Lantana Lane (7 page)

“You can't miss it; just keep going till you come to a green ute.”

OUR CLIMATE
, as anyone in the neighbourhood will tell you, is ideal. There is the wet, of course, which makes life rather sodden for a while, and admittedly we get a cyclone now and then, but no one seriously disputes our claim that the weather is—normally—just about perfect.

We are perched high enough to escape extreme heat, even in midsummer, and as for our winters, they are widely and justly celebrated. By day an ardent sun pours down its ultra-violet rays upon us, and even when darkness falls, the air is not cold, but only pleasantly nippy. You never saw such stars as we have burning over us in the cloudless night sky, nor such swarms of moths as flit about desiring them. Our dews are lavish; they drench the grass, spangle the cobwebs, trickle down the pineapple leaves, and conspire with the early sunshine to set the whole landscape glittering like a jeweller's window. As for moonlight, we would not wish to lay ourselves open to a charge of being ignorant and unscientific, but it is a fact that there seems to be much more of it here than elsewhere, and it has a dazzling, refulgent, lustrous, radiant and brilliantly luminiferous whiteness which we venture to say is unique.

Of course there was the ten-months drought a few years ago; but that was quite abnormal. Our average annual rainfall is eighty inches, and we simply do not have droughts. Nor do we have bushfires. The scrub just won't burn, and anyone who has tried to get rid of lantana by putting a match to it, has learned the meaning of frustration—so it was entirely owing to the abnormal conditions that we spent most of that December racing from one farm to another, brushing breaks, and burning back as the flames came romping up the gullies towards our pineapples.

As for frosts, it is only very rarely that we see a light, silvery powder on the ground in some low-lying spot, and the time when four farms lost about twelve acres of pines between them must be regarded as the exception that proves the rule. We do cop the winds a bit, particularly the westerlies, and the north-westerlies, and the easterlies come in from the sea pretty fiercely, and the southerlies are sometimes bad, too. But it is well known—having been established as part of the district's folk-lore since old Mrs. Hawkins was a girl—that no wind lasts more than three days; even when one does go on for three weeks, you will notice that there is nearly always a sort of lull after the third day. Cyclones just have to be accepted; at least we never get them in the winter, though there was that July a few years ago when we had three—but that was quite abnormal, too.

Naturally one expects the wet to be wet, but when we have got it over, the rest of our eighty inches comes down as needed, at well-spaced intervals. So we were rather shocked one year when, instead of taking itself off at the appointed time, the wet settled down with us. Aunt Isabelle—blandly ignoring the reassuring noises made by politicians—always referred to it as
la pluie atomique
; but be that as it may, there was hardly a break in the rain from February to September. This was a grievous blow not only to our pockets but to our local patriotism, for we are proud of our climate. Hordes of shivering fugitives from the south are only too glad to flee to it every winter, and we, for our part, are very willing to share it with the poor things. But we cannot say that they showed a proper spirit during that trying time. It hurt our feelings to hear them making satirical remarks about The Sunshine State, for anyone should know that you cannot judge a climate by a spell of crazy weather.

So we repeat that—making due allowance for the kindly rains which fill our tanks and reanimate our crops—we live perpetually under a benignant sky. Each day, unfolding from its dew-sparkling sunrise, proceeds through a golden morning to a mellow afternoon, and a crisp, star-spangled night; any meteorological aberrations which, from time to time, disturb this felicitous routine are, we assure you, quite abnormal.

A
T SCHOOL
, when learning the art of literary composition, we were bidden first to introduce our subject, then to develop it, and finally to produce a conclusion; this formula we shall now adopt. First we shall introduce Gwinny; then we shall introduce meat-day; then we shall examine the two in combination, and by that time, we trust, a conclusion will have occurred to us.

Gwinny Bell was born in this district, but she was twenty when she came to live in the Lane. She had then been married to Alf for two years, and their eldest child had already won a Blue Ribbon at a Baby Show. The brothers and sisters who followed him have since won others—so many that Gwinny has made them into a cushion cover. But this is by no means the only family trophy. Nowadays Gwinny contents herself with awards for her jams and bottled fruits, but before her marriage she won many laurels at swimming, tennis and basketball. Alf, in his younger days, was a champion weight-lifter and shot-putter, and he still tosses crates of pineapples around as if they were matchboxes. The two elder boys bid fair to follow in his footsteps, and the elder girl has collected two Certificates of Merit for physical culture. As for the twins (who are known, naturally, as Ding and Dong) they have had the three-legged race at the school sports all sewn up for several years now, and their younger sister only recently carried off several prizes in the girls' under-ten events.

All this athletic prowess seems quite a matter of course when you consider Alf and Gwinny. Alf stands six feet two in his bare feet, and weighs seventeen stone; we doubt, however whether he would have qualified, even in his youth, as Mr. Universe, for his physique, though powerful, is less reminiscent of the Greek god than of the gorilla. In strength and size Gwinny is a fit mate for him, but her Amazonian proportions are beyond criticism. She has abundant, fair hair, not yet touched by grey, and worn in thick plaits around her head, bright blue eyes in a fresh and comely face, and she carries herself like an Empress. In a way she looks too young to be the mother of two grown-up sons and, a nineteen-year-old daughter, to say nothing of solid, twin schoolboys, and a bouncing schoolgirl. But when you see them all together—as you do every Sunday morning, when they assemble, brushed and scrubbed, for Church—it is clear that only Gwinny could have mothered such a family.

And when you see her working down in the pines, or pegging out her vast quantity of vast garments on the line, or striding along the Lane to visit one of the neighbours, you seem to hear Wagnerian music, and lo!—the scene dissolves. Fade out the serviceable working clothes, or the best frock of gay, floral rayon; fade out the felt slippers, or the patent leather shoes; fade out the battered, week-day hat, or the Sunday straw with its purple flowers, and its little pink veil. Fade in accomplished draperies which reveal the limbs they should be covering, and shining breastplates which proclaim the curves they guard; fade in gold sandals laced about the ankles; fade in a horned helmet over blond, wind-driven hair. Fade out the timber cottage sitting on high stumps, crowned with corrugated iron, and surrounded by pineapples; fade in an abode of gods, resting on legend, crowned by clouds, and surrounded by enchanted air. Fade out, Lantana Lane . . . and fade in, Asgard I

Or, to put it more briefly, fade out Gwinny, and fade in Brunny.

Gwinny was, of course, called after the erring and somewhat shrewish consort of King Arthur, whom she in no way resembles. You might think that, having carried this name through life, she would have had enough of Malory (or, more probably, Tennyson), but on the contrary, each successive christening in her family has demonstrated afresh her addiction to the Arthurian romance. For this, however, neither Malory nor Tennyson may be held directly accountable. The story, as we have it from Gwinny's own lips, is as follows:

Her parents were devout folk who sent their children to Sunday School, where the eldest girl was so impeccably regular in her attendance that she was rewarded with a handsome and lavishly illustrated book entitled
Tales of the Round Table.
Introduced into the house just before Gwinny (the youngest) was born, this work had a profound effect upon her mother, who determined to name her new child Guinevere if it were a girl, and Arthur if it were a boy. It turned out to be Gwinny, and Gwinny was reared upon jousts, chivalry, Excalibur and the Holy Grail; the grosser aspects of life at the Court of Camelot appear to have been, very properly, omitted from a Sunday School prize.

Gwinny's mother so frequently lamented the fact that she had discovered the entrancing land of Lyonesse too late to bestow the names of its knights and ladies upon all her children, that Gwinny, when the time came, resolved to console and delight her with grandchildren who should enjoy this advantage—and has faithfully carried out her plan. The eldest boy is Tristy, the second is Gaily, and the elder girl is EElaine. Then come the twins. Gwinny says she did think of Balin and Balan, of course, but she felt they were a bit
too
unusual, so she decided upon Gareth and Lancelot—names which, as she pointed out, would have shortened nicely to Garry and Lance, only someone started this Ding and Dong business. (Someone also started calling Alf King Kong, but since this might have hurt his feelings if it came to his ears, it was dropped.) There is general agreement that the youngest child got off easily with Lynette.

We know what you are thinking; Gwinny appears to have missed something. What, you ask, no Arthur? . . .

No; no Arthur. On this point Gwinny is dumb—but Rumour is not. And what Rumour says is that when Alf was courting Gwinny, he had a very active and pertinacious rival—a massive young footballer, whose name was Arthur Bilpin—and one evening, at a Church social, these two fell out. Students of the classics will find the incident reminiscent of that great encounter between Hector and Achilles, for it seems that young Bilpin's nerve temporarily failed, and Alf pursued him three times round the parish hall before they came to grips. Then he turned at bay; for a few sensational moments it was Rafferty's rules, and no holds barred, but at last a haymaker from Alf stretched his antagonist on the grass. What Gwinny thought about this scandalous affair we cannot say, but she married Alf. Alf himself was overcome by shame and remorse, for he knew it was not right to indulge in mayhem at a Church function. The fact remains that in his family there is, conspicuously, no Arthur.

But it is not difficult to guess what Gwinny has called their farm. Hereabouts the farms are rarely named, though some people feel that this is a pity, and always mean to set an example with a board on the gate; but somehow they never do, and the farms continued to be known as Smiths', Browns', Joneses, and Robinsons'. Often they do have what we might call private names, but these are strictly unofficial, and the Postmaster-General's Department never hears of them. Ken Mulliner's house, for example, is surrounded by nut trees, so he calls it Nuttery Hut, and Jeff Jenkins, who has a poultry farm the other side of Dillillibill, naturally capped this with Chookery Nook. Dick Arnold, with stately simplicity, calls his place The Pines, and the Griffiths, whose house is in a pretty advanced state of disintegration, always refer to theirs as Tobacco Road. But although Gwinny went to a lot of trouble painting
CAMELOT
on her gate in red letters, beautifully edged with gold, the name was never generally adopted. This may have been due to some slightly embarrassed feeling of delicacy on the part of the neighbours, because the Bells' is a picket gate, and when Gwinny painted the name, she had to put the letters on separate pickets, which was quite all right until the last two fell off, and then it looked rather silly. However, by that time the whole gate was pretty decrepit, and a year or so later Alf built a new one; so far Gwinny has not put the name on it, and we all just call the place Bells'.

Gwinny is really something of a prodigy. Besides all her other skills and attributes, she can attend to an almost unlimited number of things simultaneously, and she has a memory which would put any elephant to shame.

Let us join her for a few moments at tennis—not when she is playing (though she does play, of course, and is no mean performer), but when she is sitting out. Sue, Marge, Myra and Biddy are having a ladies' doubles, and Gwinny is seated (very upright) on the bench outside the wire, conversing with Amy about the forthcoming Church Fair, watching all that goes on, and knitting a jumper with an extremely complicated pattern for EElaine. We cannot presume to say, guess, or even tentatively imagine just how her remarkable brain works, but if we were able to make a recording not only of her speech, but of her concurrent thoughts, it would probably run something like this:

“Yes, I said I'd go to the cake stall with Aunt Isabelle (purl 5, knit 2) but we really need a third (I must get home in time to press Gally's trousers for to-night), and Alice can't help this year of course (knit 2, slip I, pass the slipped stitch over), so I asked Edith, Tony, you'd better call the dogs away from the tea things (repeat this row three times), and she said she could come in the morning, it's thirty-love, Marge, that ball just got the line, but she has a dentist's appointment in the afternoon, look, love, Keithie's playing with a cow-pat (that's two rows), Myra, the jeep just went down the Lane, so Aub should be here soon, pick up that cardigan, Lynette, it's getting trodden on, so I'll try to find someone else (three rows). Hi, Sue, it's to the other side, your ad. Ken, how about lighting the fire for tea, no, the games are five-four, Biddy, you served first (decrease once at the end of the next and every alternate row fifteen times), but it's a bit hard, because everyone's doing something else (that cow in the Lane looks like Griffiths' Blessing), you'll find the tea in the biscuit tin, Henry (purl 5, knit 2 together, make I, wool forward knit 1, slip 1, purl 5, knit 2 together, turn), that was a let, Marge, I heard it touch, children, come away from the tank, but I expect we'll manage if we have to, yes, I brought some milk, Dick, it's on the bench in the shed, Myra, you're serving from the wrong side, yes you are, it's thirty all (knit 2, slip 1, wool round needle knit 1, purl 3, knit 1, repeat three times), it just means I can't leave the stall, see, because Aunt Isabelle gets the change mixed, Ken, don't let the children go near the fire. (I hope Tristy remembers to pump some water for the washing. . . .) “

Gwinny can keep this sort of thing up indefinitely, and think nothing of it. She is never confused, she never forgets anything, and nothing escapes her notice. She is the only person in the Lane who is really equal to meat-day.

Except for Herbie Bassett and Joe Hardy, we all have calendars, with certain days marked, hanging beside our telephones. Gwinny rarely refers to hers, but the rest of us are always rushing to them in a panic, thinking : “
Is
it our day? . . .” And relaxing with gasps of relief. No, thank goodness, it isn't!

But even our calendars sometimes fail us. Myra Dawson once turned over two leaves by mistake, and marked July instead of June, and Heather Arnold had a dreadful time for a while, because Dick insisted on regarding calendars as spills for lighting his pipe. When this kind of contretemps occurs, someone's 'phone rings, and a voice says apologetically: “Look, I'm awfully sorry to bother you, but
could
you tell me if it's our meat-day?”

Now and then, too, things are thrown into fearful confusion because somebody has to go down to the city on his meat-day, or is invited to a wedding, or succumbs to 'flu, or is in some other way unavoidably prevented from fulfilling his duty. But Gwinny can always rattle off an accurate account of even the most complicated adjustments.

“No, it
was
Dawsons' day on Tuesday, but they changed with Kennedy's and then Kennedys found they couldn't go either, so they rang Arnolds, and Dick went, so that makes this Friday Dawsons' day, and next Tuesday will be Kennedys', and the Friday after that should by rights be ours, but we have to go and see Alf's sister in hospital, so we've changed with Ken Mulliner, and we'll take the next Tuesday, and then we'll be back at the Griffiths, and we can go on by the calendar unless Sue and Henry have visitors for lunch that day, and if they do they'll have to swop with Hawkins, and do the following Friday instead, and that'll get us back to the Achesons.”

Time was when the butcher brought our meat to our doors twice a week. But nothing can stay the onward march of progress—which, indeed, gathers impetus so rapidly that it begins to remind us of an incident which once occurred in Gadara. It is difficult to work and stampede simultaneously; consequently the three sections of the community which always keep on working whatever happens (namely, farmers, artists and housewives), are liable to get trampled on. So now the meat is brought from Rothwell, dumped on the verandah of the store at Dillillibill, and after that it's up to us. We try to be philosophical about this little alteration in our domestic arrangements, and hope that it means someone is better off somewhere.