by Mary Arrigan
‘There’s something else,’ put in John Joe, his face beaming. ‘Go on, Mr Maher. Tell them.’
May gave a little squeal and put her hand over her mouth, as she always did at times like this.
Grandpa put his hand in his waistcoat pocket and drew out an envelope.
‘For goodness sake, Father,’ said Mama. ‘Tell us what’s happened.’
May couldn’t contain herself any longer. ‘We found gold!’
‘What?’ Mama and I exclaimed together.
Grandpa held up his hand. ‘Only a tiny amount,’ he said. ‘Nothing to get too excited about. It was an accident really…’
‘Hammering in a bolt,’ laughed John Joe. ‘Mr Maher was just putting it in when he sees this shiny stone.’
Grandpa was shaking his head and smiling. ‘Not even a stone,’ he said. ‘More of a pebble. I took it to the Gold Office, and they weighed it and...’ he paused to open the envelope, ‘it’s enough to ease life just a little.’
Mama’s hands flew up with delight and disbelief when she saw the notes.
‘Well I never,’ she said.
‘So that’s what you were all looking so excited about,’ I said. ‘And there I was thinking it was to do with me.’
Grandpa laughed, and patted my arm.
‘Now we know there’s gold in our dig, it’ll be riches all round,’ said John Joe. ‘Riches! I’ve seen some of those diggers take bags of the stuff to the Gold Office.’
‘Well, we have to find it first, John Joe,’ said Grandpa. Then he went to the cart and pulled out the box where we kept all our money. He put in most of the new money and passed the rest to Mama.
‘Two things to celebrate,’ he said. ‘First of all, having Esty back with us, and secondly, having found our first gold.’
‘What’s the money for?’ asked Mama. ‘We have a good stock of food…’
‘A treat,’ laughed Grandpa. ‘Tomorrow is Sunday. I want you three ladies to go to the hotel on Main Street. Book a room, have baths, and put on some clean clothes.’
‘Hotel!’ exclaimed May. ‘My goodness, I’ve never been in a hotel.’
‘We can’t afford it,’ began Mama. ‘Father, we need to save for the fee.’
‘Yes we can afford it,’ put in Grandpa. ‘We need to reward ourselves for all the hard work.’
‘And what about you and John Joe?’ asked May. ‘You’ve worked hard too.’
Grandpa smiled. ‘We’ll have a few drinks in the bar and join you ladies for a meal.’
‘All this sounds so … so extravagant,’ began Mama.
‘Maybe,’ said Grandpa. ‘But labour kills a love for life, if it can’t be rewarded in some way.’
‘That’s just fine by me,’ laughed John Joe.
‘Except that we’ll be bathing in the river, John Joe,’ said Grandpa. ‘River water will suit us fine. Plenty of time to get dirty again next week.’
‘I still think…’ went on Mama, looking at the money in her hand as if it was some strange creature.
Grandpa put up his hand. ‘We’ll all be the better for this small treat,’ he said.
May hugged me with excitement. ‘Luxury, Esty,’ she giggled. ‘At last we can begin to live like grand ladies.’
‘Well, it’s just a taste, May,’ I said.
‘Oh, yes,’ she agreed. ‘But a taste will make us work harder for more of the same. I’m speaking of permanent ladyship.’
‘Listen to madam,’ laughed John Joe. ‘It’s far from ladyship you’ve come, May. The nearest you got was to tend to…’
‘Oh, get along with you, John Joe,’ Mama put in. ‘A girl is entitled to dream.’
And so it was that next day we packed our bags with clean clothes and went to the hotel. The room Mama booked was small, but to us it was heaven.
May threw herself on the downy bed.
‘Some day, we’ll actually be able to spend the whole night in a room like this,’ she said. ‘Maybe lots of nights.’
Mama laughed. ‘Let’s take it one day at a time, May.’
We took it in turns to bathe in the hip bath in the small bathroom off the bedroom. Two serving girls brought clean water for each of us. We didn’t know what to say to them, May and I. After all, we had come from a background of serving. I wanted to be friendly, to chat to them, but I knew that if I were in their position, I’d just want to get on with the job in hand and leave, just as I had always been happy to leave Miss Emma and her mother. Certain boundaries are hard to cross. And here we were, even if it was just for a day, tasting the other side of that boundary.
Mama broke the silence by thanking them and giving them some coins from her purse.
Oh, the luxury of stepping out of our dirty, dusty work clothes and into dresses that were clean, soft and fragrant because they’d been packed with the spare bars of soap from the trader in the harbour! ‘I feel like a princess,’ laughed May. ‘At least, on the inside,’ she added, looking into the mirror. ‘Whatever can we do about our sunburnt faces and rough hands?’
‘We are princesses, May,’ agreed Mama. ‘For now. So let’s join our princes downstairs.’
It didn’t matter that there were much grander ladies in the dining-room with dresses straight out of Miss Emma’s fashion pages. And it didn’t matter that our princes wore creased shirts and jackets that hadn’t quite had all the dust thumped out of them. This was our first treat since we’d left Ireland, and we were excited. We’d found gold!
Grandpa stood up as we approached, and tapped John Joe on the shoulder to do likewise.
We were served chicken soup, mutton with carrots and an orange-coloured vegetable.
‘What is this?’ asked John Joe, poking at the vegetable.
Grandpa looked at the menu. ‘Pumpkin,’ he read out.
‘Never heard of it,’ said John Joe, sniffing it suspiciously.
‘Best get used to it, lad,’ laughed Grandpa. ‘Best get used to lots of things we didn’t have back home.’
There was a slight awkwardness at the mention of home, as we remembered the Hunger, and the destitutes who would have been grateful for even a mouthful of pumpkin soup. The moment was relieved by the sudden appearance of James Baker and Adam. After a warm welcome, they pulled up chairs and sat with us. I smiled, as Adam pulled his chair close to May’s. She looked at me and blushed.
Grandpa told them of our find and they were as excited as we were, which made us happy all over again. Adam told us that they had almost finished building their ‘butcher’s shambles’.
‘Shambles?’ asked Mama.
James laughed. ‘That’s what they call a butcher’s stall,’ he explained. ‘It’s just a crude hut, really. It has to be a distance from the town…’
‘On account of the smell,’ put in Adam. ‘But my pa is such a good butcher,’ he went on proudly, ‘that there will be no smells from Baker and Son, Superior Butchers, when we’re rich enough to open a proper shop right in the middle of Ballarat.’
‘Indeed. It’s a start,’ added James. ‘Like you and your gold pebble, we’ll move on to greater things.’
‘Where is your mother, Adam?’ asked Mama. ‘Is she well?’
‘She’s very well, thank you, Ma’am,’ replied Adam. ‘In fact, she will be meeting us here shortly.’
Suddenly, all the chatter in the dining-room stopped and some soldiers in red uniforms entered.
‘Queen’s troops,’ muttered James.
Grandpa turned to look at the soldiers. I must say, I thought they were splendid in their bright uniforms. If they noticed the hushed response to their presence, it didn’t seem to bother them. Gradually conversation returned, a little more subdued, and we forgot about the momentary frisson of disapproval, especially when we were served sponge pudding with marmalade sauce. Mama was cheered when Mrs Baker sailed in with bags of shopping and a cheery smile.
‘This is the best day ever,’ May whispered to me.
The troops fascinated me. I had never seen anyone in unifo
rm up close before. Were these the people who were so hated in my old country? Surely such handsome men couldn’t be so terrible? I blinked, when I saw that a young trooper who couldn’t have been more than seventeen years old was staring back. I blushed, just like May, and switched my attention to the people at my own table. Mama and Rose were discussing the camp, May and Adam were chatting, Grandpa, James and John Joe were deep in conversation.
I looked again. The young man was still staring at me. He couldn’t be looking at me, I thought. Why would anyone want to look at me with my scorched face and wild hair? Yet I was disappointed when the troops eventually left the dining-room.
‘People come in here,’ explained James, ‘because it can get rowdy in the bar. There’s them who can’t bear to be in the same room as those troops.’
The soldiers had scarcely been gone ten minutes when another group of men entered.
‘It’s Peter!’ exclaimed Grandpa. ‘Peter Lalor.’
He was accompanied by several other serious-looking men. They chose a table at the far end of the dining-room.
‘That’s Henry Seekamp with him,’ whispered James. ‘He runs The Ballarat Times. I’m told he gets into trouble with the authorities for siding with the diggers in his paper. They say he’ll be closed down if he doesn’t pull in his horns.’
‘What does he write about?’ asked Grandpa.
James leaned closer to Grandpa. ‘Justice for the diggers,’ he murmured.
Grandpa looked at James with admiration. ‘You know a lot, considering you’ve been here only as long as we have,’ he said.
James tapped his nose conspiratorially. ‘I’m a businessman,’ he said. ‘It’s my business to know who’s who in an up-and-coming town. I listen and I learn.’
‘And what else have you learned?’ laughed Grandpa.
‘There’s trouble coming,’ replied James. ‘Big trouble.’
Chapter Twenty-Three
We tasted some of that trouble a couple of days later.
Grandpa and John Joe had finished the shaft and were now mining, aided by Mike, the Irish lad. Mike didn’t talk much.
‘Best not to ask questions,’ Grandpa said, when my curiosity got the better of me. ‘He may have something to hide.’
‘What could he have to hide?’ I wondered aloud.
‘Transportation,’ John Joe said. ‘He could be a convict who got away. But even I wouldn’t ask him.’
So Mike did his work quietly and took his share of our packed lunch to a spot some distance from the rest of us. The work we did was slow and laborious. Using a windlass – a sort of hoist – Grandpa raised a bucket filled with the gravel chippings he hammered from the shaft. Mike shovelled them into buckets which Mama, May and I emptied into a wooden barrow. Then May and I took the barrow of gravel to the creek where John Joe washed it to separate any gold. Each day Mama would leave at noon, and it pleased me when I’d see the strained look leave her face. Still, we felt her absence as the work increased. We were like automatons, each act dictated by habit rather than thought. The only noise we were conscious of was the bullock horn that was blown by the mining companies, to announce a change of shifts. But there was no change of shift for us. It was all hard graft.
One day, as May and I returned from the creek, we were surprised to see two troopers on horseback at our shaft. One of them was shouting down the entrance. As we drew closer, Grandpa’s head appeared.
‘About time, you old goat,’ the trooper shouted at him. ‘Licence. Now!’
I’d never seen Grandpa looking so anxious, and it frightened me. ‘Here,’ he said.
With a swoop, the trooper whipped the papers from Grandpa’s hand. The younger trooper wrote something into a notebook. He turned as May and I approached, and I was taken aback to see that it was the young man who’d stared at me in the hotel. My heart sank. Was this all he amounted to in his grand uniform – demanding money from hard workers like my grandfather?
The exchange was over in moments, but as the young trooper followed his rough companion, he turned and gave me a sympathetic look.
‘Scum,’ grunted Grandpa. ‘All they had to do was ask. There was no need to insult us as if we were thieves and ne’er-do-wells.’
The young trooper gave me one last look before riding away.
For reasons I found hard to explain to May, I could not respond to her cheerful chatter for the rest of the day. Something seemed to have died inside me. Silly, I thought, emptying my bucket. Silly me, for thinking that a young officer in a red uniform would want to stare at me. And sillier still to be resentful about someone who was involved in such unjust duties.
Later that night, as we sat at our fire, Grandpa still looked upset.
‘It’s not the bloomin’ licence fee,’ he said. ‘Even though I know that every digger is up in arms about paying such high fees to the English Crown. It’s something we have to do, so we do it because the whole colony belongs to them. It’s the way they shout at us. I’ve heard them bellow insults down other shafts and it’s distressing. Almost as bad as hitting us.’
There was nothing any of us could say. We finished our meal in silence and went to bed. That night was particularly rowdy – something we’d have to get accustomed to after licence inspection days.
May reached across and took my hand.
‘Don’t worry, Esty,’ she said. ‘This will all end in better things.’
I wished I could believe her. But I knew that, now we’d had a taste of verbal aggression, Grandpa’s anxiety about the licence money would continue to haunt him. John Joe took to leaving us after work, and not returning until very late. May asked him once where he disappeared to, but he just shook his head and replied, ‘Men’s affairs, May.’
‘Hm,’ May snorted. ‘I can imagine what sort of affairs they’d be.’
‘Nothing for you to worry about,’ John Joe laughed.
‘As if I would,’ May retorted. But I could see that she was annoyed.
Later that night, when I knew Mama was asleep, I nudged May. ‘What’s upsetting you?’ I asked her. ‘Is it John Joe? I thought you were interested in Adam.’
‘I am, and I’m not,’ she whispered. ‘I don’t know what to think.’
‘Are you still carrying a torch for John Joe?’
May gave an exasperated sigh and raised herself to look at me in the candlelight.
‘It’s complicated, Esty,’ she said. ‘When we were in service, John Joe and me, well, we were sort of thrown together. He was really the only one I felt comfortable with in that world. We hit it off when we first met – I was a kitchen maid at thirteen, and he was a stable lad. I used to smuggle treats to him. There was no romance. We just muddled along. It was sort of accepted between us that we’d eventually end up together when the time was right. Do you know’ – she paused and looked bashful – ‘we’ve never even kissed.’
‘Get away with you!’ I exclaimed, then looked over to see if I’d woken Mama. ‘I can’t believe that.’
‘It’s true,’ went on May. ‘We had to keep up the secrecy in case we were sacked. We only got to talk now and then, in the stables or in the pantry. It’s only now I realise that John Joe’s priorities are different from mine. He’s always been up to something – like the Whiteboys – and he’d never tell me anything. I didn’t know any better then. But I do now.’
‘Because of Adam?’
She nodded. ‘Esty, can you imagine what it’s like to be treated as someone special? To be given flowers and be told how nice you look – even if you know you look like a dried plum? I’ve never even dreamt that being a woman can mean that sort of thing. And I like it very much. I want more of it. I really do.’
That was a long speech for May. I could see the sparkle in her eyes. ‘So what’s the problem?’ I asked.
May sighed and picked at the threads on her blanket. ‘I don’t want to hurt John Joe,’ she whispered. ‘I know he treats me like a piece of old furniture, but I keep remembering how we were always th
ere for one another all the time we were in service. He made my life easier. And I thought that was what love was all about. But now…’ she sighed. ‘Now I know that there’s more to love. Do I sound like a fool?’
‘Not at all,’ I replied, giving her a reassuring squeeze. ‘Adam is smitten. I could see that when we were travelling together. He’s a really nice fellow, May. And he makes no secret of the fact that he admires you. There’s no point in trying to hide your feelings for him from John Joe. Anyway, to be fair, you’ll be leaving John Joe free to find someone else. You can’t keep playing both of them along, or you’ll end up with neither.’
‘I suppose you’re right,’ she murmured.
‘Quite right,’ came Mama’s voice from the other side of the tent.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Now that I was back at work, Grandpa insisted that Mama should stay away from the diggings altogether.
‘We’re managing very well, Kate. Especially now that Esty is strong again,’ he said, as we were sitting at our campfire. John Joe had disappeared again after supper, but we’d come to expect that now. ‘It’s not work for a mother…’
‘Are you suggesting I can’t carry a bucket of earth from one place to another?’ said Mama. ‘Really, Father!’
It was so unusual to see Grandpa stuck for words that I tried not to giggle.
‘Well, no, no, Kate,’ he stuttered. ‘Not at all. It’s just not right for a lady. All that mucking about…’
‘But you think it’s all right for me and Esty,’ put in May. ‘Hm.’
‘Well, you’re young,’ went on Grandpa. ‘I mean, you girls are strong…’
‘Oh, Grandpa,’ I laughed. ‘Get to the point.’
But Mama was standing her ground.
‘You mean, you want me to stay here and do nothing?’ she said. ‘What’s wrong with me working my shift at the diggings and leaving early to cook?
