Path to the Night Sea

by Gilmore, Alicia;

  ‘Should’ve been a boy,’ he’d said to Ellie more than once. ‘You’re useless.’ She had been a disappointment from the start. This book, with its tales of ruddy-cheeked fellows who clapped each other on the back for their jolly brave deeds, saying words like “old chap” and “by jingo” and “gosh” and having astonishing adventures, wasn’t like the books she had seen in her classroom. The stories of races and boxing didn’t interest her, though there was a story about boys who lived together at a boarding school. She couldn’t make sense of it. Did some fathers really send their children away?

  Starved as she had been for something to occupy her time, the words between these covers, like the words in the Bible and Grandmother’s cookery book, provided a way to spend the endless moments between the chimes of the clock when Daddy left the house in the morning and when he returned in the evening.

  She had been learning to read at school, in the Before—before the dogs—when she had been allowed to go, and she had been getting good at it. She had been on a higher reader than Maisie, in a higher reading group, but she’d have bet Maisie had long since surpassed her. Grandmother’s home schooling had lacked many things, but Ellie could recite by heart any page of the The Bible in Pictures, and knew most pages of the picture encyclopaedia. She knew the names of everything in the house, including every utensil in the kitchen, although they didn’t possess many. The Country Women’s Association Cookbook that Grandmother Clements had left had served her well, even though Daddy’s tastes dictated chops or sausages with mashed potato and broad beans above all else.

  From hours listening to the wireless, Ellie could imitate the clipped tones of the announcers. With perfect intonation, Ellie could declare a ‘sheep grazier’s warning for the Southern Highlands and Goulburn districts… a king tide warning along the South Coast…’ to her dolls, even if she didn’t know what all the words meant. She knew words. Not all of them, but many. Yet none of them helped her understand this book of her father’s or why he kept a book he rarely looked at.

  She had tried to learn, to learn more words, to learn to be good. Grandmother had slapped her at first when she had stumbled over her words. One day she had called her as stupid as Miriam, had called her a slut. Ellie had run to her room, grabbed Ever, and hidden under the bed. She had never been hit when her mother was here. It was only since the dogs, since the hospital. Since her mother had gone away and left her.

  Ellie tried so hard to get the words right and to understand their mysteries, but when her grandmother was mean, she’d had visions of throwing the books off the cliffs, of seeing their pages scatter to the wind and fall into the ocean to sink to its watery depths, their indecipherable messages washed away. Ellie wished that she could have flown away after them, leaving Grandmother Clements and Daddy far behind. She would have taken the globe with her and marked off where she had been, places she had gone, and perhaps, one day, the place she would find Mummy. Some day, she would find the place where good things happened, where amazing adventures were had, and where people called you a “jolly good sport.”

  It was only after her Grandmother too had left her that Ellie truly appreciated the company these few books provided. When her chores were done, she had often stayed huddled in her room, turning the pages until her father came home demanding dinner.

  Ellie stretched out her legs and tried to flex her feet. Kneeling, cleaning, losing herself in the past, had caused her body to stiffen up. She’d crossed the hallway now, past the entrance to the lounge room, heading back towards the kitchen, determined to scrub every last millimetre of the skirting board. Moving her hands above her head, she felt her shoulders click. Here, along the base of the wall, was an outlet for a telephone. Daddy had plugged the phone in here sometimes. She’d never been allowed to touch it. If it rang, she was usually sent to her room, but one night the phone had rung and Daddy had scowled at her over the burnt lamb chops and tasteless, boiled vegetables. She had flinched under his gaze. That was the first night Ellie had cooked their dinner by herself. Grandmother Clements hadn’t come that day. Ellie had tried so hard to remember what to do. It had been a challenge to reach the saucepan on top of the stove and she had burnt her arm on the grill. She now wore an angry, raised, red slash that throbbed along her forearm. It’s not fair, she had wanted to cry out, It’s not my fault. I tried. I really did. It wasn’t her fault the phone had rung. She couldn’t use it; Daddy was the only one who knew the magic codes. He had dropped his fork on the tabletop and stalked across the room. Ellie looked at where the fork had made a mark on the tablecloth. He would want that washed now.

  ‘Clements residence,’ he had barked into the receiver. ‘Yes, it is. What do you want?’ He had glowered at her sitting hunched at the table.

  ‘I’m aware my daughter hasn’t been attending school.’

  School. Ellie’s heart had lifted. People. Mrs Burton, her teacher. If she could return to school, return to Maisie, the days wouldn’t be so long. She wouldn’t be alone. She had lifted hopeful eyes to his.

  ‘When can I go to school? Tomorrow?’ He had silenced her whisper with a glare.

  ‘No.’ His words were abrupt. ‘She won’t be returning. She’s gone to Victoria with my wife’s family to recuperate. They’ve enrolled her down there.’ His mouth had twisted as he had looked straight at Ellie. She couldn’t interpret the look in his eyes.

  ‘Yes, I agree they should have let you know. I thought they had.’ He’d barely disguised a sigh and rolled his eyes. ‘Yes…yes…she’s getting better…yes, yes, I’ll tell her next time I call. Good night.’ Her father had hung up the phone and returned to the table, picked up one of the lamb chops and sucked the gristle from the bone. His lips came together with a smack, as he dropped it back onto his plate.

  Ellie had braved initiating conversation. ‘Am I going to Victoria? Is that where Mummy is?’

  ‘No.’ He looked as if he were going to laugh.

  ‘What were you going to tell me? Tell me what?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘But you said…’

  He had reached across the table and given her a swift backhand to the face. ‘That’s for speaking when I’m on the phone.’ He had smacked her again. ‘That’s for listening to my private conversation, and,’ he had grabbed her by her good ear and half dragged her across the table towards him, the tablecloth bunching up and her glass of water spilling, ‘this is for asking stupid questions.’ He had twisted her ear before pushing her back in her chair. He gestured towards her spilt glass. Ellie’s face and ear were burning, but she had not dared raise her hand to them. She merely righted her glass and tried to smooth out the cloth.

  ‘God! Get the tea towel and mop that up. Do I have to tell you every dammed thing?’

  She had hurried to grab the cloth and mopped at the wet patch. She had told herself that she would not cry.

  ‘Well, Miss Stickybeak, you want to know everything? You’re not going to school.’ The amused look was back on his face. He shovelled another mouthful of potatoes and overcooked beans into his mouth, ‘Never again.’

  Ellie had steeled herself for another blow. She had to know. ‘Why can’t I?’

  His knife had clanged against his plate with a force that reverberated down her spine. ‘You want to be a laughing stock? Make me a laughing stock? You’re a freak.’ His black brows had knitted together. ‘No child of mine is going to be…I’m not going to have people pointing, talking about me, about…’ He had stabbed his fork in her direction, spitting the next words at her. ‘You’ll do as I say. You’re not going back to that school and you’re not leaving this house. Not now, not ever. Got it?’

  Ellie’s lower lip had trembled throughout his speech and her tears had started to fall with great, heavy drops onto her plate.

  ‘I want to see Mummy.’

  ‘She doesn’t want to see you.’

  ‘I want to go to school.’
>
  ‘I’ll teach you all you need to know. Stop your bloody snivelling or go to your room. I’m done with you.’ Ellie had fled to her room, to Ever and her dolls, burying her head in her pillow. She had heard her father throw something, a plate from the sounds of it, breaking on the floor. He would be in here soon enough, making her clean it up. Fresh sobs had wracked her shoulders. Mummy didn’t want her, Mummy had left her here…with him. No Mummy, no school, no Maisie. Ellie had felt the walls and ceilings of the house pressing down on her. She would be trapped here forever.

  

  Once she had been a little girl who giggled in a way her Mummy called ‘mischievous’, a little girl whose Daddy had grabbed her and tickled her under arms he called ‘chubby’. There had been smiles and laughter.

  ‘Look, Daddy, look.’ A drawing, a toy, a biscuit. Sometimes he would take the proffered gift in his hand, forehead furrowed in contemplation, before offering a gruff, ‘Thanks.’ Sometimes he’d reward her with a grin.

  ‘A flower, Mummy, for you.’

  ‘Oh, for me? Thank you, darling girl.’ A kiss. With her little offerings of love and joy, Ellie was a generous child, delighting in the world she was exploring. She had already figured out that the world her parents lived in was not the same as her own, that in their world there were times when you did not go near Daddy, times he would yell, times to stay in your room, times Mummy was sad.

  Mummy and Daddy had told her to always tell the truth, and Ellie tried, really tried, even when the truth could lead to a smack from Daddy. ‘Did you leave your towel on the floor?’ ‘Did you touch my matches?’ and Ellie would confess her sins, prefaced with ‘I forgot,’ or ‘I didn’t mean to,’ and hope that Daddy would listen. Mummy would forgive her, but Daddy…

  Daddy always told the truth. And he said Mummy was a liar. ‘Don’t lie to me, damn you,’ Daddy would yell at Mummy when Mummy said she hadn’t flirted with the man at the shop, or hadn’t spent all of the allowance Daddy gave her for their shopping. Mummy told the truth—most of the time, Ellie knew—but sometimes Daddy was right. Mummy lied. Mummy said she was happy when Ellie knew she had been crying. ‘I tripped on the back step,’ Mummy had told Maisie’s mum one day. ‘I knocked my head on the closet door’ to Mrs Burton at school.

  ‘No, you didn’t. Daddy…’ Ellie had tried to tell the truth but had been quietened by her mother.

  ‘We don’t tell everyone our private business.’

  ‘What’s private?’ Ellie asked.

  ‘Private is what happens inside the house. We don’t tell anyone.’

  Ellie wanted to make her parents happy. She had kept trying. Surely a present, a flower, would make her mother’s smiles come back. A smile for her, if not for Daddy. By six, although Ellie had realised that her parents didn’t always understand or want her gifts, still Ellie had tried. Be happy. Like me. The words beat in time with her heart. Please like me, please, please like me, love me.

  Once she had been a little girl who had let the keys and spare change fall from her fingers, enjoying the trilling, clinking sounds they made as they fell into the bowl. One hand had lingered on the small key. Daddy’s special key. She had clutched it in her left hand and jumped down from her perch on the chair.

  ‘I’m hungry, Mummy.’ She had tugged at her mother’s vividly printed skirt with her free hand and pleaded.

  ‘Can’t you wait until lunch?’ Her mother had been leaning against the sink, hands stilled, staring out of the window. From the lounge room they could hear Arthur grumbling, the murmur of the radio commentator’s words in the background too low to make out.

  ‘But I’m hungry now.’

  ‘Oh, all right: you may have a biscuit.’ Mummy had rummaged in one of the cupboards. ‘Then wait for lunch.’ Daddy had sworn loudly at the bastard of an umpire. Mummy had frowned as she produced the biscuit tin.

  ‘Bastard,’ Ellie had smiled as she repeated the naughty word and tasted it on her lips.

  ‘I beg your pardon?’ Her mother had stressed every syllable.

  ‘Daddy said it.’

  ‘You are not Daddy.’

  ‘Sorry.’

  ‘Hmmm.’ Her mother had handed her a biscuit. ‘I don’t want to hear you say words like that, Ellie.’

  ‘Yes, Mummy,’ Ellie had nodded before adding a pleading tone to her voice. ‘Two? Please?’ She looked up at her mother hopefully. The sound of Arthur swearing could be heard again, louder this time.

  ‘Eat them outside, Ellie.’ Dolores had pushed her daughter towards the back door.

  ‘Hullo, doggies.’ Ellie had wandered over to the dogs’ cage and placed her hands on the wire. One of the dogs jumped up from where it had been lying and licked her tightly clenched hand, trying to get at the biscuits, his tongue snaking through the wire.

  ‘Are you hungry?’ She had looked back towards the house. She wasn’t allowed to open the dogs’ cage. Only Daddy could, but he was busy. They were Daddy’s dogs, his ‘good dogs’, and he loved them. Spencer was his ‘good boy’ and Dash was his ‘good girl’. If they liked Ellie, maybe Daddy would call her a ‘good girl’ too. Maybe she could shove a biscuit through the wire for the dogs to share? Or maybe she could leave one on the fence for Maisie, in their secret place, so when she came outside she could have a treat too? Both dogs were up and pacing now. The bigger one, Spencer, let out a whine.

  ‘Okay, okay, good doggies.’ She had dropped her biscuits on the ground just outside the enclosure door as the dogs futilely snuffled and pushed against the wire trying to reach them. Ellie had looked around her and spied her mother’s wicker laundry basket below the clothes line. She had dragged it over to the enclosure and turned it upside down. She had stood on it to reach the padlock. It had taken her a couple of attempts to insert the key correctly. She had twisted the small key and laughed when she heard the padlock click and finally give. Daddy would be mad, but if she was quick, he would never know. Ellie had fumbled with the latch and pushed the door ajar, the hinges stiff and beginning to rust in the coastal air. She had jumped down to grab her biscuits.

  ‘No, wait.’ Spencer had wedged the door open further with his snout and barrelled up to her. His eager mouth had nudged violently at her hand.

  ‘No, bad dog!’ She had smacked him on his nose. He had snarled and exploded upon her. The biscuits had dropped to the ground, broken, as he had launched himself at her face. She had felt his teeth pierce her cheek, her nose as she squeezed her eyes tight against the dark fur and wild fury. She had felt every second of the savaging. She had flailed her arms and struck out frantically. The other dog, Dash, had given a feral howl and joined the frenzy. She had come closer and nipped at Ellie’s legs. Spencer had let go briefly to snarl at the other dog, a flash of white teeth, red gums, before returning his pitiless attentions to her face, her ear—the tearing flesh, those sharp incisors, snapping, clenching, then locking.

  Ellie had felt something flapping against her jaw and raised her arms in self-defence. An abomination of textures on textures: smooth, sharp teeth, skin, fur, blood, and canine saliva mingled. They were the textures of pain, of air where the tip of her nose used to be, an ear, a cheek hanging in space, ripped open. The sensation of tooth on bone, of bone bared to the sky. Pain scorched her face, her head, her arms, her legs. Blinding white, excruciating pain seared through her mind, and in the distance she had heard a howl of rage. Her mummy screaming, her daddy yelling, ‘Dead bird!’ and still the pain, the constant, fiery pain.

  

  Arthur had never forgotten the night he’d left his grieving wife and torn daughter at the hospital. That first night he had slept alone, aware of a fleeting sense of pleasure at having the entire bed to himself. Whiskey had dealt with his shock. He had dismissed the thought that Dolores had been right for once in her miserable existence: that he was an insensitive, unfeeling bastard. What use would he be at the hospital? What use wa
s Dolores, for that matter? Ellie was sleeping, medicated, and wouldn’t know a thing.

  He had heard the commotion erupting from the back of the house, just as he had raised a match to light his hand-rolled cigarette. Hysterical screams had disrupted him and brought him to his feet.

  ‘Bloody hell, woman!’ Hadn’t she learnt by now that he couldn’t stand her fussing? Then he heard the sound of the dogs baying wildly as if they had game bailed up and were aching for the kill and he ran.

  ‘Oh God, Arthur, stop them, stop them, save her!’ Dolores screaming before the sight he had tried to forget from that moment—his hunting dogs, his pride and joy, clambering and tearing at a broken and bloodied doll on the ground, his daughter.

  ‘Drop her, damn you, drop her!’ Spencer’s neck had bulged as his head whipped from side to side, jaws clamped tight on her tiny face and scalp. Dolores shrieking, her own arms bloodied as she kept trying to break the dog’s hold and pull Ellie to safety. Arthur pushed her away.

  ‘Shut up, woman, for God’s sake, shut up.’ He stepped into the fray. ‘Dead bird. DEAD BIRD!’—the game shooters’ command to their dogs to drop the kill. It worked. His daughter’s immobile form dropped to the ground, her precious face mauled and ripped open. An ear, torn and macabre, hung down from what was left of a bloodied cheek. Arthur growled. The dogs started to slink away, fearing his wrath. Dash yelped as Arthur kicked her with a polished leather boot. He had cradled his daughter’s inert body in his arms. His little girl. His Ellie.

  The disappointment he had felt at her birth upon hearing the baby was a girl and not the son he had wanted had gradually decreased, but never entirely disappeared. He could have raised a son to be a man, taught him things about the world. Girls, well, they were weak, but if he trained her… It had taken all of those first six years before her delicate manner and flashes of smiles had burrowed a narrow passage into his heart. Her unsteady gait, those giggles of joy even as she cried out, ‘Stop, stop,’ when he had held her close and tickled her.