In the Company of Strangers

by Liz Byrski

  Alice looks up. ‘You knew?’

  Fleur nods. ‘I knew your name when you first came here but I couldn’t think how, and I kept looking at you and then I remembered it all from the papers.’

  ‘Well I hope not everyone has such a good memory,’ Alice says. ‘I thought it was pretty safe here until Paula found out.’

  ‘Most people won’t remember,’ Fleur says, ‘they won’t put two and two together, and even if they do they won’t really care.’

  They sit for a moment in silence, Alice, shaken, wondering how to move on from here. ‘Are you still planning on leaving?’ she asks.

  ‘I don’t know, ’ Fleur says. ‘I was so sure and now I’m not. I should’ve left straight away but I knew it was difficult for Declan and Ruby so I hung on. It’s nearly three months now and the longer I stay the more confused I get. It’s good having you around, and I’m really getting to like Ruby. Even Declan’s starting to grow on me. Some days I just want them to hurry up and find someone so I can bugger off and have a new life, and others it feels really good, as though Benson’s might have a future. It’d been running down slowly for a long time and now it feels like it’s turning around. I must sound like a complete moron but I don’t know what I want anymore.’

  ‘I think it feels good too,’ Alice says. ‘It was very sad and flat when I got here, but there’s energy now. It could be quite exciting, you know, Fleur.’

  Fleur nods. ‘Yes, that’s what I’m starting to feel. I’d better get a grip on it and make up my mind, I suppose, or I may be too late. Alice, can I say something personal?’

  Alice looks up, shrugging. ‘Of course.’

  ‘Tell me to mind my own business, but I don’t think you’ve set foot outside this place since you got here. I know it must be tough but if you don’t bite the bullet and get out into the world soon it’ll just get harder.’

  There’s something about being alone in the shop that gets Lesley itching to move things around. It’s like staying in someone’s house when they’re out or away, she thinks, you want to try the ornaments in different places, mix the cushions or shift a chair. She had done that once in a friend’s house. She was babysitting the friend’s sick mother who was fast asleep upstairs while the daughter went to a funeral. Lesley had forgotten to bring a book and there was nothing in her friend’s small collection that interested her, so she started experimenting. She’d done the cushions, moved a large exotic vase and was standing back to admire the chair in its new position when the door opened. Her friend was not amused. It could be different here, though, Lesley thinks – after all, no one is actually managing the place and she can see now, towards the end of her second day, that Kim has only been doing the essentials. There is a lot of unpacked, unpriced new stock in the back room, and quite a few things were on the shelves but not priced, so she’s been sorting those out today. It’s as though no one really has a sense of ownership, and it’s probably been like that for several months. She doubts that anyone would mind if she changed things around and put out some more stock. It’s pretty quiet now; a very popular band has just started playing and ten minutes ago people who had been wandering around aimlessly suddenly headed like lemmings into the field.

  Lesley has a quick look around and gets to work. She unloads a display stand with scarves, aprons and tea towels, and moves it across to the opposite corner. Then she moves the cookery, gardening and wine books and the meditation CDs to the same shelves as the other books. And from the back room she pulls out a rather nice tiered stand which looks as though it hasn’t been used for a while, dusts it, and sets up a very different display of Benson’s lavender skin care products. Then, thinking that this is enough for a while at least, she perches on the stool to survey the changes. It looks good. What she’d really like, though, is to redo the whole place, and she gets a sheet of paper and begins to draw up a plan.

  She’s well aware that this, yet again, is a distraction. It’s designed to take her mind off the email she needs to write to Gordon. Her conversation with Declan yesterday morning had cleared the air between them, but what he said about Gordon had really started Lesley thinking. Could Declan be right? Could it be that Gordon, while he was giving out all the signs of wanting to embark on their long-planned future, really wanted to do something entirely different? After all, he had gone off to do his own thing pretty quickly once she was out of the way. Had he always wanted to keep working, not in the same job but back in the field again, on projects like the current one, which is so similar to what he was doing when they first met: gathering soil samples, testing things, bagging up bits of rock, drawing up plans and calculations? She realises now that she has very little idea what Gordon did on those trips, which means that she’s never taken enough interest in his work, but thinking back she knows he seemed happier, or at least more at peace with himself, in those days. Each time he left on a field trip it was as though he was setting out on an adventure. But of course a series of promotions brought him the daily non-adventure of hopping on the train from Claremont into Perth and strolling along St George’s Terrace to the office. And he’d never seemed as delighted to be heading off to KL or China as he had in the days when he left for the bush.

  Lesley runs her fingertips idly along the shelf near the counter and inspects them. They are covered in dust. Pulling the duster out from under the counter she gets to her feet and unloads the shelf. She’s going to email him, that’s what she’s decided, tell him they have to talk, and soon. It has to be soon because she’s confused now, confused and stuck. She’ll ask when he’s coming home and if it’s not for a long time maybe he can come back sooner or, she thinks, she might just fly up there to the Kimberley for a couple of days. But only if there’s a proper hotel with clean linen and hot water; camping has never been Lesley’s style.

  ‘Oh, this looks different,’ Ruby says, taking her by surprise.

  ‘Goodness, I didn’t hear you come in,’ Lesley says, blushing. She hadn’t expected to be caught out changing things quite so soon.

  ‘That stand with the lavender things on it is lovely.’ Ruby stops in front of it, looking closely at the labels.

  ‘I hope you don’t mind me moving things around,’ Lesley says, ‘but the shop was looking a bit jaded, especially with the gap where the glass cabinet used to be.’

  ‘Not at all,’ Ruby says, ‘I’m delighted. It’s desperately in need of revival. We’ve all been so busy with other things that the shop has been neglected.’ She moves on around the shop, inspecting the local pottery, picking up one of the scarves and examining the fabric. ‘Lovely,’ she says again, and turns back to Lesley, smiling. ‘I haven’t come to interfere, I’ve come to make sure you’re okay after yesterday’s drama, and to thank you for stepping in like this, and for calming Paula down. I hope it didn’t upset you too much.’

  ‘No, no, I’m fine,’ Lesley says. ‘And I don’t think I did calm her down much. I just managed to get her in an arm lock so she couldn’t throw anything else. Have you heard from her at all?’

  Ruby shakes her head. ‘Not a word. Todd tells me she’s blown up like this before and then she usually lays low for a couple of days. Good thing probably, but it leaves us without a cleaner just when we need her most. I’ve arranged for the agency to send us a couple of people – I suspect it’ll be another day or two before she shows up.’

  ‘Well if you need anything done I’m happy to help out,’ Lesley says. ‘I mean, it may take you a while to find someone to replace Kim so I can stay until then if you like.’

  ‘Could you? We’d pay you the proper rate, of course.’

  ‘Okay – well, I can stay as long as you want,’ Lesley says. ‘I’m really enjoying it. Can I change a few other things too while I’m here?’ She blushes. ‘Actually, when you came in I was drawing up a plan to reorganise it. There’s so much that you could do to make it more inviting. And you could get some new lines in – jewellery, novelty items … sorry, I’m being too pushy.’

  �
�Not at all, I’d love to see the plan. But aren’t you going back to Perth soon? You have family there, don’t you?’

  Lesley shrugs. ‘Yes, but my children are adults with lives of their own, and my husband’s working on a project up in the Kimberley. We’re … well, we’re going through a bit of a difficult time, I’m not sure what’s going to happen in the long run. In the meantime I’m planning to stay down here for a while.’

  ‘So would you be interested in doing more than just filling in for a couple of weeks?’

  ‘I’d love it, but I don’t know what Declan would say, you see—’

  Ruby holds up a hand. ‘You don’t need to tell me anything about that. Look, I’ll talk to Declan. Would you leave it with me? I may not get a chance to talk to him properly until tomorrow morning, but I’ll pop over then and we can talk some more.’ She reaches up behind her head and tries to gather the strands of hair that have slipped out of the combs. ‘My hair is driving me madder than usual,’ she says, trying to twist the delinquent hair back into her tight little bun. ‘It’s always a mess. I haven’t had it trimmed since I’ve been here. I’m terrified of everyone except my own hairdresser in London.’

  ‘You could have it really short,’ Lesley says. ‘It would be easier to manage and it would suit you. You’d look like Judi Dench – you are rather like her, you know.’

  ‘Other people have said that too,’ Ruby says, still fiddling with it. ‘I’m not sure Dame Judi would see it as a compliment. I can’t have it cut. It’s my phobia. A nurse cut my hair off after we were bombed, and then for years the nuns hacked it off with kitchen scissors, sometimes even with secateurs. A couple of times they cut it so close with the secateurs that I had little cuts all over my head. It was punishment for something. So I grew it as soon as I escaped from the convent and keeping it long is about …’ she hesitates. ‘This probably sounds silly, but it’s about who I am.’

  Lesley smiles. ‘It must be an awfully long time ago,’ she says, keen to know more but aware that this is not the time to ask. ‘And I don’t think anyone would be confused about who you are if you cut it, not even you.’

  Ruby opens her mouth to say something, but Lesley goes on: ‘If you do want to keep it long you could do something else with it that would keep it tidier.’

  ‘Really?’

  Lesley comes out from behind the counter and goes over to the glass topped display case of interesting pieces by local craftspeople. Opening the lid she takes out a large double comb clip, in purple perspex shot through with turquoise.

  ‘May I?’ she asks, indicating Ruby’s hair. And she unwinds the bun and draws the thick silver hair into a ponytail, then twists it like a rope up the back of Ruby’s head and clips it into place. ‘There you go,’ she says, turning Ruby’s shoulders so that she can see herself in one of the mirrors. ‘What do you think?’

  Ruby studies herself, twisting her head from side to side, and Lesley unhooks another mirror and holds it up so she can see the back. ‘That’s nice,’ she says, ‘very nice. That clip thing is really lovely. But of course my hair won’t stay, bits will keep slipping out, they always do.’

  ‘I think you’ll find it’s pretty secure – the clip is really well made. Shake your head around a bit and we’ll see.’

  Ruby shakes her head, side to side, up and down, several times. Nothing moves.

  ‘Goodness, you’re right,’ she says. ‘Well that’s amazing, but would I be able to do it myself?’

  ‘Of course you would,’ Lesley says, and she takes the clip out and shows her again. ‘Now you try.’

  ‘I see,’ Ruby says, and she pulls her hair together and starts twisting and then secures the clip. ‘It’s quite easy, and it does feel secure.’ She pats her hair a couple of times. ‘Thanks, Lesley, I think this might work for me. I’ll certainly give it a try,’ and she takes one last look in the mirror before heading for the door. ‘And we’ll talk again tomorrow.’

  ‘Fine,’ Lesley says. ‘Look forward to it, and Ruby … ?’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘You haven’t paid me for the clip.’

  Even the twin distractions of Paula’s blow-up and subsequent disappearance and the discovery of the marijuana haven’t dulled Ruby’s senses nor her conviction that something has been set in motion and is moving inexorably to some sort of climax. Indeed, the discovery of Catherine’s stash yesterday morning had, she felt, simply brought her and Jackson closer, albeit in the most unlikely circumstances. Last night she had sat with Alice among the ecstatic crowd and discovered for the first time the Jackson that people around the world had known for decades: the professional musician, the artist, the consummate performer who brought his own unique magic to the instrument and the music. Watching him play gave her the chance to study him closely. He was totally unlike any other man she’d been attracted to. For a start, Jackson was mixed race, his mother from Ethiopia, his father, he’d told her, from North Carolina. Todd was fascinated by his curly silver hair – ‘mega cool’, he’d said – and Ruby silently agreed. And when he put the saxophone aside, took the mike from its stand and launched into ‘I Just Want To Make Love to You’ she was just as weak with longing as she had been when she had ached for Rossano Brazzi to claim her across a crowded room.

  Today she has grasped at her efficient, practical self and held on to it long enough to do what she had to do to without making a fool of herself. In the mirror, thanks to Lesley’s attention, she can see that she looks different – softer, more modern, not so messy or dated. But what she wants is not just to look, but to feel different – to feel like a woman who is still in the game of life rather than merely kicking around on the sidelines.

  This evening, now that the final performance is over, the party atmosphere is winding down. Out in the field some campers are getting quietly drunk, setting the world to rights while they cook sausages on their picnic stoves, and others grasp the last hours of the weekend, singing to guitars or strolling among the tents reliving the performances, swapping phone numbers, relating memories revived by the music itself or the mere fact of being once again at a festival. But in the house kitchen Ruby has her hands full. Todd’s birthday dinner feels like the sort of ritual meal that in the early years of both her marriages she had believed would be a regular feature of her family life: a heaped table surrounded by children and later their girlfriends and boyfriends, spouses, and then grandchildren. Ruby switches off the heat and pushes the curry and dhal to one side of the stove then fetches Todd’s birthday cake from the pantry and counts out the sixteen candles, pressing them into holders and then spearing them into the cake. Todd, Declan and Alice, of course. ‘And Fleur,’ Todd had insisted, ‘and can I ask Bundy and Johno?’

  And this morning he had invited Jackson, which she would have done if he hadn’t beaten her to it, and since then Lesley has been added to the guest list. Ruby stands back surveying the cake, and then she takes off her apron, bundles it away and walks down the passage to change her clothes for dinner.

  t’s the sort of occasion that makes Declan realise how glad he is that he stopped drinking. Since Todd had unknowingly given him such an emotional kick up the arse this morning, he has been feeling exceptionally fragile and wobbly, but if this were a dozen years ago he would by now have been blind drunk, argumentative, rambling and abusive. Ruby has done them proud this evening: several curries, rice, salads and naan bread, followed by a lemon tart and Todd’s magnificent birthday cake. Todd’s face when he saw the cake had almost reduced Declan to tears again.

  ‘It’s awesome,’ he’d said, and he did indeed seem awestruck. ‘I never had a birthday cake – just once I had a cupcake with a candle in it but never a proper cake, a big cake for me.’

  Declan thought that Ruby seemed moved almost to tears by this, and looking carefully at her now he thinks she looks different this evening. By the light of the lamps out here on the deck she is a little flushed, her eyes rather brighter than usual, and she’s done something different with her
hair, which is a big improvement. It’s odd, he thinks, watching as she helps Todd to cut slices of cake and hand them around, that he knows so little about her past, particularly about her friendship with Catherine. Everything Catherine had told him about their childhood had been harrowing. It had taken years for the full story of the child migrants to be extracted from reluctant government departments and the defensive organisations to which the children had been sent, and when those stories were finally told they had been met with horror, disbelief, even threats. Now, watching Ruby, Declan wonders how much of what he had found difficult about Catherine was the result of the trauma of her childhood. He curses the self-centredness that has so often dulled his curiosity and blinded him to the reality of other people’s lives. Why had he never asked Catherine more about her life? His mind is filled with questions for which it is now too late. But it’s not too late for Ruby, not too late to find out what led to all those years of hostile silence to which they never seemed to fully recover.

  Todd and the other boys have left the table now. Fleur and Lesley left half an hour ago, just Alice, Ruby and Jackson remain. Alice gets up to make coffee, brings it back to the table and begins to pour it. Jackson yawns, stretching his arms above his head and putting his feet up on one of the chairs that the boys have vacated.

  ‘I was thinking about the birthday cake Catherine made for me years ago, Ruby,’ Declan says, adding cream to his coffee. ‘I would have been thirteen then and it was all iced in green like a football pitch. You weren’t here then, were you?’

  She shakes her head. ‘No, you were much younger when we met. You were eight, I think, when you were being the crop duster.’

  He nods slowly. ‘Yes. And the more I think about it the more it seems that you were living here then, is that right?’

  ‘Such a strange career choice at that age,’ Alice says, smiling at him.