The Last of the Bonegilla Girls Read online

  In the minute between one song ending and the next beginning, Vasiliki reached for Iliana’s hand and tugged her across the dance floor.

  ‘Hello,’ she said and the two girls hugged their friend.

  And then there was a shouted hello and Frances was there too. ‘Good evening,’ she said, looking at Elizabeta, Iliana and Vasiliki in turn. ‘You all look beautiful.’

  ‘Sehr schön,’ Elizabeta said.

  ‘Bellissimo,’ Iliana added.

  Frances beamed. ‘I love your dress, Vasiliki.’

  ‘Thank you,’ Vasiliki said.

  ‘I didn’t realise you all had such nice clothes to wear. I thought you might not have …’ Frances waved a hand. ‘Oh, never mind.’

  Elizabeta leaned in close. ‘We bring our good clothes from Germany.’

  ‘Yes, I can see.’

  The four girls shared warm smiles. Vasiliki didn’t know what else to say. She wished her mind worked faster in English. She had an idea. She pointed at the dance floor, wiggled her hips, then turned a questioning gaze to Frances.

  Frances laughed. ‘Dancing. Do you remember the word from our lessons?’

  ‘Dancing,’ Vasiliki repeated.

  ‘Yes!’ Frances smiled. She turned her attention to Iliana. ‘Will you dance if a boy asks you?’

  Iliana shook her head fiercely. ‘No.’ She crossed her arms and blushed and moved ever so slightly in behind Vasiliki.

  The song ended and enthusiastic applause filled the hall. Another song began and it sounded something like the can-can. Vasiliki looked to the stage. A Yugoslav sat behind the drums and an Italian strummed a guitar. The trumpeter with fat cheeks was Dutch, the pianist with quick fingers a German. The four girls listened for what must have been half an hour. There were folk songs, waltzes and even something that tried to sound like a Greek song. Vasiliki admired the effort, but it wasn’t the same without a bouzouki. Andreadis was in the Riverland now and had taken his instrument with him when he’d left. At the end of a song, the Dutch trumpeter held a note so long that Vasiliki held her breath until it ended and she felt such a tightness in her lungs, she could barely breathe. People around her whooped and clapped.

  And before she could recover, someone was standing before her with his hand out in invitation.

  ‘Vasiliki.’ He said her name like an Australian but she didn’t care.

  It was Frances’s brother. He was so tall she had to crane her neck back. He wore a black suit, with a silver tie around his neck in a slim knot and there were white triangles poking out of the breast pocket of his jacket. His light brown hair was smoothed in a quiff with some kind of lotion. His smile was generous and wide.

  For a moment she forgot her own name in any language. ‘Vasiliki. Yes.’ She glanced at her friends, standing in a line. Elizabeta and Iliana were wide-eyed. Frances was holding in a smile.

  ‘Tom.’ He took a step closer to her to be heard above the music. And then he leaned in and said some other words in her ear but Vasiliki only recognised one of them: dance. And when he smiled and lifted his hand out to her again, she put hers in his, and he guided her to the dance floor.

  Elizabeta stood with Frances and Iliana, swaying from side to side with the music. The dance floor had quickly filled with people, stepping and twirling, happiness in every step. The girls watched Tom dance with Vasiliki, his hesitant waltzing feet the cause of much laughter.

  ‘His dancing is not good,’ Elizabeta noted.

  ‘No,’ Frances laughed. ‘On the cricket pitch, he can play. On the dance floor? He has two left feet. And I expect he’s terribly nervous.’

  Elizabeta frowned. ‘What is that?’

  ‘Nervous? Oh, it’s being a little scared.’

  Elizabeta stored that word away in her head. It was what her mother was most of the time. In English, a little scared. Aufgeregt.

  ‘I’m rather thirsty. Would anyone like a drink?’ Frances asked. ‘There’s a table by the door with drinks and some food.’

  ‘Yes. Thank you,’ Elizabeta said. ‘I like a drink.’

  Iliana nodded politely.

  ‘I’ll be right back.’ Frances moved off and then looked back, pointed to her brother and giggled.

  ‘Guten Abend, Fräulein. Möchten Sie tanzen?’

  Someone moved in beside Elizabeta, in the space left by Frances’s departure. She turned to the man’s voice. So formal. So properly German. He was older than she was but not as old as her parents. His blond hair was cut short over his ears, with a long sweep at the front. A neat grey suit hung from his slim frame. He smelled of aftershave and cigarette smoke.

  Did she want to dance with this stranger? She felt skittish at the thought. She had come to the dance tonight to watch, not to be watched. What would her mother and father say? She knew. They would want her to be polite to a man who was older, to a German. To show her good manners. Before she could answer, he spoke again.

  ‘Ach,’ he closed his eyes in a kind of reverie as the musicians began a new song. ‘“An der schönen blauen Donau”. Sehr schön.’

  He stepped out in front of Elizabeta and held out an upturned hand.

  She swallowed her nerves, put hers in his, and let herself be led to the middle of the dance floor. When they stopped, the man placed one hand at the small of her back before holding the other in the air. Elizabeta rested her fingers on his warm palm and he led her into the dance, guiding her gently, in and out of the other couples, deftly weaving around them. Elizabeta had never been asked to dance by someone who wasn’t her father. Her cheeks were hot and she hoped no one could see the blush. She was too nervous to look directly at him, for fear that he might notice her pink cheeks. The man was very good dancer. He twirled her in time with the beat of the music, so light-footed and practiced that she let herself be led effortlessly around the dance floor, keeping her gaze to her left as they spun and turned. There was no conversation and she didn’t know what she would say if he attempted it.

  When the song ended, the man lifted his hand from her back and let go of her hand. He stepped back and bowed, and then led her to the side of the hall where other guests were standing in a line, their backs against the wood panelling, watching the dancing. Elizabeta craned her neck, searching for Frances and Iliana and Vasiliki, but she couldn’t see them.

  ‘Danke schön,’ he said. He brushed his hands down the lapels of his suit jacket as if dust had settled there during the dance.

  ‘Bitte schön.’ Elizabeta fidgeted her fingers together. She had thanked him too but something was wrong. Her mouth felt dry. She wanted a drink of water but didn’t want to tell him in case he decided to fetch one for her. If he did, she might be expected to wait for him to return, to begin some kind of conversation, to thank him. She didn’t want to stand with him. She wanted to go back to her friends. Where were Frances, Iliana and Vasiliki?

  ‘Tell me your name, Fräulein.’

  So many men had asked for her name in her short life that it didn’t occur to her not to tell him. ‘Schmidt. Elizabeta.’

  ‘You’re here with your family, yes?’

  She nodded, dropping her eyes to the parquetry floor. It zigged and zagged in a perpendicular pattern, like arrows pointing in opposite directions.

  ‘Where are you from in Germany?’

  ‘Hessental.’

  ‘How long have you been here at Bonegilla? Does your father have work yet?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘And your mother? She is here with you too?’

  As Elizabeta’s unease had bubbled up inside her, so had her courage. She finally lifted her eyes from the parquetry and turned to face her inquisitor. She stiffened her spine, lifted her eyes and looked into his face for the first time.

  The jolt of recognition almost blinded her.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Frances stood at the refreshments table at the front of the hall surveying the offerings. There were silver platters filled with cheese sandwiches cut into small triangles, and a variety of c
akes cut into slices, with pale yellow butter thickly lathered on top, like slices of cheese. Jugs of water were half-empty and being replenished by staff, and newly opened bottles of lemonade sat beside towers of paper cups. It would be lemonade for her and Elizabeta, she decided. She was never allowed it at home and Frances felt tonight was worth celebrating. She may not have been asked to dance by a handsome stranger, but she was at a dance without her parents and she felt completely grown up tonight. As she poured two cups full, she wondered where Tom and Vasiliki were. She had lots to tease Tom about when they got home later that night. His silly expression as he’d tried to learn the steps of the waltz. The way he’d looked at Vasiliki and the way she’d looked at him, just like Richard Burton had looked at Jean Simmons in The Robe. Or Audrey Hepburn and Gregory Peck in Roman Holiday. Frances had loved that movie. She’d seen it at the camp’s cinema three times over the last school holidays.

  ‘Buona sera.’

  All at once, every part of her seemed to have come alive, from the roots of her hair to her toes. She knew that voice.

  ‘Hello there,’ she said.

  In her dreams, Massimo was always wearing his sports top, the one with the black and white stripes. Tonight, he was wearing a suit, a white shirt and a thin black tie. His dark hair was slicked back in the continental style and his smile was as wide as Lake Hume. Against his olive skin, his teeth were as white as summer clouds.

  Frances tried to match his effortless smile but nerves took hold. She was suddenly self-conscious, her tongue thick and her head light. She wasn’t used to talking to young men who weren’t her brothers. She talked to boys in school, of course, but they didn’t count. They weren’t Massimo and they weren’t looking at her like he was Gregory Peck and she was Audrey Hepburn. She glanced down at the table and reached for one of the lemonade bottles.

  ‘No, no.’ Massimo moved quickly. He reached for the cups of lemonade and gave her one.

  ‘Thank you,’ Frances said. She was glad the music was so loud or he would have heard the embarrassing girlish squeak in her voice.

  ‘Lemonade,’ he said.

  ‘Yes,’ she smiled. ‘This is for my friend. Elizabeta. I think she still might be dancing. But I can’t see her out there. There are so many people.’ And then, to stop herself babbling, she quickly downed her lemonade in one gulp and set the cup back on the table.

  ‘Frances.’ He took a step closer towards her and leaned in close to be heard above the music. Had his lips brushed her hair on purpose? Everything inside her seemed to tighten.

  ‘Your head,’ Massimo asked. ‘Is okay?

  ‘Yes,’ she managed.

  ‘I am sorry.’

  Before she could find any words to answer him, he’d reached for her free hand and raised it to his lips. His warm breath on the back of her hand tickled, his lips on her knuckles were soft. His eyes lifted from her fingers to meet hers. She stared straight back at him.

  ‘Francesca.’

  ‘Massimo,’ she whispered.

  He hadn’t let go of her hand and somehow, without him even asking, she let herself be led to the dance floor. Then, his hand was at her waist, pressing into the small of her back. Her hand was on his shoulder, and as they made their way around the dance floor, stepping in time to the music from the band, swaying when the next song was slow, she felt his muscles bunch and tighten. When the music demanded it, he pulled her close, and when his body pressed against hers, she rested her cheek against his chest and she felt his heart beat, so fast, as if it was about to burst from his chest.

  When the second song ended, he led her back to the food table. He dipped his head and smiled, and then he was gone. As he disappeared into the crowd, music continued to play in Frances’s head, spinning, whirling, and her heart had struck up a new tune, one she’d never heard before.

  Someone bumped her. It was Elizabeta, reaching for the bottle of lemonade. She hurriedly poured some into a cup, spilling it over the tablecloth in her haste.

  Frances turned to her. ‘Oh, Elizabeta. I’d poured one for you. Where have you been?’

  Elizabeta didn’t answer. She was breathing hard and fast. Her face had drained of colour and she seemed not to be able to speak in any language.

  Frances reached for Elizabeta’s trembling hand. ‘Goodness, Elizabeta. Are you all right?’

  No answer. Her whole body shook.

  ‘Did something happen?’

  Elizabeta stared into the distance, glassy-eyed.

  ‘Whatever is the matter, Elizabeta?’

  ‘I go to my family,’ Elizabeta stammered. She tore her hand away and ran.

  Chapter Fourteen

  The next Tuesday, three days after the dance at Tudor Hall, Elizabeta was finally alone with her mother. Luisa was at school, her father at the Employment Office.

  It was a cool autumn morning despite the clear skies and sunshine. She’d taken her coat from the nail behind the front door and slipped it over her skirt and jumper to warm her on the steps of the hut. Her mother sat in a deck chair on the flattened grass in the alley between the rows of huts, her arms crossed, one thin leg draped over the other. For the past hour, she’d been moving her camp chair a foot at a time as the sun moved over Bonegilla, trying to find warmth in the shaft of weak autumn sunlight. Berta was watching the new family in the hut opposite. The Latvians had arrived the day before. There were always new neighbours at Bonegilla. A young child, perhaps only one year old, was taking wobbly steps on the grass, falling over and getting back up again with a push of his chubby little hands, much to the delight of his mother who was hovering nearby. He was a lucky little boy, Elizabeta thought. He was learning to walk in a new country. He was growing into a person in a new country. He would have no memory of the past, or even of being here at Bonegilla. His first birds would be magpies. His first sky would be this big wide blue Australian one. He would grow up fresh and new, without even an accent. No one would ever mistake him for a reffo or a dago or a wop.

  As Berta watched the little Latvian boy, she began to hum. The Blue Danube. Her foot began to tap in the air to the invisible rhythm, every note matching the little boy’s step.

  It was the song that did it, that made Elizabeta tell her mother. Her secret had become so big that it was filling her up, pushing on her from the inside, choking her like a growth. She had tried to swallow it down during the past three days but it lived and breathed inside her, growing bigger and bolder and stronger. She’d tried so hard not to think about the waltzing German, about what she’d remembered. She didn’t want the news to hurt her mother. Because this would. This would up-end the fragile equilibrium her parents seemed to have found since they’d arrived in Australia, a place far away from the memories that could haunt them.

  ‘Mutti?’ Elizabeta heard the word squeeze out into the cool air from a throat so tight she could barely swallow.

  ‘Ja?’

  ‘At the dance, last Saturday. I danced with a man.’

  ‘The dance?’ her mother asked, distracted. She was staring at the little boy.

  Elizabeta continued. ‘The dance in the hall. The band played The Blue Danube and everyone was waltzing.’

  ‘That sounds nice.’ Berta chewed on a fingernail. She barely had any left as it was.

  ‘Mutti … there was a man at the dance who was asking about you. And Vati.’

  Berta didn’t answer.

  Elizabeta wanted to shake her. Listen to what I have to tell you. ‘The man. I danced with him, before I …’ She struggled to find the words. ‘This man. At the dance. He was asking questions. He’s German.’

  ‘There are lots of Germans here at Bonegilla. Why is that important to tell me?’

  The little boy toddled and fell again.

  ‘Yes. I know.’

  ‘Do we know him?’ Berta asked. They’d met so many people in so many places over the years: in Hungary, in Germany, on the boat all the way across the world, and now in the thousands of people who flowed through the camp. So
many faces. It was hard to remember them, or their names or their families.

  But his was a face Elizabeta would never forget.

  ‘He wanted to know if Vati has work yet. He asked how long we’ve been here at Bonegilla.’

  ‘And you said he asked you to dance?’ Berta stopped looking at the little boy. She finally turned her face to look at her daughter.

  Elizabeta nodded. ‘Yes. I didn’t mean to. I wouldn’t have if I’d known it was him.’

  Berta leaned forwards, almost folding her thin body in half over her legs. She looked from side to side to see if there were eyes and ears nearby, then whispered. ‘Who is he, Elizabeta?’

  ‘This man …’ Elizabeta waited, knowing the weight of the words. ‘He has a scar.’ She lifted the index finger of her right hand to her face. She dragged it in a jagged line through her right eyebrow, across her eyelid and in a forty-five degree angle across her cheekbone.

  Her mother stood quickly. The magazine she’d had in her lap fell in a flutter to the grass. The front cover was bent in half. Elizabeta could only see half of the lady with the glittering crown on her head. Her mother took a quick step towards her, lifted a hand high and slapped Elizabeta across the face where she’d just traced her finger. The shock stole her breath. Her face stung as if she herself had been slashed with a kitchen knife almost ten years before in Hungary.

  ‘Go. Now. Get Luisa from school.’

  Elizabeta held in a sob.

  ‘Go.’ Berta reached for her arm and her fingers gripped tight and hard. ‘And do not tell a soul. Not even your father.’

  When Elizabeta returned with Luisa, having had to tug her away from the activities and her friends she loved so much, they could hear the arguing three huts away. She slowed her pace, kept her grip tight on Luisa’s hand, and when they realised what was going on behind the rust-red door, they decided to wait outside. The Latvian woman from across the alley, who had earlier shared a friendly smile with them, lowered her eyes and closed her door firmly, as if anger and hurt were catching and she didn’t want them slinking inside her home.