‘Is that your real hair?’
‘Meg!’ said Emily.
‘Why is it white like Mum’s horse?’
‘Tilly!’
‘Are you a witch?’
‘Meg!’ they all chorused.
Evie smiled. ‘It’s all right. Most people think I’m a complete nutter. It’s just because I’m a woman and I choose to live alone on a mountain. At least I don’t have a house full of cats and share their food with them.’ Her smile warmed not just her face but the whole room. The Flanaghans laughed, relieved. She seemed like a very nice, normal person.
‘How did you know we needed someone to help Emily?’ Sam asked, still a little suspicious of her.
‘Oh, word gets around,’ Evie said vaguely. ‘Which reminds me …’ she reached into her bag. ‘Today’s paper.’
The headlines loomed large. PARLIAMENT BILL TO OUST CATTLEMEN.
‘It’s not looking good for you,’ Evie said.
They huddled round the article. A Bill to ban the renewal of grazing licences, which had been in place for over a hundred years, would be debated in parliament the following week. If the Bill was passed, there would be a statewide blanket ban on cattle grazing on government parkland. The Flanaghans would be one of many high-country families affected.
Emily glanced at Evie. Had she come to gloat?
‘We’re going to have to get onto this,’ Flo said. ‘We haven’t got much time.’
Rod looked up at Evie. ‘Thanks for letting us know. We’d better get back down to Tranquillity and crank the computer up again.’
Sam rolled his eyes. ‘Oh, God. Here we go again. Bloody groundhog day!’
‘This is different, Sam!’ Emily said, jabbing her finger on the article. ‘In the past they’ve only threatened bans. Now, if this thing gets through, it’ll become law. They’ll kick us off for good!’
‘And what if they do?’ Sam said bitterly. ‘At least we’d be done with this endless fight.’
‘It’ll be the land that suffers. They do it every time. Make one rule for an entire region. It just doesn’t work that way. Not all the mountains are the same! You don’t think we should be kicked off?’ Emily turned to Evie, almost pleading.
‘No need to shoot the messenger,’ Rod said.
Emily slumped back in her chair and muttered an apology to Evie. But the news that the Bill could become law in a matter of weeks unhinged her. To be locked out forever was too much to bear. This was the only place she wanted to be – where snowgums flowered like frothy lace, the summer meadows growing thick with tiny star-like daisies and purple orchids as pretty as fairy skirts nestled at the base of grey-streaked, twisting gums, where billy buttons dotted yellow across the snowgrass, and around the soft edges of secret springs, moss grew in swathes of green magic beneath the ferns.
They had all worked hard to fence the cattle out of creek crossings that might become bogged. They had split trees and slung the heavy timber into deep postholes, straining wire and pulling taut barbs. If the snow melt was too soon and the country seemed drier and delicate, they lightened the load and took fewer cows up – sometimes well below the light stocking rates stipulated by the National Parks, if the land deemed it so. Wherever they could in the rugged country, Rod and Flo put in a snaking trail of underground poly-pipe to create gravity-fed trough systems to keep the cattle from the creeks that ran over the tufted snow plains.
‘You don’t need to convince me,’ Evie said, holding up her hands. ‘There’s no right and wrong in anything in my world. Life just is as it is.’
Emily took in Evie’s gentle words. She thought of the landscape across the fenceline, which told a very different story about the cattlemen. Uncle Bob’s country, where the paddocks were flogged bare, where he let the cattle wander where they may into creek crossings. He’d spray weeds one year but then, on a booze bender, have no money for spraying them the next. He was rude to the Parkies, vocal with the media and caused all kinds of trouble. It was that kind of hypocrisy within her own kind that sometimes made Emily shy away from the whole debate. But then she thought again of her family’s history, and the fact that city bureaucrats were planning to put a blanket grazing ban across the entire Alpine area.
‘But how can you not question this?’ Emily asked. ‘It’s a decision based on lines on a map, not the land itself. What kind of management regime is that? We’ll be allowed to graze the forestry areas but not the Park, but how do you fence an area as steep as this when it’s an imaginary line on a map? It’s bureaucratic crap.’
Flo was getting fiery now and joined Emily by her side. ‘We’re being targeted as environmental scapegoats so as to distract people from the real issues – like fossil fuel, water shortages, global warming, mass consumerism. It has nothing to do with the land. It’s all about getting votes. That’s why we’re getting our arses kicked!’
‘Ladies!’ said Rod, holding up his hands. ‘We can talk about this later. But Evie came here for other reasons, and, for now, we need to find out what kind of care she can offer Emily.’
‘Yes, you’re right, Mr Flanaghan,’ Evie said. ‘I’m here to nurse Emily back to health. And anyone else who may need it,’ she said, directing a mild look at Sam. He folded his arms across his chest.
‘Who sent you?’ he said.
Ignoring him, Evie rummaged in her bag.
‘Here are my nursing qualifications and here are my fees, though I expect you can claim a percentage on that with your government health care.’ She pushed a piece of paper over to Rod and Emily.
‘It’ll be easy for me to cook, too, as I’m not far down the road. That’ll be no charge for meals. Just neighbours helping others.’
Rod surveyed the documents, looked across to Emily and said, ‘Sounds like we should give it a shot, eh, Em?’ When Emily didn’t respond Rod clapped his hands together like an auctioneer. ‘Done! You’re hired.’
Before Sam and Emily could question Rod’s decision, the dogs outside began to scrap, to the sound of growls and teeth snapping.
‘Jesus Christ!’ cried out Evie.
‘My sentiments exactly,’ muttered Sam to Emily.
Fourteen
Two days later, with Jesus Christ lying on her lap and Rousie sleeping at her feet, Emily nestled contentedly in a comfortable lounge chair on the verandah. She sat in gentle sunshine, watching Sam and the girls grooming the ponies. Her grazes and wounds looked ugly and raw in the daylight, but Emily could feel the air on her skin doing them good.
In the kitchen Evie was humming to herself and even though the unfamiliar cooking smells emanating from the open window were disconcerting, Emily was strangely comforted by Evie’s presence.
The peace and quiet was shattered momentarily as the old green phone shrilled from the kitchen. It was happening again, Emily thought sadly. The frantic phone calls flooding in for Rod and Flo as they planned the cattlemen’s media campaigns to defend their right to alpine grazing. Ever since the eighties it had been this way, a long, drawn-out battle that left them depressed and depleted.
‘Do you want me to get that?’ Evie called, but Sam was already sprinting to the house.
‘Could be my agent,’ he puffed.
‘Don’t get your hopes up. It’s probably someone from the Mountain Cattlemen’s Association looking for Dad,’ Emily called.
The girls wandered over to Emily. They looked with fascination at their mother’s scars, grazes and fading yellow bruising. She felt the gentle zing of their fingertips and flinched when their touch strayed too close to a sore patch.
‘Careful,’ she cautioned.
‘I’m glad Evie’s here,’ Meg said.
‘Oh? Why’s that?’ Emily said absently.
‘She’s an angel.’
‘She is not,’ said Tilly, hands on hips. ‘She doesn’t have any wings.’
‘She is too,’ said Meg, and so they began to squabble until Emily guiltily raised her voice to quieten them and then coaxed them to go and gather some kind
ling for the campfire that night. It would be great to sit out under the stars and talk Sam into playing a tune.
Just then he came banging out the door with a tray in his hands. On it was a steaming pot of tea and their grandmother’s ornate teacups, the ones from the back of the cupboard that they never used.
Sam set the tray down and leaned towards Emily as he said, ‘She’s a whacko, all right! You should see all the herbs in there.’ He curved his index fingers in the air when he said ‘herbs’. ‘I’ve never seen a bigger stash of hooch. She’s probably put it in your tea, in these biscuits she’s cooked and in the stew she’s making for dinner. We’ll all be off our heads by sundown.’
‘Well, you’d know, wouldn’t you?’ Emily sniped, then regretted it. ‘I’m sorry, Sam. I’m a bit over it all at the moment. Clance, the parliament thing, my body. I’ve got too much time to think.’
‘Drink your tea to start with,’ said Evie as she came from the house. ‘Chamomile for calm,’ she said. ‘And yes, Sam, I have a lot of herbs, but they’re purely medicinal.’
‘Yeah, sure,’ said Sam, winking. ‘Sure they are.’
‘Nothing of mine can be smoked or used to get high, I’m sorry. It’s either blackfella bush medicine or European herbs. I’ve got a bit of Chinese stuff, but I find I can’t grow a lot of that where I am.’
‘I can get you a deer penis, if you like,’ Sam said. Emily whacked him hard on the arm.
‘Don’t be disgusting, Sam,’ she said.
‘He’s fine,’ said Evie, settling down on an old chair. ‘I love bum and dick jokes. You go for it.’
Emily pulled an amused face at the statement from a seemingly innocent old lady.
‘It’s medicine that’s bought me up to the mountains. That and my own personal crud that I don’t need to explain to you. But it’s healing I’m interested in. Health and healing.’
‘Really?’ said Sam. ‘I thought you were the local hooch grower. That’s what they say at the pub.’
‘Do they now? Well, they’ve never asked. And I’ve never said. Let ’em make up stories. It’s fun for them and it does me no harm. Most of them say I’m mad. But aren’t we all in some way?’
Sam and Emily glanced at each other.
‘But why live on your own on the mountain? And not in the town and work as a nurse at the bush hospital?’ Emily asked.
Evie shrugged. ‘I’m a loner. Like you Flanaghans, I love the mountains. Anyway, I’ve moved past that conventional medicine stuff so the hospital has no place for me. It serves its purpose well, but I’m interested in what’s between the ears in health.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Well, take yourself, for example.’ Evie looked squarely at Emily. ‘From your injuries I can tell a lot about you emotionally and how you think.’
‘Yeah, right,’ said Emily, laughing. ‘I thought – shit, here comes a tree!’
Evie ignored her jibe and continued talking in her calm, gentle voice. ‘The fact you have broken ribs tells me you’re having deep trouble being the woman you think you should be in your relationship with a man. You sold out your true self. It tells me you’re rebelling against authority in some way. And the fact you had an accident tells me you not only want to rebel against this authority, but you have lost your voice from it. No doubt, from your injuries, you’re finding it hard to breathe, which tells me that you are fearful, not able to take in life fully. It tells me you sometimes feel that you don’t even have the right to take up space and exist in this world.’
‘Crap,’ said Sam, who was leaning on the verandah post, rolling a cigarette. ‘You don’t know our Emily then.’
‘Fine if you think it’s crap, Sam,’ Evie said. She turned her clear gaze on him. ‘A person takes on addictive habits when he is trying to run from himself. I’m sure you have that feeling of “what’s the use?” in life. I know you feel guilt, futility and inadequacy.’
‘Doesn’t everyone?’ Sam said defensively.
‘Drug addiction and alcoholism,’ Evie continued, ‘are forms of self-rejection from someone who can’t see the light of God within them.’
Sam’s eyes were blazing. ‘So you’re calling me a drug addict now? And an alcoholic? How do you know?’
Evie looked heavenward. ‘I’m guided by intuitive energies from Source.’
‘See! She is a God-bothering nutter.’ Sam shot a glance at Emily, then looked back at Evie. ‘What right do you have to come here and judge us?’
‘I’m here because I was called here. And I don’t judge.’
‘Ooh! Called here, were you? Direct line to God, eh? He got you on the 1800 Source hotline, did he?’
‘No. It was Penny, actually. She knew your family needed more than just medical healing. I know she feels terrible guilt, but that’s her journey.’
Emily froze at the mention of Penny’s name. She felt Evie’s steady gaze on her, and somehow felt calmer.
‘I’ve been out to enough remote bush-nursing stations to know that the displacement from the land will affect your spirit. You see, the body and its health reflects your thoughts and emotions and these mountains are your heart-place. The medicos may dismiss it as hippy shit but the more science and spiritualism become aligned, the better people will heal.’
‘And what about yourself?’ Sam said, resting a foot up behind him on the verandah post. ‘Do you have any pearls of wisdom on yourself?’
Evie smiled. ‘Are you asking to avoid reflecting on your own self? Is that why you haven’t yet given up your addictions?’
Sam let out a strangled cry of frustration, grabbed up his tobacco and matches and stormed off towards the stables.
‘He’s still using, isn’t he?’ Emily said, watching him go.
‘I think so.’
‘He said he gave me everything he had. I burnt it in the campfire, but he must have more somewhere. He’s not normally so hostile.’
‘Do you want me to look?’
‘He’ll be angry,’ Emily said sadly.
‘It has to be done.’
‘I know.’
‘Leave it with me.’
Evie went inside, leaving Emily to meditate on what she’d just said about herself and Sam. This woman, a complete stranger, had perfectly summed up their lives. Each painful breath Emily took reminded her of her battles with Clancy over the past six years, and her family’s struggle with bureaucracy.
Evie came back out, a plastic packet in her hand. ‘That should be the last of it.’
‘Thank you,’ Emily said.
They sat in silence for a time, the buzz of march flies disturbing the dogs now and then.
‘Evie?’
‘Mmm?’
‘Why is it that people reckon mountain grass-fed cattle farts and global warming are intricately connected, when there are massive cities and factories that keep pumping out stuff and most people don’t even question it? Some days it’s all too big and upsetting to digest.’
‘My dear girl,’ Evie said, ‘you can’t alter what people think, do, say or how they act. It’s how you respond to situations that counts. Not how you react, but how you respond. Worrying is a complete waste of energy. You need to work out your own true path and not worry about others. How are you going to respond?’
‘Respond to what?’
‘The situation you’re in.’
‘Like losing the cattle runs?’ Emily paused, thinking. ‘The Mountain Cattlemen’s Association’s organising a protest ride in Melbourne in three weeks’ time.’
‘And is that the answer?’
Emily shrugged. ‘I doubt it. But we have to make people aware!’
‘Sometimes the more we protest, the more we’re anti something, the more fuel we add to that fire. We perpetuate the negative situation. Better to be pro-something. It creates a better flow of energy.’
Emily sat in stunned silence staring out to the trees. Evie was right. The more they railed against the government, the bigger the battle they seemed to face.
The more they went head-to-head against the scientists, environmentalists and bureaucrats, the less ground they seemed to gain. Emily suddenly thought of Ratgirl in the ambulance and her fury over the bilby. Suddenly, horrifyingly, she realised she was no different to that strange angry girl dressed in a costume (except Ratgirl had the gorgeous boyfriend). They were both protesting against something, and making the problem even bigger. She thought of all the money that had been spent by both sides of the alpine grazing debate on campaigning, protesting, advertising and spin. It was money, time and energy that could’ve been spent on the land itself. It was such a backwards way of doing it and it meant that the one thing that mattered, the land, was lost in it all.
She frowned and turned to Evie. ‘So you mean I should be pro-environment and pro-grazing? Is that what you’re saying?’
‘Firstly, ban the word “should” from your vocabulary. That word is a waste, a noose!’ Evie reached out and touched Emily’s hand. ‘You can be anything you like, dear, but you’ll create more change being pro-something, coming up with answers and solutions, creating flow, instead of hitting one energy against another.’
‘Ahh!’ said Emily. ‘But how do I do that?’
‘Wait one sec.’
Evie disappeared into the house again. Rousie stood, stretched and settled back on his haunches. He sat his head in Emily’s lap, nosing Jesus Christ out of the way, and sighed deeply as if to say, bear with her. Bear with this strange old woman. Have patience.
Evie returned with an armful of books.
‘The best way to make a difference and to heal yourself and the people around you is to control the thoughts in your mind. I’ve brought some reading for you.’
She unloaded the books onto Emily’s lap.
Beyond the Brink, The Future Eaters, Ask & it is Given, and the odd one out – a government publication with a dry, lengthy title.
‘What’s this one?’
‘It’s a study on how the Tasmanian National Parks organisation use cattle and the cattlemen’s expertise to periodically graze wilderness areas there. It’s particularly interesting as it shows people working together, not against each other, to manage the land,’ Evie said, tapping the cover. ‘It shows that, perhaps, in a controlled way, the cattle do belong here on this mountainside, and that local people are worth listening to.’
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