‘He’s not mangy.’
‘You said you were living with a bloke.’
‘He is a bloke.’
‘Why did you let me think—’
‘You’re married. Remember?’ She puts Stuart on the floor and opens the pantry.
‘I’m not married. I’ve left. I’m gone. We’ve separated.’
Her eyebrows arc. ‘Since when?’
‘Three or four months.’
‘Months? But I’ve spoken to you on the phone half-a-dozen times since. Why didn’t you tell me?’
‘Because you were living with a bloke – remember? Same as you were in England – remember? Which, I assume, is the reason you stood me up. But why – why leave without a word? Why leave me waiting, week after week with no explanation? Silence. Only silence.’
She fills a bowl with water, shakes biscuits into another dish and puts them on the floor. The cat hoes in.
‘I can tell you why, Chris, but you won’t like it.’
‘There’s a lot I haven’t liked over the last eighteen months. One more thing won’t make much difference.’
She looks towards the door. Lily and the baby have disappeared. ‘All right. I was … when you and I first met in London, Oliver and I were already married.’
‘Married …?’
‘That day. Our last, magic, unforgettable time together, I’d been to the doctor and found out.’ She pauses. ‘I found out I was pregnant, with Stephie.’
Chris swallows.
‘I had no intention of deceiving you. When I arrived that day it was to tell you we had to stop seeing each other. But you made it so difficult. Of all the days you chose …’ She gazes at Stuart, chasing biscuits around the bowl. ‘I wanted you so much, Chris. Too much to leave without … being with you. I’m so sorry I hurt you but I couldn’t see you again. I had to choose and I chose Oliver and Stephie and it was the right decision. I loved Oliver, though … not as I love you.’
Stuart yawns and arches his back, making his crooked tail tremble.
Chris holds out his bag of off-cuts. ‘Here. I never did manage to assemble them into anything worthwhile. I told you it needed two people.’
She peers into the bag.
‘Did you say you love me, Bertie?’
She nods. ‘I reckon I did.’
‘Ankle deep, or submersion?’
‘Submersion.’
He sighs. ‘Good.’
‘Why?’
‘Swimming lessons,’ he says. ‘I’ve come to collect.’
He lies on his back, rigid as a plank. Sucks air deep into his lungs and clamps his lips together. While he holds his breath he’ll stay horizontal but as soon as he lets go, his bum will sag. Beside him, seal-like in her Speedos, Bertie waits for him to breathe out, catching him as he sinks. She’s teaching him to float. Swimming, she reckons, will come naturally after that. Floating is about trusting the water. The sea is not malicious; it will support him if he lets it. It’s a body thing.
So she reckons.
He breathes out. His bum sags. She catches him.
‘Again,’ she says patiently. ‘Shut your eyes. Just feel. Floating has nothing to do with your brain.’
Every morning for the past eighteen days they’ve done this; come here to the rock pool, in time for the sun to come up. Bertie questioned the likelihood of Chris ever being able to overcome his fear in the place where he nearly drowned, but ironically, it’s the safest place to swim. When they began, his body rebelled. It bucketed and flailed, his legs pumped and his arms shot off in all directions; water stung his nose and filled his lungs; he coughed, spluttered and cursed. Now, he no longer lurks on the edge of the pool but wades in and sinks, chest deep, awaiting her instructions. Every morning, he mutters his mantra.
‘Life in abundance.’
Water in abundance, anyway.
‘Nothing to be afraid of,’ she says. ‘Humans are seventy per cent water. All that’s between us and the sea is skin and fear.’
Skin is not the problem; his body exults in water. It’s his brain that rebels. He lies back. Her hands beneath him are light and tender and for a fleeting moment he has the impression that they are superfluous; that the water really is holding him up. But immediately he thinks it, he sinks again.
‘Come on,’ she says. ‘Shut your eyes.’ One arm supports him while the other moves over his chest, arms and neck. Her hand is as cool and slippery as a fish and it’s all he can do not to reach for her but her rules forbid it. No fooling around in the water until he can float.
‘Your body has its own mind, its own way of being with the sea. Give it a chance to find it.’
He allows his neck to relax, his head to become heavy. Water slops and gurgles in his ears. Fighting the urge to lift his head, he presses back further until it is under the water and he’s looking up at the world through warped and weaving light. A silent world where soft aquatic fingers weave through his hair and caress his limbs.
Bertie begins to lift him, gently, slowly, up and down, giving him time to breathe in and out with each rise and fall. Up and down, up and down, the movement gradually becoming regular and hypnotic until he can feel his body adapting to the rhythm. His muscles soften, up and down, and his flesh begins to feel as if it’s merging with the sea. As his breathing becomes even and regular, knots of memory loosen and Liam’s body no longer smothers him with the weight of memory and time.
An image forms of Diane, lying in bed as he lay in the water when he first tried to float. She’s rigid and resisting, bubbling with the panic of impending loss, the terror of drowning in the sea of another human being or even another version of herself, a remembered self of pain and shame; needy, vulnerable and unloved. In a heartbeat he comprehends her fear. But he also knows she will never experience freedom while gripping the past with one hand and reaching for the future with the other. Now rests between them; it is all that exists. Now demands surrender.
He opens his eyes.
Bertie has disappeared – so imperceptibly he didn’t feel her hands leave his body. He’s been floating on his own, just him and the sea. He turns his head and sees her lying nearby, her eyes closed, hair dark and wavy around her head. He moves his arms, finlike, and draws closer. Without opening her eyes, she reaches for him, her fingers curling gently around his own.
He closes his eyes, surrendering his body to the sea, to the pulse of life and the hand of his beloved. His breath comes, and goes and comes again – in, out – it makes no difference. It isn’t air holding him up any more, it isn’t even water.
It’s joy.
Last Day in the Dynamite Factory is not a solo achievement. Loved ones, friends and professionals all contributed to the soup of words and ideas that became this book.
Information in these pages has been drawn primarily from the first-hand accounts of my uncle, Albert Edwin Svensson, and my aunt, Alison Rosemary Svensson, both of whom worked in a munitions factory in Victoria shortly after the end of World War Two. Alison wrapped dynamite, Albert worked on an assembly line. An inveterate inventor, he devised a finger-guard to protect workers against the ever-present risk of amputation. This book is dedicated to their memory.
To my husband, Alec Faulkner, my inexpressible gratitude. For your never-ending nourishment of my literary, emotional and physical wellbeing, your incisive editorial skills, your moral (and immoral when moral became boring) support. For always being there.
Heartfelt thanks to my friend, mentor and consummate editor, Rose Allan. Your willingness to listen, to entertain and support my vision, your astutely critical comments and encouragement made my journey to realise this book far less lonely and difficult than it would otherwise have been.
Many thanks to my brother, Peter Svensson, for bringing your vast reading experience and keen editorial eye to my manuscript.
To Graham Johnson, for the incomparable honour of being admitted to your shed and introduced to its contents, for feedback on ‘bloke stuff’ and the loan of your terri
fic 1965 Reader’s Digest Do-it-Yourself Manual, great thanks.
Big hug and a forelock tug to Alister Jan Shuttleworth for admitting me to your shed, explaining the gear and introducing me to the intricacies of wood-turning.
Dr Caroline Pattison
Many thanks for squeezing time from your busy schedule to supply me with first-hand information on the effects and treatment of CVA.
David Wixted, Architect
My sincere gratitude for your courtesy, time and expertise in the supply of information on explosive factories.
Stephen Cashmore, Conservation Architect
Many thanks for your warmth and enthusiasm, the generous sharing of your specialty knowledge, time and passion for conservation work.
Michael O Kennedy, Architect
Thanks, Michael, for your research suggestions and the loan of your precious old tome.
To my Special Agent, Clare Forster at Curtis Brown, my sincere gratitude for your encouragement, support and continuing efforts on my behalf.
Huge thanks to the entire Team Picador, with particular mention to my publisher, Alexandra Craig, for her faith in my ability and in this book, and for seeing it through to publication. To the editors, Emma Rafferty, Julia Stiles and Brianne Collins, who painstakingly picked their way through the flaws, anomalies and faults to produce this result, my sincere thanks.
I am particularly grateful to Michael Leunig for allowing me to use his beautiful poem as an introduction to this book.
Special thanks go to a very special person: the matchless and marvellous Annie Grossman of Annie’s Books at Peregian Beach.
To each and every reader, friend and acquaintance who enquired about progress and encouraged me on my journey, thank you.
Finally, to my unseen friends and helpers, eternal gratitude for your ongoing inspiration for my work; for supporting me from beginning to end, and from end to beginning.
In 2011, The Beloved won the Queensland Premier’s Literary Award for an Emerging Queensland Author. In 2013, it was commended for the FAW Christina Stead Award, shortlisted for the Miles Franklin Award and won the Nita B Kibble Award.
Annah and her husband live on Queensland’s Sunshine Coast and spend extended time in beautiful Tasmania.
Last Day in the Dynamite Factory is Annah’s second novel.
It’s Got Maribyrnong Written All Over It by David Wixted
Our War Effort – Life in Melbourne’s Western Suburbs, 1939–1945
Go West Young Woman! Munitions Diary 1985: Women and Work in Melbourne’s Western Suburbs compiled by Jenny Mitchell and Rod Faulkner, Melbourne’s Living Museum of the West, Melbourne, 1985, 2003
History of Munitions Explosives Factory Maribyrnong, 1910–1946
Fighting Fit in the Factory, Occupational Health & Safety Pamphlet
Australian Military Small Arms Ammunition Production 1888–2003 by David A Mayne CP Eng, MIE Aust, FRMIT
Albion Explosives Factory by G Vines and A Ward, 1988. Updated in 2005 for this project by O Ford and the Friends of the Black Powder Mill
The National Trust of Victoria
Extracts from unattributed personal stories found in the archives of the State Library of Victoria (with apologies to those unable to be identified)
Great effort has been made by the author to acknowledge all the people who contributed to the material in this book. Unfortunately I was unable to trace everyone, for which I apologise. My sincere thanks, nevertheless, for the information you have made available in the public domain.
About Last Day in the Dynamite Factory
Silence, Chris discovered, is easy. If nobody asks, you never have to tell.
Christopher Bright is a well-respected conservation architect, good neighbour and loyal friend. He has a devoted wife, two talented children and an old Rover. He plays tennis on Saturdays and enjoys a beer with his business partner after work.
Life is orderly, yet an unresolved question has haunted him for as long as he can remember: who is his birth father? Devotion to his adoptive parents has always prevented Chris from inquiring too deeply, but when one of them dies, explosive information from the past triggers a chain of events that rocks his closest relationships.
As light is cast on his father, attention turns to his birth mother. But when Chris goes in search of the person behind her photo, he encounters a conspiracy of silence. Determined to expose the truth, Chris finds the price of knowledge becomes increasingly costly.
Nevertheless, the truth must be told …
Or must it?
Also by Annah Faulkner
The Beloved
The Beloved
When Roberta ‘Bertie’ Lightfoot is struck down with polio, her world collapses. But Mama doesn’t tolerate self-pity, and Bertie is nobody if not her mother’s daughter – until she sets her heart on becoming an artist. Through drawing, the gifted and perceptive Bertie gives form and voice to the reality of the people and the world around her. While her father is happy enough to indulge Bertie’s driving passion, her mother will not let art get in the way of the future she wishes for her only daughter.
In 1955 the family moves to post-colonial Port Moresby, a sometimes violent frontier town, where Bertie, determined to be the master of her own life canvas, rebels against her mother’s strict control. In this tropical landscape, Bertie thrives amid the lush pallette of colours and abundance, secretly learning the techniques of drawing and painting under the tutelage of her mother’s arch rival.
But Roberta is not the only one deceiving her family. As secrets come to light, the domestic varnish starts to crack, and jealousy and passion threaten to forever mar the relationship between mother and daughter.
Tender and witty, The Beloved is a moving debut novel which paints a vivid portrait of both the beauty and the burden of unconditional love.
First published 2015 in Picador by Pan Macmillan Australia Pty Ltd
1 Market Street, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia, 2000
Copyright © Annah Lee Faulkner 2015
The moral right of the author has been asserted.
All rights reserved. This publication (or any part of it) may not be reproduced or transmitted, copied, stored, distributed or otherwise made available by any person or entity (including Google, Amazon or similar organisations), in any form (electronic, digital, optical, mechanical) or by any means (photocopying, recording, scanning or otherwise) without prior written permission from the publisher.
Cataloguing-in-Publication entry is available
from the National Library of Australia
http://catalogue.nla.gov.au
EPUB format: 9781743538524
Typeset by Midland Typesetters
Cover design: Debra Billson
Cover images: Richard Schultz/Corbis and Shutterstock.com
The characters in this book are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
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