Gifts of the Peramangk

by Dean Mayes

  Virginia slumped back against the cabin of the truck and drew her legs up even closer, gripping the single bag she held in her hands. Though she felt too tired to be frightened at this point, her heart was pumping quickly in her chest.

  At the foot of the stairs leading up to the verandah of the house, a tall man stood in wait. He was wearing a flannel shirt, dusty brown pants with suspenders and an aging leather belt. A wide brimmed pastoralist’s hat sat low on his head, concealing his eyes and much of his face in shadow. A cob pipe jutted from one corner of his mouth; curling wisps of blue smoke drifted up into the air from it. The man stood, his huge arms bent at the elbows, his hands in his pockets, silent. Waiting.

  The driver stepped out of the cabin of the truck and strode around to the rear. Once there, he signalled with a sharp gesture of his hand and a shrill whistle.

  “Come on,” he snapped.

  Virginia didn’t respond. She didn’t look up. She didn’t move.

  Hoisting himself up into the tray, the driver snatched the bag out of Virginia’s hands and angrily tossed it over the side. Before she knew what was happening, he grabbed her arm roughly and jerked her forward, dragging her like a rag doll off the back of the truck. Once off the ground, he leaned close to her.

  “Pick up your bag, you little grub.”

  He let her go and immediately stood tall, flashing a syrupy smile as he adjusted his Stetson on his head and walked up to the man at the foot of the verandah.

  The dog, who had sat itself down on the ground several feet away, watched the crumpled form of the girl beside the truck. Slowly, she got to her feet and stepped over to her up ended bag. The dog, its tall ears pricked up and forward, whimpered softly, its long tongue lolling.

  The driver offered his hand to the silent man who remained frozen where he stood. He did not return the gesture.

  “Good afternoon,” the driver greeted drippingly, withdrawing his hand quickly in a pathetic attempt to pretend that he had meant to swat an insect from in front of his face. “I’m Whitchester, from the Aborigines Protection Office.”

  The Pastoralist’s eyes were focused beyond Whitchester, upon the child who stepped gingerly toward them, her bare feet flinching on the hot, dusty ground. Her dress was dirty, plain and torn in a couple of places. She looked sick and pasty, despite her dark skin.

  Virginia stopped a few feet behind Whitchester and looked up at the Pastoralist. He was a huge man, with a broad pair of shoulders, a stubbly jaw that appeared as hard as granite. She could not see his eyes under the brim of his hat.

  Whitchester turned and subtly dragged Virginia by her arm around to stand in front of him. He placed his hands down on her shoulders, causing her to wince.

  “This is the black you asked for,” Whitchester said.

  The Pastoralist tilted his head, examining the child from head to toe. His expression remained as flat as Virginia’s. After a few moments, he spoke.

  “Bit small. She got the mange or something?”

  “No, no—not at all,” Whitchester answered hastily. “It’s perhaps just the drive up. We passed through some weather on the way. I can assure you, the Office has given this black a clean bill of health. It’ll be…productive.”

  The Pastoralist took a meaty hand out of his pocket and rubbed his chin thoughtfully allowing several more moments of silence to pass. On the verandah behind him, two figures huddled at the corner of the house, watching the exchange.

  He cocked his head and issued a shrill dog whistle that echoed across the compound. The two figures, two young Aboriginal girls several years older than Virginia skittered quickly along the verandah and stopped at the top of the stairs.

  Without turning, the Pastoralist spoke.

  “Clean her up. Get her out of those rags.”

  One of the young girls skipped down the stairs and went across to Virginia.

  The barefoot teen-aged girl wore a crisp, white linen dress with an apron. Her hair was shiny and combed neatly to one side. When she reached Virginia she flashed her a warm, encouraging smile and took her hand. The girl’s skin felt soft and velvety against Virginia’s own. Quite inexplicably, Virginia felt a sharp jolt of something she had not experienced in a while.

  It was warmth.

  She had no idea what to expect. No idea where she was being taken to, but she submitted to the girl’s leading hand without protest.

  From a window of the farm house, Virginia caught a fleeting glimpse of a pair of eyes that peered out from behind a curtain. As Virginia climbed the steps, she noticed the curtain being held back by a petite and feminine hand. It lingered for a time, then it released the curtain and was gone.

  As the child stepped up onto the verandah, the dog sitting across the compound tracked them both with its eyes until they disappeared around the side of the house.

  The Pastoralist waited until the girls were out of sight then he turned on his heel and ascended the stairs silently, leaving Whitchester to stand there alone, awkwardly.

  Eventually, hesitantly, he turned and climbed into the truck. He started the engine and drove away from the farm house, disappearing over the horizon as though he had never existed.

  Virginia sat in a large metal tub filled with hot, soapy water as the two girls washed and scrubbed her tiny frame.

  It was the first bath she’d had in days and though she didn’t say it, Virginia felt indescribably good to be clean again.

  One of the girls, whose name was Deliah, fussed over Virginia’s hair, massaging it with the ends of her fingers, ridding it of all the dust and the grime that had accumulated. The second girl, the one who had first greeted Virginia, was perched on her haunches in front of Virginia, armed with a cloth and was cleaning her face. This girl, Marjorie, chatted away happily as she washed, telling Virginia all about the farm, the chickens in the yard, the wood they used for the fire, the shearing sheds for the sheep, the horse stables and the farm house with its beautiful furniture, its large kitchen with a big, old, cast iron stove and the ginger cat that flopped around lazily on the table there.

  Virginia remained silent, not daring to utter a word. Squinting through the soap, she surveyed her surroundings. They were inside one of the stone buildings outside the main house. It was a sparse single room with a fireplace at one end, a table and chairs in the middle, a sink and cabinets along one wall behind and a pair of bunks, standing along each side wall at the other end.

  Finally, Virginia was extricated from her bath and was dried off with fluffy white towels. They dressed her in a brand new white cotton dress, similar to the ones they wore, and an apron.

  Deliah combed Virginia’s hair, parting it carefully to one side until she was satisfied, then she nodded to herself.

  “There you are,” she said proudly. “Good as new.”

  Virginia didn’t say anything. She just blinked up at Deliah.

  “You don’t say much do you,” Deliah noted. “Can’t you talk?”

  Virginia remained silent.

  “Well, that’s no good,” Marjorie observed dryly. “We love to talk around here. We always talk—especially to the animals. They’re the best ones to talk to. All the time! Talk, talk, ta—”

  “You love to talk Marjy,” Deliah cut in gruffly. “You’d talk the leg off a horse if you were given the chance.”

  Marjorie appeared hurt for a fraction of a second before she smiled and winked at Virginia.

  Deliah appraised Virginia with her hands on her hips.

  “You don’t have to talk if you don’t want to—but it would help if we knew your name.”

  She cocked her head slightly, waiting for an answer.

  Virginia didn’t respond.

  Unperturbed, Deliah turned and went over to the bag Virginia had brought with her, which lay on the bed.

  Deliah opened the flap and rifled through it casually, looking for anything that might be labelled. Sure enough, she lifted one of the hospital dresses out of the bag and inspected its collar.

 
; “V. Crammond.” Deliah announced. “V. What is that—Violet?”

  Virginia remained still where she stood.

  “Hmm,” Deliah mused. “Viole…What about Veronica?”

  Still, Virginia didn’t move, didn’t speak.

  Deliah frowned then looked down into the bag once more. She reached in and pulled out a rather squashed and wrinkly rag doll—a bear—with patches all over and one missing button eye.

  She turned it over in her hands and looked closely at some text written on a tag that jutted out from one hip.

  “Virginia,” Deliah said. “It’s Virginia.”

  Marjorie grinned broadly and clapped her hands together.

  “Oooh—that is a lovely name,” she gushed.

  Deliah carefully returned the items to her bag and closed the flap once more. She stepped toward Virginia again.

  “Well, Virginia it is then. We’ll look after you here, Virginia. This place isn’t like the hospital. It’s—different.”

  Virginia noted Deliah’s pause, and fleetingly wondered at its significance. But she said nothing.

  “We have lots of things to do and we’re always bus—”

  The door to the out building flung open and the huge figure of the Pastoralist stepped through the entrance, ducking his head to avoid hitting it on the door frame.

  Both Deliah and Marjorie snapped to attention as he rose to his full height once more, while Virginia froze where she stood, blinking up at the Pastoralist, dumbfounded.

  He eyeballed all three girls.

  “You got her clean yet!?” his voice boomed in the confines of the room, causing both girls to shudder where they stood, while Virginia remained deathly still.

  The Pastoralist inspected Virginia up and down. He reached out and grabbed her hands in his own, seemingly monstrous palms. He turned them over in his, checking to make sure they were clean. He inspected her nails to ensure there was no dirt trapped underneath.

  Virginia watched him, too frightened to move or to protest.

  Once he was satisfied, he let them go and stood back.

  “Put her to work!” he snapped malevolently. “There’s chores to be done!”

  The Pastoralist scowled at them, before backing out of the room and leaving without shutting the door.

  Once he was gone, Deliah and Marjorie looked at each other with barely contained relief.

  Marjorie crept cautiously over to the entrance and peeked around the door frame to make sure he was gone.

  Deliah put her hand on Virginia’s shoulder.

  “Come on kiddo,” she said flatly. “We’ll start you out on the verandah.”

  And it was on the verandah, where it began—this new life that Virginia had been foisted into. She had no idea what was expected of her, no idea why she was here. Deliah fetched a wide broom that was leaning up against the stone work of the house and placed it into Virginia’s hands. She gestured to the dusty wooden boards of the verandah.

  “Start,” she said simply.

  While Deliah assigned herself to an axe handle and Marjorie spirited herself away to the kitchen, Virginia stood on the front porch of the house, armed with the broom that was almost twice as tall as she was. Slowly, steadily, Virginia extended the broom outward in her hands and began sweeping.

  With a methodical rhythm, Virginia quietly swept away the vestiges of her old life.

  She awoke before dawn, when the night sky still twinkled with a billion stars and began with the twice daily routine of sweeping the verandah of dust and grit. She was then directed to the chicken coop, down behind the out house where she slept, where she collected the eggs then cleaned out the coop—a constant battle she undertook with birds flying about her head and defecating on her. After that, Virginia was put to work in the horse stables, feeding the Pastoralist’s horses hay, ensuring they had fresh water and that their stalls were mucked out. She chopped wood in the darkness of the pre-dawn and long after dusk, regardless of the weather, wearing nothing but her linen dress. Chopping the firewood was the one task that frightened her. She struggled with the heavy axe and could barely wield it. She constantly feared that she would break it. She had already witnessed the consequences of breaking one of the Pastoralist’s tools.

  Once, Deliah had done just that whilst attempting to split a particularly knotted piece of timber. Deliah had brought the axe handle down, striking the wood awkwardly and the handle had cleaved clean in two. She stood there, blinking at the broken end of the handle. As if from nowhere, the Pastoralist materialised and stormed up to Deliah like a monstrous wraith. He snatched the broken handle from Deliah, grabbed her throat with his huge hand and smashed the splintered axe handle across her face, over and over, drawing blood through gaping lacerations. His ferocity wasn’t assuaged until she lapsed into unconsciousness. Then, calmly, he threw her to the ground and walked away, the bloodied axe handle still in his hand.

  Stunned by the horror she had witnessed, Virginia turned away and continued with her own work, too frightened to go to Deliah’s aid. She withdrew even further, making her work her refuge, her protection. Day after day, she would toil without stopping, without protest. All the while, watching from a short distance away was the black and white cattle dog with the pointed ears and mottled socks on its front legs. Virginia knew he was watching her, but she didn’t respond to him.

  Virginia fell into her bed each night and lay in the darkness, weeping softly until she fell asleep, tormented by her longing for home. Above Virginia, recovering from her grievous injuries, Deliah listened to her quiet sobs, whilst holding back her own, but she made no move to comfort Virginia.

  Virginia lost all concept of time. One day melded into another. She saw the sun rise and set. She made every effort to avoid the attention of the Pastoralist. She quickly grew to fear him—to hate him and she made sure she kept as far away and out of his view as possible.

  One evening, just on dusk, when the shrill song of crickets floated across the fields, Virginia moved along the verandah in one direction, sweeping the wooden boards clean, quietly proud of her work. She was careful to ensure that she had covered each part of the verandah twice, making sure that no area was missed or that a rogue collection of dust had accumulated behind her. The Pastoralist would skin her alive if the boards were not perfect.

  The dog sat beside a rocking chair while she worked, watching her. The dog had become a constant companion, even though Virginia continued to ignore his presence.

  As Virginia progressed, her mind filled with images of home. Memories of sweeping the small verandah of her parents’ cottage. Virginia would look up to see her mother’s smiling face as she watched Virginia with gratitude. Other memories rose up. Of riding tall on her father’s shoulders, laughing and singing as together, they walked along a track under the boughs of eucalyptus.

  She struggled against the grief as she stood here alone, on this vast porch that could, for all the world, have swallowed her whole. Tears spilled from Virginia’s eyes and dropped onto the boards under her feet. Panicked, she swept them away with her broom, fearing that the Pastoralist would see her and punish her.

  Why am I here? Why can’t I go home?

  The questions echoed, reverberating off corners and around bends inside her mind, tormenting her.

  She looked across the compound, out through gates of the farm, along the road that disappeared into the vast distance—an all consuming nothingness. Her desolation was complete.

  Suddenly, from behind Virginia, a sound issued forth from the closed window. It was a sound that Virginia had never heard before—a long, crisp refrain that seemed to go on forever. It wavered melodically then dissipated into nothingness.

  Virginia wiped furiously at her eyes and turned around as the sound came again, slightly louder this time, as pure as the one before it. She was struck. What on Earth could it be? Carefully scanning the verandah, ensuring there was no one else around, Virginia crept slowly up to the window. She leaned the broom handle against the s
tone work beside it and carefully placed her hands on the sill. As gently as she could, Virginia leaned in, craning her neck and peered through the glass.

  In the parlour beyond, a woman sat in a plush chair, her back to the window. A gramophone with a large brass horn stood on a pedestal in front of the woman. She was perched slightly forward and was holding something in her hands, up against her neck. Virginia squinted in the soft light from the parlour, trying to make out what it was. The woman drew a long, thin stick with a string tied to it across the object, eliciting a sound—the sound that Virginia had heard.

  Her grief had been completely usurped now, by fascination.

  The woman played, stringing several of these long notes together into a coherent stream of sound that sounded all at once somewhat mournful but also very pretty.

  Virginia was entranced.

  She watched, as the woman played some sort of music with the object in her hands. To Virginia, at first glance, it resembled something akin to a guitar. But she had never seen a guitar quite that small.

  Her attention was so focused, Virginia failed to notice that the broom handle beside her started to slide downward from its position, the head losing purchase on the wooden boards. Inevitably, it clattered noisily to the floor.

  Virginia squeaked in alarm and jumped. Inside, the woman—startled by the noise—lowered her instrument and wheeled around in her seat, just as Virginia ducked out of view.

  Crouching low, below the window sill, Virginia could feel her heart pounding with panic. She was unsure if the woman inside had spotted her. The dog got to his feet and gingerly stepped forward toward Virginia, whimpering softly.

  Several moments passed before Virginia plucked up the courage to creep on her haunches to the fallen broom and picked it up as quietly as she could. She did not dare look around. Virginia quickly skittered away to the other end of the verandah and furiously began sweeping once more—stealing worried glances at the window at the far end of the house.

  The woman inside the parlour stood at the window, looking out upon the spot where, just a few moments before, the child had been. She turned to one side and lingered for a moment, a smile tugging at the corners of her lips.