Frederick's Coat

by Duff, Alan

  ‘You’re not allowed to leave me alone! I want Mummy! I want Mummy!’

  You want, you want, you want what you can’t have. And it wasn’t him who’d walked out of the child’s life. But what if he ducked out for quarter of an hour and the kid did something drastic?

  Danny took to his room where he went on a door-kicking mission. Then a knock at the front door — probably a neighbour, or the cops. Anyone was a relief.

  His father let himself in, heard the noise. ‘Cripes. You got an angry wombat in there?’

  ‘Hasn’t stopped since he woke up. Evelyn’s walked out, taken Leah. Danny’s my responsibility — her parting words.’

  ‘So she did it, eh? God almighty, that’s one boy in big protest.’

  ‘Was I ever like that? I mean is this normal?’

  ‘No. You were younger when your mother — when I kicked her out,’ said Laurie. ‘But you could’ve put money on it, just her gloomy expression.’

  Thumping and breaking sounds of objects being thrown around Danny’s bedroom. ‘You taking sides already?’ said Johno.

  ‘Aw, come on. You know you’ve been out of order for a long time. I told you, you were too young for a wife and kids. Our way of life doesn’t suit marriage. And you’re not long out of—’ Laurie checked himself. ‘Better not say that word in case he hears it. Wouldn’t help matters right now, would it?’

  ‘You’d think the kids would know,’ Johno said. Watched his father take out his cigarettes, offer one expertly thumbed halfway out the packet, followed by a gold-plated Dunhill lighter. Old crims have a thing for them — same with slim, expensive watches, diamond rings, anything that has a brand name and costs money. ‘Smoke?’

  ‘No,’ Johno said, surprising himself. ‘Later. So what do I do about him?’

  ‘Just hang in there,’ said Laurie Ryan, sucking on his cigarette. ‘I was lucky. You were only eleven months old so you didn’t really know a thing and I had a girlfriend who was a big help. What you need’s a chick, a good woman to take the load off you.’

  ‘Dad, she left this morning, crack of dawn. Gi—’ Johno winced as the door shook under Danny’s kicks. The kid had stamina. ‘I have to get a job, not find a replacement for Evelyn.’

  ‘Don’t worry. I’ll keep you going till you get this little bloke settled.’

  ‘Doesn’t sound too hopeful, does it?’

  ‘Like getting out of jail, like anything a bit painful in life. Doesn’t end, and then it does. What kind of job? Not as a common wage earner, I take it?’

  ‘What else is there?’ Johno said, wondering if he shouldn’t reiterate his decision to live a straight life.

  ‘Well, your Gramps knows someone who moves stolen cars inter-state. He’s been a bit crook of late or he’d be here. You’d be a go-between, right away from the heat end of the business,’ said Laurie. ‘Good dough in it.’

  ‘No, thanks. Come on, I said I was never going back inside.’

  ‘Sure. But we all have to eat, and you have an extra mouth. How about my mate up in Brisbane? Wants an out-of-towner to follow his casino staff in their off-hours to take photos of who they mix with to see who’s ripping him. He’ll pay well. Beats a wage and it’s legit.’

  ‘The casino legal?’

  ‘Kind of. He’s got the cops on-side. Corruption is still rife up there in blowfly and cane-toad country. You want I call him?’

  Johno was tempted, but no. ‘A taste’s never that, is it?’ A thought then, that smoking was the same as sticking to the lawful way: he’d gone most of the morning without one and yet had he died? But then again, what if he couldn’t cope with this fatherhood lark?

  ‘If I can’t get Danny on my side, do I hand him over to welfare? Tell them the mother left no forwarding address, only her lawyer’s name?’

  ‘She’ll make contact, you can bet on it. Any mother, like …’ Laurie trailed off to let his son finish for him.

  ‘Like even mine did. Not something I’d forget.’

  ‘No, you wouldn’t.’

  ‘Too late to say you should’ve let her talk to me a bit.’

  ‘I was too hasty. But you were better off not knowing her. Junkies are on a one-way street.’

  ‘To hell, right?’

  ‘Whole world agrees on that,’ Laurie said. ‘Evelyn’s parents still got the pip with you?’

  ‘Absolutely. From the day I got charged.’

  ‘I guess any parent would take that attitude,’ said Laurie. ‘I mean law-abiding parents.’

  ‘How about a single parent?’

  ‘You’re asking me?’

  ‘Till I was ten and then, hello, early adulthood. Johno Ryan can look after himself. But I’m not going back to the past.’

  ‘I still raised you.’

  ‘If the authorities knew how, you’d’ve been back in jail.’

  ‘Didn’t seem to do you any harm. Did I love you?’

  ‘Sure you did. And I forgive you. But how am I going to do this?’

  ‘I’ll bring you in on my little goer, make a lawful living selling cars on my mate’s lot. Since you went away everything’s changed. After the royal commission, the politicians jumped on the bandwagon and ordered massive clean-ups of the police, of corruption across the board. I’d say those detectives who sent you down will be taking over your cell. Despite what your wife — ex-wife — thinks, I finished with crime a couple years ago. I pay my mate Wrighty a ground rental for the space I use, find sellers desperate for cash, screw them down even further, put my margin on. It’s not a bad living. Anything rather than work for a wage.’ That one again, heard from his father and grandfather since that day they told him they weren’t what they seemed: ordinary, law-abiding citizens.

  ‘At least you’re doing it honestly.’

  ‘Not when you see me negotiate these desperado sellers down into the dust, son. You’ll wonder if I was more moral being a crim,’ his father chuckled. ‘They could have me up for mental cruelty and stealing. But it is legit. Jesus, listen to him …’ Danny was banging a hard object repeatedly against the door.

  ‘He’s just shy of five,’ said Johno, ‘but he’ll break that door down any moment. Or I will. Can you believe it?’

  ‘You’ve got thirteen more years of him, minimum. Unless he runs away. He’ll get fed up soon, or wear himself out,’ Laurie said.

  The cigarette smoke had a delicious aroma yet Johno had once again got through the body’s surging demand for nicotine. One whole day without and he’d have the victory, tiny and petty though it was.

  ‘When I was his age and making a fuss, what did you do to settle me?’

  ‘I hope your memory’s not saying I hit you?’ Laurie got defensive. ‘I never laid a hand on you.’

  ‘Didn’t say you did. I asked how you calmed me down.’

  ‘I can’t remember you ever losing it. Not like that. Your Gramps never laid a hand on me, either. Have to say, what little I’ve seen of Danny he’s different.’

  ‘Day I got out I gave his mother money to buy him a big paint set. He didn’t say thank you, not a word. Yet he used them every waking moment. Same at Christmas, big drawing pad, fine pencils, brushes, and he just tore open the box and started drawing and painting,’ said Johno. ‘Now I know I was grateful for anything you and Gramps gave me.’

  ‘They say gratitude can’t be taught. You’re either grateful or you feel entitled—.’ The door under attack again. ‘Cripes for a kid I thought was gentle he knows how to throw one.’

  ‘It’s like his arty streak. I don’t know where it comes from.’

  ‘Don’t be looking at the Ryan side. Must come from his mother. You just have to stay patient. Losing his mum and his sister is about as big a blow as you can get at his age. Imagine being in his head. Here. This’ll keep you going.’ Laurie handed over a wad of bills. ‘He’ll come right.’

  With perfect timing the sounds of shattering glass came from Danny’s room.

  Johno shook his head and said, ‘You know I’m gr
ateful.’

  ‘Wouldn’t give you money if you weren’t,’ said Laurie, then surprised Johno. ‘And don’t be leaving him alone like I did you. Too late to say I’m sorry. Was it, like, hard? Did you get scared? I always left you plenty of food in the house and you had Shane’s mum.’

  Forcing a smile, Johno said, ‘Felt like you and Gramps had abandoned me, and for no reason. But I’m over it.’

  ‘And I’m sorry,’ said Laurie. ‘Way late, but truly sorry. Guess a man doesn’t know what he doesn’t know.’

  Johno said, ‘I haven’t won Father of the Year myself.’

  Now look at the situation — at him, Danny. Beautiful. A year’s a long time. Seemed acceptance came the day Danny appeared in his father’s room saying he’d had a bad dream. When told he could hop in with his father, the boy at first just stood there. Then he came and stood right by Johno and didn’t resist being lifted and taken into the bed.

  The boy had fallen asleep in his father’s embrace; Johno lay there awake, fearful that any movement on his part would break the spell. It was the worst sleep and the best night of his newly reformed life. Danny came back often after that, a given that it was to his father’s arms. Thank God, too, for the distraction of his art, which could make him oblivious to anything.

  Slowly the understanding that he and his father were a team of two making their way in a perilous world and must support each other. At times Johno wondered who really gained most from this partnership.

  No words could describe the sweet ache, the almost frantic sense of responsibility he owed this child: that he couldn’t let the kid down, must ensure Danny reached his potential, always be there for him.

  He knew, too, that Danny had saved him from becoming his old self, or perhaps worse, that he might have drifted back to the easier lifestyle of no responsibility and no obligation. God knows he’d had thoughts of giving up.

  Now, watching the eyelids lose their struggle against sleep, the long dark lashes, then one last burst of telling about something from school, how everyone loved his drawings — ‘and our teacher says I’m going to grow up to be proper artist one day’.

  ‘You sure will, son. You’ll be famous.’ Sleep finally claimed a boy who could be hyperactive — read hypersensitive — where his art was concerned. Johno daren’t tell him it was time to go to bed, or do any task; yet when Danny’s arms reached up for his father, Johno placed his careful weight in his five-year-old son’s embrace.

  Waiting for Danny at the school gates every afternoon, picking out his face in the frenetic crowd of jabbering children, excited at seeing him and hearing of his day. Walking home holding hands, Danny with his own excitement at what he was going to draw as soon as they got home. Food of little interest to him.

  This was the same boy who’d once said, ‘You’re not my father. I don’t have a father. Now go away.’ Like being hit by machine-gun fire.

  Using a car lent by his father, Johno finally got his mind around working for a living, took a job as assistant to a chef in a café called Harry’s Authentic Aussie Tucker — authentic stodge, more like it. A truckers’ cafe when it wasn’t frequented by beer-gutted drunks.

  Slave would be a better job description. The pay was twelve dollars an hour for a fifty-hour week of Thursday to Sunday lunches and heavy dinners that catered to overweight workers, to entire families suffering obesity pigging out on ten-buck ‘All U Can Eat’ specials, late-night drunks ordering steak, eggs and chips and spoiling for a fight. Johno was often tempted to come out from the kitchen and sort out some aggro troublemaker, but knew he mustn’t.

  The most popular dish was a mixed grill — lamb chop, sausage, piece of steak and a mince pattie, with fried chips and choice of two eggs as an extra. Aussie tucker sold by a Croat. Harry Novak worked the public end of his business, put on a ruggedly affable persona with his Slavic accent and told crude jokes to his regular customers. In the kitchen he was an abusive dictator who screamed at his staff for the smallest reason, or for none at all. He reminded Johno of certain prison guards who abused their power. The day would come, surely, when he’d thump this bully and walk off the job.

  A neighbour, Mavis Wilkinson, looked after Danny when Johno was at work. Widowed at forty-six, she had grown-up kids who lived in other cities. She was country plain with noticeably warm blue eyes, especially when they looked at Danny, who came to really like, even adore, her. But he was just as capable of ignoring her existence if engrossed in drawing or painting. Danny was still young but his father could see the rapid development in his work and wondered when he should get him some professional guidance — not that he could afford it on his wage.

  One day Johno bought a big pad of good-quality art paper, a set of pencils and a novelty pencil sharpener that played ‘Twinkle Twinkle Little Star’ and flashed on and off in fluorescent green when you used it.

  Ignoring his father’s gift for an admirable length of time, Danny responded when Johno sharpened a pencil and the familiar tune played. Johno said, ‘I bet you can’t draw me.’

  What the child produced was remarkable for his age, though disturbing, too.

  ‘Is that me?’ Danny nodded. ‘Doesn’t look like me. I bet you can’t do Dad working in the restaurant kitchen.’

  To his great surprise Danny drew a plate of food like the one Johno had once sketched when he was trying to win the boy over. Danny had looked at it for about half a minute, torn it up. Danny’s depiction of Harry Novak’s fare was far more precise: a perfect oblong sausage, a very good rendition of a lamb chop, a rectangular steak with a ridge of fat, and a circle for the meat pattie, but textured, as well as numerous chips drawn in three dimensions, with little square ends. Two eggs with yellow yolks carefully coloured in. How did someone so young draw like this?

  Presumably Johno was the figure wearing a tall chef’s hat. He’d told Danny that he had to wear one at work. The mouth was turned downward in misery and tears were coming out of the almond-shaped eyes.

  ‘Why am I crying? I like the mixed grill. Remember Daddy cooked it for you.’ Come to think of it, the kid had only picked at the food his father had so carefully prepared.

  Danny said, ‘Because Mum doesn’t like you.’

  ‘That’s sad. Does Leah like me?’

  ‘Nope. That’s why they left.’

  ‘Do you like me?’

  ‘Yes. But I didn’t used to. Mum said you spent all our money on horses. We could have had a house and they would be living with us.’ This was hard to take, coming from a kid.

  ‘Why did you buy a horse?’

  ‘I didn’t buy a horse.’ Johno explained betting. ‘One day we might have our own house,’ he said. Got a look that said Danny didn’t believe him.

  ‘So why am I crying in your drawing? Mean dads don’t cry. They make other people cry.’

  ‘You made Mum cry. We saw her when you didn’t live here. Why don’t you go away? Then she’ll come back.’

  Johno tried again. ‘Adults do things kids don’t understand till they get older. Then you’ll be doing the same with your kids.’

  ‘Will not.’

  ‘Okay, maybe you won’t,’ said Johno. ‘You didn’t say why I’m crying.’

  ‘You’re sad.’

  ‘At what?’

  ‘Mum.’ Pulled his lips closed as if stitching them together. Defiance filled his eyes.

  But he didn’t resist his father’s embrace, even snuggled into him.

  Now that all seemed in the dim past.

  Chapter seven

  In a year of working at Harry’s he’d saved precisely nothing. If it hadn’t been for his father, he and Danny would be out on the street. But he no longer considered going back to crime. Selling cars on his own account like his father was doing, he might have to if nothing better than working for Harry came up. Though he was no car salesman.

  ‘You’ve got that look,’ Johno said to his father, who was standing in the front doorway looking pleased with himself.

  ‘Does
it show?’

  ‘Grin any more and your face will split. You win something at the pub?’

  ‘I don’t frequent pubs like I used to,’ said Laurie Ryan. ‘Guess what?’

  ‘I got over guessing games at about age ten. Just spill it.’

  ‘That partner I told you I went in with on the property deal?’

  ‘Shall I pop out while you get the melodrama over with? You can play it to Danny. I’m sure he’ll be impressed.’ Johno not in the mood after another day of unpleasant kitchen tasks that were an affront to a man’s dignity, not helped by a mad boss.

  ‘To think, it’d been literally sitting under my nose all this time,’ Laurie said. ‘The equity I had in the house — gone way up. Equity, son. Beautiful word that.’

  ‘You used to say to me a good story is a short one.’

  ‘Remember my mate Wrighty informing me I had all this equity in the house, so I could borrow against it to invest in some industrial properties that earned me rent to cover the loan payments? Well, the local shire re-zoned the area to residential, which shot the value of the land way up. Just sold it and I’ve ended up with a surplus of — wait for it.’ He lit a cigarette, the smell no longer one Johno enjoyed. ‘Would you believe I made three hundred and thirty grand?’ The words came out on a slowly expelled stream of cigarette smoke.

  ‘Jesus. And I doubted when you told me about this so-called investment.’

  ‘Not me who put the word “so-called” into it. I knew with Wrighty having big skin in the game it had to be a goer. Well, first thing is, I’m buying fifty grand of shares for our Danny boy.’ This was what he called his grandson when he was in a good mood. ‘Where is he?’

  ‘Out with Mavis,’ said Johno. ‘Shares in what?’

  ‘A logistics company. Boring, but a safe and steady Eddie growth company. Danny’s annual dividends will be converted to shares. By the time he’s twenty-one …’ Using monetary terms Johno had never heard of, and surprising coming from his father.

  Laurie held up his finger to say he wasn’t quite done yet. ‘You said your boss has put his business on the market. Well, I’m happy to put up the dough to buy it. How much does he want for it?’