From the Ashes Page 9

  ‘We have some gorgeous autumn ensembles arriving just after Christmas exclusively for the parade,’ Miss Weaver went on. ‘I think you’d enjoy yourself. Your little girl would look divine. But if you don’t think it’s for you . . .’

  Kathleen waited several beats so she wouldn’t seem too eager. ‘Well, I wouldn’t want to deprive Rosemary of such an exciting experience. Would you like to be in a fashion parade, sweetie?’

  ‘What’s a fashion parade?’ Rosemary asked.

  Miss Weaver bent down to her. ‘It’s a sort of show where you walk up and down in front of nice ladies and you wear the loveliest new clothes, so that the ladies can decide what they want to buy for their children and for themselves.’

  Rosemary looked at her, then up at Kathleen. ‘No, I don’t want to.’

  ‘You’ll be with me the whole time,’ Kathleen said. ‘I’ll be holding your hand.’

  ‘No.’

  Kathleen said quickly, ‘She’s a little shy but I’m sure she’ll be very good at it when the time comes. Thank you, Miss Weaver, I think we’ll accept your invitation.’

  Wait till she told everyone she was walking for Smith and Caughey. That would show them.

  *

  ‘How are you feeling?’ Allie asked as she wrestled the enormous bunch of white, pink and lilac stock into a vase. They were her nan’s favourite, smelt gorgeous and would go a long way towards covering up the less pleasant smells in the ward, like bedpans, sick people and boiled cabbage.

  ‘Oh, I’m coming along.’

  She didn’t look too bad, Allie thought. Her teeth were in and someone had combed her hair, though it seemed far wispier, like candyfloss, now she wasn’t having it curled and set, and you could easily see her pink scalp. She was really thin, though. Her wrists were like sticks, her cheeks were hollow, her eyes seemed like they were sort of sinking into her head, and there was a rasping noise every time she took a deep breath.

  No, actually, she did look quite rough.

  ‘Have you caught a cold?’ Sonny asked, pulling up a chair.

  ‘I don’t think so.’

  ‘You sound a bit chesty,’ Allie said. ‘Shall I help you to sit up a bit?’

  Rose was lying almost horizontal, her head on two uninspiringly flat pillows. Allie had a look at the mechanism that raised the head of the bed, put her foot on the lever, struggled and swore for a few moments and managed to jerkily ratchet Rose into more of a sitting position.

  ‘That’s better. Thank you, dear,’ she said, rearranging the bedclothes.

  And then she coughed, hard. Out of her mouth flew a massive lump of green phlegm that sailed through the air and landed wetly on the white bedcover. They all stared at it.

  ‘Yuck,’ Allie said.

  Grabbing a flannel off the nightstand she scraped it off, though it left a nasty mark.

  ‘Has anyone said anything about your chest?’ Sonny asked.

  ‘Oh, I don’t know,’ Rose replied, leaning back against the pillows. She suddenly seemed to Allie to be exhausted. ‘I get told this and I have pills and injections for that. I can’t remember.’

  Sonny said, ‘I think you might have a chest infection.’

  Rose closed her eyes. ‘And when did you become a doctor?’

  ‘He’s just trying to help, Nan.’

  ‘How’s Mr De Valera?’

  ‘Don’t change the subject.’

  ‘I’m not. Is he missing me?’

  Allie exchanged a look with Sonny. Apparently not. He’d made himself very much at home in their flat, monopolising the sunny window seat in the kitchen nook during the day, if the fur all over the cushions was anything to go by, and the armchair in the evenings, leaving the couch to her and Sonny, which was all right with her. He’d conceded to doing his business out in the back garden, miaowed a greeting when they came home, and even stooped these days to rubbing against her legs when he was hungry. He cost a fortune to feed, though, and absolutely refused to eat cat meat from a tin. Spoilt little bugger.

  ‘Lots,’ Sonny said. ‘And he sends his love.’

  Allie gave him another look, this one full of pity. Or was he just trying to cheer Rose up?

  ‘Well, tell him I love him back,’ Rose said.

  ‘I will.’ Sonny suddenly waved out to a passing nurse. ‘Excuse me!’

  She stopped, looking harassed.

  ‘Could you please tell us what’s happening about Mrs Murphy’s chest? Does she have an infection? We’re a bit concerned.’

  The nurse frowned. ‘Are you relatives?’

  ‘She’s my nan,’ Allie explained.

  The nurse whipped Rose’s chart off the end of her bed and flicked through it. ‘She started antibiotics this morning and she’s scheduled for a chest X-ray tomorrow.’

  ‘Thank you very much,’ Sonny said.

  ‘You’re welcome,’ the nurse replied and marched off, her shoes squeaking on the linoleum floor.

  Full of admiration, Allie said, ‘I’d never have thought to do that. Or had the guts.’

  ‘We could have found out ourselves if we’d known those’re her notes hanging on the end of the bloody bed,’ Sonny said.

  Rose erupted into another fit of coughing. No phlegm flew out this time, but her teeth did. Allie handed them to her and she and Sonny both looked away while Rose put them back in.

  ‘Thank you, dear. I think my gums must be shrinking,’ she said eventually. ‘They’re not fitting as well as they used to. I don’t know what’s wrong with them.’

  ‘Well, you still look a picture,’ Sonny said.

  ‘That’s very kind of you to say so, but I know I look a dog’s breakfast. In fact, I doubt I’ll be seeing in the new year.’

  Allie was genuinely shocked. ‘Nan! Of course you will!’

  ‘I don’t think so, love. My hip isn’t healing, I can feel it, and now there’s my chest. I think God’s calling me home.’

  ‘Don’t say that!’ Allie couldn’t believe what her nan was saying. Hot tears pricked at her eyelids and she furiously blinked them away.

  Rose laid a thin-skinned hand over hers and said gently, ‘It’s my time. Nobody lasts forever, Allison. And I’m not frightened. God’s kingdom awaits me.’

  Bugger God and his bloody kingdom, Allie thought. That was all right if you were a staunch Catholic like Rose and believed in all that, but she wasn’t and she was the one who was going to be left behind without a precious nan. Well, all right, her parents and sisters would be left without her too. But why couldn’t Rose fight a bit harder and hold on? It might make the difference between whether she lived or died.

  ‘Well, I don’t believe you,’ she said. ‘I think your chest’ll clear up and your hip’ll come right and you’ll be home before you know it.’

  Rose squeezed her hand but there was no strength in it at all. ‘I hope you’re right. We’ll see, shall we?’

  Chapter Six

  The Apanuis and the Irwins shared their Christmas, just as they shared almost everything. They would have liked to have gone home to Maungakakari but neither family could afford it, so Henare put down a hangi in his backyard using the special stones he’d brought with him when they came to the city. Before breakfast he heated the stones in a fire and, when they were white-hot, he and the older boys moved them to the hangi pit then lowered in wire baskets filled with potatoes, kumara, pumpkin, chicken and pork, all wrapped in cabbage leaves and wet mutton cloth. Then in went the puddings in the big fruit tins and the whole lot was covered with a clean wet bed sheet, then carefully layered wet sacks, then a layer of soil to stop the steam escaping, and left to cook for five hours.

  While everyone waited for the hangi they went to church in their Sunday best (which they would have done anyway because it actually was Sunday), except Henare and Joshua who stayed at home to tend the hangi — to Kura and Wiki’s disapproval. They felt it could look after itself, especially on Jesus’s birthday.

  On arriving home everyone had a snack then exchanged present
s. No one could afford to give expensive or frivolous gifts, so in both families the children received shoes, or clothing that Kura and Wiki had made in secret, mostly knitted garments as both women were very accomplished knitters, while the children gave their parents small tokens or something they had made at school. However, Kura’s eldest girls, Patricia and Mary, had chipped in together and bought Johnny a copy of Lloyd Price’s song ‘Lawdy Miss Clawdy’ to save the family from Elvis (Kura shuddering to think where they’d got it), which delighted him. But presents weren’t the highlight of Christmas Day, Christmas dinner was, and at four o’clock, with much anticipation, the hangi was brought up. It was cooked perfectly and the Apanuis and Irwins enjoyed a long and leisurely picnic in the Irwins’ derelict backyard.

  After the feed Johnny plugged in his record player and everybody, even the grown-ups, danced to Elvis and Lloyd among the cast-off sheets of rusted roofing iron, the rubbish, the dirt and the weeds.

  *

  At the Leonards’, David was home for the Christmas break. They had a beautiful roast leg of lamb, which David had brought back from his travels, and new potatoes and peas from Sid’s garden, and trifle and Christmas pudding. Ana had tried making a pavlova but it hadn’t really worked, though the kids had eaten it anyway under piles of whipped cream. Still feeling horribly guilty for uprooting the children from the farm, she and David over-compensated and went mad with their Christmas presents. While David stayed home minding Jack on the Friday night before Christmas weekend, Ana went out and, spending far too much money, bought bicycles for each of them, which they’d never had before (why ride a bike when you owned a horse?), and books, and clothes from Farmers. She bought gifts for Jack too, and she and David stayed up late on Saturday night wrapping everything, except for the bicycles, which were parked on the back lawn at the bottom of the steps.

  On Christmas Day Jack seemed to be on his best behaviour — Ana thought probably because David was at home — and ate his dinner mostly using his knife and fork, hardly swore, and even offered to help with drying the dishes, though he couldn’t remember the word for dishes and wandered off before he got round to it. But he didn’t seem to know it was Christmas and asked why there was a tree in the front room and what the presents were for. The next day, while out in the garden, he shat his pants and didn’t appear to notice till he came inside and Rowie asked what the horrible smell was. It was a first for him and left Ana praying it wasn’t going to happen again. But she suspected it would.

  *

  Everyone in the Roberts family trooped up to the hospital to visit Rose on Christmas morning. She wasn’t doing very well. Her breathing was shallow but raspy and bubbly, and her eyes seemed glassy and a bit unfocused. A nurse told them they had to give the antibiotics time to work and that they shouldn’t expect miracles.

  Sid said, ‘I thought antibiotics were a miracle drug.’

  Colleen shushed him and got out the gifts she’d bought for her mother: a tin of her favourite Cashmere Bouquet rose talcum powder, a pretty new floral nightie, and a bed jacket she’d knitted. Donna and Pauline had gone in together for a boxed set of 4711 toiletries, and Allie and Sonny produced a gift basket of chocolate and biscuit treats from Smith and Caughey, plus a tiny cat ornament from Mr De Valera (purchased by Sonny). They all knew Rose was getting the best presents this year, and none of them begrudged her.

  She seemed pleased with her gifts, said she was sorry she hadn’t been able to get anything for them, but was so tired she fell asleep fifteen minutes after they arrived. They sat around her bed for a while but she didn’t wake up so they left, piling into Sonny’s truck for the ride back to Coates Avenue. Pauline, Donna and Allie sat in the back laughing, saying they felt like the Joads in that book by that bloke John Steinbeck.

  They exchanged gifts, ate an enormous Christmas lunch of roast chicken, garden vegetables and assorted puddings, then slumped around the kitchen table, Allie and Sonny wondering how they were going to fit in another feed at Awhi’s place, where they were due for a family Christmas dinner in about an hour.

  ‘Walk up there,’ Colleen suggested.

  ‘All the way to Kitemoana Street?’ Allie exclaimed, her hands resting on her distended belly. ‘Up that hill? I’m just about vomiting as it is.’

  ‘Do you good,’ Sid said, not quite stifling a burp.

  Pauline said, ‘A vomit? God, I could really do with one. I shouldn’t have had all that trifle.’

  ‘No, the walk, you silly girl,’ Colleen snapped.

  Shrugging, Pauline picked a cherry out of the Christmas pudding and ate it.

  ‘I think we’ll probably take the truck,’ Sonny said. ‘Would you like a hand with the dishes?’ he asked Colleen.

  ‘No thanks, love. You finish your beer, Pauline and Donna can do that.’

  ‘Not me,’ Pauline said. ‘I’m going out.’

  Colleen looked at her. ‘Out where? It’s Christmas Day, and Sunday. Everything’s shut.’

  ‘I dunno, just out.’

  ‘That’s what you think, young lady. It’s Christmas. You’re going to stop in and enjoy being part of this family whether you like it or not.’

  ‘But—’

  ‘But nothing. You’re stopping in and that’s that.’

  Her expression foul, Pauline stalked from the kitchen and down the hall into her room, slamming the door so hard that elsewhere in the house other doors opened.

  ‘Ho, ho, ho,’ Sid said.

  *

  The Lawsons were back in Auckland for Christmas Day, as Jonathan had to fly the day after Boxing Day. They had a twenty-pound turkey for their Christmas dinner, a ridiculously over-sized bird for a family of five. Kathleen had to cook it herself along with the rest of the meal, as to her irritation Evie, the nanny-cum-cook, had asked for Christmas Day off and Jonathan had given it to her, but at least she’d made Evie brine the damn thing the day before. At lunchtime she stuffed the bird, trussed it and put it in the oven so it would be ready by about six o’clock, and got on with the rest of the dinner, which was new peas and assorted roasted vegetables, and gravy for the turkey, all while drinking her way through five sneaky gin and tonics. Evie had also pre-made a trifle, a pavlova and brandy snaps, to which Kathleen only had to add cream and fruit, plus serve a cheese board, the cheese already prepared and waiting covered in muslin in the refrigerator. She’d add savoury biscuits and some dried fruit to the board before serving.

  The children had opened their gifts in the morning, having been banned from getting out of bed before seven o’clock, and were busy playing with their new toys so the house was relatively peaceful. Jonathan was in the garden drinking vodka martinis and reading, where he’d been since lunchtime, so she had the kitchen to herself.

  The turkey looked perfect, lovely and golden. While she let it rest she set the dining table with a white damask cloth, her flatware with the gold rim, crystal stemware, her best silver, two candelabrum with white candles, a floral centrepiece Evie had made with red roses and carnations, red berries, little pine cones and greenery, and placed a gold foil Christmas cracker on everyone’s dinner plate. She stepped back, very pleased with the effect. It was the sort of table arrangement you might see in a magazine featuring homes of the wealthy.

  Then she called everyone together and told them to wash their hands and get changed, which Jonathan refused to do, insisting there was nothing wrong with eating Christmas dinner in casual slacks and an open-necked shirt. But she changed into one of her nicer dresses, and made the children put on smarter clothes. She wasn’t going to let Jonathan spoil her Christmas dinner.

  The turkey, when she brought it into the dining room almost staggering beneath its weight, elicited gratifying oohs and aahs from the children, and Jonathan carved it skilfully, complimenting her on her cooking skills. But then Terence decided he didn’t like it and said he would have preferred roast lamb and wasn’t hungry anyway, which encouraged Rosemary to declare she wouldn’t eat her pumpkin or peas. Rather than tell them
off, Kathleen ignored them. Geoffrey told his siblings they were being selfish and she felt absurdly grateful to him.

  Then Jonathan eyed the turkey, laughed and said, ‘Looks like we’ll be eating turkey sandwiches till March, kids! Except your mother’s too posh to actually eat sandwiches.’

  Which stung, so she glared at him, and he only laughed harder and opened another bottle of wine. He was always doing this. She did eat sandwiches — she ate club sandwiches. What was wrong with being ‘posh’? He said it as though it were an insult. He came from money but it was as if his family’s money was different from her family’s money. Just because his was generations old and English didn’t make it any better than hers, which came from sheep farming. He never called himself posh — he just said his ‘people’ were upper-class, if he ever said anything like that about them at all. It really irritated her.

  She cleared away the mains plates, wishing Evie were here to do it for her, and brought out the puddings, to discover they’d all pulled their Christmas crackers without her. Jonathan declined pudding, patting his belly, which was as flat as a washboard (which Kathleen had never used but she’d seen one), but poured himself more wine and helped himself to the cheese. Terence, suddenly hungry now, had three servings of pavlova and brandy snaps, then declared he felt ill. Kathleen had one brandy snap, making it last.

  ‘Do you know your flight schedule for February yet?’ she asked.

  ‘More or less,’ Jonathan said, cutting a wedge of cheddar. ‘Why?’

  ‘I’d just like to know.’

  ‘Why?’ Jonathan said again.

  ‘I’d like to know whether you’ll be able to come to the fashion parade.’

  Jonathan was still for a moment, then his face flushed red and he thumped the table mightily with a fist, making the cutlery and glasses rattle. ‘Do you know something, Kathleen? I am sick to bloody death of hearing about this fashion parade. Even if I am home I won’t be coming. Why would I want to come and watch you prance around wearing some God-awful bloody frock?’