Stillwater Creek (25 page)

Containing himself, distancing himself. George had been doing that all morning. Occasionally, when he least expected it, it came rushing in at him again, threatening to overwhelm him. Then he had to stop whatever he was doing and take deep breaths until he was strong enough to push it away from him once more. He wasn't going to give in though.

Mentally gauging the length of each log, he stood in front of the wood pile. They were uniformly eighteen inches long and he planned to rearrange them so the pile was even more orderly than usual. The whole afternoon lay in front of him. He would stack the logs in the timber frame he had constructed the previous Sunday.

He began to arrange the logs between the constraints, with their rough sawn edges facing out. Or facing in, it all depended on your perspective, and he feared he was losing his. The growth rings, year after year, were exposed to view. The big logs he would stack first and afterwards he'd slot between them the more slender pieces of wood.

The day was hot and the woodpile was in the sun. He took off his felt hat and wiped the sweat from his brow with a
handkerchief. Eileen was indoors having a rest. He could do with one himself but he had to keep his exhaustion at bay, just as he had to keep his loneliness at bay too. He drove himself on, not heeding the splinters, not heeding the heat.

After several hours he heard the fly-screen door slam but he didn't turn. He knew it was Eileen. She didn't say anything and he didn't stop working. He didn't even turn around, but he was aware of her standing on the verandah, watching him.

‘Quite a work of art, that,' she said at last. ‘Reminds me of the Royal Easter Show.' Her voice was not unkind.

He stopped at this, at the memory of those piles of fruit and vegetables, and the beautiful arrangement of the more colourful vegetables into the coat of arms of New South Wales. The background to his meeting with Eileen all those years ago. He felt a prickling behind his eyes. Eileen's kindness was not what he needed at the moment, and it wouldn't be genuine, it would be part of their war of attrition.
It isn't fair to Andy
. He could hear again the savageness of her tone the previous night.

He had to hold himself together, he had to be self-contained. Taking a deep breath, he turned slowly to look at his wife, who was standing on the verandah and smiling at him.

‘Nice to see you being tidy, George.'

For once he was glad of the veiled reproof. It would stop him falling apart. He thought of the shopfront window of Cadwallader's Quality Meats. Of the exquisitely arranged display of chops and steaks, of the orderly rows of sausages and the mounds of tripe decorated with sprigs of fresh parsley. He knew he was always tidy but Eileen would never look at that display.

‘Would you like a cup of tea?' she added.

She brought it out to him in the old enamel mug with the chip on it right where his mouth went. Unhygienic it
undoubtedly was, but it was his favourite mug and had belonged to his father before him. Gratefully he took it but didn't look at her face. When she'd gone back inside, he sat down on the stump he used as a chopping block and again wiped the sweat from his brow.

That morning Peter Vincent had telephoned to tell him the news about Lorna Hunter. He knew about this policy in the abstract but it had never before happened to anyone he knew. Never to a kid who was in the same school as his sons. It must be a mistake and he was going to phone the Burford police himself this afternoon. That sort of thing couldn't be allowed to happen in a civilised place like Wilba Wilba Shire.

Yet if Peter was right, what would it be like to lose your family? He couldn't bear to lose his. They meant more to him than anything. Without warning he began to weep. For the callousness of authorities who would take away half-caste children, their families were only Abos after all. For Jim, whose cleverness meant that Jingera was not big enough for him. And for Eileen who no longer loved him, he was quite sure of that now.

Putting the half-empty mug down on the ground, he rested his head on his hands. Softness and love, that's what might have been. But not for the likes of Lorna Hunter, if Peter was correct. Not for himself either, as long as he refused to yield to Eileen. He knew that soon he'd have to resume constructing his barrier. There was no meaning to life, there was no order to life, unless you imposed it.

Only at this instant did it occur to him to put himself into Eileen's shoes. Maybe it wasn't just the expense that was bothering her. Maybe it wasn't fairness to Andy either. Maybe she was thinking she was losing a part of her family; in a way she was. Even though the scholarship was the right thing for Jim,
and George was absolutely convinced of this, the children were Eileen's life and now unexpectedly part of this life was about to be removed. At such a prospect Eileen might well be feeling a sense of loss. Or even of anger, and what better way to manifest this than to refuse any physical contact with him? How insensitive he'd been not to think of this before.

On the other hand he wasn't entirely to blame. If only Eileen had been able to say to him, George I'm going to miss Jim terribly, if only she'd been open with him. Then they could have talked things through and avoided this awful alienation. He would have to tread more lightly with her. Although Jim was going to be allowed to seize this opportunity, he himself would need to work harder at understanding Eileen's point of view. She might never soften but he had to try to understand what she might be going through.

At this point he rubbed a handkerchief over his face. It was as wet as if he'd just washed it and his mouth felt dry. Picking up the mug of tea again, he deliberately sucked at it, slurped at it, something he would never do if he were not alone. When the tea was finished, he carried the mug to the back verandah and left it on the splintered planks. Constructing the wall of logs was allowing him to put things in perspective. Constructing the wall was holding back the worst of his unhappiness.

Jim, washing his hands in the bathroom later that same afternoon, wasn't aware that his father was on the phone until he came into the hallway. Dad had his back to him and was holding the receiver up to one ear and a cupped hand over the other ear. The radio in the lounge room sounded quite loud, even through the closed door, but Dad was speaking softly in spite of this. Jim might have gone straight past him and into
the kitchen if he hadn't heard him mention Lorna Hunter. He stopped still. This wasn't exactly eavesdropping, he just wanted to know more.

‘I'm phoning about Lorna Hunter,' his father repeated, rather more loudly this time. ‘Can I speak to the officer in charge? … Surely you can put me through.' There was a pause and then he continued, ‘What about the parents? No one in Jingera seems to have heard anything … Oh, I see, well I won't hold you up then. I'll try again some other time. Thank you. Goodbye.' Muttering something about the police all being stupid fools, he put the receiver down before noticing Jim standing in the hallway.

‘News about Lorna?' Jim said, trying to give the impression that he'd only just come out of the bathroom.

‘There's some news about Lorna,' Dad said, looking worried. ‘But I don't know if it's true. That's the trouble, son. I don't know enough yet.' He glanced at his watch. ‘Time you fed the chooks, isn't it? We don't want your mother rousing on you again, do we?' Before limping down the hallway, he gave Jim a distracted pat on the shoulder. Into the lounge room he went and shut the door firmly behind him.

Jim stood still for a moment longer, puzzling over his father's conversation.

There was something unusual about Lorna's absence, that much was clear. Perhaps the rumour he'd heard from Zidra was wrong and Lorna hadn't moved to the Sutherlands' property. Another report had it that the whole family had been shifted back to Wallaga Lake, but perhaps Lorna had run away instead. Perhaps she'd become a Missing Person and that's why Dad was on the phone just now. Although wanting to ask his father more, he guessed from the overheard conversation that he didn't know anything much.

And it was the first time ever that Dad had told him to feed the chooks.

Jim went outside anyway, although he'd already fed the chooks that day. Needing some time to think, he went straight to that favourite hiding spot of his, under the fig tree below the chicken run.

The day of the Christmas dance was stinking hot. Jim mooched around at home, trying to keep out of his mother's way. Her entire morning had been spent baking stuff for the dance at the church hall and by early afternoon she was at her grumpiest. You might have thought she'd be glad to let him and Andy outside to play but she wouldn't have a bar of that, and she wouldn't let them near the kitchen either.
Hanging around getting underfoot
was how she put it. Eventually they shut themselves in their bedroom and started a game of Monopoly. By late afternoon a light breeze sprang up that cooled the house and their mother's temper. She was almost back to normal when it was time to head off to the hall to get preparations underway. The boys also had to go to help carry, for their father had gone on ahead in the van to collect the trestles. She wouldn't hear of Jim and Andy dragging her pots and plates along on their billycarts, so they headed off balancing trays, a much more precarious undertaking.

The hall felt stifling, even though all the sash windows on each side were wide open, and Jim was glad the kids would have the backyard to play in once the dance started. After they'd put
down the trays in the kitchen at the back of the hall, and grabbed a couple of sausage rolls when no one was looking, Jim and Andy went outside. Around the back of the hall, some of the boys had started a game of French cricket with a bat and tennis ball. They weren't allowed cricket balls here after that time Andy lobbed a ball through the rectory window and smashed it.

Then Jim saw Roger O'Rourke pick up something from the back of the incinerator. Holding it behind him, he came running across the yard. ‘Here's O'Rourke coming in to bowl,' he shouted and lobbed whatever he'd been holding straight at the batsman. It missed and went through the window of the shed at the back of the hall, shattering it into a hundred pieces. Roger shrieked with laughter. ‘It was a cricket ball,' he shouted. ‘Gotya! I'm batsman now!' He seemed as unaware of the broken window as he was of several fathers advancing down the side passage, rolling a keg of beer in front of them like a drum announcing their arrival.

Roger's father was the first to notice his son racing around the yard holding a cricket bat and ball, and the pile of broken glass in front of the shed. ‘That's enough,' he shouted, advancing down on him, red hair bristling. Roger swung around and his father yanked the ball from him. ‘Where did you get this from? You know cricket balls aren't allowed here any more.'

‘Nowhere,' said Roger.

‘Nothing comes from nowhere.' Roger's dad was red in the face now as well as the hair.

When Zidra heard the crash of breaking glass followed by shouting, she ran down the back steps of the hall. Roger
O'Rourke being bawled at: she couldn't stop herself smirking at the sight. Staring at the ground, Roger looked miserable but he was certain to have deserved it. Mr O'Rourke continued rousing on Roger. She might have felt sorry for him if he hadn't tipped ink onto the cover of her exercise book yesterday afternoon. Miss Neville had blamed her and she'd accepted the blame. Although she could have told on him, she didn't. But that hadn't seemed to make him feel grateful.

Roger started to kick with one foot at a clump of grass. This made Mr O'Rourke even angrier. Now Mrs O'Rourke appeared in the yard and marched across the rough grass to her husband and son. Zidra followed close behind and was unable to prevent her smirk from turning into a grin.

‘Where did you get that cricket ball from?' Mrs O'Rourke's voice was sharp enough to cut through a stale loaf.

‘Behind the incinerator.' Roger waved towards the back of the yard. They all stared at the incinerator for an instant.

‘What was it doing there?'

‘How would I know? I s'pose someone left it there after the last game.'

All the boys snickered a bit at this and Zidra grinned too, but Roger carried on watching the grass grow.

‘What are you gawping at, the lot of you?' Mrs O'Rourke said, turning on them. ‘I'm going to get rid of this and I don't want you playing with cricket balls here again. Plus you're going to have to pay for that pane of broken glass from your own pocket money.'

Roger looked up and saw Zidra standing behind his mother. He grinned defiantly. Seeing the grin, Mrs O'Rourke cuffed his ear. Now Zidra grinned more widely. She followed Mrs O'Rourke into the kitchen and saw her stuff the cricket ball into the garbage bin. It wouldn't stay there long, she knew.

Just then Mama swept through the door from the hall and gave a little shriek. ‘There you are, darling Zidra! I have been looking all over for you.'

Squirming with embarrassment, Zidra wanted to tell Mama to speak like a normal person, not a foreigner. Instead she said, ‘We Australians are given to understatement.' It was her best imitation yet of Miss Neville. ‘You won't find us an emotional lot, Mrs Talivaldis.'

Mama laughed, though Zidra could tell it was in spite of herself. So too did some of the other ladies. Zidra's spirits lifted. She liked an audience, even if it was only mothers and not the children she really wanted to impress. Looking around quickly to see if Miss Neville might have heard, she was relieved to see that she was nowhere in sight. One or two of the older ladies were glaring at her though. ‘Too clever by half,' one of them muttered. ‘If she were mine I'd give her the strap.'

Mama chose to ignore this, or perhaps she hadn't heard. ‘You will help Mrs Bates with distributing the knives and forks across the tablecloths in the hall,' she told Zidra while giving her a hard shove, her equivalent of the strap.

It was late afternoon by the time Peter shut the main gate into Ferndale and turned the car onto the road heading south towards Jingera. It was still several hours before sunset but the western sky was beginning to glow golden through a thin red haze that looked almost like dust. He'd wound down the car windows to get some air but he still felt unpleasantly hot. Accelerating to generate a cooling breeze, he almost missed seeing Tommy Hunter walking along the verge of the road heading north – the very man he'd wanted to see. Immediately he stopped the car and backed up to a patch of shade.

‘G'day,' Tommy said. He didn't smile though. It was almost as if he hadn't wanted Peter to stop. ‘Where are you off to?' His voice was listless.

‘Jingera. The Christmas dance.' Peter got out of the car. ‘Can't say I'm all that keen though.'

‘Could've fooled me. You was goin' like the wind. Flyin' along. Think you was still up in the air?' Tommy took off his old felt hat and fanned himself with it.

‘Where're you heading?'

‘Wallaga Lake. The missus and kids are still there.'

When Peter had last seen Tommy's family, his wife – a small shy creature in a baggy floral dress – had five children in tow. All with brilliant smiles and a willingness to look straight at him, unlike their mother, and now there were only four children. He wondered if their smiles were still as brilliant. ‘How's the family coping?' he asked.

‘Pretty crook.' Tommy fanned himself once more with his hat. ‘Missus in tears plenty often and little kids too.'

‘I checked again, Tommy. With the Welfare Board this time. I drove in to see them yesterday. I'm afraid the police were right. Welfare has taken Lorna.'

It had been a hopeless visit. The woman he'd spoken to, a tall blonde who'd spent too much time in the sun, had been adamant it was for the children's own good. Got any children yourself? he'd asked her. No, she'd replied but if I did I'd want them to have the best start in life, and then she'd smiled in that mawkish way people did sometimes when they were talking about kids in the abstract. Now he hesitated before adding, ‘And there's nothing we can do about it, Tommy, but at least we know for sure where she is – Gudgiegalah Girls' Home.'

‘That's what Welfare told the Missus when they tookem other kids.'

Peter felt helpless. He didn't tell Tommy what he'd also learnt from the woman at the Welfare Board. That the children weren't allowed to keep in touch with their families. There was little chance of Lorna seeing her family again, or at least not until she was older, fourteen or fifteen, but Tommy probably knew that already. ‘I'm so sorry,' he said. Lame words, but it was better by far to say something, anything, than to ignore Tommy's distress.

He sighed. Lorna was a bright kid and maybe she'd do all right in Gudgiegalah. She'd get an education and maybe make a life for herself. Though from what he'd heard she was more likely to end up as housemaid to some rich property owner out west, far from where she belonged.

Tommy, gazing into the distance, appeared to be staring at the range of mountains to the west. Or staring beyond the range, as if he could see as far as Gudgiegalah. ‘Gotter get on,' he said eventually. ‘Gotter get back.'

‘Would you like a lift?'

‘No,' Tommy said so quickly that Peter wondered if he had interpreted his offer as pity, but it was probably more that he needed to be alone.

Although the car was now as hot as Hades, Peter sat in it for a few minutes. In the rear-vision window he watched Tommy's reflection, a shabby figure trudging along the dirt verge. It was a long way to Wallaga Lake if you had to walk.

Eventually Peter started the engine and drove on, more soberly now, towards Jingera. Occasionally he caught glimpses of the ocean that was so smooth it looked like faintly rumpled silk. Silky like a woman's skin. Although he didn't especially want to go to the Christmas dance, particularly after seeing Tommy's sad face, he knew that Ilona would be there. Over the past week or so he'd experienced no more nightmares and he'd
come to the conclusion that Ilona hadn't intended to offend him that afternoon;
she gets like that when she's tired
, Zidra had said. Instead he'd found his own conduct wanting. It wasn't his coughing during the Shostakovich prelude that now bothered him but his laughter at her misuse of English.

Initially he'd wondered if she lacked a sense of humour. That would explain why she found correction difficult, but it was one thing to be corrected, quite another thing to be laughed at. Learning new idioms was hard enough without being mocked and he wanted to make amends for that.

The fleeting hope that she too might want to apologise he dismissed as a wild fantasy.