Stillwater Creek by Alison Booth

irregular slabs of shadow from the buildings opposite. The curtains of Miss Neville’s bedroom were now drawn and there was a lamp on in the sitting room downstairs, although more than that she could not see. Further down the hill, the woman with the purple hat and her child were leaving the post office.
    Bill came out from behind the bar and stood in the doorway overlooking the square. ‘There are the reffoes,’ he said loudly. ‘Been here for over a week now and hardly been out at all. Thewoman’s spent the whole time scrubbing out the house and playing the piano, Mrs Blunkett said, but I saw the kid hanging around outside the post office the other day.’
    All of the drinkers, even the most morose or loquacious, gave up what they were doing and flocked to the windows. Cherry seized the opportunity to dash into the hallway. She took a compact out of the drawer in the hallstand. In the bar the men were now commenting so loudly it was a wonder the reffoes didn’t hear.
    â€˜Jeez, have a perv at that,’ said one. ‘Wouldn’t mind gettin’ stuck into ’er.’
    â€˜Good looker, sport. Where’d ja say they were from?’
    â€˜Didn’t. Just bloody reffoes from Sydney.’
    â€˜Better than bloody Abos, eh?’
    â€˜Yeah, the reffoes work and the coons don’t.’
    â€˜What’re they doing down here? The season don’t start till November. Don’t get no holidaymakers from Sydney this time of year.’
    â€˜Dunno. Why doncha ask? Satisfy your curiosity the bloody obvious way.’
    In the hallway Cherry finished powdering her face. Silly gossips, she thought as she slipped the compact back into the drawer; far worse than a bunch of women. For a moment more she stood listening as the conversation continued.
    â€˜Poor little kid looks a bit lost.’
    â€˜Sydney, you say they’re from?’
    â€˜Yeah, but they’re reffoes from Europe. Husband dead. She’s a widow.’
    The men sobered up a bit at this. Probably thinking it could have been one of them or one of their sons, Cherry thought. Could have been their widow and daughter beached up in Jingera.
    Slipping out the side door onto the verandah, she found she was too late to meet the reffoes. They were walking on the other side of the road, heading down the hill towards the McIntyres’ cottage and not into the square as she’d hoped. Then the woman and the girl both turned at the same time and looked straight at Cherry, who smiled and waved. The woman hesitated before waving back. The girl had an engaging grin.
    She watched the pair walk down the hill and turn into the front gate of the McIntyres’ cottage, a shack rather than cottage, held together more by vines than nails. A bit like the place she’d grown up in, only that didn’t have the vines.
    The clock struck the quarter hour. Back in the bar, she collected empty glasses and wiped down the messier tabletops. Then, putting on a bright smile, she returned to the serving side of the counter to take more orders.

Six feet underground were bones. Catholic bones, Protestant bones. But none of the other denominations. Ilona picked her way around the listing gravestones and the signs partitioning the faiths. The cemetery, on the top of the headland, was bound on the cliff side by a white-painted fence. Beyond that, on a narrow ribbon of land, bloomed blue-flowering shrubs of a type she’d never come across before. Standing here she could see in all directions. To the north lay the long yellow arc of the next beach, ending in another headland that looked not dissimilar to this. To the east the ocean swelled endlessly in. To the south stretched Jingera Beach, a sweep of sand rising into high sand dunes. Behind the dunes lay a wide strip of dense bush that separated the beach from the lagoon. Jingera was built in the wrong place, she thought. It would surely have been more convenient for everyone