Hope's Road (11 page)

She sat on the bench, put her cup down beside her. She wondered how many people had sat on this very seat struggling to understand the curve-balls life had sent them.

The air around her was dank with humidity, making her feel sticky and hot. And cranky.

She toggled the phone to bring up Lucy's messages, one after the other.

Ring me!

Ring ME!

RING ME! IT'S URGENT!

Chapter 17

‘
I think Shon's moved in with Joanne!' Lucy's voice screeched down the phone before she'd even said hello.

‘Well, yes.'

‘What do you mean “yes”? Last time I saw he had his boots under your bed, the bastard.'

Tammy wasn't entirely sure if Lucy was indignant on her behalf or whether she was just unhappy she didn't have the heads-up on the gossip. ‘He left me. About three hours ago in fact. I'd decided to try to make him leave but when I got home he was going anyway.'

‘Well, at least that made it easier for you. He's moved into the pub. His beer fridge is sitting outside the accommodation donga and a lounge chair followed by a mattress went in the door to one of the rooms.'

Tammy felt sick. It was actually happening.

‘Are you okay?' Lucy's voice came down a couple of octaves.

‘Sure. I'm fine.' But even Tammy could hear her own voice wobble.

‘Are you sure? I can come over. I've finished my shift.'

‘No, Luce, I'm okay. I'm not home anyway. I'm at the hospital.'

‘So you're not fine! I'll be there in half an hour!'

‘No, it's not me, silly. I'm fine, I told you. I'm here with Joe.'

‘Jo? Oh, for heaven's sake, you haven't taken a machete or something to her, have you? Honestly, neither of them is worth it, Tim Tam. He's a loser. A lying, cheating loser. And she's nothing but a cock-teaser.'

‘Lucy Granger, you're asking for Tabasco on your tongue.'

‘Tabasco, my aunt's fanny! I'm just saying it how it is. About time someone did.'

Tammy sighed. She had no idea so many of her friends had an opinion on her marriage which didn't include happily ever afters. ‘As I said, I'm here with Joe. Joe McCauley.'

‘Hooley
dooley
! You're kidding, right?'

‘Nup.'

‘Why?'

‘He's broken his hip. Fell off the front verandah while trying to shoot a rabbit.' And just missed killing a little boy, she added silently. The whole town of Lake Grace didn't need to know that, and they would if she told Lucy.

‘Oh my aunt's fanny!' Tammy held the phone away from her ear. Lucy's screeches tended to give you temporary tinnitus.

Finally Tammy decided to cut through the semi-hysteria. ‘Ummm . . . excuse me, Luce? Lucy?
Lucy
!' Her friend paused in mid-stream. ‘Joe's in surgery now. Trav's just finding out how long things are going to take.'

‘Trav? As in Travis
Hunter
?' Another screech.

Tammy couldn't help but give a little laugh. ‘That's the one. Him and Billy.'

‘My oh my, I want to know all the juicy details of this one, Tim Tam. In one afternoon you have managed to ditch one bloke and pick up two others. Two
elusive
others. Three, counting the boy. I knew you were good but this just about takes the cake.'

If only that was true. She momentarily relived the scenes back on the hill and in ED before Trav had arrived. The look on Joe's face as he'd flung his insults at her.‘Tammy? Tammy! Are you still there?' Lucy's piping voice brought Tammy back to the hospital park bench.

‘Yep. I'm still here.'

‘You sure you don't want me to come across?'

‘No, Luce, it's fine.' The last thing she wanted was her highly excitable friend muddying the waters any further.

‘I'd better go, mate. I've got to find Trav and Billy and see how long old Joe's going to be. Luckily I organised the relief milkers to come in tonight so I don't have worry about the cows.'

‘Well, if you need me you know where I am,' said her best friend.

‘Thanks, Luce. That means a lot.' And then Lucy was gone.

She found Trav and Billy in a square cubicle labelled Hospital Quiet Room. Trav was staring out the window, while Billy was rolling around on the floor pushing a Matchbox car he'd snaffled from a small toy box in the far corner of the room. It was amazing how kids could amuse themselves with four wheels.

‘Vroom . . . vroom . . . vroom.' Tammy watched as Billy tested how far he could flick the car with his index finger, and how quickly it would travel if he ran it off the seat of a tilted chair. The young bloke didn't seem too worse for wear after his shooting ordeal. Kids were so resilient. She wished she could say the same for adults.

Her eyes moved to the man who was intent on the scenery beyond the building's walls. A flowering gum stood directly outside the window. Elegant and flourishing branches spread wide to capture space and love and care in the green lawn. Beside it was a tall spotted gum. Tall and alone, its leaves crept up the trunk. This is my space, keep out, it seemed to say to the other tree.

‘What's happening with Joe?' asked Tammy.

‘He's in surgery now. They couldn't say how long. It depends on the severity of the break,' said Travis, moving his legs to find a more comfortable place to rest them.

Tammy couldn't help but notice how his worn clothes moved with him, like they were glued to the muscles lurking underneath the fabric. The blue flannelette shirt beneath a soft windcheater looked like a safe place to cuddle into. She shook her head. What was she thinking?

‘Joe's going to have to go into the nursing home for a while,' she stated in a flat tone. She'd been pondering it while walking around outside.

‘What the hell?'

‘But, Tammy, you said –?'

‘I know what I said, but seriously, how are we going to cope? I've got a farm to look after. Trav, you've got a job. You're barely home long enough as it is.' For a little boy who desperately needs you, let alone an ungrateful, abusive old man, she added silently to herself.

‘I can help!' Billy got up, dropping the car. ‘Dad?' The child swung towards his father, a begging note in his voice.

But his father ignored him. Instead his vivid eyes were boring into Tammy's. He sat up straighter in the chair. ‘Joe is not going into a nursing home.' The words came out firm, a full stop after each syllable. ‘I had to put my mother in a home. I had no option; she is entirely immobile and . . .' He blushed. ‘She can't use the toilet properly'. Here we do have a choice and I'm not doing it to Joe.'

But Tammy wasn't ready to back down.

Pulling herself up to her full height and jutting out her chin she shot back, ‘Then how the hell do you plan to see it through, Travis?'

Billy started hopping from one leg to the next in agitation. ‘But Tammy, you said you'd help!'

‘Billy.' One growl from his father was all it took to have the young boy back down on the floor.

‘He's going to need specialist care. Things to help him to do stuff on his own. Meals. Watching over. We can't do that for him,' Tammy said, sitting down on the nearest chair, arms folded, legs crossed.

Trav just sat and considered her for a moment. Then turned his head to look back out the window. Silence rebounded around the room. It wasn't a comfortable silence, by any means. Not like when she and Trav were working on the fence. Billy lay on the carpet looking sulky and bereft, as though he'd lost his most loved toy in the whole world.

She went to go on but Trav just shifted his gaze and shot her a glare as loaded as his son's. Don't say a word. It irked her that she understood that look.

Seconds ticked by, then minutes. Finally the man at the window turned his head and faced her.

‘I'll cut back my hours of work. We've got a few months before the wild dogs will be after newborn lambs and calves. Not much activity around at the moment for the bigger sheep. We'll find out if the occupational therapy people can sort out some stuff for him to take home to make things easier. We'll get some bars put up in his bathroom. We can take turns with cooking or there's always Meals on Wheels. We can get him one of those emergency buttons like my mother has around her neck. He can push it if he goes down again. Billy and me can keep an eye on him.' Trav paused, laid his legs out in front of him, put his hands back behind his head. ‘And you too,' a cock of his head, an arched eyebrow – a challenge. ‘That's if you're up to it?'

It was the longest speech she'd ever heard the man make and he'd covered everything. The baton had been passed to her for an answer. Billy's head swivelled from his father to Tammy, like an automated clown at the carnival. Hope in his gaze.

Tammy stared at Trav. Both man and boy's eyes bored into her. She felt herself wilt under their scrutiny, their expectations. Could it really be done?

Trav must have sensed her indecision. He leaned forward in his chair. ‘Tammy. There is no way you can cage your uncle in a nursing home. He's like me. I 
have
to be out in the scrub otherwise I'll go nuts. Back when I was young, at school in Burra . . . it was like they'd stuck me in a cage. Blokes like Joe and me don't cope with walls and . . .' Trav threw his hands around, obviously trying to find the right words, ‘and people. We don't cope with folks real well, no matter
who
they are. Joe's a man of the bush. A free spirit who loves the land and the environment with a passion that is rarely seen these days. You can't lock a bloke like that up in a building and expect him to conform.'

‘He'd just curl up and die,' added Billy from the floor.

Tammy looked down at her boots, up at the ceiling and then out the window at the gum trees. One shared its shade and beauty by spreading its leaves to encompass the surrounding space, the other kept to itself.

And she felt shame, that she'd only been thinking of what was right for
her
. She was his great-niece after all. Even though he abused her and obviously hated her guts, maybe this was their chance to get to know each other, bury the hatchet. Be a family?

Maybe.

Chapter 18

It was late when Tammy got home. So late the relief milker had long since left. The dairy was in darkness, and the cows safely tucked up in their paddock for the night.

‘Thanks for the ride, Luce.'

‘You sure you don't want me to come in for a cuppa? Perhaps I can talk you into
trying
pole dancing. It might make you feel better?'

‘No, I'll be fine.' Tammy smiled at her friend. ‘Thanks for caring though.'

Lucy had arrived at the Narree hospital some time after six that evening. Obviously it was killing her not knowing what was going on. She seemed surprised to find Joe still in recovery and the others in the waiting room, Tammy absent-mindedly reading a magazine and Hunter looking out the window. The only sound to disturb the peace was the ‘vroom, vroom, vroom' from the young boy who had spent the last three hours making roadways on the floor.

‘Hi, I'm Lucy,' she'd said moving forwards, fingers out to shake Hunter's hand.

Hunter reached over half-heartedly to return the gesture before slumping back into the chair.

Lucy shot Tammy a look, dropped her hand and gave a small harrumph.

Tammy smiled apologetically and motioned her friend to meet her outside the room.

‘What's up his ringhole?' asked Lucy, straight to the point as usual.

‘He's pissed off with me.'

‘Why?'

‘Joe needs time in here and then some respite care at the nursing home recovering.'

‘He's not going to like that.'

‘That's the point. He didn't like it and so wild man in there offered to look after him at home.'

‘Right. And the problem with that is . . . ?' Lucy paused and gave Tammy the evil eye. ‘You
did
offer to help, didn't you?'

‘No, well yes. No. Ummm . . . yes, I did offer but . . .' Tammy stopped and then went on in a rush, ‘How the hell can I do that, Luce? Look after him, I mean. I've got a farm to run, cows to milk.' She blinked back a couple of tears. She would not cry over Shon Murphy, not any more. She'd wept enough tears on his behalf over the last few years to fill the Lake Grace dam. She swallowed hard before going on. ‘My husband's just left me and what's more,' another gulp of air, ‘Joe hates my guts. He's spent most of his time today yelling abuse at me in front of half the town. Why would
he
want
me
to look after him? Correction, why the hell would
I
 want to look after
him
?'

Lucy stood there a moment, silently contemplating what she was going to say, which made Tammy pause. Lucy never ever contemplated what she was going to say.

Tammy took a few more steadying breaths. A woman with a food trolley came trundling past, adeptly dodging the two friends. A clock donated by some long-gone benevolent forefather ticked on a wall. Someone in a room nearby laboured over a phlegmy cough that went on and on, rocking and rolling around the now empty corridor. Still Lucy wrestled with her answer.

Tammy waited.

Finally, just as a loud speaker announced the visiting hours, Lucy spoke. Unusually her tone was sombre, her voice pitched low – almost a murmur, not quite a whisper. Tammy had to lean right in to hear it over the mechanical voice spruiking about visitors do's and don'ts.

‘You'll look after him, Tammy, because he's family.'

The homestead at Montmorency was as sombre as a gravesite, as dark as an after-hours hotel. She stood and contemplated the old place long after Lucy had headed back to Lake Grace.

Why was she here? What was it all for, working her guts out to keep the place going? She didn't have much to show for it. Sure she had the farm, her heritage, the legacy of previous McCauleys. But she had no one to hand that hundred and fifty years of history on to. And now she had no husband to share it with, to make babies with, who would love and cherish the place as much as she did.

The house stood silent. Empty.

She walked down the path towards the back of the house. On the screen door a note was fluttering in the slight breeze blowing off the mountains behind her. The wind was chilly now; there'd been a westerly change. Not like the humidity which had swamped her in a giant wave outside the hospital.

She took the note from under the peg that was used specific­ally to communicate with her workers.

Gidday Tammy,

Hope your uncle is ok.

Cows in billabong padock.

Seeya later tomorra. Going ta Bairnsdale for darts 2night.

Ta,

Jock & Barb

Jock might not have been able to spell but both he and Barb were brilliant with the cows. Good relief milkers were like gold around these parts and she'd hit the mother lode with these two.

Jock and Barbara were retired dairy farmers and old friends of her grandfather. They had come into her life again two years earlier when they were looking for a house to live in after they'd finished up at their last share farm. Tammy had gladly installed them in the spare home on their run-off block. She'd thanked God many a time that in return for their own house, plus meat and a small amount of remuneration, they'd agreed to relief milk and help her out when she needed an extra hand on the farm.

She unlocked the door and walked straight into the paintings she'd bought from the gallery in town. Jock must have taken them out of her ute. He knew where she kept the spare key to the house and he was a thoughtful man. Not like Shon, who would have dumped them in the dirt against the side of the shed.

She picked up the wrapped packages one at a time and wrestled them into the formal lounge room. It still looked like a tip after Shon's exodus. She checked out the walls. Lots of dead relatives and landscape prints. Nup. Not in here.

She dragged the prints into the family room with its saggy, worn leather chairs and dining table piled high with mail and farm journals. Last week's papers,
The Weekly Times
,
Stock and Land
– Shon liked to keep on top of what was happening in the farming world. Tammy would have liked to as well but she rarely had the time. And like most dairy farmers, once she sat down she inevitably fell asleep.

A Coonara heater stood solidly in the fireplace. On the mantle bride and groom beamed from their wedding photo. Correction: she beamed at the world, Shon just looked smug. The cat who had finally got the cream.

Tammy hauled down the picture, throwing it onto the floor, face first. It was destined for the big skip-bin at the dairy.

She dusted her hands together and unwrapped one of her new purchases. And there was the angel in all her glory, standing on the edge of a cliff, leaning into the wind. Scenting freedom. The second print was next. The sphinx-angel flying. The expression on her face was still one of happiness and love, just as Tammy remembered. She herself yearned for those feelings.

She went to the kitchen and riffled in the pantry until she found a few solid hooks, measuring tape and a hammer. Back in the family room she marked the right spots and hammered three hooks into place. Then she wrestled the prints up on the wall. Hands on hips, she stood back and studied the results of her labour.

The prints looked perfectly at home. They belonged there. Now all she had to do was wait for Alice to get number three and the set would be complete. In the meantime she could start doing what the pictures were surely telling her to do. Get her life back. One step at a time.

Tammy walked over to the answering machine, which was flashing a message, something she hadn't noticed when she first came in. Hitting the replay button she heard the voice of one of the irrigation district's water planners.

‘Hi, Tammy. Just ringing to let you know your irrigation water has been brought forward to start at ten o'clock tonight. Any queries, ring the Irrigators' Line. Thanks
.
'

Damn! In all the drama of Shon leaving and Joe's accident she'd forgotten about the water. She checked her watch. Nine-thirty. She'd better head to the paddock and set things up to irrigate, especially now it was coming earlier than she expected. She could check the cows while she was there. Some people in the district had been having trouble with bloat, thanks to the out-of-the-ordinary amount of humidity they'd been getting this season. The sultry conditions were conducive to producing heaps of clover in the pastures. The hollow stems of the plant caught lots of air, which fermented in the rumen and caused the cow to almost strangle.

That afternoon, before he milked, Jock would have sprayed the overnight pastures with anti-bloat oil mixed with water using the boom spray. All the same, it didn't hurt to check.

Tammy grabbed a quick drink of water then headed back out the door, shrugging into a short coat as she went. The wind would be damn cold on the motorbike.

After turning the four-wheeler's engine over and pulling on a helmet, she swung the vehicle out of the yard and headed up the laneway towards the Billabong paddock.

She found her big no-nonsense spotlight in the old milk crate strapped to the front of the bike. Plugging it into the power, she swung it out across the paddock. A couple of cows moved into view. They were sitting down, not doing too much. A few more passed through the beam, then they were gone, and the light slung itself across an empty paddock.

Where was the rest of the herd?

Tammy pivoted her spottie back and took a closer look at the small mob standing in the light. They were staggering sideways, looking for all the world like they were trying to belch.

Tammy swore and focused the torch back on the cows not doing too much. Realised they were stock still. Legs stuck straight out, parallel with the ground, stomachs distended like big round balls. Big, round
dead
balls.

Fuck!

She spun the four-wheeler on a fifty-cent piece and roared up to the gateway that led into the Billabong paddock. Grabbing a Dolphin torch from the carry-all, she leaped over the gate and ran down the hump of the delver channel to where the cows lay – on the wrong side of the electric fence. Three of them. Stone cold dead.

Fuck! Fuck!

The bastards had got through the electric tapes which acted as a gate into the next paddock. Tammy hurdled the remaining tape that sat a foot off the ground and into the offending pasture.

A couple of older cows were propped on the delver channel bank, head up on the high side, bum down on the low, mouths open, trying to belch. That they'd had experience with bloat before was obvious and, even though she was in a panic, a tiny part of her brain applauded them for their ingenuity.

Further across the paddock, at least four cows were staggering, heads out, mouths open and in extreme pain. Two others were down but still moving. Not dead. Yet.

She hurdled back over the tape, ran the delver again, leaped the gate and rushed back to the motorbike, hoping her pocket knife lay buried in the milk crate among baling twine, irrigation pipe plugs, poly-fittings and cattle tags. It wasn't there.

Fuck!

Tammy jumped back on the bike and took off towards the dairy, spinning wheels and throwing dirt and gravel into the air. The spotlight jumped crazily up and down on her lap, still sending out light beams on the water pooling in the irrigation channel to her right. She ignored it. Her eyes and mind were set on the dairy.

She had to find a knife.