by Carmel Bird
My dearest Iris,
The mosquitoes are terrible this year, but still Father will not let me fill in the old well. I truly believe they breed in there. He is dying. All day long he sits in his chair with Auntie Ann’s red rug on his knees, and stares out to sea. Out past the old palm trees, over the rocks, and far, far out across the water. As though he were still hoping to see Caroline and Arthur come floating back. He has no fingernails. They sort of dissolved as his illness got worse. And his hair is as white as a baby’s, thin, and standing up on end. I rub the citronella on his face and hands as he sits out there in the dusk, staring out across the ocean, portraits of Caroline and Arthur mirrored in his eyes. The mosquitoes do not bite him and his beautiful eyes have faded. They are now like the tinge on the edge of a glass of buttermilk.
You will come home for Christmas, won’t you, Iris. And we will go and look down again, down, down from the purple pigface, down, down the sloping cliff into the suck suck suck of the blowhole. Arthur and Caroline, happy young tragedy rolling slow at first and then faster faster down the slope of the pig-face into the mysterious pounding darkness of the blowhole frilled with froth.
Auntie Ann said that Caroline would be the death of Arthur. Well, who knows? We would rub the citronella on our arms and legs and go out for walks at dusk to pick the flowers poking through the fences of people having tea. Through the windows we could see the pink frilly flounces on their tablecloths, and there was cucumber green as toads, little green toady frogs which live down the well. Always one jump ahead, and we never caught a toad. But we came back with our arms full of somebody else’s snapdragons and petunias, and we sat under the palm trees to suck the nectar. Out on the rampage raiding people’s gardens. The stuff in the middle of petunias is poisonous. People have died. Father sitting dying in the cane chair in the garden not far from where I found the egg.
I parted the leaves of the violets, thick with darkness and velvet mystery, and pearly in the heart of them was an egg. I was quite used to handling delicate things, and I picked it up with ease, and let it rest in the palm of my hand while I stroked it very gently and whispered. There was no shell, but a soft membrane, dusted with pale pink powder, gently beating like the top of a baby’s skull.
You will come home now, won’t you, Iris my darling, now that Father is dying, and I am all alone, small and alone, my darling Iris, in the dark.
Your affectionate sister, Muriel
Muriel Writes to Iris
Woodpecker Point, November 1986
My dearest Iris,
Crepe paper always reminds me of poppy petals. The red especially. Poppies, all kinds of poppies, but above all the red ones, are Father’s favourite flowers. I have planted dozens of them in the bed along the front fence. He will be able to see them, bright between him and the sea.
Today I tidied out the bottom of Mother’s wardrobe, and there I found the old basket, the one with coloured flowers on the side. I used to love those fat pink hollyhocks, but they are faded now. Anyway, in the basket I found a bundle of crepe-paper party hats we used to make with pointy edges just like crowns. They were scattered with old bits of lavender like the droppings of mysterious mice. And there was a red hat. It was the colour of the birds I used to dream about. Oh no, I used to say, they are not the colour of our blood at all, and they are not the colour of goldfish. No, they are the colour of tree-blood, these tree-blood birds that flick and skim through the veins and arteries of the forests of my night. And crepe paper, as I said, always reminds me of poppy petals.
The red hat that I found in Mother’s basket wasn’t just the texture of a poppy, but the exact same colour as well. It was the hat, I remember, that Brian wore. You remember Brian, don’t you? He came to all our parties in the garden. Every year until we were seven and he was eight, and he hanged himself from the branch behind his father’s shed. We have never talked about this, Iris. But as I go through Mother’s things, so much unsaid comes back to me, and I wish that you were here and we could sit under the palm trees where we used to put the table for the parties. We could talk about the things that we remember. If you do come for Christmas, my darling Iris, we will look at Mother’s things together and compare our memories.
I remember Brian’s face. It was always full of pain. I used to stare at him when I thought he wasn’t looking, and wonder why he screwed his eyes up, why he squinted at the light, and smiled as if he really wanted to cry. He didn’t want that poppy-red crown at all. But Mother said, ‘Oh, do come on, Brian, it will suit you perfectly,’ and her fingers caught a little on the roughness of the paper. He looked more sad than ever then, the red crown slightly crooked on his forehead. He was so blond and used to burn so quickly in the sun.
It was our birthday, Iris. We were seven that year, and there were silk flags on the cake. I loved those little flags, Union Jacks and Australian flags. I must search for them among Mother’s things. They always looked so important standing up between the candles on the cake. It’s a wonder they didn’t ever catch fire. I never really liked Brian at all. But when he just went down the garden and hanged himself from the apple tree with the belt of his father’s pants, I felt a most peculiar rush of love for him, or a great sadness for life, or a terror at the ease with which he had crossed the line between life and death. Without making a sound. That was what his mother told our mother. He did it without making a sound. Noiseless—dying on the branch of the apple tree. I imagined him dangling there with the red crown on his head, the tips of his toes in his grey socks (I hated his socks) just grazing the top of the long grass. It’s still there, you know, the tree. The fruit were never anything special, and now they are very sour little things. They ought to think about cutting it down.
I used to hope that Brian was a ghost who would speak to us, but he never did. And nobody ever talked about him, did they? It was as if he had never existed. He wasn’t a ghost, and he wasn’t even supposed to be a memory. I wondered what his mother did with his train set and his teddy. He had a Noah’s Ark too. In the photo of our seventh birthday party, there he is sitting on the piano stool next to his sister, Jennifer, squinting into the sun, his head on one side, the paper crown all crooked.
Then in the photo of our eighth birthday, Brian isn’t there, and Jennifer is sitting alone on the piano stool as if she didn’t miss him at all. And the hats are all the same, and the flags on the cake are the same. And I seem to think that in the corner of the picture I can see a bit of the apple tree. But that is all there is of Brian.
If you can come home for Christmas, my dear Iris, we shall go through all the photograph albums. There are so many things to remember. And there are also the albums full of pressed flowers and ferns. The petals of the poppies are as thin as dreams; the tulips shine like sinews. I burnt the paper hats. I think it was because the red one brought back to me the sight of Brian squinting at the sun, and I was flooded with an unbearable sadness.
Your loving sister,
Muriel
Jennifer Writes to Muriel
Woodpecker Point East, November 1986
Dear Muriel,
I hope that you remember me from ever so long ago. We used to live next door to you when we were children. I remember you and Iris and Arthur, how we collected shells and starfish, and how we used to play in the hedge. Well, I have just recently come back here to live, and I have been looking up all my old friends. It would be so nice to see you. I heard that your mother had passed on and that you were there looking after your father. I have never forgotten your mother’s big wardrobe and how we used to dress up in her things and put on her shoes and go marching off up the street. And once we all got into terrible trouble for leaving your father’s red blanket out in the rain. There are so many good times to remember. When I have settled in over here, I must come round and see you and we can talk about old times.
With best wishes,
Jennifer Lilley
Auntie Ann Writes to Mother
Hobart, April 1945
My dear Margaret,
I am longing to come and see your dear baby Arthur. In the picture you sent he looks exactly like Iris and Muriel at his age. How are they? I have almost finished the blue dresses I was knitting for them. I did the two-year-old size. So I hope they haven’t grown too much.
The red rug is coming along very well. I have sewn together all the squares I have knitted, and I am very pleased with all the different shades of red that we have found. Could you, do you think, send me ten more skeins, and then I will have enough to finish the whole rug, and you will have it in time for Christmas. You know how slow I am, and I do seem to let other bits and pieces get in the way. Won’t James be surprised! It will be the first thing I have ever knitted for him, since the scarf I did when we were ten and I had just learnt to knit. You should have seen it. It was full of holes and he hid it in the bottom of the wardrobe.
I am doing a bonnet for Arthur. I’ll send same with the dresses for the girls.
Hope you are keeping well, and Arthur is sleeping. With love,
Ann
Muriel Writes to Iris
Woodpecker Point, December 1986
My dearest Iris,
Today I found something that was so wonderful it seemed almost miraculous. You remember the red birds of my dreams. Well, you must also remember I used to speak of a bright-red windmill that turned and turned in a perpetual wind above an endless field of yellow wheat. The sound it made as it turned was what I used to describe as red laughter and it was so deep and soft and menacing and sinister, that laugh. Mother would say it was just a dream, it has no meaning and it is nothing to be afraid of, there is nothing to be afraid of. And then I used to cry and say that there really was a windmill, and that out beyond the field of wheat there was a sea of tulips. Mother would say, ‘There that proves it, the windmill is just something in a dream, there is no such thing as a sea of tulips.’ Well, as I said, today I found something that was wonderful. I found a little fluted dish and in the centre of it was a picture of the red windmill. It was real after all. Of course, I always knew it was real. There in the bottom of Mother’s wardrobe, I found it. It was wrapped in tissue paper, and made from quite fine china, splashed with blurred and iridescent rainbows. I was so happy when I found it, Iris, but there was nobody to tell. Father was sitting in his chair, staring across the water, gazing into his dreams. It seemed to be an impossibility to rush out there with the windmill and explain about the past and the dream and the windmill and the truth. But I did look out to sea, and I saw again the sea of tulips, bobbing in the distant purple breeze.
I was standing right next to Father. We were both looking out past everything, and then the red laugh started. Iris, it was coming from Father. The windmill was turning in our father’s throat, and he was softly gurgling with the deep sinister sound. It was always like a distant noise from inside the earth. Father sat there in his cane chair, Auntie Ann’s red rug across his knees, and I knew that the windmill was real, and Father was real, and the laughter of the windmill bubbled round and round in Father’s throat. The miracle of finding the windmill had become once more the terror of the laugh. And now I have the windmill, and I have Father laughing, and I wish all over again that we could put back the dreams.
It will all be better, Iris, if you can come home for Christmas. Do say you will.
Your loving sister,
Muriel
Muriel Writes to Jennifer
Woodpecker Point, December 1986
Dear Jennifer,
I was so pleased to hear from you after all these years. You may have heard, since you wrote to me, of the death of my father. It was a peaceful end.
It is rather strange and touching that you should have mentioned the red rug. Father’s sister, Ann, knitted it for him years ago when Arthur was a baby, and in the last months of his life Father could not be parted from it. He was always so close to Auntie Ann, and she died so mysteriously and tragically. Father used to sit in our front garden and stare out to sea, always with the red rug on his knees. When he died I had the red rug buried with him. I know he would have wanted that, and it seemed the correct thing to do.
So now I am living in the old home all by myself. Iris is still in Portugal and I have so far been unable to get in touch with her. It is sad. She would have wanted so much to see Father again before he died, and now he is gone.
I found some photographs with you in them. You must come round soon and have a look at them and we will have a talk about days gone by.
With love,
Muriel
Muriel Writes to Iris
Woodpecker Point, December 1986
Dear, dearest Iris,
I have tried so hard these last few weeks to get in touch with you, to find you out there somewhere in the world so far away. I have stood on top of the cliff and I have fancied that I saw you on the dark-green rim of the horizon as I wept. For Father has died. I went out in the evening with his cocoa as he sat in his chair in the garden, and he was as still as a toy, our small toy father in his favourite chair where he died.
I needed you to be here, my darling Iris, to help me and to tell me what to do. There was a stranger passing on the street, and I called out to him.
‘Please telephone the doctor for me,’ I called. It seemed to be the right thing. The stranger was only Brigadier MacArthur, and he stayed with me until the doctor came. He was so kind. I missed you so much, Iris. All I could hear was the croaking of the frogs down the well and the slow and terrible roar of the terrible ocean snarling in from far across the world spurting up the blowhole and sucking back our souls.
There was one of those summer storms on the day of Father’s funeral, and all I remember is the sight of so many umbrellas at the cemetery, all black and navy blue, and the organist’s orange hat in the church. We had chrysanthemums. Some of them were pink. Afterwards, when the storm was over, I walked along the beach.
Home is very big now. I walk around it and wonder how we ever filled it. There were over a hundred people here the day Arthur and Caroline got engaged. That was the last time, wasn’t it, that we had people here. The day after that was the day they were lost. Father is gone now, Iris, and now that I have tidied out Mother’s wardrobe, I have decided to sell the bedroom suite. The Brigadier is a dealer in antiques, and he says he can guarantee us a very good price. Do you remember Jennifer Lilley? Well, she brought me a basket of oranges.
Christmas has come and gone, my darling Iris. Do you think that you will get home soon? The poppies are just coming out now.
Your loving sister,
Muriel
Father Writes to Muriel
Part and Parcel Hotel, January 1987
Dear Muriel,
I know how much you like to get a letter, and so I thought I would write as soon as I got here. I am not sure about stamps and so forth, but if I ask the girl at the desk and give her a nice smile, she will post it for me. It was comforting to find a Part and Parcel here. As you know, the old Part and Parcel in Brisbane Street was always a favourite haunt of mine.
Well, imagine my surprise when I got here and found that George Glory had been living here for years. I am sorry to say that he has not aged well, and has become a very boring old fellow, far too fond of the bottle for his own good. I bought him a double brandy for old-time’s sake, but from now on I will be avoiding that corner of the bar. He said he has never been back to see Alice since she lost the baby. I said I thought he ought to go occasionally, or at least drop her a line. But he said that the way she carried on with the gardener was more than he could bear. I said I had never heard of any such thing, and he just gulped his drink and snorted in a most unbecoming fashion. He also said that the cake shops have gone completely to the pack, but I can’t see that at all. Wouldn’t you say that Morning Glory’s in Elizabeth Street was immaculate? I spoke of my preference for Dolly Varden cake, and I fancy he deliberately blew smoke in my face. His manners really have gone downhill.
Speaking of smok
ing reminds me that I would like you to send me some Navy Cut if you would. I can’t seem to get it here. Otherwise I have everything I need. Thank you for packing the red rug. Even though it is getting rather threadbare it is still quite cosy. The poor fellow next to me got the most awful chill.
So far I have been unable to locate your mother and Ann. George said he didn’t think they were here, but I wouldn’t really be prepared to trust his memory these days. Really, Muriel, he is pretty well shot to pieces. I am also trying to get in touch with some of the fellows from the ship. I believe they drink at the Mermaid Tavern, but my taxidriver yesterday refused to go there for fear of getting beaten up. Said it is in a very unsavoury part of town.
I met some people who have recently been in Portugal. I plan to ask them if they have heard anything of Iris. It’s a long shot, but you never know. Won’t learn anything if you don’t ask.
I am writing this letter in the lounge, looking out across a sort of caravan park with the sea in the distance. The golf course is somewhere over to the left, and there are apparently some good walks. Masses of rhododendrons.
Somehow or other I managed to forget my camera and binoculars. I think they must be in the bottom of Mother’s old wardrobe. Would you mind looking them out and sending them to me?
I’d like to put together a set of photographs of this place. As far as I know, it hasn’t been done before, and I was just getting used to my new Nikon.
I am your loving Father.
Iris Writes to Muriel
Portugal, January 1987
Dear Muriel,
Your letters were waiting for me when I came back from The Pyrenees, where I have been on holiday for the past six weeks.
I am so dreadfully sad that Father has gone and I did not see him. It seems he did not suffer, and I know you cared for him with great devotion.
There was something I thought of. As a small memento of Father, I should like to have the red rug Auntie Ann knitted. Do you think you could send it to me as you tidy up? I would be so grateful. It would remind me of Father, and also of Auntie Ann and Mother and Arthur. I was trying to remember, the other day, what Caroline’s surname was. Do you know it? I fancied, when you said MacArthur, that it was that, but I am just not sure.