‘It’s good to see you too,’ she says to Belinda, then lets go. ‘Now, what would you like to drink? My shout.’
Order taken, she heads to the bar and the grumpy barmaid, smiling the whole time.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Mr Williams was very generous in his estimate of how much the furniture was worth and paid Margot for it promptly. The furniture was gone the same day, and Margot had a moment – several, in truth – of wondering what she had done.
‘Maybe Mummy and Papa wouldn’t have wanted me to sell it,’ she said to Lavinia over dinner that night.
Their dinner was a hard-boiled egg each, a piece of bread and some fruit. Well-balanced, yes, but they’d been eating mainly eggs, bread and fruit for a while now. At least if they had money, they could buy something else to eat.
‘They should have put that in their wills if that’s what they wanted.’ Lavinia shook some salt onto her egg. ‘They left you the house with no conditions. They would have expected you to sell it if you needed money. And honestly …’ She raised her eyebrows. ‘You should have.’
Margot was in the process of swallowing some egg, but it stuck in her throat. Or maybe it was her guilt that was stuck there. Guilt because she’d ignored her responsibilities to Lavinia in favour of keeping the house, which she loves so much.
‘Selling the furniture is your prerogative,’ Lavinia said firmly. ‘And it will be good to have some cash.’
The cashisgood and also surreal, because they haven’t had money for so long. Given they’ve lived frugally for quite a while, Margot could make it last – but she’d also like to spend some of it on doing things they wouldn’t normally. Which is why she asks Lavinia if there’s anywhere she’d particularly like to go.
‘The city,’ her aunt says, ‘on the ferry. Then we can take a bus to the Art Gallery. Or walk.’
The Art Gallery of New South Wales was one of Margot’s favourite places when she was a child. Its neoclassical architecture and the riches within – the paintings that were so lush, so grand – made it seem like a palace to her young eyes. It was Lavinia who would take her, holding Margot’s small hand in her bigger one. Lavinia had played piano since childhood and had the strong grip of someone whose hands have worked. Margot used to think her own hand might disappear inside her aunt’s but it never did. They would take the ferry to Circular Quay and walk up through the Botanic Gardens, Lavinia stopping to point out plants she knew and some she didn’t, just because they were pretty.
The city was so big and strange to Margot then, and not even half as busy as it is now. Which is why she finds herself holding Lavinia’s hand again as they sit on the ferry.
They’re outside, with the wind whipping their hair around, but Lavinia doesn’t seem to care, so Margot feels she shouldn’t either. She has it tied up, so it’s mostly contained, although there will be a few loose strands – the trade-off, she supposes, for the joy of smelling the salt air and feeling the sun on her skin.
‘It is ludicrous,’ Lavinia had said as they slowly descended the steps to their gate, then those to Avenue Road so they could walk down to Mosman Wharf, ‘that we have the ferry literally at the end of the street but we haven’t been on it foryears.’
Margot couldn’t disagree, but she also knows that her life is, if not within the walls of the house, within the boundaries of Mosman, and she hasn’t minded that. It has been easier that way.
Now they’re on the ferry, though, she can see what she’s missed. The view as the vessel rounds Cremorne Point and there in front of them, the Sydney Harbour Bridge, the Opera House, the high-rises of Kirribilli to the right, and the bustle of the harbour with its working boats and ferries and navy ships all around them. She feels it too: the roll of the water beneath them, the sensation of freedom, the pleasure in having a place to go and something to do.
Margot has lived for a very long time without having a purpose, and while she’s long known it she hasn’t wanted to face it. Even facing it now makes her feel ashamed. Languishing in the house with Lavinia was by far the easiest thing to do because it was the path of least resistance. But it was the worst thing for their wellbeing. They have stagnated, all this time. She doesn’t want to contemplate what else they could have been doing.
‘Are you enjoying this?’ Lavinia asks, and squeezes her hand.
‘Oh, yes,’ she says, and squeezes back. ‘I can’t believe I haven’t been on a ferry for so long. It’s …’
‘Fun?’
Margot beams. ‘Yes.’
‘You’ve forgotten how to have fun,’ Lavinia says.
‘Haven’t you?’
‘No. But fun is harder to find at my age.’ Lavinia sighs. ‘So many things are.’
There’s nothing to say to that, because it’s true. So Margot comes up with something else. ‘It’s good, having money.’
‘Indeed. Mr Williams was generous, I think.’
‘Was he?’
Lavinia doesn’t respond, so Margot angles toward her and finds her looking amused.
‘I think he had his reasons,’ Lavinia says.