What You've Got Within You

8: Perth 1957

8Perth 1957

James Henderson’s sentence was over. He sat beaming as the train shook and rumbled south towards Perth. All he could think of was Jenny. She dominated his consciousness. His memory of her sweet face. Her voice. Her touch. He let her memory free to take flight in his mind. Glittering pulses of light speeding down disused neural pathways, lightening, lifting his spirit. The horror of the past twelve months ebbed out of him. It was already a lifetime away.

He had no doubt Jenny Jenkins would be there for him. She had to be. He was certain of his own feelings. He knew when he was right. He could not countenance any error in his interpretation of her feelings towards him. She must feel the way he did. There was no question about it.

As his head rocked to the rhythmic bumps of the train, he closed his eyes, thinking of Jenny. He drifted off to sleep in contagious peace. Passengers stared at the small, odd man slumped on the bench seat in an endless reverie. They smiled as they looked at his relaxed face before turning to gaze out the windows at the staggering vastness washing away in a blur of colour.

Jenny stood nervously on the platform as the dirty red rattler eased itself to a stop. It had been a busy twelve months working in the King Edward Memorial Hospital for Women. She had been glad for the relentless demands of work, the changeable shifts, the drudgery, the ecstasy of new life squealing its arrival in an otherwise soundless night. Work had distracted her from the profound loneliness she felt creeping up on her every time she paused to think. She longed for the return of James so that her life could start again. She had not enjoyed the dances her friends had dragged her to. She had not listened to the flattering, insisting advances of the young (and old) doctors on the wards. She wanted James. Would he be the same man she had pictured in her brain?

James was one of the first passengers to disembark. He stepped on to the platform with his battered leather case and turned to his right to look down the length of the wide, concrete platform. There were very few people waiting for the new arrivals. But she was one of them. She stood twenty metres away, petite, anxious, beautiful. Her face looking at his enquiringly. Her eyes questioning his intentions, his heart. The red lips, moving into a tentative fragment of a smile, vanishing with a frown. James stared at Jenny as her gloved hand rose to greet him, hanging in the air uncertainly as he had left her. He then smiled. He watched as doubt disappeared and her face lit up. They walked towards each other radiating, attracting, pulling in with a pure, liberating joy.

They paused for a second, a grinning couple caught within a private, irresistible electricity, as the business of the railway station languidly flowed on. And then they embraced. They held each other tightly. So tightly the tide of air stilled in their lungs and their arms fatigued with the pressure. They kissed. The long months of the aching separation was released. Their passion streamed through them, uniting them in a fierce bond. Jenny wept. She laughed. James pushed her face gently away to see her tears. And then he hugged her with all his might.

“I love you, Jenny. I can’t think of anything else. I don’t know how I got through that without you.”

“Please, don’t leave me again. Please don’t. I love you so much,” Jenny mumbled through their kiss.

They stood holding each other, whispering affections, until a porter politely asked them to move so that he could push his trolley of luggage along the platform. They moved aside apologetically to let him pass. He shook his head as he trudged by. They laughed, held each other again and then walked out the exit, James with one arm around Jenny, the other holding on to his small suitcase. They emerged into warm sunlight and a gentle sea breeze.

They checked in to a room at the nearby hotel. James was impatient to tell Jenny of the plans that had been stewing for months in the heat of the Gorge. “Jenny, I heard a lot of things about the eastern states while I was up north. The west is no good. Some of the boys were going to head over to Sydney or Melbourne after their time was up in the mine. I think that’s where the opportunities are.”

“What are you suggesting? Are you thinking of running away from me again? That doesn’t sound like a good idea to me.”

James was not sure she was serious. Was he being reprimanded? He was not going to take the risk. “No, no, Jenny. I’m not running away from you. I wouldn’t do that. I want you to come with me.” Suddenly realising where he was blundering at break-neck speed, James hesitated. What am I saying? He thought. Jenny looked at him waiting for it. He could not see the playfulness in her expression. He thought about it a moment longer and then, “You see, Jenny, I was hoping… you know… I was hoping you would marry me.” There, he’d done it. And now that he had, he was having trouble reading her reaction. He forged on. “Jenny, will you marry me? Will you marry me and come with me to the eastern states?” He gulped and stared at her bug-eyed.

“God, James, I thought you’d never ask. Of course, I will. Do you think I want to stay here all my life?” She laughed. He was overjoyed.

“Fantastic,” he said, and leant over and kissed her. They were both sitting on the edge of James’s bed. As they touched, they simultaneously lost balance and fell backwards onto the mattress in a clumsy, fervent embrace.

The curtains swayed out and into the respirations of the wind through the windows. A splatter of light fell over the wallpaper with each movement, illuminating columns of flowers separated by thick golden lines. Outside, the bustling sounds of an infant city rose in the warm air to be aspirated into the room as the fabric gaped.

Later, the susurration of the moving curtains felt like the only sound in the world. James and Jenny lay side by side staring at the shadowy intricacies of a ceiling rose. The light was fading. Their thoughts turned to the future and they held each other tightly as if by sheer willpower they could forever ward off their fears.

At dinner, Jenny agreed she would quit her job the next day and that James would book berths on the next ship sailing to Sydney. As it turned out, they only had three days to wait before being able to leave Perth.

While waiting, James and Jenny spent the time visiting some of the sights around the city. James was amazed at the contrast between the broad reaches of the Swan River and the gloomy Clyde. The coruscating light was almost blinding. And the breeze from the ocean, warm, salty, invigorating. So different from the foul reek of heavy industry in Glasgow. They strolled along the foreshore of the beaches, felt the hot sands massaging their pale feet, sat gazing out at the deep, blue swells rolling and crashing apart into a spume of thousands of tiny white gems. They felt happy, expectant. This country offered them so much hope compared to the impoverished narrowness of their homelands.