Читать книгу Up the Country - Miles Franklin - Страница 16

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When the news was conveyed to Charlotte she was dismayed for a moment. But, recovering her poise, she saw that it would be to the family advancement and would go a long way towards conquering the social inferiority under which the motherless Pools laboured.

Old Mrs Mazere, as she was unfailingly coming to be called, had found Charlotte a great support and suggested that, owing to the advent of a stepmother, it would be wisest for her to remain at Three Rivers. Undecided, Charlotte wrote to her husband explaining that though she was happy enough, nevertheless she feared becoming lazy amid the softness and luxury of Three Rivers. She was lonely for her own dear sweetheart and wanted little Philip to know his daddy. In fact, Charlotte fervently wished that Philip could start in a little place of his own, but loyally did not express it. Her strength lay in her self-containment. She was one of those able to thank God for the things she never did and those she never said.

In response to her letter, Philip thereupon employed what capital he had saved in buying a share in the main line where he would double his earnings, and said that he hoped to return to the land within a year. But a little later there was bad news. Philip had been robbed one week and had suffered a broken leg in a smash the next; now he was laid up at a wayside shanty near Yass. Charlotte hurried off to him without delay, her purse supplied with money from Mamma, a fact unknown but probably not unsuspected by Papa.

Remaining with Philip till he was able to return to work, Charlotte realised sadly that it would probably be better for her to return to Three Rivers for the present. Her return was heartily welcomed. Old Mazere had missed her more than he admitted and Mrs Mazere had felt her absence sorely. Though still hardy, the elder woman was beginning to feel the need of rest. She had always been public-spirited, as much as was compatible with her day and locality. She took a prominent part in advancing the church, and women for miles sought her attendance at their confinements, or brought ailing children to her. Her skill and resourcefulness had made her beloved of her richer neighbours as well as her poorer. They liked to have her as a consultant in addition to anyone else they might be able to retain. The poor preferred her to the doctor; they were sure of finding her sober, and they were probably not incorrect in believing that she knew more than him, and also did more. She supplied them with linen and food and medicine from the provident store chests of Three Rivers homestead. Her liniments and ointments had wide fame and, it may be noted, were the basis of commercial products in a later generation.

For all such activities Charlotte freed Mrs Mazere Senior by taking hold of the household, as naturally as breathing. Too inexperienced to know quite how to set about laying her own plans, she then found that another child was coming, and this held her hands again.

Thus she bore herself patiently till more than a year of separated married life had passed and the news of gold discoveries came to change the tenor of life in the colonies. Situated as he was, Philip Mazere was one of the first to hear the news and be away to the diggings at the Ophir, as it was then called. He arrived there in the first big rush in the autumn of '51, without travelling up country to say goodbye to his wife and child.

The gold fever took the country by storm. Not only did the discovery of gold appeal to the gambling streak in man, ever ready to adventure all on chasing the rainbow or the snark, but the new way of life came as a welcome relief to those tired of the monotony and isolation which were the pioneers' greatest hardships. Without a backward glance, they left the plough and the herd behind in the lonely bush, running like children to a Punch and Judy show.

George Stanton was left with but one shepherd but, being knowledgeable and able enough to be his own head stockman, his situation was not as difficult as lots of others'. The blacks were welcome that year at Mungee, which now reaped the benefit of its early generous treatment of them. Old Mazere was fortunate that he could turn to manual work again himself, and felt the better for it. "It's taking a little of the pot off me," he explained. He was lucky too in still having Hugh at home; Grubb, his imported (and transported) gardener, also stuck. Grubb was a true lover of growing things. Astonished by the luxuriant growth of his beloved crops and plants in the rich soil and genial climate, enjoying independence in his own cottage with his wife and children—that was Ophir enough for him.

Charlie Slattery, one of the Three Rivers stockmen, was one who ran. Ellen, his wife, was glad to be reinstated with her boy in the comfort and sociability of the homestead, and the Mazeres were relieved to have a trained helper not likely to be carried off by some swain as soon as she began to be useful.

Philip had appeared to do well for a time. Glorious tales of his finds filtered through to Three Rivers and he sent his wife and mother brooches of queerly shaped nuggets of gold, almost like flowers or animals. For a time, he sent Charlotte a good deal of money, which she was careful to hoard, but then that dropped off; Philip said he was afraid of the bushrangers sticking-up the coaches and rifling his communications. Later he wrote that the diggings were played out at the Turon and Ophir, and that he was off to Mount Alexander in Victoria where there was a solid mountain of gold.

Charlotte was anxious to follow her husband to the diggings but the second child, James, hampered her and even old Mazere was against her going.

"Stay where you are. If a man can't make a place to settle down, a woman and children won't help by dragging after him," he said with solid commonsense and a more straightforward appraisal of Philip than his wife and mother's loyalty permitted.