by Barbara Wood
Now, as she paused in her work to look out the window at the moonlit plains, she realized that Philip's presence in the house was going to be very unsettling.
She heard a sound, turned and saw him emerge through the trees.
"Oh, hello!" he said, coming to the open doorway. "I was looking for Joanna. Alice has gone to bed, and Hugh thought Joanna might be in here. He said she might be able to help me with a problem I've suddenly developed."
"Joanna is probably reading a story to Beth. Is it something I can help you with, perhaps?"
He smiled self-consciously. "I suppose it's nothing," he said, and he rolled up one of his sleeves. "But something down by the river doesn't agree with me."
When he stepped into the light, she saw the angry rash on his forearm. "You must be allergic to something here," she said. "But I don't recall this happening the last time you were with us."
"It didn't. But I think I know what it is. I've had this rash before, back home. Has Joanna by any chance added a poplar tree to her garden? I'm allergic to poplars."
"We imported several trees from America a few years ago, poplars among them. Here, let me take care of this for you."
"I have it on both arms, I'm afraid," Philip said, as he rolled up the other sleeve and took a seat on one of the stools by the workbench. "And it burns like fire." He looked around the room that, by day, was open to sunlight. It was crowded with plants in pots, or hanging from the ceiling, flats of seedlings, trays of leaves and stems drying out. The workbench was cluttered with bottles and phials and jars; and the air was thick with the mingled fragrances of fennel and honey.
But it was Sarah who was the focus of his attention. Sarah, who had caused such a startling rush of emotion when he had seen her at the exhibition, and whom he had not been able to put out of his mind since.
"All right," she said, coming back to him. "This should make the rash feel better." She unstoppered a jar, scooped a creamy mixture onto her fingers, and gently applied it to his arms.
"What is that?" Philip asked, as he watched her hand move slowly back and forth over his arm, noticing how her olive skin contrasted with the white cuff of her sleeve; feeling her nearness, detecting her faint perfume.
"This is calendula," she said. "It won't cure the rash, but it will help the itching. The only way to get rid of the rash altogether is to stay away from the poplar tree."
He was silent for a moment, then he said, "It certainly is a hot night."
"I'm afraid we're in the middle of an autumn drought."
"In America, May is a spring month, not autumn. What I couldn't get used to the last time I was here was the reversal of the seasons. I discovered something else, too. Did you know, Sarah, that water going down a drain runs in the opposite direction here than it does in the northern hemisphere? Very difficult for a person to adjust to."
She smiled and said, "There now. That should give you some relief for a while. Keep this jar, and apply the cream whenever the rash flares up, or when it is particularly bothersome."
As Philip rolled down his sleeves, Sarah went back to the workbench to check on the simmering fennel. It was time to add the honey and allow the mixture to cool.
"It's nice to see you again, Sarah," he said. "To tell you the truth, I hadn't expected you to still be here at Merinda. I thought you would be married by now, and living somewhere else."
"No," she said quietly, "I'm not married."
He wanted to ask her why; and then he realized that it wasn't a fair question. Sarah was what some people in America would call a half-breed, not a kindly term. He suspected that the same prejudices that pervaded society back home were also at work here in Australia.
"Do you still know things, Sarah?"
She looked at him. "What do you mean?"
"I remember that you used to have premonitions, or second sight. Remember the night of the storm, when Hugh lost so many sheep? You knew then that something bad was going to happen. Do you still know things like that?"
"Sometimes, but not often." She smiled.
Sarah returned her attention to the fennel syrup. She brought down some earthenware jars from the shelf over the workbench, lined them up and poured small amounts of fennel syrup into each.
"What will you use that for?" Philip asked.
"It settles the stomach, and it also works as a diuretic."
They fell silent again. Philip looked at the jar in his hand—it was made of opaque purple glass, heavy and smooth, and it was stoppered with a large round cork. A label had been pasted on the side: calendula cream: FEBRUARY 1880.
"Alice seems to be very nice," Sarah said when the syrup was measured out. "How did you meet her?"
"I was traveling in England, and we met through a mutual friend."
"You do travel a lot."
"Yes, I do. I suppose I'm restless."
She looked at him again, her hands pausing over her work. "I remember that you were searching for answers the last time you were here. Are you still searching for them?"
"I don't know if there are any answers, Sarah. I work; that's mostly what I do."
"Building other people's houses, without having one of your own."
He stared at her, at the high cheekbones and full mouth, and the stray curls from her upswept hair that caressed her bare neck. And he was stunned by her raw sexuality; a sensualness that was only barely tempered by the carefully cultivated delicacy of her tiny pearl-drop earrings, the modest cameo brooch at her throat and the tortoiseshell combs holding the thick brown hair in place.
"You know, Philip," she said, as she stoppered the jars, "if you were an Aborigine I would say that you go walkabout a lot. I would say that you were following your songline."
"Following it," he said, "or maybe just searching for it? Can a songline go all the way around the world, Sarah?"
"Yes. But it must end sometime, somewhere. Just as there was a beginning Dreaming, there is an ending Dreaming."
"I know, they're called birth and death. Maybe my life is my songline, and I don't know where it's leading me."
She smiled. "You cut your hair."
He touched the back of his neck. "A couple of years ago. Alice didn't like it long. For me, it was a reminder of the time I spent living with the Navahos. I sometimes think that that was the happiest period of my life. That," he said, "and the six months I spent here."
A large moth suddenly flew against the window above the workbench. It fluttered desperately against the glass, beating its wings to get inside to where the light was. Sarah stared at it, aware of Philip sitting close to her, watching her. Something was starting to happen between them, something that she knew he also felt; and she sensed that they were both afraid of it.
"Tell me about the book you're writing," Sarah said.
"I want to make drawings of Australian country houses, and I'd like to get started on it as soon as I can. I want to go around the district and choose the most typical examples of Australian architecture. Perhaps you could go with me, and show me around?"
"Joanna and I are leaving for New South Wales tomorrow. We have been invited to pay a visit to an Aboriginal mission there."
"When you come back then?"
"Perhaps," she said, noticing that the moth had flown away.
Joanna tossed in her sleep. "Where are we, Mother? What are we doing here?"
Lady Emily's voice came from far away: "Hush, little one. We're hiding."
"What are we hiding from, Mother?"
"From the dogs—"
Joanna sat bolt upright in bed. "No!" she cried.
Hugh was suddenly awake. "Joanna," he said, sitting up. "What is it? Another bad dream?"
She was shaking so badly she could hardly speak. "It was awful," she said. "It was so ... so real."
"Why don't I get you some milk. We can sit up and talk about it."
She laid a hand along his cheek, feeling the rough stubble. Hugh had come to bed late, and he had to get up early again and ride out to the dist
ant flocks to make sure they had water. "Really," she said, "I'll be all right. I just want to sit up and read for a while."
She put on her dressing gown and slipped out of the bedroom, quietly closing the door behind her. She went into the parlor, lit a lamp, sat down in one of the easy chairs and laid her head back. She closed her eyes, trying to will the headache away. She knew that none of her medicines would help. The headache had no physical origin; only mental effort would ease the dull throb that was always brought on by the nightmare.
If only she could stop these dreams. She had brought her mother's diary into the parlor with her, and she opened it, turning to pages she had read many times before, but which she read again, hoping to find some hint, some hidden clue that she might have missed.
The clock over the mantel ticked softly; something rustled in the brush outside the house. A night bird perched briefly on the windowsill, then flew away in a whispered flapping of wings.
Joanna slowly turned the pages until she came to the end of her mother's handwriting and the beginning of her own—her first days at Merinda, her early worries over Adam, her first stirrings of love for Hugh. And then she came to the day when Sarah had taken her down to the river and told her about the Kangaroo Dreaming. "Sarah told me that I am following a songline," Joanna had written nearly nine years ago, "and that I am singing up creation as I go. What did she mean, that I am singing up creation? I am not aware of doing this."
Joanna stared at the page and suddenly remembered something Sarah had also said long ago, about the diary being a kind of songline.
If this book is my songline, she thought, then perhaps the act of writing in it is the same as singing up creation. Is that what Sarah had meant? And if this is my songline, then it is also my mother's because it was her book before it was mine— but I am continuing it, just as I am now experiencing the nightmares she suffered, and feeling the same sense of fear and dread that haunted her final days.
Songlines, Joanna thought wearily. Rainbow Serpents and wild dogs. What did it all mean? She was sick of it, and yet obsessed with it. Why couldn't she unravel the mystery here? There had to be a way of changing a songline, altering its course. She refused to let her mother's fate become hers—or hers become Beth's.
Laying the book aside, Joanna went to the small desk where she took care of correspondence; she lit the lamp, took out a fresh piece of paper and a pen, and sat down and wrote: "Dear Aunt Millicent, I know that I have asked you in the past to please fill in for me certain blanks in my mother's life, and out of respect for the pain of grief that you said such recollections would bring back—grief for the loss of your sister—I did not press for that information. But now I must insist. I have begun to suffer from a certain affliction that troubled my mother in the months before she died—nightmares and headaches, and a increasing feeling of dread. It is urgent that I determine the cause, which I believe lies somewhere in her childhood, the details of which you alone can supply for me. I entreat you, Aunt Millicent, for the sake of my health, and for my daughter's also, as I fear she too will fall victim to this legacy, to please tell me what you know about the circumstances surrounding my mother's departure from Australia. Is there something I should know?"
The coachman was obstinate. "I'm sorry, missus," he said. "I don't give rides to blacks. I gotta think of the other passengers. They paid their money. They got rights."
Joanna couldn't believe it. To have come this far, after so many hours of traveling, and to be this close to Karra Karra, only to have the driver of the overland coach refuse to take Sarah because she was an Aborigine.
"Surely you can't mean that," she said. "You aren't seriously going to leave us here!"
He lowered his voice. "It's not me, you understand, missus. I got nothing against niggers. If it was up to me I'd let her on board. But the other passengers—"
Joanna looked at the five people who had gotten off the train with her and Sarah—three men and two women—seated inside the coach and pointedly looking the other way.
"What do you expect us to do?" Joanna said to the coachman. "There is nothing here!" The train stop consisted of a small shack and nothing else. A few yards from the railroad tracks, dense forest grew. This was the end of the line for anyone not continuing on to Sydney. Those going to other towns and settlements disembarked here and took the overland coach the rest of the way.
"I'm sorry, missus. But it's company rules. No Aborigines." He shrugged apologetically and climbed up into the driver's seat of the coach.
"Please, Joanna," Sarah said. "Go with him. I'll be all right here."
"But I might be spending the night at the mission, Sarah. Where will you sleep? In that shack?" Joanna turned to the driver and said, "Can you at least tell me how far it is to the Karra Karra Mission?"
"Ten miles up the road. But it's uphill all the way. And it looks like it's gonna rain. You might want to do as the girl says, and ride with me."
"I have no intention of riding with you. And you can be sure that I shall be writing a letter of complaint to your company."
"Suit y'self," he said and snapped the reins.
As the coach rattled away down the road, disappearing into the towering pine trees, Joanna sensed the threat of rain. The western plains might be crippled by drought, but here in the lush mountains near the border of New South Wales, a light rain was common. "Well, Sarah," she said as she picked up her valise, "I suppose we had better start walking."
The brisk mountain air invigorated them as they walked. The smell of pine trees and loamy earth was almost intoxicating. As she followed the forest track, Joanna felt her excitement mount. Could this really be Karra Karra after all these years? Was there a creek nearby named Bowman's? And another place called Durrebar? Were she and Sarah, in fact, walking over the ground that was designated in the deed—property that was rightfully hers?
Joanna had written to William Robertson, the director of the mission, asking if he knew anything about her grandparents, but he had sent back the hasty reply of a busy man: "I don't know what I can tell you, Mrs. Westbrook. But if you come and visit us, we shall offer you the extent of our modest hospitality."
Whenever rain threatened, Joanna and Sarah stopped frequently and sought shelter under the trees. Their wool coats became heavy with the dampness, and their boots were soon caked with mud. But their spirits remained high. Joanna had been excited ever since reading the handout Adam had picked up at the exhibition.
And now here she was, high in the mountains, about to visit the place where perhaps her mother had been born.
They trudged along the road, listening to the forest silence. Occasionally they saw a flash of blue and red among the trees, as a parrot flew by. Animal sounds came from deep within the forest; and flowers unlike any they had ever seen grew in profusion. They were both starting to get tired, being unused to the altitude and feeling the effects of an uphill walk. They paused every so often to switch bags from one hand to another, and to catch their breath.
Joanna began to worry. How far had they walked? How much longer before they reached the mission? With the sky so cloudy, it was impossible to guess what time it was.
Finally, they followed a curve in the road and came upon a strange sight.
Up ahead, the way was blocked by a bullock team. Twelve massive animals, harnessed in pairs, were drawing an enormous dray loaded with logs. It was driven by a man who stood on the dray cursing the bullocks, flicking their hides with a four-teen-foot whip. Hugh had written ballads about the bullock teams and their colorful drivers—bullockies—most of whom had been convicts. The teams had been a common sight in his youth, when the country was being opened up, but now they were vanishing, because they were expensive to operate and slow moving. Horse teams were replacing the bullocks, and so was the new railway. To preserve their memory, Hugh had written the immensely popular ballad, "The Bullockies."
What made Joanna and Sarah stop and stare now, however, was not the bullock team, but rather the over
land coach, which had come to a halt behind it. The passengers were leaning out of the coach, complaining loudly, and the coachman was shouting at the bullock driver, who ignored him.
Joanna and Sarah walked by them all, feeling small next to the monstrous dray and its load. It creaked along at an impossibly slow pace, the wheels, which were taller than Joanna and Sarah, digging into the mud, the animals straining in their harnesses. When the bullocky saw the two women, he smiled and waved. Joanna waved back and called out, "Do you know how far it is to Karra Karra Mission?"
"Eight miles," he said. "Just follow the road."
Eight miles! That meant she and Sarah had only gone two. It had seemed so much longer.
They continued on past the bullocks, trudging through the muck and praying that the rain would hold off. They had gone only a few yards, and Joanna was saying, "Perhaps we can find a homestead," when she saw a wagon coming down the road toward them.
"Hoy there!" called the driver as he pulled up. "Are you Mrs. Westbrook? I'm William Robertson, superintendent of Karra Karra."
As he helped them into the wagon, he said, "When it started to get late and the coach hadn't come by, I decided to come looking for you. This happens sometimes, the bullocks taking up the road. It'll be hours before that coach even gets to the first stop."
Robertson turned his wagon around and headed back up the road. Joanna and Sarah glanced behind them at the coachman, red-faced and still shouting at the bullocky, while the passengers sat miserably in the stalled coach. After a few minutes they were left far behind.
Robertson was a Scot with long red hair and a bushy red beard. Joanna was surprised when he told her that he was a minister, because he was dressed like a lumberjack. "I can't tell you how pleased I was to get your letter, Mrs. Westbrook," he said. "We receive so little attention at our mission. You asked about a couple named Makepeace. I found no mention of them in our records, but then some of our early superintendents were not efficient record-keepers. But I thought maybe if you talked to some of our older members, they might remember something."