S O F T T O U C H L A M I N AT I O N

Angie loved Mr Foxs magnificent, absurd hotel. In fact, it was her

one true great love. But ... today Angie was so cross, so fed up with
everybody and everything, she would probably cheer if a wave of
fire swept over the cliff and engulfed the Palace and all its guests.
A sweltering summers day, January 1914: the charismatic and
ruthless Adam Fox throws a lavish birthday party for his son and
heir at his elegant clifftop hotel in the Blue Mountains. Everyone is
invited except Angie, the girl from the cottage next door. The day
will end in tragedy, a punishment for a familys secrets and lies.
In 2013, Foxs granddaughter, Lisa, seeks the truth about the past.
Who is this Angie her mother speaks of: the girl who broke all our
hearts? Why do locals call Foxs hotel the palace of tears? Behind
the grandeur and glamour of its famous guests and glittering
parties, Lisa discovers a hidden history of passion and revenge,
loyalty and love.
A grand piano burns in the night, a sance promises death
or forgiveness, a fire rages in a snowstorm, a painters final
masterpiece inspires betrayal, a child is given away. With twist
upon twist, this lush, strange mystery withholds its shocking
truth to the very end.

Cover design: Kirby Armstrong

Cover photograph: Ilina Simeonova/Trevillion Images

FICTION

Spine 39.93

P L E A S E TA K E C A R E W I T H T R I M L I N E O N R I G H T H A N D S I D E

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organisations, places and incidents

eitherare a product of the authors imagination or are used fictitiously, and any
resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

First published in 2015

Copyright Julian Leatherdale 2015
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any
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tobe photocopied by any educational institution for its educational purposes
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a remuneration notice to Copyright Agency Limited (CAL) under the Act.
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ISBN 978 1 76011 160 1
Photograph page i: Hydro Majestic Hotel, New South Wales, c. 1938
Internal design by Kirby Armstrong
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Chapter 1
Angie
Meadow Springs, January 1914

The promise of fire was in the air that morning.

Crouching inside the hedge, Angie could feel it in the dry,
oven heat that pressed against the skin of her face. She could
feel it in the beads of perspiration that bubbled on her forehead
and the bracelets of moisture clamped around her wrists. She
could hear it in the gushing of the hot, violent wind high in
the branches of the gum trees overhead.
Later, what she would remember most clearly was the
shimmer down in the valley. Beyond the cottage garden and
the cliff, she could see the familiar haze that hung over thegum
forest and farmland. But the view from the garden had altered:
behind its smoke-blue veil, the valley now rippled and flashed.
An ancient seabed millions of years ago, it seemed to be flooded
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J ulian L eathe r dale

again with a bowl of bright silver water. It was an illusion of

course, a trick of the heat and light. How beautiful, thought
Angie. Beautiful but frightening. For on a day like this, she
knew, amirage was another portent of fire.
Here, inside the giant photinia hedge between the cottage
and the hotel was Angies favourite hiding place. It had been
this way since she was small, her secret cave of coolness and
red-green dappled light from which she could watch the world
come and go. She shared this secret with no one. Except Robbie.
She shared everything with Robbie.
Angie was much taller now and had to squat low in the bed
of leaf mulch underfoot, making sure to hitch up the hem of
her expensive linen dress. How Freya would howl if she soiled
that! She held her wide-brimmed summer hat in her lap to
make sure it didnt snag on the branches; she would repin it
as soon as she came out of hiding.
Through the glossy leaves, Angie spied on the preparations
next door. There was her father, in his dungarees, wiping the
sweat from his face with his red handkerchief. Freddie and
three of his boys from stores had already pitched a big white
marquee on the lawn and were now assembling trestle tables
in its oblong of shade. Meanwhile Mr Carson and his team
of waiters struggled to pin up paper streamers and coloured
balloons, which were torn out of their hands by the hot gusts
of wind roaring over the cliff edge. She laughed to herself
to see poor chubby Benedict, painfully squeezed into his
too-tight tunic and trousers, lose a race with a rogue balloon
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Palace of Tears

that bounced six times across the grass and then soared high
over the valley, free from his beefy clutches.
When would the guests arrive? she wondered as the hedge
shuddered under another onslaught of wind. Overhead,
asulphur-crested cockatoo, blown off course, shrieked indignantly. This wind brought no relief, only blasts of more heat
and clouds of dust and dead leaves.
What a day to hold a party!
The trestle tables were now covered in snowy-white damask,
held down with pewter tablecloth weights in the shape of koalas
and kangaroos. Agold sash festooned each chair. MrCarson
paced back and forth, overseeing his waiters as they painstakingly measured each table setting with their little rulers and
laid out the Palaces best silverware embossed with the hotels
elaborately scrolled P. Mr Hawthorne, the general manager,
emerged from his office to speak briefly with MrCarson before
hurrying away in that brisk, self-important way of his. There
was no sign of Mr Fox. Or of Robbie and his governess.
Angie counted the chairs. Aformal sit-down lunch for eighty
people at noon on one of the hottest days in January. It was
such a Mr Fox thing to do. She looked out to the shimmering
valley again and sniffed the air. Nothing. Shielding her eyes,
she scanned the horizon. Again, nothing. In her eleven years,
Angie had already lived through two bad fire seasons. She knew
the local wisdom: it was only a matter of time before this hotel
on the cliff top would be destroyed by fire. Foxs Folly, they
called it. As if building a luxury hotel in the Australian bush
was not insanity enough, what lunacy had possessed Adam
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J ulian L eathe r dale

Fox to choose this of all places, where, each summer, winds

came rolling out of the valley and drove waves of flame up the
gorges on either side?
Angie loved Mr Foxs magnificent, absurd hotel. In fact, it
was her one true great love. But, to her secret shame, the idea
of a fire, the grand commotion of it, also excited her. And if
she was to be really honest, today Angie was so cross, so fed
up with everybody and everything, she would probably cheer
if a wave of fire swept over the cliff and engulfed the Palace
and all its guests.
A trickle of sweat ran from her hairline down past her ear
and under the lacy edge of her collar. This wretched heat made
her itch and squirm but it was not the reason for her temper
that morning.
No, that was something else entirely.
She was furious with Robbie. It was a fury unlike anything
she had ever felt, aknot of anger that had lodged in her chest
and would not let her breathe freely. It pressed its fingers
against her temples, making them throb and ache. The fact was
that her so-called closest friend had invited nearly everyone
in Meadow Springs to his thirteenth birthday party. Everyone,
that is, except Angie. She was humiliated. And deeply hurt.
Weak. Just like his father, said Freya when she found out.
Her mothers outrage at Angies public snubbing only made
her feel worse. Her mother had a gift for making anything
that upset Angie into a drama about Freya.
At first Freya had insisted it was a mistake. Maybe the
invitation had been lost or overlooked. She asked her husband
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Palace of Tears

Freddie, the hotels storeman, to make discreet inquiries with

the head housekeeper. Mrs Wells usually handled such matters.
No invitation, came the reply. It seemed that all the staff and
their families had been asked to attend. Except Angie and her
mother. Poor Freddie stammered when he delivered the news
to his wife and quickly made an excuse to withdraw to his
storage sheds on the other side of the hedge.
When it was clear that morning that no invitation was
forthcoming, Freya had stormed about the cottage in one
of her worst rages in memory. At such times, she reminded
Angie of an avenging angel, her uncombed copper hair like
a fiery halo about her pale face, her clenched fists raised as if
to smite those who had offended her with lightning bolts of
wrath. Angie knew better than to say anything; that would
only stoke her mothers self-righteous anger.
The nerve! cried Freya, still in her nightgown, as she
paced the cottage veranda. The salmon-pink battlements and
slate-grey dome of the Palace next door could be glimpsed
through the trees, above the green barrier of the garden hedge.
Who do they think they are? Jumped-up pedlars! We were
here first. This is our valley. Ours. And they have the nerve to
come and build their ridiculous castle here and carry on like
lords of the manor! How dare they!
Angie had heard this speech or versions of it many
times before. She sincerely hoped that her mothers shouting
was being drowned out by the noisy wind in the gums.
Freya paused for a moment then charged off into her
daughters bedroom, and returned holding Angies linen
7

J ulian L eathe r dale

summer dress with its high, ribbed collar and embroidered

skirt. Getdressed. You are going to Robbies party.
But . . . The word escaped her mouth before she could
stop herself.
But nothing! shouted Freya. You have as much right to be
there as anyone. You are his oldest friend. And the brightest
and prettiest of these cow-faced mdchen! Why wouldnt he
want you there? Iwill not let that woman she spat the word
out humiliate us like this. Iwill not!
That woman was Adelina, Adam Foxs wife. The White
Witch, Freya called her, much to Angies shocked delight.
Awoman of mystery, adistant and threatening figure. Stories
about the Foxes circulated freely in Meadow Springs, which was
hardly surprising given they were the richest family in the Blue
Mountains and their hotel one of the most famous landmarks
on the eastern seaboard. Angie had heard these stories many
times throughout her childhood but still did not know which
were to be believed and which were the stuff of gossip.
Adam was the only son of Patrick Fox, Irish immigrant
and fortune-seeker whose top-hat shop in the goldfields of
Bendigo had led to a string of drapery stores in Melbourne.
Adam took over running the family business at age twenty
and guided it through the stormy seas of the 1890s depression.
Even more ambitious than his father, Adam then sank his
entire inheritance into a one-off venture in 1895: a palatial
emporium, modelled on the grand Galeries Lafayette fashion
store in Paris. It occupied a whole block in central Sydney
and boasted chandeliers, marbled bathrooms and the citys
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Palace of Tears

first electric escalator. Apopular expression for someone with

overweening confidence became youve got more front than
Foxs. With a flair for self-promotion, Adam emblazoned
mr fox has everything you need on coaches, billboards,
awnings and even a giant hot-air balloon tethered in Hyde Park.
When the balloon came adrift in a high wind and wrapped
itself around the flagpole of the department store of his major
competitor, Fox lit an extra candle of thanks to the Holy Virgin
in St Marys. Blessed by higher powers or not, his store was
a gamble that paid off handsomely as Adam Foxs became a
household name.
Everyone knew that his delicate young wife came from
arich, well-established Melbourne family. Rumour had it that
her father, also a baron of commerce, only accepted Adams
proposal of marriage when Old Man Fox sweetened the marital
contract with a favourable secret commercial one. As it turned
out, the marriage was an excellent investment in its own
right. When Adelina inherited her fathers fortune four years
later, Adam used it to build his great folly in 1900: the Palace.
Despite the naysayers, the Palace proved a resounding financial
success over the next ten years and Adam continued to expand
and refurbish the hotel using loans secured against his wifes
substantial fortune.
It was well known that Adelina, as pale and fragile as antique
porcelain, had managed to bear Adam a son thirteen years ago
before lapsing into a state of near chronic convalescence.
Shewas rarely seen in public usually shrouded in white and
seated in a bath chair and when the family visited the
9

J ulian L eathe r dale

mountains in the summer she spent most of her time secluded

at the Foxes private house in Meadow Springs. It was said that
she struggled with deep melancholia after the birth of Robbie
and that, in her weakened state of mind, she had become
convinced her husband had married her only for her money
and accused him of cruelty and disloyalty. Her one consolation
was her son, whom she smothered with an overbearing,
suffocating love. In her bedridden absence, it was the young
governess, Miss Blunt, who became her eyes and ears, charged
with vigilance over Robbies welfare every moment of his day.
Adelinas ongoing illness distressed Fox. Not just as a
loving husband, so the local gossips insisted, but also as an
entrepreneur. Foxs hotel was founded on the reputation of its
hydropathic spa, modelled on the famous health retreats of
Europe. Here, guests paid handsome fees to take the healing
waters from the local spring (actually imported in steel drums
from Baden-Baden in Germany) and a remarkable variety
of water cures under the care of a specialist doctor. These
expensive health regimes even included the latest fad of sun
baths, whereby ladies and gents were persuaded to lie naked
in shallow sand pits, segregated from each other and protected
from public view by screens, to be healed by the purifying rays
of the sun. While Fox genuinely hoped for his wifes recovery
for her own sake, the failure of the Palaces spa to find her a
permanent cure was a persistent source of embarrassment.
Whatever the truth of these stories, one thing became
increasingly clear to Angie as she got older. The White Witch
did not approve of the girl from the cottage as a playmate for
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Palace of Tears

her son. There was little doubt it was Adelina who had made
sure Angie was not invited to Robbies thirteenth birthday party.
This was a new and disturbing development. Despite her
tearful pleading and threats, Adelina had failed for seven years
to stop Robbie from seeking out Angies company during his
summer vacations. With a flick of sandy blond hair hanging
over restless brown eyes and an impish grin in a sharp-chinned,
freckled face, Robbie Fox was a portrait in miniature of his
father. He also had his fathers air of reckless Irish charm. He
had found so many artful ways to manipulate and lie to his
mother and governess that it made Angie think he would do
a fine job of running his fathers business one day.
Angie did not love Robbie Fox. That was ridiculous. He was
just the skinny boy from next door who filled her summer
holidays with adventures and pranks and games. He was the
bush naturalist who caught yabbies and frogs from the creek
and kept them in a glass tank in the garages. Who organised
sports for the children of hotel guests skittles and hoop races
and leapfrog and was always the captain at cricket. Who fell
off the roof of the machinery shed trying to retrieve a cricket
ball and sliced open his knee on the iron sheeting. Who got a
belting from his father for the joke he played on Chef Muntz
with a blue-tongue lizard, almost giving the poor man a seizure.
He was just Robbie. But she planned to marry him anyway.
And forgive him for not inviting her to his party.
The canvas of the marquee flapped loudly with yet another
gust of wind. Mr Carson and his waiters were now trimming
the elaborate flower arrangements on each table: baskets of
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J ulian L eathe r dale

white and red blossoms tied with silk ribbon. Nearby, bottles
of champagne chilled in steel buckets and rows of crystal
flutes glinted in the sunlight. A band were setting up near
the marquee and spent as much time swatting away flies and
rescuing windblown sheet music as they did tuning their
instruments.
You cannot be serious?
Angie laughed out loud and clapped her hands at what now
appeared on the terrace. Mr Fox had ordered an ice-carving of
the number 13, flanked by translucent statues of an emu and
kangaroo in imitation of the national coat-of-arms. She watched
Freddie anxiously ushering his boys as they bore the heavy
carving down the stairs and across the lawn into themarquee.
Its glassy surface caught every surrounding detail, twisting
them into ribbons of colour like the insides of marbles. The heat
would gnaw this comical sculpture into a puddle in no time.
What a show-off!
The ringmaster. That was Freyas nickname for Adam Fox
when she was feeling uncharitable, describing the hotel as his
big top and the guests as his menagerie. Fox certainly had
something of P.T. Barnums aptitude for publicity and shared
his predilection for the bizarre and novel. Apart from his
business trips to Europe and the United States, Fox loved to
travel for adventure and sent home crates of curiosities from
Siam, Malaya, the Dutch East Indies, Japan, British East Africa
and Madagascar which filled the cabinets and crowded the
walls in his hotel.
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Palace of Tears

Strangest of all was Foxs prize purchase last year from a

crew of Arab fishermen in Libya. Come see the real mermaid
trumpeted the advertisement in the local papers. Angies father
was responsible for unpacking the seven-foot-long corpse, dyed
mahogany brown from being pickled in a tank of formaldehyde
on the boat out from Africa. Laid out on a bed of wood shavings
in the shed at the back of the Palace garages, this mythic
monster attracted huge crowds. Freddie gave Angie a quick
private viewing before the doors were opened to the public.
Angie recoiled at the sight of the bare-breasted mermaid with
her hollow eyes, flaccid flesh and sliced-open belly. She had
been gutted like a fish, with her spinal column placed alongside
her in the manner of a scientific specimen. A sob rose in
Angies throat. Whether this magnificent creature was real or
not, there was no denying the pathos of this tawdry display.
The ringmaster, the showman, the impresario, Adam
Fox also liked to collect people. The Palace soon became a
mandatory destination for famous and wealthy foreigners on
the Australian leg of their world tours as well as a mecca for
a clique of home-grown celebrities. Foxs Folly was the place
to see and be seen. From her hole in the hedge that separated
her familys cottage and the hotel grounds, Angie had spent
hours of her childhood admiring this fantasy world of wealth
and sophistication. It held an overwhelming fascination for the
young girl and filled her with a compelling, almost dizzying
sense of entitlement.
From her hiding place among the leaves, she loved to spy
on the guests as they arrived in coaches and cars or took the
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J ulian L eathe r dale

short walk from Meadow Springs railway station over the road,
always with that same look of gawping wonder at the sight of
the Palace. Swathed in heavy jackets and travelling cloaks, they
crunched their way up the gravel driveway, accompanied by
the porters trolleys of valises and steamer trunks.
On hot summer afternoons, she watched the ladies in their
puffy white dresses and enormous gauzy hats playing croquet
on the front lawn to the tuneful clack of the wooden balls.
Their husbands, meanwhile, lounged on the terrace smoking
cigars or took the waters in the pool outside DrLiebermeisters
clinic. On crisp autumn mornings she smiled to see the excited
honeymooners climbing into the hotels natty Panhard et
Levassor motor with a hamper to go on a daytrip to the limestone wonderland of the Jenolan Caves further west. In the
winter evenings, when snow fell like icing sugar sifted over
the wedding-cake frosted hotel, snatches of music and laughter
drifted towards the cottage and Angie kept vigil at her bedroom
window on the distant lights visible through the trees.
Sure, her father, Freddie, was the king of his domain in
the hotels sheds and vast cellars where all the machinery and
supplies were stored. He loved it when his daughter visited him
at work and he would show her the latest barrels of German
beer stacked in the dark or the new American lawnmower he
had just unpacked from its casing. But she yearned for more.
She yearned to enter the forbidden realm of the hotel itself.
It was Robbie who knew every secret corner and passageway
of the Palace so intimately that he and Angie could creep about
undetected by Hawthorne or Wells though of course half
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Palace of Tears

the thrill was the danger of almost being found out. It was
Robbie who had discovered the perfect hiding places for them
both behind the marble statuary in the gallery or the huge
leather Chesterfield in the billiard room. How Angie treasured
the memories of those secret excursions. They afforded her
even more confidential glimpses of this other worlds plush,
glittering life.
Most unforgettable and coveted of all was the night of the
Coronation Ball held in honour of King George Vs ascension to
the throne. It was the year Angie turned seven. Squeezed in next
to Robbie in the storage area behind the main stage beneath
the frescoed dome of the casino ballroom, Angie watched
spellbound as the hotels palm court orchestra playedwaltzes
and mazurkas, a storm of music only inches from her face.
At this distance, she could even read the polished plaque
screwed to the glossy black haunch of the Bechstein grand:
In gratitude to the Palace staff Baroness Bertha Krupp von
Bohlen und Halbach, December 1908. The brief visit of the
German armaments heiress one of the richest women in
theworld had made quite an impression in Meadow Springs.
The casino was garlanded with bunting and flags and all
manner of patriotic paraphernalia for the occasion of the
Coronation Ball, including a large triumphal oil painting of
theRelief of Mafeking. The gold and blue dome echoed with the
cacophony of swooning violins, squeaking shoes, the tinkling
peals of female merriment and trumpet blasts of male laughter.
For months afterwards Angies feverish dreams were inhabited by beautiful, poised women in silk chiffon gowns orange,
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J ulian L eathe r dale

cerise and jade whirling in the arms of bright-eyed, cleanshaven men, their lustrous black hair matching their spotless
black swallow-tail coats, all under the brilliance of the casinos
three-tiered crystal chandelier.
There was only one way she could gain the keys to this
fairytale kingdom. She would have to make Robbie fall in love
with her and propose marriage. Was it wrong for her to want
to marry Robbie out of love for his familys hotel? It was not a
cruel plan. She had every intention of making him happy. There
were worse reasons for a marriage. Just look at Robbies parents.
A wasp hovered menacingly in front of her face before
being blown out of sight. She stretched out her left leg to ease
a cramp in her calf muscle. When was this ridiculous party
going to start? Her plan was to slip through the hedge when
the festivities began and mingle with the guests before they
were seated for lunch. It was possible the White Witch would
make one of her rare public appearances as a special effort for
her son. Nobody will challenge you, promised Freya, Iknow
the Foxes and the last thing they can stand is a scene. Carson
will be made to fetch you a chair and set you another place at
the table. Youll see.
It was almost certain that Adelina had guessed Angies
intentions. The White Witch knew she must strike now before
Angies power over her son grew any stronger. Did Mr Fox
know too? He was aware of Angelas existence, of course, but
in all the years she had played with Robbie, Angela doubted if
Mr Fox had looked at her more than once or twice and even
then without close attention. Children were to be seen and not
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Palace of Tears

heard in his book. A quick glance and a nod were the only
acknowledgement she had ever received as far as she could
remember.
Angela knew how much Mr Fox respected her father,
Freddie, who had been head storeman from the day the hotel
opened. His attitude to Freya was more mysterious. From the
first, so the stories went, Mr Fox had taken a keen interest in her
talent as a painter. He had even bought one of her landscapes
for his picture collection in the gallery and commissioned a
mural of plump auburn-haired mermaids like the sea maidens
in Mr Arnold Bcklins paintings for the lobby of the spa.
For a while Freya taught watercolour classes on the terrace to
artistically inclined female guests. Mr Fox would drop by her
studio to admire a work in progress. But that all stopped years
ago and Freya had not had a good word to say about Mr Fox
or his wife since.
Angie hoped her mother would not come into the garden
to make sure she had joined the party and find her still hiding
here in the hedge. She was considering abandoning the plan
altogether when she spotted Robbie sauntering across the lawn
with his latest toy: ahunters shooting stick, complete with a
single-legged fold-up stool. He had been promised his first
kangaroo hunt this autumn. Spoilt little rich boy, not a care in
the world! The thought spilled out of her, unchecked.
Today she was angry with Robbie, and not just because he
had not stood up to his mother about the birthday party. It
was because this was the final proof that this summer he had
changed. It had started with an unusual awkwardness the last
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J ulian L eathe r dale

time they had spoken, with Robbie fidgeting and avoiding her
eyes the whole time. It continued with him finding any excuse
to avoid her when he came to the hotel, which he did less and
less, and ended with him deliberately ignoring her whistles
and calls from the hedge and ducking away inside whenever
she appeared.
What had changed?
It was not something she could ask her mother; over time
Angie had come to realise how much Freyas view of the world
diverged from reality. Angie also suspected her mothers praise
of her cleverness and beauty had given her false hope. She loved
and hated her mother for that. Certainly Freyas strangeness
was well known. It was the reason the hotel staff took pity on
her and Freddie. It was the reason Robbie rarely came to the
cottage, even though he knew what it was like to have a mother
everyone thought was mad. Her family was not normal, there
was no doubt about that. Apart from Freyas regular outbursts of
anger there were also her parents frequent unexplained silences,
their furtive glances, their covert and pained expressions of
guilt. Angie noted them all. Urgent whispered conversations
at night were impossible to understand though she strained
to hear the muffled words through the bedroom wall. What
were they hiding? For as long as Angie could remember, the
atmosphere in the cottage was thick with secrets and her mother
was the keeper of them all.
So Angie had to work out lifes puzzles all by herself and
come up with answers different from Freyas. What she had
started to understand was that Robbies friendship with Angie
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Palace of Tears

had been tolerated when he was a naughty little boy, but

Robbie was now a young man, the only son of a respected
businessman and lone heir to the Fox fortune. The innocent
days of childhood were dwindling fast. No doubt Adelina had
insisted that this childish friendship be brought to a natural
end before more complicated adult feelings surfaced.
What hurt Angie most of all was how Robbie seemed to
take this all in his stride. Maybe he understood the rules better
than she did. Maybe he had always known their friendship
was just another childhood toy to be put on the shelf when the
time came. She had told herself she would never love Robbie,
so why did this knowledge hurt her so much? It was partly
because she felt so foolish for thinking she could ever have
made him her husband. She was the daughter of the humble
storeman and the crazy painter in the cottage. Girls like Angie
Wood did not become Mrs Fox.
Hey, you! Look what Ive got!
Angie stepped out onto the lawn and shouted, staring
defiantly at Robbie as he ambled towards her, swinging his
stick in lazy circles like a childs hoop. Startled for a moment,
he came to a halt several yards from the hedge. With a flick
ofhis hair, he looked back quickly over his shoulder to make
sure his governess was not watching. But it seemed Miss Blunt
was distracted today, possibly by her recently discovered interest
in Mr de Witte, the new front office manager.
Robbie did not meet Angies stare. It was what she was
holding in her hand that caught his attention. Just as Angie
had intended.
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J ulian L eathe r dale

Her mothers anger on her behalf had given Angie the

courage and the excuse to defy the White Witch for now
and make an appearance at todays party. In fact, Angie had
decided to go one step further. As she studied her own reflection
in the bedroom mirror while her mother brushed and plaited
her long black hair and buttoned her into her white linen
dress, Angie knew what she must do. She feared she had only
one more chance to win back Robbies interest. He needed an
irresistible reason to defy his parents.
When did you get that? asked Robbie. His eyes glistened
and colour flushed his cheeks. He looked over his shoulder
again and jabbed the sharp end of the shooting stick into the
lawn, where it remained upright. Angie laughed and waggled
the small object in her hand invitingly. She was teasing him.
Robbie took a step forward like a sleepwalker. He licked his
lips nervously.
Its your birthday present, Robbie Fox, she said. From me.
Even though you couldnt be bothered to invite me to your party.
Im sorry, Angie. Ididnt ... Icouldnt ... His eyes flicked
to hers for a moment and she thought she could detect a spark
of real regret there. Or maybe it was just the hot, dry wind
making Robbies eyes water. He took another step towards her.
Like to take a look?
There was no doubt that Robbie very much wanted to take
a look. The object in her hand was a secret that she and Robbie
had discovered months ago. While Robbie had been the guide
to adventures on the other side of the cottage hedge, she had
repaid this debt with an adventure of her own. Treasures of a
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Palace of Tears

different kind were to be found on her side of the hedge: inside

her mothers studio.
One day last spring, Freya had left the studio unlocked by
accident when she went off on one of her sketching trips into the
bush, and Angie had trespassed into this inner sanctum with
her fellow adventurer. There, amid the chaos of half-finished
canvases, dried-out paint tubes and jars of cloudy turpentine,
they found Freyas collection of erotic French postcards.
They had both laughed at the photographs of nude women
posing theatrically in exotic, usually oriental, settings. But Angie
heard the quickening of Robbies breath, saw how his fingers
trembled a little as he held them. These cards excited him.
Today she held one of the postcards in her hand: acurvaceous,
broad-hipped, snake charmer wearing nothing but a necklace
at her throat and bangles at her wrists.
Robbie took another glimpse over his shoulder towards the
marquee and hotel. Without a word, he lunged towards his
childhood friend.
She was ready for him and retreated a few feet to maintain
the distance between them. Oh, no you dont, Robert Fox.
Youll have to catch me first.
Robbies face, stuck in a kind of blissful torment and confusion, relaxed a little. He smiled. This was a game. Just like when
they were children but also very different. Alright then.
Angie had always been the faster runner. Her legs were
longer for a start. And Robbie suffered from asthma so he
could only manage short bursts before struggling for breath.
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J ulian L eathe r dale

Hitching her linen skirt to her knees, Angie turned and bolted
down the stone steps from the hotel lawn to the lower terrace.
Out of the protection of the hedge, she could feel the full
force of the wind, gusts slapping her face and clawing at her
dress and hat. Robbie sweated in his dark morning coat and
blue necktie, the perfect little gent; this birthday party marked
his passage to adulthood, his parents were making no secret
of that. His mouse-grey homburg was snatched off his head
by the wind and bowled across the terrace, coming to rest
against the stone balustrade. He let it go as he chased Angie
down the second flight of steps to the cliff track below.
Angie hesitated for a moment at the bottom of the grassy
slope that led to the cliff top. Which way should she go?
The valley shimmered brightly before her. To her left was
Sunbath Road, leading to the hotels flying fox, asteel pulley
and overhead cable that hauled fresh produce up the cliff face
three times a day from Mr Foxs farm in the valley. To her right
was the cliff-top bush track to Sensation Point. She turned right.
Later Angie would agonise over that single moment: how her
whole life might have been different if she had chosen the other
path. Or had destiny already decided how this day would end?
Fine dust was kicked up by her shoes as she ran along the
bare, rocky path. To her left was the glorious view of the valley
that tourists flocked from far and wide to see: grey-green
forested ridges, sheer cliff faces, banded and mottled in orange,
yellow and purple-grey, all filtered through a smoke-blue haze.
When she was younger these fissured precipices made Angie
think of ancient ruins, fashioned by long-dead giants out of
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Palace of Tears

massive, crudely cut blocks. Now scarred and weathered, these

blocks were tumbling slowly back into the quarry from which
they had once been dragged.
When the creaking of branches and thrashing of leaves in
the canopy overhead quietened for a moment, she could hear
Robbie scrambling along the track behind her. She glanced
back to see him making his way around the silver-white pylon
of a Blue Mountains ash, tripping over its ragged skirt of bark.
His black trousers and morning coat were covered in a film
of chalky dust and his face was glossy with sweat. She could
hear him beginning to wheeze.
Come on, Angie! Please!
For one fleeting instant, she pitied him. But then she
remembered how easily he had let go of their friendship, their
seven years of secrets and memories. Why had he betrayed her
like that? What prizes had Mr and Mrs Fox dangled in front
of Robbie to make him forget her? What picture of misery had
they painted for him if he chose her for his future? Or was it
his own feelings he was most afraid of?
She let Robbie catch his breath a little and then she took
off again. Dodging under a sandstone overhang as she came
around the next bend in the track, she saw Sensation Point less
than a hundred yards away. When she could hear nothing but
the sound of the wind in the trees, she wondered, with a brief
twinge of panic, if her pursuer had given up and turned back.
Then she heard Robbie wail miserably, Angie! Angie! Wait!
She knew what she was doing. She wanted to punish him for
his betrayal. But she wanted to forgive him too. To take him in
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J ulian L eathe r dale

her arms and let him discover a new sweetness between them.
The warmth of his chest pressed against hers. Her heart beating
fiercely next to his. The taste of his lips, of her lips on his.
What would that be like?
She leaned against the warm wall of the cliff face and
waited. Aparrots call tinkled bell-like above her in the fork
of a gum tree. They would have their first romantic kiss here,
at Sensation Point. The valley she loved so well would be the
silent witness to their vows of love. It was her valley and her
mothers valley and her grandfathers long before the Foxes
came. It had a hypnotic power that had captured Mr Foxs
soul and emboldened him to gamble against all the odds on
an absurd dream. And the valley had repaid his daring a
thousandfold. Maybe it would do the same for her.
Robbie saw her as he came round the corner, stooping so as
not to bang his head on the overhang. He slowed now, realising
that Angie was waiting for him. There was even a trace of his
usual carefree, arrogant saunter as he came closer. As if he
had chosen to have a stroll in the bush rather than engage in
a desperate pursuit. His outfit was caked in dust, his hair and
face damp with sweat. He wheezed a little but did not seem
to be in any distress.
She smiled at him. But he was not smiling back.
Where is it? His eyes blazed and there was a definite note
of urgency in his voice, maybe even anger. This was not the
way the game was meant to be played, thought Angie. Or was
it? The intensity of Robbies gaze alarmed her.
Robbie ... ?
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Palace of Tears

She was trying to read the mood in his dark brown eyes,
but the meaning of his gaze eluded her. She could hear her
own voice pleading with him. It was not meant to sound like
an apology, more a surrendering, a softening, inviting him
closer. She hoped he would understand.
I said where is it?! Robbie was definitely angry now.
Angie let the postcard she had hidden up her sleeve slide
into her hand.
He lunged at her and grabbed her wrist roughly.
Robbie, please dont ...
Give it to me.
His voice was demanding, petulant. Angie felt her resentment rise like a surge of blood behind her eyes. Robbies face
was close to hers. She could see the blond downy hair on his
upper lip, the lushness of his long lashes, the pink moisture of
his mouth. He had grown into a handsome man like his father.
Leaning against him, she pressed her mouth against his
and realised with a shock that she was the one who desired,
who yearned, who loved. Robbie was only interested in the girl
on the postcard. Not her. In that instant she saw a different
Robbie, atricky, lying, impatient Robbie who, like his father,
got everything he wanted no matter what it took.
What happened next was hard for her to recall.
Did she push him away? She was not sure. She felt the card
fall from her hand, felt his fingers reaching for it. Then they
were both buffeted by a blast of hot air. The giant tree behind
them groaned like the mast of a ship in a high gale, its branches
grinding against each other in agony.
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J ulian L eathe r dale

Robbie turned away from her in time to see the postcard

flicked by the wind over his head. He did a strange little twist
and leap, trying to catch it, and landed awkwardly, jamming
his foot against the thick root of the gum tree.
And then he fell.
Angie? His first cry was a confused question, rising shrilly
to pure terror. Angie!
She watched his body tumble over the tree root and pitch
forward through a gap in the scrub on the other side of the
path. His foot dislodged a clod of earth that rolled away into
the void. The struggle was brief. Robbies arms flailed wildly,
searching in vain for a firm handhold. She heard a soft grunt
as he crashed through a wattle bush on the cliff edge. And
then he was gone.
Angie heard her own scream and the shrieks of a flock of
startled cockatoos as if in response. Below, the valley rippled
like the waves of a cruel ocean that had swallowed up the only
son and heir of Mr Adam Fox.

26

Julian Leatherdales first love was theatre. On graduation,

he wrote lyrics for four satirical cabarets and a two-act
musical. He discovered a passion for popular history
as a staff writer, researcher and photo editor for TimeLifes Australians At War series. He later researched
and co-wrote two Film AustraliaABC documentaries
Return to Sandakan and The Forgotten Force and was
an image researcher at the State Library of New South
Wales. He was the public relations manager for a hotel
school in the Blue Mountains, where he lives with his
wife and two children. Palace of Tears is his first novel.