Gran smacked her hand. ‘Stop it, Margaret! Stop it! You’ll frighten Matthew.’
But Mother couldn’t be stopped. ‘When we were married, he was so handsome—’
‘And later so full of drink.’ Gran’s bitter remark stopped her.
‘But he wanted to live, to be well again. He became a shadow of all the things he had been. It was as if there was nothing there, just words, words that meant nothing.’
Gran soothed. ‘Yes, it’s awful when words mean nothing. When a whole life means nothing.’
‘Gran, where will Father go when he dies?’
His mother answered: ‘To Heaven, Matthew. Everyone who dies goes to Heaven.’
‘Don’t lie to him, Margaret. We don’t know where the dead go. After life there may very well be nothing. Which means that since we only have this life we need to make the best job we can of it.’
Matthew felt no sorrow for his father but his mother’s hysteria and Gran’s efforts to diminish the effects of her fear on him frightened him. When a person died it was different from an animal dying. When a bird died, a yabby or the little trout or the rooster, other animals did not gather around and weep and scream and remember the past or fear the future. The animal died and all other living things just continued. There must be something different about a person dying, something to do with afterwards—perhaps the nothingness, the blackness, the ghost that dripped blood or wept for things wanted and denied.
Gran spoke to Grandfather. She had some sort of key to the shadows which clung to life, but what was Grandfather and where did he wander while he waited for her to call him? Did he rush about like the poor beheaded rooster seemingly alive but really dead? It was a ghastly image—the headless demented dead running always in circles.
He could remember. He could wonder what would happen in the future. When you were dead did all this cease? Could you only run around in the same place, at the same time, like on Sunday night at eleven o’clock when you died? Was that nothing? To never remember anyone like Edward or Gran or Mother, to never wonder what would happen next? It was horrible. He shuddered. He longed for Edward to be there, to pick him up and run with him along the beach where the only shadows were those deeper blue streaks cast by clouds whisking across the sea.
Gran pulled him up from his chair and put her arms about him. ‘It’s all right, darling. It’s truly nothing for you to worry your little head about. It’s better your father dies. His life had become nothing. And when there is only nothing it’s better …’
She rocked him gently. ‘Come now, darling. Gran’ll tuck you up and sing you a little song. You’ll like that.’
He nodded because he did not want to hurt her. But he shrank from listening to the sad Irish songs which wept around the room craving the dark night. There were too many shadows in his life. He longed again for Edward, for his light.
Edward came in the morning, large and bulky like a heavy winter sweater dried and warmed before the fire. His step was solid. Matthew ran to him and Edward picked him up, slung him across his shoulder and then swung him back to the ground. Matthew held his hand and felt the bones and sinews of his wrist and the muscle that flexed his arm.
Edward sat down and held him in the crook of his arm and Matthew leaned against him and smelt the saltiness of Edward’s jacket. Edward always smelt of the sea, although sometimes Matthew also sniffed the oiliness of ships on his hands. They were outside smells, the comfortable routine smells of the day.
Gran and Mother were busy, mysteriously going in and out of Father’s room with bowls of water, towels and clothes. Edward asked if they needed help. Gran shook her head. ‘He isn’t heavy. There was nothing of him at the end.’ Matthew looked away, longingly, towards the door.
‘Then I’ll cut some wood. Come on, Matthew. I’ll cut wood and you can collect the eggs and pick some vegies.’ They went out together.
‘Let’s water the tomatoes, Edward.’
Edward looked surprised: ‘If you like.’
Matthew filled the can to the brim. ‘I can’t lift it,’ he said.
Edward laughed. ‘Silly, empty some out.’
‘Won’t you help me?’
‘Of course.’ And Edward reached for it while Matthew stood firm, clinging to the handle, his little hand tiny beside Edward’s.
‘You let go and I’ll carry it.’ Reluctantly Matthew released his grasp.
‘That’s better. Now I can lift it. Otherwise I’d have to crouch down and hop along at your height.’ He laughed again and swung off while the water slopped from side to side in the can and occasionally flopped over the edge. Matthew trotted beside him. ‘Can’t I help carry it?’
‘We’ll be there in a second,’ said Edward, as he tipped the can so that water splashed along the row of plants. ‘Pick some, Matthew.’ Matthew, seeking the reddest of the fruit, twisted it off the bush and smelled the wet earth, wet tomato smell of the growing plants. He held it and saw the redness of its skin deepen the pink of his hand. It was as if he had held his hand up to the sun and seen the light shine through his closed fingers, rosy, delicate, infused with the life busily functioning inside.
‘Eat it, Matthew. Go on. Tomatoes are best off the bush.’
But Matthew shook his head. He couldn’t break that surface, skin perfect, and watch the redness ooze out.
Mother worked all day making black dresses for herself and Gran. ‘Black,’ Edward said. ‘Not for you, Margaret.’ And Margaret dabbed at her eyes. ‘My
