Yesterday's Dust

by Joy Dettman

  And now the rain. What a day for a wedding.

  Poor Jack. He should have been here to see Bronwyn. From the rear she did look like an angel.

  But what if it was him?

  She shook her head, shook the thought away. She wouldn’t think about him. She would not. Not today. As if he’d mix with criminals. As if anyone would . . .

  Buried out near Charlie Owen’s property. As Bessy had said, everyone knew about Vera Owen and Jack. Charlie Owen had split Jack’s head open one night, and everyone knew he’d been threatening to kill him.

  She looked up, swallowed and tried to force her mind back to the Latin. She glanced at Johnny. He’d know what the priest was talking about. She peered at his book, saw a picture of a bell and turned her page to catch up with his. He was listening to the Latin, his mouth moving, saying the words too.

  My goodness. Fancy being able to talk a different language. Her son. How proud she was of him. How wonderful it would be if he decided to go back to the church. He might one day. Her son, her own beautiful boy, a priest! Wouldn’t it have been lovely if he could have done the wedding?

  Ellie had wanted him to give the bride away, him being the eldest, but Bronwyn refused point-blank – like she’d refused to let Ellie wear her overcoat.

  ‘Benjie will give me away,’ she’d said. ‘He was the nearest thing I ever had to a father.’

  The mouth on that girl! Lord only knew how she’d given birth to either of her daughters. Both of them were so determined. Just as well they had been girls and not boys or they would have turned into second Jacks. Benjie had more gentleness in his little fingernail than both of those girls put together. No Jack in that one. And he’d been that pleased when Bronwyn asked him to give her away. Just as well she hadn’t asked Johnny as it turned out. His foot was in plaster.

  She’d wanted to buy him a new suit for today, but he’d refused. He was wearing the one of Jack’s he’d worn to Liza’s memorial service. Annie had let the trousers down as far as they’d go, put false hems on them, and taken the waist in, but the suit jacket looked tight across his shoulders, and not as well as it had looked at Liza’s service. All the heavy work he was doing was broadening his shoulders, Ellie thought as she brushed white fluff from his sleeve.

  Jack had always dressed well. That suit had cost over five hundred dollars, and Ellie knew it. His clothing was one of the first things she’d noticed about Jack. She’d always been proud of the way he’d dressed, but spending five hundred dollars on a suit!

  Jack’s shirts wouldn’t do up around Johnny’s neck. She’d bought him a new shirt for today, but he was wearing one of his father’s ties, the dark grey with the red and light grey stripes. It had always looked well with that suit, so that was the one she’d chosen.

  Johnny hadn’t wanted to come to the church. He’d told Ben to pick him up at the hospital on the way to the reception. But it wasn’t as if it was a bad break, just one of the small bones, and the bruise of course; he had painkillers if he needed them.

  ‘How’s your foot, love?’ she whispered.

  ‘Fine.’

  Nick said something, and she’d missed it, but everyone was giggling again. He and Bronwyn were probably a good pair. The first night Bronwyn had brought Nick to the house, to introduce him, he’d told Ellie that she ought to get her hair cut, that she’d look ten years younger with short hair. He’d said that if he were twenty years older he’d dump Bronwyn and run away with her mother.

  And in front of Jack too. Was it any wonder that he’d . . . he’d . . . he’d taken a dislike to Nick. Poor Jack.

  She caught the thought before it had time to form and crushed it. Today was Bronwyn’s day and that’s all she was going to think about.

  The Smiths had organised the wedding and the reception. They’d hired an old hall miles from town, but Ben knew where it was. While cameras flashed, Ellie walked off to Jack’s old car, her skirts held high. The rain had stopped but the sky was black.

  ‘There will be some good rain before nightfall,’ she said. ‘I wonder if we’re getting any at home.’

  Johnny, already seated in the rear of the car with his crutches, nodded, then in silence they waited for Ben, one of the bridal group and long in coming. But he came with his map, and he led the Burton convoy to the old hall beside a disused football oval, ten kilometres from town.

  ‘I hope it’s a bit better inside,’ Ellie said.

  ‘I hope we don’t get bogged,’ Benjie replied and Johnny looked out the window, wishing he was digging post holes.

  Bronwyn had been in a fiery mood when she’d arrived this morning to do Ellie’s make-up, but she was smiling now and waving, beckoning Ellie and Benjie to join the wedding party again for more photographs. Side-on she almost looked – Ellie shook her head. It was just the way the wind was blowing her dress. Her interest still on Bronwyn’s waist, Ellie dodged the mud and puddles and joined the group, stood where they told her to stand.

  But why the rush, if she wasn’t? She glanced at Nick. Some men could be too persuasive, and well she knew it.

  Three weeks. Three weeks notice was all they’d given Ellie. Everyone in Mallawindy was talking about it. Bronwyn said they were rushing it because Nick’s father had to go into hospital for a serious operation, but he was standing beside Ellie now, his hand on her shoulder. He looked well enough. He looked like an older version of Nick; those same cheeky eyes and grin, but bald as a billiard ball. Ellie didn’t like men who looked at her like that, and she couldn’t stand for them to put their hands on her. She moved away as the cameras clicked, then walked quickly into the hall, again looking for Johnny.

  She found him and Mr Fletcher already seated so she couldn’t change the place names. The hall didn’t look as bad inside as out, thank goodness, and they had plenty of mats to wipe the muddy feet. There were pot plants by the dozen hiding the worst of the walls, and someone had spent the day blowing up balloons. They hung from every corner and over every window. And the long trestle tables looked a picture, they really did.

  David walked in alone. He joined the men.

  ‘They did a nice job with the decorations,’ Ellie said. He smiled, nodded. He’s going quite grey, Ellie thought, and no wonder. He looked as if he’d lost weight too, or maybe it was because he was standing behind Mr Fletcher. Then Benjie joined them, and David didn’t look so slim.

  The men got to talking about cars, and joking about David’s new six-seater van, so Ellie wandered off, eyeing the tall flower and candle arrangements on the tables. Silk flowers. She hoped they wouldn’t catch fire when they lit the candles.

  The place cards were handwritten and set out in front of pink serviettes folded like fans, which must have taken someone a lot of time, she thought, peering closely at names, needing her reading glasses. She hadn’t brought them; one of the arms was missing. Her bad eye closed, she squinted at a place card. It wasn’t Elizabeth Burton, but Elizabeth Burkitt. Surely they hadn’t made a mistake. Wandering alone then from table to table, just a little panicky, she continued her search.

  ‘You’re looking lost, dear. Come over and meet Nick’s aunties. You’ll be sitting with them.’

  ‘I told Bronwyn to sit me with Bessy.’

  ‘You and Ben are at the bridal table,’ Bronwyn’s new mother-in-law said. She looked to be years older than her cheeky-faced husband, Ellie thought, as she followed Mary Smith to a group of women who all looked the same.

  ‘Didn’t the boys do a wonderful job with the hall?’

  ‘It all looks a picture,’ Ellie replied.

  Over a hundred Smiths and their offspring were at the reception, and most of the adults were introduced to her. She was kissed, had her hand shaken, and she tried to keep track of their connections to Nick. She could remember Mary Ruth because of her size, and she could remember Mary Aileen because of her hat. She said a word or two to each face, frequently adding, ‘Doesn’t it all look like a picture?’ Occasionally she turned the phrase around. ‘My word,
it’s a picture.’

  She’d had little to do with the preparations, apart from making the wedding cake and giving Bronwyn five hundred dollars to put towards the catering, but not for alcohol. She’d stressed that. Someone else had paid for alcohol. There was beer and wine on every table.

  ‘Who did the catering?’ she asked.

  ‘There are enough of us, Mrs Burton. We’ve got it down to a fine art.’

  ‘You must be very proud of yourselves, I’m sure.’

  Ellie’s shoes were pinching by the time she took her seat between Bronwyn’s new mother-in-law and Mary Aileen, one of Nick’s aunts. She nodded towards the three-tier cake that didn’t look anything like the three fruit and pumpkin cakes she’d baked two weeks ago. ‘They did a lovely job with the cake. Who decorated it?’

  ‘Mary Ruth.’

  ‘Oh, the big one,’ Ellie said then, aware she’d opened her mouth and put her foot in it, almost committed the unforgivable sin of stuffing her runaway mouth with a tiny circular sandwich, and before Father John Frances Smith had said grace.

  The sandwich hidden in her hand and held on her lap, she bowed her head and wished again that Johnny hadn’t left the church. But he’d always been the same, even as a little boy. Once he’d made a decision there was no going back for Johnny. She glanced across the table to where the Burton guests had been seated. Johnny was beside Annie. She hoped they’d be all right together. They were very strange with each other – polite enough, but strange. Not that it was Johnny’s fault. Ellie had always found Annie hard to talk to.

  Father Fogarty sat at the end of the table, Mr Fletcher on his left, Kerrie on his right. She was beside Jenny. Old Granny Bourke was between Jenny and Bessy so they could keep an eye on her. Mickey had been seated at the head of the table, then Johnny, Annie and David on Mr Fletcher’s side. Bessy had already moved the flower arrangement and the candles from the table. A law unto herself, was Bessy, and wearing her old grey pantsuit again.

  Ellie bowed her head while Father John Frances droned on and the sandwich filling oozed into her hand. She opened her palm, allowing the sandwich to lie flat, her hand held well above her dress. It had been a long time since she’d said grace before eating. Jack had refused to allow grace in his kitchen.

  As if he’d end up buried in a shallow grave. It sounded so . . . so criminal. She flinched, shook her head. He’d been gone for over a year one time but he’d come home. He’d be back one day. One day.

  The priest’s words rumbling in the recesses of her mind, her thoughts turned to Benjie. He didn’t look as if he was ever going to marry, and of course Johnny wouldn’t. Bessy only had the one son but four grandchildren already; they all lived with her. Ellie rarely saw her grandchildren. Annie spent most of her time with Mr Fletcher, or at the shop with Ben on her rare visits to Mallawindy.

  If Benjie had married, it would have been different, she thought. She would have had his babies living with her, but Benjie had never shown much interest in girls. All he ever did was work. Never went out.

  Jack had wanted to go out and have fun when they were first married. Of course she hadn’t been able to, being pregnant. After Johnny was born, they’d left him with Bessy twice and gone to the pictures. Then there was that time when Jack had decided they were going to move to Narrawee. Ellie hadn’t wanted to leave her father and Bessy, but Jack had packed her bags and said that she was going. He was her husband after all, so she’d gone to Narrawee for over two months. Just left everything. Left the chooks and the cows to Bessy and her father.

  Like a fish out of water, she’d been. The house was a mansion; the only place she’d ever felt at home was in the kitchen. And Jack’s father! What a horrible old man. He’d ignored Johnny. Sam hadn’t. He’d been nice – a real gentleman, but when he went and got himself married to May Hargraves, Jack had packed their bags again and they’d caught the train home to Mallawindy.

  Since those months she’d spent in Narrawee, Ellie had had a soft spot for Sam; it was a pity that they’d lost contact since Jack went missing. Sad, really, how families grew apart, she thought, easing her heel free of her right shoe, wriggling her toes.

  Too new, the shoes were killing her. She shouldn’t have worn them today. Bessy had said she was a fool to buy high heels at her age; but they looked so smart, and she could tell that Bronwyn had been proud of her when they’d got her all dressed up for the wedding.

  Annie had made her outfit. That girl was a magician on the sewing machine, there were no two ways about it. She’d chosen the material, paid for it, then made it the way she wanted to.

  It wasn’t really what Ellie had wanted to wear. Mothers of the bride wore chiffon. She’d always liked chiffon, and she had the money to buy nice things these days. She’d been planning to go to Daree with Bessy to buy her outfit, then Annie had turned up one afternoon with this one.

  She looked down at her jacket, jade-green shot silk. And to the frock, long, a muted floral that picked up the jade green. It looked like something out of one of those expensive magazines. She liked it. She did really like it, and it was so smart. Too smart for a wedding reception in a football hall.

  ‘Amen,’ she said, noting the mumbling had ceased. Head still down, she popped the entire sandwich into her mouth then licked the filling from her fingers. Some sort of peppery paste. It reminded her of the sandwiches her own mother used to make for church suppers, neat and small, their fillings always holding a surprise. She chose a second sandwich, obviously cut with a small scone-cutter. The patience of the maker! And what a waste of bread!

  Chicken livers. That’s what it was. Chicken livers boiled up and made into a paste, a taste she had almost forgotten. She’d have to ask Bronwyn to get the recipe for her. After her marriage Ellie had thrown out the chicken livers. Jack had refused to eat any of the chooks’ innards, and the day she’d made soup from their feet – my goodness, had he put on a performance!

  With a shake of her head she glanced around the table. They were friendly enough, and noisy now, but Ellie had always been ill at ease with strangers, and today she couldn’t get Jack and the little brindle heifer out of her mind. Just too young, that’s all. She hadn’t wanted her to have a calf this year, but fences and a river had never stopped Bessy’s bulls.

  Bronwyn had a lot of her father in her, a lot of his expressions. She was more like him sometimes than either Annie or Johnny, even though people said she took after Ellie, which she did around the eyes and the figure, but somehow her eyes had always had Jack’s expression, sort of sarcastic, and her mouth when she was bored was so much like Jack’s. She looked bored at the moment. And her hands, the way she held that cigarette. Jack all over.

  She and Nick were going to Melbourne for their honeymoon. Nick liked the city. He’d lived there for a while. Itchy feet, that one. He’d moved to Warran when Bronwyn had moved there, years ago, but he changed his jobs as often as Jack had changed his socks.

  Ellie flinched.

  Black socks. They’d found one black sock still on the body. On Monday she’d have to go to Daree, look at it. She shuddered, bit into a third sandwich, filling her mouth with taste. This one was fishy. Smoked salmon. She didn’t like it, but she got it down.

  Mary Ruth from across the table commented on someone’s frock.

  ‘It’s all a picture,’ Ellie said, turning to Bessy’s laugh and wishing she was sitting with them, laughing with Bessy, who liked a glass of wine. By the sound of her laugh she’d already had a few. Annie was opposite old Granny Bourke. They seemed to be talking. David had his arm behind Annie’s chair, his hand on her shoulder.

  She’d chosen a good husband, even if he was a divorced man. The loss of a child could draw a couple closer, or push them apart, and well Ellie knew it. But my goodness, pregnant again so soon!

  Annie had been Ellie’s fourth baby, Johnny already eight years old the night Annie was born. Poor little long-limbed wisp of a thing, she’d looked like a skinned rabbit. There had been less than eleven
months between Annie and Liza when there should have been thirteen. They’d been too close. But she’d had a good space between Benjie and Liza, and six years between Annie and Bronwyn.

  Jack had . . . hadn’t been the same after Liza went missing – died, Ellie mentally corrected. After all those years thinking of her eldest daughter as kidnapped, it was still hard to think of her as dead. A shudder travelled from her scalp to her knees. What if the body they’d found was Jack’s?

  What if?

  No.

  But in all the years Liza had been missing, Ellie hadn’t believed she was dead. And she had been dead.

  She shook her head, shook it hard, and glanced at the glass of wine in Bronwyn’s hand. She was drinking but not eating a thing and she’d always liked her food. She looked thinner around the face lately and her eyes looked different. And that dress, the way Annie had made it, sort of eighteenth century, fitted at the bust-line then flowing. Almost like a . . .

  ‘My goodness,’ Ellie said.

  ‘They got a lovely lot of presents,’ Mary Ruth said.

  ‘My word, they did. And did you see the size of Mr Fletcher’s cheque?’ That probably wasn’t the right thing to say. Ellie was reaching for another sandwich to stuff up her mouth when Bronwyn caught her eye, touched her left cheek. Ellie wiped at her face, removed a spot of chicken paste, licked her finger. Bronwyn nodded.

  Why on earth they’d sat her in the middle of a mob of aunties, Ellie didn’t know. Bronwyn was four seats away and Benjie away down the other end with the groomsmen. It might have been all right if they’d sat Benjie beside her, but they probably didn’t want to sit him in the middle of all the elderly women, Ellie thought. They’d stuck her there instead.