local practices generating a sufficient surplus of funds to do so.

I parked the car and strolled along the footpath, happy to stretch my legs.

*****

The first thing to strike me was the freshness of the air, crisp and inviting with its exciting country overtones. The second was the quiet, not so much an absence of noise as a harmony of sound. No semi-trailers here!

I continued walking, both for the exercise and to keep warm. For a moment I considered returning to my car for a pullover but then decided against it, it seemed too much bother. However, it was only a short time before I found my hands bunched up and thrust into my pockets for warmth.

Most of the shop windows were stodgy and unimaginative, many of the boutiques still displaying tweedy winter skirts and cashmere cardigans although in the city summer outfits had taken pride of place weeks earlier. Wherever you looked there were dead blowflies against the base of the glass, flat on their backs, legs crossed, unwitting suicides inveigled inside by the inviting warmth of the central heating and, once trapped, condemned to spend what little remained of their lives beating themselves to death against the panes in a frantic attempt to regain the freedom of the outdoors.

Across the street a coffee-shop took my eye. In spite of its unpromising name, ‘The Marmalade Tea-Shop’, it had a tasteful decor and, best of all, it looked warm and cosy. I glanced at my watch. Ten to eleven. Check-in time at the guest house was not until twelve-thirty with lunch served at one. It was only a ten minute drive from the village at most, or so the brochure promised. What could be nicer than a hot cappuccino to fill in the time!

I crossed over and pushed open the door with its sign which read ‘OPEN. Please Close Door, Heated for your Comfort’. How sensible! I felt an empathy with the unknown proprietor already.

Seating myself at a table for two by the window, from where I commanded a grand view of the passers-by through a gap in the chintz curtains, I extricated my glasses from their case with fingers that were a little stiff from the cold and began to study the menu.

Scones with home-made Blackberry Jam and Cream.

Freshly made Apple Muffins.

Crumpets with local White Clover Honey.

Positively mouth-watering!

The country air was weaving its magic already and I found myself debating which to choose, even though all meals were pre-paid at the guest-house and I knew any indulgence would spoil my lunch. I’d better settle for a cup of coffee.

A pleasant middle-aged woman came over. ‘Hello. Would you care to order? I can recommend the scones.’

My resolution wavered. Be strong! I counselled myself, but the issue was never in doubt. ‘Yes please, scones and a cappuccino.’

‘Some cream with the blackberry jam?’

Why not? In for a penny…! ‘Thank you, that sounds delicious.’

She pulled a scribbling-pad from the pocket of her apron and jotted something down in that indecipherable shorthand known only to waiters and waitresses and disappeared out of sight behind the screen which hid the kitchen. On it was depicted, obviously by an enthusiastic local amateur, an outsize orange marmalade cat. Whoever was responsible for the art-work had either lacked any sense of proportion or else been inebriated at the time, for the image they had created was lop-sided to such an extent as to appear grotesque. At least it was colourful!

The front door opened, admitting a blast of cold air and two elderly ladies.

Very old ladies! I thought to myself, praying they weren’t about to drop dead there and then, so abruptly had they stopped in their tracks on entering and so great was the expression of consternation and amazement on their faces. Or was it horror? I wasn’t sure. All I knew was that they were staring at me with that morbid fascination one usually reserves for traffic accidents, bedside vigils over dying, not-too-close relatives, or a butterfly impaled on its pin by the collector awaiting its death-flutter before setting its wings.

Surreptitiously I examined myself, even casting a covert glance at my trouser fly to make sure I had not committed some heinous sin of omission. Reassured I looked up, only to find they hadn’t moved but were twittering away to each other in a most agitated fashion.

The proprietress, for so I had deemed her to be, she was far too brisk and efficient to be merely an employee, returned with my order set out on a well-worn, but probably genuine, silver tray garnished with a posy of real jonquils. It was a nice touch.

‘You’re sitting at their table,’ she whispered as she put down an enormous plate of old-fashioned scones, a silver bowl of jam and a wide-lipped jug of thickly-whipped cream. She busied herself arranging the cutlery. ‘They come in every week. Everyone knows them. None of our townsfolk would dream of taking their place.’

‘Oh, I’m sorry,’ I muttered in some embarrassment. ‘Would you like me to move? I don’t mind, really!’

‘Good heavens, no. You were here first. Anyway they never stop complaining about the draught at this table every time someone comes in the door.’

‘Then why do they sit here?’ We were like two conspirators, all this ‘sotto voce’ conversation out of the sides of our mouths.

‘They can’t bear to miss anything that happens in the street. It only needs Mr. Featherstone, he’s the post-master, to say ‘Good-day’ to Mrs. Wilson, she works at the bank, and they’ve enough gossip to keep them going for a week. I’ll bring your cappuccino straight away.’ This last was said in a normal voice.

‘Thank you.’ I gingerly broke a scone in two, it was still steaming from the centre so freshly baked was it, and began spooning an indecent amount of jam upon it. Real jam with lumpy bits of berry, not the artificially coloured and flavoured jelly the food manufacturers have the temerity to label as jam! I had heaped it so liberally that putting the cream on top was tricky, especially so because I could feel four accusing eyes on me, eager for any misdemeanour upon which they might seize.

The manoeuvre successfully accomplished, I was about to sink my teeth into the gastronomic delight I had engineered when a voice quavered, ‘He must be a stranger, Agatha.’ I looked up quickly.

Need I say what happened? It was my undoing. The cream, which had barely maintained its precarious balance while still cold and stiff, responded at once to the increased temperature of its situation and, melting, slipped sideways from its plinth of jam and spattered ostentatiously over my shirt.

‘Damn!’ I swore, and instantly could have bitten off my tongue. I didn’t have to look at them, I could feel the disapproval.

‘Your cappuccino.’ It was the owner. She was smiling and making no pretence of hiding the fact. I misinterpreted her mirth, supposing I was its object. Actually I was, but she was laughing with me not at me. It was infectious and I started laughing too. A giggle at first, but a giggle which rapidly progressed into loud guffaws of uncontrollable laughter.

‘We’ll come back later Agatha, when there are not so many strangers.’

The front door slammed behind them. I looked around the shop. I was its only customer.

‘Well, that got rid of them!’ I gasped, tears of mirth rolling down my cheeks. I felt wonderful.

‘They won’t half have a piece of Mrs. Peachley at cards tomorrow.’ The pleasant lady straightened the sign hanging on the door which had been bumped askew by the force of its closing.

‘Mrs. Peachley?’ I queried.

‘The owner.’

‘Oh, I thought it was your business.’ Wrong again!

‘Good heavens, no! I only come in to help out a couple of days a week. Gets me out of the house and gives me a bit of spending money. Everything alright?’

Fine. Thank you.’ And indeed it was.

*****

My feeling of well-being not only persisted but increased as I made the short drive to ‘The Retreat’. The route took me through what had been perhaps the loveliest part of the district, along avenues of elms and pin-oaks where the homes, all gracious and some even stately, were sited far back from the road and framed by settings of tranquil beauty.

It gave me a reassuring sense of order and continuity, of old-world virtues and elegance. It was my type of world. Perhaps a bit stuffy, but solid. The scone sat satisfyingly in my stomach and I was at peace.

CHAPTER 2

‘Peace?’ Dare I even use the word? Two years of watching my wife waste away to a living skeleton. Twenty-four months of raging against the futility of life and its injustices; the over-powering sense of helplessness as I realized the inevitability of what must ensue and strove for acceptance. How could I accept it as my laughing, warm-hearted companion and supporter of so many years was transformed by pain and suffering into a sick, complaining shadow, a travesty of her former self, who constantly demanded more and more attention?

I had nursed her well, or so I believed, - was that too merely a sop to my conscience? - but out of love for what she had been, not for what she had become. When eventually she was taken my first reaction was one of relief that the load had been lifted from me. When friends and relatives were sympathetic and tried awkwardly to console me with trite clichés such as ‘It was a blessing’ or ‘You mustn’t be sad’, I agreed, not from polite convention but from conviction. I truly believed it was best for both of us and that now I would set about the business of putting my life in order, assisting my children without interfering or being a burden, and enjoying my grand-children. The image of a benign patriarch dispensing love and wisdom fitted the erroneous view I held of myself.

The sense of release lasted all of three weeks. It is amazing both how cleverly memory can rid itself of that which it chooses not to remember and how quickly it can distort our perceptions. For by the fourth week after her funeral the enormity of what had occurred struck me like a thunderbolt. Gone were the frustrations and annoyances of her protracted illness, disappeared was the - dare I say it? - feeling of freedom I had first experienced, and in its place there was growing day by day an overwhelming awareness of having sustained a devastating loss.

I forgot the unhappiness of the past two years and relived more and more the joy we had brought each other, the solace and the comfort, the understanding and the purpose we had given to both our lives, and I missed it terribly. There was a dark, terrifying void in my existence which I did not begin to know how to fill. Nor did I dare to try.

I became withdrawn and sought oblivion in mindless television ‘soaps’ or video movies. I didn’t read any of the books I had waited half my life to read, nor did I attempt to attend to the innumerable little tasks which required doing around the house after two years of neglect.

What was the point? The incentive was no longer there. Besides it would have caused an insupportable guilt to finish at this time projects which my wife had pleaded with me to do for years.

Guilt too, as much as sadness, was now a constant visitor to my life. Every day brought its own regret for an action undone or a word unsaid. I wallowed in self-castigation. I could see no future, only the past was real. Every incident of our courtship and marriage was trundled out and examined minutely, and such was my state of mind that it caused not the joy it deserved but only feelings of great sorrow for what I had lost.

Our children were tremendous but they didn’t understand. They had their own lives, lives which were already full and still expanding, with children of their own who were developing and needed care. How could they know, at this early stage of their marriage, what it meant to be completely in harmony with another human being, to be aware of their needs and frailties, to anticipate their desires and worries, to complement each other’s personality and yet still enhance their individuality? What it was to really love? Perhaps the saddest thing was that I never realized while I still had her how much I loved her.

It had taken me six months to come to terms with myself, with what I had become. Six months of hell during which I began to dislike myself a great deal. I discovered I was not the wonderful companion I had thought myself to be, that I had some very irritating habits and that the high opinion I held of myself, so lovingly cultivated by my wife, could not withstand close scrutiny. Indeed, without her for counterpoint, I was an extremely dull fellow, whose achievements in the main amounted to very little when removed from the context of our life together.

Finally it had been my work which saved me from total disintegration. Having done virtually nothing for almost three years, I now determined that in labour lay my salvation. And, being highly desirous of being saved, I threw myself into an overload of work with more enthusiasm than good sense. It was partially successful.

As long as I didn’t stop to think I could convince myself there was a purpose to it all. It was only when I awoke in the small wee hours and reached for her and encountered only cold, empty space that I saw through my own subterfuge. Then the loneliness was unbearable, my achievements pointless. How many times was I about to recount some event of the day only to realize my adoring audience was gone forever. ‘My darling, I miss you!’ Oh the agony! Many nights the pillow-slip was damp with tears.

However, the new day would bring its demands and challenges. It was not living, it was existing, but what else was there? Work was my panacea, my opiate. But, like all drugs of addiction, it exacted its price. Larger and larger doses were necessary to obtain the desired effect until, after eighteen months, I developed severe headaches and a tightness of breath.

The doctor had been blunt and to the point. ‘My God man, what do you expect? Do you need to work as much?’

‘Not really.’

‘Then why on earth are you driving yourself so hard?’

I couldn’t be bothered explaining. He wouldn’t have understood. He still had a wife and, by all accounts, wished he hadn’t. I did listen to his prescription however.

‘Ever thought of taking a holiday?’

‘No … I haven’t. I—‘

‘Might be a damn good idea. Give yourself a break, brush off the cobwebs, you know what I mean.’

‘Yes.’

‘Not one of those taxing, round-the-world jaunts. Plenty of time for that later. What you need now is ‘R and R’, rest and recuperation. A couple of weeks in the country, lots of exercise and early nights. Oh, and NO telephones!’

‘Well, maybe I can get away in a month or two.’

‘No ‘maybe’s’. Either you’re as indispensable as you think, in which case they’ll have a hell of a job replacing you when you drop dead in the office, or else you’re not and they’ll get by quite well without you for a fortnight or so.’

And that was how, after a long session with my travel agent, I came to be drawing up at the front entrance of ‘The Retreat’, a broken-down racehorse who, out of pity, was being spelled for a bit in the country rather than being ‘put down’.

CHAPTER 3

The vestibule was dark without being gloomy and the worn carpet had long since lost any vestige of softness underfoot. Age had crazed and yellowed the varnish of the stained plate-rail and foot-high skirting-boards, but a clever choice of wallpaper and paint had contrived to render the atmosphere rich and redolent with history rather than depressing. A vague aroma of smoke pervaded the air, a heritage of countless fires stretching back into a more genteel past, and the brass door-knobs were burnished to an unbelievable brightness.

Whoever had chosen the light-fittings had done a marvellous job. Made from wrought-iron hoops suspended on chunky chains far above in the dim recesses of the panelled ceiling, they were furnished with a myriad small replicas of candles and gave the entrance-hall area a warm, restful glow.

The furniture too had been chosen with care. Nothing brash or intrusive, everything with a well lived-in air, and a nice mixture of styles. Obviously there had been no effort made to confine the selection to any one period, each piece had been picked for its own merit and its suitability for the position it was to occupy. I was particularly taken with a worked oak hat and umbrella stand by the front door. How one could indulge one’s fancy speculating about the stories of all those who had made use of it over the years!

There was no doubt about it. Entering ‘The Retreat’ was like returning to the home my grandparents had owned when I was a child, only on a much grander scale. Everything combined to give me an impression of subdued welcome. The look of the leather arm-chairs with their worn patches, the lead-light windows so small in proportion to the size of the room by modern standards, the odour of cigars and briar pipes impregnated into the drapes. It was uncanny. Whether by accident or design whoever ran the place had captured exactly the blend of tranquility and nostalgia I needed.

I went to the reception desk, or rather the office. It was a small room off the main hall whose only concession to modern technology was an impressive telephone switch-board. No-one was there. I rang the bell.

‘Can I help you?’ A young woman dressed in a white blouse and tight black skirt emerged from the far end of the hall. ‘I’m sorry. Just had to dash out for a moment.’ She was a trifle breathless and very apologetic.

‘You have a booking for me. The name’s Sinclair, John Sinclair. I’m afraid I’m a bit early.’

‘Oh that’s no problem. Welcome to ‘The Retreat’, Mr. Sinclair. Your bags? Where—?’

‘I left them in the car. I wasn’t sure the room would be ready.’

It had seemed a possibility when I pulled up out front a halfhour before time. Now, surrounded by orderliness, such a notion appeared heretical.

‘One moment, I’ll get George to bring them in.’ She depressed a button on the intercom. ‘George, would you come to Reception please!’ Turning to me she said, ‘I hope you’ll like the room we’ve chosen for you. It’s at the back with a view over the golf-course. Very quiet as you requested.’

‘I’m sure it will be perfect,’ I replied, quite convinced this would be the case.

‘Here’s George now. Give him your car-keys and he’ll bring everything to the room. What make of car is it?’

‘A BMW, JS301. It’s silver.’

George was a lumbering giant of a boy, not overly bright I judged but full of bucolic good humour. ‘Good trip up, eh?’ he asked, beaming. ‘‘Spect it would be in a luv’ly motor like that.’

‘Yes, beautiful. The countryside’s in splendid heart.’

‘Ah, yes. It’s the rain, you see. We had ‘bout an inch last week and it—’

‘Would you follow me please, Mr. Sinclair?’ the receptionist interrupted the lad, not unkindly. ‘The bags to Room 23, thanks George.’ Then, leading the way up the great staircase with its enormous oil-painting of the ‘Battle of Trafalgar’, she said, ‘Lunch is at one. We’ll be serving it outside on the terrace, it’s such a lovely day. Just gives you nice time to freshen up and have a look around to get your bearings.’

At the end of the corridor she halted in front of a heavily carved door and took out a key. The door swung open without a sound on well-oiled hinges. Standing to one side she said, ‘Here we are. Now remember, if you’re the slightest bit