The Day They Shot Edward

by Wendy Scarfe

  To each fresh exhortation their audience in mock agreement yelled back: ‘Hallelujah, brother, hallelujah!’ or ‘Bless you, brother, bless you.’

  Some raised their arms and shook their hands above their heads and rolled their eyes, slapping each other on the back and roaring with laughter.

  ‘The flames of hell will swallow the unbeliever!’ bellowed the speaker.

  ‘Ooh!’ roared the crowd.

  ‘’Ow ’orrible!’

  ‘Ooh! I can feel them now, scorching my toes.’ And several hopped about. The crowd roared again.

  ‘Believe in Him!’ chanted the speaker.

  ‘Hallelujah, brother,’ the crowd chorused.

  ‘And you’ll find Life Everlasting.’

  ‘Glory be,’ the crowd returned.

  Gran laughed. Matthew listened uneasily. Would someone mention the little grey room on the verandah, the nothingness, the wasteland? He knew creatures did not return from death, but where did they go? What did ‘repent’ mean? He had heard Gran tell his mother that ‘she would repent it’ but the ‘it’ remained a mystery. His mother had not treated ‘it’ seriously. He screwed up his face trying to imagine fires burning in nothing. It was not possible, fires burned trees or logs or paper. Was the man right? Could they feed on people? He shuddered.

  ‘Gran,’ he asked, ‘can fires burn people?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘When they’re dead?’

  ‘When they’re cremated.’

  ‘What does cremated mean?’

  ‘When bodies are burned, not buried.’

  ‘Do they go on burning?’

  ‘Only till there’s nothing left to burn, I suppose.’

  ‘Can people be nothing?’

  ‘Eventually.’

  ‘Will there be fires in nothing?’

  ‘Fires can’t burn in nothing. They need oxygen.’

  ‘Then there won’t be fires like that man says?’

  ‘What man? The preacher?’ Gran laughed again. ‘Of course not. His religion is make-believe.’

  Some speakers, like his teacher, trumpeted loyalty, devotion and sacrifice for the Empire and others shouted that the Prince of Wales was a pretty parasite, sucking the blood of the poor. Some brayed about the twin evils of drinking and smoking and the general corruption of the world because of alcohol and tobacco—a fool at one end, a fire at the other—and they pointed accusing fingers at the crowd. Some railed against the greed of the squatters, bellowing for land taxes.

  And then there was Edward.

  It seemed to Matthew that Edward on his box reached miles into the sky and Matthew, if he stood close, had to look up and up and up to see the thrust of his chin and Edward’s legs: twin pillars planted slightly apart and balanced a little forward, his weight on the balls of his feet. He looked like a statue of a Greek god in Matthew’s school primer. Hercules, perhaps, the strongest of the heroes. Or Atlas, powerful enough to hold up the sky if he lifted up his hands and balanced it there. Or perhaps he might throw it to the crowd, throw the sky joined to the earth and bowl them all over like ninepins.

  He understood no more of what Edward said than he did of the other speakers. He took individual words home in his head and rolled them around like marbles in his hand. When Edward spoke of the Wobblies Matthew wanted to laugh at the word but laughter was not appropriate. Edward did not even smile when he said it. Gran didn’t laugh either. She watched Edward and her mouth puckered as it did when she was thinking.

  Edward didn’t shout but his voice boomed out of his chest like a wave forced through a narrow cleft.

  ‘Parliaments—anachronistic survivals of the feudal era,’ he boomed. ‘Executive committees of the capitalist class, geographical electorates where workers roost at night. cartwheel administration, industrial unions—ownership, ownership, ownership.’

  Matthew sang the words in his head. He rearranged what he could remember: ‘Anachronistic geographical union—union, onion, union.’ He played with the familiar sounds, adding layers of syllables, peeling them away, in safe domestic allusions. ‘Anarchist.’ He knew that word but he didn’t like it. He waved to Edward but Edward did not see him.

  ‘Gawd, ’e’s swallered a bloomin’ dictionary.’

  The crowd laughed.

  ‘Bolshie!’

  ‘Twelve of you going to gaol, and good enough.’

  ‘Bloody arsonists.’

  ‘No! They were not! They were framed!’

  ‘Who by?’

  ‘The Minister of Whore, of course,’ a wit jibed.

  ‘Like the politician’s wife,’ another mocked. The crowd hooted and cheered.

  ‘The police framed them!’

  ‘Police? Garbage!’

  ‘Where’s your evidence?’

  ‘Yeah, show us your evidence.’

  ‘There is evidence and we’ll get more.’

  ‘Sure, mate. I’ll bet you do.’

  ‘Manufacture it more likely.’

  The interjections came from all sections of the crowd. Matthew twisted this way and that trying to see the speakers, shocked that they should be so rude to Edward.

  ‘You’re lying.’ This time the speaker stood beside Matthew.

  ‘No!’ He plucked the speaker’s sleeve. ‘No, Edward never lies, never!’

  The speaker looked down and grinned. ‘Gawd, he’s just a kid.’ And he picked Matthew up and held him aloft. ‘He supports you, bolshie. There’s hope for you yet.’ The crowd applauded boisterously and Matthew struggled.

  ‘Give him a few years and he’ll carry the red flag for you.’

  ‘He won’t be dead in this rotten war like all the exploited working people of this generation,’ Edward thundered. ‘To arms! Capitalists, parsons, politicians, landlords, newspaper editors, and other stay-at-home patriots. Your country needs you in the trenches.’

  ‘Put him down, young man, at once!’ Gran’s voice sliced through their buffoonery. Matthew, on the ground, red-faced, struggled back into his disordered clothes. His tormentor, with a good-natured smirk, offered him a penny. He reached for it but Gran smacked his hand.

  ‘He doesn’t take money from strangers.’

  ‘OK, Grandma, OK. Meant no harm.’

  ‘Of course not.’ The second voice beside them was quieter, more refined, but less friendly. Matthew glanced up and saw again the man in the cigar-brown suit. He shrank a little closer to Gran who exuded suspicion.

  ‘Do you know my grandson?’

  ‘We’ve met. Haven’t we, Matthew?’

  Matthew took refuge in silence. He looked unblinkingly at the stranger. But this man did not laugh or giggle or make some excusatory comment, such as ‘kids have no pretences’. He smiled but his eyes fixed on Matthew’s face were cold.

  ‘He knows Mother,’ Matthew answered evasively.

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘The very pretty “widow”.’

  ‘She’s not a widow, young man.’

  ‘But who can deny that she’s pretty?’

  Gran didn’t bother to answer. ‘Come, Matthew, your mother will be waiting.’

  ‘Can I speak to Edward first?’

  ‘No, not today. He’ll be busy.’

  ‘He doesn’t look busy,’ said Matthew.

  ‘No,’ said the stranger. ‘He doesn’t, does he? He might like to talk with you.’

  ‘Edward always likes to talk to me.’

  ‘When he visits you …’

  ‘And he likes to talk to Gran. Edward’s our friend.’

  ‘That’s enough, Matthew. Strangers don’t need to know our business.’ And she held him firmly so that he had to follow her.

  ‘I don’t like that man,’ he told her.

  ‘Nor do I. His collar’s too tight.’

  ‘And he has a very, very tiny little laugh.’

  ‘How frightful.’ Gran laughed but Matthew noticed that when she glanced back over her shoulder her mouth puckered again.

  A small group of men had started
singing. Matthew knew the words of ‘Onward Christian Soldiers’ but these words were different.

  Onward Christian soldiers, duty’s way is plain.

  Slay your Christian neighbours or by them be slain.

  Pulpiteers are spouting effervescent swill.

  God alone is calling you to rob and rape and kill.

  Edward joined in the song. His opposition countered with ‘Rule Britannia’. Singing became shouting, pushing and punching, and Edward, dragged from his box, disappeared into the brawl.

  ‘Gran!’ Matthew protested as she pulled him away. ‘It’s Edward …’

  ‘No, Matthew, come. Edward can look after himself.’ He followed, head turned trying to find Edward in the scrum.

  It was in the middle of their arithmetic lesson that Mr Werther opened the door to their classroom and entered with short bouncing steps. He bobbed down the aisle to the dais, beaming at the children as he passed and making mysterious pointing movements at the strangely shaped case he carried. He smiled at the teacher, who looked down on him from her place on the dais. She was a tall woman and Matthew was sure that a little piccolo man like Mr Werther would see her wide bulbous base thinning to a tiny narrow head. She was always distorted like this to him.

  When Mr Werther reached the dais he hopped on to it and laid his case on the wooden table where Miss Loyal Empire Woman kept her mark book and strap. He edged the strap to the side of the table with his case and then smiled again at the teacher. By a slight body movement she indicated acknowledgement of him; by the slightest lift to one shoulder she suggested her necessary tolerance of his eccentricity. Her smile was little more than a grimace and the corners of her mouth twitched contemptuously.

  ‘Miss Pilkington, children, today we will have a little happiness, yes? Now what do you think I have here?’ He waved a magician hand over the case. Pilkington. It tickled Matthew’s tongue. It was quite a nice name—a light, bright stutter. She should have had a heavy name, a name with sounds that crushed everything they fell upon. Or a snarly name that twisted the tongue into a tight knot. Pilkington was wrong unless you tittered it behind your hand because you were too afraid to speak it.

  ‘I will show you, yes?’ He searched for a response but although the faces in front of him looked eager, mouths remained tightly shut and eyes wary. Mr Werther sighed.

  ‘Do you see this funny chap, shaped like a pear, like me?’ And he patted his waist. ‘I wonder what is inside? We will look, yes? You and me?’ He nodded and a few tentative nods imitated him. ‘Good, good. Now we look.’

  He undid the clasps on the side of the case and reverently raised a violin from the green felt bed. The wood of the instrument glowed a soft golden-brown. He plucked a string and the sound shot into the spaces of the room. He plucked several strings and the single explosions became a runnel of colour mysteriously linked together, each tone separate yet each part of the whole. He cupped the violin under his chin like a loving mother nestling her babe and caressed the bow across the strings. Now there were no single explosions. The sounds melted together, mingling and spreading, singing even after the bow had stopped.

  ‘It is beautiful, yes?’ And he nodded again.

  Matthew nodded in response and smiled at Mr Werther, at one with his pleasure.

  ‘Ah, my little friend Matthew. You like it. You would like to try? Eh?’

  Matthew hesitated. Miss Loyal Empire Woman was watching him. She stood in the shadow and the light from the window picked out the bones of her face, peeling away the flesh. He couldn’t leave his seat. Something reached out from her and leaned on his shoulders, pushing him down.

  ‘Come, Matthew. You are shy? Eh?’ Mr Werther, all spontaneous joy, bounced across the dais and down the aisle. He handed the violin to Matthew and with encouraging chirrups slipped it under his chin, adjusted his hand to support the instrument and handed him the bow.

  ‘Now Matthew will make some music. Put the edge of the bow against the strings and draw it across. Tenderly. You must love it. Music grows with love. Like people, you know. People are like music. Love makes them grow. Tenderly, Matthew, gently.’

  The violin felt warm in Matthew’s hand, like a tree on a hot day. It was warm, growing wood. He tilted the bow and holding it as steady as he could drew it across the strings. It sang a medley of sounds, some sweet, some jarring.

  ‘They don’t melt.’ His disappointment echoed in the silence of the room.

  ‘Not yet but you will see. We will make them “melt” as you call it. They will all sing together. It takes practice, Matthew, but you have taken the first step, yes?’ Reluctantly Matthew returned the violin.

  ‘Now I will play you a story. You have stories in English. Miss Pilkington reads you stories. All children like stories? Eh? In my country we have many stories—legends they are called, because my country is very old. You, too, will have legends, one day.

  ‘But music has stories, too. Mr Schubert wrote songs and his music tells a story. It is about a little trout. You know little trout? Eh? Perhaps not. A little fish—a little fish we will call it. And about a fisherman. He wants to catch the little fish. It is a happy day. The sun shines. The brook, the stream—creek you call it—hurries along jumping over the rocks, running smooth in deep pools. The sun glints through the willows, or the gum trees. The fish is happy. He swims about flicking his little tail. But the man, it is sad, he wants to catch him, to end his life. The man and the fish they struggle together. It is sad because the man will win. Men usually win. He catches the little fish and it no longer flicks his little tail in the water, and the man he has what he wants. But it is sad.’

  He stopped, no longer beaming, and he drew the bow across the violin so that a thin, soft wail filled the room. Its desolateness made Matthew’s throat ache.

  ‘So sad,’ Mr Werther whispered. ‘But I should play it all, shouldn’t I? Today we were to have some happiness.’ And he filled the room with images of the stream bounding over the rocks, the silver frisking fish, the angler impatient, the crescendo of drama when the captured fish gasped on the bank, the final sadness.

  Matthew saw it all and he understood. It was the same when he caught yabbies.

  ‘Now you will draw a picture for Miss Pilkington. On your slates. Whatever you like—about the man and the little fish. So beautiful the music. You will remember as you draw. Mr Schubert would have liked to see your pictures. You can imagine that he is coming to look at them. He will say to Miss Pilkington: “What lovely drawings. I will collect them and take them back to Heaven with me and prop them up in God’s room so that He is reminded of how beautiful music is.”

  ‘Mr Schubert would like to see them because he was a lonely man. He didn’t have many friends. That is sad? Eh? Not to have friends. Only a very few were kind to him. They were called his “Schubertianer”. But you know, musicians can have friends when they are dead. And that is wonderful, to have friends forever. And you can all be his little Schubertianer.’

  Everything inside Matthew softened and let go, like when he held out his arms to Gran and she wrapped him in a hug so warm that their bodies melted together. He shut his eyes feeling the warmth jostle the shadows from the corners of the room and chase them down the long rafters of the ceiling. But it did not touch Miss Loyal Empire Woman, her coldness spread until it had filled the vacuum of Mr Werther’s departure.

  ‘We will have no German pictures here,’ she grated. ‘No German spies either. Take out your primers. Read the story of how Sir Francis Drake destroyed the Spanish Armada. Then draw a picture of that great battle. Sir Francis Drake was a loyal Englishman, not like some Hun-loving boys.’ Her eyes clawed Matthew’s face. ‘Some boys and their anarchist friends who sabotage our war effort on the waterfront.’

  Gran needed help with the garden. Edward was coming and he was to lunch with them. Matthew’s happiness roared through him like one of the new motor cars, all red and glittering brass. Everything shone and shimmered, neither tired nor tarnished from the day bef
ore. Marigolds bordering the path were bright as shredded suns. The brilliant light hurt his eyes and he sought the sanctuary of shadows where mosses sucked the morning moisture.

  Edward arrived at ten. He had attached a hessian bag to the crossbar of his bicycle and in it he had a present for each of them. For Matthew he brought Mark Twain’s Tom Sawyer, for Gran a collection of poems by Rabindrinath Tagore, and for Mother a small rosewood box inlaid with ivory and slivers of tinted wood. When Matthew looked at the design he saw that it was a picture of an Indian lady sitting on a rock while a deer calmly nibbled her fingers. Mother held it in both hands cupping the ends so that her fingertips would not smear the surface. Gently she lifted the lid. Inside was a serviette ring of scented wood carved into twists of leaves and flowers. It breathed out a sweetness of honey darkened by wood and sharpened by the astringency of herbs.

  ‘It’s sandalwood,’ his mother said. ‘From India.’ She ran her finger over the pattern on the box. ‘Does it have a story?’

  ‘The Indian hawker told me that it is Shakuntala sending a message to her lover through the deer.’

  ‘Oh,’ Margaret said. ‘Oh.’ And although her head was bent over her gift Matthew saw the back of her neck change from its usual creaminess to a faint pink.

  ‘It’s lovely, Edward.’ Gran’s firm appreciation routed the emotions scuffling around the room.

  ‘Lovely, Edward. Thank you,’ said his mother. ‘We didn’t expect presents, Matthew, did we? Today we are all going to be bally gardeners. And we’ll have a party, too.’

  Matthew, responding to this sudden gaiety in his mother, snatched first at her hand and then at one of Edward’s, a link between them. He jumped up and down shouting: ‘Bally gardeners! Bally gardeners!’

  They laughed together. Gran at the table placing a cloth over the fresh scones laughed too but there was a gap, like an echo, that takes its reality from something not its own. Edward said the lettuces needed manure so he and Matthew had better put on old togs and clean out the fowlyard.

  ‘And I must find some old togs, too. I shall be a farmer’s maid today in faded cotton skirt and bonnet. Come, Matthew, and help me choose,’ said his mother.