Evelyn Edwards—Waraganj (Black Mary) Grandmother-Granddaughter Relationship

Evelyn Edwards is Waraganj’s grandmother, but the relationship is concealed from Waraganj and comes to light only through the Edwards family’s photographs and Evelyn’s changing recognition. Their connection gives the household’s rejection of Waraganj a particular force: the hostility is not simply between strangers, but within a family whose racial hierarchy overrides its blood ties.

Kinship Hidden Within the Edwards Household

When Waraganj arrives at the Edwards homestead, she seeks shelter after fearing unfair treatment because of her fair skin and mixed heritage. Eleanor asks Evelyn to let her stay as a housemaid. Waraganj does not know that the older woman is her grandmother, that Florence is her stepmother, or that Eleanor is her sister-in-law, married to her half-brother Neville. The Edwards property is therefore at once a possible refuge and the home of Waraganj’s paternal family.

The family’s circumstances help explain the household Waraganj enters, but do not soften its divisions. Evelyn is the matriarch; her husband has died, and Neville is the only surviving son. Eleanor takes responsibility for Waraganj and teaches her English, while Florence is often away and prefers city life. Evelyn tolerates Waraganj for Eleanor’s sake rather than welcoming her as kin. Waraganj, meanwhile, understands her place through work and obedience, believing that diligence will secure her care.

Recognition and the Photograph

Evelyn’s attitude shifts when recognition crosses her face, followed quickly by disgust. The relationship becomes legible to Waraganj through a recent family photograph: as she studies the people gathered before the brick buildings, she notices that she resembles a woman she does not know. That woman is Bertha, the Edwards’ daughter, and Florence has separately remarked on Waraganj’s likeness to her.

The photograph does not bring the two women together. Evelyn draws the image to herself and drives Waraganj away, who retreats to sleep in the barn, afraid of the hatred she sees. The scene turns a family record into evidence of belonging that cannot safely be claimed. Waraganj can glimpse her place in the Edwards line, but Evelyn’s response makes recognition a source of danger rather than acceptance.

The truth of Waraganj’s parentage is eventually told to the women through the story her mother had given her. Florence and Eleanor are appalled; Evelyn leaves, and thereafter addresses Waraganj as Black Mary, insisting that her fair features do not change the racial identity she assigns her. Her contempt makes explicit the gap between biological kinship and the identity imposed on Waraganj within the household.

Racial Hierarchy and the Broken Family Bond

Evelyn and Waraganj’s relationship unfolds against a larger contest over Ngarigo land and freedom. White settlers take land, establish fences, and force Aboriginal people from their homelands; colonial authorities permit the shooting or dispersal of Aboriginal people. Charles Edwards participates in meetings promoting development around Cresthill and argues that Aboriginal people must be managed. The family’s power in the district thus belongs to the same settler order that makes Waraganj vulnerable, even when individual women offer her shelter.

That contradiction sharpens the significance of Evelyn’s refusal. Waraganj is related to the family, works in its home, and is taught the language and customs that might appear to promise inclusion. Yet the recognition of her ancestry does not overcome Evelyn’s racial hostility. Her grandmother’s position as matriarch gives her the power to define Waraganj as an outsider despite the family connection.

The Relationship’s Echo in the Children’s Threatened Removal

The novel later links Waraganj’s concealed ancestry to the danger facing Molly Johnson and her children. Miss Shirley invokes the children’s mixed descent as grounds for their removal, and Judge Eisenmangher authorizes it. Danny brings the news to Molly, who recognizes the classification as a threat rooted in the earlier attempt to remove her herself. She burns the authorization and leaves with her children.

The parallel does not make the generations’ experiences identical; it shows the repeated force of racial classification within family life. Waraganj’s kinship with Evelyn fails to protect her from rejection, while Molly faces an official order that treats her children’s ancestry as a reason to separate them from their mother. Against both forms of power, the novel places the value of family knowledge and care. The author’s note also describes the loss of culture through government policy that prevented the author’s mother and grandparents from passing it on, connecting the novel’s fictional family rupture to its explicit concern with disrupted cultural transmission.