Читать книгу The Boy in the Bush - D. H. Lawrence - Страница 20

When Tom was away, Jack felt as if the pivot of all activity was missing. Mr. Ellis was not the real pivot. It was the plain, red-faced Tom.

Tom had talked a good deal, in snatches, to Jack. It was the family that bothered him, as usual. He always talked the family.

"My grandfather came out here in the early days. He was a merchant and lost all his money in some East India business. He married Gran in Melbourne, then they came out here. They had a bit of a struggle, but they made good. Then Grampa died without leaving a will: which complicated things for Gran. Dad and Easu was twins, but Dad was the oldest. But Dad had wandered: he was gone for years and no one knows what he did all the time.

"But Gran liked him best, and he was the eldest son, so she had this place all fixed up for him when he came back. She'd a deal of trouble getting the Reds out. All the A'nts were on their side—on the Red's side. We always call Uncle Easu's family the Reds. And Aunt Emmie says she's sure Uncle Easu was born first, and not Dad. And that Gran took a fancy to Dad from the first, so she said he was the eldest. Anyhow it's neither here nor there.—I hope to goodness I never get twins.—It runs in the family, and of all the awful things! Though the Easu's have got no twins. Seven sons and no girls, and no twins. Uncle Easu's dead, so young Red runs their place.

"Uncle Easu was a nasty scrub, anyway. He married the servant girl, and a servant girl no better than she should be, they say.

"He didn't make no will, either. Making no wills runs in the family, as well as twins. Dad won't. His Dad wouldn't, and he won't neither."

Which meant, Jack knew, that by the law of the colony the property would come to Tom.

"Oh. Gran's crafty all right! She never got herself talked about, turning the Reds out! She saved up a stocking—Gran always has a stocking. And she saved up an' bought 'em out. She persuaded them that the land beyond this was better'n this. She worked in with 'em while Dad was away, like the fingers on your hand: and bought that old barn of a place over yonder for 'em, and bounced 'em into it. Gran's crafty, when it's anyone she cares about. Now it's Len.

"Anyhow there it was when Dad came back, Wandoo all ready for him. He brought me wrapped in a blanket. Old Tim, our half-caste man, was his servant and there was my old nurse. That's all there is we know about me. I know no more, neither who I am nor where I sprung from. And Dad never lets on.

"He came back with a bit of money, and Gran made him marry Ma to mind me. She said I was such a squalling little grub, and she wanted me brought up decent. So Ma did it. But Gran never quite fancied me.

"It's a funny thing, seeing how I come, that I should be so steady and ordinary, and Len should be so clever and unsteady. You'd ha' thought I should be Len and him me.

"Who was my mother? That's what I want to know. Who was she? And Dad won't never say.

"Anyhow she wasn't black, so what does it matter, anyhow?

"But it does matter!"—Tom brought his fist down with a smack in the palm of his other hand. "Nobody is ordinary to their mother, and I'm ordinary to everybody, and I wish I wasn't."

Funny of Tom. Everybody depended on him so, he was the hero of the establishment, because he was so steady and ordinary and dependable. And now even he was wishing himself different. You never knew how folks would take themselves.