Bettany's Book

by Thomas Keneally

  ‘Good evening, Mr Finlay,’ I said after a polite cough. ‘It is a great pleasure to see you, not least because I wanted to discuss what you would consider a minimum price for your Leicester wool.’

  ‘Not now,’ he said, not looking at me but holding out the papers. ‘For the moment would you read aloud from the third paragraph on page 1 to the end of the second paragraph on page 2 of this letter from my daughter?’

  Confused by his lack of welcome, I needed to ask him could he nominate the passages again. He repeated them in insistent tones, like a man teaching the wilful or the idiotic. I took the pages and fumbled with them. At the head of the first, in an earnest hand, rich in copperplate flourish, was written ‘The Convent of the Soeurs de Sacre Coeur, Genève, June 27th, 1838’. The letter was nearly four months old.

  How curious, I thought, that the English gentry, who so mistrusted Papists, would so willingly commit their daughters to be trained by nuns. But French nuns … they were considered elegant and safe. My eyes glanced over a mention of a forthcoming expedition by coach the young ladies of the Sacre Coeur would make to Frutigen.

  But the third paragraph on page one began, ‘Though it is possible to regret the raw nature of new country, I must tell you that no life other than that of New South Wales will satisfy me. Before I left Lansdown Park, I proposed an arrangement to Mr Bettany by which he would in the end marry me and take me into new country. The sight of European men, who have not known and cannot know the size or the nature of our continent, confirms me in the wisdom of this compact. Since a dutiful daughter reports such decisions, I must report that I intend upon my return to fulfil our agreement and to marry Mr Bettany. This means I must live if necessary in a bark hut as his spouse, and this I thought it right to inform you in good time. I look forward to an existence as Mr Bettany’s spouse, and it is something of which all my fellow students not only approve but at which they express envy.

  ‘If then you should meet Mr Bettany in the interim, I would ask you to exercise the duty of a wise parent and treat him with all the courtesy of a future spouse of your daughter and of father to your grandchildren.’

  I looked up in confusion. I could not believe a promise exacted from me by a child, a half-joking pledge, could turn on me like this.

  ‘Perhaps you could explain,’ suggested Mr Finlay, ‘what Mrs Finlay and I are to make of our daughter’s statement.’

  ‘A promise was half-given, it’s true. It was given as in a play …’ Even to myself I sounded flustered, like a man lashing about. It had been a joke, or nearly a joke. But I could not quite say that, just the same. I could not have her parents say, ‘Mr Bettany thinks your letter a joke.’ So far from New South Wales by the waters of Geneva, an accusation of silliness might be very wounding to the girl.

  ‘Please,’ I said, ‘it was a fantastic idea your daughter proposed almost as a whimsy.’ I realised that this was a very poor substitute for calling her foolish. ‘Naturally I thought a European education would remove her from that sort of intention. Visiting your relatives in Scotland, I assumed she would meet some suitable young Englishman …’

  It was time to be silent. I could see Mr Finlay’s dark eyes running through various phases of furious disbelief. ‘I would have thought that as a courtesy,’ he said, ‘I, who have welcomed you to my house and extended to you pasture not otherwise available, could have been confided in.’

  ‘Certainly,’ I said. ‘Had I thought the idea a genuine one, I would have done so.’ But I confessed to myself that I had in a way, and however briefly, enjoyed the secrecy of our contract.

  Becoming more and more severe within his compact, manly body, Mr Finlay said, ‘I cannot help but wonder under what circumstances this supposed betrothal was arranged?’

  How could I say, she came to my room! ‘Let me tell you, those circumstances … they were utterly innocent.’

  ‘A Vandemonian and the son of a convict speaks to me of utter innocence?’

  The jibe brought on the normal panic in me, a panic of rage but also of the inescapability of my description. It seemed to me once more so obvious and so universal that whoever looked at me saw above all a felon’s child. No matter how much of their fleece I had brought them, no matter the stock books I kept, or how I comported myself, the intervening description of who I was cast its yellow, questionable light on all I did.

  ‘Did you mention the concept?’ asked – or more accurately – demanded Mr Finlay. ‘Which she then took up with her normal girlish enthusiasm?’

  How could I let myself be accused of planting such an idea in a child’s mind? For to Mr Finlay it was, no doubt, the sort of thing the offspring of convicts did all the time.

  ‘No,’ I insisted. ‘It was a fanciful suggestion of your daughter, as I’ve said. I would like to take as much blame as is appropriate, but my mind was very much set, and happily so, on the enterprise of finding my own station beyond the limits.’

  ‘And so you closed the matter off then?’ asked acute Mr Finlay. ‘You told her that it was unseemly and ridiculous and impossible?’

  ‘Ah,’ was all I could say, looking to at least two of the corners of the room for aid which they could not offer. ‘You will sometimes promise a young person something for the sake of pleasantness. And because you know that all undertakings will evaporate under the pressure of time.’

  Mr Finlay now did something very confusing in the midst of this intense quarrel. He sat down. ‘I mention the fact of your father being an emancipated felon. I did not know that till, on his last journey here, Charles Batchelor let it slip.’

  I did not like to see my father dismissed in those few words. ‘My father is a transportee, that can’t be denied. Surely I didn’t tell you otherwise?’

  ‘No, but the letter from Mr Batchelor concerning you was so enthusiastic, and it did not mention it.’

  ‘The Batchelors were always very kind to our family and treated us as members of theirs.’

  ‘But surely I expressed my views on emancipists when you were at dinner here.’

  I felt myself possessed by my unruly blood.

  ‘Are you trying to say, Mr Finlay, that apart from any objectionable aspects of my role in your daughter’s daydream, my problems stem from my paternity?’

  ‘You would not want me to dissemble on that matter, I take it?’

  Charlie had been right. Mr Finlay was a gross interferer and a gleaner of power. I apologised for my neglect of him and his wife, thanked him for his past kindnesses, and then said, ‘But I think I must go now, since you entered into our business arrangement under a false impression that I was the child of free settlers. That I have kept correct stock and wool books, and I have some quite splendid wool out on the wagon, much of the longer staple wool being yours – that is clearly nothing to your mind. When I have found the opportunity to sell it, I shall recompense you.’

  ‘Very well,’ said Mr Finlay. ‘I expect ten pence a pound from my share of the wool. I would be very pleased to forget that sum if you write to my daughter and tell her that any sort of connection between the two of you is ridiculous. That you live in a bark hut surrounded by natives and by the lowest of the felonry.’

  ‘And am a felon myself, no doubt,’ I said.

  He ignored my irony, and I knew that in some ways his offer was reasonable. But the thought that he was enjoying, was congratulating himself on having me skewered on the immutable iron of my father’s transportation brought out a fierce reluctance in me. Also, I had a sharp vision of Phoebe’s face against the white of her gown as she made her preposterous speech in moonlight. There was something in her that could not be traded for ten pence per pound of Leicester wool.

  ‘I would be very pleased to oblige such a generous offer,’ I told him, ‘but I can’t. You see, we owe your daughter’s letter the courtesy, in my book, of not letting her know the two of us have discussed it in terms of wool prices.’

  Now Mr Finlay looked away as if to an unseen witness. ‘Dear God,’ he murmu
red, ‘I think there is still some sort of ambition in the man.’

  ‘Oh,’ I said, ‘there is certainly ambition, but it is not directed at your daughter.’

  ‘Very well,’ he said. ‘I shall expect an accounting. You’ll deal with my agent, Mr Tute of the Bank of Australia. You may deliver my Leicesters to me before Christmas. You may keep your one-third of the increase, but I would like to see an appropriate and at least plausible record. Please do not delay in rendering me that record or in returning my sheep. Since you occupy land beyond the limits, your tenure is insecure, and I have friends at the newly formed Land Commission who could make it extremely insecure indeed.’

  I told him he could have his Leicesters back well before Christmas. I decided I would send them up in the care of the sullen O’Dallow, who could be depended upon not to show excessive respect. Then, profoundly offended, I left the Finlay house, its chance of a splendid dinner and tea of a delicate tint in a china cup.

  My flock had been diminished, and must somehow be restored – obviously from the money earned by the sale of wool. I would therefore not have many reserves of cash to deposit in the Bank of Australia or the Savings Bank at Goulburn. I was above all tormented by the revived image of the young Phoebe, and thus spent a doubly tormented night resting beneath the wagon with Clancy, and ended in rousing him early so that I could get away from the hated reach of Mr Finlay.

  Hope kept me lively on the way over the divide and down the terraces of the foothills, where at every stop I was vigilant to keep Clancy out of the pubs we passed. If he got drunk I did not have the wagon-driving skills to keep up the pace, and certainly lacked the breadth of profane language to make the bullocks take me seriously. In warm, humid days and country flat and pleasant we drew near the area called the Black Huts.

  Ahead of us, in this nondescript little village of aged slab-timber huts which gave the place a look of pervasive greyness, natives could be seen walking in the streets in shirts and with blankets over their shoulders. An occasional white settler rode the main street past a small stone bank and a large brick hotel. The place had no look of being a golden town.

  Yet energy suffused the landscape as a slim man in a plum-coloured swallow-tailed coat, nankeen pants and neat tan leather riding boots came thundering out of the town on a very fine roan mare. Drawing level with us, he hauled his mount to a stop, jumped down and ran up to me, his eyes frankly on our load of fleece.

  ‘Sir,’ he said breathlessly, in a Yorkshire accent from which in the north country way he dropped all definite articles. ‘Sir, name is Barley and I am a Sydney wool merchant. I started out early along road on offchance of encountering such a load as yours. May I ask where you come from, sir?’

  But he did not wait for an answer, walking instead to the bales of wool on the wagon and having a look at the name on them: a rough stencil cut by Long had provided the woolsacks with the inked words ‘NUGAN GANWAY’ together with the letters ‘CBJB’.

  ‘My dear Lord,’ said Barley, ‘I’ve been meeting wagons three years now and each year names multiply as if it were infinite out there. Tell me, is Nugan Ganway located just this side of infinity?’

  I said that it was far south of Goulburn and he started to laugh like someone wishing to share a joke, fraternally. ‘I’m sure I might have a pleasant proposition for you, Mr Nugan Ganway. But it must await my inspection. With your permission …’ He took from his pocket a knife and at the same time a courteous needle and heavy thread. He hauled himself by the ropes on the load onto the great structure of bales, and with only the rims of his tan boots keeping purchase on the edge of the wagon he set about cutting some sacks open to sample the wool. The needle and thread were for Clancy to re-sew whichever sacks he opened.

  He slit only three of the wool packs, two on one side of the wagon, then one on the other, thrusting in his hand and surveying the handfuls of fibre he extracted. He seemed engrossed but made no comment on them until he jumped down and waited with me, chattering away, while Clancy mended the packs.

  ‘Now, sir,’ he said. ‘When your man is done with that, could I prevail upon him to remove some outer packs? Not you, sir, not you of course, but some squatters are careful to put all fine fleece on outside of load. It is utterly customary for a chap in my position to look within load, and I know you would not consider that in any way a personal affront.’

  I was taken by the fact that he had as much energy for the wool as I. I looked at his eager face and glittering eyes – he was slightly shorter than me, with a big-nosed, terrier look which, taken with his general energy of manner made him easy to like. I said I would not be offended by his request, but that some of the bales were of Leicester wool from the same station. Clancy removed some of the bales and Barley climbed again aboard the wagon to test the Leicester and other inner sacks of wool. He plied his knife, pulled out a handful and considered it. Jumping down a last time, I was pleased to see he played none of the normal games one would expect of a wool broker. There were no frowns, no sighs supposedly induced by poor quality in what he had just inspected.

  ‘This strikes me as wool grown at altitude, sir,’ he observed.

  I admitted that much of my property was at 1500 feet and some of it, the hills in which my herd of cattle was located, higher.

  ‘Well I must say this is excellent, sir, excellent crimp and scale. You have done very well in my opinion, my dear Lord, yes. Nine pence a pound won’t do for this, at least for your Merino! I shall have to offer you 10 pence ha’penny to stop you from being intercepted by other merchants.

  ‘You see, sir, that little town yon will by noon today be full of Sydney wool merchants, but none as jovial as Barley, I promise, and few as willing to be generous. If you would trust a good fellow and honour me with your business, sir, I can weigh your wool this afternoon – there are facilities for it, a large scales, in town. Money would be handed to you over dinner tonight at the Wool Pack Inn in Liverpool, a few miles beyond.’

  I quelled the intoxication I felt. This previously unknown sprite had emerged from the landscape to be the first to praise the Nugan Ganway fleece.

  ‘I must,’ I told him, ‘in consideration of my partners, consult other dealers and their clerks.’ He managed a frank grimace of disappointment.

  Dusting his hands, he took a pair of fawn gloves from his pocket and put them on.

  ‘In that case, sir, I must bid you good morning. But if you should see me at Liverpool and Parramatta crossroads, where agents less energetic and more brazen than young and fortunate Barley are at this hour barely rousing from their beds and complaining at being in bush, then I shall greet you as a friend whatever happens, and we may feel need to discuss things further.’ He nodded, briskly remounted, and rode away, a natural in the saddle. I was sad to see him go. I wanted to come to terms with him if possible.

  Clancy and I rolled through the Black Huts, and in a few miles neared the famous inn called the Wool Pack, at the place where the road from Parramatta joined the Liverpool road on the edge of that small village. In a great space before the inn we saw an armada of bullock trucks groaning with wool, and scattered amongst them the sleek town phaetons of Sydney wool merchants. The verandah of the Wool Pack seethed with men in more or less the same town uniform Barley had worn, and men too like Clancy and myself, dust in their coats and broad brimmed hats, trousers which had known river, mud, and the blood of sheep.

  The clerk at the Wool Pack told me that all the rooms were three times full, so I rode across the junction towards Liverpool to the Dangling Man where I found a room in which to put my shirt and bed roll. On the crowded verandah of the place many other pastoral gentlemen were sitting, smoking pipes and drinking ale. I saw one settler who had not bothered to shave rush up to another and cry, ‘Eight pence a pound, Mr Tucker. How does that make you feel?’ And the two of them were laughing, a year in the bush redeemed at 8 pence per pound.

  It seemed these gentlemen had not met Mr Barley.

  My accommodation s
ettled, and with the firm intention of later rewarding Clancy with a bottle of rum, a prospect I did not distract him with at this stage, I went back to the wagon and waited for visits from some of the gentleman wool merchants. Few of them were as pleasant or enthusiastic as Barley. They gave instead a sour appearance of weariness. Most of them had clerks whom they made climb up and bring down handfuls of wool – no clambering for them. Nor did they have the courtesy of needle and thread, so that Clancy and I were required to reseal the packs by our own devices. Some of them offered as little as 9 pence, others 10. One of them offended me by offering 7 pence ha’penny.

  ‘Where is your station?’ he asked. He had already been drinking, and there was a map of pink veins on his cheeks.

  ‘South of the County of Argyle, on the plateau, up against the southern ranges.’

  ‘Well, sir, why don’t you call a spade a spade? That’s the Maneroo country, as I fully expected from the quality of the wool. That is not prime wool country, sir. That is passable wool country.’

  And so they came, inspecting the handfuls of wool as if they were the entrails of chickens, looking for omens of coming great houses, of better phaetons, of rarer bay mounts, of imported crystal, of exporting their sons to Oxford and their daughters to finishing schools. By 11 o’clock I had been offered 11 pence ha’penny by a sour old man in a frock coat. At his offer, I remembered hearing, at the age of twelve, an old Tasmanian ticket-of-leave man, a West Country fellow, in conversation with my father, saying, ‘There be great wealth in ha’pennies.’

  At noon I went back to the Dangling Man for some ale and bread, and I saw the same two men I had noticed earlier, one rushing up to the other and exclaiming, ‘Nine pence a pound, Clarence. What do you think of that?’ By the door, as this sentence was uttered, I was grateful to see Barley sitting in a big cane chair, looking hot yet composed.