The Sisters' Song Read online

  I went in. I picked up a copy of Mozart’s ‘Eine Kleine Nachtmusik’, as well as a book of Beethoven sonatas, and began ironing out the creases with my fingers. I gathered up all the music that was strewn on the floor and tried to smooth it. Some of the pages were torn and I joined them as best I could, then I packed all the books back inside the stool. It was only then I noticed Nora’s singing music wasn’t there—all of her songs were gone.

  I waited up for Nora, but she didn’t return, so I went to bed alone. The room felt thick and black. I lay listening to the Tasmanian devils fighting and the possums scampering over the roof. Much later, the door creaked open, and Nora’s dim shape slipped in. She changed out of her clothes and the bed dipped on her side as she climbed in. I could hear from her breathing that she was facing away from me.

  ‘I’m sorry, Nora,’ I whispered. ‘I really am.’

  ‘No, you’re not.’ Her voice was muffled, and she whimpered before continuing. ‘You probably arranged it just to stop me singing.’

  ‘No, I didn’t. Dr Godfrey-Smith asked me…’

  ‘You’ve ruined my life, and I’ll never forgive you.’ Her voice was a growl.

  I kept facing away from her. I wanted to turn back time, back to when we were younger. Back to when Nora was a child and I could hold her and comfort her, and feel her breath against my cheek. But it was too long ago, and too much had happened since, things that couldn’t be repaired. So I kept to my side of the bed, and eventually I drifted off. When I opened my eyes, the room was grey with early light, and Nora was already dressed.

  ‘What time is it?’ I whispered.

  ‘Shhh!’ she said, her finger to her lips. She bobbed down, and the suitcase scraped as it slid from under the bed.

  I sat up. ‘What are you doing?’

  ‘Shhh!’ she said again. She turned and opened the drawer.

  I was breathing faster. ‘Are you running away?’

  She spun around, her finger over her lips and her face stern. ‘Would you shut up? You’ll wake the house.’ She hissed the words through gritted teeth, and the whites of her eyes gleamed.

  She packed her clothes into the suitcase, then came over to the bed and slid her hand under the pillow. The pearly rosary beads shone even in the dimness. They jangled softly as she placed them on top of her clothes.

  ‘Don’t go, Nora!’ I whispered.

  She shut the lid and clicked the latches closed, hoisted the case off the floor and shuffled out. I hesitated a moment, then climbed out of bed. The floor was icy against my soles.

  Out in the hallway, Nora lugged the suitcase silently down the hall, past Mum’s room, then Grandma’s. At the door, she pulled on her coat and hat.

  I caught up to her. ‘You can’t just leave.’

  She lifted the case and twisted the door handle slowly until it clicked, ever so faintly.

  ‘Where’ll you go?’

  She shook her head. ‘As if I’d tell you.’ She pushed the door open until it was wide enough for her to squeeze through, then peered back at me through the gap. Her eyes were puffy and she looked as if she hadn’t slept all night. Then she pulled the door closed.

  I barely paused before I opened it and followed her outside. The air felt brisk through my nightdress. The verandah was in semidarkness, the moon still visible just above the horizon. Nora was already walking towards the gate, slim and fragile in the half-light. I hurried down the steps and along the path after her.

  ‘Nora!’

  She reached the gate and pulled it open.

  I caught up to her. ‘I’m sorry…It’s all my fault…I’m sorry I was horrible to you. I shouldn’t have been.’

  She turned and her eyes held mine. A few coils of blonde hair had escaped from under her hat. She sighed and her shoulders hunched forward. ‘Ida, it’s not your fault. Mum will never let me sing, no matter what, but I have to do it, so I must go.’

  I reached out and pulled her to me. Although she held herself rigid, I could feel her bones through her coat, and she felt slim and fragile. When I let her go, she wiped her nose with the back of her hand.

  ‘I’m sorry you have to go,’ I said.

  ‘I’m not sorry.’ She adjusted her case. ‘I’ll be all right. I can look after myself.’

  ‘Write to me,’ I said. ‘Let me know where you are.’

  She turned quickly and stepped onto the footpath. Her feet almost criss-crossed as she trudged up the street in a straight line.

  ‘Good luck,’ I called.

  I watched until she turned the corner, but she never looked back.

  Chapter 6

  The wind felt cold through my nightdress. I turned away from the empty street and the lightening sky, and walked back inside the house. I gently pressed the front door shut so I didn’t wake anyone, and crept back down the hall to our room. The note on the pillow caught my eye as soon as I opened the door. I unfolded it and read the neat lines of Nora’s handwriting.

  Dear family,

  I am sorry to leave like this, however I have no choice. I cannot go to work for the Godfrey-Smiths. If you knew me, you would understand why, but you do not know the dreams I have inside of me. They are so important that I would rather die than give them up.

  This is something I must do. I will write to you again when I get where I am going.

  Mum, I hope that one day you will understand. Grandma, thank you for everything.

  I will miss you all.

  Nora.

  I heard a creak, and when I turned Grandma was standing in the doorway.

  ‘I didn’t mean to make her leave,’ I said. ‘I really didn’t.’

  Grandma took the note. Her chin trembled as she read.

  ‘I tried to stop her. Oh, Grandma, I’m so worried. What’s she going to do? Where’s she going to live?’

  Grandma was quiet until she finished reading, then she closed her eyes and sighed. ‘We will find her. Don’t worry.’

  In the kitchen, I was quiet as Grandma lit a fire we both knew wouldn’t warm the air. ‘I really did try to stop her,’ I said.

  She blew out the match. ‘My dear, no one could have stopped her.’

  Mum’s face turned ashen as she read Nora’s note, and it fluttered slightly in her hands. When she’d finished, she tossed it on the table. ‘She’ll be back before nightfall,’ she said.

  ‘I don’t think so, Alice,’ said Grandma.

  At lunch, Nora’s empty seat was pushed tightly against the table, and later, when we sat in the lounge, the piano lid was closed, the stool vacant and the music still stacked away.

  I sat on the woodbox facing the fire, watching the hot coals and the flames, listening to them sizzle and hiss. Grandma sat on the chaise, Mum on the fire chair opposite. We were all silent and the air felt full, as if something heavy was about to fall.

  ‘What on earth’s she going to live on?’ said Mum.

  No one answered.

  ‘Why didn’t you stop her?’

  I kept my head down.

  ‘Why didn’t you stop her?’ she repeated, her voice more shrill.

  I raised my eyes. Mum was staring at me, her eyes full of tears and her face twisted.

  ‘I tried,’ I said, my voice small.

  ‘You didn’t try hard enough.’ She leant forward and shook her head. ‘Why didn’t you wake me? Or your grandmother?’

  ‘Alice,’ Grandma’s voice was sharp and she fixed Mum with a glare. ‘Leave her be.’

  Mum turned towards her. ‘You…You…’ She pointed at Grandma. ‘I blame you most of all.’ She shook her finger at her, the tendons in her neck standing out. ‘Feeding her dreams. Giving her false hopes, and now look what you’ve caused.’ She was shaking when she’d finished.

  Grandma’s head bobbed and her lip trembled. She looked down for a moment and took a few breaths. ‘I think we’re all feeling a little repentant right now.’

  Mum stood and left the room.

  I returned to the Godfrey-Smiths’, but on my fir
st night back I didn’t hear La Traviata as it played on the gramophone. As the soprano’s voice spiralled around the room, I kept biting my lip and rubbing my nose, hoping the Godfrey-Smiths wouldn’t notice I wasn’t concentrating. I could only think of Nora and wish she’d come with me to work for the Godfrey-Smiths. At least then I would have known she was safe.

  I tried to keep busy so I wouldn’t think of Nora.

  The Godfrey-Smiths employed a piano teacher for Elizabeth—Miss Gertrude Hart. She was an imposing lady, almost as old as Grandma but taller and stiffer, with iron-grey hair, rimless glasses and a string of pearls around her neck.

  Each Wednesday afternoon, Elizabeth and I dressed in our coats and hats, and we walked down the steep hill to Miss Hart’s house in Frankland Street. There was a short, swept path to the front door, and we waited under the iron lace of the verandah as the previous student’s piano notes tumbled from the front room.

  At half past three precisely, Miss Hart would open the door. A boy would race out and Elizabeth would trudge in.

  ‘Come,’ she’d say, and Elizabeth would look pleadingly at me before following Miss Hart into the front room, clutching her books to her chest. I’d wait on a spindly chair in the narrow hall outside and listen to Elizabeth’s slow, leaden notes coming from behind the closed door.

  ‘No, no, no,’ Miss Hart’s clipped voice would say. ‘Like this.’ The notes that followed would be flowing and melodic.

  Elizabeth would try again, the notes even more hesitant.

  ‘No, no, no,’ Miss Hart would say again. ‘Watch carefully.’

  Each week as Elizabeth left her lesson, Miss Hart would raise her finger and admonish, ‘You must do more practice.’

  Elizabeth’s eyes would dull, her shoulders slope, and her footsteps drag. On the way home, we’d stop at the swings in the square. I’d push, and Elizabeth would say, ‘Higher, higher.’ I’d push harder. By the time she climbed off, her cheeks would be pink, her eyes bright and she’d be smiling again.

  At home, Mary and I would sit with her while she practised. Her fingers moved like caterpillar legs over the keys. Away from Miss Hart, they didn’t trip but hit the notes and created a melody. As she played, Mary and I would sway and dance, and when she finished, we’d clap.

  ‘I wish I could play like that in the lesson,’ she’d say.

  I’d sigh and pat her shoulder. ‘It will come in time.’

  Yet each Wednesday afternoon as we neared Miss Hart’s, Elizabeth’s grip on my hand would tighten and her step would slow. Every week she’d play the same songs in the same lifeless manner, while Miss Hart tapped her cane and repeated, ‘No, no, NO! You must COUNT! One-and-two-and-three-and…’

  Afterwards, I’d take Elizabeth’s hand and squeeze it as we walked up the hill to the square. ‘Higher!’ she’d say. ‘Higher!’ And I’d push her so high on the swing I thought it might go around in a full loop.

  I was waiting out in the hall during one piano lesson when Miss Hart’s voice came screeching through the door.

  ‘No, no, NO. You are not counting.’

  The notes came again, faltering and muddled, followed by an almighty clash and a sob, then hurried footsteps towards the door. I stood as the door flew open and Elizabeth ran out, straight into my belly. She stretched her arms around me and clung tightly.

  Inside the room, Miss Hart sat primly on her chair next to the empty piano stool and stared at us. She sighed, then stood. ‘Tell her mother that I can’t teach her anymore.’ She gathered Elizabeth’s music books off the piano ledge and came to the doorway. She stood stiffly, a vein pulsing at her temple. ‘And that she hasn’t a musical bone in her body.’

  I held myself rigid and took the books from her hands.

  ‘See yourselves out.’

  I pinched my lips together as I dressed Elizabeth in her hat and coat. I tucked her hand in mine and went to open the front door, but I turned back.

  Inside the lounge, Miss Hart was replacing music books on her shelves.

  ‘You are wrong,’ I said from the doorway.

  She turned, lowering her chin and eyeing me over her glasses. ‘I beg your pardon?’

  I swallowed and went on. ‘It’s not true that Elizabeth hasn’t a musical bone in her body. She just plays badly in front of you. Because she’s afraid of you.’

  Her eyes widened and a flush spread up her neck. ‘She’s afraid of me?’

  I nodded. ‘Yes. When she plays at home, she plays beautifully.’

  She raised her eyebrows. ‘And you would recognise beautiful music?’

  When I didn’t answer, she turned back to her music books. ‘Be gone with you,’ she said, with a flick of her hand.

  ‘Stupid woman,’ I said under my breath as we set off.

  ‘I’m not musical,’ said Elizabeth.

  I crouched down and placed my hands on her shoulders. ‘You are musical. Don’t pay any attention to her.’

  ‘But, she said—’

  ‘She hasn’t a clue what she’s talking about.’

  Back at the Godfrey-Smiths’, I hung up my hat and coat, and went straight to Dr Godfrey-Smith’s office. The door was ajar, and I could see she was on the telephone.

  ‘I’m sorry Elizabeth’s not up to your standard,’ she said into the receiver. ‘We were hoping she would improve…Yes, yes…Offensive? Ida? My apologies…Did she?…I’ll speak with her…I’m sorry that’s how you feel…It’s probably for the best then…’

  I crept back to the kitchen and started whisking the eggs, my stomach churning like the yolks in the bowl. It wasn’t long before Dr Godfrey-Smith came in.

  ‘Ida, may we talk?’ Her voice was steady.

  I set the bowl down and wiped my hands on my apron. ‘I’m really sorry. I know I was disrespectful. I’ll write and apologise…’

  ‘Ida…’

  ‘I’m so sorry to have embarrassed you. My mouth runs away without me sometimes.’

  ‘Ida, I want to thank you—for standing up for Elizabeth.’

  I exhaled and let my shoulders relax. ‘I tried to keep my lips zipped because she’s an old lady and a piano teacher. She knows music and I’m just a girl from the country who can’t play a note. But when she scolded Elizabeth and told her she had no musical talent, it was too much. I thought no one should say things like that to a child, especially when I see how Elizabeth plays at home when she’s with Mary and me. It’s not her fault she gets to her lesson and plays badly because she’s so frightened of that woman. I had to tell her…’

  Dr Godfrey-Smith came around the table to where I stood. ‘Thank you, Ida. Thank you for caring for Elizabeth. For both of my girls.’ She bent and kissed my cheek. She felt as soft as cheesecake and I caught her lavender smell again.

  Not long after that, a letter arrived from Mum. Nora had written home. She’d found a place to live as well as a job, and she said things were working out. She didn’t say where she was, not even if she was still in Tasmania, and Mum said the postmark was smudged so she couldn’t read it. But at least she was safe, and I could tell from Mum’s letter that she was relieved about that, too.

  Chapter 7

  Dr Godfrey-Smith hired a new piano teacher, Mrs Higgins, who was nicer and didn’t use a cane. Her piano room was cluttered with furniture and books. Not only did she teach Elizabeth how to play the piano, but she taught her about the composers, too. About their lives, their lovers, and even their pets. I used to sit close by so I could listen to the stories as well.

  The girls were well into their schooling by this stage. Sometimes, as I shelled the peas and chopped the onions for dinner, I heard them talking with their mother in her office. They discussed things like Ancient Greece and the planets and how we evolved from apes. I used to shake my head as I listened—if Sister Xavier had taught us any of this, I certainly couldn’t remember it. All I could recall were the lists of mortal and venial sins and being whacked for mispronouncing my Latin.

  When I dusted Dr Godfrey-Smith’s office
, I saw the big, heavy books on her desk. I tried to read the long medical words and understand the drawings of the insides of people’s bodies, but I couldn’t. I couldn’t imagine knowing all of that.

  But I’d never had much of a brain for learning.

  Returning to Tinsdale wasn’t the same after Nora left. A pall hovered over the tiny house, and it felt almost as grey as it did after Dad had died. The piano sat unplayed against the wall, the sheet music neatly stacked on top. It all seemed to hold the ghost of the girl no longer with us.

  Mum barely spoke to Grandma, so I tried to fill some of the emptiness when I sat with them in the lounge. I told them funny anecdotes about the Godfrey-Smith girls, but they didn’t smile, and I felt as if I was just talking to myself.

  My visits dwindled, and each time I returned, I felt more like a stranger and less like I was going home.

  One day, Dr Godfrey-Smith walked into the kitchen and held up a ticket. ‘I’ve arranged for someone to mind the girls so you can come with us,’ she said.

  She placed the card on the table:

  Dorothea Schwarzkopf in Concert

  Princess Theatre

  Circle A18

  7.30 p.m. Saturday 28th November, 1936

  I couldn’t wait to visit home and tell Grandma.

  ‘Oh, Ida!’ she said, her hand flying to her chest. ‘How wonderful!’

  ‘May I borrow one of your dresses? One of those in the box…’

  She hoisted herself from the chaise, and with joints creaking but a bounce in her step, she left the room. When she returned, she peered down the hall, then shut the door behind her. She put a finger to her lips as she came towards me, her eyes bright and a playful grin on her face. She looked almost young again. Instead of the big box of dresses, she carried a small wooden box and key. The lock was old and she fumbled with it, but when she opened it up, it was filled with wads of neatly folded banknotes.

  ‘Oh, Grandma!’ I said, my hands on my cheeks.

  ‘Shhh!’ she said. ‘Or your mother will hear.’ She unrolled the notes, counted out three pounds and held them out to me. ‘Here!’ Her face was lively, and I thought she was about to giggle. ‘Go and buy yourself something nice.’