Benevolence

by Julie Janson

  ‘This old lady is called Granny Wiring and is real hungry, so we give her our tucker tonight? That alright?’ says Mercy.

  ‘Wattunga? Where you from, Granny Wiring?’ Mary slips in, close to the old lady, wanting her love.

  ‘Naibala, finish up,’ says Granny Wiring.

  ‘All fella belong you, he gone? He baletti?’ says Mercy.

  Granny Wiring nods and tears flow as she slides down to sit on the floor. The children all think the same thing: she could be their Granny and the waibala have taken her food and her place. Mercy hugs her.

  ‘Our Burruberongal Darug mob up near Cattai. They your people, Mary girl. All people come quiet, after all fella been shot,’ says Granny Wiring. ‘All been burnem up. Waibala shootem. No more run away in that place. Might as well give up,’ says Granny Wiring. ‘War been finish. We safe now. No more body in wombat hole. Bits of broken boomerang everywhere. We run, real frighten. They saddle up, load musket, shootem all mob. We tell everybody about that killing. No good. Blackfella been settle down now.’

  Mercy wraps Granny Wiring in a shawl and the children are still.

  ‘We look after Granny, hide her here and feed her up. Make her real fat. She’s only got one blanket. No country,’ says Mercy.

  All the girls fear that Mr Barnes might find her during inspections and throw her out. Mary thinks of the shining table in the school house, how it gleams with beeswax polish and her elbow grease. The old granny can be hidden under that table during the day and at night she could stay with the girls and she could teach them about their Country.

  After a week, Mr Barnes finds Granny Wiring and he drags her out from under the table to face Mrs Shelley.

  ‘Whose grandmother is she? And why is she sleeping in our house?’ demands Mrs Shelley. Mercy pushes Mary forward.

  ‘All our granny. Belong to all us girls. But she from Burruberongal mob like me and she might find my daddy for me. We feed her up. She’s starving,’ says Mary.

  ‘Yes, I can see your Christian care and I am glad of it. I too care, but it won’t do,’ says Mrs Shelley. ‘I feel the utmost kindness and good intentions towards all you natives but she will have to be taken back to her correct family.’

  ‘They all dead, all rotten on trees with corn cobs stuck in mouth,’ says Mary.

  ‘Come now, Mary, that’s simply not true. No lies here. We will find her home,’ says Mrs Shelley.

  ‘Granny Wiring says, that dyin women got nothing, but she not want government handout, she says she butter her own bread,’ says Mercy.

  ‘Please don’t use that word dyin. It’s not nice. We are all trying to use proper English, aren’t we? Now, girls, please oblige me by hastily returning to the schoolroom. I will deal with Granny and we will provision her with appropriate attire and arrange for her care. She reminds me of an old dear I used to know in Cornwall.’

  ‘I go on long foot walk now; you come find me one day soon, eh, Mary and Mercy?’ says Granny Wiring. The children watch Granny Wiring hobble away with Mrs Shelley and they cry for her, and for themselves. They see their families walking into the distance. She is the only link with the old people they have had, and that is all that they long for.

  …

  One day, a dusty lieutenant rides his mount down the road and arrives at the school. He has ammunition strung about his chest, knee-high leather boots and a blonde moustache. Over his saddle dangles a new child for the school. His red jacket is stained with blood.

  The lieutenant enters the house, but Mr Barnes does not want any more pupils and Mrs Shelley’s eyes look suspiciously at this man. The children watch as the boy is laid down on the couch in an exhausted sleep. The boys stand nearby ready to help find clothes to dress the lad.

  ‘I have brought you another student, one of those saved by Captain Woodrow near the penal settlement of coal town. It is a wonder that I made it back from the northern frontier. It is wild country,’ says the lieutenant.

  ‘I regret that the child is not well-disposed. Perhaps the travelling on horseback did not suit him. Or perhaps it’s just a high degree of shyness; he seemed mightily afraid of the horse.’

  ‘A drop of medicinal laudanum will fix him quick,’ says Mr Barnes.

  ‘We are honoured to accept this innocent, so please thank Captain Woodrow and remind him of my intention to join him on an expedition,’ says Mr Barnes. ‘He is said to be a veritable demon in battle when he was on the sub-continent and so fashionably dressed when not in uniform, the ladies are all aflutter.’

  ‘I have heard that he has shot many of our sable brethren,’ says Mrs Shelley with a worried glance at Mary and Mercy.

  ‘I couldn’t be sure, Madam,’ says the lieutenant.

  ‘We will nurse this child back to health, won’t we, Madam? Teach him to have manners and dress him like a proper Englishman,’ says Mr Barnes. Mary looks at the trembling little body and as he wakes, she takes him in her arms.

  ‘Biana, biana,’ says the child.

  The little one huddles against Mary and she thinks how silly he would be to believe that he will see his family again. She knows there is not much happiness here and she feels like yelling it to the boy, to his beautiful upturned black face.

  ‘Please, if I might be so bold as to make a suggestion: don’t over-teach him. We want compliant servants, not upstarts. They are stupid and humility is best,’ says the lieutenant.

  ‘You bimung garai, stupid!’ says Mary and the children laugh.

  ‘Enough cheek, young lady,’ Mr Barnes warns.

  ‘Subservience paves the way for exploitation of wealth in a Colony, where the landed gentry get wealthier. The poor get poorer and the Aboriginal people will get nothing but degradation,’ says Mrs Shelley with fervour.

  ‘You sound like Mary Wollstonecraft. You have a touch of revolutionary zeal,’ says the lieutenant.

  ‘We are the civilising mission overseas. I am a model of propriety,’ snaps Mrs Shelley.

  ‘What will become of society if women feel they have the right to speak as such?’ the lieutenant mutters.

  ‘We shall endeavour to whitewash his soul of heathen ways and we will protect and love him. He can be baptised Harry,’ says Mrs Shelley.

  ‘His name’s not Harry. He tells me his name Yuranyi, like duck,’ says Mary.

  ‘He needs a good English name, to be sure,’ says Mr Barnes.

  Mrs Shelley stands upright suddenly, her gaze on the lieutenant’s hand as it strokes his sabre in its leather casing.

  ‘While I am grateful that you bring us a child, however, I fear what may have happened to his parents,’ says Mrs Shelley.

  ‘He is from the Coal River,’ says the lieutenant.

  ‘Awakabal and Wonnaruah mob there,’ says Mary.

  Mr Barnes casts a warning glance at Mrs Shelley, but she ignores it, clears her throat and continues:

  ‘I have heard all manner of atrocities committed in the name of bringing progress to the natives and I cannot approve of your methods or accept that you have no choice. Why, you have gore all over you! I would, if I could, seek justice for those miserable people who are God’s children also. We have heard enough of your military violence. You are not wanted here, Sir. Get out of my house now!’

  Mary is thrilled with this daring speech. She opens the door and waits to escort the soldier out. He takes his hat and bows curtly to Mrs Shelley. Mr Barnes is silent with indignation on behalf of the military man and his endeavours. Mary gives the visitor a shove and slams the heavy door behind him. She leans against it and Mrs Shelley smiles at her.

  ‘You cannot treat our military like this. There will be gossip. He was most respectful. Did you see his garb? A nice pair of breeches and those boots with silver clasps; how does he afford such things?’ Mr Barnes asks, but no-one is listening.

  Mary helps with little Harry as he lays still and hot in a crib. They need medicine from the town but Mr Barnes has refused to allow the older girls out of the premises. He wishes to control every
aspect of their lives. He paces the floor and cleans his musket in the dining room.

  Mary hears the stories of her Burruberongal Darug people making raids on settlements and wonders if her father is amongst them. She imagines him with spears standing against the sky.

  But Mrs Shelley is adamant, ‘Mary will go for the medicine and you let her out, Mr Barnes. She is our fastest runner and has the best English. We cannot be patient with your fearful fantasies and wait any longer or the child will perish,’ says Mrs Shelley. Mr Barnes opens the door and Mrs Shelley gives her instructions. Mary flies out.

  She runs through the streets and marvels at the busy markets and storefronts. Even the church seems busy with settlers gathered outside for a wedding. At the apothecary Mary asks for the medicine and is given the precious mixture. She runs back to the schoolhouse and is met with gratitude; the medicine will save the child.

  That night Mrs Shelley is feeling melancholy and writes to her sister to cheer herself up.

  Dear Sister,

  How I long to see you in a few years’ time. How are the lovely children?

  I am now a sad widow, as you know. I have adjusted to life, although I tire of wearing black.

  The town of Parramatta is growing and my students are a joy. As you know from my past letters, my husband was always looking for ways to improve the Aborigines, and the children can now all read and write. A miracle.

  I have recently been honoured with a visit from Lady Macquarie who informed us that the Governor has set up a small farm for Chief Bungaree at Georges Head overlooking Sydney Harbour. The Governor holds this Aboriginal chief in high regard as an ambassador for his people. This is also a home for the Chief’s family, including his dashing son, young Bowen. He is only a youth but is held in high esteem because of his father.

  This native has proved himself worthy of our trust and in 1803 he returned from circumnavigating Australia with Matthew Flinders. There have also been other voyages of exploration.

  The family of Bungaree have a timber hut but you will be amused to hear that all his sable brethren prefer to sleep outside. They also have been given a boat for fishing.

  The Governor granted some convict servants to help them in learning agriculture and they have grown trees of peaches and apricots.

  There are visits from Governors and French explorers dripping with soft talk. They talk to the people, but no gift is given to the clan. They lack the English sense of generosity.

  The Russian Arctic expedition with Captain Bellingshausen and Michailov has arrived in their sloop, the Vostok. They have drawn some splendid pencil portraits of Bungaree’s family and I enclose one for your interest.

  I do trust that all your family is well, and my sweet nieces and nephews are in good health. Please write soon as I am desirous of news from home.

  Your loving sister, Eliza Shelley.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  1819: ELOPEMENT

  Governor Macquarie is planning his departure from the colony after a leading role in the social and economic development of New South Wales. Convicts are still nearly half of the population but it is no longer a simple place of penal servitude; free settlers are arriving by ship every week from Great Britain. An inland settlement of Bathurst, west of the Blue Mountains, has replaced the illusion of a mythical Arcadia beyond the mountains. Now is the golden age for squatters and it heralds the continued destruction of Aboriginal society.

  The Parramatta Native Institution has been improved and there is now a pretty thatched cottage with a white picket fence surrounded by tall eucalypt trees. The cottage, of thick pisé walls, built by convicts, has glass windows, while the garden thrives with vegetables, young fruit trees and chickens. The children climb the lemon tree and nibble the green fruit. A muddy road leads into the centre of the busy town where chain gangs of convicts sweep the paths outside the school and load wheat from outlying farms into carts to take to Sydney.

  Mary is three years older and her English is nearly fluent. She writes a letter to the Governor asking about her father and fears she will never see him again. The image of his face floats in front of her and she tries to keep him there all day. One day she thinks she can hear his voice arguing with Mr Barnes. The voice demands his child, Muraging, but he is told to go away. Mary runs to the door but there is no-one there. She rushes outside, convinced she will see him, but the path is empty.

  The days continue and the seasons change. Cold winds blow from the mountains and Mary can hear the whistling of birds telling her to be strong. She sees other children’s families camping near the schoolhouse, but still no sign of her own.

  One day, Mary watches as Mercy hands a baby boy to his mother under the fence. Mrs Shelley holds out her arms to take him back but Mary is standing with her and shakes her head as she points to the mother and says, ‘Baby wants his mummy, please Mrs.’

  Can’t she see this baby needs his mother’s milk? Mrs Shelley relents and smiles. She walks away with Mary’s hand firmly in her own.

  Mrs Macquarie visits the school in her horse and carriage. She shimmers in silk and a coloured hat as she pats the girls’ heads with her white gloved hand, which makes Mary feel strange and light-headed. The lady’s presence makes Mr Barnes and Mrs Shelley bow and mumble. She moves like a swan, gliding across the floor of the school room where she takes off her glove and places a hand on Mary’s.

  Mary gazes at the pale pink nails and gold rings as the hand directs hers to the ink well, dipping the nib. The lady places a piece of parchment on the desk then directs the writing of Mary’s name. With a flourish and a firm grip, she pushes the nib to write curls and no blots. Mary inhales her perfume, like some strange hypnotic flower, and the lady whispers:

  ‘My dear child. I guess that you can smell my perfume from India, Harum bin Ali. Let me anoint you – dab some on your hand. Such a pretty thing, and so clever,’ says Lady Macquarie.

  Mary allows the perfume to touch her wrists and ears and she swims in fields of flowers. She wonders if a smell can take you away into the sky and take away sadness.

  Lady Macquarie reads aloud from the Sydney Gazette:

  ‘Every human heart must have fondly dilated with the glorious and humanising conception of beholding so many children, snatched from the wilds of barbarism, ignorance and misery … the Native Institution must then have shone forth with all the resplendency so vast and glorious as an object that is capable of emitting: The civilisation and salvation of fellow creatures, at present involved in gross darkness.’

  ‘Lovely, we are so very proud,’ says Mrs Shelley.

  ‘I will undertake to make certain that, after the arrival of the next ship, you all have some Canton cloth, Scotch cloth and lovely Pondicherry cotton to make new attire for all,’ says Mrs Macquarie.

  Mary swoons with love and watches the lady sit near the new female students who are struggling with their writing. These girls have a wildness about them and they whisper about escaping in a language she cannot quite understand.

  …

  One day, two of the newer girls, Betty Fulton and Nancy, elope into the wild. The girls are seen throwing away their clothes and running naked through the bush. Before long, however, they are both returned to the school and native police constables are swiftly rounded up to marry them at St John’s church in Parramatta.

  Mrs Shelley informs the children that the young couples are to be given a hut, a farm and a cow. They will live near Nurrugingy, beside Richmond Road in the bush. They are also given tea and loaves, three petticoats – that Mary has sewn – and a quarter pound of soap, two yards of print cloth and the same of calico. Mary is jealous of these girls and their new-found freedom and wonders at the justice of it.

  Death has recently come to the school – the babies died in the night of pestilence. Harry, too, is sick and his feverish head lies in Mary’s lap. His hands clutch the blanket and he thrashes back and forth. Mary prays to God, but Jesus does not come to heal him. She makes a medicine of sarsaparilla vine
and drips little bits into his mouth with honey. They boil up willow bark for pain and fever and rub the eucalyptus oil from steamed leaves onto the child’s chest. Other little ones are sick and Mrs Shelley paces the room with her lantern.

  Mary and Mercy wash the little ones’ heads with cool water. Harry does not survive. The baby’s ghost is now amongst them. Mercy takes some sticks and they make a fire in a bowl in the babies’ room so they can cleanse the area. But as the blue smoke winds up to the roof, Mrs Shelley runs in with a bucket of water and puts it out.

  Mary thinks she cannot stay in this terrible place a moment longer. The waibala force them to stay in rooms full of death and spirits. Mr Barnes takes Harry’s crib and washes it with turpentine, but the girls will not go near it. They can feel the baby’s face looking at them and the light from his crib fills the house.

  It is cold and Mary escapes the dormitory – she would rather curl up by the kitchen fire and sleep with the dogs.

  …

  Time moves slowly and the long year has made Mary stronger. She keeps the memory of her father safe and will not talk about her aunts. Perhaps they are gone forever. The mob’s camp at Freeman’s Reach is a secret thing and only Mercy is allowed to know about the people who live in this fading place.

  ‘You’d better not eat with your fingers, you dirty guttersnipe. My da would fix you, gach maidin,’ says Cook. For many years she was a convict and her suffering has made her angry and bitter. A Presbyterian from Ireland, she waddles when she moves and is always eating more than her share. When Mary reaches for more bread, Cook hits her hand with a metal spoon.

  ‘You go and empty the chamber pots quick fast or feel my stick. You Sambo san Afraic,’ Cook bleats and Mary runs to do her work.

  Mr Barnes sits in the kitchen when Mary runs through and grabs a piece of bread to eat. He is furious and chases her with a wooden spoon – she laughs and escapes to the yard. He calls to Mrs Shelley but she is preoccupied with the storeroom and has lists to be made.