Purple Threads

by Jeanine Leane

  ‘Ahhh, ya worry too much, woman! Richie was always half-cut an’ so charged up he wouldn’t know who signed what. An’ Dad couldn’t see properly no more so he wouldn’t know either.’

  She drew a long breath that whistled through the gaps between her teeth. ‘Mum an’ Bubby was always callin’ Richie a lazy sod behind his back, but I said it’s a blessin’ that ’e be a lazy useless bastard coz that gets him outta the way. If he’d been real work sharp, me plan wouldna worked. An’ it was a real blessin’ that he was born stupid too, coz he couldna understood the bookkeepin’ even if he was sober.

  ‘But I had ta talk Dad in ta writin’ a will an’ gettin’ me to lodge it fer ’im at the solicitors. That was the tricky part, makin’ sure bloody Richie didn’t read it. I knew how ta read them men though, knew the time was ripe ta make a grab fer our bit o’ land, otherwise we wouldna had nuthin’ when Dad was gone. Can youse girls see what I’m sayin’?’

  ‘Yeah, Aunty.’ We knew we were going to get this story whether we liked it or not.

  ‘So, I went ta Dad an’ said, Lord spare us should anythin’ happen ta ya, Dad, but if it did, ya wanna make sure everythin’ worked out fer Richie, wouldnya? Ya know, with the place an’ all. Stuck in me bloody throat praisin’ up Richie all the bloody time, but the ol’ man tells me that Richie already knows everythin’s goin’ ta him an’ that he’s talked ta Dad ’bout lettin’ Mum an’ us girls stay on in the house. But I knew that lousy mongrel ’ud wanna sell up soon as the ol’ fella passed. This paddock here with the house, it got the best bit o’ creek too, an’ it’s our home so we had ta keep it. An’ it’s justice too, afta all the bloody work us girls did, we done more than all the boys put together. How ’bout another cuppa, sista? I’m dry.’

  Aunty Bubby filled the kettle and Nan resettled herself between the dogs and cats.

  ‘Anyway, I left Dad thinkin’ fer a few days coz ya can’t rush men, an’ while I was waitin’ I went ta Richie. Brother dear, I said, Dad’s gettin’ on an’ he aren’t well an’ I’m worried ’bout ya inheritance.

  ‘Now Richie never paid us girls much mind ’cept when he needed somethin’, an’ ’e never bothered with Dad much no more afta ’e ’ad the stroke an’ couldn’t get ’round an’ ’ad trouble talkin’, but his ears soon pricked up when I mentioned inheritance, greedy sod! So ’e says that ’e already got it sorted with Dad, an’ ’e knows he’s gettin’ everythin’ an’ he’s s’posed ta leave us in the house. So I said ta him, Brother, I don’t wanna tell ya how ta run ya affairs, coz ya so good at it, but I heard that a spoken agreement ain’t strong an’ it could be challenged by other family. An’ what about the other boys? I know they well set up an’ all now, but jealousy is a terrible thing. Who knows what they might do when Dad passes. An’ think about it, brother, ya always sayin’ how greedy Johnny’s missus is, an’ ya a real good judge o’ character. Johnny prob’ly wouldn’t cross ya on his own, but I wouldn’t put it past that missus o’ his ta try an’ grab some land off ya. Then course, if Johnny’s missus puts ’im up ta challengin’ then the other two brothers might do the same. There ain’t nuthin’ like a greedy woman.

  ‘Now Richie ain’t smart, but I could see the wheels in his thick head turnin’. So I kept on going, coz that’s how ya work the men, ya let ’em think ya lookin’ out fer ’em.’

  ‘I was gettin’ real frightened when she was goin’ back an’ forth ’tween Dad an’ Richie,’ Aunty Bubby said, sitting on the edge of her chair even then. ‘Thought they’d find out she was schemin’.’

  ‘Nahh!’ Aunty Boo was brazen. ‘Ya worry too much, sista, I tell ya. Ya always did. Like I kept sayin’, Rome weren’t built in a day an’ it weren’t destroyed in one either! Besides, them two was always too busy makin’ their own useless plans ta know us girls had any of our own. So while Richie was standin’ there thinkin’, I said, Why donchya ask Dad ta draw up a will that says ya get everything when he’s gone. I know ’e can’t write no more but I can write it fer ’im, jus’ needs ’is signature, an’ Mum an’ I’ll help ’im with that. Then we can take it ta the solicitor’s office an’ he can look afta it till the time comes, then no one can argue with ya. All ya hafta do is say the word an’ I’ll organise it fer ya. Thinka ya future, brother, an’ that nice young woman ya got in town. Ya could build a real flash house on that land next to the ol’ place fer ya-self an’ family in the future. Bit o’ hard work, coupla years an’ ya could get rich.’

  Aunty Boo laughed but Nan and Aunty Bubby were circumspect.

  ‘I knew I had ’im then,’ Aunty Boo resumed, ‘soon as I started talkin’. But ya can’t rush a man. Next time ’e come out here pretendin’ ta work I seen ’im go an’ sit by Dad, an’ I knew what was goin’ on.’

  ‘Yeah,’ Nan jumped in, ‘soon as Richie left, Boo sent me off ta get some water ta wash William’s feet an’ ask him if there was anythin’ anyone could do fer ’im. An’ sure enough, he told me he wanted ta talk ta ya Aunty.’

  ‘I wasted no time at all,’ Aunty Boo said, grabbing her story back. ‘What can I do fer ya, Dad? I asked, an’ ’e had a lotta trouble but he managed ta spit it out. Richie reckons it would be better if I had a will drawn up. He coughed an’ spluttered an’ spat out a few more words. Reckons there might be trouble with Johnny’s wife if I don’t make it clear . . . says she’s a greedy one . . . might get the other boys’ wives worked up too.

  ‘That’s all ’e needed ta say. I was real quick off the mark afta that, I was! Well, Richie’s a wise man, Dad, an’ that’s a real good idea o’ his ta write a will. Can’t have greedy women grabbin’ the land out from underneath ya, can ya? Why donchya let me ring Mr Cross right now while ya thinkin’ of it, an’ ya can let ’im know ya gunna tell me what ya want said. I’ll write it all out fer ya jus’ so as Mr Cross knows it’s all proper an’ the like. An’ I’ll make sure Richie’s happy with it before I drop it off ta Mr Cross. Oh, an’ Dad, betta make sure ya tell ’im that Richie wants it this way, jus’ so he knows it’s all been worked out ’tween the men.

  ‘I got Cross on the phone quick smart an’ Dad told ’im he talked ta Richie an’ was gunna draw up a will an’ get me an’ Nan ta take it to ’im. Afta that I wasted no time gettin’ the paper an’ pen out. Course there weren’t no surprises, it was all fer Richie, an’ when we finished Mum guided Dad’s hand ta sign it. Then, this one ’ere –’ she poked Aunty Bubby – ‘gets real teary when I read it back ta her that night.’

  ‘I didn’t know what we was gunna do!’ Aunty Bubby clasped her hands together.

  ‘Ahh, bloody woman reads too many o’ them love stories. But not me, lucky I read up on all that cloak an’ dagger stuff or she’d be out on the high road. Whatchya think I gunna do? I ask her. I’m gunna write the bloody thing again an’ say ’e don’t want no burden or responsibility on Richie fer us, so he’s leavin’ us the house paddock, which ain’t big enough fer a proper farm anyway.’

  ‘An’ I said, Ya can go ta jail fer that!’ Aunty Bubby was still knotting her hands.

  ‘An’ I said, Only if we get caught, an’ even then least we’ll have a roof over our head!

  ‘So that’s what I done. Stayed up half the night writin’ it out again an’ forgin’ the signature. First thing the next mornin’, me an’ Mum took it in ta Cross’s office. An’ Mum was panickin’, weren’t ya, Mum?’

  ‘I could feel the sweat tricklin’ down me back an’ off me hands, I could.’

  ‘Ahh, ol’ Cross was a drunk too, but he was a soft, kind one. Besides, he was a Catholic an’ been a good family friend of ol’ Mrs O’Brien, an’ she was such a ’spicious ol’ bird she never trusted hardly no one but she use ta get me ta wheel her down ta Mass every Sunday an’ tell everyone what a good girl I was, an’ that I was one o’ the few people she trusted . . . so I knew it’d be good enough fer Cross an’ it was.

  ‘Cross, he looked at the will
an’ read it real careful like. Usually a will is made with the person present, he says ta me, but I know your father is old and sick and can’t be moved and me being the only solicitor in town, I can’t afford the time to make house calls. Besides, your father rang and let me know what was going on and the old Mrs O’Brien, God rest her soul, always said that your character was beyond reproach.

  ‘God rest the ol’ darlin’s soul! I said.

  ‘Cross asked if the other boys’d be likely ta contest it, an’ I ’sured him they weren’t interested in that kinda farmin’ an’ they all had their own lands an’ interests elsewhere. An’ ol’ Cross, he was a decent fella ’part from his weakness fer drink, he says, Well. I think it’s only fair that he leave the house and that little bit of land to his widow and unmarried daughters, after all the work you’ve done. An’ I was real quick ta agree with him. Most definitely, Mr Cross, he is a kind and generous man, my father. An’ Cross scrawled his signature across the bottom under Dad’s, an’ it was done! Like I kept tellin’ these two, if it’s good enough for Rome’s first lady ta change the Emperor’s will, then it’s good enough fer us. Future woulda been a lot different if I hadna. Someone’s gotta change history if it ain’t goin’ the right way.’

  ‘An’ not six months later William passed away,’ Nan sighed.

  ‘Course Richie bellowed when we went ta Cross fer the readin’ o’ the will, but Cross told ’im ta settle down an’ that he was under the influence of alcohol an’ grievin’. I never said nuthin’. He was always under the influence an’ he weren’t grievin’, jus’ greedy. Cross told ’im it was only fair an’ that he couldn’t argue with his father’s signature – an’ that was that.

  ‘So now youse know how I grabbed this little bit o’ land fer us an’ I won’t give it up, never. Ya’ll hafta carry me outta here in a box before I’ll be goin’ anywhere!’

  ‘Me too,’ Nan said.

  ‘An’ me.’ Aunty Bubby set her lips firmly.

  All my visions of a house in town vanished out the window.

  The National Sheep Dip Alliance Party

  Aunty Bubby liked to dream. Her head was a giant scrapbook of memories and stories. When she wasn’t reminiscing about the past or reading her romantic novels, she was dreaming of the future.

  Aunty Boo was sharp. She liked to watch people. Her favourite books were histories of cloak and dagger intrigue. When Aunty Rose gave us a second-hand television – so Nan would stay inside on wet winter days – Aunty Boo developed a keen interest in politics. The results of the 1967 referendum only served to heighten her interest. She always thought it was a good idea to keep a watchful eye on the men.

  Late on Monday nights she would crane her neck, sit forward on the old sofa and squint through the snowy fleck that swirled across the screen to watch Meet your Member. The talking heads of local politicians from all over the Riverina and the South West Slopes graced the set as they spoke of promised changes and the disgraces of their political opponents. She got familiar with the lingo and tried to explain it to Aunty Bubby.

  ‘ALL-IANCE,’ she pronounced the word slowly and precisely through gaps in her teeth. ‘Means when they all join together, like ta get somethin’ done or, more likely, gang up on someone else.’

  Aunty Bubby wasn’t interested.

  ‘Or NE-GOTIATION,’ she persevered. ‘Means they all sit down an’ make bargains, ya know, do trade-offs an’ swap one thing or another.’

  ‘Hmmm . . .’ Aunty Bubby shook her head. ‘Well I betta go an NE-GOTIATE feedin’ all them stray lambs ya bring ’ome.’

  Aunty Boo was undeterred. She learnt the names of all the local members and the political parties they represented.

  In the seasons following the big drought, the rains were so good that men like old man Cooper and his flash son moved back to the land in droves. They brought big mobs of sheep, harvesters, rolls of wire, bags of cement and dusty grain to build lots of new fences and big shearing sheds on the flats. The neat paddocks with hardwood fence posts surrounding docile dairy cows were taken over by this new breed of men. They built wide brick houses and tall fences with steel stake posts to contain their big mobs of sheep. They had sleek lean kelpies and flash new Fords. Their wives had chequebooks and got their hair permed in town. They sat for hours under domed driers in front of plate-glass windows and gossiped the days away.

  A few of the wealthier farmers worked together to build a sheep dip and bought a big truck to bring sheep to and from their properties. They built a loading ramp next to the sheep dip under a huge pepper tree. It became their regular meeting place. The farmers scowled and cursed the droughts and the floods and asked, ‘What kind of God-forsaken country is this?’ In temperate seasons they laughed, patted each other on the back, counted their pennies and said, ‘This is God’s own country – and he gave it to us!’

  But we knew otherwise.

  With her newfound knowledge of politics, Aunty Boo named these men the National Sheep Dip Alliance Party. She was convinced they were up to something. She bought a pair of binoculars to get a better view. Nan and Aunty Bubby thought she was crazy.

  ‘Ya silly ol’ goat! Whatchya think ya gunna see over there?’

  ‘Never ya mind, sista-girl. I’m jus’ keepin an eye out. Learnin’ lotsa things ’bout this lot.’

  ‘Like what?’

  ‘Like bloody wasteful, that’s fer sure! See ’em leave dead sheep with good wool jus’ lyin’ out in the paddocks ta rot. An’ baby lambs! Lor’, never seen one of ’em stop an’ pick up a lost baby lamb. An’ ’specially black sheep! Seem to not want ’em!’

  ‘Read somewhere, sista, that black wool’s not worth much. Nobody wants it.’

  When Prime Minister Harold Holt disappeared just before Christmas that year, Aunty Boo was in her element. The men met at the National Sheep Dip for days after. Their ruddy faces were solemn. They nodded gravely to one another as they swigged beer from tall brown bottles. Aunty Boo set up by a tree on the hill and pretended she was collecting bark and sheep manure. The heat was relentless, but she kept it up for days.

  ‘Ya’ll give yerself sunstroke, woman!’ Nan warned when she walked home for lunch.

  ‘She prob’ly thinks she gunna see Harold Holt over there.’ Aunty Bubby laughed and winked at us.

  ‘Youse can laugh all ya like but I tell ya, you’d be surprised what I might see over there. An’ I’ll tell youse another thing! Ya right, sis, I reckon Harold Holt ain’t dead either.’

  Aunty Bubby and Nan laughed.

  ‘Reckon she’s got a touch of the sun already,’ Nan said to Aunty Bubby.

  ‘So ya reckon he might turn up over there near the sheep dip?’ Aunty Bubby teased.

  ‘Not unless he’s bloody mad! Nah, sis, I reckon he’s gone to IN-DO-NES-IA or some other place where ya can live real high on taxpayers’ money.’

  We rolled our eyes.

  ‘Youse wait an’ see! I tell ya he’ll turn up again with that SU-KARNO bloke or some other dictator some time. Jus’ youse wait.’

  She was never one to sit back, Aunty Boo. She read late at night by the fire but during the day she liked to be mobile. She’d walk to the top of that hill on our little block every day to find a vantage point to spy from. One day she came home outraged about the slaughter of some black and speckled lambs for dog meat. She ranted and raved in the kitchen to Aunty Bubby.

  ‘There’s nothin’ ya can do about it, sis.’

  Aunty Boo always used to tell us kids that there was no such thing as can’t. So telling her she couldn’t do something was like a red rag to a bull. Aunty Bubby realised her mistake straightaway.

  ‘Ya can’t go over there an’ say nothin’, sis. Ya not meant ta be lookin’ anyway.’

  ‘I can go over there an’ say I happened to see it!’ Aunty Boo dug her hands into her hips. ‘I can go say I seen
it when I was walkin’ round me own place mindin’ me own business.’

  ‘That’s a lie.’

  Now it was Aunty Bubby’s turn to put her hands on her hips.

  ‘That’s what they call NE-GOTIATIN’. I’ll offer to clean up the black lambs an’ dead wool off their place.’

  ‘An’ what’ll they get in return?’ Aunty Bubby asked smugly. ‘Your word that ya won’t spy on ’em no more?’

  ‘Nah, sista-girl, I ain’t sayin’ that! Them blokes is always lookin’ fer wood an’ rabbits. They can take as much dry wood an’ rabbits as they want off the flat there at the bottom of the hill ’tween our fence an’ theirs.’

  She was really proud of her suggestion, but Aunty Bubby frowned and squinted. ‘I don’t think ya betta,’ she said quietly.

  ‘But I aren’t you, sis!’ Aunty Boo walked away to take off her big boots and straw hat. ‘I’m me own woman, ’member?’

  One afternoon, not long after, my sister and I came home to a new lamb. Aunty Bubby was cross because it wasn’t black and Aunty Boo had said she’d only take the black ones. Aunty Boo picked up the baby lamb carefully and showed us a black spot on its inside front leg.

  ‘Black, ain’t it?’

  She looked straight at Star and me. We nodded.

  ‘I was shamed seein’ all them men over there laughin’ an’ shakin’ their heads when Boo finished talkin, to ’em,’ Aunty Bubby ranted to Star and me.

  ‘So, who’s the spy now, hey, sis?’ Aunty Boo grinned. ‘Left me binoculars at home, girls,’ she said, turning to us and looking pleased at having caught Aunty Bubby out. ‘So they wouldn’t suspect nothin’. Shoulda known big eyes ’ud be lookin’.’

  One day the bus broke down and Star and I couldn’t go to school, so we went with Aunty Boo to check for dead wool and orphaned lambs. We didn’t find either, but as we walked home by a different track we heard the panic-stricken cries of a trapped animal. None of the farmers had permission to set traps on our part of the hill but they often set them close to the boundary fences to snare unsuspecting trespassers. Sometimes domestic dogs and cats were also the victims of the steel-toothed traps.