by Mark O'Flynn
‘Shut your pie hole,’ Douglas roared.
‘Shut your own hole.’
‘Are you looking for a stoush?’
What were they fighting about? It seemed, like most arguments, to be about nothing.
‘Just you two quit it,’ said Emma.
‘Just you two quit it,’ Clancy mocked her.
At that, Douglas picked up Clancy’s bowl and threw it through the canvas flap of the window. Emma whacked Douglas across the fingers with a ladle. As I recall it now, it is almost funny, his flinching fingers, but it was not so at the time. Clancy stood up and took a roundhouse swing at Douglas. He missed. In the flickering candlelight it took a long second for me to see he had a hammer in his hand. Douglas saw it, too. He took it off Clancy with a deft gesture, then he sat Clancy squarely down on his pants with his big ham fist. Clancy went ‘Ooof’. My mother gasped, as did I. What was going on? Douglas examined the hammer before it followed the stew bowl outside.
‘Stop it,’ Emma shrieked. She held the ladle as if she was warding off devils, looking back and forth as though wondering which one of them she should wallop. I sat stone still. I could see mosquitoes darting in and out of the candle smoke.
‘After all we’ve done for you,’ growled Douglas.
‘You’ve done nothing,’ said Clancy.
‘Feeding you. Clothing you. All the sweet talk I put in with Edwards and Baldock.’
‘I never asked you to.’
They were like a couple of currawongs at each other’s throats over a morsel.
‘After the favour I did your mother by taking you in.’
‘Don’t start that again,’ said Clancy. ‘It was hardly charity.’
‘I found you a good living,’ Douglas roared in indignation.
‘This isn’t a life. Going blind. Burrowing underground like an animal.’
‘It’s work.’
Their shoulders were squared. Their voices had gone up an octave.
‘It’s slavery. It’s being buried alive.’
‘You can always pack your swag.’
‘I will.’ Clancy rose to his feet and stepped outside. If the door had been made of wood he would have slammed it. As it was, his departure was an ineffectual gesture. It was too dark for him to go anywhere tonight.
I remained seated, shocked. In a while my mother said, ‘Go and see if he’s all right.’
I hoped he hadn’t climbed to the top of the tallest tree. I went outside and joined him. We sat before a fire on the far side of the clearing, listening to the families and the burping men in the other humpies. The sounds of them settling for the night. Douglas and Clancy’s clash of voices still seemed to hang in the air.
We sat in silence tossing twigs and the odd lump of coal into the fire. The moon on the cliff top shone like an egg. Coal smoke drifted about the village. It wasn’t hard to hear fragments of my parents’ conversation.
‘Look what you’ve brought us to,’ my mother was saying. ‘That was hardly Christian.’
‘What do you mean? He will not listen to reason. He will not do as I say.’
‘Is that the legacy you want to leave him – that he did as he was told? He is no longer a child. What do you think you are to him now? You cannot treat them this way. Can’t you see that? They will choose their own path.’
After a pause Douglas said, ‘I do, Emma, I see that they’ve outgrown me and that I no longer know them. I fear that they do not know me.’
There was a long silence, like a bucket too full of frozen water.
Clancy beckoned me away, out of earshot. ‘Byron, I’ve something to show you. But it can’t be until morning, before work.’
I wondered if there would be time before work, then I remembered. ‘Edwards and the men are taking Dundas’s body out tomorrow.’
‘And you are not?’
‘I have been excused.’
He thought about this at length.
‘And you know nothing about the maids?’ I pressed him.
He did not. He only knew about Violet.
‘What happened to Violet?’ I demanded.
‘Violet has been attacked.’
But more than this, despite my protestations, Clancy would not say.
SEVENTEEN
I was woken at dawn by Clancy’s hand over my mouth. He whispered in my ear, ‘Come with me.’
We crept off in the faint light, carrying our boots. My father was snoring softly like two branches rubbing together in a breeze. I had grabbed a couple of johnny cakes, which we ate as we walked.
‘Where are we going?’
‘Follow me.’
‘What happened to Violet?’ I asked again.
Clancy took me southwards out of the village. We climbed to the Ruined Castle. At the top he swore me to secrecy for what he was about to tell me. We spat. We squeezed our hands together and the saliva seeped between our fingers. The sky was reddening to the east.
Out there somewhere a party of miners would be preparing to stretcher Dundas’s body up the cliff. North, at least, had been forthcoming in allowing the men to do that.
After the extraordinary meeting, (we were right) Clancy had gone to Ann’s. No surprises there. Clancy waited and waited in Bursill Lane for Violet to happen by, as she told him she often did on her way to the shops, but she did not appear. He was drawing attention to himself. Eventually he went up to the Carrington and crept through the alleys at the rear of the great hotel to knock at the kitchen door.
One of the maids opened it and after a while Mrs Haddock appeared. In Clancy’s estimate she did look about three hundred and fifty years old.
‘Hmpf.’ She peered suspiciously at Clancy.
‘Can I see Violet?’
‘No, you cannot.’
‘Why not?’
‘She is not here.’
Still none the wiser, Clancy had gone, at great personal risk, to Violet’s house on Darley Street. Tom Kefford, made aware of Clancy’s presence, flew out and threatened in a rage to give him another two shiners. Did he realise, Mr Kefford said ominously, that Violet was in there bawling her eyes out? Only in the face of Clancy’s utter bewilderment did Mr Kefford begin to suspect that there was some other cause for his daughter’s distress. Clancy had a vague comprehension that he and Mr Kefford were suddenly on the same side, the side of complete ignorance and stupefaction. Neither of them knew what had happened. Both Clancy and Mr Kefford wanted to find out what was going on so they could fix the situation, as they would any broken thing. They wanted to do something practical, make the world cooperate. But instead they were both obliged to practise patience, something neither of them was good at.
Mrs Kefford came out from the girls’ room where she had been comforting Violet and told them to keep their voices down.
‘What’s wrong with Violet?’ asked one of the children. They had seen their sister come running home with blood on her dress from where she had fallen and scraped her knee.
The parents said nothing; this uncharacteristic reserve upset the children more than the anger to which they were accustomed. It was only when Violet herself emerged from the girls’ room that Clancy was able to piece together a rudimentary account.
I later heard the story firsthand from Violet, who filled in some details for me. And perhaps over the years I have embellished it with some details of my own.
Perhaps a maid is spying from an upstairs window as Sir Henry Parkes puffs like a steeplechaser up the carriageway of the great hotel, albeit a steeplechaser that has long been retired. Parkes, though, will never retire. They will have to carry him out of the parliament feet first. He will see the nation as a federated one if it is the last thing he does.
He has made a good impromptu oration at the Congregational Church Hall. (Even I have to admit that.) He always feels invigorated after a good oration, hence his sprightly step as he approaches the hotel. Even at his age he still has all the old political cunning – the way he has forged an affinity between himself and tho
se pick-swingers. Well, there is an affinity. He feels it. He has extrapolated the notion of unionism to the broader canvas quite nicely. Has he actually said in parliament that North’s elevated tramway is – sorry, was – the greatest engineering achievement in the colony? Is that in the Hansard? And then the damned thing has to go and fall into the valley a few months later. Designed by foreigners. That is the unfortunate timing of politics, he supposes. North has paid dearly for that. The stockmarket has punished him. The hotel steps seem longer every time he climbs them. Statues of barely dressed nymphs dancing in the sun greet him at the top. Very lifelike.
Inside he pauses by an inordinately long chaise longue of green velvet. Mr Goyder comes out of his office and personally hands him his key.
‘Productive meeting, sir?’
‘Very, Goyder, very.’ Nice chap, Goyder, still a touch of the squatter about him. Good shot by all accounts.
‘I was wondering, Sir Henry, if you’d care to join a few of us for a game of bridge this evening?’
‘Too tired, Goyder. Too tired. The mountain air.’ Besides, I imagine he hates bridge.
Sir Henry slowly climbs the carpeted stairs. Coming along the corridor outside his room he confronts a maid carrying a bucket of dirty water and a mop. ‘Good morning,’ crows Sir Henry.
‘Good morning, sir,’ Violet replies. Sir Henry drops his key. Violet stops. She retrieves it for him.
‘Thank you, my dear.’
She picks up her bucket as Sir Henry opens his door.
‘Oh, miss.’
She stops. ‘Yes, sir?’
‘There’s something I wish to show you.’
‘Show me, sir?’
‘Yes.’
‘I’m not permitted to enter that room, sir.’
‘Poppycock. I am the Premier of New South Wales. I grant you permission.’
‘But sir —’
‘Mr Goyder is a personal friend of mine.’
It is not Mr Goyder that Violet is afraid of. She puts down her bucket again and, after glancing down the hallway, crosses the threshold. Sir Henry shuts the door.
Room One, the King George Suite, is a majestic room with a rich burgundy carpet and floral-patterned wallpaper. Burning lamps hang from the ceiling even though it is a bright day. Violet hasn’t seen a room like it. It is like stepping into a palace from a picture book.
‘What did you wish to show me, sir? Have you enough water?’
A silver bucket with a bottle of Champagne in it sits on an ornate whatnot by the bed. Parkes ushers Violet over to the window where he parts the lace curtains, finely stitched with the appliqué of a peacock’s fan. The ridges and gorges before her are blue and purple, resplendent under the sun. The view is as imposing as, closer to hand, the snow-peaked mountain of a man displaying it to her. It is as if he owns it.
‘Do you know that on a clear day you can see all the way to the smoke of Sydney?’
Violet doesn’t know that. She finds it hard to believe. As they admire the view, the vivid cliffs juxtaposed against the blue of the distant forest, Sir Henry begins to intone:
‘Where the mocking lyrebird calls
To its mate among the falls
Of the mountain streams that play,
Each adown its tortuous way;
Where the dewy-fingered even
Veils the narrow’d glimpse of Heaven …’
Violet isn’t sure she knows what he’s talking about. She isn’t sure she likes that bit about the dewy fingers. But he seems to expect a response.
‘Is that poetry, sir?’
‘It is. It is my curse.’
She doesn’t know what to say. Is this meant to make the big bear of a man seem more doe-eyed and lamb-like? It is certainly a strange combination to have in such a large frame.
Oh no, there is more. He resumes:
‘Where the morning re-illumes
Gullies full of ferny plumes,
And a woof of radiance weaves
Through high-hanging vaults of leaves …’
Enough of the ferny plumes, she thinks, she has a bucket of dirty water sitting out in the hallway that she must empty. The bucket will leave a ring on the carpet. Versifying and elbow grease do not rightly equate to her mind.
‘Do you like that?’ he asks.
‘I’m not sure I understand it, sir.’
‘Lord Tennyson liked it.’
‘Do you know Lord Tennyson, sir?’
‘Indeed I do. As I know Lord Carrington, who I understand is soon to grace us with his presence. He is not a man of such sensibilities. He does not possess, as I am told I do, a soul above huckstering.’
They are still looking out the window. The view has not altered. It is now that Sir Henry places his hands on her shoulders. She freezes. Now his mouth is on her neck. His arms are about her. Now he has her on the great big soft bed. His weight bears down and his hands fumble at her pinafore, lifting her skirts. She gasps. She cries out. His beard is suffocating. He is so hairy. He won’t get off. His forehead is sweating. She cannot breathe and he begins to make sounds as if he is choking. For a moment Violet thinks he has died on top of her, until he splutters and begins to sob.
Outside, Mrs Haddock is wondering who has left a bucket of dirty water right where someone might trip over it. She will have to have words. She looks up and down the corridor. Suddenly the door of Room One flies open and that maid – which one is it? – dashes out and down the stairs two at a time. Mrs Haddock doesn’t even have time to call her to a halt and deliver her reprimand before the door closes again with a solemn click. There is nothing else for it but to pick up the bucket herself. She shakes her head and grunts sourly. ‘Hmpf.’
Mr Kefford, on her behalf, was outraged and indignant and furibund. He wanted to march straight up to the Carrington and take charge of things. Mrs Kefford reminded him it was the Premier of New South Wales they were talking about. Clancy, also eager for revenge, persuaded Mr Kefford that he should, in wisdom, bide his time. Knowing the answer to the question Who? they could wait until he was on his own. They could pin him to a door with a pitchfork. Clancy’s mind was racing. Mrs Kefford told him to stop that nonsense. They could … Clancy swallowed his sentence and kept this last unspoken thought to himself, fingering the hammer at his waist. Mr Kefford looked at Clancy through new eyes. Perhaps he could see the youth’s point. Best not go off half-cocked.
Violet was sick of Clancy’s wheedling for information. She wanted him to go. Her eyes were red with crying, her uniform was stained and crumpled and her knee hurt where she’d fallen. She was disoriented and not thinking straight. She just wanted to forget and Clancy wouldn’t let her. Her father didn’t like it when Clancy put out his hand and patted her arm, a gesture that was less one of comfort than of taking charge. Mr Kefford, however, kept his fists by his side.
Somehow Clancy persuaded her to his plan.
‘What plan?’ I asked atop the Ruined Castle.
‘My sly plan.’
The next morning, after a sleepless night, Violet had dressed as normal for work.
‘Surely you’re not going back to that place?’ asked her mother.
‘They owe me a week’s wages.’
‘Are you up to it, Violet?’ her father asked, having slept badly himself.
‘Yes I am,’ she said.
‘Do you want me to come with you?’
She shook her head.
‘Take my hatpin,’ said Mrs Kefford.
‘I don’t need it.’
‘Well, at least have some breakfast.’
She arrived at the hotel on time and proceeded to wind all the clocks. She didn’t loiter in the corridors but moved quickly from clock to clock, staying out of the way of Mrs Haddock. She didn’t pluck a note from the piano in the music room. She didn’t dawdle outside the King George Suite. She had other chores to attend to.
When she went to fetch the day’s vegetables from Wei Sing’s cart she met Clancy in Froma Lane. There she took from the p
ocket of her apron Mr Goyder’s master key, and handed it to him. Mr Goyder hadn’t even noticed her behind the reception desk, rattling among the keys. Violet didn’t know exactly what Clancy had in mind. A primitive part of her urged him on. Shock had brought her this far, and numb routine would carry her through the rest of the day.
At one o’clock Clancy crept up the fire escape at the rear of the hotel. Within, the carpet muffled his footsteps. He saw no one.
He quietly unlocked the door and let himself into Room One. The room was enormous. All icing and plaster curlicues. However, to his surprise, he didn’t find the manly accoutrements of the Premier of New South Wales, but the trunks and portmanteau embossed with the names and insignias of Lord and Lady Carrington. They hadn’t unpacked and were probably finishing their luncheon with Sir Henry in the dining room below. This I know because Violet and several other maids were serving them cheeses, finger asparagus, olives, filberts, figs and other delicacies.
Violet trembled at her station. She was terribly tempted to spill a bowl of hot soup down Sir Henry’s neck. Having heard all the kitchen talk she knew that entertaining the party was a portrait painter, a Mr Julian Ashton, who had been commissioned to paint Lord Carrington’s portrait. He called for port.
Upstairs, Clancy was confused. His plan wasn’t a complicated one, yet it had already been foiled. Was he in the right room? He had a hammer in the waistband of his trousers, the very hammer that had nailed the Reverend Fisher’s hand to the door of St Hilda’s Church. He had intended to use it to cave in the teeth of the old man who had laid hands on Violet. He would wait in ambush until he caught him on his own, then he would teach the old codger a lesson he wouldn’t forget. Let him make speeches through a mouthful of broken teeth. Ivory turner be buggered.
Clancy, I saw, was the one who had gone off half-cocked.
But was he in the right room? It said Number One on the door. Lady Carrington’s trunk was open, and sitting in a nest of silk and taffeta dresses was an ornate maple jewellery box decorated with garnets and lined with silver trim. Clancy had never seen such a beautiful object. That is, until he slipped the catch, lifted the lid and beheld the glittering, shimmering things within. Emerald earrings, diamond bracelets, sapphire necklaces, pearl brooches and rings all sparkled in the light from the open window. He was dazzled by their brilliance, like a bowerbird before some strange new treasure.