Dresses of Red and Gold

by Robin Klein

  ‘Five more days to get through!’ Cathy said sadly. ‘Dad, you reckon you once fought off a whole enemy platoon single-handed in the desert—why don’t you just tell her to go home?’

  ‘Have a heart,’ Dad said. ‘Aunt Ivy’s a different kettle of fish. I’ve seen her wade in and bust up a barney in a shearing-shed with only a little rolling-pin.’

  ‘In other words we’re expected to just lump it till Mum comes home,’ Heather said. ‘Well, count me out! I’m inviting myself down to Isobel’s after school tomorrow night and every other night until Mum gets back!’

  ‘Me too!’ Cathy cried.

  ‘And me!’ Vivienne said.

  ‘That Isobel’s a dingbat and so’s her mother, barmy as bandicoots the pair of them! You don’t want to camp down there…’

  ‘Better than up here with Aunt Ivy.’

  ‘Listen, you can’t do this to a bloke! If you all nick off, there’s only going to be me here to get picked on!’

  ‘Better you than us,’ they said heartlessly, but because he looked so miserable, they made him an extra round of French toast.

  ‘Bloody woman, why couldn’t she just stay up the river and get on with her feud?’ he muttered crossly, refusing to cheer up.

  ‘What feud’s that? There wouldn’t be anyone brave enough to start one with her!’

  ‘Old Mrs Gammon who lives down the road from her did. One of them won a prize in the Show for a cake ten years back and the other one reckoned there’d been a mix-up and she should have got it instead. Jealous, just like two squally cats, and they’ve been at it ever since…’

  ‘What may I ask is going on out here?’ Aunt Ivy said at the door, making them all jump. ‘Leighton Melling, I’m surprised at you letting these children get up and ruin their digestions in the middle of the night—not to mention joining in yourself!’

  ‘Me? I only came out to send them back to bed with a flea in their ear,’ Dad lied.

  They all gasped at his craven deceit and still weren’t speaking to him in the morning. He deserved to be left alone with Aunt Ivy, they decided, but their personal escape plans came to nothing. Aunt Ivy spotted pyjamas and toothbrushes in various school-bags and said she certainly wouldn’t allow them to spend the night at any other house, especially not Isobel Dion’s, while she was responsible for them in Mum’s absence. And besides, they had to come straight home after school to give Dad a hand cleaning all the rubbish out of the shed. Heather, Cathy and Vivienne turned pale at the prospect, but Dad, oddly enough, didn’t react, even though no one was ever allowed to touch as much as a roofing nail amongst all his years of jealously hoarded shed junk.

  ‘I’ll make a start on the shed right after breakfast,’ he said virtuously. ‘Been meaning to do it for months, really. Oh, by the way, Aunt Ivy, you know that old feller Bert Gammon lives up your way?’

  Aunt Ivy glanced at him with irritation. ‘Naturally I do, seeing he’s a neighbour. Now, about that shed—you’re going to have to make a whole lot of trips to the tip. I counted four rusty old ploughs in there and what looks like a complete tractor taken to pieces…’

  ‘I was having a bit of a yarn to Bert over the front fence before I did the milking this morning,’ Dad said. ‘He came downtown early to pick up a new sawblade.’

  ‘I’m not particularly interested in those Gammons and what they do with their time,’ Aunt Ivy said. ‘When the shed’s cleared out it could do with a lick of paint…’

  ‘Bert said to give you his regards. Oh…and his missus sends hers and wants to know just when you’re planning to sell up.’

  ‘Sell up? I’m certainly not planning to sell anything! Why on earth would they have such a stupid idea?’

  ‘Well, as far as I can make out they seem to think you’re planning on living down here permanently. With us, to be close to the hospital. Bert says he was very sorry to hear about your ticker, but his missus wasn’t surprised—she thought you’ve been looking a bit pale round the gills lately.’

  ‘The nerve of that Agnes Gammon—I’ve never had a day’s sickness in my life!’

  ‘Aunt Ivy, I’ve really got to hand it to you,’ Dad said admiringly. ‘You’re a real old battler, and even if you had double pneumonia you’d just pass it off as hayfever. You should have told us you’ve been crook, you know. Tearing around doing all the work here, it’s not right, specially if the old ticker’s mucking up on you. I don’t think you should walk up that hill to the hospital for treatment, either—one of the girls can nick up there and get a lend of a wheelchair…’

  ‘I’ve never ever been to hospital and I don’t intend to!’ Aunt Ivy said with scorn. ‘Illness is all in the mind. Why, that time I gashed my leg out in the paddock I just boiled up a needle and thread and stitched it up myself! Looking poorly, indeed—I can run rings around Agnes Gammon any old day! Gossip-mongers, that’s all they are up in Baroongal. Leave that place for five minutes and they’re all hard at it, ripping people’s reputations to shreds! There’s nothing wrong with my heart…’

  ‘Well, I’m pleased to hear it. The way Bert was telling it, you wouldn’t even be up to putting your cake entry in the Show this year.’

  ‘Oh, won’t I, indeed? If Agnes Gammon thinks that, she’s in for a very nasty shock!’

  ‘I’m pleased to hear there’s nothing wrong with your health,’ Dad said. ‘They’re a lot of blabbermouths up there, just like you said. I know what you mean about that Mrs Gammon, she sounds the type can do you serious dirt if you’re not there to keep her in check. Take that other thing Bert mentioned, those little frippery icing things you put on cakes…’

  ‘Just what are you talking about, Leighton?’

  ‘Not me—Bert’s missus. She reckoned to Bert you’ll probably be buying a packet of those little icing things ready-made from the bakery on account of your arthritis. To put on your Show cake, if you can manage to get one made in time this year…’

  ‘Ready-made cake decorations from the bakery?’ Aunt Ivy said faintly. ‘You girls—I don’t know why you’re all still sitting around when it’s time you were off to school. You’re big enough to get yourself off to school without being stood over…and as a matter of fact, Leighton, I don’t see why on earth you couldn’t all manage on your own till Connie gets back.’

  ‘I suppose I could,’ Dad said. ‘It’s just a matter of keeping noses to the grindstone. I’ll get on to those bone-idle hussies soon as they come home from school, make sure none of the chores get skimped. Too much larking around and frittering away their time, that’s the trouble…’

  ‘I’d stay a bit longer, of course, but there’s a few things I have to get done up at my place. My little fondant icing flowers I make every year, got to get them just right. More than right—perfect. What time does the mail-van pass by here?’

  ‘About twenty minutes,’ Dad said. ‘You girls, where’s your manners, look lively and give your aunt a hand with her packing.’

  ‘Dad,’ Cathy said, cunningly staying behind to unbraid her antler plaits. ‘You went straight out the back to do the milking this morning—I saw you.’

  ‘So what?’ Dad asked, whistling.

  ‘So—how could you possibly have talked to anyone over the front fence?’

  ‘Hold your gabby tongue,’ Dad whispered. ‘Or I won’t let you wag school and come fishing with me.’

  Bridesmaid

  ‘It’s not really maroon and it’s not exactly burgundy,’ Heather said. ‘Cerise, maybe…’

  ‘Red,’ Isobel said firmly. ‘It’s going to be the most peculiar-looking wedding—fancy walking down the aisle with four bridesmaids dressed in red! Bridesmaids always wear pink or blue or maybe at a pinch mauve, and if you ask me, Cathy’s going to look exactly like one of those pageboys they have in big posh hotels. I wouldn’t be surprised if someone asks her for a packet of cigarettes.’

  ‘It’s more russet coloured than anything else,’ Mum said. ‘I think it’s pretty, even if it is…well, unusual. Autumn colours
picked to fit in with the season…Hilary Melling always was a sophisticated sort of girl, so it was on the cards she’d choose something a bit different when the time came. Cathy’s going to look sweet as a bridesmaid, and it’s a shame Dad will miss out seeing her—though, mind you, I think he chose this week on purpose to go up and run the Grantbys’ farm while they’re away. He doesn’t like weddings all that much. I remember when we got married, he tried to talk me into running off with him the day before so he wouldn’t have to get all dressed up and make a speech. Cathy’s the same. I just wish she’d show more enthusiasm, it was like roping a steer to get her along to the fittings even!’

  She spread the bridesmaid dress carefully over the dining-room table beside the gold mesh Juliet cap, the gold basket and a new pair of red ankle-strap shoes, a gift to Cathy from the bride-to-be. Vivienne gazed yearningly at those glorious things, particularly the dress, which had been collected from the dressmaker that afternoon. It had a long skirt like a calyx, a square neckline trimmed with gold braid, and a beauty that magnetised her fingers.

  ‘Vivienne, don’t you dare touch anything on this table!’ Mum ordered. ‘And that goes for the whole lot of you—I’m going to shut the door and no one’s to come in here at all. Heaven knows, I’ve got more than enough to do without sponging off sticky fingerprints and ironing out creases. There’s my poem to write. I’ve never missed out yet commemorating the special events in people’s lives with a nice verse—and you can’t believe how hard it is to find a word that rhymes with Hilary. Plus there’s all those little posies to make up yet.’

  ‘Cathy’s got to stand at the church door with the gold basket and hand out flower sprays to all the ladies as they go in,’ Heather explained to Isobel.

  ‘Well, if I was a guest I’d rather get handed a glass of champagne right at the start. And that basket looks more like a gold stingray…’

  ‘Isobel, you can run along home now you’ve seen Cathy’s outfit,’ Mum said crisply, ticking off agitated lists in her mind. ‘The girls won’t have time to sit around gossiping, they’ve got to help me with all the last-minute things. The posies, plus all those chicken wishbones out in the kitchen waiting to be painted gold and have little ribbon bows tied on…oh, how I miss Grace at a time like this! It’s such a pity she couldn’t get time off for the wedding. Still, I mustn’t grumble about that, she’ll be home for a visit in a few weeks.’

  ‘Grace is well out of it,’ Heather told Isobel. ‘That’s another one of Hilary’s high-falutin ideas, those chicken wishbones. They’re for the table place-settings, and I don’t see why she couldn’t be doing it instead of us. She’s the one thought it up. I don’t think it’s fair, anyhow—Viv and me have been slaving away collecting fern down by the river and stuff like that, and we’re not even invited to her old wedding! It’s only Mum going, and Cathy because of her being one of the bridesmaids.’

  ‘Hilary had to draw the line somewhere. If she invited every relation in Wilgawa there wouldn’t even be standing room,’ Mum said. ‘And where is that aggravating Cathy, by the way? I want her fetched in now from wherever she is to have her hair washed and put up in rag curlers—better not mention the curlers until you’ve got her safely inside.’

  Cathy wasn’t difficult to find. For the past week she’d been spending all her free time building a complicated platform in a tree at the end of the paddock. Furious at being disturbed, she scowled down at them with a fistful of nails.

  ‘There’s a scratch on your cheek going to need half a bottle of calamine lotion to disguise it,’ Heather said. ‘You’re supposed to be a bridesmaid tomorrow, in case you’ve forgotten. Come down out of there before you do yourself any more damage.’

  Cathy fingered the scratch and dismissed it as minor surface injury, nothing which she or anyone else in their right minds need be concerned about. She banged in another nail and inspected the result. In her imagination, the finished lookout would be as splendid as a military headquarters, boasting multiple levels connected by gangways, a trapdoor and a secret safe with a combination lock where she could store her possessions. But all she had to show so far for several days’ hard work—maddeningly interrupted at intervals by stupid dress-fittings—was a rough floor of planks and a wonky roof, the seams filled with tar. Some of the planks creaked and wobbled alarmingly. Perhaps, she thought, it might be advisable to prise the whole lot off and try hammering them down at a different angle…

  ‘Mum wants you right now,’ Heather said bossily.

  ‘You’ve got to come in and have your hair washed and put up in rags for tomorrow,’ Isobel blabbed.

  Cathy, enraged, hurled away the fistful of nails and yelled, ‘I’m not having my hair tied up in curling rags and end up looking like a merino! It’s bad enough I’ve got to wear that gruesome dress! I didn’t even want to be a bridesmaid, and I don’t see why they couldn’t have asked Vivienne instead—she’s so soft in the head she’d probably like it!’

  ‘Hilary Melling’s your godmother, that’s why you got asked,’ Heather said. ‘Come on, act your age and stop making such a fuss. You know you can’t get out of having your hair done.’

  Cathy climbed miserably down the slats she’d nailed to the tree trunk for a ladder. ‘I’ve got a good mind to eat a whole packet of prunes before I go to bed,’ she said. ‘Then they’d have to use Viv instead of me. There’s only going to be one good thing about this whole rotten wedding, and that’s the party food afterwards. Asparagus rolls, they’re having, and little crumbed cutlets done up in paper frills and Napoleon cakes…’

  ‘Make sure you pinch some off the table and bring them home for us,’ Isobel said greedily.

  ‘And just where am I supposed to hide them?’

  ‘In your gold stingray basket, of course,’ Isobel smirked. ‘Geeze, what a hoot having to lug that thing down the aisle, just like Little Red Riding Hood…’

  Cathy’s foot shot out and Isobel sat down suddenly on a thistle.

  ‘It’s not polite to poke fun about people’s weddings,’ Vivienne said indignantly. ‘I think a basket full of sprays for all the guests is a lovely idea. Cathy won’t even be lugging it down the aisle, anyhow. After she’s handed out the posies she’ll be carrying a bouquet of gold pom-pom chrysanthemums like the other bridesmaids.’

  ‘I reckon that sounds just as bad—they’ll look like a handful of ox eyes on skewers,’ Isobel said, and Cathy, plunged into deeper misery, stomped down to the house to have her hair lathered and rinsed in a basin then curled tightly around strips torn from an old pillowcase, with Mum ignoring all her squawks.

  ‘I’ll never be able to get to sleep tonight lying on all this!’ Cathy muttered furiously. ‘It’s medieval torture, just like the rack—why don’t you yank my fingernails out, too, while you’re about it!’

  ‘Fingernails—I’m glad you reminded me,’ Mum said. ‘Isobel, you can make yourself useful for a change before you scoot off home. Do something about this child’s nails, they look as though she’s been putting up dry-stone walls all her life.’

  Cathy grizzled and complained while her cuticles were pushed back and the nails filed ruthlessly into neat ovals. To complete the manicure, Isobel rubbed in cold cream and made her put on a pair of cotton gloves, with instructions that they weren’t to be removed until the morning. Cathy, not in the least grateful, didn’t get up to see her out or wave goodbye. She scowled all through supper, cheering up only when she realised that she couldn’t be expected to do the dishes with her hands encased in beauty gloves, even though it was her turn. She also got out of feeding the hens and fetching the washing in for the same reason, and Vivienne had to do all those jobs alone, for Mum and Heather were busily assembling the buttonhole sprays at the kitchen table.

  ‘There’s not going to be nearly enough maidenhair fern,’ Mum said worriedly. ‘And I don’t want to skimp on them, either, and have half the relatives getting a posy and the rest missing out. That could lead to all sorts of feuds. We’ll just have to put
them aside and make up some more first thing tomorrow. One of you can go out before breakfast and pick some extra fern, but right now we’d better get cracking with these wishbones…’

  Vivienne would have loved to help with a fascinating project like that, but Heather, who also liked being artistic with gold frosting, said she’d only make a mess of it. The wishbones were placed to dry on matchstick supports while Mum cut up a roll of narrow ribbon for bow decorations, snipping the edges into V shapes so the satin wouldn’t fray. Vivienne wasn’t allowed to help with that, either, because everyone in the house knew she couldn’t even be trusted to tie her own plait ribbons properly.

  ‘Stop breathing down my neck, it’s like standing next to a llama! You nearly made me cut this in the wrong place,’ Mum said crossly, and sent her off to sweep the hall, a job Vivienne loathed because of the coir matting which had to be rolled up and then replaced. She cheated by lifting the mat at one side and flicking the dust underneath, then unable to resist temptation, slipped through the lounge-room door to gaze at the bridesmaid things. Oh, the dress was sublime, in spite of Isobel’s and Cathy’s comments! Aunt Ivy had a tapestry firescreen with a lion and a unicorn worked on either side, and a princess in a blossomy bower in the centre. That tapestry princess wore a dress just like this one—a beautiful maroon-burgundy-cerise-russet dress trimmed with bands of gold, and a little gold cap on her head…It would all be completely wasted on Cathy! Tomorrow at ten she’d go with Mum across town to Hilary Melling’s place to be garbed in all her finery with the other bridesmaids. What an utter and abysmal waste, such glories for someone who never showed the slightest interest in what she wore, and whose idea of a good time was sliding down clay slicks at the quarry!