Lillipilly Hill (6 page)

‘Don't go,' implored Harriet. ‘I won't tell anyone you're here.'

The girl paused, eyeing Harriet suspiciously.

‘You're the one I saw yesterday, near the school,' Harriet went on eagerly. ‘Do you live in Barley Creek?'

‘Yes,' said the girl, but she was still wary and unfriendly. She wore the same faded blue frock that Harriet had noticed the day before, and her feet were still bare. Her hair, black and curly, hung around her face in wild disorder, and her skin, like Boz's, was a dark brown. But her eyes were a startling light blue.

‘I wish I could climb like you,' said Harriet wistfully.

‘Why don't you, then?' demanded the girl rudely.

‘We're not allowed. We might tear our clothes.'

‘Do you have to wear all those clothes all the time?'

‘You mean pinafores and things? I thought everyone had those,' said Harriet, in genuine surprise.

‘I don't, then. Silly, I call them,' said the stranger, not without a glance of envy at Harriet's blue hair-ribbon, which Mrs Wilmot had carefully tied after seeing Harriet's own attempts at hairdressing.

Harriet, having been unusually humble until now, thought it was quite time that she asserted herself.

‘You don't have to be so rude. That's our tree you were climbing. You might tell me what you were doing.'

‘Just climbing,' said the girl defiantly.

Harriet changed her approach. With her customary keen observation, she had noticed the girl's interest in her hair-ribbon.

‘If I give you my blue ribbon, will you tell me your name, and what you were doing, and everything?'

‘Why do you want to know?' asked the climber, coming a little closer.

‘Because I saw you at the school, and I know you live in Barley Creek. You're the first person I've spoken to who goes to that school. You see, we're going there ourselves on Monday.'

‘You and your brother and sister?'

‘How do you know I've got a brother and sister?' demanded Harriet.

‘I know all about you. Polly told Mrs Tolly, and she told Ma. But I didn't know you were going to school. Are you going to give me that ribbon?'

Harriet untied it and smoothed out the creases.

‘Tell me first.'

‘All right. What do you want to know?'

‘Your name, and how old you are, and where you live, and why you were in our tree.'

‘Nosy, ain't you?' grumbled the girl. ‘I'm Dinny O'Brien, and I'm eleven, and I live up the road from the store—the last house, it is. And I climbed the tree because I wanted to see you and your sister and brother, only I didn't mean for you to see me. Now gimme that ribbon.'

‘Dinny isn't a real name,' said Harriet firmly.

‘Who says it isn't? That's what I've always been called. It's a better name than yours, anyway. They'll call you Harry at school, just see if they don't.'

‘I don't care,' said Harriet. ‘And you can have your old ribbon.'

She handed it over, and turned away. She was bitterly disappointed. Here, it seemed, had been a chance, almost literally heaven-sent, to make a friend. Dinny could have been her first friend in this
new country, and could have given the Wilmots much valuable help in settling down at the school, and in learning to know the ways of the township.

She had reached the cowshed before she realized that Dinny was following her.

‘Wait a minute,' said the girl crossly. ‘Don't go so fast. I didn't say we wouldn't be friends. I'll wait for you outside the school on Monday, and if anyone calls you Harry, I'll punch them. But you'd better not be so hoity-toity with the others—they won't like it.'

Boz appeared just then around the corner of the shed, and Dinny vanished in complete silence.

‘Boz,' said Harriet, following him into the shed. ‘Is there a path down that hill to Barley Creek?'

‘Bit of a track,' said Boz. ‘Not used much.'

Harriet made an unspoken vow that she would one day find that track, but in the meantime she decided to return to the house and find a fresh hair-ribbon.

At the foot of the back steps she encountered Polly, who had been cleaning out the lean-to bath-house. Polly's round, freckled face was red and damp with heat, but her smile was as broad as ever.

‘'Mornin', love. I've just heard I've got a new job—takin' you all to school every day. Isn't that brother of yours old enough to look after you?'

‘Father says he's so dreamy sometimes he might
forget the way,' explained Harriet. ‘Polly, do you know a family called O'Brien?'

‘In Barley Creek? Oh, everyone knows them. Pinky O'Brien's a splitter—works for Bentley's, over at Winneroo.'

Seeing Harriet's blank expression, Polly set down her bucket and broom, and went on: ‘A splitter cuts wood for shingles—you know, like they put on this roof before this new iron was used. There's not so much money in splitting as there used to be, or so they say. Pinky does a bit of sawing as well, and helps with the loads. Bentley's is the biggest mill in these parts—old Bentley has about a hundred men working for him, counting bullockys an' all.'

‘Why do the O'Briens live here, then, and not at Winneroo?'

‘Because this is where Pinky started working, and built his bit of a house. Not much of a house, either, for all those children.'

‘How many?' asked Harriet, fascinated by this picture of Dinny's background.

‘'Bout six, I think. All boys, but one.'

‘And the girl would go to Barley Creek school, wouldn't she?'

‘If an O'Brien goes to school, it's only because the law makes him,' declared Polly scornfully. ‘They're a
wild lot, those O'Briens. And don't you be gettin' too interested in them—your Ma wouldn't like it.'

Remembering how Dinny looked, with her bare brown legs, unkempt hair, and grubby clothes, Harriet was inclined to believe that Polly might be right. However, Harriet found herself thinking quite often of Dinny during that day and the next, and she certainly had no regrets about her lost hair-ribbon.

4

The Bark Schoolhouse

On Sunday night it rained, gently and softly, but when Harriet awoke in the morning, the sunlight was once more struggling through the vines. Peeping through the french window, she could see a low, silver mist wreathed across the garden, with the trees rising above it like the sails of some ghostly ship.

‘Get up, Rose-Ann!' she called. ‘We're going to school!'

Rose-Ann slowly unwound herself from her bedclothes, and blinked sleepily at her sister.

‘Is it cold?'

‘Of course not,' said Harriet. ‘It's all misty, and still as still. I wish we could go
now.
'

‘There wouldn't be anyone else there yet,' said Rose-Ann practically. ‘What dresses are we to put on?'

‘The green ones, Mother said. I do think it's silly, us always having the same dresses, when we don't look a bit alike. I
hate
my green dress.'

A few minutes later, she surveyed herself as best she could in the cracked looking-glass over the washstand. The green dress had a high neck, trimmed with black braid, and more braid adorned the hem and the too-tight sleeves. The colour seemed to Harriet to make her hair even more sandy, her grey eyes even duller, and her freckles even more prominent. Thankfully she slipped her starched white pinafore over her head, and gave all her attention to the lacing of her boots. The pinafore hid most of the green even if it
was
babyish.

It was most unfair that the identical dress should make Rose-Ann look particularly pretty, and that Aidan, in his Eton suit, should be so neat and scholarly. As they waited at the gate for Polly, after breakfast and last-minute instructions from their parents, Harriet reflected that Mr Burnie should be well pleased with at least two of his pupils.

‘Here we are,' said Polly cheerfully, hurrying down the path, shedding her apron as she came. ‘My, don't we all look smart!'

Aidan scowled at this compliment. He was still
far from being reconciled to the idea of attending the Barley Creek school, but at least he was prepared to show the other pupils how an English schoolboy should look and behave. He marched off at the head of the procession, with an unnecessary number of books under his arm.

For once Harriet did not glance continually about her, in search of wild flowers and animals and insects. She did lift her head once to listen to the excited chatter of a group of gillbirds, and to watch a formation of black swans pass far above, across the milky sky towards the sea. But for the most part her thoughts raced ahead of her feet, in the direction of the schoolhouse. She wondered whether Dinny would keep her promise, and whether Aidan and Rose-Ann would welcome it.

As they came in sight of the school, Aidan drew even farther away from the rest of the party. To be escorted to school at all was bad enough, but to be conducted thither by a loud-voiced servant-girl was too much of an indignity altogether. He ducked through the sliprail, and stood aloofly under a near-by pine, while Polly took her leave of the girls.

The Wilmots had arrived early, and only half a dozen children were as yet grouped in the shade. Dinny was not one of them. Acutely conscious of six pairs of
staring, intensely inquisitive eyes, Harriet yet mustered the courage to gaze at the strange new faces. Five of the children were quite small, ragged, sunburnt little creatures, all barefoot and bareheaded. The sixth was a boy, larger than Aidan, and the proud possessor of a grown-up waistcoat. He was not particularly prepossessing, having a pudgy, sullen face, and bristling hair.

‘What's that pile of books for?' he demanded of Aidan, without preamble.

‘To read, of course,' said Aidan, his nervousness making him sound more precise and aloof than ever.

The other boy sniggered, and his laughter was echoed dutifully by the younger children. Harriet flushed, and Rose-Ann edged away towards the fence, already entertaining notions of flight.

‘We don't wear fancy white collars at this school,' went on the big boy. ‘We leave that to the girls—don't we?'

A chorus of assent came from his followers.

‘Do you leave your manners behind, too?' asked Aidan, and turned his back on them.

The boy was for a moment baffled, being somewhat slow-witted, and less ready with his tongue than with his fists. One of the smaller children ventured to laugh at Aidan's retort, and that annoyed the big boy still further.

‘Don't you speak to me like that!' he bellowed, darting round to peer into Aidan's face. ‘What's your name, anyway?'

‘Aidan Wilmot. What's yours?'

The other boy ignored the question. He turned delightedly to his followers.

‘D'you hear that? Aidan! Will we call him Ada?'

‘Ada! Ada!' came the joyful chorus.

Harriet could stand it no longer.

‘Hit him, Aidan! Go on—punch him on the nose!'

But Aidan merely shook his head, and strode off towards the schoolhouse.

‘He's scared!' said one of the little boys, in a disappointed voice. ‘Why don't he fight? He's nearly as big as Paddy.'

‘Yeah, your brother's scared,' repeated a small, tow-headed girl at Harriet's elbow.

‘He is not!' cried Harriet. ‘He just doesn't want to get his hands dirty touching that big bully!'

The boy thus described lifted a hand menacingly, and Rose-Ann began to cry. Harriet, standing her ground, was none the less greatly relieved to see a familiar figure burst through the fence, and to hear Dinny's shout: ‘Get away from her, Paddy Tolly, before I go and tell your Ma on you!'

Although Dinny had no supporters, except for two
very small boys clutching her hands, Paddy and his band speedily withdrew, muttering vague threats as they went.

‘You don't want to let Paddy scare you,' said Dinny. ‘He's as stupid as one of our broody chooks.'

‘I wasn't scared,' Harriet declared stoutly.

‘But
she
was,' said Dinny, indicating the trembling Rose-Ann. ‘And where's your brother?'

‘He went inside,' said Harriet, rather shame-facedly. ‘He hates people shouting and making scenes.'

‘Why didn't he hit Paddy, then? Paddy's all noise—he's not all that good at fighting, though he thinks he is
.
Here, Pete, stop snivelling!'

The child thus addressed was the smaller of the two—indeed, to Harriet's eyes, he looked as if he should have been at home in the nursery. He was crying quietly to himself, wiping eyes and nose on the grubby sleeve of a jacket several sizes too large for him.

‘Pete's only just started school,' Dinny explained. ‘He's four. Ma asked Mr Burnie to take him because the baby's sick an' Ma hasn't got much time to look after Pete.'

Rose-Ann was staring at Dinny as if at a creature from another world. Harriet remembered that Dinny was only a year older than Rose-Ann. Compared to the Barley Creek girl, Rose-Ann was hardly more than a baby.

‘She's real pretty, your sister, ain't she?' Dinny observed, making Rose-Ann blush. ‘How d'you like my ribbon?'

She wore Harriet's ribbon proudly on her tangle of black hair. Her dress was the same washed-out blue as before, but today it was clean.

The hearty clamour of the school bell, hung from a post near the water-tanks, made the Wilmots jump. Since Dinny's arrival, the rest of the pupils had straggled into the grounds, and most of them were grouped at a distance, studying the strangers with frank interest.

‘Just stay with me,' ordered Dinny. ‘You can sit at my desk.'

Harriet never forgot her first glimpse of the classroom. Over Dinny's shoulder, she could see a floor of rough, uneven planks, bark walls with several chinks through which the sunlight entered, two high windows which failed to give sufficient light, and four rows of battered desks and narrow forms. The only adornments to the room were two coloured religious pictures, a globe, and some large sheets of multiplication tables. Harriet's optimistic spirit quailed a little at the sight of the place to which she had so cheerfully consigned herself and her brother and sister.