Voss

by Patrick White

  Then, when he had done, he took pen again, almost immediately, and was writing with what would have appeared to an observer in a public room as an intensity of purpose, combined, if it were not so contradictory, with a strange lack of personal control.

  Voss wrote recklessly upon the neat sheet of paper:

  Rhine Towers,

  Oct., 1845

  Dear Miss Trevelyan,

  It will be surprising for you at this stage to receive such a letter from me, but my recollections of you, together with the peaceful beauty of this country where we have even passed several days of idyllic unemployment in the hands of the most considerate of hosts, have compelled me to put pen to paper, and unite by conscious thought and sentiment all that would appear to have been present by fragments in my mind. For, it would seem that, beneath the cares of responsible preparation for this great expedition, and the many agreeable incidents of the journey thus far, I have ever been aware of your friendliness, and sincere interest in our welfare, as well as the great value I myself place upon our connexion, however slight this may present itself at first, and subordinate in the plan of life that fate has prepared for each of us.

  I would hesitate to express my feelings in such personal terms, if I were not aware already of your moral strength and discernment, and that you have happily grasped certain grounds of my character. The gifts of destiny cannot be returned. That which I am intended to fulfil must be fulfilled. Consequently, I am aware that a companion must stumble almost daily over the savage rocks of circumstance, but that a companion of strength and judgement, such as I have already perceived to exist, would be forearmed against destruction.

  Materially, I have nothing to offer. I am convinced, however, that my mission will be accomplished; this I would pledge against any quantity of gold or bonds. Dear Miss Trevelyan, do not pray for me, but I would ask you to join me in thought, and exercise of will, daily, hourly, until I may return to you, the victor.

  In the meantime, also, I would ask your allowance that I may write to your Uncle, Mr Bonner, with necessary formality, for your hand.

  So, I have little more to say at this late hour, and tomorrow start by lanternlight. At Jildra, the property of Mr Boyle on the Darling Downs, I can receive your answer, if you are so agreeable. Weigh carefully every possible consideration, but do not overweigh, for Jildra is my last chance!

  From Jildra also I hope to write you interesting details of flora and fauna encountered, and to include some account of our behaviour on the march. I will give this now to Mr Sanderson, whose men descend periodically by wagon to Newcastle, and hope that from there it will be dispatched with all possible speed and safety into your kind hands.

  Yours most respectfully,

  JOHANN ULRICH VOSS

  Next morning, while the lamps of friendship hovered touchingly in the dew and darkness, and naked voices offered parting advice, the company began to move northward, with the intention of crossing New England. It was a good season, and the land continued remarkably green, or greyish-green, or blue-grey, the blue of smoke or distance. These were sparkling, jingling days, in which sleek horses, blundering cattle, even the sour-heeled mules had no immediate cause for regret. Men shouted to their mates, their voices whipping the blue air, or else were silent, smiling to themselves, dozing in their well-greased saddles under the yellow sun, as they rubbed forward in a body, over open country, or in Indian file, through the bush. At this stage they were still in love with one another. It could not have been otherwise in that radiance of light. The very stirrup-irons were singing of personal hopes.

  As the party advanced, settlers came down to show it kindnesses, or to hang about, if too shy, with every sign of respectful curiosity. The especial object of all these individuals was to catch a glimpse of the foreigner, with whom, of course, even the boldest did not presume to communicate on account of the peculiarities of his speech. However careful he was to imitate their own, the settlers preferred to address a member of his party; the honour of his presence was enough. The foreigner himself remained indifferent. Seated on his horse and intent on inner matters, he would stare imperiously over the heads of men, possessing the whole country with his eyes. In those eyes the hills and valleys lay still, but expectant, or responded in ripples of leaf and grass, dutifully, to their bridegroom the sun, till all vision overflowed with the liquid gold of complete union.

  The demands Voss made on his freshly-formed relationship were frequent and consuming, but, although exhausted by an excess of sensuousness, it was a period of great happiness to him and, in consequence, of unexplained happiness to everyone else.

  7

  THE source of irritation had been removed from Mr Bonner with departure of the expedition. Now he could enjoy its purpose, now that it was becoming history, hence impersonal. To such as Mr Bonner, the life we live is not a part of history; life is too personal, and history is not. So the merchant returned to those personal pleasures, of house and family, business and equipage, and quite considerable bank account. If customers or friends ever alluded to that other matter of exploration for which Mr Bonner had, in fact, been personally responsible, he would smile what was an ethereal smile, for one so hearty, and materialist, and self-willed, and proceed to hold forth, between the chinking of the money in his pocket, on the historical consequences of such an expedition. But thanks be, it no longer directly concerned him. The Crusades were not more remote. No doubt he would have subscribed to a Crusade, just as he would continue, if called upon, to support the expedition, but in hard cash, and not in sufferings of spirit. While approving of any attempt to save the souls of other men, he did appreciate the comfort of his own.

  The comforts, both material and spiritual, so conveniently confused in comfortable minds, inspired the merchant’s residence. Of solid stone, this had stood unshaken hitherto. As a house it was not so much magnificent as eminently suitable, and sometimes, by pure chance, even appeared imaginative, in spite of the plethora of formal, shiny shrubs, the laurels, for instance, and the camellias that Uncle had planted in the beginning. The science of horticulture had failed to exorcise the spirit of the place. The wands and fronds of native things intruded still, paperbarks and various gums, of mysterious hot scents, and attentive silences: shadowy trees that, paradoxically, enticed the eyes away from an excess of substance. Moreover, the accents of poetry were constantly creeping in through the throats of doves, and sometimes young ladies might be seen, sampling strawberries from the netted beds, or engaged in needlework in a little latticed summer-house, or playing croquet with the military, but later, in the afternoon, when the hoops made long shadows on the crisp grass.

  The Bonners’ garden was a natural setting for young ladies, observers were aware, particularly for the niece, who was of a more solitary nature, and given to dabbling in flowers – in a ladylike manner, of course – when the climate permitted. In the mornings and the evenings she would be seen to cut the spring roses, and lay them in the long, open-ended basket, which the maid would be carrying for that purpose. The maid was almost always at her heels. People said that Miss Trevelyan demanded many little, often unreasonable, services, which was only to be expected of such an imperious young person, and a snob.

  She was quite unlike Miss Belle. On those suffocating days when the change would not come, and the feet crushed a scent out of the fallen camphor leaves, Miss Belle would be crying out loud, and fanning herself, and pushing back her hair to be rid of its weight, but would not escape, it was seen by people passing the other side of the wall; Miss Belle remained dripping gold. Or in the grey gales of afternoon, when at last they came, the great round gusts that smote the camphor trees, Miss Belle would catch up her skirt, and run at the wind, and drink it, and feel it inside her dress, and shout, even, until her mother or cousin would hush her. Yes, Miss Belle was the lively one.

  So the life of the garden merged with the thoughts of the passers-by. The flickery muslins and the brooding leaves obsessed the more speculative. Indistin
ct voices would follow them to distant quarters of the town, almost always the voices of ladies, devoted to those pursuits to which ladies do devote themselves, because they must pass the time.

  ‘Oh dear, I would write a letter,’ Belle might say, ‘if I had not written to everyone.’

  She had, too, but she did receive in return many informative letters from other girls.

  ‘I would not know to whom I might write,’ Laura replied on such an occasion.

  They were sitting in the latticed summer-house, from which the wistaria from China hung its buzzing, drunken heads.

  ‘But there is everyone,’ Belle replied. ‘There is Chattie Wilson, and Lucy Cox, and Nelly McMorran. And everyone.’

  ‘Or that I would find a subject of sufficient interest.’

  ‘That is not necessary,’ said Belle. ‘One simply writes.’

  Time was heavy, although, in the afternoon, Tom would come.

  ‘Papa is surprised he has had no word from the expedition,’ Belle rattled, to save herself. ‘He would not expect, of course, civility from Mr Voss, but he did fancy Mr Sanderson might keep him informed, on that stage of the journey at least.’

  ‘It is early yet,’ suggested Laura, who was sketching the garden from an angle that had only recently occurred to her.

  ‘Or Mr Palfreyman,’ said Belle. ‘Mr Palfreyman could, and ought to, write.’

  She did not look at her cousin.

  Laura frowned at the garden.

  ‘It is not his duty. He is not the leader of the expedition.’

  ‘Dear Lolly,’ sighed Belle, taking her cousin’s hand as if it had been a cat to cuddle.

  ‘You are absurd, Belle,’ laughed Laura, to whom perspective was a problem.

  ‘But you found Mr Palfreyman agreeable. You admitted it yourself. The day the ship sailed.’ For Belle Bonner, her cousin was a fascinating mystery, whether sketching from the summer-house or taking her leave of suspected admirers. ‘Such an amiable man, Mamma considers.’

  ‘Most amiable,’ Laura agreed.

  ‘Even Tom feels – because I have asked him – that Mr Palfreyman is so good. Of delicate constitution, perhaps. Still, delicacy of health can make a man considerate of others.’

  Laura was entertained.

  ‘Is that also Tom’s opinion?’

  ‘No. Mamma’s.’ Belle blushed.

  ‘Then, poor Mr Palfreyman has been discussed.’

  ‘Dear Laura, I could be so happy.’ Belle caressed her cousin’s hand.

  It was exasperating. She would have forced those she loved to eat of sweets she had not yet tasted.

  But Laura laughed. She withdrew her hand, and took the pencil to her sketch, and ploughed it with one long, dark line, almost through the paper.

  ‘You have spoilt your sketch!’ cried Belle.

  ‘Yes,’ said Laura. ‘It was an insipid thing.’

  She crumpled it up, and dared her dear Belle.

  At that season, Laura’s glistening, green laughter was threaded through the days. These were warm, though not yet oppressive, full of the clovey scent of pinks, with harsh whiffs of torn gum-leaves, dissipated by the wind, and married with perfume of roses, in passionate gusts. Heady days. Green was garlanding the windows, the posts of balconies, the knobs of gateways, in celebration.

  In celebration of what, others did not know, except that there was something. They were looking at Laura for some sign, as she moved in the garden, in a crush of cool flowers, or appeared suddenly in doorways, in the sound of her skirts, or under trellises, trailing a dappled shadow, or at windows, that she threw open suddenly, her arms flying upward after the sash, to stay suspended there a second, the greenish flesh of those stalks glimmering against vines. All these acts were joyful, without revealing. Her mouth did not so much smile, as wonder.

  For Laura herself had not yet grasped the full sense of that season, only that it was fuller than ever before, and that the flesh of roses was becoming personal, as she cut the long, pointed buds, or heavy blooms that would fall by evening. She had to take all, even the big, blowing ones.

  ‘Those will make a mess, miss,’ Rose Portion did protest once.

  She was holding the basket.

  ‘Yes,’ said Laura. ‘I am aware of that.’

  ‘Tt-tt-tt!’ sighed the brown woman. ‘All over the tables and carpets. A mess of rose petals.’

  But the girl was dazed by roses. She continued to cut the big heads, in which bees were rummaging. She bent to reach others, till roselight was flooding her face, and she was forced to lower the lids of her eyes against the glare of roses. Then she became caught. It was one of the older, the more involved, the staggier bushes, of sinewy black wood. She was held. Neither one way nor the other was it possible to move, however she shook the tough bush. She began to laugh, mirthlessly, out of exasperation for her powerlessness, and call:

  ‘Help me, Rose! Where are you? Do something!’

  The woman set down the basket then, and freed her mistress easily.

  The girl was laughing, though blushing, because she was really rather annoyed.

  ‘Can you see whether I am torn?’ she asked.

  ‘Not that I can notice,’ Rose replied, ‘but I expect.’

  Controlling her wind, the woman picked up the basket. This business of flowers was not her work, but it pleased her to do it, and since she had grown heavy, the people of the house humoured her.

  Although Mrs Bonner, who had just come out upon the balcony, stood frowning down. At the back of her mind, there was always Rose.

  Once Mrs Bonner had gone to her niece at an awkward and unexpected moment, as the latter was practising a new piece, and sat beside her, and said, there and then:

  ‘We must really think, Laura, what is to be done about Rose. I understand there is a Mrs Lauderdale, who has founded some institution to provide for women in that condition, during, or perhaps it is for afterwards, the unfortunate children, I do not know, but must consult Mrs Pringle, and think.’

  Then Aunt Emmy looked right up into her niece’s face, as if she had been a tree with something hiding in it, and not a young woman engaged upon an arpeggio.

  ‘Yes, Aunt. Of course,’ said Laura, who suffered all the difficulties of music.

  Laura is selfish, Mrs Bonner sighed.

  ‘Nobody will help me,’ she murmured.

  So she went away.

  Now Laura could see her aunt upon the balcony, threading the ribbon through a clean cap, but looking, instead, at Rose.

  Rose looked, and saw, and understood – there was very little she did not – and said:

  ‘There is Mrs Bonner. She could be wanting something of me.’

  ‘I do not think so,’ said Laura firmly.

  Laura Trevelyan had given much consideration to the question of Rose Portion, but the answer to it was withheld. She did not fret like her aunt, although it concerned her personally, she sensed, even more personally. For personal reasons, therefore, she would continue to give the matter thought, although her faith in reason was already less. She would prepare her mind, shall we say, to receive revelations. This preoccupation, which was also quasi-physical, persisted at all times, though most in the overflowing garden, of big, intemperate roses, with the pregnant woman at her side. At such times, the two shadows were joined upon the ground. Heavy with the weight of golden sun, the girl could feel the woman’s pulse ticking in her own body, and was, in consequence, calmer than she had ever been, quietly joyful, and resigned. As she strolled towards the house, holding her parasol against the glare, though devoured by the tigerish sun, she trusted in their common flesh. The body, she was finally convinced, must sense the only true solution.

  Mrs Bonner, on the balcony, sensing her own limitations, tweaked the ribbon through the starched cap, and went inside.

  ‘They have not yet heard from that German,’ said Rose Portion, whose habit it was to state facts, rather than commit a possible indiscretion by asking.

  ‘Not yet,’ Laura T
revelyan replied.

  She had bared her teeth, it seemed, somewhat convulsively – it could have been the violent glare – and the tips of her teeth were quite transparent.

  ‘Not yet,’ she said, and mumbled: ‘But perhaps we shall hear, perhaps this evening.’

  Although it was spoken more slowly than she had intended, in her mind it sprang like a shiver. Her mouth was dry.

  ‘Ah, I cannot understand that man,’ said Rose.

  ‘How?’ asked Laura. ‘Not understand?’

  ‘It is his speech, I suppose. Though half the time I think he does not understand himself, even in his own language.’

  Laura did not answer, but was listening to breath, footsteps, pauses, and pauses were the loudest.

  ‘No more can I understand his eyes,’ breathed Rose. ‘You should understand a man by his eyes, if by no other avenue.’

  Then she cleared her throat, because she had said too much.

  They were entering the house by way of the conservatory, in which little ferns rang with bells of moisture, and the teeth of the palm were sawing at the spider’s silk. Here the heat was so intense that the women’s breath was taken from them. Their faces were barely swimming forward between the walls of watery glass. Their features clove painfully the green gloom on which hairy branches swayed.

  ‘I can understand him,’ said Laura, ‘if not with my reason.’

  She was drugged.

  ‘Even when I cannot agree with him, I can understand him.’

  The other woman drew her breath with difficulty.

  As they passed into the house, the girl put her hands to her temples in an ecstasy of coolness. When she could not understand, she would pray for him, though of recent nights happiness had made her dumb, and prayer grows, rather, out of wretchedness.