Daughter of the Regiment by Jackie French

be her garden, thought Harry. Cissie would want to be photographed in the garden she had planted.
    ‘What happened to her?’ he asked softly.
    ‘I’m not sure. She had five kids, I think. Or was it seven? You’d have to ask your father, I’m just remembering what your great-gran told me. She was a great one for family history. They had big families in those days. And all of them lived, I think, which didn’t happen often back then.’
    ‘And Cissie married my great-something-grandad?’
    ‘Of course,’ said Mum. ‘Otherwise you wouldn’t be here.’
    Of course.
    Of course! It all made sense. Daniel—that kid—he must have been Daniel Brookes . My name, thought Harry … Dad’s name … Grandad’s name. Grandad was even called Dan. And their farm was Gran and Grandad’s farm on the river, a long way away in those days, but only ten minutes by car today …
    ‘It was a really romantic story,’ said Mum. ‘Your gran told it to me the first afternoon I came out here. I was still in High School and your dad had just got his driver’s licence and this funny old Holden he’d bought with the money he got hay carting. I called it the Flying Wombat because it was brown, and your dad used to …’
    ‘But what about Cissie, Mum!’ insisted Harry.
    ‘Cissie? Oh yes … Your gran was showing me round the garden, and she told me this story. This Cissie was an orphan, your gran said. Her father had been an officer at the garrison—you know, the old restaurant down by the river. We haven’t been there for ages have we? Not since your gran’s sixtieth birthday party. Then her father died, and her mother. There was talk of putting her in an orphanage down in Sydney, or even shipping her back to England to relatives there. But then she stayed here instead. They all paid for her to stay here.’
    ‘Who?’ asked Harry.
    ‘The soldiers who were here. All of them together. The regiment. There was a fund or something, for the widows and orphans. What did your great-gran say about her? Some phrase she used … That’s it. She was the daughter of the regiment.
    ‘She stayed with a family down in Sydney for a while, so she could get an education. The soldiers all sent money every six months for her keep. Oh, and my pearl brooch—you know, the one I wear at Christmas? That was hers, too. See, she’s wearing it in the photo. It’s all coming back to me now.
    ‘She was an orphan, and the garrison was being withdrawn. It was only here in the first place because they were worried that the French might invade, but of course they didn’t. Anyway, after they left and went back to England, Cissie was put to board down in Sydney but she spent her holidays up here with your great-something-grandad’s parents. And your great-something-grandad, of course.
    ‘Well, they fell in love and she married him when she turned eighteen, and they selected this place and built this house—or the main part of it, anyway, your great-grandad added the back bit—and Cissie planted her garden. All the big trees are hers. Oh, and the hedge along the drive, of course.
    ‘The blokes in the regiment sent the brooch out to her when she got married. Every time the eldest son marries it’s given to his wife. Your gran gave it to me that first Christmas after your father and I were married—you were born just three months later, just two weeks before your dad’s birthday. You’ll give Cissie’s brooch to your wife some day I suppose,’ said Mum smiling.
    ‘So she’s been here all the time,’ said Harry slowly. ‘She left, but she came back. She’s been here all along, there on the bureau.’
    But of course she’d been here in other ways as well …
    Mum blinked.
    ‘What do you mean?’ she asked.
    ‘Nothing. Nothing at all,’ said Harry. ‘Are there any more photos of her, Mum?’
    ‘I’m not sure,’ said Mum. ‘People didn’t have their photo taken very often in those days. A photographer probably only came to this district