Poor Fellow My Country

by Xavier Herbert

  And there soon they were with the surging mob helping to destroy the crystal clarity of the morning with dust and gasoline and the sweet silence that had reigned for the night over the river there, so that tracks of regular habitués of the region of the Racecourse, the brolgas, plovers, curlews, were to be seen before the mob stamped them out.

  There must have been lots of times in Frank Candlemas’s association with his impulsive bride that the combination of his love and astuteness had saved the day for her in sticky situations; and surely this was one of them. The way Jeremy Delacy looked Alfie over in a swift sharp look, when the day before he had scarcely seemed to notice her get-up, was hardly a good omen, even though he received the pair politely enough. Then there was his abruptness in introducing those of his household not yet known to the visitors. He certainly excused it by saying it wasn’t the best hour of the best day to be showing anyone around, with all the work to be done with the racing team and the tension of both man and beast. When she would have shaken hands with the blacks, he stopped her, saying, sharply, ‘Don’t do that!’ When with flaming cheeks and hot dark eyes she turned on him, he added shortly, ‘These people take physical contact much more seriously than we do. You only embarrass them by forcing false friendship on them . . .’

  She said breathlessly, ‘I assure you it wasn’t false . . .’

  He cut in: ‘How could it be otherwise, when you don’t know the people, or they you? If and when they get to know you, if they like you enough, they’ll even embarrass you by fondling you.’ He looked at Frank, whose usual smile had been replaced with a tight mask. Then he said, ‘I’m presuming that your wife wants to understand the realities in such matters . . . since she’s writing a book about the country?’

  Frank saw it as what it was, as near apology as could be expected. The mask relaxed as he answered, ‘Yes . . . thanks for the tip.’

  Alfie looked quite helpless, with black eyes ready to swim. Frank saw that too, and said quickly, ‘As a matter of fact, it’s on account of the book we’re here so early.’

  Both Jeremy and Alfie looked at him in surprise. He smiled at both of them, and then at staring Nan, and added, ‘Material. We were hoping you might let her stay around a bit and watch . . . or even help, if she can. Country race-meeting stable . . . seeing the Favourite prepared for action, et cetera. Would it be asking too much?’

  Both Alfie and Jeremy went red. But while Alfie looked blank, Jeremy smiled slightly: ‘So that’s what the ringer’s rigout’s for on Ladies’ Day!’

  Frank slipped an arm about his beloved’s slim but stiff waist, chuckling, ‘That’s it. Greater love hath no woman for her art, than that she miss putting on a smart dress to serve it.’

  Jeremy also chuckled, taking another but different look from before at Alfie. ‘But I’m afraid that pretty outfit’s going to get messed up if you really want to lend a hand.’

  Alfie’s eyes shone. ‘I can always wash it . . . I’d be so happy to help.’

  Frank said, ‘Well, I can leave her with you. Thanks a lot, Jeremy . . . I’m much obliged.’ He turned the smile on all and sundry, departed.

  Jeremy remarked as he disappeared, ‘Nice fellow, your husband. One of the nicest persons I’ve ever met.’

  Alfie said, ‘Yes . . . he is a dear . . . what can I do?’

  Nan giggled, ‘He handsome, too.’

  Jeremy feigned a growl, ‘That’ll do you, Ngunkomlalli . . . I got a paper reckon I the handsome one for you.’

  Nan squealed with mirth, as did Water Lily, her daughter-in-law, and a couple of black girls. Alfie, looking at a loss, asked, ‘What’s that word mean?’

  ‘Simply wife. Now, I’ll leave you to her. Have to go and see them at the Committee room.’ Jeremy went off.

  ‘What you want to do, Missus?’ asked Nan.

  ‘Please call me Alfie, dear.’

  ‘But dat boy name!’

  ‘That’s what they call me. I’ll do anything . . . anything at all.’

  ‘You like to curry-comb?’

  ‘What’s that?’ When Nan looked incredulously over the stockrider-girl, Alfie made a little grimace. ‘Shows what a phoney I am, doesn’t it. But you teach me, eh?’

  Nan produced a metal comb. ‘We try Golden Girl first. She de quietest one . . . if she like you. We see if she like you first-time, eh?’

  The introduction between pretty ringer and beautiful chestnut filly was made, with complete success. Golden Girl so much liked the smell of Aelfrieda, the enchanted one, that she sought more of it by nibbling at the buttons of her shirt so as to undo them and nuzzle a little brassièred tit, much to the amusement of the other females present.

  ‘She think you got him milk!’ squealed Nan.

  Alfie, just as tickled, said, ‘Wait till I get round to that part of her . . . I’ll take my revenge.’

  It was all great fun. Golden Girl loved the fondling and fussing. The other horses got interested in the newcomer, too and whickered for attention. Nan gave Alfie some glucose squares to feed them as titbits. Jeremy cruelled things a little when he heard the titty-searching episode, which he did from the articulate one of those concerned, when he met her up at the course as the bulk of the household rushed up there to see the first race run with one of their horses in it. He didn’t smile, but glancing over her swiftly, as one of his kind might a mare, asked, ‘But you’re not lactating, are you?’ She evidently didn’t like it, but giggled slightly, remarking that he was a real horse-doctor, wasn’t he; to which he replied shortly: ‘Yes,’ and concentrated on the race with his binoculars. Still, it went pleasantly enough. Alfie got grubbier and grubbier and more excited with every race, to which she came rushing up with the rest, to stand beside Jeremy for all his apparent lack of interest in her compared with the equine performances.

  She would have lunched with the Lily Lagoons people at the stable only for a request made to her at the end of the last race before lunch: that is to say before the Great Race, the Cup, which would follow lunch and end the serious business of the festival. It was Frank, coming to her, who made the request. He drew her aside and told her Lady Rhoda had been rather uppity with him when he had given her Alfie’s apologies along with the reason for her absence from the company of the other Committee Ladies. He said, ‘You’ll have to make some little gesture, darling. Come to lunch with me, eh? Then you can make your own apologies.’ Alfie looked annoyed. He insisted, ‘It’s important, sweetheart. They’ve got their rigid conventions, whatever we might think of them. You can go right back to your fun afterwards.’ She agreed reluctantly, excused herself to Jeremy.

  There was that polite bit of boozing to be done in the annexe of the privileged under the grandstand before lunch. Alfie and her Frank went in to join the bleating throng. There was Lady Rhoda talking with the Patron, Colonel Chivvy, and his lady wife and the Widow Trotters who had at last made the Big House guest-list. Rhoda quickly caught Alfie’s eye as she came smiling towards her. Who could have helped but see a dusty ringer walk in amongst that gathering of elegantly attired squatters? Alfie said nicely, ‘Bit late with my apologies, Lady Rhoda, but . . . but . . .’ Looking right past the vulgar intruder, Her Ladyship said to the Lady Patroness that she thought it time they adjourned for lunch. All swept by the red-faced big-black-eyed Alfie with a swish of silk and stiff-starched khaki linen. A moment. Then she rushed to the door and out, through the crowd swarming like flies over dung round those dispensaries to the gustatory needs of the common herd: Finnucane’s temporary gold mine, Ah Loy’s hot-pie and dim-sim foundry, Ali Barba’s Rusoyee. She was stared at sharply from the latter by a pair of small goggled eyes above busily working yellow-brown hands, but seeing nothing herself, not even those coarse fellows who took advantage of the crush and her haste to slap and pinch her wobbly bum, because her eyes were swimming with tears.

  Back at the stables, under the bough shelter that served as dining-room, all were seated at the table eating, except Jeremy, who was standing, drinking from a b
owl of soup. All stared in astonishment at the precipitate entry. Alfie halted just short of Jeremy, blinking her tears, strangling her sobs. Jeremy put down his bowl, asking, ‘What’s happened?’

  Alfie panted: ‘That . . . that . . . your wife . . . was rude to me . . . ooooooh!

  Jeremy murmured, ‘My wife?’

  ‘I . . . mean . . . Lady Eaton . . .’

  ‘She’s Sir What’s It’s Eaton’s wife.’

  Alfie’s tears got the better of her: ‘Ooooooo . . . I know . . . I’m glad too . . . she’s a . . . ooooooh!

  Jeremy reached and touched her arm, drew her, saying, ‘Come and sit down . . . have lunch with us.’

  ‘Ooooooo!’ The corduroyed arms clutched at him, slipped round his neck, while the hat was knocked back to hang by its chin-strap as the curly head dropped on his breast.

  Just then Frank came up. Gently disengaging himself, Jeremy handed Alfie to her rightful owner, saying, ‘This’s your job, man.’ But Alfie was recovered now. She shook her curls, gave a weak smile, sniffed, planked her wobbly bottom on the space on the form available to her. Then, getting out the bit of grubby lace that was her hanky, and dabbing her tears, with laughter that sounded a little hysterical, she told what had happened. At Jeremy’s invitation Frank sat beside her; while Nan leapt up to get them food. Jeremy’s eyes twinkled in looking at Frank, causing Frank to smile slightly in return. When Alfie asked Jeremy what he thought of it, he shrugged, and picking up his soup-bowl, answered, ‘Well, you could hardly expect anything else, when you deserted the table of the squattocracy for the stable of the one they call the Scrub Bull.’

  Alfie cried, ‘Give me the Scrub Bull every time!’

  Nan, dishing out to her, squealed with a little laugh, but looked with searching brown eyes at those big black ones fastened so avidly upon her man, whose own grey eyes had taken flight to distance.

  Whatever was being said about the incident around the squatters’ table, there was no time for table-talk here. Finished his soup, and while the others made haste with their cold corned beef and mash (except Darcy, who hollow-cheeked, nibbled a cracker and drank black tea and watched the gorgers hollow-eyed), Jeremy got out a stethoscope and went to Golden Girl, standing quietly enough in her special shelter, but with a dark stain of sweat here and there that betrayed her nervousness. The filly whickered at his approach, and nuzzled him to embarrassment as he went over her heart and lungs, listening, listening, with eyes looking, as he kept pushing her velvet nose away, as if he saw those mighty mechanisms in actual rhythmic operation. Then there was his going over of every point of her slender limbs with searching fingers that seemed to have eyes in them, over her hoofs, her mouth, even a peep at what she had under her silky bridal-veil of tail. Alfie, who had soon leapt up to join him, boldly asked what the last inspection was in aid of. He answered off-handedly, ‘To see if she might be coming into oestrus . . . the excitement could bring her on.’

  ‘Would that make any difference to her performance?’

  ‘Could even better it . . . with a good jockey to handle the situation. The trouble would be with the stallions running with her. Properly, she’d have to be scratched if she were . . . Objectionable Horse, is the official term. Sexual misbehaviour is grounds for disqualification. They’re not machines, you know . . . but living, feeling intelligent creatures, essentially the same as ourselves.’ He was not looking at her, didn’t see the excitement growing in the pretty childish face. ‘Well, she seems to be in perfect condition for what we want her to do. It depends on whether she wants to do it . . . and, of course, her opponents, the luck of the game, and all the other hazards.’

  ‘What could go wrong?’ asked Alfie.

  ‘Anything . . . from a snake on the track to Darcy’s losing his weights. Well, we must be moving.’

  ‘Can I come with you?’

  He looked at her. She added: ‘I mean, to see everything this time . . . weighing-in, saddling . . .’

  ‘Of course,’ he said shortly. ‘Tag along.’ He left her.

  He bridled the mare and led her, with Darcy in his silks and carrying his tiny saddle on the other side of the beast’s tossing head. Darcy’s own head was cocked to listen to the Mullaka’s final instructions. Alfie, as if understanding that she could have no place in this, came behind. Frank, as if realising that he was not wanted, went with the household straight up to the spectators’ flat.

  They entered the Saddling Paddock. There was Charlie Bishoff looking the horses over. He eyed the trailing Alfie sharply, but ignored her while he made his inspection of the mare. He said to Jeremy, ‘Although I says it as shouldn’t . . . she’ll romp in. Anyway, I’ve got my missus’s year’s dress allowance on it . . . or rather, she has. Good luck.’ There were numerous sharp glances. Alfie ignored them, looked about boldly, followed Darcy to the door of the scales-shed, watched him sit the big brass scales — while a battery of Committeemen’s eyes watched her.

  The mare was saddled carefully. She was excited now, snorting, quivering, rolling golden eyes, lashed a kick at one of her male rivals who took the liberty of a sniff. Alfie said with a chuckle, ‘She’s like a prima donna, isn’t she?’

  Jeremy, hoisting Darcy aloft, ignored her. A last word, a last pat; then horse and rider away, heading, prancing now, for the show-off of the Cup Parade. Jeremy headed for the gate leading to the flat where the common herd were swarming. Alfie darted after him. He looked at her as if he’d forgotten her. He didn’t speak till they came up to the Totalisator: ‘You having a bet?’

  ‘Frank’s betting for us . . . on Golden Girl, naturally.’

  ‘They’ve all got a chance . . . and the odds are better on the others.’

  ‘You can’t bet on your own horse, can you?’

  ‘It isn’t done, of course . . . openly. But I don’t bet at all.’

  ‘Why’s that . . . one of your principles?’

  ‘Not really. It is my opinion that the money business’s what makes racing stink, probably worse than anything else human, except prostitution . . . but the reason is I’m not a gambler.’

  ‘But you’re a man who’d take risks?’

  ‘Gamblers don’t take risks . . . they just don’t recognise them.’

  ‘Isn’t that the same thing?’

  ‘Hardly. Gambling’s a form of conceit.’ When she eyed him with wide inquiry, he added: ‘To be a true gambler you’ve got to think you’re a special favourite of the gods. You can expect miracles simply by tossing for ’em, placing a bet at long odds. You don’t curse yourself for a fool if you lose against logic, but the gods for letting down their white-haired boy.’

  They were up to the rails of the course, amongst the Lily Lagoons people. She said with a cocky little smile, ‘You know all the answers, don’t you!’

  ‘To questions mostly of little consequence, I’m afraid.’

  ‘What are the consequential ones?’

  ‘Shh! If you don’t mind . . . this is the matter of most consequence of the moment.’

  The horses were prancing and wheeling about, with Charlie Bishoff on his snowball patiently manoeuvring them to the barrier. The tension came from the horses to the crowd. Sweat was pouring, lungs straining.

  Then: ‘They’re off!’

  That scatter of gravel and whirl of dust — the heaving rumps and flying tails — the Favourite at the rear. Alfie shrilled her dismay: ‘Oh!’ and grabbed at Jeremy’s arm.

  Gently disengaging himself, he said, ‘He held her to stop her getting out in front.’

  ‘Is that a disadvantage?’

  ‘To some horses . . . the opposite to others. She’s very lively, is our little girl. She’d lead the field, knock herself up before she’d done half of it.’ He was looking through his glasses. He added: ‘Where she shines is in the last two furlongs. All being well, she’ll just tear away from ’em.’

  ‘How do you know all this about a horse?’

  ‘You breed the horse. You know what its progenitors have done. You s
tudy its own peculiarities . . . every little thing.’ He was only muttering, intent upon the wave of colour disintegrating into the surf of rolling red mirage. He was silent till the field appeared across the way at the Four-Furlong. He gave her his glasses, saying, ‘See if you can pick her out.’

  After a moment Alfie cried, ‘Yes . . . I see her . . . she’s in the middle.

  ‘Her right place till she gets to the mile and a half.’

  She looked at him as she handed back the binoculars: ‘If you could only breed human beings like horses . . . so that you’d know what they were likely to do.’

  He grinned wryly: ‘You can generally pretty accurately anticipate what the great majority are likely to do . . . something silly.’

  ‘You are a misanthrope, aren’t you!’ He was looking through the glasses again: ‘Not really. Man with his intelligence, and with his beauty when he’s got it, is the most wonderful thing in creation.’

  She touched his arm, saying swiftly, ‘I’m so glad to hear you say that . . . Jeremy!’

  He withdrew his eyes from the glasses to look at her again, met her wide dark adoring eyes, went red, and retreated with haste back to the glasses and the field now coming for the first time into the Straight in this gruelling race of two miles.

  There was no talking to him now, as the wedge-like storm came thundering towards them and the mob gasped to the strain of striving flesh and sinew. Past in a roaring flash of colour, while the crowd shrieked its excitement and danced like lunatics — then gone again in dust. She asked where the mile and a half would be. But he ignored her, watching for the field to come into it as that strange rolling rainbow-hued wave across the way.

  Then out of sight again, as only a willy-willy of dust, sweeping along as if all the Dust Devils in the land were in it. The wedge again — the thunder — the flying storm of flesh and hair and silk and hoofs: ‘Golden Girl . . . she’s out in front . . . the Favourite . . . the Favourite . . . come on girlie, come on sweetheart, you got ’em . . . keep it up . . . keep it up!’ With Golden Girl two lengths ahead the storm swept past the Flat, past the Post: ‘Golden Girl . . . Golden Girl . . . the Favourite wins!’