The Promise Seed

by Cass Moriarty

  Or the boy. Anything to do with the boy affects me. Funny, I never would have thought I’d have given a toss. Some skinny kid who steals other kids’ lunches, and ciggies off his mother’s boyfriends. But he’s gotten under my skin, that kid. Stolen into my heart and stolen a piece of it clean away.

  …

  Pushing fifty, I did an inexplicable thing. Headed south. To this day I can’t say why. Maybe I felt myself getting older and wanted to go back to where it all began before I got too old to do it. Truth is, around that time of my life I felt a bit adrift. Like a sail that had come unfurled in a strong wind, flapping about, untethered. I had no ties to speak of. No wife. Apparently no daughter. Parents and sister, all long dead. My friends had all gone on with their lives; they were having grandkids by that time, some of them. So I locked my little house and packed up the car I had at the time, a beat-up old Datsun 200B, and I headed down the Cunningham Highway.

  I remember I stopped at the Gap, Cunningham’s Gap, the highest spot en route. Beautiful place, up in the ranges. You can pull off the road next to the truckies’ rigs – them all sitting there like warts on the face of a princess, having their smoko – and you can take a walk. Which I did. Fresh, crisp mountain air, like a cold shower. And I remember the bellbirds. The sound of them calling to each other, their shrill cries whipping through the air and echoing off the cliffs. I walked for a good hour that day. I wended my way through the towering trees and forged through brush so green it was like a different planet. Flowers I didn’t recognise. Smells I couldn’t place. I even saw a pademelon. It was getting towards dusk and he was grazing along the path. The sound of me startled him and he looked up, straight at me for a moment, before bounding off into the undergrowth, leaving behind a small pile of brown pellets, the only proof he had ever been there at all.

  By the time I returned to the car, the truckies had mostly gone, although there were still two or three big rigs planted firm, no drivers in sight. Maybe they were sleeping in their cabs. I don’t know.

  I passed through Warwick. And Stanthorpe too. I stayed a couple of nights in one of the pubs in town. The second morning I was there I decided to go for a walk and see if I could find my old house, the one I’d lived in with Mum and Emily and, for a little while, with my father. I didn’t hold out much hope. I’d been such a little chap when all that happened and I got whisked away to the Home. There were so many new houses or renovations of old homes. Nothing familiar stood out. I doubted my chances of finding something that I’d lost so long ago, in another time, another world. Another life.

  And then I saw it. The huge spotted gum towering into the blue, standing sentry on a three-way corner. That tree brought back a rush of memories – its solid trunk, its branches wide and sheltering, higher even than I remembered. I could almost see the shadow of my six-year-old self hiding behind it, the sharp smell of gum sap, the whirr and clack and chirrup of cicadas rattling like dried beans in a shaker.

  I counted two houses up the street and stared.

  There it was. My old home. The same low stucco fence. Two leaning poles strung with washing line. Windows shuttered against the wind. A house full of secrets and lies. A house full of the ghost of my baby sister.

  The stories that place could whisper through its boards. The families it’s sheltered, the truths it could reveal. Tales settle in the landscape of those places and remain long after the characters have gone.

  I stood there for quite a while. No-one was about. I thought about knocking on the door, but what would I say? In the end it was a house, only a house. A shell. Its inhabitants been and gone, their stories replaced by new people, new families. Maybe if I kept my distance, whatever bad things had happened in that place would remain only in my memory.

  And so I moved on.

  In Toowoomba I found my way to the workers’ cottage that served as the Historical Society – four or five rooms laid out with dusty record books and glass cases full of farming implements and common household objects from years ago. But it was the walls of photographs that interested me. Every available space on every wall in every room was taken up with black-and-white enlargements from as early as the turn of the century. I found what I was looking for – three photographs of the Home. The first was a close-up of the building itself. It was as I remembered it: the grey stone walls, the enormous willow with its curtain of leaves like a waterfall, the monochrome tones emphasising the dreariness of the place. The second was shot through the bars of the fence into the grounds. The last picture showed a smiling Mr McCready in one of the boys’ rooms, one hand pointing to an iron bed made up with stiff white sheets, and the other gesturing as if to show the spaciousness and comfort offered by his establishment. I felt myself smiling right back at him. He hadn’t been a bad guy, Mr McCready. The only male role model I had as a boy. Seeing him standing there, in his ancient suit with his hair all slicked back, I got a feeling of nostalgia, like I might have been looking at a picture of my own father.

  …

  Determined little bugger, that kid. Twice now he’s rescued me from the brink – once from the pneumonia and now from myself. Rescued me from myself. I didn’t want to be rescued, not this time, that’s for sure. I wanted to curl up and forget, lost in the fumes of alcohol and dreams – or nightmares, more like. But that kid, well, like I say, he’s a determined little bugger.

  Just as well, I suppose. We had a game of chess this morning and, if I’m honest, I quite enjoyed it. Truth be told I’m pretty glad he rescued me.

  Life’s a long, hard road, but that doesn’t have to mean you give up and lie down when things get stony. I mean, have a gander at the kid. He hasn’t got an easy life, I know that now, for certain. But I never hear him complaining.

  So I think maybe I’ve learnt a thing or three over these last few days.

  About the boy.

  And about myself.

  34

  The ache sprang from deep between his shoulders and extended along each arm. When he lifted the heavy bucket, or brought the hoe down hard on the loamy soil, or even stretched upwards in an attempt to ease the strain, his muscles burned with fatigue, screamed at him to stop. But he didn’t break pace for a moment. He was too happy.

  The soil writhed with worms and emitted a rich smell of chicken manure and trapped sunlight. The two had worked side by side for most of the morning, talking only when necessary. Pass me that bucket, would ya? Or Could you hand me the rake please? Or I think this bit here could do with some more water. The bare bones of gardening conversation.

  Prickling heat and sweat collected under the boy’s hat and through his hair, tickling his ears and dripping from his temples. He could taste salt when he licked his lips. The old man stopped often. Sometimes he leant on his shovel and stared at nothing in particular that the boy could see. Sometimes he turned on the water and lifted the hose to the boy’s face; the water was cold and refreshing. The boy could see the weariness in his eyes, the age spots dappling the backs of his hands, the trembling as he lifted the shovel. But he was here, the old man was out here in the sunshine, and the two of them were digging in the garden, and they were happy.

  Over jam sandwiches, a cup of tea for the man and a tumbler of lemonade for the boy, the two surveyed their work. Raised mounds ran the length of the neat garden, sugarcane mulch filled in the valleys, and the perimeter was lined with protective chicken wire. It was ready.

  The old man pushed his hat back on his head and wiped his forehead on his shirtsleeve. He hawked a ball of phlegm from the back of his throat and spat onto the grass.

  This grime gets up my nose and in my throat like nobody’s business. You’d think I’d been eating the stuff. So, what are we going to plant?

  The boy didn’t hesitate. Beans. Silverbeet. Tomatoes, the normal ones and those little cherry tomatoes too. Lettuce. And shallots and onions and potatoes. And maybe some of those other fancy lettuces, you know, like rocket a
nd those Chinese ones you get in supermarkets. Oh, and carrots, definitely carrots. Hey, maybe we could get some of those purple carrots? You ever seen them, purple carrots? They’re really cool. And what about chillies? I like chillies, but not too hot. And herbs … parsley and basil and coriander and all of those ones. And—

  The old man interrupted him with a barking laugh, his palm held high. All right, all right, stop! Enough already! We’ve got a small backyard plot here, not a farmstead. I don’t think we can plant all those things, not right away anyway. What about you pick a couple of your favourites and we’ll start with them and see how we go? Don’t want to get ahead of ourselves here.

  The boy nodded sagely, as if deliberating on this wisdom.

  I’ve been googling, he said with a self-conscious grin. Do you know how many gardening websites there are? There must be a hundred different vegies. More than a hundred. A thousand.

  He looked up at the old man from beneath his lashes.

  Broccoli and eggplant. Can’t forget those.

  The old man groaned and lay back on the grass in mock exhaustion.

  The boy jumped up and did a whooping victory dance around the garden, frightening a bird from the mango tree and scaring the chooks into a cacophony of squawking.

  35

  Hard to believe it took Pete and me as long as it did to work it out. And when we finally did, we were that staggered you could’ve knocked us for six. People always talk about it being a small world – six degrees of separation and all that – but still, it was a helluva surprise. I mean, we’d worked together all those years. Drank together at the pub. Shared the odd meal.

  Just never talked much about our families, I suppose. I certainly hadn’t.

  Wasn’t until Pete’s brother died a few years ago, and we got to pondering about how many of our generation were falling off the perch, that we got onto the topic of how people were generally living longer, and Pete mentioned how his Aunt Daisy had passed away not too long before at the grand old age of ninety-six, and how she was the youngest of six girls, and wasn’t that something, a family of six girls? Not too many families around today with six kids, let alone all girls – it was a different time back then. And something in my mind turned over, like I was peering through smoked glass and couldn’t quite work out what was there. Something about the name Daisy.

  It’s a nice name for a girl, Daisy. Coming back into fashion, I said. And the smokiness cleared a little. You know, I reckon I might have had an aunt named Daisy too.

  Could be, said Pete. Popular name back then.

  I rubbed the sandpapery stubble on my chin. I seem to recall my mum had a lot of sisters, I said. My mum was June, and there was Kath … and I’m sure there was a Daisy …

  Pete stared at me over the rim of his beer glass. He placed it down, slowly.

  And Elizabeth and Eunice, he added. And my mother, Patricia.

  We stared, our bleary eyes trying to look back in time and make sense of what we were saying. He mentioned a few place names and gradually it began to dawn on us.

  You’re June’s boy, he said in astonishment.

  Peter, I said. Peter. You kept rabbits. And … Harold? Arnold? Who died in the war.

  Harold. My oldest brother, Harold. Died in ’41. Pacific.

  Well I’ll be, I said. Peter. Peter with the rabbits.

  And you’re June’s boy.

  At that moment the reminiscing grew quiet. I could see it all playing out in Pete’s mind. What he could remember of his childhood. His little cousin from Stanthorpe.

  June’s boy.

  I could see him joining the dots.

  You had a sister … didn’t you have a sister who died as a baby?

  I took a big gulp of beer and the glass slammed down on the table heavier than I meant it to. Beer sloshed over the side and onto my hand.

  I wiped my fingers on my trousers.

  I did, I said. I had a sister. Emily. Died when she was a little ’un.

  I was wondering how much he would remember. How much he’d been told, all those years ago.

  He rubbed his eyes, trying to dredge up the memories.

  I seem to recall, he said. Some tragedy. Family tragedy. I remember Mother was upset. And her sister Kath went down to help. And then the baby died and you were … you were sent away. I remember now, you were sent away and we were told we were not to ask about you again.

  I’d forgotten, he said. So many years ago, and I’d forgotten.

  Yeah, well, no sense dragging up the past, I said. I waved at the waitress, tried to get her attention. Anything to take the spotlight off me.

  He slapped his hand against his leg.

  Your father, he passed away during the war too, didn’t he? Like Harold. I remember now. That’s why Aunt Kath went to help. And I seem to recall your mother getting remarried.

  I concentrated on my drink.

  Did she? he asked. Remarry?

  I raised my eyes to him with as level a gaze as I could muster.

  I don’t know, I said. I haven’t seen her since I was six years old.

  He gave me a searching look then, but he pried no more. Merely nodded, like I’d answered his question.

  He covered my hand with his own and I realised I was shaking.

  Steady on, he said. All a long time ago now, mate.

  Felt so peculiar, his hand on mine like that. An unexpected familiarity. Men our age don’t touch much as a general rule, and it had been a good few years since I’d been with a woman.

  It occurred to me that this particular man – Pete, my friend, my cousin – was the first blood relative I’d sat with in almost seventy years. I don’t mind saying, fair sucked the breath out of me for a moment.

  What if he knew? What if he remembered – if not now, then surely later – what had happened back then? What if the story had survived in family lore all these years? I wondered what he knew, what he had been told, what he remembered, and I thought: What must he think of me?

  I’ve gotta go, I said. I pushed back my chair and fished some notes out of my wallet. Put them on the table. My hand was still shaking. The blood was thrumming in my eardrums.

  I’ve gotta go, I said again. I could hear Pete talking, something about what a remarkable coincidence and how come we’d never worked it out before now, but I couldn’t comprehend him over the pounding of my heart. All I knew was I needed to get away before he asked me anything else about Emily.

  …

  Pete was a good friend. He left me alone for a few days and then when he did mention it – us – again, he was as considerate and charitable as I could have hoped for.

  Look, mate, he said. Whatever happened then was a long time ago. Obviously it’s something you don’t want to talk about. He waited. I nodded. And that’s fine by me. But I’m so glad to have discovered we’re related. All right?

  I nodded again, relieved.

  From then on, Pete would make a point of telling people that we were cousins, but that’s as far as it went. Said we’d gone thirty years without setting eyes on each other, and that we’d then worked side by side at The Tele for many more years and still hadn’t discovered we were related, and how about that. He seemed proud of me, proud to lay claim to me.

  And that wasn’t something I’d ever felt before.

  …

  A few months after that, he took me for a beer, said he wanted to talk to me about something.

  Now I know you don’t like talking about the past, he began, but I got to thinking. I’ve been going through a box of Mother’s things. Old papers and whatnot. Should have probably thrown it all out years ago, the kids keep telling me to, but you know what a hoarder Sandra was and I can’t bring myself to do it. Anyway, I found a few bits and pieces that I think you should have. If you’d like them. I think they belong to you.

  He pushed ac
ross an old shoebox and a tattered envelope.

  He hesitated, as if he wasn’t sure how to say the next thing that was on his mind.

  I’m not sure why Mother had all this stuff. There’s a whole collection of things from all her sisters, especially after they’d … you know … He looked awkward. I mean, we’re in our seventies, aren’t we, mate. I assume …

  No need to state the bloody obvious, I said. I can assume as well as you can. But I’ve never been told, so I don’t know the details. And to tell the truth, I don’t need to know. What does it matter, now? After all this time?

  If it had happened years earlier, I’m not sure I would have taken the news as well as I did. But as it was, I’d marked my seventieth birthday and I finally felt – despite all the odds – that I’d made old bones. I began to think of the past as just that – past. Gone. Finished. Unable to be changed or undone or bettered. I can’t say I was too upset or emotional or even very surprised. After all, it didn’t matter much anymore. They were all dead, or as good as. Nothing to be done about it now.

  Later, at home, in private, I went through the box. Mostly junk. Some old jewellery that had blackened with age, a couple of old-fashioned keys, a cut-glass bottle, a pewter vase and a broken watch.

  And the envelope.

  The envelope contained a few papers and a photograph. The seal had long since come unstuck and I suppose Pete had read the contents before he passed them on to me.

  But he had the decency never to ask me about it. Never mentioned it again. Like I said, he was a good friend.

  The photograph, of course, was of me. I must have been about three years old. I’m standing ramrod straight and I’ve got one of those fake smiles plastered on that kids get when they’re told to smile or else. I’m in short pants and there’s a kitten curled up on my left foot. Funny, I don’t ever remember having a kitten. But I recognise the ivy on the wall behind me, and the cross-hatched door, and the bit of driveway where the policeman slipped in the slush all those years ago.