Tim Winton - The Turning

The night was surprisingly cold. It took some time for the stove to warm the room to the point where it was comfortable, but when it was we sat in the light of two hurricane lamps and ate the stew the old man ladled from a cast-iron pot.

This is good, I said.

Goat, he murmured.

You shoot them? I couldn’t help but smile.

Now and then. What? he asked.

Nothing, I said. It’s just like. . I dunno. . stepping back in time. Out here, I mean.

He shook his head, said nothing.

The smell of that wood, I said. What is it?

Desert pine.

Smells like cypress.

He nodded.

The Yanks have taken Baghdad.

I don’t have an opinion on it.

Fair enough.

We ate in silence for a time. The dog sprawled before the stove swooning in the warmth.

I hear you’re a lawyer now.

Yeah.

What kind?

Industrial relations.

On whose side?

The little bloke.

That’s good, he said. That’s good. Gotta look after the little bloke.

Well, that’s the theory.

He pushed his plate away and sat back.

Your mother, he said. She’s sick?

Yes.

He closed his eyes a moment and nodded and it struck me that he was disappointed, hurt even.

How sick?

She’s dying.

He sighed and looked at his hands. He shook his head sadly. He looked at the dog.

Well. It. . it hasn’t been for nothing then.

What hasn’t?

Sobering up. I couldn’t have gone drunk.

I don’t think she cares anymore, I said bitterly.

I wouldn’t have. I wouldn’t have gone drunk.

That’s irrelevant.

I wouldn’t have gone, he said with feeling. It’s not irrelevant to me.

Jesus, you’ve been dry fifteen years anyway, it turns out.

Every day. Every day in readiness.

For what, seeing her?

Not seeing her. Facing her.

I sighed in exasperation.

Even another fifteen years would have been worth the wait.

It’s not really about you, I said. I’m doing it for her.

I know that, he said hotly. But who’s she doing it for?

I’m buggered if I know, I said in disgust, but even as I said it I realized what it was. This whole expedition. It was her way of bringing the two of us face to face.

Have you written to her?

Not since I’ve been straight.

Why not?

He shrugged. Shame, I spose. And I didn’t want to get in her way.

She’s still married to you!

So I believe.

I sighed. It’s good that you’re sober.

I’m proud of it, he murmured, with tears in his eyes. You won’t understand. But it’s all I have.

I sat there and hated myself, hated him too for making me the dour bastard I am, forged in shame and disappointment, consoled only by order. Childless. Resigned.

I’m sorry, he said, wiping his face. I wish I could undo it.

But you can’t.

No.

So what the hell was it, Dad?

I lost my way, he said.

Yes, well, we’re across that already. You lost your way and we all got lost with you. But you never said. You’d never tell us. It’s like this cloud, this dark thing had found you and you wouldn’t say what it was. The job. There was something you did.

No, he said. Is that what you think? You think I’m sitting here waiting to be named in the inquiry?

I’ve wondered, I said without pleasure. I’m sorry.

I saw things, he said miserably. Well, I half saw things. Things I didn’t really understand at the time. Don’t even really understand now. But it was the surprise of it, knowing that I was on the outside. It was like wheels within wheels and once I sniffed something crook I saw there was no one safe to tell. I was stuck, stranded.

Nobody at all?

For a while I thought I was going nuts, he murmured, his face turned from the murky lamplight. Didn’t trust myself. Thought I was imagining it. But then there was this kid I remember. Smalltime petty crim. Had his legs broken out on Thunder Beach. You remember that place?

I nodded. I remembered the beach vividly and now I knew who he was talking about.

People said he got into a car with detectives, I said. That same afternoon.

That’s it, said the old man. Two of the demons were down from the city.

What was it about?

Drugs, I spose. Never really understood it. Just that he’d fallen foul of em. And any question, any witness account died on the vine, didn’t matter who it came to. Felt like, whatever was going on I was the only bloke not in on it. And the city blokes were in on it; it was bigger than that little town, that’s for sure. So who do you talk to? Even if you’ve got the balls, who can you trust? It ate me alive. Ulcers, everything. I should have quit but I didn’t even have the courage to do that. Would have saved us all a lot of pain. But it’s all I ever wanted to do, you see, be a cop. And I hung on till there was nothing left of me, nothing left of any of us. Cowardice, it’s a way of life. It’s not natural, you learn it.

He got up and collected the plates and cutlery. He took a lamp from the table and hung it on the wall over the sink where he tipped in water from the kettle. With his back to me and his head down in the rising steam he looked like a figure from another time, a woodcutter from a fairytale, a stranger without a face, an idea as much as a man. I wanted to get up and help but I sat there behind him while the stove clucked and hissed and the dog snored.

I believed him. I couldn’t help myself. What he said gave some shape to the misgivings of my youth, the sense that things were not alright around me. And I felt pity for him, for the trap he’d found his way into, but none of it changed what we’d lived through, my mother and I. It would take another lifetime to forgive him that. Even then I knew it might not be fair to blame him for her cancer but none of me was about to release him from it. From his very posture there at the sink, the quiet, cautious way he handled the pieces that he washed, you could see that he sensed it.

So you’re not curious about the royal commission? I said at last.

They won’t be losing much sleep, he said.

When he had wiped up and put the gear on the spartan shelves we went outside and stood at the edge of the verandah to see the hugeness of the sky and the blizzard of stars upon us. The cold night air had the cypress tang of woodsmoke.

So how did you get off the booze? I asked him.

Went to a meeting in Kal.

Just the one?

Only the one.

And what? I said with a dry little laugh.

It was looking at them, he murmured. The others. They disgusted me.

What, you didn’t feel sympathy?

Any more than you’re feeling now, you mean? No. It was like looking in the mirror and all their whining faces were mine. I’d had enough self-pity.

So?

I was living behind the pub then. The Golden Barrow. Had a donga out the back, called meself a yardman but basically I was an alcoholic sweeping floors for drinks. Came out here, walked it with the dog. And hid. Had a humpy way back off the track. Think I was tryin to work up the nerve to kill meself. Lots of shafts out here, no shortage of means. Spent months plotting and planning. Went mad, I spose. Nobody left alive anymore to tell those tales on me. And then I realized that I’d been six months without a drink. There was none to be had. Woke up one morning, it was winter, and the sun was on this fallen tree, this dead grey tree, and there was steam rising off the dead wood. And I felt. . new. Had this feeling that the world was inviting me in. . like, luring me towards something. Life, I dunno.

I didn’t expect it to be beautiful here, I said for no reason other than not knowing what to say. The cold burned my face and, whenever I moved, the chill of my jeans branded my legs.