One Saturday morning, there was a knock at the back screen door. Dad went to answer it. It was that same Aboriginal boy from school. He smiled and held up his hand in acknowledgement of seeing me.
"Yes son, how can I help you?" Dad asked. The boy held out a tattered piece of paper in his long slender fingers and handed it to Dad. "'I am Johnny August. Can't speak but not deaf. Looking for work,'" Dad read aloud before looking at the teenager as he handed the note back to him. Now I realised why he hadn't answered me back in the schoolyard. I stood there shamefaced, knowing now how my innocent remark to him at the bins was actually very hurtful. I smiled at him, hoping he would forgive me.
"Well Johnny …" Dad began, as he caught at first the disapproving shake, then the reluctant nod of agreement of Nan's head. "Let's see, there's a load of wood out there for the fireplace that needs chopping and stacking under the house. Do you think you can handle that?" Johnny flashed a broad grin. "You take a look, and then we'll work out a price." Johnny did and eventually held up one finger. Dad countered with, "There's a good hour's hard work there. We'll make that five shillings instead."
Deal done, Johnny removed his shirt then set about chopping the wood. Doug and I sat on the top step of the back stairs, watching as he laboured away furiously.
While he worked, we could half-hear Dad and Nan from inside the house.
"I just don't know if it's such a good idea, is all. We don't want any trouble," Nan warned.
"There won't be."
"You know what I mean. People'll talk. Before he's finished, the whole town'll be abuzz with the news we've got a black boy working for us."
"He's done the right thing. He's knocked on the door and rather than asking for a handout, he's willing to work for a few bob. I'm surprised at you. A good Christian woman who helped many a traveller on the wallaby during the Depression, now turning your back on a young boy. You can see by the look of him, he lives pretty rough."
"I'm not turning me back son, it's just that I'm worried about the repercussions. Ya know what some people are like."
"I won't live my life worrying about what other people might think. You brought me up to look out and care for those in need. And you
know
the kind of conditions these poor buggers live under."
"You're right," Nan conceded. Dad came out to view the progress.
Johnny's build was lean but surprisingly muscular. The muscles in his arms were taut as he swung the axe down over the top of the log that rested vertically on a sawn off tree stump. Most times, with only the one attempt, the log would split easily down the centre. By the time he had finished with the stacking of the chopped wood under the house, he was dripping sweat. His hair stuck to his face. Nan came out onto the back verandah.
"Here's a towel love, ya can wash up in the laundry sink under the house." As she handed it to him Dad gave her a little smile. "I'll have a cool drink ready for ya," she added as she went back inside.
Freshly washed, he hung the towel on the line and put his shirt back on before knocking on the back door. Dad asked him to come inside, but he wouldn't and moved slightly back from the screen door remaining there with his head bent. Dad came out with his money and Nan followed, putting on a tray the jug of lemonade and some sandwiches she'd originally set out for him on the kitchen table. Dad counted out the coins and shook Johnny's hand, thanking him for a job well done. Johnny looked longingly at the refreshments but seemed to be waiting for permission to start.
"Well go on lad before the lemonade gets warm," encouraged Nan. With that, Johnny wolfed it all down like he hadn't eaten for a month. Nan and Dad looked sympathetically at him over his actions.
"If you come back next weekend, there's some mowing of the front and back that needs doing, as well as the edges," Dad offered. Johnny smiled and shook Dad's hand. "Say, six shillings?" Johnny's broad grin confirmed his agreement.
"There'll be a hot lunch with yer name on it as well," added Nan. After he'd gone Nan pulled us aside. "And you two, next time, don't keep staring at him while he's trying to work. You'd give anyone the heebie-jeebies."
The very next day Doug and I saw where under the cover of night, someone had painted in lime wash over Dad's surgery window ABO LOVER. Dad didn't bother to explain and we thought nothing of the words, just wondered why someone would put them there in the first place. We helped as Dad calmly set about cleaning it off.
Sure enough, Johnny came the next weekend as promised and continued on a weekly basis to do the lawns, tidy up the yard and do the gardening. As much as Nan wanted to tend to Poppie's labour of love herself, she was finding it too difficult to maintain.
One time I introduced Johnny to Miss Bridget but led off with how he couldn't talk, to save her thinking he was ignoring her. He carried several loads of cuttings around the back and burnt them off, refusing any payment. But Miss Kitty wouldn't let him go without a drink of milk and a couple of pumpkin scones instead, to settle the matter.
Finally, in early November and much later than usual, we knew Elliott's black mulberry tree was ready for harvesting. Nan's exchange of some of her tomato relish and choko chutney, always guaranteed a couple of bucketfuls of fruit in return. Doug and I were given the task of taking the jars of preserves to the Elliott's and collecting the coveted mulberries.
Before we entered their gate, we placed the jars on the ground and began to scoop up and eat the plump ripe mulberries that had fallen over the fence. We were stuffing our faces with the rich flavour of the berries when Mr Elliott came around the side of his house with an armful of empty buckets.
"Hi Mr Elliott," I called out. "Nan's given us these here preserves to give to you for some of your mulberries. She's gonna make some pies and jam this year. There's two of the tomato relish that you like and one choko chutney as well." He didn't respond.
"She told us to ask how Mrs Elliott's arthritis is," Doug added as we entered the yard.
"Er fine, fine," Mr Elliott stated, finishing his sentence with his usual upward inflection that turned each statement into a sort of question. He seemed distracted, not looking at us as he picked the fruit from the tree and placed it in one of his buckets.
"There's no mulberries this year."
"But there's plenty on the tree, see?" pointed out Doug.
"Well they're for them that don't um, fraternise with blacks. You can tell ya gran that from me." We started to leave, feeling hurt and confused.
"What's fraterise?" I asked, as I hadn't ever heard the word before. He repeated it again so that I got it right.
"Fratern-ize. F-r-a-t-e-r-n-i-z-e," he spelt out, with that upward finish.
"But what does it mean?" I asked.
"I'm not here to give no English lesson. Ask yer gran. Now go and take them preserves with ya."
"Is it okay if we collect a few of the ones that've fallen on the ground?" asked Doug.
"Didn't you hear me? There's no mulberries for you lot 'til you come to yer senses. I'm sorry, but we've um had a meetin', and well um, we're not prepared to turn our beautiful town into a Mission, for the likes of that black boy you lot are so keen on and the rest of 'em."
"You'd like Johnny if you met him. He's really friendly, and …"
"Pat, I can't stand here all day listenin' … Look um, it was decided at the meetin'. I'm not s'pose to even be talkin' to youse." Mr Elliott seemed a bit rattled. "Oh for goodness sake, stop lookin' at me you two with them big eyes. Go on, ya can fill two buckets, but no more." Doug and I wasted no time picking up the fallen fruit and putting it in the buckets.
"Not them ones, the better ones from the tree. But be quick about it. I don't want no one seein' me fraternisin'." We filled the buckets. Mr Elliott added a few handfuls to the top. "Now go before anyone sees ya. And um, thank yer gran for the preserves. Much appreciated."
We raced back to the house without dropping a single berry. Johnny was raking the leaves on our front lawn as we got back.
"Here Johnny, have some mulberries. There's heaps," I offered.
"Heaps," Doug restated. Johnny took a few then got back to the raking.
"What are we gonna tell Nan?" I whispered, as we went up the front steps.
"She doesn't have to know. It'll only get her upset. We delivered the preserves and got the mulberries – simple."
Doug was always able to see through a potential problem and find a simple solution. We convinced Nan to let us give the fruit a rinse, so that she wouldn't see the dirtier ones on the bottom – problem solved.
I looked up Dad's thick dictionary secretly that night, but was none the wiser as to what we did that could have got Mr Elliott so upset. He seemed angry that we were mixing with Johnny. The first meaning of 'fraternize', for they did indeed spell it with an 'ize' back then, indicated that we must have associated in a fraternal or friendly way, which was fair enough. It was the second definition of the word that must have riled Mr Elliott and the people at his meeting – the fact that we 'associated intimately with citizens of an enemy or conquered country'. Johnny wasn't our enemy, and yet I recalled Dad telling us at the Reserve that they were the first inhabitants of this country and that the white man took the land for themselves. Trying to work out what was what confused my young brain, but I kept it there at the back of my mind. We dropped the buckets back over the Elliott's front fence when Mr Elliott wasn't about.
Nan made three thick mulberry pies and still had fruit left over for jam. While Doug went off to Barry's place to play, Nan gave me one of the pies covered in a tea towel to take next door for Miss Bridget and Miss Kitty. I went the right way around this time, through their front gate and not the swinging palings. I banged on the front screen door and waited. Miss Bridget was off cleaning for the Patterson's still, so Miss Kitty came up the hallway.
"It's me Miss Kitty, Pat. Nan baked this mulberry pie for you."
"Oh isn't that nice of her. Please come in." I hesitated a bit, but as she held the screen door back, I looked at her smiling face and continued. Her hair was pulled tightly back off her face and pinned in a bun at the nape of her neck.
I placed the pie on the kitchen table then she removed and folded up the tea towel for me to return.
"Oh my, isn't it a beauty? Please, take a seat. Would you like some homemade ginger beer? My father's recipe." I agreed with a nod. On the table was a plate of veal and the ingredients to crumb it. I looked around the kitchen. The higher kitchen cupboard doors had some of their leadlight inserts missing and the whole place seemed to be so old and in need of a paint.
The ginger beer was cold and strong and I could tell the jam-centred biscuits came from Mr Green's corner store. Nan sometimes would send Doug or me down to his store to get sixpence worth of broken biscuits as a treat. Miss Kitty's were the dearer unbroken ones. As she continued flouring then dipping the veal slices in egg before crumbing them, I knelt on the chair and watched. With her hair done the way it was, you could clearly see a large port-wine birthmark covering almost half of the left side of her face from the temple, a bit over the eyelid and down over her cheek and ear. Even with the mark her white skin had almost an ethereal glow. At one stage she caught me staring.
"It's a birthmark."
"I'm sorry. Nan says its bad manners to stare." But I wanted to ask her some more things and I guess she felt it because she smiled.
"What's on your mind?"
I hesitated then asked how come she was so white and how come her eyes were a funny red colour. She smiled when I said, "funny red colour."
"I'm an albino. Do you know what that is?" I shook my head. She continued preparing the meal, placing the crumbed veal pieces in a frypan of hot dripping on the stove as we talked.
"Your father has an olivey skin that browns in the sun."
"So does Doug's."
"And you burn if you stay out too long, don't you?" I nodded. "Well, an albino like me can't go out in the sun at all, unless we're fully covered, 'cause we burn even quicker and blister then peel. The thing that makes other people's skin turn brown, albinos don't have. We're also born with reddish eyes that can't stand the glare of the sun. Does that answer everything?"
"What about your sister? How come she's not – ?"
"She's pale, but not as pale as me. She can take a bit of sun."
"How did you go outside and play as a kid?"
"Like you saw me the day you fell off the lattice – gloves and sunglasses and usually a hat. And dresses that covered my whole body. It wasn't very pleasant."
"Why?"
"Well, besides the heat from all the clothing, children can be very cruel. Adults even crueller – when they see someone who looks different. Different to them." She turned the veal over in the frypan.
"What did they do?"
"They called me names. Hurtful things – especially to a child."
"What did you do?"
"I ran inside and hid. I vowed I'd never go out and be laughed at again. Of course eventually I did. Mother put makeup over the mark so I'd look just like everyone else. Except I didn't. I was still an outsider, just not as noticeable."
I could see by her face, that remembering it made her sad. I squirmed in my seat a bit before getting the courage to say what I felt I had to get off my conscience.
"I should apologise too."
"Why's that then?"
"Thinking you were a vampire."
"It's not your fault. You only believed the story you were told. If I chose not to retreat from the world, maybe the stories wouldn't have started up. Who knows?" She gave a weak little smile. I smiled back and her eyes sparkled like the red rubies in Nan's engagement ring. She put the cooked veal on a plate before placing it in the oven to be warmed up later.
"More biscuits?"
"No thanks. I want to leave room for a big slice of pie later. I better go."
"Let yourself out. Thank your Nan for the pie. And Patrick, you're welcome to call in anytime."
"I'd like that. You can call me Pat, if you like." I leaned over and gave her a little kiss on the cheek, right on the birthmark. It took her by surprise. Her white eyelashes fluttered as she touched the spot where I kissed her. She watched as I skipped, tea towel swinging in my hand, back up the hall and home.