Owen Marshall Selected Stories (49 page)

Naylor kept his pace down, and told his father about the birth certificate and Helen's new-found enthusiasm for him to make some inquiries regarding his birth parents. Greg squeezed his eyes shut momentarily and compressed his lips, as he did when making some concession, some declaration, or coming upon emotion. ‘Your birth mother did get in touch,' he said. ‘It wasn't long after the new legislation and some counsellor or other approached me with a letter from her. That's the way they do it evidently, or they did then. I accepted the letter, but didn't tell Helen. You know how she feared just that. I accepted it, and replied saying I thought it best that contact wasn't made. You were going off to secondary school and had enough to cope with.'

‘What did it say?'

‘Just that she didn't wanted to poke in after all those years, but she'd never forgotten you and would appreciate any information. I
told her I didn't think it was the right time, and that was it. There weren't any more letters. I don't know what happened to that one, otherwise I'd give it to you even now.'

They stood on the corner that marked the turning point of their walk. The sun had gone beyond the hill and dusk was blurring the sharper demarcations of the day. A steady breeze came in from the sea, which was hidden from view. ‘I had to make a decision, and I hope it was the right one,' his father said. ‘I admit it was as much for us as for you, especially Helen.'

‘You did it for the best — and it probably was.'

His mother almost stopped eating in the last weeks, and died earlier than the doctors, or her family, expected. She went on a morning she was being visited by a relative she'd never much liked, and while Greg was making coffee. He told Naylor maybe she chose to avoid the visitor in that way. It was a form of humour Helen would have enjoyed. The funeral was non-religious and well-attended, and both husband and son spoke, but Naylor felt a dissociation and lack of grief which arose not from any deficiency of love, but an inability to accept that someone so integral in his life was there no more. No reference was made to Naylor being adopted: most people wouldn't have been aware of that.

Afterwards, though, he found himself thinking about it a good deal, and talking about it too with his father. It was not at all that he sought replacement for his mother, but for the first time he felt curiosity, which was partly the consequence of his mother's death: a sense of permission when the inquiry she had encouraged could not possibly threaten her.

Greg was encouraging also, perhaps partly as a self-imposed penitence for stifling that approach by letter many years before. And the mystery of it was a mild intrigue. ‘Of course your birth mother may be dead, your father too for all we know, but I think you should consider them as well as yourself. Maybe your birth mother is all alone, or unhappy. Maybe she still wants to know about you. And
there's no obligation on either side: that's the good thing, as I see it. Definitely no obligation. None at all.'

They were talking in the lounge on the evening of the day spent helping Helen's sister pack up her things. In time, his father said, he'd move back into the main bedroom with its en suite and view over the sea, but not for a while. Helen's presence was still strong there, and neither wished to diminish it. During the nights immediately after the funeral, Naylor had woken sometimes thinking his mother had turned on her light, thinking he heard her muffled cough. There would be nothing, though his father still padded to the lavatory, still left it unflushed — habit, or a transferred consideration, Naylor wondered. His aunt had suggested some of Helen's jewellery be given to her female relations, nieces in particular, though no such bequests were in the will. Naylor was surprised at the vehemence with which his normally placid father refused to consider that. Naylor was to have it all, he said. They'd talked about it, he said, he and Helen, and just because Naylor was male didn't mean the personal stuff shouldn't be his. And just because he wasn't theirs by blood didn't mean that either, though neither Greg nor his sister-in-law spoke of that. ‘Give away the clothes and all that spare linen in any way you like,' Greg had said. ‘And take what you like of the dinnerware sets. We're indebted to you for your help.'

In the evening, though, he did talk of adoption and Naylor's options. ‘It's completely up to you,' he said. ‘You've already got the birth certificate. You can look up the surname in the Telecom White Pages: it's not a very common name. If she's married since then you can check the marriage records. It's up to you, though. Maybe something good could come of it for you and her, maybe not.'

Greg clearly saw the likelihood that he might soon follow Helen, and that Naylor would be left only relatives with whom he had legal connection. Although his father rarely talked of love, he was both sensitive and consistent in its application.

It was a distraction as much as anything else at first, the search
for Frances Emily Coombes, and it had as well the element of detection. Naylor was surprised, however, by the comparative ease with which he was able to track his mother down. The changes to the law facilitated it, as did access to official records, and he soon knew Frances was still alive, that she had married and taken the surname of Hollister, and that she lived in Sydney by the zoo. The hard part was deciding if he wanted to make contact after leaving it so long. The satisfaction of his only recently aroused curiosity would be little compensation if any reunion turned out badly, and it wasn't as if he felt any driving need to find Frances, even after Helen's death.

It was a dream that made up his mind. Nothing apocalyptic, or even particularly surreal. He dreamt his father died in the same way as his mother and of the same disease, and that at the funeral, which was held in a very open, paddock-like space, a spiky-haired woman wearing an orange skivvy and grubby tracksuit pants stood up unbidden, and said that the loss of parents was sad but natural, while the loss of a child was unnatural and grievous. Naylor didn't at all think the woman represented his birth mother — rather she reminded him of a mature student in his Bristol University study group whom he'd rather disliked — but the idea that his mother might have suffered in some significant way because she was denied knowledge of him, remained strong.

He said nothing to Greg about the dream. His father would be doubtful of such provenance for any contact with Frances Coombes, or Hollister. Naylor gave instead the rational, commonsense reasons his father had given him, and Greg was satisfied in this way with his own persuasion returned. He agreed, too, with the advice Naylor had been given by the Adult Adoption Central Registry, which was to write to his mother, but have a counsellor in Sydney approach her to see if she wished to receive the letter, and, if so, by what means. Who knew how she might react, or if the husband had been told of Naylor's existence.

The letter said nothing of Helen's death, and not a lot about
Naylor and his life: just that he was now independent and wondered if Frances still wanted to make contact. The reply was prompt and came directly from Frances herself. She didn't have any other children, she said, and made no reference to her husband. After such a long time, they should meet as soon as possible. She suggested, in what Naylor took to be a joke, that they toss for which of them should travel to see the other, ‘though maybe it would be awkward for your family if I came over. I don't want that. Minimum expectation, no demands, but how I look forward to seeing you.'

Naylor wondered if his father was well enough to be left by himself, but Greg said he would be fine, and promised not to overdo things. ‘I think it's better you go there,' he said. ‘If it all gets a bit tricky, you can choose when to disengage. Not that there's any particular reason to think it will, but there's the potential for a great deal of emotion, isn't there,' and he squeezed his eyes closed at the thought of the heightened feelings a woman could be capable of in such a situation. ‘But she said minimum expectations and no demands, didn't she. Good, good.'

So not long before Christmas, Naylor flew to Sydney, and then took the ferry across the harbour, and a taxi to his mother's house close to Taronga Zoo. The day was overcast and hot, the house was wooden and unexceptional, Naylor's feelings were confused, and for a moment he considered turning back. Instead he looked at attractive treetops in the distance, and guessed they were in the zoo, then he used the wrought iron door knocker which was in the shape of a woodpecker.

What did he expect there in another country and unfamiliar surroundings? How, at twenty-six years of age, was he meant to greet his mother for the first time? At the very second the door opened there came a single, piercing wail from the zoo. ‘It's the bloody howler monkeys,' the woman said. ‘I'm Frances — give me a hug.' She was short and he was tall, which added to the awkwardness of the brief embrace. ‘Come in, come in,' she said in a consciously
cheerful voice, and led him inside. ‘That too,' she said, when he was about to leave his bag.

They walked right through the house and onto wooden decking at the back which looked out to a square of lawn, four rows of vigorous tomato plants, and neighbouring houses on slightly lower ground. In the centre of the lawn a spray hose attachment rotated with a faint protest, and the water made a soft hiss in the air, and a repetitious patter on the grateful grass. Naylor and Frances sat on wooden patio chairs and took stock of each other as they talked.

‘It'll be strange for a while won't it,' she said. ‘I think we should aim to become friends first, and then let things happen naturally. My God but you're tall. I know you're Campbell now, but it means a lot to me that your first name's still Naylor. I chose it because it was my dad's name, and he never completely gave up on me.'

‘Mostly I come across it as a surname,' he said.

Had he expected some genetic frisson on meeting his mother, an instinctive bond immediately apparent between them? Well, it didn't happen, but there was pleasure and goodwill, and curiosity too, beneath the wariness which at least Naylor showed. Both of them were aware of the incongruity — a mother and son who were complete strangers to each other, making rather routine conversation in mundane surroundings. The unseen zoo was the only external sign of any peculiarity, and exotic hoots, shrieks and ambiguous cries occasionally punctuated their conversation. There was so much for each to find out about the other, and such sensitive care not to push interest into interrogation, that peripheral topics took hold. Naylor was told all about the tomatoes in the whispering spray, and their importance for Frances's favourite pastas, long before learning that no longer was there a Mr Hollister on the scene, and Frances heard all about Bristol University in the first hour or so, but not that Helen was dead.

And as they talked they studied each other, letting their gaze fall briefly in consideration, rather than embarrassment, when their eyes
met too directly. Naylor could see nothing of himself in his mother, unless it was her hair, which was brown, soft and limp like his own. She was perhaps five foot five and slightly overweight, but Naylor was surprised how young she looked, and realised he had illogically been expecting her to be Helen's age. Her skin was smooth, her bust unaccentuated, and her hands, spread on the wooden armrest of the chair, were small. She was an unexceptional woman, one you would pass in the supermarket aisle without more than a glance, and Naylor was slightly disconcerted by that. He realised he had subconsciously assumed his mother to be different, to be outstanding to him, because of their relationship. That she wasn't, caused not so much disappointment as a faint bewilderment.

‘It's an odd situation, isn't it,' he said, realising she might be feeling much the same.

‘Jesus, that's certainly right. But it's special too, don't you think, to meet up like this after years and years.' There came a particularly loud trumpeting from the zoo.

‘Must be feeding time,' Naylor said.

‘For me it's like living next to the railway tracks, or the ocean: the noise becomes so familiar it hardly registers, unless some new creature starts up.' They both listened for a moment, but the zoo didn't proclaim itself further. ‘Why don't we ask each other two questions before I get something for us to eat? It might make it easier to relax afterwards.'

‘You mean difficult questions?' said Naylor.

‘Ones to get out of the way, yes. Short answers now and perhaps the full explanations when we know each other better.'

‘Fair enough.'

‘You go first then,' she said.

It made a game of the situation, almost, but a game that permitted licence. The zoo was quiet as if even the animals there wished to hear the questions and answers, and the spray from the hose attachment caught the sun briefly in a glitter of rainbow fragments.

‘Why did you give me up?' he asked her. ‘I'm not at all bitter though.'

‘I was nineteen years old, unmarried, and my mother said it would be best for everybody.'

‘Who was my father?'

‘I knew that would be the next question. He was a tutor at the polytechnic where I started a journalism course. He was in his early forties and married with three daughters. When I told him I was pregnant he gave me $5,000 and the brush-off. I can give you his name if you want it.'

‘I've got a name,' said Naylor. ‘Anyway, he's probably dead by now, isn't he.'

‘I haven't a clue,' said Frances. ‘But it wouldn't be hard to find out. But it's not just him to consider — you know now you have half-sisters?'

Naylor asked her if she had more children of her own although he knew the answer, and she smiled and shook her head. ‘That's another reason why it's so great you've turned up. I did try to get in touch, you know, years ago now, and Mr Campbell was against it.'