by Maris Morton
Scribe Publications
A DARKER MUSIC
Maris Morton was born in 1938 and currently lives in Uki in rural NSW. She has worked in various jobs around Australia, including as an English teacher, shearers’ cook, shed hand, artist, art restorer and director of an art gallery. A Darker Music is her first novel.
A
Darker
Music
Maris Morton
Scribe Publications Pty Ltd
PO Box 523
Carlton North, Victoria, Australia 3054
Email: [email protected]
First published by Scribe 2010
Copyright © Maris Morton 2010
All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise) without the prior written permission of the publishers and the author of this book.
Typeset in 12.5/17.5 pt Garamond by the publishers.
Printed and bound in Australia by Griffin Press. Only wood grown from sustainable regrowth forests is used in the manufacture of paper found in this book.
National Library of Australia
Cataloguing-in-Publication data
Morton, Maris, 1938.
A Darker Music.
9781921640650 (pbk.)
A823.4
Scribe Publications gratefully acknowledges the assistance of the Cultural Fund of the Copyright Agency Limited, for sponsoring the 2010 CAL Scribe Fiction Prize.
www.scribepublications.com.au
The man that hath no music in himself,
Nor is not moved with concord of sweet sounds,
Is fit for treasons, stratagems and spoils;
The motions of his spirit are dull as night,
And his affections dark as Erebus.
Let no such man be trusted.
— William Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice
Contents
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
Acknowledgements
1
THE YOUNG FELLOW OUTSIDE THE FRONT DOOR was staring at something across the street, jingling keys in his pocket. His dark hair was glossy and beautifully styled. She could see a Gucci label on the back pocket of his jeans, his sweater looked like cashmere, and when he turned around his face was more like that of a model than a farmer.
‘Mrs Lanyon?’ His brown eyes glanced at her, then quickly away. He didn’t smile.
Mary let her own welcoming smile fade. ‘That’s right. Mary Lanyon. You must be Martin Hazlitt?’
‘Yeah. You ready?’ He started back towards the gleaming Mercedes parked at the kerb.
‘Yes, sure.’ He didn’t offer to help with her luggage so she took the initiative. ‘Can you give me a hand?’
Her bags were ready inside the door and she passed the first of them to him. He seemed disconcerted but took it, then the next, carrying them out to the car. He wedged them into the boot and got in the driver’s seat, leaving Mary to fetch the rest.
During the drive to the airfield at Jandakot, Martin didn’t speak. When he ignored Mary’s opening conversational gambit, she sat back, puzzled by his silence but content to enjoy the luxury of being driven in the Merc, with its scent of new leather.
The prospect of working on a famous Merino stud was an exciting one. She’d worked on farms before, but never on anything so grand, or so far from the city. To be travelling there in the owner’s small plane seemed like the height of glamour. That the man who’d be flying the plane had turned out to be so good-looking was simply the icing on the cake.
By the time the Piper had taxied down the runway and climbed into the air, Mary was brimming with happy anticipation, her mind buzzing with questions, but Martin still responded with stony silence. Once clear of the suburbs, they flew over the endless forested catchment, where there was nothing much to see. In frustration, she watched the dials swing their needles and tried to interpret the messages they were sending, but after a while she had to admit that she couldn’t make any sense of it and gave that up, too. Gradually, the warmth of the sun flowing in through the canopy and the drone of the engine combined to send her into a headachy doze.
She was roused by a change in the sound of the engine. As she opened her eyes, her heart thumped in panic. Then she realised from the slanted horizon and the pressure in her ears that Martin was bringing the Piper around in a slow tilting curve, losing height. Her ears popped, and she swallowed, leaning sideways into the safety harness to press her cheek against the cold perspex of the window, straining to take in as much as she could of the place that would be her home for the next few months.
The earth lay like a rumpled carpet, fading into a distant haze. There was a scattering of scrub and denser patches of bigger, greyish trees that were probably eucalypts. Each paddock was outlined with a corduroy strip of ploughed earth, which looked like a child’s crayon line, never exactly straight, and as they came closer to the ground she could see that the greens of the paddocks were each subtly different. And coming into view on the far horizon — could it be the ocean, that faint glimmer trembling in the blue haze? They weren’t far from the south coast, so it could be. And what was that? That pale blue hump, like the pallid spectre of a brontosaurus, browsing peacefully in the misty distance? Could it be a mountain? There were more of them, a whole herd of them, fading to invisibility along the horizon. She felt a stirring of childish excitement and turned to ask Martin about the humps, but his eyes were intent on the instruments, and he wouldn’t have been able to hear her anyway over the noise of the engine.
The lower they flew, the brighter green the ground became. It was the kind of lushness she’d expect to see in England or Europe at the height of spring, not here, in the sunburnt country; not even after the autumn rains. As they banked away from the mountains, if that’s what they were, a collection of buildings that must be Downe came into view. Some of the corrugated roofs were bright silver, some rusty grey, others the dark red of old blood, nestled among a tapestry of trees and bushes, a tracery of tracks, more like a village than her idea of a farm. She could see no town, no sealed road.
Then the Piper was rushing in to land in a field of grass, blown flat in the wind. The wheels bumped on the ground and the little plane slowed and taxied up to a corrugated-iron building.
Mary unfastened her seatbelt and flexed her cramped legs. These little planes weren’t built for comfort. She stretched her arms and looked at her watch. Yes, almost two hours: a long time in such a confined space, although it was partly her own fault because she’d brought such a bulk of baggage that some of it had had to be wedged under her feet.
Everything was as vibrantly green as it had looked from the air. The buildings, except for the hangar, were hidden behind a belt of trees. Across an expanse of grass, a group of sheep stood watching. Were these some of the famous Downe Merinos? But, no: these had brownish faces and she knew enough to understand that they must be some other kind. It hadn’t occurred to her that there would be other breeds of sheep here.
When Martin opened the cabin door, a gust of icy wind speared into the cockpit. She gasped and reached for the down parka she’d taken off in the stuffy cabin. She waited for Martin to offer to help her out, but he simply walked off, leaving her to slide across into his empty seat and let her feet drop to the wing. The wind drilled through her clothes; the skin on her arms contracted into goosebumps. She pulled on the parka, zipping the front and tugging the hood up over her head, then stood on the wing and contemplated the drop to the ground. Thanking providence that she’d worn jeans, cursing her short legs, and glad that Martin was nowhere to be seen, she jumped down.
The wind was sending leaves and shreds of dry grass skittering along the ground. One of the sheep looked at her and stamped its feet. It was much bigger than she’d expected, big enough to knock her over if it had a mind to. A bank of clouds was moving up from the horizon and would soon cover the sun. Mary tucked her hair into the hood of her parka and began dragging her baggage out of the plane.
Martin came back driving a dusty utility. He waited till she’d finished before reaching for his own bags, then stood back and watched while Mary struggled to heft her mismatched baggage onto the tray of the ute.
‘Like something out of one of those refugee camps,’ he said, indicating her baggage.
Mary gritted her teeth. In other circumstances, she might have laughed. There was a grain of truth in what he’d said, though: she’d chosen the ill-assorted baggage not as a fashion statement but to squeeze into the interior space of the Piper. She never travelled without her feather pillows, and her knives and cooking essentials, and winter clothes were bulky. She shrugged, hoisted another bag up, shuffling it against the back of the cab, hoping none of them would be bounced out. The vehicle smelt of dog and sheep and dust.
Now that she’d arrived Mary wondered again about the family. It was Martin’s father who had made the arrangements with the agency, but Mary hadn’t met him. Mrs Hazlitt had been sick, that was all Mary knew about her. Her brief was to keep the household running smoothly till Mrs Hazlitt was ready to take over again, which they expected would be in another two or three months.
But for now, with the dusty windscreen streaked with rain, the ute bumping over the dirt track and the noise of its motor no less insistent than that of the Piper, Mary told herself to sit tight, wait and see. She was committed.
If things didn’t work out, she could always leave. But how? She felt a flutter of alarm. She couldn’t remember the name or location of the nearest town. But, she told herself sensibly, there must be other people living under some of those roofs she’d seen on the way down. In a few days she’d be laughing at herself for this attack of the jitters.
2
IN THE DOWNE HOMESTEAD, Mary discovered a cold leg of mutton in the fridge and served a scratch meal to Martin and Paul Hazlitt. There was no suggestion that she eat with them. The men consumed their food without comment, and after they left the house Mary ate her own meal. Now that she was alone, she felt like crying.
Paul Hazlitt was just as good-looking — and just as silent — as his son. There’d been no sign of Mrs Hazlitt. Maybe she was still in hospital. Neither man had mentioned her. Apart from the men the house felt deserted. Shabby, too, what she’d seen of it, and dirty. It was a far cry from the gracious homestead of her imaginings.
Martin had gone off somewhere and left her to find her own way into the house. There had been a girl there, but after introducing herself as Gayleen, and giving Mary a quick tour of the kitchen, she’d had to go home to help her mother. She was very young, probably still at school. A pretty kid, though, with a rosebud mouth and natural ash-blonde hair, eyes and lashes darker than you’d expect. Mary guessed that her family occupied one of the other houses she’d seen from the air.
She leant back in her chair and rubbed her hands over her face. It was no use moping. After she’d cleaned up the kitchen, she’d go and explore the house. She might even come across the elusive Mrs Hazlitt, if such a person really existed.
Gayleen had shown her the huge pantry, stocked with preserves, pickles and jams, canned and dry goods. This had been the first piece of good news. There were freezers, too, and a vegetable garden, chooks and even a milking cow, as well as farm-killed mutton and lamb. At least she wouldn’t starve.
The house was an old one built of dark bricks, with an iron roof, wide verandahs and a passage up the middle. She’d come in through the back door, so she didn’t know what the rest of the house was like. Except for the room where she’d be sleeping. That had been another disappointment: a louvred sleepout off the back verandah, cold as charity, with an old iron bed and sagging wire mattress base, a mile from the sole bathroom that was inside the house. She couldn’t do anything about that, but she would see what she could do about the bed. Later.
On the plus side, the kitchen had a big bay window at one end, a dining table long enough to seat ten, a good old slow-combustion stove next to a modern electric range. It was light and warm, and there seemed to be a plentiful supply of hot water. Dirty, though, and with an unpleasant smell, but she could fix that. It looked as if nobody had cleaned the place for months.
IN HER ROOM, Clio Hazlitt lay in a nest of pillows, feeling her way towards consciousness.
In the distance, she could hear someone moving about, a creaking board, a door closing, must be the night nurse — no, not that, those floors were vinyl, grey and unforgiving, but they didn’t creak. The cleaners dragged those big industrial polishers over them every morning, the black-haired women in pink uniforms, none of them speaking English. In the ward, there was always the smell of food. Eating. Not the pleasure it once was.
This time the smell was wrong, too: no antiseptic, no boiled cabbage, no body smells.
She breathed carefully, not to hurt her wound. The sounds weren’t right, either. No clatter of trolleys, no squeak of rubber soles on shiny vinyl. No bells, no running feet. No nurses chattering. No urgency, no panic.
Where was she? What room was this? She’d lost all the old landmarks. She’d lie still and wait until she recognised some shape, some light and shadow, some clue of scent or sound.
She could remember the train rattling through the darkness, the syncopated ticking of the wheels, ghostly reflections of faces on the window floating across the black night outside, distorted, like caricatures, among them her own, barely recognisable. Then the screeching halt and painful getting to her feet, stiff after sitting so long, finding her things, steadying herself, anxious to get out in time and not be carried on, and Garth’s welcoming smile bright in the island of fluorescent light on the station, waiting, whistling, pacing on the gritty platform, swinging his arms, keeping warm. His face was full of kindness, a white-lit man-in-the-moon holding back the darkness.
They’d driven through the black night along the tunnel carved by their headlights’ high beam, the ute swaying on the bends and making her lean to her damaged side so that she had to bite her lip to hide the pain. Garth hadn’t noticed, peering out through the dusty windscreen, eyes fixed on the double white line, alert for roos and emus and rabbits.
It had still been dark when they’d arrived, and she’d been too tired to take anything in, just staggered to the house, dropped into bed and fallen asleep.
Under the duvet she touched her body, but with caution. Yes, she knew what this thick fleecy fabric was: the tracksuit she’d travelled in. Hadn’t had the energy last night to change. She flexed her toes: must have kicked off the ugg boots, at least; thank heaven for that.
Since the surgery, each awakening was like a struggle to be born again. Everything was alien, her own body included. Her flesh belonged to a stranger; a body that had to be explored, courted, tested afresh, each time she woke. She lifted her head from the pillow — not too quickly, it might hurt — and she wasn’t dreaming: she was in her own room, just as she’d left it, a lifetime ago. Relief flooded her like tears.
She lay still and listened to the sounds of the house
. Rain, softly pattering on the roof; the inevitable wind, streaking up from the South Pole, sighing through the distant pines; it must be afternoon. The light seeping through the closed curtains confirmed this. She drew a shaky breath. They’d told her she might be a bit weepy. Well, she was.
There was definitely somebody moving about the house — a soft footstep, a creak of floorboards. Who would that be? Not Paul or Martin, the steps were too light. She let the question slide away.
The trip had been a horror. She ought to have stayed in Perth till she had her strength back. Every cell in her body felt outraged. But she’d been desperate to get back home. Home! That was a laugh. But it was the only home she had, and she’d be comfortable here, in this room. She made herself relax while she carried out the audit of her body. All of it ached. The wound was too sore for her to touch, still raw where they’d taken the drains out. Her arm was numb where she must have been lying on it. She flexed her wrist. Winced. Tried again, more cautiously. Gritted her teeth and did it again. Panting, she let her head relax onto the pillow.
She’d have to get up sometime, have a shower. Do the exercises, creeping hands up the tiles, left hand, right hand, till she wanted to scream with the pain. Be a good girl. Do what they’d told her and she’d be better in no time. Or so they said.
Later. She was too tired for that now.
She was home. Someone would come. Just wait quietly, and maybe sleep some more. Someone would come. It would be all right.
MARY FINISHED CLEANING the kitchen floor. She’d uncovered a pattern of slate-blue and cream squares connected by small red diamonds, bright as spilt blood. A coat of polish would help, but she couldn’t find any. She checked the time: best get her own quarters organised.
The mattress on the iron bed was an old kapok one, its striped ticking marked with brown stains that hinted at leakages of unimaginable body fluids. Mary concealed it with a dusty cotton blanket, tucking it under firmly. She wondered if there was a linen cupboard: in a house of this vintage there was bound to be. She found it just outside the bathroom. Pleated piles of white cotton sheets, old and heavy with the scents of mildew and lavender, yellowed on the folds. She took two and rummaged for blankets. Given the austerity of the sleepout she picked warm colours: a soft ochre and a pink. On the top shelf she found a blue eiderdown, dotted with white daisies. It was a tad musty — but never mind that. And another blanket perhaps to go over the mattress? If today’s weather was anything to go by, she’d be needing it.