by Alex Miller
‘So why don’t you do something completely new?’
‘Sit for me,’ he said. ‘And I’ll do a painting of you awake.’
‘I meant,’ she said carefully, ‘does it have to be me?’ It was clear she had not quite meant this, or at least had not meant only this.
‘Artists paint each other’s portraits,’ he said. ‘We’ve always done it. It’s a tradition with us.’
There was a considerable silence.
The blackbird had moved on.
‘How about I come over to Richmond in the morning and do some studies of you working on that picture, Chaos Rules? If that’s what you’re calling it.’ He waited. He was fearful of losing this possibility. ‘I need to be working, Marina.’ It was a confession of vulnerability. ‘I need to be painting again.’
The sun had come out, steam rising from the barricade of sodden clothes, as if fires still smouldered within the pile of his discarded installations. He would miss them, he realised, his featureless people. In a way, of course, they had been the uncelebrated people of the flats, with whom he had grown up. The anonymous people who had left no trace. Something also to do with himself and his brother and his mother and father, and that terrible sudden end. The lost and voiceless people of his parents’ pasts. All that. Loss and the past. But Marina was right, he had finished with it, or had finished with that particular form of it. Impossible to know when it is the last time for something, until we look back and, suddenly, we know it is finished, and then we experience this surprise and nostalgia for it.
‘None of us ever imagined you’d turned your back on painting forever, Toni,’ she said. ‘But you don’t need me to tell you these things. It might be less complicated, don’t you think, if you asked someone else to sit for you? Why not Teresa? And what about Nada? Or your mother?’
He was impatient with these suggestions. ‘What’s so complicated about you sitting for me? You’ve sat for me twice already. I’ve done two drawings of you asleep. This project began when I drew you at Macedon all those years ago, not this afternoon on the island.’
‘Project?’ she said. ‘It’s hardly a project, is it?’
‘Well whatever it is,’ he said. ‘It wouldn’t feel right to be painting Teresa or Nada or Mum at the moment. I’ll paint them one day, when I’m ready. Right now, I want to develop the suggestion that’s in these two drawings of you. They’re studies for something. I want to follow them up. I want to see where it takes me. There’s an offer in it.’ He waited, but still she said nothing. ‘So,’ he said at last. ‘You don’t want to do it?’
‘I didn’t say that. But perhaps it’s something you ought to think about for a day or two.’
‘I could try for a series of you. A suite. The Marina Suite.’ The title appealed to him. A series of her from his old Macedon drawings set alongside a series from her life now. His imagination was running on with it. ‘I might try for a series,’ he said. ‘Three, or maybe four, paintings. Three probably, to match the three you’re doing. What do you suppose Robert would think?’
‘Robert will support whatever you decide to do. You know that. But he’s not expecting paintings from you. Paintings weren’t what he was thinking about when he asked you. The idea was to have the contrast of your installation with our canvases.’
‘Artists always do the unexpected. Robert knows that. He said so in his first book. The artist always disconcerts our expectations. He’ll understand. Did you tell him about today?’
‘He’s not home yet.’
‘Will you sit for me or not?’
‘I’ll have to think about it.’
‘How about I come over in the morning and show the Macedon drawings and today’s drawing to both of you? We can talk it over between the three of us. I can do some drawings of you working while I’m there. Your whole family is in this sketchbook, you know. There are several drawings of your mother and your father. And the interior of your house.’
She said, with a kind of heaviness, ‘All right. But why don’t the three of us meet at the Red Hat in Bridge Road in the morning instead of at our place? We can have breakfast. It’s pleasant there. Do you know it?’
‘It’s that little place opposite the furniture auctions?’
‘And Toni, I do think it’s wonderful you’re going to be painting again. Really. That’s what’s important.’
‘But what?’
‘I suppose it’s just that I feel partly responsible. I know I’m not, of course. But I can’t help feeling as if I am.’
‘You’ve had a hand in it. Of course you have. I wouldn’t be doing it if you hadn’t come back. But that’s good, isn’t it? It’s the way it is. You can’t pretend you’re not involved. These things always surprise us.’
He hung up the phone. The rack beside him was still wearing his father’s buttoned waistcoat and trousers, reminding him of Sunday mornings in the kitchen before his parents went to the market, his dad in his shirtsleeves brewing a pot of coffee at the stove, classical music on the radio, last night’s pictures already cleared from the table and stored in the suitcase. He picked up both sketchbooks, climbed over the steaming barricade and walked across the courtyard.
five
Teresa was at the kitchen bench slicing chicken breasts. She had changed out of her suit into jeans and a grey top, her blue apron tight around her waist, an open bottle and a glass of red wine by her hand. Nada was sitting on the rug in the living area watching the television. Teresa looked up as he came through the door from the courtyard, the blade of the knife paused in the yellow chicken flesh. ‘You should see yourself,’ she said.
‘It’s Dad’s.’
‘It’s not just the jacket.’
He put the two sketchbooks on the bench, took off his father’s jacket and hung it on the back of a chair.
Teresa set the knife on the bench and wiped her hands on her apron. She picked up his old sketchbook and examined the cover. ‘So what were you two doing at Macedon?’
‘We were staying at Marina’s parents’ place. Robert was with us.’ He watched her going through the pages, pausing at each drawing.
‘Who’s this?’
‘The housekeeper’s husband.’
‘And this?’
‘Marina’s mother.’
She stopped when she came to his drawing of Marina asleep on the cane chaise, his precise archival note underneath the image: Marina Golding in the conservatory at Plovers, June 19, 1989. Without taking her eyes off the drawing, Teresa felt for her wine glass and raised it to her lips. She took a sip and set the glass on the bench again, still looking at the drawing.
‘I did it when I was a student,’ he said.
‘How come you never showed these to me?’
‘This early stuff’s been packed away.’ He watched her. ‘I did another drawing of her today. It’s in the other book.’
Teresa put down his Macedon sketchbook and picked up Marina’s. She turned the sheets, pausing once again to examine each drawing.
‘I’m sorry I forgot to pick her up,’ he said.
Teresa was looking at his drawing of Marina asleep in the shade of the wattle. She looked at the drawing for a long time. ‘You did this today?’
‘Yes.’ He leaned over her shoulder.
She moved away from him. ‘So this is what you were doing? On an island with her, doing this all day? You said, we got caught up. You got caught up on this island with her? Who else was there? Was he there? Was Robert what’s-his-name there?’
‘No, Robert wasn’t there.’
‘You were alone with her on the island? Is that it?’
He motioned at the sketchbook. ‘When I said I got caught up I meant with doing the drawing. It’s the first real drawing I’ve done since Dad died.’
‘You said we got caught up. I know what I heard. Now you’re changing it. You didn’t say, I got caught up doing my first real drawing since Dad died. If you’d said that, it would have meant something else.’
‘Marina
was showing me the space. That’s all. For the inaugural show. I’ve told you about it. It’s going to be important. I’m thinking of doing some paintings for it.’
‘Of her?’
‘Maybe.’
‘What’s maybe supposed to mean? Are you planning on doing pictures of her or not?’
‘That’s the idea at this stage.’
‘So that’s a yes, is it? I can tell you, you’re not making this look good.’ She looked at the drawing again. ‘I’d say she was showing you a bit more than the space.’ She studied him. ‘It’s a good drawing. Anyone can see that.’
‘Thanks.’
‘So tell me, those two come back from Sydney and suddenly you forget to pick up your daughter? Then you throw your installations out the door into the rain? Now you come in here wearing your Dad’s old jacket and looking half-deranged. So what’s going on?’
He reached a glass down from the shelf and poured wine into it.
‘I just want to know what’s going on.’
He swallowed some of the wine. ‘I’m going to Richmond tomorrow to talk over an idea for a project with them.’
‘The project of doing pictures of her?’
‘Yes.’
‘So you’re going to be a real artist again? Is that it?’
‘I hope so.’
‘You know what I was doing today while you were on that island getting caught up with her, being a real artist again? I was asking Dad for another ten thousand. Yes! That’s it. Have you got any idea how that makes me feel after everything he’s done for us with the agency, without ever being asked for anything? You know how it makes him feel? Do you have any idea what I’m doing to keep this thing going for us? Then I’m in conference with these people and I get a call from the kinder telling me Nada hasn’t been picked up. Come and get your daughter, they tell me, we’re closing up. I’m sorry, I say to them, and I tell my clients, See you later, I’ve got to pick up my daughter from kinder. And that’s it. They look at me as if I’m crazy. Am I going to see them again? You’ve got to be joking! That’s not the kind of service these corporate people are looking for. You’ve got no idea what I have to do to run this business. It’s not just your dad’s old jacket! You’re like a stranger since those two got back from Sydney. I’m not in touch with you.’ She put down the sketchbook and picked up the kitchen knife. She waved the knife in Nada’s direction. ‘If you want to do something useful, take your daughter for a walk. She watches too much of that. It’s not good for her.’
He would have spoken but she overrode him. ‘Just do it! Do something! Do something useful for once!’
‘There’s no need to get worked up.’
‘You want to see me worked up?’ She sliced at the chicken. ‘I sometimes wonder if my father wasn’t right about you.’
‘Come on! Take it easy. You’ve had a massive day. Careful!’ he said. ‘Don’t cut yourself. You work too hard. You should take a break.’ He put his arm around her.
She twisted away and stood facing him, the knife in her hand, her shoulders tense, a rush of emotion in her eyes.
‘I was going to fill you in with what’s happening,’ he said quietly. ‘But when did we get the chance to talk until now?’
She gave a little gasp and turned back to the chicken. ‘Take her for a walk!’ She sliced through the chicken with a suppressed energy that made him wince.
He stood a moment, then turned and went over to the television and scooped up his daughter. Nada pushed at him and he put her down again. ‘Don’t you want to come to the swing park with Daddy, darling?’
She didn’t look at him but stalked off down the passage.
Teresa was ignoring him, flouring the chicken fillets. He followed Nada.
Teresa yelled, ‘Snoopy Dog!’
He came back and picked the toy dog off the rug. He straightened and met Teresa’s eyes.
‘This’ll be ready in twenty minutes,’ she said, and she stood looking across the room at him, her dark eyes glassy with tears. ‘Go on. She’s waiting for you.’
‘I’m sorry, darling.’
She shrugged helplessly. ‘Yeah, I know. It’s me, too. I’m strung out with this money business.’
‘I’ll be back soon.’
She called out to Nada, ‘Have a good swing with Daddy, darling.’
At the end of the passage he handed Snoopy Dog to Nada. She took the toy from him and tossed it aside. It hit the wall and fell in a heap.
‘Poor old Snoopy Dog!’ He leaned down and retrieved the toy. ‘Looks like you’re in the doghouse, old Snoop.’
‘His name’s not old Snoop,’ Nada corrected him severely, unimpressed by his flippancy. ‘He told me he doesn’t want to come with us to the swing park.’ She stood facing the door, waiting for him to open it.
He propped the toy with its back to the wall. ‘There! You’ll be okay till we get back. You don’t think he might change his mind while we’re out?’ he asked her.
‘He can’t hear you,’ she said.
‘See you later, Snoopy.’
They went out and down the path. He tried to take her hand but she wouldn’t let him. She walked ahead of him along the footpath, being independent; he stayed a couple of paces behind, reprimanded.
She stopped abruptly and looked back at her heel.
He squatted beside her.
The ribbon on her pink imitation ballet shoe had come loose. She did not say anything but stood twisted around, frowning at the trailing ribbon. He leaned her small body into him and retied the ribbon. She watched, making sure he was getting it right. ‘How’s that?’
She resumed her solitary progress, siding with her mother.
•
Toni and Teresa were standing together in the open door of Nada’s bedroom looking in at their sleeping daughter. They had been curled up on the sofa all evening, drinking wine and watching a movie. There had been no big talk between them. They had been keeping to the privileged intimacies of the small stuff, staying within the safety zone.
Nada was lying sideways across her bunk on her back, the sheet thrown aside, an eerie glimmer of the whites of her eyes, her lips parted, her arms flung out as if she had been tossed, weightless, through the firmament by an elemental force and was no longer their little girl but a small stranger embarked on a journey that was not their journey.
Teresa whispered, ‘Should we straighten her up, do you think?’
He stepped into the room, took hold of Nada and eased her around so that she lay lengthwise along the bed, retrieving her from the wildness of her dreams.
She frowned but did not wake.
‘Don’t wake her!’ Teresa whispered at his shoulder.
They pulled the sheet and the summer doona up around the little girl’s chin, placed her arms in under the covers and stepped back. She twitched but stayed straightened. Their little girl again. No longer flying away from them.
‘That’s better,’ Teresa whispered.
They watched her, held by the fascination of their intense feelings for their child, a sense of their own frailty, the fragility of the link that was carrying them along together.
‘We should give her a little sister or brother,’ Teresa said. ‘It’s not fair to leave her on her own.’
‘We’re not leaving her on her own. She’s got us.’
Teresa turned to him. ‘Do you remember when you were her age?’
‘No.’ But he did remember.
‘What happens to our first memories?’ Teresa wondered.
He looked down at his daughter. His first memory was vivid; he had been Nada’s age. He and his father were standing by helplessly watching his brother Roy fighting his father’s tormentor in the entrance to the flats. The man going over backwards, his head hitting the kerbstone with a crack like a beam snapping. And they had stood, appalled, in the apocalyptic silence, knowing the man was dead and everything had changed for them . . . ‘She doesn’t need a brother or sister,’ he said. ‘She’s okay the way she is.’<
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Teresa looked at him. ‘An only child is not a real family,’ she insisted quietly.
‘I need a drink of water,’ he said.
‘Get me one too.’ She touched his arm.
He turned and kissed her gently on the mouth.
She went down the passage and into their bedroom, and he walked back through the house to the kitchen. In the half-light of the living area his father’s dark jacket hung on the back of the chair, as if his father were there working in the night hours, bending over his paints in his shirtsleeves and braces, lovingly disclosing the quiet beauty of the everyday in their lives, surprising them by making art of his wife’s kitchen utensils. The wonder of how he did it. The whisper of his own childhood voice, What are you painting, Dad? The beautiful smell of his father in the night. His dad portraying his love for them through the objects familiar to their hands. He remembered a small rectangular watercolour of his mother’s ironing board and iron, an image as poignantly the woman herself for those who knew her as his own carefully crafted portrait had been . . . He was not sure whether Marina knew the story of his brother’s imprisonment. He could never remember who knew their family story and who did not know it. He went into the kitchen and filled two glasses with water from the tap and carried them back to the bedroom.
Teresa was under the sheet, her bedside light off, turned on her side, her face to the wall. He set the glass of water beside her.
She murmured sleepily, ‘Thanks, darling.’
He undressed and climbed into the bed, and lay on his back beside her. Minutes passed and he was drifting into sleep when she turned to him, her voice coming out of the dark, husky and anxious, as if she had been building her resolve to put the question to him. ‘Were you two lovers?’
He came out of the haze of his half-sleep. ‘Who?’
‘You and her—Marina Golding? Back then, at her place at Mount Macedon? Before my time?’
‘No,’ he said firmly. He was alert now.
‘How can I be sure?’
He thought about her question. How could she be sure? She had never sought such a reassurance from him before. They had never questioned each other’s word. Now, suddenly, the certainty of each other was no longer there. He spoke carefully. ‘I didn’t like her back then,’ he said. It was true. ‘I was just doing a drawing.’
