Monterra's Deliciosa & Other Tales &

by Anna Tambour

  One night he had a dream, and he knew it to be real and true, just as S1 and S2 knew the same of their dreams. And this is what his dream said:

  "Go to the secret place where you eat your morning meal, and tied to a bramble bush, you will see a real Great Theory, not formed by your imagination. You will know it to be a Great Theory because it will be wearing a halter. Untie it and lead it back to your village, and though your looks will fade and your voice will lose its sweetness, the villagers will still love you because you have brought them the Great Theory."

  ~

  The fourth scientist had no loving wife nor adoring village wenches fainting at his words. He had no home hearth to go to, nor any comforts. The only fire in his life was the Great Theory, and if he met you on the road, you would soon wish he were a bandit who would only steal your jewels and victuals, and be off. Instead, S4 was famous for exhorting you to see his Great Theory in your mind's eye, whether you be a scientist or not, whether Great Theories stirred your blood, or not.

  "Blue-headed, it is," he would tell you, with his face so close you could read his pores. "with black and white plates on it like floor tiles," and you'd have to nod agreement, even though you'd certainly never seen his Great Theory. Even then, he'd not let you escape without paying more of a toll, listening to all the characteristics of the beast as if he'd lived with it close as man and wife. And you'd have to exclaim, "Yes, yes!" as if you also knew the Great Theory to be exactly as he described, and found it as fascinating a creature. And finally, after you thought you could bear no more, he'd yell out, "There it is!" and be off running down the road, with you seeing nothing, but getting away from him as fast as if the forest were haunted.

  And one night, S4 had a dream, as vivid as the dreams of S1, S2, and S3. And so real that when he woke, he cried out in agony. And this is what his dream said:

  "The Great Theory you have chased and described in such detail to so many strangers these long years is not a Great Theory at all, but a bluejay sitting on the head of his friend, a spotted boar. Go to your most secret spot in the forest, and they will be waiting for you, roped to a tree. Take hold of the bridle, and they will turn into your Great Theory, in looks and character, exactly matching your belief."

  ~

  The fifth scientist was a simple man, with only one goal in life: riches. If he could have paid a simpleton nothing to catch a Great Theory, and then sell the thing, he would have done it. The problem was, he didn't know a simpleton who could catch a Theory, and the smarter men would all want to be paid themselves, if they were to pass the prize on to him. So instead, S5 worked in a secret spot, making a Great Theory. He had to make it look convincing, with legs that flopped, a mouth that gaped, a tail that looked as if it had once slashed the air. His plan was to arrive at the King's court laden with his catch. Dead, unfortunately, but, he calculated, still worth quite a lot. By the time the King discovered the fraud, if ever, S5 would be raking his fingers through his riches, safe in a far-off kingdom.

  S5 toiled alone, and was a great admirer of himself. So he cursed everything but himself, for his project was still unfinished, and was, moreover, becoming more difficult, costly and time-consuming than he'd ever considered.

  And one night, S5 had a dream, more real than his constructed Theory would ever be, and so convincing that he believed the dream utterly. And this is what the dream said:

  "When you awake, go to your secret place, and in the corner where you've propped your ragdoll Theory, will stand a real, live Great Theory, more magnificent than your wildest imagination. Take hold of its bridle and it will be yours."

  ~

  The sixth scientist would have admired the flair of S5, as he had none of his own. Every day he ate his breakfast, and walked to the same spot in the forest, sat down in the same place, sharpened his pencil, polished his spectacles, opened his pad, and recorded what went past. He was the child of two scientists, and always knew he would grow up to be a scientist himself. But he never expected to find a Great Theory, so he didn't consider it worth wasting his time looking. He did his work dutifully and trudged home, every workday the same, hour for lunch, a space in his log for public holidays.

  And one night he had a dream, and he was startled but he did believe it, and this is what it said:

  "Go to the workplace where you sit, and a Great Theory will be waiting there. She is very tame. Take hold of her halter and she will be yours."

  ~

  The last scientist was S7, and though he went to the forest every day, he never saw a Great Theory. He examined spoor from many beasts, including his fellow hunters. He listened to the birds' speech, and observed them at their rest, and when they suddenly took flight. He put his nose to the stones and sniffed, and crumbled droppings between his fingers and peered. He had heard many stories, but believed no tales except the tales that he observed, by adding up their own unspoken words.

  He heard certain sounds, and some days he thought with a leap of heart, that they might be the sounds of a Great Theory. Odd wild smells woke him in the night with their strange vigour. He saw footprints like no other. Some days, a flash amongst the tree trunks left him breathless, his eyes throbbing.

  He never spoke of these things. He had never seen a Great Theory.

  Over the years, the forest taught him many things, as he looked and saw and listened and heard and observed all around him.

  One day, deep in the woods, he reached a little bare patch of ground. He picked up a little stick and squatted down, and scratched a picture in the dirt. It was a picture of one Great Theory, as he thought it could possibly look. Its tracks had been fresh daily for a moon, and it almost seemed to be following him. Then there had been smells, leaf rustlings, flits of colour through the trees. When he was finished drawing the picture, he suddenly stood, and rubbed the dirt smooth with his boot. His cheeks were warm, and glowed red. He was embarrassed to have drawn the picture. After all, he had not SEEN any Great Theory.

  And that night, he had a dream. And when he woke, he knew it to be real, and absolutely true. And this is what S7's dream said:

  "The Great Theory that you have drawn is the Great Theory that has been watching you. When you wake, go to the place where you drew her picture, and she will be waiting for you. Take hold of her bridle, and she will be yours to parade for all to see."

  ~

  And so, each scientist woke and knew his dream to be true.

  And each scientist went to his own special place, and did as he was told, and a Great Theory was his.

  Except for one scientist, who sat and gazed at the beast and marvelled.

  And the beast gazed back at him and said, "Take hold of my bridle and I am yours."

  And he took hold of the Great Theory's bridle, and she bowed down her head in acquiescence.

  And he cried, for she was more beautiful to him than he ever thought any thing could be.

  And with his two hands, he removed the bridle and left her naked as she was born.

  "You are free," he said. "I will not capture you."

  And at that, the Great Theory tossed back her head.

  "Then I ..." she said, "will walk with you."

  The Afterlife at Seahorse Drive

  "Merrymook! What are you waiting for? Death?"

  If there were billboards to attract, this could be Merrymook's successful appeal. This is a take-no-chances heaven by the sea, the first glimpse of it being those honeymoon days in gypsum weekenders, now remembered with clouded eyes reflecting romance enhanced by forgetfulness. Indeed, so many couples have chosen to return to Merrymook for their duration, that today this little etheria is an earthly looking suburb with a golf course and large brick houses built on the sites of the old sea-coloured shacks.

  Bede and Coralee Dinning live at number 26 Seahorse Drive, so close to the course that Coralee could watch the whacking of balls from her lounge window, if she'd a mind to.

  The air here feels so different from Girilambone. The breeze comes inland, se
a-smelling—telling different tales to the hot wind blowing where the Dinnings were born, where the overland comes rushing hot pushed and parched—running over the dusty land like a kelpie-dog over the backs of sheep.

  ~

  The kids were shocked when the station was sold. Though why they should have been, was a hard one.

  Donna (the oldest)—a mum on a station in Narrogin out in Western Australia. Sue left for Canberra soon as she could type. Angus—now calling himself CJ for some reason—somewhere in Melbourne with his friends in that band.

  "What put their noses out of joint?" Bede asked Coralee the night before the auction. "They never wanted to stay."

  Even the green nylon bedspread they sat on would be on the block tomorrow morning, come 10 a.m.

  Coralee shrugged, running her finger over the ruches of a rosette. She felt a little guilty. "We never discussed it with them, Bede. Maybe we should have. Angus—"

  "Angus! When was that lad last in the shed? One clip and he's gone, that bludger. And I suppose he shed tears over Emoh Ruo?"

  Coralee's shoulders pulled themselves up around her ears till she looked like a bedraggled vulture. "You get a bit cross at times and he's a sensi—"

  "Sensitive boy, sensitive boy. You can dip my arse!" Bede pushed himself too violently off the bed to suppress a grunt of pain—his hard heels bit the floor, and he banged his fist so hard against the edge of the LOT23-stickered wardrobe that a crackle of split veneer answered back.

  When the kitchen door slammed, Coralee relaxed enough to crawl into bed. She dreamt of a slab of white beach, dolphins looping in and out of a sparkling sea; of her naked body glistening under a pulsating chrome shower head—source of a clear endless waterfall regardless of the weather; she dreamt of an emerald-green lawn, automatic sprinklers spraying fans of rain against a real brick house with a picture window glinting out over the sea; the slap slap slap sent by the sprinkler against the tight-pressed mob of dahlias.

  To Bede, a weekend away from Woororra was about all he could take. He'd been born in this room, on this bed, fifty-five years ago. The back of his neck had only known the same scouring sun. His hands had felt like unkempt leather as soon as his growing juices stopped flowing; and for as long as Coralee could remember, Bede had smelt like a combination of White Oak rollee, kelpies, sweat, and sheep.

  ~

  "You're bloody crooked, you are, Bede. Look at yourself. A gorilla on the left side and a roo on the right. And that Ki-ro—yeah, I know about him. That crack-yer-bones guy you're sneaking off to. He can't keep popping you forever. I'm not gonna tell you again, mate. Pack in your boots and buy a fishing rod."

  Bede grunted. Fishing was for people who sat all their lives. But there was something to what the man said.

  Doctor Swain wasn't a real doctor, not like the type that sends you off to Wagga for tests, or that you think Second Opinion. Swainy and Bede had gone to school together. And though Bede had tried young Tudhope in desperation, his pulling and cracking had done about as good a job as taking a deep breath, and blowing the blowflies off a stricken ewe. And crikey, Swainy was right. Bede gazed at himself in the doctor's full-length mirror, and he did look crooked, and he didn't need a mirror to know that he felt so crook that even the dogs slunk clear of him now.

  ~

  The pre-auction chatter was as pitiless as pre-auction utterings always are. The prime merinos sneered at openly, coveted secretly. The battered formica dining table that was once Coralee's pride, now part of a job lot, leaned against to check for wonky legs. The milling crowd before the auction is always the same. Bede had often been one of them. But to be on the other side ...

  The speaker coughed, the gavel clapped, and the auction began. The unimportant stuff first—as far as the auctioneers are concerned. For the sellers, the heart of memories—"household assorted".

  " ... Lot 5, children's bunk bed, toy box, phonograph player and ten records ... highchair ... double bed, original condition iron, missing one ball ..."

  The auctioneers were friends, Bede had thought, until today. Sure they talked up everything, but they settled too quick, didn't really try. Couldn't they see real worth?

  Bede's insides felt pretty watery. It was his idea to sell pretty much everything. Coralee had argued, but he saw the gleam in her eyes at the prospect of everything new. "What'd the place look like with our tatty old duds?" he'd asked her. "Old mutton," he'd declared. But he had his reasons. Now, here, with it flowing away at the worth of water in a flood, he felt panic. Never was Bede Dinning a man to change his mind. But Stewart McKell had been right, he mused. Should've gone anywhere today but here.

  " ... Lot 31, Green vinyl sofa and matching chair..." Clive McKell glared at Bede, stomping around with his hard face. Clive had also told Bede to spend the day in town. Take the wife shopping. Treat her to tea. But no. There's Bede, just like the rest of these selling buggers—overflowing septics all. Long green face, muttering outrage, stinking fear.

  The usual crowd was here today. The professionals, the neighbours, those newies who think they'll make a go of it, if it is a "bargain"; that young Ickersly fellow and his wife. Looks like a young Bede, and those size-up eyes.

  It turned out to be Ickersly's day, or maybe Bede's, after all. Ickersly bought the wool plant, the this, the that, at cruelly low prices. But for the sheep he paid top dollar. The station itself went to him in a surprisingly tense duel between him and a total unknown. And the dogs—no one sells dogs this way the McKells swore to Bede, but acquiesced to his insistence. The dogs were a bared-tooth brawl, a real pack fight. Someone said Ickersly actually growled at one point. In the end, Ickersly ended up with all the dogs, even old Louie; every one of em—excepting of course Coralee's Snowball, the house poodle that wasn't on the block.

  He paid too much for the dogs, everyone agreed—especially for Louie who only had a season or two left and hardly heard a thing.

  And by two o'clock, tea being served at break, it was over.

  Throughout the whole auction, Bede lurked silent on the edge of the crowd. His face only turned from green to its normal meat-pink once.

  Six p.m.—Bede, Coralee and Snowball are on the road. Snowball, smart dog, curls up on Coralee's lap and puts himself to sleep immediately. There are no sounds to wake him up.

  ~

  "But I put a down payment on it. I counted on it! I—"

  "Well, you can stop counting now!" Bede grabbed the phone from Coralee's hand and slammed it down so hard that it jumped out of the cradle and yelped back beep beep beep beep until Coralee shepherded it back with both hands into a position of silence.

  "Be more convenient if we were dead. Divvied us up, they did. It's obscene!" An innocent pencil was grabbed up by Bede's left paw, and with a splintering crunch, suddenly became two stubs. "Sound system now, huh? Like he needs one. When that boy wants something, I can bloody hear him from the loo!"

  Coralee stood with her back against the counter in the beachside caravan, just a step away from a husband hot enough to fry eggs on.

  The house plans, large as a coverlet, slithered in noisy folds to the floor, just within stomping rage.

  She couldn't breathe.

  Bede reached over and quietly picked up the plans as if they were a lamb, neatly folding them again. He handed them to her.

  "I'll ring this lot in the morning. They better get started right away."

  She wanted to touch him, put her arms around him, kiss him perhaps, but just stood as she was, to attention.

  He wanted to cry. "Expect you need milk," he said. "Wanna go for a drive?"

  ~

  The house, like all the neighbours', has four bedrooms, a separate dining room, one huge window in the lounge looking onto a yard that no one ever uses; heavy, full-length curtains for privacy; and a lovely small private back garden fronted by the toilet and laundry.

  No seasons that make any difference to the year's activities. Summer and winter both mild. The land, something to be mowed by a law
n mower and whipper-snipped into shape. Slash the tops of those hedges. Neaten those errant grass stems that would lean rampant over the concrete curb with the same hand-held gadget and its spinning nylon line.

  No clip here, except the snipping of flower stems for the vase sitting on the TV.

  The dairy farmers, the few left, gather in the carpark of the old co-op, but there isn't a farm-parts dealer in town. The rolling hills that were so green, are growing black lines now, and sprouting brick. The necessary shops sell postcards, fishing tackle, golf balls, antiques, goat cheese and artwork, teddy bears, lots of medications and arthritis cures.

  The animals: dogs, cats, "pet" kangaroos, parrots, possums—those pests in the roof.

  Snowball is exhibiting increasingly spoilt characteristics as Bede has begun to take him in the car for drives, take him on walks with a lead, and pet him of an evening.

  Sue came to visit once. Soon as she left the car, Coralee whisked her into her new bedroom—where Coralee had fussed half the night before till Bede dragged her away with a quiet "It's beautiful, blossom. Come to bed, or you won't be able to keep your eyes open to look at her."

  Sue held her suitcase in her hand. "Where's my bed? And my horses? And Winnifred? And the pink table?"

  When told that all the stuff she had long abandoned at Woorora, including Winnifred, the doll—that it had all gone in the auction, she mumbled something about "hotel room."

  She had a big suitcase, much bigger than for the two nights she'd stayed.

  Angus rang one afternoon, asking if his band of five guys could stay for a week. "Heard there's some gigs there while the surf's up—"

  "Sorry," Coralee cut in, chasing her apology with a barely audible "We can't."

  With that No, she felt something break, or maybe just wear away in the cool silence of the air between her son and her ear, followed by a too-casual "Just great!" and from his end, the stub-out crash of the connection. She never told Bede.

  Donna came once with her two children, and her being six months due again.