Dulcie hadn’t looked at the passenger until then, and she saw he was half the other man’s age, probably only seventeen or eighteen. She thought perhaps they were father and son, though they weren’t alike. He moved closer to the driver to make room for her, and so Dulcie got in, squeezing her case between her feet. The lad handed her a half-full bottle of water and looked curiously at her as she guzzled it down greedily.
‘No drink with you!’ the driver said as he started up the truck again. ‘No hat either! Where’ve you come from?’
Dulcie’s instinct told her to say nothing, but the man had been kind enough to stop, he sounded friendly, and he didn’t look a brute like Bill Masters and his men. ‘A few miles up the road,’ she said vaguely.
‘And what’s in Salmon Gums?’ he asked.
‘The train,’ she said.
‘Ah!’ he said, and gave a little chuckle. ‘So you’re running away! Now, there’s only two places on that road you could’ve come from, and my guess it’s the Masters’ place. Am I right?’
The driver wasn’t looking round at her, he had his eyes on the road ahead, but the lad was looking sideways at her very intently. He was wiry, with dark auburn curly hair and freckles across his nose. ‘Did they treat you bad?’ he asked in little more than a whisper.
‘Now, Ross, I’m the one that asks the questions,’ the driver said, with laughter in his voice. ‘Come on, love, tell me the score. You can trust me.’
Nervous as Dulcie was, her need for, a sympathetic ear was greater. So she took a deep breath, then blurted it all out, the nastiness of the Masters, the stone-clearing, the leftover food, and finally what had happened this morning. The only thing she didn’t say was that she had been sent from an orphanage to work there.
‘I wasn’t going to hang about and get a beating from Bill,’ she said. ‘So I ran.’
‘Can’t say I blame you running off,’ the older man said, this time looking round at her. He was handsome, with smooth, tanned skin and sparkly blue eyes. ‘Fair dinkum, I would’ve done too. But where’re you heading for?’
‘Is Esperance a big town?’ she asked.
Both the man and the boy sniggered. ‘If you blink you’ll miss it,’ the man said. ‘There’s more life in Norseman or Salmon Gums. Know anyone in Esperance?’
Dulcie shook her head. ‘I just thought it would be a better place to get another job than Kalgoorlie.’
‘It’s a beaut place,’ the man replied, looking thoughtful. ‘But work’s hard to find for sheilas. You’d be better gettin’ on home to your folks. Are they in Kalgoorlie?’
‘I haven’t got any,’ Dulcie said, but she felt the boy nudge her with his elbow as if trying to stop her saying anything more. She hesitated for a second. ‘I was brought up by my aunt there,’ she lied. ‘I can go back to her.’
Suddenly they were turning off the smaller road on to the wider one where the station was. She was surprised it had taken such a short time – clearly she’d walked a great deal further than she’d imagined.
The man pulled in at the post office, saying he had to pick up something. ‘You two get out and wait in the shade,’ he said to both Dulcie and the boy. ‘I’ll get some lemonade for you and I’ll ask what time the train is.’
They all got out, the man went into the post office and Ross suddenly caught hold of Dulcie’s arm. ‘You’re from an orphanage, aren’t you?’ he said. Dulcie was taken aback by the intensity in his voice and his eyes – they were a strange tawny colour, reminding her of a cat’s.
Dulcie had always found it hard to lie to a direct question, but her hesitation answered the question for her.
‘I guessed you were as soon as I saw you. But you’ll be in big trouble if the police catch you,’ he said.
‘They won’t catch me,’ she said more confidently than she felt. ‘Unless you’re going to tell them where I am?’
‘I don’t dob people in. But there’s plenty of bastards who will,’ he said, looking deeply troubled. ‘But I ain’t happy about a young sheila out on her own, I’ll be worried about you.’
To Dulcie that was as good as being hugged. Aside from Sister Ruth who’d expressed a little anxiety when she left her on Perth station, he was the first person to show any concern about her well-being for many years.
At that point the man came back out of the post office with three bottles of lemonade. Dulcie felt Ross stiffen, and it seemed to her it was a warning she shouldn’t be too frank with the older man.
‘There’s no train today,’ he said, ‘but there’s a bus to Kalgoorlie at six. You just wait here for it.’
The man introduced himself as John Withers and said he and Ross worked on a property down at Esperance. Ross stood back slightly, just looking at her. Dulcie had a feeling there was a great deal more he’d like to say to her but he couldn’t in front of John.
‘Don’t suppose they need a cook, cleaner or even someone to look after their children?’ Dulcie said, looking up at John hopefully. He had such a nice face, a wide smiley mouth and a direct way of looking at her, so very different to Bill Masters and his men.
‘Sorry love, nothing doing. You go on home to your aunt, and next time make sure you find out about a place afore you get there. A sheila as young and pretty as you shouldn’t be stuck out in the middle of nowhere.’
Dulcie blushed at the compliment, she thought she must look a fright in her old striped St Vincent’s dress. But it could have been worse, she might have been wearing the men’s trousers and shirt she put on for working outside.
‘You got enough money for the bus?’ John asked.
Dulcie nodded.
‘Well, we’d better be off then,’ he said. ‘Look after yourself, Dulcie. You seem a smart girl, try and get a better job, in a shop or sommat. You got to be born to farming to really like it.’
As they got back into the truck, Ross was waving his arm, not like he was waving goodbye, but as if he was trying to tell her something. She looked towards the post office and saw that it closed at two. She thought perhaps he was warning her to get another drink and something to eat before it was too late.
After the hard work of the last weeks Dulcie didn’t mind waiting for the bus one bit. She bought a magazine in the post office, a bar of chocolate and a big bottle of lemonade, then went and sat in the shade over by the station with her back to the wall, and took her shoes off.
She dozed a little, jerking her head up nervously whenever a car or truck went past. But she must have fallen dead asleep because she didn’t hear the man walk up to her and only woke when he spoke.
‘Wake up, little girl,’ he said. ‘I’ve got to talk to you.’
Her eyes flew open to see a policeman crouching in front of her. Panic made her curl into a defensive ball, her arms covering her head.
‘I’m not going to hit you,’ he said gently. ‘Now, just sit up and we’ll have a little talk.’
It was he who did the talking, not her. He said that John Withers, the man driving the truck, had become concerned on the drive back to Esperance because he sensed his young workmate had something on his mind. After some persuasion Ross finally admitted he doubted Dulcie had an aunt in Kalgoorlie and he was scared she’d come to harm.
‘John’s a good man,’ the policeman said. ‘He didn’t call on me to try and make trouble for you, he just didn’t like the thought of someone as young as you wandering around looking for work. Now, suppose you tell me all about it?’
Dulcie took a good look at the man. John had said she could trust him, he looked like she could too, but then he’d told on her. This man looked as if he could be trusted too, middle-aged, chubby, a round unlined face and soft brown eyes that were looking intently at her. His blue uniform shirt was clean and well ironed, his trousers had a sharp crease down the front. He even had a nice voice, she had heard the lilt of Irish in it. She didn’t have any choice but to trust him, but maybe if she told him the whole truth he’d help her get a job.
So she told him e
verything, in far more detail than she’d told John and Ross. ‘No one should get away with treating me like that,’ she said. ‘I had to leave, those people are pigs.’
He took her hand and helped her up, then led her over to a low wall for them both to sit down. ‘The question is, what am I going to do with you?’ he said. ‘By rights I ought to take you up to Norseman and hand you over to the police there, because this isn’t my patch. I’m stationed in Esperance, see.’ He paused for a moment as if in deep thought. ‘You must have been told by the Sisters what happens if girls like you leave a job before they are eighteen?’
‘The reformatory,’ she said. But even as she said the word she felt angry. ‘But why should I be punished? I haven’t done a thing wrong. It was them who treated me like a slave. That isn’t fair!’
He nodded as if in agreement. ‘The trouble is, you are a ward of the Australian government, and it’s their rule that orphaned children must stay where they are sent. Now, suppose you put yourself in my boots for a moment. Suppose I was to let you get on that bus to Kalgoorlie. You’d get there well after eleven o’clock tonight. I know there are bad men who hang around the bus station waiting for young unprotected girls just like you to get off. Would you think, knowing this, that it would be a kind thing for me to let you do?’
‘I suppose not,’ she said reluctantly. ‘But I’m not stupid. I wouldn’t let anyone take me off somewhere.’
The policeman sighed. ‘These bad men aren’t stupid either. They have dozens of different ways of persuading girls,’ he said. ‘Sometimes they work with a woman, she might offer you lodgings or a meal. There’s a street called Hay Street, that’s where girls end up, and almost everyone of them started out just like you, a little innocent sucked into something evil.’
‘Well, can’t I go somewhere else then?’ she asked. ‘Somewhere there aren’t bad people.’
The policeman sighed deeply. ‘The way I see it, there’s really only one solution and that’s to go back to the Masters.’
‘Oh no,’ Dulcie exclaimed. She clutched hold of his arm in her fear. ‘Please don’t make me do that, they’ll be twice as nasty because I ran away.’
‘Hear me out first,’ he said, patting her hand. ‘I take you back there, and I talk to them, give them a warning they’ve got to treat you better. Then you write a letter to St Vincent’s, explain how unhappy you are and ask that they give you permission to find another job or that they find one for you. That way no one can punish you by sending you to the reformatory.’
‘But I can’t bear to go back there, I’d sooner die,’ Dulcie said, beginning to cry.
The policeman put his arm around her shoulders. ‘I’m sorry, love, I wish I could think of some alternative, I really do. If I take you up to Norseman as I really should, it will be taken out of my hands, they’re tough bastards up there, used to troublemakers from the gold mines in Kalgoorlie, so I don’t want to do that. But I’ll ask around in Esperance, see if I can find someone who needs a bright girl like you. I’ll come by from time to time too and check you’re all right. Bill Masters will go easier on you after I’ve spoken to him.’
Dulcie could see she had no choice. Although the policeman hadn’t said as much, she knew that if she refused to do as he said, he’d have no alternative but to take her to the police station in Norseman.
Sergeant Sean Collins kept stealing glances at the girl as he drove her back to the Masters’ place. Her expression was one of abject misery, and judging by the way she wasn’t crying or pleading with him, he suspected it was a state she’d been in all too often before. On his last trip to Perth a few months ago a policeman friend had spoken about hearing rumours of cruelty in orphanages run by both the Christian Brothers and the Sisters of Mercy. He said he had tried to get senior police to investigate, but was told in no uncertain terms that the Catholic Church was outside police jurisdiction. As a Catholic himself Collins found it hard to believe that nuns and priests should treat children badly, but now he knew that Dulcie, a completely inexperienced child, had been sent out to work on such a remote farm, without checks being made on the prospective employers, he wasn’t quite so sure they were all they seemed.
Collins knew all about back-breaking land-clearing, he’d come over from Ireland at eighteen in 1920, and it was the only work he could get until he eventually got into the police force. He felt sorry for Dulcie and believed everything she had said, but he couldn’t do anything more for her than he’d already offered. Hundreds of immigrants arrived every day in the big ports, not just from England but from all over Europe, and the migrant camps set up for them were bursting at the seams. People with a trade or profession had little trouble finding work. For willing, strong young men who were prepared to go wherever work was available, there was more than enough too. But for the rest, Australia often proved a great disappointment, a harsh, strange land of vast distances, extremes of temperature, prejudice and hardship. For a young, pretty girl like Dulcie it could also be very dangerous.
‘You stay in the car while I go in and speak to them,’ Collins said as they drove up to the Masters’ homestead. It was almost six now and he could see the black truck parked up outside. ‘Don’t take it into your head to start running again. If they refuse to be reasonable I’ll take you back with me.’
She gave him a look which said she hoped that would be the case, and it made a lump come up in his throat.
Collins went straight round the back – people in the outback didn’t stand on ceremony, even the two dogs barely glanced his way. He rapped on the screen door and it was opened by Jake, whom he’d known for some years.
‘G’day, Jake,’ he said. ‘Can I have a word with Bill?’
‘How yer doin’, Sean?’ Jake said, grinning and showing off his protruding teeth. ‘You’re a long way off your patch! Come on in.’
‘When you hear about a runaway kid you don’t care if it isn’t your patch,’ Collins said as he followed him in.
He was almost overcome by the heat in the kitchen, and by Pat when she turned at the stove to face him.
Her baleful look was enough to turn milk sour, but what really shocked him was her appearance. He’d only met her once before, that was just after Bill married her and was working up at Norseman. She wouldn’t have been described as a pretty woman even then, but she was attractive and stylish with a good figure. She looked like a skeleton now, her face gaunt and her eyes dead.
‘G’day, Pat,’ he said, trying to disarm her with a wide smile. ‘Sorry to call when you’re having your meal.’
Bill was surprisingly courteous. He got Collins a chair, introduced his cousins Bert and Ted, and asked if he wanted a beer. He said their meal could wait a little longer.
Collins had met Bill on innumerable occasions. Before the war when he worked on several different properties all around this area he was known to be something of a larrikin. A bit boastful, too hot-headed sometimes, getting himself into fights when he got drunk. When he returned after the war, that seemed to have gone, he was quieter, didn’t seem to laugh any more the way he used to. He once told Collins that all he wanted was a farm of his own, a wife and a few kids, so when he married Pat, Collins was glad for him. Then he got this place, and everyone predicted he’d fail as so many others had around here. Yet Collins hoped they were wrong. Bill was a hard worker, he was determined too, but perhaps if things were going badly, that was why he was taking it out on Pat.
Collins took the bottle of beer gratefully and launched straight into his reason for calling.
‘It’s about young Dulcie,’ he said. ‘I picked her up waiting for the bus to Kalgoorlie. I want to hear your side of what happened today.’
‘She said the kid got into a blue and kneed her in the belly,’ Bill said, looking round at his wife. ‘Didn’t strike me as the kind that had it in her!’
Collins picked up that Bill didn’t believe his wife. ‘That’s exactly what she told me she did do,’ he said. ‘But she only did it because your wi
fe struck her first.’
‘You hit her?’ Bill turned towards his wife and scowled. ‘Whatcha do that for? She’s a good kid, never gives any lip, works like a dog.’
‘She had it coming to her. She spilt a pan of water outside and then blamed Sly,’ Pat retorted. ‘You say she never gives any lip, you should’ve heard what she said this morning.’
Collins didn’t know who was worse, a man who thought a fifteen-year-old should work like a dog, or a woman who would clout someone for something so trivial. It was also shocking that they clearly hadn’t made any attempt to find the girl after she ran away – a twenty-mile walk in hot sun for someone without a hat or water could have proved fatal. In carefully chosen words Collins pointed this out to them.
‘She’s a good kid,’ he finished up. ‘You know that orphanage kids who run away have to be taken in. I don’t want to do that to her, she don’t deserve it. Now, how about taking her back and treating her right?’
‘Whatcha mean? Treating her right!’ Bill said, his low brow furrowed with a frown. ‘We pay her ten bob a week, she gets her bed and board. What else does she expect, bloody French lessons, tennis in the afternoon?’
‘No, of course she doesn’t,’ Collins retorted. ‘She just wants what is fair, a proper meal, not leftovers, a decent room to sleep in, not a shed, to be treated kindly.’
‘I had it a darn sight worse than her on the property they sent me to,’ Pat burst out. ‘I was only fourteen and I had to milk twenty cows at five in the morning. In the winter it was so cold I couldn’t bend my fingers.’
At that outburst Collins understood Pat a little better. Maybe she was an orphan herself, and while anyone would expect that would make her more compassionate to someone in the same position, he knew all too well this wasn’t so. Brutality begets brutality, children who receive cruelty will often be crueller still themselves.
‘You give her leftovers?’ Bill looked at his wife in astonishment. ‘You said you put her dinner and yours back till we’d finished.’
‘I do. She’s lying,’ Pat said but she gave the game away by blushing and looking away.