The girl with nine toes, Ray Wilkins [black female authors .TXT] 📗

the homestead, the school you
went to , and Cooper Pedy's such a beautifull place - and
full of Opal shops!„
I smiled. “Okay my love I'll start organising it, maybe we
can stay in one of those underground hotels?„
“No fear mate!„ she answered shaking her head
vigorously , and her long blond hair waved in the wind.
“You forget that I get claustrophobia when I sleep in
closed up spaces, how about a camper? My Dad knows a
place where we can get a good price, then we can take
our time driving up and stay wherever we want and… its
so romantic! And that’s very important for a honeymoon
or do you think otherwise? John Raymond Macmillan ?„
I felt my face getting red and looking down into
her deep blue eyes I mumbled. “Who am I to resist your
womanly charms.„ She looked back at me, then took me
into her arms and kissed me passionately standing in the
middle of the downtown Civic Center.
The next few weeks flew by very quickly, I received
my Bachelor of Politics and Commerce from the
National university , Mary and I got married at All Saints
church, my mother filed for divorce , and we were ready
to drive up to Coober Pedy in our rented, small but
romantic camper. On the morning of our departure we
rose early. Looking out the kitchen window I could see
the sun coming up over mount Ainslie and I knew it was
going to be a fantastic day, full of sunshine and
excitement .“John, have you packed the camera and film?
what about the reserve water canister? and the new maps
I bought last week, are they in the glove box?„
“ My darling everything is packed and organised.
Relax, put your feet, up and fasten your seat belt, South
Australia here we come!„ I backed slowly out of the
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driveway not yet used to the size of the vehicle, she put
her hand on my thigh and with the other hand she
opened up the road map.
“Relax? How can I relax with your sense of
direction, I have to even give you driving directions
when we go to Cotter Dam for a day.„ she laughed.
When we got onto the highway my mind started
wandering , thinking back to the past, to the place where
I lived my childhood. We owned a small homestead
standing outside the opal fields. I remember the animals
we had, the chickens, the sheep that I helped my father
shear every spring, and our dog Frosty - a rather
cantankerous Samoyed who never quite got used to
swallowing dry yellow dust instead of freshly fallen snow.
I remember the Aborigine camp where a lot of my
friends lived. The taste of my first Witchity grubs and
learning to play the Didgeridoo.
But mostly I remember Waraala, dressed in feathers
and painted with ochre mud, who taught me how to use
the Woomera and Boomerang - the stories he used to
tell us about the Dreamtime and the earthy smell of his
skin. We drove the whole day and towards evening when
I started thinking again about my childhood Mary's voice
brought me back to the present.
“John, you turn right at the next exit, then keep
driving for 25 miles until we reach a bridge - maybe we
can stop there by the river and take a rest.„
“That’s a good idea my love I'm starting to feel
tired and we still have a good two hundred miles to go.„
It was an old wooden bridge leaning over a small
unknown river that was dry anyway.There were three
Weeping Willow trees struggling to survive the heat on
one side of the river , and on the other side there was a
small flat area where we parked the camper.“This looks
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great!„ I said, looking up and down the dried up river
bed. I could see nothing but sand and rocks and a few
trees and bushes struggling for life, competing with the
willow trees to survive. Mary walked up beside me and
put her arm around my waist.
“Isn’t it beautifull? so much space and freedom,
unspoiled and pure - magical.„
“Is that the lawyer speaking or the Poet? But you
are right this is like standing at the beginning of time
.This is the country untouched by human hands,
unchanged, it almost seems like the Earth is holding her
breath to keep back time. I remember the colours and
shapes as a boy , walking barefoot across our land you
could see people and animal forms in the rocks and
termite hills , and when the wind came up you could
almost hear the spirits singing. The older Aborigines used
to talk about a very special spirit who could change lives,
they used to call her the girl with nine toes. The old people
used to say that she came whenever a great change was
going to happen in the country , and spoke always with
the elders - with the leaders of the tribes, teaching them
how to make the right decisions by listening to their
heart.„
“That girl I would like to meet, but I would
probably have to become the first female Prime Minister
of Australia to attract her attention.„
“Who knows what the future holds said the girl
with nine toes.„ We both laughed aloud at my corny joke
and the Galahs sitting in the Willow trees flew up to the
steel blue sky.
We made ourselves a small fire and boiled up a billy
full of tea. As the sun went down we sat by the fire
talking into the night. We stayed overnight beside this
old dried up river and before I fell asleep I listened for a
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long time to the noises outside, the crickets chirping their
relentless melodies, the rustle of the spinnafex rolling
across the plain driven by the hot dry wind, and in the
early morning light the laugh of a Kookaburra waking us
up to remind us about where we were bound. We hit the
road at seven, to drive the last two hundred miles to our
destination.
“John, tell me why haven’t you mentioned the
story about the girl with nine toes before, you have talked
about all those other Dreamtime stories that you heard as
a kid around the campfire with your aborigine friends ,
but never this one - - why's that?„
“No idea love, it seems just to have escaped my
mind ,and it popped up again in my memory recently ;
and anyway its one of those special ones that has it own
songlines and nobody seems to know what it really
means. Waraala used to say that she could cross the
bridge between reality and the dreamtime - that's like
thinking with your conscious mind and your
subconscious at the same time. Like setting up a dialogue
so that you can create your own future with what you
know, what you knew , and what you will know in an
instant. Through this reality you were able to change the
future before it even happened. It all sounds rather
complicated , maybe that’s why I've put it in the back of
my mind over all these years.„ I looked over at Mary and
she had a really weird look on her face, she smiled, “John
do you know why I love you?„
“No darling, you tell me„
“Because whatever you do and however long you
try, you just can't hide behind your feelings, and the part of
you that I love the most is your spirit - and one day you will get to
know this part of you, and then you will know that you are going
home John ! Watch out there's a snake on the road!„
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I quickly steered in the other direction and soon
had the van once again under my control .“Now why did
that make me lose my concentration, this girl with the
missing toe seems to be coming a part of our
honeymoon, hope she's not moved into the back of the
camper.„
We soon arrived at the Coober Pedy camping site,
turning into the driveway I could see the other campers
and caravans, people all over the place, the souvenir
shop. Everything was built for the comfort of the
customers ,even down to the “Opal café„ where you
could sit under rainbow coloured sun umbrellas and drink
tea or beer. I looked at Mary seeing in her expression
exactly what I was thinking. I turned the camper around
and drove back onto the road. “No way, Mary, I'm sorry
I didn’t realise that it was so modern . I remember a more
natural camping site with trees and bushes instead of
plastic and beer tables, and there used to be a little creek
at the back that sometimes even had water in it.„ Mary
just laughed.
“Ah! John don’t worry about it, lets just drive out into
the bush maybe near there where you lived, there should
be some place where we can make camp, and if we need
to get some water or load up the battery then we'll just
drive into town”. It had been fifteen years now since I
had left for Canberra ,but it felt like fifteen days, the
roads were the same, the shops and pubs and the opal
seller’s shops were the same, the only thing that seemed
to have changed was the camping site.