Harlequin Rex (8 page)

Lamar
Haven
was
the
name
of
the
house,
proclaimed
on
an
Ozymandias
bronze
plaque
on
the
main
gate,
which
was
pushed
back
permanently
in
to
the
hedge.
The
branches
grew
through
the
bars
of
the
gate,
and
the
twitch
covered
its
raised
footing,
matted
like
a
Clydesdale
hoof.
‘Llama
Heaven’,
they
rechristened
the
house,
for
students
can
rarely
leave
a
word
alone.
Poverty
has
no
power
when
you
are
young.
They
rejoiced
in
the
almost
derelict
squalor
of
the
place,
for
they
foresaw
great
futures
for
themselves.
Even
as
they
lived
there,
they
consciously
stored
experience
so
that
they
could
retell
it
to
great
effect
—
when
they
had
surpassed
it,
of
course.

The
world
of
tacky,
ill-partitioned
flats,
tall
weatherboard
boarding
houses
festooned
with
rusted
fire
ladders,
working
class
homes
that
took
in
lodgers,
pawnbrokers,
second-hand
furniture,
fish
and
chip
shops,
bright,
defiant
op-shop
clothing,
bedroom
televisions
and
computers,
corner
dairies
and
draught
beer
pubs,
welfare
grants
and
student
loans,
and
garage
sales.
That
world
shook
together
alcoholic
solo
mums,
emphysemic
retired
wharfies,
ageing
whores,
perpetual
victims,
hard
men
grown
old,
ranting
prophets
of
a
new
order,
the
marginally
and
criminally
retarded,
failed
 
poets
and
illegal
Island
immigrants,
the
shickered
and
the
shattered,
bankrupt
pyramid
sellers
and
old
women
with
visions
of
the
crucifixion
—
and
the
students,
just
passing
through.
Young
intellectuals
experience
poverty
and
the
failure
of
others,
as
a
bridal
party
passes
through
the
graves
of
the
churchyard.

Dan
Posswillow
was
challenged
to
provide
a
meal
on
a
moneyless
Sunday,
and
he
went
out
as
a
baron
into
his
fief
dom.
He
stole
onions
and
carrots
from
a
market
garden
in
Heathcote,
potatoes
from
a
pensioner’s
allotment
by
the
Shirley
golf
course,
a
pineapple
from
a
still
life
in
the
foyer
of
the
McDougall
Gallery,
and
under
a
small
bridge
in
Hagley
Park
he
caught
two
mallard
drakes
with
a
whitebait
net.
He
should
have
been
dared,
like
Maui,
to
pull
down
the
sun.

Motorbikes
were
stabled
on
the
verandahs
of
Llama
Heaven,
where
once
Canterbury
tea
parties
had
been
held.
Weeds
covered
the
gracious
curve
of
the
drive.
Where
roofing
tiles
had
failed,
they’d
been
replaced
by
sheets
of
second-
hand
corrugated
iron.
The
leadlight
windows
on
either
side
of
the
main
door
retained
a
few
wonderful
pieces
of
blue
and
gold;
the
gaps
were
covered
with
plywood
and
carton
flaps,
past
which
pollen,
scraps
of
blossom
and
the
winged
insect
husks
eddied
into
the
hall.
Some
vanished
tenant
of
better
days
had
hung
three
wire
plant
baskets
on
the
west
verandah,
and
they
had
filled
up
with
cans,
fried
chicken
boxes,
collapsed
candles
and
unmatched
sneakers
stiff
and
dark
with
sweat
and
toe
jam.

Llama
Heaven,
with
some
engineering
students
from
the
Coast
in
the
front
flat,
a
Baha’i
couple
in
the
side
one,
a
retired
jockey
in
the
single
room
behind
the
garage.
Llama
Heaven,
where
David
and
Kevin
played
poker
when
they
should
have
been
working,
partied
when
they
should
have
been
working,
read
Roth
and
Updike
when
they
should
have
been
working,
lay
on
their
beds
and
agonised
over
their
lack
of
academic
progress
—
when
they
should
have
been
 
working.
Louise,
on
the
other
hand,
was
diligent
and
organised,
evenly
friendly,
and
fitting
in
more
sex
than
either
of
them
—
writhing
and
calling
to
her
maker
with
a
married
solicitor
who
came
through
her
window
late
at
night
to
lay
down
the
law.

Come
to
Llama
Heaven
on
a
summer
afternoon.
The
overgrown
drive
mottled
with
shadow
and
gold
from
the
trees
and
the
sun.
David
and
Kevin
join
with
all
the
engineers,
but
one,
to
throw
screwdrivers
at
a
centrefold
target
on
the
trunk
of
the
cherry
tree.
They
leap,
shout,
push
each
other,
and
shake
the
branches
like
a
band
of
chimpanzees.
Nick,
the
last
engineer,
lies
on
a
stretch
of
verandah
boards
that
has
direct
sun:
all
his
underclothes
make
a
modest
collection,
drying
on
twine
slung
above
him,
and
he
has
a
dishcloth
to
keep
his
cock
from
sunburn.
The
Baha’i
woman
has
her
foot
on
her
window
sill
to
cut
her
toenails,
and
her
hair
is
free
about
her
face.
The
retired
jockey
is
obscurely
within
his
lean-to
as
usual:
just
his
sharp
coughing
to
represent
him,
over
and
over,
as
if
he
tries
to
kick-start
his
life.
All
the
youth
fulness,
promise
and
summer
joy
is
a
bitter
surfeit
for
him
perhaps.

Come
to
Llama
Heaven
when
a
winter
smog
caps
the
city;
when
the
elms
sweat
coldly
and
the
mould
glistens,
but
not
quite
able
to
match
the
iridescence
that
the
drizzle
unfolds
from
the
oil
where
the
motorbikes
have
stood.
In
a
shallow
puddle
before
the
front
steps
the
worms
have
come
to
die,
pale
and
swollen,
and
dark
leaves
are
star
tramped
on
the
hall
floor.
Each
downpipe
has
a
slightly
different
tune,
and
the
colour
supplements
of
junk
mail
plastered
on
the
pavement
by
the
gate
catch
the
soft,
winter
light
in
a
transient
gleam.
The
swollen
cupboard
doors
refuse
to
close,
the
one
bar
heater
fizzes
by
David’s
desk
as
he
reads
his
mother’s
letter
from
Beth
Car,
the
engineers
bicker
in
front
of
a
video
of
violent
heroism,
Louise
completes
another
A+
academic
assignment,
quite
at
ease
because
she
is
the
lawyer’s
brief
for
the
coming
night.
The
Baha’i
couple
make
familiar
 
love
beneath
a
patchwork
quilt,
and
the
jockey,
his
professional
recollections
roused
by
that
sound
of
energetic
riding,
coughs
the
more
urgently.