Caprice (3 page)

Jack Donaldson began work immediately on his return from Mt Dunbar Station, as an orderly at the Kingsley Hospital.

“I liked it until they asked me to do a shift in the morgue, you know, handling dead people. I couldn't do that, I told the matron, Matron O'Neil,” he said.

“I told them I was pulling out straight away. But they called me back and gave me a job as the gardener,” he said proudly, his leathery sunburnt face lighting up with self-satisfaction.

Phyliss Charles was one of the hospital laundresses. Her Auntie Bella Charles was the senior laundress. Their working day began at 5.00 am, lighting the two coppers. They washed everything by hand—no washing machines in those days.

“We starched and ironed the next day. We worked really hard then,” remembered Phyliss.

Phyliss actually came up from Geraldton for a holiday with her aunt and decided to stay on in Kingsley.

“I'm glad she did, cos I wanted to marry her as soon as I set eyes on her,” said Jack.

She was a very attractive young girl, short—not quite five feet—slightly plump with dark brown hair, not too curly, but nice and wavy. She was a pleasant smiling, popular
young woman. She and Jack were married six months later at Geraldton.

At the same time, Lucy was working as a part-time kitchen hand, until she became pregnant with Peggy, who became my mother.

Before Lucy and Mick Muldune were married, Sergeant Andrew (Andy) Miller and other white people in town tried to undermine their relationship and some even went as far as encouraging unattached white women to seduce the Irishman.

“Marry a nice white woman,” they said.

There were few white eligible women to choose from: there were the nurses from the hospital, the local barmaids and a few transients, so the competition amongst the men folk of the town was fierce. The ratio must have been in the vicinity of 80:1. There must have been more unmarried males in Kingsley than anywhere else in Western Australia.

“We used to watch all the young white fullahs, all spruced up, going up the path to the nurses' quarters to try their luck,” said Jack grinning sardonically.

The Irishman used to tell the others, “Why should I want to marry a white woman when Lucy's perfect for me. She doesn't yell or shout and let her tongue run away out of control.

“And further,” he added, “When I go out I know she'll be waiting for me at home.

“No man, and I mean no man,” getting quite angry now, “will covet my wife. I can trust her not to run away with any oily-tongued, charming hawker.”

Is this what happened to the Irishman back in his homeland? Did a hawker elope with his sweetheart? Perhaps so, or perhaps not. Who knows? He was a very private person, secretive and selective. No one will ever know. He continued expounding Lucy's attributes with great fervour.

“She's a good cook, a good housekeeper. She's not a demanding, domineering woman. She suits me very well, thank you very much.”

To Mick Muldune, Lucy compared with his mother as the embodiment of pure womanhood. A most unusual comparison considering one was an Aborigine and one was Irish. “Me mam was a saint, who struggled all her life without complaining. God bless her.”

Others tried to influence him by attacking Lucy personally, advising him, “You don't have to marry her. Do what the other white men do.”

“Oh, and what's that,” snapped Mick, getting angry and annoyed with these so-called well-meaning friends.

“Stay with these gins until a decent white woman comes along,” said another boring condescending man.

“Are you saying that Lucy is not a decent woman?” roared Mick, who was moving menacingly towards him, his large fists clenched ready to strike.

“No! No, I didn't mean that at all Mick,” said the man backing slowly away from the bar.

“I am making Lucy my wife and that's that,” said Mick with finality. All discussion on the matter stopped abruptly.

Was my grandfather really mad? I wondered. Because to describe him as “mad” would be to attribute insane qualities such as spontaneous violence, wouldn't it?

I was reassured by the Donaldsons that although he
frequently dished out his own form of Irish deterrent, “he wasn't mad in the head”.

“And he didn't always win either,” said Jack passionately as he recalled dimmed memories. “I seen him get flogged a couple of times.”

Sergeant Andy Miller, the sandy haired officer in charge of the Kingsley police station, was a large strong and powerful man.

“He must have been about 24 stone, a real big man,” said Jack.

“In fact, he looked like those policemen in cartoons. You know those big-chested blokes like that,” Jack said, spreading his arms wide.

He didn't ignore Mick's behaviour—especially when a pugilist like him metes out his own form of punishment. That's taking the law into his own bare hands; or rather his large bare knuckles. It was impossible to reassure some that the Irishman wasn't mad. His fines amounted to a few bob.

Mick Muldune always maintained that he fought to uphold his principles and he was ready to defy the law for them. But he never made moral judgment on any man.

Under normal circumstances he was the most law-abiding citizen, and one of the most civic minded. He was by birth a fervent Catholic, so naturally enough blasphemy against the Pope and the Catholic church, also racism and bigotry, would rile him.

But there were two things he hated with a firmly ingrained vehemence: they were the colonists and the constabulary.

This became apparent one Saturday afternoon when the public bar at the Kingsley Arms Hotel was full to capacity, and the topic was marriage ceremonies. This incident occurred before Mick and Lucy were married.

“The sergeant has powers vested in him to perform
marriages, funerals and things, you know, anything legal,” informed a stranger at the other end of the bar.

“What!” roared “Mad” Mick the Irishman, “me get married by the local constabulary!

“Jesus, Mary, Joseph, me mam and da will roll over in their graves. Holy Mother of God. What blasphemy,” he moaned.

He turned to face the unfortunate stranger and continued to bombard him with verbal abuse, pausing only to glare at him with contempt.

“How dare you suggest such a thing,” he said, banging his large fist on the bar top, making the drinkers grab their glasses firmly in their hands. He apparently took a quick sip from his glass of beer and without wiping the froth from his mouth, he continued his verbal attack on the stranger.

“Well,” recalled Jack, “some of the blokes in the pub saw the white froth around his mouth and passed the word around that the Irishman was frothing at the mouth like a mad dog with rabies.”

“I only made a suggestion,” said the stranger meekly. He was visibly agitated and bewildered by my grandfather's outburst. This surely was a reaction he never expected.

“He was a miner from the Red Hill Mine, southeast of the town, there wasn't as many slag dumps as there is now. He left quicker than he came in. Poor bugger,” said Jack sardonically.

Someone made a drunken, submissive speech, and thus pacified the Irishman and everything went back to normal, well almost normal. Many were still astonished and confused by Mick's outburst. They couldn't understand it at all.

“That's why they called him ‘Mad' Mick or the ‘Mad Irishman'—though not to his face, mind you. They wouldn't be game enough,” said Jack.

“Mick and Lucy were married by Father John Delvany,” said Jack. “The marriage ceremony took place in Matron Margaret O'Neil's sitting room. I was best man and Phyliss was Lucy's matron-of-honour. We had drinks and eats after. Most of the hospital staff and railway workers came to their wedding.”

Mick and Lucy lived simply and quietly by themselves without any interference from anyone and were very devoted to each other. Lucy's patience and silence bothered many visitors.

“They thought she was deaf and dumb because she didn't talk much in those days,” said Phyliss.

“I got sick of telling them that was the way with tribal women and also that she was very shy when strangers were about.

“The only time I saw her get wild was when she was carrying (pregnant) for your mother Peggy,” said Phyliss quietly.

“Yeah, I remember that time,” smiled Jack. “He forgot to bring some oranges and tinned lambs tongues home for her.

“She banged a pot on the table and swore in Mardu Wangka, her own lingo. I don't know what she called him. Well I never seen that Irishman move so quickly.

“‘Sorry, dear, I forgot,' he said sheepishly and he hurried down the road to the store.”

Their relationship was truly established; their marriage flourished with few demands made on each other, which resulted in less pressure and tension. They accepted each other for what they were. They never tried to change or act out roles, and they never got on each others nerves. Mick often said, “You can't expect respect and tolerance from others if you have none yourself.”

Despite her husband's reputation as a pugilist who violently thrashed the daylights out of abusive, insulting and offensive men, he never showed any violence towards Lucy.

Although she was not demonstrative with her affection for her husband—the embracing and touching, the natural displays of love—her facial expressions and smiles said all. Her emotions were not suppressed but merely simmering under the surface, and remained hidden from prying eyes. This was yet another aspect of their unique relationship and a new quality Mick Muldune saw in his young wife to whom he vowed “to love and cherish, until death do us part”.

Book 2

It was late afternoon, the humidity was making the conditions most unbearable.

“Isolated thunderstorms, that's what it said on the hospital wireless last night,” said Phyliss as she gazed expectantly towards the north, beyond the gorges and breakaway country—as if she was willing the rolling clouds to move faster and empty their contents on this arid thirsty town.

The two friends could hear the thunder clouds rumbling in the distance. “The storm might get here about suppertime,” predicted Phyliss hopefully.

“Yes, might be suppertime, he come,” agreed Lucy, nine months pregnant and extremely uncomfortable and restless. She was seated on a single bed in the bough shed. Phyliss and Jack Donaldson's eighteen month old son Michael John lay asleep on the bed opposite.

“You alright Lucy?” asked her friend with a slightly worried expression on her face. “Can't you rest today? You know what Matron O'Neil and Dr Callahan said, ‘Get plenty of rest.'”

It was impossible to relax. Even the black iron stones across the flats were shimmering in the heat, making it worse by reflecting the midsummer heat.

“I'll be glad when the sun goes down,” sighed Phyliss. “At least it will be a little bit cooler for us.”

Lucy said nothing but nodded in agreement. She was absolutely sick of her condition. Big and fat. Can't walk around much. Never mind, she thought to herself—soon be over—everything. The prospect pleased her greatly. Not long now, she smiled softly.

About 5:00 in the afternoon there was a loud clap of thunder followed by flashes of lightning. Excitement and peals of laughter came from the houses behind them, accompanied by shouts of expectancy, “Yore, yore!”

The two friends had spent months cutting out and sewing a layette for the baby. There was still plenty of calico left to make more matinee jackets and nappies as the baby grew and developed.

Raindrops on the roof? The women pricked up their ears. Then it came down, the heavy, powerful torrents of rain came to give them relief. The frightening loud, unusual noise had woken Michael John who began howling in fear. His mother picked him up and tried to pacify her frightened son.

“Phyliss, my baby, he coming now,” said Lucy.

“Oh, my God,” blurted the panic-stricken friend, holding her own child closer to her chest. “You take Michael John, while I go over the road and get Clarry Pincher,” said Phyliss as she raced out into the storm.

“Lucy's ready to go to the hospital, will you take her?” Phyliss was dripping wet but that was the least of her worries right now.

“Clarry's car was one of those square things—olden day cars. Worth a lot of money nowadays,” informed Jack.

“He took us to the Kingsley Hospital and dropped us off then drove to the railway yards to tell Mick,” said Phyliss.

Phyliss stayed with her friend until Matron O'Neil and Dr Callahan came into the labour ward, then she went
in search of her husband the hospital gardener. The couple drove home in their brown run-about.

Water was everywhere, like a large lake—the creeks were filled to overflowing. What a lovely sight—most welcome indeed. The sight of it made the locals feel cooler.

The Donaldsons had an early supper then sat in the bough shed to watch the storm and wait for news of the birth of baby Muldune.

“Your grandfather came home about one o'clock in the morning looking like a drowned rat. His black hair was straight and dripping wet,” said Jack.

“He had the biggest grin on his face. Yeah the biggest I ever saw.”

“It's a girl! It's a girl! We're calling her Margaret Bridgid Muldune, Margaret after Maggie O'Neil and Bridgid after me mam,” he said excitedly.

She weighed 6lb 5oz and she was beautiful, the proud father told them. The resemblance was remarkable. He was perfectly satisfied that Peggy—that was what he called her—was the most wonderful gift in the whole wide world. He doted on her from her birth and continued to dote on his only child throughout the following years.