Forever Young

by Steven Carroll

  It is then that Peter hears the voice of his daughter telling him to begin, and why is he waiting? And immediately the voice of his other daughter follows, asking why he is staring at the drawings for so long. One story-book world opens onto another. Doors open onto other doors. But his daughters’ voices bring him back to the here and now.

  They are all sitting on one of the beds in the girls’ room, Peter in the middle, his daughters either side. Mobiles hang from the ceiling, posters cover the walls. It is a modestly large house, with a large garden all around it in a suburb south of the city’s river where the modestly large houses are. It is the weekend. Friday night, and Peter is back home in Melbourne reading to his daughters before bed. It is story time. When he is finished, when his daughters are in their beds, he switches off the light. The faint sound of television floats towards him up the hallway from the lounge room where his wife, Kate, will be stretched out on a couch.

  But instead of following that sound he crosses the hallway into his study, taking the story-book world with him.

  Not so long ago, but long enough to be distant all the same, Peter and his Pussy Cat played together in a world of pop-up animals. They had adventures together. And their adventures acknowledged no end of things, no whisper of mortality, because death hadn’t been invented then. Death came later. Even now Pussy Cat leans over the terraced balcony of that house with provocative innocence, like Juliet from a popular film of the time, and calls down to him in the street below. At least, that is how he remembers her.

  Then their adventures stopped. Bunny Rabbit’s eyes began to wander and rest upon creatures other than his Pussy Cat. One night, he walked out and didn’t come back. Pussy Cat cried herself into a sleep from which she never woke, and death was invented. And once more, as he does from time to time, he sees his hand snatching Pussy Cat’s medicine that night just before walking out. There were always two small bottles by her bed — one, her medicine for those days when the world was too much with her (which it was more often than she cared for it to be), and the other, the sleeping pills that gave her blissful sleep at the end of those days. And as Peter sits at his desk, the hand that was death’s minister reaches out again and snatches Pussy Cat’s medicine before disappearing into the night. One last jibe (for the jibes were many by the end), one last act of retribution before leaving. And all, in his mind, a prank. A bit of a laugh: that’ll fix her. Did you do something, Peter? Did you? Trix, the quick, brown, young fox eyes him with a playfully dangerous smile.

  Yes, a prank, that was all it was meant to be. Just one last prank before disappearing into the night, the medicine in his pocket — with every intention of bringing it back the next morning. But when he returned late in the afternoon the next day, having forgotten all about the pills (for youth sleeps in and forgets), it was already too late. Pussy Cat, the world too much for her, had cried herself into a sleep from which she never woke. Death had been invented and Peter had invented it.

  Pussy Cat’s eyes now watch him as he leaves his study. They accompany him to the door, then stare back with Pussy Cat resignation as he closes it. He has not felt the eyes of his Pussy Cat upon him for a long time; it is the story-book world that has brought her back. Her eyes stare at him with resignation — or is it — accusation? Both, perhaps. And he’s asking himself if he will yet see forgiveness, even absolution in those eyes. Just a prank, after all. That was all it was ever meant to be.

  He closes the door and treads softly as he passes the children’s bedroom. As he enters the lounge room, recorded laughter erupts from the television. Kate is laughing too and acknowledges him briefly, eyes on the screen. The garden is dark but the house is bright. Then the man on the television says something funny and they’re both laughing and he slides into the armchair that is generally regarded as his.

  Chinese whispers. Is this how it all works? The news. Newspapers. All Chinese whispers. Someone spoke to someone who spoke to … It is neither the lead story nor is it buried. A substantial article on the front page. And written with such authority that he almost believes it himself. Except that he knows full well that in that chain of whispers, his was the first.

  The kitchen is large and bright. The Saturday-morning sun slants in through the silver birch in the garden. When Peter finishes the article he puts the paper down and looks around. Colour and light. Kate is a lawyer by day and an artist by night. The kitchen is a faithful reproduction of Monet’s in his house just outside Paris. It’s a sort of artwork. A pleasing arrangement of colour and shape. Others might call it kitsch — let them. He doesn’t. He likes it.

  But he is not thinking of the kitchen at the moment. He is contemplating the whole business of Chinese whispers and news. Facts and truth. There are facts. The world is composed of facts. And there is truth. Not to be confused.

  The newspaper article he is looking at is a fact. It exists. But that’s as far as it goes. It exists because of a chain of whispers, light as air, that led to the article, and his was the first whisper. The woman, Beth, to whom he whispered, chose, in the end, to believe it — and passed it on to others inside the newspaper who chose to believe it enough to print it. The article appears in the newspaper, ink on paper. A fact. But not the truth. Not yet. But should one thing lead to another, and should events arrive at the point where we no longer control events but events control us, will it, at some stage, become the truth? And if it does, will anybody care at all if it began with a whisper?

  At the same time, he is surprised that the story was ever printed. Perhaps even astonished. But he shrugs. What the hell, they fell for it. And there is something thrilling in that. Some stunt! Some con. Who knows how it went — that chain of events that led to publication. Perhaps, he imagines, sipping the last of his coffee, it went like this. Of course, there are checks and balances in newspapers. Checks and balances such as, let’s say, Mike and Janet. What do you think, Mike? What do you think, Janet? How good is your source, Beth? What do you think, Mike? Not sure. Do we wait? Can we? They’ve already tried, are they going to kill him off this time? Not just before an election. Surely not. But, what if … In the end, though, there is the editor. And the editor is human. And let’s just say that this editor and Beth go back a long way (as, in fact, Beth and her editor do). And let’s just say he knows that Beth needs something, that she needs this. And if so, did he, in the end, want to believe it as much as she did? What turns a whisper into a story? What steps in? Let’s say humanity stepped in. And once humanity steps in, anything is possible. Beth explained her story to the editor and he listened, by turns disbelieving and believing. And then, at some point in their discussion, a look came over his face. A look that didn’t need explanation, one that Beth read perfectly and that said: What the fuck, we’ve done crazier things than this, haven’t we? We’ve done crazier fucking things than this. And what if she’s right? We’re in on the ground floor. What the fuck. What the fucking fuck.

  He is once again aware of being the anonymous artist of the whole public play. Of scripting events to the point where the author begins to play God. Or where the two begin to resemble each other — for, at this moment, he does indeed feel like a god in his universe, everywhere in evidence, but nowhere visible. A god who blew into the air a chain of Chinese whispers. Fact, but not truth. At least not yet.

  It is then that his wife, who has just finished reading the same article, looks up from the paper.

  ‘Is this true?’

  He shrugs, and she shakes her head slowly.

  ‘It’s not fair. Not right.’ She pauses. ‘Is it true?’

  There is, he notes, troubled concern in her voice. He looks at her, curiously, knowing that, like him, this mountain, this Whitlam, was once hers too when she was younger, when everybody was younger and youth surged to the mountain — but he isn’t hers or his any more. All the same, there is lingering affection in her eyes, even care.

  ‘I don’t know.’

  He doesn’t even have to think. The answer pops out na
turally. Convincingly. But it’s a lie. When he set the thing in motion he never thought of it entering his kitchen. After all, the idea was hatched in a small room in the faraway world of Parliament House. Not here. He looks around. The sun slants in through the tree in the garden, highlighting the blues, greens and yellows of the kitchen. The smell of coffee and toast lingers in the air. On the television one cartoon gives way to another. It could be a scene from a film or from television and they could all be players. He has just lied, convincingly. And naturally. The scene is credible. But one part of the scene isn’t telling the truth. And does that make the whole untrue? Of course, he’s making too much of things and this thought will go away before the dishes are cleared. All the same, it’s a nagging thought. One that contains a shiver of guilt. Vaguely disquieting. Is this, when we start playing God and start playing around with these things, how our inventions come back to haunt us? Dismantle one part of the play and soon, whether you want to or not, you start dismantling all the other constituent parts, until the whole construction comes tumbling down. Is this what you get for playing God? Is this how it feels? And it occurs to Peter that a life spent immersed in inventions, the like of which he has just set in motion, might just eventually destroy all those things you take for granted, until you don’t believe anything any more. Is this how people fall from the grace of happy living and condemn themselves to the life of the penitent judge, wandering foggy wharves in foreign cities and seeking out strangers to tell their story to?

  He shrugs. It’s nonsense. One of those thoughts we play around with. The sort of thing that happens in books, and usually foreign ones at that. All that matters at this moment is that it’s working, it’s actually working. The look of concern on his wife’s face will fade, nothing more will be said, and the story, this passing topic of conversation, will leave the house as quickly as it entered.

  The sound of television cartoons that has continued in the background ceases, and the spell is broken. Kate bundles the children upstairs, a walk to the local park is proposed, and the kitchen is now empty. He shakes his head, shaking himself free of the thought, then rises. The newspaper, its photographs, stories and all its sense of self-importance, is left on the kitchen table, surrounded by Monet cupboards, pantries and straw chairs. A deserted set, in between takes? Or the real thing?

  If power was lying there on the streets of St Petersburg just waiting to be picked up, can the same be applied to this building and these cluttered corridors? And, if so, in what part of this place does power lie? With that group of senior members gathered at the far end of a corridor, behind that closed door, or with some harmless, anonymous-looking figure (which, Peter imagines, is the way this place sees him) who knows the power of a whisper, and knows how to set it in motion so that it multiplies into the plural?

  The Monday papers, the Tuesday, the midweek papers, the television and the radio, talked of nothing but Beth’s article after it first appeared that Saturday earlier in the month. And this talk blew through the streets of the country like the October wind and, like the October wind, has now exhausted itself. The power of a whisper is far greater than he ever imagined. The denials were issued immediately and emphatically, again and again, with derision and ridicule directed at all those involved, and now the story is completely discredited and nobody believes it. But they did for a while. Or at least were ready to. So the denials and the discredited story are not as important as the fact that there was talk. For a moment, when it could have been true, it was as good as true. And damage was done. For a short time.

  Peter is looking back on it all from the vantage point of a late Friday afternoon. The hand behind it all, the anonymous artist, watched his invention come to life with a sort of detached fascination, as if contemplating the question, and with a degree of admiration: who did this? And so all the sentimental concern he read in his wife’s eyes that Saturday when the story broke, and the shiver of guilt that came with it, now forgotten, he strolls onto the steps of Parliament House in the late October sun, as absorbed with thoughts of his work, of the story and how it played out, as he might be with an intriguing tale he just read. And while part of him is saying be wary of playing God too often, young man, another part is acknowledging that he has already acquired a taste for the game. And, what’s more, has a natural facility for it. That, he also recognises, is a talent that might take him places. Certainly lift him from the bureaucratic rounds that now take up his time. And a political life that has stalled can start moving again.

  He’s not even aware of her at first as he looks over the wide street that sweeps past with the dominant spectacle of Mt Ainslie in front of him. He finds it impossible to look upon these steps without picturing, all over again, the mountain of Whitlam standing upon them on the day he was sacked, uttering words befitting of a mountain, when half the country (the half that Peter had once counted himself among but by the time of the sacking didn’t) stood shocked in the streets, threatening violence and revolution. But the shock faded and everybody eventually went back to work. And as he stands where he imagines Whitlam stood that day, more or less, he can’t help wondering if, for all the drama of that day and that moment, there was some part of Whitlam that was, however momentarily, contemplating the spectacle of Mt Ainslie and asking himself if it was really a mountain at all or just a big hill. And, if so, did the mountain of Whitlam feel diminished by the question? Are all our mountains, depending on how we look at them, just big hills in the end?

  It is then, lost in speculation, that he turns and comes face to face with Beth. The transformation is dramatic. And in so short a time. A middle-aged Marguerite Duras has become an aged one. All in a matter of weeks. And because he knows and she knows that any expression of concern for her would be false, he offers none. That is one game he will not play. The game of false concern. And so he greets her as he would any day. As though nothing has happened. She doesn’t speak. He greets her and still she doesn’t speak. She will speak, her manner says, with her eyes.

  You did this thing, her eyes say. A game, was it? No, not so much a game as an experiment. And all of us your guinea pigs. You lied, and why should I be shocked that you did? I know that you lie and that it is your job to lie, but did you have to lie to me? And could you not have returned at least one of the calls I made or shown the slightest tremor of feeling or concern? But no, they’ve got you, like they’ve got all of us, for as long as we’re useful. But I can only say these things now because my usefulness has ended. As, one day, will yours. And all those who are useful, and who use, will become used. It is the nature of things. And I have no desire to rehearse and repeat all that has been learnt and unlearnt over the years. You will learn that our inventions come back to us. And, when you do, the approval of fools will sting. And your achievements will ring hollow in the air like a cracked bell. This you will learn.

  And for a moment, it seems to Peter, it is almost as though she is not there. Almost as though he has been silently conversing with a ghost. As though the cold shadow of a ghost has passed over him, blotting out that late October sun in all its dazzling brightness. You used me … and why am I surprised? And when she turns to leave, there but not there, it is almost as though she fades on the sound of a distant horn, and in the blink of an eye is gone.

  The surprise in her eyes, that hint of the belief that old times might have amounted to something more than this, lingers on. Amused glances will now follow her, whispers, raised eyebrows and audible laughter. It will all follow her now as he knew it would. Ridicule will smile back at her from hotel bars and supermarket check-outs. And she will spend her last days in this city, once her domain, before being shifted to the inevitable gardening supplement, as the object of laughter.

  He walks down the steps to a waiting taxi, looking for her as he goes, for she seems to have dematerialised. Talk blew through the capital like the October winds, and for a few days or weeks talk was truth — or could have been. The effect was the same. Damage has been done. And nobody wi
ll ever know where it started, because — and he is fully confident of this — for all the look of censure and surprise on her face, she would never disclose her source. Not Beth. Ethical Beth. She will endure ridicule and laughter, but never do that.

  The taxi draws away into the quiet, deserted street. The invisible hand will stay invisible. Whisper was truth for a while, damage has been done and will be done again. That is the nature of things.

  Within weeks the whole affair — which some papers called a story of betrayal as old as humanity — is forgotten. That is the nature of things. Except, even for Peter, who invented the preposterous and made it plausible for a while, it is now impossible to look at this Whitlam of theirs and not see a man looking over his shoulder. Apprehensively. And if Peter is thinking this, is it possible that others are too? Does a mountain look over its shoulder to see if the landscape has changed? To reassure itself that in a land of few mountains, the mountain of Whitlam still prevails? Or does that short time in which invention was truth linger as some sort of pursuing shadow?

  Nobody knows the author of it all. There is a certain wonder in that. In the sheer anonymity of it all. Like being the hero of one of those revolutionary tales who leaves his calling card at the site of daring deeds, but whose identity is never known. Everywhere in evidence, but nowhere visible. And there is, it seems to Peter, a certain wonder in not being known that makes fame look crass. Of being, for as long as the affair and its consequences lasted, the possessor of a secret that goes to the very heart of earthly matters and activities; knowing that the vast, timeless department of human affairs we call the nature of things has anonymous agents on the ground.

  But all things end. He has not only discovered a taste for the game, he has also discovered he has a talent for it. And it is a talent that will take him places, but only if those who matter know. And so a time will come when he will have to discard his anonymity and reveal his talent to the select few, but not yet.