Homesickness

by Murray Bail

  His short treatise on museum fatigue followed. Unlike most other major museums this one had been carefully modified not to reduce museum fatigue, but to increase it. To draw their thoughts down to their legs! Hidden gradients and featureless walls, monochrome colour and bare boards, had been carefully incorporated. It had taken him several years. The voice rose, exhorting: learn not only from the contents of museums and natural sceneries, but from your own two pins. They are you. They are a measure; have ways of speaking, even barking. Ha ha.

  He laughed for a second.

  ‘God bless!’ he suddenly finished, dropping his arms over his crutches, the exhausted teacher.

  Filing past they found they had a real affection for him. Bowing slightly, he shook their hands like the village curate farewelling his flock. They saw how his small head was moist from the sermonising; perhaps that’s why he bowed? They wouldn’t forget. As they were leaving they realised they would never be returning.

  And standing outside they were uncertain of direction. They stood for a second on the white steps, blinking.

  The layabouts were still draped on either side, taking an interest, and the shoeshine boys, although reduced in numbers, began banging their brushes, automatically. It was chilly.

  Then Kaddok detached himself; but he couldn’t have seen the perspective of the rooftops, the deeper shadows and the completely different pattern of the sparrows. Gwen watched, out of pride really, for he proceeded to hurry down backwards, unaided (one leg higher than the other, his legs and balancing arms almost forming a swastika side-on) to take their photograph: wide angle shot of squinters and handbag-holders which would reveal that patch of magenta behind them. Agostinelli, locking the doors.

  ‘Well…’ one of them offered, a bridging word.

  What happened next?

  The black-clothed swastika then turned towards the crowd on the steps and seemed to merge; the jumble of ponchos, of taut emaciated faces, one fitted with a dusty bowler. Something wrong here. A flicker, an irritation. They rose to meet him—yanked up in unison by strings. Kaddok seemed to get tangled up. As Gwen stumbled towards him crying out Kaddok missed the spittle on his shoulders, seagull shaped, dripping, and all their arms. A brief look of surprise and he was multi-armed himself, cartwheeling down the steps, one arm somehow always holding the camera.

  He could have broken a leg.

  Screaming, Gwen pushed back the men. The shoe-shine boys began barracking, rattling their tins.

  To the rest it had unfolded in a slow motion of disbelief. There was a gap. They had remained separated.

  ‘That’s nothing, when we were in South America…’ they might say in years to come.

  Shouting out Spanish words, Gerald took two steps at a time; wide steps which are tricky to run down. A little misunderstanding. ¡Basta! ¿Qué hay? Gesticulating, appealing, he was joined by Garry Atlas and Borelli—Borelli, the interested.

  Thrusting forward, Garry said something to the chief Indian.

  ‘Shut up!’ hissed Gerald, turning.

  ‘Leave it to him,’ said Borelli. ‘Leave it to him.’

  And Ken Hofmann sauntered down.

  ‘This is a nasty place,’ Violet commented, meaning Ecuador. ‘He wasn’t doing any harm.’

  Nodding, nodding, Gerald listened to the sallow one in the front and turned to look back at Kaddok. He nodded again. He held up the palm of his hand and cocked his head: of course, of course. And again as if they were controlled by pulleys and wires the mob slowly subsided, back on the steps. ‘What’s eating them?’ Garry demanded. Certain primitive peoples believe a camera paralyses.

  Bending over, Gwen kept dusting the photographer’s coat, a form of visual loyalty, for he was still on all fours. The shoeshine boys had begun laughing, the nasty little wretches: a dark window in one of Kaddok’s eyes had shattered.

  Getting to his feet he looked dazed. He had to be pointed in the right direction.

  They heard him saying, ‘As I fell I took shots of myself. Wait till you see them. They might well be unique in the history of photography.’

  Oh yeah? Sheila had hidden her little Instamatic in her bag, as they all stepped down.

  ‘They won’t hurt us,’ Doug reassured; how could they? ‘I mean, we’re only visitors.’

  As Violet said again, ‘You could feel it before. It’s not a pleasant atmosphere. I don’t think we’re welcome.’

  ‘I haven’t felt sure about anything here,’ she added.

  There was a group-nodding at that, natch. If this was South America it had been interesting, but…no one could say it was exactly pleasant. A queerness pervaded, an edge. The arches; the formal geometry of the stone plazas; the impassive copper faces; unknown statues. It was so remote. The public clocks gave a different time. As for their friendly museum director: he’d shut the doors.

  ‘We should go.’

  ‘All walk slowly…’

  Still breathing heavily Garry said, ‘That bastard in front. Did you see him? If he took one more step I was going to poke him one.’

  ‘Come on!’

  Leon had lost his lens cap.

  ‘I’d leave it,’ North murmured to Gwen. ‘There’s no sense in staying; tell him.’

  She took his elbow. She pulled. She almost had to drag him. First loyalty, now compensation. She said loudly, ‘I should have thought these people would have liked their picture taken. They’re not doing anything.’

  They drifted away from the Museo and its plaza. Stubbornly, the facade was the last to go. When they turned it had suddenly gone, cut by a corner decorated with stately quoining. It would remain in the memory, a cavernous stain. It would grow larger and more deeply shadowed, it would be heavy and grey; yet strangely empty. Already it had saddened them. The procession could not go much faster. Limping badly Kaddok was supported first by Gwen, then by Garry while the others drifted on.

  A city encircled by volcanoes, tall cones, and those cube houses tumbling down the slopes supplying an interesting analytical space and shape to the bowl. Ghost houses: a tremor either in the photography or the printing, plates (Photogravure, Quito) had multiplied the images, including the steeples and belfries, the hands on the clock. Which part was real? Which edge? The many thousands of red roof tiles had multiplied three, four times, their blood-coloured ink seeping across the sky, spoiling the otherwise typical postcard blue—that perfectly clear, international over-blue. An arrow in biro pointing down to a roof in middle distance, and the words OUR HOTEL had found instead the Museo de Piernas.

  Hello All

  Having an interesting time here—2nd highest capital in the world—did you know?—shops—colourful blankets & people—lawns—Spanish is the spoken language—Catholics—do you know Spanish for man, boys?—you’d like the volcanoes!—quite an interesting party, I think I said—no word from you—anybody. Did you get my scarves? S.

  Mrs Cathcart also took the opportunity of writing postcards; sitting among their luggage stacked in the foyer there was little else to do. She scribbled the same fractured message to one and all. Having a good time, etc. Climatic conditions. Summary of cleanliness as related to skin pigment of the locals. Leaving today. At least these postcards would serve to pinpoint their location. The receiver could look at the picture on the front—the same as Sheila’s—and try to imagine. Seated on a suitcase beside her, scarcely had Doug licked a stamp when another card was flung down ready; the two were like an economic unit, a cottage industry. In pale blue shorts and the knitted shirt with his sunglasses hooked over the pocket, Doug liked to be occupied.

  The others ambled around; the men, hands in their pockets, testing at random the edges of cases and the carpet pattern with their shoes. It hardly mattered if the bus was running late. Wearing a demilune brooch Louisa struck a gay pose; her eyes and head moved like a child’s. While Hofmann preferred to drift, allowing the residue of the shuttered-up alien place to recede, she chattered about this and that, not even expecting an answer. Strange how seem
ingly trivial images—section of a peeling wall, the pores of a stranger’s nose—persisted in challenging the most obvious landmarks.

  Violet, now she—

  Violet smoked cigarettes not so much from habit, but with aggression or realism. She wore large sunglasses and smelt of powder. It generally happened in a group: she found herself isolated, to one side. Sasha had dragged North and Gerald Whitehead over to a display set up along the side wall. Approximately thirty one-litre jars of water had been placed on a long shelf. Beginning clearer than gin the liquid gradually darkened until the final jar was a pale brown with a good inch of silt on the bottom. Interestingly, this was Amazon water collected at evenly spaced, consecutive intervals along its entire course. Although no more than ten yards long here the graduation of the jars graphically demonstrated the length, and even the steady speed of the almighty river. The freshly painted banner running the full length listed in several languages statistics and wildlife, signed by the Amazon Tourist Board.

  ‘But it could be any river,’ was Gerald’s complaint. ‘I don’t see the point.’

  ‘You’re never satisfied!’ Sasha laughed; but so excited by their company and the prospect of movement again she hugged his arm, squashing her breast. And the trouble with Phillip North: if you showed him anything, he took too much of an interest. Hands clasped behind his back he was peering closely now at the last jar.

  Watching them Violet became angry at her own contempt. She stood to one side, a sharp rock, dark.

  ‘Did you see your lavatory this morning?’ she demanded of Hofmann. He had been standing a few feet away, facing her.

  He wandered all over her face, keeping her waiting, but he couldn’t penetrate her sunglasses.

  He began half-smiling.

  ‘You’re a bastard,’ she said.

  She blew out cigarette smoke.

  ‘I wasn’t listening. What did you say?’

  ‘This morning in our room,’ returning to the subject, ‘the lavatory was boiling. I wondered…’

  Hofmann remained looking at her, his smile spreading.

  She turned away slightly.

  Cupping both hands over his mouth and imitating an airport voice…that Esperanto of steadiness which rises at the end…Garry Atlas announced the arrival of their bus. No one laughed at him, whereas early in the trip they might have out of politeness or caution.

  They each had to lift their own luggage out: all that leaning and bumping of knees, striving forward; and Gwen there solemnly holding the shrunken head.

  The bus had a dashing cream wave painted down its side and shivered as it waited for them. At the same time it stood boiling—one of those minor Latin American paradoxes. The driver seemed anxious, his foot stamped the accelerator, and as they got going looked over his shoulder at them, scratching his moustache with a finger.

  They were chattering as the bus went through the narrow streets, glancing at the familiar sights as the dogs of Quito began barking. The sky had darkened. Dogs barking, skidding around and around in streets and the open spaces behind them and one crazy mutt ahead, in front of the bus. Rabid roosters were crowing. The small zoo was in turmoil. The air became still; but obscured, hidden, by the moving bus, its windows open; and such a noisy loose engine. Something hit the roof, more than likely a by-product of speed. But was it rain or was it steam stroking the cracked windscreen? Birds, wild squadrons, were yanked across the sky. The animals know, Beyond the town sheep reportedly huddled in the corners of paddocks. These, and the birds and the mad dogs, couldn’t be seen from the bus; no one, not even Kaddok looked behind. They had entered a poor part of town, misery, stench, and the driver surely was speeding. His engine and juggernaut back-draught seemed to pull a tottering balcony away from a wall, tilting and dropping bits; dust, smoke, masonry behind. Metal shutters on shops clattered down. Shutters on first and second floors swung open, hit and cracked. In the bus they nodded, made comments, expressing interest. The southern walls of the Archbishop’s palace had come down largely intact. And long lines of washing fell from nails, from hooks and poles. Cooking pots cracked; many unscathed would later explode at a touch. At least a dozen road maps filed behind the driver’s sunvisor cascaded on his head. And now he had to stop, reverse and go back. A load of jars and plaster virgins had scattered on the street, off a truck apparently. The heavy streetlights on wires were swinging. Bronze bells throughout the city were ringing, terrible toll, causing Violet to glance involuntarily at her watch. The tiny minute hand had fallen off. Such a noisy engine, so many vibrations. Other walls had fallen. There was smoke elsewhere, behind, everywhere, and small running figures among the dogs, a quicksilver effect, like the fast-receding scenery of the streets and signs, memory erased. A fissure split a major intersection, a rip in a postcard, like an error of fact, and already a carabineer there shining a torch down it. The sewerage pipes had opened like the bank vaults hadn’t, revealing riches, darkening the gutters. What a stench. Say, a light pole describing an arc, before held at an angle by its violin wires. Burst water mains; rolling oranges and bowls. Look, group of Indian women crying. Rubble and dust and steam. Almost out of town, the row of shacks on the left collapsed, erased by time and speed, on the edge of vision, part of the general blurring of impressions. The South American racing driver had been arrested lapping the Plaza San Francisco in a friend’s Pontiac, scattering beggars and chooks, collecting a wild dog. Shrunken heads rolled off shelves; many shelves tilted. A flattened street market was quite a carpet of colour: peppers, cracked melons still hovering and rolling. Man lying face down. A crack ran up a wall like a rat. And behind them a motor scooter slipped through a bridge, one less in the mind. The distant faces melted. The hotel and the shape of the main plaza and the hulk of the black Buick were among the last to go. There were premature births and deaths, smiles unknown to them. The city was blurred by speed, and receding. It was all collapse. A tidal wave in the Amazon swept through the jars, flooding the carpet. The bus pulled up and they were ushered into the plane, the calm of the cabin, of split seats, leaving Quito under a cloud, on time.

  4

  There are two hemispheres, a Greater and a Lesser. The one above of tall rectangles and glass, andromeda dazzle and the landmass; the other with its oceans of heat and tangle, raw materials.

  One is congested, the other sparse.

  All things imaginable spread or screech to the south in a curve filling the emptiness, for better or for worse. The heads of antipodeans glance upwards (shielding their eyes): multicoloured wires, tightly bound, possess magnetic powers. Moths to flames? With its museums and plethora of laws and words the Centre of Gravity lies in the Northern or Upper Hemisphere. It preserves.

  There are two hemispheres, Left and a Right. One has words and equations stored like insects, hemisphere of engines and Armstrongs, one step at a time. Its partner is a map of manias, of blurred phrases, rhythms, shape, praise the Lord. The line dividing is properly blurred. The Left hemisphere constructed the right-angle; the other knows the Golden Rectangle. There are three sides to every story.

  Blink, blink.

  The Right is responsible for the recognition of faces and flags.

  Heck, to the majority the city of New York was an immediate religious experience! Always a shade prosaic, Gerald Whitehead thought their dizziness might be induced by the towering rectangles. They’d spent the first day walking and had aching necks, for the glass surfaces appeared to lean in and the reflected clouds swirled, slid slowly across the surfaces, giving the illusion their legs were not properly on the ground. Until they were accustomed it was necessary to check their perpendicular positions, hastily.

  ‘Whoops! Ha ha!’ They suddenly clutched at each others’ elbows.

  Still limping, his souvenir from Ecuador, Kaddok bumped into a parking meter where it hurts.

  Interesting how the left or logical hemisphere is responsible for jerking the right arm up in fits of emotionalism—nationalism’s puppet.

  They were wa
lking around Wall Street eating ham sandwiches, Garry a Hot Dorg. He had his right arm raised, a German salute at something high. Chins raised and following comments they took up most of the footpath. ‘Look at that. Fantastic!’ he pointed. However, the pedestrians here were all running. Narrow side lines had been reserved for cripples or tired people, although these were virtually empty. Among the runners a dark-suited President could be seen sprinting from a lunch or heading for an appointment, and there were bankers and brokers, dark horses and operators, chartists, and the inevitable programmers trailed by assistants, and many middlemen and hired consultants all after a slice of the apple pie. Even the cannon-fodder—the mail boys, messengers, recently married clerks—were carried along, although theirs was a variety of jogging.

  —‘Move your ass!’

  —‘Outta the way!’

  The group had to spill out almost into a culvert. Sure enough, as they looked on, a silver-haired cambist in a Hathaway and the essential cufflinks tripped and fell on his dial, spilling his Parker 51 and snapshot of the family. When Sasha moved to help him, he pushed her away. ‘Then piss off yourself.’ she hissed. It’s easy to join in.

  A hectic day on Wall Street. They quite understood—being visitors—when a cop asked them to move on. Another party, Japanese, was waiting.

  The white clouds above were slotted into a narrow gap of blue and were triangular, surprisingly straight-edged, mysteriously erased at intervals like the revisions on a commodities graph. Framed by the tops of buildings the sky-scape was signed lower right ‘Steinway’ (advertisement for grand pianos). Elsewhere a perpetually rolling news flash consuming God knows how many watts demanded FREE ENTERPRISE! Yes, the nation’s largest aircraft carrier had been seized by some tin-pot country, Asian, communist-ruled. ‘Fantastic…’ Garry craned, as a hand lifted his wallet.

  And over all was the rattle of jackhammers. These alone managed to surpass the combined brouhaha of the teleprinters, the ticker-tape machines, the whirring photocopying machines, the banging carriages of thousands of electric typewriters. New York: aptly titled. Like that ship of the Argonauts each part was gradually changed, so that the citizens constantly had a new city without having to change its name or idea. Single rectangles or entire precincts were coming down. The materials of the city were light for this reason. Small museums at intersections showed how the neighbourhood once looked.