Knitting

by Anne Bartlett

  On the first night, after Tony cooked dinner and they finally cleared the table, they played Scrabble. Martha surprised them all with her extensive vocabulary and a cheer fully relentless competitiveness. Sandra had begun the game with a certain discretion, not wanting to show off with obscure words—but when Martha put quincunx on a triple word score, using all her letters, the rest of them were obliged to resort to the dictionary. Sandra threw off the traces then and tried to catch up, but it was too late. Kate and Tony were laughing too hard at Sandra’s late burst of attention to care about their scores.

  “Where did you learn to play like that?” Sandra asked Martha over cocoa and crumpets.

  “At home, Sunday afternoons. We had a long-drop dunny out the back, with an old Oxford dictionary hanging from a nail. Malcolm and I learned new words to try and beat Dad. I learned all the q words off by heart.”

  No matter how many times Sandra tried to categorize Martha, she kept turning into something else.

  THE second evening, after a day of working on patterns and a leisurely dinner with some smooth red, Sandra suggested they tell stories from their lives before the age of twenty.

  “You make everything hard work,” complained Tony. “Don’t you ever let up?”

  “You first,” said Sandra. “You’re the oldest.”

  “Let me think,” said Tony, leaning back in his chair. “OK. Back when I was a boy, long, long ago . . .” Kate and Sandra rolled their eyes. Martha leaned forward.

  “Go on, Tony.”

  So Tony told how as a fourteen-year-old he and two friends had played hooky from school and had ridden their bikes down storm-water drains. In the dark he had fallen off his bike and cut his head quite deeply, but he had to wait until school finished to have it stitched, to avoid being found out. Sandra and Kate had heard the story before, but Tony added embellishments for his appreciative new audience. Martha rocked with laughter and applauded every paragraph.

  Kate’s story began when she was eighteen. Tony had proposed eight times before she said yes. She switched back and forth, replaying the events, mimicking her own youthfulness, her parents, and Tony’s increasing desperation. Again, the story was mainly for Martha. The wine loosened them and they laughed easily.

  “Now you, Martha,” said Tony.

  “Well,” said Martha, “I’ll tell you what happened when I was seventeen. There are things your friends should know.” She stood up and smoothed down her clothes and moved so that she was standing in a free space where they could all see her. She patted her hair, made eye contact with each of them in turn, clasped her hands in a melodramatic gesture, and began.

  “My name is Martha, make no mistake.

  “My name is Martha. I am the sister of Malcolm, and I am seventeen years old. Our father and mother are dead.

  “I am Martha the wife of Manny. Martha, Manny, and Malcolm. Three Ms in a nice straight row.

  “My brother Malcolm is married to Penelope. Penny and I don’t get on.

  “Manny is dead. This is how I felt the day that Manny died.”

  Martha sat down and assumed another pose. Sandra looked across at Kate. What was she making of this strange performance?

  “Manny’s chops are on the plate in the fridge, covered with plastic wrap. I must throw them out. They have been there five days and are starting to smell. I can’t bring myself to throw them out, because that is the last thing I did for him, cook those chops. It was a mistake to cook them so early: even if he had come home they would have been tough as leather. I am still learning how to time the cooking so everything ends up perfectly all at once, and nobody is waiting for the potato to mash or the gravy to be made. It’s not Manny who cares, it’s me. Manny likes everything, including me.” Here Martha winked heavily. “And I like Manny too. But I like to have everything just right.”

  Martha sighed heavily and went on. Her voice filled the room.

  “Manny rides his bike to work and on the way home someone knocks him off. He never came home to eat those chops. At the funeral it is freezing and rains. I wear his leather jacket over the sweater I made him. They are much too big, of course, but it is like going with him, only it’s his funeral, so how can I be going with him? I can’t think straight. I can’t breathe properly. I have been knitting, because knitting helps me breathe. I am knitting a scarf. It’s too long, it’s ten feet long, but I can’t stop, it just keeps growing, and I just keep adding more wool.” Martha’s hands were busy showing and shaping.

  “What would happen if I stopped? That’s the question. I have rolled the scarf up from the bottom and pinned it with diaper pins. We won’t be needing them for a baby, not now, because you can’t have a baby without a father. The scarf gets longer and longer. I must stop soon, I must stop knitting and throw out those chops.”

  Kate and Sandra exchanged looks. What had they unleashed? Was it finished? But Martha went on.

  “I’m making a weeping scarf, a mourning scarf. A mourning scarf to wear on a cold morning. I will knit it long enough to wrap around the house. The house and I will stay wrapped up forever with memories of Manny. But I can’t keep the chops forever, or I won’t be able to stay in the house.

  “Where is my knitting? I made a mistake. I must fix the mistake so I can knit and keep calm, so I don’t make more mistakes. It’s a love scarf to keep me warm, there’s no mistake about that. My name is Martha. Thank you.”

  Martha bowed and sat down in her chair. The per formance was over. Neither Sandra nor Kate knew what to say, but Tony laughed suddenly.

  “So did you throw out the chops?”

  “Of course I did,” said Martha in her ordinary voice. “You can’t keep going like that, keeping yourself and your chops wrapped up forever. Besides, they started to stink.”

  “And did you really knit a scarf big enough to go around the house?”

  Martha grinned. “No, but it was pretty long! I could wrap it around myself a few times.”

  “And did it work? Knitting it? Did it really keep you calm?”

  “Yes. But then I made a lot of mistakes and things got messy. But Malcolm organized a holiday for me. I got better eventually.”

  Sandra and Kate were silent. Normal rules did not apply. Tony, never known for his conversational sensitivity, was holding everything together.

  “Have you still got the scarf?”

  Martha frowned.

  “Somewhere. Tucked away.”

  “I’d like to see it,” said Tony.

  “No way,” said Martha. “I don’t show people my mistakes. I bet you don’t either.”

  “Good one!” said Tony. “No, I don’t.” He paused. “Well, thanks, Martha, that was very interesting. Glass of port, anyone? Or a cup of tea? Then it’s your turn, Sandra.”

  “Oh, we’ve had enough, haven’t we?” said Sandra. “Martha gave a real performance. I couldn’t do anything like that.” She saw the pain on Martha’s face. “I mean, it’s getting late. We should be going to bed.”

  “Oh, no, you don’t,” said Tony. “You started this. We’ve all had a turn. Don’t think you can dip out, just because you’re a poor old widow.”

  “Tony!” said Kate.

  “You don’t mind, do you, Sandy?” Tony was the only person in the world who could get away with calling her that. And Sandra didn’t mind his teasing. It was better than everyone tiptoeing around her feelings all the time.

  So Tony brewed tea in the white china pot and poured them each a cup. They all looked at Sandra expectantly. Well, she’d tell them something they hadn’t heard before.

  “When I was a kid,” said Sandra, “I was staying with Auntie Mert. My mother had been sick and my dad was being a misery, so Auntie Mert took me to her place for a few days. On Saturday morning I came out for breakfast, and there she was dressed up in her good clothes.

  “’Are you going out?’ I said. Yes, she was.

  “’Where?’ I asked her.

  “’Got some business,’ she said. ‘But Uncle Darce
is taking you to the beach with the cousins.’ There were five of us, and we often went to the beach.

  “So I packed my beach bag, but I knew something was odd. Auntie Mert wouldn’t look at me. I said I’d wait out front for Uncle Darce.

  “As I was going down the hall she called me back and knelt down so her face was level with mine.

  “’Listen, kiddo,’ she said. ‘I can’t tell you what I’m doing today because the family won’t let me. Otherwise I would. One day you’ll work it all out. And when you do, just remember I thought you should come with us and not go to the beach.’

  “’But I want to go to the beach,’ I said

  “’Good,’ she said. ‘You just enjoy it. I hope you have a very happy day.’

  “Anyway, we played on the beach all morning. Then, when we were sitting on the rug under the jetty having lunch, my oldest cousin said, ‘How come you’re not at the funeral?’

  “’What funeral?’ I asked.

  “’Your mother’s,’ he said.

  “She’d died, you know, and they hadn’t even told me. Nobody had told me. Auntie Mert was the youngest aunt, and the others wouldn’t let her tell me. They didn’t want me at the funeral, so they decided they’d wait until after.”

  The others sat in respectful silence. Tony proffered the pot of tea, Sandra nodded, Tony poured. There was a sniff from Martha’s chair, and then another.

  Martha was crying, her face heavy with tears, a large hankie held to her nose. Her shoulders were shaking. The other three looked at one another in consternation. Martha kept crying, quietly and thoroughly, then put her head down on the arm of her padded chair and began to sob loudly, with small cries of pain that increased in volume as time went on. Wailing, thought Sandra. Martha is wailing.

  “Martha,” said Sandra, “whatever’s the matter?”

  More sobs.

  “Did I say something to upset you?” Sandra was quickly reviewing her own story, and Martha’s. Was Martha unstable? Had she said too much?

  Sandra looked at Kate and Tony, then got out of her chair and went to kneel by Martha, putting a tentative hand on her shoulder.

  “Martha? Are you all right?”

  “I’m all right,” said Martha, looking Sandra full in the face. They searched each other’s eyes. Martha’s face was red and blubbery like a child’s.

  “I’m all right,” she repeated. “It’s you I’m crying for, Sandra.” She swiped at her running nose. “Because you can’t. You don’t know how.”

  Sandra sat back on her heels. Then she picked up her cup of tea and took it out into the night.

  SANDRA and Kate had had enough sightseeing, but Tony had a list and wanted to visit everything, as did Martha. They had climbed through caves, gawked at the Blue Lake, toured the pumping station, done the boardwalk, stared into the still deep water of Ewens Ponds. Now they pulled into yet another car park.

  Kate eyed the sandy hill. “I’m staying here, Tony. But take your time.”

  Sandra took out her binoculars to look at birds and said she’d keep Kate company.

  Tony and Martha trudged up the hill. It wasn’t as hard going as it looked, though they were glad to pause at the top. The beach stretched for miles, a long white expanse in both directions, the tide halfway.

  “This way, I reckon,” said Tony, turning left. Martha stopped to take off her shoes. Her springy hair had gone wild in the wind, and her skirt flapped around her bare legs.

  Tony enjoyed Martha’s company. She loved everything, the ink-black caves, the startling blue of Blue Lake, the hollowed volcanic shell of Mount Schank. At the bottom of the empty crater she had written MARTHA WAS HERE with white stones, and read the words from the top of the ridge with great satisfaction. Taking Martha around was like having an excited child for company, which allowed Tony to return freshly himself when he was in danger of being disappointed by finding beloved places diminished or slicked over for tourists. Yesterday he had seen the yawning mouth of a cave that had been accessible in his youth; now it was gated and locked against him and the flashlight he had packed in anticipation.

  Martha had tucked her skirt into her knickers and was prancing along the beach waving her arms in the air. She looked like a large flapping kite that couldn’t quite take off. Tony tried to swing his arms as he walked along and clapped his hands once or twice, but he felt like a dancing bear. He couldn’t quite bring himself to cavort. Sandra might be watching through her binoculars from a sand hill.

  “Tony! Look!”

  Martha had stopped still and was staring at a spot in front of her feet. Next to her knobby toes, water was erupting out of the flat sand like a miniature volcano.

  “What is it? Oh, no! The wave’s covered it.”

  She waited anxiously for the water to ebb.

  As it receded, Tony saw it, too, the clear bright water bubbling out of beach sand.

  “There’s more, Tony—look! There! And there!” Martha was spinning around, pointing and laughing.

  All around were little craters of bubbling sand. Yes, this was it. And this time just as he remembered. Tony bent down and cupped his hand in the water.

  “Taste it.” He smiled and put his mouth to his hand.

  Martha dipped her fingers in one of the holes and licked them.

  “What? It’s fresh!” Martha looked so surprised that Tony laughed out loud.

  “But how come?”

  “It’s a freshwater spring.”

  “We nearly walked right past! We nearly missed it! We would have if the tide was higher.”

  For a few minutes they watched the miracle of fresh water flowing through persistent washes of salt.

  “I want to see how deep they are. Here, Tony, hold my hand.”

  Tony held out a steadying hand while Martha swayed, awkward and unbalanced, her foot deep in one of the bubbling craters.

  “It’s rocky down the bottom. Like broken shells.”

  She let go of Tony. “I want to put my hand in.”

  Martha leaned over and put her hand down as far as she could reach, threatening to topple.

  “Watch out, you’ll get wet.”

  “But I want to feel the bottom.”

  “You did, with your foot.”

  She ignored him, waited till the wave receded again, then knelt on the sand, pushing her hand deep down so that the water bubbled above her elbow.

  “It’s stony. Like broken rock. I think there’s one big hole and lots of little holes, but I can’t tell, because of the shells and stones.”

  “You’re going to get wet.”

  But it was too late. A wave swirled around Martha, up and over her legs, lifting her skirt around her like a hooped petticoat. She gasped with the shock of it. Tony offered her his hand, but Martha sat back in the water and laughed uproariously. Then, to Tony’s dismay, she kicked out her legs, turned over, and lay full-length, front side down, in the water. The sea flowed away, leaving her marooned on the sand like a small beached whale. She put her face down to the spring and drank greedily.

  “It’s good, Tony! Want some? You get more this way.”

  “No, thanks.”

  “You don’t know what you’re missing.”

  “Yes, I do. I’m missing wet and cold all the way home.”

  “Tastes really good. I was thirsty.” She splashed water at him. Tony moved out of reach, uncomfortable. He started back toward the car.

  Martha trailed behind. Her legs chafed against her wet clothes. She saw a black double fin sweeping along, fishing close to shore, but she didn’t tell Tony—he was too far away. It was dangerous out here. You had to watch out. Anything could happen.

  Behind the security of Tony’s determined back she slipped off her wet undies and wrung them out. She wouldn’t embarrass him if she could help it. She put them in one of her big skirt pockets. Sand rasped her skin in awkward places. It had been worth it though, to feel that deep and secret water bubbling up hard against her body and have the cool fresh water washing her
mouth.

  IN THE car, Kate and Sandra had been talking.

  “Martha’s strong, you know,” said Sandra. “She’s really robust. You wouldn’t think it to look at her, but she is.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “Imagine, a young woman, and her husband killed like that. Sure, sounds like she was pretty disturbed at the time, but she moved through it OK. She’s never remarried; she’s quite content to live her single life, be responsible for herself. She’s not grieving. She might have been weak once, but now she’s as tough as an old boot.”

  “Everyone’s got their vulnerabilities,” said Kate. “Maybe you just don’t know Martha well enough.”

  But Sandra had made up her mind. “No, she’s a healthy survivor. I wish I was strong like her.”

  “You’re too hard on yourself,” said Kate. “Jack’s only been gone twelve months.”

  At that point Martha and Tony opened the doors and climbed in. Martha leaned toward Sandra as she reached around for her seat belt.

  “Ugh! Martha, you’re all wet. What did you do, go swimming?”

  Martha’s skin was blotched purple with cold.

  “No, I got baptized.”

  “You are really weird, Martha,” said Sandra, then bit her tongue.

  “Yes,” said Martha cheerfully. “Just like you.” She turned to look at Sandra. “Only your trouble is you don’t know how to enjoy it.”

  Like a child, Sandra gave Martha a little shove. Martha pushed her back, gently, but with a lot of body contact, so that a good deal of wetness was transferred.

  “She’s wetting me, Mum,” complained Sandra to Kate.

  “Stop fighting, you two,” said Kate. “Martha, move over to your side of the car. Does anyone want a mintie?”

  “Yes,” said Tony. He chewed it stoically, looking straight ahead over the steering wheel, pretending to ignore the commotion in the back seat.