‘Harry doesn’t have to live out the back of Woop Woop. We do.’
‘Well then maybe we shouldn’t be getting married,’ he countered.
Stella stared at him. ‘You don’t mean that.’
‘Sometimes I wonder if you’re cut out for the type of life I want.’
His words were again said sharply. Stella reached for the pack of menthol cigarettes on the table and lit one, inhaling with sudden need.
‘I thought you were giving those up.’
‘You’re still drinking beer and you know how I hate the smell of it,’ she countered.
In the street below a car honked and a man yelled out in response.
‘I don’t know how you can live here. A man can barely think with all this noise.’ Joe walked inside and sat on the sofa.
Stella decided not to pursue the matter, at least not at that moment. The fact that he’d purchased property without even discussing it with her was more than cause for worry. It suggested her opinion was unimportant to him, and, at worst, that he considered her willing to go along with whatever he decided. Joe’s attitude was new to her and it dulled the thrill of the previous day when he’d lowered himself to one knee and proposed.
What was she to do? Walk away because he’d cut her out of a major decision, one that in the end would probably benefit her as well? Hadn’t he promised to provide her with a home and a decent income? The diamond on her finger was small, but she’d wanted it – and its giver. So she found herself joining Joe on the couch and reaching for his hand.
‘Our first argument.’
‘Not good,’ he replied stiffly.
‘So, then.’ She elbowed him playfully in his side. ‘Tell me about this property you’ve bought. How did you manage it?’
‘I have my contacts, and a good bank manager.’
‘But there’s a war on,’ she argued.
‘Exactly. The British contract covers Australian wool for the duration of the war and one clip after. Wool is the fibre, Stella. That’s never going to change. I can’t lose. This is my chance.’ He took her hand and squeezed it.
‘Our chance,’ she corrected.
‘That’s what I meant.’ Joe left her side and walked about the room, his raw energy filling the living area so that the space appeared to shrink. He wasn’t seeing her; his expression was one of remoteness. She knew at that moment Joe was in another world and she felt almost inconsequential to his needs.
When Joe was away from her, back in the Valley, Stella liked to envision him in the paddock with his sheep. The sun belting down. Shirtsleeves rolled high. The bushman’s tan on his arms, face and neck, like a tidemark from his outdoor life. She could almost conjure up the sweet scent of hay as he cut the twine on a bale and handfed one of his rams. Now, as he stood in the centre of the room, she saw how restricted he appeared, as if the unit couldn’t hold him. The man before her was not the bricks-and-mortar kind. Stella wondered where he might lead her if she let him.
‘Harry was an Anzac,’ said Joe. ‘He was at Gallipoli.’ He met her stare, returning from whatever place he’d just inhabited. ‘I always wondered what it would have been like to be there, Stella. To be one of the brave. A hero. One of those men who battled incredible odds.’ He placed his hands in his pockets and then, just as quickly, withdrew them. ‘Every year I think of him marching on Anzac Day and imagine the cheering crowds and I wish with all my heart that there was some great event that I could be involved in. Some way that I could follow in his steps and be tested, as he has been tested.’ He sat on the chair opposite her, his leather boots leaving a smudge of dark-brown polish on the floor.
‘You’re not going to enlist?’ she asked with trepidation.
‘No, I’m not,’ said Joe adamantly. ‘There’s only one war hero in this family. Besides, I’m thirty-five years old and about to be married. While I don’t have any issue with being conscripted into the Citizen Military Forces, I’m safely outside the government’s reach.’
‘Good,’ said Stella. ‘Because I wouldn’t let you go without a fight.’
Joe’s expression was like that of a child just given a lolly. He sat back, contemplating the floor as if the answers to humanity’s greatest problems could be found in the woody knots at his feet.
‘When I was eighteen I took my swag and headed inland on foot. People gave me odd jobs along the way. And I learnt to do things that I never would have had the opportunity to do if I’d remained on the farm. The first thing I did was grow a beard. Harry was a stickler for a close shave. It took a while,’ he admitted with a smile. ‘I spent a lot of time in the bush, camping out, educating myself about the different trees and grasses, collecting beetles and bugs, stick insects, cicadas, dead spiders. I wanted to understand how the tawny frogmouth could stay so still during the day that he appeared like a fallen branch. Why ants don’t always bite. How butterflies sip nectar. I guess I was trying to understand where I fitted in.’ During his speech his face had grown animated, as if he were reliving every moment of those years.
Stella smiled at him, toying with the not-unpleasant thought that, in his unbridled curiosity, he was part child.
‘You’ll think me strange,’ said Joe.
‘Not at all,’ said Stella.
‘I ended up in the north-west of the state on a sheep property for eighteen months. Mr Wells, my employer, was frank and honest. He took people on merit and though I worked for him and called him Mister or Boss, I always felt like an equal.’ Joe leant forwards in the chair. ‘You see, Stella, we were battling the weather and bad sheep prices, side by side. It made no difference that I came from a family of cane farmers and he was a wealthy grazier. If Mr Wells thought himself better than me, he never said anything or acted that way.’
A brief quiet followed. Stella wondered if he was waiting for a response but realised, from the unaffected tone of Joe’s words, that he wanted nothing more than for her to understand the substance of what he was sharing. So she said nothing, simply nodding for him to continue.
‘During the worst of it, when his wife had to shovel dirt from the dust storms off the veranda, we fed the sheep still living and shot those soon to die. There was something grand about what we did on that property. The way the business survived through sheer persistence. From the first week I arrived to the day I left, my opinion never varied of Mr Wells, nor of what he was trying to achieve. Feed his family, clothe the nation and be damned the obstacles that got in his way. It was a noble way to live. I read something about the Anzac spirit not long after I’d left Mr Wells. The words that were used in the newspaper were ones like “endurance”, “courage” and “humour”, and it made me think that those things could still be found. Not in the Valley, where people hold their grudges like they tend potted plants, but in the bush. The real bush. That’s when I decided where I wanted to be. The path I would take. So, you see, it’s not that I intentionally cut you out of the decision-making, Stella. It’s simply that I have to go where I’m called. And it’s the bush that calls me.’ He came over and sat beside her again. Kissed her on the cheek. ‘Harry doesn’t understand. He’ll never understand. He’ll hate what I’m about to do.’
‘You mean buying the property?’
After what he’d just shared, it was a complete reversal to find Joe suddenly so guarded. He finally offered a hesitant yes in answer to her question, but Stella knew that something else troubled him.
‘What’s the matter?’ she queried.
‘Harry holds grudges,’ Joe replied. ‘Always has. Probably always will. Our father was the same. I don’t want to be like them.’
‘And you won’t be. You are your own person, Joe.’
‘I want to do great things with my life as well.’
‘And you will, but what if I’m no good at living on a sheep property?’ Stella said quietly. ‘I’m a city girl, Joe. I go to the beach and eat banana splits and I drink Chianti on the weekends.’
‘And you love me,’ he added.
&nb
sp; ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘But country people are different. They’re used to that kind of life. I’m not. I’m thirty years old. I worry that it will be hard for me to adapt.’
‘But you do love me,’ he persisted, squeezing her knee until she laughed and brushed him away playfully.
‘You know I do.’
‘Well then, the other things don’t really matter, do they?’
‘But what if I don’t fit in?’ she argued.
‘We’re not going to some fancy party.’ He stroked the silver cross at her neck and then pressed his tongue to the hollow at the base of her throat.
Stella had not expected to think so much when Joe was with her. But with everything he did, the way he touched her, the places he chose to concentrate his efforts, her own desire was inevitably blighted with questions. Why did he always push her back on the couch so that her head was angled uncomfortably? Did he enjoy squeezing her breasts or was it done for her satisfaction and, if so, should she murmur or moan? And how far should she allow his interest to wander when at that very moment he was struggling to remove her knickers. They weren’t married yet. What if she let him have her and she became pregnant? What would people say? She was Catholic. So was Joe. It was a sin to have sex before marriage. A bulge was pushing up into her. She struggled a little and they fell from the couch to the floor.
‘Joe, we shouldn’t,’ she said.
But Joe was single-minded. ‘We’re engaged. What can it matter now?’
‘It matters a lot.’ She spoke into his neck, her words muffled. His belt-buckle flapped hard against her thigh. A boot scraped her shin.
‘Joe . . .’ she repeated.
But it was done. He was inside her and she had not the courage to ask him to stop, for, finally, there was pleasure for her as well.
Chapter 10
Stella carried a reminder of that afternoon for more than a week afterwards in the form of a bruise on her leg. Every morning she checked her reflection in the mirror before heading off to her typist job, expecting to see a change. No woman could experience what she had without some singular mark exhibiting the fact to the outside world. She had been infused with love, and this awakening gave her a sense of joy that in the past she’d associated with entering a cathedral. That comparison was undoubtedly a sin. However, to her surprise, afterwards she remained quite blandly herself. Apart from the bruise, there was nothing to declare the sanctity of the moment shared with her husband-to-be, and it was something of a disappointment and a relief to realise that no one had any idea of what had occurred in a third-floor flat on a quiet afternoon.
She studied her womanly proportions. Her olive skin. Spent a good half-hour rolling her dark hair into a complicated bun that swirled like spoon-curved butter about her head. She had prayed to the Virgin for forgiveness for her transgression and spent long hours in confessional with a priest, who seemed more interested in detail than repentance. She had sinned, but if there was no sign of a child before the wedding then her fear would change to happiness and the secretive pleasure she’d enjoyed could be pursued all over again without reproach.
Her fingers brushed the purple discolouration in the shape of a lily that spread across her thigh. She tried not to dwell on Joe’s decision to purchase the sheep property without discussion. Decided that it was far better to be with a man who knew what he wanted, one that was prepared to be tested, than another who chose a vocation for simplicity, or worse, lack of forethought. Joe O’Riain wanted a big life. There was a mythic quality to the way he explained his awe of the bush and now he owned a portion of it. A noble run of ancient lineage, far removed from the existence either of them knew.
Stella glanced through the narrow window to the street from the typing pool on the lower-ground floor. Her fingers flowed effortlessly across the keys as people walked past the office. Only briefcases, women’s hemlines and children were visible from where she sat, providing a ceaseless view of moving feet. She had learnt to angle her chair throughout the course of the day to ensure she received as much of the streaky rays of sunlight that the window would allow. It had pleased her once, this manoeuvring of seat and desk. Now the stripy light seemed petty, and her chasing of it futile. The clack of her nails on the typewriter keys was an annoyance.
‘I suppose you won’t bother with any of us once you’re married.’ Jordan Vincent was one of the older women at work. A slight and bony spinster, she stepped in front of Stella, effectively blocking her from joining the other girls as they filed from the office for a quick cigarette outside before their usual morning tea-break.
‘What do you mean?’ said Stella, ignoring the pulling of faces by the departing women over Miss Vincent’s shoulder.
Miss Vincent shrugged. ‘You and your pleased smile. You’d never know there was a war on.’
Stella tried to walk past but Miss Vincent blocked her. Everyone knew Miss Vincent entertained aspirations of becoming the typing-pool supervisor, however ten years had passed without a hint of promotion. She dealt with her disappointment by exuding superiority whenever she had the opportunity. ‘You always struck me as a young girl with few prospects and limited intellect, but I see now that you’ve quite the ambition.’
‘Because I’m getting married.’
‘Your parents own a café, don’t they? I heard you call it a “greasy spoon” to one of the other girls yesterday.’
‘I was only joking.’
‘Were you?’
Stella hesitated. Miss Vincent had made her sound mean and ungrateful, when her comment had actually been inspired by anger at her parents for refusing to accept her fiancé or her invitation to the wedding.
‘Trying to fit in, are we? But what’s the point? Once you’ve married you won’t bother with your old friends. Do the girls know that while they’re all scrabbling together their ration coupons to help with your wedding day that you’re desperate to leave them behind? I’ve seen you roll your eyes at the trainees and daydream out the window while the rest of us are working and worrying about the war. But the war wouldn’t be causing you one bit of sleeplessness. You’re not even Australian. In fact, you Italians are our enemies.’
‘I’m Australian. My family came here last century,’ Stella replied indignantly.
‘That’s not so very long ago, compared to some of us. I’ve seen girls like you come and go. Marry up, down, sidewards, but not all of them have been quite so smug on announcing their engagement. Be careful of leaving your past behind and aspiring to greatness. Marriage is never the perfect vision young brides imagine.’
Miss Vincent lifted her chin in conclusion, as if the slight elevation helped stress her point. The older woman unfurled a Daily Telegraph from under her arm, pushed a typewriter to one side and spread it on a table. ‘The 1941–42 wool clip is expected to total 3,590,000 bales,’ she read. There was a corresponding picture of a well-dressed man in a yard full of sheep.
‘Mr Pollard told you.’ Stella had pleaded with the section manager when she’d given her notice not to tell anyone of her and Joe’s plans to go west.
Miss Vincent placed her hand on a hip, particularly cheerful. ‘Think you’re special, don’t you. With your overseer, cook and governess for when the little ones come, and your husband safe from doing his duty.’ Her particular word emphasis suggested that she held a low opinion of those who considered themselves better than others. She snatched up the paper, curled it into a tube and placed it in a rubbish bin. ‘It’s worth remembering, dearie, that once you’re out there you’ll be in the middle of nowhere.’ She left the room.
Stella waited a few seconds and then, retrieving the paper, began reading. It was true what Miss Vincent had said. People were making good money from wool. She now had every reason to believe that buying the property was a sound idea. Stella perched on the edge of the desk, a warm sensation settling within her. She looked to the plaster ceiling and then back to the oblong room realising at last the constrictions of the world she inhabited. Ahead lay a new home,
fresh opportunities, family and staff. Miss Vincent was wrong about her, on so many levels, but on one score she was right. She would leave the small world they inhabited and never return. For she was soon to be a grazier’s wife.
Chapter 11
Richmond Valley, 1867
The tree was massive, perhaps one hundred and sixty feet high. Brandon wedged the pole into the cut in its trunk and hoisted himself up onto the narrow, wobbly platform, balancing like a circus performer. He was standing thirty feet above the ground. The air was so hot and humid that he almost believed that if he pushed against it, it might well press back. Sweat trickled down into his eyes.
For the last few months, he and Sean had contented themselves with smaller specimens near the river, ones that could be easily felled and floated downstream to be sold. There was a pile of their branded logs hidden away on the fringes of the forest, waiting for a summer flood to move them. Why he had felt compelled to go exploring he couldn’t explain, except that he suspected that this hill, much like the depths of the forest, contained pockets of timber that other cedar-getters would avoid due to the difficulty of removing the precious wood from the rough terrain. So he and Sean had bashed their way uphill through the scrub, their efforts leading them to this very spot, where they’d found a tree so mighty it was impossible to walk away from. It was like discovering a gold nugget.
Brandon hacked at the vines and creepers that twisted about the trunk, careful lest they recoiled. A weak breeze rustled the surrounding foliage and, as if engulfed by the thickness of the forest, quickly dropped away. They were in the Big Scrub for the second year running. A strange name for a place that grew the tallest, thickest trees he’d ever seen.
He waited for Sean to join him, listening to his cousin grunting as he heaved himself up onto a separate horizontal piece of timber thrust into a notch on the opposite side of the tree. Behind them, a narrow track showed the path they’d slashed through fallen saplings, tangled vines and brush to reach their target. In front of them lay the thoroughfare they’d readied for when the tree would fall. They’d cleared away the smaller trees they’d already felled, piling the timber on either side of the thoroughfare. An understorey, once thick with ferns, palms and spikey bushes that scratched and drew blood, had been obliterated by saw and hoe.
The Cedar Tree Page 7
