Pearl in a Cage by Joy Dettman Read Free Book Online Page A

step as he stretched out the leather concertina section of his camera, lined up on the coffin, then disappeared beneath a black sheet. There was a blinding flash and it was done.
    His mother wanted to get away, but John took a step nearer to the coffin. It was too sad. A pretty woman’s final photograph shouldn’t be in a cheap dress in a cheap box in a greasy cellar.
    â€˜Can you . . . do something with her hair, Mum?’
    She couldn’t, but Moe Kelly removed the pins and settled it around her shoulders. John moved his equipment closer, close enough to capture her face in near profile.
    â€˜Can you move some of her hair over that grazing, Mr Kelly?’
    The hair was moved, then, overcome by sadness, John hid again beneath his black sheet to clear his eyesight before capturing the final photograph of a beautiful stranger he’d caught sleeping.
    Â 
    They buried her at eight in the morning on the first day of January, 1924. Vern Hooper was there, Gertrude, Constable Ogden, the local parson, Moe Kelly, John McPherson and hismother, and the grave diggers, who stood back, studying their blisters.
    What was there to say about a nameless woman no one had yet missed, when you didn’t know if she was Catholic, Muslim, Jew or Callithumpian? What could you do but go to the good book and find something to say? The parson chose a brief passage. Then she was gone.
    It wasn’t the type of funeral any one of those mourners might have wished for themselves. No one wanted to hang around. The parson and the McPhersons left together. Vern, Ernie and Gertrude followed them to a big old gum tree growing on the far side of the cemetery gates. Ernie’s bike leaned against it, Gertrude’s horse was tethered to one of its low-hanging branches, Vern’s car was parked in its shade.
    â€˜What’s happening with the infant?’ Vern asked.
    Ernie was more interested in his bike’s back tyre. It had a slow puncture or a leaking valve.
    â€˜I spooned some water into her before I left, but there’s so little of her. She’s weakening,’ Gertrude said.
    â€˜We’ve got nursing mothers in town. There’ll be one amongst them who’ll take her in until we can see if any of her folk are found,’ Ernie said, applying a bit of spit to his valve, which didn’t seem to be leaking.
    No problem at all in finding a nursing mother in Woody Creek; the begetting of kids was the main activity after sundown. Finding one willing to take on an extra baby was the problem. Ogden had already asked a few chaps if their wives might be willing. He’d found no takers. Kids came, wanted or not, and their folk welcomed them, but it took a special type of person to put the same time and effort into a stranger’s infant.
    â€˜Paul Jenner’s wife is a kindly sort of girl,’ Vern said.
    â€˜She’s got enough to deal with right now,’ Gertrude said.
    â€˜Could you see your way clear to getting the babe down to Willama?’ Ogden asked Vern.
    â€˜I’d have Joanne down there if I thought the car would make it. These temperatures would have her kettle boiling before I hit the ten-mile post.’
    â€˜What’s wrong with her?’ Gertrude said.
    â€˜The usual, aggravated by too many folk treating her house like a hotel.’
    It was Joanne’s house, built for her by her first husband. Vern had done the wrong thing by offering to put up the Duckworths.
    â€˜There’s still a few hanging around, I see,’ Ogden said.
    â€˜Not at my place,’ Vern said with feeling.
    Ogden mounted his bike and pushed off; Gertrude freed the rein, swung up to the saddle and was away. Vern stood on alone, watched her ride.
    He may have been the wealthiest man in the district. There wasn’t much in life he couldn’t have if he wanted it — apart from what he’d wanted since his eighteenth birthday and maybe even before that: Gertrude.