Freedom's Land (24 page)

Gil came to stand beside him. ‘You get two each from this lot.’

‘We’ve got one cow already.’

‘You can keep that.’ He winked.

‘Are you sure?’

‘Yes.’

‘I can’t believe the dairy only wants the cream. There’ll be a lot of milk going to waste once we get the rest of our cows.’

‘Piglets fatten up well on it.’

‘Where would I get some of those?’

Gil tapped the side of his nose. ‘I know a man who has a litter for sale.’

Andrew grinned. How Gil knew so many people in the area constantly amazed him. They’d fallen lucky with their foreman. Without him, they’d have struggled even harder to make sense of the mess into which they’d been dumped. Special group, indeed! Sudden afterthought, more like.

Two hours later he and Norah started driving their new cows home, cows which Gil had helped him choose without letting the others see that he was doing it.

The three children walked with them, Jack whistling cheerfully as usual, Ned lost in his own thoughts and Janie grumbling about the rain.

‘Right,’ Andrew said when they got back. ‘We all need to be able to milk these cows. What if I was ill, or your mother was? How would you manage then? Anyway, it’s a job which children can do, milking is.’

Janie looked at him in horror. ‘I don’t like cows. I’m not doing it.’

‘You’ll do it,’ he promised grimly. ‘We all will.’

She looked pleadingly at her mother.

Norah shook her head. ‘We can’t have one person being lazy. We all have to help.’

Janie began to cry and when the two boys laughed at her, cried even harder.

Andrew’s voice cracked out like a whip. ‘Stop that, young lady!’

She stared at him in shock, then edged away from him and nearer to her mother. But Norah merely said, ‘Do as your father tells you.’

They took the cows out to the proper cowshed Andrew and the other groupies had built, and the presence of Blossom seemed to soothe the newcomers, because they were soon standing in a little group, tails swishing, jaws moving as they ate some of the hay he offered them.

‘I’ll get the water hot and scour out the buckets,’ Norah said. ‘Gil said the Dairy Company will be coming to collect the cream every morning from tomorrow onwards. Andrew, we’ll need somewhere to stand the cream can near the gate, somewhere off the ground.’

He smiled. ‘I know. I’ve got the rest of the day off, so I’ll cobble something together. The boys can help me.’

‘And Janie can help me separate the cream.’

When she’d got everything clean, Andrew settled down beside her and they started milking. Jack was soon wanting to have a try and proved to have a fair touch, almost as good as his father’s. Ned tried next and wasn’t nearly as good, but remained his usual cheerful self and kept trying.

Andrew ruffled his son’s hair. ‘You’ll soon learn. Your turn now, Janie.’

She moved forward a little, then shook her head.

‘No work, no tea,’ he said.

She moved closer to the cow, but it swished its tail at her and with a shriek, she fled across to the house and disappeared.

When the cream was separated, Norah set the can carefully on the shelf Andrew had built her in the dairy, eyeing it with satisfaction.

At teatime, she set four places only.

When she called everyone to table, she pulled Janie aside. ‘Your dad said no work, no tea. You can sit at the end of the table but you get no food.’ It upset her to see her daughter go without, but a stand had to be made.

Mute and hunched, Janie watched them all eat. With all the milk to spare, Norah gave the boys as much to drink as they wanted, already planning to buy some rice and make puddings with it regularly.

In the morning, she got her daughter up early, gave her a glass of milk and took her along to the cowshed. ‘We’ll do the milking together and you’ll see that there’s nothing to be afraid of.’

Janie was stiff at first, wincing each time the cow moved, but like the boys she was big for her age, taking after her mother, and old enough to help.

When Andrew and the boys joined them, no one commented on the fact that Janie was milking, so they had another lesson and between them, got the three cows finished quickly. After that Andrew carried the lidded cream cans to the entrance to their block and set them on the rough bench he’d made.

Within half an hour the dairy truck had collected the cream and the boys were fetching the empty cans back, claiming further glasses of the morning’s skim milk and chatting about what they and their father would be doing during the day.

Soon they fell into a routine, and by the end of the week, even Janie had lost her nervousness with the cows and was milking them when asked. She never managed to work as quickly as the two boys, but she did what she had to, and made considerably less mess when she helped clear up and wash out the pails and separator and cream cans.

But underneath, the child was unhappy. It showed in the droop of her mouth and the listless way she moved around. She was so unlike her old self it worried Norah a lot. Nothing they said or did seemed to make a difference to her.

They could only hope that time would work a gradual cure.

Gil watched his group carefully, noticing more than most people realised. The one he worried about most at the moment was Freddie Dawson. What was wrong with the man? He’d chosen to come here, it was rebuilding his wife’s health, why was he so surly? He was a misery to work with these days.

Something about Irene still drew Gil’s eyes to her whenever they were together. But she had eyes only for Freddie, didn’t notice the foreman’s interest in her.

Well, why should she? Gil thought. She wasn’t a loose woman like that Susan Grenville had been. No doubt the Dawsons would sort themselves out one way or the other, people usually did. And if he could help them, he would.

He bought the piglets and left word here and there that he was looking for more, before delivering the little creatures. Andrew had converted his original cow shelter into a pen for the two piglets. Freddie was working with a gang of men today, but had assured the foreman that he too had an enclosure ready for the piglets. But it was such a sorry excuse for an enclosure, one which even small piglets would soon escape from, that Gil nearly took the lively little creatures away again.

Then he looked at Irene and her unhappy expression stopped him speaking his mind.

‘It’s not good enough, is it?’ she said.

‘No. The piglets will get stronger and they’ll soon be able to push their way out of that.’

Tears filled her eyes and she bit her lip.

He couldn’t bear to see her upset. ‘I’ll help you sort it out, shall I?’

‘Why? You’ve got enough work of your own to keep you busy from dawn till dusk.’

‘I don’t mind. The cows look good. Milk coming nicely?’

‘Oh yes. We’ve plenty to spare for the pigs.’ Her smile was genuine this time. ‘I like milking the cows. They’re such gentle creatures.’

He’d chosen their two with care, for that very reason. ‘Good. And as for your pig pen, I can always spare a few minutes to help a neighbour.’

‘Thank you. I’ll do what I can to help you—’

‘In your condition, you need to be careful.’

‘Oh. You know, then? I wasn’t going to tell anyone yet.’

He smiled. ‘We all live so close together that if someone sneezes the rest hear it. Congratulations.’

But more tears welled up in her eyes and escaped, and she pressed one hand against her lips as if to hold them back. He couldn’t bear it and before he knew it, had his arms round her and she was sobbing against his chest.

‘Tell me,’ he said when she stopped weeping.

‘Freddie doesn’t want the baby.’

Gil knew that, thought less of the man for it, and didn’t know how to comfort her. ‘He’ll come round.’

‘He’s showing no signs of it.’ She fumbled in her apron pocket and found a handkerchief, blowing her nose and scrubbing at her eyes, then straightening her shoulders. ‘I’m sorry. I shouldn’t be burdening you with my troubles.’

‘A foreman’s here to help and you’d be surprised what people tell me.’

‘No.’ Her voice was soft and there was even a faint smile on her face. ‘I’d not be surprised. You’re equal to anything.’ She moved away from him.

His arms felt empty without her. He was annoyed at himself for feeling like that but he couldn’t help it. She was such an attractive woman, the prettiest in the group, but what attracted him more than that was the sort of woman she was, gentle but hard-working, ready to try anything, pleasant to others. He could see no fault in her.

Taking a deep breath, he said as cheerfully as he could manage, ‘Let’s see to this pig enclosure then, shall we? And don’t forget the manure will be really useful. You’ll need to shovel it out and make yourself a muck heap.’

Talking to fill in the silence that seemed fraught with her pain and emotion still, he set to work, remaking the fences and putting on timber cross pieces to stabilise the pig shelter. This was a simple structure, made mainly of corrugated iron that formed a wall and bent over in a quarter circle to form a roof high enough for pigs but not high enough for a man to stand under. It was built to shelter the animals against the prevailing winds, and at least Freddie had got that right. Well, more or less right.

By the time Gil had finished, the shelter was built to last a good few years and he and Irene were in a fair way to becoming friends, chatting comfortably as she passed him things.

Which was better than nothing, surely?

A couple of weeks later, on May 7th, there was an official proclamation and naming of the townsite.

‘It was already called Northcliffe,’ Gil said, shaking his head in amusement. ‘Trust government officials to be behind the times.’

But the group used this occasion as an excuse to have a Saturday gathering and as the weather co-operated, a good time was had by all.

Some of the men joined the new Returned Soldiers’ League, which had formed a chapter in Northcliffe, but not all of them bothered. They were too busy, working on their new farms.

Or in the case of Freddie, too disenchanted with everything to bother.

15

T
he huge tree on Pam and Ted’s block was in exactly the wrong place, right in the middle of the approach to the house if they were to have pastures of decent size on either side. Ted wanted the tree felled as soon as possible and when the rainy weather eased, Gil agreed to bring a team to have a go at it.

‘You’ll need to take care,’ he warned the men. ‘Trees like these are known as “widowmakers”. They can drop branches without much warning. So if I yell “Run!” then you move away from it as fast as you can. Right?’

Things started well and the men worked up a sweat, using their axes to chop out the base of the massive trunk. They were all learning to fell trees, a necessary skill here.

Gil mostly left them to it, because they had to learn to do this sort of thing without him. He kept a careful eye on their progress, however. He didn’t trust the bigger trees.

They were nearly there, ready for the tree to fall in the direction they’d planned when suddenly there was a loud crack and one of the big lower branches shuddered. As everyone knew, branches like this could weigh a ton, especially after a rainy period, so Gil yelled, ‘Run!’ at the top of his voice.

The men scattered, but as Andrew, who was directly underneath it, swung round, his foot turned over on a small stone and he fell headlong. There was another cracking noise right above his head and he tried to roll to one side to avoid the branch, but didn’t manage to do so completely. The earth shuddered as the heavy branch thumped down on to the ground and the fallen man vanished from sight beneath the thrashing foliage of its side branches.

‘Andrew! Are you all right?’ Gil shouted.

There was no answer.

‘Stay back!’ he ordered the others. ‘The rest of the tree’s going.’ He could have wept for his own helplessness, couldn’t see whether his friend was all right, but didn’t dare move forward.

The huge tree creaked and groaned, falling slowly down amid the noise of branches breaking as they hit the ground. They sounded like gunshots and for a moment Gil was reminded of the war.

The tree had fallen slightly to the side of where they’d planned, coming down very close to where Andrew must be lying.

Gil prayed as he’d never prayed before that his friend would be still alive, but not till the last sounds had died away did he move. Even then he kept looking anxiously at the other branches jutting upwards from the fallen forest giant. ‘Keep back. Let me check that it’s safe first.’

As he approached the foliage and branches under which his friend lay, he was able to see that Andrew had been protected from the rest of the tree by the huge branch. Taking great care of where he set his feet, Gil crept closer.

‘Is he all right?’ someone called.

‘Can’t see his face yet, but he’s not moving.’

Step by step Gil threaded his way through the mess of branches, some broken off, some still attached to the fallen tree. And at last he was able to push the final piece of foliage aside. Andrew’s chest was moving slightly. He closed his eyes for a second, groaning in sheer relief.
His friend was alive!

Praying that the other wasn’t too badly injured, Gil looked round at the bigger branches nearby, which were jutting up at all different angles. None of them seemed poised to fall in this direction, so he pushed through to kneel beside the still figure. Andrew was still unconscious. There was a bad bruise and grazing on his forehead and his left arm was trapped beneath a side branch, but fortunately not beneath the main piece that had fallen. The side branch was big enough to do serious damage to a man’s soft body, though.

He turned to call back. ‘He’s unconscious but trapped. Two of you come and help me get him out. The rest stay back.’