Jack had met the German briefly once when scavenging the tip with Franco. An inhospitable man, everyone called him Hans but Franco had said that was not his name. His name was Friedrich. He and Franco had been friends but once the war began their friendship had made the locals suspicious. They were arrested on the same winter’s night and held in the lock-up at the police station in Tindall until transport could be arranged to an internment camp in Hay. Father O’Hara had intervened and pleaded Franco’s case on behalf of his family and he was home within a week. It was two years before Friedrich came home, though, and since then, despite speaking four languages, Friedrich spoke to no one, not even his old friend. Today he sat alone, his eyes closed as if in private communion.
Across the aisle were Dot and Marge, rosy-cheeked but tearful in their best finery. It was the same finery he had seen them wear to milk their goats, as it happened, early last summer when Franco had first taken him up the back paddock to meet them. As the two men climbed the hill they could hear the women’s distant warbling floating in the stillness. ‘Doraaa! Nessieee! Staaarlight! Petuuuniaaa!’
Behind their neat pink weatherboard cottage was the goat shed. The basic timber and corrugated-iron structure was transformed by several dozen candles propped in jam jars placed on ledges and in crevices around the shed. The sisters sat squat on low milking stools. One wore a red dress and a cream shawl around her shoulders; a satin hat with a small veil completed the ensemble. The other was in jade green with ruffles down the front. She’d added pearls and a red cloche hat. The trilling of an operatic soprano could be heard from a large wooden radiogram against one wall.
‘Buona sera, Signore Martino!’ called the sister in red. ‘Where are our darling girls? We haven’t seen them for weeks! Who is this you’ve brought to see us?’ Keeping one hand on the goat’s udder, she reached out and gave Jack a damp handshake with the other. ‘Dot,’ she said. ‘And this is my sister, Marge.’ Marge stopped milking for a moment and blew him a kiss.
‘Can we offer you a sherry?’ Dot gestured to the half-empty flagon sitting at her feet.
Jack laughed. He picked it up and took a swig. Its warm sweetness seemed to seep into every part of his mouth, it seared his throat and warmed his gut. He gave a delicate cough that set both women almost toppling off their stools with laughter.
‘Just let me finish with Lilac and I will show you the caprino,’ said Dot. ‘They smell divine, don’t they, Sister?’
‘Divine,’ smiled Marge, giving Jack a wink.
Using Lilac for support, Dot hoisted herself off the stool, dusted her skirts, adjusted the tilt of her hat and led the two men to the laundry behind the house.
‘Is always the same,’ whispered Franco. ‘Beautiful.’
There was no room for Jack in the laundry. He was relieved – the acrid, intimate odour of goat cheese emanated from the room. He leant on the doorframe and watched the candle-lit shed across the yard become a cavern of flickering lights as the night engulfed it.
But now, in the church, Marge gave him a sad smile across the aisle and he acknowledged her with a nod. For Jack, the place to dwell on Franco’s life was not in this church. He longed to escape its stifling atmosphere and the pinch and scratch of his best tweed suit.
As the service ended Luigi, Alberto, Rocco, Joseph, Snow and Jack stepped forward to bear the coffin. As the men lifted the casket to their shoulders Friedrich stood and came towards them. Jack saw the strain in the German’s face, the regret pooled in his eyes, and Jack fully understood what he wanted. Friedrich had left it too late to make amends with Franco. Jack’s face felt hard and unyielding, his heart numb. He would not give up his place. He looked straight ahead and led the pallbearers down the aisle and out into the small cemetery behind the church.
Jack was shocked at the sight of the gaping hole in the ground. He wanted to crawl into it like a wounded animal. Around him he saw the faces of his wife, her sister and mother, distorted with sorrow, exhausted by grief. He felt helpless and angry.
Late that afternoon Jack stood at the gate for a long time. To step onto the hallowed ground of the olive grove filled him with foreboding. As the wind picked up he could see flapping scraps of black cloth tied to every tree. He opened the gate and walked slowly through the grove just as he had watched Franco do. He wished he had learnt more about the olives from Franco when he had the chance. He had vague thoughts about carrying on the work – building the olive mill. Jack ran his hands over the rough terrain of bark, trying to feel what Franco felt, trying to understand the hold these trees had over Franco. But in the end they were just trees. He wasn’t even particularly fond of olives.
He climbed the hill on the far side of the grove. From there he could see the entire farm. A lazy plume of wood-smoke drifted from the house chimney. The sun was low and the paddocks were now in shadow but on the hill he stood bathed in the last rays of sun. Then he realised there was something he could do for Franco. It seemed so right he practically ran back down the hill and through the grove. He slowed to a walk as he saw Rosanna leaning on the gate, watching him.
They faced each other.
‘He was trying to move one of those millstones when he had the heart attack,’ said Rosanna without emotion.
‘Did he say anything – at the end?’ he surprised himself by asking.
‘About you?’
‘No. Anything.’
She paused for a moment. ‘There is no translation.’ She turned and walked away.
All the mourners had gone home and dinner was subdued. No one seemed to want to meet Jack’s eye and yet he somehow felt they were looking to him for guidance. As soon as the meal was over he excused himself, began to fabricate a story about something he had to pick up; then he saw they were waiting for him to go, and left. He felt Rosanna’s eyes follow him.
He threw a shovel and several ropes on the back of the truck and roared off into the night.
Jack flicked off his lights and cruised, almost silently, down the last part of the road. Rather than take the driveway used by the hearse, he opened the gate into the paddock beside the church and drove around to the back of the cemetery where he couldn’t be seen from the road.
By torchlight he carefully examined the way the earth had been left, its shape and gradient, the gravedigger’s trademark shaping of each corner of the plot. He stood for a moment to observe the layout of the various wreaths and bouquets. One made to resemble a clock with the hands set at eleven – the time of Franco’s death – had been placed in the centre, a bouquet of lilies to the left, beside a white floral cross. An extravagant arrangement of mixed blooms lay at the feet, a wreath at the head. He laid them out in the same formation on the neighbouring plot, just to be sure. He threw his jacket into the cab of the truck, pulled his shovel off the tray and set to work.
A waning moon offered barely enough light. He would have to come back at dawn to put everything to rights. It took much longer than he had anticipated to open the grave. He hitched the ropes around the handles of the casket and, using the truck as a counterweight, hauled the box to the surface. Inch by inch he dragged it to the truck and used his last vestiges of energy to winch it onto the bed of the vehicle. He had the uneasy feeling of being watched. God? Franco? Or just his Sunday-school conscience?
Leaving the grave in disarray he drove back to the farm, bumping along the rough hilly track that ran along the eastern perimeter of the property until he came to the point where the track dipped down and ran along the back of the grove. Here, he turned off the dirt track and urged the truck up the steep incline of grass. Near the top of the hill was a long, flat ridge, protected from winds but touched by the dying breath of each day’s sun. The ridge was home to generations of flowering wattles. Each year its flare of golden blossom lit up the cold winter days. Jack could think of no better place for Franco than high above the olives, the wind at his back, the sun setting at his feet.
Driven on by the fear of an unforgiving dawn a mere hour or two aw
ay, Jack lowered Franco’s casket off the truck and pushed it under the low branches of the wattles. He swung the truck around and headed back to the church. He was almost there when he suddenly realised that there wouldn’t be enough soil to fill the grave without the coffin. He slammed on the brakes and came to a shuddering halt, pounded the steering wheel with his fists, furious at making such a stupid mistake. He recalled that nearby was a pile of gravel dumped by a road gang – he had passed it dozens of times. He turned the truck around and drove with his head half out the window, eyes desperately scanning the roadside. Finally his lights illuminated a dark heap among the roadside grass. The gravel was heavy on his shovel and the crash of metal on stone made his head throb.
First light found him on his knees, clothes encrusted with earth and almost weeping with exhaustion. He carefully brushed the soil over the top of the gravel grave and replaced each wreath and bouquet.
By the time the church bells tolled for Sunday mass he had scrubbed himself clean under the icy stream of the yard tap and slept for an hour in Franco’s armchair.
The women declined his offer to drive them to mass, clearly not happy that he had no plans to attend. Until she started up the truck and backed it out, Jack was not even aware that Rosanna could drive. It was only later he realised that it was a special mass dedicated to Franco.
When they had gone he made himself bacon and eggs, three rounds of toast and several mugs of strong tea. He put his shovel on his shoulder and walked up through the grove. The sun warmed his back, his boots glistened with morning dew and he could hear a thousand birds calling. He felt at peace. He felt as if Franco walked beside him.
Nine
AN OFFER is made to my great relief and, after an appropriate period of restraint, I email Warren and accept the position. I will start mid-January, after the holiday season. As I press Send I know that all my problems are solved; my future is secure. I feel good.
Lauren is happy for me. ‘How much are they paying you?’ she asks over the phone.
‘Why do you need to know?’
‘I’m just wondering if you’re going to get a decent apartment,’ she bleats.
‘Perhaps I’ll just commute for a while. I rather like the train.’
‘Yeah, right.’
‘I’ll sort something out,’ I say airily.
‘I might not be around anyway. I’ve had a job offer.’
‘From whom?’
‘Well,’ she’s says coyly, ‘Sarah rang me to see how I was doing. I told her about you abandoning me with no money and the uni fees and everything …’ She expects to hear me protest but I accept that as an accurate description of the situation. ‘I applied for a job with her London company as a marketing assistant – and got it. I’ll be working right in Knightsbridge!’
‘What? This has all happened very fast,’ I venture, dismayed.
‘Ah, friends in high places, you see.’
‘My friends in high places. What about the airfare? What about your marketing degree? Why didn’t you even tell me?’ I finish on a shrill note. Jesus! Sarah didn’t offer me a job!
‘It’s only come together in the last few days. I’ll defer for a year and Diane’s lending me enough for a one-way fare.’
London, one way. Who’s abandoning who here? I know I’m going to say the wrong thing seconds before I do. It’s as though I’m watching myself from a distance, a middle-aged woman with bare feet and in a brown dressing-gown, gripping the telephone with both hands. ‘Lu, I cannot deal with you going away right now. It’s not a good time. Everybody giving us hand-outs … you’re not going,’ I suddenly snap.
‘Giving me hand-outs? It’s got nothing to do with you! I didn’t tell you before ’cause I knew you’d kick up a stink. I’m taking this job and there’s nothing you can do about it.’
‘There is something I can do about it. I can tell Diane and Sarah to butt out.’
‘Why? Why would you do that?’
‘Because I forbid you to go.’
‘Forbid me? Why?’ she demands once more.
Silence. Just the hum of the line between us. The ground beneath us seems to be shifting, sliding away. She knows the answer.
‘Everything’s always about you, isn’t it? You’re just selfish, Adrienne. Incredibly selfish. You always were, and you always will be.’
‘I beg your pardon! I’ve worked my derriere off the last twenty years so you could have the best of bloody everything and now I’m in the shit all you can do is whine about losing your bloody mobile phone.’
‘You haven’t worked your so-called derriere off for me – that was for you! It made you feel important. Your business was like your brilliant eldest child who had to be protected from any disruption by the “little nuisance”. It was like a perfect older sister I couldn’t possibly compete with. I was a drain on resources, an impediment to your glamorous existence. I’ve always felt – been made to feel – that I was the biggest mistake you’ve ever made.’
‘What rubbish! I’ve never tried to hide the fact that you were an accident – it’s the truth – half the people born in the world are conceived by accident.’
‘I didn’t say accident. I said mistake,’ she replies coldly. ‘But the difference between those people and me is that mostly their parents actually care about them. They hang around netball courts on freezing mornings, they go to see their child in the school play – every performance! Where were you, Adrienne? Where were you when I needed a mum? And what about you pretending you were an orphan? It’s a joke really – I was the orphan.’
‘I don’t think you really understand what I’ve been through the last year —’ I cling stubbornly to the script I’ve learnt off by heart.
‘I don’t think you really understand what I’ve been through the last nineteen years. You know, I was actually glad in a way when the business died because I thought —’ She stops and gives a heavy sigh. ‘You’re so convinced you’ve lost everything —’
She falters mid-sentence. There is silence for a moment, then the line goes dead.
In the days after my fight with Lauren a sort of lethargy overtakes me and slows me down. I seem to wander through the next week getting almost nothing done, half expecting a placating call from her. How ridiculous for her to be in competition with the source of everything she has ever owned, her education, her holidays – the lot! She is the most self-absorbed, unreasonable child. It’s impossible to please her.
My thoughts turn, selfishly perhaps, to my own future. Now the job is in place, I need to tie up the many loose ends around here. It takes me a week to dig out the letter from Goldsmith & Son, Jack’s solicitors. When I ring them they insist I make an appointment to collect my father’s documents.
Their offices are in a red-brick building in the main street of Duffy’s Creek, above the printing office. The tiny reception area smells sad. A stain on the carpet the size and shape of a large dog is the focal point of the room. The elderly receptionist gives me a sorrowful look.
Mr Goldsmith Senior and his son have tiny offices located opposite one another across a narrow hallway. Both have metre-high piles of manila folders teetering around the room and stacks of papers slewed across their desks. Mr Goldsmith Senior is unnaturally affable. As he shows me in, I see him glance across the hall to Mr Goldsmith Junior, who immediately materialises at my side. There almost isn’t room to sit down but finally we uncover a visitor’s chair and the meeting can commence. Mr Goldsmith Senior settles himself, rearranging files in an exasperated way as if they had got themselves in such a silly old pickle.
Son of Goldsmith is in his mid-fifties, thin of hair and thick of waist, so conservatively dressed that he seems like a man from an earlier era. He takes his place as though on sentry duty beside his father’s desk. I’m flattered they consider me too hot for one solicitor to handle. Arms folded, the son nods his head encouragingly as I explain the purpose of my visit. His pants cuff has caught halfway up his shin on what appears to be a garter holdin
g his socks up. Very Mr Bean. I have to avert my gaze so as not to be distracted by it.
‘Mr Bennett’s bank accounts I can’t help you with – you’d need to see Mr Finley at the bank. You’ll need to provide the death certificate to access his accounts, which we’ll give you today, but I can’t imagine there’d be too much there …’ says Goldsmith Senior ponderously. Goldsmith Junior shakes his head sadly to indicate just how strongly he concurs with his father on this one. Obviously my father was not one of the shakers and movers of this town. ‘Now, Jack didn’t make a will as such. Mr Bennett, in fact, gave us an envelope for you quite a while before his untimely death and signed the property over to you at that point. When we wrote to you it was simply to discharge our duty and deliver it to you personally as the beneficiary.’
I half expect him to say that the envelope is here somewhere and we should all pitch in and start looking. I glance around the room and notice an entire column of files propped in the corner all marked Leeton Earthmovers – a vexatious litigant if ever I saw one.
But Mr Goldsmith slides an envelope across the desk with my name on the front. ‘Perhaps you would like to look at the papers now, in case there is anything you would like to discuss with us.’
Against my better judgement I open the envelope and take out a deed document, the death certificate and a sealed envelope with my name on the front. I read the deed carefully, fold it up and replace it in the envelope. ‘No, I don’t think there is anything I need to discuss,’ I say brightly. ‘It all looks perfectly in order, thank you.’
They both look disappointed. ‘If you do decide to sell, we would be very happy to handle the sale and conveyancing aspects of the transaction.’
‘I’ll keep that in mind, should I decide to sell.’ I get up to leave and shake both their hands. ‘Can you tell me which bank Mr Finley’s with?’
They smile in unison; now I’m the joke. ‘We only have one bank in this town, Miss Bennett. Right next door.’
The Olive Sisters Page 11