by Peter Temple
I crossed the room, reached around her, put my hand on the doorknob, pushed, turned, the tongue moved enough. I pulled the door open a crack.
‘I keep meaning to fix the damn thing,’ I said. ‘I’ll see you down the stairs.’
She was still, we were close, I could feel the electricity in her. She pushed the door closed, spoke without turning.
‘I wanted to die after that night,’ she said, voice thin. ‘Three men treated me like a toy. They did anything they wanted to. Then I almost killed someone. I would have killed him, I didn’t care. So if I’d been offered surgery to take that night out of my brain, I would have said yes, yes, yes. Yes, please.’
Her forehead was against the door. I was looking at the nape of her neck, the clean dark hairs in the soft and pale hollow.
‘I couldn’t speak about what had happened,’ she said. ‘Not to anyone. I didn’t have the words for it. So if I said I didn’t remember, then I didn’t have to speak about it.’
A silence, the crackling of the fire, the wash of rain on the roof, the swallowings in the downpipes.
‘I was just a young girl,’ she said. ‘Can you understand, Jack?’
‘Yes,’ I said, and I did touch her. I reached out and put my right hand on her shoulder.
Sarah turned and looked up at me, a sheen on her eyes. I took my hand away but I could not take back the touch. She moved closer and I drew her to me, no urgency in the embrace, just the desire to touch.
But she raised her face and we kissed. It was just a gentle pressure of lips, I tasted beer and nicotine and salt, and I knew that could not be the end of it. I put a hand on her neck, felt the taut muscles, she put both hands behind my head, pulled me with strong hands, strong arms, our lips opened.
There was a moment when we came apart and I said, gruffly, ‘Sarah, I don’t think …’
‘Think,’ she said, as throaty, ‘Don’t think. I want to lie down. Is that possible?’
‘Possible?’ I said. ‘It’s probably compulsory.’
I rose in the dark, pulled on the ancient garments and set out on my route. Punishment for the body in a cold, moist dawn. I ran over surfaces glistening, slippery, treacherous for ankles. In the parade, I saw the night’s sad survivors limping towards home. I saw the pioneers of the opening day, going to some dull task with narrow eyes and thin lips.
As I shambled along, I thought about sex and remorse. I always felt regret after the first sex with anyone. Something in my history triggered a feeling of wrongdoing. Enthusiastic consent wasn’t ever enough for me to look back with pleasure. I shook my head, ran the moisture off my hair with a hand. Never mind the past, this time I had other good reasons for feeling guilty. Linda had been gone not much more than a week. Sarah was almost a client, she had been in an emotional state. There could be no excuse for having sex with her.
‘Listen, Jack,’ she’d said, standing at her car in the small hours, not the old ute, a VW, ‘I was going to make a pass the first chance I got. But I didn’t mean it to be teary. I’m sorry about that.’
She took a fistful of my old T-shirt, pulled me close and we kissed goodbye, not a short kiss. I went back to bed, tingling, her scent on the pillows, dropped in and out of sleep.
I turned right off Brunswick Street to run through the gardens, the tree trunks black, still holding the night, the lamps of the park making rough wickerwork of the bare lower branches. Just ahead was the place where a man had tried to shoot me. For months afterwards, I avoided coming this way, and then one morning, running on automatic, mind on something, I found myself approaching the near-fatal spot. The taboo was broken, it never bothered me again.
Sarah couldn’t exonerate me by saying she was primed for action. She would say whatever was needed to prevent the thought entering her mind that she had been a victim again.
But she was not my client. I was just a researcher. Doing the academic work, the oral history. Vansina, was that his name? The oral historian. Vansina. Could be a soccer player. Did they still call themselves oral historians? It could mislead.
Nonsense. I was trying to save Sarah from going to prison for murder. Drew and I stood between her and the years of nothing, the evening meal at 5 pm. She knew that, she knew how important I was to her future.
That was why it was my duty to avoid personal involvement.
Still, as personal involvement went, it had been intensely pleasurable. She was strong and erotic. Also clever and funny and self-mocking afterwards, easy to be with.
Ah, lust. Guilty of lust, it had ever been so. Lust had often overruled what passed for my common sense, my principles. And would again, given the chance.
I looked across at the tennis courts that had been the scene of the Greer–Irish marathon. No more could I play Drew Greer at tennis for three hours. Play and lose to him. He never spoke of that late summer afternoon that became a summer evening. I didn’t speak of it either but the loss still rankled with me. I should have won, I was cruising to victory and then I let him back in and my nerve went.
To win and not to gloat. Drew was good at that. Still, he’d had a lot more experience of winning. Had a lot more backbone too. Backbone. I hated the expression, my grandfather used it, he was a backbone expert, X-ray eyes for backbone, could spot backbone in toddlers. I hated it yet I thought it.
Home in sight, feeling weak in character, in body, in mind, my legs full of lead sinkers.
I had a long shower, thinking about whether to tell Drew. Of course I should, he was entitled to know. Why? It was a private matter, it wouldn’t change anything. Indeed, it was better that he didn’t know. She was his client, nothing should cloud his judgment. The prosecution could at any time offer a deal and he would have to put it to her, offer advice. Cop manslaughter, you’ll get the minimum, that’s the best we can hope for. I don’t think we want to fall for this, they know how shaky their case is, we’ve got an excellent chance of an acquittal.
Drew didn’t want to be offering advice to a client in the knowledge that his friend was her lover.
I wasn’t her lover. One night, that would be it. Yes? I didn’t like the chances if she kissed me again. She knew a bit about kissing, knew a bit about things beside kissing too …
Oh, shit.
I dressed formally, my defence on days of uncertainty, made tea, sat at the kitchen table and tried to read my book for an hour, mind wandering like a goat on a hillside. Then I put on a tie, red silk, English, hardly worn, no knot wrinkles, went downstairs and fired up the neglected Stud, listened to the animal-enclosure sound of eight cylinders for a while, aimed the beast towards breakfast.
Sex and Principle, Body and Mind, torn between. And hungry. Nothing less than a repeat of the Cholesterol DynaHit at Enzio’s would be of any use at a time like this.
Just me, an office cleaner called Vern who drank at the Prince, and a couple, women. Carmel, the waif who knew all the midnight things, took the order. ‘I advise you that there is a new first-shift cook,’ she said. ‘As owner, Enzio wants to sleep in. We are encouraging that.’
‘Properly trained, the person?’ I said. ‘Well-briefed?’
‘Smartarse little turd,’ she said.
A message. I’d read the first five pages of the Age before the food came. Eggs hard, bacon burnt, sausages charred and split, tomatoes raw, ditto the mushrooms, toast cut too thin and barely exposed to heat.
I ate what was edible, a picky affair, read the sports pages, the horse stories, thought about how much I missed Les Carlyon. Where was he? Why didn’t he write for the paper anymore? No one wrote better about the people who lived on dreams, didn’t whinge unduly about the hip-and-shoulders of disappointment, went to bed and got up with trouble and debt, carried on anyway, prisoners of love and habit and not knowing what else to do.
Nearing the end of the food, I found the eyes of Bruno the Silent, a Lygon Street legend Enzio had plucked from vegetating in outer Reservoir and rechained to the coffee wheel. Bruno was sitting on a cushioned high stool
with a back, giving him some ease from the leg pains caused by forty years of standing.
I nodded, he nodded. Bruno had first exchanged nods with me deep into my second year at law school, after I’d been ordering the same thing three or four times a week for more than eighteen months. One morning, as I came through the door, he looked at me, not an inquiring look, just a look one might give a known dog entering your premises.
I’d nodded. Bruno nodded. I sat down, opened the newspaper. Soon a short black arrived.
Now Carmel picked up my half-eaten remains. ‘I have nothing to say,’ she said, eyes down. ‘I merely wait upon table.’
‘It’s not easy to get the timing right,’ I said. ‘He may get better at it and become a Brunswick Street breakfast legend.’
‘Possibly,’ she said and gave me a look that brooked no misinterpretation. I watched her go, always a pleasure. A minute later she came back with the small glass of tar-black liquid. Looking out of the window at the life in the street, I sipped the dark bullet, felt the small surge of optimism kick in.
Time to go. A man in a good suit, judgment impaired by sex and red wine. I went to the counter, nodded to Bruno the Silent, paid Carmel, caught a glimpse of the cook, his hair, peaked and golden-tipped, his plump mouth. Outside, in the awakening street, standing beside the Stud, I switched on the small telephone. It rang immediately.
‘Jack?’
Sarah. I felt a little tightness in the throat. ‘Yes.’
‘Sarah. I tried you at home, left a message. I’ve had a call from someone, a man.’
‘Television jackal?’
She laughed. ‘No. He says he can help us. Help me. He’s coming at 9.30. He wants you here. Can you make it?’
‘You’re at work already?’
‘Couldn’t sleep when I got home. I should have stayed. It was all too brief.’
‘Passed in a flash. Telling this person about your place of work, I don’t know about the wisdom of that.’
‘He knew. Will you come?’
‘Yes,’ I said, ‘I’ll be there. Did he give a name?’
‘No. He said it was dangerous for him to talk to us but he would.’
‘I’ll see you in half an hour.’
‘Good,’ she said. A few seconds. ‘Jack.’
‘Yes?’
‘Regrets?’
‘No,’ I said, no trouble lying. ‘You?’
‘Not a single one.’
I said goodbye, got into the Lark, sat and thought about why I was in the beginning-of-the-affair state, thought about Linda in London, watched a woman in overalls washing a window. A small brown dog sat behind her, head up, inspecting her work. Then I drove to Kensington.
Sarah’s old yellow ute was alone in the parking area, right-angled to the patchwork building. I considered waiting for the visitor to arrive. No, it might spook him. I got out. The wind was keen here, coming off the bay not far away, carrying the sounds of the railyards and docklands, clanking, roaring, groaning. Underfoot, the damp gravel made a squealing noise.
I slid open the door. The big space was gloomy, as before, the human-like metal forms somehow even more menacing at second meeting. I walked past the witches, paused to look again at what I’d at first thought to be two boxers, touched the stainless steel. It was icy, like having local anaesthetic on the fingertips. I went across to the pack of humanoid dogs attacking something, mounting each other in their fever, walked around it. These creations were all saying something about humans, about the world they made. I needed to know their titles.
I would ask the creator. I walked down the shed, around the scrapmetal pile, the car bodies, car doors, the assorted steel junk.
Sarah was where she had been the first time, in the open space. She was on one knee, wearing a full black mask, welding something onto the metal figure. A stream of sparks was erupting from the seam she was creating.
I stopped and watched her, her deftness. She must have felt my presence, she could see nothing but the glow of the weld through the helmet window. She stood up, raised the torch, turned her back on me, doing something, I saw the flame diminish, die. She put the torch on the stand, turned.
Sarah pushed up the helmet and looked at me, took off a glove, ran fingers through her hair, smiled the half-furtive smile.
She was lovely. My throat felt dry.
The world behind her went white, then bright orange.
The floor between us erupted.
In the air, backwards. A knife of pain. Darkness, I couldn’t see, pain in my side, something inside me.
I could see flames, hear a terrible roaring sound. Get to the door. I crawled. More explosions. A blow to my back.
The door, open, blown off, I felt a wind on my face.
Get there, just get there.
Black.
Nothing.
They let me out on a Friday in early May, round 6 of the football, damp, a wind shaking the bare trees. Drew carried my bag to his car. It wasn’t necessary, but I didn’t want to argue about it.
We drove in silence. He was going the wrong way.
‘What route is this?’ I said. ‘Have they reconfigured the city while I wasn’t looking?’
‘My place,’ said Drew.
‘Mine, I think,’ I said. ‘I have a need for home.’
‘You can’t come out of hospital after umpteen weeks and go back to an empty house,’ he said.
‘Bullshit. Anyway, what do you mean empty? Furniture gone? Haven’t you noticed it’s been empty for fucking years? No one there except me. Take me home.’
I heard the harsh tone of my voice.
We stopped at lights. Drew turned his long face. ‘Jack,’ he said, ‘don’t spoil my plans. Tonight, we have a beer or two. Then we eat these steaks from the main man. With them, a red I’ve been saving for fifteen years. Then we sit in front of the fire with a drop of Rutherglen nectar and watch the footy.’
He coughed. ‘Unfortunately,’ he said, ‘we then see the Saints get their scrawny arses kicked to buggery.’
I looked away, willed myself to be a normal person.
‘Steak?’ I said. ‘Just steak? Is that all?’
‘Good boy,’ said Drew.
I saw relief on his face.
‘With home-cooked thick-cut chips,’ he said.
‘Yes?’
‘Well. Heated at home in the home oven. Defrosted. That’s close, isn’t it?’
‘And the wine? What’s that?’
We pulled away, he jerked his head at me. ‘I can just as easily drop you off at home,’ he said. ‘You appear to me to be fully recovered.’
‘Drive,’ I said. ‘Just drive. It’s what you’re not good at.’
Taken home on a Saturday of fleeting sunshine. At the boot factory, at my downstairs door, I said thank you to Drew.
‘Well,’ he said, ‘I’ll come up and see if you’ve got everything you need.’
‘If I need anything, I’ll go out and get it,’ I said.
I set off up the stairs, stopped after the first few, shocked by my weakness, the heaviness of my legs. I looked down. Drew was rubbing his unshaven jaw. I thought I could hear the sawing sound.
‘What?’ I said.
‘You know what,’ he said.
‘Fuck off,’ I said. ‘That’s not going to happen again.’
‘You’re too quiet for my liking.’
‘Well, it’s a good thing I’m not dependent for my state of mind on your liking.’
He shook his head. ‘You and explosions,’ he said. ‘There’s a fearful fucking symmetry.’
‘Thank you for that perceptive observation and goodbye.’ I set off upwards again.
At the top, I had to stand for a minute to recover before I unlocked the door and went in. Everything was as I’d left it on the morning: on the kitchen sink, the glasses, the teapot and cup. The novel was on the kitchen table, place marked with an old window envelope, a bill-carrier.
I washed up, put the spoiled cheese, fruit and vegetabl
es in the bin, switched on the heating, walked around – sitting room, study, spare bedroom, kitchen, sitting room. I looked out of the window at the trees, the park beyond, there were children playing, splodges of colour. I sat down, got up, went back to the window, put my forehead against a cold pane.
I didn’t want to go into the bedroom. I’d left the bed unmade that morning. Her perfume would be on the pillows, the sheets.
Drew offered to get cleaners in, I said no. Why? What stopped me?
A drink, a drink, and then I’d do it. I felt a strong desire for a drink, went to the kitchen and looked in the cabinet. Whisky, a Glenlivet, an unopened bottle. Just the ticket, a whisky, neat. I took down the bottle, found a cut-glass tumbler, also an explosion survivor, now we were both explosion survivors, I didn’t want to think about explosions, poured two fingers, added another two.
I had the glass to my mouth, I had the peaty smell in my nose.
That’s not going to happen again.
Explosions.
You and explosions. There’s a fearful fucking symmetry.
I poured the liquid back into the bottle, spilled a lot, put it away. I went into the bedroom, pulled the sheets off the bed, pulled off the pillowcases, didn’t breathe, stuffed everything into the laundry bag, half full already. I lugged the bag downstairs. But then my energy was spent. I left the bag at the front door, went slowly upstairs, each step an act of will, and I lay down on the sofa and closed my eyes.
When the telephone woke me, it was dark, I had no idea where I was, panic.
‘Are you all right? You sound awful?’
Rosa, the baby my father never saw, named for a Communist heroine.
‘A nap,’ I said. ‘I was asleep.’
‘How could you leave the hospital without telling me? I ring the hospital only to find that you’ve been discharged.’
‘I didn’t know they needed your permission.’
A deep sniff.
‘I trust you’re not doing a line while talking to me,’ I said.
‘I resent that,’ Rosa said. ‘I assumed that, being your sister, I assumed I would be the one.’