Rosetta by Alexandra Joel Read Free Book Online

Pakenham,’ she begins.
    â€˜Please, I would like you to call me Lilian. And, if I may, I will address you as Rosetta.’
    â€˜Lilian.’ A little more at ease now, Rosetta starts again. ‘As you know, our society is young and those who came here first were not always of fortunate circumstance.’ She looks down, examines the oriental pattern of her cup. ‘I myself am the granddaughter of a former convict. I feel it best you know that.’
    Lilian is composed. She says that she has met others – even in Government House – possessed of a similar background. She adds that, in any case, she does not care. Then, with a wry smile, she remarks, ‘Still, my grandfather the Earl and, who knows, perhaps yours too, might have had something to say about it.’
    Despite the marked differences in lineage, both women enjoy a rare harmony. After this first visit Lilian comes often, and as their friendship deepens it occurs to Rosetta that her companion seems as distanced from her own husband as she herself is from Louis. One day, while strolling with Rosetta in her garden, Lilian breaks off a stem of lavender, inhales its scent and then confesses, ‘My husband and I …’ She hesitates before adding, ‘There is an arrangement …’
    Her friend moves in circles more exalted than Rosetta’s own. They make their own rules, have their own discreet ways ofobserving society’s conventions while, in private, they conduct their lives precisely as they choose.
    Rosetta, at first a little taken aback by Lilian’s revelations, finds herself intrigued. She begins to see that relations between men and women are not fixed within the immutability of marriage but allow for unexpected variations.
    The people Lilian knows are the kind whom the Melbourne newspaper The Argus reports on in a regular column headed ‘Personal’, which chronicles the lives of the socially well connected. Reports are constructed within a pyramid of status, always commencing with Vice-Regal activities before moving on to matters concerning lesser men and women. It is in one of these columns that Rosetta discovers that Captain Pakenham ‘had the misfortune to break his collar-bone when playing tennis at Mr. R. Power’s residence, Toorak’.
    â€˜Yes, of course,’ Rosetta thinks. This must be the reason that is given for Mrs Pakenham’s frequent appearance at official engagements in the company of the Governor’s handsome aide-de-camp , Lord Richard Plantagenet Neville. The Argus says she also hunts with him.
    Rosetta, alone and heavy with child, lies upon her day bed and dreams that it is she who hunts with Lilian riding at her side.
    Â 
    On the morning of 22 February 1900, the first pains strike. They are as sharp and as hard as punishment, and for what? Rosetta, furious and wild, slams her hand down, hard, upon the mantelpiece and cries, ‘Why should I suffer in this way when it is Louis, Louis who is to blame?’
    Her distress rapidly heightening, she calls out to the tow-haired girl who helps her in the house. ‘Dear God, Ivy! Go straight away – fetch my mother and the midwife.’
    Now the pain is far worse. It wracks her and torments her; there is nothing else. When Fanny arrives she finds her daughterwalking back and forward across the parlour. Every few minutes Rosetta stops, clings to a marble-topped table, gasps and writhes. Mrs Wainwright, the midwife, comes in moments later, takes in the scene and insists that Mrs Raphael retire to her bed. ‘It is happening very quickly,’ she says to Fanny. ‘You wouldn’t think it was her first.’ Rosetta is feverish. She feels she is surely being consumed by fire. As the fierce urge to bear down consumes her she thinks only, ‘Let me survive.’
    At last a little girl, red and bewildered, is born. Her translucent eyes open briefly to meet those of her mother, then close as