My parents knew Ma Stewart very well in pre-war Wau.
They told me to visit her when I got into Patair.
One day when I had an over night in Lae I tramped round to her home... not the Cecil.
I banged on the front door at about three PM and it swung open... That was different, a non locked door.
No stirring from within so I knocked again.
The view was different too.
The front door at footpath level was at the head of a staircase that descended to a lower level lounge room.
After a moment an eerie, weak, owl-like voice boomed, "Whoo wants mee?".
I announced myself.
"Whooo"
Again, my name with the addition of "Tess and Charlie's son".
"Whoo".
I'm peering around the lounge and doorways and can't see who I'm talking to.
I introduce myself again LOUDER.
"Whoo?'
Finally I spot her. She's peeping round a bedroom door that's the same level as me on the opposite side of the house.
The beaut gawdy Chinese silk dressing gown, bunched up in front of her is a pretty good camoflage ... probably, not out in the jungle but here with paintings on the wall...
Anyway, Ma finally tunes into my youthful rapid English and announces, still like an Owl, "Charlie Graay ... know him well... Whoo are Youu"?
"I'M 'is SON!"
Introductions over, I'm instructed to go downstairs and wait.
Joint's like a museum with some pretty impressive stuff to covert.
Mar comes down dressed in some heavy material that'd go well as curtains and she gets the meri in to operate the afternoon tea ceremony.
We had a great old time, except....
Ma kept patting me on the knee and saying, "Charlieee you're a very naughty boyyy! Why haven't you been to see me?
I gave up and became the old man for a while.
Man those four bars felt good... better than my lousy little half bar while I was on probation.
She was certainly a tough old girl and I've heard some good stories of her sortin' out drunken miners at Wau before the war. But then even miners were more gentlemanly than todays drunks.
Mate, THEY always dressed for dinner on the ships enroute to and from New Guinea.