Cheon rose at cock-crow (“fowl-sing-out,” he preferred to call it), and
began his duties by scornfully refusing Sam’s bland offer of instruction
in the “ways of the homestead.”
“Me savey all about,” he said, with a majestic wave of his hands, after
expressing supreme contempt for Sam’s caste and ways; so Sam applied for
his cheque, shook hands all round, and withdrew smilingly.
Sam’s account being satisfactorily “squared,” Cheon’s name was then
formally entered in the station books as cook and gardener, at twenty-
five shillings a week. That was the only vacancy he ever filled in the
books; but in our life at the homestead he filled almost every vacancy
that required filling, and there were many.
There was nothing he could not and did not do for our good, and it was
well that he refused to be instructed in anybody’s ways, for his own
were delightfully disobedient and unexpected and entertaining. Not only
had we “struck the jolliest old josser going,” but a born ruler and
organiser into the bargain. He knew best what was good for us, and told
us so, and, meekly bending to his will, our orders became mere
suggestions to be entertained and carried out if approved of by Cheon,
or dismissed as “silly-fellow” with a Podsnapian wave of his arm if they
in no way appealed to him.
Full of wrath for Sam’s ways, and bubbling over with trundling energy,
he calmly appropriated the whole staff, as well as Jimmy, Billy Muck,
and the rejected, and within a week had put backbone into everything
that lacked it, from the water-butts to old Jimmy.
The first two days were spent in a whirlwind of dust and rubbish, turned
out from unguessed-at recesses, and Cheon’s jovial humour suiting his
helpers to a nicety, the rubbish was dealt with amid shouts of delight
and enjoyment; until Jimmy, losing his head in his lightness of heart,
dug Cheon in the ribs, and, waving a stick over his head, yelled in mock
fierceness: “Me wild-fellow, black fellow. Me myall-fellow.”
Then Cheon came out in a new role. Without a moment’s hesitation his
arms and legs appeared to fly out all together in Jimmy’s direction,
completely doubling him up.
“Me myall-fellow, too,” Cheon said calmly, master of himself and the
situation. Then, chuckling at Jimmy’s discomfiture, he went on with his
work, while his helpers stared open-eyed with amazement; an infuriated
Chinese catherine-wheel being something new in the experience of a black
fellow. It was a wholesome lesson, though, and no one took liberties
with Cheon again.
The rubbish disposed of, leaking water-butts, and the ruins of collapsed
water-butts, were carried to the billabong, swelled in the water,
hammered and hooped back into steadfast, reliable water-butts, and
trundled along to their places in a merry, joyous procession.
With Cheon’s hand on the helm, cream rose on the milk from somewhere.
The meat no longer turned sour. An expert fisherman was discovered among
the helpers—one Bob by name. Cheon’s shot-gun appeared to have a
magnetic attraction for wild duck. A garden sprang up as by magic,
grasshoppers being literally chased off the vegetables. The only thing
we lacked was butter; and after a week of order and cleanliness and
dazzlingly varied menus, we wondered how we had ever existed without
them.
It was no use trying to wriggle from under Cheon’s foot once he put it
down. At the slightest neglect of duty, lubras or boys were marshalled
and kept relentlessly to their work until he was satisfied; and woe
betide the lubras who had neglected to wash hands, and pail and cow,
before sitting down to their milking. The very fowls that laid out-bush
gained nothing by their subtlety. At the faintest sound of a cackle, a
dosing lubra was roused by the point of Cheon’s toe, as he shouted
excitedly above her: “Fowl sing out! That way! Catch ’im egg! Go on!”
pointing out the direction with much pantomime; and as the egg-basket
filled to overflowing, he either chuckled with glee or expressed further
contempt for Sam’s ways.
But his especial wrath was reserved for the fowl-roosts over his
sleeping quarters. “What’s ’er matter! Fowl sit down close up kitchen!”
he growled in furious gutturals, whenever his eyes rested on them; and
as soon as time permitted he mounted to the roof and, boiling over with
righteous indignation, hurled the offending roosts into space.
New roosts were then nailed to the branches of a spreading coolibar
tree, a hundred yards or so to the north of the buildings, the trunk
encircled with zinc to prevent snakes or wild cats from climbing into
the roosts; a movable ladder staircase made, to be used by the fowls at
bedtime, and removed as soon as they were settled for the night, lest
the cats or snakes should make unlawful use of it (Cheon always foresaw
every contingency); and finally, “boys” and lubras were marshalled to
wean the fowls from their old love.
But the weaning took time, and proved most entertaining; and while the
fowls were being taught by bitter experience to bend to Cheon’s will,
the homestead pealed with shoutings and laughter.
Every evening the fun commenced about sundown, and the entire community
assembled to watch it; for it was worth watching—fowls dodged, and
scurried, and squawked, as the staff and the rejected, under Cheon’s
directions, chivied and danced and screamed between them and their
desire, the lubras cheering to the echo every time one of the birds gave
in, and stalked, cackling and indignant, up the ladder into the branches
of the coolibar; or pursuing runaways that had outwitted them, in
shrieking, pell-mell disorder, while Cheon, fat and perspiring, either
shouted orders and cheered lustily, bounded wrathfully alter both
runaways and lubras, or collapsed, doubled up with uncontrollable
laughter, at the squawk of amazement from fowls which, having gained
their old haunt, had found Jimmy there waiting to receive them. As for
ourselves, I doubt if we ever enjoyed anything better. A simple thing,
perhaps, to amuse grown-up white folk—a fat, perspiring Chinaman, and
eight or ten lubras chivying fowls; but it is this enjoyment of simple
things that makes life in the Never-Never all it is.
Busy as he was, Cheon found time to take the missus also under his ample
wing, and protect her from everything—even herself. “Him too muchee
little fellow,” he said to the Maluka, to explain his attitude towards
his mistress; and the Maluka, chuckling, shamefully encouraged him in
his ways.
Every suggestion the missus made was received with an amused: “No good
that way, missus! Me savey all about.” Her methods with lubras were
openly disapproved, and her gardening ridiculed to all comers: “White
woman no good, savey gard’n,” he reiterated, but was fated to apologise
handsomely in that direction later on.
Still, in other things the white woman was honoured as became her
position as never Sam had honoured her. Without any discrimination, Sam
had summoned all at meal-times with a booming teamster’s bell, thus
placing the gentry on a level with the Quarters; but as Cheon pointed
out, what could be expected of one of Sam’s ways and caste? It was all
very well to ring a peremptory bell for the Quarters—its caste expected
to receive and obey orders; but gentry should be graciously notified
that all was ready, when it suited their pleasure to eat; and from the
day of Sam’s departure, the House was honoured with a sing-song: “Din-
ner! Boss! Mis-sus!” at midday, with changes rung at “Bress-fass” or
“Suppar”; and no written menu being at its service, Cheon supplied a
chanted one, so that before we sat down to the first course we should
know all others that were to come.
The only disadvantage we could associate with his coming was that by
some means Jimmy’s Nellie had got on to the staff. No one seemed to know
when or how it had happened, but she was there, firmly established
working better than any one else, and Dan was demanding payment of his
bets.
Cheon would not hear of her dismissal. She was his “right hand,” he
declared; and so I interviewed Nellie and stated my objections in cold,
brutal English, only to hate myself the next moment; for poor Nellie,
with a world of longing in her eyes, professed herself more than willing
to wear “good fellow clothes” if she could get any.
“Missus got big mob,” she suggested as a hint; and, although that was a
matter of opinion and comparison, in remorse I recklessly gave her my
only bath wrapper, and for weeks went to the bath in a mackintosh.
Nellie was also willing to use as much carbolic soap as the station
could afford; but as the smoking and spitting proved more difficult to
cope with, and I had discovered that I could do all the “housework” in
less time than it took to superintend it, I made Cheon a present of the
entire staff, only keeping a lien on it for the washing and scrubbing.
The lubras, however, refused to be taken off my visitor’s list and Cheon
insisting on them waiting on the missus while she was attending to the
housework, no one gained or lost by the transfer.
Cheon had a scheme all his own for dealing with the servant question:
the Maluka should buy a little Chinese maiden to wait on the missus.
Cheon knew of one in Darwin, going cheap, for ten pounds, his—COUSIN’s
child. “A real bargain!” he assured the Maluka, finding him lacking in
enthusiasm; “docile, sweet, and attentive,” and yes, Cheon was sure of
that “devoted to the missus,” and also a splendid pecuniary investment
(Cheon always had an eye on the dollars). Being only ten years of age,
for six years she could serve the missus, and would then bring at least
eighty pounds in the Chinese matrimonial market in Darwin—Chinese wives
being scarce there. If she grew up moon-faced, and thus “good-looking,”
there seemed no end to the wealth she would bring us.
It took time to convince Cheon of the abolition of slavery throughout
the Empire, and even when convinced, he was for buying the treasure and
saying nothing about it to the Governor. It was not likely he would come
in person to the Elsey, he argued, and, unless told, would know nothing
about it.
But another fat, roundabout, roly-poly of humanity was to settle the
servant question finally, within a day or two. “Larrikin” had been
visiting foreign parts at Wandin, towards the west, and returning with a
new wife, stolen from one “Jacky Big-Foot,” presented her to the missus.
“Him Rosy!” he said, thus introducing his booty and without further
ceremony Rosy requested permission to “sit down” on the staff. Like
Cheon she carried her qualifications on the tip of her tongue: “Me savey
scrub ’im, and sweep ’im, and wash ’im, and blue ’im, and starch ’im,”
she said glibly, with a flash of white teeth against a babyish pink
tongue. She was wearing a freshly washed bright blue dress, hanging
loosely from her shoulders, and looked so prettily jolly, clean,
capable, and curly-headed, that I immediately made her housemaid and
Head of the Staff.
“Great Scott!” the Maluka groaned, “that makes four of them at it!” But
Rosy had appealed to me and I pointed out that it was a chance not to be
missed and that she was worth the other three all put together. “Life
will be a perennial picnic,” I said, “with Rosy and Cheon at the head of
affairs”; and for once I prophesied correctly.
Rosy, having been brought up among white folk, proved an adept little
housemaid and Cheon looked with extreme favour upon her, and held her up
as a bright and shining example to Jimmy’s Nellie. But the person Cheon
most approved of at the homestead was Johnny; for not only had Johnny
helped him in many of his wild efforts at carpentry, but was he not
working in the good cause?
“What’s ’er matter, missus only got one room?” Cheon had said, angry
with circumstances, and daily and hourly he urged Johnny to work
quicker.
“What’s the matter indeed!” Johnny echoed, mimicking his furious
gutturals, and sawing, planing, and hammering, with untiring energy,
pointed out that he was doing his best to give her more.
Finding the progress slow with only one man at work, Cheon suggested the
Maluka might lend a hand in his spare time (station books being
considered recreation); and when Dan came in with a mob of cattle from
the Reach country, he hinted that cattle could wait, and that Dan could
employ his time better.
But Dan also was out of patience with circumstances, and growled out
that “they’d waited quite long enough as it was,” for the work of the
station was at a deadlock for want of stores. They had been sadly taxed
by the needs of travellers, and we were down to our last half-bag of
flour and sugar, and a terrifyingly small quantity of tea; soap, jams,
fruits, kerosene, and all such had long been things of the past. The
only food we had in quantities was meat, vegetables, and milk. Where we
would have been without Cheon no one can tell.
To crown all, we had just heard that the Dandy was delayed in a bog with
a broken shaft, but he eventually arrived in time to save the situation,
but not before we were quite out of tea. He had little to complain of in
the way of welcome when his great piled-up waggon lumbered into the
homestead avenue and drew up in front of the store.
The horse teams were close behind, the Dandy said, but Mac was “having a
gay time” in the sandy country, and sent in a message to remind the
missus that she was still in the Land of Wait-awhile. The reminder was
quite unnecessary.
There was also a message from Mine Host. “I’m sending a few cuttings for
the missus,” it read. Cuttings he called them, but the back of the
waggon looked like a nurseryman’s van; for all a-growing and a-blowing
and waiting to be planted out, stood a row of flowering, well-grown
plants in tins: crimson hibiscus, creepers, oleanders, and all sorts. A
man is best known by his actions, and Mine Host best understood by his
kindly thoughtfulness.
The store was soon full to overflowing, and so was our one room, for
everything ordered for the house had arrived—rolls of calico heavy and
unbleached, mosquito netting, blue matting for the floors, washstand
ware, cups and saucers, and dozens of smaller necessities piled in every
corner of the room.
“There won’t be many idle hands round these parts for a while,” a
traveller said, looking round the congested room, and he was right, for
having no sewing machine, a gigantic hand-sewing contract was to be
faced. The ceilings of both rooms were to be calico, and a dozen or so
of seams were to be oversewn for that, the strips of matting were to be
joined together and bound into squares, and after that a herculean task
undertaken: the making of a huge mosquito-netted dining-room, large
enough to enclose the table and chairs, so as to ensure our meals in
comfort—for the flies, like the poor, were to be with us always.
This net was to be nearly ten feet square and twelve high, with a calico
roof of its own drawn taut to the ceiling of the room, and walls of
mosquito netting, weighted at the foot with a deep fold of calico, and
falling from ceiling to floor, with a wide double overlapping curtain
for a doorway. Imagine an immense four-poster bed-net, ten by ten by
twelve, swung taut within a larger room, and a fair idea of the dining-
net will have been formed. A room within a room, and within the inner
room we hoped to find a paradise at mealtime in comparison to the
purgatory of the last few months.
But the sewing did not end at that. The lubras’ methods of washing had
proved most disastrous to my meagre wardrobe; and the resources of the
homestead were taxed to the utmost to provide sufficient patching
material to keep the missus even decently clothed.
“Wait for the waggons,” the Maluka sang cheerily every time he found me
hunting in the store (unbleached calico or mosquito netting being
unsuitable for patching).
Cheon openly disapproved of this state of affairs, and was inclined to
blame the Maluka. A good husband usually provides his wife with
sufficient clothing, he insinuated; but when he heard that further
supplies were on the bullock waggons, he apologised, and as he waddled
about kept one ear cocked to catch the first sound of the bullock bells.
“Bullocky jump four miles,” he informed us; from which we inferred that
the sound of the bells would travel four miles. Cheon’s English
generally required paraphrasing.
Almost every day some fresh garment collapsed, and I bitterly regretted
my recklessness in giving Jimmy’s Nellie the bath wrapper. Fortunately a
holland dress was behaving beautifully. “A staunch little beast,” the
Maluka called it. That, however, had to be washed, every alternate day;
and, fearing possible contingencies, I was beginning a dress of
unbleached calico, when the Maluka, busy among the stores, came on a
roll of bright pink galatea ordered for lubras’ dresses, and brought it
to the house in triumph.
Harsh, crudely pink, galatea! Yet it was received as joyfully as ever a
woman received a Paris gown; for although necessity may be the mother of
invention, she more often brings thankful hearts into this world.
A hank of coarse, bristling white braid was also unearthed from among
the stores, and within three days the galatea had become a sturdy white-
braided blouse and skirt, that promised to rival the “staunch little
beast” in staunch-heartedness.
By the time it was finished, Johnny and the Dandy had all the flooring
boards down in the dining-room, and before the last nail was in, Cheon
and the Maluka had carried in every available stick of furniture, and
spread it about the room to the greatest possible advantage. The walls
were still unfinished, and doors and window frames gaped; but what did
that matter? The missus had a dining-room, and as she presided at her
supper-table in vivid pink and the pride of possession, Cheon looked as
though he would have liked to shake hands with every one at once, but
particularly with Johnny.
“Looks A1,” the Maluka said, alluding to the stiff, aggressive frock,
and took me “bush” with him, wearing the blouse, and a holland riding
skirt that had also proved itself a true, staunch friend.
Dan, the Quiet Stockman, and the Dandy, had already gone “bush” in
different directions; for with the coming of the year’s stores, horse-
breaking, house-building, trunks and waggons had all stepped into their
proper places—a very secondary one—and cattle had come to the front and
would stay there, as far as the men were concerned until next Wet.
Cattle, and cattle only, would be the work of the “Dry.” Dan and the
Quiet Stockman, with a dozen or so of cattle “boys” to help them, had
the year’s musterings and brandings to get through; the Dandy would be
wherever he was most needed; yard-building, yard-repairing, carting
stores or lending a hand with mustering when necessity arose, while the
Maluka would be everywhere at once, in organisation if not in body.
Where runs are huge, and fenceless, and freely watered the year’s
mustering and branding is no simple task Our cattle were scattered
through a couple of thousand square miles of scrub and open timbered
country, and therefore each section of the run had to be gone over again
and again; each mob, when mustered, travelled to the nearest yard and
branded.
Every available day of the Dry was needed for the work; but there is one
thing in the Never-Never that refuses to take a secondary—place the
mailman; and at the end of a week we all found, once again, that we had
business at the homestead; for six weeks had slipped away since our last
mail-day, and the Fizzer was due once more.