He glanced at Ralph. ‘Your mother – Meg, she was strong. She organized the women on the ship; she was the one who complained about the conditions or asked for extra rations and blankets, and I expect your mother saw that and that’s why she handed you over to her. She must have known you’d be safe with her.’
‘What are you saying, sir?’ Ralph was bewildered. ‘Are you saying she deliberately gave me up?’
‘I’m only guessing of course, I didn’t know what was going on in that hellhole below decks. But she handed you over to Meg and then when they came up on deck—’ He hesitated. ‘You said you wanted to know, so I’m telling you. She didn’t fall overboard. She jumped. She committed suicide.’
Ma didn’t tell me that. Ralph sat quietly, just staring into space. She only said that the woman who was my mother had drowned; she was trying to protect me from that knowledge. A warmth spread over him and he knew that he must comfort her, tell her that it didn’t matter that she hadn’t given birth to him. She was his mother in every other sense.
Yet he felt sad that a woman should be so desperate as to take her own life. Rose Elizabeth Scott. What had driven her to that final act? Was it guilt? Who had she tried to kill? Who had been his father and where was he? Was he dead or still living in England?
His mind was full of confused thoughts and imaginings as he rode out of Parramatta towards home and he was startled as Jack rose up in front of him from his same position on the ground where he had left him.
‘Did you find out about your mother?’ Jack loped alongside him.
‘I found out more than I wanted to know,’ he said morosely. ‘I found out her name – ’
Jack put up both hands and protested. ‘Aborigine custom forbids the mentioning of dead people’s names!’
‘But you don’t follow native custom,’ Ralph argued, ‘except when you used to go walkabout and miss your school lessons!’
‘Sometimes I do,’ Jack retaliated.
‘All right, I won’t mention her name to you. But I can tell you that she came from the same part of northern England as my parents did.’
‘So they must have known of her or her family! I’ve seen a map of England. It’s a very small place.’
Ralph shook his head. ‘I don’t think so. It might be small compared to Australia but it’s full of people.’
Jack sighed. ‘Yes. That’s why they sent so many here and turned my people out.’
‘I think I shall go to England, Jack. To try to find out what happened.’
‘You can’t change anything. You have only known Meg and Joe as your parents.’
‘I need to know,’ he said. ‘You know about
your ancestors. You can trace your family back since – what is it? Since Dream Time?’
Jack nodded. ‘Since Dream Time. But those are our ancestral spirits who were there when the world began.’ He was silent for a while as he ran by Ralph’s side. Then he said, ‘Yes. I can see it is important to you. Come with me tonight. We’ll find a quiet place where you can think.’
The supper Ralph shared with his parents and Peggy that night was eaten under a strained attempt at normality. Peggy had been crying, her eyes were red-rimmed and she kept sniffing into a handkerchief; his mother was pale-faced and his father ate hurriedly, saying there were dingoes about so he would have to go out again.
‘I’ll come with you, Da,’ Ralph offered, but his father refused, saying that Benne and some of the hired boys were going with him.
‘Stay with your ma,’ he said gruffly. ‘Don’t go raking around Sydney. She could do wi’ some company.’
‘I’m all right, Ralph,’ his mother said after his father had picked up his rifle and gone out. ‘You don’t have to stay. You could have gone instead of your father.’
‘He won’t take time off, Ma. You know that. I could manage the sheep station, I know how, but he won’t let me. He has to do it all himself!’
‘It makes him feel good.’ Meg smiled. ‘He’s so proud of what he’s achieved.’
Ralph wasn’t convinced and a sudden thought occurred to him. ‘Are you sure it’s not because
I’m not his real son? If Peggy had been a boy instead of a girl would she be allowed to take charge?’
‘That’s a dreadful thing to say.’ His mother was angry and rose from the table. ‘You’ve both always been treated ’same!’
‘But there can’t be many farmers in this country who share the land and stock between their sons and daughters!’ he insisted. ‘Everybody I know, the sons get the farm and the daughters get a dowry!’
‘Peggy might not want to get married,’ his mother said sharply, ‘and if she didn’t then she would always be dependent on you to take care of her. Your da doesn’t want that. He wants her to be independent and so do I!’
Ralph excused himself and got up from the table. He was behaving abominably, he knew, but he couldn’t help himself. He was so very confused. ‘I’m going out,’ he said brusquely. ‘I’ll see you in the morning.’
‘Don’t get drunk!’ his mother called after him as he went through the door. ‘That’s how trouble starts!’
He came back and planted a kiss on her forehead. ‘I won’t,’ he said softly. ‘I’m not going into Sydney. I’m going walkabout with Jack.’
He took a blanket, which he put over one shoulder and secured with a belt around his waist; he wore his oldest trousers and thick shirt and carried a stout stick. He had sturdy boots on his feet, whilst Jack was barefoot and carried no
blanket but had draped a strip of wide cotton cloth around his bare chest which partly covered his cut-down trousers and bare legs. He too carried a stick.
‘Where are we going?’ Ralph asked as they strode out away from the farm and towards the hills.
‘Who knows?’ Jack replied. ‘We’ll go where our feet and dreams take us.’
Dusk was settling as they climbed and although the civilization of Sydney with newly built stone houses and white cottages was encroaching upon the hills above the harbour, it hadn’t yet reached the bush high above Creek Farm. As he looked down, Ralph could see the grazing flocks of sheep belonging to his father and Jack’s father, Benne. They could hear the occasional shot of rifle fire which told them of the crusade against the wild dog of Australia, the dingo.
Up here on this higher ground the hazy blur of the distant Blue Mountains made them seem approachable. They could hear the incessant croak of cicadas and the cacophony of birdsong all around them, the raucous cry of the cockatoo and parrot and the squeak and rustle of nocturnal animals coming out for their nightly forage. As they walked, they disturbed sleeping lizards and reptiles, their feet crackling on the carpet of dry grey leaves of the eucalyptus and gum trees which swayed above them.
‘Here,’ Jack said after two hours’ walking,
when with Ralph stumbling in the gloom and relying on his stick to probe the rough ground, they came to a small clearing, a grassy area surrounded by sweet-smelling bushes and ferns. A faint light from the sky showed through the grey-barked, ever-present eucalyptus trees, which rustled their top branches in the evening air. Jack looked around him. In the gathering darkness he seemed to have become more native than when they had set out. ‘This will do.’
Ralph sat down with some relief. It had been a hard climb, even though he thought himself to be fit. Jack searched around amongst the trees until he found what he was looking for: an old tree with its grey bark hanging off in strips. He sought for a foothold in its trunk and, reaching as high as he could and taking a loose edge of the bark, he tore it until it hung down in sheets. Then he moved out of the clearing and Ralph lost sight of him for a few minutes until he reappeared dragging a thin branch from a sapling and two forked branches from a larger tree.
Ralph started to get to his feet to help him. ‘No. I’ll do it,’ Jack insisted. ‘I shall forget the knowledge like so many of my people have done. We are becoming lazy and getting used to walls and windows. We shall forget our ancestry, those of us who are left.’
Ralph sat down again. He understood Jack’s needs. They had known each other since childhood. Their parents had been friends ever
since Benne had brought his new wife Daisy, pregnant with Jack, to meet Meg and Joe. Daisy had lived all of her life in a stone house. Her white father had thought that he was doing the right thing by bringing her up in the European manner, although her Aborigine mother had taught her the ways of her forebears. Daisy had taken favourably to Meg, who treated her as an equal, and when she gave birth to Jack the two women had called their sons brothers.
Now Jack was attempting for a few short hours to live as the Aborigines had once done: to walk upon his own territorial land which was his by right, or so his father had told him, as he in turn had been told by his father and grandfather. He had come to commune with his spiritual ancestors in whom, in his role as part white man, he only half believed.
He placed the forked branches together and held them fast by the branch of the sapling, then draped the torn sheets of bark over them to make a rough shelter. ‘You will need your blanket in the
mia-mia
, white man,’ he grinned, his teeth showing white in his face, and he took off his own cotton cloth and threw it on the ground.
Suddenly he sprang into the middle of the clearing and with his feet apart he adopted a confrontational stance, his arms held wide, his hands held low and his fingers stretched in a challenge.
Ralph pulled off his boots and jumped to his
feet and, pulling his shirt over his head, threw it on the ground next to Jack’s discarded garment. He stood opposite Jack and he too lifted his arms but with his hands held high in a passive manner.
Jack took two steps forward and bending towards him grabbed Ralph about his lower hips. They stayed locked as Ralph stood perfectly still, offering no resistance, his arms still held high, until he felt himself being lifted up and thrown into the clearing where he landed on both feet. ‘Huh,’ he grunted and now he took the confrontational stance whilst Jack took the passive.
Jack’s body was firm and muscular and Ralph had difficulty in gaining a grip around him but he did and with a great effort swung Jack off his feet and threw him as he had been thrown, into the middle of the clearing, where he dropped lightly on his feet.
Now it was Jack’s turn again and Ralph forced his strength down into his legs and feet, making himself heavy so that he was awkward to lift, but Jack’s strength was phenomenal and once more Ralph felt himself lifted and thrown. Again he landed on his feet and became the challenger but he knew who would eventually be the winner, and after several more rounds, Jack threw him and he finally failed to land on his feet and sprawled in the grass.
‘I give in,’ he panted. ‘You’re too good for me.’
‘I am,’ Jack agreed and went off to find water which he had heard gurgling nearby. He drank from a stream and came back with water cupped in a large leaf, and with a handful of berries and nuts which he offered to Ralph.
‘I ate supper.’ Ralph refused the offering. ‘But I’ll have a sup of water.’
The darkness gathered and although it wasn’t cold Ralph pulled his blanket around his shoulders. ‘I wish we’d brought a tot of rum,’ he said.
Jack shook his head. ‘As from tonight I’m giving up alcohol. When I left you in Sydney last night, I went into one of the native reserves. The place was appalling, it was filthy and just falling apart. The men had been drinking rum all day and were sitting around in a drunken stupor, and the women were almost as bad.’
Ralph protested, ‘but you’re not like that!’
‘No, I’m not,’ he answered quietly. ‘But the settlers think that the Aborigines are no good. They don’t realize that the white man’s rule has destroyed them. Our forefathers didn’t know of alcohol or money before the white settlers came. We exchanged goods with our fellow tribesmen and if we had a quarrel, then we fought each other. Life was very simple then.’
He sat quietly for a few moments, then said, ‘If only I could teach them, black and white, that there could be a better life.’ He turned and looked at Ralph. ‘A life such as you and I enjoy as brothers; as our fathers, yours and mine do,
who respect each other’s traditions and don’t interfere but live harmoniously together.’
‘But Jack.’ Ralph leaned towards him. ‘You’re different. Because of your white grandfather and your mother’s influence, you have had an education and can think of these things.’
‘And are you saying that without my English background I would still be an ignorant savage?’ His voice was scornful.
‘I’m not saying that, but you might have been if you hadn’t been shown another way! But those natives down in the reserves don’t know any better. Right or wrong, some other nation would have come to this continent and changed their lives. It’s a question of power. Your people have been uprooted from all they believed in and now they don’t know which way to go.’
‘I know.’ Jack lay down on the ground. ‘Quiet now,’ he said, abruptly ending the discussion. ‘I’m going to commune with my ancestors,’ and Ralph couldn’t tell if he was serious or not.
Ralph lay down beside him and closed his eyes. He needed to think of what to do. Should he go to England to find his relatives, if he had any, even if it meant upsetting Ma? His da, he thought, wouldn’t mind too much. He might even be pleased, especially if he promised to visit Aunt Emily. I think I will go, he mused, it would be a great adventure if nothing else.
He felt himself drifting off into sleep and as he relaxed he dreamt he could see the great ocean before him, the turbulent white crests and
the crashing waves sweeping across the decks of the ship which carried him: the ship with white sails which moved like a huge swan. ‘The
Flying Swan
,’ he murmured, and he could hear Jack moaning in his sleep, only in his own dream it wasn’t Jack, but a woman who was crying as she stood by the bulwarks of the ship looking back at him, as if saying goodbye.
Jack was carried on a gentle wind, up and up until he reached a high plateau where he was carefully laid down. He was naked and alone in a vast area of scorched earth which was devoid of trees or vegetation. Then his eyes opened wide as a horde of huge animals approached him, their feet moving stealthily and their claws extended. He lifted his spear in warning but still they came. They were unlike any other animals he had ever seen, with huge heads and grinning teeth. Crocodiles opened their massive jaws and winged goats with dainty feet flew about him. Giant kangaroos sprang over him, furry wombats nuzzled against him and enormous snakes slithered up his legs and wrapped themselves about his body. Yet strangely he did not feel threatened or afraid. They were telling him something, weaving a story which he did not quite understand.