Beneath the Southern Cross (14 page)

The block boys, or sparrow starvers as they were commonly termed, were already at work as he passed old one-eyed John Cadman's cottage. The boys, each assigned a city block, and each with broom and long-handled shovel, collected the horse manure, ensuring the streets would be clean for the Saturday-night revellers. Cheeky young larrikins for the most part, the block boys were employed by the City Council, which had realised that lads were cheaper to hire than men.

As always, George Street was bustling with activity. Amongst the pedestrians, an endless array of newspaper hawkers, boot-blacks, fruit vendors, and Chinamen with vegetable baskets slung on poles across their shoulders paraded the sidewalks. Hansom cabs, traps and drays crowded the rough pavements, the wiry ponies of messenger boys darting in and out amongst them. All hurriedly cleared the way, however, upon the arrival of a double-decker steam tram. Horses shied and people dived for cover as the fearsome vehicle thundered along the crowded thoroughfare.

Paddy ducked into a side lane away from the traffic, wove his
way through the backstreets, cut across the Botanic Gardens and fifteen minutes later was in Woolloomooloo.

They were waiting for him when he walked in the front door. ‘Where have you been, Paddy,' Dorothy demanded. ‘I thought you were coming home for tea.'

‘Forget the tea, Dotty,' he said. ‘Tis dinner out on the town for us tonight.' His six-year-old daughter squealed with delight as he swung her up onto his shoulders. ‘Kathleen, Kathleen, the jewel in my crown,' he sang as he waltzed around the tiny kitchen, his wife trying to steer him away from the breakables. Paddy's exuberance could be expensive, she knew to her cost.

Finally he put down his daughter and, with equal ease, picked up his wife. ‘Dotty, my Dotty, the wife a man dreams of …'

‘Have you been drinking, Paddy O'Shea?'

‘No, no, I swear … Well, only one small ale with the lads at the Rocks.' It had been four full pints which Paddy had scoffed at the Lord Nelson, but a little white lie never hurt anyone.

‘And I had a tiny win on the boat race, so it's a night on the town for my girls.'

He caught the glint in his wife's eye and hastily added, ‘I haven't been gambling, I swear, just a small wager on a sure bet.' It was true, Paddy's heavy gambling days were over. He still felt the yearnings, but he kept well away from the Randwick Racecourse and he knew better than to venture into the back rooms of the Darlinghurst pubs where poker was played in earnest.

‘There you go, girl,' he handed Dorothy the four one-pound notes he'd separated from the wad in his top pocket, ‘put those in your housekeeping jar, and spend one on something nice for yourself.'

‘Paddy …'

‘I swear to you, Dot,' he gathered Kathleen in his arms again, ‘I swear to you on my daughter's life, just a small sure bet on a boat race is all it was.' He kissed the little girl and put her down, kissed his wife and patted her bottom. ‘Now you two get into your party dresses, I've another two pounds will give us a night on the town to remember.' He wouldn't tell her about the seven pounds in his top pocket, it would only worry her. Besides, who knew what luck might come his way, the seven pounds could well become seventy over the next several weeks. He wouldn't gamble
heavily of course, just the odd little wager here and there. And the odd little wager did a man no harm.

Dorothy knew better than to nag any further. It wouldn't be fair, he'd brought his wages home regularly for a full six months now, and there'd been no heavy drinking. But she prayed he was telling the truth. Much as she loved Paddy, she would carry out her threat and leave him if he returned to his old ways.

It was the drink she feared as much as the gambling. There was no harm in a pint or two, she had no trouble with that, but Paddy in the rum was another matter. He was a different man, violent. Not to her or to Kathleen, but to any man who would take him on. Rage, uncontrollable, consumed him when he was in the rum, and many a time she had locked him out of the house when he'd staggered home in the wee hours to smash on the doors and shutters and bellow in the street like an enraged bull. She could not live with a man like that.

She must give him the benefit of the doubt, she thought now as she took Kathleen off to get changed. ‘Put on a jacket, Paddy,' she called back to him. ‘We're not going out with you dressed like that.'

Paddy stepped outside, lit up a smoke and sat on the steps of the front porch. He looked up the street at the rows of poky, little terrace houses, identical in design, but each one bearing the distinctive stamp of its tenant. Green shutters here, yellow railings there, a tub of flowering geraniums in a porch corner or a window box. It was an attractive street.

He waved to Tiny O'Rourke who was sitting on his chair on his own front porch, enjoying the early evening as he always did. There was room for no more than the chair and Tiny's bulk between his front door and the porch railing.

Paddy drew heavily on his cigarette, then called to Betty McCall who had stepped out of her front door in her bright purple dress, feathers in her hair.

‘Evening, Betty.'

‘Evening, Paddy. And a lovely one it is too.' She trotted down the hill towards the docks, where the pubs and the brothels did a brisk trade. Betty was a professional girl, but she was very polite and very discreet and no-one minded in ‘the Loo'. Residents there were only too ready to live and let live in the knowledge that if
you needed a hand there would always be one offered.

Paddy gazed up at the fine houses of Potts Point high on the ridge overlooking Woolloomooloo Bay. The finest of them all, its gas lights burning brightest in the gathering dusk, belonged to Charles Kendle. Surrounded by pillared verandahs, with an upper balcony of fine-laced ironwork, Kendle Lodge boasted a magnificent garden which extended down to the wall of rock in Victoria Street. Not only did the house command superb views across the Woolloomooloo valley to the city beyond, but from both the valley and the city, Kendle Lodge itself dominated the skyline.

Aware of the seven pounds in his top pocket, Paddy silently thanked Charles Kendle. He had not been told directly, but he was quite sure it had been Kendle who had rigged the race. It certainly wouldn't have been his partner and co-owner of
Wings of Honour
. Howard Streatham was said to be an honourable man.

Paddy looked about, with irony, at the dusty streets of the Loo, then up at the gaslit mansion above. Strange to think that he was related to Charles Kendle. The man was a bastard by all accounts, but tonight Paddy bore him no ill will. Tonight Paddy O'Shea would swap places with no man.

‘Where's your jacket, Paddy?'

He turned. She'd lit the gas lamp in the front room and he could see them, pretty as a picture, standing there. His raven-haired daughter with her sapphire eyes. And Dot. Dot, not pretty by conventional standards, her body too slight, her face too thin, but to Paddy she was beautiful.

‘Pretty as a picture,' he said as he stood and admired them. ‘Pretty as a picture, my two girls.'

Dotty had put on a little weight, he thought as he kissed her. It suited her, there was an unaccustomed fullness to her breasts.

‘Stop it, Paddy,' she said as his hand lingered, but he could tell she enjoyed it.

Dorothy could feel the love in him and she could feel herself responding. She wondered whether she should tell him tonight that she was pregnant. Perhaps not. She would start to show soon enough anyway, and it might bring bad luck to announce it. After two miscarriages she wanted to be sure that this one would last.

Paddy O'Shea and his wife and daughter stepped out into the evening to join the countless swarms who thronged the streets of
Sydney on a Saturday night. Barrel organs pumped out melodies on every corner; cheapjacks yelled themselves hoarse in the crowded marketplace, and shopfronts gleamed enticingly in the garish glitter of gas.

 

It was during Ludwig van Beethoven's symphony
Eroica
that Hannah started to feel decidedly ill. She glanced sideways at Anne, whose rapt attention was on the orchestra, and decided to say nothing. Gently, she dabbed the perspiration from her forehead with her handkerchief and breathed deeply. It was just the warmth of the evening, she told herself, and the overpowering music. She didn't like Beethoven, she decided. Not that she knew anything about music, the rare occasion she attended a concert or recital was really only to keep Anne company.

She always enjoyed coming to the Garden Palace, however, and she looked about the giant interior of the dome by way of distraction as she prayed for the dizzy spell to pass. The central dome, towering ninety feet high, was the grandest feature of the impressive Garden Palace which had been built three years ago to house the Sydney International Exhibition and stood in the centre of the Botanic Gardens.

Around its central stained glass skylight, the dome's ceiling was painted blue and scattered with stars, and circling its cornice was a verse printed in gold lettering: ‘The Earth is the Lord's and the fulness thereof, the World, and they that dwell therein.'

The massive circular interior was a series of arches and pillars, above which the walls were patterned with endless and intricate friezes, paintings and tiles of all fashion and design. And on its central pedestal, inpride of place, stood the bronze statue of Queen Victoria.

The dizzy spell began to fade but Hannah wished the music would stop, for her head was beginning to ache.

Again she tried to distract herself from the relentless swell of the orchestra. She thought of the basement, which housed the offices and archival storage areas. The basement was possibly Hannah's favourite part of the Garden Palace. She had made friends with an employee there who was very obliging, and she derived a great deal of pleasure from looking at the land occupancy records, and the maps and plans of the colony's early days, proudly noting the
name of Kendall which featured prominently in the first land grants.

She found it strangely moving to see her grandfather's signature on the deed transferring Thomas Kendall's Parramatta lands to the people of the Gadigal tribe, and remembered with great clarity that day when she had visited the camp with him. She wondered what had happened to the land, and to the people who had been so brutally evicted. She should visit Parramatta and see, for herself, she often thought. But she never did.

Hannah glanced anxiously at Anne. She needed some air. ‘I might pop outside for a moment,' she whispered, fumbling for her walking stick.

Anne looked up horrified. ‘Oh Hannah,' she whispered back, ‘you cannot. We are seated in the front, it would be so rude.' Her horror was swiftly replaced by concern. ‘Are you not well?'

‘Alittle dizzy,' Hannah murmured, dabbing once more at her forehead, ‘and it's so warm in here.'

‘Oh dear,' Anne said. ‘Oh dear.' It wasn't warm at all. ‘There will be an interval at any moment, I know there will.' She took her friend's hand, it was clammy to the touch. ‘Oh dear.'

By the time the interval came ten minutes later, Hannah was unsure as to whether she could even stand. ‘Wait with me, Anne,' she said faintly. ‘Wait until the people have gone.'

‘Oh dear, shall I fetch someone? Someone to help?'

‘No, no.' If she could just get out into the air, Hannah thought, everything would be all right.

When the majority of the audience had gone, she took her walking stick in one hand and grasped Anne's arm with the other. ‘I shall need your help, my dear.'

Frail as she was, Anne was of little assistance in getting Hannah's bulk out of the chair, and they both nearly toppled over as, with a mighty heave, Hannah hauled on her stick and Anne's arm to get herself upright.

‘Slowly, slowly.' Hannah was muttering more to herself than Anne as she shuffled clumsily towards the archway which led to the exit. Just as she reached the columns of the arch, however, she stopped.

‘Are you all right, Hannah?' Anne was terrified—Hannah's face was a chalky white.

Hannah said nothing, but shook her head. Then she gave a small, startled cry and fell heavily to the tiled floor.

Anne screamed. People ahead at the exit turned. ‘Help! Help me, please!' She knelt by Hannah as a man rushed to her aid. ‘Oh please, help her,' she started to sob. ‘Please help her.'

But no-one could help Hannah Kendall O'Shea. She had suffered a massive stroke. She never regained consciousness, and two days later she died.

Paddy was grief-stricken. Whilst his mother lay in a coma, he would come home from the hospital, via the pub, drunk. Not violently so, he'd not been in the rum, Dot could tell, but it took a lot of ale to get Paddy that drunk. She could hardly blame him, whilst his mother lay dying, but she wondered where he was getting the money. When she tentatively questioned him, he said that the lads were helping him to drown his tears, they were buying him drinks, and where was the harm in that?

‘No harm, Paddy, no harm.' And she supposed there wasn't.

But Paddy's friends were not buying him drinks. It was Paddy who paid the bill at the bar. ‘Drink to the best mother a man ever had,' he'd say as he told the barman to line them up.

The seven pounds had served him well. A winning hand in a poker game, and a quick visit by steam tram to the Randwick Racecourse had more than tripled his money. But he'd only done it to take his mind off Hannah, lying as if dead in that hospital bed. You could hardly call it gambling. And the copious ales he downed with the lads, you could hardly call that drinking. Ale wasn't liquor, ale was mother's milk.

The afternoon of Hannah's funeral, two days after her death, was a different matter altogether. Paddy spent the morning in the pub. And he didn't drink ale, it was rum he ordered from the bar.

‘Paddy, how could you? It's disrespectful!' Dot was shocked when he walked in the door half an hour before they were due to leave for the cemetery, dishevelled and reeking of rum.