Mary held out her hand. "I'd like that. Goodbye, Mr. Martinson, and thank you so much for your kindness."
She went away thoughtful and saddened, conscious that the most insoluble problems are those which by their very nature can have no space within them for dreams.
Seventeen
Spring in Sydney was not the brilliant, burgeoning explosion of new growth and awakening it was in the Northern Hemisphere. All but a few kinds of imported deciduous trees retained their leaves throughout the brief, balmy winter, and there was always something flowering in Sydney gardens the year round. The greatest change was in the air, a sparkling softness that somehow filled the heart with renewed hope and joy.
Mary's cottage would have been the showplace of the district, could anyone have seen it. She and Tim had worked hard on the garden all through the winter, even going so far as to buy fully grown trees and having them planted by a specialist. So when October came there were flowers everywhere, massed in huge beds alongside the veranda and circling every tree. Iceland poppies, carnations, asters, pansies, phlox, sweet peas, tulips, wistaria, daffodils, hyacinths, azaleas, gladioli; flowers of every color, size, and shape splashed their crowded heads in sheets of beauty everywhere, and the wind carried their perfumes through the wild forest and out across the river.
Four exquisitely sad weeping cherries drooped their loaded pink branches down over pink hyacinths and tulips growing in the grass beneath them, and six flowering almonds creaked under a weight of white blossom, the grass around them smothered with lily of the valley and daffodils.
The first weekend that everything was fully out in flower, Tim went wild with delight. He capered from cherries to almonds, marveling at Mary's shrewdness in choosing only pink bulbs to surround the cherries and white and yellow for the almonds, exclaiming at how they looked as if they grew wild out of the grass. Mary watched him, smiling in spite of all her resolutions to be serious no matter how he reacted. His joy was so transparent, so tender and experimental; Paris wandering the springtime slopes of Mount Ida before returning to the drudgery of an urban Troy. It was indeed a beautiful garden, Mary thought, her eyes following Tim as he danced about, but how did he see it, how different did it appear in his eyes, that it awed and delighted him so? Insects and even some higher animals were supposed to see a different world through differently constructed eyes, see colors and shapes a human being could not; what shade was infrared, what hue was ultraviolet? Perhaps Tim, too, saw things beyond her ken; perhaps among all the other tangled circuits in his brain he saw a different spectrum and heard a different frequency band. Did he hear the music of the spheres, could he see the shape of the spirit and the color of the moon? If there was only some way to tell! But his world was forever barred, she could not enter it and he could not tell her what it was like.
"Tim," she said that night, as they sat in the darkened living room with the glass doors open to the perfume-saturated wind, "Tim, what do you feel now, at this moment? What do the flowers smell like, how do you see my face?"
He withdrew himself reluctantly from the music they were playing, turning his dream-clouded eyes upon her mistily, smiling in the gentle, almost vacant way he had. Her heart seemed to quiver and dissolve under that look, something unidentifiable welled up in her, so surrounded by sadness that she had to wink away tears.
He was frowning as he puzzled over the questions, and when he answered it was slowly, hesitantly. "Feel? Feel? Cripes, I dunno! Sort of happy, good. I feel good, that's it!"
"And what do the flowers smell like?"
He smiled at her, thinking she was joking. "Why, they smell like flowers, of course!"
"And my face?"
"Your face is beautiful, like Mum's and Dawnie's. It looks like Saint Teresa in my holy picture."
She sighed. "That's a lovely thing to say, Tim. I'm sure I never thought of myself as having a face like Saint Teresa."
"Well, it is," he assured her. "She's on the wall at the end of my bed at home, Mum put her up there because I like her, I like her. She looks at me every night and every morning as though she thinks I'm the full quid, and you look at me like that, too, Mary." He shivered, gripped by a kind of painful joy. "I like you, Mary, I like you better than Dawnie, I like you as much as I like Pop and Mum." The beautifully shaped hands moved, and said more in their moving than his poor, limited speech ever could. "But it's sort of different, Mary, different from Pop and Mum, Sometimes I like them better than you, and sometimes I like you better than them."
She got up abruptly and went to the doors. "I'm going outside for a little walk, Tim, but I want you to stay here like a good fellow and listen to the music. I'll be back soon."
He nodded and turned back to the record player, watching it fixedly, as though to do so helped him hear the music.
The scent of the garden was unbearable, and passing through the daffodils like a shadow she made her way down to the beach. There was a rock in the sand at the far end, just tall enough to serve as a back rest, but when Mary dropped to her knees in the sand she turned to face it, put her arms upon it and buried her face against them. Her shoulders drew together and her body twisted in a spasm of devastating grief, so desolate and despairing that for a moment a part of her held back from participating, horrified. But the grief could not be suppressed or denied any longer; she wept and moaned in pain.
They were like a moth and a bright, burning light, she and Tim; she the moth, endowed with senses and the dignity of life, he the light, filling her entire world with a brilliant, searing fire. He did not know how desperately she buffeted herself against the walls of his isolation, he could never comprehend the depth and urgency of her desire to immolate herself on the flame of his fascination. Fighting the uselessness of her hunger and knowing it was beyond him to appease it, she ground her teeth in rage and pain and wept incon-solably.
What must have been hours later she felt his hand on her shoulder.
"Mary, are you all right?" His voice was filled with fear. "Are you sick? Oh, Mafy, please say you're all right, please say you're all right!"
She forced her shaking arms down to her sides.
"I'm all right, Tim," she answered wearily, lowering her head so that he could not see her face, even though it was very dark. "I just felt a bit sick, and came out for a breath of air. I didn't want to worry you, that's all."
"Do you still feel sick?" He squatted on his haunches beside her and tried to peer into her face, stroking her shoulder clumsily. "Were you sick?"
She shook her head, inching away from his hand. "No, I'm all right now, Tim, really I am. It passed off." One hand on the rock for leverage, she tried to get to her feet but could not, cramped and defeated. "Oh, Tim, I'm so old and tired," she whispered. "I'm so old and tired."
He stood up and stared at her anxiously, fidgeting nervously. "Mum was sick once and I remember Pop made me carry her to bed. I'll carry you to bed, Mary."
He bent and gathered her up effortlessly, shifting her weight within his arms until one was crooked under her knees and the other cradled her back. Too exhausted to protest, she let him carry her up the path, but when he stepped onto the veranda she turned her face into his shoulder, not wanting him to see it. He paused, blinking in the light, and put his cheek against her head lovingly.
"You're so small, Mary," he said, rubbing his face back and forth across her hair. "You're all soft and warm, like a kitten." Then he sighed and crossed the living room.
He could not find the light switch in her bedroom, and when he would have groped for it she stopped him, her hand pressing gently at his throat.
"Don't worry about the light, Tim, you can see to put me on the bed. I just want to lie down in the dark for a while, then I'll be fine."
He laid her on the bed carefully, looming above her in the darkness, and she sensed his worried indecision.
"Tim, you know I wouldn't tell you a lie, don't you?"
He nodded. "Yes, I know that."
"Then you'll believe m
e when I tell you that there's no need to worry about me, that I'm all right now. Haven't you ever felt a bit sick after you've eaten something that didn't agree with you?"
"Yes. I did once, after I'd eaten some candied fruit," he answered gravely.
"Then you understand how I felt, don't you? Now I want you to stop worrying about me and go to bed, and sleep, sleep! I feel much better and all I need is to sleep, too, but I can't sleep if I think you're upset or worried. Now promise me that you'll go straight to bed and be happy."
"I will, Mary." He sounded relieved.
"Goodnight, Tim, and thank you very much for helping me like that. It's so nice to be looked after, and you look after me very well. I don't ever need to worry about myself while I've got you, do I?"
"I'll always look after you, Mary." He stooped and kissed her forehead, the way she sometimes did with him when he was in bed. "Night-night, Mary."
Eighteen
When Esme Melville let herself in the back door after her Thursday afternoon tennis match it was all she could do to walk the few yards more to the living room and a comfortable chair. Her legs were shaking; it had been a tremendous strain to get home without letting anyone see how distressed she was. She felt so nauseated that after a few moments in the chair she got up and went to the bathroom. Even kneeling with her head over the lavatory bowl didn't relieve the sickness; somehow she could not vomit, the pain under her left shoulder blade made the effort ofretching unbearable. She hung there for several minutes panting, then dragged herself by stages to her feet, gasping at the bathroom cupboard and the shower door. It shocked her to realize that the frightened face in the wall mirror was her own, all muddy gray and beaded with sweat. The sight of it terrified her more than anything ever had, and she took her eyes away from the mirror immediately. She managed to stagger back to the living room and flopped into the chair, gasping, her hands flapping about helplessly.
Then the pain took her and tore at her like some huge, maddened beast; she leaned forward, her arms folded across her chest, their fists digging into her armpits. Small, moaning whimpers escaped her each time the knife-like agony worked itself up to a crescendo, and she could think no further than the pain. After an eternity it lessened; she leaned back in the chair, spent and shaking in every limb. Something seemed to be sitting on her chest, forcing all the air out of her lungs and making it impossible to suck in more. She was wet everywhere; the white tennis dress was soaked with sweat, her face with tears, the chair seat with urine she had voided during the worst of her rigors. Sobbing and choking through purpled lips, she sat there praying that Ron would think to come home before going to the Seaside. The phone in the hall was light-years away, absolutely beyond her.
It was seven that evening before Ron and Tim let themselves in the back door of the house in Surf Street. All was oddly quiet and undisturbed; no places had been laid on the dining room table, and there was no friendly smell of food.
"Hullo, where's Mum?" Ron asked cheerily as he and Tim stepped into the kitchen. "Es, love, where are youse?" he called, then shrugged. "Must have decided on a couple of extra sets at the Hit and Giggle Club," he said.
Tim went on into the living room while Ron switched on the kitchen and dining room lights. There was a terrified scream from the interior of the house; Ron dropped the kettle he was holding and dashed with a pounding heart to the living room. Tim was standing wringing his hands together and weeping, staring at Esme as she lay in the chair, curiously still, her arms folded and her hands knotted into fists in her sides.
"Oh, God!"
The tears sprang to Ron's eyes as he went to the chair and bent over his wife, reaching out a shaking hand to touch her skin. It was warm; hardly able to believe it, he discovered that her chest was rising and falling slowly. He got to his feet at once.
"Now, Tim, don't cry," he said through chattering teeth. "I'm going to ring Dr. Perkins and Dawnie, then I'll come right back. You stay here, and if Mum does anything, you yell. All right, mate?"
Dr. Perkins was at home, eating supper; he told Ron that he would call an ambulance and meet them at Prince of Wales Hospital casualty room. Wiping away the tears with the back of his hand, Ron dialed Dawnie's number.
Mick answered, his voice betraying his impatience; it was their dinner hour, and he hated to be disturbed then.
"Listen, Mick, it's Ron here," Ron said, enunciating carefully. "Now don't go frightening Dawnie, but it's her Mum. I think she's had a heart attack, only I'm not sure. We're getting her to Prince of Wales casualty immediately, so there's no point in coming here. It would be best for you and Dawnie to meet us at the hospital as soon as you possibly can.
"I'm terribly sorry, Ron," Mick mumbled. "Of course Dawn and I will come immediately. Try not to worry."
When Ron came back to the living room, Tim was still standing watching his mother and weeping desolately; she had not moved. Ron put his arm around his son's shoulders and hugged him, not knowing what else to do.
"Jeez, don't cry, Tim me boy," he muttered. "Mum's all right, the ambulance is coming and we're going to get her to the hospital. They'll fix her up in no time. You've got to be a good bloke and be calm, for Mum's sake. She won't like it if she wakes up and sees you standing there howling like a great big booby, will she?"
Snuffling and hiccoughing, Tim tried to stop crying while his father approached Esme's chair and knelt down, taking her doubled fists in his hands and forcing them into her lap.
"Es!" he called, his face old and lined. "Es, love, can you hear me? It's Ron, love, it's Ron!"
She was gray in the face and shrunken, but her eyes opened. They flooded with light as they saw him kneeling there, and she returned his clasp gratefully.
"Ron. . . . Jeez, I'm glad you come home. . . . Where's Tim?"
"He's here, love. Don't worry about Tim, now, and don't go getting all upset. The ambulance is coming and we're going to get you into POW right away. How do you feel?"
"Like something the ... cat dragged in. . . . Oh, Christ, Ron . . . the pain . . . it's awful. ... I wet meself. . . . The chair's sopping. ..."
"Don't worry about the bloody furniture, Es, it'll dry out. What's the odd leak between friends, eh?" He tried to smile, but his face twisted. For all 1 his control, he began to weep. "Oh, Es, don't let nothing happen to youse, love! Oh, God, what will I do without youse? Hang on, Es, hang on until we get you to hospital!"
"I'll . . . hang on. . . . Can't . . . leave Tim . . . all alone now. . . . Can't . . . leave Tim . . . alone. . . ."
Five minutes after Ron called Dr. Perkins the ambulance was outside. Ron directed the ambulance men around to the back door, for there were twenty steps up to the front door and none to the back. They were big, quietly cheerful men, highly trained professionals in the field of emergency medicine; as aware of their skill as other Sydney-siders, Ron felt no qualms over Dr. Perkins' decision to meet them at the hospital. They checked Es's condition swiftly and lifted her onto the stretcher. Ron and Tim followed their navy blue uniforms out the back door, feeling useless and unwanted.
Ron put Tim in the front with one of the ambulance men and rode in the back with the other. They seemed to know immediately that Tim was not the full quid, for the one who was driving settled Tim in the adjoining seat with a cheery word that seemed to have more effect on him than anything Ron could have said.
They did not put the siren on; the one traveling in the back with Ron slipped a plastic airway into Es's mouth and connected her to his oxygen supply, then draped himself along the stretcher with his hand on her pulse.
"Why don't you put the siren on?" Ron asked, looking about wildly, the oxygen and airway frightening him.
Wide, reassuringly steady eyes gazed back at him; the ambulance man patted him on the back. "Now take it easy, mate," he said calmly. "We only put the siren on going to an emergency case, very rarely when there's someone inside. It terrifies the patient, does more harm than good, you know. She's okay, and at this time of night we'll get
there just as soon without a siren. Only a couple of miles."
The ambulance threaded its way deftly through the thin traffic, drawing in to the brilliantly lit casualty room at the Prince of Wales Hospital five minutes after leaving Surf Street. Just as the sleek big car came to a halt, Es opened her eyes and coughed out the airway. The ambulance man assessed her rapidly, then decided to leave it out unless she went into another spasm. Maybe she wanted to say something, and that was important; it was better to let a patient find her own level, less distressing. "Ron . . ."
"I'm here, love. You're at the hospital, we'll soon have you fixed up now."
"I dunno . . . Ron . . ."
"Yes, love?" The tears were running down his face again.
"It's Tim. . . . What we . . . always worried about. . . . What's . . . going ... to happen to . . . Tim . . . when I'm not . . . here? . . . Ron ..."
"I'm here, love."
"Look after . . . Tim. ... Do the . . . right . . .
thing . . . for . . . Tim. . . . Poor Tim. . . . Poor . . .
Tim ….."
It was the last thing she ever said. While Ron and Tim were still milling futilely around casualty entrance, the emergency staff had whisked the stretcher away out of sight. The Melville men stood watching the white doors flap to a stop, then were directed firmly but gently to the waiting area. Someone came not long afterward and brought them tea with some sweet biscuits, smilingly refusing to give them any news.
Dawnie and her husband arrived half an hour later. Dawnie was beginning to be very pregnant, her husband plainly anxious for her. She waddled to her father's side and sat between him and Tim on the bench, weeping.
"Now, now, love, don't cry," Ron comforted. "The old girl will be all right, we got her here okay. They've taken her off somewhere, and when there's any news they'll tell us. You just sit down and stop crying. Think of the baby, love, you mustn't get into a taking at this stage."