Such Is Life Joseph Furphy (ebook reader screen .TXT) 📖

laws which govern these things; but we haven’t even mastered the laws themselves, and how are we going to forecast their operation? Here was an example: Vivian was a type Englishman, of his particular subspecies; his wife was a type Australienne, of the station-bullock-driver species; and their little boy was almost comically Scottish in features, expression, and bearing. Where are your theories now? Atavism is inadmissible; and fright is the thinnest and most unscientific subterfuge extant. The coming Australian is a problem.

Mrs. Vivian overwhelmed me with instructions concerning Alf, and frankly urged me to hurry back to his assistance. I paid little heed to her advice, for I knew he would soon come round; and in the meantime, my mind was fully occupied with his team. After drinking a cup of tea, I shook hands with her, and lingered at the door, looking at her husband, as he amused himself with Roddy.

“I’ll leave your coat on the fence, Mr. Vivian,” said I at length.

“Horrite.”

“You want to be as lively as God’ll let you,” said the excellent woman, accompanying me to my horse. “I won’t be satisfied till I see you off.”

Very well, thought I; on your own head be it. So I took off the linen coat, and handed it to her.

“You should ’a’ kep’ on a inside shirt,” she remarked kindly. “Them shoulders o’ yours’ll give you particular hell to morrow. Why, you’re like a boiled crawfish now. Hides like that o’ yours,” she added, testing with her finger and thumb the integument on my near flank, as I hastily placed my bare foot in the stirrup, “ain’t worth a tinker’s dam for standin’ the sun.” (For the information of people whose education may unhappily have been neglected, it will be right to mention that the little morsel of chewed bread which a tinsmith of the old school places on his seam to check the inconvenient flow of the solder, is technically and appropriately termed a “tinker’s dam.” It is the conceivable minimum of commercial value).

The sun was still above the trees when I unsaddled Cleopatra at my camp, and resumed my clothes. The bullock-bells were ringing among the lignum, as the animals exerted themselves to make up for lost time.

“And how are we now?” said I, assuming a cheerful professional air, as I swung myself on the platform of the wagon. “I’ve secured a drop of one of our most valuable antiphlogistics, which is precisely what you require, as the trouble is distinctly anthrodymic. You’ll be right in a couple of days.”

“No, Collins,” replied Alf gently: “I’ll never be right⁠—in the sense you mean. I won’t take any medicine. I’ve done with everything. Help me to turn over again, please, and give me another drink of water. I want to tell you something.”

After giving him a turn over, I took the billy and replenished it at the river. Before getting into the wagon again, I emptied the contents of Mrs. Vivian’s bottle into half a pannikin-full of the oxide of hydrogen, and stirred the potion thoroughly with a stick. Then returning to my patient, I raised his head, and held the pannikin to his lips. He finished the draught, unconscious of its medicinal virtues; and I refolded the old overcoat which served as a pillow, and laid him down as gently as possible.

“The water seems to have a peculiar taste,” he murmured. “I don’t notice my sight failing yet, but my hearing is all deranged. I hear your voice through a ringing of bells, and a sound like a distant waterfall. I’m just on the borderland, Collins. I’ve very little more to suffer; and why should I come back, to begin it all again? How long is it since you left me?”

“From four to five hours, I think. I put your bullocks together; they’re close by.”

“Well, now, I wouldn’t have the slightest idea whether it was one hour or twelve. I’ve been in the spirit-world since then, or a spirit has visited me here. I heard, plain and clear, the voice of a woman singing old familiar songs; and that voice has been silent in death for ten years⁠—silent to me for three years before that. Thirteen years! That may not seem much to you; but what an age it seems to me! It was no dream, Collins; I saw everything as I see now, but I heard her glorious voice as I used to hear it in our happy days; and I felt that her spirit was bringing forgiveness at last. I’m not a religious man, Collins; I don’t know what will become of me after death; but God does, and that’s sufficient for me. I never believed on Him so devoutly as I do now that He has vindicated His justice upon me. I praise him for avenging an act of the blindest folly and heartlessness; and I thank Him that my punishment is over at last. There! Listen! No, it’s nothing. But it was a favourite song of hers; and while you were away I heard her sing it, with new meaning in every syllable. My poor love!”

“Alf, Alf,” I remonstrated; “compose yourself, and go to sleep if you can.” The tears of feebleness had accumulated in the hollows of his sunken eyes, and, not having the use of his hands, he was throwing his head from side to side to clear them away.

“Did you ever make a terrible mistake in life, Collins?” he asked, at length. Before I could reply, he resumed absently, “When I was a boy, away on the Queensland border, I knew a squatter⁠—as fine a fellow as ever lived⁠—and this man married some young lady in Sydney, and brought her to live on the station. A few months afterward, he came home unexpectedly at about two o’clock one morning, and found his place occupied by an intimate friend of his own⁠—a young barrister, who was staying at the station as a guest. He managed to conceal his discovery; and, within the next few