Loving Daughters (6 page)

10

But George was not happy through dinner, although he got a good helping of curry and the pudding was trifle, using up some of the cake left over from the funeral.

The baby squirmed and whimpered throughout the meal and Violet had her body screwed towards it a lot of the time. Enid suggested putting it in a bedroom, in the washing basket with pillows (already the good cushions were getting creased with all the writhing). But Violet set a stubborn mouth. Let them see what she had to put up with and what could be their lot if she decided to pass him back to them. Back to their ordered ways as if nothing had happened! Look at the sparkling clean house and hers littered with napkins and nightdresses and basins for sterilizing bottles, as well as Ned's mess. (But she was a poor housekeeper at any time.) Wait till she got the hospital though! They would see then the real meaning of cleanliness and order.

‘Why don't you feed him?' Enid said, coming in with freshly made tea when Una had taken the pudding plates away, and Small Henry was squealing in an alarming way.

‘It's crying with flatulence,' Violet said, for she tended to use medical terms when she had an audience. ‘Feeding it would make it worse.' She looked at the grandfather clock in the corner and Una's alarmed eyes rivetted on it too if willing the hands to move faster. ‘It's a good half-hour to its feed time.'

Another half-hour! The news hit them with such force, Jack and Alex rose from the table simultaneously, and George would have got up too if Violet had not stayed where she was, her tea tucked between her elbows supporting her chin. She was not bothering to look back on the child now but allowing it to bellow on, fighting its way out of the constricting blanket. Una was afraid Small Henry would smother and her frightened eyes ran from what was visible of his purple face and neck to Violet's unconcerned profile.

‘You're finished, George!' Una said as if she had to order someone to do something. George pushed his chair back, although he felt he had eaten nothing. He had seen many kittens and puppies newly born, but they mostly lay sleeping, squirming gently when awake, murmuring with a thin sound as if grateful to be alive.

This was something different, this shouting at the world as if it was not to Small Henry's liking, and someone had better set about effecting a remedy or he would squeal himself to death.

Violet got up suddenly and lifted him from the cushions. He stopped crying, and Enid lifted a relieved face from the cups she was stacking and Una brought her hands together in a clap under her chin and left them there in a praying pose.

‘Nothing in the world wrong with him,' Violet said, binding him in his blanket from the neck down and moving to lay him down again.

‘Don't!' Una cried. ‘Let me have a go!'

‘A go at what?' said Violet, poised with Small Henry in the air, his face dropped sideways and his eyes closed.

‘Well, he might cry again!' Una said.

‘A fat lot you could do if he did,' Violet said, taking a spare blanket from her bag and tucking it over Small Henry and under the cushions, as if there was a danger of his escaping.

‘Well,' Una said, looking at the clock, ‘it's so close to his feed time shouldn't we keep him awake?' (Five minutes had gone by.)

‘I'll mighty soon wake him when it's feed time!' Violet said, returning to the table and pouring herself more tea.

Small Henry snorted and squeaked and was silent a couple of times, fooled into thinking the edge of the blanket was a bottle teat. Jack and Alex left for their rooms, like soldiers sneaking away before the firing started up again. Enid noiselessly tidied the music inside the piano stool and Una sat where she could get a full view of the clockface.

George by the fireplace marvelled at the changes in the room. The tablecloth was askew with Violet turning so often to look at Small Henry, the blind was down nearly to the window sill above his head when it was usually thrown high to let in what winter sun was about and the sight of a passing rider on horseback, buggy or car. There was only a small glow from the fire. He should put more wood on, but lifting his head he saw as much as felt the quiet. Small Henry had fallen asleep again. He dare not make a noise with the dropping of a log, and putting out a foot gingerly put some ends together, sweating gently and catching a heavy frown from Una.

Blast Henry to bring them to this! Look what he left behind this time! Usually it was a big bill for tobacco at Grant's store, and heaven knows there was plenty said about that for weeks afterwards.

Even Violet was still thoughtfully marking the tablecloth with the handle of her teaspoon. Enid was now pulling the cloth from under the cruet and the few odd things left on the table without even a tinkle of silver and Una moved up silently to help. Violet took the cue and raised her cup from her saucer so there wasn't even the tiniest grind of china.

He couldn't stay here, his joints would creak, his stomach would rumble, he would be responsible for a noise that would waken that small ruling king with his purple face faded now to the beauty of a pale mauve plover's egg. He had seen one in a nest once and stared barely believing the life inside it. Small Henry was a living thing, no doubt about that.

George would get outside, escape this oppressive atmos­phere, it was a woman's world, in spite of Small Henry, no place for him just now! He took large jerking steps to the front door, but Violet turned on her chair when he cupped the knob in his hands only inches from Small Henry's head. She frowned on his hands so he dropped them and resumed his giant jerking footsteps, walking with heels raised, fearful of a squeak from the linoleum, to the door leading to the hall past the bedrooms – left open by Jack and Alex thank heavens! – and outside into the back yard.

There the cold hit him and he shivered against a verandah post while the wind laid flat the short pale grass around Enid's roses, for she had a new planting in beds adjacent to the back verandah in addition to those in the big side garden, and would, he sometimes felt, extend it all to the dairy half a mile away if given a chance.

He took a spade from the garden shed to warm himself with some digging of the vegetable patch. Looking up he saw through the window Una in the kitchen mincing about mocking him with his tweed cap on, imitating his gait.

George put his head down and rubbed the dirt from a carrot he had sliced through.

‘Eat it up, George,' Una called. ‘Never mind the dirt since you must be starving!'

Enid came past her and put her head out the window. ‘You can drive Violet home if you like, George!'

Well that was more like it! He swung wildly into the digging, hiding his joyful face from them, not allowing them to see his great wide grin, although it almost set his ears twitching and sent sparks of delight from the back of his neck.

Una threw George's cap to land expertly on a peg in the hall, then sauntered to the other window to beat her knuckles on the edge of the table below and stare onto the garden, or more likely the empty road. Enid, not sure why, wanted to cut across her thoughts, whatever they were.

‘You can bring in some of the clothes,' she said. ‘The sheets were quite dry when I felt them earlier.'

The washing was not done on Monday as usual, but a day late because of the funeral. It threw the week's routine out and Enid would not feel totally comfortable until things were right back to normal. Una slipped into the hall and taking an old coat from a peg shrugged herself into it. She was moving fast for a change.

‘Take the basket and don't dump the things on the ground now,' Enid said, hoping the words would cause Una to turn her face and Enid to read her expression. A baffling girl! Una went without the basket and Enid opened the back door to call her, but she was walking swiftly under the clothesline and through the sliprails of the house paddock, up the short rise towards the dairy and soon would be out of sight.

The wretched girl! thought Enid, angry enough to forget the sleeping Small Henry and make quite a clatter with the washing-up. She poured water on crockery almost without sound, though, when Violet slipped into the room, soundlessly, as large women often move, to set about mixing Small Henry's bottle.

Una will miss seeing him fed, that's good! I'm glad! Enid decided she would leave the things to soak and find something to do in the living room if Violet fed him there. Violet was swirling milk inside the bottle now and Enid noted the bluish tinge, not full strength. How did she know these things, she wondered, feeling inadequate, a new experience for Enid. How did people know what to do with small babies? Given Violet was a nurse, she had never raised a child of her own, and here she was, eyes on the kitchen clock and the too-hot bottle on her morrocain knee cooling to the right temperature – what would that be? – for Small Henry's mouth.

‘Una's gone wandering off,' Enid said. (Surely the bottle was ready now!) ‘She'll do it once too often and I'll be speaking to Father!'

‘Perhaps she's taken the track to the rectory,' Violet said. ‘Then there'll be good reason to speak to Father!' She had her back to Enid, sauntering off to Small Henry, leaving Enid to guess accurately the malicious smirk on her face.

It took a while for Enid to gather her thoughts and when she did she was in front of the hall mirror, angry that her nose had gone red. She pinched and slapped at it and wished for a comb to do her hair. It might not be so noticeable then! She rebelled anew at Una, leaving her with all the afternoon work to do, and no time to wash and change her dress and shoes. You never know who might come!

After a while she went into the living room to set a small table in case Jack wanted his afternoon tea by the fire.

That done, she rearranged some daisies in a brass jardiniere that had arrived too late for the funeral. She didn't have the kind growing so would save some for seed when they were ready to throw out. A peppery smell was in her nostrils – from the flowers or Smell Henry? He was finished feeding, spread out like a frog on her cushions, the navel of his egg-shaped belly moist and bloody, legs no thicker than pipe stems, feet too long for them. His genitals lay like a mound of used tissue paper and Enid thought they might detach themselves the way Violet was ruthlessly wiping around them as she put him in a dry napkin. Of course she had set him crying again! She was too rough with him, showing off perhaps, how dare she? The small innocent thing, the victim! She felt the beginning of a small ache somewhere around her wrists and elbows, and then dropped her arms to her sides quickly lest Violet see them partly outstretched. Violet bound him in his blanket and flung him over her shoulder to go to the kitchen and gather up anything left there. Enid saw Small Henry's small squashed face on Violet's shoulder sailing away from her. She turned back to stroke the creases from her cushions in an automatic way.

A smell rose from them. Of warm flesh and urine and newness, that peppery smell again. And faintly of blood.

And tenderness and terror.

11

George put on his best trousers to take Violet home. Enid kept the smell of Small Henry close to her when she carried the bag with his wet napkins and bottle to hand it to Violet in the sulky. He was lost to her almost at once due to Violet's bulk. She's nearly as wide as the sulky seat, Enid said to herself going inside.

The sulky purred along and so did George. The air was rushing past them clear and cold, making Small Henry's face a deeper purple. Fresh air was good for him according to Violet, who told her mothers to get their babies out in the air for some time every day and not swaddle them too much or have them close enough to the fire to catch alight.

This thought reminded her of Ned. He might not be home though, out of the way in the bush somewhere and she could sit with George over the kitchen table in intimate talk. The news of her hospital was banked up there in her stout chest and George's red ear was close by, ready for a stream of words.

George was pacing Dolly out swiftly, not such a good idea in one way if he got to Albert Lane and found Ned at home. But he was dreaming of driving the Austin with the side curtains up and Violet beside him, the child somewhere else. He slapped Dolly into top speed, swaying the sulky as the Austin swayed so that Violet needed to put the arm not holding Small Henry along the back of the sulky seat and George's tingling back came in contact with her fingers.

‘Well, the place hasn't burned down at least,' Violet said, although irritated at the difficulty of getting out of the sulky. She couldn't see the iron step past her skirt and might miss it.

You couldn't see down at all with this great bulk to hang onto! George leapt out and went around Dolly's head (keep steady while this is on, you perverse old nag!) to help Violet down. She handed him Small Henry instead and his surprise was so great he nearly dropped him, looking up and down the street fearing someone would pop from a door or window and see him. Was he expected to go into the house and face Ned this way? But Violet, taking her time in hooking her bag onto her arm, hoisted Small Henry onto her own shoulder and George, turning hot then cold, was so confused he overlooked tying Dolly to a fence post, until Dolly took a warning step forward, suggesting he watch out for the consequences if she was a free agent.

Ned was in his corner of the kitchen couch, smoking and staring at the stove fire as if his one mission in life was to keep it going. Violet, having dumped Small Henry in his basket in the bedroom and closed the door, flung up the blind to show on the littered table the newspapers Ned was reading to tatters, a heel of bread he had been eating and a cup tipped over with cold black tea swamping the dish of butter beside it.

She made an angry show of cleaning it up, embarrassed that George, in spite of an association of many years, might make a comparison between her housekeeping and Enid's, and even irritated by George remaining standing with lowered head.

‘Sit down, George!' she said. Here was another exasperating man needing directing all the time! George sat and Ned went shuffling to the front room, tucking his papers under his arm, as if they were all that was worth salvaging.

‘Let him burn himself and his wretched papers to a cinder there if he wants to!' Violet cried, throwing a dipperful of water into a kettle that had puffed itself dry.

She sat at the table overcome with rage, trembling and with both hands before her face.

George longed to but didn't dare reach out and touch her wrist.

‘George!' she said suddenly uncovering her face. ‘I'm going to open a hospital!'

George had the strange and foolish thought that she wanted somewhere to admit herself.

Or Ned?

Violet brought both hands down – slap! – upon the table and the heel of bread, overlooked in the clean up, bowled itself over. Question marks hung invisibly in the air between the two. ‘A hospital for midwifery cases, George,' Violet said.

Where? said George's round eyes, grey like well water unfit for drinking, but useful in emergencies.

He looked down the back towards the fowl pens and down the hall to the closed front door as if the hospital would suddenly spring up for Violet.

‘I need some help to get it started,' she said, taking the lid off the teapot for the dipper of water in the kettle was already near the boil.

‘Money?' said George, and Violet gave him a smile for his cleverness.

George had a bit put away. Alex had some steers of his own and George had pigs and when these were sold the returns boosted any savings from wages. (Jack did not pay too generously.)

The girls received no regular wages, but gifts of money from Jack for clothes and occasional visits to Sydney or to the seaside towns of Pambula and Merimbula.

George thought of the bathing costume Una bought with money for her birthday six months ago. She ordered it secretly from a catalogue, for Jack would not approve anything so brazen, and showed it to him in secret too. It was a lovely thing of dark green wool with bands of orange at the sleeves running right up to the shoulder and around the scooped-out neck. In its box of tissue paper George saw it a tender and sensual thing and would have liked Una to put it on for him, so that he could picture Violet in it. Violet would have strained the wool and her thighs would have come out of the green legs like thickly poured cream. George put her in the costume now, her breasts nearly brushing her teacup filling their green wool nests.

Her face was soft and happy – if it could always be that way! She sipped her tea, cut more cake for George and talked on in low tones like music whispered from piano keys. She would miss out on the two local women nearing the end of their pregnancies and booked into Mrs Black's at Candelo. Mrs Black was not as good a nurse as Violet, giving more attention to the horses she kept than to her patients, and known to go off and ride in a show, leaving a woman in labour in the care of her daughter Stella and a drunk doctor.

Here was Violet saying something that made his heart jump. If she had a spare room – ward, I mean! – she would take the occasional broken limb. Or a bad case of boils. George saw himself with one of his heavy winter colds that irritated Enid and Una, and Violet putting him into pyjamas and a bed fragrant with eucalyptus.

‘Nothing infectious, though,' she said, dashing his hopes and rising briskly in good imitation of the efficient matron.

She attacked the washing-up as if already practising the ultimate in hygiene, finding a clean teatowel for George to wipe up. (At home he left all this to Enid and Una.) The day was closing in, the lemon tree casting a great shadow over one end of the back verandah. George hung his towel on the verandah line and taking a dipperful of corn from a sack in the wash-house, with the air of one who was part of the household, flung it to the fowls, who immediately turned from sad little bundles to a great screeching agitated tablecloth with grain running into a score of crevices.

He came inside to find Ned back by the kitchen stove and Violet standing by a corner of the table. She might have told Ned about the hospital! It was their secret, he didn't want anyone else sharing it! He took up his hat, trying to read her expression and Ned's, whose eyes were on the scarlet line around the stove door and whose soft pale hands were holding up a khaki knee. No, she hadn't said anything for her brown eyes were melting toffee with the dream stuck to them. He spun his hat on his hand which was his way of saying he was leaving.

‘I'll walk you to the door, George,' Violet said loudly as was her habit when she wanted Ned to be informed too.

They were passing Small Henry's door when he gave two or three warning grunts and by the time they reached the front verandah his wailing was rushing under the door and through the skylight above it. Violet's face tightened and her eyes snapped and her fists were closed and beat on the verandah rail.

‘Listen to that! What would they do at Honeysuckle if that was ringing in their ears all day long? I'm here bearing it all, and I'm not even a Herbert!'

(Neither she was, thank God, neither she was!)

She went ahead of him, flinging the gate open and causing Dolly to swing her head inquiring if Violet was to be carried home as well as George. I'm not in favour of that, said the violet jerks following the swing, and the stamping of a front hoof.

‘Steady on there!' George cried to Dolly, and he might have used the same words in a more gentle way to Violet.

‘I'm having that hospital, George!' Violet cried. ‘See if any of them can stop me! I deserve it, George! You know I deserve it!'

George leapt into the sulky and turned Dolly around. He raised the reins and set her pacing off, as if he were leading an army into battle and the prize was a hospital for Violet.