‘Where’s the big ugly bloke?’ Will said.
Jodie had seen a photo of Joey Miles, Will’s oldest brother, in a frame in Will’s upstairs flat at the pub. Ugly, he was not.
‘He and Gus have secret men’s business going on in the macadamia trees this morning. Something to do with irrigation spigots and ant nests. Come have a beer with us one evening when you’re not on shift and you can see how he is for yourself.’ The woman’s gaze shifted to Jodie. It read as frank, friendly and curious. ‘Hello.’
‘Jodie, this is my sister-in-law, Kirsty. She’s done some research work here herself, finding out about her father’s family, so she’s our secret weapon today.’
Kirsty smiled. ‘To say I did the work is a bit of an exaggeration. Mostly I opened packets of Iced VoVos and handed Carol boxes from the high shelves. But come on in. Margie Woo is rostered on today, and she’s expecting us. I told her we’re looking into Jodie’s family history—a slight misdirection, to keep curious eyes at bay—but we don’t have to travel far up the family tree to get from Jodie to Carol, and from there? Well, hopefully we’ll find out.’
‘Good thinking,’ said Jodie. ‘Let’s do this.’
Turns out, Carol really had done the work for them when she’d set up the genealogy records for the local families. Over the years, since she’d retired from the school and had time to devote to projects, she’d been involved in many of the Historical Society pursuits. Margie, custodian of the collection for the day, had been so delighted to have a relative of Carol’s in that she’d wanted to talk them through every one of Carol’s endless contributions to Clarence history. There’d been the work with the museum to provide story cards to go with exhibits, like the story card that went with an exhibit of an axe and rope, about Charles Kingsford Smith—before he became famous—saving a mail plane that had crash landed in a cow paddock. The set up of a dedicated space for school kids and interested families to do research. The sharing project with the Aboriginal Corporations to fill in gaps in local stories.
But Carol’s first project, when she’d been a lowly newbie volunteer historian, had been herownstory.
‘Why don’t you start there, Jodie?’ Margie said.
Excellent idea. It took some deft words to convince Margie she had better things to do than help them, but finally Jodie, Will and Kirsty were on their own.
Carol’s story wasn’t on display, it was filed neatly away in the genealogy archives where local family histories were stored, both digitally and on paper, and it was this paper box that Kirsty found and brought over to Will and Jodie at the big table where Jodie had first sat with Carol the other week. ‘You guys go through this,’ Kirsty said, ‘while I read Joan’s article so I know what I’m looking for.’
It didn’t take long to find the reference to the 2/9th Australian Infantry Battalion. ‘Kaboom,’ whispered Jodie, not wanting to have Margie scurrying over.
Will abandoned the land titles records from the 1940s he’d been reading and looked over her shoulder. She pointed to the annotation beneath a black and white photograph. ‘Same battalion as in Joan’s article.’
Names were listed, and they found Sergeant Sloane in the back row. The soldier beside him, grinning in that heartbreaking way young men in old war photos do (so the person looking at the photo eighty years later can feel staked in the heart because they know the young man was one of the many that age would not weary), was listed as Sergeant Bruce Wallace.
‘This has to be the connection,’ Will said. ‘Carol’s father and Joan’s father in the same battalion?’
‘But her father’s friend was called Bluey.’
‘A common nickname. In the older generations, at least. Today it’s a cartoon dog. Let’s read the other names in the picture and see if anything stands out.’
Kirsty had come to stand behind them and leaned over their shoulders. ‘A pity the photo’s not in colour.’
‘Why’s that?’ said Jodie.
‘Bluey. It’s a nickname for people with red hair.’
Will reached his hand up to touch the lock of Jodie’s hair falling against her cheek, just as Jodie did. ‘Huh,’ he said. ‘You’d think I’d have remembered that. My brother Anthony is called Red Ant for the exact same reason.’
‘Let’s not jump the gun,’ Jodie said. But her breath had turned to fizz in her chest—she was totally jumping the gun. ‘Do we know what colour Carol’s hair used to be?’
‘It’s been grey as long as I’ve known her,’ said Will. ‘And she taught me history in school, so I’ve known her a long time. Maybe it wasn’t grey then? But … I can’t say I was paying much attention.’
‘Too many Penny Atwells in the room?’ Jodie said, raising her eyebrows at him.
He grinned and winked at her.
‘If you two are going to share private jokes and make eyes at each other, I’ll go boil the kettle. My suggestion? Type the name “Bruce Bluey Wallace” into a search string on the internet and see what comes up. We’re not the only town with a keen historical society. If any other battalion members have shared their memories online, we may get a hit.’
‘Good idea,’ said Will, pulling out his phone.
‘No need,’ said Jodie. She’d found another article in Carol’s box. An obituary. For Bruce ‘Bluey’ Wallace.Beloved son, husband and father.
It felt wrong to thinkbeloved great grandfatherwhen she’d not known him. Not knownofhim, even—as a person with a name and a history at least—until just now. But here in this room where finding threads to the past had not been difficult at all—the opposite, they were everywhere, and they were emotional threads—and with her worry about Carol’s advancing years ever present in her mind, and her own fears about grief, and mortality, and what lifewas…it all felt so heavy and jumbled up in her head.
She found herself covering her face with her hands and indulging in a little weep. It felt nice.
