Sweet Bitter Cane

by G S Johnston

  Once back in the field, she looked to the heavens; the Madonna had answered her call for penitence. And no seed grew in her. But she wouldn’t show her pain, her tiredness. It burnt her anxiety. And her guilt.

  Towards the end of the day, as the shadow of the western mountain stretched lazily over the plains, she stood up, arched to stretch her back. Her hands were black. She raised a cloth to wipe her face. It too was black. Black-faced Dante laughed at her. She must look like all the other men. Beyond him, over his shoulder, she saw someone move in the forest. She looked but there was no-one. She’d imagined it. But then she saw the familiar colour of Fergus’s shorts. And then he stepped out from behind a tree. He stared at her. She returned his glance. And then he turned away, and in two or three steps was lost in the dense forest. How long he’d been there, she had no idea. Was he following her?

  In the coming days of work, the only thing running against her was time – just never enough. Nothing was too hard, Amelia kept telling herself. In the evening, once she came in from the field, she finished the meal Maria and Meggsy had started and served the men. They complained about the successions of stews, but she knew they only joked.

  ‘Perhaps you’d like to cook tomorrow evening,’ she said to Lorenzo Nanni, who was young and still cheeky. Her comment silenced him.

  She prayed to the Madonna for a deal; if she could not sleep for the next week, then, when all the work was finished, she would sleep for a week. But she’d already asked too much of her, and by eleven in the evening she was drunk with exhaustion and fell into bed.

  Each morning she would rise at five and have breakfast ready for the men. She would leave with them, having only eaten quickly in between. Maria and Meggsy would prepare the morning and afternoon tea and lunch. But even then, in the field, she helped serve the men, made sure they had their share of cake or scone and a full enamelled cup of tea before she’d have her own restoration from the beverage.

  And each afternoon after her work, she would see Fergus. If they were in the fields further out, he’d be in one of the windbreaks of trees in the middle of the fields. If she was working at the edge of a field, he would lurk in the rainforest, as close as he could. He remained, part of the forest, looking at her.

  One afternoon she went to the skin bag of water in the shadow of the transport. Fergus stood to the lee, less than fifty metres from the men. If the men noticed him (how could they not?) they made no sign to acknowledge it. She wanted to run to him. She wanted to run from him. In such contradiction with herself, she couldn’t stop her pleasure at seeing him, and smiled. He stretched out a hand, repeatedly clasped his fingers to his palm, his face imploring her to go with him. She clasped hers together, over her belly. Her heart stopped, a body blow, a punch in the stomach, winded. Her senses flared. She shook her head, as violently as she could.

  ‘No,’ she said. ‘Never.’

  Before he could speak, before she could ask him to keep her secret, she turned back to the field, her mouth dryer than it had been. How easy it would be to down her work and walk to him. How joyous to ignore all the glances and the words of the men around her. But these things were stronger than her heart and held her in place. And as jubilant as it would be to touch him again, in silence she thanked the men for their presence.

  On the last evening of the harvest, they cooked a special dinner. Maria mixed flour and water and eggs to pasta, rolled to even sheets by hand and cut to the long, flat ribbons of pappardelle, topped with braised salami and roasted tomatoes. But the flour wasn’t the correct hard type, another thing unavailable, and the pasta wasn’t quite right, but everyone ate it coated with a sauce that evoked rich memories in all. But the men brought bottles of beer and some wine, and Dante brought out the accordion and a violin, and they sang their old songs. The men raised their glasses to the women, for their cooking, but also for the hard work Amelia had done in the field. They knew of this work, and from that could judge her mettle.

  And the next morning, except for the burnt and rutted fields, it was as if the harvest had never been. All the tasks were done, the carnival rolling on to the next set of fields. She had no planning, no buying, no cooking or cleaning and no canes to bundle. The men were gone from the barracks. But Italo went out to the fields. He had a few ‘free’ days before he and the gang would start on another farm. He had to turn what was left of the cane into the soil to rot and nourish the earth, preparing it for the next planting.

  That evening, after they’d finished dinner, as was usual, Italo prepared to go and check the horses and smoke a final cigarette in the last of the day. He came to the kitchen doorway.

  ‘Come,’ he said, smiling. ‘Walk with me.’

  She hesitated, and he felt it.

  ‘Leave your work,’ he said. ‘There’s something I want to show you.’

  Slowly, she lowered the towel to the bench, pulled the cord of her apron free, pulled it over her head. He reached out his hand to her. She smoothed her hands over the front of her dress and then over the loose strands of hair. Despite her profound weariness, she thrust her hand to him.

  His hand was warm and roughened, like Fergus’s. But she must stop this, school herself to forget this man, not allow this continual judging. They walked to the breezeway and then out to the open evening air. Italo carried his caning knife, stuck down his belt at his rear. They followed the path she’d taken towards the bush and the ridge. Italo said nothing, occasionally pulling the blade free and slashing at the scrub on the path. And she had no words, the air alive with the night sounds of waves of rattling cicadas and drumming frogs.

  They went in the direction of the rainforest, where the path led off to Fergus’s hut. She tightened. Where was he taking her? Had he seen Fergus looking at her in the field? She hesitated, and her hand slipped from his. Some bird retched high in the canopy, loud and intrusive. The damp, the ever-present moisture, filmed her skin and hair. She stopped and he did too, ahead of her. He looked at her.

  ‘Where are we going?’ she said.

  ‘I want to show you something.’

  ‘What?’

  He extended his hand again. But she didn’t want to take it.

  ‘You walk ahead,’ she said. ‘I’ll follow.’

  He lowered his hand and moved slowly into the forest.

  ‘When I first came here,’ he said. ‘I didn’t like the forest. Compared to the forests at home …’

  She looked out into the dimming light. They were now well along the path to Fergus’s hut. Would he be there? Surely, he wouldn’t say anything? But she didn’t want to see him. She could smell smoke. Fergus had a fire burning. Her heart began to drum. What could she do? She looked ahead, over Italo’s shoulder. She couldn’t yet see the hut. But they were close. She stopped walking. Should she turn back? Why had he brought her there? He knew what had happened and meant to confront them. What excuse could she offer?

  ‘Italo,’ she said, the word shrill and unguarded. The forest lulled.

  He stopped, some metres ahead of her. They were in a small clearing, the earth flat but rising behind them.

  ‘There’s something I must tell you,’ she said.

  ‘Later.’ He smiled. ‘What do you think of it?’

  She looked at him, her face knotted in pain. He raised his hand, the knife pointing at the view. Through the trees, she could see their house and the stable and the fields beyond, almost a bird’s view.

  ‘Would you like to live here?’ he said.

  He confused her. She looked from him to the aspect and then back at him. She bit on her tears. What was he talking about?

  ‘We do live here,’ she said.

  He laughed and his blue eyes smiled.

  ‘I want to build a house, here, for us. We can get access from the main road and come around the back of the hill.’ He pointed in a large arc to mimic a new road. ‘We’ll get the breeze.’

  She turned from him to the view. What a thing to wake to every morning. But it was too near Fergus.
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  ‘But it’s in the forest.’

  ‘I can clear the forest.’ He walked away. ‘All this land was covered only a few years ago. It’s one of the reasons Kelly sold it to me. He thought it was unusable. But the first ten years I was here, I cleared acres and acres in Chillagoe to earn the money to buy this land. These people leave the stumps in the field and plant around them, which makes harvesting even harder. They can’t even lay the tracks for the transports. We dynamited the massive stumps out. All that beautiful wood went to fire a smelter. But we can use it to build.’

  But what about Fergus? They couldn’t build near him. Was he to be evicted?

  ‘I don’t know …’ she said.

  He smiled, coyly lowered his eyes to the ground. ‘You’ve brought good fortune,’ he said. ‘The harvest was very good.’

  Colour came to her face. ‘I don’t know of that.’

  ‘I can put some money aside. We can start to plan the house.’

  This man. So simple. So direct. What had she done? To tell him now, at this moment, was brutal. Did everything have to be said in a marriage? How could she know?

  ‘We’ve not really had a chance—’ he said.

  ‘I was pleased to help.’ She lowered her eyes to the ground. ‘It had a purpose.’

  ‘Purpose?’

  These feelings, even in Italian, flopped and floated and evaded expression. But Italo had been honest with her, and she should try with him.

  ‘In Italy,’ she said, ‘everything I did was for someone else. All the work we did for my father, of all the money we earnt, the major part went to the feudal lord.’

  ‘That much I remember of Italy.’

  ‘Do you know how I met your aunts?’

  He thought for some moments and then shook his head.

  Surprised he didn’t know, she recounted the fateful day, two years before they’d married, when she’d travelled with her brothers, Giuseppe and Aldo, to this distant village of Bovegno.

  ‘We’d lost so much during the war,’ Amelia said. ‘The Austro-Hungarian army took the cow and the few chickens, the apples, really anything they wanted. Once it was over, we had to … find ways to recoup the losses. But it was impossible, when so much went to the lord. Until Aldo had an idea: we’d sell some apples away from Signore Mancuso’s and his accountants’ sight.’

  Just hours after Aldo had conceived his plan, a Bovegno market vendor had insulted him with a stupidly low price. Could this imbecile not see quality, in contrast to his own rotting produce? How much Amelia would have liked to bypass these damn fools and heap their father’s apples, six or seven shiny varieties, onto a trestle table and sell them directly to the public. The markets had eyes, willing to report to the feudal lords those stepping up from their low stature to such enterprise.

  ‘Have you tasted the sweetness?’ Amelia said.

  The vendor turned to her. She could read him – how dare a woman bargain? She reached to the cane pannier strapped to her back and handed him an apple. He took it, sniffed it, and bit.

  ‘You feel the firmness,’ she said. ‘And is it not … juicy?’ Amelia held his eye. She knew these words – sweetness, firmness and juicy – would work an incantation on the vendor.

  At a small distance, two slight women watched her. She strengthened her performance, leant into the vendor, held his eyes while he savoured the apple, her blouse at her chest. Her brother raised his price higher than even she’d hoped. In a daze, the vendor agreed. While her brothers closed the deal, the women approached her, commended her skill and asked her name and provenance.

  A week later, a letter had arrived for her father, who couldn’t read; her mother read it. Italo’s aunts had liked the look of this eighteen-year-old girl, doll-like as she was but still with fine proportions. She’d had the fire to argue. They had thought her a fair match for their nephew, Italo Amedeo. And there’d been no talk at all of a dowry.

  Now Italo remained, his gaze intense and unflinching. Finally, he said, ‘Such a flirt to know your power over a man.’

  ‘One must cut a coat with the available cloth.’

  He continued to stare. She’d revealed too much – this didn’t speak well of her, that she knew so much of men; their impulses were so plainly read, though. But then he threw his head back and broke to laughter, and she joined him by smiling.

  ‘This work with the cane,’ Amelia said, ‘was for you. And me.’ She looked him in the eye. ‘Us.’

  Italo was quiet. He looked towards the view. ‘Do these mountains remind you of home?’

  She remained looking at him until he motioned to the view, the Bellenden Ker Range. Slowly, she turned her head. Mount Bartle Frere was the highest peak. These mountains were nowhere near as rugged. And they had no buildings, no signs of civil life. And the forest, the trees and the ferns, were nothing like those of home, growing in cold, dry air. Had he forgotten? Or did he just try to view this place as home? Did that make it more acceptable? But perhaps he was right; she did see something, maybe just the play between the flat plain and the sharp rise to the mountains. She nodded to him, slowly.

  ‘Then you mean to stay here?’ she said.

  ‘Stay?’ Some of the joy left his face. He breathed out slowly. ‘What does that mean?’

  ‘Then why build a house?’

  Italo remained still. Her argument had turned too quickly.

  ‘To hear the other men talk of going back to Italy …’ she said. ‘Why? They’ll go back to flaunt their new money to old ways. Nothing’s changed.’

  ‘I’m pleased to hear it.’

  ‘Here, you can build a house where and how you like. Who can build a house in Italy?’

  ‘I might own the land,’ he said. ‘But I don’t belong to it.’

  ‘All those songs they sing aren’t known anymore in Italy.’

  ‘Then something has changed.’

  She looked at him and he started to laugh. ‘They’ll still be peasants toiling for masters.’

  ‘You don’t want to go back?’

  She swallowed hard and looked out at the view, breathed in the endless expanse. ‘I thought I would … I don’t know. I can’t say. Your mother made me promise we’d return.’ She turned to him. ‘With children.’

  ‘She’s alone.’

  ‘Already, I feel … free. I don’t want to lose that.’

  They were silent, separate, looking together to the north and the future.

  ‘I know you don’t love me,’ he said. ‘I can just imagine what my aunts told you.’

  ‘They said you had blue eyes.’

  ‘And a full head of hair, I’m sure.’

  ‘And I can imagine what they said of me,’ Amelia said.

  ‘You don’t even know me …’

  When she thought of what had happened with Fergus, she thought she didn’t know herself. ‘Love takes time.’ She drew in her breath. ‘When do we start to build?’

  He smiled. He pushed a wisp of her hair behind her ear. He leant forward and kissed her, his thick moustache prickling her lips. Did her heart drum? Did her face flush with heat? She checked all these signs. She felt none. Perhaps a person only felt these things once in life, and once they were done, all other kisses were just pale reminders.

  The daylight was nearly gone. They started back along the ridge, back into the forest. Italo had confused her. He wanted to return to Italy and build a large house in Australia, a contradiction. In the dark damp, she smelt smoke laced with mutton fat, Fergus’s dinner.

  ‘What was it you wanted to tell me?’ he said.

  ‘Oh …’ She blushed again. ‘I forget.’

  Later that evening, Italo carried her through the breezeway to the bed. Fergus’s face rose in her mind, his soft, hairless thighs silk to her touch, his soft skin pearl to her eye. She conjured these memories again, more to counter this pain she’d not felt at all with Fergus. His name came to her lips, but she sucked it back and swallowed the word. Italo took this as a sign of encouragement, emboldening
his efforts, forcing harder into her. No appreciable, pleasurable sensation or release came to her as Italo quaked and shuddered.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Now the earth was bare, a new rhythm came to the farm. Italo rose each morning, and after she’d made him coffee he’d walk out to the main road to be collected by Manny Pellegrino. They were now harvesting Salvatore Lanza’s property, to the north of Babinda. Amelia’s days became her own. She didn’t mind. It was months since she’d been alone. She wished her mother would write, and she may have, but it would take at least six weeks or more for the letter to arrive. On the verandah table, she wrote another letter home, a long study on every aspect of the harvests, from their mounds of food and her labour in the field to how, despite the exhaustion, she’d enjoyed it. She wrote of the lack of beans and good flour, and the abundance of meat and how much Australians liked mutton.

  And she decided to clean the whole house, as it evidently hadn’t been cleaned for a considerable time. She opened all the windows but doubted she’d ever clear the mosquito coils’ odour. She dragged the dining table and chairs from the main room into the breezeway. On one side of the room, closer to the fire, Italo had a desk, covered with pieces of paper. They appeared to be invoices and payments. But they were higgledy-piggledy over the desk, no order to the dates. Those at the top appeared to be closer to the present date, those lower were older and then older still. She shuffled them to a single stack, found some string, tied them and placed them in the empty drawers and carried the table and the chairs outside.

  She rolled back the rug and scrubbed the boards with a stiff, purpose-bought brush. She took the rug and hung it over the side fence and beat it with a wide plank. Once she’d returned it to the room, returned all the furniture to their stations, a thin layer of dust already covered the dining table. She sighed. She was never going to win this war. But she would fight.

  And since that day in the field by the tractor, she’d not seen Fergus. In the early evening she looked for signs of him – a trail of smoke from his fire, him walking along the edge of the forest – but found none. Even in the village, she’d not seen him. Somehow, the lack of him, although it was what she’d asked for, worried her. Perhaps he’d accepted the impossibility of the situation and avoided her out of grace.