Muwullupirri

22

Muwullupirri

    Since they were following Cal, and it was his house, anyone might’ve thought there was a fair chance that he’d get to open Muwullupirri’s front door himself. Anyone who didn’t know his mother.

    Sure enough, Mrs Wainwright was opening the door before Cal was even halfway out of the ute and while Dick and Sloane were still pulling in behind him.

    “I thought,” said Sloane grimly to her father, “that she wasn’t living here any more?”

    “Eh? Aw, at the homestead? Nah, well, they’re just over the way.”

    “You know what I mean, Dad!”

     Dick sighed. “Cut her some slack, eh, Sloane? She’s just a dim old biddy that’s incapable of looking at her own actions rationally—or anything, come to that.”

    Sloane blinked. “Um, yes.”

    Naturally Mrs Wainwright was wearing a floral, frilled apron. And there was a strong smell of roasting meat.

    “Beef, eh?” said Dick happily, sniffing.

    “Yeah, and with any luck she will’ve done roast parsnips,” replied his daughter snidely.

    “Yeah, but she knows I don’t like them,” he replied calmly.

    Burbling happily, Mrs Wainwright ushered them into the big front room with its lovely, gracious lines and—

     Sloane’s jaw dropped. Where were the awful cabbage-rose Sanderson linens and the frightful fake Queen Anne furniture?

    “Hullo, what’s happened to the suite?” asked Dick.

    “It’s in the new house, of course, Dick!” replied Mrs Wainwright happily. “Cal insisted, he reckons he doesn’t mind this old stuff. Never mind, when he’s not so busy we can always pop down to Adelaide and find something prettier for him.”

    Sloane looked weakly at Cal but he remained completely poker-faced.

    Once they’d delivered their reports, which took some time, she mercifully pushed off back to the kitchen again, ordering Cal happily to offer the guests a drink, dear.

    “Amontillado for Sloane,” Mr Wainwright reminded him.

    “I know,” he replied mildly. “You fancy a fino, Dick?”

    “You bet! –Where’s Kym? Talking of those without taste buds.”

    “Gone up the north-eastern boundary with Pete and Hughie. Should be back some time on Sunday, unless that fence is worse than I thought. Pete reckons there’s a mob of wallabies up there that’ve got a trick of leaning on the bloody thing.”

    “That or leaping over it,” put in his father very drily indeed.

    “Right: one’s as likely as the other!” Cal agreed with a grin. “Thing is, if the wire strainers need tightening, they probably are getting over it.”

    “Good-oh, we’ll think of the three of them eating baked beans while we have your mum’s roast!” grinned Dick. “Beef, is it?”

    “That’s right,” agreed Mr Wainwright. “One of those new steers of Cal’s. Newfangled.”

    “What are they?” asked Sloane abruptly.

    “Charolais cross. It’s a French breed, Sloane,” Cal explained. “Great meat animal, low in fat. Mind you, if you listen to Bob Keating’s mates the Japanese market wants fat—ever heard of wagyu beef? –Marbled with fat,” he said as she and Dick shook their heads. “Might be all right the way they eat it in Japan, very thin strips, but I don’t think the rest of the world needs its beef with a high fat content, not if it’s part of the staple diet, like here. Charolais are very suitable for cross-breeding. Got these ones off a bloke up the Territory, they’re doing a lot of crossbreeding with Brahman strains up there. Highly resistant to heat and tropical diseases.”

    “Yeah. Half the world calls ’em zebu, but never mind,” put in Dick unexpectedly.

    Cal blinked. “Brahmans? Yeah, that’s right.”

    “I was watching that dim Landline thing on the ABC: they kept blahing on about Brahman cattle without explaining what the Hell they were on about—as per usual. Looked it up,” explained Dick. “Bit of a surprise, actually, ’cos we’d just been watching a BBC thing—think it was—on Africa, and the word ‘zebu’ got mentioned, all right, but no-one so much as breathed ‘Brahman.’” He shrugged. “—Pale grey, Sloane, love. The cows are very pretty: they’re the sacred ones in India,” he added.

    “Um, I think all cows are sacred to Hindus, aren’t they, Dad?”

    “Yeah, but the pale grey ones are the usual ones. They are very pretty, he’s right,” agreed Cal, smiling a bit.

    “You could get the photos, Cal,” suggested his father.

    “Yeah, go on, Cal,” agreed Dick tolerantly.

    “And tell you what: get that Indian picture that belonged to Grandfather Pickering: she’ll like that,” the old man added. “You could bring his album, too, come to think of it.”

    “Um, yeah. Where are they, though, Dad? In the loft?”

    “No, in a box in the wardrobe in Aunty Miriam’s room,” replied the old man, and Cal, nodding, went out.

    “Aunty Miriam? That’s a new one on me, John,” noted Dick.

    “Mm? Oh. That’s what we always used to call one of the spare bedrooms, Dick. No, well, you wouldn’t remember her. She was my aunt, my mother’s sister. Old Pickering was in the Indian Army, settled in Australia when he retired. Aunty Miriam was a spinster, came to live at Muwullupirri when the old man finally went. She had a lot of his Indian souvenirs—the rest of the family wasn’t interested, evidently.” He smiled a little. “Remember the carved chair with the snakes on it?”

    “Aw, yeah! Used to stand in the front hall—murder to sit on, of course!”

    “Mm. That was one of Grandfather Pickering’s. Made for the English, of course.”

    “Right, sort of a souvenir! You haven’t still got it, I suppose?” Dick asked on a wistful note.

    The old man looked dry. “Well, I haven’t thrown it out, Dick.”

    Sloane had to swallow. “Dad, it sounds like the sort of thing that’d need an awful lot of dusting.”

    “Mm? Aw, Hell, not thinking of it for us, love! Your mother’d probably burn it! –No: Cal oughta put it back in the front hall!” he beamed. “Part of the house’s history!”

    Sloane looked limply at old Mr Wainwright but he just said mildly: “Up to him, Dick.”

    “These are the snaps of my trip,” said Cal, coming back. “There’s a Helluva lot of stuff in that wardrobe, Dad, think the box is at the bottom.” With this he disappeared again.

    “What trip was this?” asked Dick, as Mr Wainwright began sorting slowly through the packet of photos.

    “About a month back. Went to France to look at Charolais on the hoof. Full-bloods, ya see. Thinking of importing the semen.” The old man rubbed his chin, looking very dry. “Knowing the ruddy government, it’ll take years to get a licence. Might be a better bet just to bring in some heifers.”

    “Yes, but—” Sloane broke off.

    “Go on,” he said neutrally.

    “Um, well, I don’t know anything about it, Mr Wainwright, but if he brings in heifers, won’t it take an awfully long time to build up a breeding herd? I mean,” she said, swallowing in spite of herself, “if he just imports the semen he could, um—”

    “Do ’em,” interrupted Dick snidely.

    Frowning, Sloane said: “Inseminate a lot of cows at once.”

    “Yeah,” Mr Wainwright agreed.—“You’re not funny, Dick,” he noted.—“Yeah, that’s right, Sloane, that’s his thinking. But like I say, it all depends on the government.”

    “Yes,” agreed Dick peaceably. “Well, if he’s getting into that sort of breeding programme he will need a database to keep track of it all, won’t he?” he added brightly.

    “Da-ad!”

    “Look, strike while the iron’s hot, love! He buys the software off Gail’s mates in Sydney before the buggers wise up to what they’ve got and shove the price up, and you and me design the database together! Well, I can work out what’s feasible, but no way am I gonna waste me time mucking round with their WYSIWYG designer: you can pretty up the screens for ’im! Make it user-friendly, eh?” he finished brightly.

    “Clear as mud, Dick,” said the old man drily.

    “Yes, there’s no need to introduce your dratted obsessions into every conversation, Dad.”

    “But it’s relevant! Look, come on, most of the farmers in the country use their computers for their breeding programmes, these days!”

    Mr Wainwright sniffed. “Yeah? I never heard you could cross a cow with a computer.”

    “Hah, hah,” said Sloane evilly to her father. “So Cal went to France, Mr Wainwright?”

    “That’s right. Now this, this is the prize bull they showed him.” He held up a photo and Sloane went to look at it.

    “Help, it’s huge!”

    “Uh-huh. The bulls are. Mind you, the steers aren’t that small,” he added with a smile, showing her another picture. “And this is a carcass.”

    “Good grief,” said Sloane limply. Two hefty men in white uniforms and white cotton caps were getting the giant thing onto the back of one of them. Unloading from a truck, it looked like.

    “Yeah,” he agreed with satisfaction. “The Charolais-Brahman crosses up the Territory are quite a lot smaller. Mind you, I think their Brahmans ’ud be Indian stock, originally. Come from strains that aren’t used to such a good diet, see? But the French Charolais steers, they’re pretty big, all right.”

    “Pretty big! Come and look, Dad.”

    Obligingly Dick came and looked. He gulped.

    “Mm. Good eating. Cal reckons the French age their beef, though,” the old man reported dubiously. “Hang it a bit.”

    “That’d be up to the end clients,” said Cal firmly from the doorway. “Is this the box?”

    “Yeah, ’course,” he grunted.

    “Full of rocks,” Cal explained, setting it carefully on the floor near his father’s big chair. Possibly a Victorian wing chair? It was covered in a revolting olive-green brocade, very worn and rather grimy, but the chair itself was a lovely shape.

    “Put it on the coffee table, Cal,” said Dick in surprise.

    “It’s not a coffee table, Dick, it’s an early Colonial tea table, circa 1850, and I’ve got more respect for its surface.”

    “Yeah, that box is iron-bound,” grunted the old man. “Sit down, Sloane, I’ll pass you the photos.”

    Sloane sat down on a sofa she’d never laid eyes on before. It was very plain, rather high-backed, with slender wooden arms and legs and not very heavily padded. Unfortunately it was covered in the same hideous stuff as the big chair.

    “That sofa’s supposed to show the influence of the Arts and Crafts Movement. Late 19th century,” said Cal. “English.”

    “It’s a pretty shape,” replied Sloane weakly.

    “Yeah. Doesn’t really go with that wing chair, though. There is a big Victorian sofa out in one of the sheds that I might haul back in. Weighs a ton, mind you.”

    “That old thing? It’s filthy. That blighter Bluey of Hughie’s used to sleep on it,” noted his father.

    “Well, yeah, and since then it’s had that mad Bolshie hen nesting in it—that one that kept getting out of the run, and Mum eventually gave up on her,” Cal reminded him. “Not to say the rats.”

    “Ugh, rats?” gulped Sloane.

    “Yeah. Well, Pete and Hughie had the dogs in there at one stage, think that finished off the worst of them—anyway, they took the hint and never came back. The back and arms are more or less intact, though they’ll have to be replaced, of course, but the seat’s gone: I burned its remains.”

    “Glad to hear it,” said Dick drily. He passed a bunch of photos to Sloane. “Here ya go. Looks like a lovely farm, this place in France, Cal.”

    “Mm? Yes—well, they all were. Which is this?” He sat down beside Sloane. “Aw, yeah, that’s Jean-Michel’s place. Nice bloke. Let’s see... That’s him.”

    “He the one being dwarfed by the bull or the one being dwarfed by the wife?” asked Dick in a friendly way.

    “The bull. The other bloke’s his head stockman—don’t think that’d be the equivalent of the French word, but I dunno what else to call him. Jacques. Marie’s his wife. Great cook! Poor old Jean-Michel’s a widower, the wife died of cancer some years back, so Marie cooks for him, ya see.”

    “Right, so this bird isn’t the wife, then?” said Dick, holding out another photo. “Looks very French, doesn’t she?” he said, handing it to Sloane.

    This photo couldn’t have been taken by Cal, because he was in it. Between the stocky, red-faced Jean-Michel and a slender, brown-haired girl. They were all smiling like anything and they all had their arms linked. She looked French, all right. There was nothing you could put your finger on: the brown hair was just in a simple bob, and she was only wearing tapered slacks and a tee-shirt, but—yeah. Very French. Possibly because there was nothing under the tee-shirt but a pair of small but very perky breasts?

    “Yes, she does,” agreed Sloane in a small voice.

    Cal smiled a little. “That’s his daughter, Jacqueline. Lovely girl. Took me round and showed me a bit of the country. Jean-Michel wasn’t interested, he’s like most farmers, only interested in his cattle!”

    “So she lives on the farm, does she?” pursued Dick.

    “No, she works in Paris, Dick, but she was down for the weekend.”

    Sloane had now found another picture of Jacqueline, with a beautiful old stone mansion behind her. In a different pair of slacks and different tee-shirt, but looking just as casually elegant. “Did she take you down the Valley of the Loire, then?”

    “Eh?” Cal took the photo off her. “Oh! The château! No, that’s about eight K or so from their place. Pretty, isn’t it? Still owned by some nob.”

    “Beautiful countryside, eh?” put in Dick. “Very green, nothing like SA.”

    “Mm,” Sloane agreed.

    “Drink your sherry, love,” he advised her.

    It dawned she’d scarcely touched her glass. Reddening a little, she picked it up and sipped.

    “Had some great wines when I was over there,” said Cal in a reminiscent voice, looking at another photo. “Old Jean-Michel, he just knocked back the cheap reds, and Jacqueline and her mates weren’t interested: more the spring water and healthy living type, ya know? Never expected to find that in France! But the Duvals were really into wine—they’d be more up-market, I think, though I dunno that I grasped the local norms that well. Had a fancier house, all that, but mind you, Charles-Xavier drove a beat-up old Renault, rust molecules holding hands, kind of thing!” He laughed. “But Francine, their eldest, she drove a really smart little BMW: sports model, never seen ’em out here.”

    “Probably see hundreds of ’em parked one behind the other, if ya dropped in at Double Bay,” drawled Dick.

    Sloane had been thinking more or less the same thing. “Yes,” she said sourly. “So did they drink fancy wine?”

    “Bottles of it,” replied Cal in a prim voice.

    “Yeah, hah, hah,” noted his father unexpectedly. “Nah, they did, Sloane, only the girl, Whatsername, took him round the vineyards as well, ya see. Shipped a few crates back, dare say we can expect ’em some time next century.”

    “They’ll have matured, Dad,” said Cal smoothly.

    “That or curdled,” noted Dick swiftly. “Wasn’t that how they used to make Madeira? Send it through the tropics by ship?”

    Cal grinned. “Bit more to it than that, Dick! No, well, I brought a few bottles back with me, as well. –Here, this one was taken in Champagne.”

    Dick looked at it with interest. “Right, their summer. Yeah, good-looking vines they got, eh? Good-looking bit of French fluff, too!” he added with a snigger, passing it to Sloane.

    “Francine,” Cal explained. “She knew of some obscure little vineyard that sells quite a bit of their champagne at the cellar door: you never tasted anything like it! Can’t describe it... Well, ever been in the pea patch when they’re in flower?”

    Dick just gaped at him.

    Sloane was rather flushed. “Peas? What on earth do you mean? Not sweet peas?”

    “No, ordinary ones. Or beans—on a really hot day. Runner beans, maybe?”

    “We’re not gardeners, mate,” said Dick quickly, seeing that his daughter was starting to look really narked.

    “Oh—no. Well, I was only gonna say that the taste of the champagne was like the smell of bean flowers or pea flowers on a very hot day. Not sweet, but—” He shook his head. “Wow!”

    “He did bring a few bottles back with him, but we’re having the red with the beef,” put in the old man, sorting through the photos. “Think this is the place where he got that.”

    By this time Dick Manning had a fair idea of what was getting up his daughter’s nose. He took it in a palsied hand. Jesus: another French bird?

    “Brigitte,” said Cal with a grin. “Real good sport, she was.”

    “Trip to remember, eh?” said Dick.

    His wide shoulders shook. “Yeah, something like that, Dick!”

    Sloane found her fists had clenched. She swallowed hard. “Um, was there something about an Indian picture, Mr Wainwright?”

    “That’s right. Open the box for her, Cal. –This’d be that other bloke’s prize bull, Sloane,” he said, holding it out. “The homestead’s off to the left, there. He reckons it isn’t a château.”

    Oh, yes? She’d have called it a château. Well, it was stone, and it had a little tower with a pointed witch’s hat of a roof—true, she had seen similar styles in the older Sydney suburbs, but in wood, not stone, and not this big! And only dating from around Federation, while this place looked at least five hundred years older than that!

    “Um, Charles-Xavier’s, is this?” she said in a small voice, not managing to pronounce the name the way Cal had.

    “That’s right, yeah,” Mr Wainwright agreed. “Mind you, very nice bloke, no pretension about him—eh, son?”

    “That’s right,” agreed Cal with his head in the box. He looked up, smiling. “Took me to the races one day; after the house, I was expecting an owner’s box—but no, we just went in the stands, yelled our heads off with everybody else!”

    “What do they yell in France?” asked Dick in fascination.

    “Dunno, Dick, but it was loud, all right! –I’ve found the picture of the monkeys, Dad, but I can’t find the other one.”

    “Well, keep looking. –No, show it to her, Cal!”

    Sloane didn’t much like monkeys. Not the ones at the zoo, anyway. Or on David Attenborough, really. She took it dubiously. Slowly she smiled in spite of herself. “Look, Dad! It’s really pretty!”

    Dick took the small gilt-framed picture, looking dubious. Slowly his eyebrows rose. “Hul-lo! What palace did the old joker nick this from, John?”

    “Think it might have been given to him. Well, as a bribe, dare say. Back in those days all those Indians rajahs were at it, weren’t they?”

    “That or he grabbed it when his regiment sacked some unfortunate’s palace, yeah,” drawled Cal. “A miniature wouldn’t be much of a bribe in a rajah’s terms, Dad. Not unless it had a real gold frame with rubies and pearls in it. –’Tisn’t, Dick,” he said as Dick then looked closely at the frame. “Gilt over some base metal—European: not the same period at all.”

    “Yeah. You oughta have this looked at by a specialist, mate,” he said weakly.

    “Why?” replied Cal blandly. “No-one here’s gonna want to sell it.”

    “You might learn something, though,” put in Sloane on a sour note.

    “Mughal work. Sixteenth-century,” he murmured. “Took it in to the Art Gallery of NSW a while back—thought they might have more of a clue than the types in Adelaide. They thought they oughta take it off me hands, it’d be a tax break for me, and I thought they could shove it—see?” He sat back on his heels, grinning at her.

    “Knock it off, Cal,” advised his father without animus. “I like the green bits,” he said to Sloane.

    “Yes, the grass and the trees,” she murmured. “Isn’t it amazing how the colour’s lasted?”

    “That’s right. Have to keep it out of the light, mind.”

    “You mean you couldn’t have it in here?” said Sloane in disappointment.

    “Not near the windows, no. There’s an old sideboard in one of the sheds—weighs a ton, mind you, worse than the old sofa—but Cal was thinking of bringing it in. It's got a top compartment that’s glassed in: my mother used to keep the best glasses in it. Could go in that, so long as it was facing away from the windows.”

    “That’s a good idea!” Sloane looked eagerly at Cal.

    “Might get round to it,” he grunted, hauling out an old photo album. “This is the album, for what it’s worth. We think it must’ve been Aunty Miriam’s mum that did it; it’s not just photos, by any means.” Dick was nearest, so he handed it to him.

    Its outside was fairly battered: a brown leather cover, not in good repair, with the word “Album” on it in a flowing gold script, very worn. He opened it at random. He choked.

    “Would you call it an album?” added Cal dubiously.

    “No, mate,” croaked Dick. “I’d call it a scrapbook!” With this he broke down in a horrible fit of the splutters.

    Sloane was looking bewildered. Kindly the old man said to her: “Don’t take any notice of Dick, dunno what he’s on about. You can call it a scrapbook if you like—see, it’s got fancy stuff round the photos, cut-outs, and some she’s painted frames round, and so on, but I’ve always called it a photograph album: it’s got Grandfather Pickering’s family photos in it, see? –Oy, Dick! Get over yourself, mate! Give the book to Sloane!”

    Cal scrambled up, taking the album from Dick. “Here,” he said, giving her the book.

    Limply she opened it. It was a photo album: what on earth was the matter with Dad? Faded snaps, some sepia, some just black and white, of men and women in old-fashioned clothes, big sunhats featuring largely, squinting against the sun on lawns, riding horses, standing beside horses holding croquet mallets—um, no, what was that daft game?—them, anyway; and here were some of soldiers in uniform, this must be Grandfather Pickering himself in uniform, it had a very fancy, um, label, was what you’d probably have to call it, underneath, scrolls and things, with his name, and the letters must be his medals, he was certainly wearing enough of them, and some Indian word, it must be the name of the place, and the date.

    “‘John James Calvert Pickering,’” she read slowly. “So is that where your name comes from, Cal?”

    He made a face. “Yeah. Family name, see?”

    “Better than Percival,” said his father stolidly.

    “Um, yeah,” Cal agreed with a sheepish grin. “That was one of Great-Grandfather Pickering’s brothers.”

    Dick was now wiping his eyes. “Percival Pickering, eh? Poor bloke!”

    “As a matter of fact,” replied Cal drily, “he had a distinguished military career and died in the Boer War.”

    “Never mind that. Show Sloane the pictures of the family: there’s one of Mother and Aunty Miriam in sunbonnets, somewhere, she’ll like that,” his father predicted comfortably.

    Sloane wasn’t too sure she would. She said nothing, as Cal sat down beside her on the straight-legged sofa and turned the pages of the album slowly. “Here we are, this is the section with the kids. Think this is the one he means. Pair of tricks, eh?”

    Two little girls dressed in white on a lawn. “Mm. Those sunbonnets are incredible,” she admitted feebly.

    “Yeah!” he agreed with a chuckle. “Starched cotton, Mum reckons.”

    Sloane couldn’t imagine Mrs Wainwright being interested in the album, in fact her bet would’ve been she’d have called it “that old thing” or even “that old rubbish.” She swallowed. “Does your mother like it, then?”

    “Mum? Aw, Hell, no! Not interested at all, but Dad and me were looking at it one day and we couldn’t figure out how the things were made—well, look at them! They’re obviously cotton, eh? But these bits are sort of stiff. I mean, if it was just cotton material they’d droop down over their faces—”

    He broke off: Sloane had collapsed in giggles.

    “Yes! Sorry!” she gasped. “No, you’re right, of course they would. I see, so you asked your mother and she said they must be starched?”

    “Yes, that’s it,” agreed Cal, grinning. “Well, I wouldn't say they’re super-stiff—”

    “Don’t set me off again,” she said shakily.

    “—but enough. Must’ve been a lot of work keeping kiddies clean, in these rig-outs, eh? Not to say that climate. Well, s’pose it isn’t all that much hotter than ours. They’d’ve got loads more rain, though, it’s in the monsoon belt.”

    “Help, yes! White cotton frocks in the rain and mud? The poor servants must have been at it all the time, trying to keep them clean! –Though maybe to have their photos taken they’d have had clean clothes on, anyway.”

    “Yeah, but those aren’t their best, by any means!” Smiling, Cal turned over a couple of pages.

    Help! This one was obviously a studio portrait. Two little girls, presumably the same ones. This time they weren’t in bonnets: their hair, very long, was combed out—it looked as if it had been plaited ruthlessly tight while wet and allowed to dry like that, it had that sort of crinkled look—with giant bows on top of their heads. The dresses seemed to be white again but this time a much softer material with large lace-edged collars and giant sashes. The photo only showed them from about mid-thigh, so you couldn’t see how long the dresses were or what they had on their feet. This one had been favoured with a very elaborate frame, not painted, but cut out, featuring bluebirds, flowers, and curlicues. Underneath was written: “Miriam Pickering, Edith Pickering, Calcutta, 1899.”

    “That’s my grandmother, Dad’s mother: Edith,” said Cal.

    Help, 1899? “So—so when would she have been born, Cal?”

    Mr Wainwright was now going through the French photos with Dick, telling him a lot about the cattle, but at this he looked up and said: “1893. My Grandfather Pickering was born in 1850. Mother was one of the younger children. Aunty Miriam was a bit older, she’d have been ten or eleven in that photo.”

    “Historical, isn’t it?” said Dick.

    “Um, actually it is,” Sloane admitted in a wavering voice. “I— It makes you feel... I dunno. Odd. Well, all these lives... And here you are,” she finished weakly, looking at Cal.

    “Continuity,” he said tightly. “You don’t get that in a town.”

    Sloane had no idea what to say to that, in fact she had no idea how to continue the conversation at all, so it was just as well that at that moment Mrs Wainwright appeared, on a wave of hot roast beef.

    “What are you looking at? Good Heavens, Cal, Sloane won’t want to look at that old thing!”

    And with that they were all bustled off to eat.

    Muwullupirri did have a dining-room, but as Mrs Wainwright’s taste had always featured largely there, Sloane hadn’t originally been looking forward to eating in it. Since getting here, however, she’d admitted to herself it could now be looking like anything at all. It was a panelled room, which once upon a time had featured “awful old family portraits” according to Mrs W., who had banished them. The panelling had been painted a very pale blue-grey, which Mrs W. felt was not too glaring, and lightened the room. It certainly did the latter but as it was a high-gloss paint, managed to be pretty glaring. The shade set off, or so it was claimed, the soft pinks and mixed blues of Mrs Wainwright’s floral Sanderson linen curtains and chair seats. Not the same pattern as in the big sitting-room, no. Likewise Mrs Wainwright’s floral Axminster. The background was fawn but yes, the thing did have blue in it, so— Yeah. And the fake Queen Anne rosewood dining chairs, sideboard, and truly horrible dresser certainly looked as if they felt at home in there.

    The entire dining suite—curly-legged oval table, dresser, sideboard, and all—was gone. Help, so was the carpet! The curtains remained but they and the walls were the last remnants of Mrs W.’s taste.

    “Sorry about the floor,” said Cal cheerfully. “Me and Pete are gonna do it up next winter.”

    “Shit, what is it?” croaked Dick, gaping at the wide old floorboards. Once varnished but now very shabby indeed.

    “Jarrah. Most of the wooden parts of the house are. Shipped in from WA,” grunted Mr Wainwright.

    “Are you going to varnish it, Cal?” asked Sloane faintly.

    “Yeah, of course. Well, sand it and varnish it, yeah.”

    “Oh, good,” she said weakly, sagging.

    He eyed her drily but merely said, pulling a chair out for her: “Here, come and sit down.”

    Limply Sloane sank down onto a beautiful dark, balloon-backed dining-chair. “Where did these chairs come from?” she croaked.

    “Up in the loft with that Persian rug,” replied Cal calmly, nodding at it.

    In place of the giant white damask tablecloth that had usually covered Mrs Wainwright’s oval table, the new table, possibly the old table, featured merely place mats. Dick bent and peered underneath it. “Two pedestal legs,” he announced, straightening. “Be some extensions somewhere, then.”

    “Yes, but we don’t need them for five of us, Dick,” murmured Cal, pulling out the larger chair at the head of the table. “Sit here, Dad, this chair’s a bit more comfortable.”

    “Doesn’t match, eh?” spotted the eagle-eyed Dick.

    “No. We think the set must’ve had a carver at some stage, but Dad can’t remember one in his lifetime. Might’ve been given away, who knows? That one was made in Adelaide, Grandfather was given it on a trip down there.” Cal shrugged. “Group of blokes who wanted to buy his cattle cheap, and get into the refrigerated trade with Britain.”

    “It’s a nice chair, so he took it,” noted Mr Wainwright. “Never did business with them, though: didn’t like the look of ’em.”

    “So was it new when he got it, Mr Wainwright?” ventured Sloane.

    “No, it’s quite an early Colonial piece, would’ve been made around 1840. Mind you, if they really wanted to bribe him they could’ve offered him an English antique, fair few of them floating around Adelaide.”

    “You’re sitting on one,” noted Cal very drily indeed.

    His father sniffed. “Nah, Victorian.”

    “He means 19th-century, not from Victoria,” said Cal heavily.

    “So are they English?” Sloane faltered, now very off-balance.

    “Yes. English mahogany, the style was all the go in the 19th century: by that time most furniture was factory-made, you see. Churned ’em out by the hundreds.”

    “Which doesn’t mean they’re not worth a few bob now,” noted Dick, bouncing up as Mrs Wainwright staggered in under a giant meat plate. “Here, lemme give you a hand, Mrs Wainwright! –There we go! Boy, looks good, eh?” he beamed.

    Sloane looked limply from his beaming face to Mrs Wainwright’s flushed and proud one. Help, even Mr Wainwright was smiling and nodding! She risked a look at Cal. He winked.

    “Yeah, looks great: you’ve done us proud, Mum!” he said loudly.

    Sloane gulped and was incapable of speech.

    “Pour Sloane a glass of wine, Cal, she looks tired, I’m sure all that technical stuff isn’t good for a girl,” said Cal’s mother severely. “It’s rather strong, dear,” she added kindly, “but it’s full of iron, it’ll do you good.”

    Mercifully, ladies of her generation didn’t then go on to ask you tenderly if you had your period in front of the menfolk, so she didn’t. She did, however, having actually let Cal carve, insist on giving Sloane some roast parsnip as well as roast everything else except the carrots and green beans. God knew what roast parsnip was supposed to have in it. Apart from the cholesterol and fat, of course.

    “That’s better, dear!” beamed Mrs Wainwright as she laid down her knife and fork. “I knew you wouldn’t have been feeding yourself properly!”

    Sloane looked weakly at her empty plate. Good grief! She’d eaten the lot!

    “That’s a good girl!” grinned Dick. “Eaten up all your nice veggies, too!”

    Happily Mrs Wainwright began to tell them how the beans weren’t theirs: she hadn’t really had much time to do anything in the garden this year, with the new house, but Mrs Bailey from Lallapinda had put some in—only of course they’d moved on...

    How many calories must it have been? Help!

    It had been fairly late by the time they got to the homestead, so what with the apple pie for dessert—Cal always liked his with ice cream but there was cream as well—and the chat after dinner, Mrs Wainwright sniffing at the album and the Indian souvenirs but not otherwise objecting to them, and Dick’s laborious explanation, well oiled with the Muwullupirri brandy, of just what a custom-designed farm management program could do for Cal, no-one present except Sloane understanding a blind word of it and her only understanding one or two, and Mrs W.’s detailed description of the state of Lallapinda post-Baileys and presumably pre-Kitten and Hugo Kent: she didn’t know what they imagined they’d do with themselves in a house that size!—Dick luckily being so used to her that he didn’t even blink, but Sloane having to swallow and Cal suddenly putting his hand over his mouth—what with all this, and a sudden diversion, God knew why, onto a very special knitting pattern for a baby’s matinée jacket which looked very sweet in pink but would also be nice in blue—what with all this, by the time Mrs Wainwright realised what the time was and bore Cal’s father off to the new house, it was really pretty late. And as her parting shot was: “Mind you ask Dick and Sloane to stay the night, Cal: don’t let them drive all the way to the beach house in the dark,” what could the poor man say?

    What he did say was, completely poker-face: “Stay the night, you mustn’t drive all the way to the beach house in the dark.”

    Immediately Dick collapsed in splutters.

    “Stop it, Dad!” cried Sloane, very flushed. “It’s all right, Cal, you don’t have to—”

    “More than—’is life’s—worth!” wheezed Dick, tears oozing out of the corners of his eyes.

    “Shut up, Dad, you’ve had far too much brandy! I’ll drive.”

    “You won’t,” said Cal quickly.

    Dick stopped spluttering. “Uh—no. Ya won’t, love. –Quite a good little driver, in the city,” he explained, “but she’s got no sense of direction. Now, Kitten’s the one: dump her down anywhere between here and the coast, she’ll make a beeline for wherever ya care to name. Got the instincts of an Abo, that kid.”

    “Don’t say that,” said Sloane tiredly. “Look, it’s an imposition, Dad.”

    “Rats,” said Cal calmly. “Mum’ll have made up a couple of beds for you, sure as eggs are eggs.”

    “Yeah,” agreed her father. “This is the country, ya nit! Come on, lessee.”

    Unlike many Outback homesteads, Muwullupirri, though not nearly the size of Lallapinda, was a two-storeyed stone house. In the very early days it had been merely a small mud-brick structure but the country had been fertile, the first Wainwrights had prospered, and the current house had been built around 1870. It was scarcely a mansion, but a very pleasant family home. Or could have been, without Mrs Wainwright’s décor—yes.

    Dick led the way upstairs. A bed was made up in the room with the new curtains and bedspread. New about ten years back. A lovely pattern of huge, puce-tinged pink magnolias. Instantly he decided Sloane could have that room. Saying nothing, Sloane followed him along the passage to the next room. Completely covered in blue forget-me-nots. As a last thoughtful touch the bedside table with its blue forget-me-notted frilled tablecloth featured a blue forget-me-not tea-set.

    “Yes, you’ll be much more comfortable in here, Dad,” she said, escaping.

    She hadn’t thought she’d sleep, but actually she went out like a light and slept like a log till half-past seven. Unfortunately about two seconds after she woke up her nerves started jangling. Grimly she went off to the bathroom—the house did have a couple of small ensuites, one attached to Cal’s room and the other to the big bedroom that his parents had always had. The ensuites only had showers, but the main bathroom of course had a bath as well. Not a big old-fashioned one with legs, alas, but a pale green fright that had been new when coloured baths, basins and toilets had first hit Australia; so, uh, the Sixties? Probably. Anyway, Sloane couldn’t remember when the bathroom hadn’t been done out in pale green. Someone had put out a whole set of dark green towels and bathmat to go with it; she’d have liked to believe it had been Cal, for a joke, but it was only too probable that it had been Mrs W., in deadly earnest. She avoided the bath and just had a shower. Wondering for the very first time, as she did so, how they managed the water at Muwullupirri. Ugh: all tank water? There were certainly a lot of huge tanks out the back of the homestead. Just in case it was, she made it a very quick shower.

    “Oy,” said a voice that wasn’t Dad’s outside the bathroom door, just as she was  huddling herself back into the bright pink quilted dressing-gown that someone had thoughtfully put out on the bed in the magnolia-ed horror.

    “What?” she gulped.

   “‘If you look in the second drawer of the lowboy that’s cowering under those magnolias in your room, you’ll find a whole lot of guest knickers,” said Cal’s voice with a laugh in it.

    Sloane gulped.

    “All right?” he said.

    “Yes; thanks!” she gasped.

    “Don’t thank me, it’s one of Mum’s bright ideas. Aw, yeah: and if ya need any more personal feminine stuff, just look in the bathroom cabinets,” he drawled.

    What? “Very funny, Cal,” replied Sloane grimly.

    “It’s not a joke, this is the Outback, ya know,” he said mildly.

    “Come off it; at her age?”

    “No, ya nit, they’re for lady visitors! Ya never know what can happen. Well—dust storm, flood? Poor Mum got really stuck, the year of the big flood. –Yonks back, I’d have been about two.”

    “Don’t tell me she told you that,” croaked Sloane.

    “Eh? Aw! No!” said Cal with a laugh. “’Course not, I’m a male. No, we had two couples from the Big Smoke staying, and Dad and the blokes and I were out on the verandah after tea, smoking the Havanas one of the blokes had given Dad, and the ladies were in the lounge-room, knocking back the liqueurs, with the French windows open, ya see. One of the dames was saying what an idyllic life it was out here, so Mum launched into her horror story. Well, several, but I’d heard the others before!” He laughed again.

    “I see,” said Sloane weakly. “Gosh, poor thing! What on earth did she do?”

    In the passage, Cal smiled to himself. He hadn’t expected that’d be her reaction, at all. “Well, like I say, I was about two at the time, I’d’ve been almost out of nappies, so she used those. Folded up, I gather. The ladies thought they’d be bulky, that’s right,” he said, the smile creeping into his voice, “but were terribly relieved and sympathetic!”

    “You would be,” agreed Sloane sincerely. “Heck, you really have to think of everything out here, don’t you?”

    “That’s right.” He was about to add “Just use anything,” but she said: “Um, what about the water?”

    “Uh—the filtering plant’s in one of the big sheds out the back. –Bore water, Sloane,” he elaborated to the puzzled silence. “We’ve got tanks as well, of course, but they’re no use in a drought.”

    “I see. It’s—it’s like a little city,” said Sloane in a stunned voice.

    “Uh-huh. Gotta be self-sufficient, this far from civilisation. Aw—and if ya feel cold, there’s a couple of cardies in the lowboy, as well. There’ll be some brekkie when you’re ready,” he finished.

    “Thanks,” said Sloane weakly. She had had a couple of spare tampons in her handbag, but last night she’d had to use the second one, so— After a moment she opened the cupboard under the green handbasin. No, it was full of cleaners. She looked in the large mirrored cabinet above the basin. Crikey. Stuffed with stuff! Loads of talcum power and deodorant, too. Three different brands of sanitary pads, and two sizes of Tampax. In some relief she seized a packet of the larger size, reflecting that at least if they were on bore water it wouldn’t matter if she flushed the toilet again.

    On second thoughts she used one of the deodorants, too. After that she felt almost strong enough to go and get dressed and go downstairs and face him. Almost.

    Cal was in the kitchen stirring something in a huge pot on the stove.

    Grimly ignoring the somewhat swoopy feeling in her tummy that the sight of his straight back and wide shoulders was giving her, Sloane said feebly: “Is that porridge?”

    “No,” he replied, turning his head and smiling at her. “Mash for the chooks.”

    “Is—is that a joke?”

    He was about to wither her: then it dawned that she was really nervous and uncertain of herself. Silently apostrophising himself as a nit, Cal replied mildly: “Nope, they really do have to have this sort of muck on a pretty regular basis if you want them to fatten up and produce eggs.”

    “But— How much work are they?” she croaked.

    Smiling just a little, Cal said: “Not all that much. Just making them a mash every so often and remembering to give them water and some wheat and a few greens, really. Well, you have to start off with a decent henhouse, proper roosts and nest-boxes, but after that there’s not that much entailed.” He looked sideways at her and murmured: “Didja think they were self-sustaining?”

    “Well, um, yes, I suppose,” Sloane admitted feebly, sitting down at the big old kitchen table because her legs suddenly felt weak. Cooking breakfast for the chooks? Help! “Um, they keep having these segments on, um, well, Gardening Australia, and all of those home programmes… They always seem to have huge gardens with towering rows of, um, green stuff, and the chooks just, um, potter about in their run, um, pecking,” she ended limply.

    “Well, they do,” replied Cal mildly.

    “They never show how you’d look after them… Um, I suppose I’d’ve said that you just buy them packets of dry chook food. I saw a thing on those great big hen barns, once, and they just had dry stuff in a sort of… bin. No, trough. Well, they didn’t look all that healthy, not compared to the ones on the gardening programmes,” she ended limply.

    Cal sniffed. “Factory farming. Not surprised. Well, if you look at a decent book on raising chooks for your home garden, it’ll tell you all about making them a mash.”

    “I see.” Sloane goggled as he then tipped what appeared to be a bowl of potato peelings into his mixture. “What was that?”

    “Potato peelings. From last night. Uh—the books’ll probably tell you that, too,” he added with a laugh in his voice. “Though the sweet potato peels’ll be a bit of treat for them!”

    After a stunned moment it dawned. “Genuine recycling!” gulped Saone.

    “Re— Uh, no, Sloane, you’ve got the wrong end of the stick. Not recycling as such. That’s more re-use, eh? Taking something that’s been used already and turning it into something else. This’d technically be waste minimisation.”

    Her jaw sagged.

    “That is the modern term,” murmured Cal after a moment. “’Course, it’s only been going on in the rural sector since our ancestors first settled down in the valley of the Tigris and Euphrates and started farming; but the trendies have only just latched onto—”

    “Shut up!” she gulped.

    He smiled but said mildly: “I’m not taking the Mick. Traditionally, you use everything you can on a farm, instead of chucking stuff out.”

    Sloane began to recover. “Right, you only chuck out stuff like antique sofas and sideboards!”

    “Yep. ‘Hard waste’.”

    “That’d be the technical term, would it?”

    “Uh-huh.” He turned the element off under his pot of mash and said: “That’s done. I’ll take it out to them when it’s cooled down a bit. Do ya fancy porridge?”

    “No, just a bit of toast, thanks.”

    “Sure? Eggs, bacon?”

    “After last night’s roast? Are you serious?”

    “No, but Mum’ll be sure to ask me if I offered them.”

    Sloane took a deep breath. “What are you having?”

    “Muesli, toast and coffee. There’s cornflakes as well as muesli, if you’d rather.”

    “Um, no, thanks, Cal, I’m really not hungry after that huge roast dinner.”

    “Okay.” He opened a cupboard and produced— Sloane gaped. A genuine Italian coffee-pot as recommended by bloody Kitten for those who couldn't afford a full-blown espresso machine from David Jones at $6,000 per, no kidding.

    “Is—is that yours?” she croaked.

    “Uh—yeah.”

    “No, I mean, did you buy it?” she gasped.

    “Oh! Yeah—well, sort of. Got indoctrinated in France—actually, I hadda swear I'd get one after it dawned on me French hosts what sort of muck Aussies normally drink for breakfast.” He unscrewed it and sorted out its component parts. “Discovered off me own bat, though, that if you boil the water first,” he said, switching on the electric jug but also turning on a small element on the stove, “it takes a fraction of the time it’d take if you start with cold.”

    “I see,” said Sloane blankly.

    “Pass us that tin of coffee, wouldja?”

    Jumping, she picked up the tin that was sitting on the table in front of her, got up and handed it to him.

    “Thanks.”

    “Kimbo,” read Sloane uncertainly off the coffee tin. “I don’t think I’ve seen that brand before.”

    “Italian. Really good. Got this lot in Melbourne when I got the pot, but I’ve seen it in Adelaide, too. Well, Vittoria’s a good brand, too, if ya buy the dark roast.”

    She watched silently as he poured boiling water not into the top part as she’d been expecting, but into the bottom. Then he filled the thingo for the ground coffee and fitted it on top of the water. After that the top part, that was like a little jug, got screwed on. Then the pot was set carefully on the element with the jug’s little handle that seemed to be plastic, anyway it was black, away from the heat.

    “But how does the water get into the coffee? It’s underneath it,” said Sloane dazedly.

    “Steam,” replied Cal succinctly.

    “What?” she said limply.

    “Uh—oh. Never used one of these? They’re really popular in France, and there were loads of them for sale in Melbourne. Looked for them in Adelaide but I could only find a fancy shop that sold a much fancier stainless steel version for megabucks. Well, the water boils, and the steam forces it up the little tube on the cup thing that the coffee sits in—through the coffee, ya see—and up the tube in the jug, and it comes out of the little hole in the top of that tube and fills the jug.”

    “That’s the scientific explanation!” said Dick’s voice from the doorway.

    “Gidday, Dick,” replied Cal unemotionally. “Sleep okay?”

    “Yeah, like a top, thanks. Those a pair of your pyjamas, were they?”

    “Nope, guest pair. Likewise the underdaks. –Mum. Thinks of everything.”

    Dick just nodded and conceded: “You gottoo, on an Outback station. One of them Italian jobs, is it?” he added.

    “Eh? Aw, the coffee-pot. Yeah. Works like a charm.”

    “Yeah, and then ya spend the rest of your life looking for a replacement rubber seal for the bloody thing.”

    “Well, probably, but I haven’t had it that long. No, well, I think Muwullupirri’d wear the cost of a replacement cheapo Italian coffee-pot, Dick.”

    “Yes, but from Melbourne?” said Sloane on a distinctly weak note, sitting down again.

    “Put it on the next mail-order, love,” said Dick, patting her shoulder.

    “Yeah,” Cal agreed. “Or online order, these days. Well, depending on how well the bloody connection’s working. Spent well over an hour trying to order a decent reel of hose pipe the other day, like a tit, until it dawned it wasn’t a cost-effective use of me time!”

    “What about Mitre 10 in Nearby Bay?” replied Dick.

    “Too short.”

    “Aw, right. Shall I make some toast?”

    “Yeah, thanks, Dick. The spreads are in the pantry,” he added, nodding at the big corner cupboard.

    “I’ll get them,” said Sloane quickly, getting up.

    “Not Vegemite,” said Dick firmly.

    “Don’t think we got Marmite, Dick, it’s un-Australian,” noted Cal.

    “Not that, mate: sick of it. Find some nice jam, love, like your mother won’t let me have.”

    Resignedly Sloane looked in the giant so-called pantry. Help! “Um, strawberry, apricot, raspberry, boysenberry, cherry, um,” she swallowed involuntarily, “wild blueberry—”

    “’Tisn’t,” said Cal from the stove.

    “Yes, that’s what it—”

    “No,” he said, smiling. He came over to her. “It’s that French stuff, eh? –Yeah, ‘Bonne Maman’. Dunno where Mum found it: didn’t think we let Froggy jam into the country. No, that name’s just for their English-speaking audience. Probably had an eye on the Yank market. It’s—” he paused, his eyes twinkling. “Bilberries.”

    “Eh?” replied Dick.

    “Bilberries. Les myrtilles, in French. They’re native to Europe. Grow wild all over France. They are related to blueberries, but they’re much nicer. That jam’s a bit acid, though: doesn’t do them justice. Their cherry jam’s a bit similar, unfortunately. But they’ve cracked it with the fig: never tasted anything like it!”

    “Ugh, fig jam?” shuddered Dick. “Mum used to make that, it was revolting!”

    “That’d be yer good old traditional Aussie home-made dried-fig jam, mate.”

    “Ugh!” said Sloane involuntarily. He looked down at her, smiling, and she muttered: “I can’t stand dried figs.”

    “And so say all of us!” agreed Dick with feeling.

    “I think this must be made from fresh figs,” said Col. “It’s wonderfully delicate. There’s some at the back here, Sloane.”

    “Nope. Leave it in the cupboard, Sloane, love, it’s too early, can’t face it. Think I’ll try the boysenberry,” Dick decided. “How about you, Cal?”

    “I’m sticking with Vegemite,” he admitted, getting it out.

    “Me, too,” Sloane agreed limply.

    “Oy, yer coffee-pot’s going mad, Cal!” warned Dick.

    “Uh—right!” Cal leapt on it and took it off the heat. “Um, in France they have morning coffee with hot milk. I usually heat some up: any takers?”

    Weakly both Mannings agreed, since he was going to heat it up anyway.

    “Got indoctrinated over there, didja?” concluded Dick.

    “Yeah, pretty much!” Cal agreed, grinning. “Croissants, bowl of strong milky coffee—they don’t drink it out of cups in the morning—and you’re set for the day!”

    “Not way out in the country, surely?” said Sloane limply.

    “On the farms? Yeah, sure. Every little village still has its baker in France that gets up well before crack of dawn to bake the croissants. And the bread, of course. French bread has to be eaten the day it’s made.”

    “Eh?” croaked Dick.

    “Yeah.”

    “But then someone’d have to go down to the village,” said Sloane limply.

    “Well, everyone gets up early on a farm—or a vineyard! No, well, depends on the baker, I’d say. Some of them deliver. Like one place I stayed at, the workers got up around five—well, it was summer, ya see—had the first round of coffee, put in a couple of hours of hard yacker, and then the baker’s girl turned up in her little van, so we sat down and had the second round of coffee and the croissants. But another place, the farmer’s wife made the croissants herself. Set the dough to rise the night before, see?”

    “Couldn’t you buy some and freeze them?” said Sloane limply.

    “Well, ya could. But lots of country people there, they still do things the traditional way. And Francine said that even in Paris there’s still a little bakery every few blocks once you’re off the main drag: you just nip downstairs to the local baker huddled in your parka with your jeans pulled on over your pyjamas, and nip back, ya see!”

    “Or your boyfriend does,” she said drily.

    “That is the usual story, yep,” he agreed mildly.

    “Yeah,” said Dick thoughtfully. “Boy, I can just see it! Supposing your mum’d come at letting me eat croissants for brekkie in the first place, that is,” he added to his daughter. “She’d be booting me out the minute the bloody alarm went off, all right.”

    Sloane bit her lip. Sadly, this completely sexist and male chauvinist utterance struck her as all too plausible!

    “Yeah, well, before we had freezers, whoever was in charge of the kitchen here—wasn’t always the lady of the house by any means, they used to have a cook in Grandmother’s day—the cook’d be up at crack of dawn baking bread, no worries,” noted Cal.

    “Homemade bread, eh?” sighed Dick over the Muwullupirri toaster. “Bonzer…”

    “Dad, you can get very good breadmaking machines these days,” ventured Sloane. “Ingrid was reading a review of them. Um, Panasonic, I think she said was the best brand. Mind you, she did say it sounded as if it’d be a bit like driving a Boeing.”

    “Eh?” groped Col.

    “It looked so complicated: evidently it had loads of different settings.”

    “Right. Thought you just bunged it in the oven,” he groped.

    “No, this was for the rising and everything. Um, the kneading, too. It does the whole thing, you see. You just put the ingredients in and leave it overnight.”

    Dick brightened horribly. “Hey! That sounds the go!”

    “Um, yes, but Ingrid said there was a warning in the article ’cos lots of the brands are hopeless.”

    “I’ll suss it out! Probably be an article in Choice,” he decided.

    Well, it’d turn into an obsession, but better that than an obsession with Muwullupirri’s farm management system, so Sloane didn’t raise any objections, merely found some plates and knives and put them out. And at her father’s prompting a bowl for Col’s muesli.

    “And a spoon, Sloane!” prompted Dick.

    Reddening, Sloane put out a dessertspoon for Col.

    The coffee was superb. Dick didn’t even need to load his with sugar, though he did anyway, of course.

    After breakfast Col picked up his pot of chook mash. “Coming?” he said to Sloane.

    “Um— Dad! Leave Col’s coffee-pot alone! Kitten’ll tell you where to buy one if you really want one!”

    “It’s an STD call and your mother—”

    “Email her and she can ring you back if she likes, Hugo Kent can afford it. Yes, I will come and look at the chooks, Cal.”

    Trying not to laugh, Cal opened the back door for her.

    “Are they new?” said Sloane numbly, looking at the fat fluffy red hens in the run. Back when Mrs Wainwright had had chooks they’d always been white.

    “Yeah—well, newish. Well, place this size, seemed bloody stupid not to have a few chooks.”

    “I see,” she said weakly as he dished out the mash. Heck, they were going for it, all right! “Um, is it too much for them?” she asked: he’d left a bit in the pot.

    “Mm? Aw—no. This is for old Ollie,” Cal admitted with a feeble grin. “Discovered he fancies it, too.”

    “Native emu tucker!” said Sloane with a sudden loud giggle.

    “Yep!” Grinning, he led the way to the aviary.

    Sure enough, Ollie Emu came running as soon as he spotted them. Well, running: he was a bit lopsided, poor thing.

    “What?” said Cal, noticing she was kind of squinting at the big bird.

    “Um, just looking at his poor foot. His toes are big, aren’t they? Losing one has made a difference, poor thing.”

    “Yeah, he’s a bit gammy.”

    “How on earth did it happen to the poor thing?”

    Silence. Sloane looked up at him in surprise.

    Cal made a face. “Trap, we think. Bloody horrible things—Dad would never have them on the place.”

    “A—a trap?” she faltered, unable to envisage anything likely.

    “Yeah. Some blokes set ’em for foxes—well, and dingoes, too. Plus any unfortunate kanga that might happen along.”

    “Um, you mean it’d fall into it?”

    “Eh? Uh—no,” he said limply, running his hand through his hair. “You got the wrong end of the stick entirely, Sloane. Um—well a townee, you wouldn’t have ever… No, well, in the old days the buggers set them for the Abos, as well, thought you might have seen a documentary on SBS, maybe. They’d’ve called them man-traps.” She was still blank; he bit his lip and explained: “Like a huge pair of metal jaws, Sloane. You set them on the ground, open, shove a bit of brush or something on top of them, then the unwary animal—or man, as it might be—steps in them and they snap shut. Um, well, they used smaller versions for trapping rabbits, but, um, same idea,” he finished uncomfortably.

    “You mean it takes their foot off?” she gulped.

    “Not usually. Look, I wouldn’t have mentioned it, but you did ask.”

    “Um, yes; I’m not blaming you.”

    “No,” he said weakly. “Good. Well, the more usual thing—and this is frightful, but like I said, Dad never allowed the bloody things on Muwullupirri—the usual thing would be that the trapped animal wouldn’t be able to get free and would die.”

    Sloane’s eyes filled with tears. “Yes,” she whispered.

    “Shit,” said Cal under his breath. “Don’t cry.”

    A tear slid down her cheek and she sniffed hard and wiped it away with the back of her hand.

    “Oh, bugger it!” said Cal loudly, dropping his mash pot and putting both arms right round her. He pulled her against him and said: “For God’s sake don’t cry, love, it kinda stabs me right through the chest when ya do that. I never meant to upset you— Shit, Sloane, I never meant any of it! I’ve been a stupid bastard! I suppose I was jealous of bloody Kendall Burgoyne and I lost my temper. Hell, I can’t even remember what I mighta said to you, I was so wild. Can you gimme another chance?”

    Sloane just leaned against him and cried and cried.

    Dick Manning came round the corner of the house, stopped dead, and retreated noiselessly, grinning. That looked all right!

    After quite some time Cal leaned his head on hers, having to stoop rather to do so, even though she was a tall girl, and said: “It’s all right, lovey. I’ve got you. Come on, have my hanky.”

    Sniffing miserably and avoiding his eye, Sloane took the handkerchief. Spanking clean, and ironed into the bargain. She blew her nose and mopped her eyes, still not looking at him. “You’re too well trained by half,” she said faintly.

    “Yeah, something like that. Think you better stay on here and start teaching me some of your sloppy townee ways, eh?”

    She looked up, about to say something light and airy, and dissolved in tears again.

    “Oh, boy,” mouthed Cal silently. He hugged her harder than ever and said against her hair: “Come on, silly one, it’s all right now.”

    After considerable gulping and sniffing and recourse to the handkerchief again she was able to mutter into his chest: “I’m really sorry for being such a pig, Cal.”

    “Eh? No, it was all my fault. I really lost it. Don’t think I’ve ever been so angry in my life. –No, I tell a lie. Back when I was about ten, a bastard that used to work for us beat the bejasus out of an old donkey we used to have. Well, he was useless, but some nit from Nearby Bay had dumped him on us: had an idea he'd start up donkey rides on the beach, evidently they do that in Britain. Only old Neddy, he didn’t fancy the idea. So Dad said he could come out to us, Muwullupirri’d never notice the amount one donkey could eat.”

    Sloane blew her nose again on the now soaking handkerchief and looked up at hm in surprise. “I never knew you used to have a donkey, Cal.”

    “No, don’t suppose any of us ever mentioned it. Because,” he said, taking a deep breath, “this bastard I was telling you about, he beat the poor little creature half to death. Saw it with blood running down its poor old nose and—well, I went berserk, love. Threw myself at the bloke, tried to kill him. Of course I was half his size and it didn’t work, he just kinda chucked me away—flew about three yards through the air, landed so hard it knocked the wind out of me. That didn’t stop me, I went inside and got a gun—Dad didn’t know I knew where he hid the keys to the gun cupboard, of course—went back out, and shot the bastard.”

    “Cal!”

    “Yeah,” he said, grimacing. “I was still steamed up, you see.”

    “But—surely Mr Wainwright didn’t cover it up?”

    “Eh? Aw! No, I didn’t kill him: my aim wasn’t good enough for that,” said Cal, beginning to smile a bit. “He tried to run when he saw the gun. I got him in the arm. Never really fired at a moving target before, you see. Well, there was a row, as you can imagine, but the bastard got the sack, all right.”

    “Good! But what about the poor little donkey?”

    Cal smiled crookedly. “Mum slathered him in ointment and bandages—there was nothing broken but the poor little creature was bleeding pretty bad, and horribly bruised. He pulled through, but he didn’t last long after that. Mum and me spoilt him rotten, but…” He swallowed. “Pete reckoned he lost the will to live, and I think he was right.”

    “Oh, Cal,” she said sympathetically.

    “Yeah,” he said in a vague voice, hugging her again but gazing unseeingly out across the aviary to the wide open spaces of Muwullupirri. “Oh, well, it was a long time ago… But that was the only other time I lost my temper really drastically.”

    “Mm.”

    He cleared his throat. “Um, so whaddaya reckon? Stay out here with me? See if we can give it a go together?”

    “I—I’m afraid I’ll be hopeless,” said Sloane in a low voice.

    “I don’t mind.”

    “Um, but I—I ought to be making sensible objections,” she faltered. “I’ve never lived in the country…”

    “No, but do ya want to?”

    “Yes!” she gasped, bursting into tears again and this time pressing herself against him.

    “That’s all right, then,” said Cal mildly, hugging her tight. “Work it out as we go, eh? Take it one day at a time.”

    Sloane said something indistinct against his chest.

    “Mm?”

    “I said,” she said with a huge sniff, “I can make scones.”

    To his credit, that macho man Cal Wainwright refrained, though the effort was actually physically painful, from laughing. “Good-oh,” he replied stolidly. “Scones it is.”

    Quite some time later they wandered back to the house, he with his arm round her, and Sloane smiling dopily.

    “So that’s how poor Ollie lost his toe,” she murmured as he opened the kitchen door for her.

    “Eh?” said Dick from the kitchen table.

    “A horrible man-trap, Dad, like they had in the olden days.”

    Dick opened his mouth to say he could remember very clearly his grandfather setting them, if she meant dingo traps, and shut it again. “Oh, right, poor ole blighter, eh? Still, he’s oke now,” he managed.

    “Mm.” Smiling dopily, Sloane sat down opposite him at the table.

    Dick eyed Cal warily.

    “Fancy a cuppa, Dick?”

    “Uh—might as well, yeah. Thanks.”

    Cal made tea silently. Sloane just sat there smiling dopily at nothing.

    Dick accepted a gingernut with his tea but only got as far as lifting it up preparatory to dipping it. “Look, is it all right with you two?” he demanded loudly.

    “Pretty much, I’d say,” replied Cal, poker-face. “She's gonna stay on, aren’tcha, love?”

    “Mm? Mm,” Sloane agreed. She dipped her gingernut and bit into it. Dick watched her uncertainly. She swallowed. “At least that ruddy job at Nearby Bay is finished, thanks to you, Dad.”

    “Yeah. Uh—so you gonna tell Gail where to put it?”

    “Mm? Oh—yes, I suppose I’ll have to, I am on RightSmart’s books. I suppose she’ll be wild, she seemed to think I could take on lots more jobs for flaming Total Database Solutions.”

    “Never mind,” said Cal mildly. “We’ll invite her to the wedding.”

    At this Dick’s eldest daughter gave a loud laugh, gasped: “Yes!” and burst into tears.

    “Keeps doing that,” said Cal mildly. “Don’t panic. Think she’s got her period on top of everything else.” He got up and went round the table to her. “Come on, love, you can come and have a nice lie-down. I’ll make you a hottie to put on your tummy.”

    Sloane’s face was now very red. “How did you know?”

    “Well, heard you rummaging round in the bathroom cupboards for ages this morning.”

    “I thought you’d gone away!” she gasped.

    “Nope, I was making sure you found everything you needed. Mind you, Mum’s got the bathroom stocked up like a chemist’s shop, but I wasn’t sure if the brands’d be right. And you have got a little spot beside your nose, that’s usually a pretty fair indication.”

    “Yeah. Not to say bawling at the slightest provocation and/or losing her rag at the slightest provocation,” agreed Dick.

    “Shut up, Dad,” said Sloane weakly. “Um, I’m okay, Cal, I really don’t need to lie down.”

    “Yeah, ya do. Come on.”

    Dick just watched weakly as she got up and allowed Cal to steer her out.

    … “Well?” he said when the joker eventually came back with a hottie in his hand.

    “Well, she’s given in and admitted she’s got cramps, plus and a headache. Made her take some Panadeine. Think Mum was saying they’re gonna make it prescription only, but Muwullupirri’s not gonna run out of it any time soon, I can tell ya.”

    “Right. Well, if ya keep her barefoot and pregnant, she won’t use it up anyway, will she?” said Dick, more or less getting his second wind.

    “That’s right,” Cal replied stolidly.

    “Well, are you engaged or not?” the driven man shouted.

    Cal was filling the hottie from the electric jug but at this he turned round and grinned at him. “Pretty much, yeah, Dick. Haven’t got the ring on ’er finger yet, but yeah.”

    “Well, thank God for that,” he said limply. “Um, I’d get it onto it right smart, actually, in your shoes.”

    Cal just raised his eyebrows slightly.

    It dawned on Dick what he’d just said. He gulped. “That ‘right smart’ wasn’t a joke,” he said feebly.

    “If you say so, mate. No, well,” he said quickly before Dick could actually explode, “think she’d like Grandma’s old ring?”

    “Um, I musta seen it on your grandmother’s finger at some stage, Cal, but I can’t say I recall it. Um, well, not if you gave it to your first, no, she won’t.”

    “No, I didn’t,” he replied tranquilly.

    “Well, um, have ya got it here? Better give us a dekko and I’ll give you me expert opinion.”

    Nodding, Cal went out with his filled hottie.

    Dick just sat there and sagged.

    The ring was a large South Australian amethyst, a very dark shade, supported on either side by good-sized diamonds, two to each side, kind of leaf-shaped, the whole set in… Dick swallowed. “Would this be Edwardian, old mate?” he croaked.

    “Mm. There’s a portrait in the loft of my great-grandmother wearing it plus the amethyst set she got when they were married: a necklace that converts to a tiara, and a giant brooch and earrings. The earrings are very pretty, actually: that lacy look, y’know? Drops, the stones set in filigree.”

    “Filigree what?” whispered Dick.

    “Platinum, like this,” he said, nodding at the ring. “I like it better than gold with amethysts—most antique South Australian amethyst stuff is set in gold. Doesn’t really set the stones off. –That one’s rose cut,” he added helpfully as Dick held the ring up to the light.

    It was a very large round stone. “Right.”

    “Another cuppa?” asked Cal insouciantly.

    “Look, drop it, ya bugger. Where’s the rest of it?”

    “The set? In Dad’s safety-deposit box, Dick. Not Adelaide—Sydney. Um, not the bracelets that were part of the original set, unfortunately. My great-grandmother gave them to her eldest daughter when she got married.”

    “How sad.”

    “Well, do ya think she’ll like it?”

    “Uh—oh! Um, she’ll like it, Cal, I’m sure, but she’s got thin fingers, you know. I really think it might be a bit big for her—I mean, she could wear it as a dress ring, but, um, might not be too comfortable for every day.”

    Cal made a face. “Thought ya might think so.” He took it back and replaced it carefully in its box. Then he dug in his pocket again. “Well, how about this? Dates from the same period, but it’s daintier. Uh—had them valued, not so long since. That’s a really good amethyst, and the diamonds are good ones, too. This isn’t worth nearly as much, but I think it’s pretty.” He took out the second ring. It was a white opal in the shape of a heart, the stone set in gold, supported on either side by tiny gold hands.

    Dick had to swallow. “Uh—very pretty, yeah, but, um, the womenfolk have some daft superstition about opals, ya know, Cal.”

    “Yeah. Opals are the birthstone for October. What month’s her birthday, Dick?”

    He sagged. “October. –You’re not kidding, are you?”

    “Nope. Looked it up. There seem to be lots of variations for most months but all the sources agreed on opals for October.”

    “Right. Well, I think you’ve really lucked out there, Cal. –Come from Coober Pedy, did it?”

    “Yeah. Dad’s grandfather found it when he and his sons were up there fossicking. Um, Mum reckons it’s a girl’s ring, really,” he added uneasily.

    “I think she’d qualify. She wasn’t male last time I looked.”

    “Um, no, a young girl. It used to belong to Dad’s Aunt Celia.”

    “Don’t think I’ve heard the name,” said Dick, scratching his head.

    “No, you wouldn’t have. Died young of TB—consumption, they used to call it. Only seventeen.”

    “Jesus, Cal! For God’s sake don’t let on that one to any of the girls! –Does your mum know?”

    “Don’t think so. Dad told me when he gave me the ring. Thought I might like it for Trisha but it wasn’t her birthstone, ya see. Um, well, these things happened, you know, Dick, back then. Lot of infant mortality, too.”

    “Yeah,” said Dick with a little sigh, holding up the dainty little ring. “All that’s dead and gone history in the towns, now, ya know. Doubt if there’d be one person in a thousand that’d know what consumption was, even. Not even polio. One of the blokes at work was saying only the other week that his old gran had one leg a bit shorter than the other from polio but when he told his teenage kids about her they had no idea what he meant. I dunno… You got longer memories in the country, that’s for sure. Well, place like Muwullupirri… I guess history seems more real here, if that doesn’t sound too feeble.”

    “Nope, sounds about right. Well, Dad won’t tell her the ring’s history and I certainly won’t, so shall I risk it?”

    “Mm, I think she’d really like it.”

    “Good.”

    “Yeah,” said Dick limply as he put it back in its box and then returned it to his pocket with its mate. “Um, well, congratulations, or something, Cal.”

    “Thanks!” he said with a laugh.

    “You gonna tell your parents today?”

    Cal rubbed his jaw. “Maybe not, with Sloane feeling rotten, because Mum’ll go bananas. Roast dinner with all the trimmings’ll be the least of it. Um, well, wait a few days, eh?”

    “Yeah, might be a good idea. Um, well, can I tell Karen?”

    “Aw, heck, yeah, Dick! Of course!” he said with a laugh. “Think the phone’s working,” he added casually.

    Falling right into that one, Dick paused, bum raised above his chair, and asked in alarm: “Why? You been having problems with it?”

    “Well, last big storm a dead crow got caught on the flaming mast. Couldn’t figure out how the Hell to get the bugger off it, short of taking a pot-shot at it.”

    “What didja do, in the end?”

    “Hadda wait until the wind changed,” replied Cal, dead-pan.

    “You bugger!” he gasped.

    “Gotcha there,” said Cal happily. “No, well, there was a crow, got caught where the stays join the mast. Didn’t seem to interfere with the reception, though.”

    “Get knotted, Cal,” replied his father-in-law to be, going over to the phone extension.

    Cal just smiled, said: “I’ll be round the place,” and strolled out.

Next chapter:

https://thelallapindarevenge.blogspot.com/2022/11/return-to-lallapinda.html