Dark Fires Shall Burn (37 page)
âI'm sorry,' the man says again. He looks from the ledge of skulls to Templeton and back again. âQuite a set-up you have here. Is this ⦠is this a hobby of yours? What would you call yourself? Amateur collector? Natural history curator?'
âI don't put on airs to call myself anything.'
âUnexpected.' He scuffs the sand beneath his feet. âPeculiar even, I grant you. But more interesting than your run-of-the-mill numismatics, I'll give you that.'
âWhat's it to you?' He can't help feeling he is being mocked in a way he does not understand.
âOh no, nothing. I don't mean to be rude. I was just on my way down to the beach and I heard you reciting that poem. You said it so beautifully.' The man's eyes, the colour of the morning sea, stare into his. âYeats.' He sits down on the ledge with his legs crossed and hands clasped around one knee. âWhy are you reciting it?'
âWhat do you mean?' Templeton says stiffly. After a moment of silence, he confesses, âWell, it's ⦠it's for a friend. Who died. A girl.'
âI see,' he nods.
He stays near the precipice, holding the book against his chest. âActually I didn't know her all that well,' he blurts. âBut she died and I found her.'
He taps a cigarette from the pack and holds it out. âWould you like one?'
Templeton takes it and lights it with his own match, ignoring the one offered. He bends and picks his beer up from the sand and swigs, aware of the man scrutinising him.
âI'm going to meet some friends. A few of us like to meet in Marks Park, just south from here.' The man puffs on his smoke. âAs I said, a place where men may meet each other. I love it up here. It's private.'
Templeton keeps necking his beer, not knowing how to respond.
âMy name's Anthony â Tony, my friends call me.' The man moves forward to shake his hand. The pads of his fingers press Templeton's wrist. âI never caught yours that night.'
âTempleton.'
âUnusual. Is that a family name?' Tony's eyes meet his.
âYes. My mother's side. Scottish. From her family in Strathclyde.'
âSo then, Templeton ⦠would you like to come with me and meet my friends?'
âI don't know. Perhaps.'
âYou never know. You might enjoy it. If you let yourself.'
âI don't know if I should,' Templeton says, shyly.
âCome on, now. Hasn't the world had enough death for one decade? Hell, for one lifetime? It's just further along the cliffs, over there in the park. Come, please. Come and meet everyone.'
âEveryone?' Templeton's resolve wilts. He lets his arm be taken.
âThere's a fellow! I bid your esteemed ex-creatures farewell. Goodbye extinct things.' Tony bows to the circle. â
Adieu
to the obsolete, the defunct, to all those bereft of life.'
Templeton laughs and gives Tony a sideways glance. âYou're a funny one.'
âI'll show you a new world, if you'll let me.'
Templeton hesitates. He looks up at Tony's clear, earnest eyes and then back down at the surf. âI think I've seen it already. But I'll come with you all the same.'
He thinks of Frances cheekily asking him for a cigarette in the graveyard, talking about
National Velvet
with the great stretch of track that was to be her life in front of her,
and then her body face down, blue and stiff in the grass, her arms bound, yards from where they had spoken. The last thing her eyes had seen must have been the very grave slab they had stood upon.
Why had she gone with that man that night, as the papers suggested she had, perhaps willing? What had compelled her? He thinks of the cemetery framed by silent bloodwoods, gumtrees and figs, the deep stillness. The secret they would always keep.
He gestures to Tony to wait while he lights a smoke. The match flames and Templeton watches, letting the teardrop of fire burn down. Annie is in his mind, shut up in that dank curtained parlour, drunk and alone, her sharp goodbye to him and Dot as she discarded them as though in a card game of pick-ups, exchanged them for Jackie's fists disguised as love.
He thinks of the minotaur, with Theseus' hand around its horn, the reflection of the blade pointed at its throat in the monster's vanquished eyes, the streetlights loose minnows in the Archibald fountain's water, and all the hope that held of a life extraordinary.
âComing?' Tony asks, pleasantly, with no impatience.
âYes.' He turns and he says it again. âYes.'
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Thank you to my grandmother Barbara, and to Clive Peterson, for a life of stories and an unshakable appreciation of words, especially the phrase âscrew your courage to the sticking place â¦'
I would also like to thank my editor, Julia Carlomagno, for her impeccable insight, care, and dedication.
To Paul Dawson for seeing it through, and for the whiskies and hijinks along the way, I thank you. Ineffable gratitude to my readers, Sabine Brix, Amber Jones, Elizabeth King, and Sam Sperring, for their wisdom and encouragement.
For the Polish language and measureless patience (and more), thank you to Anna Antoniak and to Basia Niemczyc. Any errors of translation in the text are mine alone.
Thank you to Georgia Anderson, Teresa Avila, Donmoy Batiz, Tamryn Bennett, Justine Doidge, Kate Dorrell, Charlotte Farrell, Anna Gibbs, Prue Gibson, Jane Gleeson-White, Ashley Hay, Carmen Huehn, Mette Jakobsen, S.A. Jones, Hannah Kent, Viv McGregor, Elizabeth McMahon, Billie Muchmore, Ruth Phillips, Elizabeth Russ, Mal Semple, Emma Thomas, Meredith Williams, and Holly Zwalf.
Thank you to the University of New South Wales, New York University Sydney, Marrickville Council, the Australian Society of Authors, the Red Rattler Theatre, and to Cora Roberts and everyone at Scribe.