You’ll come a-waltzing Matilda with me.
Banjo Paterson, ‘Waltzing Matilda’
MATILDA
Light flickered silver from a thousand leaves. The ground breathed warmth under her skirts, her young straight stockinged legs. The air smelled of bark-stained water, wood smoke and grilling sausages.
How long had it been since she’d eaten sausages by a campfire? The cattle dog beside her panted, his dingo eyes on the sizzling meat.
‘Sauce?’ asked Fred, handing Matilda the bottle. He grinned, showing crumbling teeth. ‘Had to do without tomato sauce for years, till I became a ghost proper-like.’
Tommy inspected the sausage grilling on his stick above the fire. ‘Used to have sausages on Saturday nights when I was a kiddie. I used to dream of sausages. Why didn’t we have sausages, darling?’
‘Because we had twenty thousand sheep. I’d forgotten about sausages,’ she admitted. Forgotten the warm feel of Hey You against her.
‘Baa?’ said the sheep.
Her father laughed. ‘Sheep don’t like sausages,’ he informed it. ‘Even poddy lambs in heaven.’ He reached into the tucker bag and handed the sheep a hunk of damper, its crust ashy from the fire.
Was this heaven, or just a place to rest, watching those she loved, the land she loved, till it changed enough to scissor her connection to it, for her soul to make its final flight? Or was her soul in heaven already, while this small part stayed put?
Matilda didn’t know. Nor did it matter. She passed around a plate of lamb sandwiches with peach chutney — they had always been Tommy’s favourite — and then a plate of date scones. Perfect scones: Aunt Ann’s date scones. How could she have forgotten the lightness of Aunt Ann’s date scones?
Hey You panted, waiting for the sandwich scraps. She wondered if old Drinkwater would visit later. Not ‘down came the squatter, riding on his thoroughbred’, but the old man, her friend, partner and mentor, greeting his great-granddaughter at last, and his grandson too. And Auntie Love? Matilda smiled. Auntie Love was all around. She always had been.
‘What will they do now?’ she asked, meaning not just Michael, Nancy, Tom and Clancy, Jim and his family, Jed, Sam, Nicholas, Felicity, Scarlett, Leafsong, but the whole of Australia.
‘They’ll work it out,’ said her father confidently. ‘Give ’em time. One thing you learn as a ghost, it all takes longer than you want. Lifetimes, maybe.’
Tommy smiled at her, that crooked, wicked Tommy smile. ‘Not much you can do about it now, darling.’
She caught Fred’s eye. Fred winked at her. She looked at the billabong, clouds in a haze of blue drifting on brown water. A frog jumped. The mirror rippled, calmed. He leadeth me beside the still waters . . .
‘We’ll see,’ said Matilda.