A Thing of Blood Read Online Free Page A

woman?’
    Even from my mother, this struck me as an astonishing question. It jolted Brian out of the fug of his confused emotions.
    ‘It was a woman, of course,’ he said sharply.
    ‘I’ve lived long enough to know that there’s no such thing as “of course”, Brian,’ she said. ‘If I’d asked you this morning whether you’d always been faithful to Darlene you would have said, “of course”.’
    ‘My God,’ I said. ‘You were only in Maryborough for a few days. Who was she?’
    ‘Stop firing questions at me,’ he said, ‘I can’t think.’
    ‘All right,’ Mother said. ‘Take your time.’
    ‘Her name is Sarah Goodenough. I went for a walk on the first night I arrived up there, just to clear my head. I ended up at the Royal Hotel. It’s a nice place. I met a woman there. Sarah. We had an immediate connection. I can’t explain it. It just took me over. We had a few drinks and it seemed perfectly natural that we should go up to her room. She was staying there. Her husband was in New Guinea. He was an officer in the militia, not one of the chocos.’
    ‘What on earth is a choco?’ asked Mother.
    ‘You know, a conscript. A chocolate soldier. That’s what they’re called. It doesn’t matter. I didn’t mean to cheat on Darlene, but it was like the world outside that room didn’t exist. When I was with Sarah there were no husbands, no wives, no betrayal. Just us. Intense. So intense. Fierce.’
    ‘The intensity of madness,’ Mother said.
    Brian gave no indication that he’d heard her.
    ‘I saw her twice after that. Only twice. It wasn’t the same. There was something wrong between us. Sarah was highly strung. Nervy. I thought she might be worried about her husband, but she said she hated him and that she hoped the Japs would do her a favour and kill him. I found that a bit frightening. She said we could make a new life together. I’d told her I was married. I hadn’t lied about that, but she sort of assumed, I think, that I felt about my wife the way she felt about her husband. The last time I saw her — the third time — there was a terrible scene. I told her that I was returning to Melbourne, to Darlene, that I loved my wife. She said — excuse the language, Mother — she said I fucked like someone who was glad to be doing it properly for a change.’
    I hope, even under extreme emotional pressure, that I would have had the sense to omit such a hideous and telling detail. Mother, way ahead of me and unembarrassed by the revelation, said, ‘If Darlene is boring in bed, Brian, that’s your fault as much as hers.’
    Suddenly, and mortifyingly, Brian began to cry.
    ‘Sarah said that if only Darlene and Michael — that’s her husband — were dead, we’d be happy. I told her I thought she was mad to say such things, and then I told her I thought we’d better not see each other again.’
    ‘What do you know about this woman?’ Mother asked.
    ‘Nothing, really.’
    ‘Is she a local Maryborough girl?’
    ‘No. She’s from Brisbane.’
    ‘Let’s assume that she followed you to Melbourne. Let’s assume that it was she who attacked and kidnapped Darlene. If she doesn’t know Melbourne, what would she do with her?’
    This line of questioning led to the ghastly consideration of the options available to the kidnapper. Would she imprison the living Darlene somewhere, or dispose of the dead Darlene?
    Brian slumped, exhausted, in a chair.
    Mother suggested that he go upstairs and put a shirt on.
    ‘You must tell the police everything you told us,’ she said, ‘and you can’t do it half naked. It all sounds so much worse somehow when one can see your nipples.’
    Brian stood up and left the room.
    ‘Honestly,’ Mother said. ‘I really do think the world would be a much better place without a single penis in it.’
    When a policeman finally arrived it was after 3.00 a.m. I opened the door and admitted him. He was decked out in the absurd Gilbert and Sullivan uniform of the