Disquiet

by Julia Leigh

  The canoe went under. When it happened, it happened quickly. The boy struggled to keep his sister afloat. The doll was lost. Neither child cried or even made a sound – as if a sound, a pip-squeak, could irrevocably tip the balance, send them down.

  The woman scrabbled and pawed at the water. And though she scrabbled and pawed she wore on her face a small serene smile: O she was radiant. With her left hand she reached out to stabilise the girl, the three of them treading water. The boy she instructed in a kind and firm but breathless voice, ‘Take off your pack.’ After a moment’s delay – he hesitated, she nodded in reassurance – he released the girl into his mother’s care and laboured out of his backpack. Then between them they helped the girl. ‘Now,’ said the woman tenderly. ‘Take her back.’

  Once more he showed a look of doubt and when she repeated herself, again with great tenderness, he pursed his mouth and blinked rapidly. ‘It’s okay,’ she said. ‘Go on.’ He told the girl to lie on her back, which she did without protest, and slipped his arm under her neck in order to support her head. The girl played dead. He started to tow her and had not gone far before he looked back over his shoulder. His mother was treading water; she lifted her hand and waved him toward the shore.

  She did not begin the return journey. Instead she jellyfished: she took a great gulp of air and, belling her back and letting her arms fall loose, submerging her face in the water, she hung suspended. Each time she could no longer hold her breath she let out a stream of bubbles before briefly lifting her head, taking another great gulp and then returning to the water. She floated. She appeared – she was – a simple life-form, with no mind other than mind-through-body, a nerve net, and with each new breath, each new shocking breath, she was reborn; it would take an aeon for her to be human. The lake let her be.

  When the boy reached the shore he saw to it that his sister was safe. She sat very quietly on the sand, though she couldn’t stop her teeth from chattering. He stood beside her, heaving and gasping; he had his hands on his hips and there were little shadows in the hollows beneath his bony shoulderblades. As soon as he had modulated his breath he re-entered the water.

  In the middle of the lake he waited for the woman to resurface. He made small shallow circles in the water to better help him stay in place. It seemed she could hold her breath for ever. At last she came up for air. There he was: her boy. They weren’t far from one another, a metre or so, and there was a long silence until the boy said – or implored – ‘Please. Come on.’

  She closed her eyes, turned onto her side. He towed her in. More than once he dunked his heavy load. On the sand she crouched on all fours and pitched and gagged. The boy lay flat on his back looking up at the sky; the girl, shivering, watched over him. Soon after the commotion the lake was distilled; it disdained secrets, held nothing.

  When she had recovered the woman bunched her belongings to her chest and proceeded toward the house with small measured steps. The children followed at a distance, hand in hand, knobbled by the cold. She stopped when she caught sight of Sophie: Sophie, who had not moved an inch from her observation post, who had not relinquished her bundle. At first the woman glanced at her with a kind of weary solidarity, a war widow’s glance, but sensing a defiance, some sort of refusal, the woman almost did a double take; she stared at Sophie for a long time. Sophie stood unrepentant. The children joined their mother, dragged her away.

  Ida and the twins were busy fixing breakfast in the kitchen. One twin was watching over the pop-up toaster, the other was ladling boiled eggs out of a saucepan. Ida was rummaging around in the pantry looking for a replacement pot of raspberry jam. When the sodden bedraggled trio appeared in the doorway the twins were quick to rush to their assistance. Ida, leaving the pantry, gasped and grew pale.

  ‘We had an accident,’ said the woman.

  Ida got on her knees before the girl. ‘There, there, my little one. My darling.’

  The girl gave her the bare and crestfallen look of the betrayed. ‘Pinky’s gone.’

  ‘No, my darling, no no,’ said Ida. ‘Come here, come here little one.’ She hugged her close.

  Marcus entered the fray. He cast an anxious glance around the room.

  ‘She’s by the lake,’ said the woman coldly. He hurriedly excused himself, departed.

  That night the woman put the children to bed. First she tucked in the boy as best she could with one hand, kissed him on the forehead. The girl she tucked in too. They lay perfectly still and straight. She made sure they both had a glass of water beside their beds. Standing by the light switch she said, ‘Goodnight, darlings. Ni-night.’ It was dark, they listened to her footsteps. As soon as it was safe the boy reached over and switched on his lamp. The girl pushed back her sheets and changed beds, squirmed in beside him. Stay close. The lamp went off and it was dark again.

  The woman stood by the window, the curtains were open and she beheld a small herd of deer that had gathered on the lawn, fearlessly close to the château; the deer were standing and staring, their eyes glinted, reflecting the light from her room. A berserk star caught her attention: it might have been a plane.

  At first light the sky turned a deep orange, a smoky grey, a tallow white, and then grey once more until – annealed – the day broke powdery blue. A long dark scratch against the sky turned to cloudbank. The woman was bent low pulling the artificial grass off the small grave beside the headstone. She was dressed in a pearl-grey tweed suit, stockings and heels. Her broken arm was hidden in a blue silk sling. And she had fixed her hair, a loose chignon, and had gone to the trouble of putting on make-up. To her left was the tiny walnut casket that she had dragged over from the house. First she removed the square of grass, kicking it into a heap; then she manoeuvred the casket as close as she could to the earthen maw. She worked methodically, not with stealth but with blatant purpose.

  On the way back to the house she made a detour via the rose garden. Without thought for the look of the plants she took her scissors to the blooms. One by one the roses fell to the ground and when she had a sufficient number, fifteen or so, she pocketed the scissors and collected the stems with her left hand, thorns and all.

  She marched into the kitchen, ignoring Ida, ignoring the twins, and dumped the roses on the wooden table. She headed hellbent toward the freezer and – stunned – they did not try to stop her. The freezer, the top compartment lined in pink satin, was empty save for a little lace-trimmed pillow. Slightly disconcerted, she turned to leave but on afterthought turned back to double-check its silver pair, the refrigerator. Every shelf was crammed with food. No matter; she slammed the door shut and, brushing past the twins – ‘Excuse me’ – strode away.

  ‘Get up! Wake up!’ She broke into the children’s room. ‘Lucy! Andrew!’ she yelled. ‘Get dressed! Hurry! Get up!’

  The children scrambled to attention. She threw open the left curtain. On hands and knees she rooted through the clothes heaped carelessly on the floor until she found the outfits they had worn at the funeral, the suit and the black velvet dress, and she tossed these, garment by garment, onto the girl’s bed. After swapping glances with one another the children hurried to unbutton their pyjamas.

  She buzzed insistently on the intercom outside Grandmother’s suite. Five times. Six times. One uninterrupted demand until the door could be heard to click. Stormed through the rooms, called out, ‘Wake up! Get dressed! Hurry!’

  Grandmother had pulled up the bedsheet to a level just below her eyes, timorous. The woman ripped it away. She grabbed Grandmother’s shoulder, skin and bone, and gave her a strong shake. ‘Get ready!’

  Ida rushed in and with a placatory gesture – gently cupping the woman’s elbow – she insinuated herself between Grandmother and assailant. The woman released her grip and waited hand on hip as Grandmother clambered out of bed. Ida helped her to her feet and while Grandmother wasn’t looking, searching for her slippers under the bed, she nodded to the woman in tacit approval.

  Marcus, all bleary-eyed and wearing
a clumsily tied dressing gown, slumbered down the hallway. He lifted his shoulders in an open-palmed shrug that said, What’s going on?

  ‘Sophie is ready,’ said the woman.

  ‘She’s ready? Now?’

  ‘Yes. Now.’ Curt.

  Without losing momentum she sidestepped around him and marched toward his room. After a moment he followed.

  The room was empty: no Sophie. Nowhere, not there. She opened the door of a neighbouring room. A draught of air set an intricate kiddy-mobile turning and tinkling. Here was a nursery, with a wooden cot and a rocking-horse, a large doll’s house. The walls and ceiling were painted fingernail-pink and sprinkled with silver stars. No Sophie. And the next room – she gripped the door handle like she would grip at the rung of a ladder, then wrenched it down. No Sophie. The full length of the hallway: door open, door closed, door open, door closed, door open… unstoppable. Every room was empty.

  She scuttled down the central staircase, weightless, her left hand lightly passing over the banister. Looking straight ahead, the exact breadth and depth of each stair an engrained bodily knowledge. In the entrance hall she hesitated a moment and then turned sharp left into the drawing room, yanking open the door. Empty, all the furniture shrouded. She went over to the windows and banged behind the curtains, sniffed and sniffed. Nothing there. Halfway across the room she stopped and scratched furiously in the small space between her skin and her cast. Then she turned on her heels, marched back to the entrance hall and crossed into the salon whose walls were spiked with antlers. Sophie was wearing her coffee-silk nightgown and was sitting peaceably on a chaise longue. The white wicker bassinet rested within arm’s reach on a low table. She did not seem surprised by the intrusion, not in the slightest; the impression she gave was that nothing whatsoever was amiss. Without pause the woman walked over to the table until she and Sophie were equidistant from the bassinet. There they held one another’s gaze. Very slowly the woman leant forward, reaching out her left hand toward the bassinet, and Sophie mirrored this movement, reaching at the same pace – but not grabbing, not snatching – until their fingertips were almost touching. And the woman, unwavering, settled her hand onto the wicker bands, closed her fist. It was heavy, the bassinet. She carried it away.

  Once more they encircled the open grave. The woman was there, the bassinet by her feet; the children were dressed in their finest. Grandmother sat very straight in her wheelchair, tended by Ida and the twins. Two solemn gardeners were armed with shovels. Sophie, still in her nightgown, was at the head of the grave and Marcus stood beside her.

  The woman transferred the bundle from the bassinet to the casket. Afterwards there was a long pause until Marcus assumed the lead and, kneeling down, lay a rose beside the corpse. At his encouragement Sophie did the same. Grandmother was next, Ida wheeled her forward. The girl took a deep breath and quickly had her turn, followed by the woman. And the boy was last. He balled his hand over the head of the rose so that only the stem was protruding. They waited. The girl, helpful, pointed her finger over and over toward the ground. His mother nodded at him as if to say, Continue. Eventually he obeyed. Arching up he saw that Sophie had also broken out of their circle and was now staring at him. She tried to touch his shoulder but he shrugged her off. Her fledgling smile was sad and tender and asked of him forgiveness. The boy was mountain and lake. Marcus drew her back.

  The gardeners lowered the casket into the grave. They set about with their shovels, scattering dirt on wood. Ida gave a loud sigh of relief.

  In the garden the clipped topiaries, the long rows of cypress, the rose beds, the lotus, the elms, the poplars, the great oak, each nipped blade of grass – all were animate, transforming sunlight, and the woman, breathing in, breathing out, sensed this, felt this silent and constant becoming, was a part of it, and this burgeoning feeling, gentle and immanent, so long dormant, spilled from behind her sternum and into her throat, it filled the space behind her mouth, behind her nose until – practised – she did not so much cut it off or snuff it out as simply let it pass. All things can be refused. The next moment she turned toward her son. My child. He was ancient and implacable, a boy most beautiful. But no boy is mountain and lake and knowing this – knowing that mountain is rock and lake is water, that even rock sheds fine grains and water shapeshifts, knowing it impossible to be rock or water, and knowing the disappointments she had visited upon herself – she made a wish for him. Hold, hold.

  Acknowledgements

  Australia Council for the Arts; The Authors’ Foundation (UK); The Marten Bequest Travelling Scholarships; Rolex Mentor and Protégé Arts Initiative; University of Adelaide.