The Tallow Image Read online

  It was time to go home. The day was almost over. Soon the sky would begin to darken, and thoughts of tomorrow would busy their minds. Slowly, still holding hands, they sauntered along the beach, heading homeward. Together, the three of them made a rewarding sight – Ralph who was tall, with slim, upright figure and tousled hair, starched white collar and long black jacket, and Maria, dressed in her Sunday gown of blue taffeta and the pretty white shawl which was crocheted by her own hand. The wide-brimmed blue bonnet was not exquisite or of the best quality, but it had a deep-blue extravagant ribbon that made an elegant bow beneath her chin, enhancing the blueness of her eyes and lending a delicate aura to her lovely face.

  Their route took them by way of the old lock-up, known as the Round House and occupying an elevated position above the cliffs; beneath were the great caverns and tunnels excavated around 1837 by the Fremantle Whaling Company, who used the tunnels as a convenient and direct route by which they could transport their goods from the beach to the warehouses along Cliff Street. From the sudden, lopsided weight on his shoulders, Ralph realised that his daughter had fallen asleep; gently he took her into his arms and cradled her against his breast. Maria began to hurry on ahead, over to Cliff Street and into High Street, then home to the tiny house on Henry Street. Along the way both she and Ralph exchanged pleasantries with neighbours and acquaintances who also enjoyed the habit of a Sunday evening stroll along the front.

  The call of the sea was strong in a place such as Fremantle. For many years the Aborigines had lived on the bounty of the seas, and sailors made up a good deal of the population. The smell of the ocean was pungent to the nostrils; by day and night the sea thrashed and talked, always moving, heaving and breathing, ‘like the heart of a man’, some said, ‘or the milken breasts of a woman’. Lingering awhile, Ralph roved his eyes over the blue and gold lines of the distant horizon, so vivid and powerful, so evidently made by a mighty hand; the vast silvery-blue of the ocean, going on as far as a man’s eye could see, and the sky – huge, daunting, beyond human perception. It was a splendid and awesome sight. One that never failed to make him humble.

  As he walked away, the wonder of it all stayed with him, but the closer he came to home, such admiration was cruelly lost in a surge of misgivings – misgivings which he had deliberately suppressed all day, and which now were rising through the joy and laughter his family always brought him. Misgivings that suddenly were paramount to his mind, dulling the day’s enjoyment and harbouring doubts that wouldn’t go away. Was he right to ask for a transfer back to the asylum? Surely he was stronger than the woman they called Rebecca Norman. Why had she got under his skin, riling him until he couldn’t think straight? It seemed incredible, but she had. She had!

  ‘Are you all right?’ Maria had seen how troubled he was. At once he was on his guard. ‘Never more so,’ he lied, and she seemed satisfied.

  ‘What do you want for your tea?’

  ‘I don’t mind.’

  ‘You never do.’

  ‘Are you complaining, woman?’ he demanded in mock authority.

  ‘No, but just for once I would like you to say what you fancy.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Really.’

  ‘You.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I fancy you.’

  ‘How?’ Now she was playing the game.

  ‘Oh…’ He eyed her up and down, stroking his chin and quietly smiling. ‘Naked, of course.’

  ‘Of course! And on satin sheets?’

  She was smiling at him and he adored her.

  ‘You’re shameless,’ he said.

  ‘I know. But you wouldn’t change me?’

  ‘Not for the world.’

  ‘I’m glad,’ she said. And as they made their way home, there was no more need for words.

  The following morning, Maria seemed troubled. Now, when she spoke her voice was low and her blue eyes looked to him anxiously. ‘Are you sure, Ralph?’ she asked. ‘Have you done the right thing?’ She had faced him with the same question many times during the past week. ‘You mustn’t be swayed by my condition; if you really want to stay at the prison until you’re no longer needed, then it’s up to you. Don’t worry about the shifts. Elizabeth is never far away.’

  Ralph had been standing with his hand on the half-open door. Closing the door, he placed his two hands on her shoulders, gently shaking her and replying in chastising voice, ‘Maria… oh, Maria! I’ve told you that I have already given it a great deal of thought. I’m not altogether happy working at the prison.’ Images of Rebecca Norman came into his mind. Suddenly all his doubts vanished. ‘Yes, I’ve made the right decision,’ he told her firmly. But then he kissed her. ‘Now then, let that be an end to your nagging, woman,’ he said, good humouredly.

  ‘If you’re sure.’ Maria did not relish the thought of him working either at the prison or the asylum. She would rather he had stayed at the warehouse on Cliff Street, where he was employed when they first met. It was true the pay was more, in Her Majesty’s establishments, but she felt he was not happy.

  ‘Trust me,’ he said, then, suddenly, he was gone.

  Coming out to the pavement, Maria watched him go down the street. He seemed lost in thought, head bowed, his footsteps less jaunty than usual. When he reached the bottom of the street, she waited for him to glance back as always. When he did not, she went back into the parlour. For some inexplicable reason, she was suddenly filled with a fearsome premonition of danger, of something beyond her control. When a small voice cried out from an upper room, Maria hurried upstairs, anxious that her daughter might begin fretting. She called to her. ‘It’s all right, sweetheart… Mammy’s here.’ For the moment, the deep murmurings that had so disturbed her were forgotten.

  In her innocence, Maria could not know of the dark forces already unleashed, nor of the awful consequences they would avenge on her and her family.

  Coming up the rise of land that led to the lunatic asylum, Ralph Ryan indulged in thoughts that had already steeped him in a mood of uneasiness. He had not lied when he told Maria that his transfer back to the asylum was for the best, nor had he regretted making that particular request. His only deception was when he had allowed Maria to believe he preferred his work here. He did not. It was true that the asylum was a splendid feature of architecture, being a vast and striking building of character built in the 1860s by the convicts and making an impressive sight, with its distinctive gables, fortress-like structure and far-reaching views over land and sea. And it was true that there were less pleasant surroundings. But, while in the prison there were undesirable and dangerous criminals, there were worse things here – least of all, madness.

  But then again, while there was madness here in the asylum, there was Rebecca Norman in the prison. Madness was a terrifying thing. It made him nervous. She made him nervous, creating a yearning in him that terrified him even more than did these poor, mindless creatures. For some time now, he had come to believe that the Devil had walked with him, whispered to him, tempted him in the form of Rebecca Norman. When faced with a choice of the two evils, he was convinced that he was now faced by the lesser of them. Relief washed through him. A smile whispered over his mouth. All that was behind him now, thank God, he promised himself. And yet, the more he tried to convince himself of it, the more he felt threatened. Even after this past week back at the asylum, it was hard to thrust her from his thoughts. There were even moments when he truly enjoyed her nearness to him… deliciously dangerous moments when he actually called her to him, beckoning her magnificence into his senses, letting her toy with him, allowing her to invade every corner of his being, wanting her there, the longing in him almost like a physical pain that took away his very reasoning. But these moments had grown few and far between of late. And, as he grew stronger, the yearning in him grew weaker, until now at long last she was no more than a memory, growing ever dimmer, fading like a bad dream in the sunlight.

  ‘You’re in fine spirits, ain’t you?’ Mr Bull
en was a kindly man. Tall, large boned and cumbersome of movement, he had a most unpleasant habit of staring at a body through bright, green eyes that were slightly out of focus, and squeezing them into glittering narrow slits that glared out of fleshy bulges with unnerving directness. With his smooth, bald head and slow methodical movements, he had the look of an inmate, rather than the authority of one who minded them. When he smiled now, it was to display an astonishingly beautiful set of straight, white teeth. ‘Been a strange sorta night,’ he told Ralph, who had just come into the small office adjacent to the main ward; at that time of the morning the lunatics were already congregating for their first meal of the day. They began shuffling past now, flanked on either side by their minders, and occasionally grinning through the office window; they made a rare and strange assortment – young and old, male and female, a collection of lost souls, some quiet and helpless as newborn lambs, other dangerous in their madness, violence ever simmering beneath the surface. Yet they were not criminals, never totally responsible for their own actions. They were sadly demented. Warped and twisted beyond repair. More to be pitied than blamed.

  Ralph was regularly reminded of this very fact by Mr Bullen, who had minded such unfortunates long before this building was erected. For nigh on twenty-five years he had watched over them, even during the early days when they were temporarily housed in an overcrowded, ill-ventilated and damp warehouse, alive with the overpowering stench which crept up from the beach and the putrescent jellyfish, seaweed and other decay there. Other minders had come and gone, only a few stayed for any length of time. But Mr Bullen stayed. He would stay until the day they carried him out feet first, or so he told Ralph. And Ralph had not the slightest doubt that Mr Bullen meant every word.

  ‘You’re assigned to the laundry this week,’ Ralph was informed.

  ‘I could have done without that.’ The laundry duties were among the worst.

  ‘Sorry, matey,’ Bullen apologised, again consulting the duty roster. ‘I know what you mean, but that’s it, I’m afraid.’

  Laundry duties were not well received by any of the minders. In the large wash-house situated out in the yard, the female lunatics laundered an average five hundred pieces of clothing each week. It was a tiresome task, hard and grinding, made worse by the heat and steam from within, and the scorching hot sun beating down relentlessly on the outside. Tempers were quick to flare, and on many occasions in the past it had been necessary for the minders to break up what might otherwise develop into a dangerous situation – in fact, some two years ago, there had been a strangling. Done out of sight and in the midst of a deliberately planned ‘uproar’, it was all over by the time the minder realised. From that day on, a contingent of four were on duty at any one time. Since then, there had been little trouble, although it remained the most unpopular duty in the asylum, both for minders and inmates alike.

  All the day long there was no respite from the debilitating heat that sapped a body’s strength. The sun’s rays beat down mercilessly, the slight breeze that had cooled the air in the morning hours suddenly sped away before noon turned. In the rising steam from the cauldrons the women visibly wilted; like zombies they continued in their work, their thin, shabby garments clinging to the film of sweat that coated their bodies. The overpowering odour from flesh and laundry alike billowed into the air. It was fetid, offensive. For minder and inmate alike there was no escaping it.

  ‘Christ almighty… it’s a bloody scorcher!’ The tall, bony man peered at Ralph from beneath unusually hairy eyebrows, the beads of sweat breaking open on his forehead and trickling down the weathered skin to be absorbed by the thick, greying brows that were drawn tight together in a frown. ‘We’ll get no trouble today, and that’s a fact,’ he told Ralph, ‘it’s too hot to work, let alone squabble.’

  ‘At least we’re outside, and not cooped up,’ Ralph pointed out. He had not forgotten the grim interior of the prison, the darkened corridors and the confined work areas; a stark contrast to the lofty, spacious rooms in the asylum.

  ‘Huh! If you ask me, we’d be a bloody sight cooler inside,’ came the retort. When Ralph gave no answer, merely nodding before turning his attention to the women at their work, the man wandered away, skirting the walls of the wash-house and occasionally stopping to chivvy one of the inmates.

  Ralph had been standing in the wide doorway, legs astride, his back to the yard and his thoughtful brown eyes skinned in observation of the women. He could never remember a time when he had been so physically uncomfortable. The stiff jacket with which all minders were supplied felt like a metal tube over his body, the sharp-peaked cap pressed into his skull and forehead, sticking to the sweat that lay like a band round his head, and, even as he stood there, he could feel the rivulets trickling down his spine, fusing the shirt to his back and creating a dull irritation to his senses. Now, when the sweat erupted on his face, running down his neck and into his shirt collar, he reached up, and taking off his cap, he wiped the cuff of his jacket across his forehead and promptly replaced the cap. Taking a deep breath, he prepared to begin a tour of the wash-house.

  Something held him back. A feeling, an awareness, a strange excitement that rippled through him, riveting him to the spot and compelling him to look behind, look behind.

  Slowly, he turned, his brown eyes suspicious and curiously afraid. The sweat was like a torrent now, bathing his whole body; he could feel himself trembling. A glance told him there was no one behind him, nothing in sight at all; the yard was normally deserted at this time of day. It was deserted now. Strange, he thought, he had the feeling that someone had come up behind him. More than that, he could have sworn that he’d heard the sound of laughter, low and soft in his ear; pretty, silvery laughter, yet cruel and taunting.

  ‘Are you all right, matey?’ The bony man with the hairy eyebrows stared hard at Ralph, whose face was drained of colour and whose brown eyes were wide with fear. ‘Bugger me, if you don’t look like you’ve seen a ghost!’ he chuckled, seeming both surprised and amused by the sudden change in his colleague’s countenance.

  Quickly composing himself, Ralph forced a small laugh, though it clogged his throat. ‘It’s nothing,’ he said, in a matter-of-fact voice, ‘the heat, I expect… it has a way of getting to a man.’

  ‘Aye, well, it’s bloody uncomfortable, there’s no denying it.’ He grabbed Ralph by the shoulder, and shook him good humouredly, at the same time dipping into his jacket pocket and taking out a round silver fob-watch. Flicking open the case, he stared at it with narrowed eyes before announcing, ‘Almost four o’clock. Nearly time to march this lot in and get ’em fed.’ Swinging round, he stuffed the watch back in his pocket, saying, ‘Matter of fact, there’s Jim now… look… y’see.’ He pointed to the far side of the wash-house, to the stocky minder who was signalling to them. ‘That’s it, matey,’ he sighed, smiling at Ralph. ‘Pack the buggers up… let’s get ’em outta here.’ Dipping into his pocket again, he withdrew a whistle, which he promptly put to his lips, the ensuing shrill sound the signal for the lunatics to make orderly file towards the door. This they did, and in a surprisingly short time, the same tired and straggling file was making its way along the spacious walkway and on into the heart of the asylum.

  ‘Phew! I reckon that bugger’s shit himself.’ The other man brought Ralph’s attention to the old bent figure as it went by. ‘Dirty buggers, some of ’em,’ he added, wrinkling his nose and momentarily pressing the flat of his hand to his mouth. Angered, he stuck the tip of his truncheon in the old lag’s back. ‘Get on!’ he urged. ‘Get on, yer stinking sod!’

  Ralph took little notice. He had more important things on his mind. There were times, like now, when he was able to lift his thoughts from what was going on around him. He did that now, and found comfort in his family.

  It was while he was in the washroom, splashing cold water over his face and neck, that Ralph heard the unearthly uproar outside in the corridor. Rushing out to investigate, and fearing some kind of trouble, he
was not surprised to see the small party of uniformed men already going out of sight towards the cells reserved for violent lunatics.

  What he saw was a new inmate being brought in. The guards were desperately struggling to contain the woman; her unnerving screams echoed in the air long after she and her captors had gone from sight. Shaking his head sadly, Ralph made to turn away, pointing his footsteps in the direction of the office. His shift was finished; he was eager to make his way home to Maria. Suddenly, he was filled with the same inexplicable feeling that had disturbed him earlier that afternoon.

  Curious, he paused, the sweat once more breaking out all over his body, creeping through his skin like icy fingers. He shivered, cold yet hot all at the same time. There it was again! The same silvery laughter, teasing, beckoning. A deep compulsion took hold of him. He didn’t even want to fight it; it was uniquely pleasurable, exciting, almost like making love.

  Like a man in a dream, he turned, changing direction and following the same route that the other uniformed men had taken, back along the corridor where the sun came in through the fanlights and chased away the shadows, then on, deeper, to where the light grew dimmer and the corridor narrowed to a walkway flanked by eight tiny, grim cells, places of darkness and despair, places that were designed to incarcerate the most disturbed and violent of all the lunatics; places of safety, and hopelessness.