Wellstead - 10. WSD Chapter 10

Chapter 10

I woke up in the middle of the night and immediately vomited. My head pounded with pain each time I threw up. Reaching for my phone I speed dialled Kyle.

“Help, I am…”

I threw up again all over the bed and on the floor. Within moments Kyle raced into the room and switched on the main light, revealing the mess all over the room. Looking at me he grabbed my phone and called for an ambulance.

Once he had done that he carefully helped me get up and removed my soiled pyjamas, before giving me a towel down to remove any vomit that had soaked through the clothes. Totally ignoring my nakedness, he fetched a fresh set of pyjamas and helped me into them. Then carefully picking me up, he carried me into the small lounge where he placed me on the couch. He covered me with a blanket to keep me warm. He then went back to the bedroom to deal with all the soiled clothes and bedding, and to clean the floor.

I woke up later that same morning in a hospital bed, and Kyle was sitting in a chair nearby half dozing. When he saw me awake he jumped up and smiled. “Hey, Boss. Good to see you awake. The doctor said you have a very bad concussion, and you are to stay in hospital for two days.

I rang Mr Hills this morning, so he knows where you are. Aunt Anne and Quinn are very worried about you, but are staying home at my recommendation. They may come by later in the day, after they have gone to gather some of Quinn’s belongings, as he is moving into the spare bedroom in the cottage,” Kyle said as he poured a small cup of water and helped me to sit up so I could take a drink.

“Did I imagine it or did you see me naked last night?” I said in a serious tone. Suddenly Kyle went into a deep blush and I couldn’t help but laugh, which hurt, so I had to force myself to stop laughing. “Its O.K., Mate. I know you were just doing your job looking after me. Thank you for what you did for me last night. You are a very dedicated young butler,” I added to stop him being embarrassed any more than he already was.

“Tell me, Kyle, when you finished high school what was it that you wanted to do, if the circumstances had been different?” I asked him seriously. “Well, I was an A level student in most subjects. I enjoyed science and maths the most, and I wanted to be either a marine biologist or veterinarian or both,” Kyle replied nervously.

Near the end of the 2nd day when I was finally released from hospital, Kyle helped me into the house after the drive from the hospital, and made sure I was seated comfortably in the drawing room, wrapped in a blanket and with a number of books close at hand.

For the next few days Kyle kept a very close eye on me, even staying in the bedroom next to mine in case he was needed by me quickly. Mrs Parkes had now insisted on me calling her by her first name, Anne, which took a bit of getting used to. She alerted me to two phone messages which she took while I was confined to the couch.

One message was from Mr Hills informing me that the boy’s mother had her charges upgraded to aggravated assault causing injury. She pleaded guilty to the charge, was fined $6000, put on a good behaviour bond for three years, and banned from making contact with either of her two sons for three years.

The second message was a bit unexpected. It was from Elspeth Wellstead, informing me that she and her son, Lloyd, were immigrating to Australia, and requested assistance with finding a home for them, preferably close to where I lived. There was a phone number with that message and so retrieving my mobile I dialled the number on the message.

“G’day, Elspeth. I received your message. You and Lloyd are most welcome to stay with me till you are settled. I have plenty of room at my place for both of you,” I said as soon as she answered the phone.

“Oh, my dear boy, thank you so much for this. We will be forever grateful for your help, as my husband has managed to track me down twice, and we are both very concerned for our safety. We are in London at the moment. I hope it will be impossible for him to find us here,” Elspeth said with a concerned voice.

“Let me handle everything at this end. Just have your passports and visas ready, and I will sort out the plane tickets for you both to Australia. Travel with as little as you can so it will be harder for him to find you,” I said to her and we chatted for a bit longer before ending the call. After a few minutes of thinking I dialled another number. This one I knew off by heart.

“Hello. This is a message for Judge Samuel Andrews. It’s not urgent. Just ask him to return my call as soon as possible please. This is Grant Wellstead speaking… yes that is right. Thank you for your assistance,” I said and ended the call.

About twenty minutes later I received a text message: ‘Received your message. Will call you in about two hours, S.A.’

I smiled and put the phone down and went back to reading. When the phone rang it was almost three hours later.

“Sorry about the delay. It’s been a very rough day at work. Now, how can I help you?” the Judge said when I answered the call.

“As I said, it wasn’t very urgent. My aunt and cousin are trying to get away from a violent ex-husband and father in Scotland. He has found them a number of times, and they are now in hiding in London. They are asking me to help them to come to Australia. I was wanting some advice on what to do,” I said feeling a bit worried after openly talking about it for the first time.

“Well, young man, we can get them an emergency visa because of the safety from violence issue. That would last for 6 months, and in that time, they will need to apply for permanent residency visas. I will make a few phone calls and see if we can issue emergency passports with different names, to stop him tracking them travelling overseas to Australia. So, leave it with me for a few days, O.K.? I will get Frank to do most of the ground work, and I will authorise anything that needs it,” the judge said.

I was relieved to have such good friends who were able to support me with difficult issues. I rested for the remainder of the day knowing the issue was in good hands. The following day I was able to get to walk around a bit more, as I was not getting any headaches, and I was getting tired of being confined to the house all the time.

Sitting on the back veranda, I could see Quinn was keeping busy with weeding the vegetable patch, and patching up holes in the netting which protects the fruit trees from birds. When Kyle came out with a cup of tea for me, I stopped him.

“Make sure you keep track of what hours Quinn does when working here. I want him to be paid for what work he does,” I said to Kyle, who nodded that he understood and returned inside.

After about half an hour of watching Quinn working I went inside and grabbed a glass of cold lemonade with ice, and I took it out to Quinn.

“It’s quite exhausting just watching you at work, my young friend,” I said as I handed him the drink. Quinn laughed and gulped down the whole contents of the glass, before handing it back to me with a big grin and returned to work.

The following day at breakfast in the kitchen, I said, “I think it’s time for some fun. Us three are going for a drive to do some relaxation and hanging out,” I announced which surprised them all. “Anne, can you make up a basket for our lunch and snacks please?” I asked Anne before finishing my breakfast and going into the office to make a phone call.

After calling Frank to find out the progress of my request from yesterday, I returned to the kitchen, to find Anne doing the finishing touches to the basket. There was no sign of the boys. A few moments later there was the sound of a car horn from outside, and I went out the back door to find the EK Ute in the driveway with Kyle at the wheel.

For the next 6 hours Kyle, Quinn and I enjoyed a wonderful drive in the country. We checked out a few wineries, saw some tourist sights and checked out a remote beach in the national park. It was good to see the two brothers spending relaxing time together on the beach, after so many years of being separated, and I hoped that this would help to heal the wounds caused by their parents past actions.

Suddenly the thought of my own parents and my younger sister came to mind. Sure I had cried a bit while recovering in hospital, but now with no grandparents alive either, I was feeling very alone for the first time. It was getting too much to deal with and suddenly I was crying uncontrollably. It took some time for Kyle and Quinn to get me to settle down. They bundled me into the Ute and we made our way home. I don’t recall anything of the journey home, only that I was very tired and I wanted to sleep.

Quinn had rung ahead to his Aunt Anne, and she had contacted the doctor, who had arrived and was waiting when we arrived back at the house. I was taken to my room, and the doctor did a basic medical examination, before he gave me a few tablets to swallow, and instructed me to lie down and to rest for as long as I felt the need to. When I woke up next, it was sunny and felt like it was around the middle of the day. Anne walked into my bedroom a few minutes after I woke and asked if was hungry.

“Yes, please Anne. That would be nice. Can you remind me please what happened? I don’t seem to remember much,” I asked her as I tried to remember how I came about being in bed and not remembering getting there. “Yes, I can do that. When you and the boys were enjoying your afternoon at the beach after your picnic lunch, something seems to have triggered a flood of memories. What I think it may have been, was the memories of your parents and sister, and maybe your grandparents also.

This seemed to be too much for your body to take in all at once and you started crying and shaking uncontrollably. The boys tried to calm you down as best as they could before bringing you home. When they rang me to let me know what happened, I called the doctor, and he was here when you arrived. He examined you and gave you a sedative to help you stay calm and to sleep.

The doctor and I came to the same conclusion that you have bottled up your feelings about the loss of your parents and sister so much and when you were with the boys something triggered the release,” Anne explained.

Kyle came in a few moments after Anne left and picked out some clothes for me to wear. He placed them on the lounge chair in the corner of the bedroom and left the room. After a visit to the bath room, I slowly dressed and made my way to the kitchen to eat. It was only then that I noticed that it was nearly 3pm in the afternoon. I sat down in my usual chair, and Kyle served me a cup of tea, while Anne presented me with two rounds of club sandwiches.

Just as I started eating Quinn entered the kitchen to get himself a glass of cold water. “Thank you both for taking care of me when I was not coping with life yesterday or whenever it was,” I said to both of them, and both of them smiled.

“As your staff and friends, it was our pleasure to assist you. We are here to help you whenever you need us,” Quinn said, and Kyle nodded in agreement.

After resting for the remainder of the day, I went to bed early, still feeling very drained of energy from all the dramas of the previous day. When I woke the next day, it was just after 9am, and Kyle had just entered holding a portable hand-held phone.

“It is Mr Hills. He has some news for you about your aunt and cousin in Scotland,” Kyle said handing me the phone before leaving the room. “My dear boy, I hope you are feeling better today. I have managed to arrange everything for Elspeth and Lloyd Wellstead.

Late yesterday their time they arrived at the Australian Consulate in London, where they were handed emergency passports using assumed names for their protection, plus visas to enter Australia, and two 1st class tickets on the late flight from London to Australia, via Singapore, which is due to arrive at 7am tomorrow our time. Kyle will collect them from the airport and bring them directly to your home,” Mr Hills said to me. Pleased, I calmly thanked him for all that he had done and ended the call.

I was looking forward to meeting Elspeth and Lloyd, and I was hoping to be able to spend as much time as possible with them for the next three weeks, till I started my university course. I went online to research what things I could do to show them around and keep them entertained during that time.

Then I thought maybe I should defer attending university until the new year. That way I could take a holiday with my relatives and get to know them better, and after a little bit more thought on the idea that was what my final decision was. While I was in the office researching possible places to go for a holiday, I came across railway journeys through Australia. There were two extended train journeys available.

I thought about somehow linking these and after some more research I was able to put together a nearly around Australia train journey. Starting from Adelaide on a Wednesday, there was a 2 day and 6-hour train journey to Darwin on “The Ghan”, with a 4-hour stopover in Alice Springs and a 3-hour stopover in Katherine. There would be a two-day rest in Darwin before flying to Mt Isa on the Monday morning to board the overnight train at 1.30 in the afternoon, arriving in Townsville just after 10am the next day.

After a 3-day rest in Townsville, we would board the overnight train south just before 2.30pm on Saturday, that left from Cairns earlier in the day. We would arrive in Brisbane just after 1.30pm the next day. With a 2-day rest stop in Brisbane, we would board the train very early Wednesday morning for the full day journey south to Sydney, arriving just after 8pm in the evening.

We would have a 2 ½ day rest stop in Sydney before boarding the Indian Pacific train, just before 3pm on the Saturday afternoon for the 2-day and 6-hour journey to Perth, which included a 2 hour stop in Broken Hill, 3 ½ hour stop in Adelaide, a 1 hour stop in Cooke and a 3 ½ hour stop in Kalgoorlie, before arriving in Perth just after 9am on the Tuesday morning. The whole journey would take three weeks to complete.

Although it was a very long journey, I felt that it would be worthwhile, and we would be able to see a lot of Australia’s outback in different states and territories of Australia. By late afternoon having spent most of the day in the office, stopping only for some lunch in the kitchen, I had managed to put together a rough itinerary of the journey. After some more thought, I had decided to include Anne and the two boys in the journey also, but I wouldn’t announce that till closer to the time.

I telephoned Frank Hills and told him of my plans. He thought it was an excellent idea to just relax with family for a while and have a good look around our big nation. He said he would ensure the funding was available for the journey for me, Elspeth, Lloyd, Anne and the two boys.

After dinner I returned to the office. The first thing I did was send text messages to Danny & Sam Alder, Mick & Toby Kilton and my best mate Julia Crenshaw, to let them know what I was planning, so they would know that I would be away for three weeks. Next, I began to look at possible times for this journey. This would take a bit of coordinating due to the connecting trains, and accommodation required between each train trip.

After a bit of searching, and much to my surprise, I was able to get 1^st class bookings for all 5 train journeys to match up, starting less than a week away. Now I had to just find suitable accommodation in Darwin, Townsville, Brisbane and Sydney.

By 10 pm I had managed to confirm and pay for all the train trips and all the accommodation, for our wonderful holiday starting in just 6 days’ time. I went to bed happy and with a big smile on my face.

The next morning, I woke at 6.30 am and I went out for a walk around the gardens, front and back, and by the time I had returned indoors Anne was in the kitchen cooking breakfast. I could hear Quinn humming down the hall. By the sounds of it he was busy preparing the bedrooms for the two new guests that would be arriving soon, and I guessed that Kyle was at the airport waiting to collect them.

At 8.15am, the Bentley arrived home with the two guests. I made my way to the front door to greet Elspeth and Lloyd, who looked a bit tired from the long journey. They seemed pleased to have arrived. After all the greetings were over, I led them indoors and introduced the three staff members, who took over carrying all the luggage and leading the way to their rooms in the guest wing.

I went into the office to go through the folder that I had put together for the journey, and was reading it when there was a knock on the door. It slowly opened with Lloyd peeping through the gap to see if it was alright to enter. On seeing that it was my cousin I smiled and motioned him to come in. Quickly I closed the folder and placed it in the drawer. No sooner had I closed it when Lloyd was right beside me. He gave me a great big sideways hug.

“Tapadh leat,” (thank you) Lloyd said in Gaelic.

“Se do Bheatha,” (you are welcome) I replied, as I stood up allowing Lloyd to give me a proper hug. “Now, young man, how would you like to spend three whole weeks touring around Australia on a train journey holiday?” I asked Lloyd.

“Wow, that would be cool! Thanks, cousin,” he replied.