Beneath the Southern Cross

by Judy Nunn

  ‘Certainly.’ Well, you couldn’t expect manners from the working classes could you? ‘I shan’t be a moment,’ and Harriet sailed away with her nose in the air.

  Norah was mortified. ‘How could you be so rude, Ben?’ she whispered. ‘She’s a lady, she’s very refined.’

  ‘She’s a saleswoman, that’s what she is, and we’re the ones who’re buying.’

  He had that look in his eyes which told Norah she mustn’t argue. She gave an inward sigh. It was very hard keeping up appearances when Benjamin was in one of his defiant moods. ‘I didn’t look at the price,’ she said, ‘I hope we can afford it.’

  He grinned, the mood broken. ‘Course we can, love. We’re doing well, remember?’ He was referring to the raise he’d received at Wunderlich’s the previous month.

  ‘Yes, but it looks so expensive …’

  ‘Sssh.’

  Benjamin would brook no argument, and when the woman returned with a pair of ice-blue kid gloves, Norah was so distracted by their softness and perfection that, as she tried them on, she failed to notice either the exchange between Benjamin and Harriet Winterman, or the fact that they had both disappeared to the nearby service counter. She rested her gloved fingers against her cheek, relishing the velvety touch, and gazed at her image in the oval mirror. Was this really her in the picture hat with the blue satin ribbon and the ice-blue gloves to match?

  Suddenly the woman was at her side again, and Norah felt herself once more flush with embarrassment. How vain she must have appeared.

  ‘Shall I pack it for you, madam?’ The woman carried a ribboned hatbox, and her tone was icy. Benjamin must have offended her again.

  ‘Yes. Thank you,’ she said a little nervously.

  ‘No.’ Benjamin took the hatbox from the woman. ‘She’ll wear it, won’t you, Norah?’ He opened the hatbox. ‘Put those in here, thank you,’ he said peremptorily, gesturing to Norah’s hat and gloves which sat on the satin stool beside the mirror.

  ‘Of course.’ Harriet picked up Norah’s straw hat with the beige tulle around the brim as if it was slightly suspect. Then, together with the cream cotton gloves, she gingerly placed it in the hatbox. ‘I trust we will see you again, madam.’ She smiled tightly.

  ‘Yes. Thank you so much.’ Norah took Benjamin’s arm and they left to collect Tim from the toy department.

  Harriet Winterman watched them go, furious with herself. How could she have allowed such a trivial incident to upset her? He was a common, vulgar, working man, yet he had successfully reminded her that, not only was she well past her prime and no longer attractive to men, she was on a social level comparable to his. She, who had been Charles Kendle’s mistress, albeit for a short period of time.

  Harriet watched the couple disappear up the stairs, then turned to survey her domain. For the rest of the morning, she prowled the Millinery and Haberdashery Department wielding her power and wreaking her vengeance upon those unable to fight back. Harriet Winterman was not a happy woman.

  ‘I can’t wear it, Ben, truly I can’t. It’s far too grand.’ Norah’s mortification at Benjamin’s rudeness to the stylish saleswoman had been replaced by self-consciousness, and she stopped him as they were halfway up the stairs to the second floor. ‘I’m going to take it off right now. I’ll put it on again as soon as we get home, I promise.’

  Benjamin looked at the women parading past, up and down the grand staircase. Many of them wore picture hats far more ornate than Norah’s. He pointed them out, one by one. ‘There,’ he said. ‘See? And there.’

  ‘Stop it, Ben, it’s so rude to point.’ She started up the stairs once more, sure that they were conspicuous, loitering mid-level. ‘It doesn’t go with my dress,’ she insisted.

  ‘Yes, it does.’

  ‘My dress is beige.’

  ‘What colour is your shawl?’

  ‘Blue,’ she admitted after a moment’s hesitation.

  ‘A perfect match.’ He stopped her as they reached the second floor. ‘I want you to wear it, Norah. For me. As a birthday present. Please.’

  Benjamin desperately wanted his wife to wear the hat. It was true that it didn’t really go with the dress, Benjamin could see that himself, but he wanted Norah to assert herself. He wanted her to do something a little bit daring. Just this once.

  Norah registered that it was important, for some unfathomable reason, that she wear the hat. She hesitated. Dare she? ‘All right,’ she said, steeling herself, shoulders back, head held high. This was Ben’s birthday and she wanted to please him.

  They collected Timothy and bought him a set of marbles. Impressive but not expensive.

  ‘You’ll be the envy of Surry Hills with those, Tim,’ Benjamin said, and Tim nodded happily. He was a good-natured child and easy to please.

  ‘We must buy a present for you now, Ben,’ Norah said as, upon Tim’s insistence, they headed once more for the dreaded lift.

  ‘Not yet, love, it’s lunchtime. After lunch we will. You hungry, Tim?’ He hoped to avoid the issue altogether—there was no money left to buy him a present.

  Benjamin had been astonished to discover that the cost of the hat was a full week’s wages, more than they could afford, but not for one moment had he contemplated admitting as much to the patronising saleswoman.

  The gloves had cost close to another week’s wages and Benjamin had been left with three pounds in his pocket. Enough for a modest present for Tim, a picnic lunch in Hyde Park, and a little bit left to tide them over. He’d intended taking them somewhere posh for lunch, but the idea of a picnic in the park met with such delight from Tim that Norah readily agreed, unaware of its financial necessity.

  The lift doors clanged open and they stepped out into the main foyer, Norah instinctively flinching as she caught sight of herself in one of the many wall mirrors. Benjamin noticed her reaction and, when he took her hand, she looked up at him, smiled, and her gloved fingers squeezed his. The expense had been worth it, he thought. She did look pretty in the hat but, far more important, she had quelled her inhibitions. Just for him. And he admired her for that. It wouldn’t have been easy, Norah being Norah.

  Of course she’d be furious when she found out the cost of the hat and gloves, and they’d have to scrimp on housekeeping for the next two weeks. But they were hardly going to end up in the poor-house. Not for as long as he was employed by the Wunderlich Patent Ceiling and Roofing Company anyway. The Wunderlichs looked after their employees, particularly those who had worked for the company for a full eight years. Benjamin and his family were set for life.

  As they crossed the foyer, he looked up at the huge emblem in pressed metal above the main doors of the store. The gull’s wings and the sailing boat, and the motto, ‘Kendle and Streatham, Trading on the Wings of Honour’. Strange to think that he owed his good fortune to none other than Howard Streatham himself.

  Benjamin could vaguely remember having met Howard once, as a small boy, but his father must have known him quite well. In fact Benjamin recalled Samuel having once said that they were distantly related. Benjamin himself didn’t know how, and he didn’t much care, but he was deeply grateful to Howard Streatham.

  Samuel Kendall’s approach to Howard Streatham during the depression of 1893 had been a desperate last resort to help his son who, along with dozens of others, had lost his job due to the financial collapse of his employers.

  ‘I realise that Benjamin is in the same boat as hundreds of others all over the country, Howard,’ Samuel had said, finding the situation even more disconcerting than he’d expected. Perhaps it was the luxury of his surroundings, seated on the terrace of Streatham’s mansion in Kirribilli, looking out over the immaculate lawn at the ferries crossing the harbour. Samuel, a builder’s labourer, had worked on many a fine house in histime, but never one as grand as this. And here he was asking Howard Streatham to give his son a job. No wonder he felt awkward.

  ‘But you see, the boy’s got himself into a spot of trouble,’ he explained. ‘A girl.’
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  ‘Ah.’

  ‘Yes, stupid young pup, only twenty-one he is. They’re getting married within the month.’

  ‘I can see your cause for concern.’ Howard pushed his spectacles up his nose, a nervous mannerism he’d adopt when he felt uncomfortable.

  Howard had seen little of Samuel since Hannah’s funeral all those years ago, but he knew that although uneducated, even somewhat coarse, Samuel was an honest man, a man worthy of respect. ‘But, as I’m sure you realise,’ he continued with regret, sincerely wishing that he could be of help, ‘Charles would refuse to employ your son.’

  ‘Oh yes, I know that only too well,’ Samuel growled. Charles employ a Kendall? He’d die first. ‘That’s why I’ve come to you instead of your cousin.’ Samuel leaned forward in his chair. ‘You employ so many, couldn’t you give the boy some back-room job, anything that’ll earn him a few quid, and Charles’d be none the wiser?’

  ‘Regrettably no. Charles regularly examines the books and visits every department of the store. It would be only a matter of time before he found out.’

  ‘I see.’ Samuel took his hat from the table in front of him. He certainly wasn’t about to beg. ‘Thanks for your time,’ he said as he stood.

  Howard knew exactly what Samuel was thinking. The store’s half yours, why don’t you tell Charles to go to hell? But to employ a Kendall simply wasn’t worth the trouble. Not since the killing of Paddy O’Shea. Since then Charles had become fixated.

  ‘He was Hannah’s son! A Kendall and a lunatic!’ he would roar. ‘The man had been out to ruin me for years! He attacked me at his own mother’s graveside. If it weren’t for the butler, my wife would be dead.’

  Howard religiously avoided any discussion on the events of that night. They were simple enough, it appeared. A small paragraph in the newspaper had been enough to explain it all. An armed burglar, caught committing a felony in the home of Charles Kendle, had attacked the mistress of the house and the butler had had the presence of mind to take the master’s revolver from his desk and shoot the attacker dead.

  ‘One moment, Samuel.’ Howard rose from his chair. ‘I have another idea. Your boy is a builder like yourself, is he not?’ Samuel nodded. ‘Any experience with roofing?’

  ‘He’s done the lot.’ Samuel’s reply was terse. Howard Streatham was a coward.

  ‘Come and have a look at this.’ Howard stepped from the porch onto the lawn and Samuel joined him as he strode several paces down towards the harbour then turned back. ‘See that?’ He pointed to the gabled roof of his magnificent Queen Anne style house. ‘Terracotta roofing tiles from Marseilles. The Wunderlich brothers have recently become the sole agent for their importation.’

  Samuel’s belligerence turned to hope. ‘You’d put in a word?’ he asked, wondering, however, just how much influence Howard really had with the Wunderlich company. If he was afraid of his own cousin, how could he command the respect of men like the Wunderlichs?

  Howard had nodded. ‘I’m sure they’ll take him, they need experienced roofing men.’ And they had.

  The picnic lunch having been an unmitigated success, Benjamin, Norah and Timothy alighted from their tram in Elizabeth Street outside the Tramway Hotel, turned the corner and walked up Wexford Street into the heart of Surry Hills, happily exhausted.

  Although the City of Sydney Improvement Board had demanded the demolition of many hundreds of working-class houses in Surry Hills, the suburb had remained relatively unchanged. Thickly populated, tenanted mainly by working-class labourers and small freeholders who lived on the premises of their numerous pubs, workshops, stables and grocery stores, Surry Hills had a character uniquely its own.

  The press, in eulogising the mayoral efforts to clean up inner city suburbs, ran rampant with stories of Chinese gambling and opium dens, child whores, and the murderous push gangs that prowled the lanes and alleys of the slums of Surry Hills. But overlooked by the newspapers was the true resilience of the local residents. A network of neighbourly support, coupled with a common cynicism of authority, bred a close-knit community which rallied together in the face of adversity.

  Benjamin, Norah and Timothy walked up the hill, past the small joss house where their nostrils were assailed with the odour of burning incense, past the gaming house and the sly grog shop, past the restaurant which boasted three-course meals for sevenpence. ‘Soup, meat and sweets’, the sign said, ‘bread and butter and a cup of tea included’.

  They stopped to say hello to Ping Kee, the Chinese storekeeper who was seated outside his shop. The Chinese had long been resident in Surry Hills and were recognised as a peaceable community, despite their fondness for gambling and opium.

  They crossed over Exeter Place, a narrow lane running east of Wexford, and Norah shuddered as she always did. Exeter Place was a constant reminder of the plague. Mostly demolished during the cleansing operations of 1900, the houses which remained standing amongst the rubble were hovels of stone and rusty corrugated iron, where poverty was rife and families lived five to a room.

  Not that Wexford Street was much better, but at least the congested rows of terrace houses had survived. And some even looked attractive, here and there an iron lace balcony, albeit rusty, or a wooden awning, albeit in need of a coat of paint. But many a family in Wexford Street lived on the poverty line and, like their neighbours, they had not escaped the plague.

  Norah could remember only too vividly the months of quarantine during the cleansing operations, when gangs of ratcatchers and disinfectors had combed the crowded dwellings. Samuel Kendall and his sons, Benjamin and young Billy, along with many other locals trapped within the quarantined areas, were unable to go to work and had lined up for employment as ratcatchers. It was dangerous work, potentially fatal but, at seven shillings a day, eagerly sought after. Rumour had it that up to a thousand men had camped out in the backyards and lanes of the Darling Harbour goods yard in the hope that they would be quarantined and so obtain employment. Such was the desperation of the poor, Norah supposed; but she had watched daily, with sick foreboding, as her husband, together with his father and young brother, had joined the ranks of the professional ratcatchers.

  It was the fleas that carried the plague, that’s what the newspapers had said. The rats had come into the city on board ships from foreign ports and the rats brought the fleas.

  Outbreaks of bubonic plague had seized the older and poorer neighbourhoods of Sydney and over three hundred people had been infected, one third of whom had died. It was no wonder that Samuel, strong as he was, had been taken. The wonder lay in the fact that his sons had escaped his fate, and Norah had been deeply thankful that the good Lord had seen fit to save her Benjamin. But her heart had gone out to Beth who had had to watch the hideous death of her husband.

  ‘Beth,’ she said as they arrived at the shabby door of number 22 which opened directly onto the pavement and where, overhead, the red climbing geraniums in the corner tub wove their way through the iron lacework of the balcony. Norah was very proud of her red geraniums. ‘We should have bought a present for Beth.’

  ‘Mum can live without,’ Benjamin replied, opening the door. ‘She can share Tim’s marbles,’ he grinned, winking at his son. ‘I bet she’ll beat you, you know how good she is at marbles.’

  ‘I bet she won’t.’ The boy raced into the house yelling at the top of his voice. ‘Gran! Come and look at my marbles!’ They heard him inside, thundering up the narrow stairs to the little rear bedroom he shared with his grandmother and which doubled as Beth’s sewing room. ‘Gran,’ they heard him yell as he went, ‘do you want a game of marbles?’

  It was only then Norah realised, with horror, ‘Ben! We didn’t buy you a present! It’s your birthday, and we didn’t buy you a present!’

  ‘Well, what have we here?’ a female voice interrupted from overhead. ‘Royalty visiting Surry Hills,’ and a loud guffaw followed. It was Nellie Putman, on the balcony adjoining theirs; she’d watched them walking up the street.

 
Benjamin and Norah stepped off the pavement and onto the street to look up at their neighbour who was dangling herself dangerously over the railing.

  ‘Wondered who it was under that fancy hat.’ There was no malice in the tone, but Benjamin could feel Norah cringe beside him.

  Nellie Putman was a large, loud, vulgar woman. Married to a petty criminal who spent much of his life behind bars, her two older sons were the terrors of the neighbourhood, but Nellie herself had a heart as big as any to be found in Surry Hills and people respected her for it.

  Not Norah, however. Norah found itembarrassing, having the Putmans as neighbours, and Benjamin found her embarrassment irksome.

  ‘Must have cost a pretty penny,’ Nellie yelled down at them.

  ‘It did, but it was worth it,’ Benjamin called back. ‘Doesn’t she look a treat?’

  He glanced at his wife, praying that Norah wouldn’t spoil their perfect day. She would not be outrightly rude to Nellie, he knew that. But sometimes her embarrassment caused her to be aloof, and aloofness in Surry Hills was interpreted as snobbery, one of the cardinal sins, a public brawl being far more acceptable than a social snub.

  Norah had automatically winced at Nellie’s raucous tone, and she was now painfully aware that strangers passing by, and neighbours peering from doorways and balconies, were all looking at her hat. She wished wholeheartedly that she could disappear but, conscious of her husband’s scrutiny, she bravely stood her ground and smiled up at the balcony.

  ‘He bought me these beautiful gloves too, Nellie, look,’ she held up her hands, ‘and he bought some marbles for Timmy. But it’s his own birthday. It’s Ben’s birthday, and we didn’t even get him a present.’

  ‘You’ll be his present in that hat, lovey, you mark my words you will.’

  Pleased by Norah’s unexpectedly friendly response, Nellie Putman gave them a wave before she went inside. ‘Happy birthday, Ben, we’ll share a beer before tea, what do you say?’

  ‘Good-o. See you out the back at six then.’ Benjamin returned the wave, then pulled Norah close to him. ‘She’s right, love,’ he kissed her lightly, ‘you’re my birthday present.’