And he must see some sort of stilling, because he lets me go.
The train’s gone. There was no way I would have caught it.
‘Home now,’ Dain says. ‘You’ve work on the morrow.’
There’s that, at least. There’s the work.
So I walk home and it’s Egan I see. Coming at me down West Street. He’s smiling and full, with the fullness of hungers sated. Not that it ever is, not really with these folk. Looks like he’s won, looks like he’s been waiting for me, and I get a sense of how petty these fellas are. How little are their pleasures in this little town that he’d bother with me and my miseries. No misery too small if it means he might hurt Dain a little too.
‘Night, sir,’ I say.
‘Night, young man,’ he responds, polite as ever. He stands still, not a bit of movement in him. But the motion is all around him, in the air, in the earth, in the animal juddering of my heart. ‘Lonely one for you.’
‘Yes,’ I say, and I don’t bother hiding it, don’t bother suppressing my pain, nor do I throw it out. If he’s looking for a fight, he’s found the wrong sort of stupid tonight.
‘You’ve few friends around you, now,’ he says. ‘Think on that. This town is all the leaner of comforts for you now.’
‘Yes, sir,’ I say. ‘Goodnight, sir.’
Egan looks at me like I am some sort of puzzle that he’s failed to solve. At last he frowns. ‘Goodnight indeed,’ he says. And is gone, all at once, into it. As good as this night, as bleak and dark and terrible. And I’m alone. I’m alone.
But I feel like, just for a moment, I’ve won something. Knowing that winning now might be losing later. It’s always that way, isn’t it? Victories never last long. Hold them or let them go, they leave you anyway.
When I get home, bruised and bitter, there’s a small package on my bed, wrapped in brown paper. I tear it open.
And in that package is Thom’s hat. It’s wrapped around the stake he carved, the taipan’s eyes coloured eggshell blue. I lift it in my hands, and I realise that he never made it for himself. It’s weighted perfectly for me.
CHAPTER 41
THE NEXT EVENING, after a day where I reckon I couldn’t have done less if I tried, Dain calls me to his study, asks for two shots of his whisky. And when I bring it I see such a look of contrition that I don’t know whether to cower or laugh, and can’t muster much for either.
I set the whisky down on his desk. He looks up at me from the book he’s reading. An old, well-thumbed thing, the yellow jacket thinning to brown in places.
‘Mark,’ he says, ‘there are some things you need to know. There’s two reasons I went to the city. One, as you’re aware, was to speak for you.’ He stands and puts the book down on his desk. ‘The other was to speak for Anne.’ He looks at me, perhaps to gauge my reaction. I can’t help myself, my fingers curl to fists. But Dain’s lips thin.
I take a deep breath. Then another; neither’s deep enough.
‘She will be safe there. She will be respected. She has a talent, and a will to use it. And she wanted this. Not just Mary, Anne wanted this.’ Dain takes a sip of his drink. ‘So, do you hate me, too?’
I pretty much do right now. But it comes out as a child’s cry, not a man’s. ‘Why does everyone go?’
‘Because everyone does.’ He pats my arm. ‘Your time will come, boy. Sooner than we will credit it. That’s the way of things. You will forgive me? And her?’
‘In time,’ I say, and I don’t sound like a child anymore.
‘Time dulls every sting, believe me.’ Dain picks his book up again, and sighs. ‘I’ve read this book a dozen times. Nothing new since we came,’ he says. ‘No new stories. We put an end to them.’
‘Why don’t you write some? Finish your book.’
His eyes narrow at that, but he lets it pass.
‘I keep trying,’ he says. ‘It’s dead, if I’m honest. Withered in me. But I still try.’
Perhaps that’s all the Masters have left to them, an unchanging eternity, a dulling endless road. Perhaps that’s why they hold to their old feuds; they’ve so very little left that even hatred is a treasure.
Been a year since I was hunted in the river and now the other hunt is on, the deer hunt. Guns are cracking, fools shooting at shadows with rifles banned but for this single day of the year. Whistles blowing, drums beating. Deer running for their lives.
Morning, and there’s always a list left on the table.
And there always will be—except there won’t. I still don’t know what’s coming after, and in truth there’s a panic in me. When I’m done, who’s going to tell me what to do? Where will I be? This town doesn’t have a place for me. I used to think it did; maybe that was true, but now it isn’t. Not anymore. I have to push those thoughts away, and focus on this, on these. Still work for me; still purpose. And panic fades in the face of drudgery.
Lists and lists, I’m in a valley of them, all those words written neat, piling up, do this, do that, get this, see to that. Here’s some writing that he’s finished! Though it’s never-ending. I’m not in any mood for tasks, but I’m in less of a mood for a clip under the ear. World’s got its challenges enough and I’m done with pain. Done with looking after anyone but myself. Who else is there in this town?
I study that damn list. The door to be marked, and the places where money’s to be paid. Then the yard work. I’ll see to these things in the order made out. Make my circuit of the town, close in on home. Good to have a plan. Seems like everyone else has.
There’s a line scratched on the door. Dougie’s called a meeting at twelve. I’m not going. He can come and drag me out of bed for all I care. I wipe the damn line off with my thumb. Easiest job of the day.
I go out and make payments with those Sun-stamped coins.
Mary calls out at me across the street. I don’t feel like talking, but I come anyway. Of course I do. It’s Mary, she’s all I have of Anne.
Into the shop I go, and she shuts the door behind me. Pours me a tea, gestures at a stool by the counter. ‘Sit.’
I take a sip of that tea, and wait. And she doesn’t sit with me, doesn’t even pour herself a cup, and I look at mine suspiciously.
‘You set to poisoning me?’
Mary almost smiles at that.
‘I’m not Tennyson, but there’s all manner of poisons, I suppose. Mark, I was the one that sent her away,’ Mary says. ‘A girl like that, like mine, this town’s too small for her. This town would have killed her.’
And I know what she means, I know she’s talking about me. I don’t know what to do. I don’t know how to feel. I want to hit her, I want to put the world between forefinger and thumb and squeeze until it pops.
Instead I put that teacup down, gentle as. ‘You know what you done to me?’
Mary nods. ‘But don’t you realise that this wasn’t about you? This was about her. She’s safe now.’
‘You didn’t like me an’ her,’ I say.
‘No, I didn’t. I like you, Mark. I love you, almost; as much as one can love one of your sort. But I love my daughter more, and I had to let her go.’
‘But she loved me.’
Mary laughs and it’s as thin and bitter as any poison. ‘You don’t know nothing about love.’
‘You ever stop to think that you don’t neither?’
Mary slaps me. Hard enough to loosen teeth. ‘Foolish boy. Foolish, foolish boy. All you know is chest-puffing and sentimentality. You think the world loves you for what you are? It hates you for what you do. You serve the monsters.’
My eyes are wet, and I don’t hide it. I let her look. ‘How am I supposed to be? Where am I supposed to go? I’ve lost it all, and I gave it all away. What else am I supposed to do? ‘
Mary’s face softens some. ‘You’ll learn that. And maybe survive it. My Anne is safe, and maybe you are too.’
‘Nothing safe about this world,’ I say.
Mary nods. ‘And there never was. But you have to try. And your Master thought likewise.’
Don’t hear anything else. Because I’m slamming open the front door, running onto the street. Running away from her.
I’m feeling those tears. They’re just welling up, and there isn’t a thing I can do about them. Not a thing. I don’t feel like paying any more bills, I don’t feel like walking. I find myself a bit of gutter and I sit in it and I sob, knees pressed against my chest, face down.
‘Eh,’ Grove says from behind me. ‘Eh, what’s this about?’
I give him a fair bit of glare. ‘You know what this is about.’
Grove settles me down. ‘It’s all right,’ he says. ‘What’s done is done. You might see her again.’
Might don’t mean nothing, I want to shout, but I keep my teeth shut, stop my lip quivering. Squint through the rude light of midday at my friend. If he blames himself for Anne’s leaving, I’ll give him a serve of knuckles, I swear.
‘Ain’t the end of the world,’ Grove says, and laughs. But I don’t laugh with him. ‘All she did was talk about you, you know.’
Don’t even crack a smile.
Grove winces. ‘Boy and girl in love. Nothing new there. You’re not the first to find tragedy. Not the first who’s been messed with by the world.’
I look at him hard. Like this lad understands such things! Maybe Anne said no to him, maybe she was interested in me, but what does that amount to? World’s never messed with him, not hard. It hasn’t pushed the way it’s done with me. He’s made for this world, and it accommodates him.
‘Now, enough of your moping. We’re running late for that meeting of Dougie’s.’
‘Not going,’ I say.
I’m yanked to my feet. Grove’s eyes burning. I think he’s going to hit me. Second round from those I count as friends. But he doesn’t.
‘You’re a Day Boy,’ he says. ‘When a meeting is called, you go. Until you’re not. We’re late as it is. We’ll have to cut past the Summer Tree.’
Half the town’s in the woods. Shooting at stuff. There’s guns cracking, whistles blowing, and all them deer regretting the tradition, regretting that they’re not already in the High Land. Isn’t safe to be in these woods, but here we are. The Summer Tree, with its red flowers ready to drop in this heat.
I can’t help pausing. Standing in front of it, clenching my fists, like I could strike out at the world and get in a good hit.
‘You’ll be all right,’ Grove says. His head swinging this way and that. ‘But we have to hurry.’
A deer skitters in our path, stops dead still when it sees us.
‘Bugger me,’ Grove says.
A gun cracks nearby. We both jump, and laugh.
The deer stares at us both. Long and lingering. And then it does something peculiar. It walks up to Grove and sniffs his hand. Such a beauty, and here we are before the Summer Tree.
‘Something’s set their heart on ya,’ I say, and it’s the first time I find a bit of light in the day. A wind starts blowing. Warm and from the west, and the deer doesn’t move. Keeps its eyes on Grove.
Grove settles himself on his haunches. And extends his hand. He touches it gentle behind the ears. ‘World’s too cruel for the likes you. Run, little thing. Run.’
‘We better, too,’ I say, and the deer comes to life, startled by my voice. It’s all a flurry of legs, and fear, and it’s racing west past the Summer Tree, back into the woods.
Grove gives me a look, irritated. ‘You scared it,’ he says.
There’s a crack of gunshot, real close.
Grove grunts next to me. ‘I think—’ he says, and that’s all he says.
I scramble to him, and he’s blinking at me. Gasping for air, and I’m holding his hands, and there’s blood on them. And he’s moving his mouth but there’s no words coming. His hands grip mine back. And I’m looking into his eyes.
He lifts his head a little.
‘I’ll get help. I’ll get help.’ But I don’t want to leave him. ‘I’ll get help.’
I hear myself start yelling. Then people coming. And Grove’s there, and I’m holding him, and there’s blood, and more blood, a lifetime’s worth. And he’s just looking at me.
‘Sorry,’ I say. ‘So sorry.’
I just want him to yell at me. To curse me and hurl a plague on my house like in that play, but he don’t. Just looks at me with his frightened eyes.
He tries to lift his head again, squeezes my hand even tighter. So I lower mine. Can hear his breathing, frantic. But then it catches and slows.
‘Don’t—’ he says, there’s more blood in his words than sound. He shakes his head, and there’s no hate in his eyes, just a calm rising up as he falls into nothing.
And his hands aren’t holding me back anymore.
I’m howling, and Mick comes at us through the woods. He’s holding his rifle, and he sees what he’s done.
‘You,’ I scream, still on my knees, and I lift my bloody hands. ‘You.’
‘All I saw was a deer. Big old stag. The boy, the boy, is he—’ He shakes his head, his eyes are wide, never seen such horror in a man’s eyes, not even Mr Stevens’ when he was hung. ‘All I saw was that deer. Not the—’
But he’s already backing away: dropping the rifle, and running. And even then, on the sharp edge of my hatred, I know two people are dead because of that shot. Because of me.
‘You,’ I say to his back, but he doesn’t bother turning, and I’m already filling with pity for him. There’s nowhere he can run, and Grove won’t ever take another step.
There’s others coming at me, eyes wide.
‘He’s dead,’ I scream. ‘Shot dead.’
I’m holding him, and none of them come near. A circle that they can’t seem to breach, too frightened, like those gentle-boned boys that watch us fight.
There’s flies though, big fat bastards coming for my friend, and I’m brushing them away. Big fat flies so quick to find him like they find all death. Not gonna have him yet.
‘He’s dead,’ I say, and my eyes burn, and I’m brushing away those bastard flies. And they’re on my face, too, crawling over my tears. Flies aren’t fussy. Flies will eat anything. And I can’t brush
them all away. So I do the best I can with my friend. I do the best I can.
It’s Certain and Mary that come. That push through that mute circle. That pull him from my hands. How long have I been there? How long did people do nothing? He’s cold in my grip, and I scream and swing, but Certain’s got hold of me.
‘Calm,’ he whispers. ‘Calm.’
Then louder. ‘Dougie. Twitch. All of you. Grove needs seeing to.’
Don’t need seeing to. He’s dead. Won’t need seeing to again.
Dougie nods. Him and Twitch, they get their arms around Grove. The twins do, too. They lift him up gentle.
Dougie looks at me. ‘Egan’s gonna kill you,’ he says. ‘He won’t let this lie.’
Right then, I don’t care. In fact I’d welcome it. I nod my head. And they carry him into town, away from the Summer Tree, and the deer running to the High Land, away from his blood.
‘You’ll be all right,’ Certain says, but there’s a shake in his voice.
‘No,’ I say. ‘No I won’t.’
Certain doesn’t say another thing, just squeezes my shoulder.
‘God help us all,’ someone says.
God sure as hell won’t help me.
CHAPTER 42
CERTAIN’S THERE WITH me when Dain wakes. He rises groggy, but is quick to see that the world isn’t right. And I’m barely moving. Just sitting in the kitchen.
Cup of tea in my hand that Certain must have given me, cold and undrunk.
‘Grove’s dead,’ Certain says. I have no talk in me, just an ache that fills my body, deep and dire. ‘Mark was with him when he died. You know how Egan gets. You know how this’ll play.’
Dain nods.
‘Boy, my boy,’ Dain says, and he holds me as I sob. He lets me go when I start shivering.
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