Songs from the Violet Cafe Read online

  ‘She said there was a special guest.’

  ‘No, the special dishes, you idiot.’

  So Marianne had to stop then and show her how you took orders in turn from each person, not mixing up the dockets, so that the food flowed back to them in the order they had asked for it. Jessie found herself beside a table, notebook in hand, reciting the soup of the day, French onion, and our fish is terakihi, cooked very lightly with a delicate lemon sauce, our special tonight is grilled lamb with a Turkish sauce made from onions, tomatoes, capsicum and pine nuts blended with wine. How chic it sounded, she would remember. And for those of discernment, there was chicken with truffles, poularde de truffée. Marianne made her say it two or three times over and seemed pleased with her efforts. ‘I’ve never seen a real French menu before,’ Jessie said.

  ‘An adaptation of the classics, I suspect,’ Marianne said dryly. ‘You’ve learned French, have you?’

  ‘Just at school.’

  ‘Same here. Not that the French understand me.’

  ‘You’ve been to France?’

  ‘Not likely. The French come here sometimes when they’re visiting. As you know, this town gets a lot of visitors. Now, about the wine. People might ask for it. You ask them if they want a cup of tea, and if they say yes right away, you go out and ask her ladyship if they can have one. If they seem surprised and ask why a cup of tea when they’ve asked for wine, tell them straight — we don’t serve it, we keep the law. You understand?’

  ‘I think so. But if it’s a Frenchman, mightn’t he be surprised?’

  ‘Ah well, that’s different. You still ask Mrs Trench. I promise you’ll get to know which is which.’

  Jessie saw that Marianne had taken table six, after all, and that the man sitting there was the man who had spoken to her in the street. Evelyn’s father. He winked when he saw Jessie, and grinned. His companions were a couple of men in their thirties and forties perhaps. A business dinner of some kind, Jessie guessed from words overheard. Marianne moved forward. ‘What would you like, sir?’ she asked, and he laughed. The men with Lou Messenger were not bushmen or farmers, but outdoors kind of men all the same, with smooth tanned complexions. They wore suede ties with coloured shirts and, out in the kitchen, Marianne said it was a business celebration, a good sale their company had just made. Hadn’t Evelyn been told about the sale?

  ‘It’s not what I’d heard,’ Evelyn said. ‘Ask my mother.’ Her voice was full of a startling bitterness. ‘Tell the new girl to tell her.’ Jessie overheard this in a snatch as she whisked away another plate in the rising heat of the kitchen, and shivered. A quick wink didn’t go unnoticed in this place.

  ‘Don’t, Evie,’ said Marianne, as if they knew each other better than they were letting on.

  Jessie had, in fact, been delegated to the table where Evelyn’s mother was sitting, because Evelyn wouldn’t serve her and her assembly of surprising friends either. Evelyn seemed to be the one who got away with things.

  Jessie tried to think of the menu as if it were a poem, or the law of torts, but found herself tripping on the poularde de truffée, because the author was playing with his spoon, banging it on the side of his water glass. It made her think of Grant and Belinda and Janice, so much so that she almost stopped. Evelyn’s mother, whose name was Freda, stared at her in an intense kind of way as if willing her to get to the end. Jessie thought that this might be a job lived on the edge of desperation. Even so, at the end of her performance, the author slow-clapped.

  Violet was there in an instant. ‘There’s a pie cart at the end of the road if you’d rather.’

  ‘Oh please,’ said Freda. Her eyes darted over to table six, but her husband didn’t seem to be paying any attention.

  Violet straightened her shoulders. ‘You did well, Jessie,’ she said, before she moved off.

  Alongside Freda there was an odd assortment of men wearing cravats at the throat of their white shirts, smoking cigarettes in gold-patterned holders, a woman with an overloud laugh and bright lipstick who had come along because there was nothing in the fridge at home, a sallow youth with red-rimmed eyes, as well as the famous author in his checked shirt with the sleeves rolled up, and the frail-looking woman with big eyes and hollow cheeks. At Violet’s insistence, the famous author had taken off his hat and put it at his feet. He said he’d like a beer — any chance of a beer?

  ‘Would you like a pot of tea?’ Jessie asked.

  ‘Tea, for Chrissake, I don’t want tea.’

  ‘I think she means tea, you know, tea,’ said his girlfriend. ‘I think I’d like a cup of tea.’

  It was like a complicated dance, waiting on tables in that crowded room. Marianne did it best, gliding among the tables with a feline grace, looking as if she was enjoying herself. Her broad shoulders bent again and again over the tables, delivering food with an accomplished ease. In the kitchen hardly anyone spoke to one another, although thighs touched and brushed as the chefs concentrated at the stove, and the waitresses flung the dockets on the spikes overhead. Once, later in the evening, Belle got in Evelyn’s way as she dashed over to John with a sauce pot, causing a minor collision. Evelyn’s dessert order, a crème brulée wearing an exquisite net of spun sugar, teetered in mid-air before she saved it with a flick of her wrist. Evelyn turned a glower of rage upon Belle, and then shrugged her shoulders as if she was beneath her contempt.

  Now that the café was almost full, Violet promenaded among her guests, dispensing a charming word here, or a cool stare where it suited her. For a while she stopped beside a heavy-set man with closely cropped greying hair, and his wife, a thin woman whose face was drawn into a pale mask, her hair pulled back tightly in a chignon.

  ‘This is Doctor and Mrs Adam, Jessie,’ said Violet, although Jessie heard her call them Felix and Pauline. ‘I want you to take care of them. I’m sorry the crowd is a bit noisy in here,’ she said, appearing to refer to Lou and his friends, as well as the famous author and his companion. ‘How do I begin to explain my restaurant to people who want fish and chips and a beer?’

  ‘You don’t allow them in,’ said Mrs Adam.

  ‘Its not always as simple as that,’ said Violet. She glanced at her watch as if she was expecting someone. ‘The doctor and his wife have travelled a great deal,’ Violet told Jessie, as she leaned over to clear their soup plates. As if that explained everything, and Jessie would instantly see the good breeding and aura of fine dining that surrounded them.

  ‘So why don’t you introduce us to your friends?’ Lou called out loudly across the room to his wife. ‘Your mate and I are in the same business.’

  ‘Excuse me,’ said Violet, getting to her feet. ‘Lou, that’s enough.’

  ‘I’m in the hunting and fishing business,’ Lou said, addressing the author.

  ‘You are?’ said Gary, a look of interest lighting up his face for the first time. Freda was holding a napkin to her bloodless lips.

  ‘You can’t do this,’ Violet said. ‘Stop it, Lou.’

  ‘You telling me I can’t talk to my own wife?’

  ‘Not across my restaurant, you don’t. A restaurant is not a place where people call out from one table to another. You know better than that.’

  ‘Oh, is that so?’

  ‘Lou, please,’ said Freda.

  Lou dropped his eyes. ‘What a farce,’ he muttered, and turned back to his friends as if nothing had happened.

  The hush that had fallen for a few moments lifted and everyone carried on as before. Pauline Adam suggested to her husband that perhaps it was time they went home, but he said, not yet, not just yet, as if something else might happen.

  Felix’s eyes followed Violet.

  Felix Adam was probably the only person in town who knew the year Violet Trench was born: 1907. April 12, to be exact. Doctors are able to find out that sort of information and, like priests, they can never tell. His wife Pauline had said to him more than once, that absurd blue she rinses her hair, it looks as if she’s been in grandma’s wash
ing tub. Somebody should tell her. But Pauline, thin as a rake and as spiky, couldn’t see how truly handsome Violet was, how utterly sensuous and appealing. Well why should she, and would he want her to? Not at all. He would like to bed Violet Trench. This private admission was shocking in itself, not what doctors were supposed to think about their patients. Felix did know she had had a child once, a girl she hadn’t seen for nearly thirty years. This fact of child-bearing was something she couldn’t hide from him at the time of his first examination. But it irritated him to think that, for all his position of privilege, there was so much more to know. He couldn’t understand, for instance, the odd sad parade of girls, mostly end-of-war babies, whom she employed in her café. He mentally examined his files:

  Hester Hagley d.o.b. 19 September 1935 (the exception), Mother in advanced menopause at time of her birth, nervous temperament prescribe salts for blushing. To be married. Virgin. Hymen may require surgical intervention if coitus to be achieved.

  Belle Hunter d.o.b. 5 June 1946

  Girl in generally good health, annual tonsillitis. Early maturation, precocious development with sexual activity. Contraception supplied at mother’s request. Police matter? Better not.

  Evelyn Messenger d.o.b. 12 December 1945

  Bright hard-working girl. Anaemia, suffers from depression and severe mood swings, may improve when she leaves home. Mother very exacting. Father periodically treated for gonorrhoea.

  Marianne Lindsey d.o.b. 23 November 1945

  Claims dysmenorrhoea, probably psychological. Showed up in surgery on a Friday night with pimple on her lip. The vanity of the girl. Gave her a good talking to, bothering me when I was about to go skiing for weekend. Mother came in on Monday morning with girl in tow, face blown up like a balloon with an abscess. Incorrect diagnosis? Very difficult to tell with flighty badly behaved girl like this. Mother took her to Rowe [his opposition, at the other end of town], said she’d complain to Medical Council. Woman’s a tramp, make note to Medical Council to warn them of ill-informed outburst. Not seen either of them in months, and good riddance.

  ‘And where are you from, girl?’ he said to Jessie, as his wife grudgingly ordered dessert.

  ‘Tipperary,’ said Jessie. Just the sort of thing she’d always wanted to say to customers in the china department. Or her tutor in torts for that matter. That’s me done, she thought, preparing to take off her apron, and found herself grinning.

  She was saved by the appearance of a very old man, entering the café with the aid of a stick.

  THE SPECIAL GUEST

  Violet escorted the special guest to the reserved table by the window and helped him take off his black beret and raincoat, before he sat down. His face was beak-like, his teeth yellow; he smelled gently but not unpleasantly of unfiltered De Reszke cigarettes. Beneath his coat he was wearing an old carefully brushed hound’s-tooth jacket with a hint of red in its chequers. Jessie saw the strings of his hearing aids around his neck, connected to the little pink enamel blocks behind his ears. His hands were bent and weathered, fingers knotted around the joints. He and Violet talked for a while, until she had to go to the desk and turn away latecomers who didn’t have reservations. Violet took one of Hugo’s hands in hers and studied a bruise. The light from a passing boat flared and was gone. She released his hand. ‘Happy birthday, dear Hugo,’ she said as she rose. ‘Jessie, tell John that Hugo is ready for his dinner. I’ll be back soon, when table twelve’s guests have paid their bill.’

  ‘You’re new here, aren’t you?’ said the old man.

  ‘It’s my first night,’ Jessie said.

  ‘Ah well, then, sit down and tell me about yourself.’

  ‘But won’t I get into trouble?’

  ‘Of course you won’t. It’s my birthday, and Mrs Trench will let us do what we like. Besides, John will bring me my dinner soon. Now tell me your name.’

  When they had introduced themselves to one another, he said, ‘So what brought you to the Violet Café?’

  ‘I’m just travelling, really,’ Jessie said.

  ‘Oh travel. It’s a great thing. I’ve travelled from one side of the world to the other, but when I got here I stopped. By the time I had the money I was really too old for that sort of thing. Now tell me, where do you want to go?’

  ‘To China,’ said Jessie, off the top of her head.

  Hugo blinked rapidly, and peered at her, as if to discern something behind her words.

  ‘My mother had a friend who went to China,’ she explained.

  ‘Oh, I see. Well then, so you should go to China. I would have liked to have gone there more than anything else in the world. I’d have liked to have seen the Yellow Mountain. I have a dream of it here in my head. A place of infinite beauty. But closed now to people like us. You’ll have to think of somewhere else to go in the meantime, perhaps.’

  This was the moment when Hugo’s meal arrived, and Jessie, seeing that there were tables to be cleared, got to her feet. The food John brought was not on the menu. He placed before Violet’s friend duck cooked the Oriental way, slick with sauce, sprinkled with spring onions, and accompanied by a small bowl of rice, and chopsticks. As if this was the most natural thing in the world, and in spite of people who stared at him as he ate Asian-style, Jessie saw the way Hugo enjoyed himself, chewing in an old man’s ruminative way. When finished he wiped his mouth carefully and placed his folded napkin beside his plate.

  Felix watched the old man with dislike. He was sure that Hugo knew more about Violet than he did. He was Felix’s patient, but the boy in the kitchen, a mongrel kid, as he thought of him, had come between them. His birth that had gone unregistered for some years. Surprising, for the father was meticulous in most things. He had switched his boys to Rowe, too, as if he didn’t trust Felix. And yet Hugo had stayed with him; Felix knew his asthma, his arthritis, his prostate problems and his in-growing toenails, but still there was so much he would like to have asked him, and most of it concerned Violet Trench.

  ‘Violet,’ Hugo said. There was something he had to say to her, before it was too late. But Violet was busy, one minute out the back scolding, the next charming the doctor. Hugo saw the electricity running between them, wondered how she would get Felix for herself, because it was clear that that was what she wanted, and it grieved him. Then, in the next instant, she was back chatting with Lou Messenger. He’d known Lou since he was just a kid who came on holidays to the big brick house round the bay. The Messengers were high fliers. Upper class, or that’s how his lawyer father would like them to be seen. No, not quite right. Upper middle class, perhaps. Funny how it was all coming back now, the old shibboleths of his childhood. He’d thought it was all vanished, all gone long ago when he married the woman from Yellow Mountain. Lou Messenger, for the hot months of the year, was the boy next door, with an endless insouciance about him. He wanted more than anything to build a boat of his own. His mother, a bridge-playing woman with a laugh like a clatter of pans, thought the idea was ridiculous, when they already owned a launch. We’ll help you build a boat, he’d told the boy, I’m sure we can find a plan. You can set it up in our backyard. He was fond of the boy, liked the way he joined in, didn’t seem to notice people’s complexions. His own was dark, anyway, his father a man with tight skin and a blue-ish mouth, perhaps Indian in his origins, although he kept that to himself. He was fluent in several languages, sometimes breaking off in mid-sentence and launching into French. The lawyer spent those summer months in a hammock under the trees, endlessly smoking and reading, and pacing up and down at night. And then his wife had died, and so had his own, his second great loss. His dear wife Ming.

  He hears her. She is describing a river that widens between its banks, a river so slow that it might almost be a pond or a lake. The bare earth of the banks is a light yellow clay. All around are trees with feathery branches that trail down towards the water, reflected there. Between the leaves the sky is relentlessly blue. Something distinguishes this natural scene, this composition of water, li
ght, foliage and sky — a scarlet bridge that spans the river. It has horizontal sidings, so that it looks like a red cage. There is a girl on the bridge, as she tells it, carrying a basket of ducks.

  ‘See,’ she says, ‘that is me. That is my young life that you never knew.’

  Now the girl has moved away.

  But the red bridge is still there.

  ‘Ex-cuse me,’ the authors girlfriend said. ‘Are we going to get a pot of tea tonight or not?’

  ‘I’ll have to ask,’ Jessie said.

  ‘I’m sorry, madam,’ said Violet in an icy voice, at Jessie’s shoulder, ‘but we’re not serving any more tea tonight.’

  The author had eaten his dinner very quickly, while the others dawdled over their food, although Freda didn’t seem to want her meal, and pushed it around her plate.

  ‘Is your meal satisfactory, Mrs Messenger?’ Violet asked.

  ‘Very nice, thank you.’ Her voice was almost drowned out by the laughter at table six.

  ‘Our chefs are having a busy night. I hope you’ll speak well of your meal here, next time you go to air.’

  ‘Truly, it’s excellent,’ said Freda.

  ‘It’s been a bit of a rush for Hester today, she had to help her mother out this afternoon.’

  ‘I know,’ said Freda miserably. Jessie didn’t understand why Violet was holding her customer to account for the fiasco at the bookshop, but clearly she was.

  The bookseller said, ‘Really Mrs Trench, this is a business matter.’ He was beginning to look tetchy and tired, as if the evening had been a mistake.

  ‘I reckon it’s about time we shot through, mate,’ the author said to the bookseller. ‘All very nice, but where does a joker get a good feed round here?’

  The bookseller and Freda stood up and shook hands with the author, and agreed that they should go too. Everyone at the table decided to leave, except the skinny youth who had been sitting beside Freda. It was as if he could now declare himself, show that he wasn’t really part of the group. On the way out, Freda said goodnight to Evelyn, while the author offered Violet his autograph, and seemed puzzled when she said no, but thank you.