That Boy, Jack

by Janeen Brian

  That was how it’d felt to me.

  Back in the change room, Gilbert removed his helmet and boots. “That was hard work, Jack, but it was better than I thought it’d be. I reckon we’ll be good miners, don’t you?”

  “Yeah,” I said. But I was lying. I was glad my feet were back on the ground. I took a deep breath, glad of the crisp night air.

  It was the first time I truly understood that Gilbert and I were different.

  Chapter 14

  Gilbert and I went on being picky boys almost as if nothing had happened. Only something had happened. If not for him, then for me.

  I couldn’t understand what was wrong with me. Going down the mine, going down a shaft, was nothing to Gilbert. He’d just grin and leap, blindfolded, if he had to.

  I didn’t like going outside at night much if I didn’t have a lantern, but at least the sky was vast and I was somehow part of it. But down there, in the mine, it was as if I couldn’t breathe. And knockers or no knockers, I kept thinking about Mr Oates, dead Mr Ellery, deaf Mr Phillips and Da with his cough. And when I did, my heart started to race.

  I wouldn’t have cared except for one thing.

  Gilbert and I were going to be miners.

  I’d made a promise to Mam and Da, to Captain Trelawney and to Gilbert. It was what I’d decided to do six years ago. I was going to work in the picky-shed and be a picky boy until I was old enough or ready to go into the mines. And that’s what I would do, like Da, for the rest of my life.

  And I would do it.

  I would make myself do it. Maybe I’d go down the shaft by myself. Maybe make myself stay there until the dark and the earthy closed-in smell didn’t matter. Until I was brave like Gilbert.

  One day, Gilbert didn’t turn up for work so I had to make a hurried dash up the steps at the last minute, before Captain Trelawney came out of his smoky little room and tapped on his fob watch. Where was Gilbert? I knew he couldn’t afford to lose a day’s wage.

  That afternoon, I ambled home along a few different tracks. I guess I was still wondering about Gilbert and not really watching where I was going. But after a while, I found myself at the new school building and caught sight of Samuel and Henry. I waved and called out. At the same time, I took in the school, now with walls and a roof that sprouted about a dozen chimneypots.

  The boys raced towards me, shouting their hellos.

  “What are you doing here?” I asked.

  “Nothing much. Just having fun.” Samuel turned and pointed. “Look how many rooms there are.”

  “Thousands, I reckon,” I said with a laugh.

  “Bet you don’t know where the big stones came from?” said Samuel.

  “Where?”

  “Moonta Bay.”

  “How did they get them here?” I asked. “By billycart?” We all laughed. “Gilbert and I are going to make a billycart one day. So, are you coming to this school next year?”

  “No,” they both replied.

  “Hey, Jack,” said Samuel. “Miss Goldsworthy’s getting married. She got engaged and she’s got a ring on her finger.”

  “Really?”

  “So you can’t marry her after all.” Henry grinned. I leaped at him and we rolled about, scuffing and laughing on the ground.

  “Anyway, I’m too busy to marry anyone,” I retorted.

  After a while, we sat on the tufty ground and I told Samuel and Henry what they wanted to know. What it was like being a picky boy. I found myself exaggerating the fun at break times and how quickly time flew when you only had to concentrate on doing one job, getting the ore in the right containers. I spoke of the money and how Mam gave me a coin from every wage packet.

  And I told them about going underground.

  “Wow!” said Henry. “I reckon that’d be the best. Better than being a picky boy, eh, Jack?”

  “Do you have to work hard?” asked Samuel.

  I could answer that question more easily than Henry’s.

  “Like you’ve got no arms left,” I cried, loping about with my arms hanging low like a gorilla.

  The boys laughed again and then said they had to go.

  “If you come to my place some Saturday afternoon, you could help Gilbert and me make a cart,” I said. “Or you could make one too. Then we could race.”

  “Sounds good,” enthused Henry.

  I wandered past the Tree. For old times’ sake, I gazed upwards and checked for nests. Then I set off once more, enjoying the rare mild weather that didn’t whip the cap off my head or nip icily at my ears.

  As I approached Mrs Ellery’s, I thought I saw someone in the backyard. It wasn’t Mrs Ellery. It was someone younger, with yellow hair. But as I drew closer, all I could see were sheets flapping on the clothes line. Perhaps I’d been mistaken. Perhaps it was a yellow garment, after all, swishing about.

  Even though I’d told Samuel and Henry about my work and going down the mine, it somehow felt as if I was telling them a story. As if I was making it up. Or it happened to someone else. But that night I had a nightmare.

  Gilbert and I were in my backyard. I remember checking to see that Gertie was all right, because I had a sudden feeling of terror that I couldn’t explain. I turned to Gilbert and he began to laugh in a weird way. When he opened his mouth, it changed colours like the upturned glass bottles that edged our pathways. Then a noise split my ears and the ground gave way beneath our feet. Horrified, I leaped backwards but Gilbert disappeared. I didn’t see what happened. Did he fall in? Did he get away in time? “Gilbert!” I shouted. “Gilbert!” No one answered. The next thing I knew, the ground I was standing on began to rise. Then it crashed down, sweeping me into the dark hole. I screamed.

  Chapter 15

  To my relief, Gilbert returned the next day, but his face was white. It made the dark circles beneath his eyes stand out more starkly. Perhaps the family didn’t have enough to eat. I’d ask Mam to make more food for them.

  Worse still, he hardly spoke a word. The usual chatty, silly Gilbert stared ahead as we walked towards the steps.

  “What’s wrong?” I said.

  “Nothing.” He made to go up the steps, but I grabbed his arm.

  “You didn’t come yesterday. Now it’s like your mouth’s glued together. What’s wrong, Gilbert?”

  His face twisted. But no words came.

  “Come on, Gilbert!” I punched his arm to make him angry. He’d talk if he was angry.

  “Leave me alone!”

  “What’s happened then?”

  Again, he twisted away, but I pinned him against the railings.

  “Yeah! Fight! Fight!” cried Bert, throwing pretend punches.

  “Get away, Bert,” I snapped. “This is between Gilbert and me.”

  “Oooh,” he crooned in a singsong way, but lazily made his way towards the picky-shed.

  “So?” I demanded.

  “All right,” said Gilbert. “You wanna know?” His voice began to rise and his eyes grew red. “The doctor got rid of Da’s legs. They’d started to rot. Dr Hughes cut both legs off at the knees. Da can’t walk. He can’t go back to work. He can’t do anything.”

  He stared at me.

  Speechless, I stared back.

  From then on, it was as if the Gilbert I knew really had disappeared down that hole in my nightmare. And it was as if winter would never end. It had been a cold winter, with teaser clouds and little rain. I’d tap the tank occasionally as I walked past, hoping for a miracle. Did miracles exist? Had they ever existed?

  There was no miracle for Mr Oates. He had to be lifted or carried everywhere: to the dunny, to the table, to his bed.

  At work, Gilbert put his head down and drove his arms like machines, as if by tossing the ore furiously into the buckets, somehow, something at home would change.

  At my house, I drew comfort from reading Gulliver’s Travels or by gazing at the special things in my treasure tin.

  One afternoon, I pulled out my tin and noticed that my schoolbooks had been disturb
ed again. I opened the English book. Sure enough, more words had been copied. I was going to let Dorrie have it! Even if I never used those books again, she had no right to touch my things.

  Abstractedly, I began to flick through some of my other books: arithmetic, geography, history, spelling and dictation and my writing copy book. I read about things I hadn’t thought of for ages.

  I opened my tin and started looking at objects that were somehow more real: shells, parrot feathers, rocks, beetles and the skull bones.

  But something in the back of my mind nagged me.

  What could I do to help Gilbert and his da?

  At last, I had an answer.

  In my treasure tin were also a few coins – money I’d saved from what Mam had given me from my wages. I plucked out a shilling and curled my fingers tightly around it.

  That was my answer. I’d give Gilbert a coin each week from my earnings. I was sure that it would help the family and then maybe some of the old Gilbert might reappear.

  I couldn’t wait to take the coin to work the next morning to give to my mate.

  But sometime during the night, there came a noise at the window. I turned over and hugged the pillow around my head. The noise grew louder.

  Someone was thumping on the window.

  My skin prickled. No one came to our place that late at night.

  “Who is it?” I called tentatively.

  “It’s me, Gilbert.”

  I quickly lit the candle and held it up to the glass.

  “Can you come outside?” he said. “I don’t want to wake anyone else.”

  I didn’t stop to ask questions. Not once I’d seen the expression on Gilbert’s face. I dragged on my britches and jacket and tiptoed outdoors, being careful to close the back door quietly.

  With my candleholder high, I saw a shadowy figure creep around the corner.

  I beckoned. “Over here, out of the cold,” I said, directing the candlelight towards a wooden box by Mam’s washing copper.

  We sat down and I set the candle at our feet.

  I guessed it had to be something about his da. But why would Gilbert come out at night to tell me?

  Gilbert sat with his elbows on his hunched knees, his head in the palm of his hands.

  Suddenly, it seemed the whole world went quiet. There wasn’t a sound except the two words that Gilbert uttered.

  “We’re leaving,” he said.

  Chapter 16

  At first the words were words. We’re leaving. Then came the shock. The questions.

  I turned to face Gilbert. “What do you mean, leaving?”

  “We’re going, Jack. The whole family. We’re leaving Moonta Mines.”

  The night sat around us, clouds, stars, sky, a sliver of moon. All still the same. All listening.

  But I sat with the words ringing in my ears.

  “It’s not true,” I said, knowing that Gilbert could lie through his boots if he had to. But why would he lie about this? “You can’t,” I insisted. “You can’t go! What about us being miners?”

  He might’ve shrugged.

  After a short silence, I said with uncertainty, “What’s really going on, Gilbert?”

  “I’m not lying, Jack. Mam and Da only told us kids this afternoon. We’ve been packing the cart until late tonight.”

  A chill swept through me.

  “You mean you’re going soon!”

  “Tomorrow morning.”

  “What?”

  “I only just found out. I wanted to tell you then, but I couldn’t. I had to help. I was going to come and tell you before we left, but I couldn’t sleep and we’re heading off at sun-up in the morning.”

  I leaned against the cool metal of the copper. It was impossible. No one I knew had left Moonta Mines to live anywhere else.

  More questions bubbled up, thick and fast.

  “But why are you going? Where are you going?”

  “We’re going to Adelaide and–”

  “Adelaide!” My voice screeched in the frosty air. “But that’s miles away!” It could’ve been the moon, it was so hard to imagine. “Don’t go, Gilbert. Tell your parents you want to stay here, with us. Da’s going to build another room. That’d work out and then we can still be picky boys and miners and do things together and–”

  “Shut up, Jack, will you? You don’t know anything.”

  The words stung. I sat back, feeling the rough stone wall against my back.

  “I don’t want to go, but I have to, so stop going on as if it’s my fault.”

  “I know it’s not your fault, but–”

  “If you don’t shut up, I’m going.”

  My heart beat fast. I lowered my voice. “Why can’t you stay here? With us?”

  “Because I have to help Da in a shop, that’s why.”

  I gave a gruff laugh because it sounded so ridiculous. Gilbert working in a shop? How would Mr Oates stand behind a counter, like Mr Pascoe at the Moonta General Store?

  Gilbert leaped to his feet. I thought he was going to kick the candle. Hurriedly, I pulled him down.

  “Do you want to know the rest or not?” he snapped.

  “Yes. Sorry,” I muttered.

  “My uncle has a shop and house that’s joined together. He’s going to live at Glenelg, by the sea, and was going to sell everything. But he said we could live in the house and work the shop. Only we have to get there soon, so the shop doesn’t lose money.”

  I was breathing slowly, deeply.

  “What kind of a shop?”

  “A … draper’s.”

  “What? Where they sell reels of cotton and pins and needles and frock material?”

  “Yes.”

  “But you’ll hate it, Gilbert; you know you will.”

  “Stop it, Jack. I don’t want to fight. I don’t know when I’ll see you again.”

  And that was when I knew it was for real.

  My world spun. Gilbert was going for good. My shilling was no help to him now. It wasn’t going to be the miracle I wanted.

  “Does Captain Trelawney know?” As if that mattered now.

  “Yeah. Lucy told him.”

  “And your da? How will he be able to move around the shop?”

  “My uncle’s getting him a wheelchair. So he can sit in it …” he trailed off.

  “A bit like a billycart.” The joke was a sad attempt.

  “Yeah, but without Gertie,” Gilbert replied. He was struggling too.

  There was a long silence.

  “Will you write?” I asked finally.

  “Yeah. Probably not for a long time. It takes days to get to Adelaide, then we have to unpack, start work and …”

  “I’ll write back as soon as I get your letter. I’ll need your address.”

  “Yeah. Well, I suppose I better go.”

  As if on cue, we both stood. I held the candleholder at a distance. My eyes had begun to water and I didn’t want Gilbert to see.

  “I’ll miss you,” I said.

  “Yeah, I’ll miss you too, Jack.”

  We didn’t say goodbye.

  My best friend walked off towards the back gate. In no time, he’d disappeared into the night.

  Chapter 17

  I knew something was wrong when I woke. I rolled over and clutched my stomach. There was a hollow feeling inside. When a crow cawed mournfully outside my window, I knew why I felt ill.

  Gilbert had gone.

  Or had he? Would it still be possible to get to his place and wave goodbye?

  I flung off my bedclothes, got dressed and scorched through the kitchen and out the back door.

  “Don’t slam–” cried Mam.

  Slam!

  Mam rushed out after me. “Where do you think you’re going, Jack Pollock? It’s seven o’clock and you should be getting ready for work.”

  Seven o’clock!

  I stopped in my tracks and ran my fingers through my fringe. With a sickening feeling, I knew Gilbert would be well gone by now. He’d be travelling along
the Adelaide Road. The house would be empty.

  Slowly, I turned and saw Mam standing there, hands on hips.

  “Gilbert’s gone, Mam,” I said. The words echoed in my ears.

  “What? What are you talking about? Come inside and tell me, Jack. That seems sudden.”

  It was then, as I passed the washing copper, that I saw the note. It was addressed to Mam.

  “It’s from Mrs Oates.” I could hardly raise any interest. “It’s Gilbert’s writing though. He must’ve left it last night.”

  “What does it say, Jack?” Mam’s frown made two small lines between her brows. She stirred the porridge and spooned it out into bowls.

  “Dear Mrs Pollock,” I read, “Mr Oates and I say thank you for your kindnesses and help. We have gone to Adelaide. Bless you and goodbye. Mrs Oates.”

  Mam rubbed her forehead, tutting, as I told her what’d happened the night before.

  “It’s probably for the best,” she said. “For Mr Oates and the family.”

  “It’s not for Gilbert!” I clenched the spoon in my fist. I wanted to hurl it at the wall.

  “You look mean,” said Dorrie as she pranced into the kitchen. “Like this.” She pulled a face and laughed.

  “Dorrie,” Mam interrupted, “go and fetch me a bucket of water.”

  “I can’t.”

  I gritted my teeth at my sister’s whining.

  “Yes, you can,” said Mam, “and no more talking back.”

  “I can’t, Mam,” Dorrie insisted, “ ’cos there’s no more water in the tank and I can’t pump the other big one. It’s too hard.”

  “Jack?” Mam gave me a pleading look.

  “I’m not doing it on my own. Dorrie can carry the bucket. And she can stop touching my things as well!”

  Pouting, Dorrie picked up the bucket and followed me outside. Little sisters! I had to start collecting small stones for the mud mixture to make the walls for the other room. If I did, I thought, it might hurry Da up with the building.

  I worked the pump up and down to raise the water to the surface and fill the bucket. But I left Dorrie to carry it back. I still had Gertie to milk.