The Slipping Place

by Joanna Baker

  ‘Paul, I’m sorry. Roland’s obviously got you in some kind of …’ Paul had brought an umbrella. He tapped it on the ground and tucked the other hand under his arm. Out here, in the fading light, he looked older. There was a new looseness around his eyes and mouth and a plumpness in the cheeks, faint shadows of indulgence.

  ‘I know he’s told you not to tell me,’ Veronica said, ‘but I will help. It is possible to be too loyal. I know you care –’

  ‘I adore him,’ he said easily. ‘Always have.’

  ‘Yes, you have. I’m so glad.’

  ‘It’s not hard to understand. He’s wonderful.’

  Veronica sighed. That was what everyone said. Roland’s wonder-fulness, his floppy charm – they were what people noticed. They remembered that, and forgot about how impossible he was.

  Paul said, ‘And as you know … those school days …’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘It formed a bond – me being gay and everyone thinking he was.’

  Veronica grunted. There was something Paul knew, something big, and he wanted to tell her. But first he would play around, reaching for the old jokes. He too was trying to regain the ease they had once had. She feigned surprise for him. ‘Did they?’

  ‘Still happens.’

  ‘I never knew.’

  ‘Veronica. You miss everything.’ His voice was flat. He was failing to find the right note of levity.

  ‘People keep saying that.’ She laughed softly.

  ‘We did an experiment once. We had a porn magazine. We left it in full view on the bed and when you came in we put our hands behind our backs. You thought we were eating the Wagon Wheels. You made us show our hands and then you went out. You didn’t see the porn.’

  He laughed too, then, but when he met her eyes she saw a familiar expression, Paul’s own peculiar brand of diffuse misery. She had a new thought, that whatever caused it had happened a long time ago.

  She said, ‘I’m so sorry about this.’ She looked out over the water, the waves moving towards them. ‘He’s dragging you into something.’

  He shrugged. ‘It’s just Roland being Roland.’

  ‘You don’t have to keep …’ She had been going to say ‘lying for him’ but stopped herself.

  ‘I do. It’s what we are.’

  ‘Does your mother –?’

  ‘Oh, fuck.’

  ‘Paul.’

  ‘No. Really. Don’t talk about her.’

  ‘All right. In that case, are you going to tell me what’s happening?’ He blinked at her. ‘He’s been trying to help a girl. Someone we used to know when we were at school. You know, those kids from Clarence High we used to kick around with? And the girl from Collegiate you said was off the rails? You and Mum hated them.’

  ‘I don’t remember.’ There had been so many. Paul and Roland had gone to Fawkner School in Sandy Bay, but they had always had friends from other schools, kids Veronica and Alan didn’t know, from what Alan called ‘all walks of life’, by which he meant they were undesirable. There didn’t seem to be anything the parents could do about it. They couldn’t find out what the boys did with these groups. Alan liked to say their son had been led astray, mixed with the wrong crowd, but Veronica knew it wasn’t really like that.

  ‘Anyway, this is one of them. She’s … doesn’t matter. Treen. She’s got a partner called Dane and a little boy … and things are … not good.’ He spoke very flatly. ‘The kid’s getting hurt.’

  A child who was hurt.

  Look at him.

  ‘Treen’s been trying to get hold of Roland for a while now, trying to get him to come and help and now he’s come. He’s been working out how to get them away from Dane.’

  ‘Why did she ask Roland?’

  ‘Because he’s Roland.’

  It was true. Roland had always been a fighter of lost causes. She could still see him, her gentle, plump boy, skin thin to the point of translucence, worrying about a sister’s cut knee, the neighbour’s wailing dog, a spider, endless questions about the goldfish Clinker – was he hungry, cold, hurt, lonely? Roland, hot, red, drained and unhappy, desperate to fix it all, exhausting himself.

  ‘There must be other people who can look after her?’

  ‘Well, yeah, you would think so. And I suppose there’s some department that’s keeping an eye on her. But they can’t watch them all the time. Treen won’t report Dane and the police can’t do anything unless she does. Isn’t that how it works?’

  Veronica looked back towards the town. Across the front, hiding the gallery from view, were the old Marine Board buildings. They were built decades ago, with thick stone walls to shelter the occupants from the wind, facing resolutely out to the harbour, away from the mountain and all the wilderness that lay behind it.

  ‘And Roland’s been here for two weeks?’

  ‘He’s been trying to help – to just be, you know, a friend, while he thinks of what to do. He’s been taking the little guy for drives and things. I went sometimes, just to … I dunno. We even took him to Mum’s. That’s why Roland had to move out of Mum’s.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because the kid had dirty feet and he jumped on the Chelmsford lounge suite. Mum went into one of her tirades. She took off his shoes and brushed them with some kind of brush. She was freaked. It was actually pretty funny.’ He laughed weakly and his eyes looked sadder, really tragic now. ‘So then she and Roland had this huge fight –’

  ‘Fight?’

  ‘Well, you know how Mum fights. It was completely silent, but Roland knew. He moved out and went to stay with the bookshop woman. But really he should just go away. There’s nothing he can do for Treen.’ His voice rose and thinned. He took a breath.

  ‘But he has tried.’

  ‘A few days ago he had some kind of run-in with Dane and got punched in the face. He’s all right. But there’s no hope for the situation. Treen is … really …’ He couldn’t find a word for her. ‘I mean … a lot of drugs and a lot of men.’ His voice was rising, becoming tighter. ‘And the child is just a monster. It’s really a horrible child. But I suppose you can’t blame it for that. What hope does it have with those parents?’

  ‘Not “it”, Paul.’

  ‘They’re just a nightmare. Just evil, hopeless people.’

  ‘You can’t say that.’

  Suddenly he was distraught. ‘What?! What would you know?’ ‘Paul.’

  ‘No. You’ve got no idea.’

  ‘But –’

  ‘I say “There’s a kid being hurt” and you go “Oh dear, that’s no good”. That’s what people say.’ His eyes were black and wet. ‘We don’t think about it. When really … It’s the worst thing you’ve … It’s the worst thing that can ever be.’

  She thought for a moment. ‘Hurt in what way?’

  Paul drew in a breath as if he’d been stung. ‘No way. It doesn’t have to be special. It’s all …’ He gestured weakly. ‘He had … The little kid had … There was a night when he got bashed, that’s all. I was the one who … John and I …’

  ‘Tell me.’

  ‘Oh. No …’

  ‘Paul.’

  ‘It’s not something you tell. You don’t want to hear it.’

  ‘Paul.’

  ‘Ohhh.’

  ‘Paul.’

  ‘A few months ago I got a phone call.’ He stopped. He seemed to search for a better way to approach the story. ‘I mean, I never saw Treen. She was trying to get Roland to come, but you can’t get hold of him. You know that. And then one night things went really bad and she rang me.’

  There were so many questions to ask. Veronica tried to keep it concrete. ‘This was when?’

  ‘In March. She said she needed help so I went to this house in the middle of the night. John came with me.’ His eyes slipped out of focus. One lid was lower than the other, so that they seemed to have different expressions, to be looking in different directions. ‘It was in Mornington. Treen and Dane had been having some kind of gathering. You kn
ow, lots of alcohol and loud music. I don’t think there were actually drugs of any kind at that point.’ He said that as if it was surprising. ‘But there were a lot of people there and the little boy had been hurt.’ It was after four. Evening falling. Streetlights were coming on, windows and signs lighting up.

  ‘John found him. He was lying in this horrible mouldy little back room. John had him lying down.’ His voice weakened again. ‘There was blood everywhere. Ahhh. The carpet was quite light so it looked … awful, just bright red … John had tried to wipe it off his face but … I thought he was dead. And John was calling the ambulance, so I was supposed to just sit with him and keep everyone else away.

  ‘But he started trying to get up. I touched him and he just screamed, so I didn’t do anything, and he got himself onto all fours. And then the blood started flowing again. He had this cut on his head and his head was tipped forward, so …’ Paul’s face contracted. ‘It was dripping off his … chin … And he couldn’t get going. He just stayed like that, swaying.’ Paul bent his knees, as if he was about to sit down, but then straightened them again. ‘Ohhh. So. Then I touched him again and he did lie down and I got to press a towel on his head. He made a noise, but then he just lay there.’

  On the pier near them was a wooden block, trimmed in copper, a nautical seat for tourists. Paul went to it and sat down. As Veronica joined him he leaned forward, knees apart. He had never spoken of this, she realised. He had thought about it constantly but he had never had the words in his mouth before.

  Veronica stared at the tiny harbour. There was a movement of waves towards her, but over that the reflections of black pylons remained steady. The lights from buildings and signs scattered into broken lines and random flashes, red and white and yellow.

  After a while Paul sat up. ‘They got him to hospital. It was the most terrible, terrible …’ He looked down at his feet and then up, lifted his eyebrows as if to prevent tears. ‘Aaah.’

  ‘Oh, Paulie boy.’

  Help me. Please. Roland wants you to help us. Mayson. Veronica had tripped on the pusher and bounced the child’s head.

  Paul took a shaky breath. ‘Mayson had been hurt before, I think. This time he had broken ribs and a fractured skull and concussion. But then, while he was in hospital, Dane went to Western Australia. And anyway they couldn’t prove he’d done anything. Treen said Mayson had fallen off a cupboard.

  ‘So-o-o they released him back to Treen and she was living with an old friend, Belle Ahern, but then Dane came back to Hobart and moved in with the three of them and now they’re back to where they started. And then the kid was hurt again, not as badly, but this time Treen found Roland so he came down and waded in.’ He rubbed fingers up the sides of his nose. ‘But he can’t fix it.’

  ‘I’ll help him.’

  ‘He should just give up on it and go back to Kandina.’ Paul’s voice began to weaken. ‘There’s no hope. It’s just … a kind of hell.’

  She watched the lights on the water, fragments of red, yellow. And blue. But that couldn’t be right. There was nothing blue around the pier or the road. There was a sign on the chandler’s and a light on the angel at the Mission to Seafarers but they were both too far away to be reflected here. Blue was impossible. Which proved in some way that none of this – this day, her standing here with Paul, Roland, the bruise, the little boy – none of it was real.

  Paul said, ‘He should just go.’

  ‘He won’t, though, will he?’

  ‘That little guy. He was just … swaying.’

  ‘Oh, Paul.’

  He rubbed his face. ‘And look. I’m not tolerant like Roland. I think some of these people are just bad people and they can’t be … we can’t fix it and we should just walk away. Roland isn’t like that. And that’s good. I know it is. He’s wonderful.’ This was like a conversation from years ago. For a moment she felt herself slipping back, didn’t know what year it was.

  ‘His only weakness is he doesn’t pick and choose. He cares about everyone. Even the lost causes. Especially the lost causes.’

  She tried to help him, found something from the past. ‘Alan says it’s our fault. When Roland was little we told him we’d named him after the fairy tale, “Childe Rowland” – a young prince who rescues children from under a mountain. It’s not true, of course. We picked the name because we liked it. But Childe Rowland became a family joke.’

  Of course, like all these things, the joke had contained a sharp crystal of truth. And maybe that, in turn, had acted as an influence, a tiny point of definition. Whatever the reason, Roland had always been a self-appointed righter of wrongs.

  ‘Yeah. He told me. But I thought it was a poem.’

  Yes, it was that too. At one time or another they had read him all the stories. He was the knight in the poem, riding bravely towards a Dark Tower, without hope, to fight evil where no-one else had succeeded.

  They thought he had forgotten about it. But now he was back. Childe Roland, back from the Saracen wars, back from the warmer lands, from under the mountain, from behind the church. Roland. Back to save them all.

  Veronica looked out at the water, all the ridiculous, nonsensical light. ‘He wasn’t supposed to take it seriously.’

  Chapter 7

  ______

  Veronica had a missed call from Georgie and now there was a string of long texts. Instead of reading them, she started the car and rang her as she drove home.

  ‘I spoke to Dad. He’s in Hahndorf.’ Georgie’s voice was hard. That was partly a function of the car speakers, but she was cutting her words short. ‘There was someone else with him. I could hear that whiny voice. It’s the receptionist woman. He’s got her there with him.’

  In a way, Georgie had always known this was happening. Sons and daughters always knew; not the details, but – even from across town, even from across the country – they sense the way things are. Now, confronted with evidence, she was furious. Her adored father.

  ‘Well, say something.’

  ‘Sweetheart.’

  ‘So I Skyped Libby and she says he’s done it a lot.’

  ‘Oh no, it’s –’

  ‘Libby said Dad’s a slut.

  ‘Georgie.’

  ‘No wonder she won’t come back from Rotterdam.’

  ‘That’s not why.’

  You couldn’t protect them. That was what you had to learn. Your children are going to feel pain and there will be nothing you can do about it.

  ‘Tom knows too. He never comes home. No-one ever comes home. I should have realised.’

  ‘Tom is in Melbourne for his career. Libby has Praveen. He’s got the job until the end of semester. Then he looks like getting the lec-tureship in Scotland.’

  ‘I can’t believe you never told me.’

  ‘Come on, George.’

  ‘Fucking bastard.’

  ‘My big girl.’

  Then, aggressively, as if this was some kind of retaliation, ‘Have you found Roland?’

  ‘George.’ They needed to talk about Alan, about the separation. ‘Tom and Libby and I rang people. He’s in Hobart. Someone saw him driving around in Paul’s car. The old blue Honda.’

  ‘Yes. He was staying with Lesley for a while. He’s not there anymore.’

  ‘So Paul’s known all along. I told you he lied. And there’s something weird going on. Roland’s been asking people about adopting children, or fostering them or something. And he’s been asking around about AVOs. For domestic violence cases. It sounds like typical Roland stuff. He’ll be mixed up in some huge disaster.’

  ‘I know where he’s staying. I haven’t managed to talk to him yet, but I’ll go and see him tonight.’

  ‘I’ll come.’

  ‘Oh, sweetheart. No.’ At least Veronica could take that burden. It was only Monday evening and Georgie’s biochemistry conference was complicated. In their different ways, her children were all under pressure at work. And now they had to come to terms with their father’s new life. ‘Roland i
s my problem.’ He had always been hers.

  ‘I could help you. I could have helped you with Dad.’

  ‘Dad is not something for you to worry about.’

  ‘Shit, Mum.’

  So they were back on Alan again. ‘Things are never simple.’ Weak. She sounded weak.

  ‘Mum, I’m not stupid.’

  ‘George.’

  ‘And you need me to help you with Roland. You don’t realise what he does.’

  ‘Of course I realise. I’m his mother.’

  ‘No, he manipulates you. You and Lesley. He’ll be asking you to do all this stuff and you’ll be jumping through hoops for him. But there’ll be something else going on. There’ll be a secret agenda.’

  ‘It’s not your –’

  ‘You’ll see. He’ll pretend he’s helping with something but really it will be serving some purpose of his own. It’s how he always does things.’

  ‘Georgina, it’s not your problem.’ Georgie hung up.

  The next day the weather broke. Around noon, the temperature dropped ten degrees in ten minutes and a south-westerly blasted the town with fine stinging rain. On the mountain there was snow down to Fern Tree.

  That continued for two days. Veronica made several trips back to the bookshop. It was locked and silent, but the car was always in the yard. She pictured Roland and Judith in there, huddled together in the gloom, ignoring her knocking.

  She kept trying Roland’s phone. She rang every Hobart person who might have seen him. She rang Paul several times.

  An email came from Alan saying he had rented an apartment in Wapping and an agent had a key and she could move any of his things that were in the way.

  She began to paint the sky, in great washes of transparent white and grey. The paintings were all failures. By Thursday she had five watercolours, lying dry and lifeless on the trolley in the hall.

  After lunch the rain began to clear. She drove past a bonfire and began to think about flame. She took one of Alan’s precious mountaineering books out to the terrace, scrunched up some of the pages, and set fire to it. She photographed it burning, to paint later. Then she went to get some more. Golf books, sailing books. After a while, she stopped taking photographs and just watched.