The Dressmaker

by Rosalie Ham

  ‘You’ve always had lovely roses,’ said Molly. ‘How come?’

  Irma lifted her eyebrows to the petals above but did not open her eyes. ‘Molly Dunnage?’ she said.

  ‘Yes.’ Molly reached over and prodded Irma’s bruised and kidney-shaped fist. Irma winced, drew her breath in sharply.

  ‘Still hurt does it?’

  ‘A little,’ she said, and opened her eyes. ‘How are you Molly?’

  ‘Awful but I’m not allowed to complain. What’s wrong with your eyes?’

  ‘Arthritis in them today.’ She smiled. ‘You’re in a wheelchair too, Molly.’

  ‘It suits my captor,’ said Molly.

  Tilly leaned down to look at her and said, ‘Mrs Almanac, my name is –’

  ‘I know who you are, Myrtle. Very good of you to come home to your mother. Very brave too.’

  ‘You’ve been sending food all these years –’

  ‘Don’t mention it.’ Irma cast a warning look towards the chemist shop.

  ‘I wouldn’t want it mentioned either, you’re a terrible cook,’ said Molly. She grinned slyly at Irma. ‘Your husband’s mighty slow these days. How did you manage that?’

  Tilly placed an apologetic hand, lighter than pollen, on Mrs Almanac’s cold stony shoulder. Irma smiled. ‘Percival says God is responsible for everything.’

  She used to have a lot of falls, which left her with a black eye or a cut lip. Over the years, as her husband ground to a stiff and shuffling old man, her injuries ceased.

  Irma glanced over at the shoppers on the other side of the street. They stood in lines, staring over at the three women talking. Tilly bade her farewell and they continued along the creek towards home.

  With Molly safely parked at the fireside, Tilly sat on her veranda and rolled herself a cigarette. Down below, the people bobbed together like chooks pecking at vegetable scraps, turning occasionally to glance up at the house on The Hill, before turning hurriedly away.

  5

  Miss Prudence Dimm taught the people of Dungatar to read, write and multiply in the schoolhouse across the road from the post office, which her sister Ruth ran. Prudence was also the librarian on Saturday mornings and Wednesday evenings. Where she was large, white and short-sighted, Ruth was small, sharp and sunburned, with skin the texture of cracked mud at the bottom of a dried-up puddle. Ruth shared night shift on the telephone exchange with Beula Harridene but was solely responsible for loading and unloading the Dungatar letters and parcels onto the daily train, as well as sorting and delivering them. She also deposited everyone’s savings for them, cashed cheques, and paid their household and life insurance.

  On the big, leather couch at the post office, Nancy Pickett lay with her head in the soft curve of Ruth’s thin thigh. Beside them the exchange stood quiet, an electric wall of lights and cords and plugs and earphones. Bougainvillea branches scraped hard against the window. Nancy woke, lifted her head and blinked, crinkly goose pimple white and naked, nipples erect like light switches. Ruth stretched and yawned. A branch snapped outside, as Beula crept along the wall of the post office.

  ‘Beula!’ hissed Nancy.

  Nancy scrambled behind the exchange to dress. Ruth leapt to sit at her post, snapped on the overhead light and called, ‘Morning Beula.’

  Outside, Beula dropped into a mattress of jagged thorns and broken branches. Nancy skipped the short distance down the lane and popped through loosened palings in a fence, then scrambled through her open window and landed silently on the red-rose linoleum. Her mother Lois lay in her bed scratching at the blackheads lumped over her nose, yesterday’s underwear beneath the pillow.

  Nancy padded softly to the bathroom and splashed water on her face, grabbed her purse and made for the kitchen where Bobby was mixing powdered Denkovit and warm water to feed his lambs. Nancy had given him a dog for Christmas – she thought it might stop him sucking his thumb. But recently, while defending the house and all in it, his dog had been bitten by an attacking brown snake and died. In his spare time Bobby played football and rescued animals, including several tortoises, a goanna, a blue tongue lizard and some silkworms the school kids had tired of.

  ‘Morning sis.’

  ‘I’m late, Mr A will be waitin’.’

  Bobby poured warm, liquid Denkovit into empty beer bottles on the sink. ‘You haven’t had breakfast. You’ve got to have something, it’s not good to start the day without breakfast.’ He stretched rubber teats over the mouths of the bottles.

  ‘I’ll have milk.’ She grabbed a bottle from the Kelvinator door and shook it, then raised the bottle to her lips and drank. She dumped the bottle back in the refrigerator door and inched her way through the hungry pets crowding the back porch – three lambs, two cats, a poddy calf and a joey, some pigeons, magpies, chooks and a lame wombat.

  As she unlocked the chemist shop door she saw Beula Harridene advancing. Her shins were scratched and a purple petal clung to her cardigan. Nancy stepped into her path, smiled and said, ‘Morning again, Mrs Harriden.’

  Beula looked directly back at Nancy and said, ‘One of these –’

  Suddenly she gasped, slapped a hand over her mouth and bolted. Nancy was both pleased and puzzled. She unlocked the chemist door, stood by the mirror to run a comb through her hair and saw why Beula had run – a white milk smear rimmed her lips. She smiled.

  • • •

  By eight fifty on Monday morning Sergeant Farrat had bathed and dressed in his crisp navy uniform. His cap was perched gaily to one side, his navy skirt was taut across his thighs and generous buttocks, and the seams at the back of his pale nylon calves were straight as a new fence line. His new checked gingham skirt hung starched and pressed on the wardrobe doorknob behind him. He was vacuuming the last of the telltale threads into the bladder of his upright Hoover.

  Beula Harridene stood on the porch, her face pressed to the window, squinting into the dimness. She banged on the door. The sergeant switched off his cleaner and wound the cord precisely up and down the handle catches. He removed his skirt and hung it with his gingham skirt in the wardrobe, then locked the door. He paused a moment to run his hands over his nylon stockings and admire his new lace panties. Then he put on his navy trousers, socks and shoes. He checked his image in the mirror and made his way to the office.

  Outside, Beula hopped from one foot to the other. Sergeant Farrat glanced up at the clock and unlocked the front door. Beula fell in blabbering.

  ‘Those dogs barked all Saturday night, stirred up by those hoodlum footballers, and since you haven’t silenced them I’ve phoned Councillor Pettyman this morning and he’s says he’ll see to it, and I’ve written to your superiors again – this time I told them everything. What’s the point of having a law enforcer if he enforces the law according to himself, not the legal law? Your clock’s set wrong, you open up late and I know you lock up early Fridays …’

  Beula Harridene had bloodshot-beige eyes that bulged. She had an undershot chin and rabbit-size buck teeth, so her bottom lip was forever blue with bruised imprints and froth gathered and dried at the corners of her unfortunate mouth. The sergeant concluded that because her bite was inefficient she was starving, therefore vicious, malnourished and mad. While Beula went on, and on, Sergeant Farrat placed a form on the counter, sharpened a pencil and wrote, ‘Nine O-one Monday 9th October …’

  Beula stamped her feet. ‘… AND, that daughter of Mad Molly’s is back – the murderess! And that fancy William Beaumont’s been hanging around town too, Sergeant, neglecting his poor mother and the property, hanging about with those hoodlum footballers, well let me tell you if he’s got any queer ideas we’ll all suffer, I know what men get up to when they go away to cities, there are men dressed as women and I know –’

  ‘How do you know Beula?’

  Beula smiled, ‘My father war
ned me.’

  Sergeant Farrat looked directly at Beula and raised his pale eyebrows. ‘And how did he know, Beula?’

  Beula blinked.

  ‘What is your particular problem today, Beula?’

  ‘I’ve been assaulted, this very morning, I’ve been assaulted by a pack of marauding children –’

  ‘And what did these children look like Beula?’

  ‘They looked like children – short and grubby.’

  ‘In school uniform?’

  ‘Yes.’

  As Beula talked the sergeant wrote. ‘Sergeant Horatio Farrat, Dungatar police station, reports an official complaint made by Mrs Beula Harridene. Mrs Harridene has been the victim of marauding schoolchildren, two boys and a girl, who early this morning were seen fleeing from outside Mrs Harridene’s residence having attacked her premises. Mrs Harridene accuses the said three school-children of throwing bunches of seed pods onto her corrugated iron roof, having stolen the bunches of seed pods from the jacaranda tree located on her nature strip.’

  ‘It was those McSwineys! I saw them …’ She continued to screech, sweating, a sweet pungency permeating the room and small droplets of spittle flying, landing on Sergeant Farrat’s logbook. He gathered the form and his book and took a step back. Beula clutched the counter, swaying, her teeth puncturing her lower lip.

  ‘All right Beula. Lets go see Mae and Edward, look over a few of their kids.’

  He drove Beula to her house. First they established that wind must have blown away all the bunches of seed pods from the guttering surrounding her roof. Next Sergeant Farrat drove in search of the said accused criminals. Nancy was leaning on her broom chatting while Purl hosed the footpath. Irma was at her front gate. Lois and Betty were at Pratts’ window, their arms through wicker basket handles. Miss Dimm was standing in her school yard, waist deep in a pool of children. Opposite, Ruth Dimm and Norma Pullit paused while unloading mailbags from the small red post office van.

  Everyone saw Beula drive past squawking away at poor old Sergeant Farrat and everyone smiled and waved back as the sergeant tooted his way through the main street.

  It was a fine sweet Monday out at the McSwineys’: there was an easterly blowing, which meant that their happy ramshackle home was downwind of the tip. Edward McSwiney sat on the car seat in the sunshine mending drum nets, threading new wire through bent and torn chicken wire and round and around rusty steel frames. Three small kids ran about cornering squawking flapping fowls, then took them to the chopping block where Barney, awkward, stood with an axe. The blade was stuck with blood-tipped feathers, Barney’s shirt was red-splattered. He was crying, so Princess Margaret handed him the poker and sent him to stoke the fire under the boiling chook-filled copper while she wielded the axe. Mae grabbed the hot floating chickens from the copper to pluck them, then Elizabeth lay them on a tree stump and tore the entrails from their pink and dimpled carcasses.

  The Jack Russells started yapping urgently, turning circles and making eye contact with Mae. She studied them for a moment. ‘Wallopers,’ she said.

  Edward was a quiet steady man, but at the sound of ‘Wallopers’, he leapt as though he’d been bitten and ran with his drum net. The chook herders, two small girls in bib and brace and a lad in striped pyjamas, ran to the front gate. The toddler fetched a bag of marbles and the girls a stick each. The taller lass drew a circle in the dirt with her stick, the toddler emptied his marbles into it and both knelt down earnestly. The other lass touched up the lines of an ancient hopscotch game chiselled into the raw red clay in front of the gateposts, and began to bounce through the squares on one foot. By the time the black Holden eased to a halt at the gate, the children were deep in play. Sergeant Farrat tooted. The children ignored him. He tooted again. The taller lass slowly opened the gate. Edward ambled back and sat down innocently on the seat by the caravan.

  Beula leapt from the car and Sergeant Farrat offered the three bawling children a bag of boiled lollies. They grabbed a handful each and ran to their mother, who was advancing with the bloodied axe in her hand. Margaret and Elizabeth walked either side of her, red-tinged feathers floating with them, Elizabeth red to her elbows and Margaret carrying a lighted tree branch. Beula stopped before them.

  ‘Top of the morning to you,’ said the friendly policeman. He smiled again at the three children. They smiled back, their cheeks bulging, and sweet saliva spilled and coated their chins.

  ‘Would these three littlies here be the children you saw, Beula?’

  ‘Yes,’ cried Beula ‘they’re the scoundrels.’ She lifted her hand to slap them. Sergeant Farrat, Edward, Mae and the daughters all took a step forward.

  ‘It was two girls and a boy then, Beula?’

  ‘Yes, it was, now that I see them.’

  ‘And the school uniforms?’

  ‘Obviously they took them off.’

  ‘I don’t go to school yet,’ said the toddler, ‘neither does Mary. Victoria goes next year but.’

  ‘Are you looking forward to school Victoria?’ asked Sergeant Farrat.

  The three children answered as one. ‘Na, rather go tip fishin’.’

  Sergeant Farrat looked at the short grubby lineup in front of him. They looked back at the bag of lollies he held at his chest. ‘You’ve all been tip fishing this morning, have you?’

  They answered now in turns. ‘Na, bugger-all there today. We go Fridays – garbage day.’

  ‘We’ve been catchin’ chooks today.’

  ‘Creek fishn’ tomorra, to catch fish.’

  ‘Round off your words, stop dropping your G’s and sound your vowels,’ said Mae sternly.

  ‘They’re lying!’ Beula was puce, damp and pungent. ‘They threw seed pods on my roof.’

  The children looked at each other. ‘Not today we didn’t.’

  ‘Would you like us to?’

  Beula jumped up and down, screeching and spitting, ‘It was them, it was them.’ The kiddies looked at her. The small boy said, ‘You sure got shit on your liver today Mrs, you musta sunk a power of piss last night.’

  Mae smacked young George over the right ear. The rest of the group looked hard at their shoes. ‘I’m sorry,’ said Mae, ‘they learn that sort of talk at school.’

  Sergeant Farrat explained the benefits of nipping mischievous behaviour in the bud, of setting examples. Mae crossed her arms. ‘We know all that Sarge, but what are you going do about it?’

  Sergeant Farrat turned to Beula. ‘Miss Harridene, would you be satisfied with the screams if I took these children behind the caravan to teach them a lesson, or would you prefer I brutally thrash them within an inch of their lives here and now in front of everyone?’

  The McSwineys doubled over, hooting with laughter. Sergeant Farrat handed Victoria the bag of lollies, and Beula lurched away to the car. She kicked and smashed a headlight then got in slamming the door so that the windows in the railway carriages and caravans rattled. She leaned over to the driver’s seat and put her palm firmly on the horn, holding it there.

  Sergeant Farrat drove her through the front gate then stopped the car. He turned to her and moved close, leaning across her to place his hand on the door handle. He breathed warmly, tenderly into her face. She shrank against the door. Sergeant Farrat spoke softly, ‘I’m not going your way Beula, it’s an offence to waste police force petrol. I’ll let you out here.’ He flipped the door handle.

  Above them on The Hill, Tilly Dunnage paused at her digging to watch Beula Harridene spill onto the ground from the black car. She smiled and went back to turning the soft soil for her vegetable patch.

  6

  Down in the town, William parked the Triumph Gloria outside Pratts and strode across the footpath in the morning sun. He smiled at Muriel stacking horseshoe magnets and picture hooks, tipped his hat to Lois scratching and searching for tinned
peas and waved at Reg and Faith in his butchery. Faith was waiting for Reg to slice her two porterhouse steaks, humming, I’ve got you … under my skin.

  ‘Like that song do you?’ said the handsome butcher, flashing his bone-white teeth at her.

  Faith blushed and placed her hand at her ample bosom, the gold rings on her fingers winking.

  ‘You’ve got a lovely voice,’ said the butcher, dropping his long, sharp knife into the metal holder hanging at his hip. His chest was broad under his starched white shirt and his blue-striped apron sat neatly across his flat waist.

  ‘Can I do anything else, for you Faith?’

  She could hardly speak. She pointed to the small-goods and said, ‘A Devon Roll, please.’

  In the office Gertrude was bent behind the glass partition, dusting.

  ‘Excuse me,’ William said.

  Gertrude straightened and smiled broadly at William, ‘Hello William.’

  ‘Hello …’

  ‘Gertrude, I’m Gertrude Pratt.’ She held out her small round hand but William was looking about the shop.

  ‘Could you tell me where I can find Mr Pratt?’

  ‘Certainly,’ breathed Gertrude and pointed towards the back door, ‘He’s just …’ but William had already walked away. He found Mr Pratt unstacking boxes from the McSwineys’ horse cart.

  ‘Ah,’ said William, ‘just the chap.’

  Mr Pratt looped his thumbs into his apron strings and bowed. ‘Remittance son returneth,’ he said and laughed.

  ‘Mr Pratt, a word?’

  ‘By all means.’

  Mr Pratt opened the office door and said to his daughter, ‘Gertrude, the Windswept Crest account.’ He bowed again, ushering William past.

  Gertrude handed a thick file to her father who said, ‘Excuse us now, Gert.’ As she left she brushed against William, but his attention was on the thick account file Mr Pratt held to his chest. ‘I was after some coils of fencing wire and a dozen bundles of star pickets …’