Prochownik's Dream (9 page)

‘It's for the show, isn't it?' she said.

‘It could be. If it works. You don't sound too surprised.'

‘You're a painter, Toni. What else is there for you except painting?' There was something of impatience in her voice. ‘What else can you do? You've finished with the installations. You as good as said so yourself. We come back to the things that have rewarded us in the past. We can't suddenly decide to be someone else.'

He laughed. ‘I'm wondering if I can still paint.'

‘Of course you can still paint! I'd love to see your Macedon drawings. Why don't you bring them over to Richmond one day next week? The three of us can have coffee and go over them together.'

‘Do we have to wait till next week?'

‘Is this what you really want?' she said. ‘A painting of me from that old drawing? That young woman at Macedon isn't me anymore, you know.'

‘No,' he said doubtfully. ‘I suppose not.'

‘So why don't you do something completely new?'

‘Sit for me,' he said. ‘And I'll do a painting of you awake.'

‘I meant,' she said carefully, ‘does it have to be me?' It was clear she had not quite meant this, or at least had not meant only this.

‘Artists paint each other's portraits,' he said. ‘We've always done it. It's a tradition with us.'

There was a considerable silence.

The blackbird had moved on.

‘How about I come over to Richmond in the morning and do some studies of you working on that picture,
Chaos Rules
? If that's what you're calling it.' He waited. He was fearful of losing this possibility. ‘I need to be working, Marina.' It was a confession of vulnerability. ‘I need to be painting again.'

The sun had come out, steam rising from the barricade of sodden clothes, as if fires still smouldered within the pile of his discarded installations. He would miss them, he realised, his featureless people. In a way, of course, they had been the uncelebrated people of the flats, with whom he had grown up. The anonymous people who had left no trace. Something also to do with himself and his brother and his mother and father, and that terrible sudden end. The lost and voiceless people of his parents' pasts. All that. Loss and the past. But Marina was right, he had finished with it, or had finished with that particular form of it. Impossible to know when it is the last time for something, until we look back and, suddenly, we know it is finished, and then we experience this surprise and nostalgia for it.

‘None of us ever imagined you'd turned your back on painting forever, Toni,' she said. ‘But you don't need me to tell you these things. It might be less complicated, don't you think, if you asked someone else to sit for you? Why not Teresa? And what about Nada? Or your mother?'

He was impatient with these suggestions. ‘What's so complicated about you sitting for me? You've sat for me twice already. I've done two drawings of you asleep. This project began when I drew you at Macedon all those years ago, not this afternoon on the island.'

‘Project?' she said. ‘It's hardly a project, is it?'

‘Well whatever it is,' he said. ‘It wouldn't feel right to be painting Teresa or Nada or Mum at the moment. I'll paint them one day, when I'm ready. Right now, I want to develop the suggestion that's in these two drawings of you. They're studies for something. I want to follow them up. I want to see where it takes me. There's an offer in it.' He waited, but still she said nothing. ‘So,' he said at last. ‘You don't want to do it?'

‘I didn't say that. But perhaps it's something you ought to think about for a day or two.'

‘I could try for a series of you. A suite.
The Marina Suite
.' The title appealed to him. A series of her from his old Macedon drawings set alongside a series from her life now. His imagination was running on with it. ‘I might try for a series,' he said. ‘Three, or maybe four, paintings. Three probably, to match the three you're doing. What do you suppose Robert would think?'

‘Robert will support whatever you decide to do. You know that. But he's not expecting paintings from you. Paintings weren't what he was thinking about when he asked you. The idea was to have the contrast of your installation with our canvases.'

‘Artists always do the unexpected. Robert knows that. He said so in his first book.
The artist always disconcerts our expectations
. He'll understand. Did you tell him about today?'

‘He's not home yet.'

‘Will you sit for me or not?'

‘I'll have to think about it.'

‘How about I come over in the morning and show the Macedon drawings and today's drawing to both of you? We can talk it over between the three of us. I can do some drawings of you working while I'm there. Your whole family is in this sketchbook, you know. There are several drawings of your mother and your father. And the interior of your house.'

She said, with a kind of heaviness, ‘All right. But why don't the three of us meet at the Red Hat in Bridge Road in the morning instead of at our place? We can have breakfast. It's pleasant there. Do you know it?'

‘It's that little place opposite the furniture auctions?'

‘And Toni, I do think it's wonderful you're going to be painting again. Really. That's what's important.'

‘But what?'

‘I suppose it's just that I feel partly responsible. I know I'm not, of course. But I can't help feeling as if I am.'

‘You've had a hand in it. Of course you have. I wouldn't be doing it if you hadn't come back. But that's good, isn't it? It's the way it is. You can't pretend you're not involved. These things always surprise us.'

He hung up the phone. The rack beside him was still wearing his father's buttoned waistcoat and trousers, reminding him of Sunday mornings in the kitchen before his parents went to the market, his dad in his shirtsleeves brewing a pot of coffee at the stove, classical music on the radio, last night's pictures already cleared from the table and stored in the suitcase. He picked up both sketchbooks, climbed over the steaming barricade and walked across the courtyard.

five

Teresa was at the kitchen bench slicing chicken breasts. She had changed out of her suit into jeans and a grey top, her blue apron tight around her waist, an open bottle and a glass of red wine by her hand. Nada was sitting on the rug in the living area watching the television. Teresa looked up as he came through the door from the courtyard, the blade of the knife paused in the yellow chicken flesh. ‘You should see yourself,' she said.

‘It's Dad's.'

‘It's not just the jacket.'

He put the two sketchbooks on the bench, took off his father's jacket and hung it on the back of a chair.

Teresa set the knife on the bench and wiped her hands on her apron. She picked up his old sketchbook and examined the cover. ‘So what were you two doing at Macedon?'

‘We were staying at Marina's parents' place. Robert was with us.' He watched her going through the pages, pausing at each drawing.

‘Who's this?'

‘The housekeeper's husband.'

‘And this?'

‘Marina's mother.'

She stopped when she came to his drawing of Marina asleep on the cane chaise, his precise archival note underneath the image:
Marina Golding in the conservatory at Plovers, June 19, 1989.
Without taking her eyes off the drawing, Teresa felt for her wine glass and raised it to her lips. She took a sip and set the glass on the bench again, still looking at the drawing.

‘I did it when I was a student,' he said.

‘How come you never showed these to me?'

‘This early stuff's been packed away.' He watched her. ‘I did another drawing of her today. It's in the other book.'

Teresa put down his Macedon sketchbook and picked up Marina's. She turned the sheets, pausing once again to examine each drawing.

‘I'm sorry I forgot to pick her up,' he said.

Teresa was looking at his drawing of Marina asleep in the shade of the wattle. She looked at the drawing for a long time. ‘You did this today?'

‘Yes.' He leaned over her shoulder.

She moved away from him. ‘So this is what you were doing? On an island with her, doing this all day? You said,
we got caught
up
. You got caught up on this island with her? Who else was there? Was
he
there? Was Robert what's-his-name there?'

‘No, Robert wasn't there.'

‘You were alone with her on the island? Is that it?'

He motioned at the sketchbook. ‘When I said I got caught up I meant with doing the drawing. It's the first real drawing I've done since Dad died.'

‘You said
we
got caught up. I know what I heard. Now you're changing it. You didn't say,
I got caught up doing my first real
drawing since Dad died
. If you'd said that, it would have meant something else.'

‘Marina was showing me the space. That's all. For the inaugural show. I've told you about it. It's going to be important. I'm thinking of doing some paintings for it.'

‘Of her?'

‘Maybe.'

‘What's
maybe
supposed to mean? Are you planning on doing pictures of her or not?'

‘That's the idea at this stage.'

‘So that's a yes, is it? I can tell you, you're not making this look good.' She looked at the drawing again. ‘I'd say she was showing you a bit more than the space.' She studied him. ‘It's a good drawing. Anyone can see that.'

‘Thanks.'

‘So tell me, those two come back from Sydney and suddenly you forget to pick up your daughter? Then you throw your installations out the door into the rain? Now you come in here wearing your Dad's old jacket and looking half-deranged. So what's going on?'

He reached a glass down from the shelf and poured wine into it.

‘I just want to know what's going on.'

He swallowed some of the wine. ‘I'm going to Richmond tomorrow to talk over an idea for a project with them.'

‘The project of doing pictures of her?'

‘Yes.'

‘So you're going to be a real artist again? Is that it?'

‘I hope so.'

‘You know what I was doing today while you were on that island getting caught up with her, being a real artist again? I was asking Dad for another ten thousand. Yes! That's it. Have you got any idea how that makes me feel after everything he's done for us with the agency, without ever being asked for anything? You know how it makes
him
feel? Do you have any idea what I'm doing to keep this thing going for us? Then I'm in conference with these people and I get a call from the kinder telling me Nada hasn't been picked up.
Come and get your
daughter
, they tell me,
we're closing up
.
I'm sorry
, I say to them, and I tell my clients,
See you later, I've got to pick up my daughter from
kinder
. And that's it. They look at me as if I'm crazy. Am I going to see
them
again? You've got to be joking! That's not the kind of service these corporate people are looking for. You've got no idea what I have to do to run this business. It's not just your dad's old jacket! You're like a stranger since those two got back from Sydney. I'm not in touch with you.' She put down the sketchbook and picked up the kitchen knife. She waved the knife in Nada's direction. ‘If you want to do something useful, take your daughter for a walk. She watches too much of that. It's not good for her.'

He would have spoken but she overrode him. ‘Just do it! Do
something
! Do something useful for once!'

‘There's no need to get worked up.'

‘You want to see me worked up?' She sliced at the chicken. ‘I sometimes wonder if my father wasn't right about you.'

‘Come on! Take it easy. You've had a massive day. Careful!' he said. ‘Don't cut yourself. You work too hard. You should take a break.' He put his arm around her.

She twisted away and stood facing him, the knife in her hand, her shoulders tense, a rush of emotion in her eyes.

‘I was going to fill you in with what's happening,' he said quietly. ‘But when did we get the chance to talk until now?'

She gave a little gasp and turned back to the chicken. ‘Take her for a walk!' She sliced through the chicken with a suppressed energy that made him wince.

He stood a moment, then turned and went over to the television and scooped up his daughter. Nada pushed at him and he put her down again. ‘Don't you want to come to the swing park with Daddy, darling?'

She didn't look at him but stalked off down the passage.

Teresa was ignoring him, flouring the chicken fillets. He followed Nada.

Teresa yelled, ‘Snoopy Dog!'

He came back and picked the toy dog off the rug. He straightened and met Teresa's eyes.

‘This'll be ready in twenty minutes,' she said, and she stood looking across the room at him, her dark eyes glassy with tears. ‘Go on. She's waiting for you.'

‘I'm sorry, darling.'

She shrugged helplessly. ‘Yeah, I know. It's me, too. I'm strung out with this money business.'

‘I'll be back soon.'

She called out to Nada, ‘Have a good swing with Daddy, darling.'

At the end of the passage he handed Snoopy Dog to Nada. She took the toy from him and tossed it aside. It hit the wall and fell in a heap.

‘Poor old Snoopy Dog!' He leaned down and retrieved the toy. ‘Looks like you're in the doghouse, old Snoop.'

‘His name's not old Snoop,' Nada corrected him severely, unimpressed by his flippancy. ‘He told me he doesn't want to come with us to the swing park.' She stood facing the door, waiting for him to open it.