by Alan Collins
There were no questions from Mrs Pearlman; she knew more about Solly and me than we knew ourselves. We sat quietly like a pair of garden gnomes that would soon be shifted without query from one place to another. We took no interest in what she was saying so it came as a shock to find that, like a tourist guide who reaches the end of her pitch, she had risen from behind her desk and was already leading us out into the wintry sunshine.
Mrs Pearlman shepherded us across the road to a parked car. She sat us in the back on a high seat open to the air, leaned through the window and said: “We’ve a long trip, Jacob — we are going to Lindfield, across the Bridge. Have you ever been across the Bridge in a motor-car before?” and without waiting for an answer, pulled on her gloves and got into the driving seat. I was fast becoming something of an expert on car-driving techniques. Mrs Pearlman, sitting up straight with her gloved hands holding the wheel as though it might answer her back, steered the car belligerently into the flow of traffic. Not for her the indolence of our father or the arrogance of the policeman or the irritability of the taxi driver: the car was her inferior, it would do as it was told — or else. Solly and I were as detached from her as if we were passengers on a train and she the driver far removed from us.
Once across the Harbour Bridge the traffic thinned and she dropped her shoulders slightly and wound down the window. The cold air ripped into our thin clothing. We jammed our knees together and held our arms tightly across our chests, jaws clamped tight to stop our teeth chattering. Where there were tramlines, Mrs Pearlman followed them exactly as though they were magnets drawing her forward; when they went their own way she lined up the car wheels with the yellow line down the centre of the road and never deviated from it. Suburb after suburb flashed by; we had left the densely populated areas behind and the white Pacific Highway was marked on either side by large stone bungalows with front lawns as big as parks. Some had white storks poised over giant clam shells.
Suddenly we were thrown violently to the right as without warning Mrs Pearlman swung the car off the highway and down a steep, rutted road with trees arched across it. The notes of bellbirds came clearly over the racing engine. The car plunged on like storm-water down a drain until with a frightful grinding of gears it paused momentarily before turning into a driveway that wound between tortured gums. Low branches lashed the side of the car as Mrs Pearlman drove on the high sides of ruts to avoid the water-filled depressions. Then we heard the purr of bitumen under the wheels and the car halted in a green clearing flanked on two sides by a stark, low building of pink bricks.
With one action, Mrs Pearlman was sounding the horn and opening our door. My first sensation was one of pleasure at the warmth of the morning. Without the rushing wind in the car, the sun curled around my shoulders and I could feel my taut frame respond, unwinding like a cat by a fireside. I turned my face to the sun, smiling stupidly back at it as though it were a friend I had not seen for a very long time.
“Isn’t it beaut,” I whispered to Solly.
“It’s a very big house,” he replied.
“The sun, Solly, the lovely warm sun, ah, it’s all over me.”
He stood beside me, his little chin tilted. Unconsciously my arm went around his shoulder and there we stood oblivious of everything except that marvellous pervading warmth. As though from afar, I heard the car horn sound again, heard the crunch of feet on gravel, the low murmur of voices, felt us being propelled gently forward up some steps, and only when the eaves of the building cut off the sun’s rays did I come back to earth. The cold that was only a shadow returned and enveloped us. It had a voice that was saying our names and asking us questions, hands were patting us, poking us, stroking us but I had withdrawn inside my head where the sun still shone and nobody could ever take it away from me.
Inside the building there was a smell of newness everywhere. It came off the painted wails, the polished floors, even the chairs on which we sat, across from a man and woman whose faces glowed pink, scrubbed and shiny. Above their heads was yet another of those honour boards, which I scanned while the couple conversed with Mrs Pearlman. Perhaps Uncle Siddy’s name was up there as well. It was divided into a number of columns with headings that read: President (only one name there); Life Governors (six names); Life Members (too many to count); and Committee (six names). Uncle Siddy was not there. I nudged Solly to look. He read the names slowly, his mouth working as he did so then in his high clear voice which bounced around the room he said: “Uncle Siddy’s not there, Jack.”
The three stopped their conversation and the man spoke in a strange accent. “Not where — who is not there?” Mrs Pearlman tut-tutted admonishingly at Solly and explained.
“Ah, Mr Goetz, little Solly has seen the Memorial Board at the Hall with his Uncle Sidney’s name on it. He thought …’’
“… our peoples here are from the war, yes?’’ he broke in. “No, younger man, these peoples are our — how do you say it, Mrs Pearlman?”
“Our benefactors, Mr Goetz, yes, that would be right.”
Solly burst out laughing. “Is your name really Mr Goats?” he asked and put his fingers up to his head like a goat’s horns. The man stood up and gripped the edge of the desk but the woman tugged at his coat then spoke rapidly to him in a foreign language. He controlled himself then smiled hugely.
“I am not a goat, younger man and you, you are not the Kaiser either. So, let us be friends, yes, and you call me Mr Goetz like in shirts and this lady is Mrs Goetz also like in shirts.” He leaned across the desk and stuck out his hand. Mrs Pearlman nodded to us and we went to him and solemnly shook hands. His wife beamed approvingly then clapped her hands and said, “Now, shall we have some tea?”
Mrs Pearlman saved the moment for us by cutting in quickly, “I think it is time these two gentlemen had a bath and some wholesome food, Mrs Goetz. God knows when they ate last.”
To this day I have the strongest recollection of Mrs Goetz. Her sheer size — well over six feet tall, her gigantic bosom, muscular neck and perfectly oval head with tight black hair that crowned a face with skin drawn tight would have done credit to a circus strongman. As I walked behind her, the calf muscles flexed through her stockings, driving each foot forward like pistons on a steam-engine. Mingling with the smell of newness was her own personal odour of strong carbolic soap and the creak of her heavily starched uniform. Without realising it, Solly and I fell into a marching step behind her, covering miles of polished floor-boards, through vast halls until we came to the kitchen which was bigger than our entire Bondi flat. She marched across the tiles, her heels ringing out her advance. A plump little woman sprang to attention beside a bubbling tureen, lifted the lid and silently handed her a ladle. Mrs Goetz dipped it in, blew on its contents noisily then beckoned me to taste.
‘‘Ess, young man, komm, eat the soup.”
I sucked clumsily from the hot ladle with Solly watching me apprehensively. It was rich and brown with the tiniest globules of fat dancing on it like gold dust. No words were necessary for Solly to see that it was good; he reached up and took the ladle, emptying it half down his shirt front.
“Ach so, young men, please sit here and cook will give you soup and bread but no butter eh? Here everything is kosher — you know what that means?” I didn’t know that it applied to food. The word had a different connotation when mouthed frequently by Uncle Siddy. Deals were kosher, the man who bought the scrap gold was kosher, the woman he was currently living with was not kosher. I never realised that its true meaning applied to the strict observance of Jewish dietary laws. Mrs Goetz was merely telling us that here one did not eat dairy products with meat. There was a lot to learn.
Mrs Goetz sat facing us at the kitchen table watching with obvious enjoyment as we ate. Solly burped. She wagged a finger at him but her eyes were smiling. When we had finished she stood up and issued her commands — baths, wash the hair, cut the fingernails, clean clothes and then, “You will be ready for when the other children come home from school, ye
s?”
Other children? What other children? Where did they come from? How did they get here? Mrs Goetz’s matter-of-fact statement sent my mind reeling. It simply had not occurred to me that there would be other children here; in my own tight little world there existed only Solly and me, a past that would not go away and a future that I had never bothered to think about. Now as we marched behind Mrs Goetz’s broad back I saw with confused feelings the straight rows of dining-tables each with its own little vase of artificial flowers. A sharp left turn and we entered a long dormitory of eight beds with bright blue covers; our little column continued down the centre of the dormitory, through swing-doors and into a bathroom of blinding whiteness.
“Here is water, here is soap, here is towels and,” she reached into her uniform pocket and brought out a brown bottle, “you should put this on your head but be careful, not in the eyes, yes?” She took the top from the bottle and the smell of carbolic filled the room. “Soon I shall return with the new clothes.” The swing-doors closed behind her and we were alone.
We turned on the water and stood gazing as it slowly filled the baths. “Couldn’t we just pretend, Jack?” Solly said. “What if the other kids come in, what if a girl comes in and see you with hair round your dicky?”
“There aren’t any girls here, stupid, this is the bad boys’ home, like the milko said,” I replied half-heartedly.
“Are we bad boys, Jack?”
“I suppose so, else we wouldn’t be here would we?”
“I liked the soup.”
“What do y’reckon about Mr Goats, Solly? I thought he was gonna give you a clip in the ear.”
“You’d have belted him, wouldn’t you Jack?”
“Too right and I’d ’ve told Uncle Siddy.”
We watched the mounting bathwater, undecided. Finally, with Solly watching me for a lead, I turned the taps off. Silently we undressed and stepped into the baths. It was glorious. My skin tingled, my scrotum drew taut, the fine hairs on my arms lay in beautiful patterns and the heat was a full summer sun nurturing me like a mother.
Solly was splashing around like an otter, water slopping over the edge of the bath. Neither of us had picked up the soap but the water was already murky with a grey sludge tidemark, Far off I thought I heard something that alarmed me.
“Be quiet a minute Solly I thought I heard voices.” We both lay still in the water. There was no mistaking it; through the window slats I could hear girlish laughter then a boy’s voice calling, “I’ll meet you later, Ruti.”
“Bloody girls, Solly, oh Christ they might come in here. Get out, quick. Jesus, they might even be bad girls.”
I pulled the plug and jumped out. The water made a rude gurgling sound, mocking our fears. The swing-doors opened and Mrs Goetz stood there.
“So soon finished, young man? Okay, get dry and come with me.”
I wrapped a towel around me and stood there manfully. “Are there girls here, Mrs Goetz — in this place?”
“Of course, Mister Jacob, there are five. There’s little Anna and big Renate, they are sisters and then there is Goldie, and Ruti and Erica. But don’t you worry, boys too we have for you to play with. Come, come, you will soon meet them.’’ She wrapped a towel tightly around Solly and picked him up effortlessly. I followed her through the dormitory to a room that was really a gigantic cupboard.
From floor to ceiling it was stacked with clothes — on hangers, on shelves, in drawers — meticulously categorised for size, for winter, for summer, for boys and girls. Yet unlike the rest of the home with its raw smell of newness, the windowless clothes-room reeked of a potent aroma of mothballs and dry-cleaning spirit. Mrs Goetz stood back and surveyed us critically then paraded back and forth along the shelves selecting items which she placed in two neat piles on the table.
As I stood there in the damp towel, my body cooling rapidly, I could hear laughter and shouts coming from the dormitory. Mrs Goetz grinned at us and said, “Quick now, younger men, du must get dressed.” And she added impishly, “Before the girls comm, ya!”
She pushed my pile of clothes towards me: singlet, shirt, underpants, short trousers and a jumper with school colour bands on it. All the outerwear had woven, scripted name-tags sewn into them and each item had a different name. I looked at them in horror and distaste. They were the clothes of dead children, I told myself. After they were put in the ground, someone had gathered the clothes up and brought them here. They smelled of hospitals, the owners would come back in the night and demand their clothes back, they might even kill me for wearing them! I shivered uncontrollably then, as Mrs Goetz turned to me and saw that I had made no move to dress, I swept the pile to the floor and burst out crying.
Solly, who was already half-dressed, stared at me uncomprehendingly; he sat on the edge of the table where Mrs Goetz had been trying shoes on him.
“Don’t wear them, Solly,” I cried, “they’re dead boys’ shoes.”
He looked down at his feel. “They feel nice, Jack. Can I keep them, Mrs Goetz?”
Mrs Goetz calmly picked up the fallen clothing as if nothing had happened, waited until my sobs had subsided, then crooned, half to herself, “Jacob, Jacob, it is good that you cry; such times you have had need to cry. But Jacob, my young man, you are wrong — these clothes are from our Committee. How do you say it? The kind people have children who have grown too large for their clothes so they bring them here. Believe me, Jacob, all the children are alive. God willing, they should go on helping us and maybe, Jacob, you too will one day help others.”
She took Solly’s towel and with the pretence of drying my hair, dabbed at my eyes, pressing my face to her chest. The stolid beating of her heart and the rhythmic rise and fall of her bosom settled me down; she released me and methodically began to dress me. The towel around my waist dropped to the floor and as if I had been a shop dummy, she slipped the underpants over my nakedness, her hands resting on me for the briefest of moments. “So,” she said, “you will do the rest, eh?” Solly was now fully dressed and already swanking around the little room, calling on me to hurry. “Can I have some more soup now?” he asked querulously.
The sound of feet pounding up and down in the corridor outside hastened my need to be fully clothed, despite my fear of their origins. Pants, shirt and jumper came from three different owners, who, if they weren’t dead, as Mrs Goetz had assured me, I would gladly have done violence to. The shoes were like dead weights on my feet. As Solly and I were shepherded out of the clothes cupboard by Mrs Goetz, I felt unbearably old, weary and beaten; I could not span the time from when we were Carmel’s ‘little mannikins’ to Mr Goetz’s ‘younger men’.
She marched us briskly down the corridor and into a sunny dining-hall where her husband at the head of a phalanx of children, boys on his right, girls on his left, stood as the titular if not the actual head of the establishment. The tables were covered in pink and blue cloths with a circled monogrammed ‘A.S.M.H.’ in the centre. Places were set with a plate, knife and spoon and there was a tall jug of milk on each table. Mr Goetz rang a little handbell which stilled the buzz of voices.
“Comm here to me, Mister Solly and Mister Jacob.” He beckoned us to stand in front of him, then, pulling out two chairs, pumped his arms up and down, “Up, up younger men, zo everybody can see you.”
Solly climbed on the chair and beamed around him with obvious enjoyment. It was a long time since he had been the sole centre of attention. He straightened his shirt collar, fiddled with his socks and even put his hands on his hips and smirked. I was disgusted with him and to show it, adopted an ungainly slouch, sinking my hands deep into my trouser pockets. The sun had dropped below the eaves, its rays shone through the big windows, converging on us like a spotlight. I followed them back over the tree-tops, imagining that I could walk along the rays to freedom.
Mr Goetz was making a speech. Odd words and many strange names drifted past me. I was almost at the end of the sunbeam, about to descend from the tree to the outside
world when there was a burst of clapping and Mr Goetz was prodding me to get down from the chair and shake hands with a queue of boys and girls standing gravely surveying me.
Dry hands, small hands, large hands, moist hands, names like Hans, Manfred, Ruti, Erich, Wolfgang, Renate, Anna overwhelmed me. I kept one hand in my pocket, gripping my penis fiercely, longing to escape this ordeal. The last one to take my hand was a tall, red-headed boy with freckles and greenish eyes. He was relaxed and assured.
“Wolfgang,” he said softly. “But here it is not a name, I mean in Australia, so I am called Bill. And you Jacob?”
“Jack,” I answered readily. “By jingo, you can call me Jack, eh?”
FOUR
I slept that night between cold sheets drawn so tightly over the mattress that no wrinkle dared to appear. To get into the bed I had first to exert all my strength to lever the top sheet and blankets out from under the mattress. A monogrammed quilt heavy as a sandbag now lay folded precisely in four across my feet. Light floral curtains flapped in a languid breeze; a moonbeam skittering between scudding clouds picked out the humps in the other beds. There were six on each side. In my row, all were occupied. In the other, only one; I knew that beneath that slight hummock, Solly would be lying on his back with one hand stretched out on the pillow. Next to me, Wolfgang/Bill lay at full length, his red hair almost glowing in the half-light. I had taken the last bed in the row. Mr Goetz had instructed me to occupy it despite my pleading to be next to Solly.
“Ve must fill up der side, young man,” he commanded.