The Audrey of the Outback Collection

by Christine Harris

‘Is it time yet?’ Audrey leaned forward for a better look along the railway line.

  ‘Sometimes it’s late if sand has blown on the track. Dad says they sometimes hand out shovels to the passengers so they can help clear it. Me dad’s a guard. He’s got a hat and everything.’

  ‘Will the train have lots of carriages?’

  ‘Depends how many passengers there are. And today’s newspaper day. The papers come three times a week.’ Boy sniffed. ‘I got long trousers.’

  ‘Me too, ’cept mine fall down because they were my brother’s. I have to wear braces.’

  ‘Mine are too short at the ankles because I grew so much lately. But there aren’t any patches or rips. The knees are shiny, but knees don’t matter much.’

  ‘I reckon braces are more important than knees. Do you?’

  ‘Too right.’ Boy cleared his throat. ‘I don’t have a fancy tie like Dad. But I look all right in me trousers.’ His tone hinted that he was working up to something important. But when Audrey looked at him, he glanced away.

  ‘I wear long trousers to dances,’ he said.

  ‘Can you dance?’

  ‘Sort of. It’s more like jumping. Before the dances start, we get wax flakes from old candles and sweep them onto the floor of the hall. Then we jump on sandbags and slip all round the place to shine it up. Someone falls over every year. It’s real funny.’

  Audrey wondered what it would be like whirling round and round on that dance floor. ‘I’ve never been to a dance,’ she said.

  ‘There’s cakes for supper. Mrs Dawson makes apple cider with more bang than a dunny door. That’s what Dad say, anyways. There’s a dance this Saturday night. I can hescort you if you want.’

  ‘What’s hescort?’

  ‘When you let a girl hang on your arm so she doesn’t fall over in her good clothes. I seen Dad do it for Mum.’

  Audrey felt a tug of longing. ‘I don’t know if Mrs Paterson would let me go. She might not like dancing.’

  ‘Well, she used to. Dad said her foxtrot looked so real he thought she might grow a tail and start chasin’ chooks. Mrs P and her husband were the only ones who knowed how to do that foxtrot. They learnt it from an American man. But she stopped when Mr Paterson and then her son, Lionel, died. Guess there was no one she wanted to dance with after that.’

  Audrey couldn’t picture the old lady dancing, even when she closed her eyes and tried especially hard. Perhaps Mrs Paterson was sad because her feet wanted to dance, but her head wouldn’t let them.

  ‘I can get Mum to ask Mrs P if you can go,’ suggested Boy.

  The choof, choof, choof of a steam engine announced the train was around the bend.

  Audrey leapt to her feet. ‘There it is!’

  Smoke puffed up above the trees. Then the black engine showed its nose. The wheels squealed along the tracks.

  Behind the driver’s cabin was a tender loaded with coal.

  ‘A fireman shovels that coal,’ said Boy. ‘I might do that when I get older. I’m strong cos I eat porridge every morning.’

  The maroon-coloured carriages rattled along behind the engine. The couplings connecting them clanged and banged.

  Audrey waved as though she was trying to shake her arm loose. The driver waved back. But it was a more gentle wave. One that wouldn’t damage his steering arm. Then he pulled the rope that blew the whistle.

  Some of the passengers waved too.

  ‘The engine breathes smoke like a dragon,’ said Audrey.

  They watched till the train vanished around the next bend. And then they kept watching as the smoke went too.

  Audrey sighed with satisfaction, then said, ‘Yes.’

  ‘Yes what?’

  ‘If Mrs Paterson lets me, I’ll come to the dance. I’ve never been hescorted.’

  ‘Good-o.’ Boy stood up and dusted his hands on the back of his shorts. ‘Come on, there’s somethin’ else I want to show you.’

  Audrey jumped to her feet. She knew all the best places back home—her cubbyhouses, the scrubby patch where the daddy emus walked with their striped babies, the giant ant hills, the sandy slope that was good fun to slide down on sheets of tin. But here, everything was unfamiliar. ‘Where are we going?’

  ‘Me favourite place.’

  Twenty-nine

  Audrey turned in a circle. ‘Is this your favourite place?’

  A rabbit dashed out of a hole in the ground, hopped across the dry grass, and then vanished behind a headstone.

  ‘We’re takin’ a shortcut. It’s over there.’ Boy pointed to the trees that Audrey had seen when her family first trundled into town in the cart. ‘But I catch lots of rabbits here in the graveyard. I used to sell more of ’em but people found out where I was catchin’ ’em.’

  Audrey would have lots to tell her family when they were back together. Her chest tightened as she thought of home. She remembered the crooked kitchen table, the aroma of fresh scones and Mum in her apron, her cheeks pink from cooking. Audrey imagined Dad in the kitchen too, sneaking scones while they were still hot. And Douglas, jumping up to touch the dried fruit that hung from the kitchen ceiling. Then Audrey thought about Price ruffling his messy hair, which usually made it look even more untidy.

  If Mrs Paterson was right about the expecting, there would be another little Barlow to fit into the tiny kitchen at home. Audrey hoped it would be a girl. Brothers were all right. But a girl would be better.

  Stumpy pulled a face. Audrey knew he was trying to make her giggle.

  She rolled her eyes. ‘You were supposed to stay at the Jenkins’s house with Dougie.’

  ‘Who are you talkin’ to?’ asked Boy.

  Audrey hesitated. Mrs Paterson’s face had gone prune-shaped when she heard about Stumpy. But Boy didn’t seem fussy. And now Audrey and Boy were friends. ‘Stumpy. He’s my camel. He’s mostly invisible. You can only see him if you believe he’s there.’

  Boy stared as though he was looking at Stumpy. But he was facing the wrong way. ‘Do you call him Stumpy because he’s short?’

  ‘No. When I first told my dad about him, he said, “Cut me off at the knees and call me Stumpy.” So I thought that was a good name.’

  ‘I used to play with a pirate when I was little. And no one could see him.’

  ‘Beltana is a long way from the sea,’ said Audrey. She had played pirates too. But she was the pirate. She hadn’t seen one.

  ‘He was shipwrecked,’ said Boy. ‘So he crawled up the beach and got on a train. The train stopped here.’

  That made sense. Except that a pirate was made-up. Stumpy was real. But she didn’t want to tell Boy that. He might feel hurt.

  Boy tapped a headstone. ‘I knowed some of these people. I come out and talk to ’em sometimes.’

  Audrey nodded. ‘I talk to my sisters, Pearl and Esther. They’re out the back of our house.’

  ‘There’s stories in here, if you can read proper.’

  The stone beside Audrey named Anne Johnson and her four children, who died in a fire.

  ‘Are there ghosts here?’ asked Audrey.

  ‘They don’t come out in the daytime.’

  ‘Do you think people mostly see ghosts at night because they’re white?’

  ‘Maybe.’ Boy started walking towards the trees.

  Audrey beckoned Stumpy to follow, even though a few minutes earlier she had scolded him for following her. She felt safer with him close by. Careful not to step on any of the mounds of earth, she headed after Boy.

  ‘A swaggie called Toothless told me that a headless ghost rides past the graves at Kanyaka at midnight,’ said Audrey.

  ‘Knock me bandy!’

  ‘It’d be hard doing hauntings if you couldn’t see. You’d bang into things. Doors, walls, horses. Even other ghosts.’ A fly landed on Audrey’s right cheek and she swished it away.

  Boy scrambled down an embankment, with Audrey right behind him. At the bottom was a creek. Audrey skidded on small rocks, wobbled, then regained her balance. She was
glad she was wearing her old boots, not her new black shoes. ‘Do you reckon ladies climb down to look at creeks?’

  ‘Ladies can do whatever they like. Except, maybe, burp at the table. Even me mum don’t let anyone do that.’

  Boy sat back on his heels at the edge of the creek and lifted a rock from the water. Tadpoles swam in all directions.

  ‘My dad ate tadpoles once,’ said Audrey. ‘An Aboriginal man fried them for him. The good part was they were crunchy. Bad part was they were really small. He said you’d have to eat a whole creek of ’em to fill you up.’

  Boy wrinkled his nose. His stomach didn’t like what his ears were hearing.

  ‘My dad says we ain’t never allowed to camp near a creek.’ Boy shooed a fly off his lip. ‘A flash flood can come up while you’re asleep. And you wouldn’t know nothin’ about it because there could be a big storm on the other side of the ranges that you couldn’t see. A flash flood can wash you away and, when you wake up, you’re dead.’

  ‘Too right?’

  Boy nodded.

  ‘Where do you reckon ghosts keep their heads?’

  Beltana, April 1930

  Dear Mum,

  My new frend, Boy, arsked to hescort me to a dance on Saturday. He will wear his long trousers with the shiny nees knees.

  Every time they have a dance someone comes a cropper so there is always something to larf about. There will be a man playing the squeeze box, so we don’t have to hum our own music. There will be lots of food. Enugh Enough to make people feel sick. Which is good.

  Boy says his dad can cut the eye out of a mozzie with his stock whip. I havnt met his dad yet. When he comes back home, I hope there are some mozzies so I can see if its true.

  Mrs Paterson has shoes that lace all the way to her ankools, so they hold up her legs. She bought me a new pair of shoes. They look pretty. Not like hers.

  I hope Mrs Paterson lets me go to the dance. If you arnt too sick can you arsk her? Please.

  Stumpy runs away a lot here. I call him but he won’t answer.

  Hope you feel better soon so we can go home. (But I want to show you the ribbins in the store first.)

  Love from your Audrey, Dougie and Stumpy

  P.S. Do you know what a riff raff is?

  Thirty

  Mrs Paterson sat in Mrs Jenkins’s house with her hands folded. Her gloves looked out of place in the untidy kitchen. It was full of dishes and tins that Mrs Jenkins hadn’t had time to put away. With ten children she probably never had time. When number ten finished eating, number one would be hungry again. Audrey hated to think how many dishes there would be to wash and dry.

  Audrey straightened her back to sit like the old lady. But she couldn’t manage it quite so perfectly.

  ‘I’m not sure it’s proper,’ said Mrs Paterson in a loud voice.

  Audrey scarcely dared to breathe, in case it brought the word ‘No’ from Mrs Paterson’s lips.

  Stumpy stared in through the kitchen window. He didn’t mind rain. His thick eyelashes kept water out of his eyes.

  Some of the Jenkins boys were shouting at the other end of the house. Audrey wasn’t sure which ones. Then came thumping. But nothing flew out of the window this time. They must have been playing, not fighting.

  Douglas picked up an orange kitten by the scruff of the neck. ‘He wants to come wiv me.’

  Jessie giggled and poked the tip of her tongue through her teeth. She would miss that gap when her tooth came down.

  ‘He’s only little, Dougie,’ said Audrey. ‘He needs his mummy.’

  Douglas’s face went pink and his eyes were sad. He was thinking about their own mum, Audrey could tell. She wished she hadn’t said the word. But it was too late to take it back.

  Jessie grabbed the kitten from Douglas and headed into another room. Douglas scooted after her. Soon there was the sound of giggling, followed by the meow of a cat.

  ‘A dance might be just the thing to take small minds off large matters.’ Mrs Jenkins lifted the end of her green apron and dabbed at the perspiration on her face. ‘It’ll use up some of that excess energy children have.’

  ‘The railwaymen will come into town.’

  ‘My Bert is a railwayman,’ said Mrs Jenkins. ‘He’ll be home on the weekend. He won’t let any of them get up to too much nonsense.’

  Mrs Jenkins herself could make anybody behave. She was used to bossing all the people in her family.

  ‘Boy will look after Audrey. And I’ll take the little ’un under my wing.’ Mrs Jenkins made herself sound like a chook. But then, her brood of children were like chickens around a hen.

  Finally, Mrs Paterson nodded. ‘I’ll think about it.’

  Audrey smiled. There was a chance that she would get to the dance.

  The old lady stood up, buttoning her overcoat. ‘Rain or no rain, we must go. It’s only water, after all.’ She stepped outside to pop open her large black umbrella.

  Audrey and Douglas didn’t mind rain. On the way home Douglas stomped into the first puddle he saw. And kept jumping in every puddle after that. At first, Mrs Paterson tried to stop him. But he ignored her. So she just kept a safe distance from the splashes.

  Although Audrey was wearing her old boots and she liked to splash too, she didn’t join in. If she could last the next few days without doing anything wrong, the old lady might trust her enough to let her go to the dance.

  Stumpy clomped along behind them. Mrs Paterson didn’t know that, and Audrey didn’t tell her.

  Blinking water from her eyes, Audrey grabbed the old lady’s hand and squeezed. ‘Mrs Paterson, are raindrops different shapes?’

  Mrs Paterson didn’t squeeze back, but neither did she withdraw her hand or scold. ‘It is not a question to which I have devoted much thought.’

  ‘If you let me go to the dance Saturday night I’ll be good,’ promised Audrey. ‘I’ll only dance with Boy. I won’t marry him.’

  ‘Marry him?’ repeated Mrs Paterson.

  ‘I have to grow up first. Boy’s my friend. But we don’t marry men with foydools, do we?’

  Audrey tipped the left-over dishwater on the garden.

  Thirty-one

  Audrey felt the warm sun through the fabric of her smock. The previous day’s clouds had moved away. The sky was blue and clear. Careful not to spill water on her boots, Audrey tipped the left-over dishwater on the garden. Just as Mrs Paterson had instructed.

  The old lady adjusted her straw hat, then continued trimming the leaves of a grey bush with a large pair of scissors. Douglas sat on the ground, pushing a stick through the damp dirt and making vroom, vroom noises. Now that he’d seen a car, he imagined one in every piece of wood or stone.

  ‘That grey bush smells funny,’ said Audrey.

  ‘It’s wormwood. Grows anywhere and it’s as tough as old boots.’

  Audrey tipped the last drops of water from the tin bowl. ‘Mrs Paterson, can I …’ She corrected herself. ‘May I ask you something?’

  Mrs Paterson looked doubtful, but she said, ‘If it is not too personal.’

  Audrey swung the bowl in one hand. Drips flew sideways. ‘How do I know if it’s too personal?’

  ‘I suppose I’ll have to tell you, won’t I?’

  ‘But I’d have to ask it first. Then, if you said it was too personal, it would be too late. I would already have asked it.’

  ‘Must you always make everything so complicated?’ said Mrs Paterson. ‘Is it about religion, money or politics?’

  ‘I don’t think so.’

  ‘Vroom, vroom,’ said Douglas. His stick-car turned a wide circle in the mud.

  ‘Speak then,’ Mrs Paterson told Audrey.

  ‘Why don’t you like colours?’

  The old lady paused for a moment, then she said, ‘I am in mourning.’

  ‘But it’s the afternoon.’

  ‘I mean that I am remembering someone who died … This is hardly the place to discuss such things.’

  ‘I’m good at keeping secrets.�
�

  ‘It is no secret. The whole town knows.’

  ‘Would you tell me then?’

  Mrs Paterson’s mouth tightened as though she was not going to answer. Then she said, ‘My son, Lionel.’

  ‘Is he one of the men in the photos on your mantelpiece?’ said Audrey. ‘Was he sick?’

  ‘You ask too many questions. Children should be seen and not heard.’

  ‘But then we wouldn’t find out anything.’

  Mrs Paterson sighed. ‘He was killed in the Great War. In 1917.’

  ‘That’s a long time with no colour.’

  Mrs Paterson’s face looked like a crumpled cloth.

  ‘My two sisters, Pearl and Esther, died when they were little,’ said Audrey. ‘But I don’t reckon they’d want me to be sad for a long time. They’d want me to have colours. What’s your son’s favourite colour?’

  ‘I am not certain. Perhaps … blue.’

  ‘You’d look pretty in blue. It’s the colour of your eyes,’ said Audrey. ‘I don’t want my mum to be sad. I bet Lionel wouldn’t want you to be either.’

  The old lady was quiet. Perhaps she was remembering her Lionel.

  ‘I’m a girl so I can’t be a son,’ said Audrey, determined to cheer the old lady up. ‘But I’m your project. That’s the next best thing.’

  Thirty-two

  Audrey sat on a stool at Mrs Paterson’s feet in the sitting room. Despite the metal screen with its pattern of Afghans and camels, the fire heated Audrey’s back. She held Mrs Paterson’s fingers, massaging hand cream into her skin. The afternoon’s gardening had left a few scratches, but nothing deep or painful.

  The old lady’s eyes were half-closed. Although her cheeks were unusually red, she made no move to shift away from the fire.

  Douglas rolled across the floor, from one wall to the other. Then he stopped and sat up. ‘Howolderyu?’

  ‘What did that boy say?’ Mrs Paterson spoke without fully opening her eyes.

  ‘How old are you?’ repeated Audrey, smoothing a trail of hand cream over Mrs Paterson’s knuckles.

  The old lady’s eyes did shoot open then. ‘Young man, it is rude to ask a lady how old she is.’