He Called Me Son (The Blountmere Street Series Book 1)

by Barbara Arnold

  ‘Leave it to me, I’ll think of something. Anyway, don’t you want to buy that Gay Whatsername a present seeing as you fancy her?’

  ‘We talk when we see each other, that’s all.’

  Joe sniffed.

  ‘I haven’t seen you talking to Paul Downston lately,’ I said to direct the conversation away from Gaylene.

  ‘Why should I? Our bit of business is finished. I don’t want to talk to him, and he don’t want to pass the time with me. I’ve got what I wanted out of him.’ Joe chuckled. ‘Until the next time. I haven’t finished with him yet.’

  Whenever I was working reasonably close to the homestead and her old man wasn’t around, Gaylene still seemed to find a way to meet me. The others said it was because she had it bad for me. Murray told me never to trust a woman, while Fergus said true love was a precious thing. All I knew was that when Gaylene sat next to me, I was conscious of the feel of her skin, the sunshine smell of her clothes and her slender fingers making me think of swans’ necks.

  ‘I expect you saw the Queen all the time when you lived in London. What’s she like? Is she as small as they say she is?’ Gaylene asked, the next time we met, as we sat well hidden behind a clump of bushes.

  ‘I’ve never seen her, so I don’t know.’

  Gaylene looked disappointed. ‘But you must have been to Buckingham Palace.’

  ‘No, I haven’t.’ Buckingham Palace was the last place the Gang had thought of visiting. The only time I had been to the West End had been for Fred and Lori’s wedding. Dennis once went to Madam Tussauds. He told us all about the Chamber of Horrors. I had nightmares about it for weeks afterwards.

  ‘The Queen came to New Zealand once,’ Gaylene continued. ‘Our whole school went. We waited on the side of the road for hours. We waved flags, but her car drove past so quickly, we couldn’t see her. If I’d lived in London I’d definitely have gone to Buckingham Palace.’

  I felt an urge to put my arm around her shoulders to say how sorry I was she hadn’t been able to go. ‘I’ve been on a London underground train,’ I said, hoping it would make up for not having seen the Queen or Buckingham Palace.

  ‘What’s it like?’

  ‘Crowded – well, it is in the mornings and at night when everyone’s going or coming home from work.’ I kept my hands between my knees, in case they strayed and stroked her arms. ‘During The War, people slept on the platforms.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘I think Mum might have taken Angela and me down there to sleep sometimes. It was like a long air raid shelter.’

  ‘Was the poetry you read me about that War?’

  ‘No. That was poetry from The First World War. Fergus said a whole generation of men enlisted to fight for their country. But thousands were injured and killed. He said that blokes like Joe and me lied about their age so that they could fight. They thought they were going to have an adventure and that it would soon be over. Instead it lasted four years.’ I paused and gazed ahead. It wasn’t unlike us orphan boys. We thought we were being sent to have an adventure. But we were banished from home forever. We were the ones who never returned.

  ‘I’ve copied a war poem. D’you want to hear it?’ I asked.

  As an answer, Gaylene moved closer, and I felt a powerful need to protect her.

  As bronze may be much beautified

  By lying in the dark damp soil

  So men who fade in dust of warfare fade

  Fairer, and sorrow blooms their soul.

  Like pearls which noble women wear

  And, tarnishing, awhile confide

  Unto the old salt sea to feed

  Many return more lustrous than they were

  But what of them buried profound

  Buried where we can no more find

  Who lie dark for ever under abysmal war?

  Bees hummed in the manuka bushes, drowsily, without haste. Birds sang a midday song on scented air - an eternity away from the trenches, an eternity away from … I cuffed my eyes before the tears could spill.

  The evening air held the day’s heat as Murray, Fergus, Joe and I sat on the ridge outside our quarters. I looked at the distant river, a thin band at this time of year. My three allocated strawberries from Joe’s garden, together with a sugar lump, remained untouched in my bowl.

  ‘You’re not still mooning about that Gay Whatshername?’

  ‘And what’s wrong with that, Joe me lad? Love’s never to be taken for granted. To be sure, one day all you’re left with are bitter-sweet memories,’ Fergus answered.

  ‘Well, I ain’t going in for all that soppy love stuff.’

  Murray reclined on the grass and pulled his hat over his face. ‘Too right, boy, never trust a woman.’

  At that moment, it wasn’t Gaylene who was on my mind, although she had been mostly every minute I was awake and often when I was asleep. This evening, and throughout the day, however, she had only shared my thoughts.

  That morning, before the light had broken and the birds had begun their dawn call, I experienced a stirring as if someone was trying to nudge me awake. I was sure it wasn’t a dream. I could see Fergus’ form rise and fall in slumber, hear Murray snoring and Joe’s incoherent sleep talk. It had been a bizarre impression of someone wanting to reach me.

  I sat up in bed, straining for more but there was nothing, only the desperation of a human spirit trying to touch my own.

  ‘What d’you want?’ I whispered into the stillness, but Joe muttered was it time to get up and the connection had been severed.

  Throughout the day, I tried to re-establish the link. My thoughts became caught up with a thousand others, as they had when I tried to communicate with Paula at the orphanage. I wondered if it truly had been Paula. If so, I had let her down.

  The next time Gaylene and I met was behind an old shed the rabbiters used. It was the ideal place to talk, she said, as she plucked at a blade of grass. She was wearing a yellow headband in an attempt to capture her curls, but a few wayward tendrils that looked like corkscrews had escaped.

  Although it was two days ago, my strange early morning experience was still with me. My mind kept wandering back to it and I had no idea how Gaylene and I had got on to the subject of Downston and the Missus. They were the last people I wanted to talk about, but Gaylene said, ‘Mum was going to be a teacher. All her family were teachers. Then she met Dad and gave up her training.’ She hugged her knees. ‘You should see their wedding photos. She was very beautiful.’

  Trying to imagine the Missus as a beautiful bride was as difficult as liberating my thoughts to reach someone thousands of miles away. I found it impossible to understand why anyone would want to give up everything for a man like Downston, but, then, Mum had done the same thing for our Old Man.

  ‘Mum’s never really taken to farm life,’ Gaylene continued. ‘Things that farmers’ wives are supposed to do don’t interest her. She doesn’t like making jam and bottling fruit or cooking, although she has to do it.’

  I thought of the boil-up and nodded.

  ‘I try to help as much as I can when I’m home from school,’ Gaylene paused. ‘You see, it was when I was born she had a stroke. She’s never properly got over it. She’s lost all her confidence. The men’s quarters are about as far as she ever gets. I sometimes think if I hadn’t been born Mum would still be all right and that it’s my fault.’

  ‘Of course it’s wasn’t your fault.’ I stroked her hand. When I realized what I was doing, I became embarrassed, and placed it back in her lap. I was about to say she was silly to blame herself, but I often thought if it wasn’t for me and Angela, the Old Man might have been different. Maybe it was only because of me. If it wasn’t for me, Mum and the Old Man might have got on better.

  ‘So Downston’s away, is he?’ Joe asked.

  ‘On business.’ Murray gave up trying to darn the hole in his sock and threw it on his bunk.

  ‘And you’ve got to go into the township tomorrow?’

  ‘That’s the size of i
t,’ Murray said, farting and scratching his bum.

  ‘Right, Tone, we’ve got our chance. I told you I’d come up with something.’

  ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’

  ‘I’m talking about going into township to do our bit of Christmas shopping. With the Boss away, we’ll be able to go with Murray and Fergus. We’ll lie low in the truck so no-one can see us leave.’

  ‘Steady on Ginger. There’ll be hell to pay if the Boss finds out. His orders are that the two of you have to stay put here. And you both know as well I do, you don’t go crossing Eleod Downston if you know what’s good for you.’

  ‘If he’s not here, how’s he going to know? You said yourself, now he’s started going down south he never goes into the township these days.’

  ‘Our work won’t get done, for one thing.’ I added. ‘And what about the Missus. She might suspect something.’ I suppose I could ask Gaylene to cover for us. I was sure she would, but it didn’t seem fair to get her to deceive Downston and the Missus. They were her parents, after all.

  ‘If it’s work and the Missus you’re worried about, I’ll stay behind.’ Fergus lowered his book. ‘It’s time you lads got off this place for a whiles.

  ‘But what about The Travellers?’ Joe asked.

  ‘And to be sure, what about the The Travellers?’

  ‘You know how you like your drop of sherbert.’

  ‘Are you suggesting I can’t last more than a couple of weeks without a drink? Let me tell you, I’m capable of staying sober for a lot longer than two weeks. To be sure, you know nothing about me.’ Fergus stalked outside.

  The next day, Joe and I hid in the back of the truck, as it bumped up the hill and away from the farm on our way to the township. With the Boss away, the Missus and the kids were probably still tucked up in their beds, Murray had said. I wished that was where I was. I’d been awake most of the night, feeling like a rabbit about to leave the safety of its burrow for the first time. Murray and Austin were taking a mighty big risk for us. If Downston were ever to find out they would probably lose their jobs and only God himself knew what would happen to Joe and me.

  When we arrived at the township, I shielded my eyes and looked across at a band of glimmering silver water beyond the township’s main street. ‘You never said it was by the sea,’ I said.

  ‘Nowhere in New Zealand’s that far from the ocean.’ Without locking the truck, Murray dropped the keys into a shopping bag. It was older than Mum’s ancient string one that Fred used when he did the shopping. I’d almost forgotten it.

  I returned my gaze to the sea that stretched to an empty horizon. It made me feel exposed and vulnerable. I longed to jump into the truck, and drive as quickly as we could back to the security of the men’s quarters.

  ‘Is this it?’ Joe looked around him.

  ‘Too right it is.’

  ‘But there’s nothing here.’

  ‘What else d’you want?’

  ‘Some shops for a start. It ain’t exactly Balham High Street.’

  ‘There’s Old Witchery’s place.’ Murray sounded upset Joe didn’t think the township compared with London. ‘Old Witchery’s been here years and his father before him. Farm supplies and the like, groceries, clothes, stuff from all over the world. Old Witchery sells the lot. You can even get a cup of tea and a steak and cheese pie in the back. Grannie Witchery makes ‘em herself. When she’s a mind to, she puts on lamingtons. No-one makes lamingtons like Grannie.

  Murray pointed to a two storey building opposite Witchery’s, with a board outside advertising, “The best beer ever to hit the sides of the throat”.

  ‘There’s The Travellers’ Hotel. Townships crowded today,’ Murray observed as two men entered the pub, and a woman with a small boy crossed the road. ‘That place next to The Traveller’s is the community hall. They have a monthly dance there with Rangi and the Flax Boys. Reckon half the folk hereabouts did their courting at one of those dances.’

  ‘Where’s the library?’ I asked. The panic that had threatened to overcome me began to die down at the sight of a few buildings.

  ‘Back of the Community Hall. My word, it’s a credit to the place. That and the school.’ Murray pointed to a hill on which perched a building much like the woolshed. ‘All for education here. Got the Mission to thank for it. That’s the Mission behind the school.’

  It was unusual for Murray to say so much at once, and he gulped for air. His Adam’s apple was like a grey and wrinkly golf ball ‘We’ll see what the Mission’s got later.’

  I shuddered. I’d never been sure about nuns. There had been a convent close to The Common. When I saw them, I always thought the nuns looked like black ghosts gliding along the road. Once, one of them smiled at me but I stuck my tongue out at her and ran away. No, I certainly didn’t want any nun fitting me for clothes and trying to persuade me that things I knew looked ridiculous were exactly right for me.

  ‘What about a bookie? Me and Tone want to put a couple of bob on Wandering Minstrel.’

  ‘I’ll do it for you at The Travellers. Don’t want to put it on another gee gee, do you?’

  ‘Nope. Wandering Minstrel’s the one.’ Joe assured him.

  ‘How can they call this a town when there’s nothing here?’ Joe grumbled as Murray retreated to the yard behind Witchery’s to pick up some drench.

  ‘Fergus did tell us not to expect much.’

  ‘You can say that again. And since when’s there been snow in the summer?’ Joe indicated the mock snowstorm made from clumps of cotton wool stuck to Old Witchery’s windows. In the centre angels blowing trumpets surrounded a picture of Father Christmas on his sleigh being pulled by eight petulant reindeers.

  ‘Blinkin’ snow when it’s boiling hot. What next!’

  Inside Witchery’s store, unsteady arrangements of pots and pans, crockery and cutlery filled shelves from floor to ceiling. Boxes lined every aisle so that we had to walk with pigeon steps between the clutter. We held on to whatever we could to keep our balance.

  Fly swats and strainers, feather dusters, dustpans and brushes hung like decorations from the few clear parts of the ceiling, while Good Quality Manchester was stacked in haphazard piles in every corner. Almost inaccessible counters overflowed with everything from hairnets to little liver pills. Christmas decorations, like the ones we’d made at the orphanage by linking pieces of coloured paper and gluing them together, clung to each other in sticky spirals.

  ‘I reckon there’s enough here to fill a dozen shops,’ Joe remarked.

  ‘You wouldn’t think there’d be enough people to buy it.’

  ‘We should be able to find a couple of things for Christmas. We’ll just have to move the stuff and have a good gander. Old Witchery’s still outside with Murray so we’ve got the place to ourselves for a bit.’

  Joe lifted a box and stacked it on another. It gave him room to place both his feet together. He picked up a chamber pot, embellished with blue swans. ‘We could buy this for Fergus. Save him having to pee round the back of the hut in the middle of the night.’

  ‘I don’t think he’d be happy with a po for Christmas.’

  ‘Just a thought.’

  I lifted the top from a box marked Men Only, and there they were! Underpants like large off-white sails! I looked at the labels marked Dawkins Finest Menswear. I searched until I found two smaller pairs. I pulled them from the box and held them against myself. They would do nicely; one pair on, the other in the wash. It was the sort of thing Mrs Dibble would have said. I folded them carefully and placed them on the counter.

  ‘You want to be careful what you do with your money. Once it’s gone, it’s gone,’ Joe warned.

  We were considering a pair of socks for Murray which we found in a box marked Feet when Old Witchery entered. He practically hurdled over several rugs rolled up in front of the door at the rear of the shop.

  ‘You don’t think we should get Murray two pairs?’ I asked Joe.

  ‘He can only
wear one pair at a time. We don’t want to spend what we don’t have to.’

  ‘Skinflint.’

  ‘There’s nothing wrong in being careful.’ Old Witchery walked on his toes between the boxes as if he was a ballet dancer.

  ‘So you’re the ones working out at Downstons. Heard a bit about you two. Here to do some Christmas shopping, Murray tells me.’ Old Witchery rubbed his hands together. They were smaller than Gaylene’s. ‘Murray says Grannie and me have to keep our lips tight about the pair of you’s being in the township, or your boss won’t be too happy. Downston’s a cruel bloke, always has been. There’s a few here whose lives he’s ruined. It’ll be a pleasure to keep him in the dark. You can trust me and Grannie. When we’ve a mind to, we can keep our mouths as tight as a donkey’s backside.’

  He opened a pack of playing cards, took the cards out, fanned them and put them back. ‘You can have these half price,’ he offered. ‘There’s only a couple missing.’

  Joe said we weren’t interested.

  ‘They say the two of you’s from London. Got an uncle there by the name of Sid Grice. Know him? Big bloke with a glass eye.’

  ‘Where’s he live?’

  ‘I told you, London. Need something to clear the wax out your ears? I got some oil somewhere.’

  ‘London’s a big place,’ I stammered.

  ‘You don’t know him, then?’

  ‘Well, no.’

  ‘Why didn’t you say so in the first place?’

  Irritated, Old Witchery moved to another counter. His feet were small enough for him to walk easily along the rows as if early in life their growth had been stunted.

  ‘What about a nice handkerchief to go with the socks. Had a shipment not more than ten years ago, quality Irish linen. Nothing to beat Irish linen. Like blowing your nose on a lily.’

  We bought two, one each for Fergus and Murray. At the same time we declined a haircut from Old Witchery who, apparently, was also the township’s barber.