Read The Road to Gundagai Online
Authors: Jackie French
‘She is mourning Madame,’ said Mah quietly.
Blue turned. Madame was dead.
The church was small, made from the rocks prised from the surrounding paddocks, its spire smaller than the row of night-dark pine trees along its front. On one side beyond the graveyard was a hard-grazed paddock for the congregation’s horses, for those who still came in cart or sulky. On the other side a fenced tennis court looked newly marked.
Sturdy wooden picnic tables sat under the pine trees. Wherever and whenever people gathered here in the bush, it seemed, it became a minor celebration, with luncheon and tennis after church. A wombat had dug a hole through the tennis fence, as though to state that regardless of tennis games or even elephants, her kind too still occupied this land.
It was a quiet funeral. Madame’s body and Monsieur’s remains lay side by side in their coffins below the altar. Miss Matilda had conjured black dresses and hats for Blue and Mah. The other mourners were Joseph and his brother, Miss Matilda and Mr Thompson, Mr Cummins the solicitor, arrived on the train just this morning, in a black tie that Blue wondered if he always carried, just in case he must attend a funeral in his duties for a client. The Drinkwater staff sat on one side, the men in black armbands. The stationmaster sat with a woman who must be his wife, and Sergeant Patterson, dressed in a dark suit and tie instead of his uniform, accompanied by a black-clad woman and three small boys. Joseph unobtrusively helped Blue to her feet as they rose to sing the final hymn.
She had been unable to tell the vicar what Madame’s favourite hymns had been. She suspected, in fact, that Madame had rarely been in a church, even to be married — the wedding might have been the informal ceremony practised by so many on the road, and not a legal marriage at all. But Blue hoped Madame would have approved of what she’d chosen. The song rose around her:
‘
All things bright and beautiful,
All creatures great and small,
All things wise and wonderful,
The Lord God made them all.
’
And elephants, she thought. Great and wise and wonderful.
She wished Sheba could have been here. She had almost suggested they bring her and leave her in the paddock next to the church. But that would cause too much gossip. Nor was she sure that Sheba would follow them or allow them to ride her, not with Madame gone and the life she’d known vanished. Sheba too had known more freedom in the paddock by the river than she’d known in her whole life. And the circus had never possessed an elephant harness. There had been no need while Madame had been alive.
The hymn ended. The congregation sat. The vicar spoke more words. The pallbearers stood: Joseph and Mr McAlpine, a dark-skinned man who had been introduced as Mr Peter Sampson and the sergeant. Mr Thompson had apologised for not taking part, in case his grip slipped.
The organ played as the coffin was slowly borne out of the church. Four more of the Drinkwater workmen rose and silently took the other coffin. Blue watched it go.
Did it really contain Madame’s husband? She thought it probably did. But she also wouldn’t have put it past Madame to have tricked them to the end.
Perhaps the man who would lie beside her for eternity had been a … a Russian count, escaping the revolutionaries. Something suitably, wonderfully dramatic, though admittedly a dead taxidermist hanging in a House of Horrors for two decades was theatrical enough.
Blue walked out with Mah and joined Joseph and Mr McAlpine. The air smelled of fresh soil from the grave and the flood that roiled and coiled its way down the river. She watched as the two coffins were lowered into the earth. Blue and Mah tossed handfuls of dirt onto each coffin.
‘Sleep well,’ Mah whispered.
Blue shook her head. ‘Not Madame. I bet her ghost sits on the fence waiting for customers, ready to tell their fortunes.’
‘We’ll put up a sign,’ said Miss Matilda dryly. ‘If you see a ghost, don’t panic. Just cross her palm with silver.’
‘And pay attention to her advice,’ said Blue. She watched as the sexton shovelled dirt onto the coffins. Later there would be a headstone to Madame and Monsieur Magnifico, as no one living, it seemed, knew Madame’s real name. But she had been magnificent in life. It seemed fitting she should remain a Magnifico in death. Under the names would be the words:
They lived in joy together. They gave us happiness and wonder
.
Mr McAlpine drove them back to Drinkwater in his shiny green car, Mah in the front seat next to him, with Blue and Joseph in the back. Joseph took her hand and squeezed it, then let it go.
‘So you own an elephant.’
And Mah owned three caravans, a Big Top and a necklace that might be gold and a bracelet that might be studded with real sapphires, she thought. Had Sheba stolen both pieces of jewellery? If so, it could have been anywhere — there would be no way to find the original owners. Or Blue hoped that was the case. She didn’t want to have to tell the sergeant that her elephant was also a thief.
‘I don’t know what to do with her,’ said Blue. ‘She can’t stay there by the river.’
‘Don’t see why not,’ said Mr McAlpine.
‘But she eats so much! Though of course she isn’t eating at all now. Not even apples. Do you think we should call the vet?’
There had been a little money left in Madame’s trunk, not much, but enough to pay a vet, and for two girls to live on for a few months, even without the hospitality of Drinkwater or selling Mah’s jewels or the caravans or Big Top, even without the allowance Blue expected Mr Cummins to arrange for her.
‘I don’t think the vet knows much about elephants,’ said Joseph.
‘Let her grieve,’ said Mah. ‘She’ll eat when she’s ready.’
‘But what if she doesn’t?’
‘Blue, let it be,’ said Mah gently. ‘We’ll spend tomorrow with her, just like we used to.’
‘May I come too?’ asked Joseph.
‘You don’t have to get back to Sydney?’
‘The professor gave me a week’s leave. Death in the family.’
‘But it’s not —’ began Blue, then stopped. For somehow the McAlpines had begun to feel like family, more than her aunts and Uncle Herbert ever had. And Miss Matilda and Mr Thompson too.
‘Never had an elephant in the family before,’ said Mr McAlpine from the front seat. His grin was comforting. ‘A few horses, a couple of dogs. But not an elephant.’
Blue nodded. The paddocks slid by, the sun glinting through the tussocks, a spider’s web turned to jewels on barbed wire.
The car drew up at the homestead. A crowd had already gathered on the verandah and under the shade of the rain-lush trees, for the sun was hot. The maids circulated with trays of tea and lemonade, plates of pikelets with jam, sliced honey roll, scones with cream, rock cakes and, yes, thought Blue with a lump in her throat, squished flies. Every funeral must have a wake, and this was Madame’s, even if only a few of those here had ever met her.
Blue let Joseph help her out of the car, then sat on a cane-bottomed seat on the verandah. She sipped her tea, trying to sort out her emotions — sadness and a feeling of desertion, but also a strange sensation of at last beginning a journey home, even if she had no idea what or where that home might be. Despite her loss, yet another loss, she realised that Madame’s death had freed her.
But today was for grief. She could almost hear Madame say, ‘The future is waiting for you, child, but sorrow must be attended to as well. Each to its season.’ Madame had looked so intimidating that first day in the tiny tent, with her blind eyes and secret amusement, as though she knew the world.
For a moment Blue wondered if Madame had really been able to read the future. Yes, most had been pretence. But had Madame’s true talent also been hidden in plain sight, under the fakery of shawls and whispered gossip?
Had Madame led the circus here, where the sisters would learn that they were free to go home, the Olsens to follow Gertrude’s star to America, where Mah would find acceptance and Blue perhaps love? Or had it just been an accident, their future changed unforeseeably when the Mammoth visited Australia? And Fred? Dear Fred. Fred the friend, but not a lover. She hoped he’d find a life of his own now, no longer hiding within the circus glamour.
Blue glanced across at Joseph, talking to some of the neighbouring farmers. He glanced up at her at the same moment and smiled, then looked back at the man who was speaking.
Surely it’s too soon for love, thought Blue. And yet from the first moment she had seen him he had been the … realest … person in her life. But Joseph couldn’t know how ugly her scars were … except he could, she thought. He was a medical student.
She had read in the back of one of the Felicity Mack books that she now devoured more details of how Joseph’s sister too had been crippled, and far worse than her, bedridden for the time she had written her first novel. Joseph would indeed understand the endless indignities that she had to face — that she found even using a chamber pot a challenge.
‘Miss Laurence, please do accept my sincere condolences again.’
She blinked her way back to the present and found Mr Cummins in front of her. ‘Thank you,’ she murmured.
‘Mr and Mrs Thompson have kindly offered me their hospitality. Perhaps we might talk tomorrow. Or in a few days’ time. Whenever you feel up to it.’
‘Thank you, Mr Cummins. You are very kind. Shall we say four o’clock this afternoon?’
He looked startled, then carefully wiped the expression from his face. ‘Of course, Miss Laurence.’
It was time to jump into real life, boots and all. Or rather, extremely pretty black shoes with small heels. Blue guessed that Madame hadn’t wasted a second of her long life, nor Miss Matilda either. She would do the same.
She looked at the spread on the white damask-covered table and suddenly realised that the most important mourner wasn’t here. She would take some squished flies down to Sheba. She would tell Sheba about the funeral. Sheba would listen, watching her with her small dark eyes, and even if she didn’t understand the words, she would know what Blue was speaking about — the ceremony to say farewell to the woman they both had loved.
She looked around for Mah. But Mah was being handed chicken sandwiches by Andy McAlpine. Joseph …
No, no Joseph. Joseph was her life tomorrow, and perhaps many tomorrows too. But today was for her old life, and Madame, and Sheba.
She slipped down the hallway to the kitchen. The housekeeper looked up from filling one of the giant teapots. ‘Can I help you, Miss Laurence?’
‘Thank you, Mrs Mutton. It all looks wonderful. You have done Madame proud. I wondered, though, do you have any more squished flies?’
‘Have they scoffed the lot already?’
‘Not quite. I just wanted to take some down to Sheba.’
She hoped Mrs Mutton wouldn’t feel her biscuits were wasted on an elephant. But Mrs Mutton just nodded. ‘I did just the same at my gran’s funeral. Made a sponge cake to her recipe. Duck eggs, to make it light, and passionfruit on top from the garden. But I kept a bit aside for Gloria. Gran’s dog,’ she added. ‘Every time Gran made that cake she’d keep a bit for Gloria. Here’s a tin of squished flies, Miss Laurence. You give them to the elephant with my respects.’
Blue swallowed before she could speak. ‘Thank you. You’re very kind.’
‘Kindness is as kindness does.’ The housekeeper patted her arm as she went out with the teapot.
Whatever that meant, thought Blue. But she appreciated both the thought and the pat. She tucked the tin under her arm and headed down the kitchen steps, past the lemon tree at the back door, and the hen house, through the orchard. Sheba saw her, or perhaps smelled her — or perhaps the squished flies — her ears back, her trunk in the air. She left the corner of the river paddock where she had been standing in vast superiority to the sheep and began to plod uphill to the paddock gate. Blue let herself into the first paddock, then looked back, at the dark dresses and suits and gleam of teapots. She grinned. It was a good thing Sheba couldn’t be among them. How many bracelets or pocket watches might she pinch today?
The grin faded, as another car rolled up the drive. It was black, the tyres were muddy, with the look of a hired car rather than a family automobile. The chauffeur sat in front, in grey cap and uniform. He parked neatly behind one of the neighbour’s buggies, then got out to open the passenger door. A woman emerged, tall and dressed in black that seemed to soak up the sunlight, a hat in not quite matching black, and clutching an elderly black handbag.
Blue’s breath ripped from her body. Aunt Lilac! Aunt Daisy emerged beside her.
What were they doing here? How had they found her? How could the police have let them come?
She raised her chin. It didn’t matter. They couldn’t hurt her now. Miss Matilda, Mr Thompson, Mah, Joseph, Mr McAlpine, even Cookie and Mr Higgs — she had an army to protect her.
But she could also protect herself. She had charmed five thousand people, swum as a mermaid, ridden an elephant and waved at the crowd. She was no longer the girl they locked in that small stuffy room. Two elderly aunts couldn’t touch her now.
But this was not the time to tell them so, not at Madame’s funeral wake. Impossible to kiss them as protocol required. Impossible to say in public, ‘Go away. You tried to kill me.’ Later, she thought. Oh yes. I’ll tell them later.
Let Miss Matilda greet them as hostess. Miss Matilda would keep them occupied. She would almost certainly get them seated in the living room with cups of tea, away from onlookers, so that Blue could speak to them openly.
Sheba trumpeted, a small high noise. Blue turned and began to walk towards her paddock. Sheba was a hundred times more important than the aunts. Ten thousand times. She smiled, imagining Aunt Lilac’s and Aunt Daisy’s shoes slipping among the tussocks and hard black pellets of sheep dung. She stood at the top of the hill above the river, brown and foam-flecked, feeling the vibration of the flood under her feet, smelling the sweet-sour scent of old leaves and wombat droppings. Green paddocks, grey sheep, the barbed-wire fences that carved the world into manageable shapes, the high blue ridges far away. This is my world, she thought. The aunts and their shut-in lives had no place here.