Kirste's Wine
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KIRSTE'S WINE
by
John Allin
First published in eBook form by Clan Destine Press in 2013
CDP Imprint: Crime Shots 2013
PO Box 121, Bittern
Victoria 3918 Australia
[First published in print by The Five Mile Press 2009]
Copyright © John Allin
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publisher. The Australian Copyright Act 1968 (The Act) allows a maximum of one chapter or 10 per cent of any book, whichever is the greater, to be photocopied by any educational institution for its educational purposes provided that the educational institution (or the body that administers it) has given a remuneration notice to Copyright Agency Limited (CAL) under the Act.
National Library of Australia Cataloguing-In-Publication data:
Allin, John
Kirste's Wine
ISBN 978-0-9873419-5-2
Cover Design © Rae Cooper
BLURB
More than 35 years after one of Australia's most baffling and brazen child abductions, journalist John Allin returned to Adelaide to talk with Greg and Christine Gordon. In this compelling and deeply personal story, Allin tells how a simple but precious gift kept their daughter Kirste's disappearance high in his mind for so many years.
KIRSTE'S WINE
It was a balmy afternoon, with not a breath of wind, when the newspaper reporter left the Gordon family home in the shadow of Adelaide's Onkaparinga Hills all those years ago. He remembers the stillness of that day, and how the silence was broken by the plaintive cries of half a dozen hungry cormorants as they banked high above the myriad grapevines of McLaren Vale and across the Fleurieu Peninsula to the Coorong.
Pen between his teeth, notebook wedged under his right arm, an overnight bag in one hand and a bottle of wine in the other, the reporter climbed awkwardly into the worn-out taxi.
For the past two hours he had been an intruder in the lives of Greg and Christine Gordon. He had asked questions and listened intently as the couple shared their innermost thoughts on loss and grief and everything else that constitutes a parent's worst nightmare.
While the loss of any child, for any reason, is tragic and comparisons can never be made, there are some losses that are, quite simply, different - and beyond imagining.
Greg and Christine's four-year-old daughter Kirste was taken from them in 1973; but theirs was no ordinary loss. These two schoolteachers were victims of one of the most heinous acts in Australia's criminal history.
Kirste - and her 11-year-old friend, Joanne Ratcliffe - had been literally taken; led away by a thin-faced man from a toilet during a football game at the Adelaide Oval.
In the 90 minutes afterwards, four witnesses reported seeing the man with two little girls within three kilometres of the oval.
And then nothing.
Kirste and Joanne were never seen again.
It was January 1976, a little over two years after the abductions, that the journalist entered their home. He wasn't the first, and probably wouldn't be the last, but they graciously agreed to the interview.
With an honesty and dignity the reporter would remember forever, Greg and Christine Gordon talked to him about Kirste's abduction. Without a hint of vitriol or desire for revenge, they described how they'd coped at the time, and how they rebuilt their lives. They shared, with sadness but a quiet acceptance, the impact that Kirste's disappearance had on their second daughter Catherine, and of their decision to have another baby, Ailsa.
The Gordons showed the journalist their children's bedroom and the back garden where Kirste had played. Catherine, who was now four-years-old, and 17-month-old Ailsa played happily in their room but, at one stage during the visit, they showed him Kirste's favourite toys - her teddy, and an orange-haired clown with a bright check shirt and green pants.
He developed a clear picture in his mind of a bubbly little girl called Kirste; a child with a love of singing songs she heard on the radio, with an ability to recite nursery rhymes. He particularly felt the joy she had given her parents and sister - just by being Kirste.
The young reporter didn't have children of his own; God, he didn't even have a girlfriend. Journalistic ambition had derailed all of his relationships. Selfish? Yeah, he admitted that much. But the fact was, he was married to the newspaper. Indeed, his rostered days off invariably found him in the newsroom following up contacts and story leads.
He had read All the President's Men three times already and he was eagerly awaiting the Redford and Hoffman film, which was due for release in a few months. He wanted to be Carl Bernstein; and if that were not possible he'd settle for Bob Woodward, or even Ben Bradlee.
Now here he was - just 25 years old and, in many ways, still green - on one of the steepest learning curves imaginable. And sure, he mightn't have kids of his own but the Gordons had shared only too well the sense of the dread that comes with the loss of child. A loss that was in no way ordinary; a loss that was way off the scale.
Then, through the bay window, he saw the taxi pull up and knew it was time to wind up the interview. Greg escorted him out, past the little piano and the row of hardbacks on the bookcase. The reporter noticed, on a shelf at eye level, the gold-framed photo of Kirste, her curly fair locks tumbling over her forehead, as she held the family's Australian terrier pup. For a moment he felt privileged to be allowed to enter not just their home, but an intimate corner of the Gordons lives.
They shook hands goodbye at the front door but - just as the reporter was silently marvelling that, despite the tragic turn of their lives, Kirste's father still looked younger than his 35 years - Greg said, 'Wait, do you enjoy wine?'
'Sure I do,' the journalist replied, whereon Greg went back inside and returned a moment later with a bottle of shiraz cabernet.
'Kirste was baptised at the St Francis of Assisi church down the road. We needed to build a larger church so this,' he explained, indicating the label, 'was a fundraising red we bottled last year to commemorate the laying of the foundation stone of the new church.
'Please take this as a gift from us. Lay it down for six years and when you open it make sure you have good friends around the table and remember your visit.'
As the taxi drew away from the kerb the reporter looked back to the house and spotted two little girls, their noses flattened against the glass of the bay window; their eyes wide open and wriggling fingers waving goodbye, as they held Kirste's Clown and Teddy.
Then he caught sight of his own reflection in the dirty glass window. Christ, he looked haggard. He surprised himself with a couple of involuntary breaths and realised he was fighting his own emotions. At least there would be some moments to reflect quietly in the taxi. Rummaging around in the side pocket of his bag he found an old pack of Marlboro, shook out a cigarette and lit it with a shaking hand. It tasted foul. He rarely smoked but he needed something. There'd be time for a couple of beers in the plane, he figured. He felt drained and reminded himself to stay detached.
The taxi driver took the narrow road through the grape country and soon had to contend with the peak-hour traffic to Adelaide Airport. He was a large man with few yellow teeth and a stomach that hugged the steering wheel. Sprays of spit showered the windscreen as he talked incessantly. He wanted the journalist to know just ho
w furious he was about Governor-General Sir John Kerr sacking Prime Minister Gough Whitlam just eight weeks before. His feelings on the matter extended from his mouth to his right foot that worked the accelerator like a dodgem car.
Alongside him and silently wishing he'd chosen the back seat (the only one that wasn't torn) the normally-gregarious journalist was largely oblivious to the driver's rants. On this of all days, any shrill discussion about political shenanigans - however serious and controversial the subject - just seemed banal and unimportant, especially in a scummy old taxi being steered by a madman and reeking of farts and stale tobacco.
So the reporter cradled his gift of wine and thought instead about Greg and Christine. Their stability and togetherness, their measured acceptance, their grace and humility, and the incredible absence of hatred or any hint of vengeance, had left a deep impression on him.
But now he wondered if he was up to the task; if he'd be able to capture, in a newspaper article, such strength of character, and something so spiritually impressive?
He also wondered if he'd ever see the Gordons again; then realised, probably not.
After all, shouldn't 'their story' be just another newspaper story to him; and even then, only part of a larger story. And also, wasn't there some unwritten rule, some understanding, that reporters should be professional about these things to maintain a line between work and home life? It certainly wasn't on to allow stories to get under your skin. It was just a job after all.
'Bollocks it's just a job,' he muttered to himself, drawing deeply on his cigarette. 'This story will stay with me for ever.'
His assignment had been triggered by his editor at The Age, back in Melbourne wanting a weekend-feature article on children who had disappeared. The boss's interest had been sparked by the middle-of-the-night abduction of a little Victorian girl called Eloise Worledge from the bedroom of her Beaumaris home, two weeks earlier. Since that Tuesday morning, 13 January 1976, every police officer in Australia had been briefed, and an Interpol file had been activated.
The Worledge case, which had been front page news for days, had captured the attention of the nation and the reporter had worked on the story around the clock. He knew he'd already become involved perhaps more deeply than he would with any news assignment, but it mattered little. This story had generated a special bond between police and the media. If it had to be distilled to a few words it would be simply: everyone - all stops out to find the abductor of this eight-year-old child.
But then came the new brief from his editor: stay on the Worledge case, but do a wrap-up of all other similar child abductions in Australia. 'Go to Adelaide', the editor had said. 'They get all the bizarre ones.'
The reporter started in Melbourne, where he interviewed Jean Stillwell, mother of seven-year-old Linda Stillwell who had 'disappeared' in St Kilda eight years earlier, apparently taken by a stranger while playing on the grassy slopes of the Lower Esplanade.
Then he flew to South Australia. In Adelaide Nancy Beaumont, mother of Jane, Arnna and Grant - who were nine, seven and four when they were abducted from Glenelg beach on Australia Day 1966 - had been polite and resigned. Les and Kath Ratcliffe were chatty and full of bluster and pent-up hatred for the creep who had taken their 11-year-old daughter Joanne along with Kirste. Greg and Christine Gordon, the last parents he spoke to that January in 1976, were quietly sad, not over-the-top religious but strong in faith; determined not to allow a negative attitude destroy their lives and those of their children.
With the little faces of Catherine and Ailsa pressed against the window still fresh in his mind, the reporter finally escaped the taxi driver's opinions and chronic halitosis and boarded the TAA flight back to Melbourne. As they passed through 25,000 feet on the way to cruise altitude, he took the bottle from his briefcase and wrote a reminder on the label.
'Greg and Christine Gordon. 22.1.76. Put down for six years.'
The journalist had never had the luxury of a wine cellar. A couple of wine racks - the wooden expandable jobs that fold out like concertinas - was the best he could do. They were cheap but functional and unpretentious. So, as the years went by, that's where the Gordons' bottle rested, always with the label face up - a precious gift with a special meaning known only to him. From time to time he thought of Christine and Greg Gordon and wondered how they were faring. He would not have swapped what he came to think of as Kirste's Wine for anything - not even the finest bottle of Grange Hermitage.
Then one day, when he was tidying up around the wine rack, he realised the time had come. He wondered where those six years had suddenly gone. Kirste would've been 13 by then, and probably in her first year of secondary school. With a wife and two daughters of his own now the journalist could understand the Gordons' loss in an even more personal way.
The following Saturday, with his wife and best friends gathered around the dining table at their East Bentleigh home, the reporter fulfilled his promise to Greg Gordon. It was Autumn 1982 and Kirste's wine was ready.
There was much to talk about. John Cain had just taken the reins as Premier of Victoria; and tree-hugging greenies had the gall and the wisdom to spoil government plans to dam the Franklin River. Beyond our shores, the Falklands War was hotting up - the Argies had sunk HMS Sheffield and the Brits had just torpedoed the General Belgrano. Maggie Thatcher was walking the talk - on land and sea.
The friends talked as they dined by candlelight - on crayfish and eye fillet and strawberry sorbet - and just before the main course the reporter brought the special bottle of shiraz cabernet to the dining room table. The cork protested at first and then submitted, squeaking out easily, and as he poured four glasses he told them all the story of Kirste's wine.
They drank the health of Greg and Christine Gordon and their children Catherine and Ailsa. And they spared a solemn thought for Kirste and her friend Joanne who, on an ordinary afternoon nine years earlier, had gone from being friends in frilly dresses to forever-lost girls snatched by an evil man while a grandstand of fans watched the football. They were two beloved little innocents, familiar only to family and friends, who became known to the nation through curt descriptions in police bulletins, and their pictures in the newspapers - forever frozen in childhood, in the last-photos-taken before their abduction
The friends around that table in 1982 agreed that the '73 shiraz cabernet was a lovely drop. It had been made from McLaren Vale grapes grown just down the road from Greg and Christine Gordon's home. The empty bottle did not go into the trash can. It didn't even go back on the wine rack. The reporter decided that it had come of age and resolved never to throw it away. And so it became an ornament in amongst others on his bar, next to the clock and some framed family photographs.
Occasionally the bottle would catch the eye of visitors who would ask why an empty bottle of shiraz cabernet from the 1970s was sitting with the geisha girl from Osaka, the African elephant from Bulawayo, the phallic wooden carving from Goroka, and other tangible reminders of reporting assignments in faraway places.
The reporter would tell the story of the gift; of the parents and the lost little girl. Without exception, all who heard the tale would hang on every word, empathise with Greg and Christine, wonder about the fate that befell Kirste and Joanne, and remind themselves how precious life is.
For the journalist himself 25 August - the anniversary of Kirste's disappearance - became a special date. Each year he'd take the empty bottle from the shelf, wipe off any dust and replace it in its rightful position, and spare a thought for the family.
Then, in mid-2008 - noting that Kirste would've been turning 40 that November -it occurred to the reporter that his feature article published in The Age back in January 1976 was only part of the story. Since then dozens of people had been touched by his retelling of the story about Greg's gift of the wine bottled to commemorate Kirste's baptismal church.
Although he was sure they would've moved on by now, probably retired up north if they had any sense, he resolved to contact the Gor
dons. A quick check of the White Pages showed no listing at the address he'd been to; nor any other listing under their name.
So he unearthed his 1976 contact book, yellowed and dog-eared now, and stared at their old number for a while. In fact it was so old that there weren't enough digits. He wondered if that was a sign that maybe he shouldn't ring after all.
He stared at the bottle, made a final decision and checked the South Australia phone book again. Guessing what the new prefix numbers should be, he dialled them before the old number and tried his luck. If it didn't work, he would forget the whole idea.
The number actually connected and, on the third ring, someone answered. The woman's voice blended with the interstate pips.
'Christine?' the reporter ventured.
'Yes, this is Christine.'
For a moment - a rare moment for him - the reporter was stuck for words. His mind went into overdrive as he hunted for an opening line.
'Christine, this is a blast from the past,' he heard himself lamely begin.
Half-an-hour later the journalist - who as The Age's editorial training manager had always drummed into cadet reporters the value of gut instinct and persistence - replaced the handset slowly and smiled. The warm and welcoming voice of Christine Gordon, nearly 800 km away to the west, put his mind at ease and bridged the gap of 32 years. He hadn't felt like an intruder this time - more like an old friend who had been invited back to the wine country.
Within a few minutes he had booked himself a ticket to Adelaide.
A week later, reclining in 10A on QF 675, I stare out of the aircraft window, mesmerised by a beautiful sun which is trying to penetrate a massive anvil-shaped cumulonimbus forming in the distance. My thoughts are in the faraway land of 1976, where I am still that green reporter holding Kirste's toys and sharing the grief of a couple as they tell of their nightmare.