‘We discussed his wife.’
‘His wife?’
‘Yes, sir. I told him that she probably didn’t love him, and that he was most likely right to starve himself.’
‘You didn’t, did you?’
‘Yes, sir.’
The doctor smiled. ‘Erich, sometimes I really do think that you would make a better doctor than me.’
‘Thank you, Doctor.’
‘Only some of the time, though. So don’t go getting ideas. Now, how about going up to the mess and seeing about getting some tea?’
‘Yes, Doctor.’
Eight
Vinnie
As the protective envelope of forest closed around him again, Vinnie began to shiver. The phone call had frightened him. He was back in the months of pain he was trying to put behind him.
Waking in the hospital had been the worst moment. The impersonal click and quiet beep of the machines had been the first sensations to worm their way into his consciousness. Then the light, the subdued glow of a night lamp, and the harsher glare of the fluorescent-lit passageway outside, all muted by thin, blue privacy curtains. Finally the grunting snore of his father, slumped in a nursing chair at the foot of the bed. Sleeping and waiting.
Then the pain. Rolling across him in waves somehow both distant and immediate. Awareness of sheets held aloft by frames, of raw skin constricted by thick, tight pressure, of fuzziness, of one eye and half his head swathed in slimy bandages, of not being able to think through the fog, to see, to breathe . . .
Sleep again. Then daylight, oozing in through a narrow, wall-length window. Through it, the distant clock tower of the university was framed against an overcast sky. And his mother by the bedside, reading a magazine with the distracted air of someone looking at words and pictures on a page but not seeing anything. He’d studied her, then, for a couple of moments, confused and disoriented, but at the same time, for the last time, secure.
Finally, speaking, his voice croaky after a week unconscious. Tears. Nurses. Doctors. Dad. Noise and bustle. Temperatures and readings. Injections and pills. And then the moment when the world fell apart . . .
‘What happened? Where’s Katia?’
Now, though, crunching along the track, shadowed again by the black cockatoos, memories of that other world grew slowly remote, and Vinnie could feel his perspective changing with every step. Of course they weren’t missing him. That was impossible. The house, his home, had been dead from the moment Katia drove the car off the road. His presence served only to remind his parents of what they had lost.
He knew he’d have to go back eventually, of course, but when he did it would be on his terms, not theirs. Just as he’d left. And it wouldn’t be Vinnie who returned. Not old Vinnie, anyway. It would be . . . someone else.
The afternoon grew warmer; his t-shirt became damp against his skin, especially where the straps from his pack rubbed. He stopped by the edge of the path and removed it, stuffing it into an outside pocket, liberated by the sensation of warm air on his exposed body. A couple of flies buzzed at him as he re-shouldered the pack, one landing on a wrinkle of grafted skin that ran horizontal across his chest. Vinnie flicked at it, stirring it into a gentle frenzy. He knew that his body was becoming healthy and fit below the patterned discoloration of scars and grafts. As he walked, he toyed with the idea that his markings were a camouflage, allowing him to blend like a lizard or a snake into the surrounding bush, helping him to hide from the world, from the predators.
It was a false hope, of course. The marks set him apart, made him different, and would never be anything but scars of isolation. Who would accept or care for someone damaged like he was? He’d heard the men outside the shop, had seen the look in the woman’s eyes at the refrigerator.
Swinging through the early afternoon, though, with the faint-est stirrings of a breeze cooling him and his load bumping gently at his back, Vinnie allowed himself to drift away into a reverie of better times lost.
The clearing stood still and silent, much as on the afternoon he’d first arrived. As usual, the world seemed to hesitate for a couple of seconds when he entered the scarred landscape and began to pick his way down the terraces. In the gentle warmth, with his sweat cooling on his naked chest as he walked, Vinnie meandered towards his camp.
Drawing near to the silent campervan with its attendant dome tent, Vinnie pondered for a moment the whereabouts of its occupants. He’d seen not a sign of them that morning, and the camp still seemed deserted now. The memory of the girl – Helen – sitting with him by the fire stirred something in him, and veering his course slightly carried him closer to her camp site.
As he drew parallel to the tent his calm was paralysingly shattered as the zippered opening drew itself upwards, and Helen emerged, blinking, into the afternoon light, not two metres from where he stood, exposed.
For a moment everything seemed far away, as though he was viewing the scene through a mirror of distance. Filtered, hazy objectivity removed him from the sensation of the girl’s stare, the almost physical itch of her gaze as she examined his ravaged torso, bare of hair, etched with healing scar tissue and tracked with the remains of sutures. For long moments, she allowed her eyes to travel across him as he stood, livid in the sunlight.
‘Vinnie, hi.’
His mind was numb, a fog of naked discomfort and embarrassment.
‘Been into town?’
God! Why didn’t she say something about it? Why wouldn’t she comment?
‘Good walk?’
It was as though she didn’t see him. See what he was. He could feel colour rising in his cheeks and neck.
‘There was a ranger here about half an hour ago, checking up on the place, making sure we’re doing the right thing.’
‘Huh?’
‘He wanted to know about you, and I told him that you were just a bloke camping. Nothing unusual.’
Something in the way she spoke, the way she chose the words, managed to penetrate the haze of embarrassment.
‘Unusual?’
‘Yeah.’ For the first time the girl looked askance, not meeting his eyes. ‘He was pretty interested in whether I’d had a close look at you. If you had any . . . distinguishing features.’
Vinnie lifted a hand to his face, unconsiously.
‘I told him I hadn’t seen you close up, but that you seemed fine to me.’
She was looking directly at him now. Her hair glinted a reddish hue in the sun, her head tilted slightly to one side and a small wrinkle of concern creasing between her eyebrows.
‘I did the right thing, didn’t I, Vinnie? I mean, you’re not on the run from prison or anything like that, are you?’
‘No. I . . .’ Words abandoned him.
‘Didn’t think so. You look like you just need some time away from the world. That’s right, isn’t it?’
‘I gotta go . . .’
He pushed past, stepping off the path to get by her, and his shoulder and upper arm, still moist with sweat, brushed lightly against hers. The echo of contact coursed along his nervous system; his toes and fingers tingled with brief adrenalin. Then he was clear, walking, stumbling, almost running back to his tent, to the safe, tenuous privacy of those flimsy canvas walls.
September 1943
In summer, before the madness of war, his family would picnic in the nearby forest. Father, Mother, Mathilde and himself. Mother would pack food and they’d carry it deep into the woods, sometimes near a lake, and spend the afternoon there.
Erich studied the gnarled, reddish trunks that surrounded the camp. The forest was so different. Here, trees grew twisted and misshapen, prowling through undergrowth so thick and spiny that to venture into it without protective leggings was madness. Plants here would leap at you, snagging your clothes and hair, opening seams already ragged with wear. And the animals – the birds – it was as though t
hey were laughing at you the whole while, screaming from the green shadows, mocking these strangers in all their alien hopelessness. Sitting on the hospital steps and looking out through the fence line, Erich longed for those warm summer afternoons in the forest, for trees that shed their leaves with the onset of cold, for the moist crackle of leaf litter below his feet.
‘How’s the reading?’
Alice emerged from inside and gestured at the book which lay, ignored, on his lap.
‘Fine, thank you.’
She sat on the step beside him.
‘Grandfather says that Günter is getting much better now.’
‘Good.’
‘You should be proud of yourself.’
Erich shrugged. ‘I did what was necessary.’
Laughter echoed across the compound from the guardhouse by the gate. The girl’s constant presence and chatter were irritating. It was as though she didn’t realise the gap between them – that they were enemies.
‘Are you all right?’
‘Excuse me?’
‘You. Are you all right? You’ve hardly spoken to anyone since the night we’ – she hesitated – ‘since the night of Günter’s operation.’
‘I am not the talking to people type.’
The girl stifled a small giggle and Erich threw her a sharp look.
‘I’m sorry. You sound so formal sometimes.’
‘I am sorry my English is not so good.’
‘No, it’s not that at all. You speak beautifully. I just wish you’d relax a little. It would make everyone so much more comfortable.’
‘There is a war on. Comfort is not important.’
She was still smiling. ‘It’s silly, don’t you think?’
‘Silly?’
‘This war. Pretending that you’re still fighting it, right out here in the bush. Don’t you think it’s a waste of energy?’
He stiffened. ‘Not at all.’
‘Well, I think it is.’
Erich stood, careful as he did so to keep his stance military and correct.
‘If you will excuse me, I should see if the doctor requires me.’
The door swung hard into its frame behind him.
Inside, Günter and the doctor were playing some sort of card game that they had managed to work out despite the language barrier. They were silent, yet communicating clearly through the slap of the cards on the table rigged beside the bed.
‘Erich.’ Doctor Alexander looked up from his hand. ‘Join us?’
‘No, thank you, Herr Doctor. I will continue my study in here’ – a disdainful glance back in the direction of the door – ‘where it is a little more silent.’
‘Something is bothering you out there?’
‘No, sir. It is just that I . . . just too noisy.’
Settling by the stove, Erich opened his book and made as if to read.
‘You know, Erich, it would be good for you to talk to Alice sometimes.’
‘Excuse me, Doctor?’
‘She would be a good friend for you here. Especially given the similarity in your ages.’
‘I am afraid that apart from that we have very little in common, sir.’
‘You might be surprised.’
Günter, lying and listening, asked in German, ‘You have found a sweetheart, no?’
Erich stared coldly at the man. ‘No.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because she is the enemy.’
‘Ah, yes, that.’ Günter shook his head in mock sadness.
‘And this from the boy who told me that he knew so much about love.’
‘That was just to make you eat.’
‘Well, it worked, so what you said must have been correct. If a woman can look past something like a missing limb, do you really think a little thing like being her enemy will be a problem?’
‘What is he saying?’ interrupted the doctor.
‘Nothing. He is being stupid.’ Then he added in German, to make sure that Günter understood, ‘Ein dummkopf !’
‘Doctor . . .’ Günter’s English was halting and broken. ‘I tell boy to open his eyes, see past . . .’ He paused, searching for the word.
‘See past?’ Doctor Alexander prompted.
‘To see past war. See real people.’ Erich thought he caught a wink pass between the amputee soldier and the old doctor. Günter was grinning.
‘That’s good advice, Günter.’ The doctor was smiling slightly himself. ‘Very good advice indeed. And he could start with my grand-daughter.’
‘May I be excused, sir. To the latrine.’
‘Of course.’
Alice was still sitting on the step, reading. Erich stormed past without a word.
In the latrine, he considered his anger. Why did they all insist on unsettling him like this? And Günter, who should have been his ally, was the worst – he’d forgotten about national pride, about the future of the greater Germany, everything taught at school and in the Hitlerjugend. What was the point? If his father were here . . .
Erich shook his head, stifling that line of thought before it had a chance to germinate. His father was half the problem. If Erich closed his eyes for a second his father was there before him, as clear as day, his uniform shirt, neatly pressed jacket dripping with decorations and commendations, the iron cross at his throat. How many times had Erich listened to his father speak of their family, and the pride in his voice as he told his son of the bravery of his grandfather, and of his own adventures during the first world war, and of the importance of being loyal to your country, of always being a soldier, even in peacetime.
This was his problem. This was what made him angry. If his father and all that he stood for was right, then why was he, Erich, so easily captured? Why was he in the middle of this ugly foreign forest, waiting for nothing and surrounded by weak men like Stutt and Günter? Worst of all, why was it their words sounded like they made sense?
Nine
Vinnie
The beer, cooled for a couple of hours in a plastic bag in the creek, was bitter and at the same time sweet as it trickled down the back of Vinnie’s throat. Around him the night buzzed and he sat, listening, going over his meeting with Helen outside her tent a few hours ago.
She had startled him, true. He’d thought the tent empty, the camp site deserted, and if he’d known she was there he would have replaced his shirt and covered the scars before setting out across the clearing. But all the same, he hadn’t expected, to feel so . . . so naked.
And he liked her. There was no denying it. She was the first person in a long time to make him feel complete again. She didn’t seem to see the scars, didn’t seem to notice, but he was pretty sure that was an act. Some people are good at that sort of thing. No, it was something else as well, something about the way she spoke to him. There was no bullshit, no pretence. Just conversation. That was the attraction.
He stirred the coals and sipped at his beer. The taste, familiar and yet distant, called up memories of the party, the music, people being thrown in the pool, Katia chatting to some guy in the corner, laughing, drink in hand. Vinnie could tell by the way she was standing, even from across the room, that she wasn’t really interested, just making small talk.
His mate Johnno was trying to get him pissed, kept handing him bourbon and cokes which he didn’t drink, leaving plastic cups half full of the sickly brown liquid on various window ledges around the house, pouring them into pot plants when no one was paying attention. He didn’t feel like getting wrecked, not that night.
And later, when it started raining, everyone had come inside and couples were getting together in dark corners, and he’d watched the bloke who’d been chatting her up earlier lean in to his sister’s ear and whisper. She’d thrown her drink on him and everyone had laughed. Then she’d flounced over to him and Johnno, w
riggling her bum and putting on a show, but still angry, burning inside. If you didn’t know her, you’d never spot it. Katia all over.
‘Let’s go, Vin. We’re out of here.’
‘Ah, come on, Kat, the night’s still young.’
‘Bullshit, Vinnie. I’m going. You can walk home if you want.’
‘Nah.’
And then, in the car, trees and darkness whipping by the slick road, she was driving hard, but in control, like always.
‘Kat?’
‘What?’
‘That bloke, at the party . . .’
‘Asshole.’
‘What did he say?’
‘None of your business.’
Night-car-silence. The hum of the road. Silent swish of tyres on wet asphalt. Rush of slicing through the night. Accelerating into the corners.
‘You okay, Kat?’
She never answered. The cat, black and white and feral and caught in the glaring cone of the headlights, darted from the shoulder onto the black tarmac. Katia jerked the wheel, an instinctive, uncontrolled spasm of movement and then the car was sliding, slowly, so slowly . . .
‘Vinnie?’
Helen stood a few feet away. He hadn’t heard her approach.
He climbed to his feet, awkward and shambling, limbs moving independent of brain.
‘I won’t stay. I just wanted to apologise for this afternoon. I . . .’
‘Nah, listen, I’m the one who should say sorry.’
Firelight sparked reflections in her eyes.
‘You sort of caught me by surprise, that’s all. I didn’t think you were in your tent, so I wasn’t really ready to, well, you know, to bump into you like that. I’m sorry for runnin’ off.’
‘Don’t worry about it. Happens all the time.’
‘Really?’
‘Actually, no.’ She laughed softly and for a moment they faced each other across the flames, then she moved to go.
‘Anyway, I wanted to come over and clear the air. I’ll leave you in peace.’
Fireshadow Page 6