All still there, like those dolls that sit inside one another.For Skinner has noticed this in people — how an unexpected pleasure not only lights up people’s faces, but gives you a glimpse of what they were. Releases the child in them. Gifts can also do that.
‘Well…’ His hands now empty, Skinner is not sure what to do with them or with himself. For to stay, after the giving of the gift, might be to imply that the gift was merely an excuse to talk. And idle talk, like the use of first names, would cheapen the exchange. So Skinner looks back to his farm as if to imply that work awaits him, when, in fact, the work of the morning has already been completed. Of course, he could find things but the truth is he doesn’t have to leave. But now that his hands are empty and the gift is given, he can find no just reason to stay. ‘Well then…’
‘Thank you, Mr Skinner,’ Miss Carroll says, Skinner noting that the smile is still on her face and in her eyes — that glimpse, that shadow of what she once was, the child, the girl, the young woman all still hovering about her.
But before he leaves, and he is distrustful of the impulse because it was not part of his intention as he walked across his paddock, but all the same, before he leaves he suggests (and it is more in the manner of a suggestion than an open invitation) that when she next comes for her water that she might like tea, adding that he also makes his own cream, creating, as he does, a picture of bread and jam and cream.
She nods and Skinner notes that there might also be trust in that nod; that if his gift has established anything it has established that. Trust. And so he leaves her standingby the road, one hand holding the pail of milk, her other arm clasping the butter and cheese to her chest.
She turns as Skinner walks back. A gift has been given, a gift has been received. Trust, quite possibly, has been won. And, he observes as he trudges back to his farm, hope has entered his heart. He has come nearer to the source of the light that draws him out onto his back veranda each night, and upon which he will gaze again tonight, knowing that Miss Carroll has nodded in response to his suggestion and that, having nodded, Miss Carroll, when she next comes for water, will stay for tea and he will create a table of fresh cream, jam and bread when she does. He has come nearer to the source of the light. And the glow of the light, like the petal of a rose, has not been bruised by closer inspection.
14.
Webster’s Ground
O n Webster’s ground the scotch thistle and long grass will succumb to the bulldozer. The row of pines that runs alongside the railway lines, which had a reason for being there once, possibly before the lines were laid, a logic that has long since deserted them and left them vulnerable, will tumble. The shrubs and bushes will be swept away. All will bend to the will of Webster.
Flat ground will follow. The bumps will be smoothed, the hollows that in winter and spring fill with muddy water and which are home to tadpoles and frogs will be levelled. A factory, Webster’s Engineering, will sit upon the flattened ground as soon as the obstacles of nature and the remnants of somebody or other’s farm have been removed.
It is mid-morning and Webster is standing on his ground, legs wide apart, with the architect’s plans under his arm. The plans have been finished for some time and he waits, ready to supervise the imposition of his will.A bulldozer will soon arrive and Webster is here to greet it.
Work would have begun earlier. The war has only just finished, however, and bulldozers are hard to find. But Webster has contacts — his other factory in a nearby suburb having been converted to wartime production and Webster having made a tidy sum from manufacturing the bullets for the Owen machine gun, which stopped the Imperial Japanese Army in its tracks in the jungles of New Guinea, dead on the ground, riddled with Webster’s bullets. The Imperial
‘Well…’ His hands now empty, Skinner is not sure what to do with them or with himself. For to stay, after the giving of the gift, might be to imply that the gift was merely an excuse to talk. And idle talk, like the use of first names, would cheapen the exchange. So Skinner looks back to his farm as if to imply that work awaits him, when, in fact, the work of the morning has already been completed. Of course, he could find things but the truth is he doesn’t have to leave. But now that his hands are empty and the gift is given, he can find no just reason to stay. ‘Well then…’
‘Thank you, Mr Skinner,’ Miss Carroll says, Skinner noting that the smile is still on her face and in her eyes — that glimpse, that shadow of what she once was, the child, the girl, the young woman all still hovering about her.
But before he leaves, and he is distrustful of the impulse because it was not part of his intention as he walked across his paddock, but all the same, before he leaves he suggests (and it is more in the manner of a suggestion than an open invitation) that when she next comes for her water that she might like tea, adding that he also makes his own cream, creating, as he does, a picture of bread and jam and cream.
She nods and Skinner notes that there might also be trust in that nod; that if his gift has established anything it has established that. Trust. And so he leaves her standingby the road, one hand holding the pail of milk, her other arm clasping the butter and cheese to her chest.
She turns as Skinner walks back. A gift has been given, a gift has been received. Trust, quite possibly, has been won. And, he observes as he trudges back to his farm, hope has entered his heart. He has come nearer to the source of the light that draws him out onto his back veranda each night, and upon which he will gaze again tonight, knowing that Miss Carroll has nodded in response to his suggestion and that, having nodded, Miss Carroll, when she next comes for water, will stay for tea and he will create a table of fresh cream, jam and bread when she does. He has come nearer to the source of the light. And the glow of the light, like the petal of a rose, has not been bruised by closer inspection.
14.
Webster’s Ground
O n Webster’s ground the scotch thistle and long grass will succumb to the bulldozer. The row of pines that runs alongside the railway lines, which had a reason for being there once, possibly before the lines were laid, a logic that has long since deserted them and left them vulnerable, will tumble. The shrubs and bushes will be swept away. All will bend to the will of Webster.
Flat ground will follow. The bumps will be smoothed, the hollows that in winter and spring fill with muddy water and which are home to tadpoles and frogs will be levelled. A factory, Webster’s Engineering, will sit upon the flattened ground as soon as the obstacles of nature and the remnants of somebody or other’s farm have been removed.
It is mid-morning and Webster is standing on his ground, legs wide apart, with the architect’s plans under his arm. The plans have been finished for some time and he waits, ready to supervise the imposition of his will.A bulldozer will soon arrive and Webster is here to greet it.
Work would have begun earlier. The war has only just finished, however, and bulldozers are hard to find. But Webster has contacts — his other factory in a nearby suburb having been converted to wartime production and Webster having made a tidy sum from manufacturing the bullets for the Owen machine gun, which stopped the Imperial Japanese Army in its tracks in the jungles of New Guinea, dead on the ground, riddled with Webster’s bullets. The Imperial
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