2011 - Theses - Flinders University

infestations and skin diseases and trying not to breathe the acrid smell of grease, firesmokeand sweated urine through his nose. But the children stiffen and edge away, not so practisedat hiding their disgust at the sharp stench of whitefella sweat slippery on raw scrubbed skin.Success in his classroom is no more than having all the children seated at the one time: theylearn that whitefellas like them sitting down and still and quiet, but little else.Kitty’s enthusiasm to make a letter is a relief, and Jim is grateful to her. But he feels it,nevertheless: a fearful thrill in his gut and his loins when the ‘virgin soil’ of this ‘black pearl’seemed to grasp hold of the love of Jesus. Her eyes are earnest as she confesses how Jesus’blood cleansed her from sin, from ‘all them bad things’, as she said with her head low butstealing glances beneath her lashes in the direction of the fettlers’ cottages.‘You say in my writing to Miss Baker, you say this: Jesus been make my heart clean.’Kitty looks at Jim, sitting beside her on a crate at the makeshift table Iris left in the tinschoolhouse. At least it is darker in the shade there, safe from the glaring sky, even if stiflingand close. He begins to write her words in his flowing hand, stopping at the end of thesentence, looking up at her, waiting for more.‘He clean your heart too, with His precious blood.’ The stabbing feeling spreads across hischest and his breathing is tight. He feels a tiny sting in the corner of his eyes, and blinks,looking down at the paper.‘Tell them too, God our Father make me hold words, he been teach me, he make me clean,make me happy all the time.’ Jim writes, and knows Kitty is smiling. Smiling for him.That night in the soft whiteness of his tent, Jim copies out Kitty’s letter, again sitting on hisbox before the small rough writing table that fits beside his low stretcher bed under the53