Mr Chen's Emporium

by Deborah O'Brien

  ‘Charles is going to die, isn’t he?’ Amy said to Eliza, the tears suddenly flooding her eyes.

  ‘He may still recover. The inhalations are helping.’

  ‘Eliza, when I looked out of the window just now, I saw a dark shadow.’ Amy was trembling. ‘I fear it was the strangling angel. She is outside waiting.’

  ‘Amy, stop it. There is no angel. It is a name someone invented for a disease. Now listen to me. I know I warned you not to say anything to Charles about the baby, but it is time to tell him.’

  ‘Because you think he is dying.’

  ‘Because it will lift his spirits. It will make him fight this illness in a way that nothing else can.’

  ‘Then I shall tell him right away.’

  After Amy told Charles the good news, his breathing settled, but his voice remained a whisper.

  ‘You have brought me great joy, Amy. With our marriage and now the baby.’

  ‘It is my joy too.’

  ‘When is our baby due?’

  ‘September.’

  ‘Just in time for spring.’

  Tears were streaming down her face, but she managed to keep her voice calm. ‘It is a boy, Charles.’

  ‘How can you know?’

  ‘I dreamed it.’

  He took her hand and tried to squeeze it, but didn’t have the strength.

  ‘What shall we call him?’ he asked.

  ‘Charles, of course.’

  ‘Charles Alexander Chen.’

  She kissed him on the lips, even though she knew she shouldn’t do so, in case she became infected by the invisible germs.

  The entire Miller family had gathered in the parlour at Paterson Street. Amy asked them to visit with Charles one at a time. She didn’t want to tire him, or for him to think it was a death-bed gathering and give up hope.

  In the afternoon Eliza sent for Reverend Brownlow. Full of nervous energy, Amy paced up and down the hall, awaiting his arrival. At the sound of his knock, she ushered him inside and quickly closed the door behind him. She didn’t want the strangling angel following the clergyman into the house. He prayed with the family, spent time with Charles and then spoke to Amy alone.

  ‘How are you, my dear?’

  ‘I feel helpless, sir,’ said Amy, trying to conceal the desperation in her voice. ‘I do not understand why Charles has been afflicted by this illness. If it is caused by germs, as Eliza has said, why did they attack Charles and not me or Jimmy?’

  ‘We cannot know why this has happened to Charles, but I do know that we should hand the Lord our troubles and He will comfort us.’

  ‘Reverend Brownlow, what if this is a punishment?’

  ‘What are you talking about, Amy? Why would God punish Charles?’

  ‘For marrying me! My father foresaw it. He said Charles and I would be punished. I fear that I have caused this. If Charles hadn’t married me, he would be strong and well.’

  ‘Amy, if he hadn’t married you, he wouldn’t have had the happiness of the last few months. And the illness would have come anyway.’

  She shook her head. ‘I wish I could believe you.’

  ‘Charles told me it is his love for you which is sustaining him – that and his faith. Now go and sit with him and do not blame yourself.’

  A little later, there was a knock at the front door. Eliza went to see who it was and then returned to the bedroom, indicating that Amy should follow her. Standing at the threshold was Margaret Duncan, carrying a pot of stew.

  ‘Amy, I’m so sorry to hear about Charles,’ she said, handing the stew to Eliza.

  For a few seconds Amy remained motionless, as if she were in shock. Then she threw herself into her mother’s arms.

  ‘I love him so much, Mama. I can’t lose him.’

  ‘I know, dear girl. I know.’ Margaret held her daughter, stroking her hair. Finally Amy detached herself and wiped her face on her apron.

  ‘Please come in, Mama. Just for a cup of tea. I have some of the tisane that you like.’

  ‘I wish I could, Amy, but your father doesn’t know I’m here. I’ll try to come again, perhaps tomorrow. And I shall pray for Charles’s recovery.’

  ‘Will Papa pray for Charles too?’ asked Amy, even though she already knew the answer.

  ‘Be strong, Amy. For Charles.’ Margaret kissed Amy on the forehead and was gone so quickly she might have been an apparition.

  In spite of Eliza’s disapproval, Amy lay on the bed beside Charles, holding his hand.

  ‘Sing to me, Amy,’ he whispered.

  She sang the song she had heard in Sydney – ‘Beautiful Dreamer’.

  Beautiful dreamer, wake unto me,

  Starlight and dewdrops are waiting for thee;

  Sounds of the rude world, heard in the day,

  Lull’d by the moonlight have all pass’d away!

  She kept singing, though Charles’s coughing was breaking her heart. Afterwards he dozed for a while, only to wake and cough again. Every hour, Eliza came in and felt his wrist. Sometimes she put her head against his chest.

  When the light faded, Amy heard the dark angel flapping at the windows. She rose and checked that the curtains were closed and the windows locked, before returning to Charles’s side and humming the melody softly as he napped. She must have fallen asleep herself because when she woke it was the grey hour before dawn. Charles seemed better. He was sleeping and the wheezing was gone. Perhaps the crisis was over. She climbed off the bed carefully and tiptoed into the parlour where Joseph and Daniel were dozing at either end of the sofa, and Jimmy was curled up in an armchair because he had given up his room for Eliza. She, in turn, had not slept at all. A kerosene lamp was burning in Charles’s study where Amy could see her bent over the desk, writing something. She went to the door and spoke quietly, so as not to startle her friend: ‘Eliza, Charles is sleeping and his breathing is quiet. Do you think the worst has passed?’

  Eliza followed her back to the bedroom where the first light was filtering through the muslin curtains.

  ‘I cannot hear the angel any more, thank heavens,’ said Amy as they approached the bed. ‘Do you think she has flown away and left Charles in peace?’

  Eliza put her fingers on Charles’s wrist and lowered her head against his chest. Finally she looked up, her eyes meeting Amy’s. For a few seconds neither spoke. Then Amy’s body began to crumple. Eliza caught her just before she hit the floor. As she lay in a half faint in Eliza’s arms, Amy saw the dark angel smiling at her.

  Now

  In Millbrooke, locals couldn’t just sit in a café, drink a coffee and eat a snack – they had to be doing something. In the corner Jonathan, the woodworker, was bent over his laptop, writing an editorial for the Millbrooke Gazette. At another table, the plants woman was making changes to her screenplay – in longhand with a fountain pen. Next to the window, Angie Wallace was putting the final touches to her sketch of Mr Chen’s Emporium. She had completed everything, bar the dragon-shaped brackets at the top of each verandah post. Being so intricate, they were the most difficult thing to draw. As she inked in the details, she kept glancing out the window to check she had everything right. Then she noticed a tall figure in a flannelette shirt crossing the street. Quickly she leaned away from the plate glass, but he had already spotted her.

  Richard started speaking even before he was seated. ‘I’m sorry about the other day, Ange. And I regret not telling you from the start. I suppose I’m so used to holding things close to myself and not sharing them with others that I just do it automatically. But I should have told you. Do you forgive me?’

  For some silly reason Angie had tears in her eyes. ‘Yes, of course. And I shouldn’t have said you’re a hypocrite. It was mean and unfair.’

  ‘I’m sorry about the other thing too.’

  ‘What other thing?’

  ‘The consorting remark. And the stuff I almost said. About your pants.’

  ‘So you should be!’ But she was smiling.

  ‘Have you hea
rd the latest rumours?’ he asked.

  ‘I thought you didn’t deal in rumours. Aren’t they the resort of those with nothing better to do?’

  Ignoring her, he continued: ‘Scuttlebutt has it that Songbird Minerals is pulling the plug on Millbrooke.’

  ‘Pulling the plug?’

  ‘Bailing out, folding up their tents, scarpering.’

  Sometimes Richard Scott could be very irritating. ‘You don’t have to supply a thesaurus. I understand what you’re saying.’

  ‘They’ve stopped the test-drilling. My mate, the security guard, told me that the big bosses in the States are pissed off with the delays, but what’s got them really incensed is the mooted tax on foreign mining companies.’

  When Angie remained silent, he continued. ‘They’re claiming it would be an unreasonable impost on their already tight profit margin, that it’s nothing more than a blatant cash grab. And they’re scared that once it’s introduced, the government will keep upping the rate. So Songbird is cutting its losses. Doing a dummy spit. Flying the coop.’

  ‘Will you stop the mixed metaphors, Richard. I get what you’re saying!’

  He squinted at her. ‘Jack hasn’t told you, has he? Well, apparently the company has some other project stewing in South America.’

  ‘Of course I know about Venezuela,’ she said, trying to keep her voice calm. ‘But they wouldn’t ditch Millbrooke. Not after all the money they’ve put into test-drilling and feasibility studies. Plus the investment in the Golden Days project. Are you forgetting that they’ve bought two acres of prime land right in the middle of town?’

  ‘That’s chickenfeed to Songbird. They’ll just put the property back on the market.’ He scratched his head through the woollen beanie. ‘If the price is right, I might even consider buying it.’

  ‘But what about the emotional investment they’ve made in the local community?’

  ‘Mining companies don’t operate according to an emotional agenda, Ange. It’s all about making money for the investors. They drill holes in the earth, but they don’t necessarily put down roots.’

  ‘I’m surprised you don’t have a Latin proverb to sum up those sentiments,’ she said archly. All the same, she suspected Richard was right. Mining was a transient business. It always had been. Extract the ore and then move on to a new El Dorado, or Hell Dorado, as the case might be.

  After a moment she said, ‘You must be disappointed your design won’t be built.’

  ‘Not really. It’s an architect’s lot to design things that never become a reality. If you knew the number of tenders I’ve prepared which didn’t win. And the competitions I’ve entered without success. To tell you the truth, I’ve always suspected Millbrooke’s Golden Days would remain an architectural model collecting dust in a storeroom somewhere.’

  ‘It’s sad though. I really liked that building. And it would have given the town such a boost.’

  ‘Ange, I learned long ago that life is predicated on unfinished business and unresolved dreams. And some disappointments hurt more than others.’

  His expression gave nothing away.

  ‘At least this turn of events lets you off the hook,’ she said. ‘No more inner conflict about hating the mine and loving the Golden Days.’

  ‘Yeah, fate seems to have liberated me from a tricky moral dilemma. And I could say the same for you.’

  Angie didn’t bother to answer. She was thinking about Jack, the lodger, who had become a lover. It wasn’t only the money and the sex she would miss, or even his ability to open difficult jars and kill the odd cockroach. Mr Songbird had given her a glimpse of the sun when she’d thought it was forever clouded.

  AUTUMN

  ‘The princess was inconsolable

  at being separated from Aladdin, her

  dear husband, whom she had loved

  from the very beginning

  and would love forever more.’

  ‘Histoire d’Aladdin, ou la lampe merveilleuse’

  Nuit CCCXLII [Antoine Galland c.1710]

  15

  REVELATIONS

  Then

  By the end of March Amy’s belly had formed a bump, so slight only she could see it. All the same, she moved differently now, constantly aware of the bronze-skinned, brown-eyed son growing inside her. He would resemble his father. She knew it from the dream.

  As she carried her basket along Miller Street, Amy couldn’t help running her other hand over her stomach. It had become a comforting habit which always made her smile. That was a good thing for a young woman who rarely smiled any more. When she reached the Post and Telegraph Office, she saw a bulky figure in a black suit and dog-collar coming towards her from the eastern end of town. He hadn’t seen her yet. He was too far away, but the gap was closing quickly.

  Surely he couldn’t maintain the hostility. Not when his only living daughter was a widow. Not once she told him she was expecting his first grandchild. In turn, Amy would forgive him his sins. After all, Matthew Duncan was her father, and although she might not like the man and his bigotry, a part of her still loved him, the part which recalled his overwhelming grief at the death of Peggy. If he smiled and wished her a good morning, she would open her heart to him. They might even have a discourse about the bairn. It would be the first step in their reconciliation. And soon Amy would be visiting the Manse, taking tea in the kitchen with her mother and playing with the boys.

  Anxious to reunite with her father, Amy began to walk faster. There had always been something reassuring about his strong shoulders and husky Glaswegian accent. When they were within ten yards of each other, she gave a tentative smile, awaiting at least a nod in return. Their eyes met, and she searched his face for a reaction. But it was blank. Blank as a tin soldier staring into space.

  Then he stepped off the boardwalk and crossed to the other side of the road, continuing his way up Miller Street as if she were a lady of the night he had been forced to avoid. Amy stopped dead, the smile melting on her face. Slowly her expression turned from expectation to anguish. Tears were stinging her eyes, but she wasn’t going to let the citizens of Millbrooke see her crying. Taking a deep breath, she tilted her chin upwards and threw her shoulders back. She continued down Miller Street, using her free hand to cradle the little bump that would soon be her son.

  By the time she reached the emporium, Amy had composed herself. As was her practice before entering the store, she glanced up at the sign above the door saying: ‘C. Chen, Proprietor’. She and Jimmy might have inherited the property, but they would never be its owners, merely the caretakers of Charles’s legacy.

  After hanging her cloak on the stand in the back room, she went straight to the counter, where she aligned the tea boxes in a perfect row, skimming her fingers across the labels, so elegantly written in Charles’s own hand. Until those boxes were as they should be, she couldn’t think of anything else. Then she picked up a feather duster and ran it over the large porcelain urns standing on the floor. After that, she went to the cabinet where the silks were displayed. Someone had put a red bolt among the blues and greens – a careless customer perhaps, who didn’t understand the need for everything to be in its place. Once she had returned the errant silk to its shelf and rolled up any loose ends, she set about tidying the stacks of plates, bowls and cups. Plain white on one shelf, patterned on the next, alternating them in the way Charles used to do. Only two months ago she had teased him about rearranging the shelves while he was out at the diggings. Now the thought of changing anything was anathema to her.

  When the porcelain was in order, she took a cloth and polished the brass lantern until it shone as bright as the summer sun. There would be no genie, of course, no matter how hard she rubbed the lamp. Genies were the stuff of dreams, like fairy godmothers, invented by optimistic human beings, yearning for the impossible. If Amy had once believed in fairytales, she did so no longer. Her happy-ever-after had ended that grey February dawn when a demonic angel stole her husband and laughed in her face.

>   Now

  The rumours had proven true. Songbird Minerals would soon be decamping, together with its movie-star engineer. After a respite in San Francisco, Mr Songbird would be flying south to new goldfields in South America. There would be another lonely woman, of course. He would meet her in one of those tropical bars with rattan ceiling fans flapping in relentless circles. She would be of a certain age, sitting at a table on her own, sipping tea – the iced variety, since it was steamy Venezuela, rather than chilly Millbrooke. He would chat to her about his family. She might even show him pictures of her own children – baby photos because she hadn’t put new ones in her wallet. She would explain in an embarrassed kind of way that the children were grown-up now. She might even share the fact she lived alone. Then he would tell her how he yearned to be in a real home, not a bland motel. Somehow he would end up as her boarder. And, sooner or later, she would welcome him into her bed.

  It was the second last painting class before the Easter exhibition, but nobody felt much like painting. Instead, they drew up rosters and discussed catering arrangements for opening night – a twilight preview. Now that their Clint Eastwood lookalike had left for warmer climes, the painting ladies were at a loss to know who to ask to open the show. So Angie decided a Millbrooker should do the honours, Nola from the Schoolhouse B&B. Unlike Mr Songbird, she was a real celebrity, at least for the baby boomer generation, particularly the males, who retained fond memories of her days as the rather buxom star of a seventies soap opera.

  As the women sat around the kitchen table, sipping their tea and coffee and nibbling on Angie’s ginger sponge, Jennie said: ‘We have a surprise for you, Angie, to say thank you for teaching us and organising the exhibition.’

  ‘You didn’t need to do that,’ said Angie, expecting a box of chocolates.