Kal

by Judy Nunn

  Maudie never came along. Not only because she would have been uncomfortable in such foreign company but because Sunday was a working day for her, and a busy one at that. Sunday was when she did her stocktaking, Harry told them, and balanced the books. Teresa was a little shocked and more than a little disapproving. Sunday was a day for church and prayer and enjoying one’s family.

  Over the ensuing year another person joined the ranks of the Sunday singalong. Young Paul Jones, Evan’s boy.

  True to his word, Evan Jones had regularly turned up at the Clover on a Saturday to help the Gianni brothers settle in and he invariably brought his young stepson with him.

  After a while, Giovanni noticed that the boy paid close attention whenever he and Rico were speaking Italian. Jack Brearley never did. For that matter neither did young Enrico; he was too busy speaking English with Jack—Enrico wanted to be an Australian, just like his friend. But Giovanni noticed that as he and Rico talked, Paul’s eyes darted between them. The boy was listening, he could swear it.

  One day he decided to put him to the test. ‘Capice Italiano,’ he said, turning suddenly to Paul. It wasn’t a question but a statement and it took the boy by surprise.

  Paul looked guiltily down at the ground for a second, then nodded. ‘Yes,’ he said.

  ‘Parle Italiano?’ This time it was a question.

  ‘Si.’

  ‘Buono. That is good. Speak to me in Italian.’ The boy continued to stare at the ground guiltily. ‘Why do you look so ashamed?’ Giovanni asked, again in Italian. ‘It is no sin to speak my language to me.’

  The boy looked up at him. ‘I don’t want to,’ he said in English, but Giovanni knew that he was lying. He nodded and the boy ran off to join Jack and Enrico who were fetching water for Black Bess.

  ‘His mother’s Italian,’ Harry explained when Giovanni questioned him about the incident. ‘His real name’s Paolo, at least that’s what Maudie says.’ Giovanni looked puzzled. ‘The boy’s not Evan’s, you know,’ Harry went on. ‘Kate was a widow when he married her. He keeps her a bit of a secret, don’t ask me why. Oh, he does it for all the right reasons, I’m sure,’ Harry shrugged. ‘To protect Kate and the boy no doubt. There’s ill-will towards foreigners in Kalgoorlie. Only from some of the less informed,’ he added diplomatically. ‘You may have noticed.’ Then he winked at Giovanni. ‘Perhaps he keeps his wife hidden because she’s the most beautiful woman on the goldfields.’ He shook his head admiringly. ‘No, not just the goldfields. Kate’s about the finest looking woman I’ve ever seen, I swear.’

  Giovanni liked Evan and he certainly had no wish to interfere in the man’s family affairs, but he wanted to make contact with the boy. And something in their exchange had led him to believe that Paul wanted to make contact with him too. So, the following week when he came to the Clover, Giovanni asked Evan if he would like to bring his family to dine on Sunday.

  ‘You and your wife and your children,’ he said as Evan patted his horse and tightened the girth of the saddle, preparing to leave. ‘We would like to thank you for all of your help. It is just a family dinner. We eat and we drink and we sing songs.’ He sensed that Evan was about to say no. ‘Harry and young Jack will be there.’

  Evan continued to pat his horse until it relaxed and stopped blowing its belly out, then he tightened the girth one more notch. ‘I’d have to ask Kate,’ he said. Evan knew that he would be uncomfortable socialising with the Italians, and he knew that Kate would sense his discomfort and so not wish to be there either. But Giovanni was a nice man and Evan didn’t know how to say no. He put his foot in the stirrup and slung himself up into the saddle.

  ‘It’s a little short notice, perhaps another time.’ He put out his hand for Paul; they clasped wrists and in a second the boy was up behind him on the rump of the horse. But, in the instant he’d jumped, Evan had seen the look on Paul’s face. ‘You’d like to go to Giovanni’s tomorrow night?’ he asked, and he felt the lad’s chin against his shoulderblade as he nodded vigorously.

  ‘Thank you,’ Evan said. ‘The boy would like to come. I’ll bring him around. At what time?’

  ‘Seven o’clock?’

  ‘Seven o’clock he’ll be there.’

  Paul grinned at Jack and Enrico who were standing nearby and circled his arms around Evan’s waist. Evan touched his heels to his horse and they set off home at a slow canter.

  PAUL BECAME A regular fixture at the Gianni family’s Sunday gatherings after that, but Evan never brought the rest of his family. He dropped the boy off and picked him up several hours later, and when Paul was presented with a pony of his very own, he rode over alone arriving on the dot of seven each Sunday evening.

  Sundays became very important to him. Although his mother never spoke of his father, apart from saying that he was American, she talked a great deal about her childhood in the Alps and she often spoke to Paul in Italian. But always privately, never in company. Not even in front of Evan, and Paul had grown to believe there was something wrong in being half-Italian. Singing along to the concertina with the Giannis, he felt at home, one of them. He idolised Giovanni. But then so did young Enrico and little Carmelina. Giovanni seemed to have a gift with children.

  Jack Brearley was the only one who didn’t idolise Giovanni, but that was merely because there was no room in the boy’s life to idolise anyone other than his father. To Jack, Harry Brearley could do no wrong.

  Although he was eighteen months younger than Paul, it was Jack who was the leader among the boys. Spirited and headstrong and thoroughly endearing, it was always Jack who got them into trouble. Jack who smuggled them down one of the old mine shafts at the Clover. Jack who piled them all on top of the Princess and tried to rouse a gallop from the old mare. When Enrico, who unlike the other two was not a good rider, fell off and broke his little finger, Jack diagnosed the injury. ‘Yep, it’s broken,’ he said, and swore Enrico to secrecy. Fearful of his father’s wrath, Enrico bravely bore the pain. The finger grew crooked, but no one was any the wiser.

  Although they were the same age, Jack tended to scoff at Enrico, preferring to think of himself as older and wiser like Paul. But secretly he admired Enrico’s stoicism and he vowed that the finger was a bond between them. ‘That makes us brothers,’ he would say as he studied the crooked finger.

  AS THE MONTHS went by, Kate noticed the difference in her son and it pleased her. She had worried about the boy’s friendless existence. Although he attended the local school and was a good student, he did not seem to mix with the other children. He never came home with tales of mateship. Now when he returned from the Giannis he talked endlessly of the games he’d played with Jack and Enrico. Swearing her to secrecy, he even told her about Enrico’s broken finger.

  ‘Mr Gianni mustn’t find out you see,’ he explained. He was deferential when he spoke of Rico or Teresa, always referring to them as Mr and Mrs Gianni. But, when it came to Giovanni, it was ‘Giovanni this’ and ‘Giovanni that’ and at first Kate thought that Giovanni must be another boy he had befriended.

  ‘No, Mamma,’ Paul laughed, ‘Giovanni and Mr Gianni are partners with Mr Brearley.’

  ‘Oh yes, so they are.’ The Gianni brothers, of course her husband had told her about them. Well, she was very grateful to Mr and Mrs Gianni and Giovanni. And, each week, Kate would carefully wrap up a batch of fresh-baked scones or a crusty damper loaf for Paul to take with him.

  Evan, too, noticed the difference in the boy and, although he was grateful, he was a little envious of the ease with which Giovanni could relate to the lad. Fatherhood did not come naturally to Evan.

  If he’d been a single man, Evan Jones would have chosen to work as a ‘loner’. He would have continued to live, quite content, in the old humpy. But it gave him such joy to see Kate so happy in her neat little home that he was content to become a ‘company man’.

  He was a good stepfather to Paul and he felt a great pride in his daughter, Briony, but sometimes he would sit on the front verandah in
the dusk watching Kate play tag or hide-and-seek with the children and wonder how it had come about. All those years alone, just him and his humpy and the Clover. And now this. And then he would hear Kate squeal as loudly as the children. He’d watch her piggybacking Briony, being tagged by Paul, all of them ending up in a tangled heap in the dust. Most other mothers would be scolding their children for playing in the dirt. Not Kate. She was a child herself and her energy was inexhaustible.

  Kate had become a creature of the goldfields. She loved the place. Her once milky-white skin was now a deep olive brown and her auburn hair was flecked with gold. Like the hardened, practical women of the area, she was strong. She could not only cook and sew, she could chop wood and build fires and cart water and ride a horse with the best of them. But, for all that, there was a womanliness about Kate that set her apart and, at night, when Evan took her to him and kissed her perfect mouth and felt the fullness of her breasts, he marvelled at the fact that she was his wife.

  To Evan, Kate was life itself. His love for her overwhelmed him. He never spoke of it—he didn’t know how to say the right words—but he showed it in many ways. He would work through the night to make a piece of furniture for the house or a knick-knack for one of the children. He would return from town with some fine lace or new fabric for curtains or cushion covers. He would insist she accompany him shopping in Boulder so that he could buy her a scarf or a trinket which she didn’t want but which she accepted, knowing it was a token of his love.

  Kate was fully aware of Evan’s love for her. She was deeply fond of him and grateful for the life he had provided for her and her children. In return, she worked hard to be the perfect wife. And when, after nearly two years at the Midas, Evan was promoted to underground boss, she was an undeniable asset. Evan was a shy man at the best of times and Kate was an excellent foil for his social ineptitude.

  Shortly after Evan’s promotion, Lord Laverton threw a mid-year party and, when he opened his house to the upper echelons of the Midas, it was Kate who effortlessly charmed the host and his guests. The men were attracted by her beauty and the women by her lack of guile. Kate Jones seemed oblivious of the effect she had, they thought, and, collectively, they decided that she was charming and eminently acceptable. Even Prudence, who had taken an instant dislike to her and was preparing phrases like ‘an ostentatious beauty’ and ‘looks that border on the vulgar’ to bandy around amongst her friends, finally had to admit that Kate was ‘a little lacking in refinement but quite engaging’.

  Kate knew she would never have been accepted in such company had she displayed her origins. She wondered what they would all have done had she suddenly started chatting in Italian. The thought of the look on Prudence Laverton’s face made her want to laugh out loud. But of course she would never do that to Evan.

  There were times when Kate regretted the denial of her ancestry. And then she would remember the struggling years in Fremantle and she would decide it was a small enough price to pay for the love and the brand-new life Evan had given her.

  Her husband’s desire to anglicise her was not born of intolerance. She knew that he was just being protective of her, that even his own ambition was born of his love for her, and it made her more determined than ever to be the perfect partner for him. Evan Jones was a conservative man and he needed a conservative wife. So Kate never spoke her mother tongue in his presence, not even to her own son. And in public she called her son Paul, although to her he would always be Paolo.

  But when they were alone, Kate would speak Italian to him. ‘Just you and me,’ she would say. ‘It is our secret.’

  ‘TO THE NEW Brearleys.’ Harry’s voice reverberated with pride, emotion and three-quarters of a bottle of the best cognac Kalgoorlie had to offer. ‘To my son, James Robert, and my daughter, Victoria Jane.’ He raised his brandy balloon and puffed his cigar. Maudie had given birth to twins on Christmas Eve, 1902, just one month before the opening of the Kalgoorlie pipeline. She was back at work two days later (although she kept her duties light and employed a full-time nanny to help with the babies) and, just as she’d planned, she did not miss a payday Friday.

  The men gathered around Harry on the spacious verandah of Hannan’s businessmen’s club raised their own glasses and puffed their own cigars.

  ‘To James and Victoria Brearley,’ Lord Laverton responded and even the great Paddy Hannan himself, who to Harry’s immense pride had made a point of personally offering his congratulations, joined in the toast.

  Patrick ‘Paddy’ Hannan no longer lived on the goldfields but he had made a brief unannounced visit to inspect the new water scheme. A careful, secretive man, he intended to leave before the swarms of journalists arrived for the official opening the following month.

  The man whose gold strike, together with his partners Flanagan and Shea, had led to the creation of Kalgoorlie was not at all ‘great’ in appearance. In fact, he was a somewhat unprepossessing little man, birdlike and bald. But there was something about him, an alert, charged energy, which engendered respect. And he was, after all, the Paddy Hannan.

  Harry glowed with pride. He’d made a habit of pretending he knew Paddy Hannan for so long he’d forgotten it was a lie. Well, by God, it was a lie no longer—he’d just shaken hands with the man. To think that there was a time when he would not even have been considered for membership to the club which bore Hannan’s name. And here he was, not only socially acceptable but a pillar of the community, a prominent businessman, a council committee member and now, as the proud father of two healthy newborn babies, the very centre of attention amongst the elite members of Hannan’s Club. It felt good.

  Harry looked out over the clubhouse grounds, the most luxurious on the goldfields. The only grounds which always boasted an expanse of green and an abundance of colour. A full-time gardener was employed and, even when water was at its most precious, the members’ fees, their donations and the club’s liquor sale profits guaranteed the upkeep of the border of flowering shrubs and the surround of cultivated lawn. The water used was artesian but even so, in the harsh summers when many families left the goldfields altogether, such water was a luxury and the waste of it on the Hannan’s Club’s grounds was considered by many to be a crime.

  The new water scheme would change all that, Harry thought as he studied the row of shrubs beside the club’s surrounding fence. Regardless of the wisdom of the Kalgoorlie pipeline—and Harry had heard the odd derogatory comment from several hardened cynics who had their doubts: cynics who believed that three hundred and fifty miles of pipeline was a ridiculous extravagance and that the government should have drilled for water instead—Harry himself was tremendously excited by the prospect. Not merely because of the water supply, but because of the opportunities which were bound to present themselves. The choice would be limitless for a man of vision. And Harry was, without doubt, a man of vision.

  The following month would see hundreds of important visitors pour into Kalgoorlie. There would be the scientists and engineers who had created the pipeline; there would be the businessmen and the entrepreneurs—Harry’s sort of people; and there would even be the celebrities, such as opera singers, entertainers and sporting personalities. And of course there would be the politicians and speech-makers.

  Who knows, Harry thought as he accepted the pats on the back from Richard Laverton and his cronies—‘A boy and a girl, frightfully clever of you, old man’—who knows, perhaps he’d go into politics. It wasn’t inconceivable. With the creation of the Federal Parliament the previous year, a lot of attention had been paid to the eastern goldfields of Western Australia. The miners had been feted as valuable constituents and Sir John Forrest himself, the former State Premier and newly appointed Federal Minister, was to make the official opening speech at the Municipal Banquet. Harry, as a member of the Welcoming Committee, would be seated at one of the several official tables with a number of the visiting dignitaries. Heaven only knew the valuable connections he would be able to make that night.


  ‘You give my very best to Maudie, d’you hear.’ Yet another hand was pumping his. ‘She’s done you proud, Harry, that’s for sure.’

  It was a pity Maudie wouldn’t be with him at the banquet, Harry thought. She was a damned impressive woman and a good ally. To his surprise, Maudie had not been the least bit interested in the banquet. She was excited about the ceremony at the Mount Charlotte reservoir—‘a miracle it’ll be to see the water come out of that pipe,’ she kept saying, ‘a downright miracle’. But as far as the banquet was concerned, Harry must take someone else; she was going to stay at home with her babies. James and Victoria were far more important than a hall full of swelled heads, Maudie said, and nothing could budge her.

  After pondering the situation for several days, Harry had decided to ask Giovanni. These days, since his fiancée, Alice, had taken to supervising the cut of his clothes and the trim of his beard and moustache, Giovanni looked eminently respectable. Even dashing. Yes, Harry thought, the image of the two of them together could do him no harm.

  It was still several weeks till the big night but the fire of Harry’s expectations was well and truly kindled. The Kalgoorlie Municipal Banquet would be one of the most exciting events of his life, he knew it. It held the promise of things to come.

  LIKE MAUDIE, GIOVANNI was more excited by the spectacle of water gushing into the Mount Charlotte reservoir; but for Alice, like Harry, the evening’s festivities held the greater allure. Although she would not be attending the banquet, and she had certainly not expected to, Alice intended to be amongst those lining the pavement for a glimpse of the famous visitors arriving in their finery. And she would dress in her own finery and join the street party which promised to last throughout the night.