Dissonance (29 page)

‘Mum,' Luise mumbled.

‘Come on, come on,' Madge said. ‘You'll stay with us and you'll be my new daughter, won't you?'

Luise turned away from her. She wiped her tears on her sleeve and rested her elbows on her knees. Erwin just watched, confused.

‘I've decided,' Madge said, returning to her seat. ‘I can be the doting grandma and babysit whenever I can.'

Luise sat forward.

‘Well?' Madge asked.

Luise looked at Erwin. He shrugged.

Madge told them what it would be like. She described the rug she'd crochet and where she'd place it on the floor. She described the toys, and the boy's (since it would be a boy, she stated) fat, white legs kicking in the air; his fat face, his double chin, his blue eyes and blonde hair, his long, piano-playing fingers and even his shitty nappies. She told them about a cot she'd seen in a second-hand shop, a change table, a pram, a blue jumpsuit with little yellow pompoms and one of Erwin's teething rings she still had.

Madge had it all planned. She wasn't asking for anyone's opinion.

‘It will be wonderful, won't it?' she asked them.

‘Yes,' managed Luise.

‘As long as we remember a few things.'

Luise looked at her.

‘Erwin must practise.'

No response.

‘It's only common sense. If he's to support you, he needs to make a name. Therefore you, Luise, or I, may need to take the baby out.'

Luise sighed. ‘And what about my studies?'

Madge looked concerned. ‘Well …'

‘What?'

‘We'll have to see.'

‘What?'

‘Full-time study and motherhood?'

Luise stopped to think. She stepped back from the fight. She wasn't sure about dirty nappies and four am feeds, ear infections and nap times, babysitting, piano lessons, recitals and a million other things.

Madge cleared her throat. ‘I think … I believe,' she said, ‘that someone must have the last word in certain matters.'

‘Such as?' Luise asked.

Madge wouldn't be drawn. ‘In return, you may have my room.'

Luise almost smiled. ‘Thank you, Madge.'

‘As long as we take care of things.'

‘What things?' Erwin asked.

‘Marriage.'

It wasn't the proposal Luise had been dreaming about: no ring or whispered question, no lilies or paper chains; just Madge in her ear, again. But, she guessed, this was a time for practical solutions.

‘It's settled then,' Madge said, picking up and drinking the last of her cold tea. She looked at Luise. ‘We have a ­gentleman's agreement, do we?'

Luise shrugged. ‘We have an agreement, Madge.'

The next few days were more death than birth, more funeral than wedding, more memory than contemplation, and more Madge than anyone else.

The next afternoon, after work, she sat them both at the table and said, ‘We need to plan the funeral.'

‘Mum's funeral?' Luise asked.

‘Yes, I've made a few notes, an order of service.'

Then she produced a piece of paper and unfolded it. She smoothed it with her cramped hand and said, ‘I thought we'd keep it simple.'

Of course, Luise thought. Quick, cheap and simple.

‘I thought we'd start with a hymn, something traditional.' She looked at Luise expectantly.

‘Maybe I should have a go at this first,' the girl replied.

‘If you like … only, we need to meet with the undertaker in the morning.'

‘Go on then.'

‘Nine twenty-five, approximately,' Madge read, looking up and smiling. ‘Psalm Twenty-Three. I thought perhaps, if you like, dear, I could read it.'

‘Fine.'

As Erwin thought, it's a funeral, not a train timetable. Slow down. He looked at Luise and knew she was thinking the same thing. How quickly can you bury her, Madge, and how soon can you forget her? How long will it be until you stop mentioning her, and tell me I should stop moping and get on with life?

‘Mum,' Erwin growled, taking the piece of paper. ‘Let's leave it to Luise.'

He put the order of service in front of her. ‘You say; whatever you think she'd like.'

She stopped to think. ‘Flowers,' she replied. ‘Lots and lots of flowers.'

‘There you go,' Erwin sang, looking at his mum. ‘Flowers.'

Madge looked back at him. ‘There's more to a funeral than flowers,' she explained.

‘Eventually,' he said. ‘But for now, flowers.'

He stood up, found his mother's purse, linked her arm in Luise's and said, ‘You two, off to the market. Luise, tell Mum what you'd like.'

Madge shook her had. Erwin smiled at her. ‘Starting with roses.'

When they were gone he sat at the piano, took out a clean sheet of manuscript and wrote on the top, ‘Pie Jesu'. He played around with some chords, scribbled a melody and eventually wrote a fair copy. When they arrived home he dragged Luise across to the piano and said, ‘Listen.'

He sang it once, in a flat, dry baritone, and then she had a go:

Pie Jesu, Domine

Dona eis Requiem …

And soon the melody continued, as Luise stared out at the few rows of mourners in St Paul's Church, as her eyes settled on her mother's coffin, finished with a dozen or so bunches of carnations and lisianthus.

Pie Jesu, Domine

dona eis sempiternam Requiem …

She avoided meeting anyone's eyes. The front row was filled with her mother's cousin's family from Osnabrück: a large, frumpy woman with oversized breasts that were trimmed with half-a-dozen necklaces; twin boys, their matt black hair combed flat; a few stray aunts Madge had called, barely making out their numbers from the address book Luise had found before the landlord cleaned out what was left of the apartment.

Dona eis requiem …

She lifted her eyes above the mourners. There was Jesus, on His cross, and stained-glass saints and angels, all walking through fields of yellow wheat, casting burley across still waters, laughing, praying and reclining on hill tops. She looked at Erwin, bowed over the harmonium, squinting to read his own music, softly pressing the small, sun-yellowed keys that clunked like tappets.

They finished and the undertaker stood up. He nodded his head and said, ‘And now, a special reading.'

Madge stood up and walked forward. She managed to climb two of the three steps before turning, scratching her nose and posing beside an urn full of arum lilies. ‘This poem was one of Sara's favourites,' she said. She looked at Luise, who had returned to a spot in the front row, and Luise thought, As if you'd know.

When she was finished she returned to her spot beside Luise and Erwin started playing the ‘Nocturne' from Mendelssohn's
Midsummer Night's Dream
. Half way in Luise dropped her head and started sobbing and Madge made a show of embracing her and whispering
there there, be strong
into her ear. Luise wanted to break free, to move, but couldn't. Instead, she wiped her eyes, took a deep breath and looked up.

Afterwards they gathered in the vestry. Erwin held Luise's hand and Madge stood behind them. Professor Schaedel approached them and rubbed Luise's arm. He leaned forward and whispered into her ear and Luise smiled. Then he shook Erwin's hand and said, ‘That was a nice transcription of the Mendelssohn.'

‘It wasn't mine,' he replied.

But Schaedel knew he couldn't stray too far from death. He took Madge's hand and squeezed it lightly. ‘Erwin said that you and Sara had become … friendly.'

‘Yes. She was a great help to me, settling in. She even found me a job.'

He turned back to Luise. ‘I only met her once,' he said, ‘but I remember her being very warm.'

‘Yes, she was,' Madge continued. ‘She'd do anything for you. That's how I'll remember her.'

Schaedel turned to Luise again. ‘Your dad died too?' he asked.

‘Yes,' she replied. ‘When I was a kid.'

‘Well,' Schaedel smiled, ‘maybe if this lot are right,' and he pointed accusingly at a cross on the wall, ‘maybe they're together?'

Madge thought it, but couldn't say it. Erwin looked at her, glaring.

Alfred pushed through the small crowd. He explained how sad, and sorry, he was, and then said, ‘I'm off tomorrow. I want to get a few shots in before it's all over.' He poked Erwin in the ribs. ‘You should join up too.'

‘I'm an Australian.'

‘So?'

‘We're at war.'

‘Not for long,' Luise said, announcing the date for their wedding at the registry office. Congratulations, more embraces and the weight of death momentarily lifted.

‘I'll have a German husband,' Luise smiled, taking Erwin by the arm.

It was late afternoon when Madge, Luise and Erwin left the empty hall and started walking home. They walked slowly, stopping every few blocks to let Madge rest her feet.

They turned into Bramweg just as the sun dipped below the three- and four-storey apartments. They all stopped and stared at their own damaged building. A scaffold had been erected on the footpath, reaching up and covering 2E. Bricks had been delivered and were sitting fresh, red and warm on the pavement.

‘Soon it will be like nothing ever happened,' Luise said.

Madge looked at her. ‘It will never be like that.'

‘It will.'

Chapter Four

Five weeks had passed. The exterior walls to apartment 2E had been repaired, but not rendered. Alfred was gone and Erwin, busy with other things, had put the unfinished score to their opera in a drawer under a pile of letters from Sam and Grace. Letters about cattle, carp in the North Para reservoir and an internment camp the government had built just outside Gawler; about Schmidts calling themselves Smith and changing from blutwurst to corned beef; about a sense of shame that had descended on the Valley like a cold, smoky fog.

In apartment 2A, Madge's eyes settled on Luise's wedding ring: a simple gold band, thin, like fuse wire, finished with a diamond off-cut the size of a sugar crystal.

‘It's not much,' Erwin had said, when he'd first seen it.

‘It'll do for now,' Madge had replied. ‘When you have ­millions you can buy another and give your old mum this one.'

It equated to two weeks of picture sticking, she explained. So be thankful. As she looked at him with her it-wasn't-me-who-got-her-pregnant look.

Madge looked from the ring to Luise's face and the girl smiled. Now, she believed, they were friends.

Ever since the wedding morning when Madge had sat beside her on the double bed. ‘That's the last time,' Madge had said, patting her bed. ‘I've made it up with clean sheets.'

‘I could've done that,' Luise protested.

‘The mattress is soft … it hasn't helped my back. Maybe we could buy you a new one. You'll need your sleep.'

‘It'll do.'

‘No,' Madge insisted. ‘When I've paid for the wedding, I'll put some money aside.'

Luise took her hand. ‘Thank you.'

Madge smiled. ‘Despite what everyone says, I'm not such a bad old biddy.'

‘No one says that.'

‘I wasn't always this way. When I was at primary school I was quiet, and mousy. I was teased. Hasn't Erwin told you the stories?'

‘No.'

‘But then a funny thing happened. At the end of primary school I grew – whoosh!' She slapped her hands together. ‘Over the summer holidays I just shot up. My shoulders straightened, my voice dropped and on the first day of high school people made way for me. And guess what?' She bit her lip, as if she was revealing a life-long secret.

‘What?'

‘Suddenly things were very different. People talked to me. I had friends. I worked out …' and she looked around, in case anyone was listening, ‘that it's all a big bluff.'

Luise frowned. ‘What is?'

‘If people
think
you're popular, they'll like you. If you stand over them, and put your hand on their shoulder, they'll do what you want.' She smiled. ‘See, it's a bluff.'

Luise was intrigued. ‘So, what happened?'

‘I was class rep for three years running. I wasn't very academic, but it didn't matter.'

Luise stared at her. She wondered if people could really manufacture themselves so easily. ‘Just like that, in a few months?' she asked.

‘Just like that,' Madge said.

‘Most people never change.'

‘They can,' Madge explained. ‘They just need to become assertive.'

Luise looked at her. Assertive, bully, or pain in the arse? She could see her father's face in the mirror on Madge's dressing table. It was brown, hard and broken. It was covered in furrows so deep they were full of shadow, flattening and rising as he bowed his head and clenched his jaw.

A bluff, she wanted to say to him.

But Peter Hennig was just shaking his head, rolling a cigarette and licking the paper. He seemed to be looking at Madge.

Luise was standing up. Madge was unzipping her dress, looking at the new skirt she'd laid out on the bed: lime-green, knee-length – a registry office wedding dress. It would do, for now. When Erwin was rich they could renew their vows and maybe she would wear this one.

‘Dad was always bossed around,' Luise said, sharply. ‘The problem was, I suppose, he was always honest.'

‘That has its place too,' Madge said, jamming the zip.

‘He was unemployed for years.'

‘Well, there you go. The biggest liars get the best jobs.'

Luise could hear her father telling Sara about his latest job interview. ‘He asked me if I could operate a steel-press,' he was saying.

‘And what did you say?' Sara asked.

‘No.'

‘Why?'

‘What'd happen if I got the job?'

‘You could learn.'

‘He's standing, waiting, watching me?'

‘So?'

Madge smiled. ‘When Erwin had concerts I wrote hand­bills: “Recently returned from London: Praised by Rachmaninov”. Who'd ever know?' She loosened the zip. She pulled the dress away from Luise's shoulders and it dropped, gathering around her hips. There were half a dozen red lines across the girl's back. She put a finger to the welts and traced them from shoulder height, across her bra strap to her hips. ‘What happened?' she asked.

Luise suddenly remembered. She pulled her dress up over her shoulders.

‘Luise?' Madge asked, seeing her own son's bare flesh, exposed in the half-light of their room at the Imperial Hotel. ‘Did he do this to you?'

Luise picked up her wedding dress. She walked to the door of Madge's room and turned the handle. Madge covered her hand, and stopped her. ‘I don't care,' she said.

Luise was still, and silent.

‘If you tell me, I'll never mention it again.'

‘It's between us.'

‘Did he make you?'

‘No!'

Madge released the girl's hand. Luise opened the door and almost ran across the sitting room. She went into the bathroom and slammed the door. She went into the toilet and started crying into her wedding dress.

It wasn't good, it wasn't bad, it wasn't anything, she wanted to say. It was just a whip.

(‘This is mother's,' he'd said, locking the door, unfurling the long, leather thongs.

‘So?'

‘There's something I'd like you to do … for me.' He unbuttoned his shirt and hung it neatly over the back of a chair. ‘It's wonderful, trust me.'

He handed her the whip and then lay face down on the bed. ‘Go on.'

‘I can't.'

‘Luise … for me?'

And when she was finished he said, ‘Well?'

‘No.'

‘Please? It'll be the only thing I ever ask you to do.' He paused, with pleading eyes. ‘Then we'll be … brothers.'

She frowned. ‘Like we're married?'

‘No, none of that Christian bullshit. Like brandy and water. My dad used to mix them in a jar … he couldn't come in for a glass. He kept the bottle on a ledge beside his table.')

Meanwhile, Madge was knocking on the toilet door. ‘Luise, are you alright?'

‘I wanted to,' she managed.

‘Erwin is … peculiar,' Madge called through the door.

Luise didn't answer.

It was a warm, sunny afternoon. At the Orchid Café, just beside the main square of the Altona fish market, Madge and her two children (as she'd taken to calling them) found a table and chairs in full sun on the edge of a crowded pavement. There was a family about to move and Madge saw them and pounced, smiling at an old couple who'd had the same idea and saying, ‘Sorry, pregnant mother.'

Madge settled in with a triumphant smile. She arranged her bags of apples and oranges, potatoes and onions at her feet. Yes, she'd decided, it was time for healthy eating. A pregnant mother needs vitamins and minerals, she explained to Luise. Protein, hydrates and what she called meat-juice: warm, fatty stock thickened with flour, served in a teacup as Bach played beside her growing bulge.

‘How about I cook up a big pot of vegetable soup?' she'd asked, only that morning.

‘That'd be nice,' Luise had replied.

‘And tomorrow, steak and three veg?'

Luise had learnt that Madge could be caring, as long as they stuck to her rules. She could be loving, coming in and covering her with blankets when she was asleep (as long as she went to bed on time); she would make breakfast (as long as she let Erwin sleep in); she would play music to serenade the baby (as long as she didn't disturb Erwin when he practised).

A life of slow, grinding compromise. Which was fine, for now. But things would be different when the baby came; when she had to get up at night, when she had to keep him quiet (or take him out) for hours at a time. Even now she suspected she'd done a deal with the Devil.

It had already started feeling this way. Madge had put her on light duties. ‘Luise, dear, you couldn't take the duster and wipe off those few shelves?'

‘But I did it yesterday, Madge.'

‘With all this building work, there's dust everywhere.'

Madge shaded her eyes from the sun and turned up her nose. ‘Pipe smoke,' she said, looking around for the culprit.

‘Mum,' Erwin moaned.

‘Excuse me, sir, I have a pregnant woman here, if you don't mind.'

‘It's a public place,' the tall, bald man replied.

‘My daughter-in-law is
pregnant
.'

‘So? Are you even German?'

‘Madge, it doesn't matter,' Luise said, bowing her head.

‘It does. Everything matters. Sir?'

But he just ignored her.

‘Typical,' she muttered, looking at the menu.

Erwin looked at Luise and rolled his eyes. She smiled; she took his hand, squeezed it and found herself whispering, ‘I love you.'

Madge still wasn't happy. She started coughing, waving the mostly imagined smoke away from her face. Finally the bald man said, ‘For goodness sake,' tapped the pipe on the side of his shoe and ground the tobacco into the pavement.

‘Thank you,' Madge said. She looked back over the market, down the rows of stalls full of fruit and vegetables, hairbrushes, reading spectacles and bookstalls crammed with unread copies of
Mein Kampf
. ‘A nice way to shop, if you've got the feet for it.' She looked at a fruit seller wearing an old-fashioned stovepipe hat and said, ‘My grandfather had a hat like that.'

The children looked.

‘He looks like an undertaker,' Luise observed.

‘A cup of tea,' Madge said, handing her daughter-in-law the menu, sniffing the air and saying, ‘I think I can smell the sea.' She took a deep breath. ‘Yes, it always takes you back, doesn't it?'

‘To where?' Erwin asked.

She frowned. ‘I'm not sure. Somewhere my parents once took me, I suppose.'

Luise studied the menu and looked up. ‘Coffee,' she said, handing the small card to Erwin.

Madge shook her head.

‘What?' Luise asked.

‘Remember what the doctor said?'

‘Madge.'

‘If your heart rate goes up …'

‘If you drink a lot of coffee.'

‘He didn't say that.'

Erwin let go of his wife's hand. ‘It's common sense, Mum.'

Madge was still looking around the market. ‘Well, it seems to me, what's the point of taking chances when you've got a whole menu to order from?'

‘Madge, I'm not a child.'

‘Suit yourself.'

‘Mum.'

‘I could say nothing. Then you'd be at me for not caring.'

She was surveying some of the other patrons. Not food shoppers, she thought. Wide-brimmed hats with ridiculous looking lace veils; men with thin cigarettes, fat ties, mixing-bowl haircuts. People who had never had to work for a living.

‘Orange juice,' Luise said.

Madge didn't even look at her. ‘Plenty of Vitamin C. Frans will thank you.'

‘Frans?' Erwin asked.

‘Just an idea.'

‘I was thinking, Matilda?' Luise smiled.

Madge let her eyes close and then open. ‘But then he drowned himself, didn't he?' she asked.

‘Who?'

The waiter came and Madge ordered for them. ‘Two teas and orange juice,' she said, looking at Luise and then back at the waiter. ‘Is that freshly squeezed?'

‘This morning.'

‘
Freshly
squeezed, please.'

‘The oranges were squeezed this morning.'

Four or five days before, Luise had been holding a towel between her legs, shaking, screaming, dripping blood onto the rug as Erwin pulled at his hair.

‘Calm down,' Madge scolded. ‘This happened to me too.'

After a few minutes they removed the towel and when Luise saw the blood she screamed again. ‘Please, Erwin … Madge.'

‘It's not the bag,' Madge said, ‘or else it would be clear. It's something else … tissue? What were you doing?'

Luise breathed deeply. There were limits, even for a ­pregnant woman. She sighed. ‘I was having a shit.'

‘See, you've torn something,' Madge explained. She pulled out the towel and there was only a small spot of blood. ‘Look,' she said, ‘perfectly normal.'

Luise started to close her legs. She wasn't so sure. She looked at Erwin and said, ‘What do you think?'

‘I don't know. Maybe it's not as bad as it looks.'

Luise looked down at the blood, and then up at Madge. ‘The baby's alright?' she asked.

‘Of course. I know it scared you, but it happens.' Then she smiled. ‘You just wait until he tries to get out!'

Back at the table, the waiter placed the drinks in front of them. Madge refused to thank him. She left the money on the table and looked away. Luise picked up her orange juice. She moved the glass to her lips but barely took enough to swallow. Madge had taken an apple from her shopping and was chewing it slowly. ‘These are soft,' she said. ‘I should take them back.'

A few tables away a group of four soldiers were drinking beer, whispering between themselves and looking over at them. They wore freshly pressed uniforms that were unbuttoned at the collar. They were shaved, their hair combed, and one of them had a dressing stuck across his eye.