The Sausage Tree (11 page)

Once when our chooks weren't laying Mum gave the twins a basket and sent them to buy some eggs from Mrs Barrett who lived further along our road, over the railway line and up the hill. Instead of walking, they took Dad's old bike and Geoff's new one. It was quite a stupid thing to do as the road was very rough and the hill too steep to ride up. They got the eggs and set out for home. As Geoff's bike was new they weren't sure how the footbrake worked and went careering out of control, down the road. The faster the bike went on the hazardous road the more stones it seemed to hit. The bike swayed and jolted and all the eggs were broken.

When they reached home they hid the bikes in the long grass outside the front fence then went inside and told Mum that Mrs Barrett said that a few of the eggs were cracked. As soon as she looked into the basket Mum knew that they had taken the bikes and broken all the eggs on the ride home. They got a hiding and were sent to bed without any tea.

Quite often when we were punished by not having any tea Mum would relent and allow us to have some bread and dripping, but stopped that practice when she realised that we found it very nice to eat. Other times we would sneak into the kitchen when everyone else was in bed and carefully take a big piece of fruit cake and a biscuit. We couldn't take a big piece of cake otherwise Mum would have noticed
it was gone when she cut Dad's lunch, or perhaps she did know and didn't say anything.

When we were in bed and it was still daylight, we would amuse ourselves by looking at the beautiful knot patterns that were in the wall and ceiling boards. The entire house was lined with Baltic pine boards and we quietly searched for any shape that resembled a bird or an animal. We are sure we visualised things that we wished were there because we were always finding something new.

When Dad purchased the house the bank manager insisted that the house be improved and we couldn't and still can't believe that Dad was required to paint those unique boards.

We were sent to bed without any tea (which was our main meal of the day) for all kinds of misbehaviour. When Wilma was eight or nine she needed a new pencil for school. As she didn't have any small change, Mum gave her a two shilling piece (twenty cents) to take to the shop to buy a new pencil. Wilma was so excited at having so much money entrusted to her care that as she was going to the shop she showed it to another girl who was standing on the big bridge over the creek. Wilma dropped the money and it went down a ‘hole. She spent hours looking for it but couldn't find it anywhere. She eventually had to go home without the pencil and the change and was sent to bed without her tea for being so careless.

Whenever Mrs Barrett went shopping she always called on Mum for a cup of tea. and a chat before the long walk home. One particular morning when she called, Mum got the cake tin out of the cupboard to get the fruit cake but when she opened it there was Dad's lunch. Dad had taken the wrong tin and poor Mum for a minute didn't know what to do. She called the twins who were about fourteen at the time, gave them the lunch tin and told them to go and find Dad who was working in a bush past Underwood, some six
miles or so from home. Mum told them the general direction to take from the main road and to callout loudly when in the bush so that Dad would hear them and tell them just where he was. Cross-cut saws didn't make a lot of noise and the twins could easily have walked where the head of a tree might land; the danger was very real. They eventually found Dad who was pleased to see them. He told them that he hadn't been looking forward to eating fruit cake for the rest of the day. After a drink of Dad's cold tea the twins trudged back home for a very belated lunch.

When a hen was broody Mum would “set” her with about twelve eggs in the nest. One hatching of chickens produced a small speckled hen and a black rooster. Barbara wanted to have the hen as a pet, and not to be outdone or left out, Rosalie wanted the rooster. When they were allowed to have their way they jumped up and down with joy. Mum thought that the novelty would soon wear off and that such a stupid idea as having a pet chook would soon be forgotten. How wrong she was. The speckled hen was named Fewer and the rooster became Rupert. Both birds were treated like royalty. The twins carried them everywhere, dressed them in old baby clothes and wheeled them around in the old pram. The chooks didn't seem to mind at all and became very tame. Rupert was very fussy and when wheat was thrown to the chooks “his majesty” had to eat his from a dish.

One year Rosalie entered Rupert in the poultry section of the school show. After lunch we went back to the show and headed straight for the cages to see Rupert. On the front of the cage ‘for all to see was a blue card. He had won first prize! Rosalie couldn't believe her luck. She had never won anything before. She was absolutely hopeless at knitting and sewing and, as we all knew she would never win prizes for that work, we were all as thrilled as she was. How proud she was of her beloved Rupert and over the ensuing
years her love for him and Barbara's love for Fewer never wavered.

Many family photos include the two chooks so it was a very sad day when Rupert's life came to an end. Because in his old age he had become very aggressive towards the other fowls, it created a great problem in the chook-run. One day after school Rosalie went to see Rupert, but he wasn't there. She ran inside the house screaming that Rupert was missing. Dad had tears in his eyes when he admitted that it was one of the hardest things he'd ever had to do, but he'd chopped poor Rupert's head off and buried him in the garden.

None of us, not even Barbara, can remember what happened to Fewer.

13

Dad was widely renowned for his expertise in sharpening saws. Over the years mill owners from all the mills in the district brought their saws to Dad to be sharpened. To do this he built a wooden vice on a wooden frame to hold the saws firmly while he worked. Because he suffered from bronchitis and asthma and worked on the saws outside in the clear daylight, Dad built the vice on the outside wall of the kitchen next to the chimney where he was sheltered from the cold winds in the winter. Memories of Sunday mornings echo with the rasping noise of the files on the teeth of the saws. Only the worst of the winter drove Dad inside; he hated to be idle and grumbled discontentedly when confined indoors in the daytime.

Over the years Dad taught many men the art of sharpening saws properly but only a few became proficient and gradually Dadwas able to lessen the number he sharpened. The extra money that Dad earned was very welcome as
wages in any area of the timber industry were very low, but that was the only work he knew and so he made a vocation of it. He was in great demand to work in various mills but he was a loyal employee and refused many work offers. His expert knowledge of all matters relating to saws and their operations in mills was widely acclaimed and on one occasion he was asked to go to Launceston to oversee the installation of the saws in a new mill that was being established.

As well as the saws that were brought to be sharpened, there were the thick wire ropes that logging contractors brought to Dad for splicing after he had attached heavy hooks to the ends. He was not the only man who could do this work expertly but, because it was tedious work with the wire splinters cutting their fingers, they gladly brought the ropes to Dad who was only too happy to do the job and earn extra money to provide in the only ways he knew, for his family.

Our school held a show every year and besides poultry, farm animals such as sheep, cows and calves which were proudly paraded by their owners, writing, artwork and home arts, there were novelty events. One year a double-handed cross-cut sawing competition was held and quite a few of the older boys at school were convinced they could win it. The organisers probably didn't think that girls would enter so there was no stipulation on who could compete. The twins put their names on the list then went home and took Dad's cross-cut saw down from the wall and practised on the woodheap by sawing every long piece of wood in sight. We were all very happy as it meant we didn't have to cut any for a long time.

When Dad realised the twins were quite positive in what
they were doing, he sharpened the saw and it cut through the wood like a knife through butter. The saw was so sharp that Dad said it was dangerous and not to let anyone else touch it.

On show day the twins carefully carried the saw to the school in readiness for the event. Bystanders laughed when they saw two scrawny fifteen year old girls standing by their log holding a six foot saw. They were competing against some boys who were almost as tall as the saw they held, but their confidence didn't waver. “Get ready! Get Set! Go!” The twins sawed as if their very lives depended on the result. The end dropped from their log and they looked around to see the hefty youths still dragging their saws through their logs. The twins were delirious with joy, and jumped up and down hugging one another. They had won. They had sawn through the fourteen inch log in thirty-one seconds. The bystanders were at first too stunned to applaud, but when they did the result was deafening.

There was to be another sawing competition for older boys who had left school the previous year and the headmaster wanted the twins to lend their saw to two boys who didn't have one. This was one time they did as Dad told them: they wouldn't let anyone lay a hand on it. Valda was asked to intervene, but she knew better than to go against Dad's instruction and the twins carried the saw straight home.

The following Monday their picture was in the Launceston
Examiner,
and a few days later was in other newspapers across Australia. With the picture the
Bulletin
magazine ran a feature article on the event with a heading that read “TWIN GIRLS IN SAWING CONTEST”. Barbara still has that article in her possession. For a while they were famous and the boys they had beaten had difficulty in accepting the fact that they had been well and truly defeated by girls who were so much smaller. Experienced
sawyers said the saw the girls used “would have kept an adult bushman busy”. Dad was justifiably proud of his daughters' achievement but without his expert knowledge of saw sharpening, they may not have been so lucky.

He was also very pleased when his lettuce and broad beans were judged the best in the show. We had entered some of Mum's lupins in the flower section and were thrilled when they also won a prize.

Anzac Day was also a milestone in our lives and eagerly looked forward to. A sports day was organised and run by members of the local RSL at the recreation ground. They also provided each school-aged child from Lilydale, and all the surrounding districts with a lunch, complete with apple in a brown paper bag. A lolly scramble was held, after lunch and one had to be very unlucky not to get some of the lollies that were thrown in such a way that even the smallest child was able to “scramble” at least one from the ground. Mid afternoon every child also received a free choc-wedge ice-cream.

The entire day was lots of fun and families came from the surrounding districts to take part in and enjoy the activities which included sack races, egg and spoon races and relay races. Many races were held for different age groups for girls, boys, men and women. It was an exciting day that began with an Anzac Day service in the open before any of the fun began. We all entered as many of the events as we could; we made sure we weren't missed out. The twins always came first and second in every event they ran in and, try as they might, no-one could catch them. They didn't train for anything. We think they had to be able to run fast because of some of their escapades at home.

Once when Barbara had been in trouble at home, for
what was possibly nothing very disastrous, she was told not to go out the gate for the rest of the day. Not long afterwards she was missing from the yard. Mum was furious and we were glad it wasn't us who was going to receive the punishment that was sure to come. On arrival home and reminded about not going out the gate, she airily said she hadn't done that at all—she had gone through a hole in the fence. Because he was going to give her a hiding with the razor strop, Dad made a grab for her. Barbara took off like a rocket; round and round the house she ran with Dad in hot pursuit. He must have realised he would never catch her so he stopped. When Barbara looked over her shoulder to see how far behind he was, she slowed down when she didn't see him. Thinking he had doubled back and that she would run into him coming the other way, she turned and went back the way she had come. As she was walking towards the comer of the house Dad jumped out from where he had been hiding behind a thick rose bush, and grabbed her. The fright he gave her and the look on her face made him laugh so much he couldn't punish her.

When there was a plague of white cabbage moths in the town we had plenty of running practice as, dodging cowpats, we chased those flitting little creatures up and down and across the paddocks that were near our house. We made nets from a piece of rag and a stick and ran around after the moths, tallying up how many we had killed.

The twins were widely known for their athletic abilities which they used to suit any occasion, so their antics should have been no surprise to anyone when, during the early 1940s at the height of a diphtheria epidemic, a doctor and a nurse arrived at the school to immunise all children. The twins declared that there was no way they were going to have a needle stuck into them. Off they streaked and a merry chase began. They ran like the wind across the schoolyard, scaled the old wooden fence at the back, and ran along the
railway line hotly pursued by a band of willing helpers who were only too pleased to see them get their just reward. No-one could catch them so they let them be and returned to school. After a while when they hoped they were safe, the twins returned to the schoolyard and hid behind a huge gum tree just inside the fence. Naturally they hadn't been forgotten as they had hoped, so when the searchers regrouped and came close to their hiding place, off the escapees flew, feet barely touching the ground, running as though possessed until they were exhausted. After being captured they were dragged kicking and screaming into the library where, much to their sorrow and disgust, they received their injections. When it was all over they said in surprise, “Is that all it was?”

When the dentist came to school there was another running performance from the twins. When it was time for their checkup they were nowhere to be found, but when they eventually appeared no one said anything to them. A few days later they were caught unawares and dragged off to the dentist with the usual kicking and screaming routine. After their visit they reckoned that the dentist was really a carpenter who had failed his exams in the building industry.

A few weeks later Mum was sorry that they had been caught as Rosalie had a terrible toothache and suffered so much pain that she had to be taken to the dentist in Launceston and have a front tooth removed.

When they were thirteen, Barbara and Rosalie were employed during the apple-packing season to pack apples at the sheds about two miles from home. Sometimes they walked or ran to work; on other occasions they rode Dad's old bike. When away from prying eyes they would double-dink, but usually took turns riding while the other ran beside her sister. They also had a very unique way of riding the bike. One stood on one pedal and hung grimly on one handle bar whilst the other stood on the opposite pedal.
The hardest part was steering the bike and staying on the road. What a sight to see! There they were, travelling along the road, going up and down like two clowns in a circus!