Melting Moments Read online

  And he always perks up immeasurably when he hears Elsie’s whistle at the door.

  ‘Come on then, give us a cuddle,’ he demands, lurching towards her on his frame.

  The girl avoids Ruby’s eye. ‘Need to go on with my rounds now, Mr Whiting. Be back later to check up on you.’

  Father turns to Ruby, the colour restored to his cheeks. ‘Lovely girl, Elsie. Apple of me eye, that one.’

  Towards Christmas, Matron summons Ruby into her office for a quick word. She gestures towards a box of empty Scotch bottles sitting on her desk.

  ‘And what do you have to say about this, Mrs Jenkins?’

  Ruby has nothing to say at all. Indeed, she finds herself quite lost for words. She has been giving Father a few dollars each fortnight, so he can go to the pub and make a big man of himself, but she cannot imagine where he would have found the means to invest in quite so much alcohol.

  ‘As you would know from the contract, this is a violation of the rules.’

  She starts to defend herself, but Matron holds up a hand.

  ‘Consider this a warning. No further disciplinary action planned at this stage.’

  Back in Father’s apartment, Ruby is figuring out how to broach the subject when there is another whistle at the door.

  ‘How often does she drop in to see you, Dad?’ she asks after the girl has left, but he appears not to have heard.

  Of course, it is a wonderful thing to see that spring back in his step, and there’s nothing wrong with a little innocent flirtation. And yet Ruby remembers something else about those mornings on the river. Often, as Father loaded the milk onto the boat, a woman would step out of one of the shanty houses and just stare at them. Father would doff his hat, as he would with anyone, but there was something about the way the woman’s eyes bore into Ruby’s that was unsettling: some deep, unwelcome intelligence she seemed to wish to convey. And then there was Mother’s wordless fury whenever another calf was found missing during head count.

  The following week, Ruby invites Father to Sunday lunch with Ned and Eva, but he just smiles back at her, vacantly. His eyes are becoming opaque with cataracts, as if he is slowly leaving the room – but for where?

  ‘Not this Sunday, dear. No call for it this Sunday.’

  ‘But I’ll be cooking a roast.’

  ‘Irish stew here on Sunday.’

  She reminds him that although he enjoys a good Irish stew, he has always preferred a roast, but again he appears not to hear her. On the way out, she checks the roster on the nurses’ board and sees that Elsie’s shift been moved to the weekend.

  In the midst of all this, the most astonishing thing happens. Eva phones to say that she and Ned are expecting a child.

  ‘But darling, however will you manage your studies?’ Ruby asks.

  ‘I’m sure I’ll find a way,’ Eva replies breezily.

  Ruby has a full schedule of interviews the following morning, so she drives around early to Ned and Eva’s house, dressed in her smart new work suit to fortify herself.

  Eva answers the door in a kaftan. ‘Mum! What a surprise.’

  ‘All sorts of surprises lately.’

  ‘Take it you’ve come to congratulate us on the news,’ smirks Ned.

  ‘Isn’t it something,’ Ruby replies.

  ‘That it is. It’s definitely something.’

  Ruby has never cared for Ned’s shifty grin. It always seems as if it might be at her own expense, though this has never appeared to trouble Eva. Fortunately, he is on his way to the clinic this morning, so she follows Eva through the lounge room – if indeed it could be called that, with its assortment of bean bags, and bookshelves teetering on bricks – and into the kitchen. Evidently, some sort of celebration has recently taken place, and the detritus has not yet been dealt with. Ruby removes her jacket and rolls up her sleeves, setting to work on the dishes.

  Overnight, she has prepared a few things to say.

  ‘As you know, dear, your father and I are very proud of all you have achieved, and of your diligence in pursuing your chosen course of study.’

  ‘Thank you, Mum.’

  ‘We eagerly await the time when you become established in your career, and the two of you can afford a deposit on a proper home, appropriate for the raising of a child.’

  She glances pointedly around the kitchen: at the ashtray crammed with cigarette butts; at the garlic flower teetering in a beer bottle as a single tokenistic attempt at homemaking.

  ‘We have never felt you chose an easy road, but have been glad to support you along the way, particularly given your determination and commitment. But my darling!’ – and here she is forced to put the scrubbing brush down for a moment – ‘How in heaven’s name do you imagine you could raise a child in this environment?’

  ‘It wasn’t really planned,’ concedes Eva.

  For the life of her, Ruby cannot understand how her daughter – a medical student married to a veterinarian – could have made such an elementary mistake.

  ‘Have you given any thought to family planning?’

  ‘A bit late for that now,’ Eva says with a foolish smile.

  ‘It may be. Or it may not be.’ Ruby thinks of those unfortunate girls who used to pass through Dr Fitzgerald’s hands at the boarding house; she thinks of her own ill-fated efforts with brandy and a hot bath, and of her relief that Charlie turned out so very well – if short of stature. ‘There are certain measures these days that were not available in my time. One of the boons of modernity.’

  To her surprise, Eva starts laughing. ‘For Pete’s sake! I’m not interested in any “boons of modernity”.’

  ‘But what about your women’s liberation?’ It feels as if she has only just come around to this way of thinking, in time for Eva to perform a rapid about-face, leaving her stranded, barracking alone for her daughter’s career.

  ‘Mum, the whole point of women’s liberation is that women can have it all,’ Eva explains patiently. ‘You’re going to be a grandmother, whether you like it or not.’

  Over the days ahead, Ruby reconciles herself to the idea of being a grandmother, until she begins to feel quite pleased, and even thankful for her daughter’s stubbornness. She breaks the news to the family over Sunday lunch – I always knew that girl would never make a doctor, Granny says gleefully – and starts knitting a matinée jacket for the child, as a conciliatory gesture. Before she knows it, an entire week has passed by and she has not checked up on Father.

  When she lets herself into his flat, the wireless is silent, and his pocket money lies unspent on the coffee table.

  She finds him sitting slumped in his armchair.

  ‘She’s gone.’

  Ruby has never previously known him to cry: even in the Depression when there was not enough money for the wheat bags; even when Mother finally abandoned him.

  ‘Just like that. Without a word of goodbye.’

  Robbed of his jauntiness, he is suddenly very old.

  ‘What’s that in your hand, Dad?’

  He opens his fist to reveal a small knitted mouse, clad in a pom-pom hat and a jumper inscribed with the letter M.

  ‘Did she knit it herself?’

  He nods miserably. ‘M for Maxwell, you see.’

  ‘She was certainly a very accomplished young woman, and we were lucky to have her.’

  ‘Seems she was asked to leave, but didn’t feel the need to tell me.’

  There is a knock at the door, and they both swivel towards it expectantly, but it is only the new nurse supplying clean towels. She is small and bustling and not in the least like Elsie.

  ‘Come now, Mr Whiting. The sooner you stop your moping the better. You know we’re all better off without her.’

  She deposits the towels in the bathroom, and sweeps back out of the room.

  ‘In brighter news,’ Ruby announces, ‘Eva is going to have a baby.’

  ‘Who’s that, dear?’

  ‘You know. My Eva. You’re going to be a great-grandfather.�
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  ‘Well, then. Tell her thank you for the pastilles. I always like getting them.’

  He arranges his mouth into a smile, but still looks entirely forlorn. There is a build-up of dirt on his neck, and a ridge of flakiness atop his scalp. Whatever else they might say about Elsie, she never would have allowed this to happen.

  Ruby helps him into the bathroom, where she moves the shower chair to the basin, props his stiff neck on a stack of clean towels and cradles his huge domed head in her hands. It is splotched with sun damage, traced with patterns like a small planet, and has always had an absolute quality to it: gravitational centre of the known universe. But today, as she lathers his scalp, his skull beneath her fingers feels as fragile as a baby’s. After she has patted his scalp dry, she fetches some baby lotion from her handbag and rubs it in until his head gleams like an egg. Thank you, darling, he murmurs. She cannot quite place herself in the scheme of things: all these generations around her, coming and going; loss and gain, everyone in motion. For a moment she imagines her hand passes over a fontanelle, but it is only a crater from where a skin cancer has been removed. It is a devil of a thing, old age. The way it slices bits of you off at a time; the way it removes you, in increments.

  8

  Ever since Charlie has left home, Ruby has enjoyed her quiet weekend mornings. Arthur has taken to lying in of a Sunday, and in the absence of an audience Granny is less likely to make one of her early-morning appearances. How she used to vex Ruby! When there was breakfast to prepare and lunches to cut, and she would waltz into the kitchen and insist everyone say good morning, affecting not to know what to do with her jolly milk bottle even though Ruby had told her countless times where to leave it for the milkman.

  But this morning the kitchen is all Ruby’s own, and she starts assembling the ingredients for the ginger cake. Granny will undoubtedly complain, but today is the one day of the year on which Ruby can bake any cake she wants. Don’t know what all the fuss is about, Granny had said last night, when Ruby reminded her that the children were coming for morning tea. After a certain age, it’s shameful to make a fuss. Never mind that Granny gets taken out to High Tea for her birthday every year, and that there have never been any complaints about that.

  Of course, the best present would be a full day’s respite from her mother-in-law, but Ruby gave up hoping for unexpected calamities years ago. We all have our crosses to bear, she has sometimes said to Daisy, but she tries not to vent too much to Arthur. Although he is aware that his mother is not Mrs Perfect, he has a great sense of duty, which is in fact one of the things Ruby most loves about him.

  She has sifted together the dry ingredients for the cake, and is combining the butter with the treacle when Mother shuffles in.

  ‘Baking a ginger cake, are you?’

  ‘Always fancied a ginger cake.’

  ‘That you did.’ Mother plants a mournful kiss on her cheek. ‘Happy birthday, dear girl.’

  ‘Not sure I can rightly be called a girl at age fifty-five.’

  Mother sighs. ‘To think of it. Fifty-five years ago today.’

  It does Mother no good to dwell on the past, so Ruby fetches her a pinny.

  ‘Fancy making some pikelets?’

  And no sooner has she suggested it than the milk and eggs are out of the refrigerator and whisked together in a bowl. She really is a most efficient woman.

  Arthur is the next to emerge. As he enfolds her in one of his large hugs, she makes a mental note to launder his dressing-gown.

  He presents her with a velvet box. ‘Happy birthday, darling.’

  Nestled within is a double-strand necklace, with the most elegant gold clasp she has ever seen. The pearls gleam against their velvet backdrop, lambent as moons.

  ‘Ye gods!’ she gasps.

  ‘More gems for my Ruby.’

  ‘You spoil me, you do. I just love them.’

  ‘Beautiful,’ Mother says gravely, as she fastens the clasp behind Ruby’s neck. Arthur could not look more pleased.

  ‘Sit yourself down, and your eggs will be ready shortly,’ says Ruby. ‘You’re a most deserving man.’

  ‘Where’s the paper?’

  ‘Granny’s not up yet.’

  ‘Shall I wake her, do you suppose?’

  ‘I wouldn’t do that. A lie-in will do her good. You know she never likes a fuss about anyone’s birthday other than her own.’

  Ruby allows herself these small thrusts and parries, once in a while. But then she feels ungenerous, particularly after such a gift.

  ‘Poor old thing must have worn herself out yesterday, with that double bill at the pictures.’

  ‘Scarcely a spring chicken,’ he points out. ‘What with a 55-year-old daughter-in-law and all.’

  ‘Enough of that. Now just sit there and be a good boy while I make your eggs.’

  He heads outside to collect the paper. She hears him hesitate for a moment outside Granny’s door, but then his methodical tread continues, and he returns with the Sunday Mail. Installed contentedly at the bench, eating his eggs and slurping his tea, he glances up from time to time to admire Ruby. Really, it is an entirely fine morning. She can scarcely remember a better one.

  ‘Mother still not up?’ he asks, once he has finished the paper.

  ‘I wouldn’t worry, darling. Just lying in, I should think.’

  Though she, too, is starting to feel unsettled: Granny has always found a way to ruin her birthday.

  After Arthur has showered and dressed, there is still no sign of the old woman, so the three of them venture down the back passage, where they hover uncertainly alongside the giant map of Great Britain.

  Arthur thumps the door. ‘Mother! Mother? All okay in there?’

  ‘The children will be arriving soon,’ Ruby calls out. ‘I do wish you’d come out and have your breakfast.’

  Arthur frowns at Ruby. ‘Any chance of foul play, do you think?’

  This strikes Ruby as the least likely scenario, but she offers to go outside to investigate. Arthur and Mother agree that this is the best idea; indeed, it is always good to have an idea at such a time; but as soon as Ruby pushes her way past the compost bins she sees that Granny’s window is unmolested.

  While they are pondering their next move, Eva arrives with Ned and Amy and a giant bunch of chrysanthemums.

  ‘Happy birthday!’ Eva begins, and is then silenced by the grim assembly in the passage.

  ‘I wanna visit Granny Jenkins,’ says Amy, identifying the problem immediately.

  ‘How about you come and have a pikelet, dear,’ Mother says, and steers the child into the kitchen.

  ‘Someone’s got to go in,’ declares Ned. ‘Where’s the spare key?’

  Ruby feels foolish to admit it, but she was never allowed to touch the spare key, except when Granny took her annual holiday to Normanville, and Ruby was able to sort through the year’s accretion of junk in her apartment – dismembered slippers, old magazines, button tins – alongside missing items from her own household – a soup ladle, a pair of garters, even a single earring from the set Arthur had given her for their silver jubilee. It always astounded Ruby that a woman should have such little shame about letting another woman into her private affairs like this. And it was always painstaking work, but something of a relief once completed, as if the entire house required this annual evacuation of its nether regions for the sake of its overall digestive health. Of course Granny would never offer a word of thanks, but she always seemed pleased enough to return to an apartment that was sparkling clean. Then she would promptly reclaim the spare key. Can’t have you sneaking in on me in the night. As if Ruby would have a mind to do so.

  She should have made another spare. She realises that now. It was a serious lapse of housekeeping.

  ‘How about I climb in the window?’ suggests Ned.

  ‘It’ll give her the fright of her life to discover a man in her room,’ Eva says. ‘Let me do it.’

  The two of them go outside, and Ruby hears a scuffl
e and a thud followed by a long silence. She dares not hope for anything. Eventually Eva unlocks the door.

  ‘She looks very peaceful.’

  Nobody seems quite sure of what to do. Granny always seemed as sturdy as a tank; Ruby had suspected she might outlive them all. Arthur is pacing around and blinking a lot, so she takes his arm and suggests they go in together to say goodbye.

  ‘Exactly right and proper,’ he mutters.

  As they step over the threshold, Ruby feels a fleeting shame at the squalor of Granny’s rooms. That this should have been allowed to go on in her very own home. Then her eyes adjust to the darkness, and she sees Granny Jenkins lying on her single bed in her white nightgown, her mouth slightly ajar. She is the palest thing in the room, and smaller than Ruby has ever seen her, almost like a child.

  ‘Rest well, dear,’ says Arthur, leaning forward to kiss her on the brow. Ruby does the same; her mother-in-law’s face is dry and cool beneath her lips.

  ‘Bit unsteady,’ Arthur apologises, as he stumbles on the way out, so she helps him down the passage and into the master bedroom. When she returns to the kitchen to make him a cup of tea, she sees that Charlie has arrived, looking very natty in a bow tie.

  ‘So, Doctor Eva, are you in a position to certify her death?’ he asks.

  ‘Not appropriate for a family member,’ Eva says. ‘I suppose love could cloud your judgement. I’ve called a locum.’

  ‘What happens if you’re standing up when you die?’ Amy asks.

  ‘You fall over,’ Eva tells her matter-of-factly.

  ‘But what happens if you bang your head?’

  ‘Doesn’t matter, because you’re dead.’

  ‘It’s sad that Granny Jenkins is dead, isn’t it?’

  The child’s words hang in the air, unanswered.

  Back in the bedroom, Arthur has fallen asleep. It must have been a great shock for him, poor love. Ruby carefully places the cup and saucer on the bedside table, covers him with the blanket and pulls the door closed behind her.