There are hidden forces at work! Look at that last word of my last entry, almost three weeks ago. Limbo. That’s where we live these days, in limbo. Over a month since Mrs. Delvecchio Schwartz died, and still no word about anything. Flo may as well have disappeared off the face of the earth. Though not one single working day has gone by without my phoning to enquire about her, and the people on the Child Welfare switchboard must know my voice at least as well as they know their own, I am no closer to knowing where she is. Yes, Miss Purcell, Florence Schwartz is healthy and happy. No, Miss Purcell, it is not our policy to allow acquaintances to visit our children until their future welfare is assured…I am in danger of losing my patience, yet I can’t lose my patience. What if they keep a record of my calls, what if one day a sharp and nasty comment from me is used against me? They already hold my youth, my lack of money and my unmarried state against me. For Flo’s sake I must remain pleasant and only suitably concerned. Oh, I wish love mattered to official worlds! But it doesn’t because it’s not a thing you can see, feel, or weigh. I understand, I do. It’s a lot easier to talk about love than put your back into it.
From Mr. Hush I hear that so far no will has turned up, that Florence Schwartz’s birth is not listed with the Registrar General, that there are no records of anyone named Delvecchio marrying anyone named Schwartz. In fact Mr. Schwartz, that shy and shadowy Jewish gentleman, appears not to exist at all. Every Schwartz on the electoral rolls has been, or will be, contacted. New South Wales has been done, but no Schwartz will admit either to Flo or to Flo’s father. There is no death certificate for any Schwartz that fits Flo’s father! After talking to Pappy, Mr. Hush thinks that our Mr. Schwartz actually had a different name, under which he was born, married, and died.
The trouble is that Pappy went to Singapore for two years—the two years which matter to the mystery of Mr. Schwartz. She remembers that someone shy and shadowy moved into what later became Harold’s room, but he didn’t impinge on her and Mrs. Delvecchio, as she called herself then, never even mentioned him. When Pappy came home, there was Mrs. Delvecchio Schwartz and newborn baby Flo. Mysteriouser and mysteriouser. Mr. Hush is enraptured.
The Public Trustee is now the guard dog of our limbo, but a most impersonal and indifferent guard dog. We have to pay our rents every four weeks by cheque or money order through the mail, quoting our Official Number. All of us understand that the guard dog is simply waiting for the incredible mess of Mrs. Delvecchio Schwartz’s affairs to be sorted out before positive measures are taken. After all, there may be a will in some doddering solicitor’s dusty files. We just wait in limbo for some sort of axe to fall.
In a funny way I’ve grown very close to Toby over these last few weeks. Life’s going well for him. Thank God it is for one of us! He got his hotel contract, he’s actually found a gallery owner who doesn’t rape artists—very unusual, he assures me—and someone in Canberra is waffling about commissioning some paintings for the Australian embassies abroad. Therefore it doesn’t matter that the robots are about to take over in his factory. The best news is that, since he only pays three quid a week for his attic, he thinks he’ll be able to keep it on as well as his shack at Wentworth Falls. I keep pushing him to let me see this mountain retreat, but he just laughs and says not until after he’s put in the septic tank and connected up the toilet. Considerate chap. If there’s one thing I hate, it’s a long drop. There are great debates about what constitutes civilisation, but I know my definition—a flushing toilet and hot water laid on to kitchen and bathroom.
You’re deteriorating, Harriet Purcell, when all you can find to write about is sewerage.
I just hope that I’m not getting too dependent on Toby. As I’ve always fancied him, I’m a weeny bit afraid that my dependence might give him wrong ideas. He’s absolutely right when he says he doesn’t get on well with women. He’s so—Australian. Despite my Dad, Duncan and heaps of other blokes, there’s a streak of contempt for women in a lot of Australian men. Look at my big brothers. Typical. About as far from homosexual as men can get, yet if they want to talk seriously or have a wacko good time, they’ll choose men to do it with. Women, quote Gavin and Peter, can’t talk about anything except clothes, kids, periods and home-making. I’ve heard them say so a million times. And while Toby doesn’t live in the way my Bros do, I always have a funny feeling that there’s only so much of himself that he’s prepared to share with any woman, even the pretty weird women of The House. I just can’t see Toby reduced to a quivering jelly over a woman. He’d hold something back.
The gallops and the laughs continue nightly.