Cloudstreet (70 page)

Sam looked away from the house and found the black man looking at him. Jesus, thought Sam, paint him white and he might be me old man. The black man’s stare put a foul sweat on him. He damnnear asked for his smoke back.

You shouldn’t break a place. Places are strong, important.

Bloody place is half fallin down orready. Can’t hurt to give it a helpin hand.

Too many places busted.

Sam wandered half across the street, his hands in his pockets, his stump tingling a little. He turned back to the black man. I mean, lookit that joint, willya?

You better be the strongest man.

Sam looked at him. He felt blank. All he noticed was the way the black man’s shadow came out on four sides of him like a footy player under lights at training.

How did you vote today, mate?

The black man dropped the smoke and toed it. He walked away shaking his head, his shadow reeling out all sides of him as he went.

Gift Horsed

On Sunday morning, early, Dolly threw a chunk of beef into the long, wild grass. The maggies came swooping; you could hear the whooping of their wings as they came from out of the sun, wheeling round to land at her feet. Dolly’s hands looked younger with the blood and juice of meat on them. They trembled, those hands, but the birds were used to it. Now and then one of the boldest would come and take meat off her palm and the force of the peck, the beak hitting her skin through the meat sent a thrill into her.

The last birds hopped through the bloody tangle of wild oats, checking the ground for remnants. Dolly’s back ached, squatting the way she did, but she stayed there to watch the impassive heads of the magpies, trying to see a sign of disappointment or of satisfaction, or gratitude, and smiling when they left abruptly at the sound of a footfall.

Jesus, you’ll be cookin rice puddin for em next, Sam said behind her.

So you got up, eh? Here I am, up before you.

Sam stood by her, weight on one leg, with his hands in his pockets. I’ve got a bloody hangover.

Well, that explains it. You’re still a two pot screamer.

I was thinkin.

Never think n drink at the same time. Makes you miserable. What about?

Oh, Gawd, everythin. What we’re gonna do about Chub, retirement. The house.

What about the house? Dolly’s haunches hurt now, but she stayed where she was, with the breeze rattling up her thighs.

Well, it’s the twenty years come summer. Joel said we could sell after twenty.

That was to protect us all from you.

Fair enough.

But what?

Sam scratches the inside of his calf with the heel of his shoe. I thought, well, twenty years is up. We could sell. They’re goin mad in this town, buyin the old and buildin the new. We could make ourselves a pile.

And you believe in luck!

What?

Did you earn this place?

No. You know that. Joel gave it to me. Us.

You think it’s good luck to sell what someone gave you as a present, a gift?

He sighed. Joel was the luckiest bastard on earth.

It didn’t keep him alive this last twenty years.

Yeah, but it kept us alive.

Dolly spat on the ground and laughed bitterly. What’s kept us alive is that friggin woman. A dead man and an ugly woman. Vanilla icecream, pasties and mullet.

It’s a bloody horrible old house, Doll. We could do what Rose is doin—build a new place, out in a new suburb. This is old.

Oh, it’s not so bloody horrible. Jesus, you hate the place!

Dolly sniffed. I don’t know about that. What was the horse’s name, the one Joel made all his money off?

Eurythmic. What a horse that was.

What is it they say about lookin a gift horse in the mouth?

My God, woman, you’re the evillest bitch.

Dolly laughed: You dunno the half of it.

We must be fuckin mad.

Below Deck

The night before Rose and Quick’s trip, Oriel put on a dinner in the big room where Lester slept. The bed was taken out and two tables were laid end to end, draped in a great white cloth that stank of mothballs and the
Reader’s Digest
. It was getting stupid, Oriel decided, the way Rose and Quick wandered from kitchen to kitchen, not knowing who they were supposed to eat with, and besides, if they ate with the Pickleses it was a sure bet that poor Rose’d do all the cooking, and on the night before her first holiday in years, it wasn’t right that the girl should cook. Anyway, it would save all kinds of embarrassment if a gesture was made, a compromise sealed, and they ate together. Oriel had a headache the moment she conceived the idea. But it had to be done. Someone had to take the initiative. Also, and she could barely admit it, the prospect of not having Harry and Rose and Quick in the house depressed her. After their holiday, now that their new house was finished, they’d be leaving Cloudstreet for good. It was weakness this silly dinner. It was hanging on to them, but Oriel considered she had the right to a bit of clinging.

When the big room was full of noise and laughter, Sam and Dolly came knocking. Red let them in. They looked overscrubbed and shaky. Fish was rolling soup bowls, Lester was giving the accordion a bit of a hiding, and Lon was telling a joke that no one could possibly approve of.

Come in, come in! said Oriel, brightly signalling them in and avoiding their eyes.

The stove roared, gusting hot air into the room beyond, where the riotous mob was milling.

Welcome below deck! called Lester as they went through.

Geez, it’s like the engine room, orright, said Sam to no one special.

Sit down, Mum and Dad, Rose said, trying not to bite her lip. Geez, you’re all got up.

Dolly trod on Harry who had crawled under the table, and there was pandemonium. Dolly nearly fainted with guilt and embarrassment.

It’s alright, said Rose. Relax, Mum.

Sam sat next to Fish who said: Who’s got your fingers?

Lester insisted on singing ‘The Wild Colonial Boy’. He sounded terrible, but everyone was grateful for the break, and while he was singing and squeezing, Oriel brought out the food with Elaine who passed hot plates that took the prints off a few fingertips. Out came roast lamb, cauliflower cheese, mint sauce, a tray of roast potatoes, parsnips, onions, pumpkins, cabbage, slabs of butter, hot white bread and Keen’s mustard. There was a chicken stuffed with leeks, cold ham, beetroot, and a jug of lemonade the size of an artillery shell.

Everyone passed and grabbed. Plates disappeared beneath it all.

For what we are about to receive, Lester said, stopping them all dead with his mild voice, we are truly thankful.

Amen, said Sam.

Christ Almighty, look at the food, Dolly murmured. She’s tryin to kill us.

They ate and passed and picked while Lester told them all stories that could only have been the weakest of lies, until there was steampud with jam, custard and cream. A pot of tea was hauled in, cups brought, chairs snicked back a little to allow legs to be crossed. Fish and Harry played under the table with Pansy’s girl Merrileen.

I hear you’re thinkin of sellin, Mr Pickles.

Quick put the teapot down: Mum!

Dolly rolled her eyes. Lester looked as though it was news to him.

I used to know this bloke, Lon began.

Shut up, boy, said Oriel.

Sam grinned, rubbed his nose with his hairy little stump of a hand. Call me Sam, whyn’t ya?

With the sort of smile that put Lester in mind of the old Anzac Club days, her confident, gracious, fulldentured smile, Oriel took Sam’s cup, held it out for Quick to pour tea into, handed it back and nodded.

Sam. It came to me that you were in the mood for leavin.

You were never a dawdler, Mrs Lamb.

Oriel.

Oriel. You’re still a quick one.

The old girl raised her eyebrows, as if to say: Well, that goes entirely without saying.

Dolly lit a cigarette which caused a tremor of concern round the table.

I spose youse people’d be worried about your position, Sam said.

Well, they
are
paid up on rent till about Harry’s twentieth birthday, you silly coot, muttered Dolly. We’d have to pay em to leave.

Well, Oriel said darkly, if we have to leave then there’s nothin to be done. It’s only a house.

I expect it’d be more wiser to buy your own by now, said Sam.

No. No, Oriel said, it does you good to be tenants. It reminds you of your own true position in the world.

Sam blinked.

A house should be a home, a privilege, not a possession. It’s foolish to get attached.

Yairs. Yairs, Sam said. There’s the practicals to be thought of.

Oriel put her elbows on the table and opened her stubby little workdark hands, leaning through them towards Sam Pickles whose understanding smile faltered somewhat.

But I have got used to it here, you know, she said. You might say I’ve come to love this awful old house. It was here for us when we had nothin. It never made it easy for us—and I tell youse, there’s times I’ve thought the place has been trying to itch us out—but I reckon we’ve made our mark on it now, like it’s not the house it was. We’re halfway to belongin here, and … I don’t know where I’d go anymore. Out there, she flung a hand in no direction at all, they’re bulldozin streets and old places, fillin in the river, like they don’t wanna leave any traces behind. I reckon Harry’ll never see the places we know. Can you imagine that? What am I gunna do—walk out into that? I’m sixty-three years old! This place has been good to me.

Everyone recrossed their legs, stirred their tea, felt a nudge from their neighbour, passed the fruitcake.

She’s right, said Dolly. Yer right. Yer right. She muttered, unable to look Oriel in the eye. The bloody place has got to us.

Good on yer, Doll, said Quick.

Dolly scowled back a delighted grin and looked about, as though for a miracle in the form of a loose glass of gin.

It’s twenty years soon, said Lester. He wheezed the accordion open. Twenty years.

Well, Sam said. That’s it, then.

That’s what?

We stay.

You weren’t really gunna sell, Sam? said Lester, squeezing off an allergenic chord.

No. Some Abo told me it wasn’t worth the money. Actually he said it was bad luck.