Circle of fight

CHAPTER 28

I was up bright and early. Well, early anyway. Bronte had stayed the night and Lee turned up for breakfast, along with Homer. Fi arrived about ten, so we had a good chance to get a lot done, although there were heaps of interruptions. I knew that no matter how much work we did, the place wasn’t going to be perfect, so I just had to accept that.

Fi brought a lot of flowers with her, because there weren’t too many in our garden compared to when my mother looked after it, so she started putting those in vases all through the house. Homer and Lee got stuck into the machinery shed, tidying it up a bit more, and Bronte and I cleaned away breakfast. Then I did a mow while Bronte cut back the grass around the dog pens. Fi started baking scones, so there’d be a nice smell through the house for the final inspection. Not everyone can cope with our stove but Fi handled it with ease.

Marmie ran around and got in everyone’s way, while I tried to check that she wasn’t doing a dump anywhere.

After Madeleine’s report I was very self-conscious about dogs doing stuff they weren’t meant to. Well, doing it in places they weren’t meant to, anyway.

At least the auction and all the preparations were taking my mind off Gavin. I hadn’t seen him since Thursday and I’d told him I probably wouldn’t be able to visit today, although maybe I’d get there if the sale was over quickly. The cottage he was in didn’t look too bad and he said the other kids were OK, but they were all older than him, and I noticed he didn’t mix with them. He said the food was crap, but Gavin always says that, even about the meals I make sometimes. Which admittedly aren’t always perfect.

We’d already had a couple of open days for buyers to come and have a look, plus Jerry Parsons had been bringing people for private inspections almost every day, so the place wasn’t really too messy. At one-thirty they were allowed to poke around again, so we had to be done by then. It was such a violation, having all these strangers trample around making loud comments on the way you do things, but that’s the way it was and if all went well I wouldn’t have to worry about it again after today.

Mr Parsons was good, he got there at about noon, with his son and daughter, who came along for the ride. They even brought their own lunch. I knew Justin from school. He was a good kid who was into outdoors stuff and wanted to be a farmer. They pitched in and helped too, moving a pile of roofing iron which we hadn’t had time to move ourselves. Don’t know how many snakes they found under it but I reckon there would have been one or two. The crowd started coming in early, about one-fifteen. Jerry Parsons had an assistant at the front gate, and they were in contact by walkie-talkie, but it got to the point where he said he couldn’t hold them much longer, so in they stampeded. It was like an endless convoy coming up the driveway. I didn’t know there were that many people in Wirrawee. But there’s nothing like an auction to get people out and about. Everyone loves an auction, except when it’s your own I guess, cos I wasn’t too much in love with this one.

I was glad Gavin wasn’t there to see it. His bedroom was the neatest it had ever been, thanks to Fi, but he wouldn’t have recognised it. There could have been three hundred people go through it during the afternoon. As Homer said, I wish I’d sold tickets. Homer was great and I stuck close to him. Lee kept a low profile. This kind of thing wasn’t his scene.

I saw people I hadn’t seen in years, along with all the old familiar faces of course. Homer’s parents were there, being potential bidders, not to mention being my guardians. But really, it was like Ms Randall had picked up on, they didn’t often waste too much time with that. There were all the other neighbours: the Youngs, whom I’d grown to love like they were a second family; the Lucases; the Nelsons, who were as bad as Mr Rodd. Mrs Rowntree, from Tara, with her new husband, a horse trainer. They were turning their place into a horse stud. Young Tammie Murdoch, who was as wild as her grandmother, and had inherited the family property just the other day. Jodie Lewis, from Wirrawee, who’d been run over ages ago, and was in hospital for ages, and she still wasn’t right, even though she was walking again. The McPhails and Randall, the big lout, still living at home and sponging off his parents. Col McCann. I felt so guilty about his bull. I wondered if he’d sent it to the abattoir. He’d never mentioned the two dead men to me, but I hadn’t asked either. Mr Roxburgh, from Gowan Brae, one of the best farmers in the district; Mrs Leung, who’d lost her husband in the war; and Mr Jay, who must have been ninety-five but hadn’t aged a day in the last five years and who I was now convinced would live forever. Sal Grinaldi was there, wanting to tell me a joke, and Mr George, and Morrie Cavendish complaining about rainfall, and my good mate Jack Edgecombe. Even the Kings came down from the hills.

At the same time, though, there were so many people I didn’t know, most of the crowd in fact, that it made me realise even more forcefully how things were changing. The old days were gone, that was for sure, and after today they’d be a bit more gone.

I don’t know how many people were actually thinking of buying the place. Could have been none. It wouldn’t have surprised me. No, the Linton place was the main tourist attraction in the Wirrawee district this weekend and everyone had turned up for the free entertainment.

The CWA were doing a sausage sizzle so we got our lunch from them. At least they didn’t charge me.

The auction started about ten minutes late, out the front. Jerry Parsons said to wait inside the house but I couldn’t, so I perched on the lowest branch of the old oak tree on the other side of the driveway, the tree I had spent so many hours in as a kid, and, with a hand on Homer’s head below me, tightly watched and listened as Mr Parsons started firing up the crowd.

I can’t remember everything he said, but there was a lot of stuff about this being a famous property, one of the best in the district, ‘lovingly developed and maintained by successive generations of the Linton family’, with improvements including ‘this gracious home behind me, which I’m sure you’ve all had a good chance to look through by now, and the very spacious machinery shed, along with the shearing shed which is one of the oldest in the district and has been recognised by the National Trust as being of historic significance, and most recently a fine new set of cattle yards which have just been completed’. He read a lot of that stuff off the brochure.

But eventually the time came. The knot in my stomach tightened. I really had no idea how many people might be bidding. Jerry Parsons said there were four people who’d had at least three looks at the place, and then of course there were some of the neighbours who would have only needed to see it once, if at all. But Jerry also said that there mightn’t be a single bid. ‘You just never know,’ he said. ‘I always tell people not to get their hopes up.’

A large part of me would have been quite happy to get no bids, and then I could stay on living here, but I knew that wasn’t a good idea. Besides, I’d made my mind up to leave, and I guess that meant I’d said goodbye to the place in my head. And my heart. Once you’ve done that it’s hard to go back.

‘Now it’s time for you to do what you’ve come here today to do,’ Mr Parsons shouted. He was getting good and worked up. ‘And that’s to put your hand up if you want to give yourself a chance of becoming the new owner of this magnificent property. The first new owner in nearly a century. A property like this only comes along about once in a century.’

‘That’s what he says every week,’ whispered Polly Addams, to my right, and a few people laughed. I kept my head down.

‘When you bid, bid good. Don’t be bashful about it.

Stick your hand up where we can see it. And now I’m asking for a bid to get me started. What’ll it be, ladies and gentlemen? How much will you give me for this wonderful property and all its improvements? Who’ll get me started? Come on now, is there a million? Will you say a million? There must be a million, surely?’

The suspense was terrible. Everyone was looking at the ground, except the kids, who were staring in every direction, hoping to see a hand wave. Maybe the adults were afraid to make eye contact with any of the auctioneer’s staff in case it was taken as a bid.

I didn’t see anyone move or hear anyone but then Jerry Parsons suddenly said, ‘Eight hundred is it? All right, I’ll take eight hundred, to get me started. It’s very low but I’ll take it. Now we’re here today to sell, ladies and gentlemen, so don’t be shy. Do I have eight fifty? Yes I do, to my right there.’

‘Nine hundred,’ someone near me yelled and we were away.

‘That was Mr Rodd,’ Homer whispered. My face burned. ‘No way!’ There was no way in the world I would sell the place to Mr Rodd!

But the auction was galloping and bids were coming from left, right and centre, literally. They raced to 1.2 million, then slowed down, until only three people were bidding, it seemed to me. It was very hard to tell what was happening. You must need eyes in the back of your head to be an auctioneer. Then one person dropped out and the bidding suddenly slowed to a dawdle. They started going up by $25,000 at a time, then by tens. ‘You’re going to be a millionaire,’ Homer muttered.

‘The bank takes most of it. Are your parents bidding?’

‘I’ve been watching them. Dad waved his hand a couple of times but they only saw him once, I think. It’s too rich for us now.’

We were up to 1.38 million. A man in a brown jacket and a blue tie was one of the bidders, and the other was a guy wearing a suit, on the far side of the crowd. I didn’t know either of them, but I suddenly realised Don Murray was standing next to the man in the suit, like he was advising him. I wondered then if the man was the plastic surgeon Don managed Blackwood Springs for. He’d have a few bob.

Jerry had told me that 1.5 million would be a good result, and to sell if we got 1.4, so it looked like the place was going to go.

Homer said suddenly, ‘I’m glad we’re not buying it. It would have felt weird. It’s your place. I’d feel bad trampling all over it.’

I didn’t answer because I didn’t know what to say to that. Finally I said, ‘I’m just glad Mr Rodd’s dropped out.’

The winner seemed to be 1.38. Jerry Parsons was waving his arm around like a badly balanced windmill, and saying, ‘I give you fair warning, if there’s no more bids I’m going to knock it down to the gentleman under the walnut tree, I’m selling for the first time, for the second time now, I’m going to sell it, fair warning, ladies and gentlemen, for the third time and sol-’

‘One point four,’called Mr Rodd.

The hammer stopped in midair. Mr Parsons looked at him and said, ‘Your timing’s pretty tight there, Max,’ then he went straight back into normal auctioneer mode, yelling, ‘I’ve got 1.4 now, ladies and gentlemen, that’s more like it, new bidder at one million four hundred thousand, and I’ll take fives, what about you sir, just another five thousand could be enough to secure this magnificent property, in prime condition but still plenty of room for improvement, it’d make a superb bed and breakfast or guesthouse…’ and on and on, but I felt the heat had gone out of it and Mr Rodd was going to get it. I felt sick. Could I withdraw the property from the auction just because I didn’t like Mr Rodd? But if I did, the move to town with Gavin would be delayed even further. Which was more important, Gavin or the property? I’d already answered that question.

I slipped down from the tree and walked away, not wanting to look at anyone, revolted by the thought of Mr Rodd walking through our house, sitting in our kitchen, sleeping in my parents’ bedroom. I felt like I’d swallowed a large amount of wet cow manure.

Taking a few more steps I reached the sundial and looked out across the garden to the paddocks beyond. I guess on most properties you have the kind of line that we had on ours, where the neat, civilised garden, full of hollyhocks and roses and hydrangeas, ends and the bare Australian countryside begins. It’s a bit funny really, the way the gardens are. The line is so definite. First one, then the other. Like you’re in a house, only one without walls, then suddenly you’re outside, facing the cracked ground and the yellow and brown grass and the slightly washed-out-looking gum trees and the ochrered cattle. For a moment I tried to ask my parents what I should do. I wanted a psychic vision: I begged them to appear from across the valley and float towards me, speaking words of wisdom ‘Let it be, let it be.’ Wait a minute, that wasn’t my parents. That was the song. But at the same time I realised I didn’t really need my parents because the answer was already in my own head. Courtesy of the Beatles. It would have been nice if my parents had appeared and said those words, sure, but I knew what I wanted them to say. ‘Let it be, let it go, let it pass, this phase of your life is over, face the next stage now, go on into the future.’

I became dimly aware that Jerry was still shouting away behind me. It seemed that the auction wasn’t over yet. I turned around and walked back to the edge of the arena. ‘One and a half,’ Mr Parsons yelled, ‘One and a half. Is there anything else you want to say to me? If there is, let’s hear it. I’m going to sell, I’m going to sell it, for the first time, for the second time, don’t walk away from here filled with regret, ladies and gentlemen, last chance, third time, fair warning, I’m selling’, and down came the hammer.

‘Sold for one and a half million dollars, and congratulations, you’ve acquired a very fine property, and thank you everybody for coming here today…’

As he wound up with a free ad for his next auction I looked around desperately. Where was Homer? Fi? Bronte? Lee? I couldn’t ask anyone else the big question: who’d bought the place? I’d feel too stupid. I started walking towards the house and then ran into Bronte. I clutched at her. ‘Who bought it? Who bought it?’

‘God, I don’t know, how would I know? I don’t know anyone’s names.’

‘Where’s Homer?’

‘I’m not sure. Wait, there’s Lee.’

Lee came over and I took both his hands with mine. ‘Who bought it, do you know?’

‘Yeah, it was the twins’ dad. Mr Young.’

‘Oh thank God. Are you sure?’

‘Yeah, that other guy, Rodd, he went for it pretty hard but Mr Young just kept nodding away like he didn’t care how much he paid for it, and eventually Rodd gave up.’

‘Oh that’s such a relief.’ I let go a little, let myself mould in with Lee, felt him tense against me before he too started to relax. A sudden delight ran through us both — I felt it as much in him as I did in myself. He hugged me. His passion, which had smouldered for so long, was ready to burst into wild flames and when it came to Lee I was totally combustible. ‘Hey, careful you two,’ Bronte said. ‘Here comes Homer.’

I grinned at her. ‘So?’

‘Well you know, the one you’re in love with? The one who’s in love with you?’

‘Homer? You’ve got to be kidding. Is that who you were talking about? Homer!’

I couldn’t believe the Scarlet Pimple had got it so wrong.

‘Bronte! Are you crazy? I’m in love with Lee!’