Black Diamonds (11 page)

 

DANIEL

She cries so hard and loud it hurts to hear it. And there's nothing I can do but hold her against it. I know what she means, but that doesn't help. A few of my own tears fall into her hair, for all of it, as we stand here on the landing.

Polly puts on the light in Francine's room and comes over to us. She presses a little bottle into my hand and says: ‘Make her have a good swig.'

I don't want to go into the light; I want to stand here in the dark with her. I want to hear her yell out everything I can't. Polly's pushing me towards the room and I get my sense back somehow. ‘Come on, France.'

It's too bright in here; I leave her and put the lamp on and spin about looking for the bloody cord to turn the bulb off. She's quieter now, but I make her drink some of whatever quack's stuff this is. Probably just opium and brandy. It'll do.

I don't want her to cry any more. I don't ever want to hear that sound again.

I stay in the spare room, while France goes in with Polly to wash her father's body, and in the morning the undertaker will come. It'll be full Mick honours for him on Tuesday. I never thanked him; never knew what to say to him. What could I say? Thanks for your daughter. Oh, and the house on that old orchard and the half-share in the mine, and the rest to keep us going, and the compensation fund and the lav. This isn't the way things go: it's beyond my principles, and my understanding of the way things are. I don't think even Dad could come up with a good line for this. It's clear by anyone's principles that if all of us behaved as Francis Patrick Connolly did, then there'd be no rubbish. But maybe it was just death coming that made him do it. I'm not going to knock it back, but maybe it's not real either; just an old man's fancy. Blind luck. I remember the first time I saw this room, when Francine tried to wash my face and I thought I was dreaming again, and I hated her. I don't like what that says about me, and I don't sleep at all, tossing it all around and getting nowhere with it.

Francine would look good in a sugar bag, especially, but black and grief make her look fragile when she comes into the kitchen just on dawn while I'm looking for a cup to get a drink. She says: ‘Well.' She's holding a bunch of envelopes, drops them on the bench. They're marked
Polly Rogers, Herbert McNally, Goods and Chattels, Orcharding, Fr Hurley — Wedding, One Last Word
and
Read This First.

‘Can you do it?' she asks me, staring at them. ‘I don't think I could make my eyes focus even if I wanted to.'

Neither can I but I do.
Read This First
says that France'll need to leave this house by the sixth of August, since it's been sold — that's eleven days away. There are ‘healthy' cheques for Polly and McNally, since he's assumed she won't want to take
the old folk
with her. I can guess what he's put in for them and it won't be very stingy. There's also a cheque for the Catholic priest, Hurley, that's already been promised to him
on the occasion of your wedding on the fifth, because it's a Wednesday and the middle of the week gives the best view of things.
Bloody hell — that's only ten days away. Keep reading: the contents of the house and all other effects are to be removed to Josie's Place, itemised list provided, and he's arranged for a Mr George Mellish to do it all. Basic instructions for apple cultivation are also provided.

That's the practicalities dealt with and France nods at the bench as if it's all in order, everything as expected.

‘Do you want me to keep going? We could leave this for a bit,' I say.

She shakes her head. ‘Read
One Last Word
, please.'

So I do:
GOOD LUCK! Remember to laugh at every opportunity. All other enquiries direct to Stanley and Bragg, Macquarie Street, Sydney.

She looks at me, finally, and says: ‘You can say no now, and that'll be the end of it. You can keep the apples. I'll get it sorted out.'

‘What?' I'm reeling as it is, and she's having second thoughts? But I know she must be having a hundred thoughts a second right now, and she's just airing one of the worst ones: that all this is too much.

‘I didn't mean that,' she says. ‘I'm going to go to bed for the rest of today.'

Fair enough.

And I'll go and talk to Evan, tell him the lot: that I'll take a few more days before I come back to work, that Frank Connolly's dead, and that I'm in need of a best man.

 

FRANCINE

I'd forgotten Mr Drummond existed: now here he is in the parlour, looking from me to Daniel and back to me in some understandable forehead-creviced confusion. He's come to take me to the service for Father, because no doubt he assumes that there is no one else to take me. I only remember now that Doctor Nichols said he'd go and break the news to him for me. I want him to go away; Daniel's taking me. Father's last words to me on Mr Drummond were: ‘He's not really as dark as he seems — but he's the worst sort of Catholic: an English pious one, for whom hypocrisy is an inborn way of life. He might frown and bluster, but just ignore him: he doesn't know any better. Stand firm and he'll give in to you as far as he can bring himself.' Father chuckled and added: ‘He won't know what to do with you, my girl.'

I put him out of his present wonder quickly: ‘Thank you for offering, Mr Drummond, but Mr Ackerman is taking me. We are recently engaged, you see. But we shall all stand together, yes?'

Rumbling silence. I feel a little sorry for his flummoxing now. But dignity and propriety, skewed as they are for me these days, are paramount. ‘Of course,' he says. ‘But may I have a brief word with you alone first, Francine?'

He looks to Daniel again now, who's all poured into his dark grey suit and seeming more the broader for it; he's holding Mr Drummond's gaze and for one very uncomfortable moment I wonder what he's going to do. He's virtually twice the size of The Boss and a third his age. Much as Father might think it a hoot for a punch-up to occur at this juncture, it might cause in me a very swift nervous collapse. But of course Daniel wouldn't do any such thing; he's not a thug. He only says, ‘Certainly,' a breath away from impolite, and leaves the room, not closing the door behind him.

Mr Drummond doesn't bother closing it either, and gets straight to it: ‘Was your father aware of this
engagement?
' Contempt, undisguised.

‘Yes.' I feign horror at the scandalous allegation behind the question. ‘I trust you shan't do anything so rude, but you might care to read Father's final instructions to us, or contact Stanley and Bragg regarding his will, if you have cause to query further.'

‘Ah, naturally.' Mr Drummond presses his pale lips together, no doubt thinking upon the idiosyncrasies of his departed financier, and the implications my marriage presents for the future. I can fairly hear the wheels turning in his head.

To rub it in I say: ‘In future, anything you have to say to me can be said to Mr Ackerman as well, since we shall be married on the fifth of August anyway, as Father wished. I would appreciate it if, under the circumstances of my grieving, you might direct any business matters to Mr Ackerman for our consideration.' I can feel Daniel's ears burning at that, but he may as well get used to it.

‘And what is Mr Ackerman's role in the company to be?' Patronising prig.

I'm well riled now and I can hear Father guffawing with glee as I reply, seeming stunned: ‘He's a miner, of course.' And say no more. This flummoxing is too agreeable to the circumstances of my grieving. I add: ‘So, we shall see you at the church, then. Thank you again for your kind offer to escort me.'

He nods, under his black-bellied cloud, and strides out.

I'm still shaking after the rush of blood when I hear Daniel say: ‘Who the hell made you?' And we laugh, or
crack silly
as Daniel would say, and I am light again: it's all right, everything is all right, for now.

Yes it is. It's an almost joyous day, despite the absence of a eulogy from Drummond — I've dropped the Mr now — despite Father Hurley's ramble upon thanksgiving and charity and a man he barely knew, despite being surrounded on every side by parishioners who've kindly turned out to make up the numbers in the church, despite Daniel looking like a fish out of water amid all this Catholic mumbo-jumbo. For inside this place of prayers and cool, damp bricks, scores from the Wattle have turned out too, and it's miners who carry my father to the cemetery. That they will not be paid today is a fact not lost on me; it bruises and embraces at once. And there is singing all the way, hymns I don't know, and even one sung in Welsh I think, but which sound more apt than anything I could have imagined. Apparently Evan Lewis arranged all this with Daniel and Father Hurley yesterday; and now here at the burial, Drummond is nowhere to be seen, the Lithgow conspiracy has done him in today. I weep and weep and not only because my father is gone, but because I know he would have loved this show and this enveloping of me, safe in all this strangeness.

The sun blazes down through the cold air; there is talk of carrying on to the Workers' — their club — and I cry some more for the cruelty that Father is not here to lay on the drinks. Then Daniel and I are alone by the grave, but for Father Hurley, who says as he makes to leave: ‘So I shall see you two again on the fifth.' And I don't think Father's generous donation for
the occasion of your wedding
has put the gentle smile into his tired priestly eyes today. He will overlook my lapsed state and Daniel's atheism and our poor timing for some other reason; perhaps a higher thought of his own. I could kiss him for everything he does not ask, for everything he will do for us that he doesn't have to, and by canon law probably shouldn't. ‘Around three, would that do well?'

‘Of course.' I don't care; right now would do well.

I look up at Daniel as we make our way back to the trap outside the church, and all I can think of is that I wish he hadn't put his hat back on so I could see his hair. As Hayseed begins the journey home, I grab the brim and pull it off. Yes, this is my home, in Daniel's you're-a-lunatic look, and in the land that contains our fathers' bodies and their spirits, drifting up from the smokestacks, swirling between the sleeping hills, the dreaming women.

I wonder vaguely if the war's begun yet, papers are full of talk of it, but I can't catch hold of that thought. The rest of the world is a universe away.

 

DANIEL

‘How'd you manage that?' Robby says first thing on my first day back at work, when I've told him, yes, I'm getting married. To Miss Francine Connolly. He's referring to the wonder of how we'd kept it on the shush; he'd heard a rumour, saw me with her that day at the paddock, but … And now he's looking at me as if I've just told him I've robbed a bank. From his point of view I have, I suppose.

I don't know what to say; his wife, Cass, had their second one a few weeks ago and it's written all over him: not exactly a good advertisement for marriage or the state of the working poor.

But he says: ‘You lucky, lucky bastard.'

‘Don't carry on,' I tell him. ‘Haven't you got work to do?'

‘Fuck off. Boss already, are you?'

‘You fuck off.'

What sort of a goose do I sound like? One that should fuck off and let Robby get on.

Mum's a fair bit less than impressed with me when I come home. She'd have come in from the train, expecting me to be here, but probably thinking I'm with Francine. What she sees is me stripping off round the back as she puts her head out the door. She doesn't ask, doesn't say anything, and she's not going to put on any hot water for me; she disappears into the house and there's silence. If she's not been inclined to show her disappointment with me in the past, she's making up for that now. So I just fill the tub with cold water out here and do the job at lightning speed as a sleety wind comes up through the gully.

Inside, she's starting tea, with her back to me, and I give her the rundown of what's been going on while she's been in Newcastle. She doesn't respond, just a sad sigh when I tell her about Frank Connolly, nothing else, not even when I laugh: ‘You'll have to talk to me, if you're coming to the wedding.'

Eventually, she stops clattering about at the stove and goes into her room; comes out a minute later, holding one of Dad's boxes. His records. Then she whacks them on the table and says: ‘You should bother to read at least these one day.'

I have read them, though, a few times in the last month when she's gone out. I was looking for mention of old Herb McNally, to see what his problem was, but there's nothing in there — obviously Dad considered it
no one else's business.
But I know better than to say that I was looking at all. I don't want to talk about Dad right now; and not with Mum. What would he say?
What's for tea, Sarah? Sa-hra
, he said it.

She says, and she's gripping the string around the top stack of pages: ‘You don't owe anyone anything.'

I owe everyone for everything is how I feel. But, again, I don't say it. I'm still hearing
Sa-hra
, like I'm watching him looking at her.

‘What are you trying to prove?' she says.

That I can work things out my own way and get up Drummond's nose for a bit while I'm at it. France is at least keen for that now. But I say: ‘It won't be forever, just till the end of the quarter.'

‘So you can say you're still
true blue
with some more weight to it? Why don't you use your brain for a change and accept the challenge you've been given. This is not a game about who you think you should be, Daniel — you are who you are, so go and learn how to be a good boss.'

I'm never going to be a boss. But even that thought is dippy in my head: I will be come next Wednesday, sort of, and in three years' time we will be definitely; what will we do then? It's too far away and it's easy to ignore for now.

‘Or you could go back to school and learn something else!' Mum says, and she's yelled at me. She's never done that before, except when I was a kid and doing something dangerous.

What would I do at school, though? I'm too old anyway, except for technical college, and what would I do there? Learn how to type? Bookkeeping? So that's all easy to ignore too, and I say instead: ‘France and I
are
going to do something else. She's giving up her bourgeois rubbish and she's going to grow apples. She doesn't even know how to cook, can't even fry an egg, but she's going to learn to. We're going to see what happens, all round,' I say. ‘You've got to admit that's going to be interesting …'

‘Sure.' And Mum cracks, finally, smiling as she shakes her head at me. Probably because I've only admitted that France is keener for a challenge than I am.

Time to change the subject: ‘So how's Pete then?'

Now she laughs, but sad with it: ‘Do you care?'

Not really, but I have to say: ‘Course I do.'

‘Your brother is very well,' she says and I say, ‘Good,' and that's the end of that chat too.

Later, when she's cleaning up after tea, she says: ‘I bet your leg is hurting.'

Too right. I hated every minute of today, but I shrug.

She says: ‘Good. I hope it keeps you awake all night thinking.'

It doesn't. I'm out like a light as soon as I hit the pillow, I'm that buggered. Every day, through to Saturday, and Sunday I sleep till midday, then ride up to see Francine. She's got everything organised; the house is empty, no Polly or McNally, just France.

‘Is everything gone?' I ask her.

‘Yes, absolutely gone,' she says proud as punch. ‘Last load just left. And I slept on the floor last night.' She points into the sitting room, where there's a pillow and a blanket folded near the hearth with a couple of her Sydney
Heralds
and a Lithgow
Mercury.
‘Doing penance for my sins, so that you'll have me pure. Nothing here but me. Now you have to go away — I can't bear to see you and I have far too much to do by way of setting up nest. Go on. Shoo. Go away till Wednesday.'

All right. A kiss and I'm off. Mum's horrified when I tell her France is alone. She takes off round to the orchard with her when Francine passes in the trap. Another kiss, and now I'm alone. I'm getting married in three days' time. Mum doesn't come home, she stays with France, and I'm the happiest bloke that ever lived. I even hit the piano. Christ, I even sing.

I turn up early, so close-shaved my face is still stinging from the ride, and I stand there in the church, having a quiet word with Dad about everything except what I should be thinking about; he's ragging:
You're making a bad habit of Roman Catholicism lately, boy. Leave it alone — you're unattractive enough as it is.
While I'm trying not to think about how much it cuts that he's not here, and reminding myself he is here so long as I am, then startling myself again with the fact of me being here, and hearing Dad say:
Settle down — anyone would think you were getting married today
, Hurley, the priest, pops up from nowhere and just about tears the skin from me with his ‘Hello there, lad'. But Evan's popped up from some other nowhere too, to say hello back. They have more in common in this place, and they talk about the weather, which is about to piss down.

And then I hear the trap; she comes in, with Mum behind her. I can't tell you, except that I see the flowers wound through her hair, white against her hair and her face. It's mercifully quick, and I can't hear much for the rain. I'm too busy; busier as I'm trying to move the Holy Host's piece of cardboard off the roof of my mouth with my first taste of wine, knowing Hurley's given it to me against the rules, and wishing he'd given me dispensation from this as well. Still trying to swallow as he's talking me through the I wills and the haves and to holds and I dos, and I give France the ring that I only bought yesterday, which is too big but pretty on her finger because it's there, because she's thrilled with it, and we're all nearly laughing when I kiss her, except for Hurley, who's only trying harder not to.

And then we sign the papers. Her middle name's Veronica. It's all over, we're legal, and I'm wondering what I'll do with my bike when Evan says, ‘Well, get going then,' and Mum's giving Francine her cardigan and waving us off.

It's teeming bullets and it's perfect; her little Hayseed is just about knackered when we get to Josie's Place, our place — I don't know whose heart is pumping fastest. I pick France up out of the trap and just the smell of her makes me think I'm going to drop her, but I wouldn't. These hands aren't going to let go for anything. She's soaked through, the flowers have slipped every which way down her hair and she is mine. I push the front door open with my foot, thankful it's off the latch so that I don't have to put her down, and I don't clock my head on the door frame, and I walk through our dark and dusty falling-down house which is stuffed full of fat heavy furniture and packing boxes, with food laid out on the table in the back room next to the kitchen. I don't know where to set her down in all this, but here'll do. And still I don't let go. I kiss her, properly forever now, for the first time, and I don't know what I was so wound up about; I've got no idea what I'm doing and it doesn't matter. I'm still kissing her even as we're taking off our clothes.

I'm not game to look at her, for obvious reasons: it'll all be over in a second if I do. So I stop everything and just hold her for a long moment, till it's too bloody freezing and I have to chase her to the bedroom. She dives under the covers and looks at me now, wide-eyed and so am I. The luckiest bloke in the world having the best day of his life.

I'm shivering with holding back now as I climb in with her, and I just have to kiss her and kiss her to rein myself in. She is so soft, everywhere, pale and smooth as willow. She whispers, ‘Oh my goodness,' and arches her back when I touch her breasts, and I kiss her there too. I can't wait any longer, and somehow I find her, but I'm too scared to push, that I'll hurt her. But she pushes up to me, and she cries out then. I stop. Jesus, I have hurt her. She cups her hands around my face, blinks up at me and smiles. And then it really is all over, for now at least.

I roll around next to her and she winds herself around me. Don't know what I was so wound up about; there should be a law making this compulsory.