Limestone Man (16 page)

I found her on the shore under a log the tide had brought in. A treetrunk bleached white. There she hid, like driftwood herself.

Her name was Elisabeth. Shortened to Lizzy. But we used to call her Dizzy
. You make me Dizzy, Miss… You make me Dizzy, Miss…

And Lizzy died. Young. The first one of our lot to do so. You always remember the first ones to die. They put a spell on you, the first ones. With their intolerable wisdom. Their outrageous bad luck.

Yeah, little Dizzy. With the rose petals stuck to the soles of her feet. I can see her as if it was yesterday. She ran past me with no clothes on. Like that picture in the Vietnam war of the naked girl burned by napalm.

Maybe I'm confusing them. The girls, the ants, the napalm. But I still remember it happening. I still need to know it really happened. And that it happened to me.

ELEVEN

The last time Parry met Libby was in Botanic Park in Adelaide. They came out of the tropical house with its tree ferns and lotus flowers. Then wandered along the Torrens under the Moreton Bay figs.

Parry had considered ordering bicycles, but had thought a walking pace more appropriate.

He was feeling better and after a month was allowed to drive. ‘Stroke victim' he thought. Fifty
-
five, that was all he was. Crocked at fifty.

But nothing catastrophic. Yes, he could have died. But Parry already understood that. All he'd have to do was moderate his behaviour, and admit extinction to the equation. Which, yes, was a relief. But everybody had to come to terms with that.

Now, there were pins and needles in his right hand, a stiffness in his wrist that would take months to heal. If it ever did.

He was thinner too, as the anti
-
cholesterol medication took effect. But to Parry, this seemed speculative treatment. Surely he had not been overweight. His problem was hereditary high blood pressure. This had resulted in his father's first stroke. The doctor had indicated as such when Parry attended his Australian medical in London.

‘Watch that,' was all he remarked. But had never been explicit about hypertension.

Stratospheric blood pressure, Parry now said. It runs in the family.

This was his usual explanation. Yeah, he thought. Blame something they can do nothing about. Implicate your precious genes. Your sluggish blood.

This line also became useful in his arguments with sports lovers. Parry knew the irony of his situation.

Who's crocked? Jeez, not the arty Brit? Yep, the sports
-
hating Pom who had studiously avoided the track and the pool.

Meanwhile, the red meat
-
eating, beer
-
guzzling gang who cruised every tavern in Gouger Street and made their HQ amongst the pillars of the Sebel Hotel lounge? They wandered through life untouched.

He had already told Libby he was going back to Britain after the last three months of teaching. Under the lianas and banana vines, curling like electric wires, her hair looked blacker. But her lipstick was an unnecessary flourish.

The zips and buckles on her trousers gleamed. But they had no function. They unlocked nothing and led nowhere. Stiffness returned to his right hand. His fingertips seemed cold.

Parry remembered their one night together. How feigning exhaustion he had turned away. Her nipples were grey rosettes.

She was thirty
-
four but already used up. Yes, Libby lived in an arid country. In a city like a gridiron. Hot as a griddle.

An Adelaide springtime was short. Like her strapping sons, it was sucking her dry.

If it had not been for the swamphen, he would have made excuses, cut and run. But in the undergrowth beneath the trees on the river walk, he had seen a bird. A plump, stupid
-
looking creature that gleamed in the foliage.

It's the same colour, Parry heard himself saying desperately. Same colour as … you know…

I know what?

Your lipstick.

And Libby had stared at the bird. And looked away.

Hardly, she said. It's turquoise.

Oh. I think so.

They're always here, she said.

Yes. I thought it was an ibis, said the schoolteacher in him. Sacred bird for the Egyptians or something. But it's a purple swamphen.

I didn't. Know that.

Well … he laughed. And took her hand. But the stiffness in his palm that morning felt uncomfortable.

Yes, his fingertips were icy. Sometimes, Parry wondered whether he might be disappearing from himself. A slow dissolution.

So what are you saying? demanded Libby.

Nothing. Only that it's a purple…

But I didn't know that. Jesus, you're a genius at pointing out the things people don't know. The things they are supposed to understand. How irritating is that?

I didn't mean…

What did you tell me in Goolwa? asked Libby. That Stevie Wright was a junkie. I didn't know Little Stevie was a junkie.

Why are you supposed to know that?

Because it's my country, asshole.

Sorry.

My culture.

Look, I'm sorry.

I'm not stupid, you know.

Of course.

The Easybeats are my history, said Libby. So why do you want me to feel stupid?

I don't want that.

Listen. I know those are black swans on the river. That they fight like fury. But I'll own up to not getting the purple hen.

Swamphen, laughed Parry.

I could be here with Travis and Vincent. And they might ask me about that bird. Ooh, it's the same colour as your lipstick, mummy. It must be the incredible purple swamp chicken. Oh sorry. It's extinct.

Can we sit down? Parry asked her, gesturing to a bandstand on the rise above the river.

Look, said Libby. I better head off. Have a nice life. Oh, I forgot to mention. I'm leaving too. If it's good enough for you… Three more months and that's it.

Your career?

Never wanted a career, did I? It's time I started behaving like an artist. Get something achieved. A recognised body of work.

Is that what artists do? Parry smiled. But the woman was walking away. Expensive shoes and expensive clothes, he thought, watching her go.

Libby's hair was dark swansdown. When they had gone to bed that night in Goolwa he had cupped her scalp in his fist. Soft as peach fur, its bristling pelt. Now his fingers were frozen.

I could have died, he said to himself. Could have died. But maybe I did.

TWELVE

I

It was an October day when Glan and Serene had appeared out of The Ghetto. Parry remembered what he was playing the first time he spoke to Glan: Chet Baker and his band, with ‘The Wind'. Evocative music, maybe too lush. Tainted by Hollywood.

Strange to be playing a tune like that so early. The couple had been hanging around the shop for days. Then one morning, Glan had asked Parry who was it happened to live upstairs.

Parry remembered that
happen to live
line. It made him tense.

Um … I do. I suppose.

It's all flats up there, isn't it? Or so my mother says.

Again, an odd configuration.
Or so…

Storerooms, mostly, said Parry. They're pretty small.

Well, we're looking. Aren't we? said Glan.

Yeah, agreed Serene. Looking, looking.

For a flat?

Anywhere. See, we need a place. Don't we?

That's it, said Serene. We need an Anywhere.

Well, let me think, said Parry. And he noted how his own words first created the possibility. And then the likelihood.

II

When they left
Badfinger
, the young couple were smirking. Parry had escorted them upstairs, shown off a room already half full of boxes. Then apologised for the state of his bathroom. They would all have to share.

No problem, said Glan.

No, no problem, breathed Serene.

Parry looked at Serene. Her purple rinse. Yes, he foresaw bathroom issues. And discounted them.

Glan and Serene would bring their bags that afternoon. Now they were returning to an address in Vainquer Street. A tiny cash deposit had been mentioned.

All that part of The Caib had seen better days. The pubs were being auctioned, some of the gardens were ghostly with buddleia. There was a house in the street which Parry used to visit. Severin had lived there. Parry remembered looking at a moth one June afternoon. A moth as big as a bird.

A humming
-
bird moth, Sev's mother believed it was called. A moth that drank nectar through a long mouth. Almost a hypodermic.

The boys had stood with Sev's parents, regarding the creature. That term, Sev's family had moved away. Sev with his knife, his knowledge. Tough little Severin. Who never came back.

Parry could imagine the terraced house that Glan and Serene wished to leave. Perhaps the rent was going up. Possibly the neighbours were druggies. Either way, Parry didn't believe Glan's story, plausible as it was. As to payment, nothing was clear. They'd sort it out at the end of next month.

Yes, it was asking a lot. But the couple wouldn't stay long, and Parry was used to sharing his space. The green glow of the shop in Goolwa, now the Caib's marine chill. Tough times, he said to himself. It was good to live through tough times.

And it was surely exciting to live with young people. That had to be correct. Something was needed to keep the elixir flowing.

OK, here's the plan, Parry decided. They could all choose the
Badfinger
music together. And he'd prepare the list. Serene could pick first, next Glan. Then Parry would add something classy. Not Chet, not Hank, but maybe Duane Eddy under his Arizona skies.

Duane? Are you crazy? he smiled to himself. Nothing like subtle enough. Perhaps go back to Chet and
My Funny Valentine
? Or a melody, maybe Coltrane's
After the Rain?
Why not? Everybody's got to learn some time.

And surely the couple had their own favourite tracks? They could play Parry's CDs upstairs. Make toast, drink Australian wine. He could tell them about the vineyards he'd discovered around Addy. Now, that Fox Creek Shiraz had really stood out. Sparkling, yet almost black. Blood on the lips. A real discovery.

Yes, something in his collection was sure to please Serene. To impress Glan. But Parry remembered the moth. How all four of them on that June afternoon had listened to the moth's wingbeats. Craning over the verbena. Straining to hear the breath of mothwings. Their sultry murmur.

Yeah, something classy that would have Glan following the rhythm. Or Serene whispering under her breath, tapping those purple fingernails as she brushed the crumbs from her lap.

Well built, wasn't she? Yet kind of …
lissom.
Yes, make Serene smile for once. In her skintight purple leggings. In those worn
-
out purple boots.

III

Parry wondered how he had been affected by his trauma. If some Antarctic current had come north and momentarily chilled his blood. He seriously considered it.

Black ice from a rogue floe. Like some gang of growlers out of the Weddell Sea. Or a numbing infusion through the southern ocean. Gripping his mind, roughing him up.

What element of his life, natural and unique, had been erased? How might he know?

But, as he regained confidence, Parry thought the incident might have been beneficial. It was making living richer, because his intelligence was stranger. Surely his mind was different now.

Parry believed his thinking was clearer. Yes, his mind was being salvaged from the murk of himself. His thoughts were more peculiar. Slower, that was true. But possibly more original.

Yet one thing was clear. The next trauma might kill him.

If teaching wasn't what he wanted, he had to find whatever else proved inspirational. Or tolerable.

In Goolwa, behind the antique sunscreens of
Hey Bulldog
, he dreamed intensely.

Several times his dreams featured his parents' allotment. This had passed to newcomers years previously. In his dusty shop, or brooding over Chinese tea served in the motel next door, he had time to consider his old life.

Teaching was ending. A natural conclusion. Good riddance.

But the future left him unmoved. Yes, the truth was he had been an inadequate teacher. He resented the time necessary for the mundane tasks. And had grown frustrated too easily.

He'd had little to say about the English painters who were his subjects. Little to say, but possibly resentment for the clarity of their lives. The element of heroism.