Mallawindy by Joy Dettman Page A

bit.’ A gesture, her right finger and thumb, measured the approximate thickness of pages read.
    â€˜Did you enjoy it?’
    â€˜Read for ... for promise,’ she said with a shrug. ‘Stupid. Got no story. Got no showing of how man live before ... just rules, rules, rules ... all same. Ten, twenty, hundred time, same rule. Song of Solomon, I like. Little bit like Shakespeare.’
    â€˜So the tall weed of Mallawindy has read a little bit of Shakespeare.’
    â€˜Little bit. My father, he have book. I must not touch. When he not come back, long time, I touch a lot.’ She gnawed on her lip, then she looked the fat man in the eye. ‘I take one for me. Put my name on.’
    â€˜Which book?’
    â€˜Just poem. I love poem. Honey Breath special. Love middle bit.’
    â€˜Oh how shall summer’s honey breath hold out against the wreck full siege of battering days. When rocks impregnable are not so stout, nor gates of steel so strong, but time decays. Oh, fearful meditation, where alack shall time’s best jewel from time’s chest lie hid, Or what strong arm can hold his swift foot back or who his spoil of beauty can forbid,’ Malcolm quoted.
    She sat barely breathing until he was done.
    â€˜What age are you now, child?’
    â€˜Thirteen.’ Five fingers shown twice and then three, finger spelling, ‘Soon.’
    â€˜The high school headmaster has the final word, you know. He may be approachable. If he is prepared to accept you then we have a chance.’ He sighed and looked out the window. ‘If I had started earlier perhaps? But it’s too late now. That has been the story of my life. I have always been a little too late.’ Though he appearedto be speaking more to himself than Ann, she dared not look away.
    â€˜Headmaster of a two-roomed school in a one-horse town. Headmaster with a drinking problem, I might add,’ and he sipped from his tea cup to prove he spoke no lie. ‘I hate this town, Burton. When I landed here, I had a wife and son. I had dreams. I despise this town. Its dust, its flies, but mainly its people. My wife and son are buried in the cemetery and I can never leave them. Never return to old England. If they put me out to pasture, I have no place to go, so what do I do? Doctors tell me that alcohol kills, and I say, but slowly, too slowly. What do you think of that, Miss Burton?’
    â€˜I know. Your wife, your son dead. Your son get encephalitis. He was friend for my Johnny. Same name, same year. When your Johnny die. My Johnny go.’
    â€˜Your Johnny. My Johnny. All gone, Miss Burton. All gone. It’s a fly trap, Mallawindy. One of those filthy, sticky, pink things you used to see years ago. When they were new, they held a strange fascination, but as the months passed they built up a covering of flies and dust. I looked up at Mallawindy one day, Burton, and I saw myself dangling there. Stuck fast. Not even struggling. The fly trap was no longer sticky, yet still so hard to break away from.’
    He removed his glasses, placing them on the table. Ann saw his eyes for the first time, free of their magnification. They were blue, so misty blue, like an autumn sky when it knows a long, cold winter is coming. ‘I understand your talk,’ she signed. ‘I understand. Like fly trap, become habit. Better stay stuck, you think. Oh yes, better stuck in the old fly trap, Mallawindy. New trap maybe worse, but sometime maybe new fly trap not worse, but better.’
    â€˜You may be right, Burton. You may be right,’ he said softly, rubbing his eyes with fingertips before replacing his spectacles. ‘Off you go, child, or I’ll have your arisen parent on my doorstep, accusing me of foul play. Take this with you.’ From his table he picked up a small blue dictionary, offering it to her as she replaced her sweater. ‘It was my John’s,’ he said. ‘It still has his name on it.’
    He