Just Relations

by Rodney Hall

  That period of my life came to an unpredicted halt. My father began to behave in an odd way, seeming to be occupied with some problem he couldn’t grasp. His hair was grey and he complained of feeling sick. We were never free of father’s sicknesses; if it wasn’t migraine (which he sometimes called mygrain and sometimes meegrain according to whether he had one or not), it was the gastro, or his nerves. His friends who used to arrive periodically in the evening to play cribbage ceased to call. The day came when I knew they’d never play cards at our place again. I hated his sicknesses, I had no sympathy for him. All the energies inside me longed to be free of them, with their disgusting symptoms and the burden of his helplessness. So I began playing truant instead of going to school. I went down to the railway line to look at the trains. When this became boring and I was getting too dirty in the sooty grass, I walked a mile along the canal bank to steer clear of the houses and sat in the sunshine, wondering about things, the way you do with still water and insects skittering on its surface. I told myself not to feel hungry at lunch time, because I’d eaten my sandwich hours before when I couldn’t resist though I knew it was too early. But by early afternoon I decided I could risk buying a bun somewhere on the outskirts. And besides, I had become obsessed with the clock. I had absolutely no idea what time it was. The morning stretched enormous behind me, the afternoon too. It could be four and school out, it could be two, or twelve or five, or the police could be on my tracks.

  At last something new was happening to me, success as a habitual truant. One evening my father came in as always, shabby but neat, bringing with him an event. I detected the signs of despair deepening in his face. He was tired out and feeling ill (when wasn’t he tired and ill?). I answered his questions about school. Yes it had been alright lately, no there wasn’t any more difficulty with geometry now. Suddenly my father was weeping at me, sitting across the table, wetness dripping into the dinner I had cooked. Tears seemed to come from somewhere far inside him which he himself didn’t know about and couldn’t control. His face looked puzzled as much as anything. But a terrible pain lodged in his eyes and this I shall not forget.

  – You’ve been playing truant, he sobbed. I saw your teacher. And now you’ll never do well. You’ll never be able to fend for yourself and have a decent life. You just don’t see how important school is.

  How could I explain I did it because of him, because I couldn’t stand his horrible helplessness? How could I explain I did it because I found I was beginning to sneer at him in secret, my father who used to know everything, the one who stood between me and the dangers of the world?

  – I want you to be able to do well, he said. You’ve got to be able to. You have to think of me. Otherwise, otherwise …

  I ran, I just ran, out along the passage and up to my bed where I hid, never to come out or be seen again or take up my life as it had been before. How could he let me see him crying! I was so wounded and disgusted. My father’s tears were nothing to mine, the sheet and the pillow sopped them up, silently I howled into the warm womb of darkness, I ached as I lay in my tears, till I could die. Curiously, what I remembered before falling asleep was the end of a seaside holiday, it was a holiday from the year before, a farewell to the lovely sand and rocks and the seawater with its awful taste, the mysterious world of caves and rockpools, and goodbye to the excitement of that one day helping fishermen drag in a net full of kicking fish, and most of all goodbye to my friend Mandy I’d been with for the fortnight, whom I’d met there and probably wouldn’t see again, that sweet charm of a chance friendship. Daddy was so irritable after packing the car (we had one that year, a battered Singer) he didn’t allow me time to say goodbye to Mandy, if Mandy wasn’t home I’d have to content myself with telling her parents and asking them to pass it on. So we drove off. The gap between me and Mandy suddenly, casually, total. I begged him to stop. He didn’t understand till he saw me blubbering. And when we looked back, there was Mandy pumping along behind us, red in the face, making a heroic run. She came up to the car, still frantic and tear-stained, waving a scrap of paper on which she’d written her address. We swore always to be friends and it was the most wonderful moment of the holidays. But I had to wake to the horror of life with my weeping pain-racked father. The next I knew, morning had already taken possession of my room and things were not the way I might have wished them. Great-aunt Anne was at the chest of drawers packing my things into a suitcase, tiptoeing about, her huge careful form butting soundlessly against my furniture, treading like a great weightless shadow on my fallen books and clothes. Because I wanted to die I pretended to be asleep. Eventually she had to wake me.

  My aunt Annie is a remarkable woman, sensible and strong. Wake up Vivi, she said, you’re coming to live with me and I shall love to have you. Let me tell you everything now so you’ll bear it all at once and never again, your father’s dead, he simply couldn’t bear the pain, so he did what any sensible person would do, he put a stop to it. He just said, I won’t stand for any more. She packed another pile of my things in the bag. The clothes looked so small. That is to say, Aunt Annie said, he swallowed a handful of the sleeping tablets he had for his pain. He left one tablet over. Now that’s a marvel. As though he might need it later if things didn’t work out.

  I was too stunned to cry. My feeling, at the age of twelve, was recognition: I’d always known he could be dead like this. But it would be unpardonable if I did not cry, for Auntie’s sake as my relative. So I burst into a loud hacking and moaning. She folded me against her, another thin rag of clothing to be packed, and she said, you’re such a good girl Vivi, you don’t have to cry in front of me. Then I really did cry because I didn’t have to.

  In his coffin my father looked exactly like himself but with one eye a bit crooked, and his cheeks a shade too pink. The thing that made me believe he was finally dead was the cottonwool he wore stuffed in his ears and nostrils. He was dressed in his suit, his splendid formality. As a child what preoccupied me was how had he done it: did he dress before he took the pills? Perhaps I might have been more shocked hadn’t there been so many flowers in the room: Auntie’s signature. I hardly dared imagine where they had come from. So I watched him sealed away and buried, exotic as a tropical bird.

  My aunt, determined to console me at whatever price, promised me the most precious thing in her house to help me forget. I imagined the clock, the ornaments, some lump of furniture, her black cashbox. When she brought me the gift from upstairs, explaining that she kept it under her bed, I was surprised to see it was a simple wooden case which for one painful moment resembled a miniature coffin. Open it my dear, her voice trembled with excitement, I can’t wait! Inside lay a violin. Now, said Auntie almost crossly, do what I say or you won’t be any good at all.

  She took up the instrument herself and tuned it. Imagine my astonishment. She was the last person on earth to have a violin. Then to watch her wooden fingers lifting and falling like mechanical hammers and her whole body trembling as she swept the bow its full length this way and that. I could have laughed because she handled everything as if she knew what she was doing. The violin gave out a simple spritely dance tune, stiff and rough but somehow filled with feelings that made a lump rise in my throat. Auntie, I gasped in admiration, you never told! When she finished the tune she put the instrument into my hands. Tuck it under your chin, she said grimly. Like this, now take the bow like this, no like this, no, thumb there duffer, no, knuckles in a straight line, no the two small fingers don’t touch it, no, fingers together, no the horsehair at a slant, no the other way, no square to the strings, no wrist higher than that, wrist not elbow, elbow down wrist up knuckles up fingers relaxed, horsehairs on a tilt… now draw the bow gently down, down further, keep going. To my utter astonishment the bow produced a long clean note from the violin with only two hitches as I lost confidence. Suddenly Auntie smiled. It’s yours now Vivi. She turned the smile away to a dim corner of the room. And if you don’t use it right and practise I’ll put you out on the
street to beg.

  Come on Aunt Annie, I cried proud and delighted with the note I had made, Daddy already buried and forgotten, teach me, teach me to play. No, she replied and took the violin away, you’re going to learn from someone who can really show you, you’re going to be a famous violin player, before I die I want to buy a ticket and hear you play in a concert, you can sit me in the front row so I can catch your eye when you get it right. I wished then that the future would allow me to do something for Aunt Annie, something really spectacular to make her gasp.

  What do you remember about the old days? I cajoled her because she was now an enigma. The old days? she answered vigorously. What old days? I don’t remember a thing, what do the old days matter when there’s today to live and tomorrow to think about? A little while later she added, relenting, I made one mistake in the old days and I’ll never forget that, I married a man who didn’t love me and I refused a man who did. Can you think of anything – now my great-aunt was shouting at me – anything more criminal than that, to wreck two lives, to make a good man miserable all his days and make my husband miserable too, as well as myself into the bargain? I’ve got two pieces of advice for you my girl and you’d better take note: don’t let other people try to live your life for you, and don’t get married. So I asked her who was she going to get to teach me the violin then? I know who, she said, I’ve had my eyes peeled for some time and that’s a fact.

  Auntie found me a violin teacher. She dug up someone who had played with the BBC Symphony Orchestra, she prised him out of retirement, she carted me off to his cottage and sat me in the porch, she set him up in front of his music stand and called me into the room when she was ready. Now, she announced to Mr Rosenbloom, this is my grandniece who will become a violinist and this is her violin. He peered at me over the top of ridiculous half-moon spectacles like the most perfect absent-minded professor. Really, he said and held out his hand for the violin. I passed it to him. Good morning, he said to the violin. Good morning, I answered for it. Extraordinary, he commented having twanged a couple of strings and hastily corrected the tuning. And where might I ask, Mrs McTaggart, did this instrument come from? From me, she replied promptly. Yes but before that? he asked, fingering it. So far as I know, she replied, it came from French Equatorial Africa in the 1890s. Indeed? he looked at me. French Equatorial Africa? he said cautiously and twanged it again. Yes Mr Rosenbloom, my father brought it from there to Uruguay where he was living for a while with some Scottish folk. Uruguay, eh? said the violin teacher. That’s right and from Uruguay to New South Wales. New South Wales in Australia? asked Mr Rosenbloom. And then here to England with me, my great-aunt confirmed. To England, he spoke to the violin, now that is extraordinary. He gave it an apprehensive twang. I risked a glance at Auntie, mortified on her behalf at what she must be suffering. But there she sat on a cedar chair, flounces of crimson organdie piled up from the seat to the deep ruff round her neck and the drooping crimson coyly fluttering at her shins. Her face red with pride and happiness, her great brilliant eyes met mine but she could spare only a moment, the occasion being too momentous for anything to be missed. I knew then that she was glad to be old, proud to have got there.

  At last Mr Rosenbloom managed to tear his eyes away from the instrument and looked straight at me. He was piercing me with that look. Miss Lang, he said, would you kindly stand up. He spoke English with the exactness of a foreigner and his pronunciation distracted me so much I had to think before I could understand him. I leapt to my feet dropping the handbag Aunt Annie had given me the week before, so that it fell open on the carpet spilling its contents: three coins, a pencil, a left-over wartime lipstick I’d purloined, a powderpuff deeply impregnated with Lucy Urquart’s powder, a lucky charm elephant, a piece of chewing gum and a grubby handkerchief I had been meaning to wash for this occasion but had forgotten. Instantly I was on hands and knees scooping everything back into hiding. Unfortunately my energy somewhat outdid my aim and the lipstick was sent flying across the room to where it rapped Mr Rosenbloom sharply on the ankle. His hand approached it gingerly. He passed it back to me and then permitted himself to sniff ever so briefly at his fingertips, propping at the perfume. I had stood to retrieve the lipstick so I remained standing, which was what I had been asked to do. Turn to your right please, said Mr Rosenbloom, no don’t hold the handbag leave it on the chair, yes, now tilt your chin up, now put your chin down but keep your eyes up like a Duchess ordering the dinner, good gracious, now show me your back, now still with your back to me sing this note (he played a note on the violin), I sang it. I see, he said, now sing me these two notes. I sang them. Now sing me these four notes. I sang again. Come here child, he said, and show me your hands. He took hold of them and it troubled me that his fingers were hot. Mrs McTaggart, he said mournfully in his perfectly foreign English, this is not what I had looked forward to. How awful: I glanced at my great-aunt, seeing how much it meant to her, that she was nervous, for there was not a flower anywhere on her person. No indeed, Mrs McTaggart, as I explained to you I came to the country to retire not to teach. This was too dreadful, so ashamed I felt and so sorry for Aunt Annie as he handed her the poor shabby violin she thought such a lot of. Miss Lang, he continued as if introducing me to my aunt, is beginning too late perhaps for us to hope for really great things of her, which is regrettable as it is past remedy, but she has everything a violinist should need so far as one can tell, an excellent ear, a sensitive disposition, supple hands, a sturdy constitution, and modesty. The petals of Auntie’s dress shuffled slightly as she breathed out… and you could tell then she’d been holding her breath. Of course, said the teacher, I shall sacrifice my retirement in part and accept her. On condition, he added quickly, that you mention it to nobody else, I would urge this promise on you. When can you bring her to me, he concluded, and can she come twice a week? Great-aunt Anne became as dignified as Queen Mary, if a little fuller in the figure. We shall come Tuesday and Friday afternoons at half-past four, she said for all the world as if she knew what she was talking about. Provided that is convenient. Perfectly convenient, Mr Rosenbloom snatched his half-moon glasses off his nose, snapped them shut and clipped them in a metal case. Excellent, he declared. Oh and the violin, he added, was made by a respectable Italian house but is a rather eccentric instrument, still it will serve well enough for the present.

  As Aunt Annie turned to check that I had closed Mr Rosenbloom’s garden gate after us, I saw a splendid white carnation blazing on her crimson bosom.

  – I knew he’d be alright, she said. I picked him for his name.

  For seven years Martin Rosenbloom taught me, coaxed, bullied and encouraged me. I passed my examinations with credit; but when it came to the final test, I would never be a professional.

  Aunt Annie was impatient with all forms of compromise. Forget what’s reasonable or respectable, she said, if you’re going to change, change completely. Either you’re right or you’re wrong. If you’re right stick to your guns and if you’re wrong stand up and say so. I knew she spoke from experience, that she had once risked her life, changing her mind out loud; it was through Mr Rosenbloom that the story came to be known. Aunt Annie recognized the Great War, the Depression and the Second World War as a single event, a symphony of human suffering and endurance, cruelty and resistance. The movements were different, yes, but they belonged together.

  When she was twenty-nine she changed her mind about love and walked out on Uncle to marry Joseph McTaggart, well known for his liberal distribution of white duck feathers around the Whitey’s Fall district. Luckily for their marriage these unsuited people went immediately to Sydney to enlist in the army. The year was 1915.

  So I come to a letter found among my father’s papers when they were surrendered to me on my twenty-first birthday. In a shoe box containing his treasured oddities, a glider altimeter, an ivory slide-rule, golf tees, collar studs and a pair of shoetrees, was a package of correspondence addressed to Mr Archibald Lang: in the main, letters from Grea
t-aunt Anne to my grandfather. This one was dated 1917:

  In the afternoon I arrived at the Casualty Station; three tents, a marquee and two Swiss Cottage tents. Everything was deathly in the countryside, snowflakes drifting down through the air. There were some rocks in front of the tents black rugged silhouettes standing against the snowy fields. The patients were huddled outside sitting on ammunition boxes by the clerking tent, while the staff scuttled about, you could hear voices echoing across the snow from an old bunker on the hill where I was told a couple of our boys covered the retreat of the injured with a Vickers gun, and the wounded were arriving in a hobbling column all the while.

  The men leaving the dressing station, one by one, dipped biscuits into their pannikins of hot cocoa. Then I noticed them halt, biscuits poised in the steam, and a roaring filled the air, this great plane came swooping down no more than twenty feet above the tents, its guns firing at us! Shooting at our wounded! I couldn’t believe such wickedness.