‘Like somebody I got to hate.’
‘Like who?’
‘Somebody I was fool enough to sleep with. Somebody I thought might love me. Who turned out to be a man like any other.’
‘Not Greg, surely?’
‘Oh, leave Greg out of it! He’s the husband I love and respect. I don’t have to sleep with Greg to love him.’
She had switched on the lamp. She got up in some agitation, and after flying in several directions at once, all distraught buttocks and breasts, put on a gown, and sat herself at the dressing table, feeling her cheeks, her throat, as though for damage.
While Eddie continued lying in the bed, drowsily combing at his armpits. ‘Perhaps we shouldn’t have started by fucking. Then we might have learnt to love each other.’
‘How I hate that degrading word!’
‘I was only using what they use.’
She had taken up a pot, and was creaming her face, slapping at it. ‘I don’t mind whether I never see you again.’ She went on slapping.
Soon after, he got up and began dressing. When he had finished, he kissed her on the side of the neck. ‘Poor Marcia! I hope you’ll find the love you need.’
‘I don’t need love,’ she whimpered.
‘The fucking, then.’
‘Go!’ she shouted. ‘And don’t come near me. If Greg were here …’ she tailed off. ‘I’ll write to Greg and tell him he ought …’ but again her voice and the impulse expired.
So he went. He might have packed his bag that night and asked Don to drive him to the train on Monday, but could not feel he was intended to break away from ‘Bogong’ yet. Marcia’s shoulders, as he took his leave, had only half-decided to shed him. He did not want it, nor, he liked to think, did others for whom he had discovered an affection. Peggy Tyrrell, for instance. If he had cuckolded Greg Lushington, his fondness and respect for that decent man were intact. As for Don Prowse, what would he do without somebody to pull his boots off?
Dearest,
I love your far too rare letters, but found this latest one surprising. You are of course just that, or you wouldn’t have disappeared as you did before the War, without explanation (even since, there has been no attempt to explain, and your father and I are left nursing unhappy guesses) then shooting off to bury yourself at ‘Bogong’, to lead what amounts to a labourer’s life.
I know that Edward has the highest opinion of that boring old Greg, which you, apparently, now share. Perhaps he is someone who appeals to men. I accept that. Men are what one can only accept. What I cannot stomach is Marcia Lushington from any viewpoint — who you are pitchforking at me as though you were having an affair with her. Darling, are you? But don’t tell me, I couldn’t bear to know.
Incidentally, the Golsons — my sweet Joanie who for some reason you avoid, and Curly, another of the male bores — share your passion for the Lushingtons. They have visited several times at ‘Bogong’. Curly goes trout fishing with Greg, with Marcia too (apparently she casts no mean fly.) Joanie rests with a good book. As far as I am concerned, it would have to be an extra good read, down on the farm with the Lushingtons.
Marian has had her fourth. No trouble — any of them. If only you had married nice healthy Marian, it would have made such a difference to all our lives. I’m sure I should have been a changed woman — the whole family lunching together at the Royal Sydney on Sundays. I believe grandchildren would have liked me.
But I’m not accusing you, Eddie dear. Nothing ever happens as it might. So let us forgive each other.
Your poor old
Mother
P.S. The third cyst between Biffy’s toes has, I’m glad to report, ripened and burst, but alas, she’s preparing a season.
P.P.S. Your father is on circuit in the north-west — I don’t doubt enjoying himself exceedingly.
P.P.P.S. Don’t think I begrudge Daddy those country duties which mean so much to him.
While sifting flour for a batch of scones, Mrs Tyrrell announced, ‘They’ve fixed a date for Dot Norton’s weddun.’ Raised breast high, the sifter trailed a veil. ‘Arr, it ’ull be lovely!’ She assumed the expression that some women wear for a bride. ‘Mrs Lushington ’ull see to it that Dot has a proper outfit — and everythink the baby ’ull need.’
‘But did they trace the man who came selling the separator parts?’
‘Nao!’ Peggy hawked, and abandoned her dainty fingertip technique working the butter into the flour.
‘But if he was the father?’
‘The father ain’t what matters. It’s the ring. No girl wants the loaf in ’er oven to turn into a bastard on ’er ‘ands.’ She slopped the milk; she kneaded her dough so passionately the basin almost flew off the oilcloth on to the lino.
‘Besides,’ said Mrs Tyrrell when things were again under control, ‘it wasn’t the separator man.’
‘How do you know?’
‘If yez been around long enough, you know.’
‘Then who’s the official father?’
‘The who?’
‘The one that’s gunner be registered,’ he nagged.
‘Arr,’ she paused. ‘Denny,’ she said. ‘I told yer, didn’t I?’
‘But he’s a half-wit.’
‘No worse than a lot of others. There’s padded rooms in a lot of the Woolambi homes.’
‘Won’t he mind fathering another man’s child?’
‘ ’E’ll ’ave a woman ter bake for ’im, an’ boil ’is mutton. That’s what’s practical, ain’t ut?’ Her gums showed him she was growing resentful as she marshalled her scones on the baking sheet.
‘Sounds extraordinary to me. Shocking.’
‘Anyways, it’s what Mrs Lushington arranged.’
‘Knowing the father?’
‘Everybody knows the father. But I’m not sayun. If you wanter know more, better ask Marce.’
‘It’s none of my business.’
‘When you’ve been on at me the last ’arf hour?’ She shoved the baking sheet in the oven and slammed the door. ‘That’s what’s wrong with edgercated people — argue, argue — waste yer time in argument.’
She laughed rather bitterly, and flounced out, but returned soon after, the wrinkles in her cheeks veiled in what looked like the flour with which she had dusted her recent batch of scones.
‘I’ll tell yer, Eddie,’ she announced, ‘but confidential.’ She started munching on her gums. ‘No! I’m not gunner!’ she exploded. ‘Even though ’e’s a rabbiter, Dickie Norton’s a decent bloke — and I reckon a widower must feel the cold down there along the bloody flat.’
Spring did take over at last, if spasmodically, days of brilliant, slashing light alternating with a return to leaden rain squalls; the nights still crackled as he stood shivering, pissing from the veranda’s edge on to frosted grass.
By day a visible green had crept along the grey shoulders of the hills, but the tussock remained bleached and sterile throughout the flat. Birds seemed to soar higher, to sing more shrilly, solitary wagtails to swivel more expectantly on the strand between the barbs of a wire fence, peewits tumbled through the air in pairs, briar clumps greening over were filled with the twitter of small, serious bird-couples.
The river flowed through the spring scene, at times with a mineral glitter, at others with a supple, animal life, each aspect probably more apparent to stranger than to native. In fact it seemed to Eddie Twyborn that, with the exception of Marcia Lushington, who was actually ‘from down Tilba way’, the native-born remained unaware of the landscape surrounding them, except as a source of economic returns and a fate they must accept, or in the case of Denny Allen, a river from which, by some stroke of imbecile genius, he could land a trout after one flick with a dry fly; he might even have succeeded with a naked hook.