1988

by Andrew McGahan

  I was tired of being the responsible one. It was fine for Wayne to be off in his own world, wherever it was, but what if I hadn’t been there to arrange the mundane details for him? I brooded, watched him drift vacantly about the house. What was he thinking about all the time? Apart from his art, did he have any idea about anything at all?

  Finally it was a Saturday night. We were on the back verandah. It’d been a long evening, drunken and testy. The boil made sitting down uncomfortable. It was big now, with a sharp, red head, but so far I’d done nothing to it.

  I got up to go to the kitchen. I’d had enough of conversation with Wayne. And I was hungry.

  ‘I’m gonna make some chips,’ I said, ‘You want some?’

  ‘Chips? Deep-fried chips?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Are you making anything else?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Just chips?’

  ‘Yes. Do you want any?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Fine.’

  I boiled the oil and sliced up some potatoes. What was wrong with making chips? There wasn’t a takeaway for two hundred miles, what else was I going to do? I threw the potatoes in, watched them fry. In ten minutes they were ready. I spread them on a plate, got the salt and a fresh beer, went back out on the verandah.

  Wayne started picking at the plate. I tolerated it for a time. Then he grabbed a huge handful. He didn’t ask. He just grabbed a great huge handful and began stuffing them in his mouth.

  I put the plate down, looked at him. ‘You said you didn’t want any.’

  ‘So?’

  ‘I would’ve made enough for both of us if you’d said you wanted some, but you said you didn’t.’

  ‘I changed my mind.’

  ‘Fine. Have the fucking lot then.’

  ‘What’s wrong with you?’

  ‘Why don’t you ever do anything around here? Why’s it always have to be me?’

  ‘You want me to make the chips from now on?’

  ‘No. I just wish you’d . . . I dunno, be a bit aware for a change. I don’t wanna be in charge all the time.’

  ‘As if you’d ever let me be in charge.’

  ‘Bullshit.’

  ‘Gordon, you’re a control freak. Even if I wanted to do all the organising you wouldn’t let me.’

  ‘You’d fuck it up, that’s why.’

  ‘See? What am I supposed to do?’

  I took my beer and stormed-off to my room. He was insufferable. A control freak? That was low. I sat at my desk and lit up a cigarette. They were good for everything, cigarettes. Peace. Anger. I sucked in big furious drags, started coughing. I retched and burped, stubbed out the cigarette, sat there.

  Arguments about french fries.

  We were losing it.

  Finally, in the shower, I took the boil between two fingers, gritted my teeth and squeezed. It was exquisite pain. The head popped, blood and pus gushed out. I kept squeezing, marvelling at it all. The mound of tight red skin subsided. I felt pleased with myself. Boils were nothing to fear.

  Two days later I noticed another one. On the side of my thigh. It was small, in its early stages, but I knew what it was.

  An afternoon or two later I was sitting, as usual, out the back, watching the sun go down. An event occurred. A yacht sailed into view, about a mile offshore. It was the first boat I’d seen, close in, since we arrived. It was small and black against the sun, but it seemed to be angling towards land. I remembered our duty to protect the coast against hunters, smugglers, illegal immigrants. Australia for Australians, that was the Cobourg motto. I went over to inform Vince.

  I hadn’t seen him for four or five days. I knocked on his door. There were no lights on in the hallway. I went in, down to the living room. There was a lamp on at the desk. Paper in the typewriter, black print covering half the page. Vince wasn’t at his stool. He was lying on one of the couches, asleep. His shirt was open, his face was heavy with growth. There was a glass of port on the floor beside him. The ceiling fans whirred over the silence.

  Vince?’ I said.

  He woke up. Stared at me dimly. ‘What?’

  ‘There’s a yacht out there. Close in. I thought maybe it was going to land.’

  He pulled himself up and sat forward. Coughed muck out of his throat. ‘What sort of yacht?’

  ‘I dunno. A small one.’

  ‘And what am I supposed to do?’

  ‘Uh . . . I just thought I should tell you.’

  He looked at me. ‘Well I can’t go out and meet them can I. Not unless you’ve got a spare boat.’

  ‘I guess not.’

  ‘Anything else?’

  ‘No.’

  He reached for the glass. ‘See you later then.’

  I got out of there.

  TWENTY-NINE

  Next morning Kevin was barking on our front verandah. He lived with us almost full time now. Whatever the mood was in Vince’s house, the dog didn’t like it. He slept in Wayne’s room. Wayne didn’t mind the fleas or the ticks in his bed. On the other hand, Wayne was unlikely to get up and see what Kevin wanted. That sort of thing was a control freak’s job.

  I got up, wrapped a towel around myself, went out. I assumed Russel would be there, Kevin didn’t bark for anyone else. It wasn’t Russel. It wasn’t even anyone black. It was four people, white. Two men and two women. I stared at them stupidly.

  ‘G’day,’ one of the men said. He looked about fifty or sixty. Wizened, heavily tanned, bearded. ‘We were sailing past, decided we’d land.’

  ‘You know,’ grinned the other man, ‘Saw your light on, thought we’d drop in.’

  It took me some time to realise he was talking about the lighthouse. It was a joke. He was younger than the other man. He had sleek black hair and a tight, naked chest above his shorts. I was suddenly conscious of the holes in my towel and the way my belly hung over the top. And the large, ready-to-burst boil on my leg.

  I said, ‘Was that your yacht sailing around last night?’

  The old man nodded. ‘It’s alright if we land here, isn’t it?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  They exchanged glances. It wasn’t much of an answer, but then I’d never had to deal with visitors before.

  ‘You the only one here?’ he went on, ‘We knocked at the other two houses but no one answered.’

  I was waking up a little now. It seemed about mid-morning. ‘There should’ve been someone there. They might all be asleep.’

  We went through the introductions. The old one was Angus, the younger one Greg. The two women had been hanging back, talking to each other. They looked around twenty. Their names were Gail and Jennifer. They were English. Backpackers. The four of them had set sail from Darwin a few days ago. They were on their way around the northern coast to Cairns. They had anchored in the bay, rowed to the beach in their lifeboat, then walked up the track.

  ‘So what’s the story here?’ Angus asked.

  I explained about Wayne and me and the weather station, and about Vince and Russel and the national park. Then I went inside, put some clothes on, and took the four of them over to Vince’s house. I hammered on the door, called. Eventually Vince came out. He didn’t look well. I made the introductions again. I half thought Vince might throw them off the place. Instead he brightened up, even sounded cheerful.

  ‘How long you here for?’ he asked them.

  ‘Just the day.’

  ‘Well, we might slap up a bit of a barbecue. What d’you think Gordon?’

  ‘Sure.’

  Vince invited them into his house. I went back to my own. Wayne had just got up. I went through the details. Who they were, what was happening.

  ‘Are we invited to this barbecue?’

  ‘I guess so. God knows why Vince wants to have one. He’s hardly been in a barbecue mood lately.’

  ‘There were two women you said. English backpackers.’

  ‘Yes.’

  Wayne laughed. ‘The horny old bastard—can’t you see?�
��

  We wandered over after midday. Vince, Angus and Greg were out under the tree, setting-up a table and chairs, drinking beer. They all seemed to be getting along. The women, they said, were taking advantage of Vince’s shower and its hot water system. There was no sign of Russel or Eve. Wayne and I opened beers of our own.

  ‘Vince tells me you blokes don’t get many visitors round here,’ said Greg.

  ‘No, not many.’

  ‘Just the local blacks, that right?’

  ‘Uh-huh.’

  He grinned. ‘Bet you were happy to see a couple of white women.’

  ‘Well . . . ‘

  ‘Wouldn’t mind being a fly on the wall in that shower eh? Or a bar of soap.’

  He laughed. Angus laughed. Wayne and I glanced at each other, sat down. Greg started telling us about himself. It seemed he was a businessman from Perth. He was on holiday. He’d hired Angus and Angus’s yacht for a cruise around the coast of Australia.

  ‘Then while we were docked in Darwin we thought we’d like some female company. We asked around at a few backpacker hostels and came up with Gail and Jennifer.’

  ‘And how’s it gone so far?’ I asked.

  ‘They haven’t come round yet, but they will. It’s a long way to Cairns and it’s a small, slow boat. They’ve got nowhere to hide.’

  We sat there, drinking. Gail and Jennifer emerged from the house, freshly showered. They cracked open beers, sat down, got introduced to Wayne. They gave out a few details. They were both from London, both out of England for the first time. They’d planned the trip for years, waiting until the Bicentennial. Expo was on, and all the other things. They were here to see Australia at its best.

  They were getting it. Five Australian males, a hot afternoon in the scrub, and alcohol. It had undertones of gang rape. Now that there were women around, we men were all puffed-up, alert, jockeying. Even Wayne. Even me. It made no sense. I wasn’t in any way attracted to Jennifer or Gail. They were tanned and fit and bland. I’d never liked backpackers. Never liked the look, or the attitude. But competition was in the air. The need to impress.

  Vince was the main aggressor. He was a ranger, it was his station, he was all competence. He was telling the women stories about his days in the outback. The Rock. The Simpson Desert. Greg and Angus could see he was a man to be reckoned with. They kept up with him, told stories of their own. Wayne and I were easier to dismiss. We had no stories to tell and no authority. And anyway, I had a boil.

  None of it mattered. Jennifer and Gail weren’t interested. They were polite to Vince, tolerant of Angus, openly revolted by Greg. I supposed it was nothing new to them. They’d been travelling around Australia for months, they said. Hitchhiking from Sydney to Melbourne, Melbourne to Perth, Perth to Darwin. Working here and there in truck stops, cafes, farms. They would’ve faced worse by now.

  The afternoon passed. We men grew drunker and louder. The women were treated to slaps on the back, touched knees, various innuendos. Towards dusk, Angus and Greg made noises about getting back to their boat. Vince insisted they stay. He had plenty of spare beds. It was decided. Angus and Greg, in turn, insisted on at least going back to the boat to get some of their own drinks. Vince agreed. The three of them climbed into the Toyota and drove off down to the beach. That confirmed it. Wayne and I were so harmless we’d been left alone with the women.

  We sat there. We weren’t harmless. We were men. And this was our chance. We had twenty minutes, maybe half an hour. That was long enough for anything. For clothes to come off. For fast, meaningless fucking. People did this sort of thing, didn’t they? All it took was someone to suggest it.

  Wayne spoke. ‘So what’s it like, on the yacht with Angus and Greg?’

  ‘Terrible,’ said Jennifer, ‘We should never have come. All they’ve gone on about for the last three days is sex, sex, sex. They’re pathetic. They’ve got no chance of getting it.’

  ‘They seem pretty confident.’

  ‘Tough. We made sure we got our own cabin. With a lock.’

  I swilled my beer. I was going mad. I remembered it was time for the evening weather observation. I headed off to the shack. There were People magazines open all over the desk. I looked at them for a moment, then stacked them all up, threw them under the table.

  When I came out again Wayne and Gail and Jennifer had vanished. I heard laughter coming from our house. I envisaged various scenarios, stopped myself. It was a disease. I walked over. They were all in Wayne’s studio, looking at his canvases. It was the first time I’d seen them myself, for a while. There was nothing much new.

  ‘What about your writing,’ Jennifer asked me, ‘What exactly are you doing?’

  ‘Very little.’

  ‘Didn’t you say something about a horror novel before?’

  ‘It was meant to be. I sort of gave up on that idea.’

  ‘Ever tried fantasy? I read a lot of fantasy. And science fiction.’

  ‘No.’

  It was back to art. I took no part in the discussion. I was beginning to feel slow after all the afternoon beers. Vince and the other two men returned. They had a bottle of fine scotch and some champagne. A party was called, over at Vince’s house. Wayne headed off with the others. I stayed behind.

  Somehow it seemed pointless. I was bored with all the bravado, the muddled thoughts of sex. I really didn’t want anything to do with Gail or Jennifer, and yet there was a longing for the physical. To just fuck a body. It was insane and it wouldn’t happen. I’d only get drunker and slower and more impatient with myself. With everyone. Then it’d turn to bitterness. Easier just to stay away.

  I moved around the house, listening for the sounds of music and voices from the party. I couldn’t relax. What was wrong with me? They were just people, Gail and Jennifer. I should’ve been glad to see them. It wasn’t as if Cape Don offered much else in terms of society. Maybe that was it. It was all too pressured. It should’ve been casual, an encounter, but it was overloaded by loneliness. Frustration. I was too far gone.

  I went to bed and stewed. I masturbated. I tried to think about Gail and Jennifer. About any woman. Nothing came. No woman would have me.

  THIRTY

  I rose at nine. Wayne was up much later, badly hungover. I asked him how things had gone. His memories were hazy. Too much scotch and champagne. But he had images of Angus and Greg chasing the women around the room. Of attempted hugs, gropes, kisses. Of Gail and Jennifer finally getting angry. Of arguments over the sleeping arrangements, who would have which room and which bed. Of the women barricading themselves in, Greg and Angus hammering on the bedroom door.

  ‘What was Vince doing?’

  ‘He was pretty quiet. After a while he just sat on his stool and drank port and looked sad. I think he realised the girls weren’t interested. Not in him, anyway.’

  ‘What about you?’

  ‘Not in me either. Not in anyone.’

  ‘Did Angus and Greg get through the door?’

  ‘Not last night.’

  I sat for a while on the front steps. Vince wandered by, hungover, back to his old self. He said the visitors had got up and left about eight that morning. I thought about the four of them, stuck on that little yacht again. It was depressing. One small lock on that cabin door and Angus and Greg to deal with. And after last night I wasn’t even sure I had the right to feel superior.

  But they were gone and Vince had other news. There’d been a radio call from Darwin.

  ‘Someone else is coming,’ he said.

  ‘Yeah?’

  I wasn’t very interested. I was sick of visitors, they disturbed things. This would be our third in quick succession. First Danny, then the yacht . . . maybe that was ominous. Bad portents always came in threes.

  I said, ‘So who is it this time?’

  ‘His name’s Barry. He’s a ranger.’

  I nodded, waited.

  ‘He’s the one who was here before me.’

  I sat up. This was something. The man who’d
gone mad, driven to it by life at the lighthouse.

  ‘Is he coming back to take over again?’

  Vince shook his head. ‘He’s coming for his dog and his personal property. Then he’s leaving forever.’

  We considered each other. We knew what it meant. Cape Don had broken him.

  Barry flew in on a specially chartered plane. Vince picked him up from the airstrip. The first Wayne or I saw of him was when he arrived unannounced at our front door and yelled down the hall.

  ‘Hey! You two artistes have got my dog!’

  We were sitting, with Kevin, on the back verandah. Kevin leapt up and bounded along the hall. We followed. Barry squatted down and batted Kevin’s head.

  ‘So, Kevvie boy, you missed me?’

  He didn’t look like someone recovering from a nervous breakdown. He looked very fit. Solid, tanned, with a rich black mustache. He was in full uniform. Ironed shirt, tight shorts, big black boots.

  ‘I’m Barry,’ he said, ‘I’m here for my stuff.’

  We gave him our names.

  ‘You’re both painters they tell me.’

  ‘Wayne’s the painter,’ I said, ‘I’m a writer.’

  ‘Yeah? Real fucking art community this place is now. Listen, I got some scuba gear and a few other things stored in that room there. You guys haven’t touched any of it, have you?’

  ‘I’m using it as a studio,’ Wayne said, ‘We moved some things out of the way, that’s all.’

  He wasn’t pleased. ‘I better take a look.’

  We all went into the studio. Barry looked at the scuba tanks and the spear gun and the stacks of chemicals. Now he was angry.

  ‘I had all this arranged y’know. I knew where everything was. You had no business touching it.’

  I said, ‘We haven’t used anything.’

  He surveyed the other half of the room, the studio. The paint on the walls and floor, the canvases themselves. ‘This is what you’ve been doing?’ he said, ‘I thought they said you were a painter.’