Jessica (11 page)

Jessica stops to listen as the dogs bark again. The same bark as before, though this time a little more urgent. Kelpies are working dogs and don't usually bark at nothing. Jessica's ear is now tuned to the sound as the barking draws closer. Just when she's about to go outside and whistle them in, their barking stops once more. Nevertheless she goes to the cupboard and fetches the shotgun, breaks it and loads both barrels but does not pull the hammers back. She leans the twelve-bore against the wall near the door to the yard. The kettle comes to the boil and Jessica prepares a pot of tea. She likes it strong and black with lots of sugar, the way it's made in a billy on an open fire.

Today is Sunday, though she's buggered if she's going to drive the five miles to church. Joe hardly ever goes to church, though he observes a day of rest more as a matter of habit than piety. He'll usually spend the day stitching and mending harnesses or some such task. Jessica's in charge now and she'll act the same way he does on the Sabbath. For a start, she'll keep well clear of St Stephen's with the ever-present Thomas women ticking off the names of the worshippers.

If Hester asks, she'll say one of the wheels on the sulky is giving a bit of trouble so she decided not to chance it. It's only half a fib, the rear axle does need minor attention. Hester will not allow her to go to church on horseback as she thinks it unladylike and reflects badly on the family.

All of which adds up to a pretty lazy day ahead. She'll milk the jersey cow and leave it in the paddock with its calf. Let the little fellow get his fill for once — she's not going to need the milk or the cream. She'll feed the chooks, give the two horses half a bale of hay and fill their water trough. Then it'll be time to feed the pigs with the cabbages gone to seed in the vegie-plot. She'll take a look at the sheep and then ride down to see if the cows in the paddock nearest the river have got their hopes up yet.

Joe's paid George Thomas for one week's use of his Shorthorn stud bull, Trump Card, which Jack rode over with on Wednesday. But so far the great slack bovine bastard hasn't bothered to climb up the back of a single cow. Joe won't want to pay Mr Thomas if the bull doesn't service half a dozen cows and then there'll be a blue which will leave Hester and Meg at Joe's throat. George Thomas's temper hasn't improved any since that first time when Joe took Jessica over to Riverview Station. Outside the shearing shed he has a rotten habit of picking on his son and so Jack tries to work separately from his father whenever possible, often calling on Jessica to partner him on musters and other work. Over the past four years Jessica has taken Joe's advice and stayed well clear of George Thomas. Joe can be a difficult sod, but he's got nothing on old man Thomas, a bloody know-all who thinks every ringer, stockman, shearer and rouseabout is a born malingerer and out to cheat him. By the end of a day's work his face is always crimson as a turkey's wattle and he's fit to burst with anger. As often as not, it's his own boy who has to cop his bad temper. Jessica's watched dozens of times as Jack stands there and takes it while George Thomas abuses him. She sees how the knuckles of Jack's clenched fists whiten as he holds his arms rigidly to his sides while his father humiliates him in front of the stockmen. George Thomas always needs an audience.

Afterwards Jack will move into the bush to be on his own for a bit, away from the scene of his shaming. Jessica will let him go for a while and then follow him, pretending to be gathering wood for the fire, and whistling a bit of a tune so he'll hear her before she comes upon him. Bush rules say she should leave him be, mind her own business, it's every man for himself. But when she comes up to him he never tells her to bugger off and he'll let her sit quietly, chewing on the end of a stalk of kangaroo grass, a few paces away from where he sits.

Jack's no mother's boy who blubs easily, Jessica knows that. If one of the stockmen shows him disrespect he'll climb down from his horse and have a go. Scrap with him right there, where they'll bump against the flanks of their horses and sometimes wrestle in the dust, horses whinnying and shying, clouds of dirt flying everywhere.

The stockmen always come running, not caring who wins, only hoping to see a good stoush. Jack's no pushover and knows how to scrap, but if his opponent gets the better of him, which sometimes happens, Jack'll take his punishment and shake the other bloke's hand afterwards. The men respect him as much as they hate his old man.

The men remember too how it was Jack who took care of Billy Simple after his accident at the shearing shed and they like him for it. Most would have walked away, taking no responsibility. They see the way Jack looks out for Billy, sometimes bringing him down to the shed for some company as he works, talking to him and making sure he eats his tucker.

It's been three years since Billy's accident and the men working at Riverview Station have grown used to seeing him with a watering can or digging in the homestead garden. Those who remember him of old will shout him a greeting and Billy will wave back shyly, though he gets nervous if anyone comes too close. He's grown even taller and now stands at six feet and six inches, a shambling giant of a boy with his scarred face hidden under the brim of his hat and no teeth in his mouth except for the big molars at the back.

Jessica sips her tea and thinks of poor Billy Simple. Since the accident he's somehow got his religion mixed up with his penis, which is a source of amusement for those who didn't know him before. Billy isn't a complete idiot and he can understand simple directions well enough. He'll stand with his head bowed and his hands clasped below his waist, shaking in terror when he's being addressed, especially when it's Ada Thomas. Then he'll look up calmly, no longer shaking, his watery blue eyes focused on whoever's in front of him. He'll cross himself and say, ‘Hail Mary, Mother of God!' And give a toothless smile and politely inquire, ‘Would you like to see the big cock Jesus gave me?' Then he'll start his shaking again, head bowed, eyes tightly closed, lips mumbling senselessly, his great raw hands with their bitten and broken fingernails clasped together and resting on his chest.

Billy will stay like this until he hears the word ‘Amen', which he takes as permission to leave. With his shoulders hunched he'll shamble off, his broken boots shuffling in the dust.

When Jessica works on Riverview Station she always stops over to see Billy in the garden. She'll get boiling water from the cook and make up a billy of tea and take it to him together with a bit of damper soaked in golden syrup that she's brought from home for him.

Billy, seeing her coming, will drop whatever he's doing and jump up and down and laugh like a little boy. Jessica will walk up to him and put the billy and the damper down at her feet. Then the two of them will stand quite still, Billy towering above her. After a few moments he'll reach out shyly and touch Jessica on the cheek with the back of his fingers and then reach down and take her small hand in both his huge fists and hold it for a while. , ‘Owyergoin', Billy, orright?' Jessica will say after a while.

Then he'll release her hand and clasp his own in prayer, and break into his big, gaping smile and say, ‘Hail Mary, Mother of God, would you like to see the big cock Jesus gave me?'

The first time he did this, Jessica had blushed and protested, but she soon enough realised that Billy's saying it is an empty threat. Now when he says it she looks stern and says ‘Amen' and then, ‘Bend down, Billy.'

Billy will come down on his knees and Jessica, first making sure no one is looking, will take a wet cloth and clean his face, wiping the mucus from his nose as any mother might do to a small boy. Then she'll kiss him lightly on the cheek. Billy will rise to his feet and tear off around the vegetable patch and then come panting back to her side like an excited puppy. Whereupon she'll give him the tea and damper, which he'll break off into little bits and push furiously into his mouth, swallowing tea with the bread to soften it so he doesn't have to chew. Jessica recalls how on one occasion, when she and Jack were earmarking some sheep, they were talking about Billy Simple. On a curious impulse she suddenly asked Jack, ‘When Billy talks about his gift from Jesus, has he ever, you know, shown it to you?' Jack at first didn't understand. ‘Shown what to me?' ‘You know, what he says Jesus gave him?' Jessica was trying not to giggle. ‘Nah.'

‘Have you seen it?'

‘Yeah, I suppose,' Jack replied, shrugging his shoulders.

‘Suppose?'

‘Well, I seen him taking a piss lots of times in the old days.'

‘Were it, you know,' Jessica paused, ‘like he says?' Jack, she remembers, looked up at her and grinned.‘Yeah, I reckon. A bloody monster!' he'd said, laughing. ‘In the shearing quarters when he'd take a piss someone would always say, “Hey, Billy, you should take that thing to Mike Malloy to lock up in the flamin' gun locker!” , They'd fallen about laughing, as much at Jessica's boldness as at Billy's superior equipment.

Then Jack had suddenly grown serious, and told her how Billy had become the object of horrible taunting by Gwen and Winifred, who took delight in Billy's confusion and terror in their presence.

According to Jack they're getting worse and Ada Thomas, it seems, is no better. Billy works hard in the garden and is as strong as a bull, but ‘the papist idiot', as Jack's mother calls him, can do nothing right. ‘You can see the map of Ireland all over his face,' she'll say to anyone who'll listen. Jack says she constantly tells Billy off, even beating him over his shoulders with her English blackthorn walking stick. He's often made to repeat a task for no good reason other than to please her.

Once, Jack told Jessica, Ada had spent a day making Billy move a large pile of rocks intended for a bed of succulents, changing her mind each time he'd completed the task and making him move them to a different location again. Jack had come home at sunset to find Billy collapsed over a pile of rocks, the skin stripped from his hands, the flesh of his palms reduced to a bloody pulp, and him shuddering and whimpering in a heap.

Billy had become totally bewildered for weeks after this. Jack would come home at night and find him on his knees mumbling incoherently, stuttering and fumbling at his rosary beads in the tiny garden shed — the home he shared with the garden tools, though scarcely large enough to contain his huge frame.

Since then the very sound of his mistress's shrill voice causes poor Billy to go into a blind panic. Holding his hands over his ears he'll squat on his haunches wherever he happens to be working and rock his body back and forth until she ceases her haranguing.

Billy can manage words well enough if you give him time to get them out. All it takes is a little bit of patience and calmness. Billy responds to calmness and to folks who are gentle with him.

‘There's no need to hound him, he works hard and keeps to himself. He loves the garden and has taken naturally to planting things,' Jack has said to Jessica.

‘But why, if he's doing a good job in the garden, does your mother give him a hard time?' Jessica asked.

‘I reckon she's never forgiven Billy for running away when she ordered him to fire the shotgun at the Aborigines,' Jack replied. ‘I bet she thought that him firing at the blacks was a good way to kill two birds with one stone. She could have had Billy arrested for attempted manslaughter and put into the loony-bin on account of it and, at the same time, she'd be rid of the poor starving blacks. I wouldn't put it past her.' ‘Poor Billy, can't we do something?'

Jack shook his head. ‘Whenever she can, Mother blames Billy for involving her in a court case and for the fine she had to pay. She moans about him causing her to get a criminal record and says that's why she wasn't elected to the district council.' ‘But she didn't get enough votes!'

‘I know, but of course she doesn't see it that way. She claims the other councillors spread it around that, with her criminal record, she wasn't eligible and to save her the embarrassment, folk shouldn't vote for her.' Jack gave a bitter laugh. ‘It's all Billy's fault, you see.'

Jack's tried many times to intervene on Billy's behalf, warning his sisters to stay away from him and begging his mother to leave him alone. But Jack is seldom at the homestead during the day, when all the teasing takes place. He tries to keep an eye on Billy, even thinking once to take him out on the land with him, but Billy became terrified around the horses.

At Riverview, Billy has also suffered the wrath of George Thomas, which drove him into a fresh state of terror where for two days he lay too stupefied to get to his feet, shaking and whimpering, his hand in his mouth.

Jack told Jessica how he found Billy and tried to get him to drink some water, afraid he might die of heat apoplexy. Eventually he had to kneel beside the pile of potato sacks on which Billy lay in his tiny shed, with his hat pulled down as far as it would go over his face, and haul him into a sitting position so he could get him to swallow a mug of water. Jack said how the fear in Billy had caused him to tremble so much that half the water spilled down his front.

Jack spread his hands and shrugged. ‘What can I do, Jessie? He's better off in the garden — at least he's safe from being harmed.'

On her visits to see Billy, Jessica keeps well clear of Ada Thomas and the two girls, afraid of what they might say to Hester and Meg.