My Brilliant Career

by Miles Franklin

“Now, not a step do you go, my fine young blood, until you pick up every jolly lemon and put them away tidily, or I’ll tell the missus on you as sure as eggs.”

  It dawned on me that he had mistaken me for one of the servant girls. That wasn’t bad fun. I determined not to undeceive but to have a lark with him. I summed him up as conceited, but not with the disgusting conceit with which some are afflicted, or perhaps blessed. It was rather an air of I-have-always-got-what-I-desire-and-believe-if-people-fail-it-is-all-their-own-fault, which surrounded him.

  “If you please, sir,” I said humbly, “I’ve gathered them all up, will you let me go now?”

  “Yes, when you’ve given me a kiss.”

  “Oh, sir, I couldn’t do that!”

  “Go on, I won’t poison you. Come now, I’ll make you.”

  “Oh, the missus might catch me.”

  “No jolly fear; I’ll take all the blame if she does.”

  “Oh don’t, sir; let me go, please,” I said in such unfeigned distress, for I feared he was going to execute his threat, that he laughed and said:

  “Don’t be frightened, sissy, I never kiss girls, and I’m not going to start at this time of day, and against their will to boot. You haven’t been long here, have you? I haven’t seen you before. Stand out there till I see if you’ve got any grit in you, and then I am done with you.”

  I stood in the middle of the yard, the spot he indicated, while he uncurled his long, heavy stock whip with its big lash and scented myall handle. He cracked it round and round my head and arms, but I did not feel the least afraid, as I saw at a glance that he was exceedingly dexterous in the bushman’s art of handling a stock whip, and knew, if I kept perfectly still, I was quite safe. It was thanks to Uncle Jay-Jay that I was able to bear the operation with unruffled equanimity, as he was in the habit of testing my nerves in this way.

  “Well, I never! Not so much as blinked an eyelash! Thoroughbred!” He said after a minute or so, “Where’s the boss?”

  “In Gool-Gool. He won’t be home till late.”

  “Is Mrs. Bossier in?”

  “No, she’s not, but Mrs. Bell is somewhere around in front.”

  “Thanks.”

  I watched him as he walked away with an easy swinging stride, which spoke of many long, long days in the saddle. I felt certain as I watched him that he had quite forgotten the incident of the little girl with the lemons.

  “Sybylla, hurry up and get dressed. Put on your best bib and tucker, and I will leave Harry Beecham in your charge, as I want to superintend the making of some of the dishes myself this evening.”

  “It’s too early to put on my evening dress, isn’t it, Auntie?”

  “It is rather early; but you can’t spare time to change twice. Dress yourself completely; you don’t know what minute your uncle and His Worship will arrive.”

  I had taken a dip in the creek, so had not to bathe, and it took me but a short time to don full warpaint—blue evening dress, satin slippers, and all. I wore my hair flowing, simply tied with a ribbon. I slipped out into the passage and called Aunt Helen. She came.

  “I’m ready, Auntie. Where is he?”

  “In the dining room.”

  “Come into the drawing room and call him. I will take charge of him till you are at leisure. But, Auntie, it will be a long time till dinner—how on earth will I manage him?”

  “Manage him!” She laughed. “He is not at all an obstreperous character.”

  We had reached the drawing room by this, and I looked at myself in the looking-glass while Aunt Helen went to summon Harold Augustus Beecham, bachelor, owner of Five-Bob Downs, Wyambeet, Wallerawang West, Quat-Quatta, and a couple more stations in New South Wales, besides an extensive one in Queensland.

  I noticed as he entered the door that since I had seen him he had washed, combed his stiff black hair, and divested himself of his hat, spurs, and whip—his leggings had perforce to remain, as his nether garment was a pair of closely fitting gray cloth riding breeches, which clearly defined the shapely contour of his lower limbs.

  “Harry, this is Sybylla. I’m sure you need no further introduction. Excuse me, I have something on the fire which is likely to burn.” And Aunt Helen hurried off leaving us facing each other.

  He stared down at me with undisguised surprise. I looked up at him and laughed merrily. The fun was all on my side. He was a great big man—rich and important. I was a chit—an insignificant nonentity—yet, despite his sex, size, and importance, I was complete master of that situation, and knew it: thus I laughed.

  I saw that he recognized me again by the dusky red he flushed beneath his sun-darkened skin. No doubt he regretted having called me a filly above all things. He bowed stiffly, but I held out my hand, saying, “Do shake hands. When introduced I always shake hands with anyone I think I’ll like. Besides, I seem to know you well. Just think of all the apples you brought me!”

  He acceded to my request, holding my hand a deal longer than necessary, and looking at me helplessly. It amused me greatly, for I saw that it was he who did not know how to manage me, and not I that couldn’t manage him.

  “’Pon my honor, Miss Melvyn, I had no idea it was you, when I said—” Here he boggled completely, which had the effect of reviving my laughter.

  “You had no right to be dressed like that—deceiving a fellow. It wasn’t fair.”

  “That’s the best of it. It shows what a larrikin Don Juan sort of character you are. You can’t deceive me now if you pretend to be a virtuous well-behaved member of society.”

  “That is the first time I’ve ever meddled with any of the kitchen fry, and, by Jove, it will be the last!” he said energetically. “I’ve got myself into a pretty mess.”

  “What nonsense you talk,” I replied. “If you say another word about it, I’ll write a full account of it and paste it in my scrap-book. But if you don’t worry about it, neither will I. You said nothing very uncomplimentary; in fact, I was quite flattered.”

  I was perched on the high end of a couch, and he was leaning with big, careless ease on the piano. Had Grannie seen me, I would have been lectured about unladylike behavior.

  “What is your uncle at today?” he inquired.

  “He’s not at anything. He went to Gool-Gool yesterday on the jury. Court finishes up today, and he is going to bring the judge home tonight. That’s why I am dressed so carefully,” I answered.

  “Good gracious! I never thought of court this time as I wasn’t called on the jury, and for a wonder hadn’t so much as a case against a Chinaman. I was going to stay tonight, but can’t if His Worship is going to dine here.”

  “Why? You’re surely not afraid of Judge Fossilt? He’s a very simple old customer.”

  “Imagine dining with a judge in this toggery!” He glanced down his great figure at his riding gear.

  “That doesn’t matter; he’s near-sighted. I’ll get you put at the far end of the table under my wing. Men don’t notice dress. If you weren’t so big, Uncle or Frank Hawden could oblige you.”

  “Do you think I could pass muster?”

  “Yes; after I brush you down you’ll look as spruce as a brass penny.”

  “I did brush myself,” he answered.

  “You brush yourself!” I retorted. “There’s a big splash of mud on your shoulder. You couldn’t expect to do anything decently, for you’re only a man, and men are the uselessest, good-for-nothingest, clumsiest animals in the world. All they’re good for is to smoke and swear.”

  I fetched a clothes brush.

  “You’ll have to stand on the table to reach me,” he said, looking down with amused indulgence.

  “As you are so impertinent you can go dusty.” I tossed the brush away.

  The evening was balmy, so I invited him into the garden. He threw his handkerchief over my chest, saying I might catch cold, but I scouted the idea.

  We wandered into an arbor covered with wisteria, banksia, and Marechal Niel roses, and I made him a buttonhole.

>   A traveler pulled rein in the roadway, and, dismounting, threw his bridle over a paling of the garden fence while he went inside to try and buy a loaf of bread.

  I jumped up, frightening the horse so that it broke away, pulling off the paling in the bridle rein. I ran to bring a hammer to repair the damage. Mr. Beecham caught the horse while I attempted to drive the nail into—the fence. It was a futile attempt, I bruised my fingers. He took the hammer from me, and fixing the paling in its place with a couple of well-aimed blows, said laughingly:

  “You, drive a nail! You couldn’t expect to do anything. You’re only a girl. Girls are the helplessest, uselessest, troublesomest little creatures in the world. All they’re good for is to torment and pester a fellow.”

  I had to laugh.

  At this juncture we heard Uncle Jay-Jay’s voice, so Mr. Beecham went toward the back, whence it proceeded, after he left me at the front door.

  “Oh, Auntie, we got on splendidly! He’s not a bit of trouble. We’re as chummy as though we had been reared together,” I exclaimed.

  “Did you get him to talk?”

  “Oh yes.”

  “Did you really?” In surprise.

  When I came to review the matter, I was forced to confess that I had done all the talking, and young Beecham the listening; moreover I described him as the quietest man I had ever seen or heard of.

  The judge did not come home with Uncle Jay-Jay as expected so it was not necessary for me to shelter Harold Beecham under my wing. Grannie greeted him cordially as “Harold, my boy.” He was a great favorite with her. She and Uncle Julius monopolized him for the evening. There was great talk of trucking sheep, the bad outlook as regarded the season, the state of the grass in the triangle, the Leigh Spring, the Bimbalong, and several other paddocks, and of the condition of the London wool market. It did not interest me, so I dived into a book, only occasionally emerging therefrom to smile at Mr. Beecham.

  He had come to Caddagat for a pair of bullocks which had been fattening in Grannie’s home paddock. Uncle gave him a start with them next morning. When they came out on the road I was standing in a bed of violets in a tangled corner of the garden, where roses climbed to kiss the lilacs, and spiraea stooped to rest upon the wallflowers, and where two tall kurrajongs stood like sentries over all. Harold Beecham dismounted and, leaning over the fence, lingered with me, leaving the bullocks to Uncle Jay-Jay. Uncle raved vigorously. Women, he asserted, were the bane of society and the ruination of all men; but he had always considered Harold as too sensible to neglect his business to stand grinning at a pesky youngster in short skirts and a pigtail. Which was the greatest idiot of the two he didn’t know.

  His grumbling did not affect Harold in the least.

  “Complimentary to both of us,” he remarked as he leisurely threw himself across his great horse and smiled his pleasant, quiet smile, disclosing two rows of magnificent teeth, untainted by contamination with beer or tobacco. Raising his panama hat with the green fly-veil around it, he cantered off. I wondered as I watched him if anything ever disturbed his serenity, and desired to try. He looked too big and quiet to be ruffled by such emotions as rage, worry, jealousy, or even love. Returning to the house, I put Aunt Helen through an exhaustive catechism concerning him.

  Question. Auntie, what age is Harold Beecham?

  Answer. Twenty-five last December.

  Q. Did he ever have any brothers or sisters?

  A. No. His birth caused his mother’s death.

  Q. How long has his father been dead?

  A. Since Harold could crawl.

  Q. Who reared him?

  A. His aunts.

  Q. Does he ever talk any more than that?

  A. Often a great deal less.

  Q. Is he really very rich?

  A. If he manages to pull through these seasons, he will be second to none but Tyson in point of wealth.

  Q. Is Five-Bob a very pretty place?

  A. Yes; one of the showplaces of the district.

  Q. Does he often come to Caddagat?

  A. Yes, he often drops in.

  Q. What makes his hair so black and his mustache that light color?

  A. You’ll have to study science to find that out. I’m sure I can’t tell you.

  Q. Does he—?

  “Now, Sybylla,” said Auntie, laughing, “you are taking a suspicious interest in my sunburnt young giant. Did I not tell you he was taking time by the forelock when he brought the apples?”

  “Oh, Auntie, I am only asking questions because—”

  “Yes, because, because, I understand perfectly. Because you are a girl, and all the girls fall a victim to Harry’s charms at once. If you don’t want to succumb meekly to your fate, ‘Heed the spark or you may dread the fire.’ That is the only advice I can tender you.”

  This was a Thursday, and on the following Sunday Harold Beecham reappeared at Caddagat and remained from three in the afternoon until nine at night. Uncle Julius and Frank Hawden were absent. The weather had taken a sudden backward lurch into winter again, so we had a fire. Harold sat beside it all the time, and interposed yes and no at the proper intervals in Grannie’s brisk business conversation, but he never addressed one word to me beyond “Good afternoon, Miss Melvyn,” on his arrival, and “Good night, Miss Melvyn,” when leaving.

  I studied him attentively all the while. What were his ideas and sentiments it were hard to tell: he never expressed any. He was fearfully and wonderfully quiet. Yet his was an intelligent silence, not of that wooden brainless description which casts a damper on company, neither was it of the morose or dreaming order.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Principally Letters

  Caddagat, 29th Sept., 1896

  My dearest Gertie,

  I have started to write no less than seven letters to you, but something always interrupted me and I did not finish them. However, I’ll finish this one in the teeth of Father Peter himself. I will parenthesize all the interruptions. (A traveler just asked me for a rose. I had to get up and give him one.) Living here is lovely. (Another man inquired the way to Somingley Gap, and I’ve just finished directing him.) Grannie is terribly nice. You could not believe. She is always giving me something, and takes me wherever she goes. Auntie is an angel. I wish you could hear the piano. It is a beauty. There are dozens of papers and books to read. Uncle is a dear old fellow. You should hear him rave and swear sometimes when he gets in a rage. It is great fun. He brings me lollies, gloves, ribbons, or something every time he comes from town. (Two Indian hawkers have arrived, and I am going out to see their goods. There were nineteen hawkers here last week. I am sitting on a squatter’s chair and writing on a table in the veranda, and the road goes right by the flower garden. That is how I see everyone.) Have you had rain down there this week? They have great squawking about the drought up here. I wish they could see Goulburn, and then they’d know what drought means. I don’t know what sort of a bobberie they would kick up. It’s pretty dry out on the run, but everyone calls the paddocks about the house an oasis. You see there are such splendid facilities for irrigation here. Uncle has put on a lot of men. They have cut races between the two creeks between which the house is situated. Every now and again they let the water from these over the orchard gardens and about a hundred acres of paddock land around the house. The grass therein is up to the horses’ fetlocks. There is any amount of rhubarb and early vegetables in the garden. Grannie says there is a splendid promise of fruit in the orchard, and the flower garden is a perfect dream. This is the dearest old place in the world. Dozens of people plague Grannie to be let put their horses in the grass—especially shearers, there are droves of them going home now—but she won’t let them; wants all the grass for her own stock. Uncle has had to put another man on to mind it, or at night all the wires are cut and the horses put in. (An agent, I think by the cut of him, is asking for Grannie. I’ll have to run and find her.) It is very lively here. Never a night but we have the house full of agents or travelers of one
sort or another, and there are often a dozen swaggies in the one day.

  Harold Beecham is my favorite of all the men hereaway. He is delightfully big and quiet. He isn’t good-looking, but I like his face. (Been attending to the demands of a couple of impudent swaggies. Being off the road at Possum Gully, you escape them.) For the love of life, next time you write, fire into the news at once and don’t half fill your letter telling me about the pen and your bad writing. I am scribbling at the rate of 365 miles an hour, and don’t care a jot whether it is good writing or not.

  Auntie, Uncle, Frank Hawden, and I are going to ride to Yabtree Church next Sunday. It is four miles beyond Five-Bob Downs, so that is sixteen miles. It is the nearest church. I expect it will be rare fun. There will be such a crowd coming home, and that always makes the horses delightfully frisky. (A man wants to put his horses in the paddock for the night, so I will have to find Uncle.) I never saw such a place for men. It is all men, men, men. You cannot go anywhere outside the house but you see men coming and going in all directions. It wouldn’t do to undress without bothering to drop the window blind like we used at Possum Gully. Grannie and Uncle say it is a curse to be living beside the road, as it costs them a tremendous lot a year. There are seven lemon trees here, loaded (another hawker). I hope you think of me sometimes. I am just as ugly as ever. (A traveler wants to buy a loaf of bread.)

  With stacks of love to all at home, and a whole dray-load for yourself, from your loving sister,

  Sybylla.

  Remember me to Goulburn, drowsing lazily in its dreamy graceful hollow in the blue distance.

  Caddagat, 29th Sept., 1896

  Dear Everard,

  Thank you very much for the magazines and “An Australian Bush Track.” I suppose you have quite forgotten us and Caddagat by this time. The sun has sunk behind the gum trees, and the blue evening mists are hanging lazily in the hollows of the hills. I expect you are donning your “swallow-tail” preparatory to leading some be-satined “faire ladye” in to a gorgeous dinner, thence to the play, then to a dance probably. No doubt all around you is bustle, glare of lights, noise, and fun. It is such a different scene here. From down the road comes the tinkle of camp bells and jingle of hobble chains. From down in that sheltered angle where the creek meets the river comes the gleam of campfires through the gathering twilight, and I can see several tents rigged for the night, looking like white specks in the distance.