War's End

by Victoria Bowen

  After lunch we started bringing in the clothes that were dry enough. I sprinkled and rolled while Mum and Martha, just home from school, followed with the iron.

  That night Jack suggested I tell Mum that I was knackered.

  Martha looked at him sharply. ‘Don’t you remember what happened to Nell about the farter?’ she asked.

  Jack looked a bit sheepish. ‘Sorry about that, Nell,’ he said. ‘Perhaps “knackered” is not a good thing to say to Mum.’

  If it was like the ‘farter’, I agreed with him.

  Tuesday was what Pa called the beginning of an all-out assault on the house itself.

  We washed the windows ready for the curtains to go back up. I had to do the top halves because Mum gets dizzy up a ladder. I do too when I put too much meths on the newspaper for scrubbing the glass panes.

  Wednesday we wiped down the walls and took the rugs up and pulled them over the line for Jack and Pa to beat later. Mum and me washed the floors and put polish on them. When Martha came home from school, we buffed them up. Now I had aching knees as well as sore hands.

  The next day was the turn for Pa’s room.

  ‘Why?’ asked Pa. ‘Harry isn’t going to inspect the place, Liz. He’s just going to be glad to be home.’

  ‘And I won’t have him coming back to a dirty place, Dad,’ said Mum as she marched in with her bucket and mop.

  ‘It’s not dirty,’ Pa said. ‘It’s lived in. What’s got into you, Liz?’

  ‘Harry’s coming home is what’s got into me,’ said Mum with a smile. ‘And no old curmudgeon is going to stand in my way.’

  Mum pretended to throw the bucket of hot water at Pa, only she tripped and there was Pa covered in dirty soapy water looking startled and Mum with her hand over her mouth in horror. Then she doubled up laughing and after a minute Pa joined in.

  We had to leave his room while he got changed and Mum pegged his clothes on the line to dry, but we went back in and dusted and washed and polished the floor.

  Friday was shopping and bill-paying. First we walked up to the post office so Mum could get the money the government took out of Dad’s pay for us. It had been raining and although we jumped over all of the puddles Mum’s boots were wet through and her hem was muddy. My shoes pinched. And leaked. I was still getting used to wearing them all the time again. And they were too small. Pa needed to stretch them again. And to put new soles on them. I’m the only one whose feet are still growing. Martha’s old ones are still too big for me and Mum reckons I can get another winter out of these ones.

  Then we went around to Mrs Chapman’s and Mum counted out the money we owed for last week’s groceries. Everything had to be up to date before Dad came home.

  ‘We’ve managed without credit up till now,’ said Mum. ‘No need to spoil our record.’

  Then she pointed out to Mrs Chapman where to cut the butter and left her list of groceries for Manny to bring around later. When he came, he quietly pointed to the lolly cone his Mum had put in so I could get them out before Mum saw them.

  ‘Funny,’ Mum said, poking through the basket. ‘That’s unlike Mrs Chapman not to send lollies when she knows how hard you’ve been working.’

  I handed them over.

  Saturday morning was dusting, but Mum said we’d earned a rest and we could do what we wanted in the afternoon. Martha did her homework and me and Jack spent some time weeding for Pa.

  Mum dithered about church on Sunday, finally deciding that, for this one occasion, cleanliness was more important than godliness. We were going to wash on Sunday. Goodness! What would the neighbours say?

  So while Martha and me helped Mum with the washing – just the normal wash, so we’d be up to date – Pa killed a chook. I had pointed out one that had stopped laying and, in short time, Pa had it hanging by its feet from the clothesline. Dead, in a few moments. It looked like a sad part of the washing. Mum was a bit upset it was there at the same time as she was pegging out clothes, but there wasn’t much we could do about that.

  Then Auntie Em came round. She was carrying the dress she’d made Mum for Dad’s homecoming. Mum had saved a bit here and there all through the war, and when she’d heard from Dad at Cape Town she’d gone into town and bought a special piece of deep green wool gaberdine. Mum and I could have made it up but Auntie Em offered to do it. She takes in sewing, altering frocks for the ladies from the big houses and sometimes she makes new ones just like the ones in the ladies’ magazines.

  ‘She is,’ said Mum, ‘professional.’

  I know Auntie would like me to become a seamstress and help her when I leave school, but I don’t care how good I am at sewing, I hate it. Sewing and adding up were my best subjects at school but sewing never ends. You can add up a list of numbers and that’s the end of them. But finish one hem and there’s always another.

  You could tell straight off Auntie Em had made a good job of the dress. Even on its hanger it fell properly. The little buttons down the front were perfectly even and the buttonholes didn’t show any fraying at all.

  Suddenly on the table in front of Mum was a paper bag. Auntie Em pushed it towards her: ‘A little something to celebrate Harry’s homecoming,’ she said.

  And Mum shook out the most wonderful thing I’ve ever seen.

  ‘What is it?’ I asked.

  ‘It’s a jupon,’ said Auntie Em.

  ‘A what?’

  ‘A petticoat.’

  ‘It’s beautiful,’ said Mum. ‘Where did it come from?’

  And Auntie Em laughed. ‘Ted Brownlie brought it home for Mabel from France. She says no God-fearing woman would wear it. I think you’d have to be an awfully God-fearing woman not to want to wear it. Truly, I think she’s just too fat for it. She asked me to sell it for her, so I suggested I keep it and make something for her to replace it. Now it’s yours.’

  ‘Em! I couldn’t,’ said Mum.

  ‘Of course you can,’ said Auntie. ‘It’s something from me and Mary. It’s our way of saying how happy we are for you that Harry survived.’

  And I knew she was thinking of Uncle Bert who would never come home. Mum hugged Auntie Em to her.

  ‘Can I have a look at it?’ I asked.

  ‘Carefully,’ sniffed Mum.

  It was like holding nothing. I was sure if I dropped it, it would float. I stroked the thin shivery material and held it to my face. It felt as if I was gently moving my face over a baby’s tummy straight after its bath.

  ‘Look at the roses,’ I pointed, and we all wondered at the perfection of the tiny little pink raised silk thread roses dotted across the neck.

  ‘That’s long enough looking,’ said Auntie Em. ‘Come on, Liz, let’s have a try on.’

  I stood outside the closed door listening. I heard Mum’s old dress come over her head, followed by her scratchy old cotton petticoat. Then a ‘Here we go’ from Auntie Em followed by a long silence.

  ‘It is sinful!’ whispered Mum.

  ‘But nice,’ answered Auntie Em. And the two of them burst out giggling.

  It was ages before they came out. Martha must have realised something was going on because she left our bedroom and stood next to me waiting. Her eyes were red from too much reading.

  ‘Oh, Mum,’ sighed Martha, when finally the door opened and Mum and Auntie Em came out.

  Mum was a stranger. Young. Alive. I didn’t know she was so pretty. Auntie Em had put her hair up in a new way that let it flop more against her face. Her skin shone against the dark wool dress. Martha and I both stared and had nothing to say.

  After a little twirl, Auntie helped Mum out of the dress and hung it in her wardrobe. ‘Now,’ she said, ‘it’s time to a take a break and have a cuppa.’ What she really meant was to have a gossip.

  ‘Did you know the Farmers have been quarantined?’ she began, while Mum warmed the pot.

  ‘Goodness,’ said Mum, ‘when did that happen? I saw Vi just a few days ago.’

  And you could see she was upset. This was the first ca
se of flu in our street and, besides, she likes Mrs Farmer. They always stop at each other’s front gate for a quick word and Marcie used to come down to play with me until there was not enough time between school and work. Mr Farmer had been back from the war for ages.

  ‘Young Beth was sick yesterday,’ said Auntie, ‘and Vi asked Dr McKenzie to drop in. One look and he told them they had to put the influenza notice on the front gate.’

  That meant no one could go in or go out.

  ‘What are they going to eat?’ I asked.

  Auntie Em snorted. ‘That’s not the real problem. Someone from the government will pick up their orders and make sure they get the necessities. What is the problem is that Mr Farmer can’t go to work, so how are they supposed to pay the rent?’

  Mum turned to me. ‘What’s the egg situation, Nell?’

  Eggs are my responsibility. I feed the chooks and collect the eggs each day. Jack sometimes helps. Martha won’t go near them, she’s too frightened of the rooster. Because the chook run is big I have to look everywhere just in case one of the hens was hiding eggs to hatch. Every so often Pa would say, ‘Time to let a few clutch, Nell’, and then I’d pretend not to see them nesting in corners.

  ‘We can spare a dozen easily,’ I said.

  Mum nodded. ‘Nip up to the Farmers, then, and drop off a dozen as soon as you can. It’ll take time for the powers that be to swing into action and some eggs might help tide them over. There’s a good girl.’

  That meant straightaway

  ‘But’, Mum went on, ‘don’t go up to the door. Leave them by the front fence.’

  Already there was a small packing box by the Farmers’ gate. I carefully put the eggs in their rolled cone of newspaper just like Mrs Chapman makes for our lollies. Marcie came out and I stepped back out of reach of germs.

  We waved and she went back inside.

  In the late afternoon Pa bucketed hot water from the copper into the bathroom tub and Mum, then Martha and then me had a bath. Being the youngest has its disadvantages at times, but Pa topped up the bath with hot water before I got in. It was cold out there; the wind comes under the door and we were quick about it. Then Pa and Jack had their turn, while Mum, Martha and me sat in the kitchen warming up.

  That night we had a boiled egg and bread and dripping for tea. Our shoes were polished and Martha’s and my best dresses were hanging behind our door ready for the morning. We were all going down to the Fremantle wharf on the 7.30 train to watch the ship come in – except Jack who couldn’t get time off from the Post Office. Telegrams still had to be delivered, his boss said. He’s not a nice man. Pa says he’s self-inflated.

  After tea Mum put the oven door down and we sat around it before she sent us off to bed. None of us could sleep, though. Mum and Pa murmured by the stove. Jack lay in his bed on the back verandah. I could hear him tossing around trying to get to sleep.

  In the dark, Martha started talking about Dad.

  ‘I hope he’s all right,’ she said.

  ‘Why wouldn’t he be?’

  ‘Don’t you know anything?’ she said. ‘A lot of the soldiers come back changed.’

  ‘How changed? And why? What’s happened to them?’

  ‘I don’t know. Millie’s uncle is terrible. He sits inside all day just staring. Half the time he doesn’t even get dressed. And then last Guy Fawkes night he went crazy. Screaming and running around with his hands over his ears. Millie’s dad had to sit on him, and then he just lay there and cried.’

  ‘Do you think Dad’ll do that?’ I asked.

  ‘I hope not,’ she answered. ‘It doesn’t sound like Dad, but Millie said her uncle was all right before he went away.’

  ‘Can you remember him?’ I asked. ‘Dad, I mean.’

  ‘Of course,’ said Martha. ‘He’s nice. He smells of tobacco and horses. He always read to us after tea while Mum cleaned up. He called me his bright spark.’

  That’s right, I thought. Always Martha the bright one.

  ‘What did he call me?’ I asked.

  ‘I don’t know,’ answered Martha. ‘Can’t you remember?’

  Of course I couldn’t, otherwise I wouldn’t have asked her. I rolled over so my back was towards her.

  ‘Nell,’ called Martha across the space between our beds, ‘I’m sure Dad didn’t give me a nickname until I was quite old. I must have been nearly nine or ten. I think you were just too young for one before he went away. And you know Mum isn’t one for that sort of thing.’

  WE MUST HAVE ALL DRIFTED OFF INTO OUR OWN thoughts, because when Pa spoke I jerked as if he’d shaken me.

  ‘Must have been a shock, Harry, not to be able to get off in Perth,’ he said to Dad. ‘All that way and so close and then to have to go on.’

  ‘More than a shock, William,’ answered Dad. ‘It was almost too much to take in.

  ‘We knew something was wrong when we went on deck first thing in the morning and we were off the coast around Bunbury way. If it hadn’t been so cold we’d have kipped on deck that night and we’d have known straightaway something was up. But we didn’t and in the night the ship just sailed straight past Freo.

  ‘Were we ropeable! At first I thought it was because there were only eight of us getting off and they didn’t want to stop the ship for just us, but the CO explained that no, it wasn’t that. The whole of Perth was quarantined with the influenza. “You can’t get in or out,” he said, “and that includes Fremantle.”

  ‘I still think there was a bit more to it than that. We’d all heard of the fuss over the Dimboolah and I reckon the ships’ owners were a bit uneasy about getting caught in Fremantle. I wouldn’t be surprised if they saved money coaling in Albany rather than Fremantle, too.

  ‘The CO told us that when we arrived in Adelaide, we’d be able to get on a train to take us back to Perth. We weren’t having that. Our group was furious. We threatened to jump ship in Albany, and he threatened to have us locked up while the ship was coaling.

  ‘Finally he saw sense and said he’d see if we could get off in Albany. And we did. The CO came up to the town with us and roused out the mayor to organise billeting for us.

  ‘So we settled down to wait for the quarantine to be lifted from Perth and the trains to start running again.’

  We found out when Billy came around first thing with the paper. He was so early Mum had only just poured a cup of tea for herself and Pa. I heard him through the bedroom wall.

  ‘Dad said you should see this,’ he panted. He must have been told to run.

  I heard Mum gasp and I hopped out of bed and edged into the kitchen. Mum was so upset she didn’t even notice I was in my nightie in front of Billy. Not that Billy would have cared. He and Jack have been friends for ages and they’d let me play with them ever since I showed I could hit a ball and I could run fast. We don’t take notice of things like nighties.

  Pa was looking at the paper. Billy had it opened at the shipping news page: ‘SS Orient to bypass Fremantle due to quarantine’.

  Mum was sitting very upright at the table. ‘And when did this quarantine begin?’ she demanded.

  Pa turned the paper back to the front page. ‘Today. There’s a map here of the boundaries and you can’t go outside them without a doctor’s letter. Trying to contain the influenza. Not let it out into the country.’

  Mum sniffed and she wasn’t beautiful any more.

  I saw how much Dad coming home mattered to her. She needed him to share with. Pa helped but it wasn’t the same, and he needed time to himself as well. I saw that Dad home might be able to save Jack from a life he hated, and Martha wanted him to be proud of her and tell her she was doing the right thing. I was the only one who could get along without Dad, but perhaps when I got used to him that might change.

  Finally Mum saw me. ‘Nell, what are you doing here in your nightdress? You hop on home now, Billy, and thank your dad for sending you around. Nell, just before you get dressed – and wear your old dress – wake Jack for me. I’m surprised he�
��s slept through the commotion.’

  I couldn’t wake Jack, even when I shook him. He was hot, burning up. It was a cold morning but his hair was stuck to his forehead with sweat.

  ‘Mum,’ I called, ‘I think something’s wrong with Jack.’

  Pa came out onto the verandah and felt Jack’s head.

  ‘Liz,’ he called, ‘you’d better come and have a look at Jack. I think he’s got the flu.’

  Mum did think Jack might have the flu and then the argument started. Pa wanted the doctor in, but Mum wasn’t having a bar of it.

  ‘They’ll quarantine us. If Harry makes it home I won’t have him stopped at the door! And if we’re quarantined you won’t be able to do the wood round and we’ll fall behind with the money before he gets home. I’ve worked too hard all these years to make sure he didn’t come home to debt. I won’t have it.’

  Mum started crying.

  Pa looked startled. Mum doesn’t cry often and he didn’t know what to do. And it was obvious it didn’t matter what he said, Mum wasn’t going to change her mind. In the end he agreed Martha could go into the Post Office and see Jack’s boss. She was to tell him Jack had cut his leg helping Pa in the wood yard and that he would be off for a week or so.

  ‘If he loses his job,’ Mum said, ‘that’d be just too bad.’

  Fancy Mum saying that!

  Then Mum remembered her flu scrapbook. ‘Nell, look on my dresser. It’s behind my box. And, while you’re there, look for that letter from Auntie Bea.’

  Mum’s box was beautiful. Dad had made it for her as his going away present. It was to hold the letters he would send her. I wasn’t allowed to open it. I wasn’t allowed to even go near it.

  ‘I’ll know if anyone has touched this box or if it has been opened,’ warned Mum, looking at me. ‘And I’ll know who it was and they’ll get a real good spanking and they won’t be able to sit down for a week.’

  The box glowed a deep red-brown.

  ‘French polished,’ Mum said with a smile in her voice whenever she looked at it. ‘Must have taken Harry ages.’

  ‘Dovetailed and made to last,’ said Pa. ‘A thing of wonder.’