Dark Fires Shall Burn

by Anna Westbrook

  Templeton notices that Roberta is shivering, even though she’s wrapped in Dot’s fur. That’s not the only thing he noticed: he also observed that she spent last night in Dot’s bed.

  Roberta’s face is pale with fear as they loiter in front of an ordinary-looking terrace on Stanley Street. A ripping southerly’s blown in from the coast, tossing the branches of the skeletal trees. The row of houses, squat and seemingly endless, stretches on. He wonders if this is even the right place. But bars on the windows, green letterbox: it’s the right one.

  ‘No. I’ll be alright,’ says Roberta.

  ‘Are you sure? I don’t mind. I can stay just to be there while they — when it happens.’

  ‘No. I’ll be fine.’

  ‘I’ll be here when it’s all over then. He said it would only take an hour.’

  Dot kisses Roberta firmly on the cheek and watches as she climbs the steps and raps the lionshead knocker. After she’s knocked, she crumples: Templeton can see her shoulders give way. She looks back at them with entreating eyes.

  An elderly woman opens the door. Her whole body is made up of various shades of grey: hair, skin, shoes, and a grey dress girded by a white apron. ‘Who is needing the procedure?’ She looks grimly at Roberta and then her eyes flicker to Dot. Even her irises are grey.

  ‘I do,’ Roberta says, with a found strength in her voice.

  ‘Then you will come with me. Are you the father?’ The old woman asks Templeton.

  ‘Uh — well … what?’ He is caught off guard.

  ‘Hmm,’ she says, eyes narrowing in disapproval, and turns away.

  They follow her down the corridor and find their way to straight-backed seats in the cramped, musty parlour. The place still has the blackout paper up on the windows, Templeton notices.

  ‘Wait here. Ten minutes,’ the woman tells Roberta, as if she is telling her what time to expect the bus. ‘The doctor will be along shortly. Do not go wandering off. If you need the lavatory, ring the bell.’ She walks away, and he can hear her horrible footfalls on the old creaking floorboards.

  ‘Thank you?’ Roberta answers after her retreating back.

  The house seems to bow and sway in the grip of the gale outside.

  A minute later, the woman returns to the room. ‘Ahem.’ She coughs and gestures with her palm out. ‘Ten pounds.’

  ‘Oh! Yes, of course. I’m sorry.’ Roberta takes the envelope of folded bills Dot has given her and hands it over. The woman grabs it impatiently, counts it in front of her, and walks primly back to her post down the corridor. Templeton looks about him. A clock ticks loudly on an otherwise bare wall. The only furniture is the two stark bench seats. He and Dot awkwardly occupy one, but Roberta remains standing in the middle of the room, clasping and unclasping her hands.

  ‘It’s all going to be fine,’ Templeton whispers, bright as he can muster.

  Roberta smiles wanly.

  ‘You’ll be alright. We’ll be here waiting when it’s over.’

  ‘Lucky. Just … stop talking.’ Roberta looks very nervous.

  Fifteen minutes pass, then twenty, and finally the woman comes wordlessly to collect Roberta and lead her down the corridor. Roberta looks at Dot and swallows. When her eyes meet Templeton’s, he smiles to reassure her but she shifts her gaze away.

  Dot gestures for Templeton to follow Roberta. He creeps down the corridor after her and enters a room directly opposite the one she is shown into, slotting himself behind the wooden mantle of a doorframe so as not to be seen.

  When he hears the door to Roberta’s room swing open, he peeks around to see a man in a waistcoat with rolled-up shirtsleeves. He’s stout, with small round glasses sitting on the brink of his nose. Behind him is a younger man, taller but sparrow-chested, with a cowlick of ginger hair that refuses the pomade he has applied over-generously.

  ‘Alright,’ the waistcoated doctor announces loudly. Templeton imagines him taking out his pocket watch to consult it; he can almost hear the punctilious ticking of the seconds. He wonders how Roberta must feel. ‘If you’ll follow me, please.’ He turns on his heel back into the corridor, walking down to another room.

  Templeton ducks into an alcove. He can feel Roberta hesitate. ‘Do I —?’

  ‘You may leave your things here, it’s perfectly safe,’ the younger man instructs. ‘Purse, gloves, and please take off your shoes and stockings.’

  She does so and shuffles barefoot into the chamber at the end of the corridor. Templeton tries to catch her eye from his hidey-hole, but her head is down, her eyes focused on the worn boards. He edges after her and finds that he can peer around the door while the men are absorbed. Looking in, he sees a stripped mattress in a room with barely space for anything but the tray of bottles and instruments that stands next to it.

  ‘Lie down please and remove your undergarments.’

  Roberta is crying but trying to hold it in as she lies down on the bed, holding her scanties in her hands. The doctor moves between Roberta’s legs and presses her abdomen, murmuring things to the younger man. Templeton averts his eyes as the doctor moves to inspect her with his fingers.

  ‘Jolly good. Not too far along,’ he says. ‘Not too much trouble.’

  Leaning back against the wall, Templeton imagines Roberta shutting her eyes and keeping them screwed closed as the doctor’s fingers move and she tries to stay rigid and still. She gives a sharp cry of pain, which is quickly muffled, and he knows she has shoved a fist in her mouth. It must feel as though the doctor is coring an apple inside of her.

  ‘Lie still.’

  After a silence, the doctor announces that he is done. Templeton peers around the doorframe and sees with shock that there is blood on the mattress, between her legs. He remembers again the sheet with the hem of blue daisies, ruined. His mother lying prostrate on the bed, the baby with its umbilical cord, purple and knotted, still attached.

  ‘Expect some bleeding,’ he hears the doctor say briskly. ‘Nothing to be concerned about. And you may have cramps for a day or so.’

  She is instructed to dress and wash up at the basin in the corner while the men absent themselves. He creeps back to the first room, making it just in time.

  After waiting a few moments, Templeton looks out and sneaks into Roberta’s room, knocking softly as he enters. ‘Are you okay?’ he asks quietly.

  Roberta is bent double, clutching her belly, her face green. ‘No. Get out of here, Lucky. They’ll catch you,’ she says.

  Templeton creeps back to the parlour and Roberta follows minutes later, huddled, moving slowly. It is as if she has somehow been crushed and reassembled, Templeton thinks.

  ‘You’re going to be alright.’ Dot rushes over and wraps her arms around her shoulders. ‘It’s over now.’

  Roberta says weakly, ‘If I could perhaps lie down …’

  ‘Let’s get you home,’ Dot says firmly.

  They pay for the extravagance of a taxi to Tipper’s. Dot is helping Roberta out when they hear a man’s voice come from the side of the house, where it is dark: ‘Hello.’

  ‘What are you doing here?’ Dot asks Bob Newham, as he steps out into the thin morning light.

  ‘Uh — well, I …’ Bob takes off his hat and seems to knead the brim, holding it before him. He looks at Roberta almost shyly. ‘I thought I’d come and see …’

  ‘He’s here because it’s his,’ Roberta blurts out.

  ‘What?’ Templeton can’t hold in his surprise. ‘You two know each other?’ His eyes go to Dot, but her face is inscrutable.

  ‘It’s his. Or it was his. It’s done, Bob.’

  Bob’s drawn face softens in relief. He nods. ‘Good. Good then.’ They stand in silence for a moment.

  ‘Inside,’ Dot says, as she helps the weakening Roberta into her arms. ‘She needs to get inside. Templeton, help me.’ She moves to block Bob from steppi
ng in. Templeton darts to bolster her, and they take Roberta inside together.

  Bob looks on helplessly, twirling his hat in his hands. ‘Righto.’ He clears his throat. ‘I’m going out for a few,’ he says. ‘If I’m not needed.’

  On the bed, Roberta is sweating heavily. Within moments she has kicked the sheets off and twisted them around her ankles in a Gordian knot.

  ‘Is this normal?’ Templeton asks Dot, panicked.

  ‘It’s fine. She’s going to be fine,’ Dot says soothingly. ‘Look at me, Roberta. You’re going to be fine.’

  The mauve lampshade throws sick purple shadows across every complexion.

  ‘Dot?’ Roberta tries to raise herself up on her elbows, grabbing for Dot’s blouse.

  ‘Yes, I’m here. I’m right here.’

  ‘I didn’t want to … with Bob.’

  ‘Alright. It’s alright. Lie back.’

  ‘I thought about you. Most times I was thinking about you.’

  ‘Alright, quiet now.’ Dot gently takes her wrists and tries to settle her back down against the pillows. She turns to Templeton. ‘The pain. She doesn’t know what she is saying.’

  ‘No, of course. Shall I fetch something for her? A tonic? A glass of water?’ Templeton asks.

  ‘Water.’ Dot nods.

  ‘I want to take you to the baths at Coogee beach,’ Roberta says, finally submitting and lying back, but still holding Dot’s fingers tightly.

  ‘I do not swim in the ocean.’ Dot smiles at her. ‘Never learnt how.’

  ‘Oh, you should. You will. With me. In the summertime. I’ll teach you. It is beautiful … It’s never rough. The waves just touch the sides. It’s all made of stone — the waves can’t crash in. Well, hardly ever. They just kiss the edges. On nice days it is so clear and green you can see right down to the bottom.’

  A dark patch of blood is already spreading on the sheet beneath her in an angry teardrop.

  ‘What’s wrong with her? Why is she bleeding like that? There’s something wrong!’ Templeton demands, becoming frantic. His body is seized in painful remembering.

  ‘It hurts, that’s all. It hurts like hell, but just for a day or two,’ Dot tells him. ‘She’ll be okay. Now do as I said and go and get her some water.’

  Ω‘Templeton, do not be a fool. You know what that would mean. For all of us. Go away and let me handle this.’ Her tone is firm, and he slouches off to do as he is told.

  ‘Pull up a chair, handsome,’ Tipper says to Templeton as he scuttles down to the parlour after handing Roberta’s glass of water over to Dot. Tipper and Nellie are doing a jigsaw puzzle, he sees with some surprise. Only the corners and a bit of a turquoise sky with white clouds are complete.

  ‘I don’t know. Maybe I should stay up there, in case they need me. Roberta’s up there with Dot.’

  ‘Roberta will be alright,’ Tipper says firmly. ‘Nothing they need you for.’

  Templeton draws up a chair and turns pieces over in his hands, not comprehending the relationship the fragments bear to the larger image on the box.

  Tipper is in a jovial mood. ‘Okay, this is an old one, from Chicago. Here we go.’ She smiles. ‘Two young couples are honeymooning in a hotel. They meet over dinner one night. The next morning the young husbands are waiting in the lobby. “Where’s your wife?” asks the first. “Upstairs, smoking. And yours?” answers the second. “Mine’s hot, too,” the first guy says. “But not smoking!”’ She slaps her knee.

  ‘Tipper, that’s terrible,’ Templeton groans.

  ‘Your generation just lacks a sense of humour.’

  ‘Whatever you say,’ he indulges her.

  ‘How about this one. Are you ready for another?’

  ‘Do we have a choice?’ Nellie says, nudging Templeton.

  ‘Alright, alright. “Is she a natural blonde or a platinum blonde?” one guy says to another. “Neither,” the second guy replies. “She’s a suicide blonde.” First guy asks, “A suicide blonde? What’s that?” Second guy says, “Dyed by her own hand!”’

  ‘Errrr.’ Templeton wrinkles his nose.

  ‘Oh, come on. That is wit. You don’t think that’s funny? Dot would think that’s funny. Hey, Dot!’ she hollers. ‘Come down here and tell the sprat how funny I am.’

  Dot comes down the stairs, her hair askew, looking exhausted. Templeton fixes her a drink, and she takes it gratefully.

  ‘How is she?’ Nellie asks, serious.

  ‘She’ll live.’

  ‘That’s good news. Cin-cin!’ Tipper raises her glass and they join her. ‘So, Dolly is still sweating in jail, is she?’

  ‘Apparently so.’

  ‘Snowy too?’

  ‘He’s in the hospital with a split head.’

  ‘And your sister? Where is she in all this?’

  ‘Still at Dolly’s. Or, at least she was a day or so ago. Jack Tooth came and cleaned her out.’

  ‘Hmm. Cleaned her out, I’m sure he did. But did she give it willing?’

  ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’ Templeton bristles.

  ‘I’m no good at these bloody things.’ Nellie throws a puzzle piece across the room.

  ‘Ah, forget it, boyo. I didn’t mean anything.’ Tipper waves her hand, dismissing it.

  At a quarter past ten there is a knock at the door. ‘We’re not open yet,’ Tipper hollers.

  Nellie shimmies over and slips the spyhole open. ‘Oh fuck.’ She puts a hand to her mouth and ducks just in time. There is a bang and a bloody great hole where the lock was a moment ago.

  ‘Get behind me,’ Tipper roars and is on her feet and snatching up her gun.

  Templeton places himself in front of Dot, fear striking deep in his bowels. Dot picks up a knife from the table. Nellie runs and hides behind the bar counter.

  The door bursts off its hinges and Jackie swaggers into the room. Behind him is Errol, holding a Winchester Model 12. Jackie’s razor swings back and forth by his trouser leg, unsheathed.

  ‘G’day,’ Jackie sneers. ‘Hello Dot.’ He nods in her direction. ‘It’s been awhile.’

  ‘What in God’s name is going on here?’ Tipper plants her feet wide. ‘What do you think you’re doing, bursting in and ruining my door? You have some cheek, lads. Some cheek indeed.’

  ‘It’s Tipper, am I right?’ Jackie says. ‘Sorry, don’t know if it’s Mister or Missus.’ He reveals his teeth in a snarl.

  Errol grunts. ‘We could take its clothes off and see.’

  ‘We don’t have no beef with you,’ Jackie tells her. ‘There’s just a small matter of some unpaid debts. Seems two of your girls have been a little light-fingered. I’m here to collect.’ He points at Dot. ‘Five pounds, plus interest.’

  ‘Annie paid you already. I know it for a fact. So I do not know what you think you are doing here, but I would advise you to leave.’ Dot sounds confident, but Templeton can hear her heart banging behind him.

  ‘Nellie Flanagan, is she here?’ Errol asks.

  ‘No, she’s not. I don’t know where she is,’ Dot answers. Templeton wills himself not to betray Nellie’s hiding spot with an errant glance.

  ‘What do you want with her?’ Tipper stares down her gun barrel.

  ‘Well,’ Errol rocks on his heels and pulls at his belt buckle, lifting up his trousers over his paunch. ‘The tart gingered me when I was having a root. Took me wallet right outta my back pocket. Five pounds in there too, dontcha know?’

  ‘Is that right?’ Tipper says. ‘So all you two meatheads want is ten pounds between you. That’s the reason you’ve come bursting in here, harassing my girls.’

  ‘What’s the matter — didn’t you know Nellie was round Dolly’s a few days back, getting some of what you can’t give her?’ Jackie says, and Errol cracks up in mock laughter.

  ‘Shit,’ Dot says under her breath, sq
ueezing Templeton’s hand. He looks down and sees that her other hand, holding the knife, is trembling.

  Tipper says nothing, just keeps on looking at them over the sleek line of the gun.

  ‘Is she here or isn’t she?’ Errol asks. ‘If she ain’t, then you can settle it. You’re the one that foots her bills, isn’t that right? You’re her daddy. At least you think you are.’

  ‘She must have missed a bit of the old in-out, in-out.’ Jackie thrusts his hips.

  ‘Oh, shit,’ Dot murmurs again. Templeton grips her little hand in his larger one tightly, whether to show support or from fear he’s not sure.

  ‘You deaf or something?’ Tipper asks. ‘Dot already told you Nellie’s not here. Now I don’t know what you’re thinking, busting up my place and asking me to pay money to some fucking eunuch who needs a gun fifteen times bigger than his cock to feel like a man. You’re telling me my girl stole from you? Well, you shouldn’t have been so bloody stupid in the first place! Why did you think she’d root you if it weren’t to rob you blind: you think she liked it? You think she liked some rutting hog on top of her? You’re dumber than you look, and that’s fucking saying a lot.’

  ‘What do you know, you bulldagger?’ Jackie lifts his razor but he pauses when Tipper shifts the gun from Errol, aiming it right between his eyes.

  ‘You’re a bloody freak,’ shouts Errol. ‘You’re the third sex, that’s what them newspapers say, freaks of nature. The Germans, they had the right idea putting all of you down. Like dogs.’ He eyeballs Dot. ‘You too.’

  Templeton sees the vein above Tipper’s eye begin to pulse.

  ‘Although their one mistake was gassing you perverts. It don’t hurt bad enough!’ He glances back at Jackie, who is grinning, face red with silent laughter.

  ‘You think you’re their daddy? Their protector?’ Jackie steps forward. ‘You got a pair of tits too, love. Somewhere under that damn man’s shirt and tie you’re wearing, you’re a woman. Did you forget that?’

  ‘What do you think, Jackie? Shall we pull ’er tits out and show ’em to her?’ Errol laughs.

  The muzzle of Tipper’s gun flashes and Templeton sees Errol drop almost before he hears the bang.