The Thorn Birds (64 page)

Bob, Jack, Hughie, Jims and Patsy were in for dinner, since it was Saturday night. Tomorrow Father Watty was due out to say Mass, but Bob called him and said no one would be there. A white lie, to preserve Cardinal Ralph’s anonymity. The five Cleary boys were more like Paddy than ever, older, slower in speech, as steadfast and enduring as the land. And how they loved Dane! Their eyes never seemed to leave him, even followed him from the room when he went to bed. It wasn’t hard to see they lived for the day when he would be old enough to join them in running Drogheda.

Cardinal Ralph had also discovered the reason for Justine’s enmity. Dane had taken a fancy to him, hung on his words, lingered near him; she was plain jealous.

After the children had gone upstairs, he looked at those who were left: the brothers, Meggie, Fee.

“Fee, leave your desk for a moment,” he said. “Come and sit here with us. I want to talk to all of you.”

She still carried herself well and hadn’t lost her figure, only slackened in the breasts, thickened very slightly in the waist; more a shaping due to old age than to an actual weight gain. Silently she seated herself in one of the big cream chairs opposite the Cardinal, with Meggie to one side, and the brothers on stone benches close by.

“It’s about Frank,” he said.

The name hung between them, resounding distantly.

“What about Frank?” asked Fee composedly.

Meggie laid her knitting down, looked at her mother, then at Cardinal Ralph. “Tell us, Ralph,” she said quickly, unable to bear her mother’s composure a moment longer.

“Frank has served almost thirty years in jail, do you realize that?” asked the Cardinal. “I know my people kept you informed as we arranged, but I had asked them not to distress you unduly. I honestly couldn’t see what good it could do Frank or yourselves to hear the harrowing details of his loneliness and despair, because there was nothing any of us might have done. I think Frank would have been released some years ago had he not gained a reputation for violence and instability during his early years in Goulburn Gaol. Even as late as the war, when some other prisoners were released into armed service, poor Frank was refused.”

Fee glanced up from her hands. “It’s his temper,” she said without emotion.

The Cardinal seemed to be having some difficulty in finding the right words; while he sought for them, the family watched him in mingled dread and hope, though it wasn’t Frank’s welfare they cared about.

“It must be puzzling you greatly why I came back to Australia after all these years,” Cardinal Ralph said finally, not looking at Meggie. “I haven’t always been mindful of your lives, and I know it. From the day I met you, I’ve thought of myself first, put myself first. And when the Holy Father rewarded my labors on behalf of the Church with a cardinal’s mantle, I asked myself if there was any service I could do the Cleary family which in some way would tell them how deeply I care.” He drew a breath, focused his gaze on Fee, not on Meggie. “I came back to Australia to see what I could do about Frank. Do you remember, Fee, that time I spoke to you after Paddy and Stu died? Twenty years ago, and I’ve never been able to forget the look in your eyes. So much energy and vitality, crushed.”

“Yes,” said Bob abruptly, his eyes riveted on his mother. “Yes, that’s it.”

“Frank is being paroled,” said the Cardinal. “It was the only thing I could do to show you that I
do
care.”

If he had expected a sudden, dazzling blaze of light from out of Fee’s long darkness, he would have been very disappointed; at first it was no more than a small flicker, and perhaps the toll of age would never really permit it to shine at full brightness. But in the eyes of Fee’s sons he saw its true magnitude, and knew a sense of his own purpose he hadn’t felt since that time during the war when he had talked to the young German soldier with the imposing name.

“Thank you,” said Fee.

“Will you welcome him back to Drogheda?” he asked the Cleary men.

“This is his home, it’s where he ought to be,” Bob answered elliptically.

Everyone nodded agreement save Fee, who seemed intent on some private vision.

“He isn’t the same Frank,” Cardinal Ralph went on gently. “I visited him in Goulburn Gaol to tell him the news before I came here, and I had to let him know everyone on Drogheda had always been aware what had happened to him. If I tell you that he didn’t take it hard, it might give you some idea of the change in him. He was simply…grateful. And so looking forward to seeing his family again, especially you, Fee.”

“When’s he being released?” Bob asked, clearing his throat, pleasure for his mother clearly warring with fear of what would happen when Frank returned.

“In a week or two. He’ll come up on the night mail. I wanted him to fly, but he said he preferred the train.”

“Patsy and I will meet him,” Jims offered eagerly, then his face fell. “Oh! We don’t know what he looks like!”

“No,” said Fee. “I’ll meet him myself. On my own. I’m not in my dotage yet; I can still drive to Gilly.”

“Mum’s right,” said Meggie firmly, forestalling a chorus of protests from her brothers. “Let Mum meet him on her own. She’s the one ought to see him first.”

“Well, I have work to do,” said Fee gruffly, getting up and moving toward her desk.

The five brothers rose as one man. “And I reckon it’s our bedtime,” said Bob, yawning elaborately. He smiled shyly at Cardinal Ralph. “It will be like old times, to have you saying Mass for us in the morning.”

Meggie folded her knitting, put it away, got up. “I’ll say good night, too, Ralph.”

“Good night, Meggie.” His eyes followed her as she went out of the room, then turned to Fee’s hunched back. “Good night, Fee.”

“I beg your pardon? Did you say something?”

“I said good night.”

“Oh! Good night, Ralph.”

He didn’t want to go upstairs so soon after Meggie. “I’m going for a walk before I turn in, I think. Do you know something, Fee?”

“No.” Her voice was absent.

“You don’t fool me for a minute.”

She snorted with laughter, an eerie sound. “Don’t I? I wonder about that.”

Late, and the stars. The southern stars, wheeling across the heavens. He had lost his hold upon them forever, though they were still there, too distant to warm, too remote to comfort. Closer to God, Who was a wisp between them. For a long time he stood looking up, listening to the wind in the trees, smiling.

Reluctant to be near Fee, he used the flight of stairs at the far end of the house; the lamp over her desk still burned and he could see her bent silhouette there, working. Poor Fee. How much she must dread going to bed, though perhaps when Frank came home it would be easier. Perhaps.

At the top of the stairs silence met him thickly; a crystal lamp on a narrow hall table shed a dim pool of light for the comfort of nocturnal wanderers, flickering as the night breeze billowed the curtains inward around the window next to it. He passed it by, his feet on the heavy carpeting making no sound.

Meggie’s door was wide open, more light welling through it; blocking the rays for a moment, he shut her door behind him and locked it. She had donned a loose wrapper and was sitting in a chair by the window looking out across the invisible Home Paddock, but her head turned to watch him walk to the bed, sit on its edge. Slowly she got up and came to him.

“Here, I’ll help you get your boots off. That’s the reason I never wear knee ones myself. I can’t get them off without a jack, and a jack ruins good boots.”

“Did you wear that color deliberately, Meggie?”

“Ashes of roses?” She smiled. “It’s always been my favorite color. It doesn’t clash with my hair.”

He put one foot on her backside while she pulled a boot off, then changed it for the bare foot.

“Were you so sure I’d come to you, Meggie?”

“I told you. On Drogheda you’re mine. Had you not come to me, I’d have gone to you, make no mistake.” She drew his shirt over his head, and for a moment her hand rested with luxurious sensitivity on his bare back, then she went across to the lamp and turned it out, while he draped his clothes over a chair back. He could hear her moving about, shedding her wrapper. And tomorrow morning I’ll say Mass. But that’s tomorrow morning, and the magic has long gone. There is still the night, and Meggie. I have wanted her. She, too, is a sacrament.

Dane was disappointed. “I thought you’d wear a red soutane!” he said.

“Sometimes I do, Dane, but only within the walls of the palace. Outside it, I wear a black soutane with a red sash, like this.”

“Do you really have a palace?”

“Yes.”

“Is it full of chandeliers?”

“Yes, but so is Drogheda.”

“Oh, Drogheda!” said Dane in disgust. “I’ll bet ours are little ones compared to yours. I’d love to see your palace, and you in a red soutane.”

Cardinal Ralph smiled. “Who knows, Dane? Perhaps one day you will.”

The boy had a curious expression always at the back of his eyes; a distant look. When he turned during the Mass, Cardinal Ralph saw it reinforced, but he didn’t recognize it, only felt its familiarity. No man sees himself in a mirror as he really is, nor any woman.

Luddie and Anne Mueller were due in for Christmas, as indeed they were every year. The big house was full of light-hearted people, looking forward to the best Christmas in years; Minnie and Cat sang tunelessly as they worked, Mrs. Smith’s plump face was wreathed in smiles, Meggie relinquished Dane to Cardinal Ralph without comment, and Fee seemed much happier, less glued to her desk. The men seized upon any excuse to make it back in each night, for after a late dinner the drawing room buzzed with conversation, and Mrs. Smith had taken to preparing a bedtime supper snack of melted cheese on toast, hot buttered crumpets and raisin scones. Cardinal Ralph protested that so much good food would make him fat, but after three days of Drogheda air, Drogheda people and Drogheda food, he seemed to be shedding the rather gaunt, haggard look he had worn when he arrived.

The fourth day came in very hot. Cardinal Ralph had gone with Dane to bring in a mob of sheep, Justine sulked alone in the pepper tree, and Meggie lounged on a cushioned cane settee on the veranda. Her bones felt limp, glutted, and she was very happy. A woman can live without it quite well for years at a stretch, but it was nice, when it was the one man. When she was with Ralph every part of her came alive except that part which belonged to Dane; the trouble was, when she was with Dane every part of her came alive except that which belonged to Ralph. Only when both of them were present in her world simultaneously, as now, did she feel utterly complete. Well, it stood to reason. Dane was her son, but Ralph was her man.

Yet one thing marred her happiness; Ralph hadn’t seen. So her mouth remained closed upon her secret. If he couldn’t see it for himself, why should she tell him? What had he ever done, to earn the telling? That he could think for a moment she had gone back to Luke willingly was the last straw. He didn’t deserve to be told, if he could think that of her. Sometimes she felt Fee’s pale, ironic eyes upon her, and she would stare back, unperturbed. Fee understood, she really did. Understood the half-hate, the resentment, the desire to pay back the lonely years. Off chasing rainbows, that was Ralph de Bricassart; and why should she gift him with the most exquisite rainbow of all, his son? Let him be deprived. Let him suffer, never knowing he suffered.

The phone rang its Drogheda code; Meggie listened idly, then realizing her mother must be elsewhere, she got up reluctantly and went to answer it.

“Mrs. Fiona Cleary, please,” said a man’s voice.

When Meggie called her name, Fee returned to take the receiver.

“Fiona Cleary speaking,” she said, and as she stood listening the color faded gradually from her face, making it look as it had looked in the days after Paddy and Stu died; tiny and vulnerable. “Thank you,” she said, and hung up.

“What is it, Mum?”

“Frank’s been released. He’s coming up on the night mail this afternoon.” She looked at her watch. “I must leave soon; it’s after two.”

“Let me come with you,” Meggie offered, so filled with her own happiness she couldn’t bear to see her mother disappointed; she sensed that this meeting couldn’t be pure joy for Fee.

“No, Meggie, I’ll be all right. You take care of things here, and hold dinner until I get back.”

“Isn’t it wonderful, Mum? Frank’s coming home in time for Christmas!”

“Yes,” said Fee, “it is wonderful.”

No one traveled on the night mail these days if they could fly, so by the time it had huffed the six hundred miles from Sydney, dropping its mostly second-class passengers at this small town or that, few people were left to be disgorged in Gilly.

The stationmaster had a nodding acquaintance with Mrs. Cleary but would never have dreamed of engaging her in conversation, so he just watched her descend the wooden steps from the overhead footbridge, and left her alone to stand stiffly on the high platform. She was a stylish old girl, he thought; up-to-date dress and hat, high-heeled shoes, too. Good figure, not many lines on her face really for an old girl; just went to show what the easy life of a grazier could do for a woman.

So that on the surface Frank recognized his mother more quickly than she did him, though her heart knew him at once. He was fifty-two years old, and the years of his absence were those which had carried him from youth to middle age. The man who stood in the Gilly sunset was too thin, gaunt almost, very pale; his hair was cropped halfway up his head, he wore shapeless clothes which hung on a frame still hinting at power for all its small size, and his well-shaped hands were clamped on the brim of a grey felt hat. He wasn’t stooped or ill-looking, but he stood helplessly twisting that hat between his hands and seemed not to expect anyone to meet him, nor to know what next he ought to do.

Fee, controlled, walked briskly down the platform.

“Hello, Frank,” she said.

He lifted the eyes which used to flash and sparkle so, set now in the face of an aging man. Not Frank’s eyes at all. Exhausted, patient, intensely weary. But as they absorbed the sight of Fee an extraordinary expression came into them, wounded, utterly defenseless, filled with the appeal of a dying man.