‘Come on, Ben,’ the boy’s mother called.
The child ran from the road, the flapping heel of his shoe barely breaking his stride.
By the time Edwina and the rest of the travellers crossed the paddock, went through the gate and found themselves on the open river flats where the circus was located, the shadiest spots were all but taken. The boom of the circus band reached fever pitch and then suddenly stopped. Although a good half-mile away, against the faded greens and browns of the thick trees bordering the river, the colourful uniforms of the band and the white horses leading the procession appeared like something from a fairytale. As Edwina caught sight of two elephants with their grey skin and large flapping ears, children escaped their parents’ clutches, running towards the parade. They couldn’t get far. A rough barricade manned by burly individuals encircled the spectacular, ensuring that people could only use the main entrance and pay accordingly.
The march soon broke up with the band disappearing into one of the tents and the animals smartly corralled away from the public. A man’s amplified voice announced that the menagerie would be open for viewing by the public for one hour only, from 4 pm, while tickets for the main performance were still available. Everyone settled on the grass to wait. Far from being the sizeable crowd that Edwina first supposed, she realised now that there were only thirty or so people scattered about her.
Edwina hobbled Heidi-Hoe near a tree and settled in the shade to rest. There was nowhere close where she could change her clothes and with the parade finished it wasn’t worth risking discovery by walking around looking for Aiden. It would be better if she waited for the zoo to open in the hope of finding him there. Daylight travel was a priority. By 5 pm Edwina would need to start heading back to the farm. At worst she would be travelling for an hour or so in the dark before the moon rose. At best she would encounter Aiden and then they could both return home together.
A number of families took advantage of a few hours’ rest before the entertainments began. Edwina observed their happy groupings as children played, young couples promenaded and friends and families picnicked. In one part of the paddock, Chinese vendors were selling vegetables, while the smell of roasting meat drew Edwina’s attention in the opposite direction. Whole sheep were being cooked on spits and customers were already lining up to partake of the chop picnic. Edwina sat spellbound beneath the tree, intrigued by the sights and sounds and the sheer novelty of being surrounded by people. Soon a number of clowns arrived, wandering around on stilts and contorting their painted faces. The jesters provided much laughter, although it was their presence on the edge of a small, dusty country town that made them unique.
Some of the men were talking about industrial unrest, while church in the morning was the next social outing for many, with a picnic to follow. Others, clearly labourers, complained of their employers and the Chinese who were invading the land. Yet no matter the conversation, what charmed Edwina was the happiness emanating from these people, the feeling that these family and kin not only shared labour but also happily provided care for each other. There was a distinct feeling of mutual support, of reciprocated aid, characteristics of strong family networks that, with only a brother and a father, she had little exposure to. It was nice to be here, Edwina decided. The world was a big place and she’d not had to travel far to find it. Lulled by the warm afternoon and sated by the bread and salted mutton she had brought with her, she closed her eyes.
The ball hit her firmly in the chest. Edwina sat upright, picking grass and leaves from hair and cheek. She wiped at the thin line of saliva seeping from the corner of her mouth. There were ants everywhere.
‘Mummy, that man’s a woman.’ The chaser of the object, a pretty child in a dress the colour of an English meadow, snatched up the ball and ran back to the arms of her mother. The woman tugged her husband’s elbow.
Appalled, Edwina searched frantically for her father’s ill-fitting hat. The dark brown fedora lay on its side in the grass and she snatched it up, twisting her hair underneath it. The child’s comment had attracted the attention of others. While the menfolk were intrigued, the women were most definitely not. They appeared thoroughly stunned, and Edwina wondered what to do next as remarks of ‘not seemly’, ‘unconventional’ and ‘fast’ rippled through those grouped closest to her. It was fine to wear trousers on the farm, to dress like a man when working, for Edwina knew other farm women did the same, but such freedoms did not extend to the public arena. At least not out here.
Not very far away was the Colby Brothers three-ringed circus and here she was a spectacle in her own right. A spectacle that could well be recognised as the daughter of Hamilton Baker.
As the wave of disapproval abated, Edwina heard someone calling out to her. Edwina packed up the remains of her food, shoving the newspaper-wrapped parcels in Heidi-Hoe’s saddlebags. Determined to leave immediately, she ignored the man for as long as possible.
‘I say, would you like to join me and my friends?’
Edwina turned around slowly. The man before her was tall and good-looking and the cut and material of the suit he wore was, quite simply, top-drawer. He was clearly not from the country, let alone this district.
‘We’re visiting, you see, and, well, if you don’t mind, I’m sure my friends and I would like to ask you a few questions, about being in the circus, that sort of thing.’ He took in Edwina’s appearance – the ill-fitting suit and waistcoat – his gaze falling on the loosened necktie and tight white shirt, the top three buttons of which were undone from her recent rest.
Edwina hastened to rectify her clothing. The man, who introduced himself as H.J. Bellington, was holding up paper cones of peanuts and gesturing to a group of young people who were picnicking next to a black car quite some yards away and separate from everyone else.
‘I’m not –’
‘Half man and half woman?’ H.J. chuckled. ‘I know. Too darn attractive for that sort of thing. Do say you’ll come with me. We have our very own drinking bar, and I’ll be next on the scrounge list for liquor otherwise if they discover I’d seen you and not brought you over. Let me tell you it’s impossibly difficult to get hold of the stuff in any decent quantities out here in the sticks. But I’m sure I don’t have to tell you that.’
Edwina gathered that the stuff H.J. referred to was alcohol and the invitation to his private drinking bar, as he called it, was in fact to the Model T Ford. There was nothing to do but follow him. She certainly couldn’t stay where she was. The fracas regarding her appearance may have ebbed; however, that didn’t stop women from giving her quite derogatory looks. ‘My horse?’
‘Bring him, or her. Whatever. I say, can he do tricks?’ asked H.J.
‘No.’
‘Pity.’ H.J. led Edwina through the crowd to the automobile parked right on the edge of the field. With the parade finished, people were entering the paddock to wait until the menagerie opened; earlier arrivals, having been into Wywanna to collect supplies, were parking drays and wagons near the main entrance. Edwina noticed part of the wooden fence was pulled apart, allowing the vehicle closer access to the circus grounds. Three women were lolling on a blanket in the grass while a man was searching for something on the back seat.
‘Found it.’ The man lifted his head from the vehicle, waving a bottle in the air. ‘Beer or champagne, anyone?’ The friends all cheered. He met Edwina’s arrival with a look of surprise. Tall and dark eyed, he was dressed in a white shirt, bushman’s trousers and worn boots.
‘And look what I found,’ H.J. announced their arrival, passing around the peanuts. ‘A genuine female circus performer.’
Edwina was horrified. The most glamorous young women she’d ever laid eyes on were taking careful stock of her appearance and trying not to laugh. They were powdered and rouged, with the shortest of dresses showing their knees. And, they were smoking.
‘Heavens,’ one of the woman commented, ‘wherever did you find her?’
H.J. whipped the fedora from Edwi
na’s head, her long hair tumbling free. ‘The local hayseeds put up a fuss when they realised she was incognito.’
‘How marvellous!’ A red-haired woman, introduced as Janice, sat upright. ‘And does our guest have a name?’
‘Edwina. And I am not in the circus.’ She snatched back the hat.
Two of the women giggled.
‘I’ve ridden quite a distance,’ continued Edwina, humiliated by the way they were staring at her. ‘And apart from trousers being more comfortable,’ she retorted, ‘it’s far more sensible.’
‘Good for you,’ the man holding the bottles said. He was clean-shaven but there all similarities to his friends ended. There was no brilliantine slicking his hair, no smart edge to his speech. In fact, he could have been about to go out mustering on horseback, based on the casual way he was dressed. ‘Are you from around here then?’
‘Yes,’ she answered.
‘Mason usually knows everybody,’ Janice advised, holding up a glass for champagne. ‘And if he doesn’t,’ she gave Edwina a knowing smile, ‘he will. Soon enough.’
‘That’s rich coming from you, Janice.’ A blonde-haired girl with green-blue eyes smiled prettily at Edwina. ‘I’m Louise. Do join us. You probably think we’re the most awful people but we’re not really.’
H.J. tied Heidi-Hoe to the fender of the car and Edwina found herself accepting a glass of bubbles and sitting cross-legged on the blanket. The women were all close to her age, their stylishly bobbed hair covered by snug-fitting cloche hats.
‘Your skin is so brown,’ Janice said pointedly. ‘How is it possible, when pale and wan is de rigueur, that you can look so unreasonably –’
‘Healthy.’ The third woman, Debra, blew smoke through her nose, nostrils flaring delicately. ‘Maybe she’s from abroad. An import from one of those marvellous foreign countries like Italy.’
Mason, lounging against the side of the vehicle, was staring at her, his face unreadable.
‘Rubbish, she’s a farm girl.’ Janice elbowed the pretty blonde. ‘You know, Louise, milks cows and that sort of stuff. You can tell she’s one of those capable types. Not like us.’
‘Heavens,’ said Louise, ‘do you really?’
Edwina shrugged. ‘Doesn’t everyone?’
There was a moment’s silence and then the group burst out laughing.
She liked champagne. Emboldened, Edwina accepted another glass when it was offered.
‘A farm girl you say. I could use a bit of help on my run,’ Mason told her. ‘It’s different in this part of the country. Not at all what I’m used to.’
‘That would be the Territory,’ interrupted H.J., slurping his drink. ‘He’s been up there on some godforsaken block tending cattle. Can you believe it? Chasing cattle for six years. Then all of a sudden he arrives in Brisbane and we’re off on a road trip to see the world.’
‘You didn’t get very far.’ Edwina took another sip of the fizzy drink.
‘Wywanna,’ said Mason loudly, ‘centre of the universe, isn’t it?’
His friends laughed.
‘Anyway, not all of us can be pushing pens behind a desk, H.J.’ Mason filled his glass. ‘University didn’t really gel. I did twelve months in an accountancy firm trying to get my head around numbers,’ he said to Edwina. ‘But the bush is what my family was born into. It’s what I’m good at. What I like. There wasn’t much point fighting it. And I got a push from an old friend, Mr Gordon of Wangallon Station.’
‘Namedropper.’ Janice dipped a finger into the glass of champagne and licked it. ‘You’ve heard of them?’ she asked Edwina.
‘Of course.’ Everyone in the bush knew of that family. ‘What was the Northern Territory like?’ Edwina enquired.
‘I was on Victoria River Downs Station. Now that’s a place you’d not soon forget. It was a Kidman run once but a British company owns it now. Thirteen thousand, one hundred square miles of undulating country, ridges and plateaux, limestone outcrops and floodplains. And the grasses, there’s Flinders grass, Blue grass –’
Janice yawned theatrically. ‘Our Mason just loves cows and grass.’
Mason frowned. Edwina guessed by the severity of the expression he was unused to interruptions. ‘It’s cattle country alright. This sheep-herding thing takes a bit to take to. I’m looking at country further north. A cattle run.’
‘That’s big enough for his ambition,’ interrupted H.J. ‘What he’s not telling you about the Territory, Edwina, is that it’s big and full of blacks.’
‘And a bloody good lot of people they are too,’ said Mason.
Edwina blushed at the blasphemy.
‘Of course you get the odd bludger, the troublemakers, but you find them anywhere. It’s the whites that cause the problems, mostly between them and us. I saw some messy things up there. Things that would make a white person hang their head in shame.’
‘Oh please, Mason,’ begged Janice, ‘spare us the maudlin. I don’t care about the natives or their problems. They’re all meant to be on missions or in orphanages anyway. It’s for their own good.’
Mason didn’t look convinced. ‘Many of them are stockmen. What do you think, Edwina?’
‘I feel sorry for them.’
Mason pushed his hat back further. ‘I don’t think they want your pity.’
Louise changed the topic and Edwina listened to an account of a party the friends attended before leaving Brisbane, where a girl standing on a billiard table had danced the Charleston, ripping the felt with her heels.
‘And do you do the Charleston here, Edwina, or the Black Bottom?’ asked Debra.
‘No.’ Edwina knew of the dances, but not the steps involved. She’d never seen either done.
‘Well, there’s no point bothering to learn now,’ Janice told her with a fixed smile. ‘They’re nearly out of style.’ She exhaled cigarette smoke, blowing the acrid fumes in Edwina’s direction.
She coughed and did her best to smile, aware of Mason staring at her.
‘Drink up,’ H.J. urged, ‘this is meant to be a party and I’m not going back to the river to cool off any more bottles.’
‘Party pooper,’ complained Janice.
The next time Edwina glanced in Mason’s direction he smiled.
Chapter Six
Hamilton wasn’t one for hasty assignations. Lord, he was even speaking like Gloria, he thought as he tied his shoelaces and got up slowly from the bed. He’d scarcely been in Wywanna for two hours and already he was exhausted. He should have taken the buggy instead of riding, he decided, glancing at his reflection in the gilt mirror as he straightened his necktie. At his age, when his free time in Wywanna was happily limited by business, it was important he conserve energy. Still, he couldn’t blame Gloria solely for his fatigue. He was a willing participant and, dare he admit it, quite readily led astray. Picking up her day-dress of chocolate silk, the knickers, chemise and stockings, he rested the delicate items across one of the chairs. Mrs Zane, as he occasionally addressed her when she grew tiresome, lay sprawled across the bed, her soft snores punctuating the quiet room.
Closing the door once inside the adjoining sitting room, Hamilton removed a key from his pocket, unlocking the central drawer in the mahogany desk. Inside were a number of folders which he sorted through and, with the correct one found, he withdrew to an armchair, sitting heavily. At his elbow was a decanter of whisky and Hamilton poured a nip of the amber fluid, skolling it in one gulp. ‘Better,’ he belched, proceeding to study the contents of the folder. The papers within held the details of his current business transactions, which were few. Loans for gambling debts and structural improvements to two small businesses located in Wywanna were the extent of his trade at the moment. Clients were finding it difficult to repay the money borrowed and the few customers Hamilton still dealt with in Sydney and Brisbane were only just managing their monthly interest repayments. Business was tough. But there was relief in sight.
Hamilton glanced over his shoulder towards the bedroom befo
re perusing the sheath of papers. The numbers written in his neat copperplate outlined the accumulating debt on a substantial loan made to an established pastoral family seven years prior. The Ridgeways. Another month had gone past and as Hamilton ran a finger down the neat row of columns, making a brief calculation of the monthly compounding interest, he knew that a meeting with the landholders was long overdue. With the initial capital and the addition of the compounding interest the monies owed to him had grown considerably, to a sum of thirty-four thousand pounds. Why, one could build a most respectable mansion in Brisbane with that amount, or purchase a good parcel of shares, or keep a rural holding in fine running order for years.
The Ridgeways’ growing debt was a conundrum. These people were of old money, the holding was large, the livestock considered of excellent bloodline and their wool clips were not to be sneezed at. While not everyone would agree with the current management of the property concerned, everything suggested that there was no reason for this debt to remain outstanding. But it did.
Closing the folder and replacing it in the locked drawer, Hamilton tapped the desktop thoughtfully. For the last seven years, he’d penned a monthly letter to the client reminding them of the interest due and the compounding nature of their agreement. And without fail their solicitor would respond, noting receipt of Hamilton’s advice with formal courtesy. And still the monies remained unpaid. It was unfortunate but at the end of this week the agreed term was up. And Hamilton expected to be repaid immediately, in full. He was glad that the debtors were finally agreeing to a meeting for it really was quite off-putting when a client’s hand needed to be forced.
Leaving his rooms, Hamilton walked downstairs. Once outside, he mounted the long-suffering gelding tethered in the shade and trotted the horse down the street. He was still at odds with having to attend the circus this evening and had done his best to wangle his way out of the event. Surely Gloria could have gone with one of her bohemian friends or, better yet, they could have shared an intimate supper in their rooms. But there was no dissuading the woman. He glanced at the upstairs window, feeling outmanoeuvred through a clever mix of titillation and argument. The woman should have been a lawyer.
An Uncommon Woman Page 6