So here it is:
I see us in one of the big cities in the U.S. Some city big enough and far enough away that nobody knows us. We could live under the SAME ROOF!
We can run some business together, maybe, like our dear Campbell sisters do. Or you could find some endeavour that suits you—there’s churches aplenty over there. One such as you could find place among some community that values you. I know it.
And also like the Campbells, we could present ourselves to the world as they do. No one questions they don’t look too much alike. Folk just accept it because they’d rather that than risk thinking what other truths there might be. Could be same for us, where folk don’t know us. Imagine it: a priest and his brother sharing a house. What could be more respectable?! And with taking on a shared name, like they did too. I’ve even daydreamed that, if you can believe such a thing. Thought we could give tribute to poor Lan and everything that’s happened since her tragedy.
We could be Lanling. Even sounds like a proper surname, yeah?
But I’m getting ahead of myself. Such things are aways off from where I sit this minute. Where I sit in this impressive courthouse with Lan’s justice just moments away and your touch still ghosting on me. (the seats here are bloody hard, would be hurting me arse by now even on a regular day) I feel like everything’s working towards something. Something I have to grab onto for dear life, if I’ve got any damned sense about me.
All’s it’d take is a ship and your say-so. The means of payment aren’t no issue now, are they. Our passage, and more than enough to set us up at the other end, we have that now, thanks to Benedict and his generosity. We could do this.
We don’t have to go back on Monday like planned.
We cash our rock, we buy passage and we go! Fiona and Anne will see to sending our things from back home on for us.
Just imagine it. I do.
I imagine it so hard I can see it when I shut me eyes.
If you just choose to imagine it WITH ME we can make …
Clearly, Jonah had been called into court before he could write any further.
Matthew slowly closed the book and held it out for Jonah to take. Taking the notebook back, Jonah slid closer again along the pew. Matthew kept his gaze forward, but from the corner of his eye he saw Jonah reopen the book and deftly rip out several pages. Jonah replaced his notebook in his tunic, then folded the removed pages and stuffed them down the top of his right riding boot.
They sat silently for several minutes. The choirmaster led his charges on some lilting by Thomas Tallis. Matthew’s mind was a riot of declaration and possibility.
‘You have fine handwriting,’ he eventually found the voice to say.
Jonah startled a little and cleared his throat. ‘I thought you was praying,’ he whispered sheepishly.
Matthew half-turned his head. If he wasn’t mistaken, Jonah looked worried.. Or more likely nervous. It was a proposal after all, Matthew supposed, that Jonah had just made. As for any hopeful suitor, there was bound to be nerves.
‘It would seem,’ Matthew began, not entirely certain what he was about to say, ‘that I now have quite a lot to think on.’ He looked down at his hands. ‘And not exactly the longest time in the world in which to think on it.’
Chapter 8
It was the first time on their trip that Matthew felt truly decadent; kissing fiercely in the middle of their room, barely having made it through the door before cleaving to one another, surrounded by parcels of shopping, material goods. That all the purchases were clothing and practical, paid for by earned wages not flamboyant golden gift barely mattered. Matthew spared a thought to conduct unbecoming.
But then Jonah put one hand on the back of Matthew’s head, cradling him, angling him just-so, and in a heartbeat the kiss turned tender and warm. There was nothing unbecoming in that kiss, nothing unseemly to that embrace.
Matthew let himself be cared for, to be held and worshipped, caressed into slumber and kissed awake again next morning, a bright sun streaming into their room, washing the blue from Jonah’s eyes.
***
Cricket whites were the only non-uniform Matthew had ever seen Jonah wear. Every other clothed moment they shared, Jonah had been uniformed as the rules of the constabulary dictated.
Now Jonah dressed in a dark grey suit, three-piece, with a light green shirt that he roguishly left the collar off. He had new black boots and a bowler hat he placed at a tilt.
‘Are you quite sure you won’t wear your uniform?’ Matthew asked.
‘What? I thought you liked these duds?’
Oh, Matthew liked them. Jonah looked lean and flash, even a bit boyish, in his new ensemble. But that was neither here nor there. ‘It’s not that,’ he said, lacing his own boots. ‘But you may well be carrying a sizeable amount upon your person on your way back.’
Jonah clearly wasn’t following. ‘And?’
‘And, I’d feel a little more at ease if you were, you know, a policeman while doing so.’ Matthew looked him in the eye, willing him to understand Matthew’s fears. ‘With your sidearm.’
A grin flashed at him. ‘Yer worried I’m gonna get rolled?’
‘It is a danger, is it not?’
‘Yeah,’ Jonah allowed. ‘It’s also a danger that a copper dealing with a large amount might be viewed with more than a little suspicion. Questions I don’t wanna answer might get asked.’
Matthew hadn’t considered that.
‘Tell ya what,’ said Jonah, ‘I’ll take me billy-club. That make ya feel better?’ He picked the baton from among his discarded uniform as he spoke, giving it a twirl as he asked.
‘I’ve never actually seen you use it.’ Matthew resisted pouting. Just.
‘You’ve never seen me use me Colt neither, ya daft sod!’ Jonah slid his baton into an inner suit jacket pocket, his easy smile taking the edge off his grousing.
‘At least promise me you’ll avoid Little Lon, then?’
Jonah stepped close and put his hands about Matthew’s face. ‘I promise you.’ He smoothed his thumbs over Matthew’s cheekbones. ‘I’ll give the Lon a wide berth, and I’ll be straight back here after getting rid of our rock. No excursions. And I’ll keep me wits about.’ He leaned in and pressed his lips to the centre of Matthew’s forehead.
Matthew nodded as Jonah leaned back again. ‘Money makes me nervous,’ he offered in lame explanation for his fussing.
Jonah smiled and stepped away. ‘What’re you doing while I’m gone?’
‘Have a walk, I suppose. Take my mind off worrying for your safety.’
‘Right-o, then.’ Jonah flicked the rim of his new hat, making a smart noise. ‘See ya later.’
***
An aimless wander found Matthew staring up at the bluestone face of the Catholic cathedral, St Patrick’s, on the edge of East Melbourne. It was a roughly similar size to its Anglican equivalent, but the hue of its rock lent it a more severe grace, Matthew felt, than the sandstone of St Paul’s. He’d never been in St Patrick’s before and wasn’t entirely sure he wanted to be now either, but the longer he stood out front—an Anglican priest eyeing the seat of Catholic faith—the more conspicuous he felt, and so set one foot in front of the other.
Why he headed for the imposing boxes of the confessionals, he didn’t know. Though there was confession and atonement in Anglicanism, he was alien to the workings of the Catholic church. He didn’t care so much about looking a fool himself as he cared to not appear to be making a mockery of the tenet. This comfort wasn’t intended for him. He probably shouldn’t do this. He should probably leave …
The grille slid open.
Hastily, Matthew sank down onto the prie-dieu. ‘Forgive me, Father,’ he said in hushed tones. ‘I’m not a Catholic. I’ve never attempted your form of confession and I’m sorry, but I’m not familiar with its rituals.’
‘Well, you got the first three words correct, at least,’ came an amused response. The priest beyond the grille was clearly an Irishman, his
accent thick with his homeland. ‘Proddy, are you?’
‘Yes, Father. Anglican. In fact, I’m an Anglican priest.’
Matthew wasn’t sure what response to expect, but crackling laughter hadn’t made his short list of possibilities. ‘Oh, if you haven’t just made my week, lad!’ The priest sounded as if he was trying to rein in his amusement. ‘If not my entire year, indeed. Ah, me.’
Matthew waited a moment, twisting his hands in front of himself. The priest soon regained composure enough to prompt him.
‘So, then. How can I help a fellow of the other cloth? What troubles you, my son?’
There wasn’t any point in procrastinating. Matthew was loath to waste the man’s time. ‘I fear I may have … fallen in love, Father.’
‘Sounds a nice trouble to have, that. Married already, is she?’
Matthew blinked. ‘What? No! No, unmarried.’
‘Well now, there’s no problem there for you lot, is there? Not like you’ve had to swear off it for life like us poor bastards.’
‘No, I, I see your point, Father. The problem is …’ Matthew paused. He could invent some impediment to happiness that this non-existent lady friend might present. Or he could be honest and take the consequences. ‘The problem,’ he continued, ‘is that the unmarried person in question is not a “she”.’
There was silence from the other side of the grille for some moments. Then, surprisingly, came the question: ‘Are you a good priest?’
Momentarily disarmed by the line of questioning, Matthew shifted his knees on the hard wooden bench, found his right hand moving to finger the collar of his cassock. ‘To be frank, Father, I believe I am. Yes.’
‘And how goes your relationship with God Almighty?’
Matthew hadn’t been asked such a question since his seminary years. ‘I feel … at peace with that relationship, Father.’
‘At peace? Sounds like you’ve passed on.’
‘Poor word choice, then,’ Matthew conceded. ‘I assure you, the relationship is very much alive.’
‘It doesn’t suffer from your sin?’
‘I … don’t feel particularly sinful.’
‘We are all of us filthy sinners, my son. So the Good Book tells us.’
‘I’m beginning to believe there may be some room for interpretation, actually.’
At first, Matthew thought the noise he heard was scoffing but, even if it perhaps started as such, it soon morphed into an undeniable chuckle. ‘Oh, you wouldn’t get far in this church, lad. Not with that attitude.’
Matthew smiled into the gloom. ‘Is that a note of admiration I detect, Father?’
‘Pity, more’s like. I don’t envy you trying to find sense in this pickle you’ve landed in. There’s not just the hell that awaits to be mindful of, y’know. There’s plenty of earthly hells to be endured in the here and now as well.’
‘Yes.’ Matthew’s smile faded. He held onto a breath a few seconds and exhaled it on a quiet sigh. Steeling himself, he decided to cut clear to the point. ‘He’s asked me to go away with him. My friend. He, he thinks we can share a life together.’
‘Jesus wept!’
‘Father?’
‘I thought you were just in knots over some pretty face in your congregation! You didn’t say it was ever worse than that. You didn’t say he’s in love with you, too!’
‘I …’ Matthew began, but mentally stumbled. ‘Oh. Oh, my Lord. I’m sorry.’ He bolted to his feet, scrambling for the door latch of the confessional. ‘I’m sorry,’ he repeated, words sounding like babble to his ears. ‘Thank you, Father,’ he found the wherewithal to say. ‘Thank you for your time.’
He was aware of the other priest saying something, asking him not to leave perhaps, but panic was rising in his gullet and he felt the need to flee. He managed to free himself from the booth without too much clatter and, spying the nearest door, strode swiftly towards it. His cassock snapped about his ankles as he walked, his mind telling him not to run, not to run.
The day outside seemed astonishingly bright after the dimness of the cathedral and the gloom of confessional. Matthew blinked into the sun and breathed deeply, willing his sudden sun-blindness to abate. He kept walking, still instructing himself not to run, not to run. The distance to the safety of Miss Holland’s hotel, to the room he and Jonah were sharing, felt too large, too far. He wanted only to get back there, to see Jonah, to apply this newly-given information, to see if what the old Irish priest had said could in any possible way be true.
***
Matthew had only been back in their room a matter of minutes before Jonah returned, looking a little wan. Matthew immediately thought the worst, that there must be bad news about to be imparted, a tale of woe involving theft or loss or pound-snatching untimely gusts of wind.
‘Jonah?’ He almost didn’t want to know, but he had to ask. ‘What’s wrong?’
Jonah closed the door quietly and took off his hat, locking the door one-handed behind his back. ‘You won’t believe this.’
‘What? What’s happened?’
‘Nothing’s happened. It’s what it was.’
Fool’s gold. It had to have been pyrite!
‘Forty-eight ounces,’ Jonah said. ‘A little under, but just about.’ He reached into his jacket and produced a roll of bank notes. ‘Forty-eight bloody ounces, Matthew. That’s over a thousand pound.’ He held the money towards Matthew. ‘I’ve never held this much dosh in one go.’ He looked down at the wad, expression distinctly amazed. ‘It’d take me nearly six years to earn this.’
Matthew stared at the money, made an aborted gesture towards it. He couldn’t even wrap his mind around the calculations. ‘It’d take me even longer,’ he managed. ‘Does this mean we’re …?’
‘A little bit rich?’ Jonah suggested and broke into a wide grin. ‘Fuckin’ oath, it does!’ He casually dropped the wad onto Matthew’s outstretched hand, then bent to throw his arms around Matthew’s waist and lifted him off his feet in a crushing hug.
Matthew let Jonah lift him and hug him and set him down again, but all he could do himself was stare at the bundle of money. It was so strange to think it, that something he could hold in one hand had so much life-changing potential. This roll of paper could open up the world to him, if he chose.
‘What do we do?’ Matthew looked at Jonah’s wide grin and felt a returning smile. ‘What do we do with it?’
‘I’ve always thought about getting a tattoo.’
A short bark of laughter shot out of Matthew at that. ‘I meant, where do we keep it? How do we secure it?’
Jonah crossed to the sturdy chest of drawers between the beds. It was a heavy item of furniture and the rug on the floor made sliding it away from the wall tricky, but Jonah applied his weight and hauled it a few inches further into the room. ‘Right,’ he exhaled. ‘Get the wad open,’ he instructed, ‘and pull us out about thirty quid each in various notes.’ He opened the top drawer of the chest and removed the Bible. ‘Pick a verse, any verse,’ he commanded like a stage magician with a card deck.
Dividing the money, Matthew looked over at the book in Jonah’s hand. ‘In that one? Try page nine-three-eight.’ He bent his head to the money again, but covertly observed Jonah from the corner of his eye.
Jonah flipped through the Bible pages a little roughly, going further than needed and flipping back. When he obviously landed on page nine-hundred-and-thirty-eight, his head tilted and he smiled. He walked over to Matthew and held the open book so that Matthew could place the bulk of their money inside.
‘This the right page?’ Jonah asked softly.
Matthew placed the money on the open book, right over the chapter heading that read JONAH. ‘It was either that or nine-seven-one.’ Matthew smiled up at him.
‘Lemme guess. Book of Matthew?’
Matthew knew he didn’t have to answer that.
Jonah snapped the Bible shut and took it back to the chest of drawers. There, he pushed it into the recess at the base of the
chest, it fitting snugly under the bottommost drawer, and then shoved the whole unit back against the wall. That done, Jonah then smoothed the disturbed rug with his foot, erasing evidence of the furniture having been moved across it.
‘How about you try on some of the gear we bought yesterday?’ he suggested to Matthew.
Matthew glanced down at his cassock. ‘Have you finally grown tired of seeing me in this?’
Jonah stepped close and kissed him. ‘It’s just a priest in a tattoo parlour might look a bit outta place.’
‘You can’t be serious?’
‘Deadly,’ said Jonah, and kissed him again.
***
The day had turned grey and drizzling while their train rattled them out of the city proper and into Port Melbourne. Jonah picked a tattooist seemingly at random, a shop front close to Station Pier, his mood positively gleeful.
‘Follow my lead inside, alright?’
‘Whatever you say,’ Matthew said, following him to the door. ‘Lord, give me strength,’ he mumbled to himself.
‘I’m telling ya, mate,’ Jonah said in a much broader country accent than he naturally spoke with, pushing into the parlour, ‘the girls are gonna love ‘em!’
The shop was murky at best, but Matthew had been led to believe all such establishments were undesirable, so he hadn’t expected anything other. The dark coloured walls were covered in sheets of butcher’s paper, upon which were scrawled and sprawled all manner of drawings and doodles, ranging from the twee to the obscene. Apparently, this was the gallery from which those wishing to undergo the needle could choose what to wear for the rest of their days. Many of the offerings were nautical in nature, which, the salon being situated dockside, seemed wholly appropriate.
The artist was a slender man with mutton-chop whiskers. His absence of shirt collar and sleeves rolled to above the elbow, combined with his braces hanging loosely from his trouser tops, gave him the air of one about to enter a bar fight. He regarded the two of them over the top of his newspaper with a steady expression.
‘How ya goin’?’ Jonah asked him breezily, all front and bravura.
By the Currawong's Call Page 22
