The Innocents

by Nette Hilton

  ‘Ruined. I learn a new word. Ruined. So what game is it you play wiss them?’

  ‘I’m not playing a game.’ Her voice was a whisper.

  ‘What is it that you are doing then? You are busy looking, looking...’

  ‘I wanted the jokers.’

  ‘The jok-ees?’

  She held up the cards she’d taken and he nodded.

  ‘I see. And what is it that you play wis only the joking?’

  Missie giggled. ‘Jok-ers!’ she said. ‘Jok-ing is making someone laugh.’

  ‘It is good I make you laugh. You look very...’ He mimicked her wide eyes and flung his hands open in mock surprise. ‘Like this!’

  Carefully Missie placed the cards in a stack. He was asking her, she knew, why she had tried to hide them. And why she was looking so guilty.

  ‘They don’t belong to me.’ She didn’t know why the truth had popped out. It was probably to do with the fact that he’d given her such a fright she’d nearly wet her knickers. And that’d be nothing to what Aunt Belle was going to do if she was caught.

  ‘So?’ He had his hand down to take the cards. ‘Who is them?’

  ‘Who owns them.’ It was rude to correct people and she hadn’t meant to do it. ‘Aunt Belle.’ And then it had been easy to go on and explain where they’d come from and why she had them.

  ‘Ah,’ he said when she finally had to take a breath. ‘So this is it.’ He found, in that moment, that he was enjoying this child. True, he did not understand all the words but it didn’t make a difference. Perhaps it was more important that it made no difference to her. She didn’t slow her speech, or yell at him as if he were deaf. She didn’t lean across into his face. She just went right on.

  ‘It is wrong that you do this, Missie.’

  ‘I only wanted the jokers.’

  ‘But it is not good to take without the...’

  ‘...asking. It’s not good to take without asking,’ she repeated for him. ‘I know that.’

  ‘And will you do this one again?’

  Not in a million years. Her stomach had plunged forty feet, for god’s sake, and her hands were still clammy. No thank you very much, this wasn’t something she’d be doing again in a hurry. At least it was Mr ... Mr ... who’d caught her.

  ‘How do you say your name?’

  ‘I say Shevchenko.’ He said it with flourish, rolling it out so it could never be captured by the flatness of this Australian speech. ‘You call me Oleksander. Is not so hard.’

  ‘Is that your first name?’

  ‘It is.’

  ‘I’m not allowed to call adults by their first name. Mum said it’s rude.’ It was especially out of bounds with guests in the house. God, her mother would have her guts for garters if she heard her. ‘I’ll learn the other one.’

  ‘You call me Mr Mykola. This is my mother’s name. It would be good to be called this. And it is easy, I think.’

  Mykola. It was a good name. It rolled out easily, like music almost. And thank god it was him that had caught her.

  ‘I tell you what.’ He was holding the cards out. ‘I put sem back for you and we say no more of this one. You sink so?’ He indicated for her to stand in front of him. ‘You sink so?’

  ‘I think so.’

  ‘You must make the promise not to do this one again.’

  ‘I won’t.’ Her shoulders relaxed back into place. ‘I promise I won’t do it again.’ Then to make sure he understood, she pointed to the cards. ‘...This one.’

  He smiled then. It was something she’d never seen him do before.

  He flicked through the deck. ‘Tell me again about this card you trade.’

  ‘Swap cards,’ Missie told him. She told him how she had lots of horse cards because they were her favourite and her friend, Zill, was collecting cats.

  ‘I can help you with a horse and a cat?’

  ‘Yes, please.’ It seemed like an odd thing for a man to have in his room, swap cards. ‘Why’ve you got swap cards?

  ‘I think I can make these ones.’

  It was what he loved. Drawing. Painting and making his pictures live by turning their heads, or shifting their focus. He had some paper that would suit and a picture of a horse and a cat would not be a problem. A layer of lacquer across them would make a smooth card finish.

  ‘Yes,’ he announced. ‘I will make these ones for you.’

  It was too good to be true. She should have known. ‘You don’t make swap cards.’

  ‘This time we will try.’ Oleksander stood. ‘You must not do this bad thing again.’

  ‘I promise.’

  ‘Then, it will be our little ... how you say?’

  ‘Secret,’ Missie said in a whisper.

  He surprised her then. He tapped his finger to the side of his nose. ‘Bob’s your uncle.’

  ‘It means don’t say a bloody word about it if you know what’s good fer yer,’ Sticky Walsh had explained when he’d first seen it done. ‘You got that, Al? Someone does this–’ he put his finger again to his nose and tapped – ‘you say “Bob’s your uncle”.’

  He knew also the signal for ‘up your arse’ and would like to have delivered it. But he didn’t give a shit, as they said also, about what they shoved into their carry-alls to take home so his thumb stayed firmly in place.

  But now Missie looked delighted. She mimicked him and grinned. ‘Right. Bob’s your uncle!’

  She took off but turned again before she rounded the corner. One finger to her nose. ‘Bob’s your uncle,’ she sang and her laughter filled the empty hallway for as long as the shadows took to stop moving.

  7

  OCTOBER

  LANSDALE

  Winter finally released its grip on the earth and gave way, reluctantly, to spring. Daylight lasted a little longer and the breeze from across the mountain range no longer froze all of your pointy bits, as Dotty Evans liked to say. Longest winter she could remember.

  Missie hadn’t noticed.

  The world with a friend was a place of endless possibility. Even avoiding Max was easier now that her mind and days were full of Zilla. Time before school began didn’t mean hanging out and trying to look too busy to want to play and the time between school and coming home went too quickly.

  The town that had been a well-trodden path she could have followed with her eyes shut was now full of unexplored places to go and things to do. The river with its dark, cold shadows and warning slap of deep water against fallen trees wasn’t out of bounds when you had a friend. It was still out of bounds and her mother’d have her guts for garters if she found out they’d been down there, but they had, and stayed long enough to build a cubbyhouse in the bushes that tangled closer higher up the steeper sides of the hill. They’d seen old man Harrigan who worked in the Co-op stop on his way home and have a wee in the river. Zilla said at least he was doing it in the river and it’d all mix in and go away. Better than going in the grass. They’d probably end up sitting in it. Missie sat on her haunches for a while after that.

  They’d heard a woman walking two fat dogs fart so loudly one of the dogs jumped. She heard them when they couldn’t stop their laughing and they’d almost exploded trying to keep silent enough so they wouldn’t be caught.

  They’d seen boys who’d come marauding through with sticks and meanness that seeped from the lazy angle of their stride. Zilla was quiet then, mouse quiet, tensed ready to spring, until they’d sloped off down the track.

  ‘They’d do us,’ she’d declared once they’d truly disappeared.

  Missie wasn’t sure what that meant but she was certain she wouldn’t like it. They hadn’t gone back to the cubby for a while after that.

  It didn’t matter. There were plenty of other places to be and, at the end of the month, Missie’s birthday to celebrate.

  It was wonderful. There were only two allowed and that was perfect because Deirdre had to stay home with her mum and Zill had promised to bring home some cake. They had a special birthday tea with ice-cre
am and jelly and as many slices of fairy bread as they could fit and then they went to the pictures at night.

  It wasn’t truly night-time. It was only five o’clock but it was going to be dark when they got out and they sat upstairs in the front row. Missie was allowed to wear her white gloves and new viyella dress that floated around in front of her. Zilla thought it was beautiful and had oohed and ahhed so much over it that Missie’s mum made her a skirt from the leftover material. They looked like twins. Zill even wore a pair of gloves that her own mother had found especially for the birthday outing.

  Birthdays gave way to term holidays and pussy willows and the plum tree full of blossom and soon there’d be plums. End of year tests were starting and everyone was getting ready for the concert. Which was a bit bloody stupid, according to Zill, because it was still forever away. They were going to play ‘Silent Night’ on recorders, her and Zill and Deirdre, who had to do everything that Zill did. Her mother said there was nothing silent about any night that had a recorder in it and go and practise it somewhere else. Which was a bloody rude thing to say if you thought about it. Which Missie did.

  They were getting ready to go and see the Queen too. Miss Martin said it was an honour and their school was going to be the best there. They were going to march through Saleby in proper rows.

  It wasn’t happening till next year and Zill reckoned they couldn’t help but be the best since all they seemed to be doing was marching round the playground whenever there was an opportunity.

  The asphalt fairly rang as they tried their hardest to do left-right-left to Colonel Bogey. Jimmy Johnson knew some words and he sang them when Miss Martin was standing too far away to hear.

  Hitler had something simpler

  And poor old GoBalls had no balls at all.

  It didn’t make any sense at all but all the boys smirked and spluttered whenever the music started up so it must’ve been rude. It didn’t seem right to be marching around the school to a rude song, especially since they’d be doing it for the Queen.

  Miss Martin sighed a lot and said they looked more like a centipede than the best school but she wasn’t giving up hope. That was what she said but there were days when her face was red and it wasn’t just from the sun.

  It took ages but they started to get it. Missie was pretty sure she was one of the one’s swinging her arms at the wrong time. She hoped she didn’t look as bad as Jimmy Johnson, who didn’t have a hope of getting it right. But then his dad said he wouldn’t be going to see any queen that didn’t even belong in the country. He’d said there was no way he was letting his kid cheer for some trumped-up English tart.

  Zilla had been delighted.

  She’d spent hours mimicking the look on Miss Martin’s face. It would have been hard not to cringe if Jimmy Johnson’s dad was yelling at you. Missie felt sorry for Jimmy, though. It’d be awful not to be allowed to go and see the actual Queen of England. She could hardly wait.

  ‘Do you reckon she’ll be wearing her crown?’ she’d said as they sat eating their lunch.

  ‘Reckon,’ said Zilla. ‘She’s the Queen. She’ll probably have on that ball gown as well. And that long cloak with all the fur on the edges.’

  Both girls ate silently, each building their own pictures of Queen Elizabeth in her lovely dress and crown. And them together waving. Missie dreamed a little dream about being the flower girl who got to wear a beautiful dress and curtsy and give the Queen a bunch of flowers. And the Queen would smile and say how lovely she was and would she like to be called Princess Melissa. And she’d say yes and...

  ‘How d’you get to be the one who gives her the bouquet then?’ Zilla said. ‘Reckon that’d be pretty good.’

  ‘You’d have to curtsy,’ Missie said.

  They stood up and practised. One foot in front and the other behind and slowly bend. Eyes down, and don’t wobble.

  ‘What’re you two up to, then?’

  ‘Practisin’ doin’ curtsies for the queen.’ Zilla dropped into a curtsy in front of Mr Watson.

  Missie thought Mr Watson was lovely. He was tall and handsome with hair that waved back in a long, smooth line. She wasn’t sure if Mr Watson liked her though. Sometimes when she made a special effort to show him something, or tell him that she had finished her work, his smile stopped short of his eyes. And he looked away to someone else or another book too quickly.

  ‘Take yourselves out into the playground where I can see you.’

  He was already moving away from them.

  ‘We’re not doin’ anythink wrong,’ Zilla said as she straightened up. She always dropped the ‘g’ part of her words off and added a ‘k’ to the end of ‘anything’. It drove her mother mad.

  Her little sister, Deirdre, did too. The only one that had an ending was her effing word. She pronounced that one perfectly.

  Missie wasn’t sure that she liked Deirdre. She had a little ferret face and hard, bright little eyes that saw everything and gave nothing away.

  ‘Just ignore her,’ Zilla always said.

  But ignoring Deirdre wasn’t an easy thing to do. She breathed too close through an open mouth when they tried to tell secrets and she pinched if they didn’t share what they were saying. And Missie’s mum said she was a thieving little miss because she took biscuits out of the tin without asking.

  Deirdre joined them now, hands behind her back and looking up at Mr Watson, with one eye squinted shut and the other open and unforgiving.

  ‘Where’d you come from, miss?’

  Deirdre didn’t blink. ‘Been waitin’ for my sister.’

  Mr Watson looked at them. ‘Playground,’ he said. ‘Go!’

  They set off.

  Missie would have liked it better if it had only been her and Zilla that finished up on the side of the netball court. But Deirdre stuck close.

  ‘Give us a turn then!’ she said as she sidled into the goalie ring.

  ‘Get lost,’ Joannie Melon said. She always had the ball. She was the one who chose the teams and, so far, all the teams had remained unchanged. She hefted the ball from one hand to the other before turning back to try her shot at goal.

  She missed.

  Zilla didn’t. She pounced and wielded the ball into a long arc, passing it neatly out to her sister.

  ‘She’s too young,’ Joannie Melon said. ‘Here. Chuck it back!’

  Missie had wandered up behind Zilla. She didn’t like to think she was standing in her shadow but it was nice to be here in the centre of a game that had forever been out of her bounds.

  Joannie Melon turned lazily and slapped the ball out of Zilla’s hand.

  Missie had reached out and snatched the ball back to her chest before she had time to consider what she’d done.

  ‘Pass it here!’ Zilla yelled, bobbing and belting across the goals. She dodged left and right and Missie, who’d watched from the shadowed seat in the shelter shed for so long, knew exactly what to do.

  She bobbed around in front of Mary and let it fly.

  Zilla had grabbed it, launched it at the ring, missed and it was gone, out of bounds. Deirdre was on it, like poop on a blanket as Zilla said, and sent it sailing back into the court.

  ‘My chuck-in!’ said Mary.

  ‘You reckon!’ Zilla grinned. ‘You gotta get it first!’

  Missie was quick. She didn’t know she could be so quick, but she was off, racing and calling and hearing Deirdre yelling for her to pass it out.

  ‘Give it up.’ Joannie stood, arms akimbo and shoulders hulked, blocking her progress.

  ‘Make me!’ Missie heard herself say.

  Joannie thumped her. A double-handed shove that sent her sprawling. Other girls joined in, dragging at her and trying to pull her off the ball. Parts of her were being scratched and there’d be bruises.

  An ear-splitting whistle called an immediate halt to the attack and silence reigned as one by one the girls peeled back to reveal the over-large shoes and dark, dusty trousers of Mr Watson.

  ‘Get up,�
�� he said to Missie.

  Missie did.

  ‘Whatever has got into you girls?’ he began when he’d lined them up across the centre of the grassy court. ‘Who’s responsible?’

  He looked directly at Zilla. ‘This your doing, young lady?’

  Deirdre was there before anyone got a chance to answer. She elbowed her way to the front. ‘She done it!’ she said, pointing to Joannie. ‘She gave her a great bloody shove and sent her sprawling.’

  Mr Watson looked like someone had slapped him. ‘Over there,’ he said to Deirdre. ‘I’ll teach you to swear at me!’

  ‘Zill never done it but!’ Deirdre condescended to move half a step.

  ‘She didn’t,’ Missie heard herself say quietly.

  ‘Who did then?’

  Missie kept her mouth shut. If she blabbed they’d gang up on her after school. They’d wait for her by the gate and let her have it. And goodness knows how many more they’d get to join in.

  Mr Watson looked at them.

  There was only another five minutes before bell time.

  He took his cigarettes from his pocket and fished around for his lighter. ‘I’ll be standing over there and I’ll be watching,’ he said. ‘And I want to see all of you–’ he lit his cigarette and then pointed at each girl in turn – ‘playing together nicely.’

  He took a second longer to eyeball Deidre. She was younger than the rest and he didn’t really know her. ‘And you can pick up papers!’

  He juggled the cigarette in his mouth while he tossed the ball.

  He didn’t see the trip though. Or Joannie Melon when she held Missie under her throat.

  ‘I’ll get you,’ she hissed. ‘After school. You’re in for it!’

  Somehow she’d managed to avoid it.

  So far.

  8

  THURSDAY AFTERNOON

  LANSDALE WEST STATE SCHOOL

  The school sat above the town. It hunkered down on the flattened top of the only decent hill between the showground and a wavering, green grassy meadow that could be reached by crossing a little creek. Not a proper creek. Zilla said it was just a gutter. Bordering that was the exit road that led off to the high mountain plains of the Great Dividing Range. The town proper was headed in the other direction with its back to the river. The shortest route home was down past the showground fence, along past the bowling club with its low brick fence and bushes that stopped you peering up at the bowling ladies’ knickers as they swooped down with the ball. Then a quick turn right, along Main Street and then down Dorset Street headed for the pool and there you were.