Synopsis

Cpt 1

Cpt 2

Cpt 3

Cpt 4

Cpt 5

Cpt 6

Cpt 7

Cpt 9

Cpt 10

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"I went to Princess Alexandra College as a border from the Third Form. Patricia and Vanessa shared the same section of the dormitory." Hazel gave a tiny laugh. "It was a long room with forty or more beds poked together. We each had a bed and small bedside cupboard. That was all we could call our own. Anyway, after four years I didn't want to come home to the farm. I wanted to attend university but with the war on it wasn't possible so I did the next best thing and worked in the post office.

In 1942 I was transferred as a civilian employee to the Central City Defence Headquartersin that three story brick building on the corner of Bowen and Featherston Streets."

"I know it," Alan said.

"In June 1942 the American 11th Marines arrived and our whole lives changed. They were nearly all young, many younger than we were, wore flash uniforms, spoke in a broad accent and called us all Honey. It was like a breath of fresh air. The marines on leave in town were controlled by their own military police who patrolled the town in twos with long batons called hickory bows. They were quite ruthless and violent, not at all like our own police or even army officers. They acted as if the town belong to them. There were military vehicles everywhere, all with the steering wheels on the left side. Often they'd roar around a corner and drive down the wrong side of the road. There was one huge stink when a marine truck ploughed into a ministerial car in front of the railway station. We never heard what happened but noticed that they followed our road rules more carefully after that.

Every week there was a dance in the town hall with a big time band, coloured lights and balloons. We were picked up at points around the city by bus and delivered there. Afterwards we were only allowed to leave in the same bus and be taken home. Patricia, Vanessa and myself boarded together in one of those old villas just through the Mount Victoria tunnel. Anyway, after a few weeks we began to meet the same boys, three in particular."

Hazel's lips trembled a little. "It was wartime Alan and Trevor was a year younger than me. He was like a kid brother at first. Things reached a climax when he told me they were being shifted out. They were not allowed to say where but we knew the Americans were fighting the Japs for some God-forsaken islands in the middle of the Pacific."

"I know," Alan said. "I was in Japan at the end of the war, you know."

"It just happened," Hazel whispered. "On a Saturday afternoon Trevor seemed so sad that when we began to cuddle he didn't want to stop. We made love, Alan and that would have been it, one indiscretion."

Alan flushed and tried to control anger that surged in his throat. He had always thought Hazel was a virgin when they married but now...

"Alan," Hazel cried. "Don't look like that!"

Alan gulped and his memory switched back to 1946. The Japanese girls would do any thing for a few bars of chocolate. During his time there he had slept with three girls. The youngest was sixteen... "It's okay, Dear," he said and chastised himself for being hypocritical.

"The trouble was that there was some shipping delay. Trevor's unit remained in Wellington for an extra month. Our once became a full time love affair. When he finally left I found myself pregnant. Vanessa also had a marine boyfriend and ended up like me. Patricia went somewhat wild. She slept around but escaped."

"Escaped?" Alan whispered.

"She was the promiscuous one but knew how to protect herself and never got pregnant."

"So you and Vanessa were both pregnant when the marine boyfriends left the country. What happened to this Trevor?"

"Nothing," Hazel whispered. "Sure there were a couple of letters. The last I heard was that he went back home to South Carolina after the war and picked up with a girl from his high school days. I never told him that he impregnated me."

Alan gulped. "But that was years ago, Hazel. Don't let it worry you."

"There's more," Hazel sobbed. "If I don't tell you now, I never will... Will you hear me out?"

"Only if you hear about my own sordid little story." He held Hazel's hand and told about his time in Japan. The only withheld information that he had had sex with anyone. "So I'm no angel either. I guess it is always harder for a girl, though."

"Yes," Hazel said. "Especially a pregnant one."

*

The three girls sat at the rear of the New Zealand Railways urban train on the Johnsonville Line. This short suburban railway line turned west through a series of short tunnels and up the next valley to the suburb of Johnsonville. Hazel, Vanessa and Patricia were not going that far, though.

Hazel felt her hands tremble as she glanced at her two friends, the tall blonde Patricia and shorter dumpier Vanessa. She was, she guessed, sort of half way between the other two in size. The train slid into Crofton Downs and the side doors slid open.

"Next station," Patricia said. "God, calm down. It'll be okay."

"It's easy for you to be calm," Vanessa muttered. "It's not going to happen to you."

"Oh leave her," Hazel said. "She didn't have to come with us, you know."

"I guess," Vanessa said and gazed out the window as the train doors shut and the electric train moved forward.

Minutes later they were at their destination, the suburban station of Ngaio that was really just a small shelter and platform. The train stopped, doors slide open and the three followed a handful of passengers out into the cool afternoon sunshine. Patricia glanced at a small handwritten map she had pulled from her pocket and headed up a steep footpath to their right. Middle-class homes built about twenty years earlier hugged the hillside. Some had garages underneath and they all had steps leading up to the higher back yards

Hazel glanced at Vanessa who screwed her nose up and pulled her coat around herself. They followed the road uphill for a hundred yards and Hazel felt her heart pounding. The house they stopped in front of looked very ordinary with curved bay windows, wooden walls and ornamental brick supports for the front veranda. Patricia walked up the steps and turned the front door bell. Hazel heard a distant grinding noise, it could hardly be called a bell and footsteps on a wooden floor.

The door opened and a woman peered out. She looked unusually ordinary, a squat grey haired woman of an undeterminable age.

"Three?" the woman said without even a trace of warmth in her voice. "I was told there were only two."

"I've come to support my two friends," Patricia said. "I don't need an abortion."

"Come in," the woman said.

They entered a hallway and were directed to the left into a front room, similar again to hundreds of others in the city.

"Twenty pounds each," the woman said. "In cash."

Hazel opened her purse and brought out a ten and two five pound notes. This was more money than she had ever handled before and was a loan from her father back in Taihape. Dear Old Dad had not asked why she needed the money so urgently but he was an astute man who may have guessed the reason. She handed it to the thin hand and watched as the woman almost seized Vanessa's one twenty pound note and shoved the lot down the front of her bosom as if she was afraid they might grab it back again.

Hazel stared at the door. She wanted to run, to get out but instead grabbed an armchair and steadied her trembling body.

The woman caught her eyes and her lips almost relaxed into a smile. "Now, don't worry, Dearie," she said. "As long as your pregnancy is less than twelve weeks it is a simple procedure." Her eyes turned cold. "They are less than twelve weeks, I hope."

"Yes," Vanessa whispered. Hazel nodded.

"Good. It is a simple procedure A syringe is inserted into your uterus and extracts the evacuated material into an airtight glass jar..." She opened a drawer and brought out an evil looking instrument with a syringe at one end of a rubber tube. Half way along this tube was a brass valve. The tube continued on through the lid of what looked like an empty jam jar. A second tube came out of the lid and joined onto a steel instrument like a blunt needle about six inches long.

"This is the very latest device direct from America," the woman muttered. "The American Embassy sold it to me." Her eyes turned to Hazel. "We'll go through to the other room Dearie."

Hazel shivered. " I don't know," she whispered.

"There are no refunds. I have a waiting list and agreed to fit you in."

"I'll go first," Vanessa whispered. She looked far more confident than Hazel felt.

"If you wish," the woman said and opened a second door for Vanessa to walk through. Hazel saw what looked like a doctor's surgery inside with a high bed covered in a blue rubber mattress, a bedside table with various instruments on it and a sink. It looked clean and functional. For the first time, she felt more confident.

"See you soon," Vanessa said. She removed her coat, handed it to Patricia and followed the woman into the room. The door shut. Hazel stared at Patricia who gave her a smile of confidence.

Five minutes later, Vanessa's sharp gasp followed by silence made Hazel's blood run cold. An angry retort and sobbing added to her terror. Again there was silence, the sound of furniture being moved and a thud.

"Shit!" the woman's voice came though the door loud and clear.

The door flung open and the woman tore out. Hazel reeled back. The woman's frock and arms were covered in blood. She ignored them and tore out to a telephone across the hallway and dialled a number.

"There's been an accident in Collingwood Street," she said after a short preamble. "A girl's impaled herself on a steel rail. Send an ambulance."

She banged the receiver down and swung around. There was a look of fear and desperation in her eyes.

"Your friend is bleeding. I've called an ambulance so you two can get out!"

"What do you mean?" Patricia yelled.

"Get out!" screamed the woman. "If you say a word about what's happened I'll tell the cops you're the ones that did it. " She reached in her bosom, took out the twenty-pound note and flung it at Hazel.  "Your termination is cancelled. Now go!"

"No!" Hazel screamed and ran into the other room.

Vanessa lay on the bed moaning with her head back and one arm hanging down. There was blood everywhere, her dress was saturated and, even as Hazel watched, more blooded streamed out onto the floor.

"Do something!" Hazel screamed and reached for her friend. Oblivious to her own discomfort as her clothes became saturated in blood she held her friend and tried to offer comfort.

Vanessa looked up at her and tried to say something but her voice was no more than a sort of gurgle. Hazel burst into tears and just held on. Time passed in a blur as she cuddled her friend close. There was nothing else she could do.

*

Strong arms gripped her shoulders and Hazel glanced up. A police constable guided her away from Vanessa.

"The ambulance officers will take your friend to hospital, Miss," he said in a kind voice. "Everything possible is being done for her."

"But there's so much blood," Hazel sobbed.

"We know." The policeman still held her while two men in white jackets appeared with a stretcher. They lifted Vanessa onto it and carried her out the door. Hazel turned and saw a trembling Patricia being comforted by another policeman. The woman abortionist had gone.

"I gather you didn't do this to your friend?" the constable holding Hazel asked.

"No," Hazel sobbed. "Where's the woman?"

"The bitch just shoved me aside and ran out the front door," Patricia stuttered.

The second constable looked grim. "If it is any comfort to you Miss, Molly McKenzie is well known to us and will not get far."

"She left?" Hazel cried. "You mean she just left Vanessa in this condition?"

The constable nodded. "We have been onto her for a while now but she changed her address. The Wellington Free Ambulance rang us when they suspected the real reason for the call."

"So what happens to us?" Patricia whispered.

"We'll need a few details of your names and other details then we'll take you home so your friend can clean up. If you wish, afterwards we'll deliver you to the Wellington Public Hospital to be with your friend."

"Thank you," Hazel sobbed. "I'd like that."

*

"Vanessa died a day later," Hazel said to Alan. "I never had enough courage to seek another abortion and my baby was born seven months later. I held her in my arms just once before she was taken away and given to her adopted parents."

Alan bent over, hugged Hazel close and kissed her tenderly.

"And Claire reminds you of yourself in the same situation?" he said.

"I think Claire is my daughter, Alan." Hazel whispered so quietly Alan hardly heard the words.

He frowned. "But how? Nobody is allowed to see records of adoption procedures and, as far as I know, not even the parents who adopt a child know who its natural parents are."

"Her date of birth is that of my daughter's. Patricia found that out."

Alan frowned but wasn't convinced. "So, by coincidence Claire just happened to be enrolled at the school Patricia was principal of. Those things don't happen in real life, Dear."

"No they don't," Hazel whispered. "Patricia is a determined woman and sort of created the situation."

"Oh yeah. How?"

"She only told be about it when she learned about Claire being pregnant a few weeks ago but she has followed her life over the last five years."

"Go on."

"Five years back Patricia was researching the Wellington registry of Births, Deaths and Marriages. It was something to do with one of her pupils. Anyway, she decided to look up the date my child was born. There were seven births registered that day in the Wellington hospital and three were girls. Patricia copied the names down and discretely followed them up. One of the baby girls was a Maori while another one was taken out of the country when her mother became a war bride and emigrated to United States. That left Claire who was listed as the daughter of a local vicar and his wife. Claire was at primary school at the time and Patricia offered her a scholarship to attend Princess Alexandra College in the New Year."

"How could she do that?"

"Apparently there are five scholarships given out each year by the school to successful applicants. Patricia persuaded the Vicar Woodham and his wife to enter Claire in the scholarship exam."

"So Patricia cooked the books," Alan whispered.

"It seems Claire was a bright pupil anyway..."

"Sure!"

"Don't you believe me?" Hazel cried.

"Of course I do but this last bit is all circumstantial. I've no doubt that this Patricia is a very confident woman. However, there is nothing proven. I just don't want you to build your hopes too high. Claire's a lovely girl but that does not mean she is your long lost daughter."

Hazel's bottom lip quivered. "But she might be, Alan. You don't mind, do you?"

"Of course not." Under the circumstances, what else could he say?

"And the fact that I wasn't the virgin you thought I was when we married?"

"No. You are my wife and the woman I love. After all these years do you think that would change?"

"Oh Alan." Tears filled Hazel's eyes.

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