by Kim Kelly
I walk across the university lawn with extra gravity in both shoes, heading for the Stag Hotel. You wouldn’t know there was a war on here either: I’ll probably have the veal schnitzel for my lunch. It’s just after one, so I’m expecting I’ll run into Errol, but he’s not in the front bar when I walk in. The barman sees me and nods in the direction of the lounge, indicating he’s out there. Probably with a girl. I don’t want to meet his latest conquest, not on an empty stomach: they all fall for him, nice girls and prostitutes alike. I don’t know where he finds the energy for it at all.
I’m just about to order my first beer, when Errol’s head appears at the door of the lounge, looking about – for me. ‘Doze!’ Waving for me to get over there. He looks a bit excited.
‘What?’ I go over to him.
‘They’re here, the people from the Herald – just picked them up from the airport. Come on.’
‘Oh. Good.’ Tell me when I should care.
‘Find your happy face, will you?’
I find more than that.
Two seconds later I’m being introduced to the journalist and the photographer from Sydney and being whacked for six.
‘Hello. Gordon, isn’t it? I’m Glynis Kay, I’ll be taking some pictures on the trail. Call me Glyn.’
Glyn. And you’re a girl.
For all that I am unimpressed by men who have difficulty shaking the hand of a woman, I’m having difficulty now. I’m thinking: no chance. You are not coming up on that trail with us. Somehow I maintain the wherewithal to recognise that this reaction has been provoked in me because she is extremely pretty. Long blonde hair that curves around her face. No, she’s not pretty. She’s … oh shit. This reaction is nuclear. Don’t look at her breasts. I keep my eyes fixed on hers. What colour are they? No idea. They’re not looking away from mine. Don’t look at her breasts. Shaking my hand.
I somehow manage to say: ‘Yes. Pleased to meet you.’
I think I might’ve just woken up.
‘Glyn.’
She’s twenty-eight. Three years older than me. Feels like thirty. She’s rolling a cigarette. What girl rolls her own cigarettes? A girl who rolls her own cigarettes, Brock. Get past it. She’s a professional woman, respected in her field, and not the first one I’ve ever met. My paleontology lecturer was a woman, Doctor Ida Brown, and she was frightening too. But for different reasons. This Glyn Kay, she’s got ten men and one kelpie paralysed from the jaw down, this first night out from Leigh Creek. The firelight is making shadows over the buttons of her blouse. I’ve got no idea what she’s talking about, but she’s just said something to me.
I say: ‘Pardon?’
And she says: ‘So why do they call you Dozy then, Gordon?’
‘Um …’ This probably tops my list of uncomfortable silences.
‘Ah, that’d be obvious, wouldn’t it?’ Errol jokes over it, but she doesn’t laugh. She doesn’t look at him.
‘Story for another time,’ she smiles. At me. She says the word like it might have a different meaning in her language: tiiiiime. She’s English, upper crust, but she’s not a gel. She’s something else. She grew up in Africa, taking pictures of giraffes. Stop looking at her breasts. Keep looking at her eyes. They’re blue.
I say: ‘Yeah.’ Forgetting whatever it was she just said.
Tim leans across me to turn a log. ‘Getting hard to watch you two, Dozy.’
He and Errol think I’m in with a chance. Where this thought lies on the scale of frightening, I don’t know. Nothing’s going to happen anyway. I have the close company of four miners, an engineer, a quantity surveyor and a journalist to prevent it. Fritz leans in close to me too. Nothing’s going to happen here, except my understanding of why it’s not right for certain women to work in certain fields.
I’ve lost the thread of conversation altogether when I hear Les, the journo and her boss, say: ‘It would be good for Glyn to get some shots out at the hot springs – they are going to be a great attraction for the trail. Could that be arranged when we get to Mount Painter? I’d like to spend some time having a look at the mine workings, for my personal interest.’ For the Departments of Army and Information: he’s in on the secret; she’s not. ‘And we’re on such a tight schedule. You’re not interested in the mines are you, Glyn?’
‘No,’ she laughs. The miners are crushed. She has a smoky laugh. I could listen to it all night. She says: ‘Are there more paintings out at the springs, Tim?’ Cave paintings, she’s asking. She held us up today for a bit, taking pictures of an ochre wallaby and calcite tracks under a sandstone overhang. She’s keen that Les include something on the Aboriginal art for the paper and Tim couldn’t be happier at her interest.
He says: ‘Yeah, lots of paintings, Miss Kay. I’ll show you all around up there, the spring at Paralana. Only about six mile, easy walking. But we would have to camp out, maybe two days, if the weather’s not good.’ There is no such thing as not good weather up here, Tim. ‘We would need company, ay,’ he says, meaning you can’t have a white woman going out on her own with a black man. He looks at me: ‘Dozy, you want to see them rocks up there, too, don’t you?’
Bastard. ‘I – but. No. I can’t go off on some excursion, I’m the geo–’
Errol says: ‘We’ll be blasting, Doze, don’t need you getting in the way for the first couple of days.’
Nine men and a dog looking at me – go on – as if I’ve got to do it for the team.
I know what’s going on. A conspiracy. I say, ‘Yeah, all right.’
I suppose it’s a bridge I’ve got to cross. Nothing’s going to happen, except for spending a couple of days with a girl. A smart and pretty girl who’s saying, to me: ‘Oh, well, it’s decided then.’ Looking under that curve of blonde hair that falls across her face, a little bit shy herself. Yeah. This’ll do me good.
‘Just keep following the track up, will youse, I’ve got things to do for a minute. I’ll catch up,’ says Tim ten minutes after we set out from the pits. The first of the charges is let off in Little Gem and Glyn says: ‘So you didn’t tell me, where’s the nickname come from?’
‘Ah, just, um.’ I can’t answer that. Yes, I can. I force myself to. ‘It’s a name a mate gave me in, um, Rabaul. A few years ago, in New Guinea. He’s not around any more.’
‘Oh, I see.’ It takes her half a second to put it together. ‘I mean, I don’t see but, you know. Please, don’t say any more. I’m sorry I brought it up again. I’m too curious sometimes. Mind if I call you Gordon then?’
‘No. I prefer it, actually.’ Her hand brushes against the back of mine and it’s all right. It is good. I’m glad she’s curious, and that she could keep a conversation with a fence post going if she had to.
She says: ‘So tell me, you said you’re from Nyngan – where exactly is that?’
I tell her: ‘Between Dubbo and Bourke, over the border in New South Wales.’
‘Bourke? I’ve heard of Bourke – that’s a wool town, isn’t it? You’re a country boy; I knew it.’
‘You did? What gives me away?’ I laugh, for the first time in her company. I like the sound of our laughing together. I’m falling for her. Her hair is tied back from her face with a scarf and she is even more pretty. Glynis Kay. It’s very good to be here with you. She has little feet, and a big swag on her back, but she keeps step with me.
We don’t stop for cave paintings, or even photographs of the view. You wouldn’t want the weather to change, would you. Somehow her hand ends up in mine and we’ve chatted away six miles, following Fritz, and then Tim’s saying behind us: ‘It’s only a few yards over there, you see them rocks sticking up – that’s the pool. You go a have a look. But don’t drink that water – it’s Akurra’s, no good for you. I’ll get us some fresh water – I’ll be a while. An hour or two.’
‘All right,’ I say.
Glyn says to the rocks: ‘How lovely.’
We can see the spring steaming up from the granite boulders ahead. You could power the Transconti
nental Express off the steam between us. I could love her now. I have to love her. I will.
But I’m not going to rush it.
I ask her, rushing it: ‘You want to go in the spring?’
‘Oh, I don’t know,’ she says, and her voice is as shaky as I am as we walk round the rocks. The granite here is pink and there are red dragonflies in the grasses at the edge. ‘It looks very hot,’ she says: ‘Would it be safe to go in?’
‘Um, I don’t see why not.’ I’ve started unbuttoning my shirt. ‘I’ll test it out first, if you want.’
‘Mm,’ she smiles but then she looks away from me, saying: ‘Why is the spring so hot anyway?’ Unrolling her swag onto the rocks and setting herself down on it. She doesn’t want to go in the spring. Fair enough. I stop undressing myself.
‘Um,’ I say, trying to remember what she just asked as I sit by her. The spring. Hot. Why. Conversation. I say: ‘It’s probably the radioactive decay. I mean, the energy coming off all the pitchblende round here, as it breaks down. I mean, the uranium oxide … in it.’ Sound a bit more thrilling, go on. ‘Um. It makes the rocks get hot.’
‘Mm.’ She leans away from me. She’s looking in the pocket of her swag and takes out a book. ‘It’s such a beautiful spot. Here. Isn’t it.’
‘Mm.’ Geez. What do I do now? I want to kiss her. I want to love her. How?
She looks up from her book and smiles at me again. I will never understand what women mean with anything they do or say. I’m sure she wouldn’t mind if I kissed her. I think she wants me to. But how? She’s probably as nervous as I am. Take it easy. Whoa. Stop this line altogether. I could have got this completely wrong, couldn’t I.
Ask her: ‘What are you reading there?’
She says: ‘Oh this?’ Turning the cover towards me with one hand and reaching up to touch my face with the other. The touch of her fingers sends a radioactive wave through me, taking me out past Alpha Centauri. I am going to love Glynis Kay, right here, right now.
I look down, to steady my breath before I kiss her.
I look down at the book she’s holding in her hand.
The title: Too Much To Lose.
By Bernie Cooper.
Bernie Cooper?
BERNIE
Out on the verandah, I watch the way Mitchell’s shoulder kicks up with the shot, nothing out here to stop me seeing it over a hundred yards, or a hundred miles. I can watch the desert creeping out from the Centre here, a shimmering beige disease. I could stay inside and listen to the cracks of the rifle ripping through the stillness at a steady pace, or watch, from here. Be with him somehow, from here.
He’s not alone out there. The dogs are with him: Tilly and Rex sit patiently, waiting for him to finish. And the dingo trapper, Ned Preston, is out there too. He goes over to Mitch now, asking him something; Ned has stopped by today to help dig the trenches for the sheep. It’s so sad. This is the last of them on the station that haven’t been sold or sent on agistment to Yass. Mitch couldn’t sell these ewes, or justify feeding them when they’re so sick it’s a cruelty to keep them alive. Their lambs were born too weak and they all died as well; little ragdolls in the dust, eighteen of them. Didn’t allow me to indulge in any bottle-feeding. I couldn’t do anything for them. There’s been no reason for me to be here at all these past four months, apart from not being able to leave Mitch.
Everyone else has left, his two stockmen and the cook; and the shearers didn’t have to bother coming at all. Even the rabbits have left the district apparently. Despite knowing all this was happening, I had no idea how hard things could be out here. Mitch will be all right; the Lockharts have got plenty of assets to sell before they have to hock the Tom Roberts. Money’s no comfort against having to shoot your stock, though. It makes Mr Paterson’s silly Hay and Hell poem shameful, and it’s making me a vegetarian. Or at least it’s doubtful I’ll ever eat lamb again after this. The worst drought in living memory, so it’s been declared.
Mitch and Ned start swinging the sheep into the trench; sixty-three of them altogether today. Where there were once twenty thousand. All gone. As the sun starts to sink they shovel the grey dirt back over them, and that’s that. The close of Hell Station, for the time being.
He waves to Ned as they part ways, and Ned waves his hat towards me as he gets up on his horse and rides off, back to the pub, the One Tree Hotel that’s named for the one tree that exists between here and Booligal. It’s half a mile from the pub and it’s dead too. Where’s our poem about that? Mitch starts walking back up to the homestead, rifle in one hand, shovels in the other, dog either side of white moleskins that are spattered in blood.
He gives me that crooked smile as he nears and asks me: ‘You going to tell this story too, Dette?’ His fortitude is breathtaking.
I say: ‘Quite likely.’ I’ve written a fair bit already about this quiet, forgotten war on the land, which never ceases. We cling round the edges of a continent that doesn’t want us; no wonder we hold peace so dear. Perhaps that’s why the Japs seem to have changed their minds about invading too: they came, they saw and said to themselves, these people are all mental, we can’t possibly take them on. Mr Jacobs says it’s sounding good, the inference being: hurry it along. Too Much To Lose is doing so well, he thinks he’s going to have to reprint it. People seem to like it. Well, the thirty-seven people who turned up to his Ginger Jar soiree do, he said Such a shame you couldn’t join us. Abe Jacobs must have some very loyal friends, mustn’t he. But I’ll finish this next one for the weary defeat in Mitchell’s eyes alone. Someone’s got to tell this tale, don’t they.
‘We’ll head off in a couple of days,’ he says, tapping my arm with the brim of his hat as he passes me. Kicking off his boots as he goes into the house. It’s made of rammed earth, a squatter’s cottage, a piece of wild west history. Part of me doesn’t want to leave. I can imagine myself living here, with the pedal wireless, and the kerosene lamps, and the old wood stove, and writing every day in between looking after Mitch. No telephone ringing; a timelessness in that. I love this quiet, and I do love Mitch. Our differences and needs are so complementary. A grazier’s wife needs an inner life, or some kind of interest, or she’d be a real madwoman real quickly; and I have that life. I have a lot to give Mitch. It’s time for me to make a decision.
‘It’ll be so good to see your mum,’ I follow him in.
He shrugs and tosses a broody cluck over his shoulder, mocking her, as he pours himself a glass of water, but I’m sure he’s looking forward to seeing her too. Mrs Lockhart has only been home herself for a few weeks, back from Wilcannia. Her sister Ivy had a stroke, not a bad one, and she’s all right now. And I would love to be able to call Mrs Lockhart by her name, Bess. She’s been like a mother to me, and I do want her to be my mother, really. It makes so much sense all round. It’ll stop bush telegraph tongues from wagging, too, as they must be by now. Ooo, what’s that Bernadette Cooper doing out there with Mitch Lockhart? Living in sin? We might as well be if desire can be counted as action. But no, I’m not going to let history repeat in that respect: Mrs Lockhart won’t be getting a shotgun with this romance.
He raises his glass to me. ‘Don’t know what I might’ve done without you here, Dette. Thanks, for everything.’ Scrubbing his Scotch twill and his moleskins and enduring the daily torment of his washing at the trough under the kitchen window. Service to the nation, don’t need to thank me. But he just has, and I could let him have me here on the kitchen floor for it. What’s it going to be like when I finally do let him have me? Then I will finally be in love with him, won’t I?
That almost makes my mind up. Makes me want to be his wife. Even more surprisingly, makes me want for a child of my own. Against all this death, I suppose, I want a new life. I want a family of my own. I’m ready beyond a shred of doubt for that now.
But still, something is not letting go. Silly, it’s as if I want a note from Hughie telling me it’s all right. It’s probably just proof what they say about first loves is
true: you’ll never have another like it. It’ll always niggle that I never heard from Gordon again; that’s life. Tough. Can’t wind back the clock.
I should consult the Sicilian oracle. Truly: I should tell Mrs Zoc now what I’m planning anyway, before anything’s official. She’s not going to be overjoyed, I don’t imagine, but that’s life too. I’ll take Odds over to One Tree in the morning, call her from the pub. I’ve got to go over and settle the account for the groceries anyway.
Me and Mitchell: we’re just like Odds and Pete. A little chestnut pony and a great white stallion. I hand him his clean clothes and fall into a little standing dream, of the day we rode the horses out here from Hay over Christmas, Mitchell Lockhart and me, thirty miles to Hell. Magical. It was some sort of gift after the loss of all the lambs, and he spent the next two days laughing before I could walk upright again. I can hear Gordon laughing too.
GORDON
‘Oh, I see.’ Glyn grabs my hand. ‘You know Bernie Cooper? You were engaged?’ she repeats what I’ve just told her, just as whacked, and she tells me: ‘You’re G.’
‘I’m what?’
‘G. In the novel.’ Glyn’s eyes wide with it. ‘The boy, in the book – he’s the reason I’m reading it now for a third time. The way she’s drawn him, so poetic, so tender, and she strings you along and along – is he a real boy or is he only in her dreams? Well, now I know. She’s very clever. A real original. I’ve never read anything quite like it. How on earth did you let her get away from you? And why?’
‘That’s a long story.’ And even then I’m not sure it would give an answer. I can’t get past the idea that Bernie’s written a novel. A novel? She can tell a story like there’s no tomorrow, she can make my head spin with her words, but I can’t think of a novel we’ve ever discussed, not a proper one. I don’t read novels. I read science fiction magazines and she reads romances on the tram. I once tried to impress her with a quote from some writer – what was it? Some bullshit. Like Wuthering Heights is a film starring Merle Oberon and Laurence Olivier. But that was a million years ago … Bernie? What’s happened to you? I don’t know this girl.