by Karen Wyld
‘Can I help?’
Bethel turned around, sleeves rolled up. ‘No, it’s fine.’ Brigid nodded. ‘Okay. I’ll go settle the girls into bed.’
A short time later, Maggie walked in the kitchen with another cup and placed it in the soapy water.
‘Bethel?’
‘Yes, dear.’
Maggie pointed to Bethel’s wrist. ‘Why are those numbers not washing off in that water?’
Bethel hurriedly pulled down her sleeve. Turning, she noticed Brigid standing in the doorway. She knew Brigid had heard Maggie’s question. Perhaps even seen the faded ink on the inside of her lower arm.
‘Maggie, don’t ask so many questions of grown-ups. It’s rude,’ Brigid advised.
‘I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to be rude.’
‘You should be in bed. It’s late.’
Maggie said, ‘I want to help Bethel.’
‘That is kind of you,’ said Bethel gently. ‘I have only a few more dishes to wash. Perhaps, instead, you can help me make breakfast in the morning.’
SEVEN
The next morning, Brigid didn’t need any convincing to stay one more day. She wanted to return to the site of the inland sea in the daylight. And to speak with Isabelle. Omer had promised to return early from work, so they would have plenty of time to drive out there. He kept his word, arriving home just after lunch. This time, the girls insisted on coming too. Nothing Brigid could say would dissuade them, so they all got in the cabin of Omer’s ute, and headed out mid-afternoon.
As they drove past Isabelle’s campsite, Brigid lifted a hand and waved.
‘Who’s that?’ asked Victoria.
‘The woman? That’s Isabelle. I met her briefly last night. We’ll stop there on the way back.’
Soon, Omer stopped the car and they all got out.
‘Is this where that sea was?’ asked Maggie.
Omer replied, ‘Yes. If you walk around, you might find a fossil of a sea creature. The opalised ones are very hard to find, but if you look hard enough you just might be in luck.’
The girls squealed in delight and ran off to find treasure. Omer and Brigid watched them running around, each stopping now and again to pick up a rock to examine.
‘It’s so big, I can’t even see the other side of this indentation,’ remarked Brigid. ‘I wonder why it was so important for him to find this place.’
‘Who?’
‘Someone I once knew. He left years ago to search for the inland sea. And I thought, I thought…’
Omer asked gently, ‘What did you think?’
‘It’s so silly. I realise that now,’ she said. ‘I always thought he would be here. That I would finally find him, beside the sea he sought.’
‘Don’t give up.’
She shook her head. ‘I’m such a fool.’
‘Then you’re in the right place. We’re all fools around here. Spending our days down holes, hoping to find shiny coloured rocks that will make us rich beyond our dreams. The only ones with any sense are people like Isabelle.’
‘I wonder what she wanted to speak to me about.’
Omer shrugged. Hearing Maggie shout, they both turned towards the girls. Maggie was hopping up and down in excitement. She ran to her mother, while Victoria ambled behind her.
‘Look, Mumma,’ Maggie said as she handed her a flat rock.
Brigid ran a finger along white grooves in the grey rock, tracing the outline of something ancient. Omer studied the rock in Brigid’s hand.
‘You’ve found a fossil. See. That’s the imprint of an extinct marine creature.’
Victoria handed Omer a smaller rock. ‘What’s this?’
Omer turned it over. ‘It’s a fossilised scorpion. Not as old as the marine fossil your sister found, but still old.’
He handed it back to Victoria, and she put it in her pocket.
‘You both have keen eyes, to find treasure so quickly,’ said Omer.
Brigid remarked, ‘Or perhaps they’re just lucky. Shall we head home now?’
The girls complained, as they wanted to look for more fossils. Omer reminded them there was still a tour of his mine to be had, with an added promise of fossicking for opals. So they got back in the ute, imagining the treasure they’d find in Omer’s mine.
Nearing the campsite, Brigid said, ‘Don’t forget, we need to stop here for a bit.’
Omer nodded and turned the car to the right, gingerly driving off the dirt track, over rocky ground. He stopped close to the campfire, and they saw Isabelle poking the fire with a stick. Omer excused himself and went towards a man who had his head under a car bonnet, while Brigid and the girls walked over to the campfire. Isabelle gestured for them to sit, then sat down next to Brigid.
‘Did you find what you were looking for?’ Isabelle asked.
Brigid shook her head. ‘The sea was empty.’
Isabelle laughed. ‘Not empty. Far from it.’ She turned her attention to the twins. ‘I know these ones.’
Brigid frowned. Having just been bitterly disappointed by a sea that was not a sea, and, after many years of holding hope close to her chest, she was not in the mood for cryptic puzzles.
‘I’m Victoria, and this is Maggie.’
‘Can I pat that little dog?’ asked Maggie, pointing to a small dog lying in the dirt a few steps away.
Isabelle nodded, and the girls got up to fuss over the dog.
‘I’m their aunty,’ Isabelle announced, inclining her head in the direction of the twins.
‘What?’
‘Their aunty, long way back. A great aunt.’
‘How is that possible? I have no connection to here.’
‘The girls do. Through their father.’
‘You know their father?’
Isabelle moved her legs, tucking them underneath. ‘Daniel was here. Looking for that sea. He talked a lot about you, but never once mentioned those young ones.’
‘Where is he?’ asked Brigid, jumping up.
‘Sit. Sit back down. He’s long gone.’
Brigid was on the verge of tears, her shoulders slumped in weariness.
Isabelle reached over and patted Brigid’s knee. ‘No, not that type of gone. He went back, to you. He’d found what he was searching for, both that inland sea and family. And then realised that his family was still incomplete without you in his life. So he left. And now you are here, not there.’
Brigid started to cry, softly at first, and then she sobbed loudly. Her daughters ran over, surprised by her uncustomary tears. They comforted her with cuddles until her tears stopped.
Isabelle stood and patted the dust off her dress. ‘You come back. Tomorrow. We talk more, tomorrow. And bring them girls.’
Omer, having noticed that Isabelle had left, walked towards Brigid. ‘Ready?’
Next morning, Omer dropped Brigid and the girls at Isabelle’s campsite, then, with a quick wave, continued on his way to work. Once they were settled by the fire, an adolescent girl offered them some damper. It was still warm, and the jam they smothered on it melted quickly. Soon the girls were licking their sticky fingers clean. Their chins were not so easy to deal with, so with a laugh the older girl led them to a bucket of water.
‘I can see a strong resemblance to family in those girls,’ remarked Isabelle.
‘Even Maggie? The green-eyed one.’
Isabelle nodded. ‘It’s in their eyes.’ She turned and peered inquisitively at Brigid’s deep-brown eyes.
Brigid smiled. ‘Neither of them inherited my brown eyes or their father’s hazel eyes. I got these from my father. He died overseas, during the war. I don’t remember him. I was very young when he left. The girls were born on his community, where my nana Vic and grandfather Albert still live. Victoria’s blue eyes remind me of my mother’s eyes. She got those from her father, my grandfather. I never got to meet him, neither did she. He died at sea. You see, Granny wasn’t from here, she came by boat, just before my mother was born. Her eyes were an unusual grey.’
> ‘You’re a chatty one.’
Brigid blushed. ‘Not usually.’
Victoria and Maggie returned clean-faced and sat beside their mother.
‘Do you want to hear a yarn?’ Isabelle asked them. ‘About your father’s family?’
They seemed unsure. Victoria and Maggie could both remember a time their mother often shared stories of their father. The same few treasured stories, over and over. The girls never tired of hearing about him. As the years went past, though, and more road was trodden, their mother had stopped talking about him. The girls longed to hear those stories again, but the sadness in their mother’s eyes made it too hard to ask.
Brigid smiled reassuringly at them and, turning to Isabelle, replied, ‘Yes, please.’
Isabelle addressed the girls: ‘Last time I saw your father, he sat in the very same spot as you sit now. Many years ago. He stayed here for a while, having finally found the inland sea that had been calling him since he was a little fella.’
Maggie asked in disbelief, ‘Our father was here?’
Isabelle nodded. ‘The old sea called him back to Country. I’d been waiting for him long time before the day I found him standing on the shore of the ancient sea. He was overjoyed that in addition to the inland sea he’d also found family. You see, he was taken as a bubba, from his mother’s arms.’
Brigid nodded, remembering how he had told her that many times. The government and mission refusing to tell him where he was from, or anything about his family, had hurt Danny deeply. Unlike Brigid, he’d always wanted to put the pieces of his puzzle together.
Isabelle continued: ‘I’ll tell you what I told him, as we’re family. Your father is my nephew, being my brother’s boy. So you call me Aunty. Okay? I will tell you his story. First, we must start with my parents’ story. My mother Nellie was born not far from here. This is her Country. Yours too. My father came from far away, born in a golden desert across the seas. He arrived with three camels and a prayer mat, and quickly set his path as a trader. Once a year he would visit white people’s mines and railway workers’ campsites, bringing pots and pans, sturdy shoes, cloth, thread and, occasionally, luxury items. They called him many names, the Cameleer being one, but Abdul Ziyad was his name. I called him Baba. He would also stop at my grandparents’ campsite, offering whatever the other customers had passed over, at lowered prices. When the white people’s campsites became a town, his visits became twice-yearly. And after my baba met my mother, thrice a year. Over a couple of years, Abdul Ziyad shyly watched Nellie. At first, she didn’t even acknowledge his presence. She was young and had not yet been told the way of things. It was my grandmother who first noticed the young cameleer’s awkwardness around Nellie. Knowing that the girl had never shown any interest in the men who’d been suggested as potential partners, my grandmother had a word with her husband. Reluctantly, he agreed. He could see that Abdul Ziyad was a good man who worked hard.
And so, after Nellie’s woman ceremony, my grandmother whispered in her ear. Next time the cameleer came to town, for the first time, Nellie noticed a certain twinkle in his unusual blue eyes. And from then on, she was smitten. Three visits later, Abdul Ziyad nervously approached my grandfather. When he rode out of town, Nellie was seated on the smallest camel.’
‘Blue,’ remarked Victoria. ‘Like my eyes, Aunty Isabelle?’
She nodded. ‘And you have the cameleer’s nose, just like I do. Your sister has your grandmother Eva’s eyes. Eva, your father’s mother, was such a beauty. That part of the story comes later. When Nellie returned, my grandmothers glanced at her unchanged waistline. Shrugging, they took her away from her husband and asked a thousand questions, the most common being: what did the world look like from the back of a camel? Each time Nellie returned to camp, the older women would glance at her belly and shrug. A few years later, they began to frown. And a few years after that, they began to question her more intently. A different question by then: was he not a proper husband?’
The old woman paused and reached over to pick up a branch. Gently placing it on the fire, she continued the story: ‘It took many years, but there came a time when no shrugs or raised eyebrows were needed when Nellie rode into camp, for she was very round of belly. The next time they visited, my mother carried my older brother Abdul Jafar in her arms. A few visits later, Abdul Jafar sat on the lead camel, Baba on the end, and our mother on the middle one. Mother held newly born me tightly in her arms. Baba’s blue eyes were not passed down to my brother or to me. Mother would always say: the next one. There were no more. She became unwell, at about the time I had begun to walk. It was decided that mother and I were to stay here, so she could get help with me and some much-needed rest. Abdul Jafar went with Baba. When they returned, mother had been gone a month.
As I was so young, Baba left me here, with family. Baba and my brother came back regularly at first, then less and less frequently. When the railway station was built nearby, and a general store opened, there was no further need for a cameleer’s services. Baba stopped visiting. I didn’t really mind, as his long absences had made him like a stranger. And although I missed my brother, I had many cousins to play with. When word got out about the richness of the opals being dug up here, Abdul Jafar finally returned. He had aged, as had I, so I did not recognise my brother at first sight. Abdul Jafar told me Baba had died a few years before. Abdul Jafar also told me, in secret, how he’d returned to make enough money to propose to the woman he loved. They had met when he was working on a pearler. Eva was a green-eyed mermaid. Well, the way my brother described her she sounded like one. Eva was quite a bit younger than my brother. He told me that she could hold her breath longer than any of the other divers, male or female. She had told Abdul Jafar it was because she had salt water in her blood. Her mother had come from islands far to the north-east of this continent, and had also been a diver. Eva’s father was born here. Brown-skinned, red-haired and green-eyed, which made him stand out in any crowd. When Eva was a child, he’d told her stories of long-ago shipwrecks and red-haired maroons.’
Maggie piped up, ‘Green! Like my eyes.’
Maggie and Victoria exchanged thoughts, in the silent way of twins. Until now, they had both wished they had beautiful brown eyes, like their mother’s. And like Nana Vic’s and Grandfather Albert’s. They’d often wondered why their eyes were so different and were pleased to finally find out that they did, after all, have eyes like family.
‘My brother never did make as much money as he’d dreamt of. He did, however, unearth a unique treasure from the site of the inland sea, something so amazing he hoped it would sway Eva to say yes. He’d found three perfect pearls.’
‘Pearls?’ asked Brigid, frowning. ‘Out here?’
‘Fossilised pearls, the size of small bird eggs. They had been lying in that ancient seabed since the beginning of time and had become opalised. He thought these unique pearls would win him the heart of a famed pearl diver. He did win her heart, but not because of the pearls. It was because Eva had loved Abdul from the moment she’d first seen him standing on the deck of the pearler. So they married. And seven years later, they had three sons. The youngest was Daniel, your father. Your grandfather, my brother Abdul Jafar, was unfortunately killed by a shark the day before your father was born. A week later, white people took your father and his brothers away from your grandmother Eva. She searched for her boys for many years. Even sold the fossilised pearls to hire a lawyer. Not even a whisper of her sons was found. Eva died of sorrow before her hair had time to turn grey.’
Brigid reached out and gathered her daughters closer. Them being taken was still her greatest fear, and the reason she generally avoided staying in one place for too long. She had learnt her lesson at that last town, and was never going to repeat that mistake again.
Isabelle got up. ‘It’s time for my afternoon lie-down. Don’t worry, Omer is on his way.’
Brigid turned around and saw dust in the distance, most probably made by Omer’s car. She turned to s
ay goodbye, but Isabelle had already walked away.
Brigid called out, ‘You haven’t told me how long ago Danny left.’
‘Tomorrow. Come back tomorrow. Without the little ones. We will talk then.’
Disappointed, Brigid walked over to the edge of the track to wait for Omer with the twins. She was quiet all the way back to the house, while the girls asked Omer a million questions about his opal mine.
‘Stop with the interrogation,’ he finally said. ‘You’ll see for yourselves. I’ll take you there tomorrow and give you the tour. That’s if your mother agrees.’
‘Can we, Mumma?’ asked Maggie excitedly.
Brigid nodded, and then turned to look out the window.
As it was, they did not get to go to the mine the next day, or the day after. And Brigid did not get to talk further with Isabelle. Omer had come down with the flu and was not fit for working, or even driving. At first Bethel had to order him back to bed constantly, but soon he was too feverish to even think of going anywhere. Every morning, the girls would enquire about him at breakfast, hoping that today would be the day they visited the mine. Every morning they were disappointed. Five days later, they walked into the kitchen to find Omer eating breakfast.
‘You ready?’ he asked, putting down his cup of coffee.
They scuttled from the room to get ready for the long-awaited outing. Brigid made lunch for four, and had almost finished when the girls returned. While Brigid went to put on her shoes, the girls helped Bethel pack up the lunches. Then they skipped to the ute, slowly followed by Omer and their mother.
‘Can we stop off at Isabelle’s on the way?’ asked Brigid.
Omer nodded, but once they got to the turn-off to Isabelle’s camp, they saw nothing in the distance. No smoke, no cars, nothing.
Brigid asked, ‘Can we go closer, just to be sure?’
‘They often go away,’ replied Omer. ‘Don’t worry, they’ll be back soon.’
Brigid frowned all the way to the mine, and barely took any notice as Omer showed them around. The girls, on the other hand, found the mine fascinating and had many questions.
