A Distant Dream (9 page)

“You must try to get her to sell you the place for a rock bottom price, Filbey,” Bessie insisted as they passed a wall that a couple of stonemasons were working on, seemingly to enclose the new cemetery. “Don't be swayed by her tale of woe. It's a sin for a man to kill himself and she won't be able to hold her head high in the community because of it.”

“Bessie, we don't know that her husband killed himself. There could have been another explanation for his death so don't be jumpin' to conclusions. Anyway we're ‘ere now, for God's sake keep yer opinions to yerself and let me deal with it.”

Bessie sniffed, tempted to start again with her complaining, but thought better of it as they came to a clearing and saw ahead of them a small, one windowed wooden dwelling, with a narrow verandah and a gable roof, surrounded by a roughly built picket fence. Attempts had been made to make inroads into the dense thickets of golden flowered acacia. There was bottle brush and tea tree shrubs with their long fingered tentacles, and an abundance of high growing weeds that might have engulfed the dwelling in time if left there. However, there
were
a sizeable couple of acres that had now been cleared of scrubland, where there was evidence of flourishing vegetables, a couple of young fruit bushes and a row of trees, their branches already heavy with almond blossom.

From behind the house came the sounds of a pig grunting, the cluck of a small flock of hens and a dog who had a deep throated bark. Two young boys ran along the newly laid path towards them and their young fair haired mother, wearing ballet type slippers and dressed in a grey ankle length gown over which she wore a white, voluptuous apron, stood in the doorway.

It had to be said that it was during those few minutes that Clarence Filbey, he who had been married to his barren wife for over twenty years, fell in love when he saw that the blue eyed beautiful looking young woman standing now on the verandah, was pregnant. How it happened he wasn't sure, because he had always believed that Bessie was the stuff of any dreams he had, if he was to think back to when he'd gone a courting. But this young mother brought forth a compassion in him so strong that his heart flooded with an overwhelming sympathy for her plight and he wanted to take care of her for the rest of her life.

“Good morning to yer, Madam,” he said courteously, lifting his bowler in deference, leaving Bessie wondering why he was being so polite to someone in her precarious position. Expecting a baby when there wasn't a husband around didn't merit civility. “Clarence Filbey and me wife Bessie. I was told by someone at the government hut that you might be interested in sellin' yer land and property. I was told that your name is Mrs. Aldridge.”

The young woman merely nodded and watched sadly as the couple, followed by her two solemn looking, tousle haired boys, came towards her. Clarence held out his hand formally as he walked up the three steps to where she stood. Bessie stood below, feeling cross as a bag of cats and a little jealous of the woman's beauty if the truth was known, flicking out at the persistent fly that she must have carried along on her shoulder.

“Do you want to come in?” The woman's voice sounded cultured as she opened the thin wooden door, more a plank really but it sported a brass handle, then kept it open for Clarence and a sour looking Bessie, to go in. The boys stayed outside, sitting upon a rough looking bench on the verandah, throwing pebbles idly over the edge of it, whilst they waited for the visitors to depart.

The two roomed dwelling felt cool, given that it was morning and the sun didn't penetrate until the afternoon. There was an earthen floor and wooden walls that were covered in hessian to keep the draughts out, a chimney with a hearth made of slate, but it had no fire under the iron bars that had been fixed across it. There was a rug made from tatted rags, a table made from logs, four rough-hewn chairs and an old horsehair sofa and, through the open doorway to the other room lay three straw filled mattresses.

“Can I get you a drink?” Mrs. Aldridge pointed to a glass jug of cloudy liquid that sat on the window ledge. “It's lemons, made from the fruit of a tree that my husband planted.”

It seemed that his mention had brought tears into her eyes and she wiped them with a clean white handkerchief that she took from her apron pocket.

“I'm sorry, my tears are never very far away. What must you think of me? I can pour you a drink if you wish me to.”

Clarence cleared his throat and Bessie wondered what the drink could be poured into as she couldn't see any glasses.

“No we're fine Mrs. Aldridge, we've not long had breakfast. I hope yer don't mind us callin' upon yer at this hour, it is rather early.”

“No Sir, do sit down and you too, Mrs. Filbey. I'm afraid we only have the one sofa and Mr. Aldridge made the kitchen chairs.” She sounded apologetic, running her hands over the bump beneath her apron as she spoke.

The couple did as they were asked and she stood by the window looking out to the yard.

“I was told there is around ten acres of land that may be up for sale, Mrs. Aldridge. I imagine that includes the property as well.”

“Yes and the livestock, the horse and cart, the hut where William stored his tools and I suppose the furniture. I cannot see that it is worth transporting it back to Lincolnshire, although it has a certain sentimental value.”

“Yer husband made it all,” Clarence said, seeing the young widow searching her pocket again for her handkerchief.

“Yes, he was clever with his hands.”

“So, yer intend to return to Lincolnshire? I take it that Lincolnshire is in England, although I couldn't say where. We're from Mayo in Ireland ourselves.”

“I have decided to return to my husband's family, as I have none of my own now and I am sure his parents will find me a little cottage on their estate for the sake of the children. I haven't informed them of his demise just yet; I thought I would wait until I sell this place and we can be on our way.”

Clarence coughed modestly, trying to be delicate in what he had to say next. Bessie dug him with her elbow, as if to say “don't you dare even think about it.”

“If yer don't mind me sayin' so, Mrs. Aldridge, yer can hardly travel back to England in your condition. Being a family man I beg yer to reconsider.”

“Ah, you have children.” She ignored his referral to her condition, though it was quite plain to see, as she would have had a slender figure normally, taking into account the thinness of her face and high cheekbones.

“Two girls,” Bessie chimed in, trying to coast her husband back to the reason they had gone there.

“Four years old and twelve, both very willing helpers if we should buy this place from you, which I think we will be if the price is to our likin', Mrs. Aldridge, though I question your foolhardiness.”

“Mr. Filbey!” Bessie sounded harsh in her objection. “Surely that's for Mrs. Aldridge to decide when she embarks on her journey back to her relatives, not you.”

“I am only sayin', Bessie. We could get Joseph and Fred to build another room ‘ere for the time bein', until Mrs. Aldridge and her children move out, that is.”

“At our expense? Mr. Filbey, I think we need to do some talking.”

Bessie had noticed another door that must lead out to where the livestock still grunted, barked and clucked. Filbey obviously needed her guidance; he was getting above himself.

“We'll go through there.” She pointed to a door and hustled him out of the room.

“What are you doing, Filbey?” she hissed, drawing him to the side of the cottage where the lemon tree stood dripping with its fruit and the banks of a slow running brook was evident “What are you trying to do? She looks as if the birth of her child is imminent and there's no way I could deliver it. Let her go to the government hut, there's bound to be someone who will help her. Give her what she wants and let's get shut. I don't want to spend another night in that smelly tent.”

“Bessie, yer can't just throw her and her children out and yer can't just pay ‘er off and move in neither. There will be formalities, forms to be signed, deeds to be had, probably there'll be a judge somewhere who'll want his palm crossed with silver. Then we'll need to see if we can help the poor things in some way. Don't forget the children are fatherless and she's just been made a widow.”

“Nothing to do with the fact that she's pretty I suppose? You've always had an eye for a good looking young lady.”

“Bessie, I object to that. I've always been faithful to yer and I'm tryin' to be fair to me fellow man.”

“Or woman!” Bessie snorted and flounced around to the front of the house, whilst Clarence went back in again.

“We'd like to buy yer place, Mrs. Aldridge, if the price is agreeable that is, but we don't want to put yer to any inconvenience. Do yer have the deeds? Did your husband register with the land titles office? Have yer seen anyone, an official, about sellin' the place?”

“Yes, to most of that, Mr. Filbey, but not anybody official yet about selling the place. In fact my husband is still at the mortuary until a coroner gets around to an inquest, so I've not been allowed to bury him, although he has been dead for over a week. It appears that he might not have shot himself on purpose and why would he have done? According to the man who worked for us, we called him Jackie by the way, according to him, William was shooting at a kangaroo when a spider ran up along his finger. The shock of that made him drop his rifle as he was pulling on the catch and it burst into fire hitting him in the chin. Jackie carried him back here, then ran. Being an indigenous leaves him wide open to being accused of my husband's murder, so a judge is having a think of what will happen next.”

“God Bless him,” said Clarence and crossed himself. He wasn't a religious man but sometimes it was just a comfort to have a belief.

Her name was Aubretia and she was everything that Clarence would have liked to have had in a wife if he hadn't been married to Bessie. They walked along the dirt track to the police station together Bessie having walked off to the settlement on her own, feeling cross and wrong footed. He found that Aubretia was of good nature, loved her children dearly and was a well-mannered soul. She told the him that her father had been the master of an endowed school in a small village near Lincoln and that is where she had met William Aldridge. He had been the fourth son of a gentleman farmer who owned much of the surrounding land. Although she had known of William's existence, she hadn't been allowed to play with him as a child, but love had blossomed one sunny autumn afternoon, when the traditional Harvest Home celebration was put on by his family for the villagers.

It had been of little consequence as to whom might make a suitable bride for William, given his position amongst his siblings, but with his itchy feet and the knowledge that his elder brothers would be more likely to have a permanent place at the farm more than he would, he decided to head for one of the colonies belonging to the queen.

He had read a notice in a broadsheet that a new settlement was proposed in the south of Australia, where there was land aplenty for a man who could work the soil. Aubretia and William had emigrated there in 1839, one year after their marriage and before their children were born. Little had William known that his fateful decision would cause his early demise. Her children were delightful, rough and tumble as most boys are, but seemed obedient to their mother when she called them back when they raced ahead.

*

Bessie was cross because Clarence had taken upon himself to help this damsel in distress with any formalities regarding the burying of her husband, the procedures involving the buying of the property and his genuine desire not to abandon this young woman and her children in their hour of need. To the consternation of Fiona and Mary, who had just finished clearing up after all their brood had finished eating and were about to look through their cookbooks to decide on the ingredients needed to make the midday meal, she appeared in front of them demanding to know what had happened to her children, as they were nowhere in sight and she had entrusted them in their care.

“They've gone off with the others. It seems they're on the trail of a couple of wombats. Our husbands are with them, so they shouldn't come to any harm.” Fiona, not fazed by the woman's angry words as she had lived cheek by jowel in the tenements of Glasgow with women just as bold, continued. “Would yer like me to make yer a brew or something cool to quench yer thirst this fine hot day?”

Faced with her kindness, Bessie let go and was soon in floods of tears.

“How do you put up with this God forsaken place?” she asked, from her position on the dusty ground where she had placed herself nearby. It was said between muffled sobs, as she had lifted the hem of her skirt showing off her not so clean petticoat. “I don't think I can stand it – the heat, the flies, the dirt. I wish I was back on my own little farm in Ireland.”

“Starving to death, or so I heard,” Fiona said gently. “Wasn't it in Ireland that the potato crops failed?”

“Well, yes, but we weren't too affected. Filbey and I could have sat it out, we didn't have to emigrate. It was his dream, not mine.”

“But he is your husband and as such you must obey his wishes. Whither he goeth, then ye must follow. He will be doing this to give you and your children a better kind of life.”

“Mmm.” Bessie sipped at the water that Mary had gone to draw from the communal water well for her and poured it into a thick, white mug from a heavy, glass jug. “I don't know how you can bear it.”

“We do so for the sake of our childer.” Mary's voice was certain. “We can only do our best, ask the good Lord for his blessings and the strength to carry our husband's decisions through. Isn't that so Fiona?”

The other woman nodded, ignoring Bessie now, as there'd be more to come from the distressed woman if she were to show an interest and began to read through one of the recipes she had seen in her handwritten book. It had obviously been passed down from an earlier generation, by the battered look of it.

“We could make a soup from the bones we kept from the wallaby. We can use its liver and kidneys and add a bit of barley, some peas, an onion, we could get the
bairns
to collect a few mushrooms and I'll make dumplings from last night's bread. That'll take us on to tea time and you and I could walk to the general store in the village and see what we can put with that pickled pork we brought with us.”

Bessie listened to the women's plans, feeling her stomach churn at the thought of eating soup made from yesterday's bones, especially as she didn't even know what animal a wallaby was. She'd always thrown the bones away if they'd had a chicken, or given them to the cat to lick clean, but there again, she might not even be offered a taste of this wallaby soup they were promising and might be taking a walk herself along to that general store.

*

Filbey was in his element. Though he knew he should be mourning the demise of a good man, just being in Aubretia's presence was keeping his old heart racing. He tried not to show his elation, as they walked together with her boys to the building on the reserve that housed the police station, but it was difficult to suppress this new found feeling.

William's body lay on a marble slab, whilst awaiting a visit from the district coroner, Mr. Archibald Pepper. The slab had been placed inside an empty shed away from the main building and was for the storage of the deceased of the community until burial. The coroner was due that day and according to the sergeant who was on duty, his verdict on whether the death was a suicide, a criminal act at the time, an accident or a murder by the family's servant, would rest on his findings. Retribution would be carried out accordingly.

Aubretia had already spoken before on behalf of the hapless Jackie, who hadn't yet been found, but by the virtue of being an indigenous man he was a likely suspect and wouldn't get much of a hearing anyway. She spoke to Clarence of her fears for the poor man's safety and he suggested that he accompany her and the children on a walk alongside the nearby creek for an hour or so. There was no point sitting around the place, given that she would probably be waiting for this official's arrival for a while.

“What will yer do when yer go back to England?” Clarence inquired, as the two boys ran ahead through the stand of trees that lead into a deep, dark forest.

“Be a mother to my children. Enjoy a life of leisure with a nursemaid and a round of social engagements courtesy of the Aldridge family. The children will probably be sent away to boarding school and life could become very boring.”

“Perhaps yer could stay ‘ere in Willunga.” Clarence's mind had been racing as they walked, trying to come up with a good enough reason for Aubretia to delay her departure. “I mean, in your delicate condition it would be a difficult journey – if yer don't mind me saying so.”

“I have been giving the situation due consideration Mr. Filbey, especially as I have to stay here to hear the outcome of my husband's inquest and to see that justice for Jackie is being done. There will be the funeral to arrange, and a place found to stay with my children if I were to sell the farm to you. I have a few weeks still before I will need a midwife's attention, so I thought I would seek accommodation in the city before my lying-in.”

“You could stay on at the property. I'm sure I could arrange for someone to come and build an additional room for Mrs. Filbey and meself. It wouldn't be a problem.” He could hear the words flowing from his mouth like a fast moving stream and wondered why he was saying them. Had he gone completely mad? Bessie would have his guts for garters when she heard his plan!

“Oh, Mr. Filbey.” Aubretia, for all her outward toughness sounded quite flustered and had gone pink in the face with embarrassment. “ No, I couldn't trouble you to go to such lengths on my behalf. You must put your wife and children's comforts first. It is quite uncomfortable at the settlement as I know from firsthand experience when we arrived here ourselves seven years ago. I shouldn't like to delay your family further from moving into a proper home and I am an adaptable character, Mr. Filbey, quite able to face whatever life has in store. In fact before we moved to this village we lived tooth by jowl in a squalid overcrowded building in the city, whilst William worked as a labourer there. Now, perhaps you should be catching up with your wife instead of listening to my troubles. I am sure she'll be wondering where you are.”

He would have argued, taken her hands into his and pleaded to be given a chance to make her happy, if not for herself then for the sake of her children, but she was calling to her boys, seemingly astounded at his forwardness and desperate, it seemed to remove herself from his company.

“Please think about it, please don't act too hasty – you must think of your children and your unborn child. I'll walk back with yer, you may still need a little moral support.”

“As you wish” she said reluctantly, still sounding rather embarrassed, but recovering a little after the boys had hurtled back along the track to join them. “Then you must go back to Mrs. Filbey. As I said, she'll be wondering where you are.”

A small crowd had gathered outside the building that housed the police station, when they arrived. They were mostly white; some had come from the settlement and some from the locality, and a couple of Aborigines stood muttering together, seemingly waiting for something to occur.

“They got the Abbo” a man explained, when Clarence asked why people were standing outside the place, waiting. “The troopers brought him in, caught him at the port. He started running, so they shot him.”

“Oh no,” cried Aubretia, then hurried up the steps to the verandah and through the open door with little decorum, leaving Clarence to hold her children back from following her. Her face was ashen when she returned to join them and ignoring the questions from those who waited, she grasped the hands of her two worried boys and hurried down to the street. Clarence felt he had no option but to follow, though feared rebuff as she had taken off to the stand of trees again without a backward glance. He caught them up as Aubretia sat under the shade of a gum tree near the creek, crying into the handkerchief she had plucked from her reticule, leaving her children to pat and caress her shuddering body in concern.

“It wasn't Jackie” she said between sobs a little later, not looking up at Clarence, when he asked if he could help in anyway. “Though this poor man's had half his face blown off, I could tell it wasn't Jackie. Jackie was much younger, a boy really.” Her two boys cried with her in sympathy, whilst Clarence stood there waiting, not sure what to do.

“They told me the man was running” she said after she got to her feet clumsily and walked to the edge of a creek in order to splash a little water on her teary face. “The shock of seeing the body prevented me from saying that if that was so, why had the damage been done to the poor soul's face? I saw that the man wasn't Jackie, but I let them think it was.”

The older boy, whose name was Bertie, took his mother's hand protectively, as Clarence stepped forward to try to steady her, as looking weary, Aubretia leant against the trunk of an overhanging tree.

“I will look after my mother” the eight year old said stoutly, glaring at this newcomer's intrusion. “I will be the man of the house now my father has gone.”

“If we had a house to live in, Bertie, darling,” Aubretia replied a little bitterly, clasping the hand of the youngest child too, who was looking at them all in wonder. “We must go back to England and seek shelter with your father's family.”

“But not yet,” said Clarence, firmly. “I insist that yer stay on until your infant's born. I would be a cruel man to let it be any different and I am sure that meself and Mrs. Filbey can be of assistance to yer while yer there.”

Aubretia nodded weakly and with hesitating steps she allowed herself and the boys to be led back along the track.

*

The two girls sat on the fallen trunk of a gum tree which lay in the scrub just outside the settlement. They were hot, sweaty and very dirty, but both were reluctant to show themselves. The woman would probably shout at the sight of them and Hannah knew it would be her fault for letting Molly get into such a state.

Hannah felt fearful of the woman with her nasty tongue. There had been one like her at the orphanage, no one could do right for doing wrong and only the favourite children went unpunished. The man was nice and was very kind to his daughter Molly, but she wondered what she herself was doing there. Had she been chosen to be their daughter's nursemaid? If so, she was in trouble, because a nursemaid wouldn't have allowed her charge to get so hot and dirty.

“Hungry” Molly said, looking trustingly at Hannah, hoping she had something to eat in her pocket. Her hair which Hannah had tied into a plait with a blue ribbon that morning, was hanging untidily after she had caught it on overhanging bushes when they had rushed along after the excited boys. Her white dress, which she hadn't been changed since they got off the boat, was looking very grubby. Was it part of a nursemaid's job to do the washing too? Not that Hannah made a pretty picture herself, as her shabby, green dress, one of two donated to the orphanage, was ripped in places around the calf length hem and one of her heavy, black boots had lost its laces. She hadn't wanted to rummage in her box in the shelter for a replacement in case the woman came back and found her there.

“We'll have to wait,” Hannah replied, used to going hungry when it had been the strongest and the fittest who got to eat where she came from. She was anxious to spy out the lie of the land before she took her charge back to the settlement. “Let's play a game, Molly, shall we? Let's pretend we have to find the man who brought us here and not the woman. When we see him we'll tell him that you're hungry and he's the one who will give us food.”