Coming of Hippolyta
Madge Kelly went onto the back verandah to empty the teapot on the hydrangea growing in an old tub by the wooden steps. In the darkness, she visualized the plant's lush blue flowers: to her, it was an old friend.
She had bought the plant as a cutting in a jam tin from a stall in town the year she married Ern and had propagated it many times, but the parent plant meant more to her than its offspring growing around her garden and in the neighbours' gardens.
She glanced to that part of the evening sky where the planet Venus usually appeared.
Below the planet, another bright star suddenly materialized. Madge thought it was the light of a jet, but it moved too fast. To Madge's startled gaze, it grew larger and brighter while she watched and seemed to land beyond the strip of bush in the north paddock.
Ern, her husband, called from the kitchen, "Hurry up, Madge. We're waiting for our tea."
Madge backed away from Venus and tripped over the doorstep into the kitchen. "I think I've just seen a spaceship land."
Her two sons, Kev and Ron, looked startled, and then laughed. "You read too many stories, Mum," said Kev, the eldest son.
Madge gazed timidly at him, amazed she’d produced this huge young man who towered head and shoulders over her and was already overweight at twenty-two.
Ron, the younger son, who was nearly as large as his brother, jumped to his feet. His chair went flying backwards. "I want to see this spaceship of yours, Mum," he said, pushing past her on his way to the door.
Madge winced as the door slammed after him.
"You're a fool, Madge," Ern said good naturedly from his place at the head of the table.
A few minutes later, Ron stamped back into the kitchen. "There's no spaceship out there, Mum."
His father laughed. "Your mother was having you on, Ron."
"Were you, Mum?" Ron asked.
Madge knew Ern and Kev thought Ron a bit slow, but she never disagreed with Ern. "I don't know, dear."
The three men finished their meal of roast beef and potatoes, boiled beans, carrots and steamed jam pudding and custard, and then trooped into the living room to watch the latest American television import of guns, women and booze, leaving Madge with the dishes.
Afterwards, Madge took a book about cake decorating from the wooden dresser, which she kept hidden behind a large casserole dish and sat by the coals of the wood stove to study it.
She’d bought the book on one of her fortnightly trips to town with Ern. The woman behind the counter of the only general store knew of Madge's interest in cake decorating and had kept the book for her.
"It’s too expensive,” Madge said. “Ern would have a fit if I bought it.”
“He’ll never know, dearie," said the woman. "We’ll call it a set of spanners,” she added as she put it on the farm account.
The next morning, Kev and Ron returned from going around the sheep accompanied by a young woman. “We found her at the boundary of the north paddock by a large circle of flattened grain in the wheat crop,” said Ron.
The newcomer, a tall well-built girl with blue eyes and fair hair, wore knee length shorts and stout walking boots. "My name is Hippolyta," she told Madge.
"That's an unusual name," Madge said as she put the kettle on to boil to make a pot of tea.
"It's Greek and is a sort of a family name." The girl sat at the table in Ern's place. "I'm called Polly for short."
They discussed the large circle in the north paddock: everyone had seen photographs and read about such happenings, but the Kelly's hadn't expected to see one in their own wheat crop.
“Perhaps it’s your spaceship, Mum,” Ron said.
Ern and Kev scoffed at the idea.
Ron looked annoyed. “Well, what caused the circle in the crop?”
Neither Kev nor Ern could think of a suitable answer though they came up with a lot of silly reasons, which Ron scoffed at.
“The circle would be good to meditate in,” Polly said.
The three Kelly men looked baffled.
“Don’t you know about meditating?” Polly asked them. When no one answered, she gave a three-minute explanation on the powers of meditation.
After the Kelly men left to attend to their farm jobs, Polly helped Madge in the house.
“What a slovenly pair,” said Polly as she picked up discarded clothes from the floor of Kev and Ron's bedroom and carted them off to the draughty shed of a laundry in the back yard.
"Ern's," going to build a laundry onto the house," said Madge when Polly complained what a dump it was.
When Madge and Polly finished the housework and after a cup of tea, Polly suggested they take a look at the circle in the wheat paddock.
"I have to get lunch for the men," said Madge as she washed the teacups in the basin of clean water on a table in front of the window: Ern had said he'd put a sink and cupboard there when he had time; the water to the kitchen stopped at the back step by the hydrangea.
Polly wiped a cup. "Can't they get their own lunch?"
"They never have.”
"There's always a first time. I’ll make a salad and they can have the left over cold mutton. I’ll cut some sandwiches to take with us. After we do our meditations, we’ll have a picnic lunch. There’s a marvellous eucalyptus tree we can sit under to eat.”
“It’s four kilometres to the north paddock,” Madge said when she saw Polly was determined to go. “I couldn’t walk that far.”
“We’ll take the car.”
“I can’t drive.”
“I can.”
“Ern wouldn’t like it.”
“I’m a good driver. I won’t run his car up a tree.”
Madge put away any thought of what Ern would say and went with Polly. “I wish I could drive,” she said. “I’d go to the Country Women’s Association meetings in town. It would be nice to mix with other women.”
“I'll teach you to drive while I'm here.”
“Ern wouldn't agree.”
“We won’t ask him.” Polly stopped the car at the neat circle in the crop of wheat.
Madge stood in the centre of the circle. "I wonder what caused this?" She remembered the star and how it had seemed to land… well, about here. She described the event to Polly. "Do you think was a space ship?"
Polly didn't answer. She sat in the centre of the circle, her legs crossed and her hands resting on her knees.
"What are you doing?" Madge asked.
"Meditating." Polly closed her eyes. "Sit down and meditate with me."
After a moment's hesitation, Madge sat opposite Polly.
"Clear your mind of all thought," said Polly.
Madge did and in what seemed a moment a magnificent iced christening cake popped up: she saw the delicately latticed cradle, the centrepiece of the cake, in its minutest detail as if it were here before her.
"I had a vision of the most marvellous cake,” Madge said while she and Polly ate their sandwiches. She didn’t feel the least embarrassed telling Polly as she would Ern.
“I knew you’d see something special,” Polly said.
Under Polly’s instructions, Madge drove back to the homestead and parked the car in the shed.
“Where have you been?” the three Kelly men demanded when Madge and Polly entered the kitchen.
"Polly and I went to see the circle in the wheat crop," Madge said, for the first time ignoring Ern and her sons' indignant looks. It surprised her that she was so calm. Usually she was a nervous wreck, worrying what Ern would say.
"What about our lunch?" Ern demanded.
Madge glanced at the remains of the cold beef and the empty salad bowl. "You look like you did well enough."
Ern nearly choked and couldn't speak for a few seconds.
"You're supposed to have our lunch ready," Ron said.
"Am I? I don't remember saying I'd get your lunch.” Oblivious to their shocked expressions, Madge took the icing sugar, almond paste and a mixing bowl from the cupboard, and her precious icing set, which had gone on the farm account as a pair of pliers and two screwdrivers, from under the tea towels in a drawer of the dresser.
“What are you doing, Mum?” Ron asked.
“I’m icing the cake I made yesterday. I'm going to take it to the Johnson’s for their baby’s christening.”
“I thought you made the cake for us?”
Madge seemed not to hear Ron. “They’ve invited Polly and me to their afternoon tea on Sunday.”
“I haven’t time to drive you there,” Ern said.
“Polly will drive us.” Madge glanced at Polly and smiled. “Polly is a good driver. She’s teaching me to drive.” She ignored Ern’s shock.
When Madge finished icing the cake, it looked as perfect as the one in the vision.
The Johnsons were delighted. They insisted on paying something for it. It was the first money Madge had earned since her marriage except for selling eggs and cream. That money usually went into buying food.
“I didn’t know you were an expert in decorating cakes,” said old Mrs Waterhouse who lived on a farm down the road from the Kelly's. “You’ve been hiding your light under a bushel, Madge. I'm looking for someone to decorate the cake, which I made for my grandson's twenty-first. I wonder if you would?"
Embarrassed by the praise, Madge said she'd only be glad to.
"I'll pay you, of course," Mrs Waterhouse said.
Every morning, Polly and Madge went to the circle to meditate. The decorated cakes, Madge conjured up, continued to grow in their technicolour perfection.
Ern said he didn't know what the world was coming to with Polly and Madge driving around the countryside all the time. He hadn't had a decent meal in weeks.
"I haven't time to cook three course meals twice a day like I used to," Madge said as she prepared to ice a cake for a young couple in the next town who had heard about her decorating abilities and ordered a cake for their wedding. "You're better off eating fruit instead of the cakes and biscuits I used to make. The three of you are dreadfully overweight," she added, ignoring Ern's shock.
Madge was so busy icing cakes; she scarcely found time to have her daily driving lesson with Polly. She was glad when she passed her test at the police station and received her P Plates.
“I’ll be on my way at the weekend,” Polly said one morning.
Madge glanced up from the cake she iced. "I'll miss you. Where are you going?"
"Where I'm needed, but I’ll keep in touch,” Polly said, kissing Madge farewell.
Madge received so many orders for decorated cakes that she hardly missed Polly. Her bank account grew and she had enough money to pay for the lease of a small house in town. When she told Ern and the boys about her plans, they complained bitterly.
"You're old enough to look after yourselves," Madge said. "You can stay with me when you're in town, but you’ll have to make sure you are tidy and cook for yourselves."
Madge continued to surge ahead: she won every cake-decorating contest she entered.
When the local school asked Madge to conduct a cake decorating course, her timidity vanished when she spoke about cakes.
Ron and Kev grew used to their mother's new career, but Ern never did. He blamed Polly for the change in his wife, or Hippolyta as Madge always thought of her.
Madge hadn't seen Polly since she had left, but her presence still surrounded her like an invisible cloud of love and care. Madge's thoughts went to Hippolyta and Hippolyta's thoughts came back, winging across time and space.
Battle of Boodicuttup Creek.
Three children battle to save a creek for the waterbirds.
Suitable for children 7 -11
