CHAPTER 5

Maynard told me that Caleb had been teased for not turning up to footy on Saturday morning, and that the sports teacher had made a comment about religious nuts in the hearing of most of his class.

I wasn’t surprised then when Caleb didn’t come home from school when expected, and that by four thirty Mum was beside herself with worry about him. She decided he must have had an asthma attack and would be lying in a ditch not able to breathe. Ruthy and I were pretty sure he’d just done a runner again.

We looked for him in all the usual places: the tree house, the skinny bit between the shed and Mr Driver’s house, Mr Driver’s backyard and the laundry, but he’d obviously gone a bit farther afield this time. I wasn’t personally too worried about him. Caleb had a habit of finding a spot to sit in when he was unhappy, and we usually found him within a few hours. He would curl up in a ball with his forehead on his knees and talk quietly to himself, making up stories and acting them out in whispers until he felt better. If I’d been the one to go wandering, I’d have had the strap when they found me, but Caleb was treated as the treasure he was, and just got hugs and kisses and cuddles when they finally dragged him out of whatever cupboard or neighbour’s shed they found him in.

I asked for permission to go and look for him, and Mum said okay, as long as I didn’t go near the Johnsons’, which is of course exactly where I headed straight away. I was desperate to see Sixpence again. I started to skip down the drive toward their house when I thought about seeing Mr J, and it took the skip right out from under me. And in any case, I realised Mum was looking out the window and that it would be a good idea to walk slowly with my head down as though I was really worried about Caleb until I had crossed the road and couldn’t be seen from the lounge room window anymore.

I felt so happy at the thought of cuddling my little friend again that I could feel my heart beating quite fast, and it seemed to me that spring smelled more springy than usual, and that the flowers in the Johnsons’ front garden were larger and brighter than I remembered them.

I pushed my way past the thickets of native shrubs to the path down the side of the house. And was then stopped in my tracks. In front of me was a tall gate I had never seen before. And when I gave it a little push, it was clearly locked. I walked back a few steps, thinking that perhaps this wasn’t the right house, although I knew it was. It didn’t make sense that this gate had suddenly appeared. I felt I would have known about this kind of change somehow. After a minute I looked around it to see if there was a way to open it or even to climb over it, but it was a big, solid gate that was making sure I couldn’t get to my friend.

I slowly walked back to the front door and knocked. It took a long time for Mrs Johnson to answer, and she didn’t have her usual friendly face on. I asked why she had a gate now, and if I could visit Sixpence. She just looked at me, uncomfortably I felt. She wrapped her stained pink cardigan around her even though it wasn’t cold. She told me Sixpence wasn’t living with them at the moment. Mr Johnson had taken her to work in a cage for the children who visited the museum to look at, and she wasn’t sure when she would be coming home again.

I asked her if Sixpence was okay, and she assured me she was fine – just having an adventure for a while. I asked if I could visit the other guinea pigs but Mrs Johnson said she thought it would be better if I waited until Sixpence came home, and we could talk about it then. I noticed she kept putting her hand up to her cheek, and I wondered how she got the yellow bruise on it. I heard Mr J’s mother calling out from the kitchen behind her.

‘Hasn’t that girl caused you enough grief? Tell her to go back to her saintly mother.’

I didn’t know what kind of trouble I could have caused, but it didn’t seem to be the time to ask. I just stood and looked at her for a moment, and then remembered my manners and said, ‘Thank you very much for your time,’ and turned around. I felt my heart race again but in a very bad way this time, and I started to run. I ran and ran and ran, crying a bit as I did, making little unhappy groaning sort of noises to fill up the quiet which was too sad. I ran right around the block and back to our olive grove. I climbed my favourite branch and just moaned because I didn’t know where Sixpence was and I wasn’t sure I believed Mrs Johnson.

I was pretty sure I would never be happy again, so I just let myself cry and whimper for a very long time. Teddy Edwards turned up under the tree at one stage, and asked if I was okay, but I just picked some olives and threw them at him to make him go away, which he did.

I couldn’t quite catch my breath. My heart was aching and aching. I just kept seeing my little baby and remembering stroking her and talking to her. I remembered her little swirly coat and the cute way she sniffed at me. I remembered all the cowlicks on her back and head. I wished I hadn’t waited to go to see her. This was all my fault for being afraid of Mr Johnson. If I hadn’t been so cowardly, I would have been back to visit and I could have asked Mrs Johnson not to let him build that gate. They probably thought I didn’t really care enough about Sixpence anyway, and that’s why he decided to take my baby to the museum. If I’d been to see her, he would have taken one of the other ones that were spare. This was my fault.

I dreamed up plans to rescue Sixpence. I would take the bus into town to the museum and check she was okay, and then, when no one was looking, I would pick up the cage and run away. I wasn’t sure if you could take a guinea-pig cage on the bus, but you can take seeing-eye dogs on public transport, so I could say I had to have her with me for medical reasons. I would ask Mr Driver if I could hide her in his garden until Christmas, and I would make sure I was the best-behaved child in the world so Dad would build her a cage. I didn’t have any pocket money for the bus, but I knew Ruthy had money in her Savings Bank of South Australia tin, and I would ask her if I could have it. If she said no, I would just open it anyway with the key stuck on the bottom of it. Although that would mean I would be in trouble again and it would be harder to get Dad to build me a cage, but it was the best plan I could think of, and I had to hope and hope and hope she was really at the museum and not down the creek and already a cat’s dinner. That made me start to cry again, so I just thought about saving her instead, so I could have a fierce rescue plan.

I must have been in the tree for a long time, because it started to get cold and dark. And then I remembered I was meant to be looking for Caleb and so I jumped out of the tree and ran home. I rushed into the kitchen and ran straight into Mum.

‘And where do you think you’ve been?’ said Mum.

‘Looking for Caleb. Is he okay? Has he come home?’ I asked.

‘Yes, thank goodness, and no thanks to you. You’ve been gone for hours. I hope you weren’t at the Johnsons’, my girl.’

‘No, Mum, I was out looking for Caleb. I looked in the olive grove and round the streets and everywhere. I went down to St Bernards Road. Where was he?’ I asked.

‘So you didn’t go to the Johnsons’?’ she asked. She had her hands on her hips, and a daggery look in her eye. I suddenly felt a bit sick.

‘Well no. Well, I knocked on the door to ask if he was there, but they said he wasn’t and I left straight away.’ I said it without looking at her, and tried to turn away as fast as I could so she couldn’t see the lie on my face.

Mum grabbed me by the arm and squeezed it hard. One of my feet lifted a bit off the ground. She picked up her wooden spoon from the table and smacked me on the legs over and over again. I pulled away from her.

‘Don’t you walk away from me when I’m talking to you, you dreadful child. What did I do to deserve such a beastly girl? It doesn’t matter what I do for you, you still want your own wilful way. I’ve got a good mind to send you to the children’s home tonight before your father gets home.’ She was screaming now. Ruthy and Caleb were nowhere to be seen. That was smart of them, anyway.

‘Sorry, Mum. I really was looking for Caleb,’ I pleaded. And when I said it I really meant it, even though I had forgotten all about him. But she was in one of her furies and saying anything at all wasn’t a good idea. She picked up her metal potato masher and threw it across the kitchen at me. I put out my hand to stop it, and it got me between the thumb and my fingers and really hurt. I dropped it and she screamed at me to get out of her sight. I gladly ran to the bedroom. Caleb and Ruthy were on Ruthy’s bed in a little huddle. No one was safe when Mum was in a fury.

‘Where were you really, Dorcas?’ asked Ruthy. ‘Did you go to see Sixpence?’

I was holding the potato-masher hand in my other one because it was really hurting. It was all red and throbby. I didn’t want to cry in front of Caleb and Ruthy because I was the oldest one home and I was meant to be the bravest. But my hand really hurt and my heart hurt even more because I didn’t know where Sixpence was and whether someone had given her a bed in her cage and some greens for her dinner. And what if no one cleaned out her cage and it started to smell and that meant the head of the museum commanded that she be thrown out with the rubbish? What if she was so stinky from lack of care that they gave her to the bloke in there who stuffed old dead things and he put her in a glass case as an exhibit? What if a little boy like Caleb went to see her at the museum and had an allergy attack and they decided to shoot her like they did old horses? What if Mr Johnson just stuck her behind a shed at the museum and no one even knew she was there?

I got under my covers so the others couldn’t see me. It was better in the darkness. My hand was hurting more and more, but I could close my eyes and block out my brother and sister and think carefully about my escape plan.

I heard Dad come home, and although I couldn’t hear the words, it was clear Mum was shouting about me so I decided to stay put. When Mum called us for dinner, I decided to pretend I was asleep. After a while the door opened quietly and I was pretty sure it was Dad, but I stayed perfectly still, and he went away. I could cry and cry in peace until Ruthy came to bed. And then it occurred to me this would be the perfect time to look for Ruthy’s moneybox, and I crept out from under the covers. It was dark in the room, but I could see enough to realise my hand was quite swollen now, and hurt more if I put it down, so I used the other one to hold it up. I quietly opened the wardrobe to look on Ruthy’s side, but I couldn’t find the moneybox anywhere. I heard the chairs scraping in the kitchen and scurried back to bed to play dead.

I must have fallen asleep because the next thing I knew it was morning. It was very early according to the paleness of the light through our window, and I could hear early-morning birds rather than the breakfast-time ones. I moved and made a little yowly noise because the potato-masher hand was very sore. I held it up to the window. My thumb was about twice the usual size, and every movement hurt. I wasn’t sure what to do, but I thought it might be best to hide it and go to school so Mum wouldn’t be cross again. Besides, given I hadn’t been able to find Ruthy’s moneybox, I thought I’d asked Maynard if I could borrow some money from him. If his mother gave him lunch money that might be enough for the bus into town, even if I had to walk home afterwards.

I got ready for school but it wasn’t easy because my hand was so painful, and I kept almost crying out, which might have made Mum get out of bed, and I definitely didn’t want that to happen. I was hoping it was one of her head days, so she would leave us to get ourselves to school. I quietly put out all the breakfast things as well as I could. I looked in the drive – Dad hadn’t gone to work yet, so I would have to be careful to hide my hand until he left. He usually only spent a few minutes in the kitchen in the morning because Mr Bednarski liked him to be at work very early. He normally made two pieces of toast with marmalade and a cup of International Roast Instant Coffee, thanked Caleb for his shiny shoes, gave everyone a cheery goodbye and headed for his car.

I was starving because I had missed dinner the night before, and the toast seemed to take forever to make. I used my elbow to hold the pieces down so I could butter them and didn’t hear Dad step up behind me because he still had his slippers on.

‘What on earth have you done to your hand, Dorcas?’ asked Dad.

‘Nothing really, Dad. I just hurt it jumping out of the olive tree yesterday,’ I said.

‘Let me take a look at it,’ he said. ‘Has your mother seen this?’

‘No, I didn’t show her. She was sort of mad about me coming home late. But it’s not really bad, Dad. I think it will be fine once I go to school.’

‘I think you need to see a doctor,’ he said.

‘No! Really, Dad. There’s an important test at school today and I need to go for sure. Really, it’s not as sore as it looks.’

‘Agnes!’ called Dad. ‘Agnes, come and look at this.’

We waited. Mum shuffled in. ‘What?’ she said.

‘Look at Dorcas’s hand. Didn’t you notice this last night? She said she hurt it jumping out of the olive tree.’

‘Well, how many times do I have to ask her not to climb trees?’ said Mum. She looked at me, and then at the hand, and I saw a look run across her face. She realised how it had happened but she didn’t say a thing.

‘Can you take her to the doctor this morning?’ asked Dad.

‘Yes, I suppose so. It will have to be right now though because Alice Johns is coming for a perm at eleven. Get your bag, Dorcas, and I’ll walk you to school straight after. I hope they can see us straight away,’ she said, in an irritated sort of voice.

‘I think this is more important than Alice Johns’s hair,’ said Dad.

‘Well if Bednarski paid you properly I wouldn’t have to turn this kitchen into a hair salon,’ snapped Mum, and walked into her room to get dressed.

‘Are you all right, Dorcas?’ asked Dad.

‘Sure thing, Dad. Never better. It’s no big deal,’ I said, and smiled. With a bit of luck, I would get to school by recess time and could borrow the bus fare from Maynard and get straight into town.

I walked with Mum to see Dr Frayne on the main road. She had rung ahead and said she thought my hand was broken, so they agreed to see me straight away. When I say I walked with Mum, what I mean is that I walked about three steps behind her so she could ignore me and I wouldn’t accidentally look the wrong way at her or hunch my shoulders or look at the ground instead of straight ahead or any of the other things I did all the time that drove her mad.

We waited for half an hour to see our doctor who was a very nice old man and always friendly and quite gentle. I had seen him many times for different things: glass in my knee from falling over while running with a milk bottle, a really big splinter Mum couldn’t dig out with her tweezers, measles, and stuff to put on my head at night when I scratched the scabs too much and made them bleed.

‘And how did you do this, Dorcas?’ he asked, carefully turning my hand over and trying to be careful when he moved my thumb up and down.

I looked at Mum, who made her eyes into little slits as a warning, not that I would have changed my story anyway. I noticed Dr Frayne was looking at Mum’s face though, not at mine.

‘Fell out of a tree,’ said Mum. ‘She’s always climbing trees when I ask her not to.’

‘Is that right, Dorcas?’ he asked me, peering into my face and looking into my eyes as though he could see what really happened like a television movie.

‘Yep, pretty much,’ I said, and looked away.

‘It’s a funny falling-out-of-a-tree injury,’ he said, and looked at Mum again. She just sat there with a blank look on her face.

‘Well, the good news is it’s not broken, but it is very badly sprained, and I think it would be best if you stayed home today and rested it on some high pillows to help the swelling go down.’

‘No!’ I said. ‘I mean, thank you for your concern and everything, Dr Frayne, but I really need to go to school today. I have a very important test and I can’t miss it.’

‘And it’s not as though she can afford to miss school with her grades,’ said Mum. ‘I’m happy for her to go to school if she wants to.’

‘Well, I’m not,’ said Dr Frayne, a bit sternly I thought. ‘I’m sure they will let you sit the test another time, Dorcas. I want you home with that hand up as high as you can, and if it’s not looking a lot better in the morning, I want you back here for me to take another look and maybe take an X-ray.’ He made some scratches on a yellow card with the name Wilson on the top. ‘Was there anything else?’

‘Well, while we’re here,’ said Mum, ‘Dorcas has been nagging me about what she can do about enlarged pores on her nose.’

Now this was a total shock to me, and I had to stop myself quickly from asking what she was talking about.

‘Enlarged pores on your face, Dorcas?’ he asked me. I didn’t know what to say or do, so I said nothing and tried to make my face go expressionless.

‘You know what adolescents are like these days,’ said Mum, ‘always worrying about their appearance. I wondered if there was a good skin treatment for enlarged pores. She must get them from me.’ Mum sighed. ‘Goodness knows I’ve always suffered, but she just nags me about them all the time.’

I think the words that best described what I was thinking were astonished and confused. I had no idea what Mum was talking about. I had never asked her about pores on my face, and I didn’t really know what she meant anyway.

‘Dorcas, are you worried about enlarged pores?’ asked Dr Frayne.

‘Ah,’ I said, looking at Mum, who was doing the narrow-eyes thing again. ‘Ah, yes, Dr Frayne. I worry something fierce about them all the time. And the girls at school tease me about them. They call me crater face and pock skin and other awful names as well as the ones about my ringlets from having my hair tied up at night … And I would be very glad if you had a treatment for them.’ The words ran out of my mouth in a quick kind of river.

Dr Frayne looked at Mum and said, ‘You still tie this girl’s hair up in ringlet rags, Mrs Wilson? I thought we’d decided to stop doing that? The last thing this girl needs to worry about is enlarged pores. I would worry more about why she still picks the sores in her head at night if I were you. And I have no doubt you’ve searched the chemist shelves for pore cream and will do so again. Medical science can’t help with vanity.’

He looked down at the yellow card and made more scratches. Mum and I sat perfectly still for a few minutes until it was clear he wasn’t going to speak to us again. Mum stood up, squared her shoulders, flicked her hair out of her eyes, took her clutch bag in both hands and stomped to the door. I stood to follow.

‘Thank you, Dr Frayne,’ I said quietly as I turned to go. He waved me back over with the four fingers of his right hand, and I stepped back close to him.

‘Take some jelly beans, Dorcas,’ he said, pushing his big jar near my good hand. ‘Goodness knows it’s the only thing I can offer you, child.’ I thought he looked very sad.

Mum clearly didn’t want me to stay home from school, and neither did I, but a doctor is a doctor and we both knew we had to do what he said. When we got home, she told me to make myself scarce because she had Mrs Johns coming over and they wouldn’t want a child listening to grown-up talk. She was actually a bit kind for a while and put me to bed with my sore hand on top of two pillows and brought me a Wagon Wheel from the top pantry cupboard where she kept the treats, and stroked my head for a few minutes and asked me if I’d like a book to read while she did Mrs Johns’s hair. I think I slept for quite a while, because when I woke up and walked into the kitchen the stuff from Mrs Johns’s perm was on the sink and Mum was asleep on her bed.

I was feeling very desperate about Sixpence again and decided to go outside and think about whether I could borrow money the next day and try to get into town to rescue her. I still hadn’t worked out how to get Sixpence home on the bus with a cage though, so I thought I’d sit on Mr Driver’s fence and think very fiercely about an answer.

It wasn’t easy climbing the wooden fence with a very sore hand, and my balance wasn’t as good as usual, so it probably wasn’t a surprise that I fell sort of sideways into his garden and landed on my sore hand. I didn’t want to, but this made me scream out with pain and I heard Mr Driver open his back door and run over to me.

‘Dorcas, what are you doing home from school? Are you okay, child?’ He helped me to sit up and then saw my hand. ‘Goodness. That swelled up fast.’

‘No, Mr Driver, I did this yesterday and the doctor said to stay home and rest it up on pillows, which I did, but then I had a big problem to solve and I think better on your fence. I’m sorry.’ All I seemed to do was cry lately, and here I was crying again.

Mr Driver helped me to stand up and took me into his kitchen. He sat next to me and took a careful look at my hand. He was as gentle as Dr Frayne, and just as kind. He made me a cup of instant coffee with a lot of milk and sugar. He said the sugar was good for shock. And then he asked me what the really big problem was that made me climb his fence.

I hadn’t been intending to tell him but I was so worried about Sixpence that the river of words started to flow again and it all tumbled out onto his kitchen table. I told him about Mr Johnson and the nudie girl, and Mum being cross about visiting the Johnsons, about the new side gate and Sixpence living in the museum, and about the problem of getting Sixpence home on the bus if I managed to steal her back. I asked if he would let me hide Sixpence in his garage until I could be very well behaved up to Christmas and Dad would let me keep her in the garden. By the time the whole story was out there to look at, I felt quite tired and put my head on the kitchen table, which was very cool and made me feel a bit better.

Mr Driver asked me about my hand. I said I hurt it falling out of a tree. He asked me again how I hurt it, and I just looked at him and said very slowly again that I hurt it falling out of a tree. He helped me to stand up and took me into his best front room and laid me on the sofa. He put my sore hand up on pillows that were a bit dusty but smelled of roses and lavender and asked me to try to have a little rest and he would see if he could ring and find out if Sixpence was in the museum for me. I felt a bit worried about that, but I knew I could basically trust Mr Driver, and it would be good to know if she was okay. He told me to wait until he got back, and I bit off every nail down until they all hurt.