I’ve had it, Ivy, I said. I’m sick with it. I’m sick with the worry. And you can get an idea of the state I was in, because I didn’t know her all that well, and I didn’t know what she was going to say, or even what she thought of me. Or if it was going to ruin everything, or if the whole ceremony would be called off there and then. I just knew I had to say it and say it fast. Get it off my back. So with my best hat in my hands — darned before I left — and my heart in my mouth, I said I’ve had it, Ivy. I’m sick with it, the moment I sat down in one of those soft, cool armchairs she kept for visitors. And she gives me a comforting tap on the knee because she’s seen a few things, Ivy. She knew how to settle you down, that was her gift, she could calm anybody down and get them to talk like they’ve never talked to anyone before, drunks and no-hopers, that was what she did and the Prahran police looked after her for it. She had the gift of saying the right thing at the right time, just like she did to me that Sunday. And so she taps me on the knee and says what is it, with Rita in the other room all the time wondering what on earth we were up to.
I just let it out there and then, because I had to. It’s the licence, I say. And I leave it at that for the moment, and she’s staring at me because she hasn’t the foggiest what I’m talking about. The certificate, Ivy. They’ll need the father’s and mother’s names and particulars. You can have mine any time, that’s not a problem, but you can’t have the father’s. Oh, I can give you his name if you like, but it won’t mean a thing because Vic never knew him, and I suppose you could say the same for me — except for a few months, if you know what I mean, Ivy. She’s staring at me all the time, this good woman, she nods and smiles, and all the time she’s nodding and smiling at me I’m sick inside. Because I feel like I’ve brought it with me, this stain. This awful stain. And it’s making me sick that something that happened so long ago, so far away still has the power to do all this. Not because I care, not much. They can say all they like about me and already have, all those years ago. But Vic, what did he do? What did he ever do, but get born? And now we’re going to have to write something down on that certificate, Ivy, and I don’t know what it can be. I don’t know what it is we can find to say. Then the priest, and I don’t know what to tell him either. I’m sick with it, Ivy. I’m sick with the worry of it all being a disaster, a disaster that’s all my fault because I’ve got this thing, this stain. And it just keeps spreading. I wouldn’t mind if only it’d just stop with me, but it doesn’t. Do I make myself plain, Ivy? She nods and smiles again, and I know she understands exactly what I mean. I don’t tell her this — not that she’s all that religious, because she doesn’t appear to be, but because she’s so practical, this little woman — so I don’t tell her that maybe if I weren’t around any more the stain would stop with me. And it wouldn’t hurt anybody else, and there wouldn’t be any disasters, disasters that I know would be all my doing. I’d stay away, I’d go away forever, never see my boy again if I knew that would give him a clean start and make him happy, because that would make me happy. But it doesn’t work like that. Does it?
While I’m thinking all this, keeping this bit to myself, she leans forward and taps me on the knee again and says don’t worry about the priest. Leave the priest to me, and she nods, this good, sensible woman, and I know that that bit at least is all right. She knows the priest, the priest is one of hers. Not a word will be mentioned. Nobody’s going to say a word, she says, because I won’t have it. She gives me a firm nod, this little woman, and there’s a don’t-mix-with-me look in those eyes all of a sudden. And I know it’s not for me, it’s just to let me know that this is the look that she’ll be keeping for anybody who might dream of opening their mouths or even so much as breathe a word. It’s to let me know that she’s got this look in her and that she knows just when to use it. And that when she does, nobody mixes with her.
Then she points to the table beside us, and for the first time since stepping into the house — and it’s a large, open house, big enough to have a guests’ room, which we’re sitting in — I notice that there’s a silver teapot on the table with some scones and jam that look like they’ve just been done. As she picks up a cup and a saucer, she quietly says, and as for the certificate, Mrs C, don’t you give it a thought. And she lets the milk settle in the cup before stirring it in. It’ll just say ‘Father Unknown’. But nobody will see that bit that doesn’t need to know. She gives me that look again that assures me nobody will know that doesn’t need to know because she won’t have it.
We talk about the china, because you don’t see the kind of china she serves up all that often, and the house and the many rooms and her daughters. My ghosts have gone for now. I can feel they’ve gone, and I’m happy to talk about the little things. I’m listening to this good woman talk about her house and her china, and just as I’m thinking how lucky she is to be living without ghosts she says it. You’re not so alone, she says, staring out the window. I’m not so sure what she means, and I say I’m not. I’ve got my boy, even if he’s not such a boy any more, and I’ve got my sisters, even if I don’t see them. I know they’re there. She shakes her head. In your troubles, I mean, Mrs C — and it’s good of her to call me that because she knows I’m not. I don’t say anything because I’m not sure I’m meant to. I’ve got this odd feeling I might be interrupting her, although interrupting what, I don’t know. It’s as though she’s started something that she hasn’t quite finished, and I’m beginning to feel that I’m not the only one who needs to get something off my mind. You shouldn’t feel so alone, she goes on, almost dreamy. There was a lot more of it going on than you might care to think, and as she says it she gives her shoulders a little shrug, nothing much, but enough to be noticed, and she takes her eyes off the window and meets my stare for a moment. But this time the hard look has gone from her eyes and there’s something else there — I know she’s showing me another part of her. What’s more, I get the clear impression she doesn’t show this bit off all that often, that what I’ve said has stirred something in her, and when she’s finished, when she’s done telling me that there was a lot more of it going on than I’d care to think, she just nods quietly to herself.
Because I don’t know what to say, and because I’m not even sure if she wants me to say anything, I just sit there and I nod back. But from her manner I can see that she’s not telling me this because she knows it from the helping work she does around the neighbourhood. No, this knowledge that there was a lot more of it going than you’d think is coming from somewhere else altogether. And I know I couldn’t have come to a better woman with my little secret, the one that made me sick with worry and dragged me all the way here, because this good woman knows a few things about secrets like mine. That’s when I look around this grand house of hers — its many rooms and the five daughters whose heads it puts a roof over — with a different eye.
When the time comes we put her good china cups aside and rise. She takes me to the door and I see Rita — looking more like a girl in her mother’s house than she’s ever looked before — hanging about at the end of the long, dark hall. Don’t give it another thought, says her mother. And she’s got that hard look in her eyes again, and again I know it’s not for me. It’s just to let me know that she’s got it and knows when to use it, and that no one will know that doesn’t need to know, because she won’t have it.
As I’m walking back through the park, the same elms and gums and lawns have got a Sunday look they didn’t have a few hours before when I marched along these shaded paths with this thing, this stain inside me that made me so sick it drove me out of the house. That’s all gone. Now, on the grand day, I can watch them all — but not too close — and I’ll know that nobody will know anything of what’s been said who doesn’t need to know, because that good woman won’t have it.
From here, from this bed, it’s all another life now, another age. Tomorrow is another year. Already, another year. I can hear them all laughing, out there in the yard. With their glasses, and their beer, and their funny little sparkling wines, they’re laughing in the New Year. Those wonderful, young people. I hear it all, the way you do on hot, open nights like these, and I’m tempted to get up and join them, and I might. A cool glass of beer, and a laugh. They’re just what I need.