Wild Lands (28 page)

In spite of the loneliness she was sure Mrs Hardy experienced as well, the woman was at pains to keep Kate at arm's length. She'd not been asked to sit at the rickety table and share conversation since the day of her arrival. Although, in fairness, there was little time to be idle. The closest Kate came to familiarity was at bathtime, as designated water carrier and guardian, then
Mrs Hardy talked. Otherwise the hut was quite out of bounds unless Kate was serving at table, cleaning the house or the silver. Both of which were done every second day, such was the dust.

A carriage clock ticked on the stone mantelpiece, the bath water splashed as the bather washed a leg, resting a cream thigh over the edge of the bath. The timber walls of the three-roomed hut had been plastered with a thin layer of mud and then newspapers. Needlework, images of flowers, were tacked onto the walls for decoration and the shelves held a mismatch of things: candles, glasses, books and a teapot. Swatches of material curtained windows that were mere holes with wooded shutters. Mrs Hardy had done her best to bring a touch of the feminine to the wilds.

‘Some nights I dream of London, the foggy mists, the cool, cool air and the green, the grass is a true green, not this washed-out version. My sons are over there, studying. One day they will be great men. Look at my hands, ruined, my face ruined. Truly this land has the most abominable weather.

‘My mother cleansed her face morning and night with equal parts Milk of Magnesia, paraffin oil and witch-hazel. It's very refreshing and fortifying for the skin, she –'

Mrs Hardy turned her head ever so slowly to stare at Kate. ‘I should order some perhaps. Will you run to the store?' She gave a brief laugh. ‘I have a list of things to be ordered. Such huge quantities I brought with me on arrival. It wasn't enough. Everything ran out. Six months, seven months and still I think of things that would make life easier: correspondence, a glass of milk, the newspapers. I wish the sheep would grow their wool faster for then Mr Southerland would journey southwards with my list. You should make one too, Kate. Things you need. It's all about need here, not want. I wonder how I used to fret over a pretty hat or a piece of lace.' She looked upwards. A length of canvas was swathed across the bark roof from corner to corner. A ceiling of sorts. ‘I'd like a decent house with glass windows. Mr Hardy promises to secure
the necessary materials, but he's no craftsman.' There'd been little progress made on the additions to the house although the fence was now completed and floorboards had been put down in the Hardys' bedroom.

Withdrawing her leg from the bath's edge, Mrs Hardy stuck out the other. Kate noticed the limb was swollen from the knee down. It was as if the pustular boil, having left the woman's face, had travelled south.

‘When will the wool be ready for market?' It was difficult not to stare at Mrs Hardy's toenails, which were long and yellow.

‘July or August. Mr Southerland is in charge of such things.'

A return to Sydney more than tempted. The hardships of the journey north were all but forgotten, save the killing of the native. That would never leave her. Kate thought of the fig tree in the Reverend's garden, of scowling Madge. Certainly there would be other schools requiring teachers, and employers that would pay her.

‘I envy you. As a currency lass you are bred of this land and are naturally used to its demands. Hard work never hurt a person, Kate, though I know you resent it.'

‘It's not what I expected.'

‘You hoped for better things.' Mrs Hardy nodded in understanding. ‘I thought I knew where I was travelling to, but self-sufficiency does not come easily to everyone. My one consolation is that the evenings do bring simple pleasures. To sit and sew, my daughter at my side while Mr Hardy reads by the light of his brass candlesticks, well, it is difficult to explain.'

‘I shared such a childhood with my own parents,' Kate replied. ‘Novels, books of travel and history.' It was a pleasure to talk of these things again.

The older woman wrung out the wash cloth and dabbed the material across her face and neck. ‘Really? You are quite learned, aren't you? And what of the bible?'

‘I am not a reader of it, no. I fail to see the devotion to one who has made the world a misery for so many. If God did create the world, and man and woman, why did he then create illness, snakes and spiders? Why do some people starve and children die young?'

‘Enough, Kate.' The woman dropped her hand in the water irritably. ‘Your Reverend certainly achieved very little in enlightenment where you are concerned. I would suggest not speaking this blasphemy in front of my husband. We are a God-fearing family and suffer daily from the lack of ministrations from a goodly servant of Our Lord.'

There was little point in quarrelling on the subject. The need to believe in something larger than one's life provided guidance and support for many, although Kate imagined most prayers went unanswered.

‘Among all of us you look the better since your arrival. You have lost the puppy fat you carried and are far more amenable, or perhaps I have been too self-absorbed. In any case you know how much work is required of you. There is scant time for anything else.' Mrs Hardy rested her back against the bath, her eyes becoming heavy-lidded. ‘You don't like me, do you? Don't answer that. If we were in Sydney I would simply expect my due deference. But it takes time to understand that things are different out here.'

There were plenty of things that Kate could have said in response as to why she had every right to dislike the Hardys. ‘You forget, Mrs Hardy, I am the daughter of a free settler. And I am not used to this place either, nor its hardships. I still sleep on the floor.'

The woman sat upright, revealing sagging breasts beneath the sheer cloth. She grimaced as if in pain. ‘Yes, you have complained often enough. Well then, you should have a bed at least. I shall speak to my husband about the building of one for you. Tell me,' she asked thoughtfully, ‘where do your thoughts on marriage stand now?'

‘You are here through marriage, I here for the lack of it. I could ask you the same thing,' Kate answered quietly.

‘You are a most exasperating young woman. I didn't send Sophie away so that you and I could argue. I am ill. It has been a gradual thing, starting with some pain but it grows worse by the day. I wanted to know if you had any skill with healing, if your mother had been so inclined.'

‘Only the barest, I'm sorry to say. It is your leg? May I?'

The older woman nodded and Kate pushed the skin in a number of spots on the swollen limb. The mark of her finger remained, an indentation in the puffy flesh.

‘It's dropsy, isn't it?'

‘I believe so. I have seen it a number of times but never treated it,' she hastened to add. ‘Rest, I believe, and raising the leg may help drain the fluid.'

‘Yes, I have a medicinal and pharmacological tome that suggests it is indeed dropsy, but my leg is not the only part affected. My stomach grows distended.'

‘Perhaps you are with child?' Kate suggested.

‘My courses ceased last year.' Mrs Hardy placed her leg back within the confines of the hip bath. ‘The blacks killed my baby through fright and made me barren.' Her voice drifted. ‘Dropsy can be fatal?'

How should she reply? People did die of dropsy, but whether it was the actual swelling of the limb or some other unrecognised problem was beyond Kate. ‘I really don't know. Have you had the ailment long?'

‘Long enough. I grow breathless and exhausted whether doing the simplest of tasks or in bed at night.'

They were beyond the ministrations of a doctor, of a hospital, although the limited exposure Kate had with these institutions suggested that more people went in than came out. In spite of Mrs Hardy's condescension, Kate felt sorry for her.

‘Mr Hardy expects me to sit down to a feast of rabbit for my name day.' Her words trailed. ‘We have had a shabby beginning, you and I, Kate Carter, but I would ask you not to tell a soul of this.'

‘Surely your husband should be informed? I know he would want you to seek advice. To return to Sydney.'

‘Perhaps, but no-one will be journeying south until the sheep are shorn and the wool is ready for market. It will be a chance to recoup some of the monies outlaid on this venture. This is a vital time for us, Kate. For all of us, and he can't spare men to take me to Sydney, not now, especially with the current problems.'

‘The natives.'

She nodded somberly. ‘Mr Southerland arrived with news last night that there are continued small uprisings. The mounted troops will not be coming to our aid this time. It seems that although we have leased acreage, and used our savings to settle in this unfathomable land, having gone beyond the designated nineteen counties we must look to our own to protect us. Imagine. Men were killed last year and they leave us on our own.'

‘But haven't some of the natives been killed as well?'

Their conversation was interrupted by the sounds of approaching horses. Mrs Hardy sat upright, the water sloshing. Kate's hand felt for the pistol in her skirt pocket as she ran to the open door. ‘It's Mr Hardy. Mr Southerland rides with him and another. A man I have not seen before.'

‘A visitor? Heavens, and here am I bathing.' Her voice trembled with excitement. ‘We've not had a visitor since, well, we never have. Fetch my robe, Kate, and help me out of this infernal contraption, then run and tell Cook we have a guest. She must do her best to provide.'

Kate placed the robe around Mrs Hardy's shoulders as she rose and assisted her from the hip bath, then walked outside to the verandah, closing the door firmly behind her. She too was excited to see who had arrived. The men drew up abruptly, their coat-tails
dragging across their horses' rumps as they dismounted. The animals nickered softly, dropping their heads to feed.

‘I will show you the map.' Mr Hardy stomped up onto the verandah. Ignoring Kate he kicked the door open and went inside.

Kate retreated to the side of the hut. Inside fervent whispering could be heard between husband and wife. By the looks on the faces of the waiting men they wouldn't be sitting down to enjoy tea and johnny-cakes. Mr Southerland was stuffing his pipe intently, while the other man's hands were placed firmly on wide hips. He was tall and solid with a flintlock pistol holstered at his waist and a ragged beard that matched the overseer's in length and breadth. A deep frown line, crevice-like, ran between his brows. Considering this was the first visitor to the Hardy farm since Kate's arrival seven months earlier, it was not an auspicious start.

‘Here, Stewart.' Mr Hardy reappeared, waving two sheaths of paper. ‘Lease agreement and farm boundaries,' he stated, spreading the documents on the verandah table.

‘You should have sought me out before you began blazing trees to suit yourself.' Stewart joined him on the porch and studied the separate parchments for long minutes.

‘I've been here for near two years. The most I knew of you was a name on a map.'

‘Fetch me a light, girl,' Mr Southerland told her.

Kate rushed to the kitchen hut, returning with a lighted twig, young Sophie following and Mrs Horton yelling at her to attend to her chores.

The overseer held the burning stick to the pipe as his gaze met Kate's. He sucked hard on the tobacco until the leaves lit, a puff of smoke coming from his nose and mouth. ‘Best you take the girl away, Kate,' he warned. ‘These two have been arguing for the last five mile.'

Sophie remained mute as Kate dragged the girl to her side, but they moved only a few feet away, Kate holding a finger to her lips to
ensure the child remained quiet. The air was thick with expectation. Kate drew on the atmosphere, aware that their droll life made a major problem between neighbours a welcome diversion for onlookers.

‘See,' Mr Hardy announced with obvious satisfaction, ‘it's as I told you. The tree with the markings is on my land, not yours. I'd appreciate it if you could move your sheep. I've had problem enough with the blacks burning out sections. I can't afford to be losing more feed.'

Retrieving his own map from a coat pocket, Stewart unfolded the paper and pressed a thumb on the area in question. ‘Aye, well, not by my reckoning, nor the date of this map,' he replied. ‘I was here eighteen months afore you. The right to that land is mine.'

Mr Hardy waved an impatient hand at the overseer.

‘Even if that be true, you'll have to redraw the boundary so that it's fair to both parties,' Mr Southerland advised. ‘Once it's done the agreement can be signed and dated.'

‘I'm not giving away land I claimed and paid for by the right of law.' Refolding the map, Stewart replaced it in his coat pocket. The same hand slid towards the flintlock at his waist.

‘And you think I should, Scotsman?' Mr Hardy's voice rose. ‘You think I should give way to you?'

‘Aye, I've fought blacks, whites, fire and fever. Don't think I'll fold to the first new-comer land-grabbing Englishman. You're not in your Mother Country now, Hardy. This is a new land, new rules. You'll not be lording it over me. If you've a problem with the boundaries,' Stewart told them, his fingers closing on the pistol's hilt, ‘then get on your horses and ride to Sydney, sort it out with the Colonial Secretary, but I tell you now I'll not give up one bit of –'

Mr Southerland extracted a musket from his horse and levelled it at the landowner. ‘As I said, we'll be working this out amicably ourselves, Mr Stewart, sir. If the people in Syd-e-ney Town ain't interested in our problems with the blacks then they rightly aren't going to be concerned over a boundary dispute. Besides, do you
think the likes of them will ride all this way to see who's right or wrong?' He cocked the trigger. ‘We're the ones who must come to an understanding. I thought you'd be amicable with that, especially since it was the Australian Agricultural Company that pushed you off the land you were squatting on, down south.'