The Tattooed Man Read Online Free PDF Page B

He called again, with the same result. Feeling marooned himself, he put the handset back in its cradle.
    ‘Paul? Are you here? You left the front door open.’
    Grace’s voice startled him. There was the sound of the door shutting, then her heels clicking along the hallway. She walked into the kitchen carrying a bunch of Oriental lilies, a rich iridescent pink in the light. Flowers were something she often brought into his house. She was slender in her summer dress. The sight of her face, framed by her long dark hair and beautiful like the Madonna’s, occupied his mind for some moments.
    ‘Hi,’ she said, smiling.
    Usually he would have kissed her. Tonight he was pinned in his chair by an invisible weight.
    ‘Where have you been? I thought you’d be here by now.’
    Grace put the flowers on the table. She gave him a quick, sharp-eyed look, one that got under his skin like itching powder.
    ‘I was buying these flowers. How did it go up there? Not too good.’
    ‘Do I look that bad?’
    ‘You look like death. Your face is like white rubber.’
    ‘Did you cope okay after I’d gone?’ he asked, avoiding this.
    ‘Your sleazy nephew made a grotesque pass at me. His wife was standing right beside him. I couldn’t believe it.’
    ‘That’s Phil. He’d have a hard time finding shame in a dictionary.’ Harrigan tried to joke but the humour died in the air. He breathed deeply. ‘They said Toby had no brain when he was born. Theysaid I should let him die. Look at him now. He’ll be at university next year. What did they know?’
    ‘You’re not talking about your sisters. They’re not like that. Who’s “they”?’
    Cassatt with his jabbing voice, each word like a fist in your face. Put him away, he’ll die soon.
    ‘It doesn’t matter.’
    ‘It does matter. It matters to you, that’s pretty clear.’
    There was silence.
    ‘What’s going on?’ Grace asked.
    ‘Nothing.’
    ‘Nothing,’ she repeated with exasperation. ‘Don’t tell me that. When you’re like this, it’s like being locked in a room with no light and air. I can’t deal with it. Tell me what’s going on.’
    ‘Don’t drag this stuff out of my head. Leave it where it can’t do anybody any harm.’
    He was back there at Pittwater in the unending sunlight with the seated dead. They were staring at him, willing him to sit down with them. Cassatt’s shrunken face and his living voice joined them in a mix of savage memories. You’re dead, mate.
    ‘I’m not dead,’ he shouted.
    ‘What?’
    ‘Get out of my head!’
    He turned and threw his whisky glass at the opposite wall with all the strength he had. It exploded, spraying glass around the kitchen. Grace jerked around, bending away, shielding her face from the fallout.
    ‘I can’t breathe. I’ve got to get out of here.’
    Harrigan was gone, outside to his yard, stumbling onto the thin grass. He turned on the garden tap, squatted beside it and tossed cupped handfuls of water into his face, trying to get somecoolness into his brain. He stood up and drew in breath, stared down at the bay, all the connecting pieces of land and buildings on the opposite shore, everything that had been familiar to him since his boyhood. The scene settled into place; he had a grip on the present again. Wiping his face with his handkerchief, he heard Grace behind him. She was turning off the tap which he’d left running.
    ‘You haven’t walked out on me,’ he said. ‘Did I hurt you?’
    She looked him in the eye.
    ‘No, you didn’t but you could have. Who did you throw that glass at?’
    ‘I didn’t throw it at you. I’d never do that. It was at ghosts in my head. I did hurt you. Look at your arm. I’m sorry,’
    He’d seen a sudden splash of blood on her arm. A shard from the glass must have glanced her skin. In the shadows, the blood was almost black. She lightly touched the thin, moist trickle and then stared back at him. In the mix of darkness and reflected light, her face had taken on a