Poor Fellow My Country

by Xavier Herbert

  ‘Well, as soon as he could set foot on the ground again, which was after some six weeks in hospital, Dinny had his nose to it again . . . the ground, I mean . . . along with his fellow-bloodhound, Jimbul. But catching up with the old boy was a sheer fluke. After he’d got away from Cahoon at Alexandra Downs, he’d come on alone up the Beatrice, following the track of his master, Tchamala, heading for the Snake Caves, back of my place. That’s when I first met him. My people told me he was hanging about after bread and milk. I took it to him myself, with a drop of brandy. We soon became pally. I wanted to learn what I could about Tchineke bijnitch of course. But getting accurate information from Aborigines is a matter requiring infinite patience. For one thing, they’re never in a hurry themselves . . . and who should be, dealing with the Infinite? Then they’re always mistrustful of the kuttabah. Finally, they’re shrewd enough traders to get all they can out of a deal. He let me know that he’d be in the locality for the duration of the Wet, touching up the snake paintings. I let him go with a swag of dried milk and flour for making his own bread and milk, and the arrangement to replenish the supply as needed and to have further yarns.

  ‘It was just after New Year, ’29, when Cahoon, looking a shadow even of his bony normal self, turned up at Lily Lagoons, with Jinbul and a couple of other trackers. Smart boy that he is, in looking for clues of the Toohey boys’ whereabouts, he discovered that Barbu had a couple of fresh horses bearing my brand. I’d given these to the old fellow to spare those ancient prads of his the misery of dying while hauling him and his crossbred family on his annual beat round the stations. Cahoon knew I was crooked on Barbu, because I’d reported him for trapping and exporting rare protected birds. He sniffed something odd, and wormed it out of Barbu that he’d brought Pat out to me. He also knew that Pat and I weren’t friends. Evidently Pat suggested Mack and Bellairs, and hence the Toohey boys. He tried trapping me into admission by pretending he knew all about it. I had my reason ready for why Pat had come to me. He and I had arranged it in case of inquiries. It was that Pat had become interested in racing and contemplated buying a horse from me . . . not a very good one, because Cahoon knew that Pat was crooked on the squatters and all the snobbery that goes with the Races here. Anyway, he headed out with his bloodhounds for the obvious hiding place, the Caves. I learnt from Jinbul bragging about his cleverness, how they took old Bob. First Jinbul, being a ’prentice Snake Man, observed the fresh painting, and, of course, had been associated with the Pookarakka in painting caves over in the Alice Country. Then he found a dried milk can. The old boy was famous for never leaving a track . . . but this was enough for the ’prentice dookyangana. He detached himself from the others, and went round making the secret call of Snake Men. It doesn’t say much for old Bob’s prescience as the earthly representative of Tchamala the all-knowing, that he didn’t yet know that it was Jinbul who’d betrayed him before. So he presented himself to his young henchman . . . and thus to the chain, which they saw he didn’t get out of this time. In fact, when I saw him, when Cahoon dropped in on me on the way back to demand the hospitality I was bound to give, they had three chains on him, each padlocked to a tracker. The old fellow seemed oblivious to me, wouldn’t even take the bread and milk I offered him . . . oblivious to everything, perhaps shocked to find himself, the protégé of the all-powerful, powerless . . . crying to himself in lingo what was pretty obvious, but gloatingly translated by Cahoon through Jinbul, Poor Fellow My Country.’

  ‘Poor old bastard!’

  ‘Not so poor when you come to think of it. He was jailed for what is termed “His Majesty’s Pleasure”, meaning indefinitely. Odd how they cling to these moth-eaten things. Anyway, it worked nicely for the old boy, having a new King come along whose “Royal Pleasure” it was to set him free.’

  ‘You’re not interested in this Edward the Eighth, you say. But I think with the sort of freethinker he is, his reign should make a great difference . . .’

  ‘To whom . . . the English?’

  ‘To the Commonwealth.’

  ‘You mean the Commonwealth of Australia?’

  ‘Well . . . really, the British Commonwealth.’

  ‘Doesn’t it offend you to have the title of your country ballsed up for ever by the high-handed act of Imperial Britain lumping it in with their own so-called Commonwealth of Nations . . . and the wretched supineness of our leaders to allow it?’

  ‘Can’t say I’ve thought much about it . . . although it’s confusing sometimes to know what commonwealth’s being referred to.’

  ‘It makes my guts bleed!’ The passion in Jeremy’s voice made Bishoff turn and stare at him. ‘The word commonwealth means the same thing as republic . . . res publica . . . the things of the people. How the hell can you have a king of a commonwealth, and commonwealth inside a commonwealth, as they say? British bullshit! Don’t you feel it an insult to your intelligence even to have an hereditary monarch as the symbol of authority?’

  The young man answered carefully, ‘Yes . . . but I’m in the Public Service . . . and these days they’re tough on the loyalty thing. You’ve got to mind what you say, if you want to keep your job. You’re all right. You’re a free man. I’m just starting my career . . . with a young wife.’

  Jeremy put his hand on Bishoff’s shoulder: ‘Don’t mind me, son. I’m not trying to involve you. I don’t lead any movement. I’m a one-man band . . . the Scrub Bull, as they sometimes call me. Scrub bulls are solitary creatures.’

  They were nearing the house, fell silent. Evidently the younger Delacys had retired. The light below was dying down. They went in. Murmuring goodnight, Bishoff went upstairs. Jeremy poured himself a brandy and sat awhile in the dimming light to drink it. Outside grew brighter and brighter. Now that Willy wagtail was singing close at hand, in the garden behind the kitchen: ‘Kirri, kirri, kirrikijirrit . . . Sweet, sweet, Wrong side Love!’

  Jeremy rose with a sigh, went aloft. The sleeping quarters were the verandahs that ran right round the place. Mosquito nets hooked to the ceiling reared in the filtered moonlight like shrouded ghosts. He went round to the western verandah, past a bed into which he glanced, to see his eldest son with big head dark against the pillow. No movement. He went on to the bed at the end of the verandah. He stripped to short underpants and singlet, got in, lay back with hands behind head. Still the kirrikijirrit sang in the kitchen garden . . . Love, Sweet, sweet, Wrong side Love!

  III

  Martin Delacy, at sound of his father’s snore, rose quickly from his pillow, sat listening, at length slipped out of bed, and as he was, clad only in undershorts, went tiptoeing through the luminous gloom of the stair-head. He stopped, to listen again. Someone was snoring round on the eastern verandah. He went downstairs like a shadow, made for the rear entrance, opened the lattice door and peered out. The whitewashed harness-shed blazed in moonlight. He cocked his head to listen inside again. Then, taking a deep breath, he went out. At the gate of the bit of garden about the house he stopped to look about, most intently towards the kitchen. He stepped aside to piddle. Then he set out towards the kitchen, walking slowly at first, furtively, but with pace increasing and breathing deepening until his broad ginger-haired chest was heaving. He went past the kitchen, heading for the mangan plum. He reached the tree panting, pressed against the axe-scored trunk to obliterate himself as he looked about.

  The Willy wagtail in the garden burst into song: ‘Kirri, kirri, kirrikijirrit!’

  A sound — a slight cough. He looked quickly towards the wood-shed, to see a shadow hanging in the less dark doorway. The shadow emerged, became the substance of Nelyerri Ah Loy, clad as before, a ribbon in her glossy mane, but with dark face gleaming now, eyes glowing as she came into the moonlight. She came slowly at first, then uttering a gasping subdued cry, with a rush that ended in his arms, mouth over his mouth, loins squirming into his. He was as ardent. As they broke away for want of breath he pushed her back a little, panting into her wild-bright face, ‘Christ!’

  She straine
d to him again, whimpering, ‘I loff you!’

  Still kissing her, he fumbled for the buttons of her dress, bared her small breasts, blobs of chocolate, and bent to them with greed, while she moaned and tore his hair.

  Suddenly he seized her skirt, drew it about her waist, revealing her completely naked to the cup-like navel.

  Hissing, he forced her down to the sawdust, bent over her hunched, while he tore off his own bit of clothing, then fell into the clutch of slender chocolate arms and legs she raised to him, almost puppy-yelping in the delight of coupling. He gasped, groaned. He fell limp upon her, creased ruddy forehead in the sawdust spread with ringlets of her hair. In the garden Willy wagtail sang: ‘Sweet, sweet, Wrong side Love!’

  After a while Martin groaned deeply, raised his head, stared at her, drew back when she tried to kiss him, freed himself of her clinging, lurched to knees, sank down again to sit with back to tree. She raised herself, to sit with bare legs drawn to chin, clutching at them, staring at him. Avoiding the glowing stare, he muttered, ‘This’s got to stop.’

  She answered, ‘I loff you.’

  He sighed, groaned: ‘I tell you it’s got to stop, girl. I’m a married man now . . . with a baby.’

  She dropped sideways onto hands and knees, came crawling the little distance to him, leaned against him, head on his shoulder, legs out-thrust with his. He made no response.

  They sat a long while, almost as if sleeping. The wagtail sang and sang. Curlews were crying away towards the timber of the creek: ‘Kweeluk, kweeluk!’

  She stirred, kissed his cheek, his lips, his eyes. She drew away from him, rose to knees, pulled off the dress, to become completely naked. Even in the dappled light shed through the magic tree the difference in colour of the usually unexposed flesh was evident, a smoky sepia compared with the chocolate. Tossing the dress aside she drew to him again, kneeling, offering loins and breasts to his lips. He took them, slobbering, running hands over her writhing dusky slenderness. She sank down. Again they were straining, kissing. She rolled away, drawing him with lips, arms, legs, back to the sawdust. Now it was she who was yelping, to climax with a cry: ‘Oh!’

  Again they lay still. The Willy wagtail was still singing, but further away now. The curlews were in the garden, calling excitedly: ‘Kweeluk, kweeluk, kweeeeeee-luk!’

  It was said that kweeluks called like that when, with the magic vision of those great eyes of theirs, they spied a Spirit baby wandering from its Dreaming Place, impatient to be reborn. Perhaps Martin knew of such things, even though he would hardly deign to believe them, despite the magic beaming all about him. Anyway, it seemed as if the persistent and still closer calling of the great birds roused him, he raised himself, and reaching for his pants, without looking at his partner, growled, ‘No babies.’

  With pants pulled on, he heaved himself to his feet, growling again, ‘This can’t go on.’ Then looking at the ground he said, ‘Don’t forget to clean up my tracks . . . all the way up to the kitchen.’

  ‘Yas,’ she murmured. Then she leapt up, seized him, strained to him, whimpering, ‘I loff you!’ He suffered it for a moment, then disengaging her spidery arms, pushed her away.

  He muttered, ‘Mummuk.’ He turned away.

  She breathed after him, ‘Mummuk, yawarra.’

  He went swiftly, heading back, not troubling to look behind, breathing heavily, as if in exasperation, which feeling was also shown in his face. Then suddenly, as he neared the harness-shed, the hangdog look was wiped off by alarm. From the gloomy interior a figure had appeared in the comparative brightness of the open entrance, or rather a whisp of greyness in human form, like a skeleton lately taken down from a burial platform for ritual distribution of its bones, a skeleton wearing a bulkung belt. Martin stopped dead, staring. A long moment. Then in a strangled voice he asked, ‘Who’re you?’

  First a giggle, then the cackled answer: ‘Me Cock-Eye Bob, Boss.’

  The ginger bristles of the broad chest sparkled to a deep breath, which was released with a growl: ‘What you doing here?’

  ‘Me look-about, Boss.’

  ‘Get to hell out of it!’

  The cackle became the mendicant’s whine: ‘Give it lil bits grog, Boss . . . I go ’way.’ It was the usual request of a blackfellow who felt himself able to take a liberty.

  The ginger chest heaved again. The voice came grating: ‘You sneakin’ rotten blackmailin’ old scarecrow. I’ll give you more’n you bargained for, you don’t get going.’

  The whine rose: ‘No-more growl, Boss. Lil bits lum.’

  Again the chest heaved. The grating voice was kept low, but sounded no less menacing: ‘I’ll give you rum!’ Martin darted past the skeleton figure, causing it to leap outside. Just ahead was a rack where stockwhips hung. He snatched one down, came rushing back, hissing now: ‘Now get, you black bastard, get!’ The whip whirled whistling, to wrap about the skeleton legs.

  Bobwirridirridi hopped, emitting a cracked howl: ‘No-more, Boss!’

  Martin’s face was twisted with rage, but still his voice subdued: ‘Get goin’ or I’ll skin you alive.’ He lashed again, at the skeleton torso.

  The old man yelped: ‘Ow!’ He turned and ran, towards the gate of the Big House garden.

  As the claw-like hands fumbled with the latch, Martin came leaping, with whip whirling: ‘Out o’there, you black bastard!’

  ‘Ow!’ The whip cracked on the bony rump. The gate opened. Bob staggered inside. The whip caught him round the neck: ‘Ow, ow!’

  A rush of feet in the shadowy house.

  As the old man was pulled off balance, to go staggering into a flower-bed, the whip caught him again, about the ribs.

  A babble of voices as figures appeared in the moonlight: ‘What’s up . . . what’s wrong?’

  ‘Sneakin’, thievin’, no-good, black bastard!’

  ‘Ow!’

  Jeremy’s voice rose: ‘Go easy with that whip, boy!’

  Martin was hissing again: ‘I’m going to teach this bastard the lesson of his life.’

  ‘No you’re not. He’s a frail old man!’

  ‘He’s a sneakin’ black bastard.’

  Now Jeremy was hissing: ‘Give me that whip . . . or I’ll take it off you and put it round you.’ As the lash whirled again he grabbed it, snatched the whip out of Martin’s hands.

  Crouched and staring at him, Bobwirridirridi whimpered, ‘Me no-more been do it wurruk t’ing, Mullaka.’

  Jeremy coiled the whip and flung it towards the house, saying, ‘All right, Pookarakka. You go wait long o’ motor car.’

  As the old man skipped past him, moving with remarkable agility, Martin roared at him, ‘You ever come back to this station again, I take the rifle to you.’

  Jeremy said, ‘I told you I was going to take him off your hands. What’s the idea of putting the whip round him?’

  ‘He was after grog.’

  ‘He was probably after it off me. I’ve given it to him before.’

  ‘No boong drinks grog on my run.’

  ‘What . . . has His Lordship deeded his holdings to you?’

  Dropping his head like an angry bull, Martin charged past him, into the house. As he vanished, Jeremy said to staring Clancy, ‘You’re in charge here. I want to give the old fellow a brandy and milk. Any objections?’

  Clancy was looking hangdog now: ‘So long’s he doesn’t make any more trouble.’

  ‘What trouble’s he made so far?’

  But Clancy turned away, went back into the house. Jeremy followed, but only to go to the bubbling Icy Ball. Clancy had gone upstairs after his brother. Jeremy came out with a bottle of brandy and an enamel jug of goat’s milk. Finding Bishoff still out in the garden, he said, ‘Going to have a drink with the old man . . . care to be in it?’

  ‘Yes, a brandy and milk would go well. Brandy’s your favourite drink, I see.’

  ‘Well, C2H5OH, really. But brandy’s the cleanest and most intelligent way of taking it, in my opinion. It doesn’t take
so much of it to make you high, but a lot to make you rotten . . . and then you get really rotten.’

  Bobwirridirridi was waiting outside the motor shed. He shook hands with Bishoff, cackled a bit over the conversation the young man tried to make about his release from jail, but as soon as he got the drink Jeremy dispensed for him in a stockman’s quart-pot taken from the utility, backed off and did his disappearing trick. Jeremy called, ‘You’n me two-feller go Lily Lagoons long o’ motor car tomorrow, eh, Pookarakka? See you daylight.’

  Jeremy got out enamel pannikins for their own drinks. They had them stiff, finishing up the jug of milk, then headed back towards the house. Bishoff was interested in Bobwirridirridi’s age and the average lifespan of Aborigines in general. Jeremy answered that despite the hard conditions under which they lived, both in the native state and as hangers-on to the kuttabah’s society, they appeared to average about the same as the kuttabah. Regarding Bobwirridirridi’s age he said, ‘Don’t forget he was supposed to have died back in about 1917. What’s that . . . nineteen years. I didn’t see him then, or till Cahoon took him out at my place in ’29. That’s seven years ago. He doesn’t look a bit different from what he did then. He’s about as near being what they call a living skeleton as you could get, I reckon. Amazing how he has the muscular power to get about, and so vigorously.’

  As they were approaching the garden gate, voices that had been mumbling upstairs in the house rose so as to be heard distinctly.

  ‘You’re a lying bastard . . . you did go out to her.’

  ‘You call me a lying bastard I’ll knock your bloody block off.’

  ‘Try it! I know you’re a lying bastard because I found your bed empty.’

  ‘Didn’t I tell you I went to piss?’

  ‘Pissin’ for an hour and a half!’

  ‘Same spying dirty little tell-tale shit you always were!’

  ‘And you’re the same dirty gin-rootin’ bastard you always were . . . and always will be.’ Sound of scraping of a chair and a couple of thumping steps. But no violence, because Clancy went on: ‘If you’re going to keep on rootin’ that yeller bitch, do it some other place, not where I’m in charge.’