Mallawindy (6 page)

Quickly she brought the tools of his only trade to his side, and she watched enthralled as he dipped the old pen into a bottle of black ink, then in his perfect copperplate script he wrote beneath the record of Linda Alice's birth.

Out, out brief candle. Life's but a walking shadow,

a poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the stage,

then is heard no more.

He didn't stay in Mallawindy for the funeral. He didn't see Linda's tiny white coffin sink beneath the earth. He went away, but he went often to Narrawee, so they didn't worry about him.

Summer and Christmas went, and winter came again, and Bessy bought a new electric sewing machine. She gave her old treadle to Ellie, but it was Ann who learned to thread it, and to let down the hems of Ben's trousers. He worked as a hair dresser and salesman with Bert Norris, and each week he brought his money home for Ellie.

Winter left, and still Jack didn't come home. Was he dead? He was no longer at Narrawee. Ellie had written there for news of him, but May wrote, saying she had no idea of his whereabouts.

Such a quiet year, a busy year. It had slipped away too soon.

Missing or dead, Jack was not being missed.

Bob Johnson, the policeman, came to the house. He came to discuss Jack's disappearance, but sometimes stayed for a meal or a game of cards. Father Fogarty came for Sunday dinners. Bessy and Uncle Bill came over the river often, and Linda became a pale little memory. No photograph of her hung on the wall.

12th December 1973,

Dear Ellie,

Merry Christmas and a happy New Year to you and the children. We were delighted to hear all of your news.

The police constable sounds like a very able man. We have had some of his colleagues call here. As they say, the fact that Jack's bank accounts have not been touched since he left Mallawindy is certainly unusual, but we must continue to hope for the best.

Young Benjamin sounds like a great help, and Ann Elizabeth, almost thirteen already. Time is indeed flying by. I would dearly love to see her again one day. Sam and I have been touring these last months, but Christmas and the heat always bring me running home to Narrawee.

I have enclosed a small gift to you and your family. Our love and best wishes for the season.

May and Sam.

‘Jesus, if that's small, I wouldn't mind accepting the large gift,' Bessy Bishop commented, handling the cheque and wishing she had a rich relative.

Cured for forty-five years by the sun of Mallawindy, no-one, other than her mother and the registrar of births, deaths and marriages, would have named Bessy a full sister to Ellie. Bessy had trouble believing it herself lately. Ellie had about as much commonsense as a rabbit. She was still writing to Narrawee for news of Jack, when she should have been celebrating her freedom.

‘I think I'll buy a ute for Ben with that cheque,' Ellie said, reclaiming it.

‘You won't get much worth having for five hundred.'

‘We'll sell the poddies, and we've been saving nearly every penny he makes at the shop. We should be able to get something decent for a thousand.'

Ben had been driving Bessy's tractor since he was thirteen. Bob Johnson had taken him around the block in the cop car, then given him his licence. He drove Ben and Ellie to Daree, helped them choose a good-looking Holden ute, then he drove Ellie home behind it. A divorced man, closer to fifty than forty, Bob's interest in the Burtons wasn't purely professional.

‘Take it slow and careful, Ben, and you'll be jake. You got a good buy there. Old Holdens never die, they just rust away,' Bob laughed, waved a hand and drove away.

An hour later he was back, and driving anything bar slow and careful. He ran over one of Ellie's chooks. Bob had been eating a lot of dinners with Ellie and her children. He was a big man, slow moving, who in the last month had been tossing around the theory of maybe making the dinners a permanent arrangement. By the look of things today, he might have to go back to opening tins.

Ellie walked towards the squawking fowl. ‘You're on its wing, Bob. Run your wheel back a bit, can you?'

He did as he was bid. He watched her stoop, pick up the chook by its legs, and with the minimum of moveme
nt behead it with the axe.

‘Forget something?' she said, watching the headless chook attempting to fly.

‘Yeah,' he said. ‘I just had a call from Sydney. They've found him, love.'

‘They've found him? Jack?'

‘They've got him in hospital, in Sydney.'

‘Hospital? Is he all right?

Bob looked at Ellie; he scratched his head and wished he'd been a bit faster on his feet. She was wearing a floral dress this afternoon, its soft greens highlighting her hair, which was plaited and looped at the nape of her neck – a good-looking woman. ‘He wasn't alone, love. Him and his passenger had a head-on with a train at a crossing outside Sydney. The passenger died. Jack got flung clear.'

Ellie crossed herself as she stooped, picked up the fowl by its legs, and walked with it back to the house. Bob followed the blood drips to the kitchen door.

‘They'd both been drinking. The driver of the car behind almost ran over Jack. He's a bit knocked around, a few cuts and bruises, but he's getting out tomorrow.'

Ellie sighed as she looked out at her land. The sun was still shining, the sky was still blue, but the warmth had somehow left the day. She didn't want Jack back. Life had been good, better than good. Even Annie was starting to act more like a normal girl.

‘I don't know what I should do, Bob. Who was he with? Do they know?'

‘You'll find out soon enough, I s'pose, love. Old Rella. Dave Eva's wife. They've got a place twelve miles out the Daree Road. It was Dave's car they were driving.'

Ellie's head was down. She knew Rella. Everyone in town knew about Rella and Jack. Bob placed his hand on her shoulder.

‘She pissed off two weeks back, Dave said. Must have run into Jack in Sydney.'

‘I should be thanking God that he's alive, Bob, but ... but I just wanted to know that he
was
alive. I don't – '

‘I know, love. I know what you're saying. You're doing real good by yourself. I know exactly what you mean. W
e've been getting on real good too. Of course, you've got grounds for divorce. Deserted for twelve months. Proof that he was with another woman.' Ellie stepped back and Bob's hand fell to his side. By the look on her face, he might just as well have suggested murder as divorce.

Ellie studied her blood-stained shoe, wiped at it with a handkerchief. ‘Maybe he won't want to come back,' she said. ‘I mean ... of course, he probably won't want to come back here. He hates this town, Bob. Just because he had an accident, it doesn't mean – .' She turned to the stove where the kettle was boiling, spitting its water in skittish bubbles over the hotplates. ‘Have you got time to have a cup of tea with me?'

‘I'm choking for one, love. I didn't think you'd ever ask.'

Ann and Ben sat late with Ellie that night. It was a strange night, it seemed to be leaning on their shoulders, and all eyes kept straying to the yard where Ben's red ute was parked. Soon another car might pull in there. Soon their peace, their freedom to live, might be forgotten.

Ann's hands spoke quickly. Ben replied with his hands.

Ellie wanted to understand, but there was little she could pick up when these two really got going. Annie was as handy as Ben around the farm now. So different to what she was when Jack was around. Ellie was getting on so much better with her too. And the old sewing machine Bessy had given her – Annie was a magician on it, making her own dresses, and Bronwyn's. It was a rare talent that she had, and there were no two ways about it. This last year, Annie had fairly bloomed.

Each Friday afternoon, Mr Fletcher declared an hour of silence when hand signs only were used; he'd asked Ellie if she'd like to join the class for that hour, and she had thought about it. Half the children in town could talk to Annie now, but children learned things easily. She'd probably make a fool of herself. She was afraid
of showing her ignorance. Jack had always called her ignorant.

Bob didn't.

Annie wanted her to learn the signs. She said Mr Fletcher didn't know how to laugh, and that he was like one of the giant peppercorn trees growing in the schoolyard. Ugly and old and smelly, but covered with delicate pink seeds that it shook off for the wind to sweep up, only his seeds were answers, and Annie was the wind. A funny girl, Ellie thought, she'd come out with some odd things lately, like Jack used to. They were two of a kind and no two ways about it.

Ben's hands spoke. Annie laughed. It was a delightful sound, and so normal. She never used to laugh out loud when Jack was around. To Ellie, the sound brought back memories of before the girls were taken to Narrawee, before Liza disappeared. Annie had been a capable, independent little thing, and she'd had that beautiful laugh. It was nice to hear it again.

She watched their hands a moment. They were so fast, but Annie didn't only use her hands. She used her eyes, her face, her entire body to lend emphasis to unspoken words. Ellie loved to watch her. She wished now she'd gone along on Friday afternoons, or had tried to learn the signing when Johnny wanted her to.

Never enough time. That and her lack of confidence in her ability to learn. She was no brain, and she knew it. Jack had picked it up easily enough. ‘What's she saying, love?' she asked Ben.

‘She's making up mad poems. Happy ever after no more fairy-tale. Maybe last for ever, they put Dad in jail. Give life for man slaughter. Make life safe for daughter,' Ben translated, his smile wide.

‘Tell her she mustn't say things like that. My goodness. He could have been killed too.'

‘Devil look after own man, Bessy say,' the flying hands replied as the three-way conversation continued, Ben translating for his mother. Never one to waste his own words, he enjoyed being Annie's voice now that she had found much to say.

‘No more of that sort of talk,' Ellie said. ‘It's a funny old night though, isn't it. It's like time has stopped. We should be in bed, but I'm not a bit tired.'

‘Death of last good day. This night, very strong night. Clock tick-tock, slow. Can't wear away last good night. Tonight, heart thumping happy. Bang, bang, bang, bang. Night dodge from clock. “Yes. Yes,” say night. “Go away clock. Go away time. Go away. I stay one week here. Make happy last,” ' Annie signed.

‘Bob said your Dad would be out of hospital tomorrow.'

‘Do you think he'll come home, Mum?'

Again Ann's hands spoke. ‘He come home. On bus. I think we better make early Christmas. Give him leftover. We have all thing ready. Policeman give us dead chook. Fate. Got present. Got plum pudding ready. Tomorrow we make special Christmas come. Yes. Have party?' Her eyes watched her mother's as words poured from her fingers.

Ben translated. ‘We'll invite Bessy and Bill over. The bus doesn't get in until ten. We can have an early tea and a last game of cards, Mum.'

Ellie looked at her hands and the fine golden band sunk deep into the flesh of her ring finger. She twisted it, twisted it. It wouldn't come off, even if she wanted it off. It was wrong to even think such things. Jack found. Isn't that what she wanted? She shook her head. Found, but with Rella Eva. There had always been other women. Ellie knew it, whether she admitted to knowing or not. That was one thing about Jack that she never understood. Never once had she denied him his rights. Never. Not that she enjoyed it, but it was her duty, and one she hadn't missed this past year.

One wonderful year with no fear of pregnancy. She was thirty-eight, and didn't want any more babies. She looked at Annie. She's growing up, she thought, tall like Jack and Johnny, but no sign of breasts yet. Ellie was only thirteen when she matured. She'd need to talk to Annie about things – or get Bessy
to. Bessy was good with her, she'd taught Annie a lot about cutting and sewing in the first months of the machine. They got on like a house on fire.

Ann's hand tapped the table close to Ellie's hand.

‘What, love?'

‘Yes. We ask Bessy. Play card.' Head nodding, Ann pointed to the river, miming the shuffling of cards. She made her signs painfully slow, abbreviated, repeated, willing her mother to understand.

‘We will,' Ellie said. ‘We'll open our presents tomorrow and tell Bronwyn Santa came early, and we'll invite Bessy and Bill over for dinner.'

‘Thank you.' A nod. Fingers to the point of her chin, away.

Ellie copied the sign. ‘Thank you.' She'd have to make a point of trying harder.

Annie had never been a pretty baby, not like Liza, but she was certainly going to be a fine-looking woman. Clear olive complexion and not a freckle. Good features too, strong straight teeth, and those eyes – brick walls against strangers, but tonight her eyes were speaking. Her hair was a black cloud she tried to tame in braids that swung over her shoulders. Corkscrew curls sprung free at brow, and neck, and ear. Wilful hair. She didn't inherit her curls from Jack's family. Both he and Sam had dead straight hair. Her long limbs were theirs though. The sisters at the hospital had commented on her long limbs when she was a tiny baby.

Ellie closed her eyes now and allowed her mind to wander back to the night Annie was born. Dear little Johnny. He never knew when he was beaten, so he never was beaten. That night, it was like he'd placed his claim on Annie, and years later, after she came home from Narrawee refusing to speak, Johnny had loved her, persevered with her, and finally got through to her.

And Ellie had made him run. Packed his bag and made him run.

Dear Johnny. He didn't want to go. ‘
I can't leave her, Mum. Don't make me leave her, Mum.
'

The silence grew long. With her index fingers, she dried two tears before they could escape, then she reached for her daughter's plait, giving it a playful tug. ‘It's made of strong stuff, like you are, love. You've got a bit of me in you somewhere. I think we might both bend before we break.'

Ann smiled, and her eyes that never wept, glistened beneath the light. Ellie's own eyes grew moist again. Was a word, the touch of her hand so important to this girl? Guilt washed over her. She near drowned in guilt. Of course it was, but she'd never been able to get close to Annie. Never put her to the breast. Everything had happened too quickly after the fire. Jack disappeared for five months that time. She thought he'd gone for good, and she'd moved back home to her father's house.