Rhythm

by

John Terry Moore
 

CHAPTER 33

The coffin sat forlornly on the chrome-plated carrier; a huge, obviously expensive wreath sat on top, the fern tendrils draped over the sides.  There were candles alight on large timber stands at either end of the alcove; creating an air of solemnity, even though this was a funeral home, not a church.  Annette Wu had always been a gambler and this time she had lost heavily.  A Straits Chinese from Singapore like Stephen, her husband, she had had never really tried to make her marriage work.  Theirs was an arranged marriage, as sure as if they had been Hindu, born in India.  Except in their case, the stakes were even higher; two families, each vying for industrial supremacy in Singapore, deciding to amalgamate the companies through marriage.  Their fathers had decided that it was cheaper, quicker and easier that way; the buyouts and share transfers were already planned and waiting in the wings.  Neither of them had any choice in the matter; all they had to do was to marry, cohabit and have children together. 

There was one proviso Stephen Wu made and Annette eagerly accepted.  If the marriage was to go ahead, then their permanent home would be in Australia.  He wanted the company to set him up with video-conferencing and sophisticated electronic support, and he would commute back to Singapore once a month.  There wasn’t enough room for both he and his father in Singapore anyway, so the deal was agreed to.  They were married in Singapore before he graduated from university, and Annette produced their first child, Elizabeth ten months later.  Exactly one year later, on Elizabeth’s first birthday, Claire was born, continuing the Straits Chinese desire to emulate things English, including children’s names.  Even before Elizabeth was born Stephen knew he had a problem.  Annette was a born gambler.  He accepted that most Chinese people had a gambling streak anyway, but she was way over the top.  In her last week of pregnancy she was at the blackjack tables in the casino; he had to first find her, then bring her home.  All through her pregnancy with Claire she was away from home; Elizabeth was of no concern to her; her ‘friends’ at the casino were more important. 

A week after Claire was born she was back at the casino, and the debts started to add up.  Stephen cancelled her cards and she established her own line of credit through her father’s bank in Singapore.  Desperate, he finally made everyone in the family aware of her problem, and hoped no further money would mean no action.  She had run up debts of A$500,000, and subsequently both families increased the provision for bad debts on the annual balance sheets accordingly.  The warning to Stephen was direct; his wife was his personal responsibility, and another financial lifeline was out of the question. 

Stephen was a desperate man; and it was Andrew Price, his mate and number four man from the Eight who mostly baby-sat the kids, fed them, put them to bed and looked after them whilst he was searching for his wife.  It helped that Andrew worked from home as a website designer.  So successful had that business been that he was able to employ a full-time employee, allowing him time for helping his mate.  His wife, Amanda was not impressed.  After a strenuous day in the fashion industry, “the last thing she needed,” she told Andrew, “was to have two bratty kids hanging around.”  Lance and Angelo also helped out, as did Matthew and Philippe, and Philippe’s parents, Henri and Claudette.  But it was Andrew that Elizabeth and Claire loved.  Denied kids of his own because Amanda simply didn’t want a family, he put a lot into their upbringing whilst he was standing in for their father and mother.  He usually left a meal at home for his wife whilst he cooked for Elizabeth and Claire at their house; their father searching the clubs, bars and gambling dens of Melbourne, bringing her home, only to find her missing again the following day.  Andrew would put the children to bed, tell them a story, and watch them until Stephen brought Annette home.  Stephen tried locking her in; but it was obvious he couldn’t jail his wife legally or morally.  He tried counselling, and attended himself, to try to help her.  But it was to no avail.  He rationed the money, yet she always wanted more and she resorted to shop-lifting to supplement her habit.  He tried to make her feel guilty with the knowledge that she was a hopeless mother.  But she had no shame.  She was addicted to gambling as sure as a drug addict was reliant on heroin. 

Finally, after the court appearances for shoplifting grew so serious and she was threatened with a jail term, she turned to prostitution as a source of income.  Stephen hadn’t seen her for a week when he had the phone call.  There had been an accident; she had been driving a ‘friend’s’ BMW and had run into the rear of a road transport.  The friend survived; Annette lost her life.  Stephen wept; not with sorrow, but with relief.  No one could have tried harder to create a happy home for his little girls.  But he had ended up becoming a sole parent, supported by his old university mates and their families, who had helped raise his kids so far. 

They had all been there for him of course; Adam and Patrick, the remainder of the Eight, Matthew and Philippe; the Dean and all those people who had been so kind and supportive of him.  Yet as he sat with Elizabeth and Claire in the front row, he felt so alone.  His mother was there, helpful but remote.  The service began and the kids were restless.  Further down the chapel, Andrew could see Stephen was in more trouble than he needed to be and he whispered to Amanda that they should move down there to help him with the children.  “I’m not moving now, making a public spectacle of myself just for those little shits, you go if you must,” she hissed.  He tiptoed down the aisle quietly and slipped into the seat, next to the girls.  Their faces lit up and Stephen smiled with relief.  His mate was always there when he needed him; without being asked, and looking for no reward other than his welfare and the happiness of his kids.  He moved closer, Elizabeth sat on his lap and Andrew swept Claire into his arms.  Andrew’s hand found his and one of life’s worst moments was tinged with peace. 

*****

Stephen, aka ‘Charlie Chan’ from his Australian university peer group, had been through a rough year.  His wife died in February and his father suddenly passed away at home in Singapore in September.  He was only sixty-four; a massive heart attack took him out in a millisecond.  Stephen endured several weeks of ‘paying respect’, in the Chinese Buddhist tradition.  The several days of viewing, of having the coffin and his father on public display.  So different to Australia.  His mother, pleased to have something to occupy her mind, was very solicitous with the children.  Their grandparents had always been remote; quite the opposite to most Chinese families, Stephen reflected.  ‘But when was his family ever normal?’ he thought bitterly.  Singapore was such a competitive place; the economic miracle that it was continued on the world stage.  His family were right up there with the movers and the shakers, involved in everything from oil refining to real estate.  Joined at the hip with his late wife’s family, although that arrangement had cooled somewhat because they hadn’t produced a son.  But business was still king.  Long live the king!  Margins were tighter than ever as Bangladeshis, Indians, Indonesians and sleepy Malays swarmed over building sites like ants, driving the economic powerhouse to (literally) greater heights as more skyscrapers joined the skyline on a daily basis.  Obvious wealth was paraded everywhere as evidence of success.  ‘So where had all this wealth taken them?’ Stephen thought.  His father, almost a stranger to him, dead at sixty-four.  His mother, trying to forget the misery, was at last trying to establish some sort of relationship with his children.  He knew that money had done something for him, personally, however.  It allowed him to live in a better place; Australia.  Where there were still the nouveau riche, but at least he had a large group of loving mates, most of them gay!  Most of them in loving partnerships and all of them providing a great atmosphere in which he could bring up his kids.  Because that’s all that mattered now; the girls were his life and he would take the best of Singapore and the best of Australia to give them a balanced upbringing. 

The best of Singapore was of course his Uncle Sin, his father’s elder brother.  He had been a surrogate father to Stephen, recognising at a very early age that they shared a lot in common.  One thing they shared was their ability to disappear when Stephen’s father, Albert, was on one of his angry screaming rampages.  Uncle Sin took him to the serenity of a massage house where, like Uncle Sin, Stephen found he always liked the firm hands of the male masseur best.  It seemed Uncle Sin had been married to Auntie Sylvia for a very long time.  They had two children, Robert and Evelyn, and shortly after Evelyn was born, Uncle Sin moved to another bedroom.  When the children finished university and left home, Uncle Sin, in consultation with Aunt Sylvia, moved his lover into the home.   ‘Uncle’ Harry and Aunt Sylvia were amazingly close; in fact the three of them co-habited quite happily together.  Uncle Sin explained all of this to Stephen who was amazed how close the three of them became, and how socially acceptable the arrangement was.  As long as it was never spoken of.  When Sylvia passed on only a few years ago, there were two men who grieved for her, and who walked behind her coffin.  When Stephen’s father forced him to marry Annette for fiscal advantage, it was Uncle Sin who stood up for him and who told his father it would never work.  Because he knew for certain that it was history repeating itself, and there could never be another Sylvia in this world. 

With his father gone, and becoming the majority shareholder, Stephen needed Uncle Sin more than ever.  And he didn’t disappoint.  There was no doubt the vacuum left by Albert Wu was an open invitation for the sharp and the dishonest to flourish.  With encouragement from his uncle, they quietly established a reporting system that worked.  So secretive, it surprised Stephen how easily he adapted to this style of management.  But he had everything at stake; he needed to maintain his lifestyle in Australia and not to overload Uncle Sin who was nearing retirement age.  He was able to book his flights direct so no one knew when he was due in Singapore for his monthly visits.  His internal contacts in the company emailed him from home on separate email addresses.  Where he found he had been somewhat remote in the company in the past, he was amazed to now have a much better feel for how everything was supposed to work. 

Some months after his father’s passing, Stephen was in Singapore for the monthly board meeting.  Everyone knew the children were back in Australia with a baby-sitter this time, so he was obviously anxious to return.  He left for his normal Singapore Airlines flight that afternoon, but after booking his luggage through, boarding pass in hand, he quickly turned around and headed back into the city.  He spoke to his Singapore Airlines contact, who had the booking clerk in custody, as he had been leaking departure information to his personal assistant.  He arrived back in his office to see a shocked personal assistant about to reach for the telephone. 

A plainclothes policeman took the instrument out of her hand and directed her to the boardroom, where a small group of people from the refining operation were escorted.  Altogether that day, he sacked twenty five people.  Most of them were taken away and charged by the police, including two directors who had a nice little scam going on the side, bleeding diesel fuel off from the refinery and selling it on the black market.  He and Uncle Sin divided their shares between them, taking a vice-like grip on the company on behalf of the family.