Love in the Years of Lunacy Read online

  Once in bed, Pearl found it hard to sleep, despite the late hour. Had she made a mistake in agreeing to go out with James? He was a wonderful musician, and certainly was friendly—but maybe those were the very reasons she was feeling confused. Why was he so interested in going out with her: a girl wearing what looked like a wet bird’s nest on her head, and who couldn’t get through a chorus of ‘Bugle Call Rag’? A girl who didn’t even know how to smoke a cigarette? Maybe he was lonely, she reasoned. She remembered the way he’d kissed the top of her head and her scalp began to tingle again. She was turning eighteen the following week and had never been kissed by a man on the lips—not unless you counted an Indian steward on an ocean liner who’d stuck his tongue into her mouth when she was eleven. As she drifted off to sleep she decided that even though she barely knew Private James Washington, she was determined to meet up with him.

  The next morning, when the twins appeared in the kitchen for breakfast, Clara was shelling peas into a bowl. Mr Bones was curled up and snoring on the chaise longue in the parlour while little Mikey Michaels kneeled beside him stroking the old man’s shiny shoes.

  ‘So what the dickens were you two up to last night?’ Clara asked, not glancing up from the bowl.

  Pearl and Martin only had to flash each other a look over the kitchen table to agree that they should lie. Clara didn’t approve of Pearl gallivanting all over town, as she put it, with her brother. It didn’t look right—a girl her age. Her own mother, Lulu, had chaperoned her—Clara—throughout all her teenage performances and tours until she was officially engaged to Aubrey and had a ring on her finger.

  ‘Pearl was over at Nora’s place,’ said Martin automatically. Nora Barnes, the drummer of the Trocadero’s girls’ band, was Pearl’s best friend and confidante, and lived nearby in Darlinghurst.

  ‘Martin was showing a Negro soldier around the Cross,’ said Pearl.

  Clara frowned and fixed them with a hard stare. She was a plump woman in her early fifties. Her chubby face was framed by short curls the colour of rust, but which the Miracle Hair Dye Company called Temptation Red. ‘Then why did I hear you come in together?’

  Pearl and Martin locked eyes again. ‘Me and the Negro picked up Pearl from Nora’s place,’ explained Martin. ‘So I could walk her home.’

  Clara turned her back to open the icebox, and Martin winked at Pearl.

  ‘And the Negro met Nora,’ added Pearl. ‘They got on really well.’ She glanced into the parlour and saw that Mikey was tying the laces of Mr Bones’ shoes together.

  Martin sipped his tea. ‘Actually, they’re going out on a date tonight.’

  Pearl pulled a face at Martin. ‘And they asked me and Martin to come along.’

  Mr Bones stirred and rubbed his eyes.

  Clara pulled some butter from the fridge and put it on the table. ‘Why would they want you two along on their date?’

  ‘The Negro plays bridge,’ Martin explained, causing Pearl to choke on a laugh. ‘We’ll be playing doubles.’

  At that moment Mr Bones stood up and, as Mikey ducked to one side, he took one small step and fell to the floor. Clara rushed to his side. By the time she’d chastised Mikey, helped Mr Bones to his feet and mixed him a hot toddy to calm his nerves, the twins’ tall tale was forgotten.

  Pearl still felt embarrassed about her sloppy playing at the Booker T. Washington Club the night before and so she spent the afternoon in her bedroom, practising ‘Bugle Call Rag’ over and over again. Later, Martin joined her and they played a few duets. By the time they noticed the sun was going down it was after six o’clock and they were both running late.

  Within minutes, she and Martin were rushing out of the house and, once they were out of eyeshot of their mother, they parted ways. Martin, who was meeting Roma at the William Street tram stop, ran up Victoria Street. Pearl leapt down the stairs from Potts Point to the dockside slums of Woolloomooloo, and on into the Botanic Gardens, which ran down to Circular Quay. But when she reached the gates at the western end of the park, they were already locked.

  The thin bars looked like a series of upturned spears, with razor sharp points. Desperate, she scaled them and hoisted her leg over the top, only to slip. Her dress snagged on an iron spike, tearing the skirt, and the stockings she’d sewn from an old lace curtain ripped. She felt a stab of pain as she fell and landed on the concrete path on the other side. There was now an L-shaped wound carved into her shin, beaded with blood and dirt.

  When she reached wharf five she was late; the only people there were a man sitting on the ground, facing the harbour, with a scrawny, bald cockatoo on a leash, an old woman feeding bread to a screeching flock of seagulls, and a pinched-faced boy grimly holding onto a length of fishing line that had been cast over the side of the wharf. She waited five minutes . . . ten . . . The woman ran out of bread and the seagulls flew away. The boy gave up and wound in his line. The man on the ground began muttering to the cockatoo, which crawled up and perched on his knee, squawking, Shut up! Shut up!

  Pearl felt disappointment well up. It was her first real date and she’d ruined it. Panicking, she turned in a circle, willing James to appear from behind a pylon or to step out of a taxi. She realised she had no idea how to find him again. Her upswept hairstyle was falling down in a mess of bobby pins. Her dress and stockings were ruined and her left leg was throbbing. A drunk lurched up and propositioned her, so she crossed the street and, feeling hungry and sorry for herself, headed towards the Emperor, the fish and chip shop where she’d planned to take James. She walked through the door and into the tart smell of vinegar and frying batter. She gazed up at the blackboard above the oil vats, where the menu and prices were chalked. She was trying to decide whether she wanted potato scallops or a saveloy when she glanced down the back of the shop and noticed James sitting at one of the laminex tables, a teapot and cup in front of him. He was wearing his uniform and cap, the brass buttons glowing like Christmas globes, his grey eyes fixed on her.

  Pearl’s heart hammered hard as she approached him. He was as handsome as she remembered him, and under the electric light he seemed as calm and dignified as a statue of a saint. Before she could blurt out an apology, he rocked back in his chair, smiling, and surveyed her torn dress.

  She tensed, feeling ridiculous. ‘Sorry,’ she said. ‘I tried to take a short cut and got locked in the gardens.’

  He took a serviette from the table and, with a nod at her leg, said, ‘Looks like a long cut to me.’ He licked the serviette and dabbed the gash on her shin.

  The gesture further embarrassed her. To change the subject she said, ‘I was going to introduce you to fish and chips. Do you still want some?’

  He tried to look serious but she could see that he was amused. ‘Yes, ma’am.’

  Pearl backed away from him, leaving him holding the white serviette speckled with blood. ‘Two fish and chips with salt and vinegar, please,’ she called to the Chinese man behind the counter.

  Within minutes their dinners arrived, wrapped with an inner lining of butchers’ paper and then pages of old newspaper. Pearl tore a hole in the top of the package. James did the same and steam escaped from inside. He reached into the parcel. ‘Chips, huh?’ he said. ‘At home we call these fries.’

  They left the shop, carrying the fish and chips, and strolled down to the quay. A ferry blasted its horn, and on the spur of the moment Pearl said, ‘Let’s catch it!’ They bought tickets and sat on the deck watching seagulls dip and glide across the harbour as they ate their food. To the east they could see the lights strung above troop ships docked at Garden Island. The ferry creaked and rocked. Suddenly a wave lurched over the deck and they laughed as they were sprayed with water.

  ‘Maybe we should’ve done this during the day,’ she said, ‘so you could’ve seen more of the city.’

  ‘I can see you all right,’ he said. ‘That’s the main thing.’

  The ferry began turning to the left, heading towards the Harbour Bridge. James put his package of
chips to one side and rubbed his hands, then leaned back and gazed at the lights glancing off the harbour. ‘Right now, in the States, it’s the middle of the day. Actually, it’s the middle of yesterday. Funny, huh?’

  She sensed he was probably homesick and touched his sleeve. ‘Well, they’re just living in the past.’

  He put his hand on hers. ‘That’s right, Sunshine. Now, we’re in the month of May, ain’t we?’

  She nodded.

  ‘And right now it’s fall—I mean autumn—right?’

  ‘Tomorrow’s the first day of winter.’

  ‘Back home, it’ll be summer,’ he said, shivering. ‘Lightning bugs. Town parades. Sleeping on the back porch to catch a breeze from the river.’

  When Pearl had been eleven she’d sailed to Ceylon with her mother in an all girls’ band. It was the depths of the Depression—1935—and for a year the band was the family’s only source of income. The travel had taught her that there were several time zones around the world, but she’d never contemplated the idea of opposite seasons. It was odd to think that, at this very moment, in America, people were eating lunch and probably fanning themselves against the afternoon heat.

  ‘Here summer means the beach, the cricket and lots of cold beer.’ She squeezed his hand. ‘You’ll love it.’

  As the ferry chugged on towards the Milsons Point wharf, the gate of Luna Park amusement park loomed ahead, a giant grinning clown’s face flanked by towers. The facade was as tall as a seven-storey building and had once pulsed with neon lights, but since the Japanese had bombed Darwin in February, the bulbous eyes no longer flashed and the eyebrows never moved. From where they were sitting, Pearl could see the sprawling wooden skeleton of the Big Dipper rollercoaster with its wide, feminine curves, and the Arabian minaret on top of the fun house, draped in a necklace of muted yellow electric bulbs.

  ‘How long does it take to sail to Australia?’

  James groaned and crossed his legs. ‘Put it this way,’ he replied, ‘when I left San Francisco I was still in kindergarten.’

  She nudged him playfully. ‘No, seriously. How long?’

  He pursed his lips. ‘Little over five weeks. Like sailing to the moon. ’Cept when you get off the boat all the moon people speak English in a funny accent and drink lots of tea.’

  The ferry slowed down and bobbed against the wharf. Pearl jumped to her feet. ‘Well, us moon people like to have fun, too!’ She led James down the ferry plank and they walked over to the gate of Luna Park, entering beneath the clown’s upper denture made from plaster of Paris. It was growing late but there were still a lot of people milling about, mostly American servicemen and local girls. A big structure called Noah’s Ark creaked from side to side.

  James smiled and said that the park reminded him of Coney Island, in Brooklyn. After he’d moved to New York he’d go out there almost every weekend. Pearl told him that her mother and father had once performed at Coney Island, when they’d toured the States, before she and her brother were born. According to family legend, her mother had gone into labour with the twins while she was playing percussion in the pit orchestra of the Tivoli Theatre in Sydney. By the end of the first act of ‘The Flying Dutchman’ Pearl was bursting out into the world, feet first between the bass drum and the upright piano three weeks premature. The stage manager cut the cord with a pair of scissors, and then Pearl, apparently, did the strangest thing: she didn’t scream or cry with her first inhalation. Instead, she opened her mouth and laughed. The second act was postponed until Martin arrived ten minutes later, head first in the normal way.

  By the time she’d finished the story, James was laughing so hard he was doubled over. ‘You’re kidding me, moon girl. You’re making that up.’

  ‘I’m not!’ she insisted. ‘You can ask my mother.’

  ‘Sunshine, you planning on taking me home?’

  ‘Only if you’re good,’ she joked. She led him into the midway, which was decorated with Chinese lanterns and coloured flags. He paused to watch a fire-eater swallow a neon tube. When a sidekick flicked a switch the tube lit up and they could see a silvery X-ray of the man’s ribs and the permutations of his upper intestine.

  ‘Damn,’ he murmured to Pearl, ‘you wouldn’t want to see what’s inside me!’

  Pearl patted his flat stomach. ‘Fish and chips!’

  At the shooting gallery, the lines of waddling ducks had been replaced with the heads of Japanese soldiers, made out of tin and painted yellow, already pockmarked with dents and holes. James pointed the rifle and fired, and within moments he’d won Pearl a glittery kewpie doll on a cane. In the penny arcade they came across a machine that gave electric shocks. Pearl grabbed James’s hand, dropped a sixpence into the slot, and with her free hand took hold of the metal handle. A bolt zigzagged through her limbs and out through her fingers and on into James and they were now conjoined and vibrating together and the sensation was so euphoric that they erupted with a kind of stuttering laughter.

  As she glanced at her reflection in the door of the Mirror Maze she noticed her ripped clothing, the torn lace stockings, and when they came upon a fairy floss stand she ducked behind it, where no one could see her, and kicked off her shoes. James, curious, followed her. Winking at him, she stuck her hand up under the skirt of her dress, then unrolled the stockings and pulled them from her feet.

  ‘A souvenir from Sydney,’ she said, pushing the balled-up pieces of lace into his hands.

  He paused for a moment and regarded the gift, shaking his head, then slipped the stockings into his trouser pocket. She linked her arm through his but when a pimple-faced man selling fairy floss glared at them James pulled away from her.

  They boarded the ghost train, climbing into the last carriage. The seat was so small that when they sat down their thighs rubbed against each other. Pearl’s breathing grew shallow. The train roared into the tunnel and an enormous mechanical bat swooped overhead, causing her to duck and cower against James. Eerie groans leaked through walls. A skeleton appeared out of nowhere and rattled its rickety joints. The gruesome faces, the surreal, wailing voices and the banging of coffin lids made Pearl’s heart hammer. In the green light shining from a werewolf’s mouth, James suddenly turned and put his lips against hers, and then her tongue found his and James’s hands began to follow the lines of her body. The citrus smell of his hair cream was in her throat. A vampire with bloody fangs leaped in front of them and disappeared when the carriage took a hairpin turn. James pressed his face against her breasts, traced her collarbone and neck with his fingers. His touch felt as light as breath, as sunshine.

  The carriage plunged through a set of swinging exit doors and they pulled away from each other. As the train slowed Pearl was dizzy and flushed. She’d sensed there was something special about James but she hadn’t expected her body to respond to him so quickly. It was as if her very being had made a decision before consulting her emotions—or maybe they were the same thing and she just hadn’t realised it before. All she knew for sure was that the feeling was filling her legs, her hips, travelling up her spine—and whatever it was, she wanted more.

  ‘Hey, buddy!’ James called to the attendant. ‘We’ll have another go!’ As the other passengers clambered from the train James tossed him a sixpence.

  The man narrowed his eyes and regarded them both, smirking. ‘Sorry, mate.’ He shook his head. ‘We’re shutting down for the night.’

  Pearl could see the fun house had already closed and couples were strolling arm in arm towards the gates.

  ‘He’s been in New Guinea for a year,’ she lied. ‘Coral Sea. It’s his first day of R and R.’

  The attendant sighed, glancing about.

  James riffled in his pocket. He pulled out Pearl’s stockings, then extracted a pound note, and slipped it into the man’s hand.

  The attendant’s eyes bulged. He glanced at James and back at the note then cranked the metal control lever. Within moments James and Pearl were once more gliding into the funereal darkness. A
gain they pressed against one another. His mouth on hers was warm and wet. Pearl lost herself in the noise of ghosts and dying werewolves. The cries echoing through the tunnel increased her restlessness, causing her to crave James more. She could have spent the entire night endlessly circling through the haunted tunnel, allowing his hands to grow familiar with her body, enjoying the shivers that shimmered through her like light. But when the carriage took the hairpin turn this time, above the screams of banshees, a siren began howling through the tunnel.

  James shuddered and looked about. The piercing noise rose into a crescendo before dropping for what seemed like a breath and then rising again. Skeletons and werewolves sprang from the walls. The train continued to bang and crash through the tunnel while the siren howled louder. Pearl was too breathless even to cry out. The carriage plunged through the swinging doors and back into the open air, where they saw people yelling and running for cover. The train was supposed to slow down and stop but the attendant had already abandoned his post and it continued to barrel along the rails, faster and faster. The siren rose in waves as the train hurtled back into the tunnel to repeat its race through the house of horror, crashing through swinging doors, rushing past gaunt, waxy faces dripping with blood. Pearl felt James’s arms around her, holding her tight. The ghosts and monsters seemed sinister now, threatening.