Darkness more visible

by Finola Moorhead

  'He is not!' was my riposte. I strode off.

  Rory dealt with the bickering elderly couple.

  My emotion erupted in self-defence as Chandra followed, attacking. She and I screamed at one another. Neither of us made much sense. She was mad at me for letting the situation next door get so bad. She said I had pricks in my head as she whistled her guard-dog into her car. 'Men are useless and harmful objects!'

  The fight continued inside my house.

  'And what are you doing, taking money from these murderers?' Ferociously, she picked up my contract and tore it up. That made me furious. I gave as good as I got. Sexual attraction, exciting, titillating closeness, turned into violent disagreement. I was not going to let her dictate my work.

  'Lord save me,' I exclaimed in despair. How could something that was so nice transform into this ugliness? I tried to pacify her, but her temper was a wonder to behold. She tore me to pieces with her tongue as I went out and thumped my punching bag in frustration, yelling, 'It's my bloody business how I live my life!'

  'That's the trouble with you post-feminists,' she spat. 'You only care about your own independence. We said the personal is political, and you all took that to mean the political is personal, fucken individualists! You sell your souls and say it's your business. Well, your comfortable life-style, PI Margot Gorman, is paid for by women elsewhere who have bugger-all to start with. What you do personally affects every other woman on the planet!'

  As if the weather-goddess wanted to weigh in on her side, lightning fired flashes at the earth, and thunderbolts cracked. Storm-winds began disturbing the trees. I had to shout to be heard. 'How could you tear my contract up?'

  Chandra started being sarcastic, and hobbled inside and took the audition letter into her hands and ripped that up too. How dare she? My silence was eloquent as I watched where the pieces of my correspondence ended up. Too proud, too incredulous, to gather them while she was there, I took umbrage that she judged me.

  Her passion exploding, I was blasted by a barrage of political correctness which stunned me, and left me feeling sorry for her. She exited my house on her sculpted sticks, her weapons, her weakness, spoke to someone else and slammed the Subaru door.

  When I heard her car start, I retrieved the bits of paper and took them into my office, where I sat and puzzled. I banged my forehead on the keyboard of my dead computer in resignation.

  'It's okay,' I heard behind me. Rory was in the doorway. 'She is just very angry. She'll be back.'

  'That doesn't mean I'll be here,' I croaked. 'What did you do with them?' I meant my neighbours, Herbert and Ethel.

  'Oh, she's in charge now. I made her take Valium and Panadeine Forte. Gave them both some medicinal brandy I found in the truly dreadful lounge-room. They'll go to the hospital. While not kind, he's plainly used to taking orders from her when his welfare is at stake.'

  Rory's ginger hair was flattened into an unattractive part in the middle by the constant wearing of the hat, which she now held in her hand. She carried a brief-case, as well. Solid around the hips where the army pants stretched to accommodate feminine bulges, in earthen colours, generally bulky all over, she was of a piece, whole. She reminded me of a dolphin. It must have been her eyes. Tess licked my hand. Rory convinced me to have a cup of tea. She calmed me down, talking about the history of Lesbianlands, the personalities of the women and how they had tried to put radical lesbian theory into practice there but that was much harder than anyone could imagine. She reckoned they had achieved a lot if you looked at the positive side, but there was danger in being romantic about it.

  'Real danger,' I said. 'You have someone like Judith Sloane who, if all my suspicions about her are right, can appear to be a right-on sister with colourful, angelic ideals, while, in fact, she is a mean, bitter miser who is selling you out.' I made a zipping motion indicating an outer persona opened like a suit to reveal hidden character.

  She nodded sadly, and asked me if I had read Valerie Solanas' manifesto. I told her I had glanced through it at Virginia White's when I went looking for her.

  'Margot?' she queried, getting up from the kitchen table, finding her attaché case and popping its lock. 'Can we get down to some work? I am worried. If we can't trust Judith who is treasurer, we're in deep shit.'

  'You want me to find the proof to nail her?' We went into my office. Rory pulled up a chair and sat down beside me at my desk. We both looked up to my colourful notes. Rory read a bit, then gestured toward the manila folders.

  I took a yellow lined foolscap pad from the drawer. And told her how difficult it was getting information out of the Campbells. 'Also,' I added, patting the Featherstone file, 'I think she is an accomplished forger.'

  'We need two signatures on the cheques.' Rory sounded desolate.

  'Yours? And hers?' We shared a nodding realisation. 'Your beautiful script would be a piece of piss to copy, if you don't mind my saying.'

  Troubled by the far-reaching implications of criminal skill combined with treachery, even the horrible worst-case scenario of her signing away the deeds, we worked on the Lesbianlands problem until we heard the return of Chandra's motor vehicle. Ignoring that I summarised, pencil in hand. 'Virginia White disappearing, did that have anything to do with bulldozer and unexplained explosions? What do we have on Judith Sloane apart from her strange behaviour? Her fight with Virginia? Her lying and generally acting uncharacteristically, and Chandra's theories of greed and collaboration?'

  Rory related the story of Virginia's return, her cryptic descriptions of being lost and found and the existence of heavy machinery padlocked into an enclosure hidden in the wilds.

  Chandra leant on her crutches and rested her weight on the door jamb. She seemed somewhat mollified. Her hair was wet, making her face seem bonier. Her excellent skin was high-coloured. Her deep-set eyes glared at Rory's open case. A copy of the SCUM Manifesto was all that was left inside it.

  'You haven't told her about the Solanas site,' she accused Rory.

  'Plainly I miss a lot not being on-line,' I said lightly. Rory reached down for her copy of Valerie Solanas's manifesto.

  'Not yet,' she replied, calmly.

  The atmosphere in the room was tense and thrilling. Rain hit the tin roof. I was in for a roller-coaster ride.

  'What is SCUM?'

  'SCUM is the bible.' Rory said.

  'The bible?' I looked at the slim volume in her hand. As books go, it was about as different from the leather-bound, gold-embossed, fine-papered millennial best-seller as you could get, short of junk mail and give-away leaflets. The binding, staples, had burst and the cheap paper was so stained and discoloured, the words and sentences themselves must have kept it together.

  'Well, the new testament. The manifesto of the only true revolution,' Rory expanded, handling the tract with reverence.

  'You have to have eyes to see.' Chandra's sarcasm was back. She jerked herself off the wall, swung around and assisted herself into my sitting-room to, I assumed, take the weight off her arms in a chair.

  'The reason I was going to tell you about the site that Chandra mentioned,' Rory began, lifting her voice over the sound of the downpour, 'had to do with your investigation into the murder of the young lad dressed as a girl.'

  She had my attention, but her own concentration was disturbed by the patent disapproval of Chandra. We came to an impasse. I have a nose for dissemblance, and I suspected all along that something was being kept from me by these women. The carriage of communication stopped at the top of the big dipper, engine failure. I frowned at Rory, willing that she take the plunge, release the brake, but the silent, fuming Chandra had power over both of us. I got up and, passing Rory, went to join Chandra in the other room. Rory came. I stood in front of the chair and looked down at those defiant, intelligent eyes. Rory took a seat. Professionally a problem-solver, I paced, mechanically, dirty bare feet on the gritty floor. The thunderous precipitation eased. The ensuing silence begged conversation. Where to start? It was up to m
e. The floor was still that of a holiday house, a weekender up the coast, away from the real world, my home. Sand under my soles. Words failed to meet the demands of emotional intensity. Their eyes followed my motion and I caught each's gaze again and again. I, personally, was important to both these lesbians. Their knowledge and their love, in conflict, stilled their tongues. I felt sinewy, strong, and terribly ignorant. The golden tan of my forearms was caught by a sudden shaft of sunlight. The drying fringe of my fair hair was irritating my eyebrows. I flicked it aside. I grinned as I could suddenly see why they wanted me in their commercial, yet another blue-eyed beauty exhibiting the healthy values of our sporty nation in the sun, surf and sand.

  'Let me guess then.' I sat on my coffee-table, knees apart, facing them both. 'From the bit I did read of this treatise, I gather that men are the enemy. And boys who dress as girls are just as bad because they are the like the hero, Achilles, who hid among the maidens and eventually massacred the Amazons, desecrating the corpse of their queen. Because Rory indicated this site, this SCUM Manifesto might have something to do with the murder of Neil Waughan, I deduce that, whatever is communicated between contemporary Amazons in cyberspace, the outcome could be deliberate assassination. Of the enemy. Men. Boys. In the name of revolution. Well, let me tell you, Neil was not murdered, though his death was probably caused by one of the lesbians at the barbecue. It was not an execution. But that does not free this Solanas site thing from probable intention. Guilt. The Internet is a world wide web, political slaying of the enemy could be happening anywhere. Not only your violence today, Chandra, but your evasion several times in my company, makes me wonder whether you might not have both the passion of conviction and the wherewithal to have, in fact, acted upon it. Your distrust of me, which I take personally, is more probably seated in what you perceive as my alliances, with the police, and with international corporations. Capitalism, post-feminism, post-modernism, I don't know, something you hate. It is almost as if you think I prostitute myself for the almighty dollar. Or worse, I am singly responsible for the exploitation of the workers in Nike's factories in Asia. Furthermore, you are capable of destroying your own friendship ties for what you reckon is the greater good, as evidenced by your treatment of Meghan Featherstone.'

  Rory turned a harsh glance in Chandra's direction and placed the manuscript on the table beside me as if it was hot. I picked it up and began fanning its pages. 'So what is the story?'

  Chandra had not crumbled under my attack. She had been assessing me, taking in every word and reading my logic between the lines. Now she gently expounded, 'The Solanasites are intellectual and compassionate women trying to figure out a way to effectively make the world a better place. Most of it is discussion.'

  'But lately,' Rory interrupted, 'we suspected a loose canon was rolling out of control.'

  'She, or he, worried us. Identity is hard to determine. Everyone has pseudonyms.'

  'But this one, we worked out by the way she writes, the way she speaks, comes from our own area, or visits here. I dunno. A possible psycho.'

  Chandra took over the explanation. 'She is Australian and local, of that we're sure.'

  Sceptical, I pulled my legs up into a more relaxed seat on the table. I was prepared to listen.

  Chandra said. 'I scanned the visitors to my several sites, chasing down their location. Not all who post bulletins are of the revolutionary mode, but those who are should recognise each other. We had established a code, a language beneath language. It was working. Now for the mobilisation: how to implement policy? Who, of these theorists, was in action.'

  'Hang on.' I palmed my hands as if on point duty. 'What do you mean by "action"?'

  Rory piped up. 'There were all sorts of ideas about subversive activities. We could run a prostitution racket to finance our subversive activities. The sex industry is the one thing patriarchy demands and assumes control over. Not my notion, you understand. They wanted to spike a male-only product—shaving cream? Jock-straps? Silk ties? Razors?'

  'Condoms? Inside, of course,' Chandra joked.

  I did not laugh. 'We are not man-haters.'

  'Who are you kidding?'

  'Sorry, slip of the tongue,' I parried. 'Money?'

  'Well, yes. That was obvious.' Rory reached for her flimsy little 'bible' and read, '"There is no human reason for money…' da da. "But there are non-human, male reasons for wanting to maintain the money system." Then she goes on to detail what.'

  'You can't have your beloved structures, your collective circles, your better world without dealing with everything, and everybody needs money. That includes how we treat the environment. Sustainable development.' I felt emotionally, physically and intellectually exhausted. Languidly, I folded off the coffee-table and stretched on the floor before I stood.

  Rory rose as well. She handed me her precious little book and pleaded, 'Margot, please read it. Every word, from the beginning.' She looked at me with such a selfless, caring warmth I wanted to swim into her arms.

  I said, 'Okay.'

  They prepared to leave.

  'You don't trust me,' Chandra commented as she hobbled to her car.

  'You don't trust me either,' I countered. I dearly wanted her to respond to me with the affection Rory had shown. 'I can't stand not being trusted. I'm trustworthy for chrissake.'

  She rattled her car-keys. Both dogs barked, eager for movement of any sort. She would not catch my eye, or cuddle.

  'Like, for instance, I don't know whether you pull away from me because I smell bad, because I am not really your cup of tea, or because I am not a man-hater.'

  'Ditto,' she muttered.

  'Well, I'll never be like your mother.' I stood back. I was suddenly angry.

  'I didn't know I pulled away from you,' she said, settling into the driver's seat.

  'Oh, get a grip. Think I can't read subtlety? According to my senses, you should be eager to see me again.' I didn't care what I said. 'To do anything.'

  'Sure,' she replied simply.

  'Come for a swim, bring Rory along. I don't care. I fucken don't care.'

  'You care too much, Margot.' Chandra smiled slightly. 'You are a perfectionist. And why should I trust you when you might have no conception of the ethics of what I am doing? When you, should you be given the facts you demand, see the action as wrong? I know you, Margot, I know you enough to know you would do something. You would fight wrong according to your own lights.'

  'Do you mean you are engaged in activities I would see as criminal? And how well do you know me? How?' She still had a slight smirk about her large, wide mouth which made me want to smile as much as I hated her for it. She was winding me up. Yet another drama-addicted dyke. 'Get over it.' I was wallowing in those slimy waters myself. I wanted to shout and swear. But I would not cry.

  Fiercely I looked at Chandra, I wanted to be truthful. I frowned. 'I want a lot of things from you, but I think I can deal with this by myself. You come with Rory if you want.'

  'Have a swim?'

  'Yes.'

  'Back-stroke?' she teased, showing her earthy side.

  I waved to Rory as the station wagon backed onto the road. It was hardly dark, as the moon shone brightly through a break in the cloud.

  The Subaru with the disabled parking sticker stops on sandy gravel, overlooking the ocean, not far from Margot's place.

  'The sea frightens me,' says Chandra.

  Rory watches it batter the cold sand. Open frankness is her ideal, but she is in a position where direct manner is impossible. Rory has chosen to give Margot, an outsider, the axial clue and she has to face Chandra who knows what she has done. 'Dangerous,' she comments. 'Especially when four-metre tides are expected.'

  Chandra has no more told Margot of her dread of the Summer Amazon's element, than let her in on the conspiracy of the Solanasites. 'I am the river mermaid, a fresh-water fish,' Chandra says, boasting. 'The sea is not natural with me. I can swim because my mother was wise and I was in a pool before I could walk. I could
never walk.' She changes the subject. 'Unreflective as Margot is, non-reader, non-thinker, she is not stupid. She has a nose for bullshit. The scent of crap or something wrong in the air and Margot's head goes up, eyes engage and, if you could see them, her ears would prick up like a cattle dog's.'

  'Yes, I agree,' Rory states. She moves her head around, assessing the climatic atmosphere outside the car.

  Chandra stares at the boring simplicity of the horizon, a silver line, single colour, different shades, different textures, the dramatic sky, the surface of water. 'Give me trees.'

  Rory senses Chandra's stress. The Solanasite project is facing its first real test. 'The international dyke conspiracy, the calling of the bluff of the Rightists' foreboding begs the question, can women, en masse, cold-bloodedly kill? If women had done as Valerie suggested, immediately after she suggested it, simply left men, refused to have anything to do with them, it need not have come to the matter of destruction. Murder is asking a lot of women,' she says.

  'But some have to be proud, vicious and arrogant enough to do it,' Chandra counters. 'Otherwise, the Amazon is betrayed and Achilles continues to dismember Penthesilea's remains.' Although no two days are the same, all time is now. This storm is threatening. A shower at sea causes a dramatic rainbow to appear like half a question mark on the deep grey cloud behind.

  'Do you think the betrayer in our midst is a dedicated traitor or a trickster?' Rory asks.

  Chandra looks Rory up and down, frowning. 'We cannot know this irritant, this bug, this virus, is not a man.' She turns away, having seen the ill-lit shape and profile rocking between faith or indecision. 'The meddler could be a Daddy's girl, simply out to make trouble.' Chandra puts her fist on the gearstick. 'Penthesilea led a band of warrior women whose intent was war, whose training was war, whose life-work and enjoyment in life was war. Where in the entire global village to find such a battalion again? We, to achieve the freedom of women, must have an army.'

  'Yeah, but,' Rory demurs. The spectrum disappears. The sky darkens.

  'Otherwise, the whole damn thing stays an uneven playing field in the battle of the sexes. Which is not a joke,' Chandra argues. 'Not a silly British-American comedy. Not a fantasy. It continues to happen. I could kill a man today, I could spill blood. Because Trojan wars appear to have been won and lost, the victors have prescribed the status quo, changed reality to suit themselves and convinced just about everybody this is how it is. It doesn't mean the war is over.'