Volcano Street (5 page)

The music sounded clearly, a male voice riding with prissy elegance over rippling chords. Skip found a gap in the curtains. Inside, the place looked like a house on TV, with colourful swirling pictures on the walls, wickerwork chairs and sofas, low glass tables, and a white baby grand at which a plump, balding gentleman pressed the keys with a contemplative air. Surrounding him were perhaps thirty people, some standing, drinks in hand, some leaning against bookcases, some lounging over the furniture.

Two figures flanked the pianist: on one side was the singer, a tall, heavy-jawed young man in a purple suit with a yellow, huge-knotted necktie; on the other a small gypsy-like woman with a nut-brown
face beneath a cap of black hair. When the young man fell silent, she picked up the melody. Her voice was less assured than his, almost screeching, but from the solemn attention of the listeners she might have been a diva in her prime. She wore a white blouse with many ruffles, a red miniskirt, black stockings and gleaming stiletto heels. Golden hoops hung from her ears, bangles circled her wrists, and on her fingers were many rings. She turned to the young man with a smile and their voices blended.

The song, Skip realised, was in a foreign language. From war movies she had seen she judged it to be German, though neither ‘Achtung’ nor ‘Sieg Heil’, ‘Schnell, schnell’ nor ‘Jawohl, mein Kapitän’ featured in the lyrics, so far as she could tell.

The duet ended on a dying fall. With sorrowing expressions, the singers cast down their eyes while the pianist hunched forward, double chin ballooning as he touched the final chord. The singers moved together; they embraced, as if stirred deeply by their song; applause rang out, and the pianist began a new, jaunty tune, requiring no voices.

Wind skirled. Skip told herself she should go back, but something kept her there, watching. It was then that she noticed the boy. Ignoring the grown-ups, he sat cross-legged on the carpet, facing the window. In his hand was a colourful tube that he held to one eye: a kaleidoscope. He turned it. The boy, aged perhaps twelve or thirteen, was coppery in complexion with dark, springy curls. Lowering the kaleidoscope, he looked directly at Skip.

Quickly she retreated, and was about to run away when a glass door slid open and two figures appeared on the patio. She flattened herself against the wall.

‘Whew! Hot in there.’ It was the gypsy woman.

‘Enjoying our little
Schubertiade
?’ Her companion, her fellow performer, swept back luxuriant hair. His accent, Skip thought, sounded peculiar: fruity, strangely precise.

‘
Licht und Liebe
,’ said the lady. ‘Love is a sweet light. But here am I, abandoned and unloved –’

‘Not when you’ve got Vladislav, surely.’

‘Do you know why I married him? He was the only boy in Crater Lakes who’d heard of Dvořák.’

‘Hmm. And are you telling me he’s since forgotten?’

‘Naughty boy! Give me a cigarette.’

The young man reached into his jacket. ‘Looks like rain.’

‘It always rains in Crater Lakes. But you don’t mind your exile so much now, do you?’ The gypsy’s voice was husky, caressing. She reached up for the young man’s lapels. How small she looked beside him: a child, a doll. ‘I’ve always liked a six-footer.’

‘Do you think they’ll go for our plan?’

‘It’s been a long time,’ said the woman. ‘Years. But sometimes things are better if you wait.’

‘And what are you waiting for – to play Ophelia?’

‘Lady Macbeth might be more my line.’

What were they on about? Skip squirmed. The couple, she feared, were about to kiss. But while they kissed, she could scramble over the fence. She edged her way along the wall. She was just a few yards away from them. If they looked around they would see her. Ditto if she ran to the fence.

Howling, basso profondo, burst upon the night. If a monstrous piece of earth-moving equipment had appeared beside the house, motor roaring, metal jaws gnashing, it could not have frightened her more. For an instant Skip stood frozen, mouth open, gaping at the hound that hurtled towards her, baying for blood.

Crashing back through silverbeets she could hear the dog inches behind her, collar clanking, paws pounding, breath snorting. Looming before her was the five-foot fence, grey in moonlight. A bewildered crowd – glimpsed once, in a wild look back – had spilled onto the patio, and the kaleidoscope boy, surging forward, called
to the dog, ‘Get him, Baskerville!’ and ‘Baskerville, go!’

Fear propelled Skip over the fence. She lunged at it, ploughed her palms into the tops of the palings and swung up even as hot jaws snapped at her sneakers. She kicked, flailed, fell with a thud to the other side, and rolled down the grassy slope.

Still the dog bayed, scrabbling at the fence like a plague of rats; then the palings shook as the boy, with a cry, dropped over the side. At once, Skip was on her feet again. The boy clutched her arm. She slapped him away. Rain gusted on the air. Tears filled her eyes: shame, rage, horror. Blinded, she hurled herself down the long yard, arms working like pistons, feet pounding the grass, until suddenly there was no grass, nothing under her feet at all.

The splash filled the night like an explosion.

In her shock, Skip barely registered the stench that consumed her. Viscous liquid soaked through her clothes. She rose up, spluttering, spitting out foulness. Her pursuer danced above her, a demonic sprite, pointing and cackling.

Light fell across the yard; then came the kookaburra call of Auntie Noreen, asking the boy what the bloody hell he thought he was doing, and he cackled again. Now Auntie Noreen, Uncle Doug and Sandy Campbell were there too, gaping with astonishment into the shit pit. Rain pocked Skip’s drenched head and the foul water that surrounded her.

Auntie Noreen howled, ‘Is that Baby Helen? Helen, you look like a drowned rat!’

‘A sewer rat!’ cried Sandy Campbell.

‘Poor little mite.’ Uncle Doug shook his head.

Then, like the boy, all three of them were laughing.

Chapter Three

One blustery afternoon some weeks earlier, Skip had been on her way to the tram stop in Glenelg when a man she had never seen before approached her with a friendly, purposeful air. He was tall, erect of carriage, and dressed immaculately: hat like a TV detective’s, detergent-advertisement shirt, dark suit devoid of creases, shiny shoes like enormous black beetles.

‘Afternoon, li’l miss,’ he said, and raised the hat. His voice was like Caper’s, if less exuberant. ‘Don’t suppose I could talk to you for a minute? Perhaps you and I could have a little chat.’

Skip half expected him to offer gum. ‘I’ve been warned about men like you. You’re a child molester.’ She wasn’t scared. She would kick him where it hurt.

‘What’s your name?’ he said. ‘Skip, isn’t it?’

A pulse leaped in her neck. She narrowed her eyes. ‘How do you know that?’

‘That name might be a boy’s. But you’re a girl.’

She wondered whether to deny it.

‘Been living here long?’ the man asked. ‘Like it, do you?’ Now he really did offer her gum, and Skip wasn’t sure if he was asking
whether she liked gum or liked living where she did. She took the gum, though she supposed she should not. More than this man’s voice was familiar: the curve of the jaw, the set of the eyes.

‘One of the Wells sisters, aren’t you? You call your mom by her first name. But what do you call the man who lives with her?’ Skip was sure he knew already: he was toying with her, and she wondered why. Frowning, she would have walked away, but the man gripped her arm. She gasped. In the same moment she was frightened, excited, confused. He reached into his jacket. Would he bring forth a revolver? Would he hold her for ransom?

He produced a photograph. ‘Look.’

The picture showed a clean-cut young man in collar and tie, with a dark short back and sides and a grin which, no denying it, she recognised. A moment passed before she realised that this was Caper, another Caper from another life. She looked again at the man who held the photograph.

‘You’re his brother.’ Her voice was hoarse.

Still holding her arm, he brought his face close to hers. ‘Do you have any idea who Kendall Caper is? You don’t, do you?’

‘What are you talking about?’ Skip kicked the man in the shins, but she was wearing sneakers and did no damage. She writhed, broke free and ran. When she looked back, Caper’s brother had vanished.

Skip reached the stop as a tram was drawing in. Passengers fanned out from the squeaking doors. Seeing Marlo, she called to her, waving her hands and leaping up and down.

‘What’s with you?’ said Marlo, puzzled.

‘Can’t I be happy to see you?’ Skip was breathless. She said nothing about Caper’s brother. The encounter felt barely real, and indeed hardly could have been: Caper had never spoken of a brother; his past consisted only of the magical name San Fran, where you must be sure to wear flowers in your hair.

Two days later she was walking home from school when a white sedan crawled along the kerb beside her. She eyed it suspiciously; the passenger door swung open and Caper’s brother leaned across from the driver’s side and said in that syrupy voice, ‘I’ll give you a ride.’

What force compelled her into the car? They moved off, shadows of trees passing across the windscreen, as Caper’s brother said, ‘I didn’t introduce myself properly the first time. I’m Richard Wrightman.’

‘Wrightman? Not Caper?’

‘You have a sister. You wouldn’t like it if you lost her. That’s how I feel about my brother. I’ve lost him, and long to get him back. You didn’t say anything about our meeting the other day, did you? I’m hoping to surprise my brother. Yes sir, a merry chase he’s led me these last few years. A clue here, a lead there, and most have been false. But not this time. Dad and Mom back in Frisco have been frantic. Think how happy they’ll be when they hear the news! Now, you’ll have to show me which way to go.’

Skip gulped. Oh, she was a fool! Why, why had she got into this car?

‘I’m not kidnapping you! Show me where you live.’

‘Will you let me out, please?’

Richard Wrightman laughed. ‘Now, what would that achieve? I know I’m in the right place. I’ve been to Bogotá. I’ve been to Bangkok. I’ve been to Brisbane. Not much longer now.’

They had reached a stoplight. Skip threw open the door, flung herself into the street and, not looking behind her, ran all the way back to the school gates. She plunged inside, and hid out in the bike sheds until the sky was nearly dark, when she ventured home.

As she trailed to school the next morning, Qantas bag slung across her shoulder, she fancied that the white sedan crept after her down the street. Several times she glimpsed it from the corner of her eye, but each time she turned it was gone. In class she felt jumpy, as if at any moment a knock might come at the door, and the headmaster with an imperative beckoning finger would call her from the room.
‘Helen Wells? This gentleman wants to talk to you,’ he would say, and emerging from behind him would be Caper’s brother, grin at the ready, detective’s hat clasped against his chest.

On the weekend she stayed indoors, not wanting to stir from the room above the garage she shared with Marlo. Listlessly she lay on her bed and read about Superboy and Lana Lang. On Saturday evening it was raining lightly. Saturday meant the pictures. Every week they went to the Ozone, but Skip, for once, was reluctant to go. Music blasted from Caper’s apartment. The Norfolk pine beside the garage creaked in the wind like a sailing ship at sea.

‘Skip, what is it?’ Marlo said at last.

‘What what is?’ said Skip, and snatched back the comic Marlo had plucked away from her.

‘Something’s wrong. It’s been wrong for days.’

‘How do you know? You’re always at school.’

‘I’m here now,’ said Marlo.

Skip looked at her sister doubtfully, as if she might disappear at any moment. She turned away. ‘There’s a man. He’s Caper’s brother.’

‘Man? What man?’

‘He followed me after school. In a white sedan.’

Alarmed, Marlo grabbed her sister’s shoulders. ‘Who is this man? What did he do to you?’

‘Nothing. Only asked questions – about Caper.’

‘And you answered him? Oh, Skip!’

‘I don’t understand!’ Skip wailed. ‘What have I done?’ But already the burden of guilt was upon her.

Marlo’s next words made Skip’s throat bulge as if she were about to vomit. ‘I heard Karen Jane and Caper talking. They were frightened. He’s not just dodging the draft. It’s worse. He’s hiding out –’

‘What? What are you talking about?’

‘He’s a deserter. From the navy. If this man finds him –’

‘It’s his brother!’

‘Are you sure? How long ago was this?’

‘Days.’

‘We have to tell him,’ said Marlo.

But Skip had delayed too long. As in a film or a dream where one scene dissolves effortlessly into another, they raced to the top of the concrete stairs that led down from the garage block, only to be halted by the sight below. There were shouts, and a crash, the screen door banged, and two police officers led Caper from the apartment. Cuffs circled his wrists and he was struggling, cursing, as they hustled him off in the rain.

Under the Norfolk pine stood Richard Wrightman. Stepping out from its shadows, he turned his face ceremonially, like a mask, towards the girls, who swayed at the top of the steps. Marlo looked away from Skip and said only, ‘You should have told me,’ while Karen Jane stood on the veranda, hugging herself, and the police car drove away.

The next morning, the
Sunday Mail
reported that Kenneth Wrightman, twenty-six, who had deserted from the US Navy in Sydney, had been apprehended by police in the Adelaide suburb of Glenelg, where he had hidden out under an assumed name. More details emerged over the following days: Wrightman, renegade younger son of a wealthy San Francisco family, had been in and out of trouble for years – marijuana, grand and petty larceny, receiving stolen goods. The navy had been his last chance. He would now be sent back to America to face charges. Glenelg neighbours were quoted saying that ‘Ken Caper’, as they called him, had always seemed a dubious character. He played his music (if you could call it music) too loudly. They were sure he used drugs.