JAMBOREE
"Let's get along," said Jack uncomfortably, in Tom's ear.
"Get! Not for mine! We're in luck's way, if ever we were."
"There's no fun under the circumstances."
"Oh, Lord my, ain't there! What's wrong? They're all packing into the
buggy. Father Prendy's putting his watch back a few more minutes. He'll
have 'em married before you can betcher life. It's a wedding, this is,
boy!"
The people now came crowding, nudging, whispering, giggling, stumbling
out of the church. The gentleman in the carpet slippers rakishly
adjusted his grey bell-topper over his left brow, and came swaggering
forward.
"Major Brownlee--Mr. Jack Grant," Tom introduced them.
"Retired and happy in the country," the Major explained, and he
continued garrulously to explain his circumstances, his history and his
family history. This continued all the way to the inn: a good half-hour,
for the Major walked insecurely on his tender feet.
When they arrived at Paddy's white, trellised house, all was in
festivity. Paddy had thrown open the doors, disclosing the banquet
spread in the bar parlour. Large joints of baked meat, ham, tongue,
fowls, cakes and bottles and bunches of grapes and piles of apples:
these Jack saw in splendid confusion.
"Come along in, come along in!" cried Paddy, as the Major and his young
companions hesitated under the vine-trellis. "I guess ye're the last.
Come along in--all welcome!--an' wet the baby's eye. Sure, she's a
clever girl to get a baby an' a man the same fine afternoon. A fine
child, let me tell you. Father Prendy named him for me, Paddy O'Burk
Tracy, on the spot, the minute the wedding was tied up. So yer can
please yerselves whether it's a christening ye're coming to, or a
wedding. I offer ye the choice. Come in."
"P. O. T." thought Jack. He still did not feel at ease. Perhaps Paddy
noticed it. He came over and slapped him on the back.
"It's yerself has brought good luck to the house, sir. Sit ye down an'
help y'self. Sit ye down an' make y'self at home."
Jack sat down along with the rest of the heterogeneous company. Paddy
went round pouring red wine into glasses.
"Gentlemen!" he announced from the head of the table. "We are all here,
for the table's full up. The first toast is: _The stranger within our
gates!_"
Everybody drank but Jack. He was uncomfortably uncertain whether the
baby was meant, or himself. At the last moment he hastily drank, to
transfer the honour to the baby.
Then came "The Bride!" then "The Groom!" then "The Priest! Father
Prendy, that black limb o' salvation!" Dozens of toasts, it didn't seem
to matter to whom. And everybody drank and laughed, and made clumsy
jokes. There were no women present, at least no women seated. Only the
women who went round the table, waiting. One! Two! Three! Four! Five!
Six! Seven! Westminster chimes from the Grandfather's clock behind Jack.
Seven o'clock! He had not even noticed them bring in the lights. Father
Prendy was on his feet blessing the bride: "at the moment absent on the
high mission of motherhood." He then blessed the bridegroom, at the
moment asleep with his head on the table.
The table had been cleared, save for bottles, fruit, and terrible
cigars. The air was dense with smoke, bitter in the eyes, thick in the
head. Everything seemed to be tinning thick and swimmy, and the people
seemed to move like living oysters in a natural, live liquor. A girl was
sitting on Jack's chair, putting her arm surreptitiously round his
waist, sipping out of his glass. But he pushed her a little aside,
because he wanted to watch four men who had started playing euchre.
"There's a bright moon, gentlemen. Let's go out and have a bit o'
sparrin'," said Paddy swimmingly, from the head of the table.
That pleased Jack a lot. He was beginning to feel shut in.
He rose, and the girl--he had never really looked at her--followed him
out. Why did she follow him? She ought to stay and clear away dishes.
The yard, it seemed to Jack, was clear as daylight: or clearer, with a
big, flat white moon. Someone was sizing up to a little square man with
long thick arms, and the little man was probing them off expertly.
Hello! Here was a master, in his way.
The girl was leaning up against Jack, with her hand on his shoulder.
This was a bore, but he supposed it was also a kind of tribute. He had
still never looked at her.
"That's Jake," she said. "He's champion of these parts. Oh my, if he
sees me leanin' on y' arm like this, hell be after ye!"
"Well, don't lean on me then," said Jack complacently.
"Go on, he won't see me. We're in the dark right here."
"I don't care if he sees you," said Jack.
"You _do_ contradict yourself," said the girl.
"Oh no, I don't!" said Jack.
And he watched the long-armed man, and never once looked at the girl. So
she leaned heavier on him. He disapproved, really, but felt rather manly
under the burden.
The little, square, long-armed man was oldish, with a grey beard. Jack
saw this as he danced round, like a queer old satyr, half gorilla, half
satyr, roaring, booing, fencing with a big yahoo of a young bushman,
holding him off with his unnatural long arms. Over went the big young
fellow sprawling on the ground, causing such a splother that everyone
shifted a bit out of his way. They all roared delightedly.
The long-armed man, looking round for his girl, saw her in the shadow,
leaning heavily and laughingly on Jack's young shoulder. Up he sprang,
snarling like a gorilla, his long hairy arms in front of him. The girl
retreated, and Jack, in a state of semi-intoxicated readiness, opened
his arms and locked them round the little gorilla of a man. Locked
together, they rolled and twirled round the yard under the moon,
scattering the delighted onlookers like a wild cow. Jack was laughing to
himself, because he had got the grip of the powerful long-armed old man.
And there was no real anger in the tussle. The gorilla was an old sport.
Jack was sitting in a chair under the vine, with his head in his hands
and his elbows on his knees, getting his wind. Paddy was fanning him
with a bunch of gum-leaves, and congratulating him heartily.
"First chap as ever laid out Long-armed Jake."
"What'd he jump on me for?" said Jack. "I said nothing to him."
"What y' sayin'?" ejaculated Paddy coaxingly. "Didn't ye take his girl,
now?"
"Take his girl? I? Not She leaned on _me_, I didn't take her."
"Arrah! Look at that now! The brazenness of it! Well, be it on ye! Take
another drink. Will ye come an' show the boys some o' ye tricks,
belike?"
Jack was in the yard again, shaking hands with Long-armed Jake.
"Good on y'! Good on y'!" cried old Jake. "Ye're a cock-bird in fine
feather! What's a wench between two gentlemen! Shake, my lad, shake! I'm
Long-armed Jake, I am, an' I set a cock-bird before any whure of a hen."
They rounded up, sparred, staved off, showed off like two amiable
fighting-cocks, before the admiring cockeys. Then they had good-natured
turns with the young farmers, and mild wrestling bouts with the old
veterans. Having another drink, playing, gassing, swaggering . . .
Tom came bawling as if he were deaf:
"What about them 'osses?"
"What about 'em?" said Jack.
"See to 'm!" said Tom. And he went back to where he came from.
"All right, Mister, we'll see to 'm!" yelled the admiring youngsters.
"Well water 'm an' feed 'm."
"Water?" said Jack.
"Yes.--Show us how to double up, Mister, will y'?"
"A' right!" said Jack, who was considerably tipsy. "When--when
I've--fed--th' 'osses."
He set off to the stables. The admiring youngsters ran yelling ahead.
They brought out the horses and led them down to the trough. Jack
followed, feeling the moon-lit earth sway a little.
He shoved his head in between the noses of the horses, into the cool
trough of water. When he lifted and wrung out the shower from his hair,
which curled when it was wet, he saw the girl standing near him.
"Y' need a towel, Mister," she said.
"I could do with one," said he.
"Come an' I'll get ye one," she said.
He followed meekly. She led him to an outside room, somewhere near the
stable. He stood in the doorway.
"Here y' are!" she said, from the darkness inside.
"Bring it me," he said from the moon outside.
"Come in an' I'll dry your hair for yer." Her voice sounded like the
voice of a 'wild creature in a black cave. He ventured, unseeing,
uncertain, into the den, half reluctant. But there was a certain coaxing
imperiousness in her wild-animal voice, out of the black darkness.
He walked straight into her arms. He started and stiffened as if
attacked. But her full, soft body was moulded against him. Still he drew
fiercely back. Then feeling her yield to draw away and leave him, the
old flame flew over him, and he drew her close again.
"Dearie!" she murmured. "Dearie!" and her hand went stroking the back of
his wet head.
"Come!" she said. "And let me dry your hair."
She led him and sat him on a pallet bed. Then she closed the door,
through which the moonlight was streaming. The room had no window. It
was pitch dark, and he was trapped. So he felt as he sat there on the
hard pallet. But she came instantly and sat by him and began softly,
caressingly to rub his hair with a towel. Softly, slowly, caressingly
she rubbed his hair with a towel. And in spite of himself, his arms,
alive with a power of their own, went out and clasped her, drew her to
him.
"I'm supposed to be in love with a girl," he said, really not speaking
to her.
"Are you, dearie?" she said softly. And she left off rubbing his hair
and softly put her mouth to his.
Later--he had no idea what time of the night it was--he went round
looking for Tom. The place was mostly dark. The inn was half dark . . .
Nobody seemed alive. But there was music somewhere. There was music.
As he went looking for it, he came face to face with Dr. Rackett.
"Where's Tom?" he asked.
"Best look in the barn."
The dim-lighted barn was a cloud of half-illuminated dust, in which
figures moved. But the music was still martial and British. Jack, always
tipsy, for he had drunk a good deal and it took effect slowly, deeply,
felt something in him stir to this music. They were dancing a jig or a
horn-pipe. The air was all old and dusty in the barn. There were four
crosses of wooden swords on the floor. Young Patrick, in his shirt and
trousers, had already left off dancing for Ireland, but the Scotchman,
in a red flannel shirt and a reddish kilt, was still lustily springing
and knocking his heels in a haze of dust. The Welshman was a little poor
fellow in old shirt and trousers. But the Englishman, in costermonger
outfit, black bell-bottom trousers and lots of pearl buttons, was going
well. He was thin and wiry and very neat about the feet. Then he left
off dancing, and stood to watch the last two.
Everybody was drunk, everybody was arguing, according to his
nationality, as to who danced best. The Englishman in the bell-bottom
trousers knew he danced best, but spent his last efforts deciding
between Sandy and Taffy. The music jigged on. But whether it was
_British Grenadiers or Campbells Are Coming_ Jack didn't know. Only he
suddenly felt intensely patriotic.
"I am an Englishman," he thought, with savage pride. "I am an
Englishman. That is the best on earth. Australian is English, English,
English, she'd collapse like a balloon but for the English in her.
British means English first. I'm a Britisher, but I am an Englishman!
God! I could crumple the universe in my fist, I could . . . I'm an
Englishman, and I could crush everything in my hand. And the women are
left behind. I'm an Englishman."
Voices had begun to snarl and roar, fists were lifted.
"Mussen quarrel!--my weddin'! Mussen quarrel!" Pat was drunkenly saying,
sitting on a box shaking his head.
Then suddenly he sprang to his feet, and quick and sharp as a stag,
rushed to the wooden swords and stood with arms uplifted, smartly
showing the steps. The fellow had spirit, a queer, staccato spirit.
Somebody laughed and cheered, and then they all began to laugh and
cheer, and Pat pranced faster, in a cloud of dust, and the quarrel was
forgotten.
Jack went to look for Tom. "I'm an Englishman," he thought. "I'd better
look after him."
He wasn't in the barn. Jack looked and looked.
He found Tom in the kitchen, sitting in a corner, a glass at his side,
quite drunk.
"It's time to go to bed, Tom."
"G'on, ol' duck. I'm waitin' for me girl."
"You won't get any girl tonight. Let's go to bed."
"Shan't I get--? Yes shal! Yes shal!"
"Where shall I find a bed?"
"Plenty 'r flore space."
And he staggered to his feet as a short, stout, red-faced, black-eyed,
untidy girl slipped across the kitchen and out of the door, casting a
black-eyed, meaningful look at the red-faced Tom, over her shoulder as
she disappeared. Tom swayed to his feet and sloped after her with
amazing quickness. Jack stood staring out of the open door, dazed. They
both seemed to have melted.
Himself, he wanted to sleep--only to sleep. "Plenty of floor space," Tom
had said. He looked at the floor. Cockroaches running by the dozen, in
all directions: those brown, barge-like cockroaches of the south, that
trail their huge bellies, and sheer off in automatic straight lines and
make a faint creaking noise, if you listen. Jack looked at the table: an
old man already lay on it. He opened a cupboard: babies sleeping there.
He swayed, drunk with sleep and alcohol, out of the kitchen in some
direction: pushed a swing door: the powerful smell of beer and sawdust
made him know it was the bar. He could sleep on the seat. He could sleep
in peace.
He lurched forward and touched cloth. Something snored, started, and
reared up.
"What y' at?"
Jack stood back breathless--the figure subsided--he could beat a
retreat.
Hopeless he looked in on the remains of the breakfast. Table and every
bench occupied. He boldly opened another door. A small lamp burning, and
what looked like dozens of dishevelled elderly women's awful figures,
heaped crosswise on the hugest double bed he had ever seen.
He escaped into the open air. The moon was low. Someone was singing.