As the Earth Turns Silver (20 page)

Katherine spent the weekend in bed, getting up only to go to the lavatory or have a cup of tea. Once she ate a little leftover bread and butter pudding cold from the meat safe. Another time she made a hot drink of lemon and honey. She felt weak, and went back to bed and slept.

Yung did not come. He knew she was sick, that she was grieving for her son. Why didn't he come? The least he could do was climb into bed and hold her. But she felt too sick to care. She slept. And slept.

On the Monday morning she rose and brushed her hair, bathed. Her head had cleared, though her throat still hurt. She felt lightheaded, as if her body needed to readjust to being upright, her legs learning to walk again. She drank a hot cup of lemon and honey, ate some porridge with sugar and no milk. Felt better.

She took a tram to the railway station, already more crowded than usual. As it travelled down Adelaide Road, she looked for the shop, tried to catch a glimpse of him through the shop window.

It was shut. Strange, she thought. When did they ever close except Sundays and public holidays? Could it be a feast day? She knew they closed for Chinese New Year. She leaned over to take another look, and stepped on a foot.

‘Sorry! Are you all right?'

‘Yes,' the woman smiled. ‘Are you going to watch the parade too?'

Katherine tried to smile back. ‘My son is embarking today,' she said.

‘It's so exciting, don't you think? I come and watch every parade. There's nothing like the bands and all the gallant young men. Don't they look fine in uniform?'

Katherine looked at her again and realised she was just a girl, perhaps the same age as Robbie and Edie.

They got off the tram together but quickly lost each other in the crowds. Katherine searched the rows of men in uniform and eventually found Robbie. As he moved off she followed him from Government Buildings along Lambton Quay, down Willis Street, Manners and Cuba, pushing her way through the people lining the street, following the sound of the Trentham bugle band, three brass bands, watching Robbie march, back straight, arms swinging in formation. The girl had been right. All the beautiful boys in their freshly pressed uniforms, their lemon-squeezers set at exactly the same angle, every step in time with every other, the rhythmic sound of hundreds of boots hitting the road, the hush of air in between. If only it was dress-ups and marching to the band, Katherine thought. And yet it was hard not to be caught up in the fervour as the men of the 14th Reinforcements, the engineers, the artillery and infantry, the men of the 4th Maori Reinforcements, all of them big brawny men – and Robbie, how he'd grown – marched past the waving, roaring crowds, down to the wharf, as they boarded, got rid of their kit, then surged over the decks.

The noise from shouting between ships and shore was terrific. All around a sea of handkerchiefs waving like victory flags. Everyone waving except for Katherine. Her handkerchief was too damp, and as she looked about her she realised most of the other handkerchiefs were white, waving madly as if an army of lunatics were declaring a truce but were all too excited to notice.

Katherine looked everywhere for Robbie and then found him standing on deck in the midst of hundreds of other boys – men: hundreds of men with their smiling, unafraid faces. He'd been so impatient to go overseas, to go on his big boys' adventure. Friday night he'd left to return to camp, his face flushed with excitement, to say goodbye to Wellington he'd said, maybe ride a night tram and look over the lights. Yet here he was looking out from the boat deck – and could she see correctly? Was that really him among the waving surge of soldiers, so very still, his expression flat, unsmiling?

She watched as the ships one after another slipped their moorings, as all around her the shouting and cheering intensified, as it throbbed and pulsed like one great heart beating. She waved, but Robbie did not raise his hand. She watched as tugs towed the ships out of the harbour, as the figures on deck got smaller and smaller until all she could see were specks of movement on little toy boats, now under their own steam, pouring forth their plumes of smoke. She watched as the background hum of the crowd dissipated, as snatches of conversation and tobacco smoke were replaced by gulls screeching and soaring and diving, by the smell of salt and fish.

Why didn't he wave?

The sky was fading, an appearance of winter warmth swallowed by late afternoon. She walked through town, avoiding the wet footpath outside fish shops, almost forgetting to listen and watch for trams, carts, motorcars. As she came up Adelaide Road she went into Paterson's. She didn't know what she'd have for dinner but the smell of fresh bread made her hungry.

Mr Paterson smiled at her. ‘He'll be all right, love. You just wait, he'll come home wearing a medal, that boy.' He passed her the loaf and gave her change. ‘Terrible thing next door, eh. Looks like it was a robbery . . .'

Katherine felt the colour drain from her face. She could see Mr Paterson's mouth moving, the white tips of his teeth as his lips parted, pursed, then closed and opened, the brightness of his eyes. ‘Where have you been? Friday night. Left the John for dead, he was. Dead. Used his own knife. The coppers were here but I couldn't really help them. First thing I knew was them knocking on the door . . . Two of them stood guard outside the shop right through to this morning.'

Which one? she wanted to ask. Which one did they leave for dead? But she was too afraid. He hadn't come Friday night . . . Saturday . . . Sunday . . .

Katherine walked out of the bakery and down the alley, her legs weak and wobbly as blancmange in summer. She opened the gate and walked across the yard to the back door, her thoughts flying ahead of her – what if, what if, what if, she's got to wake up now, please, please wake up, wake up! She stood at the door, next to the bags of vegetable trimmings, knocked, heard footsteps coming. She gasped as it opened, just a little.

Mr Wong, the elder, looked out and slowly opened the door, let her in.

Katherine could feel the words trapped in her mouth like small, fat birds. And then they spilled out, disembodied, shrill, flapping their wings in the air.

He shook his head, sat down at the table, face in his hands.

‘What happened?' Katherine's voice grew louder, more shrill. ‘Tell me for God's sake what happened!' She could feel her hands twisting in the air, her body, her voice out of control.

He didn't look up. ‘I come home and she clazy, clying. She hear bang door, call out, velly frighten. Velly quiet. She go downstairs. Yung lie in shop.'

Something crumpled inside her. She put her hand out, steadied herself on the table, sat down on a hard wooden chair. There it was. The loss of hope. No going back.

For a long time she was silent, but then she heard her own still, small voice asking, ‘Did anyone see who did it?'

He looked across at her. ‘No one see,' he said.

She hunched into her woollen coat, buried her face further into her scarf. She could not sleep and she could not wander at night from room to room. And so she walked.

She followed the routes she once walked with him, feeling his presence in every step. In every shadow. She knew she should find new paths but all she could see was the garden where he stole a rambling rose, or the gutter where she found the heart-shaped stone, the lamp post under which he swept the air on one of those nights of the comet.

Even darkness reminded her. Of his hair, his eyes, his lips on her throat.

The last time she saw him, she sent him away without a kiss or even a squeeze of the hand. No goodbye, no wave of a white handkerchief. She'd turned her back and hadn't seen him leave, just heard the click of the door as it shut.

She wished she could take it back. When he came to her, tried to embrace her, she wouldn't push him away. She'd take him. She'd rip off his shirt and she wouldn't care if a button flew off, if a sleeve tore from his shoulder. She'd fuck him. She'd make him pay. And pay. For dying. For leaving her when she still wanted him.

She'd take him to her bed and lie with him, her face nestled into his chest, her arm wrapped round his smooth body.

If only she could speak to him one more time. Smell him. Touch him.

He'd wanted her to join in celebrations for the Republic. She would have been the only white face, a sea of Chinese faces speaking an indecipherable tongue.

He'd wanted her to come for dinner. ‘I am very good cook,' he'd said. ‘Cook many dishes.' She'd looked at his earnest face, his slender, slightly trembling hands, and she knew it was true. He would have spent hours in the kitchen, preparing beautiful dishes.

He'd wanted to walk her home in daylight, for her to walk openly to his, to take the cable car together to the Kelburne Kiosk, to take Devonshire teas.

If only she could have changed his skin. But then who would he have been?

If only she could have spoken to him in his own language. If only he could have spoken freely. Fluently. ‘Do not let anyone steal from you that which is yours,' he would have said. She could almost see his face, almost hear his voice. ‘Never be afraid of language. You are your own master, Katherine. If you master language, you master a world.'

She had been walking for over an hour. Every step reminded her, every road seemed to lead to another and another, and there she was again, fleeing shadows.

And what was that fragrance? As if to torment her. She reached through darkness and touched the foliage as it tumbled over a wooden fence, the clusters of thin buds, the flowers like small stars. Once she would have picked a sprig, or perhaps he would have. She pressed her face into the leaves, the flowers; closed her eyes. So close, so far away – this black-hearted expanse of sky and the stars threading through it.

Always, it had been Yung who wrote to their parents, his characters flowing elegantly down the paper in even columns. Like a child learning to write, Shun could see the square each character should occupy on paper, each stroke building into a wall or roof or foundation, each word finished like a well-made house. But no matter how hard he tried, his own words seemed to collapse down the page like a village in an earthquake.

Before Yung came out, a village cousin had written Shun's letters, sometimes, like Yung, adding witticisms or lines of poetry that Shun had never heard of. But he had gone home seventeen years ago.

Today Shun walked Wai-wai to school. Just in case. He had several hours yet before he had to collect him. He left Mei-lin asleep upstairs. He could not leave her for long. Not even in daylight. In the evenings he did not go down Haining Street. He went to bed early. He took Mei-lin in his arms when she woke screaming.

Shun locked the back door, turned the handle and pushed. He looked at the milky sky, shrugged in his woollen coat and walked down the steps into light rain. He examined the yard, looked for any unexplained shadows, then walked through the gate and up the alley. He nodded to Mr Paterson through the window of the bakery. Mr Paterson nodded back. He paused on the street and gazed at the CLOSED sign hanging on the door, at the unsold fruit sitting in the window. Then, hands in coat pockets, he walked down Adelaide Road, around the Basin Reserve towards the city.

What would he write? He was the oldest. He was his
brother's keeper
. Wasn't that the phrase he had learned? He wiped his face. Even light rain accumulated over time.

A motorcar blew its horn and Shun jumped back into a puddle. He cursed, looked both ways along Tory Street, behind him and up ahead along Buckle. He crossed, breathing in the smoky exhaust, quickening his steps before an approaching tram, weaving behind a horse and cart. He passed Mount Cook Police Station, his feet squelching in his shoes, the bottom of his trousers wet against his ankles.

Yung's son was already on his way. He would not arrive in time. He would not see his father lowered into the grave.

Shun crossed the road and turned into Cuba Street. Fong-man's reputation as a calligrapher was not as great as Yung's, yet he was educated. He and Yung had shared poetry. He was Yung's best friend.

Fong-man was wrapping a cabbage when Shun walked into the shop. He looked up, nodded, handed the parcel to the woman and put her coins in the till. He called his son to come and serve.

Shun followed him out the back. He gazed at the spot on Fongman's head where the hair had thinned, where the paleness of his scalp showed through.

He did not know what to say.

Mr Wong, the elder, visited Katherine on the Thursday afternoon. He stood on the back porch and declined her invitation for tea. The funeral would be at 10.30 the following day, he said. At the Chinese Mission Hall in Frederick Street. Yung would be buried at Karori cemetery.

Katherine thanked him and watched him walk away. She could not see anything of Yung in his brother.

The next morning Katherine splashed cold water over her face. She bathed and put on her finest clothes – a cream dress and hat Mrs Newman had bought as a birthday gift from Kirkcaldie's.

At ten she put on her woollen coat and caught a tram to Lambton Quay. She could feel the damp in the air, the threat of rain, but she still climbed the staircase to the upper deck, gazing at the hills, at the smokestack towering from the cable car powerhouse at Kelburne. She watched the drift of smoke, its direction a weathervane for the city, and remembered Robbie's words before he walked into the night. ‘Mother, you know how I like a good southerly.' She wrapped her arms round herself. Shivered.

Light rain fell as she disembarked at Cable Car Lane. She bought a ticket and chose an exposed seat, alone, at the back of the trailer. The trailers were rebuilt Palace trams. This is what Robbie had told her. Why did she remember such meaningless facts? Why did she remember? She wiped the back of her hand across her eye and – through dark tunnels, over viaducts – watched the city fall away before her, the ring of the bell at Clifton, Talavera, Salamanca, past the windmill to the top of the hill, Upland.

Oh, the grandeur of the Kelburne Tea Kiosk: the twin turrets, the orange-tiled roof, the great windows and veranda.

‘Madam?' the conductor asked.

She roused herself and climbed down to the path, walked the short distance to the steps, the ornate balustrades, up past the white picket fence. She was relieved it was raining, that it wasn't Sunday. That the Kiosk was almost empty.

She gave up her coat at the desk, took a table by the windows and ordered two Devonshire teas.

The waitress brought a tray with pots of tea and hot water, a jug of milk, bone china tea cups with matching plates and saucers, silver teaspoons and knives, two large scones, and a bowl each of raspberry jam and whipped cream.

‘Should I come back?' the waitress asked. ‘The gentleman has not arrived?'

Katherine stared at the starched white tablecloth, at the bowl of sugar cubes. She closed her eyes, shook her head. Her lip trembled.

‘Are you all right?' the waitress asked.

She burst into tears, covered her face with her hands. She could not stop shaking. ‘Please . . .' she said at last, ‘just leave . . . the tea . . . here . . .'

She heard footsteps as the waitress retreated. She blew her nose. Looked out the window at the buildings of the city, the tiny wooden houses, the dark, lumpy green of Mount Victoria and the town belt; at the harbour, at Leper and Somes Islands, at the distant hills like layers of torn, grey paper – the darkest layer meeting the water, the palest disappearing into the milky sky. She watched a boat leave the wharf, move across and disappear behind Point Halswell on its way into the Heads.

She lifted her watch. Quarter to twelve. She sighed.

It was the first time she had taken tea at the Kiosk.

She took the teapot and poured. Added water from the other pot. Weak, black, unsweetened for him; white with one sugar for herself. It would be cold, but she didn't care. She cut the scones in half and spread them with jam and cream.

She gazed at the empty chair. At the cup of black tea, the scone with its swirl of cream over an ooze of jam. She lifted her cup to her lips.

*

Outside the Kiosk she took the bus, sat as it jolted over the rough, wet roads. She barely noticed the scarred landscape, passing trams, only the smell of engine oil, the groan as the bus struggled upwards, the graunch and jerk of the clutch and gears, her fingers gripping the seat as it turned corners, as it ran downhill.

She had come this way only once. A lifetime ago.

She disembarked into a puddle. The bottom of her cream dress now wet, ingrained with mud. She didn't care.

At the sexton's cottage she asked for directions. Did not look into the man's curious eyes.

All around the hills. Above and below the sweeping paths, row after row of gravestones, trees planted in disarray between them. Strangers. Lovers. Lives lived and forgotten.

The crowd was mostly black or grey haired, white garbed. Only a few dressed in black. She stood behind a tree and watched from a distance; could not hear anything but the wind rustling leaves, the soft patter of rain, birdsong. The smell of wet earth.

As they dispersed, his sister-in-law looked up.

Katherine waited until everyone had left. She gazed at the space where they had been. Do people leave something of themselves – more than memories – even when they are gone?

She took the tiny flowers from her coat pocket. They were bruised. They released their sad, creamy, pink-edged fragrance.

She walked towards him.