Beryl Fletcher

 

 

14

 

At first, they made good progress. The terrain flattened out and soon there were signs of human habitation signposted by fallen trees and areas of burnt bush. Hannalore soon became used to the movement of the horse, although her shoulders ached with the effort of holding onto Juno. 

 

‘At this rate,’ said Mr Cattermole, ‘we should arrive in the township at dusk.’

 

Hannalore wanted to ask him where they would be staying and how he proposed to hide Juno from the officials at the orphanage. She tried to engage him in conversation but he had mumbled something about little pitchers having big ears.

 

Three sheep with vacant eyes and heavy fleeces appeared from nowhere. The dog pricked up his ears. Mr Cattermole ordered Jacka to stay. 

 

‘The poor things,’ said Hannalore. ‘They can barely walk.’

‘Even though they are runaways, they still belong to someone.’

‘Can’t we help them?’

‘Beware the farmer with his gun.’

‘You mean we could get shot?’

‘The dog could.’

 

Juno, who had slumped forward without speaking for most of the journey, twisted around violently and almost fell off the horse taking Hannalore and the saddle with her. Mr Cattermole dropped the lead rope and moved quickly to the side of the horse. He grasped Hannalore’s lower leg and released her foot from the tapedero covering the front of the stirrup.  

 

Hannalore tried to release her other foot but could not do so. Mr Cattermole offered to help her. He held her ankle a little too long for comfort; it was almost a caress. Paradoxically, when he began to withdraw his hand, she wanted it to stay.

 

Mr Cattermole checked the saddle by placing his hand between the girth and the horse’s belly. He tightened it up and suggested to Hannalore that she walk the rest of the way. ‘I should not have allowed Juno to share the saddle with you,’ he said.

‘I’m happy to walk,’ said Hannalore.

‘The worst is over. We will soon be on a roadway.’

 

Mr Cattermole showed Juno how to put her hands into the gullet of the saddle and hold on tightly. Juno smiled for the first time since they had left the hut. She thought it great fun to be riding high above Hannalore plodding alongside her.

 

As Mr Cattermole had promised, they soon arrived at a dirt roadway that twisted and turned through gentle slopes and sheltered valleys. The afternoon wore on. The hovering rain clouds that had threatened them in the morning had dissolved. There was a smell of warmth and growth to come. Hannalore could almost hear the land stirring beneath her feet.   

 

Occasionally they passed plain wooden farmhouses with smoke drifting lazily from lean-to roofs and once, an elaborate bay villa with ornate return verandas. Hannalore had never seen anything so beautiful before. The villa glistened white and pure at the end of a long metalled drive flanked by willows and elms. A regenerating stand of kahikatea stood guard behind the house. Plump sheep grazed in the side paddocks.

 

Hannalore begged Mr Cattermole to stop so that she could rest her feet. Her shoes were giving her blisters and Juno was complaining of thirst.

 

‘Very well,’ said Mr Cattermole. ‘We’re making good progress.’

 

They travelled a little further until they came to a patch of thick native bush that came almost to the edge of the road. There was a sound of running water from behind the trees. Mr Cattermole lifted Juno from the saddle and placed his bed roll beneath a clump of tall ferns. ‘Sit here and keep my dog company,’ he said. ‘That is your job.’

 

He led the horses along a track deeper into the bush and allowed them to drink from the creek. He refilled the canvas water bag at a higher point from where the horses drank and brought the water back to where Juno and Hannalore waited. 

 

Hannalore offered to gather some twigs to make a fire for the billy. Mr Cattermole said that the wood was probably too wet to burn. ‘Besides, someone may notice the fire and come to investigate. We need to be careful.’

 

Hannalore did not ask him why. It was highly probable that she would get nothing but the ‘little pitchers have big ears’ comment again. Besides, seeing the white villa had calmed her fears about the outside world to some extent. She had been brought up to believe that people who lived outside her enclosed religious community were ungodly drunkards, sinners and fornicators; in short, lovers of the devil. Her world was divided neatly between us and them. Or it had been up until now.

 

The white villa had mesmerised her. The sight of it was like a physical blow, a bodily shock. She had never seen a house like this before, either in the flesh or in a book. All she knew was that the people who lived in that house could not be dangerous. Such beauty could not co-exist with evil; God would not allow it. She closed her eyes and made a mental map of the position of the sanctuary where they had watered the horses. The white house was just down the road in a southerly direction. She made a silent pledge to come back and enter that house to hear the voices of the good people who lived within. She was quite sure that she would be able to find it again without a problem.

 

‘Come,’ said Mr Cattermole. ‘Time to hit the road.’

‘How much longer?’ asked Hannalore.

‘One more hour or near enough to it.’

 

Ruby the pack horse plodded along slowly at the back of the procession. Mr Cattermole had to reduce his walking speed to accommodate her. He said that she was an old bush pony who did not enjoy walking along a dirt road. Although there were few cars in the district, there had been some unfortunate incidents with her taking fright when suddenly confronted with one of the noisy monsters.

 

Hannalore did not want to confess that she too was a creature of the bush, even more so than Ruby. The horse had actually seen a car whereas Hannalore had not. She knew that they existed but that was all.

 

All at once Ruby stopped walking. The lead horse felt the tension on the rope attached to his halter and also stopped. Jacka assumed a watchful position by freezing at the side of the road, one blue eye and one brown eye fixed on something ahead. Mr Cattermole cautioned Hannalore to be silent by placing a finger to his lips.

 

Smoke billowed around the curve in the road. There was a clinking noise of shovels hitting gravel and of men laughing and talking.

 

Mr Cattermole grabbed Jacka’s collar and walked him to the side of the lead horse. He told Juno to stay in the saddle.  

 

‘Come Hannalore,’ he said. ‘There is nothing to be afraid of. It’s just some workmen fixing the road but some of them might know me. Let me do the talking.’

 

They turned the corner. Hannalore was shocked to see what she thought was a funeral pyre burning in the middle of the road. Logs of smouldering wood were laid in rows forming a rough platform. On the top of the platform were chunks of grey bricks.

 

One of the men threw down his shovel. ‘Cattermole, you old bastard.’    

‘Thought it might be you,’ said Mr Cattermole. ‘How are you Clive?’

‘Fit as a buck rat.’

‘Didn’t know you’d be making burnt papa this close to town.’

Clive tapped the side of his nose. ‘Cheaper than road metal, but don’t tell the council that.’

 

The two men sat on a log that lay downwind from the smoke. Clive gave Mr Cattermole some tobacco and a packet of cigarette papers. Mr Cattermole rolled up a smoke, inhaled deeply, and announced it to be a breath of heaven. 

 

Hannalore stood awkwardly at the side of the road. There were two workmen tending to the fire. One was a young Maori. He tipped his hat at Hannalore but she was too shy to speak to him. The other worker was a middle-aged white man with an unkempt beard and small pink eyes. He came close to Hannalore and smiled. ‘How do Missy,’ he said.

 

Hannalore backed away from him. He smelled bad. She almost choked on the combination of unwashed clothes, rotting teeth and the acrid smoke coming from the makeshift kiln.

 

At last Mr Cattermole and Clive finished their smokes. They shook hands. Mr Cattermole came back to Hannalore and said out of the corner of his mouth, ‘I spun Clive a yarn or two. We are safe now.’

 

He would not say what these yarns were. They went back and retrieved Juno and the horses. They walked carefully past the burning pyre so that the horses would not be spooked. Hannalore endured a suggestive leer from the man who had called her Missy. 

 

Juno wanted to know what those funny men were doing. Mr Cattermole said look down little one. See how red the road is here? That is what the fire does. It turns grey brick into beautiful red papa for us to walk on.

 

The sun slid down behind the trees. A cold wind sprang up and slapped their cheeks. Just as Hannalore was becoming concerned about Juno’s well being, Mr Cattermole announced that they had arrived.

 

Hannalore peered through the gathering night. Was this Piopio? She saw a muddy dirt road and a row of buildings with flimsy wooden verandas. 

 

Mr Cattermole tied the rope on the lead horse to a hitching post outside a shop. Hannalore could see the flicker of a lamp behind the net curtains that covered the window. She peered within. She could just make out a headless mannequin wearing a tweed jacket, white shirt, cream trousers and a blue tie.

Mr Cattermole gave Hannalore her pickau from the saddle bag. He pointed out a sign above the door. Chas.Cooper, Gentlemen’s Outfitters (Established 1905.)

‘Knock at the door,’ he said. ‘Tell him I’m sorry that we’ve arrived late and I’ll catch up with him tomorrow.’

‘Can I knock too?’ asked Juno.

‘Of course little one,’ said Mr Cattermole.

 

There was a sour smell of damp clay and horse droppings in the air. This combined with the yellow lamplight illuminating the goods in the window triggered off a latent memory for Hannalore. She remembered the layout of the living quarters at the back of the shop. She remembered her tiny bedroom without windows where the scrim lining the walls flapped against the sarking during a high wind. She remembered the overgrown garden at the back of the shop full of towering scotch thistles and golden buttercups where once a great black bee had stung her on the mouth. She had cried out for her mother to come and rescue her but it was just another cry that was never answered. 

 

Mr Cattermole rode off to find a night stable for the horses. Hannalore desperately wanted to go with him but could not summon up the courage to ask his permission. 

 

Juno knocked on the door. No answer. She banged on the door again. After a short delay the door opened and a woman stood there holding a candle. For a spilt second Hannalore imagined that it was her mother but this fantasy vanished as soon as the woman opened her mouth.

 

‘You’re late,’ the woman said in a low voice. ‘Mr Cooper is not pleased. But come in anyway.’ She opened a doorway at the back of the shop. ‘Take note,’ she said. ‘You are forbidden to use this door again. There is private access at the back.’

 

‘Back back back.’ said Juno.

 

They walked down a hallway that linked the shop to the living quarters. The parlour door was open and hot coals burnt in the grate. Mr Cooper was sitting in an overstuffed velour chair reading a newspaper. He folded the paper away and mumbled something beneath his breath that sounded almost like a curse. 

 

There was an awkward silence. Hannalore was afraid that Juno would say something out of place. She tried to catch her eye, to warn her, but Juno was staring at the fire. Before Hannalore could stop her, Juno had grabbed a log of wood from the wicker basket at the side of the fireplace and thrown it into the fire. A shower of red hot embers fell out onto the hearth.

 

The woman admonished Juno by clicking her tongue against the roof of her mouth.

‘Sorry,’ said Hannalore. ‘She didn’t mean any harm.’

‘Click click click,’ said Juno.

 

Mr Cooper asked the woman to fetch some food and drink for their guests. He waited until she had left the room before he invited Hannalore and Juno to sit on the settle next to the fireplace.

 

He told them that Lena did not mean to be unkind. She was rather set in her ways and found children difficult to understand.

 

‘Is she my mother?’ asked Juno.

 

‘Good lord no. Whatever gave you that idea?’

 

Lena returned with slices of brown bread and hot milk in an enamel jug. Hannalore and Juno fell upon the bread and drank two cups each of the scalded milk.

 

Juno smacked her lips. ‘More.’

‘Say the magic word,’ said Hannalore.

‘Please.’

 

Mr Cooper asked Lena to fetch something other than bread for the girls. Like that apple tart she had made for his dessert. Any left? Good, just the ticket.

 

Hannalore, lulled by the warmth of the fire and the buttery taste of the pastry found it difficult to keep her eyes open. Juno too, had licked her fingers and declared herself to be as full as a bull and ready for a big sleep.

 

Soon, Lena led the way to the little windowless room at the side of the lean-to. The room was exactly as Hannalore remembered it. Two narrow beds, two kapok pillows covered with striped ticking, two shabby eiderdowns almost bereft of feathers.

 

Hannalore asked where her pikau was. Lena said she had no idea but if she cared to look beneath the pillows, she would find some nightshirts and a towel for their morning wash.

 

Lena left the room with strict instructions for Hannalore not to relight the candle once she had extinguished it for the night. ‘If a fire were to come, there is no way out.’

 

Hannalore had lost the feeling of relaxed warmth that had engulfed her in the parlour. She felt wide awake and in no mood to blow out the candle that provided a welcome flicker of light against the background of the creaking scrim walls.

 

Juno had gone to sleep almost as soon as her head hit the pillow.

 

Hannalore had not been in this room since she was a small child. Something had happened to her in this room, something neither good nor bad, something too ephemeral to grasp. All she had was a fleeting vision of her mother’s face leaning over her. Behind her, the hiss of a Tilley lamp and the smell of kerosene vapour. A distant sound of a child sobbing. Then nothing.

 

Juno coughed in her sleep. Hannalore blew out the candle and closed her eyes.