Of Ashes and Rivers that Run to the Sea

by Marie Munkara

  Meanwhile JJ has taken Casmira around the other side of the waterfall and is crouching in the shallows with her while mummy and I hide behind the closest cover, some reeds a few metres away on the bank. Louis has found a tree to hide behind in the opposite direction from Mario and Theresa Anne and has yelled out to distract the bull so that they can leg it to the safety of the ute. But it wants Mario and Theresa Anne, not Louis, and starts to scrape up the dirt with its hooves. The dogs are now barking hysterically but it’s ignoring them as well. There is a big black wattle on the bank about four metres away in Louis’ direction so I leap out of the water and shimmy up the trunk, yelling at the bull along with Louis. The two of us making a ruckus does the trick and it turns to look, first in the direction of where Louis is hiding behind the tree yelling and then in my direction. With the bull looking the other way Mario and Theresa Anne have wasted no time and have reached the ute and flung themselves in and slammed the doors. Mario starts the engine and tooting the horn drives off up the track in a hail of gravel in an effort to lure the bull after it. But the bull stays put and only Panacua and Yuwalinga chase after the ute barking, thinking they are getting left behind. Mario pulls up and the dogs leap into the back and then he’s off again. But my spot in the fork of the tree has interrupted the progress of a line of ants marching from their nest in the top of the tree to the ground and suddenly they are swarming all over me. I feel one bite my fanny and let off a stream of curses. They are walking around my voluminous dress under my bra and down my back, the fucking things are everywhere. I slap at the ants and pray the bull will bugger off so I can jump into the water away from this torment.

  Meantime the bull, who is obviously getting bored with its encounter with humans, wanders over to the waterhole for a drink from the bank between mummy in the reeds and Louis behind his tree. I watch Louis sidle around the trunk so as to keep it between him and the bull while I look for mummy but she has disappeared from view altogether. The bull has an earthy but not unpleasant smell. It gives a big sigh and then wanders off the way it came, its tail flicking at annoying flies on its back. When it has disappeared I jump out of the tree and leap into the water hoping to drown as many ants as I can. There are big welts starting to appear all over my body and they feel like they are on fire.

  When we pull up at home all I want to do is stand under a cold shower but the power is out which means the water pump isn’t working which means I can’t. I am so crapped off. Mario and Theresa Anne have taken up their fight where they left off and now mummy and Louis are having a go at each other too so I go into my room with JJ and shut the door and I teach him how to play gin rummy. It has certainly been a Christmas Day to remember although I don’t know if I want to do it quite like that again. I’ve never really enjoyed Christmas anyway so it might be better to just avoid it altogether.

  9.

  We’re at the club and my cousin Colin offers to take me hunting the next time he goes. I don’t like blood or guts or dead things but I want to see the bush and I desperately want to go. I tell Colin I can handle it if all the blood-thirsty stuff doesn’t happen when I’m looking. Colin’s okay with this and so are Louis and Mario and cousin-brother Danny who are coming along as well.

  We decide on tomorrow morning and true to his word Colin arrives at the arse-crack of dawn. That part’s okay, I can deal with the early start, it’s just the vehicle he’s driving that leaves me dumbfounded. It defies description. I can tell from the rusted skeleton before me that it was once a 4x4 but I wouldn’t have a clue what make it is. A cloud of black smoke billows from the truncated exhaust, and the motor sounds like it’s running on one cylinder. There are no mudguards and the bonnet appears to be borrowed from another car and held in place with fencing wire. There is no tray left on the back anymore – time, salt-water and bad driving have taken care of that. Instead my four brothers are perched on packing crates that have been lashed onto the subframe. They busily light up rollies and shiver in the cool dawn air while early-morning sunlight filters through the bullet-holes in the roof above Colin’s head. My face must be registering concern as I look at the packing crates because Colin laughs and tells me that I have the seat of honour in the cabin. The door is rusted shut so I clamber in through the open window (there’s no glass anyway) and promptly go through the floor. I look down to see myself standing on the road. They were all waiting for that and laugh uproariously as I inspect the gaping hole and wonder where I’m supposed to put my feet. I see that Colin has a similar problem, both floors are totally rusted out.

  ‘Look there,’ says Colin and I see the rope tied from the window-winder to the steering column that I can rest my feet on as we drive along. Feeling a breeze on my neck I turn to see a gaping hole behind me: the rear window is also missing. Colin explains that this happened when he pulled up and Danny’s arse went through the window and got stuck. How Danny managed to get jammed in that space is beyond my powers of comprehension so maybe Colin’s pulling my leg. I test my foot-rest and it holds, though the thought of what might happen if one or both of my feet come off it as we are driving along almost makes me climb back out again. But I think of what I might miss if I did so I stay. I pretend I haven’t noticed there isn’t a seatbelt and off we go.

  I have no idea how fast we’re going because none of the gauges are working, but I can tell it’s fast as we glide over the corrugations in the dirt road like it was smooth bitumen. Colin hoons around the corners like a racing-car driver and I hang onto the seat for dear life and push my feet hard against the rope. I manage to screw my head around without falling down the hole in the floor and look out the rear window. Despite the clouds of dust that enshroud them and Colin’s crazy driving, my brothers are still there, no one has fallen off their packing crate yet.

  Above the roaring motor and the road noise I can hear Mario’s voice saying something, then he, Louis and Danny crack up, clinging onto the subframe and each other as hysteria and the forces of gravity threaten to cast them asunder. I have to look away. I’m not religious but I pray the shotgun in Louis’ hand is not loaded and doesn’t leave another hole in the vehicle or my head.

  The bush is beautiful – it’s recently rained and everything is green and lush. We turn off onto a track to a place called Ardowani and I notice bush orchids growing in abundance on the cycads. I ask Colin to stop so I can gather some to take home to mummy’s place. No worries, we stop and everyone hops off to roll another smoke and stretch their legs. Louis helps me collect orchids – ‘Up there,’ I say and up there he goes, what a helpful brother he is.

  ‘Taringa,’ yells Colin. It’s a small king brown slithering along minding its own business. Colin and Danny jump on the back of the ute while Mario pokes at it with a stick. It lunges at him and he swings the stick at it to flick it away. The snake arcs into the air and lands within a few feet of Louis and me, twisting into loops and hissing and quite obviously pissed off.

  ‘Look out!’ Louis screams before jumping up the nearest cycad which bends under his weight. Louis is terrified of snakes. But the snake is having none of this and it heads off in the other direction as fast as it can slither.

  Off we go again. The track opens up into a plain, and a herd of feral pigs, surprised by our sudden appearance, charge off in all directions. I am surprised that the sound of the rust bucket’s motor didn’t alert them to our presence a bit quicker, but then maybe they couldn’t work out what the hell it was and were curious. Galvanised into action the three brothers on the back leap off the still-moving vehicle and take off after the departing pigs.

  Colin jumps out yelling at me to take over the wheel. I whip my feet off the rope, wriggle past the gear-stick and then throw myself into the driver’s seat, screaming at them not to kill the babies or pregnant ones and not to shoot them while I’m looking. Suddenly everyone is back again looking very sheepish. In the mad rush to seek and destroy they’d forgotten the shotgun. Louis grabs it from where he left it and they’re off. I hope they haven’t
forgotten the ammunition as well but no one comes back so everything must be okay.

  I bump along at a reasonable distance behind Colin and Louis who have separated a small group of pigs from the others. I’m trying not to look in case they shoot something but it’s hard to steer safely with my eyes averted and the fear of running over one of the blokes makes me keep an eye on the proceedings. A big sow turns and faces them while the other pigs race off into the nearby bush on their cute little trotters and squealing to each other. I imagine they are giving each other directions.

  ‘Look out for that big fucker in the footy shorts on your left!’

  ‘Let’s split up, you go that way and I’ll meet you at the waterhole.’

  ‘Where’s Dad when we bloody well need him?’

  ‘Yeah, with Dad up their arses those “two legs” would be running in the other direction.’

  ‘Shut the fuck up and run!’

  Colin motions for me to go left so I start to swing the steering wheel which to my horror promptly comes off in my hands. I look up to see Louis directly in front of me facing the other direction. If he doesn’t move I’ll run him over in about thirty seconds. I go to beep the horn but the horn, which should be attached to the steering wheel, which is grasped in my hands, is missing and there’s nothing to beep. I’m screaming at Louis to get out of the way but his mind is focused on the pigs and he doesn’t hear me. Finally instinct or the thundering noise of the motor saves him as he turns to see me advancing on him and leaps brilliantly to the side. I plough into a clump of bushes and branches shoot up through the holes in the floor, the leaves slapping me in the face. There’s an almighty thump, the motor stalls and all is still while it hisses and clicks. I part the leaves in front of my stinging face, grateful that my eyes haven’t been poked out, only to see Colin and Louis jumping around like a pair of kids with big grins on their faces. Danny and Mario join them as I clamber out the driver’s window clutching the steering wheel and wondering what the hell they are doing. Mario points and I immediately see their cause for celebration. I have run over a sizeable pig that was hiding in the clump of bushes and killed it. My heart goes into my throat before I dissolve into tears and turn away. How ironic that after all my blustering I’ve ended up killing something.

  I give Colin his steering wheel and he leans in through the window and puts it back on with a thump of his massive fist. I give him a half-hearted smile and then head down to the beach to recover from the shock while the blokes go off in search of any stragglers and to butcher the pig. I settle down under a big spreading beauty leaf tree and watch the ocean.

  Knowing my contrary stomach Louis sets up a campfire further down the beach to cut off little strips to cook. The smell is fantastic. Although I don’t usually like the taste of pork this stuff is awesome. After we’ve eaten our fill we lie down in the sand under the casuarinas to rest and with the sound of the wind blowing through the trees we all fall asleep.

  I’m the first to wake up and notice the darkening storm-laden sky. I want to leave before the storm sets in because we are in black soil country and could get bogged to the axles and be stuck for the night, but the others decide they need another feed before they do anything more strenuous than sit up and yawn. We eat as big raindrops start to plop into the sand around us.

  It’s only now as we’re about to leave that I discover the seat of honour hasn’t been named and reserved for guests such as me – oh no, it’s where they put the slaughtered and dismembered animals away from the dust. The seat that I’d thought was blackened by age and inclement weather has in reality been blackened by the blood of countless victims. I prefer to take my chances on the packing crate with my brothers rather than sit in that seat again.

  The rust bucket has a flat battery. We push it and push it and we push it some more. Finally as the sky decides to open up and pours down on us the rust bucket back-fires, belches out a huge black cloud and starts up. We all jump on. I grab the spot directly behind Colin so I have a solid rear-window frame to cling on to as the other side is nearly rusted through. Colin has been instructed to drive slowly but maybe it’s the awkwardness of my seating position that belies the true speed of the vehicle as we get off the Ardowani track and skim over the corrugations towards home. I wish Colin would slow down. I’ve already asked him twice but he grins and pretends he can’t hear me over the motor. I pray that I won’t get any splinters in my arse from the packing crates and the thought has just left my mind when the rust bucket starts to cough and then stops dead, nearly dislodging my brothers and slamming me against the back of the cabin. Colin bends over to pick the dismembered pig up from the hole in the floor where it’s fallen, and then looks sheepishly out the back window at us. I know without being told that the fuel tank is empty. I look at everyone, they’re all soaking wet and like me are covered in the mud that has been flicked up by the wheels, but they are rolling cigarettes totally unperturbed. I think I’m high on exhaust fumes because I feel a bit giddy now that we’re still. Then we push the car onto the side of the road and set off towards Nguiu on foot, the blokes with bits of pig on their shoulders and me in front so I don’t have to look at the gore. There is a rainbow in the sky in front of me and the air is pure and clean. I think I could get used to this.

  10.

  It’s the funeral of Gemma’s father, and mummy and I are making our way through the crowd to where the Munkaras are sitting and where my cousin Mavis, the organised one in the family, is busily handing out bottles of frozen water for the long day ahead. It looks like utter confusion to me but the other family groups arrange themselves in a certain way and somehow we all fit together under the mango trees and no one is left out in the sun. Gemma’s dad was an eminent artist and has carvings displayed in museums and galleries all over the world. He was a gentle and kind man and loved by all of us. He is wrapped up in a shroud and laid out on one of the mission-issue beds. The legs and frames of these beds are made of metal pipes with reo welded on the part where you lie down. They look as uncomfortable as all hell and I think other people must share my opinion as I’ve seen a lot of them in people’s yards occupied by camp dogs. We have one in the back yard that Panacua uses to rub up and down on to scratch his back while he makes little growly noises of bliss and waves his legs around in the air like he’s riding an imaginary bicycle.

  His wife, my Aunty Blanchie, and his five daughters, including Gemma, and his only son Patrick Jr, who has been released from jail for the day, sit just in front of us because we are close family. There are sheets hanging on ropes strung between the mango trees and I ask mummy why the person who owned the sheets didn’t take in their washing before the funeral started. But mummy laughs at my silliness and tells me that the sheets are gifts for people who were involved with the organising. Apparently funerals here are well-organised affairs and everything is done by people who aren’t close family members so the direct family of the deceased can get on with the business of grieving. You aren’t even supposed to feed yourself, someone else has to put the food or water into your mouth.

  As with everything around this place, the funeral begins with a mass delivered by father whats-his-name all decked out in his regalia and sweating buckets. I would have thought some concessions could have been made for the swaddling vestments in this tropical heat but maybe it’s a form of penance, like wearing hair shirts or flagellating yourself. I thought I’d seen the last of the Catholic mass when I left home but I will stay here today only out of respect for Gemma’s dad and nothing else.

  Finally the mass finishes and we get down to the proper Tiwi funeral where his kinship granddaughters perform the boat dance to send him on his way. This was performed by the Macassans who brought this ceremony with them when they visited the Tiwi Islands before the mission came and the Tiwi must have liked it so much they decided to use it as well. It shows the lowering of the flag on a boat to signify the passing away, just like Westerners lower flags to half-mast out of respect for the dead. There are the
core group of men, his kinship fathers, who perform dances from their own family groups, and then there are others who join in along the way. The most disturbing are the women who wail and hit themselves on the head and body with sticks and rocks. Different groups of women get up and do this and I am horrified to see blood running down some of the women’s faces. The wailing makes the hairs on the back of my neck stand up, then Aunty Marie Evelyn and some other women get up and move to centre stage for their turn. Aunty’s wailing is phenomenal, there is absolutely no competition as she out-wails the other women and does our family proud. Mummy confirms she is the best.

  Suddenly aunty stops wailing and flings herself into the air. I feel the ground shake and see the dust rise as she lands on the earth with a big thud. Aunty Ruthie joins her while some of the other women keep wailing and hitting themselves. I think of how much self-control it would take to do this. Could I do it? Could I launch myself into the air as high as I could go and throw my legs out from under me knowing that I was going to land on the rock-hard ground and probably hurt myself? No, I don’t think I could. Despite both aunties’ ages they aren’t afraid of bones breaking and they continue to throw themselves into the air to show they are heartbroken he had to leave us all.

  Then they stop and wander back to their places again while another group takes over. Aunty leans across the two women between her and mummy and asks mummy for a smoke and if she can have some of the wallaby Mario and Louis brought back this morning. Mummy passes two smokes, one for her and Aunty Ruthie, and tells her she can have a leg. I look at Aunty Marie Evelyn and Aunty Ruthie lighting up their smokes and chatting away like they were sitting on the beach having a picnic. If I hadn’t seen it with my own eyes it would be impossible to believe that they had just seconds before been throwing themselves around like that. I ask aunty if she is sore but she just throws her head back and laughs, right there in the middle of the funeral she laughs and nobody even cares. I love it. I love the recklessness and the spontaneity and I love my aunties.