The Sisters' Song

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The Sisters' Song Page 16

by Louise Allan


  ‘It’s trying to get out,’ said Ben.

  ‘I feel sorry for it,’ said Ted.

  With the sun sinking lower, Len showed them how to gullet the fish.

  ‘This’s where you start and you cut him like this…up to his gills…’ he said.

  Heads together, they watched.

  ‘And we don’t want these bits…’ The boys’ heads followed his hand as he flung the entrails into the river with a plip-plop, then turned back to the fish.

  Alf and I walked back to the picnic blanket. ‘They’re never like this with Nora,’ he said.

  I didn’t say anything and we sat back down.

  ‘This is good,’ he said softly.

  We made our way home, the boys and their sun-kissed cheeks and noses peering into the bucket every now and then, smiling and chatting about what they’d do next time they went fishing with Uncle Len.

  That night, I lay on the couch and Len lay in the camp stretcher alongside. I rolled towards him in the dark.

  ‘That’s exactly what we would’ve done if our boys had lived,’ I said.

  I rolled back. A moment later, I felt his hand fumbling for mine. I took it and slid out from under the blankets and lay alongside him in the camp stretcher. By the tender glow of the dying embers, I showed him how much I loved him.

  Chapter 19

  Early the next week, the telegram arrived and I propped it behind the sugar canister on the dresser. I tried to act bright and jolly and like it was any other day, but I felt its intrusion all day. As soon as Alf came in, I handed it to him.

  He read it and grinned. ‘She’s had a girl! This morning at five minutes past three.’ He lifted me up and spun me around, and kept swinging me around, dancing in the kitchen.

  I put a smile on my face and kept it there even after he’d set me down. I had to pat my cheeks because they were flushing. ‘That’s great,’ I said.

  ‘It sure is. A girl!’ He was still beaming when he scanned the telegram again. ‘Yep. That’s what it says.’ He rapped it with his fingers. ‘I can’t believe it!’

  I was happy for them, I really was, and I was surprised at the tears building behind my eyes. I turned away from Alf and called down the hall, ‘Come on, boys. Your dinner’s ready.’ I didn’t hear footsteps, so I walked out into the hall and called again, ‘C’mon, boys. Dinner’s on the table.’

  I stayed in the hall and caught my breath. Each time Nora had a baby, it brought it all back. Reminded me of everything I didn’t have. For the past week or so, the heavy void I carried had lightened like a balloon floating away with the wind. It had become so light I’d almost forgotten it was there. When I was with these little boys, I felt whole and solid again. I could almost believe this was where I was meant to be. But the reality always came crashing back, reminding me that this was Nora’s family and I was just kidding myself.

  I returned to the kitchen and, putting excitement in my voice because I really was happy for them, I said, ‘Congratulations.’ I reached up and kissed Alf’s cheek.

  He rubbed my back. ‘Thanks, Ide.’ His face turned serious. ‘I don’t know what we’d have done without you.’

  Then I remembered and my hands flew to my face. ‘Oh, dear,’ I said, ‘Mum’ll be in a tizz. She’s been sewing all blue.’

  That night I lay under the covers in the still hours and felt a familiar sensation curdling inside of me. I could usually contain it within the walls of my mind but that night, I let it spill. I lay face down on the pillow and let out a long, guttural sound from the depths of my belly. Then I clenched my fists and thumped the pillow, and kept pounding it until my arms lost their strength. When I’d finished, I climbed out, straightened the twisted sheets and smoothed the blankets. I lay back under them, panting in the darkness. The sadness came, then, for everything I wanted but would never have.

  At the weekend, Alf and I left the boys with Beryl, Rex’s wife, and drove into town to see Nora. Alf looked awkward behind the wheel of the Ford in his suit and hat. I braced myself as we walked down the hospital’s circular driveway towards the doors.

  As we entered, Alf leant closer. ‘I get all tongue-tied around doctors. Can you do the talking?’

  I tried not to notice the smell of polished wood and antiseptic and how it fermented my insides. I walked over to the desk and asked for Nora’s room. Alf followed me up the stairs and along the first floor corridor until we reached it. The other women in their beds glanced over at us standing in the doorway, but I couldn’t see Nora. A pale blue curtain had been drawn around the remaining bed, and pairs of legs were visible below.

  Then I heard a scream—Nora’s. The legs shifted quickly and gathered at the head of the bed. The curtain swayed and bulged over rounded backsides, then fell straight again.

  Nora’s voice, ‘Get away from me with that…Get away…’

  Alf stood beside me, with his hat in his hands. He was silent, but there was fear in his eyes.

  Nora kept screaming and I strained to hear what the voices were saying. My heart thumped each time I heard her shriek and saw the legs glide and the curtain quiver.

  ‘Maybe we should tell them we’re here,’ I whispered. ‘Maybe it would help her if she knew.’

  Then it went quiet. The curtain whizzed back and a doctor in a white coat stepped out. He was tall and slender with dark, wavy hair. He turned to one of the nurses. ‘I’ll write up some more Phenobarbital,’ he said in an elegant English accent. ‘In case the hysteria continues. But we may need to try ECT.’

  He walked straight past us.

  ‘Excuse me, doctor,’ I said.

  He stopped and turned to Alf. They were the same height.

  ‘Excuse me. I’m Ida Bushell, Nora’s sister, and this is her husband, Alf. Alf Hill.’

  Alf shifted his hat and extended his hand.

  ‘Dr Ernest Williams,’ he said as he shook Alf’s hand and nodded at me. ‘I’m looking after your wife. Things are not good, I’m afraid. Not good at all.’

  Alf stood beside me with rod-like stiffness.

  ‘What’s wrong?’ I said.

  The doctor blinked and kept his eyes on Alf. ‘Physically, she’s fine and so is the babe. But I suspect she has some postpartum hysteria.’ He cleared his throat. ‘Does she have a history of this with her other pregnancies?’

  Alf stared back at the doctor, unmoving, his eyes fixed and glazed.

  I shook my head.

  ‘Of any mental illness?’

  I shook my head again.

  The doctor nodded. ‘I’m sure it will pass. A couple of days, a couple of weeks at the most. It’s all right to visit her, but keep your visits short and quiet. We’ve just given her a tranquilliser, so she’ll be a bit drowsy.’

  ‘What is postpartum hysteria?’ I said.

  The doctor kept his eyes on Alf, as if he had asked the question. ‘It’s an hysteria that can occur following a birth. Your wife became unsettled yesterday, quite agitated and paranoid. Like I say, we should be able to get on top of it, but if she doesn’t settle quickly we may have to send her for shock treatment.’

  I gasped. ‘That sounds serious.’

  The doctor sighed and brought his Gladstone bag to the front. He clutched it with both hands. ‘Don’t be alarmed,’ he said to Alf. ‘It isn’t as frightening as it sounds and it’s very effective. She may not need it. We’ll keep an eye on her and, in the meantime, keep your visits quiet and don’t traumatise her any further.’ He lifted the cuff of his white coat and checked the time on his gold wristwatch. ‘I’m sorry, but I have to continue my rounds.’ He nodded again and turned to walk off, then stopped. ‘By the way, congratulations on your new daughter. And good luck—those redheads are a fiery bunch.’ He smiled as he left, the nurses like a trail of gulls behind him.

  Nora was lying back against the pillows. She wore a mauve silk bed jacket that Mum had sewn, and it gave her skin a bluish hue, like porcelain. Her hair was dull and hung limply around her face, flattened on one side. Her
eyes were half shut, as if paralysed and unable to close properly.

  I went to her, placed my hands on the starched cotton sheets and bent to kiss her cheek. Her skin felt soft.

  ‘Hello Nora,’ I said. ‘It’s me. Ida.’ I stroked her arm.

  Her eyes tried to open. ‘I haven’t shlept a wink,’ she said, chewing each word.

  I nodded. ‘It’s all right, you can sleep now.’ I kept my hand on her arm and sat on the chair next to the bed.

  Alf stood back, still holding his hat in his hands and running his fingers around the brim. He stepped forward, tentatively, jerkily, as if frightened. His suit coat stretched taut across his shoulders as he bent to kiss her, a bird-like peck on her cheek, before he stepped away from the bed again.

  I scanned the room. The lady opposite looked older than me. She was sitting up, lipsticked and knitting something in pale blue as she chatted ninety-to-the-dozen about the importance of routines for a baby. A younger mother next to her listened intently.

  Beside me, Alf waited, fidgeting and silent.

  I pulled my handbag onto my lap, and from it I took a brown parcel and placed it on the side of the bed. ‘These are in white, but I’ll get some pink wool in town, now I know I’m knitting for a girl.’

  Nora didn’t move to pick up the package. The chatting mothers laughed and Nora’s head rolled as she tried to raise it. ‘Oh, for five minutes peash,’ she called.

  ‘Shhh.’ I took her hand again. ‘It’s all right, Nor. It’s all right.’

  Her legs started agitating under the sheets. ‘I can’t do it anymore.’

  I stroked her hand. ‘Shhh. I’m here.’

  Her leg still jiggled, so I shifted closer and laid my hand on her knee. ‘I’m here, Nora,’ I whispered in her ear. ‘You’ll be all right. Just go to sleep, now. I’m here with you.’

  She didn’t speak and her lids began to drift over her eyes. The women laughed again and Nora’s eyes sprang open.

  ‘It’s okay. Shhh…Go to sleep now,’ I said, and kept stroking her until her eyes closed and her breathing slowed. ‘Go to sleep…It’s all right…’ I repeated the words as I patted her, until she was asleep. Slowly, I lifted my hands and waited until I was sure she wouldn’t wake. She was still. Her eyes were shut and her face, for once, was unfurrowed.

  Alf held the card against the window of the nursery and a dark-haired nurse in a crisp uniform found ‘Baby Hill’ in the back row. She lifted her out and set her in the crook of her arm, then carried her over to us.

  I leant in, until my forehead touched the glass.

  The baby was all red, her face scrunched up, her mouth wide and shuddering. She was screaming although we couldn’t hear her through the window.

  The nurse stood on the other side of the glass and smiled and swayed from side to side. She turned away from the window and spoke to another nurse. Their mouths moved like a silent movie. Absentmindedly, the nurse lifted the baby up over her shoulder, patting her back. We could see the baby’s face, her mouth opening and closing as she kept wailing.

  Alf tapped on the glass, smiling at his daughter. I smiled, too, but her crying was tugging at my heart. I wished I could walk in there and take her in my own arms and comfort her.

  The nurse turned to face us, again cradling the baby in her arms. She pointed towards the bassinette, indicating she was taking her back. We nodded, and she carried the baby back to her crib. She tucked her in and left her screaming on her own.

  Alf dropped me home and drove off to see a bloke at the lumberyard. I was about to open the gate when Len rode up Pearson Street on his bike. Before he’d come to a stop, I’d already started telling him the story.

  ‘Oh, Len. She’s not good…’

  I filled him in as I followed him up our tussocky driveway and around to the shed. He set his bike against the wall and untucked his trouser leg from his sock, then straightened.

  ‘It’s nice to see you too, Ida,’ he said in his gravelly voice. He took my shoulders in his hands and kissed me.

  ‘I’m sorry. It’s good to see you. It really is. But something’s seriously wrong with Nora and…’

  ‘I know you’re worried,’ he said, holding my shoulders firmly. ‘But she’s got a good doctor caring for her. I’m sure he knows his stuff and he’ll look after her. Don’t you go making yourself sick, too.’

  ‘Len, I’ve got a bad feeling. As if she won’t get better.’

  ‘You’ve got to let the doctors do their job,’ he said.

  ‘I’ll need to stay out there when she gets out of hospital.’

  He let go of my shoulders. ‘Oh…I was hoping you’d be home soon.’

  ‘I can’t leave them on their own, not with Nora sick.’

  He winced and was silent a moment. ‘I’m sick of you worrying about Nora. I want you home with me.’

  I stared at him. The heat crept up from my chest and over my face, then I spun around and walked inside. My chest rose and fell with each breath as I filled the kettle at the sink and set it on the stove. The door opened and Len’s boots tramped across the lino. He struck a match and I smelt the smoke from his cigarette. I picked up the teapot and ran water into it, then walked past Len without looking at him and took it outside.

  I needed to be out at Ben Craeg with them. Nora needed me. The kids needed me. Len could look after himself and he’d just have to wait. I swirled the water around in the pot and poured it on the ground under the apple tree.

  When I returned, Len hadn’t moved and his eyes followed me across the kitchen. I pulled the tea canister down from the shelf and removed the lid.

  ‘Sometimes I think you’d prefer to live with them instead of me.’

  ‘They need me. I should be where I’m needed.’ I spooned leaves into the pot.

  He cleared his throat. ‘I need you here, too, Ide.’

  ‘Don’t say that.’ I replaced the lid on the canister.

  ‘What am I meant to say? “Do whatever you want. Don’t worry about me?” Because you will anyway, no matter what I say.’

  I held the canister in my hands as I turned. ‘You have me, Len. All the time. But I can’t leave them on their own.’

  He didn’t say anything for a long while. ‘Are you sure you’re doing it for them?’

  I threw the canister down and it shattered on the floor. Broken pieces of ceramic bounced high and the tea leaves scuttled across the floor like ants. ‘Get your own bloody tea.’ I strode past him, my footsteps heavy and fast, up the hall and into the bedroom. I yanked the dresser drawer open and wrenched out a cardigan. And another. I rolled them up and tossed them in my basket.

  ‘Ida! Ida!’ It was Mum calling out from her room.

  I ignored her, opened the wardrobe door and unhooked a dress. As I tossed it on the bed, I heard Mum call my name again. I walked out and stood in the doorway to her room. ‘I know what you’re going to say.’

  ‘He’s right, you know,’ she said at the same time I spoke. ‘Your place is here.’

  ‘Not you, too.’

  ‘And I’m not just saying it because I want you here. But because I see the longing in your eyes, Ida, every time you’re with those kids. I know how hard it is for you. Believe me. I used to feel it every time I saw a woman with her husband. But you have a husband, Ida, and your place is here with him. You’ve got to ask yourself…’

  I put my hands up. ‘Stop. Don’t say any more.’

  ‘…who are you really doing it for?’

  ‘Mum…’

  I heard Len clear his throat and when I turned, he was standing in the doorway.

  I looked from him to Mum and back again. ‘I can’t.’ I shook my head and my chest was heaving. ‘I can’t leave them. They need me.’

  Len didn’t speak.

  ‘And I need them.’ Tears smarted in my eyes. ‘They’re the family I couldn’t have.’ I started to cry. ‘It’s not fair, Len.’

  His arms slid around my shoulders and his head was against mine as I cried. He patte
d my back and stroked my hair. I pressed my cheek against his and felt his whiskers and smelt his familiar smell—Drum tobacco and aftershave.

  ‘You are who you are, Ide.’

  I raised my head. ‘I don’t deserve you.’

  ‘Yes, you do.’

  Chapter 20

  Nora was discharged after ten days. The medications must have worked because her postpartum hysteria settled without the need for shock treatment.

  I’d been staying with them for three weeks. The night before Nora and the baby came home, Alf and I sat in the lounge by the fire for the last time. The house was quiet and Alf smoked while I knitted a jumper for Ted, swapping the needles every now and then as I braided a cable.

  Alf rolled a cigarette and licked the paper to seal it. ‘The kids will miss you when you go, Ide.’

  I nodded and tried to keep knitting, but I couldn’t see the stitches for the watery film over my eyes.

  ‘We’ll all miss you.’ He struck a match and the smoke smelt sweet like incense.

  My hands slipped as I twisted one band of the cable over the other. I caught the needle and tried again.

  ‘I want to show you something.’ He stood and left the room. A minute later, he returned carrying a piece of wood. ‘Look at this.’

  I set my knitting down on my lap and took it in my hands. The block was about a foot long and an inch and a half wide, a dull red-brown colour, with a dark wavy line like a watermark through it.

  ‘Run your fingers over it,’ he said.

  It felt smooth, as if it had been powdered.

  ‘Smell it.’

  I held it to my nose. I had to inhale deeply because its odour was faint. It smelt like earth and mint mixed together.

  ‘That’s blackwood,’ he said, as if its name was magical.

  ‘It’s beautiful.’

  He nodded. ‘It’s that good they make fiddles out of it.’

  He took the block of wood back and sat down in the chair again, turning it over in his hands. He drew back on his smoke so the tip glowed orange, then he exhaled.

 

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