The House That Was Eureka (10 page)

The bloke took a long swig of his beer.

Nobby felt cold. That was new, cops going in. It was only ever the bailiffs. It was new too, the UWM losing.

Nobby looked at the bloke, and there was sticking plaster on the side of his scalp and two big cuts on his forehead and the beginning of a black eye that Nobby had missed before in the gloom of the bar.

‘So that was it,’ Nobby said. He felt hopeless now about the Cruises. The cops would come and break their picket and Lizzie would live at La Perouse, under bags and bits of tin.

‘Oy-oy, we don’t give up that easy, Comrade,’ said the bloke. ‘I’m only up to interval. Hang on to your Minties for the second show. Here, have a read for yourself.’ He handed Nobby that afternoon’s
Sun
.

REVOLVERS AND BATONS IN EVICTION RIOT
.

It was page one, headline news. Nobby felt vaguely important just looking at it, even though he hadn’t been there. It was as if he were somehow part of history. Then a word in the headline took on meaning.

‘Revolvers!’ Nobby said.

‘I told you there was more to it,’ the bloke said smugly.

Nobby read through the first bit. It was all more or less as the bloke had said. Except that the bloke knew more, because he’d been in the house and the reporter hadn’t.
‘But there was a further development…’
Nobby read.

But there was a further development at 11 o’clock when a motor lorry on which there were about forty cheering men, drove up to the house. Several of the men jumped onto the furniture van and started to throw the furniture into the lorry. About twenty others, armed with iron bars, rushed threateningly towards the two policemen.

When one of the policemen climbed onto the van in an endeavour to drive the raiders away, the other policeman stood facing the crowd, protecting his companion. One man then emerged from the crowd with an iron bar in his hand, and, sneaking behind the constable, made a blow at him. The policeman on the waggon, however, saw the move, shouted out a warning and his mate had just time to jump aside before the blow fell.

Both policemen then drew their revolvers and warned the crowd to stand back.

In the meantime, the alarm had been sent to the Redfern police station and thirty constables dashed to the scene, flourishing their batons as they raced down Douglas Street.

It was lucky for their companions that the journey from the police station was only two hundred yards.

The police singled out two men who were arrested . . .

‘
The crowd,
’ Nobby read out loud, ‘
which almost completely filled the street, was driven away by the police, and the furniture was replaced on the van…
’

‘
Driven away!
’ The bloke interrupted, angry. ‘Makes us sound like a mob of flaming tame sheep. You can bet those reporter-johnnies would be the first to get the hell out if there was a big pack of larrupers running at
them
with their batons flying and some with revolvers waving in their mitts.’

There was no demonstration as the van was driven away, and soon the thoroughfare…

Iron bars, Nobby thought. They were new too. If the men hadn’t come with the iron bars, then the cops…

‘What I was going to tell you,’ the bloke said. ‘What the poor cove’s missus told me, see? was that the cops had their pistols out
in
the house, not in the kitchen where I was, in the lounge, see? It’s when she tells me that that I race up the UWM hall – they’re having a meeting, don’t know nothing about the blue – and right, they say what’s sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander, see?’

‘That’s new in the eviction struggle,’ Nobby said slowly, ‘cops and guns.’

Lizzie’s face last night as she held the gun
.

‘We ain’t seen nothing yet,’ the bloke said. ‘They reckon there’s a house they’re picketing around here somewhere, due for the bailiffs any time.’

‘Yeah,’ said Nobby, ‘I’m in it.’ Not saying how he was in it. ‘In the thick of it.’ Not saying how thick he was into it.

‘Barricades,’ the bloke said. ‘Sandbags and plurry barbed wire like we had at Gallipoli, that’s what yous need. I been thinking: get a big group of yous – more than what we had, but yous can’t have too many, not enough room, see? and get right into the house, dig yourselves in, make your defences strong, and the johns’ll never get yous out, see?’

‘Never!’ Nobby agreed. Feeling himself getting strong now, a tree not a beanstalk, a comrade not a sonny-boy, looking forward to an act, the blood in his veins not silver-polish and ink but man’s blood made of beer and wire and glory.

On Monday 1 June, Evie started a job; though it was hardly what you’d call a job. Ted got it for her.

‘I’ve got you a job, Sleeping Beauty,’ Ted had said the night before, over tea. ‘Doesn’t pay much. In fact it doesn’t pay at all. But at least it’ll be a change from the club.’ Ted meant the Dolebludgers’ Club. Tequila Sunrises and jackpots down the CYSS centre. This joke was getting worn.

The job was to go in next door and get the despot’s midday dinner for her, Monday to Friday. Ted had been talking to Noel’s mother that afternoon when he went in about the rent, and she’d mentioned how Noel had to come home from school and do it, and so Ted had volunteered Evie. Mrs Cavendish was worried because second term was about to start, and Noel’s last report had said he often missed afternoon classes. Mrs Cavendish thought it was because he came home at midday to do the despot’s dinner; she didn’t know he often worked up at the music shop in King Street.

‘Oh Mum,’ Evie wailed, ‘do I have to?’ It sounded dreadful. Evie hadn’t met the despot, but from the little bit Noel had said on the balcony that first night she sounded revolting.

‘It won’t hurt you, love,’ Mum said. ‘Just till you get a job. And just think,’ (speaking brightly) ‘the quicker you do that, the sooner you can stop doing this, if you don’t like it.’

Mum still deep down thought that Evie could go out and find work just like that, if she really wanted to. Mum had done door-to-door selling for a make-up company for years. They employed lots of working mothers like her, who dropped out every so often for a couple of years while they had a kid, and then dropped back into their old job again. She seemed to think Evie could just drop into a job too.

‘And it really won’t hurt you,’ Mum repeated herself.

‘What’s she like?’ Evie said.

‘I’ve still never met her. Have you, darl?’

Ted said nothing. He was getting moodier and moodier. And that was that.

The next day at 12.30 Evie let herself in the back door with the key Mrs Cavendish had given Ted for her, and read the note on the kitchen table. ‘Dear Evie,’ said the tiny handwriting…

Dear Evie, There’s a pie in the oven it should only take 10 mins to hot up. But after you turn it on go up and introduce yourself she knows your coming and turn on the electric food-warmer beside her bed. Then when you take her dinner up pop it in the warmer and don’t wait for her to eat because she never eats in front of people not even Noel and me. Her sweets are in the fridge – apple sago and custard she likes them cold. Teapot should be on the shelf she likes it strong five teaspoons please dear. Milk in the little milkjug and PLEASE remember to pop the cover over it (Noel often forgets). I’ve set the tray and please remember to put the silver covers over the plates dear. I think that’s all thank you again dear for you’re kindness in doing this, Noel says your a good friend of his so I felt confident about you’re managing to do this even though I’ve only seen you and haven’t met you yet. You must come in one night this week and Noel can play you his Bob Dylan records or maybe the weekend. Thank you again dear, must fly to work, regards Rita Cavendish.

Evie laughed when she reached the end. ‘Must fly to work dear.’ What is she, a witch or something?

Seriously though, it was weird. Mum had said the old bat had had a stroke and couldn’t speak or move. But Noel had said something…she couldn’t quite remember.

Evie looked around. The kitchen was exactly the same as theirs, but neater and cleaner. There were no Weeties packets and soft animals and
Mr Men
books and make-up samples and bits of old homework and ashtrays on the bench, but there was a small black-and-white TV set in the corner, and a big poster of Bob Dylan on the chimney, underneath a huge, old, loudly ticking clock. The clock was the kind that you have to wind up and set each morning, the glass front opening up so you could move the hands around. At Evie’s place, they had an electric digital radio one. The ticking of this clock got Evie down.

Evie read the note again, then for no reason turned it over. There was big scribbly writing on the back.

P.S. Good Luck with the despot. Have fun. See ya – Noel.

Evie thought: He’s the right age to be a friend for Jodie and Maria, not for me. It was a pity, it’d be good to have a friend around here.

She put the kettle on, opened the oven, looked at the shepherd’s pie, lit the gas. The tray on the table was set, right down to a rose in a little cut-glass vase.

After you turn it on go up, she knows you’re coming
.

Evie walked noisily up the stairs. No one had even told her what room or anything: typical. Evie was concentrating on being peeved to put her fear down.

Evie got to the stair landing and stopped. Up that way, to the two rooms at the front, or up to the back? Away from the clock, the house was silent. Evie looked at the yellowing wallpaper, the carpet worn so thin you could see parallel threads. Then she heard the breathing. Loud and arhythmic, almost like water bubbling, it came from the back room. Evie went up there. As she reached the door, the sound stopped.

Evie stepped into the back room and got her first sight of the face that was already in her dreams. The blind was down that day, and in the near-darkness of the room the face of the despot glowed out with its thick coating of white powder, glowed beneath the cracks like a whitewashed brick wall. It was Noel’s face, gone fat and rotten. The long narrow nose, the excited eyes, the high cheekbones, the sharp chin, the wide mouth; all still there on her but with the angles obliterated by the fat. The hair fine and fuzzy on the ends like Noel’s, thin on the top, flopping over her left eye as she laughed now, her hair just like Noel’s, but grey-white instead of brown. And the laughter too was wild like Noel’s, but vicious. Noel’s laughs always included you.

Evie hated her on sight. This was the most positive feeling towards another human being that Evie had ever felt in all her life.
I hate you, despot
. And mixed in with the hatred was a strange feeling of recognition, as if Evie had hated her before, and only just met her.

So that it was a satisfying feeling, and also an exhilarating feeling. Evie felt on top of the world, to be feeling something so strong.

‘I’m Evie,’ Evie said. Smiled like a nurse on TV, and switched on the food-warmer.

She waited, but the despot just sat there propped up on her three pillows, fully dressed right down to lisle stockings and polished black shoes, her revoltingly fat body taking up the whole of the narrow bed. The despot said nothing, but her eyes were going up and down over Evie’s jeans, her fresh-pressed blouse, her face, her shoulder-length in-betweenish-coloured hair.

Evie went down, fixed the lunch, then carried up the tray. Again the despot said nothing and Evie waited a while. This time she had a good look around the room. The most noticeable thing was that there was really nothing to look at. Just a big old wardrobe, a chest of drawers, the food-warmer, the bedside table, a stiff armchair. You’d expect the room of an old person (especially a
crazy
old person, Evie thought) to be jam-packed with stuff from the past: framed photos and unframed photos and china things and old paintings on the walls and other junk. But the atmosphere of this room was at the same time both crowded and bare. Crowded, simply because the room was small and the furniture was large and the body of the woman on the bed was huge and looming. But the room was bare of anything personal. There was nothing on the walls; nothing but a crocheted runner on the chest of drawers; and nothing on the bedside table but the tray Evie had just put down there, a powder compact, and one of those invisible-writing things that kids use.

The despot watched and Evie watched. The funny thing was, Evie thought, that the despot seemed to hate her too. And with the despot’s hatred, as with Evie’s, there was an element of familiarity to it, as if the despot had been hating Evie, and waiting for Evie, for a long long time.

Suddenly the despot moved her hand. This hand, her left hand, her ring-hand. Six rings weighed down the third finger – two wide gold bands, and four sparkly lumpy rings: a diamond set in rubies, a diamond set in sapphire, a diamond set in topaz, a diamond set in pearls. True, the diamonds themselves were small, and the flanking stones were little more than chips; they weren’t millionaire rings, but the kind of ring that a working man would spend his savings on. However, the effect of them all, pushed one on top of each other up the fat finger, was obscene. The hand pointed imperiously at the pad-thing on the bedside table.

Evie moved nearer and handed it to her.

The old woman wrote, held the pad up for Evie to read.

‘
REMOVE THE ROSE
.’

‘Okay,’ said Evie. She took the flower out of the vase, stuck it behind her ear like a hula-girl, wiggled her hips, and slipped out the door.

That was the pattern for the next couple of days. The despot would stare, Evie would stare back, right at the end there’d be one remark from the despot, and that would be it. Except that there was an increase in the tension between the two, an escalation of the hatred. And except that Evie’s nights got worse each night.

The escalation was shown in the remarks. The despot got more personal.

‘
TUCK YOUR BLOUSE IN
,’ said the magic-pad the second day.

Evie disobeyed, said nothing.

‘
YOU’RE NOT PRETTY, YOU KNOW
.’