The Swan Book Read online

  You need to understand something about Warren, Big Red confided in the girl. His friends are important business people. Born rich. Men of old traditions lodged in other parts of the world. They give money to his work. They want a separate voice to hold sway in this country. Do you understand? Only her eyes in degrees of openness indicated which of the cleanly shaven men embracing Warren mattered, while his own cleanly shaven face touched their own. They were either like people cast out in the desert or close-knit, like blood brothers. The girl followed Big Red’s eyes, like a ribbon from her hair that had caught the wind and flew along an invisible current through the house.

  These are all very close friendships. Big Red smiled even more stiltedly and self-knowingly at the wives who politely kissed both Warren’s cheeks, fingers lingering suggestively as they slid a gloved hand across his cheek. She said nothing about those close friendships. Red said they were rolling in money. Most of which is the laundered profits of exploiting natural resources which has wound every cent of its way around the globe many times before it lands in this multi-coloured fashion parade, my dear.

  The girl watched the kissing, hugging and laughter to congratulate Warren for marrying his beautiful promise. They glanced over to her, smiled, gave a small wave. You see how they love Warren? They are also very important benefactors who will see to it that Warren becomes the head of this country. Do you know what a benefactor is? I suppose you don’t. They give your husband a lot of money to help him become the most powerful man in the country. Not that he isn’t already. I am not saying that. Red looked at the girl strangely, and saw there was nothing one way or another disturbing her, so taking a deep breath and with a sigh of relief, ended the commentary: Well! Whatever!

  Warren smiled amicably, briefly, politely to hear snippets of important news among these high-profile advocates of worthy causes, human rights, moral judgement, espousing correct answers for saving the lives of Aborigines, displaced people, freedom of speech, endangered species, the environment. And in fact, Red said, Between them all, all of them have enough causes to cover the entire planet. You think they could bloody well save it.

  He drifted easily into careful quotes that one would expect from a happy groom, and to the varied questions of friendly media profilers. They smiled with great appreciation each time he spoke. He locked eye contact. It was impossible for the women journalists to break from his gaze until he freed them. The politicians, old hands at the artistry of seduction, cautioned a compromising situation, by ushering Warren aside. They spoke in hushed tones to fill the moment by clinking glasses to honour his peculiarly bizarre but honourable marriage whether they thought it was exploitation or not, the thing was, it was a novel idea indeed.

  The matron Red eyed her special guests sarcastically, and was scathing in telling Oblivia about how they all wanted to know about customary law practices now: See how they are staring at you? Look at them biting at the bit to say that they have always acknowledged arranged marriages. See how they are pulling Warren aside? Read their lips: Oh! Warren, What does it mean? Will this work? Last week they all wanted to outlaw it. You watch: They will be racing and falling over themselves to get back to Canberra in the morning to dust the cobwebs off that old 1970s customary law report and scratching their heads to figure out how to be first to bring all your old laws and practices into legislation which they had previously outlawed to death. That’s what they are all whispering about over there. Trying to be honourable. Such hypocrites. All of them. Fancy trying to justify oblique practices from another culture they know nothing about and wanting to build it into the normal practice of Australian law. But what can you say? Men from the mountaintops will always come down to the molehill to conquer it. That will always be the vice of the conqueror.

  The tables were festooned with red fish, octopus, squid, oysters and silver urns overflowing with prawns, crayfish, salmon and all other things cooked red from the sea. A line of waiters queued at the door with platters of steaming roasts and vegetables under shining silver lids. It was a banquet, more food than the girl had seen in her entire life, and the sight of so much food for one meal made her nauseous, and unable to eat. Inside her loneliness, she felt the pangs of hunger the night she had raided the fishing nets in the swamp, and had not found a single fish. Then, she lost track of the number of cattle, pigs, sheep, and poultry slaughtered, and vegetable fields that had been raided, the sea emptied, and all of this – deteriorating into the guts of seagulls eating the rubbish.

  She had no guests of her own. Even old Aunty and the Harbour Master had boycotted the wedding. The girl stared blankly into a world where hungry swans flew around the house in a frenzied flight of destruction. In the melee of crashing and swans’ hisses, the huge birds strike at food off dinner plates and attack the banquet. Strangely, other things fall apart in her mind too, because somewhere far off beyond the house and wedding music and guests milling in talk she could hear the single cry of a swan gliding down a lonely river calling for its mate. She turned pale. This was old Bella Donna’s story of the swan flying with a piece of bone in its beak.

  The neck of a motionless swan lay limp on the bank of the river so far away. Its mate flew on and on, and the girl could hear the swan’s wedding song coming closer as other things began to take shape before her eyes, and Warren’s guests became swans. Their clothes were transforming into swanskin with feathers of glitter and shine.

  It was a funny old world the girl thought, seeing people too preoccupied to notice their own metamorphosis. They were too busy thinking about the proper way to smile at a promised wife first lady who stared back at a room full of swans. Oh! My God! She smiled at the busy swans preening one another, and again, gliding across the glassy room to the music of Johann Strauss. Oh! My God! The girl had been captured in the blissfulness of being a bride. Look at her! She danced towards the swans flying through the air – and then, crying as they faded away, was unable to accept that they could have changed back suddenly into Warren’s guests.

  But the room danced with French champagne, chatter and music, and as guests were introduced to the girl, she found the sense of their humanity enticing. Warren’s guests had learnt about poverty from not being poor themselves, in places where you did not hear the screams and yelling of help. Their words could stay on a flat horizontal plane from one end of the spectrum to the other in speaking about the emotions of the world. Well-fed speech was flexible, versatile, and heavily pregnant with a choice of words that could be tilted with enough inflection to win hearts regardless, so when she listened to Red, she had to remember they were actually oppressors, capable of slipping down to the bottom of a fetid well to destroy whoever got in the way of their success. She shook their hands just like they might have been swans.

  In a room celebrating the glory of the country through political manoeuvres, there were no genies. This thought had struck her like lightning, and when Warren caught sight of her she froze. He patted the arm of the person he was speaking to, excusing himself to collect her. His arm guided her from one person to the next, circling the room in farewells, while she wanted to walk away. You are supposed to be a trophy wife, Warren whispered into her ear and capped it with a light kiss. He was obviously thrilled by what he overheard from his guests.

  This is astonishing. He actually went ahead with it.

  Married his promise wife.

  Someone said he just went straight in and took her from a bush camp where she was living in squalor with ducks and what have you, and she had been raped and everything. A really violent place where children were neglected.

  No!

  Well! No one can be too surprised. That’s the kind of thing Warren would do.

  I agree. He has always been a man who will stand by a principle.

  But she was half mad when he found her.

  Was that when she was living in a tree or something?

  They say she didn’t even know her name.

  Why? I never heard of someone not knowing their ow
n name.

  Well! It is true. Not all people are the same.

  Bullshit! We are one country here. We are all Australians. All equal. No one is any different.

  Well! If you don’t believe it, go and ask her what her name is.

  Oblivia overheard too. She felt strange, and could not understand why he had taken her away from her home either. It is just games, Warren said, squeezing her hand and smiling at his friends. Why would people play these games? Her head felt as though it was being whisked around inside a sphere tugged by swans circling the skies and narrowing in their search to find her.

  Finally, they were back where they had begun, walking down through the pine trees where white mist rose through the foliage, and a violin was playing Edgar’s grass owl rhapsody. She stopped to listen, and the music grew louder as it spread through all of the trees. Warren held her arm firmly. She pushed him away, trying to break free, she wanted to go back.

  Where? Where do you want to go to, he said, while he maintained his grip on her arm.

  Where is he? Edgar? she thought, trying to pull away.

  Don’t be stupid. Come on. Let’s try to dignify the occasion. At least you should be capable of doing the few simple things you are supposed to do. Who put on that music? Listen! See! The music is being piped through the trees. That’s all.

  The girl struggled to look back, and strained to hear the music as it faded into the background of the farewells of guests crowding around them. Red’s big lips smiled broadly. All eyes were on Warren as they wished him well, showering him with embraces in a wave that lifted the bride into the car while shadows flew overhead. But! Just when she thought the swans had arrived, the shadows disappeared from the curls in the mist, and then, it was sunshine. There was nothing but blue skies as the door closed, long before the violin finished playing its serenades.

  Driving away, Warren happily chatted about the simply marvellous wedding to the driver he called mate, or to whoever else was on the other end of the mobile phone which was ringing constantly. Wasn’t it great, Ethyl? Every call he included her, to back up what he thought about his marriage. Yes, she loved it, didn’t you Ethyl? Warren’s voice went on squashing her thoughts of salt lakes, spinifex and owls. She had lost the battle to preserve Edgar’s music in her head.

  The phone rang like an alarm bell interrupting her thoughts, to dominate the past, to insist the future be heard. She felt that the voice on the phone belonged to a snake. The marriage belonged to his viperous world. Then he was arguing with the phone. It means nothing…Something! Something? Believe me it means nothing. He looked out the window as he spoke, and she wanted to scream at him to stop robbing people of their thoughts. She hated how he killed silence.

  She was certain that he had intentionally stopped her from hearing the music, just as he made certain that she would never reach the point from where her emotions would overtake his plans, to leave him somehow, to return to the swans. He reached across and touched her arm and she flinched in that instant as his voice drew her back into his world.

  Warren smiled and said he had a little present.

  Don’t you want to know what it is?

  He waited until she looked at him before he handed her a small red coral box. It was carved with tiny birds with fat bellies that were larger than their wings, and each bird looked up with golden eyes.

  Go on, open it. The slightest touch to the clasp on the side of the box released the lid which sprang open, and sounded a tune. It is from Swan Lake the ballet. I thought you would like that. Inside, on its bed of silk, lay a silver ring. She looked at her left hand with the gold wedding band that sat loosely on her finger.

  Take it, he encouraged, and then put the ring on her finger.

  This is for the right hand, he said, adding how he had had it made especially for this day. She looked at the design. Two thin bands were separated by crescent moons that encased a small silver brolga, and a swan.

  Do you like it?

  It is very nice. Thank you. She imagined that she had spoken politely, like Red, but said nothing. She wished the mobile phone would call so that the voice of the snake would sit between them.

  I have another little present for you, he said. In case you are thinking about where all of this is heading, you need to know one thing. You will never be going back to where you came from. I will tell you the reason why. It no longer exists.

  Oblivia looked straight at him.

  His smile was victorious now, having conquered her indifference at last. Simple! The place does not exist anymore. There is no time for places like that. So I did them a favour. I had the place closed down the day we left. Listen!

  He tapped the phone, held it to his ear, and spoke. Is everything ready? His voice was cold with authority. A shiver ran up her back. Then he placed the phone to her ear. She listened. The countdown finished, and then, a male voice said, Do it: Now! She heard the explosions whistling through the receiver and vibrating down her fingers. She had to hold the rattling phone away from her ear, but even over the noise of the moving car, could hear the piercing sounds of everything that had flown to the sky. Warren’s face had hardened. She had only seen men around the swamp using their physical powers to destroy. How could this man destroy something so enormous that contained her world? All she saw was a very fine looking man in the suit he had chosen for his wedding day. His thumb silenced the mobile and after taking a deep breath, he placed it back in the pocket of his jacket.

  That was for you, he said at last.

  What is for me? That? What do you mean? The words did not surface, but the sound of her voice rose through a bottleneck as though gasping for air.

  They had not protected you. Nobody did. You know it is true or deep down in your heart you do, just like I know it. Their job was to protect you. That was the law. He took her hand with the ring, and twisted it around her finger, and she saw a third bird, an owl, and she could not understand how she had missed seeing it before, but instantly, she felt calmer, emptied, as though nothing remained of herself which had been scattered far away.

  So it’s very simple. Really. Anyone would understand why places like that cannot exist. It is what the whole country was thinking – even if the Government was never prepared to do anything about it.

  What will happen to them – those people? He asked the question for her. She imagined the swans agitated and frightened by the panic of people being cleared out of their homes. Flying off. Their flight shifting in clear blue skies from the sound of the explosions, the black columns of smoke chasing them away. What would happen if they had continued swimming around the hull, confused, waiting for her to return? Did he destroy the swamp and the swamp-people too?

  They had two choices. Either being moved into the nearest town where they would have to learn to live just like everyone else. Or, being returned to homelands where their real laws and government exist. There will be no Army looking after anybody anymore. Stupid idea in the first place. Intervention! Safer futures! Can’t for the life of me see why stupid thinking like that has lasted a century.

  What if they don’t like it there? What if they go back? Again, he felt the need to frame questions on her behalf, to explain his apocalyptic decision. She was still thinking about the swans and about what would happen to her, if she could go back, and if the swans were not living there anymore.

  What if, what if? What does it matter to you, or us? They only have themselves to blame. But if you want to know: Everyone on earth is obliged to live a life without endangering somebody else’s life. I work at trying to make people safe. Why do you think I went up there? I wanted to have a look. See what the place was like for myself. That was how I found out that I was right all along from the time when the old people told me about you. I had already known that you were to become my wife when I saw what had happened to you. I knew about the arrangement our families had made from a long time ago when I was a boy. You know, I could have closed them down a while back, but I just wanted to make sure, an
d I needed to go and collect you, and in any case, it was better to do it this way. You have a future ahead of you now. They were doing nothing to change things by themselves for the future so they had given up the right of sovereignty over their lives.

  She only half listened, without having any idea of what he was talking about. His boring words went in one ear and straight out the other. Bloody sell out! There were two others in the car. The old woman. Old Harbour Master. Both sitting in the front seat with the driver. They were discussing this matter too. Who does he think he is? God! Where did he learn about bombing people’s homes? Where does he think he is? A war zone. In Afghanistan? That old war! How long has that been going on for? Does he still think he is in Europe or America? Doesn’t he know this is Australia? Who gives him the right to decide on other people’s sovereignty? The old woman was saying how her bones would be blown up now, and she would have to go and find them, Let me get out of this car, then she disappeared.

  The girl looked at the passing buildings – the black and grey concrete statues lining the footpaths. She could feel the cold dampness coming off each building as they drove on. It was the same feeling of fear she had had from the abandoned dogs savagely sniffing through the sedge grasses while circling the swamp, huddling the black-feathered chaos until the water was red and putrid from the smell of rotting flesh and wet feathers. Inside a small pocket of bravery hiding in the crevices of her brain, she imagined herself being united with the swan ghosts flying away from the massacre. It was the only way she could wish herself out of this place. The brolgas would just leave naturally and rejoin the masses further east – back in Warren’s country – and dust off their old rookeries.