CHAPTER EIGHT
ON Monday the three big trucks left for Oonga with the horses that would be competing in the races and most of the station hands. The Blue River homestead seemed strangely quiet after they had clattered away down the track, raising clouds of red dust in their wake.
“Shiver won’t like it. He hates being trucked.” Jamie, who wanted passionately to go with the men and the horses, watched the motorcade until it was only clouds of dust far across the golden plain.
“He’d hate it still more travelling seventy miles on his own four feet,” Steve drawled consolingly, “and he wouldn’t have much strength left for the Gymkhana. You’ll see him tomorrow evening, Jamie. Today, let’s forget about horses and take a picnic lunch to the pool, shall we?”
Jamie walked round the paddock rails, watching an Abo ringer feeding apples to the quite considerable mob of horses left behind. “They’re disappointed they’re left behind, they don’t want to be forgotten!” he said reproachfully. “Why aren’t you riding in the races, Spinifex? You’re good, on Rocket.”
The native stockman grinned shyly, rubbing the seat of his strides gently. “I gotum boil in awkward place fer ridin’, Jamie. Dr. Banjo lanced’m fer me, but it’s still too pretty sore fer ridin’. I guess Georgie’ll ride as good as me on Rocket. Rocket’s ar right ter win the All Comers even with a boob like Georgie up! You put your money on ol’ Rocket, Jamie.”
“I will,” the boy promised seriously. He had ten dollars to spend at the races and he intended to place all of it on the Blue River entrants, though he understood that a grown-up would have actually to place the bets for him with the tote. The tote was a funny building with little windows all round it and people took their money to the men in the windows, like buying a ticket to go into the cinema, as he had seen it done once in Cairns. Last year he could dimly remember being taken to watch the races, but of course he had been too young to ride in the Gymkhana. This year he had been practising for months, and he had caught the excitement of the men.
It was like the excitement of a bush fire, when the transceiver kept sending out messages for help, and everyone got the trucks and the utility and the Land Rover out and rushed off to wherever the fire was. , Jamie thought a picnic by the river pool a pretty tame way to spend the day, but it would pass the time. Tomorrow afternoon, when Jack Hennessy was coming to fly them into town, seemed a long time away, and Wednesday, when the races would actually start, a whole lifetime away. Meanwhile he supposed he could help Lisa with her swimming lesson.
Jamie, who could swim like a fish, thought it was funny to see Uncle Steve teaching Lisa to swim with her arms, holding her up in the water like a baby. Jane could swim all right. The swimming pool was deep and cool in the shade of tall trees, and Gran had put up a good picnic lunch for them all; rather to Jamie’s surprise, the day passed very quickly, and by sunset he was yawning. Because they had spent a lazy day in and out of the water, lying in the shade of the willows, he had not had to have his usual afternoon rest after lunch.
“Your legs look all right, don’t they?” he said interestedly when Steve first carried Lisa from her chair and put her in the water, where Jane was standing in the shallower part waiting to help her sister.
“Jamie!” his grandmother said warningly. But Lisa only laughed.
“Yes, thank goodness! they do. But horribly white. I’m longing to get them tanned. I tan well, in spite of being so fair. In this lovely sun I should be cooked in a week.”
“In the sun, you’d be dead in a week. You’ll find you get tanned all right in the shade,” Steve said firmly.
Lisa was so happy because Dr. Banjo, after reading her notes and having a long talk about the accident, and examining her carefully, had told her to go ahead and do anything she felt she could do—as long as there was someone handy to pick her up if she fell off her horse, or to rescue her from drowning if she got into difficulties in the pool.
“With all these lovely men around the place, I shouldn’t be in too much danger!” she’d answered mischievously. Jane, acting as chaperone for the medical examination, had wondered what the grey-haired little neurologist would think of her for the flippancy. But Dr. Banjo seemed to understand Lisa’s brand of courage.
He had been very frank with her. “By now you understand, of course, what they mean by traumatic paralysis?”
“It’s all in the mind, isn’t it?” Lisa had countered with equal frankness, suddenly serious. “But will-power won’t move these damned legs, doctor. I’ve tried that. I’m a dancer. An actress. I want to work again.”
“Not will-power, no. Faith, perhaps. And for faith, one must have a little reason for believing.” He had riffled through the folder with her hospital reports thoughtfully. “One thing puzzles me here. You have been very unhappy, and not only because of yourself. Naturally you have been unhappy because your mother died, when you were driving the car.”
“Naturally.” Lisa was suddenly curt. “Don’t they call it a guilt complex? Wouldn’t you feel guilty if you had killed your mother? I wasn’t driving carefully enough, doctor,” she closed her eyes and her mouth was bitter. “I was hooptedoodle, if you know what that means. High—but not on drugs or drink—just happy because I’d landed my first good film part and we would start shooting the next day, on location,” she opened her eyes and looked up steadily at the doctor. “It was a lovely spring day in Cornwall, sunshine-after-rain, you know...?”
“I know.” Dr. Banjo smiled at her suddenly. “It was a lovely spring day and you were hooptedoodle. I, too, have read my John Steinbeck.”
“Mother and I were singing together like a couple of crazy kids. We often did,” Lisa said in a small voice, “it’s the one thing I try to remember. They said it must have been instantaneous, we hit a wall. Mother died singing.”
Jane said quickly, “You skidded on a wet road, in a very steep lane, darling. It could happen to anyone.” Dr. Banjo said quietly, “But your sister knows it happened this time because she was careless. Innocently careless because she was a little exhilarated, no?”
“Yes,” Lisa admitted briefly. Jane had never before heard her talk to anyone about the accident so frankly.
“So. You have guilt, and it makes you very unhappy. So unhappy that you cannot use your legs, you are paralysed. Really paralysed. I do not think there is any operation that could help you. But I think you are happier today than you have been before—by these reports.” He put the folder down gently on the bedside table and Jane pulled the light blanket up to her sister’s shoulders.
“I—yes, I think I am,” Lisa said in a surprised tone, “I’m enjoying this place. Is that wicked, Doctor Banjo?” He smiled warmly and touched her forehead where the fair, spun-gold hair grew like a halo. “My dear child! We all have to come to terms with our mistakes, one way and another. Do you imagine God wants you to carry this burden of guilt for something you did at eighteen, all through your life? Would your mother, who loved you, want you to suffer like that?”
“No—” Jane and Lisa said simultaneously.
“Then enjoy your vacation as much as possible. Ride, swim, do everything you feel strong enough to do.
Australia is a good country for making people well again,” he shrugged and spread his hands out in a small expressive gesture, “and the Blue River is a good place for making a fresh start! You will make many friends here. Now Steve and I are going to sort our fishing tackle, we shall be going upriver very early in the morning.” He added drily, “That is something I find very enjoyable. The fish we catch, that is not important. But the peace and solitude and the company of a good, quiet friend who knows when to talk and when to be silent ... that is good medicine.” Lisa caught at his hand impulsively. “Thank you, Dr. Banjo—you don’t mind if I call you that, too?” The little Polish doctor chuckled. “I like it. It is my name now. It is a great compliment when the people of Queensland give you a nickname, it means they have accepted you.”
“I think you’re go
ing to be good medicine for me, too,” Lisa grinned suddenly. “I hope you have a lovely fishing day tomorrow.”
“Only the early morning. The fish do not bite when the sun is up. Remember, Lisa, enjoy your life here as much as you can. And remember too that all of us at the hospital are there waiting to help if you feel ill or scared.” He was looking at Jane then, and his eyes were very kind, “But I feel that you need to lead a normal life in the good care of your sister, rather than another spell in hospital, no?”
“Yes,” Lisa said again, gaily. “Jane’s the best nurse in the world, and Steve is fabulously kind.”
Dr. Banjo nodded thoughtfully. “Steve is kind, yes. And now if I may I will borrow the best nurse in the world for an hour or so?” He explained that he held a surgery whenever he had time on a visit to a station, even on holiday, as there was always a number of patients with minor ailments among the stockmen and their families and the Abos.
Jane, assisting him dealing with dressings on cuts and scalds, injections and lancing Spinifex’s boils, wondered at the patience and skill of a man with high specialist qualifications for such ordinary work. He was particularly skilful with the babies and children, both black and white, who obviously adored their “Dr. Banjo”. While she was cleaning up and sterilising his instruments after surgery, preparing to repack his bag, and checking with him the contents of the Standard Medicine Chest supplied by the Royal Flying Doctor base, he asked some questions about her training at St. Joseph’s Hospital. Jane in her turn asked tentatively why he was content with this widely scattered general practice.
“Because they are all my friends, these people, and what they need much, much more than a neurologist, is a G.P.,” he answered gently. “In the cities there are plenty of specialists. Besides, even in the Outback, there are occasionally people suffering from nervous disorders. You must appreciate, Miss Lesley, that the medicine of the future will be largely preventive ... and for that one must have a good knowledge of the close connection between the nervous system and physical ailments.”
“Of course. Anyway, I’m thankful you are here to help Lisa. And please call me Jane,” she smiled back at him, closing his neatly packed bag and handing it to him, “then I, too, will feel that I’ve been accepted!”
He chuckled softly, thanking her for her assistance. “I think in a little while you will be more than accepted, you will be one of the family, no?”
She didn’t answer that. But she liked Dr. Banjo very much, she thought he was just the right kind of doctor for Lisa; it was the beginning of a very pleasant week-end.
“My goodness, you girls have got a tan in five days, you look dinkum Aussies now,” Jack Hennessy greeted Jane and Lisa like an old friend when he climbed out of his plane on Tuesday afternoon. Everyone not going to Oonga for the races was grouped around Steve and Mrs. Newbery, Jamie and the Lesleys, on the landing-strip, giving them a good-natured send-off.
Steve lifted Lisa from ‘her chair and put her gently in her seat in the plane, and introduced the Elliotts and their son Vince and daughter Susan to the girls. He had already told Jane and Lisa that the Elliots from Warren Downs were his neighbours and good friends.
“Good of you to pick us up, Steve,” Tom said when the introductions were over.
His wife Maisie laughed, her arm about her daughter’s shoulders. “It gave us another day to get rid of the last of Sue’s spots. I don’t think any of us would have dared to go this year if Dr. Banjo hadn’t said she was clear of infection!”
Jack was refusing Mrs. Mulga’s offer of tea, saying he wanted to get back to town in the daylight. Jane sat with Jamie, across the gangway from Sue, who looked just a little older than the boy. Steve, she noticed, sat with Lisa and helped her fasten her safety belt as Art stowed the wheel chair in the cargo hold at the rear of the plane.
Then they were taxiing along the runway and very soon the F27 was airborne. It circled the station once, above the plateau, before heading north-east for the township.
Jane stared down, enthralled with this view of the Blue River spread below them like a map. She saw the name of the station and its radio call-sign painted in huge letters on the storehouse roof before the aircraft rose steeply. From this height the red roof of the homestead among its encircling trees soon dwindled to the proportions of a child’s toy, and the winding river between the bush-clad banks was like a blue satin ribbon thrown carelessly down on the golden haze of the plateau. The horses in the home paddocks and the cattle grazing in the rich meadows beside the river were seemingly motionless, and the people on the landing-strip staring up and waving were like tiny toys, too, and very quickly left behind.
If they had been really leaving the Blue River, on their way back to England, Jane realised suddenly that she would have felt very unhappy instead of looking forward to the four days in Oonga because they would be coming home at the end of the festivities.
Turning to answer a remark from Mrs. Newbery, who was pointing out landmarks to her, she caught Steve’s grey glance above the children’s heads, and flushed a little. He was always guessing her thoughts and she hoped he was not aware of her emotions at this moment. Could it be possible, she thought wanly, to feel so much at home in this new place in five days...? Possible for a place and people to become so important in such a short time? A person, she corrected herself honestly; now that Steve had turned away to talk to Lisa and the two younger children were chatting about the coming Gymkhana she could steal a glance at his profile now and then. Without the inevitable old hat, his dark thick hair sprang from the brown forehead as if it scorned the discipline of the hair-oil he had obviously been using. It was strange to see Steve in a well-cut tropical suit, with a collar and tie, instead of his open-necked shirt and ringer’s strides; but no amount of tailoring, Jane thought affectionately, could make him look anything but what he was; a man of the outdoors. Stewart had looked like a Hollywood actor playing the part of a rancher, in spite of his tan and his horsemanship; Steve looked what he was, a grazier born and bred in the Outback.
Something Lisa was saying made him smile with that sudden, lopsided boyish grin of his, and softened the craggy features so that he looked young and carefree, almost as gay as Stewart had looked. They were not really at all alike, Jane decided, yet every now and then there was a fleeting family resemblance.
She roused herself to answer a question from Maisie Elliot, who was subjecting her to the usual friendly curious scrutiny to which she was becoming inured, and she thrust her private thoughts about Steve into the background of her mind.
“I’ve had chicken-pox,” Susan was telling Jamie importantly, “I had thousands of spots! They itched and itched.”
“How did you manage to get chicken-pox out here in the country?” Jane asked with interest. Steve had shown her Warren Downs station on the map in the living-room, and it was over forty miles away from any other homestead.
Vince, who was fourteen, said in his gruff schoolboy’s voice, grinning, “I had it first, weeks ago. I’d been with Dad to the Curry, we were staying with Aunt Letty, and her kids had it but it wasn’t so bad. I didn’t even have to stay indoors, but Sue got really crook.”
“Dr. Banjo says I’m O.K., I can’t give it to anyone now,” Sue reassured the visitors from England politely. “Most of these things on my face are freckles, anyway. Dr. Banjo said the calamine might take them away, too, but it hasn’t.”
Mrs. Newbery leaned over between Jane and her grandson to smile at Sue. “Jane is a nurse, she won’t worry about your spots, Susan. I’m glad you won the essay prize in the School of the Air competition, even if you can’t ride in the Gymkhana.”
She pulled a rueful face. “I’d rather ride! I don’t feel like a jelly any more, but Dr. Banjo said I couldn’t. Anyway—” she threw a mischievous glance in Steve’s direction, “I’m going to watch Daddy win the Pastoralist Stakes!”
Tom Elliot said, “Whoa, Sue!” modestly, but he was grinning.
Jamie said hotly, “Unc
le Steve’s going to win, he’s riding Ranger. I bet you haven’t got a horse faster than Ranger!”
“Moonstrike’s pretty fast,” Tom answered equably, “but I won’t have a chance if you’re backing Uncle Steve. How much money have you got to spend, Jamie?”
“Ten dollars,” Jamie said seriously, “but I promised Spinifex to bet on Rocket, ’cos he’s got boils in an orkard place and can’t ride, so Georgie’s going to ride Rocket. I’m going to bet five dollars on Georgie and five dollars on Uncle Steve.”
“Fair enough,” Tom said with equal gravity.
Lisa was smiling at her across the gangway. “Isn’t it fun—meeting the Elliots?” she looked round at the family who were smiling back at her. “On Saturday you were just voices on the transceiver—now here you are, flesh and blood!”
“Yeah. That’s what the pedal-wireless has done for the folk of the Inland,” Tom agreed. He was a big man with a nice-ugly face, a skin of leather, and the gentleness for women that seemed to go with a tough exterior in these parts; Jane liked him and his plump, good-natured wife Maisie.
“Pedal-wireless?” Lisa enquired, laughing. “And I thought you called the real Australian country the Outback?”
Maisie, laughing too, explained that the Outback was really the same thing as the Inland, as naturally the coastal belt of the vast new country had been settled first. “I guess we seem a bit batty to newcomers, but we’ve got a sort of community of our own, thanks to John Flynn and the Flying Doctor Service—like you said, we get to know each other first by voices! We may only meet three or four times a year, but we can talk to each other and listen in every day. You can live for years in a city without really knowing your neighbours, but here we know—”
Wedding at Blue River Page 12