The Valley by Di Morrissey

Author:Di Morrissey
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Pan Macmillan Australia
Published: 2012-11-23T05:00:00+00:00

For you no mad, exciting charge,

No swift, exultant flight,

But just an endless plodding on

Through the shuddering night;

Making ’neath a star-shell’s gleam

Where ere a face shines white.

Stretcher Bearers! Stretcher Bearers!

To you all praise be due,

Who ne’er shirked the issue yet

When there was work to do.

We who’ve seen and know your worth

All touch our hats to you.

How she wished she’d asked her grandfather more questions. Perhaps in his last lonely years after Emily died he might have shared some of the pain. She recalled him finally joining the Cedartown Services Club – which surprised her as he’d never set foot inside in all the previous years. He’d modestly produced his demobilisation papers to ‘prove’ he’d served. And each Friday he popped in for a hot lunch and a yarn with the locals.

Wrapped in tissue paper was a gold medallion presented to Harold Williams in 1919 by the Horseshoe Bend Ladies Welcome Home Committee. The words ‘Welcome Home’ were inscribed in a horseshoe under a royal crown. The newspaper report he’d kept noted that the medallion was presented to fourteen returned servicemen on the night by the mayor, Major Cracknell. The major was quoted: ‘All they thought of was to do their duty for their country and the Empire, and that they did.’ Lara almost smiled at the major’s final comment, in which he conceded that some of them ‘might not be in the same state of health as when they went away’.

There was one photo that brought back a vivid memory for Lara. It showed her grandfather marching in the one and only Anzac Day march he ever attended. It was in 1966 in Sydney and Elizabeth and Lara had gone to watch. How he’d chuckled at the resulting photo and asked Lara what was so surprising about it.

‘That you’re all in step after all those years,’ she’d laughed.

That had been a wonderful visit with him. She’d started working and they’d had a special day out in the city together. She sighed as she put the photo to one side and started to read the letters.

At four o’clock Dani and Tim appeared. Lara quickly put the letters back in the box.

‘Hi, Ma, what are you reading?’ Tim bounded up the front steps.

‘Oh, lots of old family letters. Some from your great-great-grandparents. Written right here in this house.’ She returned his hug.

‘We’ve registered for the local soccer team,’ said Dani, giving her mother a look that said this was a positive step.

‘Fantastic. What else have you been up to?’

‘Oh, the usual school stuff. It’s different.’ Tim gave a small shrug and didn’t look too impressed.

‘Can I get some eggs, Mum?’ Lara nodded and, as Dani headed down to the garden, Tim squeezed into the chair beside his grandmother.

‘Ma, you know what? There’s horses across the creek at The Vale. I really like them.’

‘Horses? How wonderful.’

‘Ma . . .’

‘Yes, sweetie?’

‘Do you think I could have riding lessons? Then maybe I could ride round the paddocks. Tabatha can ride.’

Lara had been waiting for this opportunity

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