Time Tells All

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Book excerpt

William Blay 

New Norfolk, November, 1839

The news from England about the falling price of wool put an arrow of terror  through my heart. My sheep were worthless, the farm was drying up in front of me, with the worst drought since Van Diemen’s Land was colonised, and the banks, themselves on the brink of closure, demanded their money. Closing the bedroom door, I sat cross-legged on the floor at the foot of the bed. I put my head back, closed my eyes and tried to get my mind to work through the chaos in my brain, the chaos that wouldn’t let me think straight, to plan a solution.

My younger brother John, and his wife Elizabeth and their three babies left for Port Phillip months ago. Apart from my own wife and children, I have no family left in New Norfolk. Mother died in 1834, Father six months later in 1835. My older brother, James, deserted his pregnant wife and left for South Australia in January.

My neck aches from being in the same position for too long, When I am anxious my breaths are short and shallow, and that’s what is happening now. It’s difficult to breathe. I know the signs of a painful headache coming on. I’ll have to comb my hair and straighten my clothes before I go downstairs for supper.

Margaret asked me if I was alright but didn’t’ wait for an answer. Her attention was diverted by eighteen-month-old Caroline putting her hands in her bowl of potato and throwing fistfuls at her sister, Maggie. The three-year-old’s screams made my head pound.

I didn’t want to answer Margaret. I didn’t want to lie, and did I want to tell the truth. The distraction of the battle between our middle and youngest daughters gave me the opportunity to ignore my wife.

The cook, Susan, took Maggie to clean the potato off her face and clothes. While she was walking past Caroline, Maggie pulled a lump of potato out of her hair and wiped it on Caroline’s face. The eighteen-month-old screamed louder than her mother did when giving birth to her.

I had to leave the table, to leave my wife, and the cook and housekeeper to sort out the battle. I wasn’t hungry. Sitting on my chair on the back verandah of my two storey, three-bedroom home that also boasted a dining room and parlour, I lit my pipe and leant back in the chair. For a short, precious moment I forgot the horrors that threatened to escalate the throb at the back of my head.

Looking over the paddocks I realised they were all the colour of wheat husks. The fresh green that layered Van Diemen’s Land every year since my brothers and I arrived with Mama in 1814 hadn’t been seen for over a year. The merino sheep were dying of hunger, but that made no difference because the wool price in London had dropped so low they weren’t worth shearing. I knew I would have to get the farm hands to organise the slaughter of the last of the cattle, so we could dry the beef. The cattle were more valuable dead, with their meat dried, than having them eat what little feed I had left. The water from the tanks kept the fruit orchard and vegetable gardens alive. We wouldn’t starve.

I pulled the letter out of my pocket, the one from the bank, and read it again. It told me to pay the arrears immediately, or they’d take the farm. The irony of a bank demanding money when they were in financial trouble too, didn’t make me feel any better. I screwed the letter into a ball so that it was no bigger than an egg and put it in my trouser pocket. The pang of the neck pain worked its way up both sides of my head.

Ignoring the sounds from the dining room and kitchen where Margaret, the cook, and housekeeper were grappling with our three daughters, I tiptoed upstairs. Perhaps if I went to bed my head would stop pounding.

As much as I tried to overcome the urge to work through my repetitive behaviours, nothing helped. I must perform the steps in the same order, otherwise I can’t go to bed. On this night, I needed to go to bed. The pain in my head was getting worse. First, I took off my clothes and lay them on the chair in the corner of the room in the order they’d be put on in the morning. Then I washed my face and hands, this evening in cold water, because I hadn’t told the housekeeper I was going to bed early. I cleaned my teeth with a rag dipped in salt. The housekeeper had put fresh salt in the bowl, along with a clean rag. I put on my nightshirt and slunk underneath the bed covers, struggling to get the garment below my knees. I had to have it below my knees and uncrumpled before I could relax. Lying on my back, looking at the ceiling, I took deep breaths as advised by the doctor to try to relieve the thumping that had travelled behind my eyes.

Closing my eyes, I let exhaustion, both physical and mental carry me to sleep.

Margaret Blay (nee Tedder) 

She looked at the plate he’d left on the table, muttering that they could ill afford to waste food. Sitting down to finish her supper with Sarah Susanna, now five years old and aware of her father’s odd behaviours, Margaret separated Maggie and Caroline. If any food was thrown, it would fall to the table or floor. Caroline refused to open her mouth when Margaret held up a spoonful for her to take. The child clamped her mouth shut, shook her head and pushed the spoon away. Not in the mood for tantrums, and angry that this was more food wasted, she called to the cook.

‘Susan, please put my supper near the fire to keep warm. I’m taking Caroline to bed. If she refuses to eat, she can go to bed early, and hungry.’

Susan had been assigned to her mother, Catherine, when Margaret and her sister, Sadie lived in the house William and his younger brother John, had built on her step-father’s eighty acres. Her father-in-law arranged for the convict workers. When her mother moved back to Hobart Town, with her new infant daughter, Susanna, the cook and housekeeper were reassigned to William. Susan asked Margaret if she needed help with Maggie and Sarah while she put Caroline to bed. Appreciating Susan’s thoughtfulness, Margaret instructed the girls to finish their supper, while she struggled up the stairs with a screaming, thrashing, eighteen-month-old.

The door to the bedroom she shared with William was closed. She struggled past it with Caroline, the volume of the child’s screams increased the closer she got to her own bedroom. Margaret dragged the child into the room and threw her on Maggie’s bed to change her into her nightdress. Wrangling with the child until she was ready for bed, Margaret put her in the crib and left the room, closing the door behind her. She stood with her back against the wall, taking in deep breaths, listening to the child crying and sobbing. By the time Caroline had cried herself to sleep, Sarah and Maggie were coming up the stairs to get ready for bed. Margaret smiled at the girls. Putting her right index finger over her mouth to indicate they should be quiet, she took a little hand in each of hers and took them back downstairs into the parlour.

‘You can stay up a bit longer while Mama finishes her supper. Caroline has just gone to sleep, we don’t want to wake her.’ Margaret explained.

‘Where is Papa?’ the eldest, Sarah asked.

‘’He went to bed early,’ Margaret answered. ‘He had a busy day. He was tired.’

‘Why didn’t he eat his supper?’ Maggie wanted to know.

‘I don’t know,’ she said, raising her voice at the girls. ‘Let me eat my supper, then we’ll go back upstairs.’

The three children finally tucked up in bed for the night, Margaret went into the kitchen to share a cup of tea with Susan. The cook had watched Margaret grow up, and the pair had developed a strong bond. Margaret, who could read and write, thanks to the tenacity of her mother, Catherine, encouraged Susan to apply for a Ticket of Leave. Its success meant Susan could work elsewhere, but she stayed with Margaret and William.

‘I don’t know what is wrong with the girls of late, Susan. They are behaving badly.’

Susan put her teacup down and reached across the table for Margaret’s hands. Clasping hers around Margaret’s she said, ‘I think their Papa’s preoccupation with the state of the farm is upsetting them.’

Margaret nodded in agreement.

Going to bed after her husband meant she didn’t have to witness his regimented bedtime ritual. Margaret undressed quietly, slipped on her nightshirt and slid into bed next to William who appeared to be sleeping, but restless. His legs twitched, and she could hear his teeth grinding. Even in slumber he had a frown on his forehead. She wondered what torments his dreams were delivering.

Caroline screaming about a devil, woke Margaret with a fright. She sat up straight in bed, then scrambled to get out before the child woke the whole house. In the darkness, she didn’t notice William had already risen and dressed. Reaching for a candle, she lit it from the embers in the fireplace in their bedroom, wrapped a blanket around her shoulders and hurried to the girls’ room. Standing up in her crib, holding onto the sides, the youngest child’s screams and sobs still hadn’t woken Sarah and Maggie. Margaret picked up Caroline, wrapped her in a cover from the crib, and holding the child on her left hip and the candle in her right hand, went downstairs.

William was sitting at the kitchen table finishing a cup of milk. The two nanny goats he’d seconded from his late father’s farm when they were kids, ensured the children had the nourishment of the milk to drink. He used a neighbour’s billy goat when nature deemed it necessary. The kids these two nanny goats bore last season, were growing, and Margaret speculated what William had intended for them.

‘You are up early,’ Margaret commented to her husband.

‘I couldn’t sleep so thought I would get an early start on the farm today. Caroline is still crying, I see.’

Margaret sat down, moving the child from her hip to her lap, and pushed the candle she had been carrying to the centre of the table. Sobs had replaced the screams, but tears still ran down Caroline’s cheeks. She held the child to her, patted her back and told her everything would be all right.

William left his cup on the table, wiped his face with a clean cloth from the supply the cook left by the fire, pecked Margaret on the forehead, and went outside into the predawn light.

Too early to get started on any activities, and still trying to keep Caroline settled, Margaret carried the child over to one of the rocking chairs placed either side of the hearth. She sat the little girl on the chair while she got the fire going. Satisfied the fire would take and burn without help for some time, she picked up Caroline, and sat in the chair with her on her lap. Rocking the chair to calm herself and her daughter, Margaret sat back, stared into the flames and wondered what was to happen to the farm.