Selected Stories (13 page)

This reflection seemed to engender a flood of memories, in which the old man became absorbed. He leaned heavily upon his spade and thought.

“Arter all,” he murmured sadly, “arter all—it were Brummy.”

“Brummy,” he said at last, “it’s all over now; nothin’ matters now—nothin’ didn’t ever matter, nor—nor don’t. You uster say as how it ’ud be all right termorrer” (pause); “termorrer’s come, Brummy—come fur you—it ain’t come fur me yet, but—it’s a-comin’.”

He threw in some more earth.

“Yer don’t remember, Brummy, an’ mebbe yer don’t want to remember—
I
don’t want to remember—but—well, but, yer see, that’s where yer got the pull on me.”

He shovelled in some more earth and paused again.

The dog rose, with ears erect, and looked anxiously first at his master, and then into the grave.

“Theer oughter be somethin’ sed,” muttered the old man; “’tain’t right to put ’im under like a dog. There oughter be some sort o’ sarmin.” He sighed heavily in the listening silence that followed this remark, and proceeded with his work. He filled the grave to the brim this time, and fashioned the mound carefully with his spade. Once or twice he muttered the words, “I am the rassaraction.” As he laid the tools quietly aside, and stood at the head of the grave, he was evidently trying to remember the something that ought to be said. He removed his hat, placed it carefully on the grass, held his hands out from his sides and a little to the front, drew a long deep breath, and said with a solemnity that greatly disturbed Five Bob, “Hashes ter hashes, dus ter dus, Brummy—an’—an’ in hopes of a great an’ gerlorious rassaraction!”

He sat down on a log near by, rested his elbows on his knees and passed his hand wearily over his forehead—but only as one who was tired and felt the heat; and presently he rose, took up the tools, and walked back to the hut.

And the sun sank again on the grand Australian bush—the nurse and tutor of eccentric minds, the home of the weird, and of much that is different from things in other lands.

THE moon rose away out on the edge of a smoky plain, seen through a sort of tunnel or arch in the fringe of mulga behind which we were camped—Jack Mitchell and I. The “timber” proper was just behind us, very thick and very dark. The moon looked like a big new copper boiler set on edge on the horizon of the plain, with the top turned towards us and a lot of old rags and straw burning inside.

We had tramped twenty-five miles on a dry stretch on a hot day—swagmen know what that means. We reached the water about two hours “after dark”—swagmen know what that means. We didn’t sit down at once and rest—we hadn’t rested for the last ten miles. We knew that if we sat down we wouldn’t want to get up again in a hurry—that, if we did, our leg-sinews, especially those of our calves, would “draw” like red-hot wires. You see, we hadn’t been long on the track this time—it was only our third day out. Swagmen will understand.

We got the billy boiled first, and some leaves laid down for our beds and the swags rolled out. We thanked the Lord that we had some cooked meat and a few johnny-cakes left, for we didn’t feel equal to cooking. We put the billy of tea and our tucker-bags between the heads of our beds, and the pipes and tobacco in the crown of an old hat, where we could reach them without having to get up. Then we lay down on our stomachs and had a feed. We didn’t eat much—we were too tired for that—but we drank a lot of tea. We gave our calves time to tone down a bit; then we lit up and began to answer each other. It got to be pretty comfortable, so long as we kept those unfortunate legs of ours straight, and didn’t move round much.

We cursed society because we weren’t rich men, and then we felt better and conversation drifted lazily round various subjects and ended in that of smoking.

“How I came to start smoking?” said Mitchell. “Let’s see.” He reflected. “I started smoking first when I was about fourteen
or fifteen. I smoked some sort of weed—I forget the name of it—but it wasn’t tobacco; and then I smoked cigarettes—not the ones we get now, for those cost a penny each. Then I reckoned that, if I could smoke those, I could smoke a pipe.”

He reflected.

“We lived in Sydney then—Surry Hills. Those were different times—the place was nearly all sand. The old folks were alive then, and we were all at home, except Tom.”

He reflected.

“Ah, well!…Well, one evening I was playing marbles out in front of our house when a chap we knew gave me his pipe to mind while he went into a church-meeting. The little church was opposite—a ‘chapel’ they called it.”

He reflected.

“The pipe was alight. It was a clay pipe and nigger-head tobacco. Mother was at work out in the kitchen at the back, washing up the tea-things, and, when I went in, she said: ‘You’ve been smoking!’

“Well, I couldn’t deny it—I was too sick to do so, or care much, anyway.

“ ‘Give me that pipe!’ she said.

“I said I hadn’t got it.

“‘Give—me—that—pipe!’
she said.

“I said I hadn’t got it.

“ ‘Where is it?’ she said.

“ ‘Jim Brown’s got it,’ I said, ‘it’s his.’

“ ‘Then I’ll give it to Jim Brown,’ she said; and she did; though it wasn’t Jim’s fault, for he only gave it to me to mind. I didn’t smoke the pipe so much because I wanted to smoke a pipe just then, as because I had such a great admiration for Jim.”

Mitchell reflected, and took a look at the moon. It had risen clear and had got small and cold and pure-looking, and had floated away back out amongst the stars.

“I felt better towards morning, but it didn’t cure me—being sick and nearly dead all night, I mean. I got a clay pipe and tobacco, and the old lady found it and put it in the stove. Then I got another pipe and tobacco, and she laid for it, and found it out
at last; but she didn’t put the tobacco in the stove this time—she’d got experience. I don’t know what she did with it. I tried to find it, but couldn’t. I fancy the old man got hold of it, for I saw him with a plug that looked very much like mine.”

He reflected.

“But I wouldn’t be done. I got a cherry pipe. I thought it wouldn’t be so easy to break if she found it. I used to plant the bowl in one place and the stem in another because I reckoned that if she found one she mightn’t find the other. It doesn’t look much of an idea now, but it seemed like an inspiration then. Kids get rum ideas.”

He reflected.

“Well, one day I was having a smoke out at the back, when I heard her coming, and I pulled out the stem in a hurry and put the bowl behind the water-butt and the stem under the house. Mother was coming round for a dipper of water. I got out of her way quick, for I hadn’t time to look innocent; but the bowl of the pipe was hot and she got a whiff of it. She went sniffing round, first on one side of the cask and then on the other, until she got on the scent and followed it up and found the bowl. Then I had only the stem left. She looked for that, but she couldn’t scent it. But I couldn’t get much comfort out of that. Have you got the matches?

“Then I gave it best for a time and smoked cigars. They were the safest and most satisfactory under the circumstances, but they cost me two shillings a week, and I couldn’t stand it, so I started a pipe again and then mother gave in at last. God bless her, and God forgive me, and us all—we deserve it. She’s been at rest these seventeen long years.”

Mitchell reflected.

“And what did your old man do when he found out that you were smoking?” I asked.

“The old man?”

He reflected.

“Well, he seemed to brighten up at first. You see, he was sort of pensioned off by mother and she kept him pretty well inside his income…Well, he seemed to sort of brighten up—liven up—when he found out that I was smoking.”

“Did he? So did my old man, and he livened me up, too. But what did your old man do—what did he say?”

“Well,” said Mitchell, very slowly, “about the first thing he did, was to ask me for a fill.”

He reflected.

“Ah! many a solemn, thoughtful old smoke we had together on the quiet—the old man and me.”

He reflected.

“Is your old man dead, Mitchell?” I asked softly.

“Long ago—these twelve years,” said Mitchell.

“NOTHING makes a dog madder,” said Mitchell, “than to have another dog come outside his fence and sniff and bark at him through the cracks when he can’t get out. The other dog might be an entire stranger; he might be an old chum, and he mightn’t bark—only sniff—but it makes no difference to the inside dog. The inside dog generally starts it, and the outside dog only loses his temper and gets wild because the inside dog has lost
his
and got mad and made such a stinking fuss about nothing at all; and then the outside dog barks back and makes matters a thousand times worse, and the inside dog foams at the mouth and dashes the foam about, and goes at it like a million steel traps.

“I can’t tell why the inside dog gets so wild about it in the first place, except, perhaps, because he thinks the outside dog has taken him at a disadvantage and is ‘poking it at him’; anyway, he gets madder the longer it lasts, and at last he gets savage enough to snap off his own tail and tear it to bits, because he can’t get out and chew up that other dog; and, if he did get out, he’d kill the other dog, or try to, even if it was his own brother.

“Sometimes the outside dog only smiles and trots off; sometimes he barks back good-humouredly; sometimes he only just gives a couple of disinterested barks as if he isn’t particular, but is expected, because of his dignity and doghood, to say something under the circumstances; and sometimes, if the outside dog is a little dog, he’ll get away from that fence in a hurry on the first surprise, or, if, he’s a cheeky little dog, he’ll first make sure that the inside dog can’t get out, and then he’ll have some fun.

“It’s amusing to see a big dog, of the Newfoundland kind, sniffing along outside a fence with a broad, good-natured grin on his face all the time the inside dog is whooping away at the rate of thirty whoops a second, and choking himself, and covering himself with foam, and dashing the spray through the cracks, and jolting and jerking every joint in his body up to the last joint in his tail.

“Sometimes the inside dog is a little dog, and the smaller he is the more row he makes—but then he knows, he’s safe. And, sometimes, as I said before, the outside dog is a short-tempered dog who hates a row, and never wants to have a disagreement with anybody—like a good many peaceful men, who hate rows, and are always nice and civil and pleasant in a nasty, unpleasant, surly, sneering sort of civil way than makes you want to knock their heads off; men who never start a row, but keep it going, and make it a thousand times worse when it’s once started, just because they didn’t start it—and keep saying so, and that the other party did. The short-tempered outside dog gets wild at the other dog for losing his temper, and says:

“ ‘What are you making such a fuss about? What’s the matter with you, anyway? Hey?’

“And the inside dog says:

“ ‘Who do you think you’re talking to? You——! I’ll——’ &c., &c., &c.

“Then the outside dog says:

“ ‘Why, you’re worse than a flaming old slut!’

“
Then
they go at it, and you can hear them miles off, like a Chinese war—like a hundred great guns firing eighty blank cartridges a minute; till the outside dog is just as wild to get inside and eat the inside dog as the inside dog is to get out and disembowel
him.
Yet, if those same two dogs were to meet casually outside they might get chummy at once, and be the best of friends, and swear everlasting mateship, and take each other home.”

SHE lived in Jones’s Alley. She cleaned offices, washed, and nursed from daylight until any time after dark, and filled in her spare time cleaning her own place (which she always found dirty—in a “beastly filthy state”, she called it—on account of the children being left in possession all day), cooking, and nursing her own sick—for her family, though small, was so in the two senses of the word, and sickly; one or another of the children was always sick, but not through her fault. She did her own, or rather the family washing at home too, when she couldn’t do it by kind permission, or surreptitiously in connection with that of her employers. She was a haggard woman. Her second husband was supposed to be dead, and she lived in dread of his daily resurrection. Her eldest son was at large, but, not being yet sufficiently hardened in misery, she dreaded his getting into trouble even more than his frequent and interested appearances at home. She could buy off the son for a shilling or two and a clean shirt and collar, but she couldn’t purchase the absence of the father at any price—
he
claimed what he called his “conzugal rights” as well as his board, lodging, washing and beer. She slaved for her children, and nag-nag-nagged them everlastingly, whether they were in the right or in the wrong, but they were hardened to it and took small notice. She had the spirit of a bullock. Her whole nature was soured. She had those “worse troubles” which she couldn’t tell to anybody, but had to suffer in silence.

She also, in what she called her “spare time”, put new cuffs and collar-bands on gentlemen’s shirts. The gentlemen didn’t live in Jones’s Alley—they boarded with a patroness of the haggard woman; they didn’t know their shirts were done there—had they known it, and known Jones’s Alley, one or two of them, who were medical students, might probably have objected. The landlady charged them just twice as much for repairing their shirts as she paid the haggard woman, who, therefore, being unable to buy the
cuffs and collar-bands ready-made for sewing on, had no lack of employment with which to fill in her spare time.

Therefore, she was a “respectable woman”, and was known in Jones’s Alley as “Misses” Aspinall; and called so generally, and even by Mother Brock, who kept “that place” opposite. There is implied a world of difference between the “Mother” and the “Misses”, as applied to matrons in Jones’s Alley; and this distinction was about the only thing—always excepting the everlasting “children”—that the haggard woman had left to care about, to take a selfish, narrow-minded sort of pleasure in—if, indeed, she could yet take pleasure, grim or otherwise, in anything except, perhaps, a good cup of tea and time to drink it in.

Times were hard with Mrs Aspinall. Two coppers and two half-pence in her purse were threepence to
her
now, and the absence of one of the half-pence made a difference to her, especially in Paddy’s market—that eloquent advertisement of a young city’s sin and poverty and rotten wealth—on Saturday night. She counted the coppers as anxiously and nervously as a thirsty dead-beat does. And her house was “falling down on her” and her troubles, and she couldn’t get the landlord to do a “han’stern” to it.

At last, after persistent agitation on her part (but not before a portion of the plastered ceiling had fallen and severely injured one of her children) the landlord caused two men to be sent to “effect necessary repairs” to the three square, dingy, plastered holes-called “three rooms and a kitchen”—for the privilege of living in which, and calling “my place”, she paid ten shillings a week.

Previously the agent, as soon as he had received the rent and signed the receipt, would cut short her reiterated complaints—which he privately called her “clack”—by saying that he’d see to it, he’d speak to the landlord; and, later on, that he
had
spoken to him, or could do nothing more in the matter—that it wasn’t his business. Neither it was, to do the agent justice. It was his business to collect the rent, and thereby earn the means of paying his own. He had to keep a family on his own account; by
assisting the Fat Man to keep his at the expense of people—especially widows with large families, or women, in the case of Jones’s Alley—who couldn’t afford it without being half-starved, or running greater and unspeakable risks which “society” is not supposed to know anything about.

So the agent was right, according to his lights. The landlord had recently turned out a family who had occupied one of his houses for fifteen years, because they were six weeks in arrears. He let them take their furniture, and explained: “I wouldn’t have been so lenient with them only they were such old tenants of mine.” So the landlord was always in the right according to
his
lights.

But the agent naturally wished to earn his living as peacefully and as comfortably as possible, so, when the accident occurred, he put the matter so persistently and strongly before the landlord that he said at last: “Well, tell her to go to White, the contractor, and he’ll send a man to do what’s to be done; and don’t bother me any more.”

White had a look at the place, and sent a plasterer, a carpenter, and a plumber. The plasterer knocked a bigger hole in the ceiling and filled it with mud; the carpenter nailed a board over the hole in the floor; the plumber stopped the leak in the kitchen, and made three new ones in worse places; and their boss sent the bill to Mrs Aspinall.

She went to the contractor’s yard, and explained that the landlord was responsible for the debt, not she. The contractor explained that he had seen the landlord, who referred him to her. She called at the landlord’s private house, and was referred through a servant to the agent. The agent was sympathetic, but could do nothing in the matter—it wasn’t his business; he also asked her to put herself in his place, which she couldn’t, not being any more reasonable than such women are in such cases. She let things drift, being powerless to prevent them from doing so; and the contractor sent another bill, then a debt collector and then another bill, then the collector again, and threatened to take proceedings, and finally took them. To make matters worse, she was two weeks in arrears with the rent, and the wood-and-coal
man’s man (she had dealt with them for ten years) was pushing her, as also were her grocers, with whom she had dealt for fifteen years and never owed a penny before.

She waylaid the landlord, and he told her shortly that he couldn’t build houses and give them away, and keep them in repair afterwards.

She sought for sympathy and found it, but mostly in the wrong places. It was comforting, but unprofitable. Mrs Next-door sympathized warmly, and offered to go up as a witness—she had another landlord. The agent sympathized wearily, but not in the presence of witnesses—he wanted her to put herself in his place. Mother Brock, indeed, offered practical assistance, which offer was received in breathlessly indignant silence. It was Mother Brock who first came to the assistance of Mrs Aspinall’s child when the plaster accident took place (the mother being absent at the time), and when Mrs Aspinall heard of it, her indignation cured her of her fright, and she declared to Mrs Next-door that she would give “that woman”—meaning Mother Brock—“in char-rge the instant she ever
dared
to put her foot inside her (Mrs A.’s) respectable door-step again. She was a respectable, honest, hard-working woman, and—” etc., etc.

Whereat Mother Brock laughed good-naturedly. She was a broad-minded bad woman, and was right according to
her
lights. Poor Mrs A. was a respectable, haggard woman, and was right according to
her
lights and to Mrs Next-door’s, perfectly so—they being friends—and
vice versa.
None of them knew, or would have taken into consideration, the fact that the landlord had lost all his money in a burst financial institution, and half his houses in the general depression, and depended for food for his family on the somewhat doubtful rents of the remainder. So they were all right according to their different lights.

Mrs Aspinall even sought sympathy of “John”, the Chinaman (with whom she had dealt for four months only), and got it. He also, in all simplicity, took a hint that wasn’t intended. He said: “Al li’. Pay bimeby. Nexy time Flyday. Me tlust.” Then he departed with his immortalized smile. It would almost appear that he was wrong—according to our idea of Chinese lights.

Mrs Aspinall went to the court—it was a small local court. Mrs Next-door was awfully sorry, but she couldn’t possibly get out that morning. The contractor had the landlord up as a witness. The landlord and the P.M. nodded pleasantly to each other, and wished each other good morning…Verdict for plaintiff with costs…“Next case!”…“You mustn’t take up the time of the court, my good woman.”…“Now, constable!…“Arder in the court!”…“Now, my good woman,” said the policeman in an undertone, “you must go out; there’s another case on—come now.” And he steered her—but not unkindly—through the door.

“My good woman” stood in the crowd outside, and looked wildly round for a sympathetic face that advertised sympathetic ears. But others had their own troubles, and avoided her. She wanted someone to relieve her bursting heart to; she couldn’t wait till she got home.

Even “John’s” attentive ear and mildly idiotic expression would have been welcome, but he was gone. He
had
been in court that morning, and had won a small debt case, and had departed cheerfully, under the impression that he lost it.

“Y’aw Mrs Aspinall, ain’t you?”

She started, and looked round. He was one of those sharp, blue or grey-eyed, sandy or freckled complexioned boys-of-the-world whom we meet everywhere and at all times, who are always going on towards twenty, yet never seem to get clear-out of their teens, who know more than most of us have forgotten, who understand human nature instinctively—perhaps unconsciously—and are instinctively sympathetic and diplomatic; whose satire is quick, keen, and dangerous, and whose tact is often superior to that of many educated men-of-the-world. Trained from childhood in the great school of poverty, they are full of the pathos and humour of it.

“Don’t you remember me?”

“No; can’t say I do. I fancy I’ve seen your face before somewhere.”

“I was at your place when little Arvie died. I used to work with him at Grinder Brothers’, you know.”

“Oh, of course I remember you! What was I thinking about? I’ve had such a lot of worry lately that I don’t know whether I’m on my head or my heels. Besides, you’ve grown since then, and changed a lot. You’re Billy—Billy—”

“Billy Anderson’s my name.”

“Of course! To be sure! I remember you quite well.”

“How’ve you been gettin’ on, Mrs Aspinall?”

“Ah! Don’t mention it—nothing but worry and trouble—nothing but worry and trouble. This grinding poverty! I’ll never have anything else but worry and trouble and misery so long as I live.”

“Do you live in Jones’s Alley yet?”

“Yes.”

“Not bin there ever since, have you?”

“No; I shifted away once, but I went back again. I was away nearly two years.” “I thought so, because I called to see you there once. Well, I’m goin’ that way now. You goin’ home, Mrs Aspinall?”

“Yes.”

“Well, I’ll go along with yer if yer don’t mind.”

“Thanks. I’d only be too glad of company.”

“Goin’ to walk, Mrs Aspinall?” asked Bill; as the tram stopped in their way.

“Yes. I can’t afford trams now—times are too hard.”

“Sorry I don’t happen to have no tickets on me!”

“Oh, don’t mention it. I’m well used to walking. I’d rather walk than ride.”

They waited till the tram passed.

“Some people”—said Bill, reflectively, but with a tinge of indignation in his tone, as they crossed the street—“some people can afford to ride in trams.”

“What’s your trouble, Mrs Aspinall—if it’s a fair thing to ask?” said Bill as they turned the corner.

This was all she wanted, and more; and when, about a mile later, she paused for breath, he drew a long one, gave a short whistle, and said:

“Well, it’s red-hot!”

Thus encouraged, she told her story again, and some parts of it for the third and fourth and even fifth time—and it grew longer, as our stories have a painful tendency to do when we re-write them with a view to condensation.

But Bill heroically repeated that it was “red-hot”.

“And I dealt off the grocer for fifteen years, and the woodand-coal man for ten, and I lived in that house nine years last Easter Monday and never owed a penny before,” she repeated for the tenth time.

“Well, that’s a mistake,” reflected Bill. “I never dealt off nobody more’n twice in my life…I heerd you was married again, Mrs Aspinall—if it’s a right thing to ask?”

“Wherever did you hear that? I did get married again—to my sorrow.”

“Then you ain’t Mrs Aspinall—if it’s a fair thing to ask?”

“Oh, yes! I’m known as Mrs Aspinall. They all call me Mrs Aspinall.”

“I understand. He cleared, didn’t he? Run away?”

“Well, yes—no—he——”

“I understand. He’s s’posed to be dead?”

“Yes.”

“Well, that’s red-hot! So’s my old man, and I hope he don’t resurrect again.”

“You see, I married my second for the sake of my children.”

“That’s a great mistake,” reflected Bill. “My mother married my step-father for the sake of me, and she’s never been done telling me about it.”

“Indeed! Did
your
mother get married again?”

“Yes. And he left me with a batch of step-sisters and step-brother to look after, as well as mother; as if things wasn’t bad enough before. We didn’t want no help to be pinched, and poor, and half-starved. I don’t see where my sake comes in at all.”

“And how’s your mother now?”

“Oh, she’s all right, thank you. She’s got a hard time of it, but she’s pretty well used to it.”

“And are you still working at Grinder Brothers?”

“No. I got tired of slavin’ there for next to nothing. I got sick of my step-father waitin’ outside for me on pay-day, with a dirty, drunken spieler pal of his waitin’ round the corner for him. There wasn’t nothin’ in it. It got to be too rough altogether…Blast Grinders!”

“And what are you doing now?”