Currawalli Street (8 page)

‘Perhaps she thinks it will take her job?'

‘As if it could. Although after the day I have spent with her I wouldn't mind if it did.'

Kathleen pats Margaret's flank. ‘Alfred will know. He has a way with horses. Do you think it's strange, how he seems to know what they're thinking?'

‘No. Some people have an affinity with things.' Maria smiles. ‘Look at me with my chooks.'

‘Yes, you're right. I wonder what I have an affinity with.'

Maria drops her left arm to her side and catches the reins in her right hand. ‘Maybe it's cockatoos. You always look up at them when they fly past and you always talk about them.'

‘Oh dear. Do I? Perhaps I do.'

They both laugh as they cross the street, but halfway across Maria looks back up the street towards the house next to the manse.

‘How is he going?' Kathleen asks.

‘Morrie?'

‘Yes. I don't know him that well.'

‘He doesn't say much. He's up and down. He's a hard man to know.' Maria looks at Kathleen. ‘You know that he has dinner at our place? Sometimes everything will be okay but then he will drop his head onto his chest and stay like that for a long time. We have learned that the best thing to do is to carry on the conversation around him. After a while he will lift his head, there will be tears in his eyes, but he will rejoin the conversation as if nothing has happened.'

‘I hardly got to know Gwen before she . . . passed away,' Kathleen says.

‘She was a nice woman. She was good for Morrie. I don't think he is an easy man. You know how some people need someone else to help them get through their . . .'

‘. . . day,' Kathleen nods, finishing Maria's sentence.

‘I was going to say life. But day is better.'

‘I've known people like that.'

‘Me too. I think I might be married to one,' Maria adds.

‘Really?'

‘He's a bit of a closed book. About some things. But then he's open about other things. I don't know. He's a good man. He and Morrie seem to get on fine. Until William starts to talk about his geraniums. Jesu Maria! He goes on and on, and finally Morrie has to go home. I can't blame him.'

Margaret jostles Maria, pushing her gently back on her heels.

‘Yes, you're right, Margaret. We had better get out of the middle of the road in case William drives up in that automobile contraption and runs us all over.'

Maria hasn't finished speaking before Kathleen starts to laugh. As the two women and the horse move off the street, Rose and Nancy hear their laughter and look over. Rose calls out to Alfred, who emerges from around the back straightaway as if he has been standing still waiting for the call. When he sees Margaret he smiles. The horse tries to walk towards him but Maria holds her reins.

‘Let her go, Maria. She won't run away,' Alfred says. He walks back around the side of the house and Maria drops the reins. Sure enough, Margaret quietly follows him. Nancy, smiling, shakes her head and Kathleen looks at Maria who is raising her eyebrows, and says, ‘Margaret loves him.'

Rose walks towards the two women. ‘We were just talking about coronation cake. Do you have that recipe, Kathleen?'

‘Here. I've read through it. It calls for . . . let's see if my memory is still working . . .' She holds the newspaper clipping behind her back and looks up at the sky. ‘Drambuie and oat flour from Scotland, dates from East Africa, cardamom seeds from India, maple syrup from Canada, sultanas from . . . Australia, I suppose, plain flour from . . . somewhere. And of course eggs from England. English eggs because eggs bind all the other ingredients together. As does England bind all the other countries together. That's what the recipe says; I remember that. We can get those ingredients easily enough, can't we?'

She hands the recipe to Rose who says, ‘Sort of. I don't think the oat flour will be from Scotland, nor do I think that the dates are going to be from East Africa, but the sultanas will definitely be from Australia.'

‘This will be an Australian coronation cake,' Kathleen says.

They move inside. As the wind picks up and pushes darker clouds
across the sky, Alfred and Margaret come back around to the front and watch them as they sail over. Alfred is absently holding an old horseshoe that he found in the grass. He tosses it into the paddock next door, just missing the wooden frame that the builders have erected.

Johnny reins in his horse when the wagons are still twenty yards away. He can see Elizabeth controlling the first. Riding forward to meet Johnny is a young man. His body sits still in the saddle, his eyes on Johnny's, no emotion showing on his face, or at least none that Johnny can read. He sits tall in the saddle and lets his left foot fall from the stirrup as he closes up.

‘My name is Walter Cummings,' he says before Johnny can begin his own greetings. ‘Beth says that you are her neighbour . . .'

‘That I am.'

‘. . . and that her father most likely sent you to look for her.'

‘He did. My name is Johnny Oatley.'

Walter holds out his hand. Johnny reaches forward and shakes it firmly. The young man turns his head back to the wagons. ‘Beth needed to stay away this long. She had to do what she did.'

‘What did she do?'

‘Married me.'

‘Oh.' Johnny answers quickly, surprised.

‘Now we are headed back to Currawalli Street to meet her parents.'

‘I promised Alfred that I would assist her to come home if that's what she needed . . .'

‘She doesn't need it.'

Walter Cummings's face is darkened by the sun and hardened by the wind. He has a striking moustache that brushes his cheeks, and even though it curls downwards it highlights his eyes, which are clear and alert.

Elizabeth pulls the wagon to a stop level with Johnny. His horse skitters sideways as the wagon creaks to a standstill between Johnny and Walter, who encourages his own horse forward. Johnny looks over at Elizabeth; holding the reins. He knows from Kathleen that she is twenty-five but she looks older. Her dark hair normally falls over her shoulders but today it is pulled back. Her arms are bare and Johnny can see the strain in her muscles as she holds the reins tight.

‘Hello, Elizabeth. And congratulations,' Johnny says.

‘Thank you, Johnny. Father sent you?'

‘He did. He started to get a bit worried. But I don't mind having a bit of a ride out here, so I suppose I may have encouraged him to send me. He probably would have waited a few more days if it had been left up to him.'

‘The silly old man. What did he say? Did he tell you I was incapable?'

‘No, not at all. He told me you would be fine. That this job would hardly tax you at all. I think doing nothing is what is affecting him. He doesn't come across as a man used to sitting still.'

‘I would wager that he and my mother are at each other.'

‘I don't know. I'm not a good judge in matters like that, but I would say probably.'

‘We're headed home now. Will you travel with us or will you go on home and tell them that we are coming?'

Johnny thinks for a moment. ‘A bit of both, I suppose.'

‘Good. It'll be nice to have someone new to talk to,' she answers, but aims the words at her new husband. ‘Walter? Is that alright with you?' Johnny looks Elizabeth's husband full in the face.

The young man looks back at him for a moment, then up at the clouds. ‘It'll be fine,' he says stiffly.

Johnny moves in behind the wagon and waits. Elizabeth flicks the two old wagon horses into action and after a few yards Johnny comes up by her side. Walter stays on the other side. It is clear that he doesn't like the sudden company. Not at all.

The wagon behind is driven by Cedric Jones. Johnny knows him only to nod to. He sees him when he is working with Alfred repairing the wagons. He looks about forty but is probably not that old. Alfred says that even though Cedric has been with him since the early days, he still doesn't know where he lives. He is as slow as a bear when nobody is posing a threat, but as quick as a snake striking when someone does. He offers more company than Elizabeth and Walter, who have launched into a heated discussion. Johnny reins back until he falls level with the second wagon.

Cedric looks at him. ‘They're having a fight.'

Johnny nods. ‘I figured that. Then I'll stay back here.'

‘It's best. They throw around words like stones. They don't care who gets hit.'

‘You sound as if you have been.'

‘I have. But not for much longer. When we get back, I'm off. Alfred doesn't pay me enough to take that sort of treatment. I work for him, not anybody else. My father once said to me, “It doesn't matter how old you get, a woman's words will still sting.” He would know—my
stepmother had a tongue like a whip.'

‘So where will you go?'

‘The army. I think that is the place for me.'

‘I was talking to a fellow who thinks there will be a big war.'

‘I talked to a bloke who said that too. He said that Australian troops will be needed. It might be hard to get into the army when it starts up.'

‘Maybe. Depends on how many soldiers they are going to send. Lots of blokes will want to join up. Sounds like a great adventure,' Johnny says, thinking about Bert Brady.

They talk above the rumble of the wheels on the track but they can still hear the shouting from the first wagon. Cedric lifts his eyebrows and then continues. ‘My father went to South Africa to fight the Boers the first time. He said it was great fun. Once you got used to the bullets and the killing.'

Johnny looks away from the track, which runs along the ridge of a slight hill, at the farmland in the valley beside them. A wattle and daub hut has smoke coming from the chimney. He has a momentary urge to ride down there and invite himself in. He nods to Cedric. ‘I wonder what they're cooking.'

Cedric smiles and Johnny sees that smiling is something that doesn't sit comfortably on his face. It makes him look slightly misshapen. ‘I reckon they're having a potato and mutton stew.'

‘With peas and cabbage?' asks Johnny.

‘No, all the cabbage is used already.' Cedric looks at Johnny and says, ‘I grew up in a place just like that. That's what we ate every day. For lunch and then for dinner. It was a winter meal but we only had
winter vegetables in our garden. That's all that would grow, no matter what the season.'

Johnny knows rural poverty. The spine of this country is made up of people living in similar conditions. ‘We only had silver beet,' he says. ‘That was our vegetable.'

Cedric nods towards the house. ‘So you know what it's like under that roof?'

‘Yes, I think I do. It looks much the same as the place I grew up in too. We were lucky; the land turned us some money and my dad was able to build us something bigger. We began to eat more than mutton.'

Cedric shrugs. ‘Good for you. My parents fought the land every year of their lives. It was the drought in the nineties that killed them. Now the shire has flooded our land to make a lake. My dad would have laughed.'

Johnny pulls out his tobacco and offers it to Cedric, who declines. ‘Besides arguing, how are the newlyweds going?' Johnny asks.

‘Alright I suppose, if you count fighting as a good thing for a young couple to do. They seem to relish it. My brother and his wife are like that. They have argued every day of their married life. They will probably still be arguing in heaven when they get there. I suppose they love each other though. It is the same with these two. You see it in their eyes, but they need only to look at each other to argue about something.'

Johnny thinks about this. ‘I don't argue with my wife. Are you married, Cedric?'

‘I was once. For a short while. I have stopped saying that she took off with a travelling salesman. I don't know who she took off with. I came home from a trip and she was just gone, that's all. Took everything. But
you know what, Johnny? I look back over the way I was with her and the way I was in general, and I have to say I can't blame her. If I ever talk to her again, I'll tell her that.'

‘Do you know where she is now?'

‘Oh yes, I found her. But when I saw her, I knew it wouldn't be right to go up and say hello. She lives in a big town. I saw her with her new family. She was picking out a dress for her daughter, I suppose it was. She looked happy. She had never been happy with me. Yes, I will take some of that tobacco.' He waits until Johnny passes it over. ‘But some couples argue; some don't have to. There is only one way to judge how good your marriage is.'

‘What's that?' Johnny asks, looking at the trees growing by the side of the road. Their trunks have been blackened by fire.

‘At the end of the day, when the lights are out and you have given up your prayers and are about to fall asleep, if you are happy to be lying next to the person you are lying next to, then it is a good marriage.' Cedric rolls his cigarette with one hand. ‘Companionship. That's the thing a man needs more than anything else. To be able to sit comfortably with someone in silence. I worked that out after my wife left me and I was looking at what I missed her for. Everything else—the food, the loving—was replaceable. The companionship wasn't.' He flicks the reins across the back of the horses. ‘Of course, I worked most of that out while standing at the bar of a pub on my own. When everyone went home to their families, I stayed there.'

Johnny glances over at him. ‘You don't look like a big drinker.'

‘Oh, I'm not. I drink slow. I don't have the thirst. My old man had it and gave it to my brother. The need to keep drinking when everyone
else has stopped. When drink is not the thing needed anymore but the urge remains. A horrible type of thirst. I have been frightened all my life that I will wake up one day with it. I haven't so far.'