The Fence

by Meredith Jaffe

  ‘Well, I might just do that,’ she says, knowing in her heart she won’t. What’s the point? To people like the Desmarchelliers, that would be a victory. Proof that the Hills are malicious troublemakers.

  Gwen watches the patrol car drive up the street. The postman has been, her letterbox is crammed with mail, but she is too upset to go down there and sort out the rubbish. Returning to the kitchen, she shifts the knife block back where it belongs beside the stove and pulls out a knife. They are lovely knives. Of the best quality German steel. There is a maker’s mark on the blade, a stylised crown and some words written in German. Throwing a knife over the fence is one thing but who throws a decent knife over a fence?

  Restless with discontent, Gwen dries the glasses upended on the draining board and puts them in the cabinet. Seeing the daffodil bulbs on a shelf in the laundry, she decides she may as well plant them. Since Eric destroyed her lawn with his snail farm, she’s resolved to go the whole hog and seed it with bulbs and meadow flowers. Grabbing her trowel and the nets of bulbs, Gwen goes into the front yard. Eric still sits in his workshop, in his pyjamas, humming to himself as he tacks a square of gaily striped fabric onto the frame of a settee. He doesn’t look up as she passes, so lost in his own world is he, a world Gwen once thought she shared. But Eric’s world is now disfigured by his failing mind. She realises, as she passes, that Eric is oblivious to the police visit. Best that they didn’t know Eric was here. All that talk of testing for fingerprints and people willy-nilly throwing knives into other people’s gardens might have set him off and goodness knows what he might have said then.

  *

  ‘Did you see young Terry here earlier?’ Eric asks as they’re eating their tea.

  They eat earlier than ever these days. For some reason, as the day wears on, Eric’s behaviour worsens. He zones out, as the grandkids like to say. He becomes vaguer, more forgetful and often stops making sense altogether. If they eat dinner much past sunset, Eric either sits staring at his plate or complaining about the food. Gwen has no idea who Terry is. She daren’t ask. He might mean that young police constable.

  ‘I hate peas. Why do we have to eat peas all the time? Why can’t we have something nice for dinner?’ Eric stabs at the peas rolling away from his fork.

  Gwen sighs. Mealtimes are such a trial. ‘You love peas, Eric.’

  His behaviour reminds her of Diane as a child. She eats anything now but as a child she was such a fusspot.

  ‘The little girl doesn’t like peas either. She told me.’ Eric tries scooping the peas onto his fork. A few balance there, almost all the way up to his mouth, but just as he’s about to shove them in, his hand shakes and they bounce onto the plate. ‘Motherfuckers!’ Eric shouts, slamming his fork onto the table.

  ‘Eric!’ Startled, Gwen spills her tumbler of water onto her plate creating a pool of water in her mashed potato.

  ‘Arseholes,’ he mumbles.

  Gwen never knew Eric had such a wide vocabulary of swear words until he became ill. He never uses them correctly and utters them at the most extraordinary times.

  ‘Use your mash to glue them to the fork, dear,’ she says, cajoling Eric back to normality. ‘Like this.’ She demonstrates with her own diluted mash and peas. It tastes disgusting but she smiles as she chews to show Eric how easy it is.

  Eric copies Gwen and manoeuvres both peas and mash towards his mouth. ‘Ha! Got you, you little bastards.’ He grins, showing Gwen his mouthful of peas and mash.

  Gwen looks away. This is another of Eric’s new habits, eating with his mouth open. She pushes her plate to the side and tops up her water. The hardest thing is waking up each day and not knowing who Eric will be. His lucidity comes and goes, declines as the day draws on or never appears at all. She is angry that this illness has stolen Eric from her, despairs that the man she has loved for a lifetime will never be returned to her.

  Eric puts his own knife and fork together. If Gwen can leave her plate half full, it means he can too. ‘Can we have sweets now?’ he says.

  Gwen goes to say, ‘Not unless you finish your dinner first,’ but despite Eric’s behaviour, he is not a child and can eat ice-cream and tinned peaches whenever he wants. If nothing else, the calcium will do him good.

  ‘Of course, dear,’ she says, stacking the plates.

  ‘And afterwards, I might go downstairs and see if the little girl is there.’

  Carefully, since Eric’s mind is as tender as an eggshell, Gwen says, ‘Do you think the little girl might like some ice-cream and peaches too?’

  Eric’s face lights up. ‘Oh she’d love that. She’s never been upstairs. I’ll go and see if she’s there. It’s hard to know,’ he confides to Gwen, ‘she keeps her own hours, you know.’

  With that, he scurries to the staircase, unaware how ridiculous he looks, a grown man in his pyjamas, rushing to meet the remembered vision of his now 43-year-old daughter.

  Gwen gets out a third bowl, just in case Eric questions her, and scoops ice-cream and peaches into two of them. She fills the kettle though she won’t put it on until after tea. The words ‘after tea’ stop her. Rushing through clearing the table after dinner and the washing up before taking a cold bottle of wine from the fridge, putting some of her homemade cheese balls in a bowl and taking the lot next door to Babs’. That wonderful time of day after the mad rush and hurry of school pick-up, homework, swimming lessons, baths, getting the tea ready, restoring the kitchen to order, when she could stop. Recovering with a cold glass of wine and some friendly conversation. She misses Babs. Not every day, but it attacks her sideways at unexpected moments, as if Babs is tapping her on the shoulder saying, ‘Hey, I’m still here you know.’ Although Gwen can’t remember Babs ever tapping her. She wasn’t the touchy-feely type, Babs. She showed friendship through her extraordinary ability to listen, to put herself in your shoes. Babs was good at that.

  There is wine in the fridge. There’s nothing stopping her taking it out onto the deck with some olives. She could sit out there in the twilight and pretend Babs was here to talk to. After all, she only had to listen.

  ‘She’s not there.’ Eric appears from nowhere.

  Gwen spins around. It takes her a moment to recover the thread of their previous conversation. ‘Oh, that’s a shame,’ she says, ‘I got an extra bowl out for her too.’

  ‘Leave it out. She might come anytime. You never know with her. She’s a sneaky little thing. Half the time, I’ve got the lathe or the bench grinder on and don’t even hear her come in. Well, I wouldn’t, would I, what with all the noise. But I turn off the machine and nearly jump out of my skin because she’s appeared, as if by magic, sitting on the work stool watching me or just playing with the dolls.’

  Eric continues through mouthfuls of ice-cream. ‘The little bugger takes them sometimes, you know.’

  ‘Takes what, Eric?’ Gwen chips a nib of ice-cream off the corner and executes the same manoeuvre with a sliver of peach. Eric’s descent into the manners of a seven year old has exacted the opposite effect in hers. She now eats with the prim precision of a boarding house mistress. Eric swirls his ice-cream around and around with his spoon until it melts and blends with the peach syrup.

  Eric likes it when the little girl comes to visit. Sometimes she brings her sister. The pair of them perch on the workbench, playing with the dolls and the furniture. She likes his tools but she’s only small so he limits her to sandpaper. They’re full of questions, those two. But she asks more questions when she’s on her own. They look exactly alike, he suspects they might be twins. Maybe that’s why she acts differently when her sister’s around. Some sort of secret telepathy.

  She likes helping him choose the colours, the wallpapers and the furnishings. Oh, she’s full of suggestions as to how he should decorate the houses. ‘Maybe you’ll be an interior designer one day,’ he said to her. ‘Do you like art?’ She said she loves drawing. He asked her t
o bring him a picture. Eric frowns. He doesn’t remember if she has yet. Perhaps she’s forgotten.

  ‘Why don’t they have a TV?’ she asked as they chose furniture for a Georgian mansion.

  ‘They didn’t have television back then,’ Eric had replied.

  ‘How did they watch Sesame Street then?’ she asked as she passed him the frame of a four-poster bed.

  Eric explained and she frowned at him in disbelief. ‘Did you have TV when you were little?’

  ‘Only black and white. Colour TV didn’t come in until the seventies.’

  As so often happened, there was a shout from next door and it was like the little girl had been given an electric shock. She slithered from the bench, dusting the sawdust from her jeans. ‘I have to go.’

  ‘Oh, so soon?’ Eric was genuinely disappointed. He loved their chats. He was just about to share with her how many devices that existed today weren’t even a gleam in a scientist’s eye when he was a boy.

  ‘Daddy’s calling me. I’ll get in trouble if I stay.’

  ‘No, you won’t. I’ll talk to him.’

  Her little face crumpled. ‘I’m not allowed to come here.’

  ‘Why ever not?’ When he was little, he used to love spending time in his father’s workshop. He enjoys her company.

  ‘It’s too dangerous.’

  Before Eric had a chance to reply, she had slipped away as her father kept shouting her name. He stood in the doorway watching her run down the drive and sneak over the fence. When he turned, he noticed that she’d been at it again. The miniature television was missing.

  Realising that Eric has disappeared into his memory again, Gwen repeats the question. ‘What sort of things does she take, Eric?’

  Eric blinks at her. ‘Oh, just little things. Sometimes a doll, sometimes a piece of furniture. Once,’ he chuckles to himself, ‘once she took, of all things, a toilet. I couldn’t figure out why. There were so many other choices. Dressing tables or a nice standalone wardrobe she could put her things in, a bassinet. You know, you’d think a little girl would like that over a toilet.’

  Eric attacks the peaches with his spoon. Slicing them is proving too big a challenge so Gwen fetches him a butter knife.

  Eric holds the knife, turning it over and over. He tests the blade with his thumb. ‘It’s not very sharp, is it, Gwennie?’ It’s not meant as a criticism, more of a comment on whether the butter knife is fit for purpose. He grins as the knife cuts through the peach.

  ‘She likes to have a chat and ooh,’ Eric shakes his head, a twinkle in his eye. ‘She’s got plenty to say, let me tell you.’

  Gwen puts her empty bowl in the sink. She’s rather tired of this conversation and wishes Babs was still here so she had an excuse to sneak away. ‘How come I’ve never met her then, Eric?’ she says.

  ‘Because she’s frightened of you,’ Eric snaps. ‘Children sense when they’re not wanted, Gwennie.’

  Gwen runs water into the puddle of ice-cream and syrup in her bowl. She thought Eric might have been reminiscing about Diane, now she’s not so sure. Still, it smarts to be told that she’s frightening. Gwen loved it when the neighbourhood kids ran screeching and calling out around the lawn and up the paths. Children bring a street alive.

  ‘She talks to me a lot.’ He leans forward, conspiring. ‘I sneak upstairs sometimes and nick a few biscuits, a bottle of lemonade if Gwen’s bought some. She doesn’t always buy lemonade. She says it’s bad for my teeth. But when it’s there, I take the whole bottle and a couple of glasses.’ He sniggers. ‘She never notices, you know.’

  Gwen has noticed but hadn’t realised Eric stole the lemonade and biscuits to share with his imaginary friend. She wonders if he means Marilyn. Although Marilyn Monroe doesn’t strike her as the lemonade and biscuits type.

  ‘She’s not happy, our little girl,’ Eric says, checking in the freezer for more ice-cream. ‘She has three sisters, you know. Apparently they give her a devil of a time, especially the eldest one. And her mother is about to have another. She’s not overjoyed about that either, let me tell you.’

  Gwen, in the process of putting on the kettle, pauses. ‘Why not?’ she prompts.

  Eric grabs a fresh spoon and starts eating ice-cream direct from the tub. ‘Ah well, you see, there’s the thing. Her parents are always fighting. I don’t like to pry, I just let her get it off her chest. Her mum works and is never there but when she is she’s grumpy with the father and the children. Daddy tells them they have to be quiet when Mummy is home and make sure they don’t leave a mess everywhere. The mother doesn’t like mess. She likes things to be organised.’

  Recognition settles on Gwen’s shoulders like a cool blanket. Eric is talking about little Amber from next door, the obnoxious one who flounces about and bosses her siblings. She’s always yelling at them, just like her mother by the sounds of things.

  ‘Any chance of a cup of tea, Gwennie?’ Eric throws the empty ice-cream container in the bin.

  ‘Of course, dear.’ Gwen pours them both a cup, before retriev­ing the plastic container and rinsing it out for the recycling.

  Eric stretches, scratching his testicles inside his pyjamas. Gwen finds this disconcerting. Eric has always been such a gentleman. They never share the bathroom. In fifty years, she’s never seen him pee.

  ‘The thing that troubles me, Gwennie,’ he says, readjusting his pants, ‘is she’s been nicking things from the workshop.’

  ‘Such as?’ Gwen asks, although they’ve already had this conversation.

  ‘Once she took a sheet of sandpaper. I saw her slip it in her pocket. I was only annoyed because she hadn’t asked. I would have given it to her.’

  Gwen passes Eric his tea. ‘No lemonade?’ he asks hopefully. ‘I like lemonade with my biscuits.’

  ‘No lemonade and no biscuits, Eric. You’ve already had your dessert.’

  Eric sighs and pushes the cup away. ‘She took a tube of PVC glue one time. Bits of fabric and wallpaper. I said to her, “How’s that dollhouse going, the one I gave you for Christmas?” Well, she gave me the strangest look.’

  Eric shoots Gwen a sly glance. ‘You sure there’s no lemonade.’

  Gwen doesn’t want to disrupt Eric’s line of thought. There is an odd clarity to this recollection. She has a funny feeling he’s taking her somewhere, in a roundabout way. ‘I’ll double-check. There might be a bottle hidden away at the back of the pantry.’ She knows darn well there is. Six bottles of the stuff hidden away like bootleg liquor behind the chook pellets.

  Eric tinkles the ice in his glass of lemonade, scoops up a cube and pops it in his mouth.

  ‘Their mummy keeps the dollhouse in the hall cupboard out of reach. She says the little ones might swallow the pieces.’

  Gwen isn’t surprised. She’d told Eric at the time that giving the neighbours one of his dollhouses was sure to be misinterpreted. He’d said, ‘Consider it a peace offering, Gwennie.’ But Gwen knew that the relationship between the Hills and the Desmarchelliers had deteriorated to a point where any gesture of kindness was bound to be considered an affront.

  ‘What else has she taken, Eric?’ she asks, trying to get him back on track.

  ‘Oh, some dolls’ clothes. A Persian rug. Things she can slip into a pocket unnoticed.’

  Eric begins rubbing circles around the table where the condensation from the glass has formed a ring. ‘She took something else, Gwennie. Something important. I saw her but I got distracted.’

  Eric pinches his nostrils shut. ‘All the thoughts fall out through the little holes. There’s no way to stop them, you know. I’ve tried. Look.’ Eric sticks his fingers in his ears, drawing out two balls of cottonwool and laying them on the table. They lie there like two tiny carcasses.

  Gwen stares at them. She’d been thinking Eric had grown hard of hearing or had been so lost in his interior world that he doe
sn’t respond.

  Eric shakes his head, first left, then right, as if shaking out water after a swim.

  ‘I saw her take Dad’s knife, you know,’ bursts out.

  Gwen sits straighter. ‘Really?’ She almost adds, but you said it had gone missing, that you didn’t know where it was. There’s no point though, Eric is right, he has a brain like a sieve.

  ‘I was clamping the sides of a house together. When I turned around, the red box was in her hands. She opened the lid and peeked inside. There’s no harm in her looking, I thought. But next time I looked, she was holding the knife. “It’s a beauty, isn’t it?” I said and told her it used to belong to my father.

  ‘We looked at his chisel set, and the lovely hand plane. She was quite taken with the foldout yard stick. We put a little oil on the hinges to make it open and close more smoothly.’

  Gwen’s never taken to Amber. She’s a slippery thing. Never looks you in the eye when spoken to. Gwen doesn’t like that about children. Whenever she works at Gumnut, she insists the children look at her when speaking or being spoken to. Amber’s brother, Silver, isn’t much better but at least he keeps his opinions to himself.

  ‘What did she do after she took the knife out of the box, Eric?’ The police officers said that a knife had been found in the neighbour’s yard. They’d shown her the knife but, in her fluster, she hadn’t really looked at it.

  Eric closes his eyes and places his hands over his ears. ‘She slipped it in her pocket.’

  ‘You let her take it?’ Gwen is flabbergasted. The knife in the yard, the knife in a pocket, Eric’s distress the other morning when he couldn’t find it. It’s all the same knife and he had let her take it. This is terrible. What if one of the younger children had found it?

  ‘She’s just borrowing it. There’s no harm done. I’m sure she’ll give it back when she’s ready.’

  Gwen feels ill just thinking about the consequences of Eric’s simple and trusting action.

  ‘Eric, the police have the knife now.’ Amber must have felt guilty about stealing it and realised that if her parents caught her they’d be furious. The child is five, upon realising, she would have dropped the knife as if scalded and run away, her little heart hammering in her chest as the fear of exposure caught up with the guilt of wrongdoing.