Carina sniffed her daughter’s wet hair. ‘What’re you cooking?’
‘Either curry or pizza, or fish and chips.’
‘Okay. Look at your couch. The footprints. You should kick him off.’
‘I don’t care. I love him. Silv can do no wrong.’
Eloise brought out more wine from the stash under the sink and poured another couple of drinks. Then Silvio went berserk all over again.
Demelza held out her car keys. ‘Carina, dear. If you could just …’
Her dog, Gerald, waddled out on the deck and stood looking across to the dog park. He was like a little, fat, uneasy old man. Hands on his hips. Resigned. No escape.
While Carina went out to park the car, Demelza settled herself between muddy patches on the sofa and addressed the Sparkler.
‘Daddy still overseas, dear? Goodness he’s away a lot.’ She looked up as Carina came in with the keys. ‘Reminds me of Terrence. He always claimed it was work. But I knew.’
‘You were a realist,’ the Sparkler said.
‘I was. You remember, dear. I believe in telling the truth. Men, you see, you’ll never get them to be faithful.’
‘Speak for yourself,’ Carina said.
‘And after women have children it’s even harder. Ooh, the wear and tear childbirth causes. They marry someone young and lovely, and they end up with … Well, put it this way, Sparkles darling, some women start out with flesh like a raw chicken and end up like one that’s been cooked! Some,’ she lowered her voice, ‘who have a lot of children, their insides start to fall. Not that I’m saying your mother … But when I see this mania for jogging (I know you like to go jogging, Carina, and I’m not meaning anything by it, mind) I think to myself, they’re going to end up like Queen Victoria. I’ve just read a wonderful biography. After eight children, Sparkles dear, Queen Victoria herself had a terrible case of …’
‘How’s Dad?’ Eloise said.
‘Oh, dreadful. He’s been under the doctor now for six months. The local GP’s been wonderful, very attentive when I’ve rung in the middle of the night. I’ve needed a lot of prescriptions, what with the strain, and Terrence’s snoring, which does keep me awake. It’s like a death rattle.’
Demelza pushed back her hair with her fingers, in little sharp stabs. ‘We’ve had Luna to stay, which doesn’t improve Terrence’s mood. My poor sister, she’s mad, of course. She insists everyone sees the world as she does. She’s deeply neurotic, an unweeded garden. Of course, she was a terrible mother. Always trying to get rid of her children, couldn’t handle motherhood. She couldn’t face things. A bolter. Shied away from the truth …’
She looked around. ‘Goodness, the house is looking a bit worse for wear. There’s mud everywhere. What are the Rodds going to say?’
‘It’s not their house.’
‘It’s their money, chuck.’
‘Well, they’ve got a lot to spare,’ Eloise said, turning to Carina. ‘I heard a new theory on Baby O’Keefe. Bradley Kirk’s the daddy.’
‘That’s a good one,’ Carina said. ‘Cross-party affairs must be rare. Because politics is fundamental.’
Demelza said, ‘There’s Eloise, mind, marrying a Rodd. Terrence and I brought you up in a good left-wing household and you went off with a right moneybags.’
Eloise said, ‘Look where it got me.’
Carina said, ‘I couldn’t marry anyone who votes National.’
‘But you liked Sean,’ Eloise said. ‘And I’m not that rigid.’
‘Sean was all right, until he turned out to be a complete shit.’ Carina stood up and went to the window.
Demelza said, ‘And what about your silly Roysmith, what’s his political persuasion?’
‘He can’t really say publicly. He has to appear balanced. He can’t come on all opinionated, like Pilger.’
Demelza pursed her lips. ‘But I must say, a lot of television people are quite open about their politics. They’re all mad fans of Jack Dance. That pompous one with the spiky hair, and the funny one in the sandshoes.’
‘But Scott’s a serious journalist.’
‘He’s serious about his hairstyle. And his outfits.’
‘What about his work on child poverty? He’s a great journalist. He cares. He has high standards.’
‘Ooh, hark at you, chuck. No need to get hot under the collar. I believe in telling the truth, that’s all.’ Demelza held out her empty glass. ‘Eloise, if you could just … What are we having for dinner? Pizza again? Not with garlic, I trust. None of that foreign muck. I won’t have anchovies or olives, and none of those capers. We could have a nice Hawaiian, if you wish. But hold the pineapple.’
‘What about salami?’
‘I don’t eat salami!’
‘Scallops?’
‘Get away with you! Don’t be silly!’
Demelza fanned herself with the pizza menu. ‘You want to get that dog seen to. There’s a right pong. Mud, is it? I don’t see how you can even wash him, he’s so woolly. Thank you, dear, I will have another glass. Now Sparkles, darling, how’s school?’
Carina said, ‘She loves school.’
‘Takes after her father, does she. The genes will out. Even though he’s so seldom present in the flesh. Now, Eloise, what’s that shirt you’re wearing? What a bright colour. It’s so elegant. Look at that, Carina. Something to give you ideas. Eloise knows how to show off the best bits of her figure. Goodness knows we all need that skill, Carina. Especially those of us with Terrence’s genes. Let’s face it, all the women on his side are so heavy-boned. Bums too near the daisies, I always say. Sparkles, did you tell me your daddy’s designing a bridge in Thailand? Ooh, such delicate, wand-like figures those Thai women have …’
Carina and the Sparkler left first, Carina having reached the end of her tolerance early on. This meant Eloise had to take Demelza’s keys and manoeuvre her car out of the tight park outside the house.
Demelza stood waiting, holding Gerald.
Eloise was wishing she’d managed to keep Silvio. The Sparkler had prevailed, which was only fair. You couldn’t commandeer someone else’s pet. But she hated the thought of a night without him.
She held out the keys. The hot wind blew dust across the road; insects whirled around the streetlights. Out in the estuary there was a disturbance in the water, a faint splashing.
Demelza made a face. ‘Must be a bit creepy living here by yourself.’
‘I love the peninsula. I’ve got a nice neighbour. You met him, Nick Oppenheimer. And I’m going out with Scott and Thee this week, they’ve been incredibly kind. There’s a man they want me to meet.’
‘Nick. I remember. Handsome chap. Not quite as good-looking as Arthur was.’
‘Here’s your keys.’ Eloise thrust them at her mother.
Arthur.
She tried to hold it back, but something broke. A great sob welled up, and another. Her body shook with them. Tears spilled and poured down her cheeks; she shuddered with crying.
She struggled, tried to control the sobbing, looked up.
Her mother was watching her, her eyes narrowed. Her smooth brown face had sharpened into an expression of intense interest. She had Gerald under one arm, and the other hand resting on her car. She didn’t move, only looked, and then drummed her fingers, very slowly, on the car roof. Turning away, she opened the car door, and dumped Gerald in the passenger seat.
She walked slowly around to the driver’s door.
‘Goodbye, Eloise,’ she said. ‘God bless.’
What is there left, when everyone leaves? Only the hours of night, and no Silvio, and the black sky up there, the universe made of dark matter, dust and ash. The day is a bright mesh over the blackness; when the night pulls it away there’s nothing between the raw self and the information beyond.
Over the shadowy dog park, the moon was a button made of bone.
He opened the door. ‘You again.’ But he was smiling, leaning against the wall in his old jeans, his denim shirt open.
‘Ah. So you’re all alone.’
‘Want to come for a walk?’
They crossed the wooden bridge and wandered along the path through the cabbage trees and flax. Eloise said, ‘I don’t want to leave here.’
‘Will you have to soon?’
‘I haven’t been to a lawyer yet. It’s on my list.’
‘Is there a mortgage?’
‘No.’
‘Really?’
‘My husband’s a Rodd. The Rodds are rich.’
‘You do need to see a lawyer.’
‘I know. I’ll find an apartment, keep working.’
‘Where do you want to be in five years? What do you want?’
‘I have no idea.’ Not to be lonely. She looked back at the house. ‘If a house is a metaphor for the mind … I’m losing mine.’
‘Mine’s rather empty at the moment,’ Nick said.
They did a turn around the park and stopped at the edge of her lawn.
‘Coming in?’ she asked.
‘Do you want me to?’
‘Yes.’
She took great pleasure in making two cups of tea. Because she didn’t need to keep the night at bay by getting drunk. They went upstairs and he kicked off his boots and lay on her bed.
He said, ‘When I was in South Africa, I knew a couple. They’d been ordinary white middle-class students when they were young — good kids — but apartheid turned them into terrorists. What they did was, they made a bomb. And they set it off. They were trying to help get rid of apartheid. They didn’t kill anyone, but they caused a lot of damage. Decades later, when the Truth and Reconciliation Commission was set up, it was their chance to tell their story without punishment. Full amnesty. They had to decide whether to take the amnesty and tell the truth, or just leave it buried.’
‘What did they do?’
‘They told their story. But then their families wouldn’t speak to them any more. They were outcasts.’
‘That’s sad.’
‘They wanted to tell; it was their right. The truth is always there. To hell with those who don’t like it. Sometimes you’ve just got to tell it like it is.’
TWENTY-FIVE
‘So,’ Eloise said, looking at Klaudia narrowly, ‘how was the retreat?’
Klaudia’s smile was shameless. ‘Very refreshing, thank you.’
Eloise sat silent.
‘How have you been, Eloise?’
‘Oh fine. Great.’
‘Is something on your mind? You seem a little …’
‘Terrific. Box of birds, me.’
No sign of the rat out there. Perhaps it was on a little retreat of its own.
Klaudia had a fresh suntan. Her skin was glowing, her eyes were bright. When they’d entered her office, she’d done a little stretching routine before sitting down.
Eloise maintained a neutral expression.
‘Do you have some things to tell me? How is the relationship with your neighbour?’
‘It’s fine.’ Eloise roused herself. Sulking was such hard work. ‘It would be great if I could trust him.’
‘You don’t?’
‘I don’t trust anyone. Well, that’s not true, I trust my colleague Scott and his wife Thee, and my sister Carina. And Silvio. Not a huge line-up.’
‘And me of course,’ Klaudia said, archly.
Eloise waited, with a chilly smile, before saying, ‘I hope so.’
‘You know, Eloise, our sense of trust can develop very early. When we are young children.’
‘Right. Blame your parents.’
‘Unfortunately. Your parents might think it’s unfair, but they are usually to blame for quite a lot! Our turn to be blamed comes when we are parents ourselves.’
Eloise said, ‘While you were away on your yoga retreat …’
‘Yes?’
‘My mother was at my house. I burst into tears in front of her. I couldn’t control myself. It was completely unexpected. Really big sobs. And it was the strangest thing, she just looked at me. Intently. She didn’t move, except to drum her fingers very slowly on the roof of the car.’
‘No hug? No kind words?’
‘Her expression — it was like a cat looking at a mouse.’
‘No empathy,’ Klaudia said grimly. She made a note in her file.
As usual, Eloise tried to rein herself in, and gave up. ‘Years ago, when Arthur had just died, I was numb, in shock. I had a moment when I came near to understanding properly that he was dead. I heard my mother coming up the stairs. I must have offended her, because she put her head around the door and said, Eloise, I just want to say, please do not be mean to me. Then she left.’
Klaudia nodded.
Eloise rushed on, ‘In her mind, it was all about her. She had no conception of what I was dealing with.’
‘I see.’
‘It was devastating. Not only no hugs and no kind words, but actually no understanding at all. Just a void. It’s like she lives in a hall of mirrors. Everywhere she looks, there’s only herself.’
She paused. Klaudia was making a noise in her nose. Inhaling, in, out.
‘Just breathe, Eloise. Deep breaths.’
‘My father would say I’m imagining things.’
‘Well, Eloise, all you have done is to say it finally: the emperor has no clothes.’
‘So I’m not mad.’
‘I would say not. You are calling a spade a spade. As I said before, telling our true story has to be existentially important.’
Klaudia glanced down at her notes. ‘Have you heard from your ex-husband lately?’
‘No. But I’m sure I will soon. I’m going to have to move out of the house. Which makes me sad.’
‘Perhaps it will be good for you to live in a less challenging environment. You could find an apartment with a friend. Somewhere cosy.’
‘I love the peninsula. I don’t want to leave.’
Klaudia’s eyes seemed to redden, to turn moist. She drew in a deep breath. ‘But tell me. What do you dream of, Eloise? What would make you whole?’
Dream of? Whole? Eloise recoiled slightly. Steady on, Klaudia. Less of the schmaltz. Hold the Americanisms. She considered how to answer, watching for the rat. His pile of leaves had been swept away.
Finally she said, ‘If the house is a metaphor for the mind, then what I would like is to fill it.’
‘Fill the house? The mind?’
‘Both. With people.’
‘If I understand you, Eloise, this will involve trust.’
Don’t say ‘reaching out’.
‘It will involve you in reaching out to people.’
Quite the cliché-monger today, Klaudia.
Eloise said with an attempt at dignity, ‘It is possible that I have difficulty with trust. It takes me on average about seven years to make friends, and even then I can hardly stand it. If things get friendly too fast, I feel as if I’m facing a blinding searchlight. I have to retreat. The only way I’ve become so close to Scott is by working with him every day. And he’s a lovely man.’
Klaudia was inhaling again. ‘Breathe, Eloise.’
Had she raised her voice?
‘Seven years to make friends, you say?’
‘That was a joke. Hyperbole. I also love and trust Scott’s wife. She’s cool. And I loved Sean. I miss him. I miss him and he’s gone off with that drip, bimbo, airhead …’
‘Breathe Eloise!’
Klaudia waited.
Eloise found she was actually not breathing at all. She gripped the arms of the chair.
‘Okay. I’m breathing.’
‘I think you are a little anxious today.’
‘I am a bit tense. There are things … I can’t really say. I decided I wanted to ask some questions about Arthur’s death. Because I failed him.’
‘You did not fail him.’
‘There are so many things I could tell you …’
‘Please do tell me. We are completely c
onfidential here.’
‘I can’t.’
‘It helps to share, Eloise.’
‘I’ve been back to Arthur’s flat a couple of times. I took someone there. Not my neighbour, another man. We drove in my car, he’d been running, it was hot because the air-conditioning doesn’t work in my car. He was sweating, I could smell him, sweat and aftershave.’
‘Yes?’
‘I don’t know. I keep thinking about it.’
‘You were attracted to this man?’ Klaudia gave her sly smile. In the studiously light tone she used for teasing out information, ‘This hot guy …’
Eloise frowned. ‘He’s quite old.’
‘Old guys can be attractive.’
‘I can’t explain what I think about him.’
‘Go back to the memory.’
‘I can’t, really. Klaudia, do you believe in Collective Consciousness?’
‘I am not sure. Probably not.’
‘You know we were talking about ESP. The girl in the bus stop is crying. One explanation for ESP is Collective Consciousness.’
Klaudia paused, considered. ‘I believe in things that do not require a belief in the supernatural. The girl in the bus stop is explicable without mysticism. You received data into your subconscious, which fed it to your conscious mind without your remembering how you’d received it … Is something wrong, Eloise? Do you have a pain in your head?’
‘The cups.’
‘I am sorry?’
‘Simon said “missing items”. Our blue cups were missing.’
Klaudia’s expression was polite, open. She waited.
‘Our coffee cups were missing from Arthur’s place. A special pair of blue mugs that I bought for the flat. I never saw them again. Arthur couldn’t have broken both while I was away.’
‘Okay …’
‘They were definitely not there.’
Silence.
‘Maybe someone had a coffee with Arthur that morning. And then took the cups to hide the fact.’
Klaudia scribbled notes on her pad. She considered. ‘Isn’t it just as likely that the police took them? Perhaps to test.’
‘They did take some things away. But they showed them to me. I saw their exhibits. There were no cups. I remember they asked me if anything was missing from the flat and I said no.’
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