Beneath Pale Water

By Thalia Henry

It's set amidst the physical and psychological landscapes of New Zealand's southern hills and grasslands.

 

Beneath Pale Water is a social realist and expressionistic novel that follows a triangle of three damaged individuals - a sculptor, a vagrant and a model - who have grown calcified shells against the world. Their search for identity and belonging leads them into dangerous territory that threatens both their sanity and lives. As their protective shells crack they are left vulnerable - both physically and emotionally - to the high country winds and their own conflicts that, ultimately, might free or destroy them.

 

Originally featured as an award winning play in the Dunedin Write Out Loud Festival, this is Thalia Henry's debut novel and has already become a best-selling novel. The author was inspired by the rugged South Island high country where she spent time as a teenager learning how to glide. In this novel, the reader is able to glide with her.

 

"Powerfully evokes the landscapes and seasons of inland Otago." Owen Marshall

 

Winner of the IPPY Gold Medal Award, Australia/New Zealand - Best Regional Fiction, 2018

• Language: English
• Publisher: Cloud Ink Press
• Release date: Jun 25, 2023
• ISBN: 9780473407278

Book preview

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First published in 2017

Published by Cloud Ink Press Ltd, Auckland

P.O. Box 8988, Symonds Street, Auckland, 1150

www.cloudink.co.nz

ISBN E: 978-0-473-40727-8

ISBN M: 978-0-473-41499-3

Copyright © Thalia Henry 2017 (thaliahenry.com)

The moral rights of the author have been asserted. This novel is a work of fiction. The characters and all dialogue are the product of the author’s imagination.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical or digital, including photocopying, recording, storage in any information retrieval system, or otherwise, without prior permission from the publisher.

Cover artwork: Rosa-May Rutherford

Cover design and ebook production: Craig Violich (www.cvdgraphics.nz)

Printed by: Ligare Ltd, Glenfield, Auckland

Published with the support of Creative New Zealand

This book is dedicated to Terry and Helen Henry

SUMMER

When I die, I’ll be a bird. I’ll fly over lakes and mountains. Another bird will fly beside me. Sometimes we’ll wheel in circles just to get a closer look at the grassy hillocks and cadences of the water. Everyday we’ll see the curve of the earth; green, blue, opalescent skies. All of this will be in silence. Sweet silence. It won’t matter if we’re lost. Why? You wonder . . . because the whole world will be our home, with Otago at the centre. With my wing tip I’ll be able to touch something precious, and pure and true. A bird’s life may be fragile but I can imagine no other life so perfect.

Freedom. Freedom is the air beneath our wings raising our silhouettes by delicate wisps of lift that take heat from the winding roads. Freedom is the crisp texture of unpolluted surroundings. Freedom is circling amongst these invisible columns and currents along ridges of mountains and beyond to empty spaces never before occupied and untainted by prying eyes.

1

A hawk was circling, majestic, powerful and free. Delia’s feet dangled idly in the chill of Lake Aviemore, her eyes looking up at the sky where the hawk cast a shadow against the hills. She traced its outline, her hand quivering, then pulled her feet out of the water and hugged her knees. In the sun, her skin warmed, and she left the lake to fly with the hawk. She followed the jagged line of the hills, swinging in a tandem dance. As she rose upwards her sight cleared. She swept above grassy hillocks and cadences of water, the curve of the earth, green, blue, opalescent skies. All in silence she flew. Sweet silence.

The sound of an object piercing the water disturbed her reverie. She turned her head and recognised a young man standing further along the shore, skipping stones into the lake. He hadn’t been around for a while and he looked different. She knew he’d grown up on an orchard not so far from here. For a moment he reminded her of Ben and her breath caught in her throat. But Ben was gone, she told herself. Ben was gone. Her cheeks were damp and her eyes watery; she wiped them clear hoping that from where he stood he wouldn’t have noticed.

Neither of them talked at first and the silence between them became accepted. The man faced the sunset and the lake. He continued to skip stones. She watched him for a time. His stance and his stare were focused, concentrated on his task as if aiming for a specific target that she couldn’t see. She squinted against the glare.

‘I came here to get away,’ she said.

He turned towards her. ‘From what?’

‘People.’

‘So did I.’ He grinned and held out a dusty hand.

‘Luke,’ he said.

She took his hand, studying him. ‘I know who you are.’

He wore a loose cotton shirt and rolled up jeans above olive skinned feet stained with dirt. His straggly hair was lightened by the sun and the tan of his skin contrasted with green eyes. The outline of his chin was shadowed with a light beard, one he hadn’t had before.

He smiled, released her hand and sat down beside her.

‘You ran away, right?’ she said. ‘That’s what everyone’s been saying.’

He seemed not to hear the comment, picked up a stone and placed it in his palm, then added a second and a third. The stones were smooth and flat and he piled them into a pyramid. He was so absorbed in the task that he remained quiet for a time. His wrists were wrapped with a few cotton bracelets that had lost their colour; his clothes were faded, earth-toned, dust was ingrained in the pores of his skin.

The cairn became a marker and she envisioned him attaching a flag to the top. When the task was complete he sat and observed it for a few moments, then selected the top stone and passed it to her. ‘How many can you skim?’

Delia held the stone in her palm. It was smooth and perfect for skimming but she didn’t want to throw it away into the lake. She placed it back on top of the cairn and he reached out to straighten it.

‘I know you too,’ he said. ‘You’re that sculptor, the one who . . .’

‘Whose boyfriend collapsed by the dam. Yeah, that’s me.’ No use pretending. ‘His name was Ben. You might have seen him around.’

His face turned a little grey. ‘Feel like a spliff?’

‘I don’t smoke.’

‘A cup of tea then?’

‘Okay . . . How, though, out here?’

‘I’ve got a gas cooker.’

He stood up and walked towards a bicycle. She was surprised not to have noticed it before. A tent bag lay beside it and a few pannier bags coated in dust. The bike was claret red and flecked with rust.

She blinked a few times. Ben had owned a bike that was similar. He’d bought it in Kurow on the day they met. Her mind was becoming foggy and she shook the memory away.

‘There’s nothing better than sitting at a lake with a cup of tea,’ Luke said.

A slight nip signalled the crisp chill of evening approaching, and she wrapped her cardigan around herself. ‘Afterwards I’d better go though, or I’ll be walking home in the dark.’

Luke busied himself making tea. She sat listening to the jingle and quiet clatter as he set about the task. In different circumstances he could have been Ben’s brother. Their resemblance was so marked and it surprised her that this had never occurred to her before. She searched amongst the stones for a flat, rounded one. The stones, although white and pure, were easily distinguishable because of the complex web of shadows they created on one another. She picked one and turned it over in her palm. It was a perfect flat circle.

‘I’ve heard that if a person can draw a circle they’re mad,’ she said, not considering that he’d listen. ‘All I’d need to do is trace this.’

He looked up, the billy in his hand, and placed it on the stove, the gas hissing.

‘Let’s see.’ He stood and walked to her, took the stone, his fingertips brushing hers. ‘You’re right.’ He too turned it over in his palm and then motioned to throw it.

‘Don’t.’

‘I wasn’t going to.’ He toyed with it, grinning. ‘What do you want it for anyhow?’

Something in her chest fluttered a little, followed by a twinge of guilt. ‘I could paint on it.’

Luke returned to the billy and they watched as steam emerged from the spout, rising up and mingling with the moisture in the air. He turned off the gas cooker and the hiss of gas spluttered and ceased.

‘Take milk?’ he asked.

‘Please.’

‘Powdered of course.’

He poured tea into two chipped enamel cups. They were brown and stained. He mixed a measure of powder into each of the cups and it merged with the tea, turning it opaque.

‘So you’ll bring it back to me then?’ he asked. ‘The painted stone, I mean.’

‘Will you still be here?’

‘I usually only stay one night.’

‘Oh.’

‘Sometimes longer.’

‘Where do you go?’

‘I’ll cycle a kilometre or so and set up a new camp.’ He glanced around as if anticipating his next move. ‘Your tea.’

She took the chipped cup and breathed in the aroma. It was such a luxury to feel the warmth of the cup against her fingertips in the evening chill. When she’d said to Luke that she’d paint the stone, she hadn’t meant it’d be for him.

‘Why not just stay in the same place?’ she asked.

‘I like the change of scenery.’

‘So if you’re not going far, why do you cycle and not walk?’

‘In case I want to go further.’

‘There’s no hurry though.’

‘No, I guess not.’

‘And when you run out of food you cycle back to town?’

‘Yes, whatever town that may be,’ he said. ‘I’m on the move – for the summer at least.’

His green eyes looked kind, flecked with different shades.

‘It’s been a lot longer than that,’ she said. ‘Your father, he –’

‘This is my home,’ he said. ‘This country, my tent. Not conventional as such but it does the trick.’

She leant forward. ‘So you mean you don’t have a home elsewhere?’

‘One made of brick or wood?’ He laughed. ‘Not usually.’

Where would he get the money to live like this? It didn’t make sense. A stock truck rumbled by. The scent of sheep dags and wool wafted past. She watched the truck trail into the distance, kicking up a squall of dust.

. . .

Helen sparked the ignition. She drove in the opposite direction to her daughter, Delia, so that she wouldn’t be noticed. To do this she had to drive in a loop but she didn’t mind. The purr of the motor jangled her nerves. People around the town had been saying there was a homeless man at the lake. The same strange young man, Luke, who had run away years ago and abandoned his father. That he lived out of a tent. She didn’t believe them at first, but now here her daughter was, sitting with him. As far as Helen knew, it was the first time Delia had returned to the lake since she’d scattered Ben’s ashes. Helen had done so much to protect her and she wondered if now she had to protect her from this runaway as well. She tried to think nothing of what she had seen as she drove, imagining how different things had been when Delia was little and they’d lived by the coast. Yet even then their lives had been unsure.

When she arrived home and settled onto the couch, Helen looked to the far side of the room, where staggered up the pillars of the firebox was an inlaid haphazard line of shells. Some things she’d managed to hold on to. But not many. She closed her eyes and pretended to watch the purl of the sea as it knitted whitewash over sand.

Back then, sitting on a threadbare blanket watching the water from a distance, Helen had held her daughter in her arms. The sand resisted the whitewash as the incoming tide bubbled over its surface. She’d rocked gently, singing a lullaby. She listened to the sea’s murmur, and breathed in the crisp salt air. It had a slight nip to it but the sand was warm underneath her feet. The Huriawa Peninsula commanded a presence on her left; she could imagine it sucking water through its blowholes and spitting it out again. Breathing. She’d walk there if she could but her legs were tired already from carrying Delia this far. Her daughter slept, her eyelids flickering. Helen took her scarf and wrapped her in a cocoon.

A rucksack was nestled beside her; she had a few dollars in her pocket, enough to get them to Dunedin on the Waikouaiti bus, but not sufficient to leave without a trace. If it were warmer she’d trail Delia’s toes through the water, and pretend they had run away. She took a handful of sand, ran it through her fingers and repeated the motion, enjoying the texture. Once when she’d sat here a pod of orca had passed through, but today the waves hid whatever was below them, seaweed swaying at curious angles. The salt in the air cleared her airways and her thoughts.

Delia had stirred, her eyelids opening, shaded by the scarf. Helen sat her up and watched her rouse with a half-drooped expression.

‘Delia,’ she said to no response, ‘however will we get away from here?’

She’d held her in the air and her daughter giggled, the scarf falling by her side like wings. Helen brought her back down again, placed her in the sand and watched her pick at shells.

Helen opened her eyes. The shells that lined the hearth glinted at her as if winking and the background hum of the sea seeped away. The scent of salt air lingered for a few moments. Earlier, when she’d seen Delia at the lake with the homeless man, she was certain she wouldn’t interfere, but now, reminded of their past, she wasn’t so sure.

. . .

Kurow sat in the shadow of the mountain cluster, the shroud of mist cutting a line between light and dark down the village centre. Greys blended into a mixture of green tinges, and shadows deepened the curves between the peaks. At the skirt of this backdrop, cottages gathered together separated only by yellowed grass and weathered fences.

Delia wandered along the street thinking how odd it was to have come across the young man who had run away. The people of Kurow and his father had mourned him, when really he can’t have gone far. It was selfish of him to have left in the first place, although why he’d done it she didn’t understand, or much care to. She might visit him in a few days, or maybe not. She approached her mother’s house and glancing in through the window, saw her sitting on the couch, staring at the outline of the fireplace as if into nothing. When they had moved to Kurow, they’d spent an afternoon inlaying shells from Karitane up the pillar of the firebox, to remind them of the shells they had collected together and the beach, her mother had said. Delia didn’t remember much of Karitane now, except the scent of salt air and falling asleep to the sound of the waves pulling and thrusting on the shore. She remembered the chill of the nights too and hiding her head beneath the cover, hiding both from the cold and arguments. She could recall her father’s voice but not what he looked like. Now, as she looked in, her mother looked like a statue, locked in thoughts and time.

Delia kept walking another block and then along the footpath towards her home. The residents of Kurow mowed their lawns into tidy squares that had become parched and sparse. The taste of tea lingered in her mouth. Shadows crept over the path and she wove around them. The occasional local saw her and raised a hand or followed her movements through a windowpane. Her hair fell loose and it felt light against her cheeks.

Her cottage stood alone, cast to the side as if unwanted, and as she came closer she smiled at the familiarity of its white-painted gleam. The mountains surrounding the town hemmed it in, appearing to cut it off from the outside world. A meandering road crossing a Tee junction from her cottage’s path reached out, left towards the shadows and right to the main drag. She could see a figure standing outside the cottage, her life model Jane. She liked to think of her as nameless though, simply an object. The summer evening had settled and in the fading light Delia narrowed her lids. The model knocked once and paused, knocked again, and after a few moments she turned, curvaceous against the doorframe, a surprised look passing across her face.

‘Oh,’ she said, ‘I wondered if you weren’t coming.’

Delia shook her head. ‘Is it that time already? I’m so sorry, I’d forgotten.’

The model stepped away from the doorframe. ‘Should we make it another time?’

‘No, no, come on through.’

Delia approached the door, her hand shaking a little as she slid the key into the lock and led the way down the hall, the scent of Oamaru stone dust greeting them. Her footsteps carved a path through the layer that had settled from the studio during the day. The model followed behind.

In the studio, the model stretched her arms into the air, releasing the first garment, then bent to remove the second and the third. The piles of cotton material fell in an unkempt heap. Her naked figure changed the atmosphere in the room, the effect so stinging, it was as if someone had switched a light on. Delia watched as the model reclined on a chair without instruction, holding her posture steady with her head turned sideways but her eyes direct and forward. It must have strained her.

Delia walked away from her subject. She breathed out, running her fingertips over a row of chisels and selected one. Its blade was newly sharpened.

She returned to stand before her subject. The model’s gaze was still locked, unnerving, her figure already frozen, statue-like and too confident looking.

‘I’m not working on the same piece,’ Delia said.

She took the model’s arm and began to manoeuvre her like a mannequin. Her skin felt smooth as if coated in silk. She tilted the model’s chin and gently repositioned the angle of her head, so that the direction of her stare was downwards. She stepped back to admire her subject. There was no doubt. The woman looked exquisite.

The stone fell away easily when she pounded at it, the mallet hitting the chisel. In the summer evening her skin was coated in a sheen of oil. Delia’s sundress splayed around her as she moved. The hacking movements were like the dance of a conductor in time with her breath. Large chunks fell to the floor and broke apart. The dust beneath her fingernails became entrenched. The surface of it felt rough and the sound had an abstract musicality to it. The model maintained her pose. Her hazel eyes stared at an empty space on the floor, intent.

When the initial phase was complete, the stone was still rough. It had merely become a shape. Delia raised and lowered her head as she studied the model, moulding the stone with care. The frantic nature of mallet hitting chisel was now subtle, replaced by a scraping noise.

Delia continued to study the model, concentrating as she removed layers of dust with fine sandpaper. The statue was nearly complete but these fine details were important. There were soon to be two models in the room, one that was real and one that might like to be but would remain in a jail of stone.

She didn’t notice when her mother entered the room but glanced up when she heard a sharp inhalation of breath.

‘Oh, I’m awfully sorry.’ Her mother’s body tensed as she averted her eyes and stance away from the naked subject whose eyelids now opened in surprise at another entering the room.

‘I keep telling you,’ Delia said, ‘this is art, nothing to be self-conscious about.’

Her mother continued to avert her eyes. ‘Maybe not for you,’ she scolded. She grabbed a nightgown perched over a chair. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said brusquely, ‘cover up with this for a moment, will you?’

The model looked at Delia who