by Rosalie Ham
‘Now come on, Jude, that’s not how I feel about you.’
Walter put his hand on Margery’s shoulder. ‘I feel like a bit of a dill myself.’
‘We all do,’ Judith said.
‘I have morals I’m prepared to die for. He betrayed me, you all betrayed me – even you, Walter.’
Judith said, ‘Walter knew less than I did, Marge. Bloody Morris is the one who knew everything.’
Anita added that all Walter ever does is try to help, and Margery shot back, ‘He was trying to help your mother.’
‘He was trying to help you too. And I’d like to point out that Floss could have easily marched across the street and told you the truth and broken up your home and family for the sake of her own happiness, and mine, but she didn’t.’
‘Well, two cheers for her,’ Judith said.
Anita sighed. ‘We don’t want to put either of you in a home. We know now that you must have felt terrible putting your own poor mother into a home.’
The teacup and saucer slipped from Margery’s hands, bounced on the carpet splashing tea across the hibiscus and lyrebirds. Anita and Walter reached for the cup and saucer, and Margery put her hand out to Judith, indicating she needed to get to the bathroom quickly. Her legs buckled beneath her and she leaned heavily on Judith’s arms, but they got there. Margery clutched the handbasin. ‘Thank you, Judith. I’ll be alright now.’
‘You sure?’
‘Yes, dear.’
Judith closed the door.
‘Don’t lock the door,’ Anita called, but she did. It was like the day in the park; bells were echoing and her chest was thick with the weight of her labouring heart when it became clear that Cecily could not be found in a room or a street nearby. She put the toilet lid down and sat, taking deep breaths, her hand over her heart. When she felt she could, she raised her eyes and looked at her reflection, looked past the bruises and her swollen nose into her eyes. She removed her broken glasses, put them in her handbag, and confronted herself.
‘Well,’ she said, ‘there it is. Nailed to my own principles with my own words, and at this very minute I’m feeling just how my mother felt when I put her in a home. Let the punishment be equal with the offence.’
Judith knocked at the door. ‘Talk it over with us, Mum, your family, we’re in the next room alive.’
Margery sat up straight, cleared her throat and said, ‘Our parents brought us up to live by principles of right and wrong, but I know now that sometimes people can be wrong. They think what they’re doing is right, but it turns out it isn’t. You’ve got to be able to see things as they are, and then do what’s best. And so here I am and, as I see it, I’m expected to go against all my long-held principles about what’s decent and good, what’s responsible and right, in order to do what all those other people out there think is morally correct. They’re asking me to embrace my enemy for the sake of what’s “right”.’
She smoothed the wet handkerchief, folded it neatly and put it in her handbag but had to reach for some toilet paper to stop the tears falling onto her lap. Through the door Walter said, ‘Mumsy, you still in there?’
She rolled her eyes, ‘Tsk’, and reached for the doorknob, but she made herself stop and look again. ‘Go on, Margery, say it.’ She reached for more toilet paper and muffled another sob. ‘There’s a lot I didn’t know, but if I’m honest, I know now I have to look to myself to see why.’ Her breakfast rose into her throat, but she swallowed it down and took a deep breath. The she powdered her tender nose, adjusted her hat and smoothed her coat. ‘It all seems so clear now.’
They were relieved to see their mother, dry-eyed, standing as straight as her stoop would allow, her expression composed and somewhat preoccupied, as usual. Margery looked at her children. Usually they presented so well, but Walter’s hair was stringy and dangling from his bald patch, and Judith was wearing a faded tracksuit. Anita was sitting on the bed, her arms and legs crossed tightly, her knees jigging. Margery realised it was the perfect opportunity to be what everyone needed her to be. ‘What about your exam, Walter?’
Judith looked at her watch. ‘It just started.’
I’m glad they prevented me from jumping off the balcony, because I met Mrs Parsons’ son. He’s a nice-looking man, olive-skinned, got the tight, curly hair. I’ll say again that I’m not prejudice, but when he showed up at my door I assumed he was a God-botherer, so I held the screen door snib and was about to say, ‘I’m Jewish’ – it usually works – but he said, ‘I’m Samuel. Are you Mrs Blandon?’
When I said, ‘Yes,’ he looked as if he was about to cry, so of course I asked, ‘What’s happened? Is it Morris?’
‘No,’ he said, ‘it’s Samuel. Sam Parsons. You were my mother’s best friend.’
Well, you could have waved away a fly and I’d have toppled over. I had to take hold of the doorknob. ‘I tied her laces,’ I said. You know, Mrs Parsons always took an interest in my sewing when I showed her, always listened when I explained about the stitches and the different sorts of threads and linens. Of course, now I know I could have been more like a friend would have been – talked about the books she was interested in – but you live and learn. I gave Samuel Mrs Parsons’ watch. He was reluctant to have it but I said, ‘You should keep it, even though you can’t wear it. I gave my daughter my watch, and my pearls, and your mother’s watch ticked away on her wrist for all those years . . . just waiting until you came along for it.’
He started to cry when I said that.
Anyrate, Kevin gave him some photos of all the neighbours and the kids having fun in the street. There were swarms of kids playing in the street in those days. You don’t see them nowadays. I saw photos of Melbourne Cup parties and pub parties with Lance and Florence there, and all the neighbourhood plays Kevin put on. Even Faye and Joye were in some photos. They were big even back then.
That reminds me, we never heard another thing from Faye or Joye. Not a thing.
I was in some photos with Mrs Parsons next to me, or just bits of us: a leg or a foot, the side of her beret, my cardigan. There was a lovely shot of her and me standing together at her front gate. On the back of the photo it said, in Pat’s writing, ‘Princess Margery and Squigglehead, 1956’. It was taken during the Olympics. ‘The Friendly Games’, they called them. Of course, none of us could afford to go so we had our own Gold Street Olympics right here in the park. The kids had brick-throwing competitions, high jump, foot races up and down the street, Olympic cricket . . .
It was the life Samuel could have had.
‘I just turned sixty-three a few days ago,’ Samuel said. That would have been the card Mrs Parsons bought. He said he got a card from his mother every year.
That’s when Kevin asked about the rumours. ‘What was wrong with your mother; why did your father take you away?’
Samuel’s expression turned very embarrassed and sad, and he couldn’t look at us, but all he said was that it was family pressure. ‘People had attitudes we don’t find acceptable these days,’ he said, but he hastened to make clear that his father supported Mrs Parsons all his life, right up until only weeks before he died. That’d be the hundred dollars every month, I’d say. I suppose Samuel was torn between his family wishes and his mother. It goes without saying that it’s obviously a very real shame he left it for so long before he did something about it.
Anyrate, he’s going to renovate Mrs Parsons house and move in, so he says. Kevin’s volunteered to help him, though I don’t know when he’ll have the time because he’s joined a rowing club of late and he’s often up and away before sunrise.
Now that I’ve thought about things, Cecily, it’s as clear as the nose on my face that poor Mrs Parsons was treated dreadfully, simply because some people didn’t approve of her type.
Before Samuel left, he said, ‘I’m glad you’re still alive,’ and I said, ‘Probably only for a few mo
re years.’
But, you know, I intend to enjoy them as best I can.
There’s no point living for things we can’t have because you don’t get the life you could have.
Naturally, I’ve had to accept that Morris has made a life for himself overseas. He’s got his own family. They say they might be able to come back one day, but Ray tells me it’s tricky. I happened to overhear him chatting to Walter and Judith on the street one day, and they mentioned something about plastic surgery and second-hand passports.
I lament not having my wits about me for so long, but, Cecily, there are things to be said for not knowing the truth about some things. And since I’d been through it all again, told you everything, in the end I also came to this: basically, Florence Potter is a floozy and an adulteress, but she isn’t evil, or bad. So if I deny her refuge, then I am doing something bad, some might say evil. It’s the principle of the matter, so I’ve had to shelter my enemy for the sake of what’s right.
It’s like the death-penalty principle. If you agree with the death penalty then you’d have to agree to hang your own son, or let someone hang your nephew for doing something wrong. It makes you a killer.
I don’t need God to tell me what the right thing to do is. I’ve always had the wise words from the calendar, and I’ve tried to do the right thing, and although I suspect Judith might have tried to kill me, I must believe her when she says she wouldn’t want Charmaine killed, if you see the principle.
If the truth be known, I was never really fond of Barry, but Pud likes him, even though he’s an adulterer, and he said Judith was never ‘warm and tender’. Perhaps that’s not entirely her fault, and I can’t condemn Morris for having an illegitimate child any more than I can blame Anita for being one . . .
There was talk of selling my little house and buying me and old Forgetful Florence a little flat each, but selling my home to furnish her is just far too generous, and anyway, she’d probably burn herself to death. They’ve got her on a list for a nice home somewhere, but I’m warned it could take some time. We’ll see what winter brings. We’ve had some terrible flus these past years, and this house is draughty and damp when it rains, and she’s got the bad chest, being a smoker.
Anyrate, Judith’s used my house as security to get a loan for her gymnasium. Judith’s much better. After Barry left she was terrible for a while, but she’s come good. She looks marvellous, just marvellous, though the weight’s come back on, of course, but she carries it well, and when all is said and done she’s happier, and that’s the important thing, isn’t it? I still think it was all that grapefruit that gave her the rash, though she swears it was stress. I told her, ‘You’ve got to be happy in the now, you can’t just be happy in hindsight.’
Anyrate, there’s a boom in Boxercise, apparently, and her gymnasium is in an old warehouse down near Sydney Road. Judith Boyle – Fitness, Health and All Your Beauty Needs (Ladies Only). Walter helps out, and it’s wonderful for him as well. He failed the Basic Food Hygiene test – twice – but I’ll take the blame for that, because even though I was driven to the balcony, I could have been more considerate about the timing and his exam. He’s doing the course again.
The new couple living at Tony’s have complained about the noise and the drunks from the pub. They’re lobbying to have it closed. Florence wouldn’t sign their petition, and I didn’t either. How dare they move in and just think they can change things to suit themselves? Tyson upended their rubbish onto their car last night, which set their car alarm off, and then their house alarms went off. I see Tyson out there today, cutting down their new tree for his barbecue.
You should have seen the look on Pat’s face when I turned up to see her with Florence! Florence was just standing there in the day room, looking about as if she was seeing an elephant for the first time, when Pat pointed at me and said, ‘Did you come in her car?’
‘You lied to me, Pat Cruickshank,’ I said. ‘Kept secrets, for fifty years.’
‘It was the right thing,’ Kevin said. ‘Mum was in the middle. What you didn’t know didn’t hurt you, or Flossy, or the kids, or anyone.’
It’s a flawed principle, if you ask me. Anyrate, Florence pipes up and says, ‘You can’t kill a whale for swimming past, can you?’
Well, I’ve never heard that proverb before but I imagine what she was trying to say was that Pat was doing what she had to do to keep everyone swimming along, for the greater good. I could easily have said, ‘Shielding men from the effects of folly is to fill the world with fools,’ but I didn’t. You have to admit it did me no harm knowing nothing about Morris, did it?
Anyrate, Pat is the one in a nursing home now, and I’m still living in my own home, with her best friend! So ha-ha-har!
I just hope we don’t burn to death in our beds.
It is a responsibility looking after Florence, and a bit like living with a praying mantis. Nothing seems out of the ordinary, then all of a sudden I notice there’s a creature in the house. That said, we all know there were a lot of things . . . I just never noticed them.
All along Kevin knew everything, of course. Absolutely amazed, he was, the day he came in and saw Florence sitting there in Lance’s chair. Fifi hopped straight onto her lap, and Kevin shook his head and said, ‘I’d never have imagined this in a million years, Mrs B, that you would end up living with Flossy Potter.’
I said, ‘Never judge a book by its cover.’
Thanks go to Jenny Darling and all at Random House. Also thanks to my honest and dedicated readers: Terry, Natalie Warren, Mercy O’Meara and Sue Maslin. For their inside knowledge, nurses Hannah May Ham and Alicia Ham, and for his expert advice, Morgan McLay, and as always, for love and support, Ian McLay.
Thanks also to Vic Arts,
and The Victorian Writers’ Centre for the
‘Writing @ Rosebank’ fellowship
Rosalie Ham was born and raised in Jerilderie, New South Wales. She completed her secondary education at St Margaret’s School, Berwick, in 1972. After travelling and working at a variety of jobs (including aged care) for most of her twenties, Rosalie completed a Bachelor of Education majoring in Drama and Literature (Deakin University, 1989), and achieved a Master of Arts, Creative Writing (RMIT, Melbourne) in 2007. Her first novel, The Dressmaker, was published in 2000. Her second novel, Summer at Mount Hope, was published in 2005.
Rosalie has also had stories published in Meanjin, The Age, The Bulletin and Invisible Ink. When she is not writing, Rosalie teaches literature.
Thanks go to Jenny Darling and all at Random House. Also thanks to my honest and dedicated readers: Terry, Natalie Warren, Mercy O’Meara and Sue Maslin. For their inside knowledge, nurses Hannah May Ham and Alicia Ham, and for his expert advice, Morgan McLay, and as always, for love and support, Ian McLay.
Thanks also to Vic Arts,
and The Victorian Writers’ Centre for the
‘Writing @ Rosebank’ fellowship
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Version 1.0
There Should Be More Dancing
ePub ISBN 9781864711929
Copyright © Rosalie Ham, 2011
The moral right of the author has been asserted.
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First published by Vintage in 2011
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Ham, Rosalie.
There should be more dancing [electronic resource]/
Rosalie Ham.
ISBN 978 1 86471 192 9 (ebook)
A823.3
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