The Blind Eye

by Georgia Blain

  Silas looked across at him. To the garden, he whispered.

  Why?

  Silas grinned at him. Can you keep a secret?

  Lucas nodded, eyes wide as he waited for Silas to tell.

  I’m in love, and Silas pinched his cheek.

  Yuk, he was smirking, and then as Silas turned to the door, he followed. Can I come?

  Silas told him to go back to bed, but Lucas ignored him, jumping down off the verandah and chasing him across the dirt yard, past the race track he and Eli had built and out onto the empty road.

  Have you kissed her? he asked, running in an attempt to keep up. He was wrinkling his nose in disgust as he waited for an answer. Well, have you?

  They were at the front of Pearl’s now and Silas was dismayed to see the shop was still closed. He looked at his watch and hesitated for a moment before banging on the window.

  Across the road, Mick was opening the garage. He heaved the roller-door up, the clatter of steel making Silas jump. Lucas was pulling on his sleeve, still wanting a response to his question. Silas pushed him away, wishing he had kept quiet, but in that brief moment all he had wanted was to speak, to roll out the deliciousness of the secret so that he could marvel at it, and Lucas had been there.

  Silas is in love, the boy chanted, skipping around him, his voice ringing out clear and loud in the stillness of the morning.

  Silas knocked on the window again, willing to incur the wrath of Pearl if it meant he could get away from Lucas and out to Constance sooner. From inside he could hear her opening the door that led to the rooms at the back, the rooms where she was born, where she had always lived and where she would die.

  Silas knocked again, and he could hear her calling out, Hold your horses, as she moved slowly, rolling on fat ankles, towards the front door.

  Did you stick your tongue in? Lucas was pulling on the hem of his shirt now, and as he turned around to tell him to shut up, he’d had enough, he saw Mick cross the road, making his way towards them.

  Leaning awkwardly on his crutches, he was attempting to step onto the island that cut the main road in two, a thin strip of gravel decorated with the hideous palms that had been planted by the Port Tremaine Local Action Group over ten years ago.

  Silas is in love, Lucas shouted out, but Mick did not say a word.

  Silas watched as Mick struggled with the crutches, trying to get a hold in the gravel, staring at him the whole time. He was about to ask if he needed a hand, but the expression on Mick’s face silenced him. He did not know what it was that he was coming over to say, but he did not want to hear it; not on this perfect morning, not now.

  As Pearl drew the bolts, pushing the heavy wooden doors to the shop open, Mick stepped down onto the other side of the road and stopped.

  What’s the racket? She had her arms folded across her stained nightgown, and her glasses balanced at the end of her nose.

  Silas told her Rudi had been ill and he needed to get some supplies up to them.

  Probably just drank too much, and she snorted derisively. Anyone would have thought the town was on fire with that carry-on.

  It was incredible, and Silas recounted the story of Rudi’s miraculous recovery as he filled his arms with what seemed to be the most practical items he could find: candles, matches, tea, sugar, bread, even a few cans of soup; the list Constance had given him having been forgotten on his walk back from her place.

  Pearl opened a bag of Minties, unwrapping one as she listened to his tale.

  Hmph, and she began to add up his purchases. Sounds like that faith-healing stuff to me. She leant a little closer. Did she lay her hands on him?

  Silas had no idea what she had done, but he had seen the change that had occurred, the feat she had performed, and he just wanted to get back to her, to be out there with her again.

  In the glare of the morning, Mick had not moved. He was leaning on his crutches and his eyes were on Silas as soon as the screen door banged shut behind him. Lucas was sitting on the kerb, flicking pieces of gravel at the squat trunks of the palms, the constant thwack of the stone against wood loud and irritating in the stillness. He jumped up as soon as he saw Silas, wanting to follow, bounding around him as he made his way over to where Mick waited.

  Silas did not know why he went over. Brushing the flies from his face, he wished he hadn’t, and he opened his mouth to speak, to ask if there was any problem, but Mick’s words silenced him.

  Is she all right? He was kicking at the gutter and his face was hard.

  Silas did not know who he was talking about.

  Well, is she?

  Silas could see his own face reflected in Mick’s black glasses, that was all he could see, and he did not understand.

  Who? and in the instant he asked the question, he knew the answer.

  Constance.

  Your girlfriend, Lucas giggled, your girlfriend, and in his confusion Silas shouted at Lucas, telling him to shut the fuck up, his voice louder than he had intended, harsh enough to silence him, so that in the sudden quiet that descended, the three of them just stood there on that empty main street, with Constance’s name still hanging between them, heavy, in that hot, still air.

  3

  Following the instructions Steve had given me, I went out to the edge of town, and as I looked at the miles of flat scrub in front of me, the tufts of saltbush coarse and bare, battered low under the cold winter sky, I knew that this was the way Silas had walked, despite the absence of a discernible track. With the stones sharp against the soles of my shoes, the bare branches scratching my arms, and the constant buzz of flies around my face, I remembered how he had told me that he had run out here, the few things he had bought stuffed into his backpack, the straps cutting into his shoulders, the swing of the weight jarring his limbs as he raced across the hot sandy soil.

  He was agitated, the full implications of Mick’s concern for Constance’s wellbeing seemingly just out of reach. But the truth is I didn’t want to know, I didn’t want to see what had become so glaringly obvious, and as he had told Greta everything, that night in her room, he had scratched at one of the sores on his arm, tearing the wound open without even noticing.

  Constance had given him the key to the gate and he had let himself in, fumbling with the lock in his haste to be back there with her, dropping his bag to the ground as he tried to close it again, all that he had brought spilling out across the dirt; his clothes, the tins of food, the matches, gathered together again with twigs, stones and leaves caught up amongst it all.

  He was out of breath when he got to her. His mouth was dry from the quick drink he had downed when he was back in the cottage, the alcohol searing his throat as he had swallowed it hastily. His hands were shaking. He pushed the door open, his heart too loud, the clatter of the bag as he dropped it to the ground causing her to shush him with her finger to her lips.

  I cannot begin to describe the relief I felt at seeing her, and he had leant forward and put his head in his hands, while Greta had listened.

  It was all right, he told himself. She was as remarkable as she had been when he left her only hours earlier, and he just stood, leaning against the door of the shack, staring at her.

  When she spoke, he jumped at the sound of her voice. It was a remedy she wanted. The doors to the cabinet were open, the rows of brown bottles, each labelled, arranged across the shelves, all within her reach. When she told him the name of the one that she needed, he almost laughed.

  But you know where it is. He did not understand. He knew she could see them, far more clearly than he could. She could work miracles. She did not need his assistance, and he did not move to help her.

  Can you get it, please? She was irritated now, and stung by the hardness of her tone, he searched for the name on the label, finally handing it to her, thinking that perhaps this was some kind of a joke that was lost on him. But if it was, she wasn’t smiling.

  All morning he followed her orders. Food needed preparing, water needed fetching, wood choppin
g, sheets washing; he did it all as soon as she asked, trying not to think of Mick’s comment, trying not to think of Mick at all, but he kept stealing glances at her, knowing he was judging her, assessing her with each sharp doubt that pricked his consciousness, knowing that Mick’s presence was still right there with him, despite his efforts to deny it.

  It was not until late afternoon that he stopped, his body weak from tiredness, his head overwhelmed. While Rudi slept, he sat under the shade of the peppercorn tree and rolled a cigarette. Constance was watering the garden and in the intensity of the last light it seemed that each petal, each stamen, each leaf, was sparkling, glittering and alive. He watched as she bent over the giant heads of the belladonna, and holding the blossoms in the palms of her open hands, she drank in the perfume, rubbing the petals against her lips.

  Why do you do that? he asked, and she straightened, startled.

  They revive me, she told him, and she turned back to the plants.

  He tried to walk quietly towards her, not wanting her to hear him, just wanting to know if she would see his approach and stop him, or if he would be able to put his arms around her and rest his head against the smooth curve of her shoulder as he longed to. She stepped back at the first sound of his footfall.

  What are you doing? she asked. Why are you creeping up on me?

  You do see me, he said, more out of hope than certainty.

  She just pressed the tips of her fingers into her eyelids, shutting her eyes, her mouth drawn tight in pain.

  What is it that you see? he asked. How did you know? How could you do what you did? and he nodded in the direction of the shack where Rudi lay.

  It was not a miracle, and she shook her head slowly. I just do what he has taught me to do.

  She turned away again, and Silas stared at the graceful curve of her neck, her pale skin dappled in the light. He could not bear it. It was all slipping away, sliding like dirt, and he wanted to stop it, but each time he attempted to, everything jarred, everything was wrong.

  He asked after you.

  She did not move.

  When I was in town. He wanted to know if you were all right.

  The flower she had been holding fell to the ground, the white petals spread open on the soil.

  Mick?

  Mick. It was Silas who repeated his name, Mick, the single syllable harsh as he uttered it just one more time for good measure: Mick.

  And then neither of them said a word, there in the corner of the garden where the weeds were far thicker than he had ever noticed and the thistles were forcing their way through the sagging fence, and for the first time since he had stepped inside that place, the flies were thick against his face and he didn’t even attempt to brush them away.

  Why hasn’t he come?

  When she finally spoke, he wanted to block his ears.

  Where has he been?

  He had heard Pearl’s stories about her. He had seen the wonder of her with his own eyes and that was the truth, but when he eventually glanced across at her, she was staring blankly at him, desperate, her eyes unseeing, the dirt smeared across her cheek as she wiped her face with the back of her hand and waited for an answer to her question.

  Don’t look at me, she told him, and she shook her head. He knows me, far more than you ever have, and her stare was defiant. He sees me for what I am.

  When I remember how Silas tried to explain, how none of it made sense, I wonder at how I failed to grasp what quickly became clear to Greta when she, too, finally heard his story.

  It did not take long, Silas told me. From the moment she stepped on the snake, to when she began to be ill.

  And I didn’t know what to do, he said. I was helpless.

  But it was not simply a matter of failing to get help in time. Of course it wasn’t.

  In the darkness of Greta’s room, with his face turned towards the wall, he had told her that it had all happened so quickly that he just did not know whether he had seen the snake slithering through the dry and scraggly grass. Perhaps he had been aware of it glittering, its scales coppery in the light, as it had flicked and darted through the dirt; perhaps he had watched, fascinated, as it had slid, stealthy, silent, across the warmth of the stone bench, its eyes two sleepy jewels, its tongue flicking out and then in, and he had wanted to know, for one horrible instant, just exactly what Constance was.

  Look out, he should have warned. Be careful, he should have said.

  But Pearl had told him she was born with venom in her veins and Rudi had told him she could see, far more than you or I could ever comprehend.

  He had told himself she was all they said and more.

  And now there was this, the very presence of Mick there between them, the jagged sharpness of his jealousy enough to spur Silas on, daring him to test all he had wanted to believe.

  I wanted it to be true, he had whispered, finally making himself utter the words out loud, to recognise it at last. I wanted proof.

  And in that one brief moment he had acted in a way that had no sanity, no rationality; he had clung, desperate, to his own ludicrous vision, wanting to believe she would see that snake as it had slithered across her path, right there where her foot was about to land, even if all she saw was just the colours that surrounded it; or that it would slide over her, without harming her; or perhaps, most impossible of all, that even if its venom did slip through her veins it would be like blood on blood, a joining of like with like. Was that what he had done, or had he, as he had tried so hard to believe, seen nothing at all?

  Silas told me that she had become sick so quickly.

  Let me help you, he had begged.

  Pushing him away, shoving him away, she had asked him to leave her, to leave her and her father in peace, and he had said he would do anything, anything at all. What did she need? What should he get for her?

  With her mouth twisted in pain, she had vomited on the ground at his feet and told him he had done enough, enough, and all the doubts about himself had solidified, hard and cold inside him, as he saw the look on her face.

  She knew, and Greta had just stared at his back. She saw the worst in my heart, the fact that I had wanted to test her. In whatever way it was that she saw, she saw.

  How could you? she had hissed. How could you?

  He had told her she needed help, he would be back, and he had run, racing across the hot red plains, stumbling across boulders, tripping on branches that grew lopsided out of the sand; he had not stopped, wanting only to reach the town and call for someone who would know what to do.

  It took them an hour to get there, and when they did, she was dead. They told me she’d had an unusually strong reaction to the venom, that some people do.

  He had been going to go back, to be with her until someone came. He had made it halfway out there, and then he had remembered the way in which she had looked at him, all that she had accused him of, and his courage had failed him.

  I just couldn’t face her. I went back to my car and I left.

  He had heard the news from the side of the road, somewhere out on the highway, the hot evening air thick around him, his hands shaking as he had attempted to roll a joint, waiting to be put through to the doctor.

  He had let the phone fall to the ground.

  He had let the match burn to his fingers.

  They said there was nothing I could have done.

  In the silence, Greta had searched for words. She had remembered the way in which she had once tried to punish me, the worst she had ever done, and she had searched for words.

  When he had finally turned to face her, she had reached for him, but he had not taken her hands.

  Can you see why I am like this? he had asked her. Can you see now? And he had held out his arms, bare under the light, before turning to gather the rest of his clothes.

  She had told him that she could, that she understood, swallowing deeply as she spoke, the entire weight of his story there inside her, needing to be digested before she could look him in the eye again
, because that was what she wanted, to face him, knowing all that she knew, and to see that he was still the Silas she had slowly come to love.

  4

  That was the night Silas knew he wanted to go back.

  Later he told me that he had not gone home. Knowing he would not be able to sleep (and it was not fear at what sleep could bring but a strange nervous release that kept him awake), he walked up and down the cold winter streets, staring into shop windows, stopping in bars, eventually ending up at an all-night cafe he used to frequent on his regular drunken nights out.

  He took a table right at the back, where he was almost lost in the folds of the faded red curtains that acted as a door leading to a dingy outdoor toilet used by junkies to shoot up, and he ordered a coffee.

  The woman at the table next to him was nodding off. The cigarette in her hand was burning down, unsmoked, the tip dangerously close to both her chipped fingernails and her long, peroxided hair. He leant over, trying to slip it from her grasp without disturbing her, but she jumped, starting at his touch.

  What the fuck do you want? Her words were thick and slurred.

  Silas told her he hadn’t wanted her to burn herself.

  She stared at him through mascara-smudged eyes for a moment and then smiled, the sly, lazy smile of someone who has floated away from the world, adrift in a better place.

  I know you, she said.

  He was about to tell her that he didn’t think she did, but then he realised she may have seen him here, years ago, or in one of the other places he used to go to.

  Yeah, and she was grinning as she nodded at him, clearly remembering something that amused her.

  Where from? Silas lit a cigarette from the end of hers, curious now.

  Her eyes narrowed a little further as she leant forward to examine him more closely, swaying slightly as she did so.

  I reckon we fucked, and the smile on her face was sly as she said his name, Silas.

  The cafe was dark. With only a single light, shaded by a bubbled yellow glass ball, it was impossible to see anyone too clearly, unless they were right there, in your face, but even that proximity would probably only lend a distortion of its own. Silas didn’t recognise her, but he couldn’t dismiss her claim as impossible.