第20章 Part I.(19)

There was a cheap little rocking-chair,and a looking-glass and some pictures that were presents from Mary's friends and sister.She had her mantel-shelf ornaments and crockery and nick-nacks packed away,in the linen and old clothes,in a big tub made of half a cask,and a box that had been Jim's cradle.The live stock was a cat in one box,and in another an old rooster,and three hens that formed cliques,two against one,turn about,as three of the same sex will do all over the world.I had my old cattle-dog,and of course a pup on the load --I always had a pup that I gave away,or sold and didn't get paid for,or had `touched'(stolen)as soon as it was old enough.James had his three spidery,sneaking,thieving,cold-blooded kangaroo-dogs with him.

I was taking out three months'provisions in the way of ration-sugar,tea,flour,and potatoes,&c.

I started early,and Mary caught up to me at Ryan's Crossing on Sandy Creek,where we boiled the billy and had some dinner.

Mary bustled about the camp and admired the scenery and talked too much,for her,and was extra cheerful,and kept her face turned from me as much as possible.I soon saw what was the matter.

She'd been crying to herself coming along the road.I thought it was all on account of leaving little Jim behind for the first time.She told me that she couldn't make up her mind till the last moment to leave him,and that,a mile or two along the road,she'd have turned back for him,only that she knew her sister would laugh at her.She was always terribly anxious about the children.

We cheered each other up,and Mary drove with me the rest of the way to the creek,along the lonely branch track,across native-apple-tree flats.

It was a dreary,hopeless track.There was no horizon,nothing but the rough ashen trunks of the gnarled and stunted trees in all directions,little or no undergrowth,and the ground,save for the coarse,brownish tufts of dead grass,as bare as the road,for it was a dry season:there had been no rain for months,and I wondered what I should do with the cattle if there wasn't more grass on the creek.

In this sort of country a stranger might travel for miles without seeming to have moved,for all the difference there is in the scenery.

The new tracks were `blazed'--that is,slices of bark cut off from both sides of trees,within sight of each other,in a line,to mark the track until the horses and wheel-marks made it plain.

A smart Bushman,with a sharp tomahawk,can blaze a track as he rides.

But a Bushman a little used to the country soon picks out differences amongst the trees,half unconsciously as it were,and so finds his way about.

Mary and I didn't talk much along this track --we couldn't have heard each other very well,anyway,for the `clock-clock'of the waggon and the rattle of the cart over the hard lumpy ground.

And I suppose we both began to feel pretty dismal as the shadows lengthened.

I'd noticed lately that Mary and I had got out of the habit of talking to each other --noticed it in a vague sort of way that irritated me (as vague things will irritate one)when I thought of it.But then I thought,`It won't last long --I'll make life brighter for her by-and-by.'

As we went along --and the track seemed endless --I got brooding,of course,back into the past.And I feel now,when it's too late,that Mary must have been thinking that way too.I thought of my early boyhood,of the hard life of `grubbin''and `milkin''and `fencin''and `ploughin''and `ring-barkin'',&c.and all for nothing.The few months at the little bark-school,with a teacher who couldn't spell.

The cursed ambition or craving that tortured my soul as a boy --ambition or craving for --I didn't know what for!For something better and brighter,anyhow.And I made the life harder by reading at night.

It all passed before me as I followed on in the waggon,behind Mary in the spring-cart.I thought of these old things more than I thought of her.She had tried to help me to better things.

And I tried too --I had the energy of half-a-dozen men when I saw a road clear before me,but shied at the first check.Then I brooded,or dreamed of making a home --that one might call a home --for Mary --some day.Ah,well!--

And what was Mary thinking about,along the lonely,changeless miles?

I never thought of that.Of her kind,careless,gentleman father,perhaps.

Of her girlhood.Of her homes --not the huts and camps she lived in with me.

Of our future?--she used to plan a lot,and talk a good deal of our future --but not lately.These things didn't strike me at the time --I was so deep in my own brooding.Did she think now --did she begin to feel now that she had made a great mistake and thrown away her life,but must make the best of it?This might have roused me,had I thought of it.

But whenever I thought Mary was getting indifferent towards me,I'd think,`I'll soon win her back.We'll be sweethearts again --when things brighten up a bit.'

It's an awful thing to me,now I look back to it,to think how far apart we had grown,what strangers we were to each other.It seems,now,as though we had been sweethearts long years before,and had parted,and had never really met since.

The sun was going down when Mary called out --`There's our place,Joe!'

She hadn't seen it before,and somehow it came new and with a shock to me,who had been out here several times.Ahead,through the trees to the right,was a dark green clump of the oaks standing out of the creek,darker for the dead grey grass and blue-grey bush on the barren ridge in the background.Across the creek (it was only a deep,narrow gutter --a water-course with a chain of water-holes after rain),across on the other bank,stood the hut,on a narrow flat between the spur and the creek,and a little higher than this side.

The land was much better than on our old selection,and there was good soil along the creek on both sides:I expected a rush of selectors out here soon.