Tears of the Moon - Di Morrissey [174]
The old woman felt a rush of affection and she started to shake as she flustered, ‘Why you and Mollie no tell us? Never mind, you here, and dat’s good news, eh?’ But she hugged Olivia tightly and Olivia felt tears rush to her eyes. Minnie had always been a key part of her life in Broome.
‘I’ve brought someone to meet you, Minnie.’ Georgie ran forward past Minnie and onto the verandah. ‘That’s Georgie,’ said Olivia with a laugh. Then turning towards Maya started to say, ‘And this is … ’ but stopped as she saw the expression on Minnie’s face change.
‘I know who this is. You don’t have t’introduce me to my own family. This be Maya growed up.’ The older woman reached out to the shy young woman. ‘You still got your totem your mumma get you, eh?’
Maya looked confused for a moment then touched her chest and lifted the pendant that hung around her neck. Minnie glanced at it and nodded with a small murmur of satisfaction. ‘I better make tea, we got a lotta talkin’ to do. Place all locked up, but we fix t’ings up no trouble.’ She marched ahead catching Georgie and sweeping her into her arms. ‘Watch you step, Missy. I kin see you gonna have to mind Minnie now.’
Maya and Olivia exchanged a smile as they went into the house.
By the following evening, with Rosminah and Yusef helping, they were all settled into the house. It felt strange to Olivia, strange because she felt so at home once more. There were only good memories here, some tinged with sadness true, but it was the happy times she relived … her ordered life with Conrad and Hamish, the excitement of setting up Star of the Sea, of Hamish playing with baby Maya, the twilight evenings with Tyndall on the verandah, good friends like the Mettas, and always, the talk of pearls, diving, luggers and adventures. How sedate her life in Fremantle was … at this point Olivia forced herself to stop reflecting on the past, and ran through for the umpteenth time how it would be when Tyndall found his daughter was returned to him.
Maya asked no questions about him, so no one pressed facts, anecdotes or information on her. Instead, the demanding, wilful Georgie kept everyone occupied.
‘She trouble that one,’ said Minnie privately to Alf. ‘She like stone in the shoe. Dunno where she come from. I reckon Georgie belong some other tribe. She’s a wild one.’
‘She’ll grow up, Minnie. She’s only a little one,’ replied Alf.
Yusef had been detailed to watch for the return of the fleet. And so one morning as the damp mist cleared from across glassy gold water that silently swallowed the mangroves, he saw the shimmering silhouettes of three luggers. Their fat jarrah hulls were low to the water as they headed for Dampier Creek to unload the haul of shell.
Yusef trotted back through town to tell Olivia that Tyndall, Ahmed, Yoshi and Captain Evans were on their way to the foreshore camp.
Now that the occasion had arrived, Olivia was nervous. Glancing at Maya, she realised she was too. They’d decided Minnie would look after Georgie. So Olivia and Maya set off.
How many times Tyndall had looked towards the shore and remembered Olivia standing there, hair blowing about her face, hand shading her eyes as she watched them sail in, desperate to be close to him, anxious for news of their haul. And there she was, just as he’d imagined a hundred times. He shook his head. It was one of those hot mornings where mirages often materialised over the water.
He looked at the shore again. The low line of the sheds of foreshore camps hunched in a smudgy line, a scatter of palm trees sentinel against the morning sky.
She was still there. And walking to her side was the slim figure of another woman. Waist-length dark hair blew around her shoulders and for a second a past image of Niah, hanging over the side of the Shamrock with her long hair framing her face, covering her breasts, came back to him.
But these were real people, for now