Trails in the Dust

by Joy Dettman

  JIMMY

  He wasn’t smiling. He offered no polite greeting. ‘Shall we get this over with as quickly and painlessly as possible?’ he said.

  She stepped towards him. ‘If I could take back . . .’

  ‘I believe you need to leave at four, which leaves us exactly eleven minutes.’

  A thousand times Jenny had practised the thousand words she’d say to her boy but his eyes looked cold. He didn’t want her words. He didn’t want to be here and came no closer than the open double doors.

  Tristan wanted to see more. He attempted to walk in but Jimmy caught his shirt-tails and drew him back.

  ‘I used to pull you back from danger by your shirt-tails when you were his size,’ Jenny said.

  ‘I would have been little older when you cashed in your investment,’ he said.

  Robin flinched at his words. Jenny thought of Vern Hooper. His bones may have been rotting in Woody Creek for half a century but she was fighting him still, and not once had she backed away from a fight with Vern Hooper. She’d told him to shove his chequebook up his backside one day. She’d smashed his windscreen with a tree branch.

  ‘Your grandfather’s blood money has been an interesting example of what happens when money is too tainted to touch,’ she said. ‘Through the eighties it was earning eight and a half per cent interest.’

  He turned away. She thought he was leaving. A taxi was making its way towards Langdon Hall. She’d told the controller she’d be waiting out front of the building. She wouldn’t be. Her legs wouldn’t get her out there. Weak, shaking, her batteries were done.

  ‘I’m flying home tomorrow, Jimmy. Is ten minutes out of the rest of your life too much to ask?’

  ‘The name is Morrie,’ he said.

  ‘Not on your birth certificate,’ she said, and she walked to the chair and sat.

  ‘Or on my bill of sale,’ he said, and attempted to clear the way behind him.

  Robin’s curls made him taller than his father. ‘Sit down, Dad.’

  ‘A video would be more beneficial to the children than this. Take them away,’ Jimmy said.

  Saying video in the hearing of a child is like saying walk when a dog is listening. They wanted a video.

  ‘Nemo,’ the pink flower girl said.

  ‘You always want that stupid fish,’ Tristan said. Not a murmur from the taller pageboy. He was old enough to understand that something he didn’t understand was happening, so he stood close to his father’s side, his eyes watchful. He’d have Jim’s hands. He had his ears. Jenny was attempting to see his hands when Jimmy stepped into the room and closed both doors on his wardens.

  ‘Richard looks like your father,’ Jenny said.

  ‘I’m not here for niceties.’

  ‘I wouldn’t worry about that. You’re not being nice,’ she said, and she picked up her wine glass and wished it full. She drained what remained in it.

  But he was here. He was with her. How this meeting would end, she didn’t know, only that it would, and today, only that had he wanted to end it, he would have gone with his children.

  ‘He wants to see you,’ Robin had said.

  So many words she’d planned to say to her beautiful boy, words edited a thousand times on the blackboard of her mind, on the plane, on the boat, in Venice. He wasn’t the boy she’d practised those words for. He was a grey-headed, sixty-year-old man.

  Someone knocking, then Myrtle’s voice, more British than the British. ‘Morrie, let me in.’

  He moved a little, enough to open one door, a little. ‘There’s no need for you to be here.’

  ‘You’re here.’ Then, pushing the door wide, Cara entered. He closed it. ‘Jenny,’ Cara said. ‘You never fail to surprise me.’

  ‘Love your frock,’ Jenny said. It was Jenny blue, that deep midnight blue, and cut in an ageless tailored style from heavy fabric.

  ‘I like it,’ Cara said.

  How many years had passed since they’d spoken? And love your frock? Their eyes met and held, each afraid of that old resemblance. Both wore spectacles, very different spectacles, Jenny’s hair curled, Cara’s was straight and sleek.

  ‘England’s climate agrees with you,’ Jenny said.

  ‘In many ways,’ Cara said. She didn’t offer her hand, but took Jimmy’s arm, showing a united front against a common enemy. And right or wrong, they looked so right side by side.

  ‘I’m not here to disrupt your lives or to accuse –’

  ‘Your presence is an accusation,’ Jimmy said.

  ‘You’re my son.’

  ‘A DNA test would prove me your daughter, Jenny. Can you begin to imagine our agony when we realised what we’d done?’

  There is no defence against a frontal attack. It was unexpected. ‘Surrogacy is a thriving business these days. You’re Myrtle’s daughter. You sound like her – as Tracy sounds like you.’

  And she was out there. ‘Open up, someone. My hands are full.’

  Cara opened the door and barefoot Tracy entered with a half-full bottle of champagne and two long glasses; one she handed to her father, the second she placed on the table.

  ‘Two of Elise’s mates just took your taxi, Jenny,’ she said. She filled her father’s glass then filled the second. ‘Can I get you a glass, Mum?’

  ‘I’ve had enough,’ Cara said.

  ‘I told Aunty Cath you’d taken to your bed with a couple of pills. She’s gone up there looking for you.’

  ‘She’ll be in here next,’ Cara said. ‘I’ll call you another taxi, Jenny.’

  ‘I’ll call my own, thank you,’ Jenny said. ‘Lovely meeting you, Cara.’

  ‘And you,’ Cara lied, and she was gone, Jimmy watching her go. He stayed. Maybe he wanted to be here.

  ‘Grandma Tilly and her sons are doing their best to empty the bottles,’ Tracy said, then turning to Jenny, added, ‘She’s Ian’s grandmother, and proud to tell anyone who’ll listen that she was ninety-two last birthday.’

  Cars crunching gravel again on the driveway, moving out, not in. Jimmy took his glass to the window and his back turned, Tracy offered a wink, mouthed, ‘Big pussy cat.’ Then in the next breath she told her father how Jenny had grown up in the same town as his Aunty Lorna. ‘Sit down for five minutes and compare notes,’ she said, then with a second wink, she was gone, the doors closed behind her.

  The wine, Jenny’s type of wine, would be her third glass since a little after midday. She’d sworn off alcohol yesterday, but English beer had been to blame for her loss of Friday. Sparkling wine was medicinal, and she needed its bubbles, so she sipped and stared at her boy, silhouetted against that old window.

  She could steal a photograph of him, standing, his face turned away from her.

  Didn’t need a photograph. She’d wear the imprint of this meeting on her soul until there were no more days, so she sipped again and thought about the banquet. She’d need to leave soon, but she wouldn’t need to dress for tonight’s outing. She’d dressed in her best for Jimmy. Ten more minutes, then she’d call the taxi.

  She got to her feet, and taking her wine with her, she walked to the window. Didn’t stand close to him but was too close for his comfort. He took a step to the side, a step to the left.

  Two middle-aged couples were standing out in the wind, discussing the bride or the meal or the weather. Behind them, an elderly man was being helped by a woman into the front passenger seat of a grey vehicle, while a second woman folded, then lifted a walking frame into the car boot. Jenny had done that, many, many times. Was he her husband, father, uncle?

  ‘That must be the final indignity for a man – ending his life dependent on women. Your grandfather ended up dependent on his daughters. But you’d know that,’ she said and sipped her wine. ‘Your grandmother never lost her independence. Six weeks before she died, she rode her horse into town to order new wallpaper.’

  He didn’t turn to her, and the time now close to four-fifteen, she reached into her bag for her mobile.

  Did she nee
d to attend a fake King Henry banquet at some minor castle where she’d drink more wine? No one would miss her. Johanna might, but she’d been tossing up whether to go. Today would have been her husband’s eightieth birthday.

  We’re all alone, Jenny thought. I’m standing where I’ve wanted to stand for fifty-odd years. I could reach out and touch my boy – and I’ve never been more alone in my life.

  ‘Granny used to say that we can’t change one second of a day once the sun has gone down on it, that all we can change is our tomorrows. I’m trying to do the impossible, Jimmy, trying to sort out my yesterdays before I run out of tomorrows.’

  ‘Morrie,’ he corrected.

  ‘You’ve no more forgotten little Jimmy Morrison than I. Calling yourself Morrie proves it, or it does to me. When you were two years old you could say James Hooper Morrison.’

  ‘It’s the name on my bill of sale,’ he said. ‘Signed by you in the presence of two witnesses.’ He looked at her then. ‘It’s not every man who knows the true value his mother placed on him in infancy.’

  ‘Two thousand pounds?’ she asked then sipped again. ‘That was your grandfather’s valuation, not mine. Ten million pounds wouldn’t have bought you. They stole you from me, kidnapped you. Lorna Hooper walked into Granny’s kitchen, picked you up and drove away while I was getting dressed to take you down to the hospital.’

  ‘You and Granny pursued her on horseback no doubt – leading the town posse,’ he said, and emptied his glass.

  ‘You were always my clever little boy. You could read and write before you went to school. That sounded smart arsed, not smart. We had the flu. Granny damn near died of it. I ended up in hospital with pneumonia, and while I was near dying of it, your grandfather dug up enough dirt to bury me. He blackmailed me into signing those papers.’

  ‘Kidnap, blackmail, or was it common greed, old woman?’

  ‘Georgie told me they would have turned you into another Vern Hooper and I laughed at her. Not once in all the years since I lost you, my darlin’ boy, did I imagine they could turn a part of me into a Hooper.’

  ‘You compliment me,’ he said.

  She shook her head. ‘That was an insult. Your grandfather was a self-serving, self-satisfied, hard-hearted old bastard. He’d stand there with his judgemental face on – just like you’re standing there, and like you, he’d find the prisoner at the dock guilty as charged, no trial necessary. Be anything, my beautiful boy, but don’t end up like him. He looked me in the eye one day and told me that Jim was dead. I’d married Ray King before I found out that your father had been carried alive out of that Jap prison camp. Damaged or not, I would have married him.’

  He’d removed his wallet while she’d been speaking, had taken folded pages from it. She watched his hands, Jim’s hands, unfolding his signed and witnessed evidence. When he offered it, she placed her glass on the windowsill and took his evidence. One glance was enough to recognise it as the original.

  ‘I can quote it to you,’ she said, and she ripped it in half, ripped the halves in half, and while he stared, she tossed the pieces to the floor and walked over them on her way to those closed doors.

  She got one open, and then glanced back for a final look at her boy. He was gathering the pieces of his bill of sale.

  ‘Don’t worry about it,’ she said. ‘My copy is in better condition. I’ll post it to you when I get home. You can have it photocopied – or better still, there’s a company in Melbourne that will turn it into wallpaper for you. This room could use a feature wall.’

  He looked at her, looked her in the eyes. He still had her Jimmy’s eyes, more grey than blue. She still loved them. She’d come here to tell him the truth, so from the doorway, she spoke her well-practised words.

  ‘You were burning up with a killer flu, taking convulsions. Lenny Hall rode his bike into town to get someone with a car to drive us down to the hospital. Dear Aunty Lorna came. She carried you out to her car while I was getting dressed to go with you, but she left while I was looking for my shoes. I thought she’d taken you to the hospital. All day I told myself that she’d have the decency to drive down and let me know if you were alive or dead. No one came, so I walked into town and phoned the hospital. You hadn’t been admitted. I went to the police. The constable was on my side, until your lying bastard of a grandfather got to him.’

  ‘Bribed him too?’

  ‘I hope that felt good, my darlin’ boy. I hope it eased some terrible hurt you’ve got buried deep behind those eyes.’

  Too weary to say more, shaking with weariness, but she had a plane to catch tomorrow and she’d make it through to tomorrow.

  ‘Granny used to say that a man’s good name was worth more than gold. I didn’t have a good name in that town, but before I signed those papers, your grandfather threatened to blacken what was left of it.’

  ‘Your signature was witnessed.’

  ‘It was, by Ray bloody King and a nursing sister. I was in hospital, in bed, half-dead with pneumonia. I don’t remember much about it – only your grandfather’s fountain pen dripping black tears onto the hospital sheet, and Ray’s, “S-s-s-sign it, J-j-jenny.” I aborted his baby in Armadale – two of them. In the forties, abortion was murder. Your grandfather found out about the last one and threatened to use it against me in court –’

  ‘I don’t recall a court case,’ he said.

  ‘You wouldn’t. There was no court case. Your grandfather was worth thousands; I swapped eggs for staples with Charlie White.’ She stepped through to the pool room and told her shaking legs they needed to get her only as far as the pool table. They didn’t obey, and she sighed and clung to the door. ‘I didn’t know a lawyer who’d work for eggs and Granny didn’t know that I’d aborted Ray’s baby. That old bastard threatened to tell her what I’d done before I signed his papers – and those papers gave you to Jim, not to the bloody Hoopers.’

  ‘Before or after you took the two thousand pounds?’

  She’d been warned. What do you do if it turns pear-shaped, Jen?

  What do you do? You walk away, but you fling the last words over your shoulder.

  ‘I’ll post you a cheque when that blood money matures, on March twenty-six. It was up to thirty-three thousand the last time I rolled it over,’ she said, and she grasped the edge of the pool table and dug in her bag for her mobile, pleased she’d keyed the taxi’s number into her contacts.

  He was at the door. ‘What happened to Ray?’

  She didn’t look at him. She looked for the number. ‘Dead. Sawmill accident.’

  ‘Raelene was his daughter.’

  ‘She’s dead too.’

  ‘I remember his stutter,’ he said.

  ‘I remember more,’ she said. London Cab. She had the number. All she had to do was hit the green button. She didn’t. ‘Ray was the one who gave your grandfather my bankbook. I would have stuffed it down that old bastard’s throat before I took one penny of his filthy money. You had your bill of sale, but I’ve still got my bankbooks, every last one of them, every record of where that blood money has been since December 1947 – and I’ve never spent one red cent of it.’

  She released the table to hit call, and her legs faltered.

  ‘Sit down, Jenny,’ he said.

  She’d done her sitting, had done her waiting. She had to go, had to call that taxi and get herself back to the hotel.

  He was at the small table, metering what remained of the champagne into the two glasses. Not enough left in the bottle to fill them.

  ‘He wanted you the first time he saw your Hooper hands. You were five months old. You were eight months old the first time he offered me money to sign you away. Five hundred pounds, a fortune in ’42. I told him where to shove his chequebook.’

  He sat and he picked up his wine. ‘I knew your voice,’ he said.

  ‘I forgot where I was. I was supposed to sing Ave Maria at your father’s funeral and I didn’t. I was in a church so I sang it.’

  ‘One of my first m
emories is your voice. I remember walking a dusty track between tall trees. You were singing. I remember seeing you in a stage show, in Melbourne. I knew you were in it, but you were wearing a long black wig and I didn’t know you until you sang.’

  She looked up at the ceiling, old plaster, not the smooth ceilings of today. Her eyes were full of weary tears and she needed the assistance of gravity to stop their flow.

  ‘You’ve seen me more recently in a dark wig and you didn’t know me,’ she said. ‘You shook my hand.’

  Granny used to call him her little Doubting Thomas. She used to say that seeing would always be believing with Jimmy. A tear got away as she looked at his doubting face, but she caught it with her finger. ‘In ’99, in Melbourne,’ she said. ‘Cara did an interview to promote A Hand of Cards.’

  Loved his face, had loved it bruised and scratched and misshapen by his birth. Could remember the first time she’d held him to her breast. Had wept that night, wept all over him. She wouldn’t today. She cleared her throat, moistened her lips, swallowed, then spoke of their meeting in Melbourne.

  ‘Georgie introduced you to Juliana Conti, the painted lady in her lolly pink suit. It was my hand you shook.’

  ‘You’re kidding me!’ he said.

  That was her Jimmy, unpolluted by Hoopers, and two heavy tears escaped. She flicked both away with a finger.

  ‘I recognised you the second I touched your hand. It was like shaking Jim’s hand.’

  ‘Georgie knew who I was?’

  ‘She looked no further than Cara. They were friends for many years. Georgie doesn’t know she met you.’

  ‘I knew her,’ he said. ‘I recognised her hair. I refused to forget Georgie’s hair. I had a jam jar full of pennies and when the sun was out, I’d sit on the lawn at Balwyn, hold that jar high, then pour those pennies in a stream into my beach bucket, chanting, “Georgie, Georgie, Georgie”.’

  Tears rolling too fast to keep flicking away, she lifted her glasses and wiped her eyes with her palms. She wasn’t bawling, only leaking water, a flood of water, all the tears of her life that she’d saved up since the day Lorna Hooper had stolen her Jimmy.