Patrick White - The Eye of the Storm

Flora Manhood awoke to greylight and a street full of skittled milk bottles. She had been dreaming of what she wouldn’t bother herself to remember though a bitterness made her suspect Col Pardoe was behind it.

Col or not, she must end by every means the goose chase with Snow and Alix: it was her worst madness to date. Snow was lying on her back, her gollywog mouth desperate for air, her stomach, with an old scar, rising and falling, but sluggishly. Alix, her curdled throat exposed, her flesh unsorted, would probably have settled for murder as the next best thing to love.

Having covered her bra and panties Flora Manhood slipped away very easily; she didn’t even bother about her hair though she carried a comb in her bag. Outside ‘Miami Flats’ the street was looking extra livid: the fluorescence had not yet been switched off to accommodate the light of morning. She walked briskly, but suspiciously, as though expecting to skid on something: one of the empty milk bottles left to roll in the gritty shallows. Crossing the Parade she avoided glancing to the right because of the PHARMACY sign, and soon afterwards arrived at 26 Gladys Street, where Mrs Vidler was scrubbing the step.

She looked up: a large brown-skinned woman with suds to halfway up her arms.’ Vid and I might worry about you, love, if we thought there was any cause for it.’

‘For all you know, I could have been prostituting myself with a G.I. at the Cross.’ Flora Manhood was that exasperated she added for good measure, ‘A Negro.’

Viddie laughed for the joke. ‘Mr Pardoe called and left a message.’

‘What message?’ She could hardly bear it.

‘Vid put it in yer room.’

Flora went in, and there was the envelope, exactly in the centre of the Vidlers’ cleanly table.

She wouldn’t open it at once, but did sooner than she intended, because what was the use?

Dear Flo,

You can only misunderstand me. I honestly love you.

COL

Flora Manhood sat a while on the edge of the convertible lounge, her trembling fingers shielding her eyes from the gun which was neverendingly, inescapably, pointed at her.

AS SHE was rushed back from the depths of sleep in which she was being rolled and ground, and laid once more amongst the soft crests of comparatively placid sheets, Mrs Hunter became aware that something — some kind of transformation — had taken place at the foot of the bed. In the blur which the shaded light and mirrors made of her rudimentary vision, somebody was dwarfed.

‘Sister de Santis—’ she realized, ‘what has happened? You’re not kneeling, are you?’

The nurse gasped; you could see her veiled head shaken like a great white — not lily — Canterbury bell. ‘I was looking for a pin I dropped.’

‘Take care. I can remember a child — I believe it was one of the Nutleys — she knelt on a needle. It disappeared into her knee, and was lost in the flesh for weeks. One day they noticed a black speck on the skin, and drew out the needle with a magnet.’

The nurse said, ‘This was a safety pin, Mrs Hunter’; and began getting up off her knees.

You couldn’t believe in the safety pin. She hadn’t been praying for you, surely? For that thing your soul; or an easy death. Extraordinary the number of people who insist that death must be painless and easy when it ought to be the highest, the most difficult peak of all: that is its whole point.

‘Now that you’re awake I might as well rub your back.’ The nurse was laying a false trail.

‘Don’t invent unnecessary jobs.’

Because she had been caught out, the answer sounded stifled. ‘I was only thinking of your comfort.’

‘You can take out my teeth at least. You forgot my teeth. I don’t wonder. So many visitors appearing-I might need them at any moment. On the other hand, I don’t want to lose them in my sleep.’

When she had carried off the teeth the nurse returned to repair the bed. Such a token raft, it didn’t seem worth the trouble. But you could tell she was glad of the job. Sister de Santis must have been praying, not for you, but for herself, while she was kneeling at the foot of the bed.

The veil, as it swept back and forth, was so sharp it almost cut your skin open, while reminding, ‘ Campanula is the botanical name.’

‘For what?’

‘“Canterbury bell” of course.’

‘Oh, yes? They’re pretty, aren’t they?’

‘They never appealed to me much. I was drawn to the more spectacular flowers.’ She laughed. ‘My enemies — and some of my friends — have called me an egoist — so other friends and enemies tell me.’

The nurse was trying to think of something kind but truthful to offer as consolation when she needn’t have bothered.

‘Lal Wyburd was the one for botanical names. They seemed to give her the feeling of superiority she needed. “Aren’t you partial to an Astilbe? So feathery — delicate — but comical. It’s common name, I believe, is goatsbeard.”’ Mrs Hunter’s laughter was wickeder for the rictus from which it issued. ‘“The great tragedy of my life is that I haven’t succeeded in growing Mimulus at Double Bay.” Poor lucky Lal never to have had a tragedy!’

‘You’ll wake yourself up if you talk too much.’

‘Don’t worry. Sleep is what will wake me up.’

The nurse was adjusting the shade as though afraid the lamp might illuminate. Then she began to tiptoe out of the room. Silly girl: anybody on tiptoe lacks a sense of unbalance.

But the teeth you were glad without already drowning as you sink down horrid when sand gets under the false gums horrid teeth oh it is tiring yawnful the comforting true gums suck and gulp their way along the bottom of the sea nobody to want anything not love not money or illumination tell me the answer what it means tell me that you love me all that silly tiptoeing around you wait for answers to flow in quietly illuminating from the inside not if it is too rough sleep too can quench the light the fire can’t you make it up Betty my feet are can’t you bring in another log bring me my dispatch case Betty we’ll burn the letters together the love-letters they’re too personal don’t you think yes Alfred if that is what you wish burn all letters I agree you don’t the bottom of the sea is littered with old unburnt sodden letters the letter you have always kept of all letters it was so cruel untrue Dr Treweek’s never liked him well he didn’t like you you can’t expect only Christians love their detractors an exercise in masochism nobody can ever call me a masochist no you are right there Mrs Hunter Bill wouldn’t have married you if you hadn’t known how to use the whiphandle on his devotion.

Oh the dreams with which the bottom of the sea is littered not always sodden like the old letters they will stand up in coral columns in whole cupolas and archways and long sculptural perspectives to confront entice you in where the daylight is solid and the expression in his eyes at that time perhaps the first clue I ever had to what is transcendent.

She was standing in the bow window at the end of the drawing-room at Moreton Drive, in that kind of light which can make a dream more convincing than life. Only she was awake. She was standing by the revolving bookcase, looking out over the park as she opened the letter they had brought her. (Miss Thormber had been admiring your hands while doing your nails. It was not a luxury bringing a manicurist to the house, more a charity: something had to be done about Miss Thormber, a hopeless manicurist — but an expert in flattery; therein could have lain the luxury.)

Elizabeth Hunter opened the letter, probably a tiresome one, and began to read, holding the indifferent paper at a casual distance: