a Breed of Women

by Fiona Kidman

  ‘What? Don’t be crazy. What’s the matter?’

  ‘Nothing. Nothing.’ She started to weep. ‘Is there someone in bed with you?’

  ‘No, of course not.’

  ‘There could be. You don’t have to be alone.’

  ‘No, that’s true.’

  ‘We agreed that it was over. I expect you to take other women to bed.’

  ‘I know. I do. But there isn’t anyone here now.’

  ‘It was stupid of me. What is the time? You didn’t say.’

  ‘Five o’clock in the morning.’

  ‘I suppose it must be. Is it going to be a good day?’

  ‘I haven’t looked yet. But I think it might be. It’s spring, you know.’

  She was quiet.

  ‘Are you just unhappy?’ he asked. ‘Is that why you rang me?’

  ‘The winter’s just starting here,’ she replied hopelessly. ‘Goodbye.’

  ‘Don’t hang up. Leonie. I want …’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Are you all right?’

  She put the phone down. Why had he asked such silly questions? She had no idea whether she was all right. She had no idea whether anything had ever been wrong.

  ‘Why did you ring Todd Davis last night?’ asked Brent the following morning.

  Leonie put down the lunch packet with care.

  ‘I didn’t ring Todd Davis,’ she answered. And inside her head she was saying to herself, I did, I did, I did.

  ‘You rang him last night,’ said Brent. ‘It was a person-to-person. I heard you put it in.’

  ‘No. You’re mistaken. I rang Mr Hicks, to cancel the paper when we go away next weekend.’

  ‘Laurence heard you, too, didn’t you?’

  Laurence raised his eyes covertly from his fried egg. She handed him his orange drink.

  ‘I can’t remember,’ he said.

  ‘Yes, you can,’ said Brent. ‘You said, that’s Todd Davis that used to work in Dad’s lab. That’s who she’s ringing, that’s what you said.’

  ‘I must have made a mistake,’ said Laurence. ‘Like Mum said. Is my lunch ready?’ he asked Leonie, as he swallowed the last of his breakfast.

  She handed it to him silently.

  ‘See ya.’ The door slammed behind him.

  ‘He did hear you.’ The boy stood there looking at her, waiting.

  ‘You’ve got no right to listen to my telephone conversations,’ she said at last.

  ‘I didn’t. I just heard you putting it through.’

  ‘I don’t listen to yours,’ she said, aggressive and self-righteous now. ‘What business is it of yours who I talk to?’

  ‘Why did you ring him?’

  ‘Please don’t tell Dad when he comes home.’

  Brent smiled, a secret pleased smile, having won an admission from her. ‘Would he be angry?’

  ‘Possibly. A toll call to Toronto costs a lot of money. I was being lazy. Todd Davis wrote to me to get some information, and I simply hadn’t got round to answering his letter, so I rang him up. Dad would be cross with me for spending all that money.’

  ‘What sort of information?’

  ‘Oh … he was thinking of emigrating here.’ By what wild flight of fancy have I uttered such nonsense? she wondered.

  ‘He wanted to know whether it was a good idea or not.’

  ‘He could have asked Dad. He used to work for him.’

  Leonie wondered how much longer she could stand the interrogation without screaming at her son. It was too much. She had to hold on, there would be no way back once it was done. ‘Dad didn’t like him much. I think he thought it was better to ask me.’ Getting in deeper. Damn. A bad line that. Why should she like Todd Davis better than Hamish? Why should Todd Davis trust her to like him if her husband didn’t?

  Brent shrugged and turned away. ‘I’d better be getting off. I’ll be late for assembly.’

  She wanted to yell at him. He couldn’t do that now, so casually abandon her without committing himself. Learning the power game. Hamish was a good teacher; both these boys of hers were quick. ‘Then is it between us?’ she asked.

  ‘Eh? Oh yeah. Of course.’

  ‘What about Laurence?’

  ‘He’ll be okay.’

  ‘How can you be sure? I don’t want to discuss it with him any more.’

  ‘Easy.’ Brent was filling his bag with books, and his lunch, taking apples from the sideboard. ‘He doesn’t like Dad.’

  ‘Brent.’ She stood still, shocked. ‘How do you know?’

  ‘He doesn’t have to like him, does he?’

  ‘I don’t know. Do you?’

  ‘Better than Laurence. Yes, I guess he’s okay. I reckon he gives us a pretty neat time. None of the kids have got as many things as we have.’

  ‘And that’s important?’

  ‘Don’t you like things?’

  ‘You can get by without them. I haven’t always had things.’

  ‘Sure you haven’t, but you never talk about when you didn’t. Dad hasn’t always had things either, but he talks about when he was a kid and didn’t.’

  ‘Maybe Dad had a happier time than I did. It … it doesn’t always have to do with things.’

  ‘Yeah. Maybe.’

  ‘Anyway, it’s an awful reason to say you like Dad.’

  ‘Tell me the other ones when you’ve got an hour to spare. Bye.’

  At the door he turned and smiled. ‘It’ll show up on the phone bill, you know,’ he said, and then he shut the door behind him, and she heard his feet running up the path.

  Dully she started cleaning the kitchen. Was it good luck to have a dishmaster, a wastemaster, a juice extractor? She repacked steaks methodically in a freezer tray, and put them away, then took them out again, removing two, replacing one, red, lonely and decidedly alive-looking. She shuddered. Perhaps it was contemplating eating her.

  The boys would have their steaks in front of the rumpus room telly. Again.

  Her head was burning. She walked to the window and leaned her forehead against the cold pane of glass. The chill seemed like an extra ache. Obviously the pain was behind her eyes, heavy tears. They wouldn’t fall, she knew that; they had never fallen when she most wanted them to, not even in the old room long ago. Harriet would cry now, she was sure. In rage and fury and frustration.

  She wished she could get Harriet off her shoulder. The wretched woman seemed to have no intention of leaving her this morning. Well, she had decided to ring her today, hadn’t she? Perhaps she might even tell Harriet what had happened last night, and this morning. She could make it sound like a joke.

  She might tell her, or again she might not. It was almost Harriet’s fault, what had happened. Or so it seemed. She dialled Harriet’s number.

  5

  THE FRIENDSHIP BETWEEN Harriet and Leonie developed quickly from the time of their first meeting in the library. Harriet was searching the shelves for a book that might help her solve some of the problems that faced her, and finally lit upon one that seemed to promise some enlightenment. Its author was Van der Velde, and it was called Ideal Marriage.

  She sat down on the edge of the chair, gingerly, because she was still hurting. The combination of her period and the encounter with Sydney the night before had left her tender and uncomfortable.

  Quickly she rifled through the pages. There seemed to be a lot about sex, but it was all for the ideal situation, and that of course meant being married for a start. She wondered if there was any point in pursuing the matter and decided to look up the index. She was just hunting under ‘V’ for virginity when she noticed someone standing in front of her.

  A girl was watching her curiously. Caught staring by Harriet, she looked embarrassed, shrugged and then said ruefully, ‘It doesn’t help much, really.’ Harriet blushed scarlet and attempted to cover the book with her hand. The girl sat down beside her and Harriet tried to decide whether to turn and flee, leaving the book behind, or whether she should put it back on the shelf.

&nbs
p; ‘I tried that one but it didn’t make me much wiser. Perhaps it’s because I wasn’t married,’ she said with a flicker of a smile.

  ‘How did you know?’ Harriet blurted.

  ‘Just guessed, really.’ But that’s the reason I went looking at it.’

  She paused. ‘I’ll bet no one’s ever told you anything.’

  ‘My mother told me to look at the ducks,’ said Harriet miserably.

  The other girl hesitated a little more. It was as if she was weighing something up. Harriet was suddenly afraid that she would go away, but the girl seemed to have made up her mind.

  ‘You’re lucky,’ she said. ‘I don’t have a mother. The orphanage I was in told me only married people could have babies.’

  ‘Well, I do know that’s not true,’ Harriet said.

  ‘It’s a start.’

  ‘Two girls I know are having babies. I guess one of them’s had hers by now.’ It occurred to her that none of her mother’s letters had mentioned Ailsa.

  ‘One of them’d be Julie Simmons, I suppose.’

  ‘How d’you know?’ said Harriet, startled.

  ‘I knew you worked with her. Well I could hardly miss, could I? I work in the shop across the road.’

  ‘Do you? Which one?’

  ‘Bookshop. It’s not a bad job. I was lucky to get it, I can tell you. Orphanage kids don’t get first in the queue with the good jobs. Oh, they say you do, and of course, if you’re smart, that’s different. I mean really smart. If you’re going to make it to university or something people move heaven and earth, it suits them to look good. But if you’re just middling smart like me,’ she added, matter-of-factly, ‘then there’s no kudos, you see. What about you?’

  ‘I thought I was okay,’ said Harriet, shrugging. ‘I seemed to do all right at school, but they wanted me to do a whole lot of things I didn’t want to, so I kicked up.’

  ‘You like what you’re doing now?’

  ‘You’ve got to be joking.’

  The girl looked her over and Harriet returned her gaze with determination. The situation seemed to be slipping out of her control. This girl who seemed to be taking charge of her was tall and rather too thin. Her hair was black and straight, she had wide, very green eyes and a nose covered with freckles. She was altogether pretty, with an oddly fragile air one also suspected of hiding steel. She was wearing a cream open-necked blouse, revealing a very long white neck. The blouse was tucked into a wide cinch belt, such as people had started to wear recently, and her skirt was very full, flowing around her as she got to her feet.

  ‘I’m Leonie Tregear,’ she said. ‘Feel like a walk?’

  They left the book lying on the table and walked out into the street.

  ‘I’ll bet you haven’t had anything to eat today,’ said Leonie.

  ‘No. How did you know that?’

  ‘You could always tell kids at the home who hadn’t had anything to eat. I’ll get us some pies.’

  She disappeared into a shop, and reappeared a minute later bearing a couple of brown paper bags.

  ‘Now, come along, we’ve only got half an hour till lunch hour’s done. There’s a seat down by the war memorial. Keep your fingers crossed there’s no one there.’

  The seats were empty, so they sat down under a hunk of concrete that had a lot about the glorious dead etched all over it. Harriet, suddenly faint with hunger, devoured the pie almost in a mouthful.

  ‘Here,’ said Leonie, handing her the other bag.

  ‘That’s yours.’

  ‘I’ve eaten. I got it for you.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because I knew you’d be hungry,’ Leonie explained patiently. ‘If I hadn’t got two bags, you wouldn’t have eaten by yourself.’

  As Harriet ate the second pie more slowly, they started to talk.

  ‘Someone get you last night?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘The first time’s awful. At least, I haven’t met anyone who didn’t think it was.’

  ‘I thought it was supposed to be nice. Ailsa … that’s one of the girls that’s having a baby, I went to school with her up north, she kept saying it was so great.’

  ‘Yes,’ agreed Leonie grimly. ‘That’s what they tell you when they’ve got a man and they want to keep him.’

  ‘Perhaps it gets better,’ said Harriet hopefully.

  ‘Could be. I’ve only tried it once, and it hurt like hell.’

  ‘You do seem to know a bit more about it than I do,’ said Harriet.

  ‘Well, I had a few mates at the orphanage, you know. I still see them sometimes. At least they told me more than the books.’

  ‘I’m not sure I did it,’ said Harriet. ‘I’m certainly hurting most awfully.’

  ‘You still bleeding?’

  ‘Don’t know, can’t tell. I’ve got my period. It came this morning.’

  ‘Bloody hell, you’re not haemorrhaging are you?’

  ‘I don’t know. D’you think I might be?’

  ‘Probably not Were you bleeding when you got up?’

  ‘No, it just started this morning when Mr Stubbs and I were putting out the safety pins. The other bleeding had stopped when I got home, after Sydney …’ She stopped, ashamed.

  ‘Sydney, eh? That sounds like his style, he tried it with me too. It was his mate Neville that got me.’

  Suddenly Leonie started to laugh. Harriet couldn’t see the source of her amusement.

  ‘It is funny, isn’t it? God, how they take us for a ride. But what the hell, we’re both okay, neither of us is pregnant and we might help each other to keep out of harm’s way.’

  ‘Why do you want to be friends with me?’ asked Harriet, curiously.

  The other girl looked defensive for the first time, even a trifle sullen.

  ‘Suit yourself. I can take it or leave it.’

  ‘No … no, please, I’m sorry. It’s just that I’m — well, I’m pretty lonely, you probably guessed that, and I feel … you see, there was a crowd of kids that sort of arranged for me to go with Sydney. I think they must have known what was going to happen to me. I guess I don’t feel too good about the whole deal here.’

  ‘Don’t blame you,’ said Leonie, relaxing. ‘Sorry I snapped. It’s just that where I come from, sometimes people don’t want to know you.’

  ‘But that’s awful. How can people be like that?’

  ‘Easy. Would you take me to your place? You stay with Mrs Harrison, don’t you. No, hang on, I’m not asking you to, I’m asking if you would. Like if we got to be friends, and you thought gosh, wouldn’t it be nice if Leonie came round Saturday afternoon, I’ll phone her up, what would she think? Would she let you do it?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘There you are, you see.’

  ‘Now, wait a minute,’ said Harriet. ‘Stop jumping down my throat. You asked me. All right, stop thinking I might be going to offend you. I said I don’t know and I don’t. She wouldn’t let me have Julie Simmons round.’

  ‘Can’t say I blame her.’

  ‘Now who’s making judgements? You don’t even know Julie Simmons. All right, so she threw me in with Noddy’s lot down there at the milkbar, but she thought it’d be company for me, and it was the only sort she knew. It’s not her fault what happened to me, it was her way of being kind. So I don’t know about you, but if Julie had been going to stay on in town I might have sorted it out with Cousin Alice, but she wasn’t going to and I’ve got plenty of troubles with my board as it is, so it didn’t seem worth the trouble. If I got to know you and we really got on, well, I guess she’d have to decide whether she could put up with my friends or put me out. I can’t keep living like this.’

  Leonie had listened to this carefully. She seemed to be looking at Harriet with more than a little respect.

  ‘Sorry,’ she said. ‘I wouldn’t have stuck up for Julie Simmons like that. I guess you haven’t got any side.’

  Harriet asked her if she still lived in the orphanage. Leonie said she had got o
ut nearly a year before, leaving school the day she turned fifteen. The orphanage had been out in the country, and she too had gone to a district high school, with little distinction and less happiness. If the inmates were not making great progress at school they were urged to try and find a job as soon as practicable. Because Weyville was the nearest sizeable town, it was usually the first place where work was sought, though Leonie said a lot of the boys got farm work in the area and stayed on at the orphanage after they left school. In her case that had not been possible and she had had to come in and get board in town. She was still under welfare and hoped to be out of it by the time she was seventeen so she could have some say about where she lived.

  Harriet asked her where she had lived before, but Leonie simply looked bleak and turned her head away. Harriet never discovered the answer, though from time to time over the next two years she added together pieces of information that suggested that Leonie had been sent from place to place for a long time, possibly by relatives. Social Welfare had only picked her up when a school teacher had noticed that the people she lived with had injured her. Whatever the circumstances had been, Leonie never fully discussed them with Harriet. There seemed to be a deep-seated horror under the surface of Leonie’s life. Nor did Harriet ever find out whether she was a true orphan or not.

  When Leonie left school, she had been given an unpleasant and boring assembly job in a factory, and she had made sure she got fired in a very short space of time. This had caused the Welfare people great displeasure and she had been placed in a waitressing job at the forestry canteen. There she had met the merry band of local electricians, her downfall with Sydney’s mate had occurred, and she had decided to take a stand on her own behalf.

  She enjoyed reading and had often retreated to the library during lunch hour. She had befriended the librarian there, a shy elderly man who had found books for her.

  One day, she had gone to the library crying and he had asked her what was wrong. She’d told him about the job in the canteen, and he’d been shocked. He found her a job in the local bookshop. It was a good shop, and he felt she might get some interest out of life working there. It seemed to have more than worked out and Leonie said she was very happy.

  When Harriet heard this, she found herself launching into the story of how she was expected to go into an office in a week or two and start work as a typist She confessed how all her predicaments of the moment seemed to stem from this one frightful basic cause.