"Gran! Gran! Did you hear about it? They're going to broadcast a smell!" The child burst into the bedroom, still dragging her luckless teddy behind her.

The old woman opened her eyes and turned her head towards her granddaughter and smiled, glad to have company again. Her rheumy old eyes fixed on the glowing face of the girl and she moistened her lips in readiness for speech. With Marie there was always a lot of talking.

"Hello, child. What's this all about then? Smells? Who needs smells? Come on, sit down and tell me all about it." Her voice seemed rusted, unused.

The five-year-old was already pulling the chair over to the bed even as she listened, the teddy meanwhile dumped quite unceremoniously on the quilt while she struggled with her burden. She was a chubby girl with a round face and recently trimmed brown curls, carrying her own special air of importance everywhere she went.

Now that the door was open the old woman could hear activity elsewhere in the house, and she silently blessed her granddaughter. It was bad enough to be bedridden without being shut away in this one room, unable to hear or to participate in what was going on elsewhere. There was precious little else left for her now.

In fact, her world was bounded by these same four walls, her hours measured by meals and the irregular visits of a cranky doctor who knew perfectly well she was dying. They both thought the visits an exercise in futility, but each had come to enjoy the contact.

When the girl had finally placed the chair to her satisfaction she climbed up on it and turned to face her grandmother.

"It was on the radio just now," the cherub's face informed her. "Michael said it was a joke, but Mummy doesn't know."

"Mummy doesn't know what, dear?"

"If it's a joke. She said Daddy would know, but he's away 'til Thursday."

A wrinkled old hand crept out from under the covers and placed itself on top, within reach. The child knew what to do; she edged forward and grasped it with her own, then hesitated and reached down to drag the unfortunate teddy up to do the job.

"Go on, you'd better tell all of it to me now, you've got me interested. Sending smells! Whatever for? We have enough of our own. Remember when the drains blocked up just outside the window here, or when your Daddy used that terrible spray on the wasps' nest? What we need is some nice smells, like mint, or sandalwood, or even the seaweed smell of the beach. That would be nice..."

"No, Gran, they're going to make a smell! That's what the man on the radio said. He's going to do it today!"

"Today! Goodness gracious! Send a smell? I do hope they'll manage to post them in time. The Post is so slow nowadays, and they don't deliver on Saturdays anymore. I mean, how do they know that everyone will get theirs all at once?"

The child's face twisted in scorn.

"No, Gran, they're sending it over the radio, that's what he said, just now. He said that they'd do it at two o'clock this afternoon. There's another funny man with him. He's got a strange name, he's a... a perf... poofessor."

She struggled with the awkward word and finally spat it out with more enthusiasm than accuracy.

The older woman looked at her in mild surprise. She remembered the same feeling of astonishment when she'd heard her first radio. That had been... uncountable years ago, now. Yes, it was at Aunt Mabel's house, she remembered now. Red velvet curtains. Books everywhere. And the radio, a monstrous great wooden thing with a bewildering array of dials and switches. Uncle George had enthusiastically twiddled things while the cluster of round-eyed children expectantly gathered around the big horn speaker listening to the hiss and occasional squeal that hurtled into the room from... somewhere... a magical aether.

Finally they'd heard a man's voice, very faintly, speaking slow, proper English. 'Hear that? That's Sydney!' Uncle George had said excitedly. ''This year they're going to build a station right here in Perth!' And so they had. She remembered she was married before they got their very own radio, though. By that time it was a very ordinary miracle, and you could buy them at almost every store. She knew why Bill had got it, too, although he always pretended it was for her. It was about that time they started sending the race results... broadcasting, they were calling it by then.

"Gran...?" She was dragged back into the present by her impatient granddaughter who had recognised the faraway look on the wrinkled old face.

"Yes, dear. You were telling me about the smells... Over the radio, you said."

"They've been talking about it since Christmas. Michael's listened in and he says it can't be done. Lots of people rang up to say the same thing, but the man thinks he can do it. It will be the first time, ever!"

"Who says, dear? The man on the radio?"

"No! Michael, of course! I heard him and Jeffrey Sanders talking about it, and he said that a smell was a smell and a sound was a sound. He says they're different." She was in awe of her eleven year old brother and quoted his opinions to anyone who'd listen.

Elsewhere in the house there was activity and footsteps sounded in the hall. The child turned her head to listen, then slipped off the chair.

"Mummy's coming with your breakfast. She'll make me go now, but I'll come back," she promised, her voice dropping to a conspiratory whisper as her mother entered the bedroom with a tray.

"Good morning, Mum. Sleep well? Marie, did you wake your Gran up? Off you go, your breakfast's on the table waiting for you!"

The words all blurred together for she talked as she laid the tray on the small table by the door and then swept over to draw back the drapes and open the windows a crack. Not too far. Gran would get a chill.

The child disappeared around the door, flinging to her grandmother one last satisfied 'I-told-you-so' look as she went, teddy still in tow. The old woman watched her and wished that just for once the windows could be thrown wide open and the garden smells would invade the cheerless room from the wilderness outside. There were flowering creepers and a Jacaranda... She wondered if that would still have flowers on it. End of March... no, much too late. Pity.

It would never happen, though. Once she'd been able to move about and do things like that for herself, but all that had ended with the fall that had broken her hip, nearly a year ago now. Then she'd been able to go outside and sit in the sun. Funny, that was one of the things she craved most now, one of the real things. The delicate touch of sunlight on the face, the warmth of it, the subtle weight of it...

The younger woman returned to the bed and helped the older struggle into a sitting position, placing large cushions behind her to support the back.

"There you are, Mum. Just a minute while I get the tray."

She fitted the special framework over the smoothed coverlet and placed the breakfast tray on top. The old lady inspected it carefully, critically. Thin slivers of toast, with marmalade. Good. Cereal... ugh, not much in that nowadays. Orange juice.

"I'll bring your tea through in a moment, I didn't want it to get cold. Michael's been and got the newspaper, would you like that?"

"No thank you, dear. You know it only upsets me when I read the death notices and see how many more have gone, and the news! Nobody in their right mind would want to read about what goes on out there. It's all changed, you know."

Her daughter looked at her in surprise. 'Why, Mum's quite perky today', she thought. Taking an interest. It wasn't always like that, sometimes she just seemed to drift off. Living in the past, no doubt, poor thing. Don't blame her at all.

"Of course it's changed, Mum. Things are better, now, easier."

The old woman snorted.

"Better? I don't know about that. And easier? I suppose you mean all the machines. Well, I'll grant you that might be a good thing, certainly in the house, but what do you do with the time you gain? Nothing! You sit and watch that silly box... I'm sorry, Jenny, I don't mean that to you personally, I really mean all the housewives."

Her daughter smiled at her.

"Maybe you're right. As long as we think of ourselves as housewives we won't get anywhere, I suppose."

She patted the gnarled old hands.

"Start your breakfast, Mum. I'll get us both a nice pot of tea."

She decided then to leave the housework and spend some time in here. It must be terrible being stuck in here all the time. She wished Derek was home more often, they could get a wheelchair for her then, maybe take her out into the garden...

She was away longer than she'd intended, but the old woman didn't mind for the door was still open and she could hear the rise and fall of their voices as the children were refereed. By the time Jenny returned with the tea she had finished the cereal and was nibbling on the toast.

"Here you are, sorry about the delay but Deborah and Michael were fighting again."

"Ahh, yes, I heard them. I never see young Deborah anymore, Jenny. She used to be such good company, too. Is she afraid of me, do you think?" She poured from the teapot, then added sugar, smiling as she saw the disapproval on the other woman's face.

"I don't know, Mum. I suppose she's growing up, sixteen is ancient according to her. Teenagers... I think her sole interest right now is boys. You've no way of competing with them."

"Boys! At sixteen? That's much too young! When I was that age I was never allowed..."

"I know, Mum, you've told me before, but it's much different nowadays, very different. I'm almost afraid to ask her where she's going, sometimes. Afraid she'll tell me."

The older woman sipped her tea and said nothing for a moment, thinking about her own childhood. Yes, boys had figured just as largely in her own girlhood, although there weren't the same opportunities then. No, it wasn't too hard to bridge that particular generation gap, there were some things that never changed, ever.

"At least we won't have the same thing happening with her as you and Dad did with me, Mum. I found she's on the pill."

"On the pill? At sixteen!" The old lady shook her head wonderingly. "How did you find that out, may I ask?"

"Oh, she told me outright, said I didn't have to worry about things like that. I was speechless!"

"I bet you were. Pity those things weren't around when you were a girl, eh? It certainly would've saved your father and I some headaches. Sit down, sit down! I'm not criticising you, Jenny, that's all in the past now. I just meant that it might be the best thing for young Deborah in the long run, especially if her heels are as round as yours were. At least she'll get past that phase without permanent damage, if you see what I mean."

Her daughter's flush was receding now, to be replaced by a thoughtful expression.

"It's not only that, Mum. I mean, I can understand how these things begin. No, there's more to it than that. Her not coming in to see you is only one of several changes we've noticed, changes... At first I just thought it was her growing up, or Derek's being away so much, but she was just the same when he returned. She smokes now, did you know?"

"So do you, dear. So does Derek, and I wouldn't be at all surprised if young Michael does as well. Probably the only one who doesn't is young Marie. Filthy habit."

"She said much the same when I found out. It's certainly very difficult to appear serious about these things when one does them oneself. No, it's more than that. Sometimes she comes home with such a wild look and..." her voice dropped to a whisper, "... she smells!"

"Smells? What do you mean, she smells? We all smell, you know. Ask any dog. Funny, little Marie was in here just now talking about the same thing. Smells. Said something about hearing a smell on the radio. Sounds double-dutch to me!"

"Yes, I heard that as well, they're doing some weird experiment this afternoon, I believe, I didn't take all that much notice. No, Deborah's smell is, well, different."

"You don't know half enough about your daughter, Jenny. You still think of her as a girl, a child, don't you?"

"But Mum, she is! Sixteen is still childhood."

The younger woman looked at the elder in surprise, then bit her lip as her mother went on.

"What do you talk to her about? School? The weather? What she's wearing? I'm sure you don't. I'd guess you only have time to criticise her lateness, or her appearance, or to ask her why she's not doing something. Right? And then you wonder why she rebels, and why she stays out all night and smokes. Would you say those same things to Peggy, next door?"

"Mum! That's not the same, Peggy's a grown woman!"

"And what is Deborah? How do you measure the difference, eh? At what precise magic moment does she become adult? Seventeen? Nineteen? Twenty-one? You don't think of her as a person at all, do you? Be honest."

There was a long silence and she poured herself some more tea. Anger, wonder and concern chased themselves across her daughter's face as she tried to comprehend.

"You mean I should... well... treat her like another person, someone unrelated? But Mum, I feel so responsible!"

"You've just finished telling me that she never does anything you tell her, that she has a strong will of her own. Think back to when we were having the same problems with you. I can admit to you now that I received this very same advice myself, and I didn't believe it any more than you seem to do. It turned out alright in the end, though, didn't it?"

"Sometimes I wonder, Mum, I really do! Never mind, I've got to go and do some housework now, and then go down to the shops. Is there anything I can get for you?" She stood, then stooped to kiss the old brow.

"No, dear, there's nothing. I don't need anything nowadays. You wouldn't consider opening the window a little more, would you? There's a lovely fragrance coming from that honeysuckle."

"Oh, alright. I shouldn't do it, you know what Doctor Francis said. It's a lovely day out there." She squeaked the windows a little further and left the room with the tray.

'A lovely day!' She'd forgotten what one looked like by now. Never mind, at least there were some garden noises filtering in now, that was something. Listen to that honeyeater! What a noise! She remembered them from the garden out on the farm. They used to flutter along the rafters of the old verandah roof, searching for insects, no doubt.

Then there were the peewits. What a noise they made! They used to nest up on the rainwater tanks. Bill used to swear about that, having to go out there and remove all the mud. In the end he'd simply covered the tank right over. The birds won, she was glad of that.

I wonder what that girl Deborah's been up to? Drugs, no doubt. They're all into things like that nowadays. Shouldn't last. These things never do, not if the person has a strong character and wants to live their own life. Jenny's a fool, letting the girl run wild like that. Hah, I'm a right one to talk, aren't I? What about that fellow... what was his name, now... goodness, I can't remember, but I can still remember what we did! That must be all of fifty... fifty-two years! My word, all that time and I can still remember Simon's touch.

Simon! Of course, fancy me forgetting a name like that...

In a very short time the old woman had dozed off, a smile still on her face as she recalled the golden years of her youth, leaving the drabness of her sickbed room to frolic once again in the dappled coolness of the trees beside the creek, watching again the footprints of the wind across the wheat. Jenny didn't return until just before lunch, but she sent Marie to peek and see if her grandmother was awake or not. In due course the child came back, still on tip-toe.

"She's asleep, Mummy. Her mouth's open, though."

"Then we'd better not disturb her, dear. Was that Debbie I heard coming back in just then?"

"She came in ages ago, Mummy. Some boy brought her back, on a motorbike! Didn't you hear it?"

Her mother admitted she hadn't.

"Shoot up to her room and ask her if she wants lunch, will you dear. Tell her we'll be having a salad, she likes that."

"OK, Mummy." The child disappeared down the hallway and the woman began to prepare the tray for her own mother, wondering if she dare give her some cottage cheese.

"Hi Mum!" She was interrupted by the appearance of her oldest daughter, her hair wrapped in a towel, wearing the now standard jeans and tanktop. "You wanted me?"

"Yes, dear. I'm making a salad for lunch, I thought you might like some. What on earth have you done to your hair?" She could see strands escaping the tightly wrapped cloth and they seemed... purple?

"It's a funny colour, Mummy, she's got yellow on one side and sort of blue on the other." Little Marie was breathless with excitement, waiting for the fracas with a certain simple glee. In spite of the age difference there was already a competitive atmosphere between the girls.

"Really? Let me see..."

With a poisonous glance at her sister Deborah unwrapped her newest creation, resigning herself to a confrontation.

"Amazing! How on earth did you manage to do all that on your own, Debbie? I would've thought that the colours would get mixed or something." She said it with real interest, her voice quite devoid of the undertones the girl was expecting, and Deborah found herself answering quite civilly.

"Oh that? It's a bit tricky, but as long as you leave it to set for ten minutes it won't run or mix. You do one side, then the other." She hesitated. "Can I help?" she asked, watching her mother cut tomatoes.

"This? Oh, thanks, perhaps you could get the cheese and cut it, dear. I'm just making something up for Gran. She was asking after you this morning, by the way."

"We're going to listen to the smells together after lunch." Marie informed her sister as she propped her teddy up at the table on a spare chair. "The man on the radio is sending it."

"What, the lunch?" Her sister paused with the cheeseknife in her hand, glad the subject of her experiment with her hair seemed to be a non-event, still trying to figure it out.

"No, silly, the smell. There's a poofessor who says it will be the first time ever in the whole world!"

The teenager looked questioningly at her mother who shrugged expressively and said nothing.

"Over the radio? Don't be stupid, you can't send smells over the radio, it's impossible. That's right, isn't it, Mum?"

"I don't know, dear, you'll have to ask your father, he knows about things like that. Maybe it is possible, they have stereo, don't they? How do they do that? Maybe they intend to send smells the same way. Why don't you listen in with Gran and see for yourself?" She sat down at the table and placed a plate of salad in front of Marie who picked at it disinterestedly then made a great show of offering it to the teddy.

The teenager ate in silence, her thoughts on the old woman and how she'd missed seeing her for a while now. How long? Months... it was really surprising how quickly time went by, she acknowledged to herself guiltily. Perhaps it would be a good thing to spend a little time in there today. After all, Kevin wouldn't be around on the bike 'til the evening...

Later, as she sipped a cup of tea she watched her mother nervously fit a cigarette to her mouth, feeling the same urge surge through herself and resenting the older woman's presumption. Their eyes met, briefly, and then she was watching in amazement as the packet was passed over to her.

"Have one, since you've started on these. You must be as stupid as me. Help yourself."

Dazedly the teenager took one and accepted a light, her eyes wide with a degree of apprehension, quite uncertain of how to act or what to say.

Later she took her grandmother's lunch into her, suddenly self-conscious about her gaudy hair and honest enough to realise she'd done it as a rebellion against her mother, rather than for any real cosmetic reason. Privately she thought it much too garish and intended to get it back to normal as soon as possible, especially as it now seemed her mother conceded her the right to have it as she saw fit. I wonder how long it takes to grow...

Her grandmother cackled as soon as she saw it.

"Heh! I bet your Dad hasn't seen that! What you young people do to yourselves... sit down, Deborah, I haven't seen you for ages. Forgotten about me, had you?"

The teenager flushed but drew up the chair as soon as she'd arranged the meal tray for the other. She was regretting her impulse now, but decided to stay a little longer.

"I've been... doing things," she said defensively.

"So I hear, so I hear. Ah, well, you're only young once. Your mother was complaining about it all this morning until I reminded her what she was like at your age. Well, a little bit older, I suppose. Girls had less opportunities for troublemaking in those days."

Deborah regarded the old lady thoughtfully. Her mother? This could be interesting.

"I thought you lived out at Northam then, on a wheat farm?"

"Oh, we did, but we were close enough to town... take note of that, young lady, bring your daughters up a long way from town, if you ever have any. Is your father still over East?" She changed the subject abruptly.

The teenager and the old woman talked for some time, the girl finding to her surprise that she enjoyed the interlude. The old woman was a shrewd observer of life and had many interesting tales to relate, some of them about her own family. Dimly the girl realised that somehow she had passed through some invisible gate, a nexus separating her from simple childhood. What had done it? She had no idea, but suddenly the desecration of her beautiful brown hair seemed so juvenile... For her own part, the older woman recognised that something had happened to the woman-child before her and that both were benefiting from the communication. 'At least Jenny had the sense to keep out' she thought and began to ask Deborah about changes to the city. It had been years since she'd been there.

"Oh, they're building more high-rise offices, and malls. Do you remember Boan's down by the Forrest Place Post Office? Well, they're pulling all that down, they're making a whole new area there, and at the rail station they're building a carpark."

"My word! What about the trains? Have they closed the station then? I always did say that those automobiles would oust the trains. What a pity..."

"No, Gran, the station's still there. The carpark goes over the top of the platform area."

"Well, I never! I'm glad the trains are to stay, I've always liked the trains. I remember taking the train in from the country to do the Christmas shopping. You know, us women would plan that trip for months... Bill never would agree to come, not after the first time. It made him nervous, he said, all the noise and the stink! That was the best part for me, the smells. Ever since I was a child the city has been a place of smells, of odours. City smells are so sharp, so tart, so unlike the soft and sweet country smells. Bill always said that he could tell when it was time to cut the wheat by the smell..."

She lapsed into silence for a moment, reliving the scenes of the past once more. The girl wondered whether she should stay or go, then was saved by the appearance of her sister Marie who reverently carried a big transistor radio into the room.

"It's nearly time," she announced firmly.

"Time? What do you mean...?"

"The poofessor, silly. He's getting ready to send the smell. Granma wanted to hear it." She placed the radio on the bedside table and the old woman stirred to watch as the receiver was switched on and voices were heard discussing the project.

'... iss very, very difficult to do, you understand. Ziss has never been done before in ze history of ze world...'

"What on earth is he talking about?" Deborah asked, her eyes narrowing.

"I told you, they're about to send a smell. That's the poofessor."

"You mean professor, child. So they really think they can do it. Amazing! I wonder what sort of smell they'll send."

"Shhhh... Gran!"

'...will people know it's working, Professor Rüsselkopf? You say the smell, the fragrance will be very faint...'

'Oh, Ja... that iss so. Of course it will only be possible to detect vatt we are sending very close, you understand, very close. If you are too far from the speaker I do not believe, zatt you can it riechen... to be aware of it...'

"Why doesn't he speak English like everyone else?" the old woman complained.

"He's German, or Austrian, I think, Gran," Deborah said, and they listened some more.

'...any way of improving the chances, Professor? What if people are using a stereo, for instance, won't that cause the transmission to be weaker? I mean, if you're in a room with a stereo surely it would be better to be close to one speaker, as close as you can get?'

'Oh, Ja, natürlich! Of course! If you are more zan a meter from zee speaker I am thinking you vill smell nozzing! You must be very close, right up to it, as close as possible!'

'So it's up against the old earhole. I can see that's possible when you've got a tranny, Professor, but one of those big speakers... I don't know. Perhaps you can suggest some universal technique for improving the reception that would apply to everyone, something that is easy enough to do, a simple thing.'

'Ja, Ja. Perhaps I vill tell you vatt my assistant in Salzburg did for the besser to hear. It vas very funny, I must tell you, but venn we made ze scientific tests we were unable to improve on it...'

'Yes, Professor? You say this method improved sensitivity? What did your assistant do?'

'Ach, it iss so ridiculous to describe, ze people out zere listening to us wouldn't vant to know.'

"It's a fake!" Deborah snickered. "A hoax! Nobody can broadcast a smell, it's impossible, and that guy's gone too far, he's trying to get off the hook now."

The old woman lay there and watched the face of the teenager ripple and change. Strange, so different to the girls in our day, so independent. And their language... sometimes it seemed she was in another country completely, with different words or where old familiar phrases all took on new, dangerous meanings. She supposed it must be a continuous process. What would it be like in another lifetime? Would Deborah attain the same bemused viewpoint in her own turn? Suddenly the woman felt very tired, depleted, outworn.

'...a blanket would be best, or perhaps a towel. You heard the Professor. We'll play a little music now to give you all time to find something suitable, then we'll do it. We'll make the very first broadcast of a smell in the whole world!'

Dimly she was aware of the younger girl racing off into the other room, excitedly calling her mother.

"Mummy, Mummy! Can we have a blankit? The poofessor said we gotta have a blankit!"

Blankets. She remembered blankets spread on the grass under the cool whispers of the big gums, always down by the river where the ants wouldn't stay because of the regular floods. Simon had taught her that, too.

She lay there and let her mind recreate that day while the children fussed with a blanket, draping it around the little transistor as it tinkled with a cheerful melody from the past. 'A blast from the past!' the announcer had called it, she recalled smilingly. A blast indeed! Simon had been a one for words too, his enthusiasms bubbling up at the most peculiar moments. Like when he...

"We're ready, Gran! They're ready, now."

The old lady turned her head and smiled vaguely at them as they huddled under the blanket. Deborah hesitated, then left the blanket open on that side so her grandmother could hear and hopefully smell the result. She seemed to have become caught up in the air of expectation and her head was close to that of her younger sister, nearest to the radio. The old woman smiled again, her eyes again seeing the flash of the sun off the gum leaves above. Simon...

'...hope you're all ready out there in radio-land. The Professor is making adjustments to his equipment now, how's it going, Professor?'

'It iss not as gut as I had hoped, ze strength vill not be so great, but it should verk.'

'And what is it that you'll be sending, Professor Rüsselkopf? What should the list... smelling audience expect?'

'Zat I vill not say! It would not be a scientific test if I told ze world first. Zey must judge for zemselves...'

The two girls crept closer to the radio, oblivious now to their grandmother.

'Now I am beginning ze process... I am turning ze amplification up now... you should be getting ze very first molecules now, zey will first form very near ze speaker... I vill stop speaking now to permit ze better, more efficient transmission, observe carefully...'

On the bed the old eyes closed and the room slipped away, replaced once more by the whisper of the wind and the scolding of the little wrens above them. Wonderful, she thought, they're sending the fragrance of the flowers... how wonderful... science is marvellous, isn't it, Simon...

Slowly her awareness of the room faded with the gentle smile still resting there on her face. She never would hear the whisper coming over the radio to the thousands of blanket-covered listeners.

'...April Fool, from ze greatest Professor ze world has ever known...'

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