Bleak Spring. Jon Cleary

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СКАЧАТЬ led them out to the back room, the garden room as his mother called it. Olive and Shelley kissed George’s cheek and did the same with Sugar; they were funeral kisses, when dislike and disagreement were buried for the day along with the corpse. Mrs Carss, unforgiving, offered neither kiss nor cheek, but did offer coffee.

      ‘Tea?’ said Sugar. ‘I’m off coffee.’

      Mrs Carss nodded sourly, as if she would have to go all the way to Sri Lanka for the tea, and went out into the kitchen. Jason remained standing, leaning against the door jamb, but the other four sat down. There was silence for a long moment, that of strangers: they had nothing in common but a dead man. Jason, embarrassed by the silence, wondering why adults always had to be so bloody uptight with each other, looked out at the back garden and the pool, where a magpie strutted like a developer marking out his territory. In another month the bird would be dive-bombing them in the pool, coming out of the big camphor laurel where he and his mate had already built their nest. He thought of going out and grabbing the maggie, bringing it in here and letting it loose just to shake up his mother, his grandfather and Sugar. Shelley, sitting there like the doll she thought she was, was no bloody use.

      At last George Rockne said, ‘Did Will tell you him and I’ve been talking to each other the last few months?’

      ‘No.’ Olive was in all black this morning, sweater, slacks and hairband. She frowned, as if she did not like the thought of Will and his father having been on good terms again. ‘Why?’

      ‘Why?’ The lines on George’s face seemed to increase. ‘Olive, we were father and son! Fathers and sons, they sometimes become reconciled.’

      ‘He didn’t mention it to me. Did he make the first move?’

      ‘No-o. I if suppose I did that. I rang him up about some legal advice and it just sorta went on from there. Just three or four times, no more than that, but at least we weren’t arguing any more.’

      ‘It did George the world of good,’ said Sugar. ‘He would come home looking real pleased, you know what I mean?’

      ‘He didn’t come to the house?’ said Olive and looked real pleased when Sugar said no.

      Jesus, Mum, Jason thought, relax for Chrissake. They’ve come offering an olive branch or whatever it is they offer and all you can goddamn do is spit in their face. He had never tried to fathom his father or mother, there really hadn’t been any desperate need; but now, ever since Saturday night, he was understanding less and less of her. She was turning into someone he had never recognized before.

      Mrs Carss came back with coffee and tea; Jason noticed she had got out the Spode cups and saucers, another of his mother’s treasures. Who was she trying to impress, for Chrissake? Sugar, who, he guessed, would bustle, maybe even bump and grind, her way through life unimpressed by anyone but God? He’d heard she had found religion, which couldn’t have impressed Pa, the old commo atheist.

      Shelley, pretty but bloody stupid, a real pain, said, ‘Did you know we’re going to be rich, Pa?’

      ‘I don’t think this is the time to talk about that,’ said Olive.

      ‘No, I didn’t know that, Shelley.’ George Rockne seemed to be taking care to balance his cup on its saucer, as if he recognized he and Sugar had been favoured with the Spode. Then he looked up at his grandson. ‘Did you know that, Jay?’

      ‘Yeah, sure.’ Jason saw the look of disapproval, almost anger, on his mother’s face. His grandfather had sidestepped her, was going to pump him instead of her. Feeling some anger of his own, he thought, Why not? ‘Yeah, Dad’s supposed to have five-and-a-bit million in some private bank.’

      Sugar coughed into her tea, almost dropping the Spode-ware. But George Rockne’s face remained impassive, didn’t take on a single extra furrow. ‘Your father told me about some money in a private account. I didn’t know he had left it to the family.’

      ‘He hasn’t,’ said Olive. ‘Not officially, I mean. We haven’t seen any will. But how did you know about it?’

      ‘It just came up in conversation.’

      ‘Some conversation you must’ve had,’ said Mrs Carss, down-to-earth as usual. ‘Your tea all right, Sugar? I forgot to ask if you took sugar.’

      Sugar gave her a big smile, peeled off her jacket; Jason wanted to laugh, seeing his step-grandmother peeling off her feathers or balloons or whatever she had worn in her stripper days. ‘No, I’ve never taken sugar, even though I come from Bundaberg. Up there in the sugarcane country, if you don’t take sugar they run you outa town.’

      ‘I often meant to ask,’ said Mrs Carss, ‘so your real name’s not Bundy? Short for Bundaberg?’

      ‘My real name’s Rockne,’ said Sugar. ‘Now.’

      A goal to you, thought Jason, a two-handed slam-dunk right into the basket.

      George looked back at Olive. ‘Are you gunna claim the money?’

      ‘Of course, if it’s legitimately Will’s. Otherwise, where would it go?’

      ‘I wouldn’t start spending it till you get it, Olive. It’ll probably have to go before the courts and you can never trust them.’

      ‘That’s because you’re a communist,’ said Mrs Carss.

      George’s wrinkles increased; he had decided to humour the old bat. She was actually six years younger than he, but he knew an old bat when he met one. ‘I’m retired, Ruby. Didn’t you know communism is dead? It’s in the papers every day.’ His face was smiling, but his eyes were not. You couldn’t laugh at the end of the world. ‘Take my word, Olive. Don’t trust the courts. Wait till you’ve got your hands on the money before you spend it.’

      When Jason had opened the front door to his grandfather he had experienced the sudden sad, mad hope that all the enmity and bitterness would be forgotten, though he had never been told or understood what had caused all the ill-feeling. He had just had the hope that as a family they would be together, as he had dreamed they might be. He had never confessed it to anyone, never could, never would, but he had always wanted the sort of extended family that he had read about in some books. He knew that family life on TV was all crap, but he had wished for something like it, to have a grandfather, even if he was a commo, who would tell him what life had been like when he

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