Daughter of the Regiment (8 page)

Looking through the hole wasn’t like watching TV or a video. It was real life. They were the watchers who could offer neither sympathy nor help. Or even a rhyme for sky, thought Harry.

Try, cry, goodbye …

‘See you tomorrow,’ said Harry finally.

Angie nodded without speaking. Harry watched her cross the flat and go down the path to home.

The school bus wound down the spaghetti road, clattering over the bridge at Three Sheep Creek, bouncing over the ruts the Council grader flattened once a year and that came back as soon as it rained and the water washed across the road.

‘Coming swimming?’ asked Spike.

Harry shook his head. ‘I’m going down to the chookhouse,’ he said.

Spike blinked at him. ‘You’re always down the chookhouse these days. Doesn’t it get sort of boring?’ he demanded.

Harry shrugged. It wasn’t boring. It was compelling, more and more each day, as though he
had
to know what happened next, as though there was something that made him look.

‘Anything new happened this week?’ asked Spike.

Harry glanced behind, but no one was listening. Trudi and Alice were whispering secrets and Sam was just staring out the window. ‘Didn’t Angie tell you?’ asked Harry.

Spike shrugged. ‘Didn’t ask,’ he said. ‘She’d just say, Why don’t you come down and see for yourself?, in a silly sort of voice … You know what sisters are like.’

Harry nodded, though he didn’t, not having a sister. ‘We’ve only seen her twice this week,’ he said slowly. ‘The first time Angie got there just as Cissie was leaving. And the second time Cissie was reading by herself.’

‘Like I said. Boring,’ said Spike. ‘Just sitting in a chookhouse watching a kid sit on a rock. Maybe something will happen soon. Hey, wouldn’t it be great if you saw bushrangers? You could see where they put their treasure then we could go and dig it up.’

‘I don’t think there were bushrangers around much then,’ said Harry. ‘Bushrangers were later.’

‘Well, something interesting,’ said Spike. ‘Hey, have you decided about next year yet?’

‘No,’ said Harry shortly.

‘I’d go like a shot,’ said Spike. ‘Anything to get away from Bradley’s Bluff. I mean at least things
happen
down in Sydney. You know Angie’s applied for a scholarship at St Helen’s?’

‘No,’ said Harry startled. ‘She didn’t say anything about it.’

‘I reckon she’ll get it,’ said Spike. ‘She’s pretty bright. But then she’s interested … hey, that means if you decide to go down to Sydney she’ll be able to tell you all the news. I won’t have to write two letters. The schools are pretty close, aren’t they?’

‘Dunno,’ said Harry.

‘I reckon it’d be great to go,’ said Spike.

The bus lumbered round a bend. Below, the river bed gleamed like it had soaked up all the sun. The last of summer’s water trickled through deep ruts carved in the sand.

Harry was silent.

‘Harry! Is that you?’

‘Yeah, it’s me.’ Harry dumped his school bag on the verandah.

‘Take your boots off before you come inside,’ said Mum automatically.

‘Mum, they’re school shoes. Not boots. They haven’t been anywhere dirty.’

‘They’re dirty enough,’ said Mum. ‘No shoes inside. There’s frozen fruit salad in the freezer if you want some.’

‘Great. I’ll take some down with me.’

‘Down to the chookshed again?’

Harry nodded.

‘You’re down there every afternoon and the new run is hardly started.’ Mum grinned at him. ‘I bet I know what you’re really doing down there.’

Harry froze. ‘What?’

‘Just watching your chooks. My dad was the same. When he was appointed someplace new the first thing he’d unpack would be his hens. It used to drive my mother demented sometimes. She’d be unpacking all the kid’s things and he’d be down checking out the back shed or whatever was there to put his chooks in … And every Sunday when he came back from the service they’d be waiting for him, all lined up. He always gave them a special lot of wheat at Sunday lunchtime. He swore they could count to seven and knew just when Sunday was.’

‘Probably just heard the music in Church and thought “wheat”,’ said Harry.

‘Probably,’ said Mum. ‘You know, it’s funny. We moved six times when I was a kid. And here I am married to a man whose family has lived in the one spot for six generations.’

And I’m the seventh, thought Harry. But he didn’t say it aloud. Mum and Dad never pressured him about taking over the farm. Never even said ‘When you do ag science at high school …’ If he wanted to be an accountant or a computer scientist they wouldn’t argue. But he knew they hoped he’d find some way to keep the farm no matter what else he decided to do.

The chookshed shimmered in the heat, even under its blanket of passionfruit. He’d scraped out all the muck and put down fresh hay on Tuesday (he’d seen Angie wrinkle her nose on Monday). The chooks kept scratching it over, looking for seeds, and so kept covering their droppings with the hay, too. The shed still smelt more like dried grass than chook.

Harry stepped inside. All the eggs were in the left-hand box today, as though the chooks had had a conference that morning and decided, It’s the left one today, girls.

The hole was a bright white light in the darkness. It must be summer there too, thought Harry. When it was winter on the other side the hole was softer, dimmer. He crouched down and pressed his eyes to it.

Someone was there! Someone new! Not Cissie, not Sergeant Wilkes, not any of the people he’d seen before.

This was a boy, about his age or a few years older. He wore a shirt and trousers, sort of baggy, but not so different from what you’d wear today, and heavy boots.

The boy knelt by the creek scooping its water into his mouth. A stained sack drooped behind him. A horse whinnied softly in the background, but it was too far to the side to see.

‘Who are you?’

Harry started. It was Cissie’s voice. The hole showed so little of its world, he hadn’t seen her approach and still couldn’t see where she was. She must be standing just downstream.

The boy jumped. He gulped water the wrong way, so he choked, and stood up coughing. ‘What the … what are you doing creeping up on me like that? I might have drowned meself in fright.’

Cissie’s voice was unsympathetic. ‘Only if you’d been fool enough to stick your head in the pool. Who are you?’ she repeated.

‘Who wants to know?’

‘I do.’

The boy shrugged. ‘Daniel then.’

‘Daniel what?’

‘Who gave you the right to ask the questions?’

‘You can ask too if you like.’ Cissie stepped forward, closer to the boy. Harry could see her clearly now.

‘I don’t need to ask questions,’ said the boy smugly. ‘I know who you are and all anyway.’

‘Who am I then?’

‘You’re the girl who lives at the garrison with the soldiers. Captain Piper told my Da all about you.’

‘Oh!’ Cissie sat on the bank and hugged her knees. ‘That’s who you are then! The new people who’ve settled down the river. Captain Piper said you’d all come up to join your father.’

‘Who did you think I was then?’

Cissie wrinkled her nose. ‘How was I to know? An escaped convict maybe.’

‘Do I look like an escaped convict?’

Cissie looked him up and down. ‘You might be.’

‘Well, I wouldn’t be wearing my best clothes to go honeying, would I?’ demanded the boy, exasperated.

‘Is that what you’ve been doing? Getting honey?’

The boy nodded. ‘One of the black women down the river told my ma about a hive along the creek up this way. The dray overturned when we crossed a river—only a week out from Sydney, too—and all the sugar got wet and dissolved away, and then the ants got in the treacle. It’s been weeks since Ma had any sweetening and when she heard about the honey …’

‘Weren’t you afraid they’d sting you?’ asked Cissie admiringly.

‘Nah, these is native bees. Native bees don’t sting.’

‘How do you know?’

‘The black women said. They know everything, the black women do. The bees didn’t sting me, so it must be true. Besides, it’d’ve been worth it for the honey.’ The boy grinned again. ‘And I got something a touch better than honey.’

‘What?’ demanded Cissie.

‘A swarm! A swarm of bees! They just dropped into my sack, easy as you please.’ The boy gestured to the sack on the ground.

‘They’re in there? Can I see them? Please!’

‘Course not. They might fly away. Or, maybe if they get angry they sting.’

‘Could I just see the honey then?’ Cissie hesitated. ‘I’ve never seen honey.’

‘Never!’

‘Not that I remember. Maybe I did back in Sydney or back in England—but I was too young then to remember anything … or not much anyway. Not honey. I’ve read about it though. I’ve read a lot. Captain Piper’s got two whole chests of books, and Mama and Papa had some as well … Can I see it? Please?’

The boy hesitated, then vanished in the direction of the horse whinny. He was back a few seconds later. He held out a slightly grubby hand. ‘You can taste it if you like,’ he offered.

‘Really? Your ma won’t be angry?’

‘There’s plenty there,’ reassured Daniel. ‘It was a whole tree full. They’re not like bees back home. I’ve never seen a hive so big before.’

‘Did you keep bees back home?’

‘My grandfather did. Twenty skeps out the back, and more sometimes. He made mead too, but they never let me taste it,’ said the boy regretfully.

‘What’s mead?’

‘It’s a drink. Honey and spring water. It’s got to be spring water mind, that’s what grandfather said. And yeast. Some people add herbs as well, but grandfather says they spoil the taste. Then you let it brew and that’s the mead. Like beer maybe, but better. Least that’s what grandfather said.’ Daniel held his hand out to her again. ‘Here, take it.’

Cissie lifted the lump from the boy’s hand. It looked sticky, and sort of shiny. It must be honeycomb, Harry realised, not like the honey that came in jars.

Cissie tasted it. ‘It’s … it’s strange.’

‘But good,’ asked Daniel anxiously.

‘Good,’ agreed Cissie. She tasted it again.

‘I’d give you some to take home,’ said the boy regretfully. ‘But I did promise Ma.’

‘No, please,’ said Cissie quickly. ‘I wouldn’t want to take your honey. Maybe … maybe you’ll be this way again though. You could show me the tree. Then I could get some for myself.’

‘I will if I can,’ said Daniel. ‘But I can’t tell you when. It took me and Mabel half the day to ride here, and it’ll be the rest of the day to get back, and the roof’s still not secure on the house and there are fences to build …’

‘I understand,’ said Cissie softly.

‘Maybe you could come our way sometime? It’s a grand spot we’ve got by the river. The most beautiful place you’ll ever see!’

Cissie was silent for a moment. ‘I like the creek,’ she said finally. ‘It’s sort of mine. I don’t think I’ll ever see a place more beautiful than this.’

‘But this is a creek, not a river! A river’s much more grand.’

‘This is my place,’ said Cissie stubbornly. ‘I think it’s lovely.’

The boy looked round, as though seeing the cascades, the waterlilies, the gentle grass for the first time. ‘WeIl, it’s a beautiful place, too,’ he agreed. ‘Do you think you can come? One of the soldiers will bring you surely if you ask?’

‘I will if I can,’ said Cissie. She hesitated. ‘It’s nice to have someone to talk to. Someone who isn’t a soldier. I mean I love them all, but … do you have any sisters?’ she asked hopefully.

‘Three,’ said Daniel cheerfully. ‘All younger than me and all the worst nuisances you’ve seen in all your born days. Sarah’s the oldest. A bit younger than you, I think. Then there’s Bet and Laura, and two brothers, too, Benjamin and Charlie. Charlie’s eight years old and Ben is seven. And we’ve dogs—a pair of them—and a dozen hens and twenty-seven head of cattle.’

‘I’ve got a pet bear,’ said Cissie wistfully. ‘It eats gum leaves. But it sleeps most of the day. I’d like to see dogs.’

‘You
must
get them to bring you down!’ urged Daniel.

‘I will,’ said Cissie. ‘I will.’

The horse whinnied and they walked away. Harry waited, but neither came again.

White Ice had laid an egg and wanted to proclaim it to the world. Sky Maze leapt up onto the box beside her, prepared to lay on top of her if she wouldn’t move. White Ice squeaked and flapped down to the floor.

‘I wish I’d seen them,’ said Angie. It was Saturday morning. Angie had brought three pots of jam—her mum had been cooking up the last of the apricots—and her homework to fill in time while Harry was watching through the hole.

‘I wish you’d seen them,’ said Harry. It was the truth. Some time in the past week he’d stopped feeling that Angie was an interloper. Cissie was hers now, as well as his.

Angie peered down at the hole again, and shook her head. ‘Still nothing,’ she said. ‘You know, it’s funny. It’s almost as though nothing happens till we’re watching.’

‘Except we don’t know what’s happened that we haven’t seen,’ said Harry practically. ‘I mean all sorts of things might have happened. Cissie might have been bitten by an eel or Sergeant Wilkes might have been carried off by a wedge-tailed eagle.’ He grinned as Angie giggled. ‘Cissie must have been here lots of times when we haven’t seen her. It’s her favourite spot—her special place, she said.’

‘I know. It’s just … I just feel we haven’t really missed anything. But you’re right. Who knows what we haven’t seen?’ She bent down to the hole again. ‘Still nothing happening. Feel like a swim? I brought my bathers this time.’

‘Okay.’

‘I’ll meet you down there after I get changed.’

‘What, here!’ Harry was startled. ‘You can’t get changed in a chookshed!’

‘Why not? The chooks don’t mind. They’re used to me. I’ve spent enough time in here in the past week. Go on. I promise I won’t disturb your chooks.’

The creek was cold, as though it had searched for all the chill within the rocks and gathered it together in the swimming hole. You could sort of smell the rocks, thought Harry, as he floated on his back. Hot rocks on the top and cold soil and rocks below. Rocks smoothed by a thousand floods, pink rocks, white rocks, grey rocks, rocks and water, rocks and sun. Clouds spilled lazily out from behind the hills and floated slowly along the sky.