Chapter 6

Richard asked for the Christmas to New Year’s Day week off and drove to Southport in two harrowing days, with extremely high temperatures. He was welcomed by his parents with the news that “Cat’s on a cruise to Auckland.”

After unloading the Jeep he showered and re-dressed. It was a luxury to have real hot water on tap.

“How are things?” Andy asked him.

“Well, I’ve worked hard for two months and I think I’ve learned a lot. I’ve been talking to one of our Aboriginal drovers and learned from him, too. I’ll have three weeks back at the station and then February till November. Graduation’s the first Friday in December. And I begin my two-year sentence on the second or third of January.”

“What will that be like?”

“No idea. I’ve never been there in the winter. Always between October and January. I know it drops to about 40 at night in July. But it never rains more’n about five or six days a month. No flood in the last forty years.”

“Might mean one’s due.”

“It was 93 when I left the day before yesterday. And warmer when I got near the coast.”

“But this will be it where Gatton’s concerned.”

“Yes. I’ll get my diploma and then be laboring for two years.”

Andy laughed. “Will Mitchell be your Leah?”

“If so, I’ve no notion who Rachel will be.” They all laughed. “Tell me about Cat.”

“Oh, dear,” began Sybil. “She stopped coming here several months ago. She said she was having a fine time ‘partying.’ Then she said one day that she’d met a bunch of foreign students. Then she mentioned she’s seen ‘Edward’ and then that Eddie’d invited her on a cruise to Auckland.”

“That’s all?”

“Well, apparently Eddie is a Yank here on a Fulbright grant.”

“That’s a US government study-abroad scheme,” Richard said. “We’ve got one or two at Gatton.”

“Don’t be jealous,” Andy said. “Invidia festos dies non agit [Envy takes no holiday] as Bacon wrote.”

“I don’t envy the grant, I envy the yacht.”

“Cat said his dad is something in the film industry. Not an actor,” Sybil said.

“Hollywood millionaires?”

“Possibly. But not in Hollywood. I know they keep the yacht somewhere south, closer to San Diego.”

“You’re no good at the details, mum. Is there a big group?”

“I’ve no idea. She said there’s a crew of six. And it takes four or five days each way to Auckland.”

“Well, given that sort of data, dad ought to be able to work out the vessel, the home port, its size, and all sorts of stuff!”

“Hardly. I’ve not done any of that research for over a dozen years. And I won’t. I’m sure they’ve ship-to-shore on board and so Cat will phone at some point.”

“You’re so placid, Andy!”

“Don’t get wrought up, dear. She can do whatever she wants. She’s over 18. We can’t prevent her getting married. And I’m not prepared to interpose my aging carcass anyway. Why don’t you worry about Richard’s black twins?”

“What? Twins? Richard!”

Andy and Richard both began laughing. Sybil was irritated, frustrated and embarrassed at the same time.

“Don’t worry, mum. To the best of my knowledge I’ve left no get anywhere in the state.”

Cat phoned from Auckland on Boxing Day and reported she was having a fine time. Eddie sent best Christmas wishes. Sybil was rather glum and Richard was glad to drive back to Lamorbey. The Jeep was aging, but he was certain it’d last another year.

He had an interesting assignment awaiting him. The station just the other side of Clermont Road had started taking tourists for up to six weeks. The Millers thought they’d build a pair of cabins for “guests” and see what materialized. If they had no luck, they’d use the structures for staff. Richard got a gang of four to prepare the ground, dig foundations, pour some pillars to put down flooring and the erect a simple 8’x16’ cabin with two 6x8 rooms and a 4x6 washroom with a shower. He was handed a sketch on quadrille paper.

Janey was just visibly pregnant – so she “supervised.” Her major contribution was to advise the staining of the lumber so that it would be termite-resistant. Richard sent for a book from a shop he’d phoned in Newtown, Sydney, Wood-Frame House Construction [U. S Dept. of Agriculture number 73, February 1955]. It arrived when they were only a few days into work. Richard spent several evenings reading it: he’d need it when he began building a real house, though it would be years from now.

The first cabin ... not really a house ... was complete in 10 days. Everyone thought it looked good and several drovers jumped up and down to test the flooring. Janey took over supervising painting the interior and placing curtains on the windows (one in each room and a ventilator in the washroom). Richard and his workmen began the second one. But Richard didn’t get to see it done, as time passed he was sent with 200 fats to the rail at Alpha and when he got back it was nearly time to head to Gatton. Janey didn’t get to work on the second one, either: Joyce, 6lbs., 4 oz., was born on 27 January.

The Millers (including Ferd) held a “farewell” barbie and just under four weeks after he arrived, Richard took the Capricorn west and was soon back on the rutty road from Jericho to Blackall and the Landsborough Highway, which he followed south-east to the Warrego and then east to Gatton. He slept in the Jeep near Morven and then drove over six hours to the college, despite urges to stop near Mitchell and in Roma.

Richard moved back into “his” single, but soon learned that Barb was no longer “available”: she’d met a recent D.V.M. who’d set up a practice in Tara, on the Darling Downs, and they were now formally engaged. They would get married before Christmas. Richard faced being on the market complacently. There were many women and he wasn’t good marriage-fodder.

Ferd was “seeing” a young woman who lived in Alpha, her father teaching at the Alpha State School. It turned out (nudge, nudge – Richard couldn’t see him winking over the phone line) that she had a friend just entering the Agricultural College. Could Richard (ahem) look her up and help her out?

He did, but while “OK,” Trisha was less than interesting. Richard showed her around the campus and had lunch with her twice, but he didn’t even try to take her to his room. The gossip from Southport was that Cat had returned from Auckland with Eddie in tow and that she hoped (per Sybil) to be engaged by July. Richard drove “home” for a long weekend at ANZAC Day, but didn’t see her. He got a call from his father just after Labour Day asking whether he’d be “around” at all in June. Apparently, Cat and Eddie had gotten engaged and would be off to California before 1 July. Eddie’s parents were going to fly Sybil to the US for a week or so around the wedding.

“Not you?”