Disquiet

by Julia Leigh

  ‘Oh – good morning.’ Marcus was surprised to find the boy deep in concentration, tying knots in a rope.

  ‘Hi,’ said the boy, feigning disruption. There was a long pause in which neither wanted to risk giving themselves away and then the boy said quietly, ‘I’m sorry about the baby.’

  ‘Thank you.’ His smile was almost apologetic. Something like sorrow passed between them and in that moment they were mountain and lake, ancient. ‘Well,’ said Marcus, finally summoning a jolly note. ‘What have you got there?’

  The boy showed him the little reef-knot.

  ‘Not bad. And what about this pair of beauties?’ said Marcus, nodding to the canoes. ‘What do you say – shall we go out later on the water?’

  ‘Okay.’

  ‘Okay, okay, it’s a deal then,’ he said, rolling back his sleeves. ‘Come on, let’s carry this one out, you and me.’ He squatted down on his heels and rubbed his palms together. ‘You ready?’

  Together they carried the fallen canoe lakeside, laid it to rest. A scurf on the sand showed that the lake had its own currents, was never entirely still.

  ‘Phase one,’ said Marcus. ‘Mission accomplished.’ He smiled.

  ‘Is that your phone?’ said the boy, pointing to the pocket.

  ‘Yes, it’s a phone. No, it’s a car. A phone.’

  ‘Can I please borrow it?’

  Marcus thought a while before answering. ‘To call Australia?’ He paused. ‘It doesn’t work. No international service. My wife banned me because of the high bills. Too bad for us, hey.’ He softly cuffed the boy on the jaw. ‘Come on, let’s go. Breakfast.’

  It was unwelcome news, a rumour received by a soldier.

  In the breakfast salon a vine had been allowed to creep up the wall and along the cornice. Plants spilled from ceramic pots on wooden tripods, from hanging cane baskets. A round table covered in a blue-and-white embroidered cloth had been set with breakfast things: a silver pot of coffee, the pot standing on skinny bird legs, clawed bird feet; croissants; jams; a pat of butter; a bowl of hard-boiled eggs. Some toast. Apples and oranges. Some milk, some sugar, the morning’s plenitude. Laid everywhere: windowfuls of light. The girl sat at the table, and Pinky was there too, atop a pile of cushions in her own chair. The woman was slowly flipping the pages of a newspaper, just looking at each page as if it were a shopping catalogue or junk mail. Then she closed her eyes and ran her left hand over the type, as though seeking a hidden form of braille. At the sound of footsteps she stopped this experiment. The boys came in.

  ‘Morning all,’ said Marcus.

  ‘Good morning,’ chimed the woman and the girl in unison.

  Marcus and the boy took up their seats and helped themselves to provisions. The woman shunted the newspaper across the table and Marcus briefly scanned the front page which was dominated by a gory photograph, the aftermath of a market explosion. He put it aside.

  The girl held up her Bunnykins mug and said to her mother, ‘This milk tastes like your arse.’

  The woman blinked once or twice and replied, ‘You don’t know what my arse tastes like.’

  ‘Yes, I do,’ said the girl. ‘I’ve smelt it.’

  The woman sighed.

  ‘You’re disgusting,’ said the boy. He took aim and pegged some apple across the table.

  ‘Am not.’

  ‘Are so.’

  ‘Am not.’

  ‘Are so.’

  Marcus brought an end to this tiff by asking a general question. ‘Has anyone seen Sophie?’

  ‘Not yet,’ said the woman.

  ‘Well,’ the girl spoke in the tone of a seasoned gossip, ‘Ida says… Ida says the dead baby is having a bath.’ So there. She smirked triumphantly at the boy.

  Marcus stood up and said in a low voice, ‘May I be excused.’

  The woman watched as the girl began to paint her lips with jam. When she raised her dirty hands like lion paws and made a roaring face the woman did not react. The girl didn’t seem to care and returned to making a mess with her food. Suddenly she looked up and made the roaring face again, trying to catch her mother off-guard. It made no impression. The girl just shrugged and happily busied herself with her doll.

  Later that morning they were all assembled in the summer pavilion, a small stone pavilion supported by nine Corinthian pillars and set on a low rise which gave upon the lotus pond. They were sitting quietly in a circle, on cane chairs that the twins had earlier lugged over from the house. Grandmother was there, in her wheelchair, with Ida standing sentinel behind her. One chair was empty – they were waiting for Sophie. A bird, a swallow, flew through and settled under an eave. The girl started banging her ankles against her chair; the boy rubbed his eyebrows up and over his browbone. Marcus kept checking his watch. A paroxysm: he dug into his pocket as if an insect had bitten him. He removed his mobile phone and made sure to switch it off. Grandmother toyed with the pearls at her throat, then with the golden buttons of her navy jacket; Ida laid a soothing hand on her shoulder. A cool breeze rose and fell and the swallow slid away. The woman watched a beetle cross the floor with brute persistence. Marcus gripped both curved armrests of his chair and made as if to stand – but he thought better of it and sat back down. At last the girl, who had a view in the direction of the house, whispered, ‘She’s coming.’ They all turned to watch as Sophie slowly made her way across the lawn. She was wearing a pale pink dress, silk that fell soft against the skin, and had pinned a flower behind her ear. Lopsided, she carried a white wickerwork bassinet in her hand. She had not removed the hospital ID bracelet.

  ‘Sorry we’re late. Thank you for waiting,’ said Sophie, bright with bravado. She settled beside her husband and lowered the bassinet to the ground. Sat there. So. Marcus reached over and lightly touched her thigh, lifted out the bundle.

  ‘Yes, thank you for being with us at this special time,’ he said. He brought the bundle under his nose, inhaled deeply. ‘This is our girl. Alice. She is loved. We will never forget her.’

  His eyes glistened and he passed the bundle, the offering, to Grandmother. She clasped it to her chest, rocked back and forth. ‘Dear Alice, dear sweet girl, granddaughter. My angel. Angel girl.’

  The boy was sitting alongside Grandmother and as she made to pass him the bundle he turned to the woman for reprieve. Her eyes darkened, inclement. He held the bundle awkwardly, as if it were heavy or sharp, and said – looking to the ground – ‘Dear Alice. Hello. I’m sorry I didn’t get to know you and —’

  The girl cried out, ‘Pass the parcel! Pass the parcel! Pass —’

  The woman gave her a hard slap on the face. There was quiet.

  The boy passed the bundle to his mother. Her cast made it difficult and they nearly fumbled the exchange.

  ‘Hello Alice,’ said the woman, peeking under the blanket. ‘Black-haired,’ she thumbed the eyelids open and closed, ‘very beautiful blue-eyed girl.’ She looked up to the group and waited for assistance. Marcus came over to relieve her and he knelt before the girl, next in their circle. ‘This is Alice. Alice, this is Lucy.’

  One look, the horror glimpse, and – unbidden – the girl’s face contorted into a fearful cry. She plunged herself into her mother’s lap, squeezed her tight. And the boy held his breath and eventually the woman placed a hand between the girl’s shoulderblades, let it rest.

  Marcus stood up and gently returned the bundle to Sophie, saying, ‘Our child.’ She took it back, she took the child from him, from them, and she wiped her cheeks and found them wet and that she had been crying.

  ‘Never. Never in my day. Never. Holy Mother. Never.’

  Ida was at the kitchen bench, muttering as she chopped the leafy greens, chopped with a fury. She shook her head and like some sort of motor this made her chop even faster. ‘Never in my day. Never.’ The twins were working alongside her, trying to be invisible. Ida paused and then slammed down her knife. She went to the back door and opened it, stealing it away from a delivery-man who was clutching a hug
e arrangement of flowers. He withdrew his knocking fist in surprise. The flowers, mostly bright orange and purple birds-of-paradise, were garish and Ida accepted them without comment. One of the twins said, ‘How pretty,’ and Ida silenced her with a glare. She carried the flowers through the house to the entrance hall and set them on the white marble-topped side-table. She stood back to study the placement and saw that the table had become a tomb. No matter which angle she turned the arrangement, or where on the table she placed it, the flowers were funereal and ugly. Muttering, she gathered them up and headed, without pause, to Sophie’s room. No-one was there. She deposited the flowers on a chest of drawers. Outside she spied Marcus and Sophie on a chequered picnic blanket, reclining on the lawn. She wiped her hands on her apron, walked away.

  On the lawn: Marcus had a sheet of paper and as he nuzzled the phone to his ear he ticked a series of names off a list. Sophie was lying beside him, the bundle resting in the soft nook of her chest. Marcus made polite listening sounds – mmm, yes, thank you. Later he said, ‘Very good, we’ll see you tomorrow, the service begins at eleven. Yes, thank you. Most appreciated. Goodbye.’

  He switched off the phone and secured it in his breast pocket. To Sophie he said, ‘That’s done.’ They studied each other as though the next thing to say or do might be hinted, revealed. He stood up. This seemed to displease her and she reached out to grab onto the cuff of his trousers, would not let go. At last he relented and sat back down. Sophie held up the bundle and offered, ‘See, she has your chin.’

  ‘She does,’ he agreed.

  With a nod Sophie claimed this as a small victory.

  After lunch Grandmother asked the woman to take her for a stroll. They went in the wheelchair to the Japanese garden, an enclave of reddish maples and azaleas all shades of pink, of knotweed and crêpe myrtle and magnolia, a colourful relief, the flower of the greater gardens. The criss-crossed rapiers of the cherry blossoms had not yet readied to bud. Grandmother remarked on a stand of bamboo, due to be thinned. They crossed an ornamental wooden bridge, arched over an ornamental pond, the woman pushing the chair so that there was no eye contact between them. On the far side of the bridge a stick caught in the wheel of the chair and held fast, jammed. The woman jolted the chair in an effort to dislodge the stick. She shook the chair, she shoved and jerked it to and fro – untold left-hand strength. Grandmother gripped the sides of the chair as if she were on a rollercoaster. Again the woman jerked the chair. She jerked it and shoved it and tipped it back so that the front wheels looked to be springing into the sky. After a while Grandmother, who had borne this without complaint, flailed one arm upward in order to rein in her daughter. ‘Just a minute,’ she said, breathless. The woman stopped immediately. Grandmother slowly levered herself out of the chair and stepped aside. The woman crouched down and examined the wheel. She tugged at the stick, mangled in the spokes, tugged and tugged until she succeeded in pulling it free. Grandmother sat back down and they resumed their stroll.

  The woman, staring ahead, said, ‘Mother, there is something I must say, that I need to ask you. I don’t expect, I can’t expect your forgiveness, I don’t need your forgiveness – it means nothing to me – but I ask that even if I am not remembered in your will that the children are, your grandchildren. Promise me you will look after them.’

  Grandmother, also staring ahead, replied, ‘They are already remembered. Your brother told me. I have always known.’

  This came as news to the woman. Her left hand held the chair steady and they spoke no more.

  In the late afternoon the children were playing in the boathouse. The boy was stashing provisions where he could, secreting away little clingwrapped parcels of food, slipping two plastic bottles of water beneath a crush of canvas. The girl, meanwhile, was plaiting and replaiting her doll’s hair.

  ‘Ummaaah….’ said the girl, drawing out the word with tattle-tale inflection. ‘Ida can see.’

  The boy carried on. ‘Sometimes you’re dumb,’ he noted.

  ‘Am not,’ she said, though quietly, a disinterested defence.

  They entertained themselves; they overlooked the hours. She plucked off the doll’s head and pushed it down into the plastic funnel of neck so that the doll faced backwards. In a similar fashion she began to reverse the limbs. She had succeeded in disarticulating the right leg when the boy came over and punched her on the arm. ‘Come on,’ he said. ‘Come on.’

  They went outside – nightfalling – he led her by the hand. In the distance the mountainside was peppered with points of light. They listened to the lap and lull of the lake. The upturned canoe lay just as he had left it; he flipped it over. He hopped inside and took up a position, ramrod straight like a ship’s captain, and then gestured impatiently for the girl to step aboard. ‘Go on, get in.’ She did this graciously and they sat there for a long time, looking across the darkening water, this vast uncharted ocean, this high sea, this Loch Ness, until the boy, in the sudden way children end their games – without warning – jumped up and over the side. He helped his sister disembark and together they retreated through the garden.

  The next morning the house was abuzz in preparation for the funeral.

  Upstairs in the children’s room the woman was doing her best to fix a thin slip of black satin ribbon in the girl’s hair. The girl, clad in her pyjamas, waited patiently, even happily, as the woman tried to fashion a bow.

  ‘Two rabbit ears,’ instructed the girl. ‘Wrapped on top of each other.’ Each determined attempt was a failure but the woman persisted with no show of exasperation – if anything she seemed fascinated by the ingenuity of the knot, by the hair so soft, by this act of decoration. The boy watched his mother’s left-handed endeavours and only when she had tried something like ten times did he step forward and say quietly, ‘I’ll do it.’ He tied the bow deftly. The girl spun around and grinned.

  ‘Very pretty,’ said the woman in approval. ‘Very pretty mississippi.’

  The girl blushed and scuffed her toes against the floor in shy delight.

  ‘I have a surprise,’ said the woman. ‘Come with me.’ The boy stiffened.

  From her suitcase she pulled a black velvet dress with a white peter-pan collar. And for the boy – a black velvet suit and a blue-and-white chequered shirt. Cuffs and all. She helped the girl into the dress. But the boy was displeased: the sleeves of his jacket fell well short of his wrist, ridiculous.

  The woman sat on the bed and handed a black silk scarf to the boy. He folded it in half, into a triangle. She held out her cast and he slipped it into the sling. She lowered her head so that he could secure the two silken ends. There was a kiss-curl at the snowy nape of her neck and with great care he stuck the tip of his little finger inside it. His mother was beautiful. ‘Come on,’ she said. He hurriedly fastened the sling and shuffled a few steps back. She rose to her full height and straightened her black fitted dress. ‘Are we ready,’ she said. ‘Let’s go then.’

  The children refused to leave.

  ‘How fast can you run?’ said the woman, adopting a martial tone and pointing her finger at the boy.

  ‘As fast as a leopard.’ Glum.

  ‘And how fast are you going to run?’

  ‘As fast as a leopard.’

  ‘So – do it then.’

  Downstairs, the drawing room that had once played host to soldiers at the end of the war was spruce and clean. The furniture, now liberated from dirty white dropcloths, had been aired and shined and polished. There was a collection of ancient instruments hung on one wall and high above the ceiling was decorated with faded seascapes of places unknown. At the end of the room a long table had been laid with a row of gleaming silver domes. Ida moved down the buffet, lifting each dome, inhaling, carrying out a final inspection of the labours of the dawn. The twins walked two paces behind her, bunching their hands in their aprons. In skipped the girl – ‘Good morning, good morning’ – over to Ida, grabbing her by the waist and then pulling away, holding out the hem of her black v
elvet dress like a sail. Ida and the twins instantly made a great fuss over the girl and allowed her – only if she promised not to touch – to join in the inspection. Ta-da! Under the dome: a gelatinous pink mousse in the shape of a salmon. The boy sought refuge near the tall windows. The first of the chauffeured cars were drawing toward the château, as if the machines themselves knew the slow pace of mourning.

  Marcus, in a sombre fine-wool suit, a tie, and clean-shaven, stood by the doorway, ready to greet the arrivals. They emerged from their cars, ancient men and women; the women were all in hats and some wore veils of black lace, black lace or rotten leaves. These were the blood relatives, the revolution refuseniks, death’s attendants. They proceeded one by one up the stairs and when they crossed the threshold each nodded or blinked to Marcus by way of condolence. Marcus, in turn, nodded and said, ‘Thank you,’ said, ‘Please, this way,’ said, ‘Good morning.’ An elderly man in a three-piece suit stopped to pat Marcus on the shoulder. With his ancient gummy mouth he tried to find an ancient word but the struggle was too much for him and he gaped and gaped until his wife tugged at his coat and led him away. Another man bowed deeply. A woman, shrunken to the size of a small child, crushed Marcus’s hand. The guests drained through the long corridors and out of the house. For the occasion a path had been marked out with white-painted stones, leading across the lawn and turning up a small hill.