‘Years,’ Jesse repeated to the fire, ignoring the whack in the chest. ‘Way back when Jimmy was still here.’
‘Bullshit,’ Marjorie exploded. ‘You’re a bloody liar and full of bloody bullshit. Jimmy never told me you were here.’
‘And why should Jimmy have to tell you, Marjorie?’ Jesse balled his hands into fists and folded his arms tightly across his chest. ‘You don’t own this place and you never owned Jimmy Waghorn either. Jimmy didn’t have to ask your permission.’ Jesse’s voice was tight. Like his fists.
The stump in the middle of the fire burnt out its heart and slumped, sending a shower of sparks into the night sky. Marjorie followed its lead and slumped, but without the accompanying beauty of the shower of sparks. She watched as the stump turned to bleak ash. Now I have nowhere left to go. Not even Jimmy’s place is safe. In fact, she realised, it never had been. Wheat Bag Boy had been sneaking around and stealing Jimmy all these years. She was such a fool. Now all she had left to run away to were books. But there was no point letting Wheat Bag Boy know how she felt. She too folded her arms across her chest. And the two of them sat there on the bench, staring at the fire.
Marjorie broke the silence. ‘When exactly did you first start coming? I remember you practically wetting your pants at the name of Jimmy Waghorn.’
Jesse scuffed the dirt with his boot. It was true enough. ‘Right after that paper dress concert. I came the night after you had me kept in at school for falsely accusing the lovely, ladylike, teacher’s pet Marjorie of swearing.’ Jesse looked at Marjorie.
Marjorie grinned. But Jesse wasn’t grinning. ‘Hang on – we were only kids then,’ said Marjorie. ‘I must have been about thirteen. You couldn’t have been older than fourteen. What were you doing running about in the dark?’
Jesse didn’t answer for a long time. ‘Secret family business, Marjorie,’ he said finally. He looked up at the stars. And back down sideways at Marjorie. Who was sitting there once again – with her mouth open – staring at him. He leant across, put his index finger under her chin and pushed upwards until her mouth shut. ‘Did you think you were the only one around here with secret family business?’ Jesse smiled a crooked smile at her.
Yes! thought Marjorie, still feeling Jesse’s touch on her skin.
‘I used to watch you all the time. I knew your family had secrets.’
‘How did you know?’ Marjorie blurted.
Jesse sighed and shook his head and didn’t bother to answer. ‘I used to try and figure out how you did it,’ he said. ‘You were so skinny and tired-looking. So scared of everything all the time.’ Jesse was talking softly to the night-time.
‘What do you mean?’ said Marjorie. ‘I wasn’t scared.’
Jesse shook his head and didn’t reply.
‘How I did what?’ asked Marjorie into the silence.
‘Survived it.’
‘Survived what?’
Jesse shook his head again. ‘Marjorie,’ he said, ‘I am stunned at how very stupid you are for such an intelligent person.’
‘What?’
Jesse ignored her. ‘Anyway,’ he continued, going around the blatant stupidity beside him, ‘as a kid would back then, I decided it might have been due to having Jimmy Waghorn living on your place. So I decided to risk it and find out.’
Jesse bent and picked up a handful of stones and started throwing them one by one into the fire as he talked. ‘I decided the consequences of turning up at Jimmy Waghorn’s place without an invite couldn’t be any worse than staying at my place.’ Jesse shrugged, rolling inwards on his memories. ‘I got here about midnight, I reckon. And there was Jimmy, sitting on this old blue bench like he was waiting for me. Like he had been waiting for me for years.’ Jesse pushed himself off the bench to go and throw some more stumps on the fire. ‘That’s when I started coming.’
Marjorie watched Jesse hurling stumps onto the fire like he wanted to make a Guy Fawkes bonfire.
‘Did you ever notice when I didn’t turn up for school?’ he asked as he sat down again.
‘No. Maybe. Sometimes.’
‘I didn’t think so. So you didn’t notice I wasn’t at school the day after you got me kept in for lying?’
Marjorie shrugged. ‘You fell off your bike, didn’t you?’
Jesse fell silent and examined the horizon and the sky.
‘Your dad get up before dawn?’
Marjorie startled at the question and the obvious reason for it. ‘Yes. Always.’ It was her turn to look at the horizon.
‘You’d better get on back home then. Get back in through that bedroom window or whatever it is you do. While you still have time.’
Marjorie jumped up and looked at the fire and at Jesse and over towards the home paddock. She was calculating before she realised what she was doing: how much time she had to get home, how much time to undress and put her nightie back on, how much time to carefully sneak back into that house and get back into bed. Before Bill got up. Without waking the house. Without waking a soul.
‘I’ll put the fire out,’ said Jesse. ‘You get going.’
‘Thanks,’ said Marjorie absent-mindedly. She was concentrating on her calculations. She had already forgotten about Jesse. She was off. Heading into the dark and back towards the house paddock.
Jesse stood at the fire and watched her – watched her move from the light of the fire into the dark of the night. He watched until he couldn’t see her anymore and couldn’t hear her anymore before he bent to put out the fire.
Marjorie stopped at the backyard fence. She stayed there until she was no longer breathing hard. Then she carefully squeezed between the gap in the gate and the fence post, and went to retrieve her nightie. She paused on the back porch to gauge the interest of the house. But it didn’t seem fussed. So with her clothes and shoes bunched tightly to her chest, Marjorie crept down the hallway towards her bedroom. She was almost betrayed by a sneak floorboard trumpeting a squeak. But no one stirred. She paused at the bedroom door to listen to Ruby’s breathing before creeping over to her bed and climbing in. She lay there, flat on her back, clutching her clothes and her shoes and staring at the tongue-in-groove ceiling boards parading out of the pre-dawn gloom.
Marjorie heard Bill get up. She heard Ruby start to wake up, so she rolled over to face the wall and pretended she was asleep – clutching her clothes and shoes – and waited until Ruby left the bedroom before charging out of bed and into a furious dust storm of getting ready for school.
‘What’s the matter with you?’ asked Ruby, glancing up from her school sandwich making as Marjorie sidled into the kitchen.
‘Nothing. Why?’
‘No reason,’ said Ruby. ‘I could ask Mum to do another drawing of you.’
‘No! You already did that yesterday and she didn’t seem too keen on the idea. So forget it!’ Marjorie grabbed the bread and started to lay into it with the bread knife – hacking and sawing. ‘I don’t want another stupid bloody drawing.’
‘Suit yourself. But it would make things easier with Mum if you asked.’
‘No!’ shouted Marjorie.
*
Marjorie managed to get on the bus without looking at Jesse. She pushed and shoved and elbowed to the back seat and threw herself into the safety of a book. And straight away went to sleep. But Jesse had managed to sit beside her and he elbowed her in the back so she jerked awake as Jesse murmured to the bus window behind her ear: ‘Just act normal.’ Which for Jesse meant climbing into a seat on the bus and falling asleep. Both ways. Going to school and coming home again. Instantly asleep as soon as the bus took off. Instantly awake as soon as it stopped. But Marjorie never slept on the bus.
She sprang up in her seat. She knew what he meant. She had spent the morning at home scanning to see if anyone could detect anything that wasn’t normal. And now here she was – giving it all away. Attention,
everyone on the bus! I was out at Jimmy Waghorn’s place most of last night. And that is not normal for me. I have not slept so am very tired now. So I am just going to go to sleep on the school bus – which is also not normal for me.
‘Back of the library. Lunchtime,’ Jesse muttered to her before he fell asleep. But he kept his elbow placed at her back to jab, solicitously, apparently in his sleep – any time he thought Marjorie was falling asleep.
Marjorie somehow managed to stay awake until lunchtime. She jammed her lukewarm Vegemite sandwich down her throat and drank more than lukewarm water at the bubble taps, before heading to the uncertain sanctuary of the back of the library. Jesse was already there. And once again, he had managed to clear the perimeters. They had the place to themselves. Jesse had also made preparations. He had a couple of large piles of books – big and solid – scattered in studious disarray. It was like he had made a queer little blockade on the table.
He grinned at her questioning stare. ‘Done this often enough. You can have a good sleep here. Libraries are always good for the mind.’
By then, Marjorie was just about asleep on her feet. She slumped into the chair next to him, folded her arms on the table, put her head in her arms and was asleep.
Jesse let Marjorie sleep for half an hour before he woke her and made her help him put all the books back. Marjorie still wanted to sleep but Jesse had enough prior experience to know a good half-hour would get her through the rest of the day. They went their separate ways for the afternoon and didn’t speak again that day. Or for the next number of days. It was almost as if the night at Jimmy Waghorn’s place hadn’t happened.
About a month after that, Jesse was suddenly at Marjorie’s side as she headed for the last class of the day. ‘Half-moon tonight,’ he said, looking for it in the sky. ‘Be cold, though. Frost most likely.’ He must have thought Marjorie needed an update on the weather forecast because that was all he said before he ambled off.
Marjorie stared straight ahead. She didn’t even give him the time of day. Because now – on account of Jesse’s unsolicited weather report – she didn’t have any time of the day to spare. She had to reserve all available time to spend on thinking about what she was going to do. She thought about it all the way home on the bus. She tried to think about it all the way home in the ute. But Ruby kept interrupting.
‘Things alright at school?’
‘What?’ replied Marjorie, concentrating on the driving.
‘The kids giving you any trouble about Mum?’
‘No. It’s alright.’
‘She’s started making a nativity set. Out of plasticine. Has she shown it to you?’
‘No.’ Marjorie glanced at Ruby in fright. ‘How long has she been doing that?’
‘A couple of weeks.’ Ruby glanced at Marjorie. ‘She probably hasn’t had time to show it to you,’ she said, trying to soothe Marjorie. But kindness couldn’t hide the truth. They both knew the rules.
‘I suppose she’ll talk to me again one day.’
‘You know how it is,’ said Ruby. ‘She’ll get over it.’
‘When do you suppose that might happen?’ said Marjorie. ‘Based on our previous experiences with the immaculate bloody Elise, it might be Christmas. What do you estimate? How about a wager on a Christmas truce?’
Ruby sighed. ‘Try to be patient with her, Marjorie.’
‘Why should I?’ Marjorie jerked the gearstick. ‘I don’t want to do this anymore. Normal mothers don’t do this, Ruby.’
After Jesse’s weather forecast conversation in the schoolyard, and now the revelation of a plasticine nativity set that Marjorie was not part of, it was very easy for Marjorie to make her decision.
She did her jobs in complete silence. But the inside of her head was rowdy. She had to plan what to wear, where to stash, where to change, what time to leave, how to leave, how to get back in time. She also thought about food supplies. And decided against food. There was never enough in the house; any shortage would be missed. She considered tobacco and papers supplies.
But she didn’t allocate any thinking time to what they might talk about at Jimmy’s place – her and Jesse.
Her final decision was to go to bed earlier than usual. And pretend to be asleep.
‘I’m going to bed now,’ Marjorie muttered when the washing-up was done after dinner. Bill looked fleetingly surprised. So did Ruby – lifting her beautiful head momentarily from her endless homework. Tea-cosy-hatted Elise didn’t move from her seat in front of the stove.
In no time at all, the house was silent, Ruby was sleeping, nearly half of a moon was climbing above the sand ridge in the distance, and Marjorie was sneaking out the back door with a stash of tobacco and papers.
It was an easy run. The night was half-lit by the half-moon, and Marjorie loved it. She ran fluently and lightly, her long legs relishing the crisp air and the concentration of effort. For a brief moment of bliss, Marjorie forgot about Ruby, forgot about Bill – she almost forgot about Elise. She didn’t even notice herself slow to dart between the gap in the paddock gate or pick up the pace for the small hill – didn’t even notice the waiting glow of the fire. She forgot about Jesse.
And suddenly she was there. At Jimmy Waghorn’s place. And the fire was burning and waiting for her. And Jesse was cooking and waiting for her. Damper and billy tea and rabbit on a stick. ‘I could hear you coming a mile off,’ said Jesse, glancing up from his cooking. ‘You need to run quiet in the night.’
‘I can run quiet if I need to,’ said Marjorie.
‘You should always run quiet,’ he said to the rabbit. ‘Then you won’t need to.’
‘Stop talking rubbish.’ Marjorie claimed a spot on the old blue bench, untied the coat from around her waist and put it on.
‘You been here since I was here the other night?’ she asked.
Jesse shrugged. ‘’Course I have. That was weeks ago.’
‘How many times?’
‘As many as I needed.’
‘Why?’
‘I told you why. You don’t have exclusive rights on secret family business hereabouts, Marjorie.’ Jesse waited for the question. But Marjorie never asked it. So he went on. ‘I come when I need to. That’s what Jimmy said to do. And that is what I do.’ Jesse grabbed the rabbit from the fire and threw it on a tin plate sitting on the bench. He hastily pulled it apart. Darting at it with his long fingers so the rabbit couldn’t attack him with its heat – its last, defiant fight. Jesse sat down, the rabbit-loaded tin plate between him and Marjorie. ‘Here,’ he said. ‘Have some.’ And started to help himself.
They ate the rabbit in comfortable silence. It was delicious as only campfire roast rabbit can be. They ate the damper with butter and jam. It also was delicious. Marjorie sighed a deep sigh of contentment. A very rare sigh. She was used to sighs – sighs were normal in her life. But not sighs of contentment.
Jesse started making a cup of billy tea so Marjorie pulled out the tobacco and papers and started rolling smokes. She rolled a slender smoke. She examined it and nodded to herself – gave it a couple of swift jabs of a matchstick in either end – before laying it on the bench for Jesse and making another one for herself. By the time she had finished both smokes, Jesse was back on the bench and watching her with more than a glint of amusement in his hazel eyes. Marjorie didn’t notice this. She was still busy. She hadn’t finished. She handed Jesse his smoke and held the match to his mouth while he drew breath. She lit her own, drawing air through the smoke until it was alive and awake.
‘Such a refined lady,’ said Jesse through the smoke of his cigarette. ‘Not only do you not swear, but you also do not smoke.’
‘Bugger off.’
Jesse laughed. A rich, melodious laugh that lit up his face. And showed his lovely teeth. With his chipped front tooth from that time a few years ago when he’d gone head first over the handlebars of his b
ike and turned up at school with black eyes and a broken mouth. Marjorie stared at Jesse. Shocked. She had never noticed Wheat Bag Boy laugh before.
The two of them stayed there at Jimmy’s place that second night and looked back out at the Mallee as it pondered them. They talked and talked about nothing, and gazed up at the frosty stars glistening overhead, and watched the Southern Cross turn slowly over. They watched the fire and listened to the thoughtful exchange of the plovers discussing matters of vast avian import out in the dark of the paddocks.
And they paused, and listened as one to the first goods train of the night as it made its slow, lonely way through the miles and miles of railway lines etched into the fabric of Mallee farm life. They heard it from one side of the night horizon to the other. Faintly, then clear and crisp on the frosty air, and then fading. A pendulum swinging slow and methodical across the night. The whistle and the wheels. Eternally hauling the wheat and wool of the Mallee. The goods train: as paradoxical as everything that survived in the Mallee. It clickety-clacked, clickety-clacked, clickety-clacked soft, then loud, then soft – determined and business-like as it carried the heart of Mallee farm survival on its back. And it moaned and wailed and shrilled soft, then loud, then soft – solitary and desolate as it carried the source of Mallee landscape devastation on its back.
‘Time to pack up,’ said Jesse. ‘If you’re back in bed before the second train, you’ll get enough sleep.’
Marjorie didn’t answer. She got up, took her jacket off and tied it around her waist again, and helped put out the fire.
‘See ya,’ she said, staring in the direction of the house. Then Marjorie was off and running.
‘Yeah,’ said Jesse. He stood and watched her leave, as he had done the first night, before turning on his heels and walking the other way.
Chapter 11
Why did Marjorie turn up at Jimmy Waghorn’s place in the dark? Why not? She had always gone there. Since she was so tiny the ripened golden heads of a good crop of wheat could lean in to her ears to whisper a warm and golden message as she ran.
Wearing Paper Dresses Page 17