To Love a Sunburnt Country

by Jackie French

  She looked at Gavin perched on Sally’s hip, this little boy who lived because this man had perhaps broken rules from headquarters to give him extra food, had perhaps broken other rules to let her pick flower buds and the grass for the string — and therefore secretly bring in the small parcels that still appeared in the bushes every few days, sometimes dried fish or a sweet potato. It was not much. But combined with the flower buds, with the meat from a rat or lizard once or twice a week, it had kept them alive.

  She looked back at him. For the first time her bow was genuine. ‘Sayonara,’ she said. ‘Arigato.’ She hesitated. This man had also starved them, allowed his men to strike them, steal from them; crimes that in normal life, if there was ever normal life, would have meant years in prison. But every man should have someone farewell him when he went to battle. ‘May you travel safely, sensei,’ she added softly.

  She gestured to Sally, to Moira. They bowed again. The other women did the same. They kept the bow as the commandant walked back to the officers’ house.

  She thought, as she looked at him from under her eyelashes, that there were tears in his eyes. But perhaps it was just the glint of the sun.

  She opened the box in the hut she shared with Moira and Gavin. For some reason she didn’t want the guards to see what was in it, though surely the commandant would not have given her or, rather, Gavin, anything the guards would object to.

  She drew the objects out, one by one. A book. A book written in English. Not just in English — an Australian book, The Magic Pudding by Norman Lindsay. It had pictures too — Gavin would love the pictures, even if the book was a bit too old for him. But she could use it to teach him to read. She could read it herself, over and over, dream of an Australia where the mornings smelt like Pears soap and there was always pudding to eat, no matter how much of it you’d consumed the night before.

  There was a small cloth bag too. She opened that, and stared. Small wrapped lollies, in bright paper. Her stomach cramped with longing. But these were Gavin’s. Nurse Rogers said it was important to give anyone with dysentery sweet and salty things, to keep up their strength. She must keep these for an emergency. Dysentery could kill a child far quicker than it could an adult.

  A bottle. She looked at the label, which was in English, not Japanese. Quinine tablets. Enough for several cases of malaria. She was glad that the guards hadn’t seen her with those.

  A can of cheese, again with an English label. Gavin needed the calcium. A can of bully beef. What soldiers’ rations, she wondered, had the beef and cheese come from? A packet of Empire Rich Teas. Also known as squished flies.

  And suddenly she was crying, gazing at the biscuits made so far away at Blue and Mah McAlpine’s factory, at Gibber’s Creek. I will keep the packet, she thought, after Gavin eats the biscuits. Because that packet had come from home, had been touched by people from her land. She would tell him the story of how the circus came to Gibber’s Creek too, how its mermaid and magician’s assistant had stayed, in the country they had recognised as home.

  She wiped her eyes before Gavin saw she was crying — he got upset too when anybody cried, so they all kept careful smiles on their faces when he was near. And then she saw it.

  Sitting at the bottom of the box was the photograph of the girl her age, sitting facing the camera. She picked it up, and gazed at it.

  Had the commandant put the photo in the box accidentally? He had held it like it was the most precious possession he had.

  And that is why he left it, she thought. Whatever he was going to, he wanted that photograph to be safe. Not buried in mud, or blown up at sea. The commandant had no need to look at it; had gazed at it for a thousand hours perhaps. But he loved it too much to risk it being destroyed. Was his daughter still alive? Perhaps this was the only image of her that remained. She could never ask him now.

  Was he a good man? She didn’t know whether he was good, but she did know that he was not bad. Had he fought battles to keep them alive? Or had he simply done his job, not caring much, till ordered to another battlefield, one with more honour for him than this one. But she thought, perhaps, it was the former.

  Sayonara, she thought, then called Gavin over to feed him squished flies, and read the most precious book in all the world.

  The car came for the commandant the next morning. Nancy assumed it had come from a ship, as they had heard no car engines until now. As far as she and the other women knew, there were no cars on the island, only bicycles, now all commandeered by the Japanese. Mrs Hughendorn had burnt their own car, just as she had ordered the burning of all machinery and the stores of rubber, before the Japanese arrived.

  No new commandant came, nor did new guards.

  ‘You know what that means,’ said Sally, as they sat around the cooking fire one evening. There had been a small packet of spices in the bushes that afternoon. The camp smelt of mould and latrines, but their nightly sago was now fragrant, mixed with the flower buds, and the small, green kidney-shaped leaves that Nancy had thought looked like ones Gran sometimes picked and ate at home (they tasted like them too), and an ‘island rabbit’, caught by the latrine and given an extra-long boiling.

  ‘What does it mean?’ demanded Mrs Hughendorn. She had regained much of her strength, perhaps as much from the knowledge that the islanders she had known had not abandoned her as from the food they left. She now sat erect again on their only chair, her skin hanging in long flaps from her jaw and arms, and swaying as she sipped her stew.

  ‘It means the Japanese need every man they can get. They don’t have any spare soldiers to come here and watch over a bunch of women and a child.’

  ‘Or maybe the opposite,’ said Moira quietly. ‘Maybe they feel confident that the island has settled under Japanese occupation. Maybe they have Papua under control now too and are fighting in Australia.’

  ‘No!’ The cry came before she realised it came from her. Nancy bit her lip. ‘We’ll beat them off.’

  ‘Of course we will, dear,’ said Mrs Hughendorn quickly. ‘You Australians are splendid fighters.’

  Nancy said nothing. That was what everyone had said about Malaya, about Singapore. That they could not be taken by the Japanese either. Australians had fought there as well, in a combined force that far outnumbered the Japanese. And they had lost.

  She ate her stew in silence.

  Chapter 42

  Gibber’s Creek Gazette, 1 December 1943

  School Bonfire Success

  By Elaine Sampson, aged eleven and a third

  Last night our school had a bonfire night. We made a big scarecrow called Hitler from Joey Marshall’s dad’s old trousers and shirt and lots of straw. We used black paper for the moustache and hair and flour-paste glue. We all brought sticks from home.

  We each paid a penny to take a ticket to see who would light the fire and Sharon Adams won but made a mess of it so Billy Bloggs did it for her. It took half an hour for Hitler to burn and we all cheered and roasted potatoes. Today anyone who gets kept in after school has to rake away the mess.

  We raised two shillings and ninepence for the war effort, and Councillor Bullant said, ‘Well done, Gibber’s Creek Central School.’

  DRINKWATER, 24 DECEMBER 1943

  MICHAEL

  Santa arrived in a dusty ute and with three days’ dark stubble below his white beard. He’d been dagging sheep for the past week, and still smelt slightly of sheep bums and lanolin.

  Kids and their parents gathered in the shade of the oak trees as Santa handed out the gifts, one to each child, not just for those whose fathers were overseas or serving elsewhere, but a special hug for them. Good gifts too. Toys were as scarce as zippers and knicker elastic, but his mother had hired old Stumpy Farrel to make wooden rocking horses, cricket bats, tricycles and wagons for the children to pull. Anything that could be made of wood, cut from the farm, mostly she-oak with its red-gold sheen from up the gullies, soft enough to work with, hard enough to take rough use. The curtains from the spare bedrooms ha
d been sacrificed to make dresses for the older girls, created by Mrs Barrington on her treadle sewing machine, inspired by the latest photos in The Sydney Morning Herald.

  There would be no party tonight. No dancing. His mother had made the excuse that it was too hard for many of the families to get to Drinkwater and back at night, with petrol rationing, too late for kids to ride ponies or bicycles. Which was true, but Michael suspected the heart of her decision was the deepening grief and worry of their family and friends. It was easier to turn the annual Christmas party into a children’s afternoon tea than smile and dance.

  But the trestles were still covered with the Christmas cloths, the silver still shone, the punch bowl was full. The plates were filled with afternoon tea: scones and pikelets, with sugarless jam from home-grown strawberries and peaches, cakes sweet with fruit too, fairy cakes with home-churned cream under their wings, thick-cut mutton and chutney sandwiches, corned mutton sandwiches, chicken and lettuce, and mock chicken, the egg and tomato and onion mix that didn’t taste like chicken at all, and that the fellows at school called ‘train smash’. The big CWA teapots were kept filled beside the rows of teacups — his parents and Mah and Blue had saved their tea rations for months.

  Michael sat on the veranda. Around him, men talked stock prices or how to keep pumps going when there were no spare parts, comparing rainfalls, pitifully small. Michael glanced up at the sky, hoping, yet again, to see thunder clouds climbing over themselves on the horizon. It was bare of all but the silhouette of cliffs and trees.

  But a prickle between his shoulder blades still said a storm might be building. He peered down at the ants that usually scurried between the veranda pot plants. None to be seen. Which meant they might, hopefully, be barricading their holes against the water to come …

  ‘Looking for the ants?’ Mr Clancy sat heavily in the squatter’s chair next to him.

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘No need to “sir” me, son.’

  ‘Thank you.’ What was he to call him then? Mr Clancy didn’t say. Instead he moved restlessly in his chair.

  ‘Feel like a walk?’

  Michael nodded. He followed the small dark man down the steps and around the Santa-less side of the house. For a moment he wondered if Mr Clancy would head down to the river, to check perhaps if the swan was there. It was, along with some of its offspring from the year before too. Michael suspected that with inland lakes drying up, the swan preferred the security of the backwaters of the river. Which did not affect its link with Nancy. Or that was what he told himself.

  Instead Mr Clancy strode past the shearing shed, over to the horse paddock. He leant on the gate, watching Snow King’s great-great-grandson canter along the fence line, excited by the scents and sounds of other horses and strangers.

  Michael leant next to him. Surprisingly the silence was companionable. Mr Clancy yawned. ‘Sorry. Long days. Too much to do and not enough hands to do it. You know how it is.’

  Michael nodded, aware as he did so that he did not really know, but only guessed at the edges of the reality, insulated as he was at school for so much of the year.

  ‘You don’t have any Land Girls?’

  ‘No.’

  The word was curt. Of course not, thought Michael, feeling he had put a size-fourteen boot in his mouth. Young women about the farm would only remind you all too much of Nancy.

  ‘We’re only staying for tomorrow, then I’d better get back to it. Need to lay pipe down from the creek up in the hills. The windmill shaft broke in the wind a fortnight ago and I can’t get the necessary parts.’

  ‘Would you like me to come over for a few days to give you a hand?’

  The look on Mr Clancy’s face told him the answer, despite his careful, ‘You’re not needed here?’

  They manage without me during term time, thought Michael. ‘They can spare me for a week or so. That’d be enough time to get the pipe laid?’

  ‘I reckon. Thanks.’

  ‘Maybe Dad could have a look at your windmill too.’

  ‘Your father?’

  Michael laughed. ‘Dad was a pretty good bush mechanic before he became the industrialist, Mr Thomas Thompson. He fixed Mah’s washing machine last week.’ Someone at the factory could probably either fix or replace the shaft too, he thought. But what went on at the factory was classified, not even to be mentioned to Mr Clancy.

  ‘Thanks,’ said Mr Clancy again, still looking at the horse, not at Michael.

  I’m doing it for Nancy, thought Michael. Then, no, not for Nancy. Even if he’d never met Nancy, he’d have made the offer. The man was a neighbour. He liked him. You stood by your own or laid pipe with them. This was simply what you did, as Mr Clancy would help in his turn, if he could.

  ‘Look.’ The older man pointed at the ground, at an ant’s nest, now covered with shreds of bark. ‘Thunderstorm’s coming. And rain with it. Hope we get it down our way too. Come on, the wife’ll be wondering where I’ve got to.’

  They turned back. We haven’t mentioned Nancy, thought Michael, unsure whether to be relieved or saddened. But we have spoken of Overflow and ants. In a way he could not explain, that felt like they had talked about Nancy too.

  Chapter 43

  Gibber’s Creek Gazette, 5 January 1944

  Red Cross Donations for this Week

  Mrs H Bullant: 14 prs socks; 5 cakes soap; 2 prs bootlaces; 2 pyjama coats; 2 parcels old linen

  Mrs H Ellis: 16 prs socks; 6 face washers

  Mrs Lee: 1 pr socks; 2 prs comforters; 2 prs bootlaces; 2 shaving cream; 12 cakes soap

  Miss Anita Bevedge: 4 prs socks; 1 hot-water-bottle cover; 3 singlets; magazines

  Mrs M Thompson: 6 face washers; 50 cakes soap

  Mrs B McAlpine: 7 prs socks; 6 hot-water-bottle covers; 20 shaving cream and brushes; 14 fruitcakes

  Mrs M McAlpine: 12 prs socks; 12 plum puddings

  Miss Beverly Bridges: 3 prs socks; 6 pillow slips

  PULAU AYU PRISON CAMP, JANUARY 1944

  NANCY

  Christmas departed: ‘roast goose’, which was really a small boiled python Nancy had caught and killed as she picked hibiscus buds, then wrapped around her middle to smuggle it into camp. Her dress was so loose now she could have hidden a medium-sized crocodile.

  Malaria came again. While they had access to quinine, at least, they survived. Mrs Hughendorn’s hands were bare of rings. Nancy didn’t know if it was because they had grown too thin for the rings to stay on, or if she had sold them all in exchange for the drugs that kept them alive. Rain came, solid water from the sky, or sudden windstorms sweeping, roaring, chewing their roofs and spitting them out.

  The rations had changed: less cassava, more sago. But she was able to catch ‘island rabbit’ nearly every night now, crouched by the latrine, ready to pounce. And bananas still came each morning for Gavin. He was thin, his legs like sticks, a small potbelly she knew was not fat. But he still had the energy to catch his ‘ball’ when the women took it in turns to throw it to him; still snuggled up to her in the heat of the afternoon to listen to The Magic Pudding and stories of Overflow, far away.

  But there would be no stories this afternoon, not over the clatter of rain in the wet season, with only half a roof left from the previous night’s storm, and the clouds building up again.

  The translator had grown even thinner, she realised, as she stepped up to him head down in a show of respect before she drew close enough to bow. His uniform hung off him now. The cuffs were tatty, his cap stained with sweat. His posture was still erect, but she thought his expression was softer these days, especially when he looked at Gavin.

  ‘Please, Translator-san, may we cut more palm thatch to mend the roof?’

  ‘No knives for prisoners.’

  ‘Oh.’ She hadn’t thought of that. ‘But perhaps the wind blew down palm fronds, Translator-san. We could pick them up.’

  He considered, nodded. ‘I will go with you.’

  The statement surprised her. He had never gone
out of the camp with her when she had picked hibiscus buds. Perhaps, she thought, he is as tired of this compound as we are, though he probably spent most of his time at the plantations, translating for the workers there, or for the fishermen who spoke more English than Japanese. Perhaps that too had now changed, as the people of this land once again learnt a victor’s language.

  ‘Please, Translator-san, may the other women come too? And the little boy? He has never seen the sea.’

  Yes, the translator’s look did soften when he looked at Gavin. ‘You and one other woman may go. And the boy.’

  She bowed low again. ‘Thank you, Translator-san. You honour us prisoners.’

  He didn’t smile. He knows I am lying, she thought. Knows I am trying to please him to get what I want. But it is worth it.

  The sand steamed that morning, as the sun sucked back the rain. Moira and Nancy held Gavin’s hands as the little boy stared at the unimagined endlessness of the sea. ‘Why does the water go back and forwards?’

  ‘I don’t know …’ Nancy had started to say, when the translator spoke from behind them.

  ‘The wind blows the water one way and makes a wave, then the water rolls back and feeds another wave, which rolls forwards.’

  Gavin frowned, trying to work it out. ‘If we push the waves, can we make them all roll back?’

  ‘No,’ said the translator. ‘Sometimes the wind makes great waves, taller than the tree. Sometimes there is a big shaking of the earth, under the sea, and a big wave comes then too.’

  Gavin stepped back, his hands clutching their fingers tighter. ‘Will it do that today?’

  The translator smiled. Nancy realised that she had never seen him smile before. ‘No. The sea is happy today because the storm is over. Come.’ To Nancy’s amazement, he took the boy’s hand in his. They walked down to the water, the translator picking up bits of debris, seashells, pointing to a crab for Gavin to laugh at.

  ‘Wonders will never cease,’ said Nancy. ‘Moira, what is that?’