Brother Sister Soldier Cousin Page 9

  That morning Mr Oakley helped Mum cull the cows and herd them into a pen for the truck to collect at eleven o’clock. Old Mother Two-Tit was kept since she gave a lot of milk even though she had mastitis in two teats. My throat choked up thinking of the freezing works; it was as bad as sending the calves off.

  Mr Oakley showed Mum how to bend number eight wire and fix a water trough’s ballcock. He stated, “If there’s no water, the cows can’t drink, so keep checking the troughs.”

  Mum knew that. I felt cross. Mum shouldn’t be bossed on her farm, as though she knew nothing.

  Ruby and Jess ironed clothes and packed. Mum sat down with a writing pad and pencil to make a list of things we could physically do on the farm. Milking cows, feeding pigs and hens were at the top.

  “Harness horses, dig thistles,” I said.

  Mum wrote that down.

  “We can harrow paddocks,” she said. “And top-dress with fertiliser.”

  “Can we lift heavy sacks?”

  Mum tapped her teeth with the pencil. “We can bucket the fertiliser out until the sacks are light enough to pick up.”

  “What about hay-making?”

  “I can drive the sweep and tedder,” she said. “You could lead the horse. The neighbours will mow the grass and build the haystack but then we can’t help them with their hay-making, and who will cook for the hay-makers if we work in the hay field?”

  I didn’t know. “Planting the turnips?”

  Mum didn’t know about that.

  “What about the pump?” Dad always repaired the pump if it stopped.

  “We’ll get the pump people out.” Mum said. “We might be able to drench cows.”

  Next morning I backed the Ford out of the garage, drove to the gate, opened it, drove through, closed the gate, and turned off the motor. Ginger strolled up and nuzzled my side, his left ear up in enquiry. When were we going to school? Grazing, lying in the shade of the lawsonianas, rolling in the grass, Ginger didn’t seem to miss it. I felt heavy and wanted to cry. The bank manager might tell us the farm couldn’t afford wages to hire a man and I would have to stop home and help Mum.

  At the railway station, Jess and Ruby took a goods’ train for Hamilton. I tried again to imagine my small self growing inside Ruby, but couldn’t. For Haskell Vale I felt nothing. For three seconds I’d thought he was an actor, a swashbuckling pirate figure; now he was a shadowy figure standing behind a shop counter with men’s shirts piled around him. I had his brown eyes, his direct look, but didn’t know how I felt about that. What did Jane and Emily look like? Did they know about me? I longed to find out their likes and dislikes.

  After hugs and kisses from Ruby, tears from Mum, a touch on the cheek from Jess, we waved goodbye. Mum drove up the main street and parked outside the bank. Her face had the closed look as she powdered it and set her hat at an angle. She pulled on her gloves, smoothing them finger by finger as if to protect herself.

  The bank manager, Mr Wyatt, shook Mum’s hand and mine, and offered his sympathy. “Mr Forbes’s financial affairs are in excellent order,” he said. “The mortgage was reduced yearly and will be repaid in four years.”

  “I hope the war is over by then,” Mum replied. “And butterfat prices up.”

  “The bank estimates another year of war. There will be a surge in prices then. Mother England still needs our butter and meat.”

  Mum handed to Mr Wyatt the list we’d made. “Helen and I will milk and are able to do these farm jobs. I hope we might have wages enough for a farm hand, which would free Helen to go to high school.” I felt hot inside. Mum was begging for a farm worker’s wages so meekly and hesitantly. She owned the farm now!

  Mr Wyatt said, “The farm can afford to employ a farm worker. Is there one available?”

  “A Te Miro lad. He is sixteen, a strong youth.”

  “Excellent. You will be able to manage the farm until Harry gets home?”

  Mum didn’t reply to that. Her face was pink. She looked down, opened and shut her handbag. “I can book food and petrol at the store and farm goods at the Farmer’s Co-op. But my personal savings are frozen. They are included in Henry’s money now going through probate.” Her nest egg from Grandma Wellwood? Eighty pounds. It belonged to Mum, not Dad.

  “The bank can lend you money. Is a hundred pounds enough? Harry would not disagree with that?”

  “No … he would think it right.”

  Of course Harry would agree. I would agree, Jess would agree. Mum owned the farm.

  “What was my husband’s bank balance?” She murmured as though it was wrong to ask. Dad’s bank book was at home in his desk drawer. Mum could have looked at it! Was it like not being able to sit in his place at the table?

  Mr Wyatt picked up two pages in front of him and cleared his throat. “A healthy balance. Mr Forbes was always prompt with mortgage and interest repayments and had money saved for farm expenses.”

  Mum nodded agreement.

  “One thousand, three hundred pounds, two shillings and eight pence.”

  Mum flinched. I was astounded. That was a fortune.

  “Thank you.” Mum inclined her head. Why was she thanking Mr Wyatt when she had helped Dad earn the money?

  We drove home. The pigs had to be fed, the yearlings moved to another paddock.

  “Dad’s bank book is in his desk,” I said. “Why didn’t you look at it?”

  Mum shoved the gear lever into fourth. “His bank book was private,” she said in a huffy voice. “A good wife respects a husband’s privacy.”

  “He’s saved a fortune. Enough to buy another farm.”

  “Your father had peace of mind with the money he’d saved for the mortgage repayments, although I was surprised to hear the amount. We could have afforded a worker when he was feeling so tired.”

  Dad used to say money was tainted; the desire for it made people do evil things. But money could be used for good, too. Perhaps if he had employed help Dad wouldn’t have died.

  I wound down the car window. “It’s not right that your inheritance from Grandma Wellwood has been treated as Dad’s.”

  Mum grimaced. “It’s law,” she snapped. “The lawyer and Harry will see I get my inheritance back.”

  “What can Harry do about it?

  Mum stared straight ahead. “The farm is Harry’s.”

  “It’s your farm.”

  “No, Henry left the farm to Harry. Harry is to buy me a house, and pay me a wage.”

  “That’s not fair.” I wanted to kick the car door.

  Mum sighed, a deep, tired breath, full of twenty-five years of milking cows.

  “What if Jess and I wanted the farm?” In fact, I didn’t want to farm and Jess had her nursing.

  “Harry wanted to farm. When he was ten, then sixteen, he knew that. Your father made a new will ten years ago. He was going to leave the farm on a share basis between Harry and me. The lawyer may have advised Henry differently.”

  It wasn’t fair to Mum, and when Harry came home I would tell him so.

  “You and Jess were to get my share when I died. Now you’ll share the proceeds of the house that will eventually be bought for me.”

  Back home, Mum phoned Ronnie Brown. The Brown boys had lips that curled into sneers and I knew Ronnie would talk to the district about the herd, and about us. I would be taunted at school by Bob Brown. Ronnie was to be part-time; he wouldn’t live in our house, but would bike home each afternoon. Mum would give him breakfast and lunch and he would have Sunday off. His wage was ten shillings a week and two weaner pigs.

  To avoid his sly eyes, I would leave for school before milking finished. Relieved I’d worked that out, I felt better about Mum employing him and decided I would call him R. Brown. But he’d better not call me Lenny!

  Harry, the farm, Dad, the law that included Mum’s money as Dad’s, all whirled in my head. At this second Mum didn’t have any money or possessions. She had her own children and me, but that was about love, not money, and money was needed
to survive. It was shame-making for Mum; she must feel awful. In my mind I spoke severely to Dad: “You should be ashamed of yourself.” Wherever he was, I hoped he knew what I was thinking and what Mum was feeling. My Dad and his lawyer hadn’t thought it through, and in Dad’s own words about people who made wrong decisions, one needed to “think details through to the final consequences”.

  I would never marry. I would earn money and keep it in my name. Marrying could make you feel like a slave.

  Mum’s face was grim and she said she didn’t want to speak about Dad’s will again.

  An hour before milking, Mum braised sausages, and I was peeling carrots and potatoes when Mr Mullins walked up the path, whistling “The Dashing White Sergeant”.

  He took off his hat and held it over his heart. “Ah, sympathies, dear lady. Henry was a white man, a white man.” For a second I thought he said a white bun.

  “Thank you, Mr Mullins,” Mum said.

  “And your lad, Harry. Where is he now?”

  “From the newspaper, we guess somewhere in Italy.”

  “Aye. With all the other fine boys fighting England’s troubles.” He shook his head. “What a waste, a waste.” He looked at the table and the kettle.

  “Would you like a cup of tea?” Mum said stiffly. She didn’t want to give Rory Mullins tea but good manners forced her to. Couldn’t Mr Mullins see that? I felt embarrassed for him.

  He put his hat on the table and sat on the form like a friendly cat wanting to be stroked. “A cup of tay would be grand.” He looked at me. “You’d be a fine wee milk-maid, no?”

  “I help Mum.”

  “And that’d be a fact, that’d be a fact,” he repeated.

  My cheeks felt hot. The way he pronounced “fact” sounded like the forbidden “f” word. He took three teaspoons of sugar in his tea, vigorously stirred it and nodded at me. “My wife was about your age when I met her — collecting a turkey stag and hen from my mother, she was. By the time we’d caught the turkeys it was dark so I took her home.” He leaned across the table and spoke solemnly. “Now if you ever need help, Pearl, I’m right next door. My son Shaun is a good lad and we’d both be willing to help you.”

  “Thank you, Mr Mullins.” Mum looked flustered. “I am employing Ronnie Brown part-time.”

  Hooray for Dad saving money; we could afford help, and not have to ask for it from Rory Mullins.

  “That’s grand.” Mr Mullins stood up and set his hat at an angle. “But if you need help, I’m on the farm right next to you.” He shook Mum’s hand. She thanked him again. He smiled at us and walked off down the path, whistling.

  Mum gave one giggle then grimaced. “There was the solution to my problems.”

  “What solution?”

  “Shaun Mullins. You marry him. Our farm could become Mullins land one day.”

  “Pooh. That’s medieval stuff. I don’t want to marry.” Although, I conceded that apart from the awful law about ownership, getting married to someone as hubba-dingerish as Herman would be okay. “Calling Dad a white man.”

  “White is his word for excellent.”

  “It’s an awful comparison to a black man.”

  Mum agreed. It made me squirm inside. If anyone with a dark skin heard that, what would they feel?

  Next morning I slept through until six thirty. Listening to the shed motor in the distance, I stretched out and lay for another fifteen minutes. I polished Ahmed’s hump on my dress. What would Harry bring home as gifts from Italy?

  It felt queer making porridge for R. Brown to eat, though Mum and I would eat it too. As I stirred oatmeal and cut my sandwiches, Dad’s face came to me, waxen, unsmiling. Had his spirit or soul watched his funeral and heard the talk at the lunch following? Did he know how Mum felt about his will? Dad, where are you? He’d never eat porridge, never do anything again.

  Ginger was slower than ever, plodding along the path through the gorse and broom. Julie and Mary Smithson held my hands as I walked up the school drive. The FJC club stared at me as though I was a freak. All the kids looked at me. I was the only one in the school without a father.

  At assembly Mr Moore spoke of the school’s sympathy for me. I wanted to bawl, and wished he would shut up. I caught up on maths and geography but the Standards had played out more of the Napoleonic war. Now Napoleon had been defeated by the Duke of Wellington’s soldiers and he was imprisoned on the island of Elba. Fred, who had last acted Napoleon, wrote that it was boring on a small island with nothing to do. Mr Moore wrote on the bottom of his essay, Exactly, an excellent punishment for N.

  Miss Cristal asked me if I was sleeping all right. Of course Mum and I were. Besides, there were no loud noises like bombs falling to wake us.

  “Sometimes after a death,” she said, “one doesn’t sleep, thinking of a loved one.”

  I wished Barbara was here to talk to about Miss Cristal. Would Barbara have continued to let me feel guilty over losing Ahmed, or would she have given him back? I couldn’t help liking Barbara, even though I’d never trust her again. I missed her easy ways. She was not nasty or a smart-mouth and we both loved talking to each other.

  We played sport or did art for the last lesson of the day, but I had to go home an hour early to do the night milking. I’d told Ginger about that and he was waiting by the gate. His ears stuck straight up as I talked about Barbara. “Herimmn,” he said in his throat, chewing on the bridle.

  I would be fourteen tomorrow. I thought I would feel different, turning fourteen, but I didn’t and I wished Dad was here. Mum didn’t have sugar and butter coupons left to make a birthday cake, but she had clothing coupons and for my present I could choose a petticoat at Hetherington’s. Next Friday we would go to town and have tea and cakes at Miss Wilson’s Tea Rooms. Ruby had given me my dress and Jess the wedgie shoes.

  R. Brown passed me as he biked back to his place. He grunted, “’llo,” and nodded.

  I nodded back. “Aftnoo …” Mum would be mad if I wasn’t polite to him. The Browns might sneer at our farm but Mum said the Browns were responsible for their sneers; we weren’t.

  “Dad, why did you die?” I wailed. Without him we were tired, keeping the herd milked. Now, the Japanese invasion seemed far away. Sadness brought carelessness and I couldn’t imagine any more bad things would happen.

  Mum had bread spread with honey and tea made, ready to pour. Hogget sizzled in the oven. “The strength of Ronnie!” she exclaimed. “He whacked Scoffer. Had Bob and Crazy harnessed in two twos and started ploughing for the turnip paddock.”

  “Hmph.” I did not want to talk about R. Brown. “Where did he sit on the form?” Mum pointed to my place, so I moved to sit in the spare chair.

  The cowshed had no guttering or drainpipes. We walked through a muslin curtain of rain to the yard, slapping sodden cows into the bails as water sloshed in our gumboots. Winston paced in a lordly way with the cows into the yard. Mad-eyed, he switched his tail, bellowed and brooded. When he trotted through a bail after Maudie and followed her up the race, Mum grabbed the knobkerry.

  Daisy’s tail lashed across my face. My eyes watered, my cheek stung, and I could taste cow muck in my mouth. “Shitty hell!” I yelled.

  Mum grimaced at me. She said people swore because they had not learnt enough English to express themselves, but I knew why farmers swore. The taste of cow muck in your mouth was obscene. I rushed to the tap, rinsed and spat.

  It may have been rain on her face, or Mum may have been crying. When she opened a bail door, I gave her a hug and she hugged me back. The cow muck hell and the rain didn’t seem so bad then.

  Chapter Nine

  I SOAKED IN THE BATH, SOAPED MY HAIR, AND WOULD have soaped inside my mouth but it tasted ghastly. After tea I scrubbed the roasting dish while Mum ironed a table cloth and pillow slips. Tip stood up and growled and there was a knock, knock on the door. Mum opened it and Sergeant Burge stood in the porch.

  “No–oh,” Mum made a whooping sound in her chest. “Harry … no?”
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br />   “I’m sorry, Mrs Forbes.” He twirled his hat in his hands. “Harry is missing.”

  “Missing?” she cried. “Not dead?”

  “A cablegram came. Missing in action in Italy.”

  We stared up at him. My mouth wobbled and tears pushed at my eyelids.

  Holding herself tightly around the waist, Mum paced to the table and back. “Harry can’t be dead.” She shook and shook her head. “Missing doesn’t mean dead?”

  Sergeant Burge handed Mum the cablegram. “Missing in action usually means dead, Mrs Forbes.”

  She read aloud: Regret inform Private Harry Forbes missing in action.

  Carrying the cablegram by her fingertips, Mum went to her bedroom and closed the door.

  “I’m sorry, lass.” Sergeant Burge ran his fingers through his hair. “Your dad and now this …”

  Not to see Harry again. “Missing” on the other side of the world was a monstrous hoax-like thing. I didn’t want to believe it.

  “Where did Harry go missing?”

  “At Trigno, near Rome. Is there anyone your mum would like notified?”

  I shook my head, no. We would phone Jess, Ruby, the Oakleys…

  “Missing in action means Harry might not dead?” I repeated Mum’s words.

  “When a cablegram is sent, it’s rare that a soldier is not dead.”

  But he was talking about any soldier, not Harry, not my cousin-brother.

  Sergeant Burge went. I held the back of Dad’s armchair and yearned for Harry. Come back, Harry. Don’t die, don’t be missing. Dad died, but you’ve got to be alive. Come back to the farm. Go pig hunting with Mike. Just be alive, Harry. Alive.

  In the bedroom, Mum lay on her back like a knight’s effigy, arms and ankles crossed, clasping the cablegram to her waist. Her eyes were the blue of sapphires as she stared at the ceiling. “My Harry is not dead! He could be lying hurt … somewhere. He could be captured. The army is incompetent!” The words hissed from her mouth, sending the army to hell. I shivered, felt weak, cried, and agreed with Mum but didn’t know what to say.

  “I’ll make a cup of tea,” I muttered.