The Thorn Birds

by Colleen McCullough

  “Yes, thanks to Cardinal de Bricassart.”

  “Then it’s all settled. I’m going to study acting with Albert Jones at the Culloden Theater, and I’ve written to the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in London, asking that I be put on their waiting list.”

  “Are you quite sure, Jussy?”

  “Quite sure. I’ve known for a long time.” The last piece of bloody beef was tucked down under the surface of the corning solution; Justine put the lid on the barrel with a thump. “There! I hope I never see another bit of corned beef as long as I live.”

  Meggie handed her a completed tray of cookies. “Put these in the oven, would you? Four hundred degrees. I must say this comes as something of a surprise. I thought little girls who wanted to be actresses role-played constantly, but the only person I’ve ever seen you play has been yourself.”

  “Oh, Mum! There you go again, confusing film stars with actresses. Honestly, you’re hopeless.”

  “Well, aren’t film stars actresses?”

  “Of a very inferior sort. Unless they’ve been on the stage first, that is. I mean, even Laurence Olivier does an occasional film.”

  There was an autographed picture of Laurence Olivier on Justine’s dressing table; Meggie had simply deemed it juvenile crush stuff, though at the time she remembered thinking at least Justine had taste. The friends she sometimes brought home with her to stay a few days usually treasured pictures of Tab Hunter and Rory Calhoun.

  “I still don’t understand,” said Meggie, shaking her head. “An actress!”

  Justine shrugged. “Well, where else can I scream and yell and howl but on a stage? I’m not allowed to do any of those here, or at school, or anywhere! I like screaming and yelling and howling, dammit!”

  “But you’re so good at art, Jussy! Why not be an artist?” Meggie persevered.

  Justine turned from the huge gas stove, flicked her finger against a cylinder gauge. “I must tell the kitchen rouseabout to change bottles; we’re low. It’ll do for today, though.” The light eyes surveyed Meggie with pity. “You’re so impractical, Mum, really. I thought it was supposed to be the children who didn’t stop to consider a career’s practical aspects. Let me tell you, I don’t want to starve to death in a garret and be famous after I’m dead. I want to enjoy a bit of fame while I’m still alive, and be very comfortable financially. So I’ll paint as a hobby and act for a living. How’s that?”

  “You’ve got an income from Drogheda, Jussy,” Meggie said desperately, breaking her vow to remain silent no matter what. “It would never come to starving in a garret. If you’d rather paint, it’s all right. You can.”

  Justine looked alert, interested. “How much have I got, Mum?”

  “Enough that if you preferred, you need never work at anything.”

  “What a bore! I’d end up talking on the telephone and playing bridge; at least that’s what the mothers of most of my school friends do. Because I’d be living in Sydney, not on Drogheda. I like Sydney much better than Drogheda.” A gleam of hope entered her eye. “Do I have enough to pay to have my freckles removed with this new electrical treatment?”

  “I should think so. But why?”

  “Because then someone might see my face, that’s why.”

  “I thought looks didn’t matter to an actress?”

  “Enough’s enough, Mum. My freckles are a pain.”

  “Are you sure you wouldn’t rather be an artist?”

  “Quite sure, thank you.” She did a little dance. “I’m going to tread the boards, Mrs. Worthington!”

  “How did you get yourself into the Culloden?”

  “I auditioned.”

  “And they took you?”

  “Your faith in your daughter is touching, Mum. Of course they took me! I’m superb, you know. One day I shall be very famous.”

  Meggie beat green food coloring into a bowl of runny icing and began to drizzle it over already baked fir trees. “Is it important to you, Justine? Fame?”

  “I should say so.” She tipped sugar in on top of butter so soft it had molded itself to the inner contours of the bowl; in spite of the gas stove instead of the wood stove, the cookhouse was very hot. “I’m absolutely iron-bound determined to be famous.”

  “Don’t you want to get married?”

  Justine looked scornful. “Not bloody likely! Spend my life wiping snotty noses and cacky bums? Salaaming to some man not half my equal even though he thinks he’s better? Ho ho ho, not me!”

  “Honestly, you’re the dizzy limit! Where do you pick up your language?”

  Justine began cracking eggs rapidly and deftly into a basin, using one hand. “At my exclusive ladies’ college, of course.” She drubbed the eggs unmercifully with a French whisk. “We were quite a decent bunch of girls, actually. Very cultured. It isn’t every gaggle of silly adolescent females can appreciate the delicacy of a Latin limerick:

  There was a Roman from Vinidium

  Whose shirt was made of iridium;

  When asked why the vest,

  He replied, “Id est

  Bonum sanguinem praesidium.”

  Meggie’s lips twitched. “I’m going to hate myself for asking, but what did the Roman say?”

  “ ‘It’s a bloody good protection.’ ”

  “Is that all? I thought it was going to be a lot worse. You surprise me. But getting back to what we were saying, dear girl, in spite of your neat effort to change the subject, what’s wrong with marriage?”

  Justine imitated her grandmother’s rare snort of ironic laughter. “Mum! Really! You’re a fine one to ask that, I must say.”

  Meggie felt the blood well up under her skin, and looked down at the tray of bright-green trees. “Don’t be impertinent, even if you are a ripe old seventeen.”

  “Isn’t it odd?” Justine asked the mixing bowl. “The minute one ventures onto strictly parental territory, one becomes impertinent. I just said: You’re a fine one to ask. Perfectly true, dammit! I’m not necessarily implying you’re a failure, or a sinner, or worse. Actually I think you’ve shown remarkable good sense, dispensing with your husband. What have you needed one for? There’s been tons of male influence for your children with the Unks around, you’ve got enough money to live on. I agree with you! Marriage is for the birds.”

  “You’re just like your father!”

  “Another evasion. Whenever I displease you, I become just like my father. Well, I’ll have to take your word for that, since I’ve never laid eyes on the gentleman.”

  “When are you leaving?” Meggie asked desperately.

  Justine grinned. “Can’t wait to get rid of me, eh? It’s all right, Mum, I don’t blame you in the least. But I can’t help it, I just love shocking people, especially you. How about taking me into the ‘drome tomorrow?”

  “Make it the day after. Tomorrow I’ll take you to the bank. You’d better know how much you’ve got. And, Justine…”

  Justine was adding flour and folding expertly, but she looked up at the change in her mother’s voice. “Yes?”

  “If ever you’re in trouble, come home, please. We’ve always got room for you on Drogheda, I want you to remember that. Nothing you could ever do would be so bad you couldn’t come home.”

  Justine’s gaze softened. “Thanks, Mum. You’re not a bad old stick underneath, are you?”

  “Old?” gasped Meggie. “I am not old! I’m only forty-three!”

  “Good Lord, as much as that?”

  Meggie hurled a cookie and hit Justine on the nose. “Oh, you wretch!” she laughed. “What a monster you are! Now I feel like a hundred.”

  Her daughter grinned.

  At which moment Fee walked in to see how things in the cookhouse were going; Meggie hailed her arrival with relief.

  “Mum, do you know what Justine just told me?”

  Fee’s eyes were no longer up to anything beyond the uttermost effort of keeping the books, but the mind at back of those smudged pupils was as acute as ever.

  “
How could I possibly know what Justine just told you?” she inquired mildly, regarding the green cookies with a slight shudder.

  “Because sometimes it strikes me that you and Jussy have little secrets from me, and now, the moment my daughter finishes telling me her news, in you walk when you never do.”

  “Mmmmmm, at least they taste better than they look,” commented Fee, nibbling. “I assure you, Meggie, I don’t encourage your daughter to conspire with me behind your back. What have you done to upset the applecart now, Justine?” she asked, turning to where Justine was pouring her sponge mixture into greased and floured tins.

  “I told Mum I was going to be an actress, Nanna, that’s all.”

  “That’s all, eh? Is it true, or only one of your dubious jokes?”

  “Oh, it’s true. I’m starting at the Culloden.”

  “Well, well, well!” said Fee, leaning against the table and surveying her own daughter ironically. “Isn’t it amazing how chidren have minds of their own, Meggie?”

  Meggie didn’t answer.

  “Do you disapprove, Nanna?” Justine growled, ready to do battle.

  “I? Disapprove? It’s none of my business what you do with your life, Justine. Besides, I think you’ll make a good actress.”

  “You do?” gasped Meggie.

  “Of course she will,” said Fee. “Justine’s not the sort to choose unwisely, are you, my girl?”

  “No.” Justine grinned, pushing a damp curl out of her eye. Meggie watched her regarding her grandmother with an affection she never seemed to extend to her mother.

  “You’re a good girl, Justine,” Fee pronounced, and finished the cookie she had started so unenthusiastically. “Not bad at all, but I wish you’d iced them in white.”

  “You can’t ice trees in white,” Meggie contradicted.

  “Of course you can when they’re firs; it might be snow,” her mother said.

  “Too late now, they’re vomit green,” laughed Justine.

  “Justine!”

  “Ooops! Sorry, Mum, didn’t mean to offend you. I always forget you’ve got a weak stomach.”

  “I haven’t got a weak stomach,” said Meggie, exasperated.

  “I came to see if there was any chance of a cuppa,” Fee broke in, pulling out a chair and sitting down. “Put on the kettle, Justine, like a good girl.”

  Meggie sat down, too. “Do you really think this will work out for Justine, Mum?” she asked anxiously.

  “Why shouldn’t it?” Fee answered, watching her granddaughter attending to the tea ritual.

  “It might be a passing phase.”

  “Is it a passing phase, Justine?” Fee asked.

  “No,” Justine said tersely, putting cups and saucers on the old green kitchen table.

  “Use a plate for the biscuits, Justine, don’t put them out in their barrel,” said Meggie automatically, “and for pity’s sake don’t dump the whole milk can on the table, put some in a proper afternoon tea jug.”

  “Yes, Mum, sorry, Mum,” Justine responded, equally mechanically. “Can’t see the point of frills in the kitchen. All I’ve got to do is put whatever isn’t eaten back where it came from, and wash up a couple of extra dishes.”

  “Just do as you’re told; it’s so much nicer.”

  “Getting back to the subject,” Fee pursued, “I don’t think there’s anything to discuss. It’s my opinion that Justine ought to be allowed to try, and will probably do very well.”

  “I wish I could be so sure,” said Meggie glumly.

  “Have you been on about fame and glory, Justine?” her grandmother demanded.

  “They enter the picture,” said Justine, putting the old brown kitchen teapot on the table defiantly and sitting down in a hurry. “Now don’t complain, Mum; I’m not making tea in a silver pot for the kitchen and that’s final.”

  “The teapot is perfectly appropriate.” Meggie smiled.

  “Oh, that’s good! There’s nothing like a nice cup of tea,” sighed Fee, sipping. “Justine, why do you persist in putting things to your mother so badly? You know it isn’t a question of fame and fortune. It’s a question of self, isn’t it?”

  “Self, Nanna?”

  “Of course. Self. Acting is what you feel you were meant to do, isn’t that right?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then why couldn’t you have explained it so to your mother? Why upset her with a lot of flippant nonsense?”

  Justine shrugged, drank her tea down and pushed the empty cup toward her mother for more. “Dunno,” she said.

  “I-dont-know,” Fee corrected. “You’ll articulate properly on the stage, I trust. But self is why you want to be an actress, isn’t it?”

  “I suppose so,” answered Justine reluctantly.

  “Oh, that stubborn, pigheaded Cleary pride! It will be your downfall, too, Justine, unless you learn to rule it. That stupid fear of being laughed at, or held up to some sort of ridicule. Though why you think your mother would be so cruel I don’t know.” She tapped Justine on the back of her hand. “Give a little, Justine; cooperate.”

  But Justine shook her head and said, “I can’t.”

  Fee sighed. “Well, for what earthly good it will do you, child, you have my blessing on your enterprise.”

  “Ta, Nanna, I appreciate it.”

  “Then kindly show your appreciation in a concrete fashion by finding your uncle Frank and telling him there’s tea in the kitchen, please.”

  Justine went off, and Meggie stared at Fee.

  “Mum, you’re amazing, you really are.”

  Fee smiled. “Well, you have to admit I never tried to tell any of my children what to do.”

  “No, you never did,” said Meggie tenderly. “We did appreciate it, too.”

  The first thing Justine did when she arrived back in Sydney was begin to have her freckles removed. Not a quick process, unfortunately; she had so many it would take about twelve months, and then she would have to stay out of the sun for the rest of her life, or they would come back. The second thing she did was to find herself an apartment, no mean feat in Sydney at that time, when people built, private homes and regarded living en masse in buildings as anathema. But eventually she found a two-room flat in Neutral Bay, in one of the huge old waterside Victorian mansions which had fallen on hard times and been made over into dingy semi-apartments. The rent was five pounds ten shillings a week, outrageous considering that the bathroom and kitchen were communal, shared by all the tenants. However, Justine was quite satisfied. Though she had been well trained domestically, she had few homemaker instincts.

  Living in Bothwell Gardens was more fascinating than her acting apprenticeship at the Culloden, where life seemed to consist in skulking behind scenery and watching other people rehearse, getting an occasional walk-on, memorizing masses of Shakespeare, Shaw and Sheridan.

  Including Justine’s, Bothwell Gardens had six flats, plus Mrs. Devine the landlady. Mrs. Devine was a sixty-five-year-old Londoner with a doleful sniff, protruding eyes and a great contempt for Australia and Australians, though she wasn’t above robbing them. Her chief concern in life seemed to be how much gas and electricty cost, and her chief weakness was Justine’s next-door neighbor, a young Englishman who exploited his nationality cheerfully.

  “I don’t mind giving the old duck an occasional tickle while we reminisce,” he told Justine. “Keeps her off my back, you know. You girls aren’t allowed to run electric radiators even in winter, but I was given one and I’m allowed to run it all summer as well if I feel like it.”

  “Pig,” said Justine dispassionately.

  His name was Peter Wilkins, and he was a traveling salesman. “Come in and I’ll make you a nice cuppa sometime,” he called after her, rather taken with those pale, intriguing eyes.

  Justine did, careful not to choose a time when Mrs. Devine was lurking jealously about, and got quite used to fighting Peter off. The years of riding and working on Drogheda had endowed her with considerable strength, and she was untroubl
ed by shibboleths like hitting below the belt.

  “God damn you, Justine!” gasped Peter, wiping the tears of pain from his eyes. “Give in, girl! You’ve got to lose it sometime, you know! This isn’t Victorian England, you aren’t expected to save it for marriage.”

  “I have no intention of saving it for marriage,” she answered, adjusting her dress. “I’m just not sure who’s going to get the honor, that’s all.”

  “You’re nothing to write home about!” he snapped nastily; she had really hurt.

  “No, that I’m not. Sticks and stones, Pete. You can’t hurt me with words. And there are plenty of men who will shag anything if it’s a virgin.”

  “Plenty of women, too! Watch the front flat.”

  “Oh, I do, I do,” said Justine.

  The two girls in the front flat were lesbians, and had hailed Justine’s advent gleefully until they realized she not only wasn’t interested, she wasn’t even intrigued. At first she wasn’t quite sure what they were hinting at, but after they spelled it out baldly she shrugged her shoulders, unimpressed. Thus after a period of adjustment she became their sounding board, their neutral confidante, their port in all storms; she bailed Billie out of jail, took Bobbie to the Mater hospital to have her stomach pumped out after a particularly bad quarrel with Billie, refused to take sides with either of them when Pat, Al, Georgie and Ronnie hove in turns on the horizon. It did seem a very insecure kind of emotional life, she thought. Men were bad enough, but at least they had the spice of intrinsic difference.

  So between the Culloden and Bothwell Gardens and girls she had known from Kincoppal days, Justine had quite a lot of friends, and was a good friend herself. She never told them all her troubles as they did her; she had Dane for that, though what few troubles she admitted to having didn’t appear to prey upon her. The thing which fascinated her friends the most about her was her extraordinary self-discipline; as if she had trained herself from infancy not to let circumstances affect her well-being.