Wings of the Morning (20 page)

Mark Bushell was his only sibling and about ten years younger, in his mid-forties. Mark was a psychiatrist. He had trained in general medicine and studied further at the expense of the
Australian government. Enlisted in their Army Medical Corps, he had spent time in Vietnam and emerged as a specialist in post-traumatic stress disorders. The brothers, different in appearance and
professions, had always been close despite the age gap, a natural friendship enhanced through the tragedy of losing both parents in a car crash when Mark was still a schoolboy. He had grown to be a
big, cuddly man. He was much darker than Peter, habitually in need of a shave. He had a great crop of curly black hair, ran easily to overweight and wore heavy horn rimmed spectacles. He had a
marvellous humour always at the ready, and spoke in an irreverent, typically Australian style at odds with his profession. But in the dawn of the seventies, Mark Bushell stood at the forefront of
international expertise in the treatment of severe mental disturbance and Peter felt a profound relief as his brother took over at Sydney Airport, emanating calm and care as he helped Alexa into
the private ambulance which stood on the tarmac. If anyone could help her, it would be his younger brother.

Peter went off to handle the paperwork and make his own phone calls. He spoke to Joffrey and Elizabeth Labarre in Paris and they came running to arrive at Alexa’s bedside two days later.
They were shocked to the core by the zombie state of their only daughter, whom they had last seen as a clever, beautiful and composed young woman, if a little wilful. Alexa had been placed in a
private clinic in North Sydney, to which Mark Bushell was one of several consultants. At that point, she had no idea who she was, where she was, whether she was alive or dead, not even sure which
she wanted to be. She was heavily sedated, fundamentally damaged. She was unconscious and uncaring. She did not recognise her parents but actually shrank from them.

Mark Bushell kept his consulting rooms in the city, in Pitt Street, but he lived at Castle Crag on the North Shore with his wife and two children. He spent much time at the Clinic which was
convenient to his home and the day before the Labarres flew back to Paris, they sat together in a small lounge close to Alexa’s bedroom, where they were joined by Peter. Elizabeth asked Mark
when they should return to see their daughter.

Mark knitted his brow and steepled his hands as he answered, ‘Look, Elizabeth, I’m buggered if I know. I’m only the shrink around here you know.’

They all had a laugh, even Peter who heard it coming. He knew his brother’s style of giving confidence to anxious relatives. Mark continued,

‘The best way I can put it is this. If Alexa had been seriously injured in some accident and I said to you that she was on life support, then you’d understand, right? She
wouldn’t be able to survive without machines taking over the vital functions until she became fit to fly free again.’

Joffrey Labarre nodded at him.

‘OK’, resumed Mark, ‘then what I’m asking you to appreciate is that Alexa is now on life support. It’s necessary, not for her body but for her brain and
that’s the most complex element of what makes us all tick. The medication I’m giving her is cutting edge stuff, plus I’m experimenting as we go. It’s supporting her, but
only to the extent of keeping her reasonably calm. That’s just the start of getting back her sanity and any sort of normality, like the rest of us. I’m sorry, but I can’t tell you
yet how long this stage will continue. I can’t even say if it will succeed. Alexa is very damaged, very traumatised. She has panophobia which means she’s suffering terror and blind
panic attacks which are way beyond the experience of the rest of us.

I’m putting this to you in such stark terms because you have to understand if you’re going to help her later on. Alexa is in very deep trouble, and I don’t know if she can come
through this. But if anyone can help her through, I believe I can. So all I ask of you is to trust me, and to trust Alexa herself. If we can do this thing, we’ll do it together. And remember,
I’ll never bullshit you. I’ll always tell you how I see things. Right now I’m saying fly on home, stay in close contact, plan on being back in six weeks or so. Otherwise, just
hope and pray.’

Joffrey Labarre felt shattered, and yet perversely a lifting of his spirits. Here was honest to God truth. He didn’t feel inclined to ask for more.

‘We’ll see you in six weeks to the day, Mark. And thank you.’

He swept Elizabeth up in his arms and guided her away on their first steps back home to France. They returned in mid-February as planned and went on travelling regularly between Paris and Sydney
during all that year. In the interim periods, they spoke every Friday to Mark who gave them the unvarnished facts. He had to report that Alexa’s progress was patchy and spasmodic. She veered
from suicidal to aggressive to lucid: huge mood swings and instant changes of mindset. She would encourage Mark one day only to have the most savage regression on the next. He felt both challenged
and depressed. Deliberately, he matched her vagaries with his own stark differences in approach. Sometimes he would be all tea and sympathy, consoling her as the victim of monstrous abuse, but in
other conversations he would be very tough, reprimanding her for being unable to find the courage to confront her demons.

Over Christmas, Alexa had a visit from her younger brother Bernard and Mark saw that his presence was a therapy. He managed to drag Alexa from her listlessness to share memories of childhood
days in the chateau outside Limoges, to talk even of their long lost brother Michel, sometimes even to laugh a little. That was a start and by the time Mark was again with Elizabeth and Joffrey in
March 1971, he was able to give them positive news.

‘Look,’ he said, ‘you’re going to see a change in Alexa this trip. Somehow we’ve found a trigger point. Something has tripped a switch in her mind and she is now
saying, acting and believing that she can get her life back. Honest to God, I don’t know whether that is due to the medication or to my sessions with her. Whatever, I’m sure that
Bernard played a part. Best guess is that we were able to keep her going whilst she found the key for herself. It’s extraordinary what the human brain and spirit can accomplish, but they need
the surroundings which give them the chance to recover themselves. Look back to the First World War and you’ll find shell shock victims who did make it back to mental stability, but not while
they were still in Flanders.’

The Labarres recognised that Mark was making light of his own professional efforts. They were uplifted by the improvement in Alexa and even more delighted when they returned in April, exchanging
the early scent of spring in Paris for bright autumn colours in Sydney. They could sense their daughter coming back to them, a bittersweet contrast to the homecoming which had never happened for
her brother Michel.

Mark told them, ‘She’s turned the corner, no question. But there’s something else you should know. My big brother Pete is often here to be with her. He’s part of the
therapy for Alexa, and I’ve got a professional and personal involvement. His own sickness has really got its claws into him. In many cases, MS means a gradual deterioration over a long
period. But for some, it can be a real aggressive son of a bitch and Pete is seriously affected. He’s completely out of Qantas now and he’ll never fly again. He still drives although
I’m not so sure he should. His reaction time is way down. His speech is sometimes a bit slurred and he’s just about always using a stick to help him walk. But with all this, Pete hardly
lets a day go by without coming to see Alexa and to be brutally honest, I think it helps her to feel she’s moving forwards while someone near and dear is getting worse. That’s the brain
for you. Anyway, you see and judge for yourselves.’

They were all together in the North Sydney Clinic to talk it over a few days later: Joffrey and Elizabeth, Alexa looking slight and thin but showing a bit of her former self and Peter also,
physically diminished, but with the spark still in his eye. Mark led the conversation.

He judged that Alexa was well enough to leave the Clinic. He was concerned about a possible relapse but the big leap back into a normal, independent life needed to be made at some point and he
reckoned that further delay might make the transition even more testing.

‘Not to go into all the boring medico details,’ he said in his breezy style, ‘but it would be good as gold for Alexa to go home now, great to spend some time in Paris and
excellent that Bernard will be around. Then there’ll be all your mates to catch up with and I hope you’ll soon feel like getting back into some sort of work. This is all the stuff of
getting your own life back, and I’ll be cheering you on from here.’

He paused to beam at them all from behind the woolly black eyebrows and the huge spectacles.

‘The only problem I have with the whole scenario is that I won’t be right at hand over the first few months while you’re finding your way.’

The Labarres nodded but kept silent as they grappled with these thoughts. Alexa crossed and re-crossed her elegant legs, a sure sign that she was working to control a rising anxiety. It was then
that Peter spoke up.

‘Perhaps Alexa could come and live with me for a few weeks. That way, she would be re-establishing her confidence but would still be just a few minutes away from you, Mark.’

‘That would be just brilliant for me,’ Alexa said before the others had time to react, ‘I’d like to do that.’

Mark nodded in sage agreement, a distant look in his eyes hinting that this was the very thing which he had been hoping to stage manage without suggesting it himself.

And so it was arranged.

Alexa and Peter had their problems of health and the future, but money was not an issue for either of them. Peter had been a Qantas employee for years, with a senior and well paid position at
the time of his enforced retirement. He was also a widower, having lost his wife to cancer. She had been a country girl, an heiress from Victoria. Children had never happened and neither had felt
the need to ask why. Together they had bought a large and luxurious apartment, located in prestigious Double Bay and enjoying a spectacular view over Sydney Harbour. It was a home for romantics and
companions, but not for young children.

At the Clinic that April day, there was no need for further discussion. Joffrey and Elizabeth could see the practical benefits of this interim stage and happy that their daughter had the
confidence in this man to go and live alone with him. There were no proprieties to be observed but it was still quite a development given that her whole crisis had been precipitated by sharing a
luxury penthouse with another man in another city.

Alexa moved across the Harbour Bridge two days later and her parents returned to Paris the following week. Elizabeth carried an intuition which she kept to herself, the feeling that although her
daughter was saved, she would not be coming home any time soon.

By the end of June, Peter was a little weaker, Alexa a great deal stronger and in truth, it was she who proposed marriage to him as they sat together on the balcony early one evening with the
mid-winter sun still playing on the waters beneath them.

They married in September on a little island which stands out in the harbour, approached from the exclusive suburb of Vaucluse. It was a celebration made better by the gathering from far and
wide. Mark played host in boisterous form and many came from the Clinic, men and women who had become friends with Alexa during her long stay with them. Her parents flew in with Bernard,
accompanied by old family friends from Limoges and Paris.

David Heaven arrived from London via Mauritius where he linked up with Pente Broke Smith. Pente insisted that he couldn’t afford the time or the cost of travel, but David would have none
of it. He battled with the monks and put a hand in his own pocket to ensure that Pente was with him. King Offenbach surprised them all by appearing unannounced.

Conrad Aveling was then near the end of his tour in Singapore and he arranged to reach Sydney a day before the others. He wrote in advance to Alexa, proposing a quiet rendezvous and the chance
to give her his own news. He came to the apartment in Double Bay and she invited Mark to be there with them.

The first sight of Conrad standing in their doorway was too much for Alexa’s composure — her Connie of old, friend, lover and saviour. She fell into his arms in a flood of tears with
the nearly forgotten panic of Bahrain threatening to return in assault. But the comforting bulk of Mark was there beside her and there was distraction from her insecurity in the look of shock on
Connie’s face. He saw behind her in the hallway the ravaged face of Peter Bushell who was a shadow of the dominant figure which remained in his memory.

At last, Alexa made a supreme effort to extract herself from Connie’s arms, using both hands to wipe her streaming eyes and to push back her hair into some semblance of order.

‘It’s very sweet of you come,’ she said shakily, ‘both of you.’ She knew who was with him, she could see the slim outline of a girl turned sideways and pretending
to study a picture on the wall, someone who was now a vital component of his life but not a part of their history. Alexa felt embarrassed for the girl and ashamed of her lack of welcome. She smiled
and spoke the name before Conrad could start in on a formal introduction.

‘Antoinette.’

The girl turned to face her with a wistful, slightly timid smile. Alexa knew that they were not far apart in age, but Antoinette looked so much younger, little more than a school girl. This was
her lineage. She was of mixed race, Asian European. The combination helped to give her a winsome beauty, but she had a background as tough, and even worse than Alexa’s own.

‘Alexandra,’ came the reply, ‘or may I call you Alexa, like everybody else?’

And then the girls were in each other’s arms in a warm embrace which both knew would last a lifetime: instant friends.

The wedding party gathered and celebrated. They were together for two days and it was an interlude touched with magic as Sydney’s best weather smiled upon them. The Oxford Five huddled
together to agree that this was a reunion dinner which should be repeated whenever possible. Looking back, they could see that Alexa and Peter’s wedding party was the start of a new phase in
their friendship. As Pente remarked, it was ‘like Enid Blyton’s Famous Five growing up a bit.’