Tumbledown Manor

by Helen Brown

  It was good to see the boys again. James declined the offer of day-old egg sandwiches and presented her with a tin of melting moments he’d baked that morning. She hardly noticed Zack’s movie camera any more. He’d become an amiable sci-fi figure with a face that was half machinery.

  Ted and James collected a couple of ride-on mowers from the hire centre and assailed the front ‘garden’ and orchard. The grounds looked half-civilised by the time they’d finished.

  As shadows lengthened, Lisa opened a bottle of ginger ale and beckoned the boys onto the veranda. James asked what was on the menu for dinner. Steak and salad, she said.

  ‘Simple’s good,’ he assured her. ‘Can I help out?’

  Did Jane Eyre wear grey?

  James lifted a portable barbecue from the back of the Kombi and set it up on the driveway.

  ‘He thinks of everything,’ Lisa said as musky smoke coiled into the sky.

  ‘He does,’ Ted said. ‘Who’s that?’ He nodded at a shabby figure shuffling around the bend in the driveway. The old man’s white hair stood out in Einstein spikes.

  ‘Looks like Mr Wright, the previous owner,’ Lisa whispered to Zack and his camera. ‘They moved to the cottage across the road.’

  The old man paused and leaned on his stick. He swayed as if on high seas.

  ‘Hello!’ Lisa called.

  ‘Mr Wright’s mouth set in a downturned line.

  ‘Would you like to come and have a drink with us?’

  He fixed her with a bloodshot glare. Anyone would have thought she was hurling insults, not an invitation.

  Mr Wright drew a handkerchief from his pocket and snorted into it. He then turned and hobbled back down the drive.

  ‘What was that about?’ Zack said.

  Gum trees rustled. A chorus of frogs cleared their throats down by the creek.

  ‘Maybe he’s confused,’ she said. ‘Never mind. Let’s eat.’

  After dinner, the boys shooed Lisa out of the kitchen. She grabbed a woollen shawl from the coat hook in the hall and nestled on the veranda. Ted brought out a freshly opened bottle of sparkling white from the Yarra Valley.

  ‘What did Alexander do, anyway?’ he asked, sitting beside her.

  Lisa watched the bubbles spiral inside her glass. ‘Your great-grandfather? I don’t know much, apart from what Dad told me. Alexander was an only child. His parents moved here during the gold rush. They were in the jewellery business. Apparently they moved in high society—well, what there was of it in Castlemaine. They had fabulous parties here.’

  ‘What went wrong?’

  ‘They got caught up in the financial crash of the 1890s and moved to New Zealand. That’s where Alexander met Gran.’

  Ted rested his hands behind his head and smiled. ‘They had a Global Financial Crisis back then?’

  ‘Something like that. There was a lot of hardship, starvation, even.’

  Ted studied the horizon. ‘Why didn’t Alexander hang around Castlemaine? Was he gay or something?’

  Down by the river, frogs croaked companionably.

  ‘Why would he be gay?’ Lisa asked after a long silence.

  A broken biscuit moon hung in the sky.

  ‘It could run in the family,’ Ted said, gazing into the distance.

  Lisa suddenly felt dizzy. A kaleidoscope of images circled through her head: Stella tickling Ted at the kitchen table. Ted looping his arm across Stella’s shoulder, laughing and kissing her cheek. A chaste kiss, admittedly. But that peck on the cheek was surely hors d’oeuvre before a banquet of passion later on.

  The attraction between Ted and Stella was visceral. Wasn’t it? The images started spinning faster. Ted and Stella walking down the aisle of a quaint wooden chapel. Ted’s beard would be trimmed and for once he’d be wearing a pair of trousers Lisa didn’t feel the urge to grab and hitch up to his waist. Ted standing at the altar, before turning to sneak a peek at Stella in meringues of tulle. At the reception afterwards, Ted giving a witty retort to his best man’s speech (James would make the perfect best man). Ted and Stella buying a house, and holding their first baby.

  Wasn’t that a window to the future? Or just wishful thinking on her part?

  ‘I thought you had girlfriends . . . ?’

  ‘I tried. Believe me.’

  ‘What about Stella?’

  Ted smiled into his lap and made circles with his thumbs. ‘She’s a friend who’s a girl, Mom.’

  Lisa had plenty of gay friends. She always claimed she didn’t care what people got up to in the privacy of their own bedrooms. In fact some of her best friends were . . . She’d been having lunch with Kerry for decades. He would have said something if he thought Ted had similar tendencies. God, she was already thinking of it as a disease.

  ‘When did you first realise?’ she asked quietly.

  ‘It’s taken years to work out.’

  Lisa tried to summon up clues from Ted’s boyhood. He’d certainly hated sports, but that was a reaction to pressure from Jake. And heaps of straight men played the piano. ‘You were just a normal little . . .’

  ‘Come on, Mom! An obsession with Sondheim, for God’s sake?’

  ‘You had a good ear.’

  ‘And the Easter Bonnet Parade?’

  She’d always assumed his competitive approach to making Easter bonnets was driven by a passion for design. As a preschooler, he used to sneak into her jewellery box and try on her earrings. It didn’t seem odd at the time, but maybe she should’ve discouraged it. She wondered if it was environmental or genetic. Maybe his suspicion was correct and he came from a long line of . . . It would go a long way towards explaining why the Trumpertons died out.

  Faggot, pillow biter, queer, butt boy. Harsh words she couldn’t associate with her darling Ted. She wanted to cry out for her shattered dreams. But they were nothing compared to what Ted must’ve gone through to reach this point.

  Strange expression, coming out.

  A tiny part of her was relieved her parents weren’t alive to be exposed to the shocking news. She wasn’t looking forward to telling Maxine. As for Jake, he’d have to find out for himself. How bad was it, anyway, if Ted was doomed to dress well and live in stylish surroundings for the rest of his life? Freed from broken nights and school fees, he could devote himself to pleasure.

  Ted gripped his wine glass and stared at the outline of the darkening hills.

  She saw a flash of white in the trees. ‘Oh look,’ she said. ‘The cockatoo.’

  A tiny smile rippled across his lips. ‘I didn’t want to let you down,’ his voice cracked with emotion.

  Her chest ached for both of them. She flung her arms around him and planted kisses over his stubble. ‘You haven’t. Honestly.’

  For once he didn’t recoil. She could feel the tension in his body tremble and melt. ‘Love’s hard enough to find in this world,’ she whispered as their tears mingled. ‘It doesn’t matter what wrapping people are in.’

  Ted sniffed and rubbed his eyes. He smiled down at her. Not for the first time, she was dazzled by the natural perfection of his teeth. No wonder young people kept falling in love with each other.

  Lisa dabbed her eyes then Ted’s with the corner of her pashmina. ‘And James?’ she asked carefully.

  Ted took a gulp of wine then composed himself. James appeared on the doorstep. He seemed vulnerable as a freshly hatched chick. The tenderness between the young men was so strong she should’ve tapped into it ages ago. It occurred to her then that love, no matter what sort, is a wonderful thing to bask in, even from the outer edges of.

  ‘The love of my life,’ Ted said, raising his glass to James.

  Lisa stood up and embraced James. ‘I always wanted a chef in the family,’ she said.

  James rocked her gently in his solid arms.

  ‘I’m so happy for you both.’ She surprised herself by actually meaning it.

  A flash of camera lens peered over the balustrade.

  ‘Oh Zack!’ she groaned. ‘Not now!’ />
  Lisa placed her Skinnymeals frozen chicken masala on the kitchen bench top. Happiness was too big an ask in today’s world. The most she could hope for Ted was that he achieved a level of fulfilment. Maybe if he was lucky he’d have moments of contentment. If she was religious, she’d have prayed for Ted to choose a path in which happiness would be less elusive.

  Except he hadn’t chosen. Gayness had chosen him.

  Could she honestly say her straight friends were happier than someone like Kerry, anyway? He was the most sorted-out person she knew. Kerry had a wonderful circle of friends and was wise about almost everything, apart from the fact that at the age of fifty-five he was still looking for Mr Right.

  She had no right to judge. Ted just preferred doing whatever gay men got up to. She wondered briefly if he went on top or underneath, and censored the thought. It wasn’t as if she wasted a moment wondering what straight people got up to.

  Neon green peas glowed up at her from the masala. It seemed unlikely peas originated in India.

  The old microwave refused to heat things up properly. It did a better job if she took the meal out of the freezer an hour or two early and defrosted it first. Not that she was looking forward to dinner. Whoever made Skinnymeals lacked a natural affinity for food. Either that or the ingredients lost their flavour in the freezing and transportation.

  Evening shadows stretched across the lino. The kitchen was beginning to look as if someone cared about it—even if Ron was right and her choice of marigold was a little strident.

  The smell of paint threatened to bring on a headache. She opened the back door to a welcome waft of night air, then trailed up the stairs to her study. How would Emily Brontë have handled a gay son? Homosexuality was illegal back then. He’d have been slammed in gaol and made to crush rocks like Oscar Wilde. But if Emily was half the woman Lisa knew she was, her love for her son would’ve won out.

  Sitting at her computer, she opened her Three Sisters: Emily file and straightened her spine to start a new chapter. She reached for her phone instead and scrolled to Portia.

  ‘Do u know about Ted & James?’

  ‘Gr8!!! He finally told u!!! R u ok with it?’

  Her finger hesitated over the screen. ‘Of course. V happy xxxxx’

  Sighing, Lisa pressed Shut Down and tramped downstairs.

  The moment she entered the kitchen she sensed the atmosphere had changed. Another presence was in the room. A shadow shifted under the table. It was the wrong time of year for snakes, and they hardly went out at night. Still . . .

  ‘Hello?’ Her voice sounded weak and girlish. She waited for the snake/rapist to return her greeting.

  Fingers of orange goo stretched across the floor under the table. Blood? Chunks of flesh floated on its surface. And peas. Her chicken masala!

  The upturned container lay under the chair nearby. Whatever was under the table made a shuffling sound. She was relieved to hear it had feet rather than scales. If it was a possum she could deal with it, possibly.

  Cool air wafted through the open door. If only she’d closed it before she’d gone upstairs. She hadn’t adjusted to how quickly darkness fell in country Australia. Her instinct was to tiptoe across the room and close the door. But then whatever it was would be trapped inside with her.

  She drew a breath and peered under the table. An amber orb glowered back at her. Except it wasn’t an orb. It was an eye hovering asymmetrically over a downturned mouth.

  The Halloween mask emitted a discordant yowl. She ran a quick scan through her mental checklist of Wild Animals of Australia. With its tattered ears, it was too dishevelled to be a potoroo, and too small to be a wombat. The shaggy coat was too furry for a lizard or any other kind of reptile. Instead, it resembled a miniature one-eyed hyena, except she was pretty sure they didn’t exist in Australia. Or a Tasmanian Devil, though presumably the whole point of them was they stayed in Tasmania.

  Lisa took a closer look. The creature crouched and exposed palisades of teeth. Its ginger and white fur hung in clumps. The tail was matted with twigs. It was a cat, feral most likely. Back at Bideawee, she and the other volunteers had dealt with similar feline fugitives who survived on their wits.

  ‘So you’re a Skinnymeals fan?’

  The ugliest, most bad-tempered looking cat in the world glared back at her through his single eye.

  ‘Hardly gourmet, is it?’

  The cat flattened its ears and hissed.

  ‘Don’t be scared,’ she said, offering a hand.

  The creature lashed out. A sudden sting made her withdraw with a jerk.

  The cat spun on its tail and hurtled out the door.

  She looked down at her hand. Blood bubbled up from two parallel lines.

  A non-communicative daughter, a gay son and a killer cat. Life wasn’t dull.

  Chapter 16

  Australia had no concept of winter. The thermometer had barely dropped before buds started sprouting on bare branches. A magnolia burst into a flurry of pink and white near the front gates.

  While the outside of Trumperton Manor was hardly grand, the interior was responding to attention with heart-warming speed. Several rooms were now sparkling with new paint (after her marigold binge, Lisa restrained herself to bisque, not that Ron liked that colour much, either). The entire house instantly smelt fresher when the mouldy curtains were replaced. And after the Grey Army finished sanding and polishing the floorboards, the manor took on new life. Lisa had inherited her father’s love of Persian carpets, but the real deal was out of her budget. Second-hand rugs of dubious heritage did the job, providing splashes of colour on top of the bare boards.

  Her ramblings through the countryside unearthed treasure troves of colonial furniture, which she loaded into Dino’s hatch and ferried back to the house. The chunky armchairs she bought from a retired farmer for Alexander’s room were delivered on the back of a truck. She was grateful the old boys were on hand to help her unload them. Covered in maroon linen, each chair was large enough for a tiger to curl up in—though they were a little firm on the backside.

  An old travelling chest made an ideal coffee table. The Edwardian clock with its hands frozen at 3.30 seemed at home on the mantelpiece alongside Alexander’s photo. Standard lamps and bookshelves made the room inviting.

  Stacking pyramids of logs in the fireplace and watching them flare to life became a meditation. As the flames crackled and released musky aroma through the room, Lisa could hardly resent the prospect of cleaning up next morning. Other women went to the gym. She swept cinders.

  The bedrooms were still stark, but at least the upstairs bathroom was no longer spooky. The only time she’d come close to having a real argument with the Grey Army was over the bath. Ron and Ken shook their heads when she’d announced she wanted the old one resurfaced. Ken told her she’d be better off with a new plastic bath from Bunnings. She argued some people would kill for a genuine claw-foot. He walked away muttering ‘crazy Yank’.

  Now even Ken had to admit the revamped bath looked good. She’d emitted a yip of delight when the shiny new taps gushed instead of dribbled. A new mirror gleamed against fresh white tiles. The heated towel rail was the ultimate luxury.

  The wood-burning stove still lurked in the kitchen like a medieval weapon. It sprang to life at weekends when James set it alight and produced delicious meals from its belly. His efforts to teach her how to feed the fire while keeping an even temperature all ended in failure. To Lisa, the relationship between the firebox and the vents was advanced physics, with the added risk of burning the house down, so she was still eating Skinnymeals.

  Lisa continued to steer clear of the stables. She was almost disappointed by the ghost’s refusal to show up. Every time a curtain fluttered or a door creaked there was always a logical cause.

  Her jaw clicked the morning Maxine called to say she and Aunt Caroline were on their way. Maxine warned her again that the old girl was losing her marbles. She was keeping the nursing home in stitches with more invente
d stories about her past, including horse riding with Princess Elizabeth and having an affair with a duke. But no matter how nutty Aunt Caroline might become, Lisa knew egg sandwiches wouldn’t cut it. The duchess of Camberwell would expect home baking.

  She creaked the wood stove’s door open and peered into its belly. How James produced melt-in-the-mouth lamb fillets from the thing was a mystery. Still, if she didn’t try . . . She snapped a few kindling sticks and set them ablaze in the firebox. Once they were crackling away, she added a block of wood. To her surprise, it actually caught fire. She added another, closed the door and wondered what to bake. Her collection of recipe books was risible. Scones from the yellowing pages of the Camberwell High Cook Book were too plain; Julia Child’s Queen of Sheba cake too ambitious.

  She mixed the batter for an old carrot cake recipe. Once she’d grated the carrots and beaten in the eggs, she folded the mixture into a tin. According to the temperature dial, the oven was about right. With a silent prayer, she slid the cake tin inside and sealed the door shut.

  As she was melting butter for the icing on the stove top, she was startled by the appearance of a video camera at her elbow.

  ‘We let ourselves in,’ Maxine said. ‘Zack wanted to come too.’

  ‘Hello, Zack.’

  ‘Hi, Mrs Trumperton. I need another trans-generational scene.’

  What was he making, Gone with the Wind?

  ‘It certainly is bright in here,’ Maxine said, surveying the walls. ‘I’d never have picked you as a bright-yellow person.’

  ‘Marigold,’ Lisa corrected.

  Aunt Caroline’s walking stick tapped across the lino. A stately woman with white hair and the Trumperton nose, she resembled a Roman emperor in drag.

  ‘Never liked the old dump,’ she said, sweeping a lilac shawl over her shoulder and offering a corrugated cheek to kiss.

  Lisa resisted the temptation to suggest, if that was the case, she could have stayed away. ‘Did you visit here as a little girl?’ she asked instead, as she took the pan off the stove top.

  ‘Your grandfather wouldn’t come near the place. Not as long as I knew him,’ she replied.