Rabbit Town

1. Rabbitoh!

When Tom was fourteen years old, he helped his father, Charlie, carry a large piece of canvas onto a tram for the journey to La Perouse on the coast. He’d never been that far from home before. The boarded-up shops and closed-down factories of Newtown were behind them and sweating it out under the heavy load was putting Tom in good stead for what lay ahead.

It was late in the afternoon when they got to the limit of the tram’s journey, ‘La Loop’, as it was known, where it stopped for the passengers to get off. Tom gazed towards Botany Bay where the cannons on Bare Island jutted into the sky.  

               He looked over his shoulder and watched the tram move off again. It circled around a large wood and iron building that served as a station of sorts, before it stopped once more for people to get aboard for the trip back to the city. 

               They traipsed along a street of weatherboard houses before turning into a track through some scrubby bush that led to the place his father called Happy Valley. It was too late to think about going all the way back to Newtown where the air was thick with grit from the rail yards.  Tom’s mother Rose and two younger sisters would be there, packing whatever they could carry into hessian bags for the trip east. 

               Charlie and Tom worked hard to prop up the canvas with solid branches and make a shelter for the night. They would make it stronger in the morning, for this would be their new home, at least until they could build something more substantial.

               In Newtown, Charlie hadn’t paid any rent for weeks, for with what resources he had, putting food into the bellies of his family took priority. Other desperate men, who like Charlie once had jobs, told him of the shanty town on the outskirts of Sydney. When his landlord gave him five days to make other arrangements, Happy Valley loomed as his only option. 

               They dumped the heavy load on a gap of ground between several huts made of corrugated iron and wood. Puffs of smoke rose into the sky from dwellings scattered about Happy Valley, people making use of what daylight remained to cook with.

               As the skies began to darken on that October day in 1932, Charlie pulled out a hard lump of bread and gave it to his son, steeling himself to deal with the intense pangs of hunger that constantly gnawed at his insides.

               They sat under the canvas. Tom sucked on the crust until his saliva softened it enough for him to swallow while his father stared into the darkness that was setting upon the rows of huts. Christ, I hope they’re orright back there.

               Charlie stood and took a few steps away from the shelter, bending to gather some small sticks he could start a fire with. Not that he had anything to cook, but a fire would make it feel more like a proper camp.

               He sat down next to Tom and threw the collection of twigs on the ground, when as if from nowhere, two black men appeared. Their grey whiskers made it hard to tell how old they were, probably somewhere between thirty and forty. Charlie responded by jumping to his feet and shaping up in self-defence. The two Gadigal men spoke to each other in words that made no sense to Tom or his father and then walked in the direction of the Aboriginal mission on the other side of Happy Valley.

               For the moment, the immediate threat had been averted but they knew that when it got darker, they’d need to be on their guard. Tom moved closer to his father, broke the remainder of his bread in half and passed it to him. Charlie put it in his mouth to soften, grateful for the distraction. Side by side they sat and waited for the rising moon to give them some light.

               Campfires scattered about the settlement glowed red. Swallowed up by the night, Tom was grateful for his father’s presence and was startled when he sprang to his feet again as the two Gadigal men re-appeared.   Charlie raised his fists again to warn them off. The taller of the two black men held out a charred rabbit with a long piece of wood through it.

               ‘Here, take this... good tucka.’

               It was with that gesture, that the new arrivals joined in with the respectful arrangement that had grown between the two collectives, desperate unemployed whitefellas who were doing their best to survive in their shanties and the dispossessed blackfellas who were pretty much trying to do the same thing. For now, on their first night in Happy Valley, physical exhaustion and meat in their bellies gave them peace and with that came sleep.

~

They woke early the next morning, using the feeble grey light of dawn to move about, chewing on chunks of stringy rabbit until it could be swallowed. The smell of smoke told them that others nearby were awake.

               A sheet of wood serving as a door, was pushed outwards from the closest hut. A wiry and whiskered man with his wife emerged and walked over to them carrying saucepans of sweet, black tea and with that they met their immediate neighbours. 

               The rest of the morning was hard work finding wood that was strong enough to hold up the part of the tent that was missing a pole. To do this they ventured into the bush that ran down to the bay where they felled a small tree to trim.

               When they got back to the tent, they continued fixing it until they were satisfied that the structure was held together well enough to withstand the elements. With some shelter now established, they began the journey back across the outskirts to the city and then back to Newtown. It would be another day before they’d return with Tom’s mother and sisters and a load of blankets, clothes, pots and some food.

~

It was a dour existence with a distinct division of chores. The small girls helped their mother collect sticks and whatever else they could use as fuel. They’d wash clothes in water gathered from one of the public taps or from a nearby creek that flowed to the bay. They turned flour and anything else they could scrounge into meals to cook over the coals.

               Tom and his father spent the daylight hours tramping large distances on foot. When the opportunity arose, they would jump onto a tram without paying to cover distances more quickly. They searched for any chore or job that paid even a small amount of money. Most days they returned with empty pockets and empty bellies but occasionally they earned a ‘bob’, the colloquialism for the currency of a shilling. On a good day, they worked for a few hours, perhaps chopping a pile of wood for a well-to-do widower or digging the ground to make a vegetable patch for someone who owned both a house and enough resources to shield them from the economic depression.

               One such property sat on a hill with views over the Chinese market gardens of La Perouse. It was full of stooped Asian men and women covered in farming clothes and topped with coolie hats. Half-way up the hill, Tom paused for breath and watched his father look down at the gardens, rubbing his whiskered chin. It’d be easy to get in there when it gets dark; we could get some of them carrots and greens.   

At the top, they stood outside the front door of a large, weatherboard house. Charlie used his fingers to brush back his hair. He gave Tom a slap on the back to do the same thing, and he knocked on the door. 

               A moment later, the door opened and Charlie introduced themselves to the lady of the house, Mrs Anderson.  She explained to them that the usual man who ran errands for her, had fallen foul with the constabulary. They were in luck and their job was to take two hessian bags to the markets near Railway Square and purchase a piece of mutton and other groceries.

               ‘Forgive me for asking, Mrs,’ said Charlie, ‘but what makes you sure that I won’t run off with the money... or the groceries?’

               ‘That’s an easy question to answer, my man,’ she replied, ‘if you do, you’ll be sure to enjoy yourselves for a day or two... but no more. Return my mutton before nightfall and you’ll become my new help. I’ll give you money for the tram. What you do with that is up to you. Just be back with what I want before dark and then I’ll pay you for your trouble.’

               With the money for the goods stashed in one pocket and the coins for the fare tucked safely in another, Charlie gave Tom the nod when the tram slowed near a junction for some horses to cross. They had come to know this to be a reliable spot to get aboard, running alongside and then hopping up near the back exit. 

               They jumped off when the tram approached the markets near Railway Square where a bustling collection of buyers were trying to beat down prices from hawkers. Most shopfronts were boarded up, though a scattering of some that had so far defied the odds remained open. The ground was littered with cabbage leaves and scraps and Tom noticed a rat scurry along the gutter to flee down a drain.

               Wafts of intense foul odours made Tom heave and he stayed close to his father while they searched for what they needed. They happened upon an alcove where a carcass was being butchered, and it all became too much for Tom. He turned his head to the side and lost what little was in his stomach to the ground. Charlie gave him a wry smile. ‘Okay, mate?’

               ‘I’ll be ‘right.’

               They continued walking between the different stalls, Charlie focussed on getting the best piece of mutton that he could for Mrs Anderson’s money. With persistence he secured a bigger and fattier lump of meat for a few pennies less than the first pieces being offered by the butchers.

               The hessian bag became full and as they finished acquiring the groceries, Charlie noticed a hawker across the street prizing open a wooden box and lifting out a pair of dead rabbits by their ears. Along that side of the street were some stalls set up against the back walls of closed-down shops, flogging different stuff.

               ‘Rabbits... two bob a head, three bob for two!’ the scrawny hawker yelled in a high pitch over the noise of the street. A group of about ten men were gathered next to his stall, all clambering around a central figure standing on a wooden box relaying information from the wireless he could hear out of the back window of an old shop. ‘He’s on ninety-eight!’ he yelled, to which they responded with a collective gasp of suspense.

               ‘C’mon, Tom,’ said his father, attracted to the hawker who was trying to sell rabbits. Tom had the hessian bag slung over his shoulder and followed his father across the road, dodging people who were walking in the opposite direction until they were up close to the rabbit man. Charlie fingered the coins in his pocket, making sure that with the tram money, he had nine bob.

‘I’m after six rabbits. How much is that?’

               ‘Three bob for two, so that makes it nine bob,’ said the hawker.

               ‘I can give you seven’.

               A cheer erupted from the nearby gathering and the men slapped each other on their backs in celebration.

               ‘No mate, but I’ll do it for eight… only because I’m in a good mood. Bradman just got his hundred! Reckon we’ll beat the Poms in this one!’

               ‘You beauty!’ Charlie was buoyed by what was happening in the cricket. ‘Could do with some good news after the first test!’

               He counted out the coins, handed them over and opened the other hessian bag. ‘Put ‘em in here, mate.’

               That was the first purchase of what was to become a focal point of the family’s existence for the next five years. Their work was done, and they walked back to where the tram would be moving slowly. Jumping onto it was more difficult now because of the loaded sacks but after stumbling, they secured their feet, wedging them into brackets on the outside of the tram carriage. They hung on for dear life as they bumped their way towards the Chinese gardens and Mrs Anderson’s house on the hill.

               Charlie yelled above the rattles and clunks, explaining to Tom how the eight bob he spent that day was going to be worth more than double that in the next few days. He remembered when he was a kid and men would traipse the streets of the inner-city, flogging rabbits. Legend had it that the local football team once rubbed rabbit blood into their jerseys before they played in honour of the dogged people from which they were spawned.

               ‘We’ll keep two, that’ll feed us and save at least four bob from not buying other food,’ he shouted, ‘keep the pelts too, dry and salt ‘em, good fur in that.’

               ‘That leaves four more,’ Tom called out.

               ‘Give one to the blackfellas; remember our first night at Happy Valley?’

               ‘Yeah, that’s fair enough but what about the other three?’

               ‘I would have been happy to pay two bob each, even three,’ he said, ‘so reckon we can flog ‘em for four bob a head. People got a taste for rabbit these days.’

               ‘When will we do that?’

               ‘Tomorrow, we’ll get up early.’

               ‘Do you mean we have to come back all this way again tomorrow?’

               ‘Yeah, then if we sell what we’ve got, we’re close enough to get some more.’

~

Mrs Anderson was impressed. The meat was better than she had expected, and they brought back everything that was on the list. All of this was done before the sun had begun to set. ‘Well,’ she said, rummaging through the goods, ‘every Wednesday morning, the earlier the better. I’ll have errands for you. Interested?’

Charlie’s eyed widened and he took a moment to find his voice. ‘Every Wednesday!’ His eyes nearly popped out of his head when she passed over a note, not coins but a note! They clambered down the hill and with nightfall almost upon them, hid behind some tall bull rushes at the edge of a swamp. From there they could gaze across the rows of raised earth full of green and yellow produce. Across the way on the other side of the field, the last of the workers in coolie hats left through a gate, turning to lock a chain before walking off.

               With that, Charlie and Tom crept closer to the fields and pulled aside some loose palings to step through. It was getting dark, and they were startled when they heard several other men behind them. 

               ‘Oi,’ one of them said, ‘Don’t take too much! We don’t want the chinks getting too angry. They have shotguns.’

~

The mood back at the tent was sullen. Another day of dreary and arduous chores was not yet over. The males hadn’t been there for any of it, and it was much later than expected when they eventually got back. The fire was going and Tom’s mother, Rose, was kneading some flour for another doughy and tasteless meal. Charlie, oblivious to her mood, could hardly wait to tell her about their good fortunes. 

               Across from their squat, some men had gathered around a neighbour’s fire to talk about politics and the downturn. A short man who had been talking loudly about the government gave Charlie a wave.

               He returned the gesture and then began relaying the events of the day to Rose who managed a smile, her first for hours. Gradually, the mood spread throughout the family, and for a fleeting moment, Charlie was once again a worthy breadwinner.

               Getting to work, the man of the house skinned a rabbit, cut it up and tossed it into the water bubbling away in the big iron pot. He tipped the vegetables out of the bag and roughly chopped a couple of onions, carrots and some other green leaves that he had no clue about. He threw them on top of the rabbit pieces with a small handful of salt. ‘Tonight, we have a feast!’

               ‘I’ll add some flour in a while, when those juices get cooked up,’ said Rose, joining in with the good news of the day, ‘we can mop up the gravy with the dough boys.’

               ‘We’ll sleep with full bellies,’ said Charlie. ‘Tomorrow, me and Tom will flog off the other rabbits. Hopefully in a while, not too long I hope, we’ll be able to buy some more canvas and thick blankets... saw some at the markets... make us some decent beds.’

~

From that glorious day onwards, after scratching together whatever they could to make ends meet, the luxury of routine was once more a part of their lives. Life was tough, but each of the Davis family was more content with their lot, knowing that there would be a bit more money around and they could put more than just flour and water together to sustain them each day.

               Wednesdays were set aside for the males to do errands and chores for Mrs Anderson and to get fresh vegetables on their way home. The days either side were for tramping the suburbs, selling some rabbits and, on a good day, going back to the markets for more.

               One evening after lugging rabbits all day, Tom was holding onto the rails at the back of the tram when he had an idea. ‘Reckon we could split up, Da.’

               ‘Wotcha mean?’ yelled his father over the wind and noise of the tracks.

               ‘I know all the good places now. There’s too many to get to when we’re together.’

               ‘Reckon you could do it?’

               ‘Yeah, been watching for ages now… I know what to do, what to say, how much to get for a rabbit… Reckon I could. Besides, I’m fifteen now.’

               ‘Orright. Give it a go tomorrow. After the markets, you do the Redfern streets and I’ll do Newtown.’

               After a couple of weeks of working separately there was distinctly more money in their pockets and the thought of sleeping on more comfortable bedding was closer to becoming a reality.

~

Evidence of the hard times was everywhere on the streets of Redfern. It was a tough suburb and the struggle for survival was etched in lines on the faces of people Tom encountered along the way. Hawking rabbits was difficult work, mile after mile lugging the heavy load to where the regular customers were.

               Along the way he would pass dishevelled men, some squatting on wads of old newspapers in doorways and others in camps they had made in small public spaces. Some existed quietly in their squalor and others were mad from the drink, abusing Tom if he got too close.

               There was one small house, towards the end of his run that he looked forward to getting to. It was crowded with Catholics, as his father had previously said, seven or eight kids greeting them excitedly each time they had passed them by. One of them was the prettiest girl Tom had ever seen and thinking about her kept a spring in his step all the way up Cleveland Street to where they lived. As he got closer to the house, he anticipated her smile and the way she would look at him.      

               ‘Rabbitoh,’ he called, just like his father had told him, but louder than he had been in the other streets for he wanted to make sure she would hear. ‘Rabbitoh!’ he called again as he stood outside her front gate.

               There was no sign of her. He sighed, his shoulders dropping as he began walking away, kicking a rock as he went. When he heard the gate squeak open, he stopped dead in his tracks and turned around. There she stood, the only one of the brood, with an empty house behind her.

               ‘Gotcha rabbits, miss,’ said Tom. ‘Where’s everyone else?’

               ‘Pa’s gone bush, the little twins got sick, and Ma’s gone looking for someone to help. The others went with her.’

               ‘How come you didn’t go?’

               ‘I’m supposed to make sure we get the rabbits.’ She spoke with a soft Irish brogue that intrigued him. ‘How come you’re on your own again? Did your father die or something?’

               ‘We split up… He’s doing Newtown and I’m here. It’s better that way.’

               ‘Well, can we get two?’

               ‘Sure.’ Tom lifted out two sets of ears and passed the dead animals over the fence. ‘It’s eight bob for these.’

               ‘Oh no,’ she gasped, ‘Ma forgot to give me the money.’

               ‘Well... er...’

               ‘We can pay double next week...to be sure...’

               ‘I don’t think...’

               Her eyes upon him made him look away.

               ‘Aw, come on… You know we’ll pay. Why don’t you come inside, and I can make you some tea. You can have a rest and think about it.’

               The thought of being alone in a house with her made his heart thump. He looked at her strawberry blond hair tied back in a ribbon made from old yellow cloth, the same colour as the patches sown into her dress. ‘Well, a cup o’tea does sound good.’

               He opened the gate wider and put the bag of rabbits next to the front door.

               ‘Better not leave them there. They may not hop away, but someone will take ‘em to be sure. Come in, shut the door behind you.’

               Tom laughed, picked up the sack, and followed her down a narrow hallway. The girl nodded towards the floor. ‘Just leave ‘em there.’ She held out her hand for him to take. ‘My name is Hazel.’

               ‘I’m Tom.’

               He wondered if he should really be alone in the house with her. She kept hold of his hand and took a step closer. ‘I look forward to you coming around every Friday.’

               He knew that something was happening but had no idea what it was. He tried to speak. ‘Er… um...’

               Hazel put her other hand on his shoulder as they stood facing each other.

               ‘How about that tea, miss… I mean, Hazel?’

               ‘Maybe in a little while… Have you ever kissed a girl before?’

               ‘Um... before what?’

               She leant into him and pushed her lips upon his. He stood, not knowing what to do, the urges that had been so strong recently overwhelming him.

               ‘Before this.’ The trace of her soft Irish accent made him dizzy. She rubbed the front of his trousers. ‘The tea can wait.’

~

Tom didn’t notice the fatigue in his legs that afternoon as he hawked the rest of the rabbits. When the last one was sold, he bounded along the path towards Railway Square and the ride back to Happy Valley.

               He couldn’t tell anyone what had happened, for he didn’t really understand it himself. The last hour was a blur, and now he was eight bob short, not sure how he’d explain that to his father. The only thing he knew for certain, was that the time until next Friday couldn’t pass quickly enough. If he was lucky, Hazel’s younger twin sisters might be sick again.

2. Conception

‘Stay away from that house,’ Charlie said.

               They had ventured further afield, trying to flog rabbits as they tramped along the street, taunted by glimpses of the ocean through the gaps between the stately homes along Maroubra Road. It was autumn, though the heat persisted in the late morning sun as they made a quest for territory closer to home.

               ‘This was a mistake, I reckon.’

               ‘Yeah, haven’t sold one rabbit. What’s wrong with that house, Da?’

               ‘The word about the place is that she lives there... Tilly Devine... Don’t reckon she’d take too kindly to a couple of rabbitohs.’

               ‘Is that because she’s rich?’

               They trudged further along the street. ‘Nah, Tom, it’s because of what she does and who she does it with. Just stay away.’

               ‘Orright.’

They walked on in silence, disappointed from the day so far.

‘Not doing any good, are we?’ said Tom.

               His father grimaced. ‘Waste of time around these parts. They’re not hungry enough around here for our rabbits... Reckon we split up again tomorrow, go back to what we were doing. I was just hoping we’d find a quicker way to sell... have more time back at Happy Valley if we could.’

               ‘To fix the place up a bit?’

               ‘Yeah, we need to get going on it quick... they’ve gone you know... the Browns next to us... He’s gone off, fighting out in the bush.’

               ‘But they were there yesterday.’

               ‘But not today; he told me to my face. They know someone at St Marys who’ll take ‘em in, and he’ll go off boxing... already got one fight lined up in Penrith, and if he wins, well who knows what it could lead to. He might be able to travel around, Tent Boxing, get a name for himself. His missus will be looked after at St Marys while he’s gone.’

               ‘What if he comes back to Happy Valley, Da?’

               ‘Like I said, he told me to my face; collapse the old place so his no-hoper brother doesn’t try and take it over. We can use the wood and iron to make a new place for us.’

               The load of rabbits wasn’t getting any lighter and their legs were heavy.

               ‘Not selling any of these here,’ said Tom. ‘Still plenty of daylight; why don’t we go back and get started.’

               ‘Yeah, sell this lot tomorrow, I’ll do Newtown and you go back to Redfern.’

               ‘But tomorrow’s Wednesday… Mrs Anderson’s errands.’

               ‘Ah yeah. Reckon you can do ‘em both, Newtown and Redfern? And I do Mrs Anderson’s errands.’

               ‘What, all of these?’

               ‘Reckon you can?’

               ‘Orright.’

               It had been more than a week since Tom had walked the streets around Hazel’s place and four months since he lay with her on the cool stone floor of the kitchen. Her mother didn’t usually buy rabbits on a Wednesday, but he might get to see her anyway. The thought of getting close enough to touch her, sent a buzz through his body. With more purpose in his step, he paced it out.

               ‘C’mon, Da,’ he said, ‘we’ve got a house to build.’

~

It was unusual to be back at the camp with so much light ahead of them and Charlie was determined to have the Browns’ shack taken apart by night fall. He had planned how the re-build could be made in a space behind their tent amongst the scrubby bushes to double the size of their squat. 

               The mood of the whole family had lifted since the men had found some reliable income. Life remained hard though, and Rose considered it one of her duties to do what she could to keep their spirits up. Sometimes when she noticed the family’s mood dipping, she would give them a jolt rather than try to placate them, reminding them that their lot in life could be a lot worse and that they were lucky to usually have a full belly so they could sleep at night.

               Life was harsh and physically demanding for even the youngest children, however those who lived in the shanty town were free of one demon, that being the anxiety of trying to find rent money when there simply wasn’t any.  

               Those in the valley were free to mix it up with the Aboriginal people from the nearby mission. There was an acceptance of mixed-race relationships at La Perouse and babies that resulted were affectionately cradled by women of all skin colours. Judgement of moral inferiority was left behind with the bills, rent payments and perceived respectability of life as it was before the crash.

               On that Wednesday, when his father did the errands for Mrs Anderson before pinching some vegetables from the Chinese gardens just on sunset, Tom spent the entire day tramping the streets from Railway Square to Newtown and then back to Redfern.

               It was a dawn to dusk effort, culminating in legs of exhaustion by late afternoon. Thankfully, the load over his shoulder had lightened over the day, with just one pair of rabbits remaining when it was time to walk up Cleveland Street, noisy with the clip-clop of horses and a small number of automobiles trying to get past them.

               He saved that part of the route until last, the stretch of closely packed house frontages that almost came right up to the front fences. Many of them had newspaper covering the inside of their windows. Most of the shops leading to the main intersection with Crown Street were closed and boarded up with sheets of wood.  He walked with haste, thinking of an imminent encounter with Hazel and maybe being alone with her again.

               He made no call along the street, for there was nothing to sell but the two he’d saved for Hazel… if she wanted them.

When he got to her front gate he stopped and put the bag on the ground. ‘Rabbitoh! Rabbitoh!’

               Nothing. Maybe I’ve made a mistake leaving it to the last part of the day… They’ve all gone out, maybe even gone bush to catch up with the father...  She probably doesn’t like me anymore.

               He picked up the sack and turned around to start the long trek back to Railway Square without so much as a glimpse of her. He began to walk away, jolting to a stop when from behind he heard a door open to a barrage of shrill shouts.

‘Come back right now, Hazel!’ yelled the mother. ‘You stay away from that boy; wait until your Pa is back! Come back right now!’

               Tom turned to see Hazel struggle free from her mother’s grip and run to the gate. ‘Tom! Tom, I must see you!’ She ran through the broken gate and into the street. ‘Tom, wait!’

               ‘If you go with him,’ screamed her mother from the doorway, ‘don’t ever come back!’

               Tom dropped his hessian sack. He stood wide-eyed and stunned as Hazel wrapped her arms around him. ‘Tom, I need to talk to you.’

               ‘What’s going on, Hazel? Why is your Ma so angry?’

               The front door slammed behind them. ‘Oh Tom, I’m in trouble... we’re in trouble... you got me in trouble.’

               ‘What kind of trouble?’

               ‘Oh, you daft bugger.’ Her face was wet with tears as she reached down and grabbed his hand, placing it on her belly. ‘I’m going to have a baby... your baby.’

               ‘But... but…’

               ‘It’s true, Tom Davis, a baby.’

               ‘But...’

               There were no words forming from the commotion in his head. He was just fifteen and babies were what older people had. Would he have to marry her? Where would they live? Would he have to build another shack at Happy Valley?

               ‘Ma says… I can’t… see you anymore.’ Her words broke up as she pushed through. ‘She says that now… now she’ll have another sprog to feed, and she can’t even afford to feed the ones she’s got.’

               ‘I’ll... I can... I...’

               ‘You’re just talking dribble.’ Hazel tried to take control of the moment. ‘I just wanted you to know. Ma says I can’t see you for what you done to me... but I wanted you to know. My Pa will be back in a while... He don’t know a thing about it yet. Ma is right, I can’t be seeing you no more and I don’t know what will happen when Pa gets back.’

               ‘Here,’ said Tom, bending down to pull out the last pair of rabbits. ‘You better take these.’

               ‘Thank you, Tom, but it will take more than some rabbits to fix the fine old mess I’m in.’ 

   She grabbed the animals by the ears and turned, taking slow wretched steps back to her house.

               ‘But I want to keep seeing you,’ he called.

               She looked over her shoulder and shook her head.

               ‘I gotta go now,’ he called out, ‘but I want to keep seeing you.’

               At that moment, Happy Valley seemed like it was at the ends of the Earth.

~

With the changing seasons, days were getting shorter, and nights were nippy, meaning that the Davis family had to fit as much as they could into the dwindling amount of daylight. Ironically, in a period of massive unemployment, Tom and his father were busier than they had been in a long while, selling rabbits, running errands for Mrs Anderson on Wednesdays and constructing the cabin behind their tent.

               After scrounging a bunch of nails, they put in a succession of late afternoons and evenings when they worked through the twilight until it was pitch black. Being busy suited Tom fine, distracting him from his problems.

               Finally, they saw the completion of the new structure. It was a rectangle of timber and iron cladding under a tin roof with the walls softened with hessian bags and rabbit pelts. When the final nail was hammered into place, Charlie took a step back, smiled, and put his arm around Tom. They would keep the tent erected as well, glad of the extra space.

               Life went on. Rose and the girls completing their chores each day, washing their few clothes and struggling to dry them in cooler weather. After that, they would look for enough wood from the dwindling supply to keep the fire smouldering to cook on. Time spent at the local school was a break for the girls and a chance to play with other kids, though it was not unusual for them to miss several days in a row to help their mother out.   

               It was obvious to his parents that something was troubling Tom, and when they sat around the fire to eat and drink tea, they probed for details. Tom, however, was keeping things to himself, and his detachment was tangible.

               It was more than a month since he’d walked back from Cleveland Street after Hazel told him about the baby, and since then he hadn’t been back. His father was concerned that Tom was in some sort of trouble. Twice his son had come home eight bob short after a day on the streets. Maybe that had something to do with it for when Tom had tried to explain why, it hadn’t rung true.

For the past month, Tom continued to hawk rabbits around the streets but turned back at the Crown Street intersection, a couple of hundred yards short of Hazel’s house. Although he longed to see her when he was so close to where he knew she’d be, going any closer would be terrible for Hazel.

               Upon returning to Happy Valley after one day of hawking, he walked straight past the rest of the family who had settled around the camp-stove while a stew was simmering away. Charlie had splashed out, buying a piece of mutton and some potatoes at the market. The mood was bright, though completely lost on Tom when he slipped through the gap between the tent wall and the timber cladding behind it and collapsed on the stack of cloth that was his bed.

               Rose had had enough of wondering what was so wrong in her son’s life. She passed a ladle to one of the younger girls and told her to move the stew around every few minutes. Then she looked at the boy’s father. ‘Come on, Da.  It’s time we found out what is going on.’

               They sat either side of him and what followed was a needling for information that only a mother could get away with. Charlie sat and listened to Rose recall some of the happy moments in the boy’s life that would evoke feelings of warmth and security. She intertwined the conversation with simple questions followed by more complicated ones, drawing on Tom’s emotions until his defences began to fracture.

               ‘There’s a girl,’ he began. ‘I sell her family rabbits sometimes.’

               With that, both parents felt some relief with the age-old explanation for the boy’s blues. His mother probed for more information and over the next few moments they learned of Hazel, one of a tribe of Catholic kids in Redfern. It wasn’t until Tom told them that he wasn’t allowed to see her anymore that the seeds of more serious concern were planted.

               ‘And why would that be, Tom?’ Rose spoke with fire in her eyes. ‘Is it because you’re not a Catholic?’

               ‘Well, I don’t reckon, Ma.’

               ‘Come on boy, out with it.’

               ‘Some some something happened,’ he stammered, ‘last year, I think it was.’

               His father sat more upright, anticipating news he’d rather not know. 

               ‘What did you do, boy?’

               ‘She’s… she’s...’

               ‘She’s what?’

               ‘She’s going to have... a... baby.’

                Charlie looked down and dropped his forehead into his hand. ‘Ah, Jesus Christ.’

               ‘What am I going to do, Ma?’

               Rose was quiet, drawing in a deep breath and sighing. She processed what was happening and recalled the time when she herself, just fifteen years old, was telling her mother a similar thing.

               ‘Sit up properly, Tom,’ she said. ‘You’re going to have some stew for supper. Your Da got us a nice piece of mutton. Then we’ll drink some tea. Then, when we’re ready, we’ll have a long talk, the three of us. You might have been barred from seeing young Hazel, but we’re not. The whole lot of us are going to have to get together at some stage.’

               ‘But Ma...’

               ‘But nothing. It’s time for us all to have something to eat.’

               ‘Not very hungry, Ma.’

               ‘We’ll all eat and then we’ll sleep. Tomorrow we’ll talk.’

3. Desperation

There was no fanfare when Hazel’s Pa returned from the bush in winter. He brought back two main things from his wanderings about the central west of New South Wales. He scooped the first from his pocket and slapped it on the table in front of his wife: a handful of coins and a few pound notes. She counted the offerings, gave him a spiteful glare and squirreled them into a tin that sat on the bench in the kitchen. ‘That’s it?’

               The second thing he came back with was a craving for rum. The small, noisy house was suffocating after the months he had spent on the track. The road had been hard, and many was a night he’d gone to bed with an empty belly, save a swig of rum to dull the pain. Though wherever he lay, be it in a shed on some property where he’d worked for a day or two, or under a tree on a plain somewhere, there was quiet space around him, and he was content with his solitude.

               Each of his kids took their turn in greeting their father, a man they didn’t really know. One by one they would spiel a rehearsed pleasantry before getting back to whatever they had been doing; chores for the older ones or the younger ones playing with clothes pegs and whatever else they could turn into some type of toy.

               When it was Hazel’s turn to welcome her father home, her mother intervened, telling him that there was news he needed to prepare himself for. ‘And this one,’ she continued after the warning, ‘as you can plainly see, this one is with child.’

               It was all too familiar for the returned traveller, a man who found it difficult to remember any time in their life together during which there was not a pregnancy. ‘I see,’ he said, ‘and do we have a father that we know of?’

               ‘The boy who did this,’ said the mother, ‘the boy...’

               ‘His name is Tom,’ interjected Hazel, ‘and he’s a sweet boy.’

               ‘He’s the Protestant boy who knocked you up!’ said her mother, ‘and I’ve warned him off! He’s not to see her.’

               The man was quiet, slipping into his thoughts and how just a week earlier he was lodged in a farm shed near Penrith. It was where he slept after cutting hay for a dairy farmer. He worked there for lodgings and rum and although there was no monetary payment for his labour, it was the most peaceful week of his time away.

               He wished that he was there again, physically spent after a day’s work and about to eat his fill of beef from a recently slaughtered beast and boiled vegetables that he’d have picked from their gardens. The drink to follow would soften his shoulders and massage his head, delivering him into a sublime tranquillity and sleep. What he’d do, to smell the pastures and cattle once more and have a long, sweet swill of the dark spirit.

               ‘We need to meet the boy,’ he said. ‘There’ll be certain arrangements that need to be made.’

               ‘What?’ Hazel’s mother was angry. ‘I think not; he’s not even Catholic!’

~

Miles away, on the coast near La Perouse, the Davis family got on with life, though not without an air of expectancy. The news of Tom’s imminent fatherhood was taken on board as another challenge, but rather than cast a problematic shadow over them, Rose made sure that it added a further sense of purpose to their existence.

               She spoke of their good fortune in having added the wooden dwelling, for they would surely need the extra space. What they wanted now, was some certainty about the future, commitment from Hazel’s family and themselves, over the role they would be playing to care for the infant.

               Rose’s motivation added lively conversation around their meal one evening. ‘No Davis has ever denied their own blood… You’ll be sure to get your name on that baby’s birth certificate, Tom.’

               ‘Orright, Ma.’

               ‘The child will be a Davis… and always have a home with us.’

               Tom and his father glanced at each other, both aware that when Rose had her heart set on something, she would remain determined.

               ‘And Tom, it will be up to you to make the first move.’

~

The following day near lunchtime, Tom stood at the front door of Hazel’s family house, sodden from the cold, persistent drizzle that fell on him all the way from Railway Square. He was doing as his mother said, making contact with Hazel’s family and showing that he was being a man facing his responsibilities. 

               Hazel’s elder sister opened the door. ‘Ma!’ she yelled over her shoulder. ‘It’s the mongrel scoundrel dog!’

               Tom stood, his hands trembling not from the cold and wet, but from the trepidation that had built since leaving Happy Valley hours earlier. There was the sound of clanging metal pots coming from inside and then the thud of heavy stomps getting louder. The door opened with the mother standing there wearing a scowl on her face. Hazel ran up behind her.

               ‘Well,’ snapped the mother, ‘you’ve got some gall!’

               ‘Beg pardon, Mrs O’Brien,’ he began, ‘Beg pardon, but if I could please...’

               ‘Please what!’

               ‘If I could...’

               ‘Ma,’ said Hazel trying to push past, ‘Ma, can’t you see he’s soaked to the skin?’

               Perhaps it was Tom’s pathetic appearance, dressed in his father’s best shirt and trousers that swam all over his cold shivering pink skin, or perhaps it was the desperation in Hazel’s voice, or maybe both, but the surprise visit managed to precipitate a kernel of sympathy as the matriarch’s face began to soften. ‘Come inside, you wretched boy,’ she managed. ‘Go through and stand by the copper heater in the back room.’

               He followed the mother, leaving wet boot prints on the hard floor as he went, passing Hazel, her belly now obviously protruding. ‘Hello, Hazel.’

               ‘Oh Tom,’ she said, ‘why did you come?’

               He was led through the narrow hall, past two rooms on the right full of boisterous kids who were frustrated in having to stay inside out of the rain. He stood with his back to the burner, his eyes darting around for a glimpse of Hazel’s father. Older kids cradled younger ones or were busy patching clothes while the mother stood at the kitchen table, holding her silent stare. 

               ‘Excuse me,’ he said, ‘is Hazel’s father here? I expect he will want to see me.’

               ‘Hmph,’ said the mother. ‘Whatever you want to say to him, you can say to me.’

               ‘It’s just that...’

               Hazel resisted the urge to wrap her arms around him. ‘Oh Tom, Pa’s gone on the track again, couldn’t get a day’s work on the wharves.’

               ‘Gone bush again,’ said the mother, ‘so it’s just us.’

               ‘Orright.’

               ‘So out with it, you despicable boy,’ she pushed. ‘What do you have to say?’

~

Later that day, Tom shivered from the wind that blew right through him as he hung off the back of the tram. He felt a strange calm after surviving the meeting with the O’Briens, relieved that her father hadn’t been there. It would be easier now when his folks returned with him the following week to further the arrangements.

               He arrived back at the shanty town just before dusk, eager to change out of his father’s wet clothes and put on dry patched shirt and trousers that he could fill. Outside, a few men gathered as they often did at this time of day to talk. Smoke drifted up from the fires scattered around the settlement, glowing in the darkening sky. Charlie and the men were talking about the government and who was to blame for what. Tom looked on, eager for them to finish and head back to their own tin sheds for there was much he needed to say to his mother and father.

               ‘Hello, young Tom,’ called one of the men. ‘Come and join us.’

               Tom walked to the gathering, happy at least that the rain had ceased, and a few early stars had begun to twinkle in the eastern night sky.

               ‘We’re talking about the Premier,’ said another of the men. ‘Jack Lang’s done alright by us, I’d say.’

               ‘And now he’s been done in with!’ said the first man.

               ‘Since the Sydney Harbour Bridge was finished, no one I know has had a day’s work... Well maybe that big bloke down at the bottom part of the valley; he’s got himself a day or two on the waterfront, but that’s it. No one else has had anything!’

               ‘Not Lang’s doing, you know; he’s done all he can. It’s the other mob, The New Guard... too much power. They’ve got too much influence. Jack Lang was elected by the people.’

               ‘My word!’

               ‘They’ve no right to sack him!’

               Charlie nodded, rubbing his chin in thought. ‘There’s a meeting tomorrow,’ he said. ‘Waterside workers and Miner workers, the big unions. They’ll be having something to say about it!’

               ‘You going?’ said the first man, ‘New South Wales needs a strong communist party. Bring the boy!’

               ‘Wotcha say, Tom?’ said Charlie. ‘We could do with a day off.’

               ‘Huh? What? Not sure. I think we need to sell rabbits.’

               ‘We’ll have a think about it,’ said Charlie, ‘but for now it looks like Ma has got our supper ready.’

               ‘Ha,’ echoed the other men, ‘it’s time for us all to get back and rustle up something to eat.’

               Back to their own company, the family made the most of the stew, mopping up any trace of the juices with dough boys that had been made earlier in the day. When the younger girls were put to bed, and while a saucepan of black tea bubbled on the coals, they sat on the wooden boxes that constituted their furniture, drank the hot, sweet liquid and began to talk about the issue of the day. That night, under a clearing sky that began to sparkle with stars, they each said what they needed to and prepared themselves for the imminent meeting with the O’Brien’s.

               ‘We’ve managed to make ourselves comfortable here, wouldn’t you say?’ said Rose. ‘And more often than not, our bellies are full.’

               ‘Could be worse,’ said Charlie.

               Tom nodded.

~

In September of 1933, as per the arrangements made between the Davis and O’Brien families, sixteen-year-old Tom accompanied fifteen-year-old Hazel and a baby boy who had been hidden from the world, now wrapped in blankets, all the way from Cleveland Street in Redfern to Happy Valley at La Perouse. Despite her reluctance to Hazel leaving home, her mother felt some relief; the constant effort in keeping the girl out of sight from the prying eyes of Cleveland Street had taken its toll.

               Tom wore his father’s best clothes for the second time in his life, carrying a case of Hazel’s clothes and treasured possessions while she carried baby William.  Befitting the occasion, he purchased legitimate fares for the tram ride.

               It had been a teary farewell; though while Mrs O’Brien was torn to see her second eldest daughter and her first grandchild walk away with their shame, she was convinced that the Davis family would provide well for them. She had never been to Happy Valley, but a picture had been painted for her of a caring community with enough food and shelter to protect them from the desperation of the times.

               The fact that she now had fewer mouths to feed also contributed to the consensus that Hazel’s departure was in the best interests for all.

               There was one sticking point; the Davis’s were not Catholic. Much of the discussion between the two families had been around that. Throughout the talking, Rose insisted that the infant’s move to Happy Valley would be the best course of action for all concerned and this came with an assurance, albeit a hollow one at best, that Tom would be converting soon. With that, the arrangements secured the necessary approval from the O’Brien side. 

~

Tom’s parents had partitioned half of the cabin so there would be a place for the new mother and child, and being Wednesday, errand day for Mrs Anderson, Charlie had spent more money than he should have on a piece of mutton from the markets near Railway Square. He even bought some vegetables and a real loaf of bread to go with what he could pinch from the Chinese gardens on the way home.

               The Davis family had grown accustomed to the hard life, and they were proud of what they had been able to put together. Rose was sure that they could not have welcomed the newcomers any more warmly.

               At first, the trek eastward was an adventure for Hazel, the wobbly tram taking her somewhere mysterious. However, by the time they passed the Chinese gardens and continued through the scrub, she became more hesitant. When they stopped at La Perouse, she clung protectively to the baby and nestled in closely to Tom when two Gadigal men approached to look at the baby. ‘Is this your missus, Tom?’ said one. ‘Gotta little one too, eh?’

               ‘Yeah, Eric,’ said Tom, ‘this is Hazel, and the baby is William.’

               ‘Hello, missus,’ said Eric. ‘You’ll like it here, Tom good fella.’

               Hazel tensed when a cockatoo screeched as it flew above them. Holding the baby more tightly, she stepped along the path, hesitating when they veered onto a rough track, and continued towards the tent and cabin.

               ‘Here we are,’ said Tom. ‘Your new home.’

               Looking at the dwelling, her stomach was twisted and nauseous as she pondered her future. She slept poorly that first night. It was still spring and although the days were warming up nicely, the cabin chilled off at night. She shared the sectioned-off part of the hut with Tom and baby William cradled between them.

               Strange sounds of the night unnerved her and when the baby cried at intervals, she did well not to burst into tears while she rummaged around in the cold dark for what she needed to feed him or to clean him up.

               After a tormented night, grey light and crow calls just outside roused the young man lying next to her. Hazel began her first morning at Happy Valley holding William as if she was scared to let him go, and listening to Rose outside, babbling excitedly about having a new infant to care for.

               Tom and Charlie heated up a big pot of water on the smouldering fire, pouring some of the steaming liquid into a can for tea and leaving the rest as instructed, for the women to use. Rose, recognising the exhaustion in Hazel’s face, insisted that she take the baby off her hands to give him a wash with a warm flannel. Reluctantly, Hazel handed William to his grandmother.

               ‘You’re a beautiful boy, young Bill,’ said Rose while she gently moved the cloth over his delicate parts.

               ‘Pass him over when you’re done,’ said Hazel, ‘and I’ll wrap him up again.’

               ‘Now you just have a rest, my girl. You’ll be needing all your energy. There’s lots of work in raising one of these. In good hands, is young Bill.’

               Hazel’s torment spilled into helplessness watching someone she barely knew take over care of William and not even call him by his proper name. Hazel watched Tom’s mother wash the baby differently to the way she had done so many times before when she had looked after her baby siblings.

               The men ate some of the leftover bread from the last night’s meal and washed it down with hot tea knowing that soon they’d be gone and on the tram to Railway Square. It was spring and the days were getting longer. It was the first day Tom was off to provide for his new family. Hazel watched him walk away with his Charlie, left behind with people she really didn’t know.

               By mid-morning, sleep-deprived and feeling the early heat of the changing season, Hazel sat in the hut and nursed her baby, grimacing in pain as he suckled on her cracked nipples. She felt relief when the feed was over and the intense throbbing started to fade just a little. Though the respite was short lived as William threw up much of the milk over her shoulder. She sobbed, feeling trapped in a world she felt had no place for her, wishing that Tom was there. Drying her eyes and patting the baby on his back, she steeled herself to go outside and join the other females.

               ‘Ah, Hazel,’ said Rose. ‘Pass young Bill over and go and clean yourself with the hot water on the fire. That’ll make you feel better.’

               She did as she was told.

               ‘I’ll take him for now and when you feel up to it, could you help the girls wash some clothes... might get them dry in this sunshine.’

               The young mother persevered for the remainder of the day, helping with chores, stopping only in response to the infant’s crying to suffer the pain of feeding William and cleaning him. While the others had grown accustomed to life at Happy Valley and were excited that it now included a baby, for Hazel, her first day with them was drudgery at best.

               By the time evening shadows stretched across the settlement and she could smell the first hint of smoke for the evening, Hazel was overwhelmed with misery. She had survived a day, one of many more just the same to follow.

               In sharp contrast, Tom had returned with his father before sundown, their spirits high after selling all but one of the rabbits they had bought that morning at the markets. The females enjoyed this part of the day when the men returned home. They would have a story or two about the characters they’d encountered and if it was a particularly good day, they might also bring home something special such as a loaf of bread or even a length of fabric to make something with.

               For Hazel, though, the mood of the camp was something she could only watch. It made her bitter towards the others who had no idea how sad she was, nor was anyone there she could talk to about it. 

~

As one day rolled into another and weeks became months, the relationship between Hazel and the Davis family failed to become any warmer. Rose had taken firm control of raising William, or Bill as she called him, handing the infant over to his mother when he needed a feed. With the passage of time Hazel began to withdraw even further, her eyes masking the hollowness she felt inside. To Rose, Hazel’s behaviour was rude and ungrateful.

               Sometimes, rather than bursting into tears, she would go for a walk around Happy Valley, occasionally coming across another woman who would be keen to spend time chatting with her. During these times she would hear about all sorts of things in their lives, dramas and tragedies that at least made her feel that she wasn’t totally alone in her misery.  

               Tom was at a loss as to how he could extract an expression of happiness from her during the daylight hours, and he was totally baffled when sometimes through the night while William was sleeping, she’d come to him. For Hazel, the touch of him and those few moments of intense desire reminded her that she was alive.

               Tom would take the passionate union as a sign that she was better again, happy to be there and that the next day would be a better one. Invariably, by morning she would have regressed once more, delving deep inside herself, leaving Tom confused and at his wits end.     

                It was late one summer morning when something jolted Hazel even further into her darkness. The young girls were away collecting pieces of fuel for the fire, and both men were running errands for Mrs Anderson, leaving Hazel and the baby alone with Rose. Hazel was having a difficult time during which the baby sucked spasmodically, screaming, crying and barely settling to take in any decent amount of milk.

               Rose held her arms out to take the baby from her. ‘Do pass him over, girl.’

               Sleep deprived and worn out, Hazel did as she was told. 

               ‘Shh, shh, little Bill,’ said Rose, ‘that’s better. What a good boy you are.’

               The baby ceased his crying and a broad smile spread across his face as his eyes locked in with those of his grandmother who rocked him in her arms. The moment hit Hazel hard, and she interpreted it the only way she knew how. William was Bill and he was better off with Rose.

               Into the afternoon the thoughts played over and over in her mind and by the time Tom and Charlie returned from running Mrs Anderson’s errands, she’d made a decision. With that, she felt a weight of burden lift from her shoulders and for the first time in a long time, she owned a glimmer of happiness.

~

The conversation offered by Hazel as they put together a watery stew of mutton bones and vegetables, was at first met with suspicion by Rose, for it had been months since she’d volunteered any contribution to discussion. As the cool of night fell over them, they began to warm to her Irish brogue, giving the young mother the benefit of doubt; perhaps after having a hard time of it she was beginning to grow accustomed to their way of life.

               Banter was lively as conversation spilled from mouths full of food.

‘Would you like a little more, Hazel?’ said Rose. ‘Need to keep your strength up, feeding young Bill.’

               ‘Well thank you. If there’s enough to go round, I would.’

               Tom was so taken with the apparent change in Hazel’s demeanour that he saddled up close to her and asked quietly how the baby had been that day. 

               ‘I’d be thinking your Ma would be better able to answer that. She has a special way with him, and it’s grand, what they have.’

              Lying on top of the blanket that night, comforted by the drop in temperature after the daytime heat, Hazel began to pack some detail around the bones of her plan. Rose had spoken of another baby, just a couple of months older than Bill, who belonged to a family at the other end of Happy Valley, fed on watered down condensed milk. That little child was apparently doing well, sometimes having his milk topped up with a little softened arrowroot biscuit.

               Hazel decided that over the next month or so, while she would feed William what she could, she would also try him on the watered-down condensed milk with some mushy biscuit and get Rose to feed it to him. Gradually, she would put some distance between herself and the baby.

               She was sure that Tom’s mother would be happy to take on the role of feeding the baby from time to time. Day by day, William would become Bill and would be more and more attached to the older woman. Then, when the time was right, she would leave them a note explaining how Bill was better off with them and that she couldn’t raise him as good as they could, and that Tom wasn’t to try and find her. With that, she’d be gone.

~

Up to that point, her plan was quite straight forward and without complication; however, in recent weeks she began to feel physically different, a condition that was strangely familiar. She had pushed aside any thought of what was growing inside her. Now she knew that if her plans had any chance of coming to fruition, she must get away as soon as she could and deal with her latest revelation.

              She had also heard from some of the women in Happy Valley that for girls who were carrying a baby, there were places they could go where things could be done to have it gone. I’ll get back to Redfern. Ma won’t notice for a while. There’ll be time to get everything sorted. I’ll find the place where they can take it out of me, and Ma will never know.

~

Six weeks later, after a day of traipsing the streets, Tom and Charlie got back to Happy Valley, tired but in good spirits. They brought home three yards of a woollen blanket from one old fellow who had given it to them to pay off a debt for a month supply of rabbits. 

               They trod their way up the track to the camp, greeting Eric and his friend along the way. They looked forward to a rest as they walked up and over the rise to the shack and the tent.

               Straight away, Charlie could tell from Rose’s face, that something was wrong. Tom’s young sisters were sitting on the up-turned fruit boxes, either side of their mother who was standing and swaying back and forth, rocking the crying baby. The girls looked on with much more concern than usual until they noticed the men approaching. ‘Da!’ one of them called, ‘Come, Ma’s been crying.’

               The men hurried their steps to find out what was going on.

               ‘We were only away for a bit,’ said Rose. ‘We only went down to the creek while she had a little rest... She said she wasn’t feeling well.’

               ‘Who?’ 

               ‘Hazel, of course,’ she sobbed. ‘I thought she had been so much happier lately too... We all did.’

               ‘What’s happened?’ said Tom. ‘Where is she?’

               ‘Oh, Tom,’ said his mother. She walked to the opening of the tent and reached in to pick something up from a wooden bench. She took a few steps towards him and held out a piece of paper with a long pencil-written message on it. ‘She’s gone, my boy. Read this.

4. Concealment

It had been a long and sleepless night. Baby Bill had spent his first night sleeping alongside his grandmother in the canvas part of their camp. Tom had tossed and turned in the emptiness of what had been their bed, her murmurs, scent and the disturbances through the night as she tended the baby, all gone. At first light he was splashing water on his face and getting himself ready to find Hazel. ‘She’ll come back,’ he persisted. ‘She must!’

               ‘Oh Tom,’ said Rose rocking Bill in her arms. ‘Not yet. Give her some time. If you go and look for her now, it will make things worse. In a few weeks she’ll be missing her baby; then she might want to see you.’

               ‘Oh, but Ma...’

               ‘Come here, Tom. Come and hold your baby boy. There’s nothing for us to be too worried about. Da and me will take care of us all, including this little fellow. Whatever happens with Hazel, well... everything will be alright.’

               Tom took the baby, wondering how he was ever going to be able to look after him properly. ‘How can everything be alright, Ma?’

~

Hazel woke in her Redfern house well before anyone else had stirred. It had been so soft, lying on a real bed in a room with the younger kids who had been excited to have their big sister home again, albeit without the baby she had left with. She had been full of anticipation on her trip back; the comfort of solid walls, a proper floor and the joy of being surrounded by people she grew up with. The other side to that was her mother, who was sure to be difficult. She had prepared a solid spiel about her failed attempt to make a life with the Davis family.

               Hazel’s mother was shocked the previous evening when she opened the front door to see her daughter standing there with no baby. Emotions spilled over from both, and it took until well into the night, when most of the children were fed, cleaned and put to bed, before they spoke about what had happened over the past five months.

               ‘I thought it was for the best, Ma,’ whispered Hazel, aware that while the other kids were in bed, they’d be doing their best to be listening. ‘Ma Davis takes such good care of him, so much that I think, that he thinks, that she’s his Ma!’

               ‘Ah, you poor mite,’ her mother said. ‘Maybe you’re right. It’s all for the best. Baby William will be well cared for.’

               Hazel’s eyes glistened over as she tried to stifle the flow of tears. ‘Oh Ma, will I ever see him again? How will I ever be able to tell my poor baby that I gave him up... just left him with another family?’

               ‘That’s it, girl,’ said her mother, ‘have a good cry and then you’ll start to be right again.’

               ‘I don’t think so, Ma.’

               ‘You’ve got to put it all behind you now.’ Herr mother pushed on; there was more to be said. ‘Who knows? One day you might see him again, maybe when he’s grown up a tad, but you can never tell him who you are... or what you did.’ 

               Her mother’s message burnt into her mind and Hazel dropped her face into her hands. She pushed the sadness down deep inside where it would never spill out again.

~

Hazel was back in the home of her childhood, but her mother’s scrutiny was never far away. Over the past few days, it had become clear that her place in the family had shifted. Each morning, she opened her eyes to the peeling paint on the ceiling, reminded of where she was. Slowly, reality would creep up upon her and send her mood plummeting.

She had been back for nearly a week when one morning, a physical nausea had her throwing off the bed sheet and dashing out through the back door to the toilet, which was embedded as a small brick room into the back wall of the house.

               She heaved and spluttered, holding her hair back and kneeling over the bowl, waiting for another surge from her insides. She heaved again and again, gasping after each episode until finally it was over. She slowly got to her feet, wiped around her mouth and pulled a rope that flushed it all away. She stepped slowly, breathing deeply as she got to the back door where her mother was standing cross-armed, glaring at her. 

               ‘And how long has this been happening?’ she asked, thinking that for the past five months that Protestant boy would have been doing his best to have his way with her again.

               ‘Ah Ma, just today.’ She couldn’t look at her mother and stared past her towards the kitchen. ‘I feel a lot better now.’

               Hazel felt her mother’s eyes follow her wherever she went from that moment onwards. As she woke each morning with her stomach feeling the need to purge itself of its contents, she would go as quietly as she could to the outhouse and stifle the moans and groans as best as she could while she tipped her load.

               She would creep back into the house softly, slip under her bed sheet and drift off to sleep again, hoping that the curse of her morning sickness wouldn’t burden her again later in the day. 

               When the kitchen became noisy each morning, she would try to join in with her siblings as though everything was normal. She helped with the younger children, getting them some bread and if they were lucky, a small cup of milk, all the while knowing that her mother’s eyes remained fixated on her every move.

               ‘Was that you again this morning in the outhouse, Hazel?’

               ‘No, Ma. I was asleep.’

               She knew that it was just a matter of time before her Ma would know what was inside her; she needed to act. 

               At Happy Valley, Tom had given her a few bob each week, money that he trusted her to keep safe for when they might need it. She thought about the place she could go to make her problem go away. What was it like? Would they hurt her? She had no choice; it was time. 

               The next day Hazel followed her usual charade of disguising her morning sickness before doing her chores. Then she told her mother that she had heard of a woman who lived in the city that might give her some laundry work. The women at Happy Valley had told her about it, but she had forgotten until now.

               ‘It will be grand if I can get us a few more shillings, Ma.’

               Her mother interrogated her for details, but Hazel held her nerve and managed to convince her that the story was true. Satisfied that she had placated her mother, she set off for a laneway in Surrey Hills where in exchange for her money, someone would take her problem away.

               She walked as quickly as she could, her hands trembling as she got to the other end of Cleveland Street. Today she would find out what having a baby taken out really meant, how it was done and when they could do it. The women at Happy Valley hadn’t said much about that. Maybe it would all happen that day and then everything would be back to normal, and she wouldn’t have to pretend anymore.

               By the time she passed the junction of Railway Square, she wore a heavy film of sweat on her brow. Her head was light and dizzy, and her legs threatened to buckle under her unless she slowed down. She continued down Elizabeth Street and then up a steep hill on Albion Street towards the laneway she’d been told about.

               She turned into the dingy lane and felt her heart thump heavily. A narrow strip of cracked road cut between narrow and squashed houses. Her hands shook and, for a moment, she thought about turning around and walking away. Then in the distance she saw it, a red gate in a wooden fence with a shiny brass handle. She baulked, stepping closer until the gate opened inwards. She froze when a young woman in a blue frock, sobbing and hunched over, stepped out and stumbled into the lane.

               ‘Mrs... Hey Mrs...’

               Hazel went to her, wanting to help the distressed woman, but not knowing how. ‘I’ll help you walk, Mrs...’

               The woman looked into Hazel’s eyes and then to her own ankles, where a thin stream of blood trickled from beneath her frock to the ground. ‘No...’

               ‘But you need help.’

               ‘No one can know I’m here,’ she managed as she did her best to clean up her inner leg with a handkerchief she pulled from her bag. She held onto her belly and began to walk away, stumbling every few steps.

               Hazel’s eyes flitted from the poor woman to the red gate with the brass handle that had snapped shut. She wondered what horrors were on the other side of the gate and began to shake. A cold sweat formed on her brow, and she felt sick inside. She turned around and walked away as quickly as she could. I can’t go back to Ma like this. I can’t go back to Tom. There’s nowhere else… I must think of something... Maybe she knows about me already. If she does, I’m done for.

               The walk back to where the day had begun was long and tortuous. Her legs ached and her head was fuzzy from hunger and thirst. When she made her way up Cleveland Street for the final stint, she was at her lowest ebb. If her mother chose that moment to continue chastising her, she knew she wouldn’t be able to contain herself. She would be sure to crumble and betray her facade.

               The gate squeaked loudly, and the front door groaned as she crept along the hallway towards the shared bedroom. She was almost there when the third youngest of her siblings raced in from the tiny concrete square of a backyard. ‘Hazel, where you been?’

               ‘Shh, Mary,’ she snapped. ‘Where’s Ma?’

               ‘Out back, pegging clothes.’

               ‘Orright,’ she said, pushing past the little girl to get to her bed. ‘I’m going to lay down for a bit.’

               She lay her head back on her lumpy pillow and looked up at the ceiling to the familiar patches where the paint had come away. She closed her eyes and gave in to exhaustion, in her mind picturing Tom and Ma Davis cradling baby William while the younger kids stoked up the fire at Happy Valley.

               It may have been minutes or hours, such was the depth of her sleep, when she opened her eyes to her mother standing over her and shaking her shoulder. ‘Hazel,’ she said. ‘No time for that. Now tell me, are you going to do the laundry work?’

               ‘What, Ma?’ she said. ‘What...’

               ‘I’ve let you sleep long enough. Now tell me, the laundry work?’

               ‘Ah, that’s right... I’m sorry Ma, I was too late...’

               Suddenly Hazel felt the sickness in her belly begin to well up again. She sat up and did her best to look as though she was okay, until the urgency of the situation forced her to take a hurried retreat past her mother to the outhouse.

               Try as she may, the sounds of her gagging and spluttering were too obvious and after she pulled the rope to flush away the little bit that had been in her stomach, she went back towards the bedroom. ‘I’m not feeling too well, Ma. I need to lay down again.’

               Her mother’s eyes watched her closely for just one more clue that would remove any doubt about her daughter’s condition. ‘Go on then, rest your head.’

               Hazel sat on the bed, laid back and rolled onto her side. Without thought she rubbed her hand over the contours of her belly, oblivious to the close attention of her mother. It was enough to confirm what the older woman had been mulling over for some time. ‘So where were you today?’ she snapped. ‘Were you seeing that boy again?’

               ‘No, Ma,’ she answered, ‘I told you... I just missed out... like I said.’

               ‘Look at me when I’m talking to you, girl! I want the truth now!’

               ‘Ma, I didn’t see Tom. I haven’t since I left there.’

               ‘The truth, I said. Did he put a baby inside you again? I’ll find out, so you may as well tell me now, girl!’

               The silence was a confession, and with that, the blanket of shame once more descended upon the household. 

               ‘There’s only one thing for it,’ said her mother. ‘It’s St Monica’s for you... for you and the likes of you!’

               Hazel was too exhausted to take on any of her mother’s words. There was nothing left to hide, and the repercussions were sure to be severe. For now though, the urge to sleep was overwhelming and for a brief moment, it gave her respite from the awfulness of reality.

~

Of all the days since Hazel had absconded from Happy Valley, Tom chose that same one to make the trip to try and find her. If Rose was right, Hazel would be aching to see her baby by now. While Hazel had walked for miles through the streets of Surry Hills that morning, he had been making the trek from La Perouse on the coast to the streets of Redfern. For the third time in his life, he was dressed in his father’s best shirt and trousers, noticing that this time, his arms and shoulders and thighs almost filled them. 

               His desire to see her was intense, so much that he had none of the jitters that overwhelmed him on his previous two trips to Cleveland Street. He took long and fast steps, breaking into a jog over the final hundred yards to her front door.

               He knocked loudly and breathed in as deeply as he could. Soon he heard the smack of tiny bare feet on the hard surface inside, running to the door. It opened slowly for him to see Hazel’s sister, reaching up to grip the doorknob. ‘Ma,’ she called loudly. ‘It’s the mongrel scoundrel dog!’

               With that he heard dishes being dropped into a sink followed by quick and heavy steps of the mother stomping towards him. ‘Get inside Patricia!’ she scolded, as the little girl scampered. ‘You! How dare you!’

               ‘Please... please, Mrs O’Brien...’

               ‘If my husband was here, he’d beat the day lights out of you!’

               ‘But I only want to see Hazel,’ he spluttered. ‘She must want to see Bill by now...’

               Inside the bedroom, Hazel woke to the commotion and lay still as if paralysed from what she was hearing. Tom was right; she did ache to see baby William and if the truth be known, to see him as well. She knew too, however, that her mother was right, and her union with him was nothing but shameful. Only more grief would come from it.

               ‘I will tell you once, and once only,’ she barked, ‘and then you will go and not ever return!’

               ‘Please, Mrs O’Brien...’

               ‘Hazel has gone,’ she said, emphasising every syllable. ‘She’s gone to do the only respectable thing. She’s at the home for girls like her... in disgrace.’

               ‘Where?’ he pleaded, ‘What home?’

               Hazel hurt with every part of the lie she heard being told, fighting her instincts to rush outside and tell him that she was there, and she wanted to hold William. Girls like me, shamefuland disgraceful... Go away, Tom... Take good care of baby William.

               She rolled onto her side and buried her head into the pillow, folding it over her ears to block out the world.

               ‘That’s not for you to know. Away with you and don’t come back!’ were her final words as she pushed the heavy door shut in his face. She should never have trusted the Protestant Davis family with her daughter in the first place and she vowed never to do it again. Let them deal with the consequences and keep the shameful William as their own. And let St Monica’s take the Protestant’s next evil spawn to teach Hazel a lesson once and for all.

               Tom walked slowly along Cleveland Street towards Railway Square. He paid no attention to what was on the road, for he was still trying to take in what Mrs O’Brien had told him and ambled across the street right in front of a horse and buggy. The huge animal baulked suddenly, jolting the man in the buggy forward. ‘Have a look where you’re going, you drongo!’ he yelled.

               Tom looked up and waved an apology, as the whiff of fresh horse droppings shot through his nostrils. He walked on, mulling over each thing Hazel’s mother had said, helpless to do anything about it. This hurts so much.She doesn’t have a clue that I’m trying to find her. Where is she? What is this ‘home for girls like her’?