Melting Moments Page 10

  ‘Well, hello,’ says Arthur when he returns home. ‘And who’s this racy redhead in my kitchen?’

  For a time, he cannot keep his eyes – or indeed his hands – off her. And it isn’t just Arthur. Even the bridge ladies are complimentary, with Norma turning up the following week flaunting a matching shade of auburn – alas, to underwhelming effect. It is as if Ruby has become visible again, in a world that has itself become more vivid.

  At one Sunday lunch – with Granny Jenkins up to her usual mischief; Father grinning deafly and attempting charm; and Mother stoically chewing through her food, looking neither left nor right – Eva declares that the Army is a stranglehold of male chauvinism.

  Arthur pounds the table. ‘I will not have you come to my house and insult the Services.’

  Eva is unapologetic. ‘Actually, Dad, it was the Services that insulted me. Refusing me entry into their undergraduate scheme. Not because of my marks, mind you. Because of my vagina.’

  Inevitably Charlie starts laughing; Father, sensing a joke is afoot, enthusiastically joins in.

  ‘Why in God’s name would you want to join the Army?’ Ruby asks. She has aimed to keep up with her daughter, to stay abreast. But as soon as she feels she is coming close to understanding her, the girl pulls away. She remembers the nightmares she used to have when Eva was a child, of taking her out to sea in a boat, where Eva would catapult herself out of her arms and somersault into the water, disappearing forever.

  ‘Because the Army gives you money,’ Eva says. ‘And I would like to be able to afford to eat.’

  ‘That is an absolute disgrace,’ Arthur says resoundingly.

  ‘Exactly right,’ opines Granny. ‘Where’s your pride? Always said you ought to have done hairdressing.’

  ‘There’s plenty of food here,’ Ruby notes.

  ‘I would have expected better from the Services,’ Arthur continues. ‘And they have certainly not heard the end of this.’

  The following Sunday, Eva arrives at the house with a young man – an Ed or Ted, or perhaps Ned – sporting shoulder-length hair and a pair of mustard-yellow bellbottoms.

  ‘And what do you do for yourself, then?’ Granny demands.

  ‘As it happens, I do many things for myself,’ he replies, in a tone that strikes Ruby as overly bold. ‘But if you’re enquiring about my job, I’m a vet.’

  ‘Trying to look like an animal yourself, are you, son?’ asks Arthur.

  ‘Actually, we just wanted to listen to Jorge Bolet play the “Fantaisie Impromptu”,’ Eva explains, and they disappear together into the lounge room.

  ‘Under your very own roof,’ says Granny.

  ‘For goodness sake, they’re listening to Chopin,’ retorts Ruby.

  Distant, urgent arpeggios ripple into the kitchen, and Ruby can only assume that Eva has put the Services completely out of her mind.

  But later that week, Arthur phones Ruby from work and instructs her to summon Eva to the house, as he has very important news to convey. Eva comes by after her classes, and is sitting at the kitchen bench, regaling Ruby with stories about her tutor – He insists we call him Sir! – when Arthur arrives, brandishing an envelope.

  ‘You will remember, my dear, that I undertook to write to the Minister of Defence on your behalf.’

  He opens the letter with a magnificent flourish.

  ‘Dear Mr Jenkins, I refer to your letter concerning careers for women as medical officers in the Services. All applicants undergo a selection process, which has historically favoured male students.’

  ‘The whole world favours male students,’ Eva says bitterly. ‘I was just telling Mum about my tutor —’

  ‘Not so hasty,’ he says, and delivers the coup de grâce. ‘I am pleased to say the Army would consider an application from your daughter should she wish to become an Army medical officer.’

  ‘Well, I’ll be a monkey’s uncle,’ ventures Ruby.

  ‘Thank you,’ says Eva eventually. Ruby cannot tell if she is pleased.

  Arthur takes out his handkerchief and wipes his eyes. ‘My dear girl. Nothing would gladden my heart more than for you to enjoy a career in the Services.’

  He folds the letter with satisfaction, and carefully inserts it back into its envelope. Ruby knows exactly where he will file it: in the carved wooden box on his study desk, alongside his handful of service medals, the bundle of letters she wrote him during the war and that single lock of Dolores’s hair.

  Later that month, Eva spends a full day undergoing physical and psychological tests at the Keswick Barracks, reporting that the Army set up her own one-woman change room, composed of sheets, and that someone had been through the entire written psychological test with a biro, changing all the male pronouns to female.

  ‘How many goals did she have to kick to defeat her sister’s football team?’ she says incredulously. ‘Because my inferior brain would have ground to a halt if confronted by a male pronoun.’

  ‘Sounds like good old-fashioned gallantry to me,’ says Ruby.

  Several days later, Eva phones with the news that she has made it through to the next round in Canberra, and that the Services will be sending a car to collect her for the airport.

  ‘Sending a car!’ says Ruby. ‘Aren’t you going up in the world!’

  When she hangs up, Arthur is beaming.

  ‘No better career than the Services,’ he declares. Ruby cannot remember ever seeing him so pleased.

  ‘And yet it didn’t sit quite right with you, dear, did it?’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  She is not sure why she feels the need to puncture his mood. ‘Well, the nature of your discharge.’

  To her surprise, he downs his entire snifter of port.

  ‘I think I was only the second man to get a medical discharge, wasn’t I?’

  ‘I can’t remember that detail, dear. I don’t think I ever knew it.’

  ‘From New Guinea, anyway. Because I remember the doctor saying you’re only the second one I’ve seen.’

  She suddenly feels quite dizzy. ‘You certainly made quick work of that drink. How about a cup of tea?’

  ‘I won’t bore you with my war reminiscences,’ he says tentatively. ‘I don’t suppose they’re of much interest.’

  ‘What’s done is done,’ she agrees, and returns to the kitchen to put the kettle on.

  Ruby spends the following week in bed, burning up with the flu. Various figures float in and out of her room in various states of concern. Mother is the most welcome, bearing cold presses and beef tea, along with reassurances that everybody is being adequately catered for. Ruby hates to imagine what would have happened if the running of the household had been left to Granny. Arthur has been banished to the study for his own protection, but makes frequent, fretful appearances.

  Most of the time she dozes, or stares blurrily at the cornices. There is a car coming for Eva. She feels its presence even in her dreams, driving towards her child. It is black and capacious, and will pull up outside the tiny flat on Magill Road, where the driver, bedecked in full regalia, will step out and open the back door, and convey Eva to her glorious future – a future that promises, in ways that Ruby does not quite understand, some form of redemption for Arthur.

  And then Eva herself seems to be in the room.

  ‘Well, if it’s not my medical officer,’ Ruby murmurs.

  ‘That’s not happening anymore,’ Eva says offhandedly.

  ‘But darling, there’s a car coming for you.’

  With any luck, Ruby will have recovered enough by Tuesday to return to bridge. She knows exactly how she will let the news slip out: casually, as if by accident. Of course, they are sending a car for my Eva.

  ‘Mum. Did you even hear what I said? There’s going to be a wedding in the family.’

  ‘A wedding? Whoever’s getting married?’

  There is rather too much laughter in the room, and Ruby registers another presence by the door, clad in mustard bell-bottoms.

  ‘
Oh, hello, Ed.’

  ‘Ned,’ he corrects her.

  ‘I’m getting married,’ Eva seems to say, as Ruby pushes herself up in bed.

  ‘But darling, whoever to?’

  7

  When Ruby arrives to collect Father, Mrs Dewey shows her to the squalid guest room, saying he’s been no trouble, no trouble at all, when it is clear to both of them that she has let him down badly, and herself into the bargain. Ruby is tempted to slap the woman, but instead she packs the remainder of Father’s possessions into a large suitcase and hauls it back down the hallway – which she can’t help but notice is impeccably maintained, without so much as a skerrick of dust on the skirting boards – and out to the car. Only after she has slammed the boot shut does she issue Mrs Dewey a frosty goodbye; a gesture Father regrettably undermines, blowing kisses from the passenger seat.

  As soon as they get home, she runs Father a bubble bath and instructs him to soak for a good half an hour, while she starts the business of sorting through his clothes and laundering those items that are salvageable. She prepares a hearty Irish stew for dinner, disregarding Granny Jenkins’ protests, and then sets him up in the spare bed in the sunroom, whence she doesn’t hear a peep until eight o’clock the following morning. Slept like a baby, I did. Warm and cosy as all get out. As he sits at the bench like Lord Muck – Nothing like a good slap-up lamb’s fry for breakfast – she gazes at his broad, good-natured face, and is struck by the way he has always lifted the mood, regardless of the environment. For a moment she wonders whether she might be able to keep him after all, as Charlie had wished to keep the white kitten that strayed onto their doorstop one Christmas Eve, but then Mother joins them in the kitchen. Although she is companionable enough this morning, Ruby recognises there is a limit to her forbearance. And so, once breakfast is over, and Ruby has pressed and folded his remaining clothes, it is time for them to be on their way. Mother issues a formal goodbye from the kitchen, graciously submitting to a peck on the cheek, while Granny Jenkins follows them out to the carport – not offering any help, mind you, but with the keen interest of a witness to an execution.

  ‘A crying shame your wife wouldn’t allow you to stay, and in your own daughter’s home.’

  ‘Yes indeed, dear lady,’ he says, doffing his hat. ‘And the very same to you.’

  He is in fine form for the duration of the trip to North Adelaide, producing his tuneless whistle, but Ruby has such a lump in her throat she is glad there is no call for talk. Still, she keeps on driving – what else is there to do? – and soon enough they pull up at Compassionate Care. It is just as dismal as she remembers from the inspection: everything smelling of disinfectant and unremittingly grey, apart from a lone goldfish in the pond by the entrance, as if this were all the elderly required by way of colour. When Matron shows Father to his room, Ruby senses a dimming of his spirits, but of course he has never been one to complain.

  ‘How lovely that you have your own little flat,’ Ruby observes. ‘With your very own facilities and everything.’

  In fact the flat is poky and smells of decay. Ruby does not wish to consider the fate of the previous inhabitant.

  ‘And you’ll be given proper food, and nicely taken care of.’

  ‘Ain’t that the case.’

  ‘And as luck would have it, you’re right next to the nurses’ station. So there’s always going to be someone on hand if you need them.’

  He parks himself on the bed and stares at the tiny window.

  ‘I imagine you’d be more comfortable on the armchair,’ she suggests, but as she busies herself with the unpacking, he remains perched upon the bed. She tunes the wireless to 5AA, filling the room with that familiar, monotonous urgency – Lord Ladbroke is making up ground let’s see Rose of Shannon is still in the lead fancy that an unexpected late casualty in Delovely – but even this fails to enliven him. When she has finished the unpacking and made him a cup of tea, she reminds him that dinner is at five.

  ‘I’m sure you’ll find friends and admirers in no time.’

  ‘No doubt I’ll be as happy as can be,’ he says generously, gazing at her with his milky eyes. He has still not removed his hat or coat, and she hurries from the room before he can see her weeping.

  Back home, over a dinner of steak and kidney pie, followed by stewed quince for dessert, she tries not to think of the slop Father must be eating.

  ‘How did Maxwell settle in, dear?’ asks Arthur.

  ‘Well enough. A great relief to get him away from that Mrs Dewey.’

  ‘A great disgrace, more like it,’ declares Granny Jenkins, through a mouthful of custard. ‘Locking up your dear old dad.’

  ‘I’m sure Mr Whiting’s needs will be more than attended to,’ Mother says definitively. It is unusual for Granny Jenkins to keep her head pulled in, but there is a look in Mother’s eye that perhaps warns her off. It is not a gaze Ruby particularly wishes to meet either.

  She will never forget the expression on Mother’s face on that fateful day last year, when she arrived at the house with suitcase in tow. After more than fifty years of marriage, one thing was clear: enough was enough. After settling her into the spare room, Ruby drove over to the cottage in Payneham to check on Father, who was still convalescing from his brain stent, which was how Mother had come to collect the bank statement in the first place.

  ‘Yoohoo!’ she had called, letting herself in the front door. And there he was, sitting alone at the kitchen table with his head bandaged up, filling out one of his coupons.

  She remembers the way his face lit up, as though he imagined she had come to collect him. But all she could think of was how hard Mother had worked her entire life. Of how the very idea of government hand-outs was anathema to her.

  ‘How could you?’ she demanded. ‘How could you, and for a second time? It’s downright wicked of you. It’s a rotten, rotten weakness. You’ve been a naughty old boy.’

  She had never previously spoken to him like this, and his entire face collapsed. Her poor, dear father. Even now, she struggles to forgive herself for her harshness.

  On her next visit, Ruby is surprised to find him alone in his room, listening to the wireless; she would have expected him to have made friends by now.

  ‘Ruby!’ he says wearily. ‘Apple of me eye.’

  ‘How are you settling in?’

  ‘No doubt I’ll get used to it.’

  There is a knock at the door, and a young nurse steps in. She is the plainer sort of girl, but smiles widely to see him.

  ‘Elsie!’ he exclaims. ‘Best of the lot of ’em!’

  ‘Following the nags, are we, Mr Whiting?’

  ‘Getting ready for the Cup.’

  ‘Got any tips for me?’

  ‘I’ve got plenty to say about the Cup.’

  As he twinkles at her, Ruby is reminded of the jauntiness that used to come upon him whenever Mrs McInernay dropped in to the farmhouse. At the time, it troubled her because she could tell it troubled Mother, but today she welcomes it as evidence of his former self, and returns home with a peaceful heart.

  The following Sunday, when she visits, she finds Father sitting at a bridge table in the common room, holding forth to several ladies, each flaunting a different shade of lilac hair. Oh, it was a close call, that one, he enthuses in his husky voice. Did I tell you about the time it was a photo finish, and everyone said I had to sell me ticket but I held fast, and there’s a great deal of immoderate laughter and even the odd smattering of applause, so that it seems for a moment to be a very jolly environment indeed, apart from the decrepitude of all present and the horrible institutional smell of stew.

  He has always had this quality, her father: wherever he is, the magic follows. In her entire life, she has only ever met one other man like it – and it does her no good to think of him. This is my Ruby, this is, Father would say, on those Saturday mornings when she joined him on the milk boat to Murray Bridge for her piano lessons. Apple of me eye, this one. And the other farmers would
doff their caps, or the more forward amongst them pinch her cheek. Of course, there was only suffering to be had at the end of it – with Sister Maude at the convent and her snappy deployment of a ruler, so that as Ruby ploughed anxiously through her Schubert ‘Moment Musical’ it felt less the evocation of a moment than the labour of an eternity – and yet as soon as she was back with Father on the boat, that eternity contracted back to a single moment, safely confined to the past, and she basked again in the distinction of being his daughter, with the empty milk tins clanging away around them.

  ‘And how was your father today?’ Mother asks over lunch, out of curiosity or duty, Ruby is not sure which. Not once has she expressed the desire to visit him.

  ‘He seemed well enough.’

  ‘Whole thing’s completely heartless, if you ask me,’ says Granny Jenkins. ‘Putting him out to pasture like that, and him missing out.’

  But Ruby is no longer sure that Father is missing out, despite the freshly stewed rhubarb she serves for dessert, in the Wedgwood crockery with the silver cutlery. She suspects Father might in fact prefer to be seated at a flimsy bridge table, entertaining a group of admirers, dunking Nice biscuits into his milky tea, free from reprimand.

  As the months pass, Ruby is touched by the level of care Father is receiving at the home. There are always fresh flowers in his flat, and recently tiny knitted items have started appearing on his shelves: an owl in a beanie, a miniature teddy bear, a kitten with a cup of milk. Cat that got the cream, says Father. That’s me. Eva is as helpful as might be hoped, regularly bringing him fruit pastilles and shouting into his ear, while Charlie drops by whenever he can for a game of cards. Although Father vexes them all with his capricious use of his hearing aid, he unfailingly knows what is going on with the horses. Stone the crows! he will call out, mid-conversation. Matching him stride by stride!