A Waltz for Matilda (36 page)

Her anger flared again. She didn’t belong to anyone. If Tommy wanted her like … like that, he’d have to court her. Tommy had never even said that she looked pretty! Going on about her skinny arms!

She bashed at the weeds with her hoe till another thought struck her.

Was he too ashamed of his scars ever to touch her? Was he afraid that she — that any woman — might be repulsed?

But that was silly. The scars had mostly faded, and anyway, when you looked at Tommy you saw his intelligence, his kindness, not his scars.

It had never occurred to her either that he stayed in Gibber’s Creek only for her. Had he really given up so much to stay in her life? She had assumed that because it suited him so well to come here after his accident, he was happy to remain here forever. He’d never mentioned anything about wanting to go back to the city.

Ridiculous to think she needed him to watch over her. She was seventeen! Yelling at her just because she was going to one dance with another man …

She stared down the track again, willing him to appear between the cliffs. At times like this she longed for another human voice. It had been weeks since she had seen Auntie Love.

She looked at her hands, their calluses and ingrained dirt. She needed some young man to tell her she was beautiful.

And Tommy …

Tommy was her friend. It was impossible to imagine a life without him. She’d have followed to make up after the quarrel if she hadn’t been so upset by that song. And when he came to apologise, she’d say …

What?

She took a breath, and picked up her hoe. She’d work out what she would say when he turned up.

JUNE 1899

He arrived just as she was carrying the milk bucket up to the house. I need a dog to warn me, she thought, as she saw his horse tied to her verandah post, saw him sitting comfortably on Auntie Love’s chair.

‘James!’

He stood up, and lifted his hat. ‘I hope you don’t mind my making myself at home.’

‘No, of course not.’ She flushed, aware that her trousers were stained, her boots cracked and the ribbons on one of her plaits untied. She probably had dirt on her face again too.

‘I knocked, but no one answered. Dad said you have a native housekeeper.’

She lugged the bucket up the steps. He took it from her automatically. ‘Auntie Love isn’t a housekeeper. She’s a — a friend.’ She met his eyes in challenge. ‘I don’t suppose you’d ever have a native as a friend.’

‘Of course I do. Old Napoleon used to be like an uncle to me.’

‘Napoleon?’

‘I think Dad gave him his name. Napoleon still draws his rations, too, even if he hasn’t done a day’s work for ten years.’ James smiled in memory. ‘He showed me and Bertram how to make a bark canoe down on the river. Bertram kept overbalancing in it. Looked like a drowned rat.’

‘But you still went shooting natives?’

He had known she was going to ask this too. ‘I protect what is mine.’

She could see when he realised it was the wrong answer. And what did Napoleon think? she thought. Had James ever even wondered? James held up the metal milk pail. ‘Should I put this inside?’

‘Please. On the edge of the stove. I’ll scoop off the cream tonight.’

She watched him look around the house. It had changed since he had seen it last, a few days after the fire. There was glass in the windows now, and curtains, and a rug by the horsehair sofa. She had cushions, and two of her sketches roughly framed on the walls, as well as a painting Miss Thrush had given her two Christmases ago, the china in her dresser, and a vase of dried everlastings on the table. It was comfortable, but a far cry from Drinkwater.

To her surprise, though, he ran his fingers over one of the chairs. ‘Someone who knew wood made this.’

‘My father.’

He nodded. ‘He was the best manager Dad ever had.’

‘My father managed Drinkwater?’

‘Gave it up to work this place when I was, oh, ten maybe. You didn’t know?’

She shook her head. ‘I thought he was a shearer.’
Did your father tell you the whole truth?
Mr Drinkwater had asked. But
their time together had been too short. She hadn’t realised that the Drinkwater boys might have known him.

He looked at her with sudden sympathy. ‘Your father went back to shearing when the drought grew bad.’

‘What was he like?’

‘Clever. Proud.’ He grinned. ‘Wouldn’t call me or Bertram “Master” like the other men. Bertram threw a tantrum but your dad told him to grow up. Only stockman I knew who was always reading. Argued with Dad all the time too. Not just about the union. Wanted him to improve the stock, things like that. Good thing too. Dad needs a kick up the … er, a good argument. He gets stuck in his ways. Look, I wondered if you’d like to come for a ride.’

‘With you?’

‘No, I’ll stay and watch the cream rise. Of course with me.’

It had been weeks since she had simply taken a day off, her and the horse and the land. Suddenly, somehow, James was no longer threatening.

‘Yes,’ she said.

She changed into the divided skirt his aunt had given her, brushed her hair and put it up properly, secured her best straw hat over the top. She liked it that he went out onto the verandah when she changed, so as not even to hear the intimate rustlings.

He stood up as she came out. ‘Beautiful.’

‘Thank you.’ I could get used to compliments, she thought. Once they were mounted she let his horse lead the way, out of the valley and past the cliffs, then out onto the back of
Drinkwater land, far from the river. Even though it was close she had never been here.

The trees hadn’t been ringbarked; nor had the sheep grazed here for years — it was too far from water. She looked up into the branches, half expecting to see koalas. But of course this land too would have been shot over, even if it looked untouched.

Is this where Auntie Love comes? she wondered suddenly. Was this why she had never seen her, not even her bare footprints, when she was rounding up the sheep?

What would James do if they came upon the old woman now?

Stupid to be worried, she told herself, her eyes fixed nonetheless on the rifle by his saddle. All stockmen carried rifles, even Mr Sampson. But she found herself calling: ‘James?’

He reined in, and cantered back to her. ‘Like a break? There’s fruitcake in the saddlebag. Mrs Murphy makes a good one. A flask of tea too.’

‘Cake! You were so sure I’d come with you?’

‘No such thing. The cake was consolation if you didn’t.’

They sat under the thin shade of one of the white-trunked trees. He was right. The cake was good. He held out another piece to her. She took it, then flushed when she saw him look at her hands.

‘Grubby nails,’ she said. ‘And calluses.’

He looked at her steadily. ‘I love your hands. Most women I meet have hands that have never done anything. Yours have made a farm.’

Matilda’s blush grew hotter. She hunted for another subject. ‘Look — there’s a beehive over there.’

‘Where?’

‘In that tree. You can see them going in and out.’

‘You are extraordinary. Did you know that?’

She bit into the cake, grateful he didn’t expect a reply. Mrs Murphy must have added dates to make it so dark, she thought. There were lumps of crystallised pineapple, too, and big crystallised cherries.

‘Gosh, it’s good to be home.’ James stretched, and put his hands behind his head. He looks beautiful too, thought Matilda. Only women were supposed to be beautiful, but that was exactly what James was.

‘This
is
home, you know. I wondered when I went to England if I’d find it so much more lovely than here. Was almost afraid I would. Everyone refers to England as home. But it wasn’t. Too —’ He hunted for the word. ‘Too water-soft. You can’t see the bones of the land, like here.’

It could almost have been her father talking. And she felt that James was right. In a way they did know each other. Moura might be a postage stamp compared to the vastness of Drinkwater, but she and James watched the same clouds, walked on the same soil.

She found he was grinning at her again. ‘Well, do I pass?’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Have I proved reliable enough to take you to Friday’s dance?’

She nodded slowly. ‘Yes. I think you have.’

‘Good.’ He sounded as if it hadn’t really been in doubt. ‘It’s Dad’s birthday on Saturday. Will you come to lunch too? Dad’s always talking about you,’ he added. ‘I think every letter had something about the incredible Miss O’Halloran.’

‘He was probably swearing at me.’

‘Only sometimes. Did you really tell him to pay the native stockmen wages?’

‘Of course.’

‘Did he yell at you?’

‘No. He said that if he did, their money would go to the Native Protectorate’s Trust Fund. They’d never get a penny.’

‘You’ve been company for him. I’m grateful. He must have been lonely with Bertram and me away.’

About as lonely as a king in his empire, she thought, but didn’t say. She stood and brushed the crumbs off her skirt. ‘I’d love to come to lunch.’

‘Good. What’s your favourite pudding?’

‘What? Oh, apple pie.’

‘I’ll ask Mrs Murphy to make one.’

He cupped his hands to help her up onto Timber. She didn’t need it, but liked it nonetheless. At once he stared, then pointed through the trees. ‘Crikey … look at that.’

She followed his gaze, then drew in her breath. For a second she thought it was an earthquake, the land quivering, then she saw that the movement was birds, giant birds, emus, their brown and black flickering through the trees.

There must be hundreds of them, she thought. She had never seen so many emus here before. Now they flooded across the landscape. What had brought them here?

‘Drought.’ He said the word as she thought it. ‘It’s gone on so long the whole world seems to be drying up. They’re heading for the river.’

The river was Drinkwater land. ‘What will you do?’ The enormous birds didn’t even glance at them and the horses, intent, desperate, pounding their great feet toward the scent of water.

‘Get rid of them. We can spare them the water. Can’t spare the feed.’

She shivered. He meant he’d shoot them — or enough to scare the others away. He was right. If she owned Drinkwater she’d be
ordering Mr Sampson to do the same; she would be out helping him and the boys.

Impossible to let sheep starve so that emus could feed. Shiftless to let your children starve when you could be trapping koalas for their fur.

But she was thoughtful as they rode back to Moura.

The Town Hall floor vibrated with the dancers’ feet. Up above the dangling lanterns jiggled too, making the shadows leap and sway.

Just three fiddles, the bows swooping back and forth like the players were using a cross-cut saw, and an old piano, slightly out of tune, but it was the beat that mattered. The rhythm was caught by a hundred dancers: old men with snow-white whiskers; young women with shining frocks; older women in high-buttoned black, their skin leathery from years of sun and work. And there were children of all ages, the girls in much-mended skirts but carefully curled hair, dancing with girls in what might have been their grandma’s best, cut down to almost fit them, and the boys with bare feet or in their father’s boots looking embarrassed from the sidelines.