The Blue Mile

by Kim Kelly

  Shhhh. Wait until she’s here, for the details. Get in with her private secretary if possible: I have her name too, a Miss Isabel Crowdy. But for now, I’d better interrupt my dreaming and get cracking on the practicalities, draw up the pattern for that jacket. Reception’s on Saturday. The streets will be aflutter with hoorah bunting and flags as their ship comes in. The thirty-first of May. Really? It will be June on Sunday. No . . .

  I release the yawn, a great big lion yawn, and look out the window, to the sliver of sky I can see through the glass roof from here. It’s not yet half-past four, but it’s getting dark, and I don’t know how I’m going to get everything done that needs doing. I’ve got Glor’s engagement frock to finish before I cut any jacket pattern. Only the collar to do, on the floatiest copper-shot chiffon chemise, gaspingly backless, but it’s a pernickety thing, bands of bronze and lapis and scarlet baguette beads. Worth it, though: she’ll look like Queen Nefertiti gazing out from her barge on the Nile. Or the lawns of Waverley Tennis Club, at least. And I won’t be able to get out of that party – tomorrow night – that’ll be at least four hours’ interruption to vice-regal jacket enterprise. I’m yet to go through my sketchbooks too – or should I design entirely new creations for Lady Game? A dozen or so . . . I should most certainly get a sandwich down at the Aristocrat before I do or think another thing – before they close for the evening, too.

  Don’t know how I’m managing at all, in fact. I look at the stockroom door as I grab my handbag off the coat stand and wonder if I might slip a little trundle bed in there, don’t tell the Jabours I even thought that. But even the ferry to and fro seems a loss of time I can’t afford. And I can’t afford it: who knows how long these charmeuse dreams will stay afloat? I’m stitching myself an ark against it. Most nights I don’t have time to remember I’m alone to even miss Mother. Which reminds me: the baby is arriving sometime around August – God, I should make it something, too. Shouldn’t I. Perhaps not; it’ll have plenty of attention otherwise, won’t it. Regardless, if things keep up, as I surely hope they will, I’m going to have to start thinking about getting a girl in to help me here. Who though? I don’t want to work with a stranger, or some middling thing waiting for marriage. I don’t want to work with some – some seamstress.

  I laugh aloud at my own snobbery. As if every great designer doesn’t start out slaving over the nuts and bolts of their craft. Perhaps I’ll find a girl who wants to be inspired. I’ll word my advertisement somehow to attract one, an apprentice of some kind . . .

  Someone like me . . .

  I catch sight of my reflection in the window as I look up from the clasp of my cape: same neglected crop of tempest on my head in need of a hat, same schnonk in need of a low brim, but how far I have come otherwise, and in such a brief time. I have more than six casually crumpled pounds in my purse, for a start. I don’t even need our Lordship’s pittance. I can ignore him back: that is so very satisfying, it makes my fears of having his disregard for me exposed for all the world to see seem small, some forgettable unsnipped squiggle on the hem of my life. Makes the opinions of Cassie Fortescue and the Ladies College set seem laughable, whatever they might be, some long ago, little girl insecurity.

  It’s incredible to me now that I could ever have felt inferior to a girl who spends her Saturday nights sipping fizzy gins at the Merrick cabaret – which are fizzy not from soda, Liz Hardy let a whisper slip to me, but from cocaine. She told me that the funsters threw a mammoth party in the Jazz Room after one of the Randwick races – some horse called Phar Lap won it, taking in almost twenty-five thousand pounds, who would believe – and Liz said wild was not the word: they danced so hard they almost did tear up the floor. They get this fizzy ‘snow’ through Customs House, right under the Commissioner’s nose – a nose which belongs of course to Cassie’s Denis’s daddy. She’s leading Min astray, too. Poor Min: her response to her ditching appears to have been to make herself as silly as her cousin, and they both look like showgirls, satin and sequins from some faux bohemian designer of haute catastrophe in the Imperial. La Boutique, it’s called.

  I open the salon door and a blast of chill air shooshes up through the arcade as I step out. La Boutique – whoever heard of anything more revoltingly chi-chi? Revenge: it really can best be served with one’s enemy entirely oblivious to it. But good God, isn’t the Imperial going downhill –

  Going what?

  Something small, dark and fast hurtles towards me. Wanting to get through me.

  And I just about sail head over celluloid heels.

  Yo

  ‘You don’t play rugby, do you, Eoghan?’ Mr Adams asks me as we’re heading home up Darling Street, just as he’s about to turn off before me down Adolphus. ‘League?’ he specifies.

  I don’t think I’ll ever believe that he asks me questions such as these. It should be more than plain to him by now that sport is not my strength: can’t bat, can’t bowl, don’t care, and no, I wasn’t interested in getting struck out or whatever it is I did at that game of baseball last Sunday afternoon either, but I did it anyway, just to disappoint and prove I am shitful at any sports. I have to tell him this time, a bit more forcefully: ‘Sorry, I’ve got two left feet there.’

  Not that I’d know about rugby league; I’ve never played any kind of football and I am not about to be talked into it now, regardless of what it might be raising funds for on this Sunday. Not football or boxing or any of them sports that require bashing, or getting one, and the Irish do it more convincingly than most. When you’ve been employed as a punching bag regularly, I suppose some just aren’t inclined to want to do it of a weekend for their entertainment. I’ve never hit anyone, as much as I might find myself wanting to at times; I don’t think I ever could.

  I think Mr Adams picks up something of that, my never wanting trouble of any kind, and he doesn’t press the point this time, thankfully. I don’t ever want to say no to him. He waves: ‘All right then, good enough. Slán then, goodnight.’

  ‘Yeah, see you. I’ll go hard on the lamingtons instead, yeah?’ I tell him and he nods. I shove my hands deeper into my pockets as I walk on, somehow hoping this action might do something against the wind. Jesus, this wind is into me today. It’s been that bad over the last few weeks, six have thrown it in, more than what quit after Nipper Addison fell, they just don’t turn up for shift: sorry, this job is too fucking monkey-nutted. Why am I never one of the lads sent dollying on the inside of a chord, ay? That’s supposed to be the worst place to be for the lack of air, but I’d like to try it. Just the once, never mind the few bob an hour extra for confined spaces. I’m too fucking good at catching, aren’t I. At least I can say I am learning, though. I am learning well the principle of physics that says the trajectory of a flying white-hot cock will remain steady while other forces of nature are attempting to lift the skin off your face. When I get in, I’ll be smothering this face with Ponds Cold Cream, like a woman. Ag thinks that’s the funniest thing in the world. It’s not funny. A half-skinless face: it fucking hurts. And this jacket is shitful: more than a pound it cost me, naval surplus, and it’s doing fucking nothing for me.

  Less when I turn down Fawcett and the wind picks up like it’s come tearing in off the ocean, through the heads, down the harbour and found this one little lane in Balmain is the best place to go.

  And there’s a woman standing in the middle of it. Outside my house. Grey coat done up to her ears, she looks about as happy as me.

  ‘Is that Mr O’Keenan?’ she says as I near.

  ‘Yes,’ I say, wary. There’s something about her, like an undertaker or some other grim thing, though I can’t see much more of her than her eyes, sharp and brown and wrinkled at the edges.

  ‘Mrs Merridale,’ she puts her hand out for me to shake it. A black glove; leather.

  I don’t take it; I say: ‘What can I do for you?’ But I’m looking at my front door, hoping Ag’s got the fire on.

&n
bsp; ‘Your sister, Agnes . . .’ this Mrs Merridale starts and I look at her: You are not going to tell me something has happened to my sister. She says: ‘I am an officer of the Child Welfare Department.’

  I don’t know how it is I remain standing upright: They’ve taken her?

  This Mrs Merridale goes on: ‘Your sister has, I’m afraid, run away.’

  Thank you, Lord: not taken. ‘Run away?’ I say: that doesn’t seem possible: ‘Why would she run away?’

  ‘Hm.’ This Mrs Merridale bites her lip. ‘May I come inside?’

  I show her in; show her I’ve got nothing to hide. The first thing I see are the cushions Ag made for our sagging old sofa: they’ve got a pattern of red and yellow chickens on them. This is a happy home. Clean and tidy, food in the cupboards, and we have a bookshelf, with books on it, fourteen of them: Ag is reading The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, she’s nearly finished, Dorothy’s following the soldier girl in to see Glinda the Good Witch. She reads it out to me when I get in from not being blown off the Bridge. She’s done her Communion: look at the print of her there on the bookshelf, smiling proud in her white dress and veil, with all the other girls at St Gus’s. Jesus, but the anger bites me with the stinging of my face: ‘You’ll see there’s nothing to run away from here.’

  ‘I’m sure there’s not, Mr O’Keenan,’ this Mrs Merridale smiles above her collar, with some apology in it. ‘This is a good home, I can see that. And Agnes is a good little girl. You have done nothing wrong – no need to be alarmed.’

  ‘No need?’ I nearly yell it at her: ‘You’re telling me my sister’s run away. Why has she done that, then?’

  ‘Well, er, I was called to the school today to observe her condition and to interview her, on behalf of the Department.’

  ‘What? What for?’

  ‘There was a complaint made, of child neglect –’

  ‘Who by?’

  ‘I am not at liberty to say, other than to tell you that it was a concerned member of the community.’

  ‘Concerned?’ I’ll bet I know who it was: that Nettie Becker, always keeping an eye on me, through her front curtain, through the back palings. I would like to show her a bit of concern, right through the fucking stone wall between us.

  The Welfare woman’s face goes as red as mine. ‘Well, perhaps an unnecessarily concerned member of the community. I’m terribly sorry, Mr O’Keenan. It has become clear to me that this was an unwarranted complaint. I have since interviewed Agnes’s teacher, and the Hanrahan family, and several other members of the community, to ascertain that Agnes is a well-cared-for and healthy child.’

  ‘So why has she run away?’ And where to? Not with the Hanrahans? Maybe she’s gone round to Mrs Adams, or she’s with Mrs Buddle, and I’ve just walked straight past her. But: ‘Why? Why would she run away?’

  ‘Hm.’ The Welfare woman bites her lip again. ‘Well, er, it’s difficult to be absolutely certain, but when I introduced myself to her this morning, she just went whoosh,’ she waves her hand at the hearth as if Ag might have slipped up the chimney, ‘right out of the room – ran for her life. This did of course seem rather odd, until my further investigations, with the Department and other members of the community, including Father O’Reagan at St Augustine’s, revealed to me your previous and less fortunate circumstances. I’m afraid I might have frightened her off.’

  Might have? Why wouldn’t she have run away from you, you fucking Welfare witch? Jesus, Aggie. I tell this woman: ‘Now you can go and find her.’

  ‘Yes, er,’ she says. ‘We have two policemen searching the locality as we speak.’

  And Ag won’t run for her life again when she sees a cop coming for her, will she. I look at the door and tell her with my silence: Get out. Thousands of kids starving across the city and the government spends money it doesn’t have on wages for this horseshit, when it could pay the dole in decent food and put a tax on grog to cover it. A bolt of something ice cold goes through me: if it hadn’t been for those standing up for us, Ag might have been pinched straight from school, and I’d now be banging on the courthouse doors at Surry Hills begging for her back. Mother of God, but she’d better be all right.

  The Welfare woman says: ‘Yes. Well. I’m sure there will be a satisfactory resolution. Ah . . .’ Her steps are quick ahead of mine: ‘Good evening, Mr O’Keenan.’

  I slam the door behind us both and I don’t stop to kick her up the arse. I start running back up Darling Street. Jesus, Ag, please be safe. Please don’t have fallen off the rubble wall down at the park, or from under the ferry wharf, if that’s where you’re hiding. Please don’t have been pinched by someone even less interested in your welfare. Please be where I think you are . . .

  Olivia

  ‘I couldn’t . . . find the . . . right . . . shop,’ Agnes gulps through her tears when I finally get her to speak to me.

  ‘Oh . . .’ I see, looking behind me at the salon, its change of name, change from gilt to black and white. ‘You didn’t recognise the shop. Oh, you poor little sweetheart.’ That doesn’t explain why she’s here, however, and in such distress. When I caught her and shrieked: Agnes? I thought she might tremble to pieces with shock. I ask her: ‘Tell me, what’s frightened you?’

  ‘The Welfare lady,’ she wails, but so softly, a tiny kitten wail. ‘And then I got . . . lost. I went round and round and I couldn’t find you . . .’

  She is as edible as ever, in her navy serge tunic, boots polished to a shine and a red ribbon in her hair, which has grown, tempest tied back in a little fat plait: Wynn’s Family Drapery would want her in the window for Back to School orders. But why does she want me? ‘Agnes, you’re quite safe now, it’s all right, but why are you here?’

  She mewls again, so that I am compelled to hold her to me, and as I do she sobs over my shoulder, for the whole arcade to hear: ‘Don’t let them take me away from Yoey.’

  ‘I won’t let them do that, Agnes. I promise you,’ I say, rubbing her little shoulders, ‘Shhhh,’ as if I could possibly have fairy princess powers enough to erase whatever dreadful thing has happened.

  When she’s finished sobbing, she sniffs, and raises those glorious blue eyes from the ground. ‘I like your shoes, miss.’

  God, but I could eat her up; I say: ‘I like yours too, Agnes.’ I even remember your surname: O’Keenan. Like it was yesterday. Eoghan O’Keenan: what’s happened? I stand up and hold out my hand, and my head spins a little as I do. I really must eat something. ‘Sweetheart, shall we go and sort this out over a sandwich?’

  She nods, takes in a steadying breath, ‘Yes, please, I’m hungry too,’ and she takes my hand.

  We take the stairs, her clammy little hand in mine, and my mind boggles at this odd event, this strange stopping of time. A tingling up and down my spine, and Glor raises an eyebrow as she spies us going past the Emporium. Her eyes follow us, with the question, as she pops a bolt of her father’s finest bebe pink lingerie Fuji back up on the shelf above the sideboard. Where I spy the brass bottle, glass rubies and sapphires winking at me, as Mr Jabour’s great booming laugh releases at some joke his customer has just shared with him.

  The gilt bands on the turnings of the verandah posts outside spin like carousel poles, and I know in this moment, mad with honking horns and clopping hooves and thousands of rushing souls, that the wheel of my world is wobbling once again, magic-carpet laughter carrying us out into the street.

  Yo

  I shouldn’t have sent her to the public school, should I. Desperately spoon-headed as this notion is, it’s a good measure of how desperate I am.

  ‘She will be found, Eoghan,’ Mr Adams says, and his firm hand on my shoulder is doing nothing to ease it.

  ‘Don’t you worry, lad, I won’t cease praying until she is safely home,’ Mrs Adams’s kind sunshine face assures me too. ‘Not for a second.’ Their Kenny is banging something in his room upstairs; but it’
s true: she won’t stop praying for a second.

  ‘Go back and wait,’ says Mr Adams. ‘There’s no good you being here when she gets in.’

  ‘No.’ That’s true, too. Everyone’s out looking for Ag: Tarzan and Clarkie, and Brother Francis from St Gus, the whole neighbourhood of Balmain East, and her teacher, Mrs Shipley, she’s got her brother going round in his car, up as far as Iron Cove bridge. Plus the two cops knocking on doors everywhere in between. I can only go back and wait, and pray ceaselessly. Jesus, but it’s nearly six o’clock and it’s moonless black out there. Please, look after her.

  Mr Adams sees me back down his hall and lowers his voice as he assures me of something else: ‘Don’t go near the Beckers. Shut your door, forget them. It will be taken care of.’

  He adds something in his Ulster Gaelainn to the promise but I don’t know what it means, and I don’t want to know. Stupid woman. It was her: took her a while but she found someone to listen to her, and that Welfare woman told Mrs Shipley, who’s friends with Clarkie’s sister, and now it’s all over town, from Birchgrove to Rozelle and up the Parramatta River. Whatever’s coming to Nettie Becker, it’s a lesson against spite, and it won’t be nice. It’ll be the long arm of Mr Sturgess, her landlord as well as mine, taking the care of it somehow, I’ll bet. How could she be such a . . . Such a stupid bitch.