A Waltz for Matilda

by Jackie French

  ‘It was a pleasure.’

  She took the glass of fruit punch from Mr Drinkwater. ‘I gather my brother has a present for you too.’ She wrinkled her nose. ‘A sheep. A male one. Extremely smelly, I assure you. He expected me to admire it this morning.’

  Matilda turned to Mr Drinkwater. ‘You’re giving me a jumbuck?’

  Mr Drinkwater looked at his sister indulgently. He likes it that she doesn’t know anything about sheep, thought Matilda. But he likes me because I do.

  Mr Drinkwater took a sip of his whisky. ‘Yes, a ram. And a damned — er, dashed good beast. I’ve had twenty brought from the United States. Bigger boned than ours, a good creamy wool but a fine texture — much finer than we have at present.’

  ‘But I thought we were too hot here for fine wool.’

  ‘I don’t believe so.’ He raised an eyebrow. ‘You’ve been reading up on it?’

  She flushed. ‘Yes.’

  ‘Good for you. Our summers are hot, but our winters are cold. I know the general view is that you can’t raise fine wool in the dust and dry, but I think breeding is more important than most people imagine.’

  ‘But if you’re wrong we might lose more lambs …’ She frowned. ‘Why not try half and half for a couple of years? See what the lambing percentages are?’

  ‘Exactly what I planned to do.’

  ‘If you are going to talk sheep all evening,’ said Mrs Ellsmore, ‘I will take my dinner in the kitchen.’

  ‘I hope Miss O’Halloran will come back to talk about sheep another time then. What should we talk about now? Votes for women?’

  ‘Why not?’ said Mrs Ellsmore. She smiled at Matilda. Matilda grinned back, and drained her fruit punch. Suddenly she no longer felt awkward.

  This was good.

  Chapter 36

  SEPTEMBER 1897

  Dear Miss Thrush,

  I hope you are well.

  I am sorry not to have answered your letter before — it has been a busy lambing season. I think the wording on your petition to the Victorian parliament was exactly right. If they were women politicians they would see why women should have the vote, but then we wouldn’t need to petition them! It is wonderful about all your new members. Please accept my very best congratulations!

  I am glad to tell you that I was able to go to the annual general meeting of our local Women’s Temperance and Suffrage League. Mrs Lacey is our chairwoman. I stayed the night at her boarding house. Mrs Lacey does not have stabling there, so I had to leave my horse at the hotel. There are drunken men there at any time of the day or night, drinking all they have made from shearing, but the groom seems a sober man, and looked after my horse well.

  It was wonderful to see so many women at the meeting. I did not know we had so many women near enough to town. We nowhave 172 signatures on the petition for women’s suffrage. Mrs Lacey even took the petition over to the hotel and stood outside the door!

  I am afraid that many of the men were so inebriated they did not know what they were signing, but Mrs Lacey says that this just shows how badly a woman’s influence is needed in our parliaments or the new federal parliament that we may get one day.

  We have had a good lambing season. It was cold going out each night to see how the ewes were, and I got very tired, but it is worth it, as that is when you most likely find ewes in trouble. Some of the ewes get ‘cast’, which means that they are unable to get up because their wool is so heavy.

  My foreman’s two sons, Peter and Michael, have come to work with us now. They were only working for rations at their last station. Mr Sampson and I share the profit from the wool and lamb sales. Mr Sampson says he will divide his share with his sons, but I do not think that is fair.

  I am going to ask Mr Drinkwater, Mrs Ellsmore’s brother, how much he pays his white stockmen. Perhaps Mr Sampson and I can pay the men’s wages out of our shares, but I do not know yet if we make enough money to do so. We are still only running just over 400 head now, as we sell most of the older male lambs of course, and the oldest ewes too. That would have seemed a great number to me when I first came here, but I know now that this is a small farm.

  Stocking rates are low everywhere with the drought. Everyone calls it a drought, but I have never known anything else, so to me this is the way it has always been. The drought has gone on for over ten years now, so I do not think the weather is going to change.

  At least we still have good water at Moura. My friend Tommy has welded a series of big metal water pipes that go all the way to six troughs right down the middle of the farm. Tommy says that he did not have to pay for the pipes, but I do not believe him, and he will not let me pay for the welding either. He has also made a sort of tap that floats on the water. He calls it a ‘float valve’. When the water level drops the pipe opens and more water flows out. That way we do not have to have water flowing into the troughs all the time. It is a pity that sheep do not know how to turn on taps!

  I wish I knew how to thank Tommy. He comes out here every week, at least, to see if we need help, and he is always working on some invention to make things easier. I knit socks for him, but one foot always ends up being bigger than the other. I am afraid that neither you nor Aunt Ann were able to turn me into a good knitter!

  I tried making cakes for him too, but somehow they always seem to get burned, I think because I forget they are in the oven while I am doing something else.

  Tommy is the best brother it is possible to have. I recommend his repair work of course to all at the League, but I do not think he needs the recommendation, as his work is highly thought of. He has also sold a few of his new float valves to Mr Drinkwater, but not many, as Mr Drinkwater mostly just lets his sheep drink from the river. If he pumped the water up to troughs with windmills the herd could graze more widely and he could raise his stocking rate ENORMOUSLY, but when I told him so he just smiled. On Moura the water flows down from the spring, so I do not need windmills.

  I am enclosing a drawing of the new sheep yards. I am not much of an artist, I’m afraid, but it will show you a little of the country here. The squiggle on one side is meant to be a sheet of bark, not a snake.

  Yours sincerely,

  Matilda O’Halloran

  Matilda stared at the figures in her exercise book and chewed the end of her pencil. It was so hard to work out exactly how much money she and Mr Sampson really made.

  Forty pounds paid for bags of oats last March to see the horses, cows, sheep and the hens through the dry winter — Mr Sampson and the boys had cut down more kurrajong branches for feed (Mr Drinkwater had told her the real name of the old woman trees), but the sheep lost condition on scrub tucker, and lambing ewes needed something more.

  Ten pounds, eight shillings and sixpence profit from the eggs and butter she sold to Mrs Lacey for her boarding house.

  There was still the cheque to come in on the crutchings, the dirty wool trimmed from the sheep’s rear ends in between shearing. Mr Gotobed had simply baled the crutchings up for her before, but Mr Drinkwater had suggested if she cut away the smelly dags and trimmed off the burrs she’d get twice as much or even more.

  It had been smelly work, and the burrs left tiny prickles in her hands, but she hoped the new price would be worth it.

  They’d used the Drinkwater shed to shear the Moura sheep this year, leaving hers as a hay shed. Mr Drinkwater even allowed her to add her wool with the Drinkwater bales, so she no longer had to sell ‘mixed bales’ of good long belly wool mixed with short fibres from the legs. Mixed bales always fetched a lower price.

  Better still, Drinkwater wool was shipped to England and sold at auction there, something Matilda could never have afforded, even though the wool sold in England fetched almost twice as much per bale as that sold in Australia. The next cheque should be good. They could buy more pipes, fencing wire, perhaps put in a crop of wheat …

  She put her pencil down and stared out the window. Chooks were pecking under the fruit trees: the lemons she’d planted in her first
month here were bearing now, and the apples, medlars and pears too. Only the persimmon tree still sulked as though it was waiting for the rain that never came. Sheep rested in the shade under the trees; the sky was as clear and cloudless as her blue skirt hanging on the clothesline. All flourishing. All …

  Lonely. She pushed back her chair and headed out to the verandah, admitting it once again.

  It had been two days since she had seen anyone at all. Even Auntie Love had headed back out bush a few days ago, taking Hey You with her.

  The first time Auntie Love went bush Matilda had worried about her, so frail and so tiny. But two days later Auntie Love was back, with a present of goanna eggs to bake on the fire. A few weeks later she vanished again. Now she was gone for weeks at a time, coming back for a few days to check that all was well and doze on the verandah, then one morning her bed would not have been slept in and her chair would be empty.

  Matilda had only asked once where the old woman was going. Auntie Love had answered, but as it was all in what Matilda thought of as ‘native language’, she was none the wiser.

  Were there still ‘wild’ natives out there? Did Auntie Love stay with them? Or was she living alone, remembering her places and her people?

  Matilda hoped that she wore clothes. As far as she knew James and Bertram were still away, and there had been no more shooting parties. But Auntie Love still ran the risk of being taken to a reservation if she no longer appeared to work for a white household. Yet Mr Sampson didn’t seem to be worried when Matilda told him Auntie Love had gone. ‘Auntie goes when she wants, eh?’ he’d said. ‘She’ll be right.’

  Even Mr Sampson and his boys spent less time around her house now that the sheep had water further away from the valley and could range beyond the cliffs.

  Matilda hesitated on the verandah. Where to now? She could call on Mrs Sampson, but Elsie’s conversation was limited mostly to yes and no. She understood English, Matilda was sure, but seemed unsure about speaking it to Matilda. Once again she wished she knew another language, could talk properly to Auntie Love and the Sampsons or the Doos.

  She could find an excuse to ride over to Drinkwater, perhaps to talk about when the next wool cheque was due, maybe, or even go into town, to call at the cobbler and order a new pair of riding boots. It was good to be able to buy something new, even if it was only a pair of boots. Or she could —

  A shadow flickered in the heat shimmer in the gap between the trees, too fast to be a sheep. Tommy, on his bicycle.

  She strode down to meet him, her heart lifting. ‘How did you know I needed a visitor? I didn’t expect you till Sunday. Come in, I’ll put the kettle on and make some scones.’

  He grinned, skidded off the bicycle and began to wheel it next to her. ‘No thanks. Your last scones were too salty even for the dog.’

  ‘I just used salt instead of sugar. I made some yesterday and they were fine.’

  ‘I’ll give them one more go then.’ His grin grew wider, with its strange twist at the edge from his scar. ‘Got some news.’

  ‘What? Errk!’ She reached up and grabbed a flying ant that had crawled onto her neck. ‘Ooglies. It’s going to rain tomorrow. Don’t think there’ll be much though — the other ants aren’t worried. They scuttle like mad before a real storm. Come on — what’s the news?’

  He reached into the pocket of his shirt and pulled out a letter. It was limp with sweat, and the ink had run slightly so she had to squint at the words.

  She looked up at him in amazement. ‘They’re paying you 300 pounds!’

  ‘Yep. I wrote an article for Popular Mechanics about that float valve I made for you. This bloke wants to make them in his factory.’

  ‘Oh, Tommy, that’s wonderful! Congratulations!’

  His grin grew even wider. ‘I’m going to use some of the money to hire a patent attorney — someone who can register the stuff I invent. Never thought I could make money from inventions before. That ain’t all either.’

  ‘What else?’

  He laughed. ‘Give me a cuppa first. I’m dry enough to drink the dishwater.’ He rested his bicycle against the steps, followed her up and sat at the table as she automatically moved the kettle from the side of the stove to boil it for tea, and put a cup of flour, a hunk of butter and a dash of buttermilk into the mixing bowl.

  ‘I’ve rented a shop. I’ll still do repairs, but I can work on my own designs. Get a boy to help me with the welding.’

  ‘A shop? But —’ She glanced over at the taut red skin of his arm, then flushed.

  ‘It’s all right,’ he said gently. ‘I’m used to folks staring now.’

  ‘It’s … it’s not as bad as it was.’

  He nodded. ‘Feels better too. I can hold stuff with both hands no worries now. But mostly —’ he shrugged ‘— people have got used to me. Anyhow, the counter is back of the shop, out of the light. Can’t scare the cows there.’

  ‘Tommy.’ A lump rose in her throat. ‘You never looked that bad. Even at the worst.’

  ‘An’ a flock of koalas just flew over. Anyhow, you goin’ to come an’ have a look at my shop? It’s two doors down from Mr Doo’s. Got a room at the back with a bed and a place for a stove too.’

  ‘You can’t cook.’

  ‘Neither can you.’ He ducked as she threw the dishcloth at him. ‘Well, I can learn.’

  ‘And roosters’ll lay eggs. And don’t you go getting your meals at the hotel either,’ she added.

  ‘No, ma’am. No imbibing.’

  She looked at him warily. ‘You don’t imbibe, do you?’

  He shook his head. ‘Why waste the dosh? Anyhow, the hotel’s full of strangers half the time, and they do stare. Forget the bally scones,’ he added impatiently. ‘Go get changed and come and see the shop. You won’t get back afore dark if we don’t start now.’

  ‘You start off then. Bet Timber and I catch you up before you’re past the boundary.’

  ‘You’re on.’

  Tommy was right. It was a good little shop: two walls of shelves and a counter, and a small room at the back with a lean-to kitchen. But the shed behind the shop was three times as big — two big bays and a lock-up room as well.

  ‘Going to put in a proper floor,’ said Tommy proudly. ‘Put a wall up here too, to keep out the dust. Turret lathe here, welding in the open bay. Young Billy Watson is a swell welder …’ He paused, and glanced sideways at her. ‘Know what I’m goin’ to make here?’

  She shook her head.

  ‘Motorcars.’

  ‘You mean like that thing in Melbourne that blew up?’

  He laughed. ‘No! There’re motorcars these days that work fine. But they’re slow as a wet washday. I’ve got an idea to make ‘em faster. See, they’ve all got big wheels, high up like a horse and carriage. Big wheels mean you don’t need as much power to pull ‘em, but —’ He broke off. ‘I ain’t boring you?’

  She smiled. ‘No.’ It was so good to see him like this. He’d been happy enough, the last few years. But this was the first time she’d seen the old Tommy, trying to reinvent the world. ‘How are you going to get more power? A bigger engine?’

  ‘Bigger engine means more weight. No, I’m going to try to keep her small. There’s this bloke Ford in the United States, he’s using petroleum in his engines instead of diesel. You can get more power with petrol.’

  ‘Why doesn’t everyone else use petrol then?’

  ‘They’re afraid of it exploding.’

  ‘What?’

  He grinned at her. ‘Don’t be a silly coot. My engines ain’t gunna explode. If a car has more power it can have smaller wheels, which means it won’t tip up so easily. That way it can go faster.’ His face was alight now. ‘Might go thirty, forty, even fifty miles an hour.’

  ‘No one could drive a motorcar that fast!’

  ‘Trains go that fast.’

  ‘But they’re on railway tracks. You don’t have to steer them!’

  He laughed again. ‘Let’s see if I can make
a fast car, before we worry about that.’ He looked at her seriously. ‘Thought I’d call ‘em the “Matildas”. What do you think?’

  She stared. ‘After me?’

  ‘And after swaggies’ Matildas too,’ he added hurriedly. ‘You know, carrying their Matildas all over. Well, you would be able to drive my motorcars all over Australia too. You ain’t laughing?’

  ‘No,’ she said slowly. ‘I think if anyone in Australia can make a motorcar like that, you can.’

  He grinned, relief sliding over his face. ‘Thought I might have bats in me attic, even thinkin’ about it. It’s a long shove from fixin’ pulleys at the jam factory. But I reckon I can do it.’

  She listened as the words poured out of him, happy for him but a bit sad too. She wouldn’t see as much of him now, she supposed, not with his own business to run and a shed to play in, following his dreams and designs.

  ‘I’ll miss you,’ she said without thinking.

  He blinked. ‘You dozy drongo, I’ll still be out at your place every Sunday. More if you need me.’

  Of course, she thought. Tommy would always be there if she needed him.

  ‘Thanks,’ she said. She leaned forward and kissed his cheek, then laughed when he blushed. ‘I’d better be getting back before dark.’

  ‘I’ll get the bike and come with you.’

  ‘Then you won’t get back by dark.’

  ‘I’ve got my lantern. Don’t want you on the road by yourself.’

  ‘I’m used to being by myself. Anyhow, Timber can beat any horse on the road. Except Mr Drinkwater’s,’ she added.

  She looked around the shed again. ‘It’s going to be wonderful, Tommy,’ she said softly. ‘Just wonderful.’

  Chapter 37

  NOVEMBER 1898

  Dear Matilda,

  I am so sorry to hear of your decision to sell so MANY of your sheep. Alas, the drought bites hard and deep. Perhaps it is for the BEST, though, my dear. I have been afraid so many were a HARD responsibility for you, being so young. However never let it be said that I doubt your COURAGE and CAPABILITY because you are female! I am sure that when the Lord sees fit to send the rain again your farm will truly PROSPER.