Careful, He Might Hear You

by Sumner Locke Elliott

  A dreadful lull.

  ‘Lemonade,’ called Vanessa hopefully as Elsie appeared, wheeling the mahogany cart on to the lawn. Lemonade and exquisite little petits fours and tiny sandwiches of bread and butter and ‘hundreds and thousands’.

  They lined up. Sullenly, it seemed to her.

  ‘There’s going to be a big tea later,’ she warned them, laughing.

  The sun came and went. Went for good. Dirty yellow clouds cast a verdigris light over the garden and the air grew hotter. Dullness ballooned over them.

  ‘All right, everybody’—clapping her hands like teacher. ‘We’re going to have a game now. Who wants to put the tail on the donkey?’ Waving the blindfold. ‘Who wants to go first?’ They stared at her resentfully. Then Cynthia Lawson said, with a sigh, ‘Oh, all right; I will.’

  Very little laughter, even when little Jill somebodyorother put the tail in a very ridiculous and somewhat suggestive place. Vanessa caught two defectors wandering away, ran after them (‘Now, boys, everybody must play together. This is PS’s party.’), returned them to the game; laughed and called, ‘Bravo’, fought the ludicrous feeling that she was the only one behaving like a child.

  The game petered out and like sheep they began straying over the lawn.

  ‘Treasure hunt,’ she announced firmly, herding them into one pack, feeling the perspiration running down her back. She had not planned to have the treasure hunt until much later, but aware of the gathering clouds, made a quick decision.

  Pairing them into twos, boy-and-girl teams, took forever. Turning from a little girl to select a partner, she would return with a reluctant boy to find the girl gone. One nasty little boy whose name she had forgotten fought her off with no-nos and threats of tears.

  ‘But, dear, if you don’t play some little girl won’t have a partner.’

  ‘No, I don’t want to.’

  ‘Oh, well, all right then. You just watch. Now, Hilary dear, whom do you want to hunt with?’

  ‘I’m not Hilary, I’m Margaret. She’s Hilary.’

  ‘So sorry, dear. Ian dear, do you want to hunt with Margaret?’

  Oh, what fun, what fun, she said to them, and bitterly to herself, Oh, for God’s sake, do try. For my sake, try.

  Finally they were paired up. Gaily, she handed out the first clue, watched as they pored over it, asking what her handwriting meant. Again and again, tirelessly, she went through the simple rules while they stared at her dully.

  ‘Got it? Off you go and jolly good luck to the winner.’ They went off, already breaking up into threes and fours. A shambles, but for the moment they were occupied, and wishing them all in hell, Vanessa lit a cigarette and went inside.

  She found Ettie talking to the magician, a waxlike man with dyed black hair and gravestone teeth.

  ‘Didn’t know it was going to be this bunch,’ he said.

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Same bunch I had a month ago. At Mrs Rutherford’s party. They’ve seen pretty well everything I do.’

  Vanessa said irritably, ‘Mrs Lawson should have thought of that. Can’t you find something new they haven’t seen?’

  The magician said it was going to be pretty hard to fool this bunch. This bunch went to a party once a week. Too many damn parties if you wanted his opinion, with a depression on and some kiddies starving.

  Vanessa said crisply, ‘I’m not interested in your opinions. Just pull a rabbit out of a hat!’

  ‘Whatever you say, miss.’

  What a hateful man. Well, she’d cook his goose with Mrs Lawson and the other mothers.

  ‘Miss Scott?’

  There was Cynthia, hair ribbon coming down, hot and resentful at the front door.

  ‘Miss Scott, Molly Barker found the treasure!’

  ‘Already?’

  ‘Yes, but she was with PS!’

  ‘Oh, but Cynthia, PS didn’t know where the treasure was hidden.’

  ‘Well, how did they go right to it?’

  She went out with Cynthia into a sea of argument. A wraithlike little girl in a blue organdy dress was holding the prize tenaciously.

  ‘Now, children, I’m sure that Molly and PS didn’t cheat. PS, you didn’t know where the treasure was hidden, did you?’

  That innocent look.

  ‘No,’ he said. ‘The clues were too easy.’

  Thank you very much! You’re a great help, I must say.

  Forcing a smile, she said, ‘Never mind; there are consolation prizes for everyone.’

  But not for her.

  The party was turning out to be a failure, as torpid as the air.

  By tea time, it had become so dark that they had to turn on the lights in the dining room and while, mechanically, they sang ‘Happy Birthday’, thunder rumbled in the distance. She could already feel the spookiness which always swept over her when lightning was in the air; the old dreaded childhood fear that still made her want to hide in closets with a pillowcase over her head. She prayed that the storm would hold off long enough for the party to be over, so that she might then shut herself in her room, pull down the blinds and stuff her ears with cotton wool. But the thunder rolled nearer and when pale sheet lightning flickered outside the windows she said in an undertone to Elsie, ‘Put the knives away.’

  (‘Don’t be such a silly-billy, Ness.’ ‘I can’t help it, Mater’. ‘It’s only combustion; it can’t hurt you.’ ‘It can. I saw a picture of a little girl all burned up.’ ‘She was standing under a tree. It’s only dangerous if you’re standing under a tree.’)

  ‘Oho,’ she laughed, as the thunder cracked now almost overhead. Remembering an old childhood joke, she said, ‘They’re moving furniture in heaven,’ but the practical children of today looked up from their ice cream, unamused.

  ‘What about a nice quiet game in the drawing room as soon as you’ve all had birthday cake? PS, when you’re finished, would you take your guests into the drawing room?’

  She ran upstairs, closing windows against the sudden fat raindrops, shuddering as the rocking claps sounded directly overhead and shook the house deeply below her.

  Nerving herself, she started downstairs again, pausing once on the landing when a boom of thunder overhead startled her so that she wanted to scream. Ridiculous. Neurotic, at her age, still to be unable to throw off this silly phobia, but there she stood, shaking all over.

  Old maid. Cringing on the stairs, afraid of a little thunder. Terrible if one of the children caught her. Humiliating. Holding herself rigid, she went on downstairs, and hearing laughter, thought, Well, at last they’re enjoying themselves; perhaps the storm has livened them up. Putting on a bright smile, she went towards the drawing room door, then stopped dead, her hand gripping the glass knob, hearing PS say in a clear light voice:

  ‘Oh. Oh, I say, what jolly awful thundah.’

  Unable to understand for a moment, she waited.

  ‘Ugh, what fraightful lightning and thundah; we’ll all be killed.’

  For a boy of seven it wasn’t a bad imitation. He had even caught the nuances of her voice, the slightly Mayfair accent. She pushed the door open. He was mincing up and down in an approximation of her walk; in one hand he held an unlit cigarette while with the other he prodded a sofa cushion. ‘Oh, PS, PS,’ he said, ‘you must get up, do you heah me?’ Then, spinning around at the sound of thunder (which Vanessa no longer heard), said:

  ‘Oh, hold me, Logan. Hold me.’

  The children laughed and Cynthia said, ‘Who’s Logan?’

  ‘My father.’

  ‘Does he live with you now?’

  ‘No, but that’s what she says sometimes when she’s frightened.’

  He hugged the cushion, wriggling all over, shaking with pretended terror. ‘Oh, oh, Logan. Hold me!’

  The children laughed and some clapped their hands at his performance. Then, when thunder again rocked the house, they began imitating him, running around, jumping up and down, calling in high, excited voices, ‘Oh, hold me, hold me. Oooo, Loga
n!’ It had suddenly turned into a nightmare game, a madhouse of children capering in time to the thunder in an obscene travesty of her.

  Then PS saw her. When he smiled, an electric shock went through her. She sprang across the room, knocking over a gyrating child, feeling the roots of her hair tingling, her face on fire, and grabbing him, she shook him.

  Shook him and shook him, speechlessly, hearing nothing but explosions in her ears, hearing the roaring of water, of boiling surf, while blinding lights burst in front of her eyes and the curious faces of the still children watched, drawing in a ring around them. Shook him, seeing his face gradually going purple, his arms dangling, not resisting her, while all the time he continued to smile at her. Smiled and smiled while she shook and shook, hearing now the ugly panting sounds coming from her as her strength drained, and beaten, she pushed him and he fell away from her, fell heavily on the floor and looking up with an intensity of hate, smiled once more.

  Then, turning away from him, she saw through scalding water the blur of fascinated angelic faces.

  ‘Go away,’ she said in a husk of a voice. ‘Go home.’

  Blundered through an earthquake, past the falling walls of the room, past Ettie and the maids, turned to stone, towards the hall, towards a staircase that was tumbling towards her, fell up it.

  Cried out. She had not cried like that for as long as she could remember. Not even when Pater died.

  Lying now in the muggy darkness, she could hear nothing but the steady drip of water on tin, an occasional toot of a ferry.

  Twice Ettie knocked on the door, murmuring about aspirin or a tray. Did she want dinner on a tray?

  ‘Go away,’ she said.

  Go away!

  Much later, she heard the bubbling of his voice, mingled with Ettie’s cooing, and heard him going into his room, probably to bed without brushing his teeth in order to punish her, and she laughed, thinking, What could possibly punish or hurt me now? She felt as remote from him and Ettie as the Pleiades. Let them go their childish ways for now. This time was hers and now that the first shock of unbelievable hurt had passed, she could think clearly, stand outside of herself and watch with a certain amount of pride the return of her own inner strength. The shock, the final exposure of PS’s hatred, had destroyed the last remaining wall of pretence between them and given her an extraordinary release. Now that the explosion was over, she was no longer afraid; a conclusion had been reached and to her orderly mind it must now have a purpose. She must and would survive this, she must rise up strong and renewed, belonging to herself. She must reach beyond the deceiving explanations which in the past she had always clung resolutely to, bandaging her wounds before setting out blindly to be wounded again.

  No longer.

  It will hurt a little, she said, being the doctor. But you are being born tonight and so for a little time you must endure the pain.

  Start.

  Start at the beginning and remember them all. The dearly loved faithless and cruel ones. Go back into the classroom and look at pale, lovely Miss Mortimer. How you loved her. Took her custard apples and green maidenhair fern and put them on her desk in front of the giggling girls; composed, agonisingly, a lyrical ode to her in poetry class. What a slap in the face when she said, I do not care for mush, Vanessa, even when it scans, which meant, I do not love you—you are only one of twenty-six meaningless pupils, and you saw, suddenly, that really she had a face like a haddock and a soul made of dried walnuts. The boy at Waverly with the classic shoulders and the face of a Bellini cherub. When he kissed you and held you a moment, you were filled with such unbelievable joy that you wanted to give him everything you possessed, which, at fourteen, was one shilling and tenpence in small change; you pressed it into his hand and he threw it down on the grass and said, look I don’t take money for it; went and told his friends that the little Scott girl wanted to pay for it and they roared! So you ran to Pater and blurted it all out in a fit of sobs and Pater said, but my dearest, those boys are just very ordinary, just tradespeople, and they wouldn’t understand that you were just being sweet my angel and anyway I love you more than all the boys in the world. But when you confided in Sinden, she said, oh but Ness you hurt his pride— I would have just let him kiss me. But Sin, you said, I was only trying to show him I loved him back, the way I do when I give Pater little things, and Sinden said, well Ness they can’t all be like Pater.

  Maybe one can, you said, seeing him run ahead of you, pure of heart like yourself. Tender and admiring. Not wanting to defile you, only love you, love you so that the sex would only be part of the divine relationship.

  But why must you legislate people Ness? asked Vere, all bosom at nineteen and with a parade of lovers. You can’t legislate people. Rot, Vere. I’m not trying to legislate, just sift a little and find what I’m looking for. But do you know what it is? Certainly. And you went on hammering the shapes and souls of men until they resembled nothing but strangers and you could not love them. Tom, Dick and Harry all refused to be made over in your mould. But one came close, seemed to fit. Beautiful Logan in Bacchus Marsh with that tenderness and respect that made you certain—almost certain—that he understood.

  Wrong again. Logan was sly and treacherous; the baker’s boy fumbling for you in a dark paddock and even though you wept for him you knew he could not be changed.

  Oh, but when you heard! They thought you were hysterical that day, sitting on the terrace at somebody’s dull luncheon at Henley on Thames when the cable came in typical Sindenese saying, darling I have married beautiful teeth Bacchus Marsh guess who isn’t life incredible letter follows. And everyone said good heavens Vanessa what can be so terribly amusing? Do you remember him? Does he have a wooden leg? You said you were laughing because honestly it was very funny but a family joke, impossible to explain. Impossible to tell them that suddenly you were choking with fury. Not over Logan—oh to hell with him, you got over that hurt years ago—but because Sinden had been able to do something you couldn’t. Because Sinden always had been able to love without trying to change anything. Sinden was really the pure in heart, unquestioning, unafraid to run out in the storm and find what she wanted while you quaked in closets with pillowcases over your head.

  What a fraud you are, Logan had said.

  If only you had understood him then. Because it all came to nothing and there was no love.

  Even the man in Paris, when you said I can’t leave Ettie but knew it was because you couldn’t change him.

  None of them.

  Ah, but if you could mould the child!

  Not Logan, but PS. If PS loved you, it would (in Pater’s words) restore the years that the locusts have eaten.

  But PS detests you and you are beaten. From now on there will be no one. You are quite alone.

  You don’t know how to love.

  All right, now you’ve said it. At least you know who and what you are.

  Now you have been born.

  Someone, Jocko probably, was mowing the lawn and she turned, opening her eyes, to gaze stupidly at the clock and was astonished to find that it was long after ten.

  For the first time in her life she had gone to sleep in her clothes and it amused her slightly to find that she had already begun her new life (remembering instantly and clearly) by doing something out of the ordinary.

  She undressed and took a shower, grateful that PS had gone to school and that Ettie was not yet up and about. She wanted a little more time to prepare herself for them.

  She felt a curious sense of suspension, of being neither happy nor unhappy, and at the same time released. The ominous feeling of the last few weeks had vanished—and this morning the summer sounds and smells brought no ghosts with them. She was no longer wavering. She knew exactly what she must do and the anticipation of it had begun to please her; it itched a little, like a healing cut.

  Wanting change, she dressed her hair differently, moving the parting further to the side and folding the soft bun a little lower. She looked, she thought, res
ted and well, considering everything. She put on a new shantung dress which she had been saving. (For what? Where do I ever go? Who ever really looks at me?) She put on her tan-and-white shoes, and admiring herself in the mirror, lingered, fully aware of the acceptance of her own vanity and the new freedom of not caring tuppence if anyone caught her or what anyone thought because there was now only herself to please.

  She went downstairs and through the green baize door into the kitchen and asked could she have some breakfast. Anywhere will do, she said pleasantly to Ellen and Elsie’s startled faces expecting a woe-begone creature or an avenging angel. But eggs, please, if it isn’t too much trouble, and some bacon too, as she was starving. Absolutely starving.

  ‘I somehow missed dinner,’ she told them needlessly.

  She sat in the warm sun in the dining room. Someone had thoughtfully removed the paper streamers and all the reminders of the party. She read in the Sydney Morning Herald that tonight the world would end. That was, according to a Dr Pollack and the disciples of the Temple of Everlasting Love, where they would gather at sundown to await the arrival of the Saviour. Poor Agnes. Who is going to have ever such a red face? Feeling the need now to talk of inconsequential things, she delayed Elsie, bringing the eggs at a run, with chat about the weather, summer uniforms and the scandalous price of fish. When Ettie came wavering in, kissed her inquiringly, she said, ‘Dear, I’m all right, really. Really. I don’t want to talk about it.’

  Wait.

  She walked around the garden, admiring everything, smelling roses and hibiscus, and feeling that this morning the salt-harbour breeze and tang of damp eucalyptus leaf were not distressing reminders of lost youth but merely pleasant assurances that she was very much alive. She chatted for a time with Jocko, asking questions about soil and espaliers, granting him quick, easy smiles and small compliments. At noon, watching the gate, she remembered suddenly that this was swimming-lesson day and that PS would not be home until after three.

  Three long hours yet.

  Ettie observed her curiously, following at short distances, humming nervously; and finally, getting no clue, she disappeared upstairs with a pretended headache.