Trooper to the Southern Cross

by Angela Mackail Thirkell

  I must say I got the wind up a bit when I got back to Hampstead, wondering if Celia was still mad with me. But as I came out of the Tube station, there she was, come to meet me. The poor kid thought she had upset me, and I might have gone straight off to Australia without her, or some kind of nonsense. She hadn’t been home because she didn’t want her mother to see she had been crying, so as far as I can make out she had been sitting in a tea-shop opposite the Tube station on the chance of catching me as I came out and making it up. Of course I was as pleased as anything at having her come to meet me, and I never said another word to her about the way she had flown out at me and Larry. I always have a very protective feeling about women. They are different from men somehow, and if we took notice of them everytime they went off the handle, life wouldn’t be long enough for it. She tried to explain about it, but I shut her up very kindly and said we wouldn’t talk about it again. We now had the business of packing to undertake. It was easy enough for me, as most of my kit had gone west one way or another. The diggers were a wonder at borrowing things. A lot of my stuff got borrowed, as I mentioned before, in the offensive before the Armistice. I got a few things back, but I lost my diary and a lot of letters and a spare revolver that I was very fond of and some Boche souvenirs and a lot of equipment. I had some kit stored on the Plain too, and I must say I felt a bit sore when I found that had been gone through too. Somehow you didn’t mind the diggers borrowing things in France. After all the poor chaps were having a pretty hard time. But to think of those blighted N.C.O.’s down at Tidworth pinching stuff off men who were fighting made me wild. However, it’s no use whining, and I decided I’d do with as little as I could and wait till I got back to Australia to buy civvy clothes and things. For one thing I like travelling light, and for another I mosdy wore uniform, unless I was in hospital, so it didn’t seem worth while buying London clothes that would make me look all dolled up. Some of our fellows went to the smart London tailors like Moss Bros., but Sydney is good enough for me. David Jones in Sydney, or Myers in Melbourne always suited me to a T, and I didn’t see the sense of standing up and having a tailor crawl all over me with his survey tape when I could walk into a neat ready-made suit.

  It is a funny thing though the way some of your English tailors get their coats all smooth across the shoulders — or else it’s the English men have a different kind of figure and not so well developed. You will always notice that an Australian’s jacket comes up in a wrinkle across the back of his neck almost from the jump. I must admit I never noticed this myself till Celia told me, but once it had struck me I couldn’t help seeing it. But it isn’t the coat that matters really, it’s the man who wears it. When I said to Celia that if I wasn’t good enough for her in a coat of Australian wool, grown here and made by Australian tailors, I wouldn’t be good enough in a robe and halo, she only laughed. But I must say now I have noticed it I do sometimes wish my coats didn’t wrinkle across the back the way they do.

  But Celia’s packing was another question, because she had some bits of furniture of her own she wanted to take out. I didn’t see the sense, for we could get just as nice things in Sydney, but the kiddie was set on it. There was a kind of medieval table and a bureau and some rugs and a grandfather clock and some pictures. And what must the poor kid do but bring her old cradle. A funny sort of affair it was, made of wood and cane, for all the world like some of the kitchen chairs at home. I expect she hoped — but oh, well, it’s no use talking about it, and when we found things seemed a bit hopeless I got some nice ferns and pot plants and put them in it, and it is quite a feature of our little drawing room. It’s not that I don’t feel things, because I am wonderfully sensitive, and I’d love to have had a whole crowd of kiddies, but you must make the best of things in this world and the pot plants do look bonzer. And she had an idea too that there were no comfortable beds in Australia and wanted to bring her own. That was all very well, but a bed takes up a lot of room to pack. Besides I am old-fashioned enough to feel that a wife’s right place is beside her husband.

  So before I knew what was happening, there were four big packing-cases and two or three smaller ones. One of the pictures was a strange kind of affair, but somehow it had a great attraction for me. I have always had a great appreciation of art and thoroughly enjoyed the landscapes of Arthur Streeton and Hans Heysen. As for Norman Lindsay, some of the fellows at the University used to collect his pictures, but I have a certain feeling of reverence for women which prevented me buying any, though I am broadminded enough to enjoy looking at another chap’s collection. The worst of collecting Mr Lindsay’s pictures is that it is such a trouble to have a lot of drawings that you have to keep put away for fear the girl or the lady help might give notice. Some of the fellows who collected them used to keep them in a box under the bed which they said was the best place for them, but there is such a thing as carrying a joke too far. I have a pretty keen sense of humour myself, but a thing must be really funny to get my appreciation.

  Well, this picture of Celia’s was a sketch of a woman in an old-time kind of gown, something in the crinoline style, sitting all hunched up with a lot of things strewn about her and a kind of little flying fox up in the air holding a label to tell you the name of the picture. But being an antique, the spelling was the old-fashioned one of Melencolia. In spite of this, and of the fact that the artist was a German, which may also account for the spelling, that picture always got me thinking. It was the occasion of quite a scene at Sydney, as you shall hear later. Unfortunately I never seemed to have time to see the picture galleries in Paris or London, but I know I would have appreciated them very deeply.

  The question now was: how much luggage could we take with us? Celia had got a paper about luggage from Horseferry Road, saying exactly how many cubic feet were allowed for each passenger. I’ve forgotten how many it was, but though it looked a lot on paper, as cubic contents always do, it boiled down to about one cabin-trunk and one suitcase in the end. Celia had gone to a Transport Agency to enquire about having our big cases sent out by a cargo boat, but what they wanted to charge would have left us broke for the next two years, beside not knowing how long it would be before we got them. Celia was getting quite nervy about it, so I said we’d go down to Horseferry Road and see what could be done.

  The first man I ran into there was Jock Maclaren, a stocky little fellow from Turramurra. He had been promoted from sergeant to commissioned rank in France, and was a second lieutenant in the artillery. I saved his leg for him after Villers Bret.

  ‘Well, Jock,’ I said, ‘how are the guns?’

  ‘Listen, Mr Bowen,’ he said, ‘I’m not with the guns now. I used to be in the shipping office in Sydney, so they’ve put me here on the shipping. Anything you want sending to Sydney you just let me know.’

  ‘You’re the man I want,’ I said. ‘This is Mrs Bowen, and we’ve a lot of stuff to take out with us, and those sharks in the passenger department won’t let us take more than a suitcase. What can you do?’

  Well, we went and had morning tea in a cafe in Victoria Street, a mean little place compared with the Sydney cafes, down a flight of steps in the basement. Jock said no one was taking any notice of the regulations. One of the diggers, a lance-corporal in the infantry who owned a big station up in Queensland, was taking a grand piano and a special bath with fittings that had taken his fancy at some show, and another was taking a whole drawing-room suite. So if we didn’t take our stuff too, he said we’d be mugs.

  ‘I’ll tell you what, Mr Bowen,’ he said. ‘Tell me where your stuff is and I’ll send over a lorry and a couple of boys and get it all down to the ship for you, and it’s no trouble at all.’

  He was as good as his word, too. Next day a lorry came along to the place where Celia’s things were stored, with two great beefy fellows in charge, and they loaded her things on and drove away. And the next time we saw those cases was the day after we landed in Sydney.

  I have always been lucky with my pals and usually find so
meone to give me a hand. It’s one great advantage of being a doctor that people seem to do you good turns. The way poor old Jock spoke about his leg, you’d think I was the only doctor that had ever put a leg in splints. There is no one more warm-hearted than the digger, and he’ll remember any little kindness and never be happy till he gets one back on you. There was little Moses Colquhoun — at least his name was really Vernon, not Moses, but his father was Ben Cohen all right, so we used to call him Moses for short — that was hurt in the first landing at Gaba Tcpe. The old ‘Colne’ was being used as a temporary hospital and, God, she stank. Our boys were wonderful, just keeping their spirits up and never letting out a sound, with the warm, sickly smell of blood everywhere and the Turk blazing away from the fort and the British Navy blazing back. I was doing what I could till we could get the poor blighters off to the real hospital ship. Little Moses was brought on by a couple of men. He had been severely peppered on the scats of his pants while getting over the gunwale of a boat with a landing party, and thought he was going to die. I hadn’t any time to waste in sympathy, with lots of other men waiting with stomach wounds, but I bandaged him up and gave him a cigarette and put my coat over him for it was a cool night, and went on to the others. Would you believe it, from that day I was little Moses’ white-headed boy. Old Papa and Mamma Cohen sent me comforts all the while I was in France and when later I set up my practice in Sydney, Moses sent all the Col-quhouns and Cohens along to give me a start. Celia took a great fancy to him. There used to be a lot of joking about the Jews, but we had a lot of real white men in the A.I.F., and if one or two of the higher ones had a bit of a reputation for using the digger to their own advantage, well, none of us is perfect.

  3 – Larry gives us the Dinkum Oil

  Our boat, this old ‘Rudolstadt’, was to leave Devonport early on a Friday. Not that I attached any importance to superstition, though many do. When we got the notice about the boat train, it was a bit of a shock, for it left Paddington at 6.30 a.m. Not a nice time to leave London on a January morning. Of course Aunt Mary got the wind up and said we’d never wake in time, and were we sure the alarm clock was working, and should she get the telephone operator to ring us up and so on. But Celia was wonderfully patient with her mother and told her to leave everything to me; which, if you come to look at it, was the wisest thing she could do, as it was Celia and I that were going to catch the train, and not the old lady.

  I hired a car from a garage near by, as we had rather a lot of luggage, and I took Celia and Aunt Mary to a show and supper the night before, just to cheer them up, and by the time I had done my own packing it was time to be starting.

  It was pitch dark of course and a cold, raw morning, but Aunt Mary’s help was a nice girl and she was up bright and early and had got us a nice hot breakfast. I always make a point of being friendly to the help, because they will do many a little thing for you which they otherwise would not have done, and I always think that a hot breakfast makes a lot of difference. Aunt Mary wanted to come to the station with us, but I knew Celia didn’t want her to come, so I persuaded her to stay at home. Her niece was coming to stay with her for a bit, so she wouldn’t be lonely. I got very fond of Aunt Mary. She was a kind old soul and reminded me a bit of the Mater’s sister, the one that was a bank manager’s wife in Geelong. She died about two years later and Celia was much cut up about it.

  When we got to Paddington, you would have thought the whole A.I.F. was there. It was like the days when the men were going back to France, except that everyone had piles of luggage and no rifles. I must hand it to the English porters for the way the heavy luggage had been put on the train. All the big trunks and cases were stowed away in alphabetical order in the luggage vans, so I could see we would have no trouble in finding our things once we got on board. There were wives and kiddies all over the place, relations saying good-bye, women crying, porters shoving trucks about, children getting lost and found again. Only officers’ wives were going on this trip, so the diggers’ wives were saying goodbye for the present and coming out later to join them. Lots of the diggers sent their wives first-class passage money later. Others just faded away.

  Although we were half an hour too early, the train seemed to be crowded already and some of the diggers had stormed a first-class coach and were cheering out of the corridor windows. God, they deserved to go first class if anyone ever did, but after all there were officers’ wives to be considered, and it isn’t like our men to show discourtesy to ladies. I thought they looked a fairly tough crowd, but I didn’t pay too much attention, as I wanted to find seats for me and Celia. We walked along the platform, looking into every carriage, but they were all full. Suddenly a well-known face came out of a window. Who should it be but the old Colonel. ‘Come in, Tom,’ said the Colonel, ‘we’ve squared the guard and got him to lock us in here by ourselves.’

  The guard came up and let us in and locked the door again, much to the disappointment of about a dozen men who hoped to get in. There was old Jerry and Mrs Jerry and Mary and young Dick and a girl they had to look after the kiddies. Gladys Barnes her name was, but she will keep. I can tell you I was glad to see Jerry, and I was glad Celia would have Mrs Jerry and the kids to talk to. She was looking a bit white poor kid. Mrs Jerry fussed round her a bit and of course blamed me as if I was responsible for the boat train starting at that early hour.

  ‘Have a heart, Mrs Jerry,’ I said. ‘Think you are changing at Albury on the way down to Melbourne, and it won’t seem so bad.’

  ‘You are a Job’s comforter,’ said Mrs Jerry, quite snappish. ‘To think of going back to a country with three or four different gauges, so that they have to turn you out of your train in the middle of the night.’

  The Colonel tried to make things better by saying anyway there was only the one gauge between Melbourne and Adelaide.

  ‘Yes, and even then they can’t give you a dining-car, and turn you out at Serviceton to scramble for your breakfast with a crowd of nasty unshaved men. One thing, though,’ said Mrs Jerry, looking round for all the world as if she were daring me to contradict her, ‘is that it will make it harder for the Japanese.’

  ‘Well,’ I said, as no one was saying anything, ‘I’ll be the mug. Why the Japanese, Mrs Jerry?’

  ‘Because, Major Bowen, when the Japanese invade Australia, which they will do when they’ve finished wiping their boots on China, they’ll have no difficulty in landing wherever they like — especially if they choose Cup Day with all the battleships bottled up in Port Philip Bay. But whatever railhead they capture it won’t do them much good, because they’ll have to spend all their time changing. By the time they’ve got, say, from Perth to Melbourne, they’ll wish they’d never started, or the Trans-Continental had never been built.’

  ‘But suppose they land at Melbourne,’ I said. And there was something in what she said about Cup Day, because it has always been a standing joke how the fleet managed to blow into Melbourne just about Cup time. One year the admiral got so wild at all the jokes that next time he wouldn’t let them come. But this was not popular.

  ‘All you’ll have to do in New South Wales is to destroy your rolling stock,’ said Mrs Jerry. ‘It will take them the next two years to build rolling stock for your narrow gauges.’

  I didn’t think this a sensible remark. It is just like a woman to say a thing like that. To begin with we wouldn’t want to destroy our rolling stock, and even if we did, who could prevent the Japs sailing round the coast and coming right up the harbour? So I said so. Mrs Jerry said perhaps I was right. She was really a very sensible little woman, but got rattled at times.

  Soon after this the train started. The boys were all singing and cheering and waving out of the windows. Mary and young Dick were waving too. I must say I felt a bit sentimental myself to think I was starting back to good old Aussie with my little missis.

  It was a long journey to Devonport. Our train stopped pretty often in sidings, to let other trains go by, and every time some of the digg
ers would get out. I heard afterwards that three or four men had borrowed some money off their cobbers and not got back on to the train. I don’t know what happened to them. We had all bought sandwiches, and we had a big flask of tea and the kiddies had chocolate and bananas. Presently the kiddies got sleepy.

  ‘Go outside and have a smoke, you two,’ said Mrs Jerry, ‘while I get these children to sleep and have a talk with Celia.’

  So the old Colonel and I went out into the corridor and had a smoke and a yarn. I said I was surprised to see him on the train, and he told me that they had to put off going on an earlier boat because young Dick had measles. Then he said let’s go prospecting a bit.

  ‘That’ll do me fine,’ I said.

  So we went along the corridor, through five or six coaches, mostly full of diggers. When they saw us they started singing ‘Have you seen the Colonel?’ and ‘Have you seen the Major?’ A good song, but not the sort for a drawing-room.

  ‘All right, boys,’ said Jerry to one digger who seemed a bit above himself, ‘wait till you’re on board, and it will be “Have you seen the steward?”’

  Well, the digger has a wonderful sense of humour, and in a minute the whole carriage-full was singing it — with illustrations. They were a cheery lot. Jerry and I went back to our own compartment. On the way we ran into a Staff colonel who Jerry knew. He introduced us. It was Colonel Picking. I had known his brother on the Peninsula — one of those blighters that give the men all the dirty work and keep their own hands as clean as they can. As a matter of fact he was such a nuisance that when he got a bullet through his arm I got him sent back to hospital in Egypt and passed the word that we never wanted to see him again. It was just as well the Turks did it, or the diggers would have put a bullet through him somewhere else. He got an adjutancy after that, which was about all he was fit for. I have never had much use for adjutants. The diggers used to call him old P. and S. — at least they used another adjective than old — which was short for Picking and Stealing. Jerry and Colonel Picking had a bit of a yarn and then we moved on. The diggers were still singing, and I had an idea there was some beer about. Jerry stopped me before we got to our compartment.