Caroline rang on Tuesday morning to say that she wouldn’t be bringing Becky next Friday.
‘You looked so tired last week, Mother. I don’t think it’s being fair to you. It’s no trouble to take her with me. She enjoys playing with the other children.’
‘But I really like having her.’
Ella knew there was little use in arguing with Caroline when she was acting for one’s good.
‘It really is too much for you,’ she said firmly. ‘You should think of yourself more.’
Ella mastered disappointment and said brightly, ‘See you Sunday, then.’
There was a pause in which she grew nervous.
‘I’m sorry. We really can’t make it on Sunday. There’s a family party for the Vorschaks, for their golden wedding. You do understand, don’t you? We have been neglecting them. I feel quite guilty about it.’
‘Of course, dear.’
As she put down the phone, she thought sadly, I am no longer interesting.
It was bound to happen sometime. They had their own lives to lead, after all. Twelve whole days without Becky – Sophie wasn’t going to like that either.
David brought the car on Wednesday afternoon. He parked in the driveway and tooted the horn, while Martha, who had followed in the old Holden, stopped in front of the house and came to join him. Ella hurried out beaming, greeted the car with love and refrained from stroking the bonnet.
‘We’re here too, Mum.’
Ella reached up to kiss his cheek.
‘I’m glad to see you. I want to talk to you about Sophie.’
David and Martha stared at each other.
‘So do we. I’ll put the car away, you go and start the coffee, eh?’
Martha came with Ella to the kitchen and got down cups and saucers in unusual silence. There was no conversation until David came in and they had cups of coffee in front of them.
‘You first, Mum.’
‘I was hoping you’d talk to your father about Sophie. Ask him to make some sort of gesture, take her to lunch or write to her, tell her he misses her – something. You’ve no idea how bitter and hostile she is. He has increased the maintenance. That’s all right now. But she says she doesn’t want to take his money. He just has to make an approach, show her he loves her …’
‘I don’t quite see Dad doing that, Mum.’
Martha said, ‘Men of your father’s generation were discouraged from showing emotion. That was one of the evils of sexism. Women weren’t supposed to think and men weren’t supposed to feel.’
‘He seems to have picked up the knack.’
David, too, sounded bitter and hostile.
‘You don’t understand how bad this is. If you’d seen how she looked at Louise …’
‘When did she see Louise?’
‘Oh, that’s nothing. She called in to get some papers.’
She noted with surprise that indeed it was nothing.
Martha muttered, ‘What nerve!’
‘It was the way Sophie acted, the way she looked at her. I didn’t think Sophie could look like that. I don’t care how hard he finds it, it’s his responsibility and he has to face up to it.’
‘Yes, Mum.’
David’s thoughtful expression reminded her that she had never been so bold when the man was in residence.
He added, ‘I’ll talk to him about it,’ in a tone which promised nothing.
‘I think it’s one reason she’s so obsessed with this film. She’s neglecting all her school friends. She isn’t acting her age at all.’
Again, there was an exchange of glances.
Martha’s eyes said ‘Now’ and David’s ‘Yes’.
‘That’s what we wanted to talk to you about. Sophie’s boss – that’s Roberta Tressider, the film woman?’
‘Yes?’
‘Mum. She’s a dyke.’
‘I thought that was a sea wall in Holland. There was a story about it in the school reader, the little boy who put his finger in the hole in the dyke.’
David answered in a controlled voice, ‘Not little boys, Mum. Little girls.’
Martha said angrily, ‘Don’t make fun of your mother. You shouldn’t have used that awful word. If you mean lesbian, say lesbian.’
‘All right. Calm down. I’m embarrassed, talking to Mum about sexual perversion. But we thought you ought to know.’
Ella could no longer refuse the message.
‘I knew, whatever it was, it wasn’t a sea wall in Holland. I just didn’t want to know.’ She added sadly, ‘She’s so nice.’
‘There’s nothing against a lesbian being nice,’ said Martha.
‘Are you sure?’
‘Yes. Max knows a friend of hers and he told Max. There’s no secret about it. She lives with this woman poet, they’re quite open about it.’
‘I don’t know what I can do about it.’
David was shocked.
‘But do you think you should have her here around Sophie?’
Ella paused, as if for reflection, then said, ‘I’m sure she’d never harm Sophie.’
‘She wouldn’t think it was harming her.’
Moral decisions. She had thought she was done with them. You did your best and then wondered for the rest of your life if you’d done the right thing.
No help for it. Here she went again.
‘If I’d known in the first place, I suppose I wouldn’t have encouraged her to come here, but it’s too late now. I can’t do anything about it now.’
And Rob wouldn’t do anything to hurt me.
‘But Sophie’s at risk!’
‘I don’t suppose it’s catching.’
‘I don’t think this is a matter for joking, Mum.’
‘If it was a man … say a married man, I’d have questioned it, bringing him here. If it was her boss and a married man, yes, I’d have objected. But I’d have asked. That’s it. I’d have seen to it that she knew the situation, if he was hiding a wife – I can see, I did take her on trust and I suppose that was a mistake. However.’
Martha was changing position.
‘They see each other at work, David. If Ella says she can’t come here, it’s the old story of forbidden fruit, isn’t it? Ella will be worrying whenever she comes home late.’
David looked sulky.
‘This isn’t a debate. All I know is, Sophie’s at risk. The woman’s her boss, it’s a power position. Having her here is like giving approval, condoning it. Mum,’ he said with anguish, ‘how would you feel if Sophie went that way?’
‘It’s Sophie’s risk,’ she answered wearily. Moral decisions were a tiring business. ‘I can’t face it for her.’
Martha had been following the same train of thought. Did Sophie love that job so much that she could … ? It was up to Sophie.
‘Plenty of women have to leave their jobs because the boss is a chaser. And probably men have trouble with women bosses, too. It’s not a matter of being male, female or homosexual, it’s a matter of being a chaser. And if she is, I don’t think she’d be coming to this house,’ said Martha.
‘She’s a bit young to be alone with it.’
‘She’ll be nineteen next month. You wouldn’t have thanked me to be choosing your friends for you at nineteen.’
‘That’s different.’
The two women started at him and said in unison, ‘In what way?’
David looked from one to the other and retired into dignified silence.
‘All I can do is make sure she knows the situation. I’ll ask her about it when she comes home.’
David looked at his watch.
‘I suppose that won’t be long. We’d better be off. No point in our being here and mixing in.’
‘She’ll have to know where the information came from.’
‘Yes,’ said Martha. ‘Tom Harrison to Max, to Caroline, who rang me yesterday.’
There was something in Martha’s tone as she spoke Caroline’s name which made Ella uneasy. But Martha had confessed she was jealous of Caroline.
‘I’m with you, Ella,’ Martha said as they were leaving. ‘I think you are taking it the right way.’
‘Thank you, dear, and thanks for bringing the car.’
She could not thank them for the information.
Ella was checking the casserole in the oven when Sophie came in by the kitchen door and dumped her shoulderbag on to a chair, saying, ‘What’s for dinner, Mum?’
‘Chicken and mushroom. Sophie, did you know Rob was a lesbian?’
Sophie stood for a moment absolutely still, then relaxed and said, ‘Yes. I know she is and she knows I’m not. Okay?’
Ella nodded.
‘So long as you know.’
‘It’s no secret.’ Sophie relaxed further, moved her bag to the floor and sat down. ‘She lives with this woman poet who gives her a pretty bad time, I think. Not that she’d talk to me about it, of course.’
This was the awkward moment.
‘You don’t think … you don’t ever get the idea that she might have designs on you?’
Ella was embarrassed. Sophie shouted with laughter.
‘Good Lord, no.’ Then she sobered. ‘I just did feel a bit uneasy about the shirt and the necklace from Hong Kong. And she must have seen it, for she said, “I’m not courting, dear. It’s just a thank you for all the overtime.” I felt very silly, I can tell you.’
‘No need to feel silly. You were quite right to be uneasy and to show it.’
‘Well, she put me straight on that and I don’t think she took it wrong.’
A less personal present might have been a more suitable thank you for overtime.
‘Don’t leave your bag and your boots there, dear.’
Sophie pushed the objects under her chair.
‘I’ll take them up when I check on the mice. I’m glad you know, Mum. I didn’t like to tell you because it seemed like making too much of it. But I’m pretty sure she likes to come here to work because it’s such a bad situation. They say this Liz is so jealous she makes Rob’s life a misery. She comes here to work in peace.’
‘Don’t be too trusting, Sophie.’
‘Look, she’s a wonderful boss and brilliant and I’m learning so much from her. And I don’t think about the other thing. It’s messy and tragic and I’m sorry about it. Apart from that it isn’t my business.’
How odd that lesbians could torment each other just like normal married people.
Sophie picked up her bag and her boots.
‘Don’t be too long. Dinner’s about ready.’
‘Ten minutes.’
At the table, Sophie said, ‘Speaking of Rob, she gave me the sixty dollars for William’s food. Many thanks and let her know if it isn’t enough. William will be here next week, maybe next Wednesday. I’ll get the room ready at the weekend.’
‘I forgot to tell you the car’s back. David brought it this afternoon.’
‘Great. And the information about Rob? I thought it was probably Caroline.’
‘She rang David.’
‘How very odd.’
‘They can’t help being worried about it, you know. David is most upset.’
Sophie frowned over this and chewed in silence.
‘You can tell him it isn’t catching.’
Ella looked back at the argument and said with astonishment, ‘As a matter of a fact, I did.’
Sophie smiled broadly.
‘Good for you, Mum. I’d like to have seen his face. Getting very narrow-minded, the old David.’
Her smile became a private chuckle.
‘What are you laughing at?’
‘Mum, if Rob was prospecting, it wouldn’t be for me, it’d be for you.’
‘Sophie!’ Ella gaped and blushed, not finding words to comment on that insanity.
‘Fact. She thinks you’re marvellous. She said Dad must have a head full of sawdust to give up someone like you. Which is the utter truth, of course.’
‘That’s very kind of her, but it doesn’t mean what you’re making of it.’
‘Watch your step, that’s all,’ said Sophie with an air of deep solemnity.
‘You are being absurd.’
She smiled, however, with pleasure at Rob’s praise, while Sophie giggled at her own daring.
Ella woke sharply at 3 in the morning to a voice saying, ‘You can’t go by the look of things. You can’t take anything on trust. You thought David was happy. You thought that one was faithful. You were fooled. The way Sophie acts with her, sunning herself …’
Another voice spoke, reasonable and calming, ‘She’s just proud of being part of something important.’
‘How much does she have to do with the script? She’s the messenger, the property girl and the listening post.’
Her dislike of the mice surfaced as a small, live grievance.
‘Perhaps a listening post is important. She may be listening and learning. You’ve always wanted her to show more ambition. She isn’t fooling herself. She says Rob comes here to work in peace.’
‘Doing research. Working in peace. That’s the sort of thing you fall for every time. You’ve encouraged her, cooking special dinners, taking in mice – you couldn’t have stopped it but you didn’t have to encourage her.’
Summoning up faces was a dangerous pastime, but when Rob’s face came to her mind, all doubts vanished, until the voice began again, ‘You can’t go by appearances …’
There was no reason for this debate ever to finish.
She looked at the clock radio: twenty to 5. She had remarked before how quickly the time passed when one lay awake and worried. One would have expected the opposite.
‘I’ll talk it over with Pam. I’ll go and have lunch with Pam.’
She had the car. A helpless woman worrying about her daughter, a woman with a car worrying about anything – the difference was subtle but immense.
She went back to sleep.