A POOR MAN’S FIELD

A handsome well groomed man stood by the reception desk talking to yet another receptionist Julia had not seen before.
It took her a second or two to realise it was Chris Marchant.
Pretending not to notice her shocked expression and Tom’s sullen manner he said, “Hello Julia, hello Tom. Let’s get straight to Annie’s ward. She’s waiting for us.”
As they entered her ward Sister was holding Annie’s wrist while looking at the watch pinned to her white uniform. When she finished she looked up and smiled. “Take the same seats as yesterday.”
She bent over Annie who appeared to be sleeping. “Annie. Julia is here.”
Annie drowsily opened her eyes and immediately brightened when she saw her daughter.
“Hello Julia I've just been dreaming about you. Do you remember the lovely lane you and Edith used as a short-cut to school?”
Julia smiled as she remembered the long shadows of early morning and the golden light that lit the treetops, promising a warm sunny day. On mornings like the one that had come to mind she would force poor old Daisy to gallop up the lane so she and Edith could spend time playing by the ford and still get to school on time. Daisy was by then too old to be worked on the farm. With their school four miles away she was their transport. The school provided Daisy and several other horses with a paddock next to the school and a concrete trough filled with water. There were plenty of eucalypts and wattle trees to shade all the horses in the hot summers.
Julia began to remember another morning when a chill in the air warned of the cold, dreary days of winter.
*****
With their lunches packed in tins and placed in a pannier bag Theo had made out of a hessian sack, they ambled Daisy down the road towards the lane. Daisy wore a bag of fresh chaff slung over her neck. Usually the bag of chaff wasn’t needed, but there had been a drought. The school holding paddock for the horses was powder dry with barely a stunted silver grass stalk to be seen.
Travelling the lane to school this time of the year was fun. Julia hated it when rain swelled the creek and they had to take the long way via the boring, gravelled roads to school. However, the drought now reduced the creek to an occasional puddle.
Julia heeled Daisy into a trot as soon as they were hidden from their house.
Hanging onto tightly to Julia’s waist Edith yelled at her, while bouncing up and down. “You aren’t supposed to make Daisy trot. Dad said she’s too old.”
“A little trot won’t hurt her. We’ll have time to stop at the ford if we hurry now.”
Edith didn’t argue with Julia. She was two years older and seemed so grown up at ten.
“Will I have to stand out the front so everybody can sing happy birthday?”
“Yes of course. Just because you’re in the big room now doesn’t mean you stop having birthdays.”
“Well sometimes you ask dumb questions.”
Heaving and snorting Daisy trotted into an open area where farmers had spread crushed rock that had become imbedded in the clay during the wet weather. It was now bone dry and solid. The ford curved into the bed of the creek and was made wide enough to allow two horses and a cart to cross.
“We can get off here and let Daisy have a drink. Get the bucket out of the hollow tree.”
“Dad’s been looking for that. When did you bring it here?”
Julia laughed. “Mum wanted me to take her special spring medicine to Mrs Wentworth's mother.”
“Why didn’t I go too?”
“Because you had a cold.”
“Oh. I don’t remember that. Anyway, why didn’t you tell Dad you took it for Daisy?”
Julia sighed heavily. “Because. We aren’t supposed to stop at the creek. Ever.”
They slid off Daisy’s back and ran down the ford. Here they could examine the pools that had formed as the creek deteriorated to a trickle and finally stopped over the past year.
“Oh come quickly, Edith. There are tadpoles in this pool. Look at them all.”
“We must bring one of Mum’s jam jars and collect some to show Mr Grenness,” said Edith.
“Better not. Then he’ll know we’ve been playing by the creek and he’ll tell Dad.”
“I never thought of that,” Edith mumbled.
“Listen. The kookaburras are laughing at you.”
“They are not,” she yelled.
The bush was alive with insects humming, buzzing and clicking. Little blue wrens flitted through the long dry grass with high-pitched trills like cork rubbed rapidly on glass. Besides the occasional kookaburra cackle the air rang with the sounds of bellbirds. All these sounds and sights the girls only registered subconsciously. As adults it would be possible to hear just one small sound to bring back full awareness of what they now took for granted.
“Come on Edith we’d better get going or we’ll be late.”
Julia untied the bag of chaff so it swung under Daisy’s chin enabling her to push her muzzle inside to graze. Edith emptied the bucket and hid it back in their hollow tree, while Julia lead Daisy across the ford. On the far side one of the local farmers had sawn off a young eucalypt, probably to replace a corner fence post.
“You get on first and I'll get on behind you,” ordered Julia.
Edith obediently climbed onto the stump while Julia held Daisy’s head steady. Then she climbed on behind. Julia decided it was prudent to let Daisy walk the remaining mile to their little school on the edge of the Kilsyth village.
“I hate William and Luke. Some of the little kids are too scared to come to school. I just can’t wait for next year.”
Screwing up her face and hunching her head into her shoulders Edith said, “I don't want to think about them.”
They arrived at the school ground just in time to see the other children forming in order of class in front of the already raised Australian flag. They both slid off Daisy at the same time and Edith ran to her class of six students, while Julia hurried Daisy into the paddock with the other horses. Just as Mr Grenness called the school to order, Julia breathlessly skidded into place beside the three others in her class.
“Place your right hand over your hearts and say, I love God and my country—”
The rest of the school joined in. “I honour the flag and serve the King and cheerfully obey my parents, teachers and the law.”
“Now we will sing the national anthem,” called Mr Grenness in his booming voice.
“God save our gracious King, long live our noble King, God save our King—”
“May he raynorverous,” Edith sang at the top of her voice.
“That's wrong!” bellowed Julia.
Realising what she had done, she peered over nervously to see Mr Grenness glaring at her. She continued singing knowing her outburst would cost her one hundred lines during lunch hour when she could have been playing tennis.
“Any birthdays this week?” called Mr Grenness.
“And when is your birthday, Edith?”
“It’s today.”
“Well now girls and boys, Edith has a birthday today so let us sing happy birthday in our best voices.”
When the school finished singing and cheering her three times, Edith stepped back to her place still grinning. Then everyone filed into the school.
By lunchtime Julia was feeling exasperated at missing out on the tennis match she and Eric had planned. She was sure she could beat him and had told him so on many occasions. Now she had to suffer a lecture from Mr Grenness as well as tediously writing, “I MUST NOT CALL OUT DURING ASSEMBLY”. “One hundred times!” she muttered with exasperation. It’s all Edith’s fault. I feel ashamed when she sings rubbish. I’ll get Eric tomorrow, she promised herself.