‘Nah, I ain’t tired. I’m thinkin’ ’bout Petal comin’ home. Remember that mauve dress o’ lace an’ tulle I made fer her when that actin’ teacher said it’d be good fer ’er ta go ta that ball an’ learn how ta carry herself in public? Pretty it was, like the lilac blossoms in October. How old was she then?’
‘Sixteen, Mum.’ Aunty Bubby set her knitting aside. ‘She looked real beautiful, she did.’
‘I never liked dresses, too much bloody trouble!’ Aunty Boo took out her latest paperback. ‘Anyway, talkin’ ’bout Petal makes me tired.’
Aunty Bubby got up and reached for the old saucepan that she used to heat the milk for the lambs. I shut my eyes and feigned sleep when she came over to collect the ones I was snuggled up to.
As the lambs guzzled Aunty Bubby’s warm milk, I pulled my heavy quilt up to my ears and turned my face towards the shimmering fire.
‘Another cuppa, sista, before we turn in?’ Aunty Bubby’s voice rose above the clatter of the dishes she was now scrubbing.
‘Shouldna got them actin’ lessons fer Petal,’ Aunty Boo said, putting the book down. ‘Or let ’er go ta that bloody dance! An’ I’ll never forgive that bloody Richie comin’ along an’ sayin’ he’d drive ’er afta I twisted me ankle in the wet grass an’ couldn’t drive.’
I’d heard how Uncle Richie liked going out, drinking and socialising with flashy women more than he liked working, and that my Grandfather William had bought him a shiny new red car for his twenty-first birthday and after that he was rarely ever home. But, there was more to the story.
‘Calm down, sista-girl,’ Aunty Bubby soothed. ‘What’s done is done. Besides, it ain’t all bad. We all still here, ain’t we?’
But Aunty Boo had to vent her spleen.
‘I begged her not ta go with ’im. I told ’er there’d be other times, but she was hell-bent on wearin’ that dress Mum made fer ’er an’ showin’ off ta all them new friends she made. I could smell the plonk on his breath but Petal wouldn’t listen. Too bloody use ta gettin’ ’er own way . . . an’ that was our fault. We never said no ta her, did we? I was the only one awake when that damn-bloody phone rang.
‘Ya brother appears ta have lost control o’ the car. The young woman was thrown clear an’ is bein’ treated at the local hospital but ya brother’s serious an’ been takin’ by ambulance ta the big hospital in Wagga . . . might even hafta move him ta Sydney . . .’
Aunty Boo’s hand was shaking so much she couldn’t even hold the cup of tea Aunty Bubby brought her.
‘Poor little Petal.’ Aunty Bubby sounded on the verge of tears too. ‘Never forget the first time we saw her face afta the accident . . . so swollen an’ bruised she could hardly see outta her eyes an’ her lips spread all the way ta her nose. An’ in the car from the hospital the poor little darlin’ jus’ buried her head in me lap an’ cried all the way home. Poor ol’ Mum, had her work cut out tryin’ ta calm down Dad about Richie. He ranted an’ raved an’ said he was gunna sell the farm if Richie didn’t get betta.’
Aunty Boo was dry-eyed now. ‘An’ Petal kept cryin’ ’bout her face. Mum tried ta cheer her up with some new dress patterns an’ you tried ta cheer her up with her favourite stories, but she jus’ stared at the wall fer days.’
As I listened from my bed on the floor by their feet, I thought that nothing much had changed. No one was ever happy if Petal wasn’t.
Aunty Boo pulled the knitted patchwork rug off the fender and covered Nan, who was snoring on the couch.
Aunty Bubby cleared her throat and said, ‘Useless as he was, it was good news when we heard that Richie ’ud get betta too, even though it’d take months. Dad settled down an’ stopped talkin’ ’bout sellin’ the farm out from under us an’ turnin’ us out on the high road.’
‘Yeah, that’s all ’e was ever good for,’ Aunty Boo said, ‘a bargainin’ piece ’tween us an’ the ol’ man. But Petal was never the same again. She jus’ didn’t wanna talk ta us no more but when I took her ta town she seemed ta have plenty ta say ta them fancy friends o’ hers. I jus’ couldn’t work it out. Never forget the day she asked me ta drive her ta town so she could see a matinee film . . .’ Aunty Boo’s voice broke up.
‘An’ we thought . . .’ Aunty Bubby took up where Aunty Boo left off: ‘We thought we was all goin’ but when we got there Petal didn’t want us taggin’ along. I was real shamed.’
‘An’ she went an’ seen that bloody Marlon Brando film . . .’ Aunty Bubby’s voice had faded so much I could barely make out what she said. ‘I knew then that our darlin’ was driftin’ in the wrong direction but there weren’t nuthin’ we could do. Yeah, an’ then she went ta stay with them bloody cowboy rodeo fellas what come ta town with their big hats an’ tight pants an’ fancy boots an’ lotsa money . . . I tried ta tell her, I said, I know he’s handsome, Petal, but he’s too wild. But she jus’ come right back at me. You like restless men, y’always goin’ on about bloody Heathcliff.’
‘An’ I tried ta tell her too,’ Aunty Boo said, shaking her finger, ‘but she come back at me too an’ said I jus’ hate all men. But it was too late. She run off with ’im an’ she was only jus’ gone seventeen.’
‘An’ we waited months, waiting an’ worryin’ all the time,’ Aunty Bubby said. ‘But she come home ta us in the end, all sick an’ tired an –’ Aunty Bubby drew a long sigh – ‘expectin’ a baby.’
Lilies of the field
In winter the shadows hit the valley from all directions and crept long and dim across the paddocks to our house. The cold air drove us inside early and kept us there through the long, wild nights. Sometimes the howling gales from the south rattled and shook the flimsy tin on our roof like paper, and our house groaned and shifted so much that the tin mugs and plates on the dresser jangled and clanged as the women’s voices rose and fell.
After supper Aunty Bubby read to us but Nan didn’t like books. She liked the stories in her head.
‘I never liked all that religious stuff.’ Nan lowered her voice, like she had to be mindful of someone else’s presence in the room. ‘Course it wouldna done for William ta hear me say that. He was a true believer. But I didn’t take to them Christians, they always seem ta say one thing an’ do another.’
The Aunties were silent. They knew Nan was going to talk about the church home where she spent years as a little girl before she went into domestic service, before William, my grandfather, saw her and decided to marry her.
‘That bloody ol’ Miss Frith, she was always talkin’ ’bout mercy, kindness an’ forgiveness. But when I made a mistake learnin’ to sew on the ol’ treadle machine an’ stabbed me finger through to the bone an’ it was caught there, she made me stay there while she gave all the other girls an’ me a lecture ’bout haste an’ laziness an’ carelessness. She shamed me in front o’ everyone ’spite all her talk ’bout forgiveness an’ love an’ acceptance. She said it’d take years ta breed all the lazy black blood outta any o’ my kids – if I had any at all – but she was pretty sure no one ’ud wanna marry me anyway. Silly cow, didn’t know there was men like William who never wanted no white woman coz they were too much trouble. Always wanting too much, them white women, William use ta say!’
You could have heard a pin drop every time my Nan told this story.
‘Even hecklin’ ta vote, they was, back in England, jus’ like the men,’ she’d add. ‘Bit like them women’s libbers ya read about who don’t wear bras no more, hey girls?’
My Aunties were not often speechless, but sometimes when Nan told this story the silence hung in the room thick and heavy. Staring into the fire made Nan remember things.
Grandfather William was well into his nineties when I was a little girl. His neck was always bright red, like the scarlet head comb on our bronze-wing turkey gobbler. He was mainly bedridden. Sometimes the Aunties lifted him from his bed to a wheelchair and sp
ent the day pushing him from one sunny spot in our vast garden to the next. They’d leave him staring vacantly at drifts of exotic flowers. My sister, Star, always reckoned she didn’t remember him. But we both remember his funeral at the big church in town. Even Petal came.
‘How come ’is neck is so red?’ I asked Aunty Bubby one day when I was helping her make his lunch to put on a tray for Nan to spoon-feed him.
‘It’s from the Boer War, dear, in South Africa last century. The sun there was so harsh it burnt the back of his neck forever.’
I didn’t know anything about this war but his neck did stand out against his pale face.
‘He’s a jingo too,’ she added.
I would have asked what that was, but she was rushing out with his tray of food. It wouldn’t do for the women to keep Grandfather waiting.
So many times I’d overheard the story of William and how he came to marry my Nan. Second-hand, of course, because I was a child who was meant to be sleeping peacefully all through the night by the fire. Descended from austere Protestant stock, William was – a Devonshire gamekeeper. It was Nan’s story.
‘Yeah,’ she mused, ‘bloody ol’ Miss Frith! Men like William didn’t want free women. He was always cranky an’ carryin’ on ’bout them blue stockin’ women wantin’ ta work an’ wantin’ equal rights, said it’d be the ruination of everythin’.’ Nan took a long draught of tea before she continued. ‘Ya father put the fear o’ God into me when he first brought me here. You’re a respectable woman now, one of the lucky ones, he use ta thunder at me. A respectable farmer’s wife and there’ll be no talk of the past or heathen talk or superstitious mumbo-jumbo or I’ll send you back to where you came from.
‘An’ I tell ya what, girls, I never wanted ta go back ta that home. That ol’ cow use ta always tell us girls we was lucky when we was in that home, lucky to be saved by Christian charity an’ civilised. She said we’d be lucky if anyone ’ud want us for more than jus’ a servant, so I s’pose when William took me from that family she sent me to, an’ wanted ta marry me it was a case of more of ol’ Frith’s luck,’ Nan chuckled.
The Aunties were silent and sombre.
‘Tell ya one thing, though!’ Nan stared beyond the Aunties and the dancing fire. ‘I was born round here, on this country, bit further back from the river ’tween two creeks, place called Murrumburrah. When Miss Frith an’ Matron Sloane sent me away to work . . .’ Her voice began to crack, and she said, ‘It was a long way from me home, nearly all the way ta Sydney . . . place called Campbell Town, with a Scottish family. One thing I hafta say ’bout William is he brought me home. Tol’ me every day I was lucky ta be farmin’ the virgin land an’ turning this empty country into a nation.’
The Aunties were still silent so Nan went on trawling her memory. I waited for the story.
‘William weren’t happy though, ’bout all the girls I kept havin’. He named me first two from the Ol’ Test’ment. That’s where ya get ya flash name from.’ She winked at Aunty Boo.
‘Bloody stupid name!’ Boo retorted.
‘Beulah means peaceful land or beautiful land or somethin’ like that, accordin’ ta the Bible,’ Nan pushed on, oblivious to all else. ‘He said if I had any more girls before he got any boys he’d get ridda me an’ get a new wife. So I s’pose I was lucky then too coz afta that I had little William and James. He was proud then, named ’em afta Kings o’ England. Afta I had them two there was no more talk o’ him gettin’ ridda me even though I did ’ave a mob o’ girls an’ only two more boys. He stopped namin’ the girls outta the Bible afta James was born, an’ that’s why all the rest o’ the daughters got their flower names . . .’
Nan stopped mid-sentence and held the thought: my garden of Aunties. After Miriam and Beulah came Blossom, Iris, Daphne, Rose, Violet and Lily, who was Aunty Bubby, the youngest girl in the family . . . until Petal.
‘I chose all them names an’ he said I could raise me girls, as long as I kept ’em outta trouble an’ workin’ hard till the time came for ’im to put youse in the service ta earn ya own keep. He never would let me ’ave nuthin’ ta do with the boys though, once they was weaned.’
Aunty Boo huffed like she always did whenever there was mention of her brothers. We rarely saw our Uncles. The two elder ones were war heroes in New Guinea and on return received settler blocks and went off to farm somewhere else. William gloated with pride about these two. Uncle John, who was much younger, married a white woman from town. The story goes that she didn’t like him socialising with his family. As for the youngest, Uncle Richie, he always caused a reaction from both the Aunties.
‘Bloody Richie!’ Aunty Boo spat. ‘Nearly sold this bit o’ land out from underneath us!’
‘But thanks to you, sista,’ Aunty Bubby, always the peacemaker, put in, ‘he never managed to.’
‘Bloody mongrel!’ Aunty Boo hissed as she threw the bedsocks she was making for us into the knitting basket and stomped off to fill the kettle again.
Aunty Bubby and Nan looked sideways at each other.
‘Well,’ said Nan, ‘least none o’ us has ta worry ’bout churches no more, ’cept ta send the kids ta Sunday school. Cold places I always thought, churches.’
She was right about that.
‘Yeah, Mum.’ Aunty Boo was edgy. ‘I use ta hate cleanin’ the O’Brien’s chapel. It was the one thing the ol’ lady use ta ask me ta do that I couldn’t stand. Full o’ all them sad, ugly statues an’ brass cups an’ candlesticks that was so hard to clean. But I did use ta like them purple robes the priest use ta wear at Easter, beautiful they were. The ol’ lady said they stood for sorrow an’ mourning, fancy that, hey! Somethin’ so bright meanin’ sadness . . . they were strange them Catholics, though I wouldna minded some o’ them purple robes ta make a nice dress outta,’ she sighed, sitting back.
‘Tell ya another thing though.’ Aunty Boo’s eyes narrowed and her voice became hard. ‘I use ta hate that young Martin O’Leary from the Knights o’ the Southern Cross, always skulkin’ round when I was in there. Course, couldn’t say nuthin’ ’bout him to the ol’ lady coz the O’Learys an’ the O’Briens was real close an’ ol’ Mrs O’Brien always said he was a fine upstandin’ young man.’
‘Never mind ’im, darlin’,’ Nan soothed. ‘Best let that sleepin’ dog lie. Like them Catholics say, he’ll get his rightful judgment in Heaven.’
‘Nah!’ Aunty Boo scoffed. ‘I don’t believe none o’ that! Still the good thing ’bout waitin’ for Petal was that we never had ta go ta church.’
Talk of the O’Briens’ chapel was always followed by talk of the time they were waiting for Petal.
‘Yeah,’ Nan would remember over and over, ‘we gotta lotta things done then, ’specially me garden. It come on real nice with all the time we put into it. William ’ud never let me spend much time on the garden before . . . said flowers were idle an’ useless. But there weren’t nuthin’ ’e could do ’bout it when ’e was at church an’ we was ’ere.’
Nan’s eyes never failed to light up whenever she talked about her garden. After years of marriage and suffering William’s dour austerity, she finally managed to plant a beauty, right under his nose while he was out worshipping other idols. The story went that while Nan and Aunty Boo were at home from church waiting for Petal to be born, they began digging and planting. Aunty Boo used some of the meagre wages she’d earned as a domestic to order bulbs, seeds and shrubs from the city. A strip of Eden emerged from the hard unyielding land that was William’s farm.
‘Yeah,’ Nan said, smiling into space dreamily, ‘Petal was everyone’s baby. Even William use ta pick ’er up an’ put her on his lap sometimes an’ ’e never did that with any o’ me others. Even them boys that ’e adored was walkin’ an’ talkin’ an’ long outta nappies before he’d have anythin’ ta do with ’em!’
‘Was nice ta have a little baby round
afta not havin’ one for a while,’ Aunty Bubby added. ‘She sure was angel-faced, that Petal!’
Petal was the baby by a long way. Until she was born, Richie had been the youngest in the house. He was eight years old when Petal arrived. Aunty Boo was twenty-eight and Aunty Bubby only nineteen. By then Aunty Bubby knew she couldn’t ever have a baby. I’d heard the sad story about how one day when she was only fourteen she was wandering home from school across the parched paddocks and the narrow creek bed in a daydream when she got trampled by a farmer’s wild rogue bull.
She was a bloody mess when Nan and the other Aunties found her injured by the creek. Nan sent Aunty Violet and Aunty Rose to pull the door off the worker’s hut nearby and they carried her home. Even William agreed to a doctor, which he’d never done before, even when Nan was having all the babies. He sent one of the older boys to bring one while Nan and Aunty Boo packed and cleaned the wounds. The doctor said Aunty Bubby would get better in time, but that her pelvic bone was beyond repair and her hip would always be weak. The other Aunties always spoke in whispers about this, even when Aunty Bubby wasn’t there.
‘Damn tragedy,’ Aunty Violet would sigh wistfully. ‘Bubby’s always been so good with children too.’
Aunty Bubby loved Petal. She was the baby Aunty Bubby had always wanted.
The room was still but for the flickering fire.
‘Bloody Petal!’ Aunty Boo crackled. She was riled up again just like she had been when they were talking about Martin O’Leary or when they spoke about her brother Richie. ‘Mighta had an angel face but she never could bloody settle!’
‘Tell ya one story I did like from the Bible,’ Nan said, changing the subject. ‘’Bout that King Solomon an’ all ’is riches yet ’e never ’ad a robe so splendid as them lilies growin’ wild in a field somewhere on a mountain in the Bible.’
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