Settling the Account (2 page)

‘You keep out of it, woman,’ said Charlie.
‘He’ll be sorry enough in a minute.’ He turned towards the door,
about to drag Malcolm outside, when the boy wrenched his arm out of
Charlie’s grip.

‘I’m
not
sorry,’ Malcolm said, his
face screwed up in a mixture of anger and threatened tears. ‘Why
should I have to go that school? Why can’t I do what I want?’

A tide of scarlet engulfed Charlie’s face.
‘You’ll do as I tell you, boy.’

Malcolm stamped his foot. ‘I
won’t
,’
he screamed. ‘I’m sick of doing what you say. I’m sick of the way
you hit me all the time.’

‘Mal, don’t talk to your father like that,’
Amy said, but Charlie and Malcolm had eyes and ears only for each
other. Amy had never seen them looking more alike, both red-faced
and panting with fury, despite the twelve inches of height and more
than forty years of age between them. David crept over to her, fear
written in his face. Amy slipped an arm around him and drew him
close.

‘You never let me do what I want,’ Malcolm
half-shouted, half-sobbed. ‘You never want me to have any fun. You
just make me work all the time. You never say I’m any good at
anything. And you give me hidings for just nothing.’

‘I’ll give you a hiding, all right, boy.’
Charlie made a grab for Malcolm, but the boy stepped backwards out
of his reach.

‘I’m sick of milking stupid cows and digging
stupid potatoes and all that stuff.’ He flung the words at his
father. ‘I’m sick of your stupid farm.’

Charlie took a long stride forward, snaked
his arm around Malcolm’s neck and grabbed him by the scruff. He
dragged the boy a step towards the door, then stopped in his tracks
when Malcolm swung his fist with all his might and planted it in
his father’s midriff.

Malcolm might be only nine years old, but he
was big and strong for his age. He put his whole weight behind the
punch, and it winded Charlie long enough for Malcolm to twist once
again out of his grasp.

‘I hate this place!’ he screamed at his
father. ‘I hate you! I hate you!’

It took Charlie only seconds to recover. He
let out a snarl and lunged at Malcolm, this time grabbing a fistful
of cloth at his throat. He gave the boy a shove, keeping his tight
grip, and Malcolm staggered backwards. He shoved again, giving the
boy no time to regain his balance; then again, slamming Malcolm’s
back against the wall. ‘You’ll not raise a hand to me, boy.’ He
yanked Malcolm forward, then pushed him back so that his head hit
the wall with a thump, while Charlie’s free hand made a fist and
slammed into Malcolm’s face.

Malcolm screamed in mingled pain and rage.
He swung out wildly with his own fists, but his father’s long reach
defeated him and his blows fell well short of their target. Again
and again Charlie slammed the boy’s head against the wall,
punctuating the rhythmic back-and-forward motion with his
well-aimed punches, shouting incoherently above Malcolm’s
screams.

David clutched at Amy, howling in terror.
She freed herself from his grip to snatch at Charlie’s sleeve.
‘Stop it,’ she cried. ‘He’s only a little boy! You’ll kill him!’
But Charlie was oblivious to her. When she hauled on his arm he
stopped hitting Malcolm just long enough to shake her off, hardly
seeming to notice the interruption.

Amy knew she did not have the strength to
pull him away from Malcolm. She ran to the bench where she had a
saucepan of carrots sitting in cold water ready to be put on the
range, snatched up the pan, crossed the room again and flung the
contents at Charlie.

He let out a yell as the cold water hit him
full in the face. The shock had the desired effect. He loosed his
hold long enough for Malcolm to free himself, stagger a few steps
away out of his father’s reach, then sink to the floor and lean
against the wall, clutching at his head. Charlie coughed and
spluttered, spat out water and a slice of carrot, then turned on
Amy.

‘What the hell did you do that for, you
silly bitch? I’m covered in this muck!’

In other circumstances Amy might have found
the sight laughable: Charlie with bits of carrot stuck in his hair
and beard and festooned over his sodden jacket, water dripping down
his face. But right now, concern for Malcolm filled her
thoughts.

‘To stop you from killing your son,’ she
flung at him over her shoulder as she knelt down to check Malcolm’s
injuries.

‘That’ll teach him.’ Two steps brought
Charlie close enough to stand over Malcolm and glower down at him.
‘You won’t try that again, will you, boy?’ But a glance told Amy
that the heat had gone out of his rage, cooled abruptly by the icy
shower she had given him.

Malcolm’s face showed the beginnings of a
black eye, one lip was split, and blood was running freely from his
nose, but rather than looking chastened he matched his father’s
glare with one of his own. Amy put her handkerchief under his nose
and made Malcolm hold it in place while she checked the back of his
head for wounds.

‘The skin’s not broken,’ she said. ‘There’s
a big lump coming up, though. You’d better lie down for the rest of
the afternoon.’

‘No, he’s not,’ said Charlie. ‘He’ll not be
getting out of his work that way.’

‘But Charlie, he should lie down in the dark
after a knock on the head like that,’ Amy protested. ‘He’s going to
have an awful headache.’

‘Serves him right. That’ll help him remember
what’ll happen if he ever tries that again.’ He took his seat at
the table. ‘Stop fussing over him, woman, and brew up a fresh pot
of tea. This lot’s stone cold now.’ He picked a piece of carrot out
of his beard. ‘And you can get me a cloth to wipe this lot
off.’

‘Can I just clean Mal up a bit first?’

‘No, you can’t. That can wait until you’ve
fetched my tea. I’ll have another of those scones, too.’ He stared
at Malcolm, who still sat slumped against the wall. ‘Get up off the
floor, boy. You can sit at the table and wait till I’ve had a bite.
You too—and you can stop that bawling,’ he told David. ‘Don’t stand
there like a ninny,’ he grumbled when the younger boy stood frozen,
too frightened to move. ‘Sit down and shut up, or you’ll get a
taste of the same as your brother.’ David scrambled to sit down,
staring at his father in wide-eyed fear.

Malcolm stood up gingerly, brushing aside
Amy’s arm when she tried to help him. He made his way safely, if a
little unsteadily, to the table and sat down opposite David,
dragging his chair as far away as he could from his father. The
three of them sat in silence while Amy passed a clean dishcloth to
Charlie, poured hot water into the teapot and buttered some scones,
then carried the pot and plate to the table and took her own
seat.

Charlie took a large bite out of a scone.
‘Your ma thinks I would have killed you if she hadn’t butted in,’
he told Malcolm. ‘She’s maybe right—I might have.’ He leaned
forward to fix his son with a baleful stare. ‘I’ll tell you this,
boy—you ever dare raise a hand to me again and I bloody will.’

Amy closed her eyes for a moment against the
wave of nausea Charlie’s words roused in her.
Don’t talk like
that
.
I’ve lost enough of my children. He’s only a little
boy
.

She looked over at Malcolm and thought about
the punch he had managed to plant in Charlie’s belly. That had not
been the wild swing of a little boy; it had had strength and skill
behind it. He might be only nine years old, but Malcolm’s fighting
had clearly got beyond minor schoolyard scuffles. Charlie’s
strength was that of a grown man, and his long reach gave him an
advantage Malcolm could not hope to overcome. Not yet.

She watched as Malcolm stared back at his
father, managing a look of naked hostility despite one eye’s being
half-closed by swelling. A trail of blood escaped through the
handkerchief he held under his nose, and dripped onto his shirt.
Malcolm wouldn’t be nine years old forever. He wouldn’t always be
smaller than his father. Amy studied Malcolm’s expression more
closely, and a cold knot formed in the pit of her stomach as she
realised that Malcolm was thinking exactly the same thing.

*

‘Are you sure, Frank?’ Lizzie asked yet
again, still doubtful after all Frank’s assurances. ‘Are you really
sure it’s no use just addressing a letter “Mrs Crossley,
Auckland”?’

‘Quite sure, Lizzie. It’s not worth
trying.’

‘But if someone sent a letter to “Mrs Kelly,
Ruatane” I’d get it all right. And look how many Leiths there are
around here, but say if someone wrote just to “Mrs Leith, Ruatane”
the right one’d get it sooner or later, even though it’d have to go
around Ma and Aunt Susannah and Lily and all them. There can’t be
as many people as all that in Auckland, surely?’

‘Lizzie,’ Frank said patiently, ‘you know
how many houses there are in Ruatane?’

‘Quite a lot, really, especially if you
count all the farms. And there’s two houses on Uncle Jack’s farm,
remember.’

Frank smiled fondly at her as she defended
the status of the only town she had ever seen. ‘All right, now try
and imagine a hundred—no, maybe two hundred—towns like Ruatane all
joined together. All those streets running into one another. Can
you do that?’

‘Not really.’

‘No, it’s not easy till you’ve seen it.
That’s what Auckland’s like. I’ve been there twice now, and it
still just about scared me silly trying to find my way around. If
you sent a letter with no address but “Auckland”, I think the
people at the Post and Telegraph would just throw it in the
rubbish.’

‘Oh.’ Lizzie was crestfallen, but only for a
moment. ‘Well, I’ll just have to find out what her address is.’

‘How are you going to do that?’

‘Ask the only person around here who knows,
of course. Amy said Mrs Crossley told her Aunt Susannah had been to
visit her, so she must know the address. I’ll go up to Uncle Jack’s
this afternoon when the girls are home from school to look after
the little fellows.’

‘Hey, hang on, Lizzie. Didn’t you say Amy
told you not to talk to your Aunt Susannah about it? You said she
made a bit of a fuss when you suggested it.’

‘Yes, she did. She got in quite a state over
it—said she didn’t want Aunt Susannah snooping into her affairs. I
think she’s worried Uncle Jack might find out about her getting so
upset over this baby farming thing, too.’

‘Then how can you ask Susannah?’

‘I’m not going to tell Amy I’ve asked her!
I’m not stupid, you know.’

‘Do you think you should, Lizzie? After Amy
telling you not to?’

‘Of course I should. I have to get this
woman’s address, and Amy won’t know how I found it out so she won’t
worry about it. It’s all settled.’

Frank knew only too well the futility of
trying to shift Lizzie from her chosen course of action. ‘Well,
just try not to get Susannah’s back up too much. She might be a bit
funny about it.’

‘Oh, I’ll be all meek and mild like butter
wouldn’t melt in my mouth. And there’s no need for you to grin like
an idiot, Frank Kelly!’

As soon as the three older children arrived
home that afternoon Lizzie, who was a firm believer in the doctrine
that the devil makes work for idle hands, marshalled them into
their tasks.

‘Now, you girls, there’s a pile of spuds
there for you to peel—I’ll have them done properly, too, with all
the eyes cut out, or there’ll be trouble. And you can pull up a
load of carrots and get them scraped and sliced. I’ll do the meat
and pudding when I get home. I want all the scraps cleared
away—take them out to the pigs—the bench wiped down and the table
set by the time I’m back. Are you pulling faces at me, Maudie?’

‘No, Ma,’ Maudie said, the scowl instantly
wiped from her face.

‘Good. Joey, you’ll be out helping your pa,
so that’ll keep you out of mischief. You’re not to come inside till
I’m back, I don’t want you getting in your sisters’ way and helping
yourself to biscuits. You girls see you keep a good eye on Mickey
and Danny.’

‘Want to go with Papa,’ Mickey
protested.

‘What do you think, Frank?’ Lizzie asked.
‘Will he get in your way?’

‘No, he’ll be all right,’ said Frank. ‘He’s
a good little fellow, aren’t you, Mickey?’ Mickey beamed at
him.

‘Couldn’t you take Danny with you, Ma?’ Beth
asked.

‘No, I couldn’t,’ Lizzie said briskly. ‘He’s
got too big now, and he wriggles. It’s too awkward when I’m
riding.’

‘Ma
,’ Maudie complained. ‘He’ll be a
little pest.’

‘Don’t talk about your baby brother like
that. You should be pleased to look after him.’

‘It’s not fair,’ Maudie grumbled. ‘The boys
get to go out with Pa, and we have to look after the pest—and do
all the work, too.’

‘Now, where’s that belt?’ Lizzie mused
aloud. ‘The one I use on girls who complain all the time.’

Maudie made a show of hurrying over to the
bench and picking a potato from the mountain Lizzie had ready for
her. ‘I’m not complaining, Ma.’

‘I’m pleased to hear it. Right, I’ll be back
as soon as I can.’ Lizzie delivered kisses all round, with Frank
giving her a pat on the bottom that he naively imagined none of the
children noticed. He followed her out the back door to help her
mount the horse and waved as she rode away.

‘You boys ready to come and give me a hand?’
he asked when he went back inside. ‘We’d better get on with
it.’

‘Hurry up, Beth,’ said Maudie. ‘You have to
help with these vegies, you know. Pull a chair over so you can
reach the bench. Get a move on,’ she said, tapping one foot
impatiently as Beth dragged at a stool.

‘Hey, don’t give your sister a hard time,
eh, love?’ Frank said. ‘She’s going as fast as she can.’ He took
the stool from Beth and carried it for her, then lifted her onto
it.

‘I
have
to hurry her up, Pa,’ said
Maudie. ‘She forgets what she’s meant to be doing otherwise. She
gets daydreaming—Miss Metcalf’s always going on at her for it.’