by Jude Thomas
‘Gracious, a pound for a child’s boots?’ Evie had suspected these shoes might be more than the eight shillings she’d planned on spending – but twenty shillings?
‘These ones are imported, madam, and there is a shilling tax on them.’
‘A shilling extra for tax! Oh, I beg your pardon, Mr Walsh, but we must change – ’
‘Yes, two years ago they would have only been nineteen shillings,’ he says with regret.
‘Nineteen shillings!’ repeats Evie, feeling faint.
Mr Damian is enamoured, and keen to be as kind as possible. ‘Bless me, I’m forgetting! We’re moving further up the Cutting next week, madam, and we are giving a discount on certain goods at the minute. So these boots are only fourteen shillings and sixpence.
Evie looks into her purse and decides that she shall pay this amount for the privilege of knowing she has chosen well.
The proprietor assesses her hesitation and makes another assumption, then says, ‘But just one moment, madam, I think my brother Mr Joseph is calling me.’
He steps nimbly out to the stockroom and returns beaming. ‘So glad I am that I heard my brother call out! He reminded me that these little beauties are the last ones, and so they are to be sold for ten shillings and six pence. A marvellous purchase!’
Evie completes the sale with a smile of gratitude that sends Mr Damian Walsh’s pulse racing. Billie gazes at the white kid slippers again, but is satisfied with her high-buttoned boots. She will not call the colour oxblood and searches for a more suitable name. ‘Mother Meg’s sideboard – this is most like it,’ she declares. The piece of furniture that has been in Meg’s family for generations and was shipped out from Home a few years back is a deep, rich mahogany, polished with love and gleaming. Billie’s new boots are therefore mahogany.
‘They’re cracker, my love,’ states Alf.
‘Mahogany boots. Cracker and marvellous,’ she agrees.
Chapter Twelve
Alf, Evie and Billie board a barge bound for Port Chalmers. It will take only thirty minutes to the end of Otago Harbour, and they will be transported to a world of ships arriving and departing. They are on their way to welcome Alf’s two brothers and their families who have decided, like himself many years ago, to strike out for a new land. Alf has decided that the journey by bullock and cart around the hillside is far too torturous, and that it is worth the sum of half a penny each way to take the lighter from Dunedin to the port. They shall then return in style on the paddle steamer Golden Age.
The southern peninsula protects Dunedin town from the ocean, and trees grow from the summit of the hills to the very water’s edge, forming a continuous panorama of wild beauty. They chug past the hamlets around Portobello on the southern coast and St Leonards on the northern, marvelling at the abundant birdlife darting about and the marine mammals splayed casually on the rocks, and keeping a lookout for dolphins. It was Billie’s fifth birthday yesterday, and as usual her mind is racing.
‘Stop fidgeting, Billie!’ Evie is somewhat cross because her best boots pinch across the toes. ‘If you fall overboard then there you’ll be, in the water and me unable to swim to your rescue.’
Billie’s eyes enlarge with the thought of the deep indigo sea engulfing her, before she laughs. ‘Mama, you are ever so funny! You know I shall not fall in, and even if I should, Alf will toss me a rope.’ Such is her confidence from having been both cosseted and let go her own way – not for her the thought of tumbling over like a baby.
Alf and Evie exchange looks and then make silent prayers, as do many plying this journey when passing Sawyer’s Bay. Not three months before, Pride of the Yarra carrying fifty passengers for Dunedin had been run down by the paddle boat Favorite steaming outwards to Port Chalmers, catching her from the bow and staving her plates almost to the starboard side. She went down with thirteen souls lost in the cold, choking water. The entire province still seems to be talking about how it could possibly have happened on an early evening with unremarkable weather or light.
Port Chalmers is calamitous, with twenty-seven vessels in port and nine more to be towed up from the Heads this day, including the Crimea on which Alf’s family have made their passage. Following one day behind is the splendid, new City of Dunedin carrying three hundred souls and Alf’s family were keen to make their passage on her maiden voyage. But she sailed from Glasgow over three hundred miles north of London and sense won out over sensibility. So the Crimea it was to be, and after eighty-six days at sea they will be amongst the hundred passengers soon arriving at their destination.
The moody, ever-changing current of the outer harbour slaps at the jetties. Sailing ships with their massive sails furled, brigs, barques, schooners, paddle steamers, clippers – it is busier than they could have imagined, even though they are aware that over three hundred vessels have entered the harbour so far this year. Some carry dry goods, building supplies, cattle and sheep. Some bring full contingents of emigrants. Yet other ships bring thousands upon thousands of prospectors bound for the gold fields of Central Otago.
Buildings along the wharf sport bunting and decorations from the recent annual regatta; public demonstrations of rejoicing are a regular thing at Port Chalmers town. The docks and streets are seething with disembarking families, unsteady from three months at sea. Relatives and friends are cheering and welcoming. Sailors are carousing while deserters and feckless gold seekers are taking to the hills. Pedlars, pimps, prostitutes, local citizens and merchants go about their daily toil. Hotels pump out beer and measures of whisky and the more genteel establishments also offer wine and cake. ‘Money runs like water in Port Chalmers!’ mimic the diggers, and their own uproarious antics flow likewise.
‘Keep close, Billie. It is very crowded and I don’t want to lose you while we wait. I believe we have nearly an hour before they will disembark, and then we shall all go to an hotel for a pot of tea and cake.’
Although she is used to people coming and going, Billie has never seen so many at one time, even in Dunedin town.
There are people who look like themselves: colonials. Sturdy children looking healthy against the new chums’ white, pinched faces. Perhaps it is the sun that shows them up in a different light or perhaps it is the skin of the people who look sun-kissed. Mama says to be sun-kissed is acceptable but to be sun-browned is not, and in summer she must wear her bonnet. But today is the first day of spring, still very crisp, and the sun is weak and not in a kissing humour.
But to those disembarking after four months at sea, all is light and bright. There are families looking pale and unbalanced. There are men with crumpled shirts and trousers, wide hats, and swags on their back.
There are elegant gentlemen and stylish ladies promenading or sitting in groups, children breaking away to play, and others moving briskly about and blowing into their hands. Steam is coming from Billie’s mouth too, and she catches it and releases its spent form into the salt air.
She is entranced with other ladies, the kind she does not see in Maclaggan Street; Mother says that fine ladies live up The Rise. Although Mother’s dresses are beautiful, with some lace or satin or feathers when she is going out, but some of these ladies’ costumes are very fine indeed, even though some of their shoes are ridiculous for the mud and she sees more than one catch their little heels between the dock boards. Billie sees a lot of shoes, and counts up to fifty, then counts up to fifty again. ‘Now I shall look at the skirts,’ she tells herself, and watches all styles of practical and fine getups, some with their rear projections dipping onto the boards. Black, grey, mauve, olive, ecru, plus stronger flashes of colour in capes, shawls, bonnets and gloves. From watching her mother’s inventive cutting and sewing, and from collecting the scraps, Billie has come to know the difference between moiré, bombazine, tartan, tweed and velvet. And then there are bustles, pleats, swags, biases and braids that are fashionable daytime wear for ladies. She is not tall enough to calculate the array of mantles and paletots, gloves and hats, but at five years o
ld Billie knows what’s what about proper attire, and pats her own jacket and tam o’shanter.
In doing so, her eyes lift upwards, beyond the realm of skirts. People still mill about, the sky is brightly pale, but Mother is not there.
‘Mama? Mama? Where are you? Alf, where have you gone?’
Billie stands tall now: the world is swirling around her; she is giddy from jumping up and from a sudden fright. ‘Mama, where are you, naughty Mama!’ and Billie feels annoyed.
But it is only momentary and she sees what she must do. Find Mama. And singing always helps, says Mama, so Billie starts up quietly, off key as usual:
Speed, bonnie boat, like a bird on the wing,
Onward! The sailors cry;
Carry the lad that’s born to be king
Over the sea to Skye.
Loud the winds howl, loud the winds roar,
Thunderclaps rend the air –
She usually shouts that second evocative stanza, but now it starts to unsettle her. She will not sing, just hum. Billie starts along the wharf, looking this way and that. Past ships with their disembarking passengers and their embracing relatives. Past the pedlars and painted ladies, past the profusion of ship chandlers, sailmakers and provedors, until she arrives at an open space. Her world once again whirls about her head and she is almost overcome by the crowds that pour to and from the pentagon of roads. Again she cries in bewilderment, ‘Mama! Mama!’
When the feeling subsides she decides that Mama must have gone on towards the place where a pot of tea and possibly cake will be waiting, and she makes her way across to the Custom House and the National Bank, to the town’s main sloped road. George Street is lined with a variety of grocers and merchants, hotels and saloons, and tearooms, all busy with trade. The brisk spring afternoon does not daunt people from sitting at outside tables, taking tea and cake, ale and stronger stuff.
At each interval Billie stops and asks, politely as she has been taught: ‘Excuse me, may I speak? Have you seen my mama, Mrs Frost? She will be looking for me.’
Some folk reply to the contrary and some ignore her, immersed in their own business. Some are concerned and ask, ‘Are you lost, wee girl?’ to which Billie responds, ‘Not at all; only my mother has lost me.’ Others dismiss her as a potential pickpocket and clutch their purses tight.
But Billie plods determinedly up the stony hill, inspecting the interior of the First Bank of Otago, and the first of many hotels. She peers into Wilson’s butchery with its live fowls in baskets and severed pig heads that squint their dead eyes at her; Kettle’s grocery store with its sacks of wheat, corn and coffee; on and on until the buildings dwindle. She stops and gazes back down towards the port, where the distant ships’ masts seem to weave a cat’s cradle of lines, blurring her determination. But she must cross to the other side of the road to the Apothecaries Hall and start her task downhill. Past the stables, past the ship chandler, past the fishmonger. At each point of reference Billie addresses the same question to the milling crowds: ‘Excuse me, have you seen my mama, Mrs Frost? She is wearing a fine purple shawl.’
She stares into the window of Reuben Tom’s apothecary with its rows of deeply coloured bottles. At Ritchie’s Bakery she is immersed in the warm yeasty aromas, but doesn’t waste time at the fish shop. Her voice is quavering now, even though singing is trying to make it better. ‘Singing cockles and mussels alive, alive-o … sweet Molly Malone, singing … ’
At a table just inside the doorway of the Provincial Hotel, an elegant gentleman is sipping whisky with his companions. Like the greater contingent of visitors, he is also waiting for arriving passengers. A small girl apologises for knocking against him. He glances up. A surge of prickly chills – a ghost walking over his grave – rushes over his body. He is disturbed. There is something about the child’s slanted eyes that momentarily catches his attention. It is as if – so similar to – but no, how absurd. He stares after her as she whirls her skirts and departs. He returns to his conversations.
Billie is weary now, but completes the full circuit and arrives at the apex where the five rutty roads converge. And there, by the entry to the wharf, is Mama! A small crowd is fussing around her and a policeman is taking notes. She is sobbing and being comforted by unknown people and there is a quite a commotion.
A shriek pierces the sea air. With relief, Evie turns to find a furious, red-faced girl hurtling towards her across the intersection. Oblivious of the horses, carts, billboards and throngs of people, the child hurtles through the convergence and flings herself on her mother. But only for a few seconds, then she tears herself off and stiffens into a rigid pose.
‘You lost me!’ Billie cries, her now-white face tipped accusingly, eyes blazing with tears that refuse to fall. ‘You lost me, Mama, you lost me!’
‘Hush, child, be done!’ responds Evie as she clings to her. ‘I didn’t lose you, you lost us! Gracious me, whatever next?’
‘You did so too.’ This time the voice has more control, but the Look remains.
‘Billie Frost, do not take that disagreeable tone with me. I’ve been in such a frenzy this past hour. You must have been day-dreaming, for I was always here, and then – then I turned and you were gone. Darling one, thank the Lord that you are safe and sound! I persuaded dear Alf to go on to The George with his arrivals to take afternoon tea, since they are so weary. And we shall follow. But Billie, I didn’t lose you, wee girl!’ She clutches at the child’s stiff form to draw her close.
Billie will not be comforted and her eyes glitter with furious love.
‘Come on.’ Evie takes Billie’s arm so they can cross safely and walk up to the hotel – she is gasping for a long cup of tea after all the commotion. Then it will be back to Dunedin on the lighter, where the beds are ready and waiting for Alf’s family.
But Billie is not consoled. She turns her head up at her mother, eyes now like steel.
‘You. Lost. Me.’ is the verdict.
Chapter Thirteen
March 1864
South District School welcomes Billie on its opening day. Known as Park’s School after its well-loved headmaster, it is the first public school in Dunedin. Maclaggan Street children do not generally aspire to school, and in many cases the adults are vague about the number of children they have reared. Certainly most children would not be able to bring the penny required for a writing slate. But thanks to her Scots heritage, Evie believes education is of prime importance.
The Maguires are happy to support Evie’s wishes and to encourage her education far beyond their own experiences. And although Evie always had a governess – allowing herself wisps of memory – she sees public school as modern and bold, and has saved hard to ensure her child starts as soon as possible. Most will start at age six, but she has met with Mr Park to put her case and Billie has been granted a place some six months earlier.
From the first day, Billie grates on the sensibilities of pinch-mouthed Miss Kerr. There is something about that Look; it un-nerves her. Mr Park understands what he has taken on – his teaching career has been long and he is imbued with the spirit of advancement – and he urges the Infant Mistress to keep watch on this fey pupil with kindness.
Miss Kerr, who bears the seldom-used name of Adele, does not identify with kindness. She knows only that she is a miserable failure in the eyes of her mother, and fortunate to receive a teaching position to sustain her sorry existence. She sends most of her wages back Home to the widowed one, who had been so sure that the torturous voyage to New Zealand would procure her graceless daughter some sort of marriage. Despite the notion that any single woman would quickly be swept up and away to the marriage bed – so desperate are menfolk for a female mate – Miss Kerr’s rotten teeth and associated halitosis is so bad, so violent, that any potential union is swiftly thwarted and she remains a spinster.
Oh yes, she had disgusting propositions on board the ship and a filthy encounter once she arrived, but she has no need of chastity precautions. Bitterness sees to that. Bitterne
ss about all the forward tarts who arrive in the country with nary a brain between them but a willingness to grin and flash their bosoms and who are quickly spoken for and married. And above all, bitterness about her lot – and what better way to deploy those emotions than to berate the pupils. Make them cry, make them suffer, and if they wet their drawers or hang their head, thrash them with a cane.
Billie is always smartly dressed, thanks to Evie’s innovative way with cloth and needle, and even the deep hems that may be let out in a year or two appear stylish. This affronts Miss Kerr, whose garments are exceptionally plain. Her comments are pointed: ‘Well, Billie Frost, I see you think you are above us with your smart clothes’; or ‘Miss Frost will show you how to calculate, since she knows it all.’
Billie does not know it all, but concentrates on her tasks while listening to older students with one ear, absorbing so much more than is allocated to the Infants. She is not overt; she knows there are always spies in the camp and does not wish to raise the teacher’s umbrage more than usual. She develops a special friendship with a pupil older but smaller than herself, Temperance Ivimey. Tempe has recently arrived from the Home Counties and her voice is refined, her disposition gentle. She is not advanced, but has a way about her that transcends book learning. With some of the girls being wary of Billie’s unusual stance, and a few making snide comments about Maclaggan Street, Tempe’s kindness is of great comfort.
Mungo oversees Billie’s journey to and from the institution. On the outward journey he trots along as she skips around the mucky ruts of upper Maclaggan Street, turns left into Clark Street and right at the High Street corner. There he stops and cocks his ragged head upward with a tender yelp and watches unwaveringly until she disappears over the hill, then turns and goes about his business. The routine is reversed during the afternoon, at a time that only he can intuit; Mungo knows his place in life is to protect his mistress.