Gifts of the Peramangk

by Dean Mayes

  Then she turned away.

  Chapter 6

  Ruby rehearsed before her grandmother’s battered music stand, upon which sat an aged and worn book, bursting with additional pages and pieces of paper that had been taped and stapled to it. It represented the wealth of Virginia’s accumulated musical knowledge.

  She studied and performed the scales on the page, occasionally glancing at her grandmother for confirmation that she was playing them correctly. Virginia rarely verbalised her satisfaction or dissatisfaction with Ruby’s performance. Rather, Ruby took her cues from Virginia’s subtle nods, her facial expressions when she had gotten it right or wrong.

  They were a well worn method Virginia employed to ensure Ruby was focused for each lesson. Through them, Virginia could sense the most minute distraction in Ruby’s performance. So attuned was Virginia’s ear that any inattention on Ruby’s part would translate clearly through the sound of the bow across the strings. When this happened, Virginia would bow her head low and immediately halt the lesson. They wouldn’t resume until they had talked through whatever distraction Ruby might be holding on to that was affecting her technique.

  So it was disconcerting to Ruby that, despite her unspoken concern for her grandmother—which was affecting her performance—Virginia gave no indication that she disapproved of what she was hearing now. In fact, as her practise wore on, Ruby deliberately flubbed some notes, just so she could elicit some sort of reaction from her grandmother. Virginia remained unaffected. Her one functioning eye remained as distant as her glass one. A curious smile tugged at the corner of her lips. Moments passed by before Virginia eventually blinked, as though returning from somewhere far away and she continued listening without so much as a hiccup.

  It began to rankle Ruby.

  Her grandmother seemed more frail this evening. The lines on her face were etched deeper into her skin and she appeared pale and tired. Ruby noticed this more frequently and it filled her with worry. She sensed Virginia’s health was failing—that her grandmother was becoming more forgetful and the stoicism that was such a hallmark of Virginia’s character was crumbling ever so slowly.

  Uncle Rex’s increasingly erratic behaviour was surely weighing heavily. Ruby felt frustrated and powerless. She would never dare cross her Uncle Rex for fear of receiving the same sort of punishment he often meted out to Jeremy and Asher. Jeremy was able to defend himself but Asher was completely impotent in the presence of her father’s drunken tirades and she often bore the brunt of them.

  As far Ruby was concerned, she sensed that her uncle Rex hated her—her aunt Belle as well for that matter. Belle never uttered more than a few sentences to Ruby and when she did, it was only to criticise her. Uncle Rex was another proposition entirely. He harboured a dark dislike of Ruby and precluded her from anything related to the family. She did not understand what it was nor why, but he filled Ruby with dread. Virginia would inevitably become too frail to protect Ruby and once she was gone, what would become of Ruby then?

  Ruby shuddered and pushed the dark possibilities deep down inside her.

  “Ruby!” Virginia snapped unexpectedly, causing Ruby to jump and completely dislocate her bow.

  Virginia clucked disapprovingly and folded her arms.

  “Where were you then?”

  “I don’t know,” Ruby confessed, shaking off the dark thoughts.

  She looked at her grandmother and, without thinking, her eyes narrowed. Ruby shot back with “Where were you?”

  Virginia blinked, not expecting Ruby’s probing countenance. She feigned protest and indignation but then Virginia finally frowned, accepting that she had been pegged by her eight year old granddaughter.

  “I don’t know,” Virginia admitted wistfully.

  Ruby lowered her violin and rested it on the chair beside her.

  “Nana, are you alright?”

  Virginia blinked again, this time regarding Ruby with a defensiveness that wasn’t entirely convincing.

  “Of course I am,” she retorted. “What kind of question is that?”

  “I dunno,” Ruby responded, bowing her head. “You seem—tired.”

  Virginia clucked at the irony of Ruby’s suggestion. She patted the bed beside her, gesturing for Ruby to come and sit.

  “I am tired,” she admitted as she placed a protective arm around Ruby’s shoulder. “I don’t run around the way you kids do any more—full of beans and biscuits. My bones are old and creaky and my heart doesn’t tick like it used to.”

  “I didn’t mean it like that, Nana,” Ruby said solemnly.

  The way Ruby looked firmly and directly into Virginia’s eyes caught her by surprise and she fumbled for a response.

  “I—I think you should spend less time worrying about me and more time concentrating on your school work—if you want to make a go of it out there in the world.”

  “Nana,” Ruby countered. She wasn’t going to be deterred.

  Virginia sat up straighter and her chin jutted forward. But after mere seconds, she let her shoulders relax. The defiance seemed to dissipate and she patted Ruby’s shoulder reassuringly.

  “I’ll be fine, my pilta,” she said, leaning in closer to her granddaughter.

  There it was again, Ruby mused. Her grandmother’s funny words.

  She smiled awkwardly at Virginia and blushed. Virginia lifted her finger silently as if in question.

  “Possum,” Ruby answered, translating the curious phrase.

  Virginia smiled and nodded sagely, before patting her.

  “It just takes me a little longer to think things through. Doesn’t mean that I’m going to drop off the twig tomorrow.”

  “But what if something does happen, Nana?” Ruby pressed. “I’m worried what will happen to me.”

  This time Virginia drew back and eyed her granddaughter with gentle incredulity.

  “What do you mean by that?”

  “I mean—what will Aunty Belle and Uncle Rex do with me. I know they don’t like me. They won’t want to look after me if you’re not here. They definitely wouldn’t let me play violin if you weren’t here.”

  Ruby stabbed a finger at the violin laying on the chair opposite.

  Virginia shook her head swiftly.

  “That is not true, child. Both your aunt and uncle love you as much as their own children. They just don’t show their affection very often is all—even to the others.”

  Ruby wasn’t convinced by her grandmother’s contrivance and Virginia knew it.

  “That’s not true Nana—and you know it.”

  “Look,” Virginia continued firmly. “Your uncle Rex is going through…a bad patch at the moment, is all. And when he has too much to drink your aunty Belle and I have to make sure he doesn’t hurt himself or any one of you children.”

  “But he’s hurt us, Nana,” Ruby countered. “Jeremy especially…and Asher.”

  Virginia took a deep breath and nodded slowly. She knew there was no deceiving her granddaughter. Virginia had raised her too well.

  “Let’s just…” she began cautiously. “Let’s just worry about tomorrow when tomorrow happens alright. We need to find you a teacher who’ll be able to help you more than I can. I can only take you so far, Ruby. Eventually, if the violin is what you want to do, then we’ll need someone who can continue your journey.”

  Ruby grew downcast and she fidgeted with both hands in her lap.

  “How’s that ever gonna happen, Nana? You can’t afford the kind of lessons I’ll need. Aunty Belle and Uncle Rex won’t help. Let’s face it—I’m stuffed.”

  “Watch your language, young lady,” Virginia scolded her sternly.

  Ruby looked up at her grandmother apologetically and was relieved to find a little of the mischievous spark had returned to Virginia’s eyes.

  Virginia hugged Ruby close and pointed toward the violin.

  “Come on. Let’s get back to it okay? It’s almost your bedtime.”

  The following morning, the children rushed about ahea
d of Virginia, preparing themselves for school. As was usual, despite her faltering memory, Virginia’s adherence to routine was unfailing. She ensured they were awake early, dressed and their tummies full with breakfast, taking the reins from Belle who had retired to bed not long after coming home from her night shift. Rex, thankfully, had gotten away early, having secured several days worth of labouring work on a building site with Davo. As much as the children fussed and fidgeted—as they often did—Virginia’s relentless badgering of them ensured that they would leave the house on time.

  The value she placed on education was of paramount importance to her and she constantly drove that point home to each of the children. If they were ever to break out of the chains that bound them to their lives here, a good education was critical. And though they often protested, Asher and Ruby at least knew deep down she had a point.

  Jeremy was another proposition entirely.

  Ruby’s worry lingered long into the night and she had slept poorly after her lesson. As such, she was the worst of the three this morning, stumbling aimlessly to get herself prepared with Virginia constantly poking and prodding at her to get ready.

  Standing at the bathroom sink brushing her teeth, Ruby was struggling to keep her eyes open as a thick soup of random thoughts and worries passed through her mind.

  “Ruby,” Virginia snapped from the living room. “Hurry it up in there. You’re going to be late for school.”

  ‘School,’ she thought darkly. ‘That’s the last place I want to be right now.’

  “I’m coming, Nana!” she called.

  Though she enjoyed her classes, Ruby often saw them as a distraction that prevented her from concentrating on her music. The music program at school was mediocre at best, designed for students who were nowhere near the level Ruby was. As such, Ruby often became disruptive in the class and was routinely being sent home with notes from her teacher requesting that Virginia or Belle meet to discuss Ruby’s behaviour.

  Today was, very likely, going to be no different.

  Ruby leaned forward and spat into the basin, then rinsed her mouth with water. As she set the glass back on the window sill and put away her tooth brush, an object on the floor caught Ruby’s attention.

  Looking down, Ruby saw a black leather wallet lying on the tiled floor.

  She frowned and bent down to pick it up.

  Almost immediately, she realised it was her uncle Rex’s wallet. He must have dropped it.

  Holding it in her hand, Ruby’s curiosity teased at her. Checking to see that nobody was nearby, she opened the wallet.

  Inside, she found the usual paraphernalia: credit card, driver’s license—which she noted was currently suspended—and scraps of paper. Poking out from behind one of those scraps, Ruby caught sight of the edge of a photograph. Gently pulling the photograph out, Ruby gazed down upon the image of a young Aboriginal woman, posing beside a car.

  Ruby frowned. She didn’t recognise the woman in the photograph, although there was something familiar about her. She wondered who it was.

  The screen door at the front of the house slapped noisily shut and Ruby shook herself back to the present, realising that she had to get moving, otherwise Virginia would have a fit.

  Stuffing the photograph back in its place and folding over the wallet, Ruby quickly wiped her hands on a towel and prepared to dash from the bathroom.

  She threw open the door and ran headlong into her uncle who was standing right in the middle of the doorway.

  Ruby staggered back and fell in a heap on the floor.

  Rex immediately saw the wallet in her hand.

  “What are you doing with that!?” he growled angrily, his eyes going wide.

  “I’m sorry…I just…foun—” Ruby stammered.

  Rex snatched the wallet out of her hand and began checking through it.

  “Did you take anything from this?” he snapped, thumbing through the notes inside. “Did you!?”

  “N-no,” Ruby shook her head desperately. “I promise.”

  Rex stood over her, eye balling Ruby malevolently.

  “I’ll know if you’re lying.”

  Virginia appeared in the hallway then, brushing up past Rex with an exasperated look on her face.

  “For goodness sake, Ruby, what are you doing?” she probed in a harassed tone. “You’re going to be late.”

  Helping Ruby up off the floor in complete ignorance of her son, Virginia collected Ruby’s back pack from the lounge room and hustled her out the door where Jeremy and Asher were waiting by the gate, talking to Davo who was waiting in his utility truck.

  Rex stood in the hallway still checking to see if any of the contents of his wallet were missing. Virginia came back into the hallway as Rex turned around.

  “That little mongr—” Rex began angrily, before he was cut off by Virginia’s raised palm.

  “Don’t even think about it, Rex,” she warned. “You know full well she would never take anything.”

  Rex considered his mother for a moment. Then, without another word, he strode from the house and out the door.

  Ruby paced back and forth underneath the watchful presence of the Sir Walter Hughes statue on North Terrace.

  After another frustrating day, Ruby was as tired as she had been this morning when she’d left home. While the mysterious photograph in her uncle’s wallet had nagged at her consciousness, the greater concerns about her grandmother overtook her and she’d remained troubled by them. She had even considered skipping this trip into the city, but the pull of the hall and the music of the string quartet was enough to keep her in its grasp.

  As usual, Jeremy stood a little way off under the steps of the art gallery building, while he waited for Ruby to have her “talk” with the statue. As embarrassing as it might have been for him and as weirded out as he was by Ruby’s quirky little ritual, he had kind of become accustomed to it.

  Ruby stepped to the end of the stone platform upon which the statue’s column sat then turned, hesitating. She didn’t know what to say this afternoon, how to begin the conversation. There was so much swirling around inside of her that she felt impotent.

  “What is it, child?” the voice of Sir Walter asked voluminously.

  Ruby pursed her lips and twisted them into an odd angle.

  “I’m worried,” she said. “About all sorts of stuff.”

  “You’re carrying the weight of the world on your shoulders, my child. How could this be?”

  Ruby nodded, then squinted up at the face of the legendary figure.

  “I’m worried about my music—my violin—I’m worried about my nana.”

  “Mmm. Age catches us all eventually…” There was a pause as the breeze picked up around the base of the statue, like a weary sigh. “For some, its grip is much harsher than most.”

  Hughes’ sombre words hung in the air between them.

  “It’s getting harder for Nana to remember things,” Ruby continued. “Like when she is teaching me. She always makes sure I’m concentrating but lately, she’s not concentrating. It’s like, she’s not even in the room with me at all any more. I’m scared that soon, she won’t even be able to remember how to teach me.”

  “You love the violin very much, don’t you?”

  Ruby nodded earnestly and clutched her bag closer to her chest.

  “I love to play more than anything in the world. Nana says that we need to find a teacher who can take me on. But she can’t afford the kind of tuition I need. I don’t even know if there is anyone out there who would teach me—not where I live anyway.”

  “Surely it’s not as dire as that?”

  Ruby shrugged meekly. In her heart though, she knew that the odds were stacked against her.

  “No one is beyond suitability for learning, my child – no matter who you are or where you come from. If you have the desire to learn—a fire in your belly that drives you—then…you can prevail in your search.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” Ruby questioned a lit
tle too forcefully. The expression on the imposing features of Sir Walter Hughes’ visage gave nothing away.

  “Merely this…” Ruby waited expectantly for half a heartbeat longer. Sir Walter always liked to draw his explanations out. “That which you seek may well be closer than you think.”

  Chapter 7

  The crowded bar of the pub was raucous with conversation. A bank of TV screens hung in a row along one wall, spewing various sporting events—horse racing, greyhounds, Australian Rules Football, and rugby. Every available space seemed to be taken up with patrons. It was dark, save from the lights from the bar itself and the glow from the screens. The air was thick with a mixture of beer, cigarettes and perspiration.

  Its patrons ranged from working men, dusty tradesmen, factory workers and—though it was rare for this place—a smattering of business shirts and ties. In amongst these were groupings of unemployed bar flies in barely presentable clothing, gambling addicts who would leave their machines only to refill their glasses at the bar before returning to sink more coins into the slot, punters with one eye on TV broadcasts of horse races and the other on a crinkled newspaper turf guide. There were hard drinkers for whom beer was a daily constitution, if not an addiction itself. All of them mingled here in the soupy atmosphere of their ‘local.’

  In one corner of the main bar stood a pool table underneath a smoky, fluorescent light. A game was in progress and a sizable audience was gathered around it watching the progress intensely.

  Rex was armed with a cue, standing at one end of the table beside Davo, watching as another player leaned over the edge of the table at the opposite corner preparing to take his shot. Both Rex and Davo had been here for several hours, after a long and productive day on the building site.

  Davo had managed to talk to the foreman on the site about giving Rex another chance and after some consideration, the foreman relented. For whatever faults Rex might have had off the site, the foreman agreed he was a hard worker and a good labourer. Thus, he had given Rex the benefit of the doubt.