Eucalyptus by Murray Bail Page B

There’s no real reason for you to be going into town. But leaving that aside: it’s worth asking, when a man starts concocting a story in front of you. Why is he telling it? What does he want?’

    The idea that Holland’s daughter was like the princess locked in the tower of a damp castle was of course false. After all, she was living on a property in western New South Wales. There was plenty of space to move about in. Yet it did seem she had been removed from view—unless she had decided herself to step back. Even if this was partly true—imaginations had taken off running—the slightest suggestion of trapped beauty produces a deeper resonance than plain beauty. It could only add to her desirability; and was Holland’s blindspot.
    Fellow arborists, politicians, soil-erosion specialists, farmers’ delegations, even the occasional tourist who had once been welcomed, were now discouraged. Holland could no longer be sure whether their interest was in the trees or his daughter. A friendly neighbour and son arriving unannounced as they do in the country districts would be received politely; that was about all. If the lanky son was lucky he’d glimpse Ellen’s face at a window, as if under water.
    Sometimes Ellen was seen across the river among the trees, sliced into verticals: that is, fragments of coloured cloth. Whenever she did step out in her dainty shoes and appear on the main street her beauty was startling—flesh, contoured and speckled.
    Holland was conscious of people waiting for him. Each day he woke to a sparkling morning, knowing his trees were arranged outside in their remarkable variety, only to find his daughter-question in all its imprecision still there before him. He was being forced to think about something he hadn’t wanted to think about; he wanted to return to thinking about the usual other things. The subject, or rather the situation, wouldn’t go away.
    The butcher’s wife wasn’t much help. It became awkward having his cup of tea with her, now joined by her friend next door, the rhythmically nodding postmistress.
    â€˜Let the poor girl make up her own mind. How old is she? She knows more about these things than you do. What do you know? A few facts and figures about gum trees. And what use are all your trees now, tell me that? You’ll just have to close your eyes with Ellen and hope for the best.’
    Time and landscape were forever porous; prescribing a narrow radius for a daughter over undulating ground could never last, not exactly.
    Holland decided to take Ellen to Sydney; she was nineteen.
    In the big city he imagined she would blend in amongst the criss-crossing movements, the congested numbers.
    In fact, everything about her was even more noticeable in Sydney, her beauty given greater contrast by the healthy downright ordinariness of the crowd-majority. As well, he soon realised there was a greater concentration of men; so many formidable men with experienced manners; he was constantly noticing a man or groups of city men running their eyes over his daughter, who appeared completely oblivious.
    They stayed in Bondi. Ellen’s idea was to go to the beach every day. She wanted to be alone. To his surprise she moved about with ease in other parts of the city, as if the dream-like distances that existed between things on their property meant nothing to her. She got him to buy her a pair of fancy sunglasses. He had always bought all Ellen’s clothes, including underclothes. There was always something he felt she should be wearing. When she raced out in the morning and returned in the evening she appeared, to her father, tall and shining.
    Although he said very little he was irritable. When he sat in the foyer or out on the footpath his nose felt too big. There was nothing much to do. He kept looking at his hands. A golden age when men stained their fingers tribally with nicotine. What these red-brown hands had