Gunshot Road

by Adrian Hyland

  A lot of our mob have gone Christian these days. All those years of missionaries, misery and boredom, I suppose. With a sceptical father and a mob of fiercely traditional elders around me in my formative years, I was never a likely candidate.

  But I reckoned I could put up with a bit of whitefeller God out here. The bush and the big blue sky were a bracing antidote.

  I felt at my throat for the fossil Doc had dug out of the rocks on Moonlight Downs. Ran a thumb across the trilobite’s ruffled spine. He’d told me it was six hundred million years old, put a rocket under my interest in things geological. The least I could do was go to the poor bastard’s funeral.

  A few minutes later the oddest cortege you were ever likely to see came grinding down the road. There was a boot-black hearse in the lead, but it was all downhill from there, a conga of zombie vehicles risen from the dead to claim another for their ranks: there were clapped out Inters and Blitzes, red F-Trucks with missing screens and one-eyed dogs, clanking battlewagons and utes that had been so patched up and cannibalised there was nothing left of the original.

  The hearse slipped in through the gate, everybody else fought for the scraps of shade provided by the ghost gums. I waited until the last possible moment—I’d already grabbed the shadiest spot, and I wasn’t exposing myself to that withering sun until I had to.

  The Rabble—the ageing miners from the Gunshot Road—emerged from their vehicles slowly, reluctantly, as if they were being dragged out into the light by the hand of a monstrous God. They dribbed and drabbed their way to where the hearse had pulled up, hats in hands, shirts adrift, rum flasks buried in their back pockets.

  Tiger Lyons pulled in close to me; his old Holden had a savage list to starboard, and so did he. He struggled out of the cab, all hobbles, wobbles and crusty bends, started out over the gravel like a dilapidated crab. He’d only taken a few steps when he stopped and looked up into the trees around the open grave. Flinched.

  ‘Jesus fuck!’ he spluttered. I couldn’t exactly say the colour drained from his face, but the workaday alcoholic scarlet may have faded to a rough rosé.

  As I turned to follow his gaze, there was an almighty thump on the roof of my vehicle.

  ‘Good god! You really are a cop.’ My father’s head appeared at the window, the rest of him not far behind. He looked me up and down—mainly down: he was a solid six three to my wiry five four. ‘Thought they were having me on.’

  ‘I think they’re having me on as well, Jack. All I’ve done so far is arrest Cookie Crankshaft.’

  ‘What for?’

  ‘Beating up Tom McGillivray.’

  He blinked. ‘Say again?’

  ‘You heard.’

  He checked out the uniform again. Scowled. ‘Not putting yourself into any danger?’

  ‘Yes—I may die of boredom. So far I’ve been hanging round the station reading files. The boss says I’m learning the ropes, but the main strand is how they take their tea.’

  ‘Who is this boss?’

  ‘Senior Sergeant Bruce Cockburn.’

  He cracked his knuckles, narrowed his eyes. ‘What’s he like?’

  ‘Keen. Likes to give motivational talks to the troops, then follow up with post-it notes. When I came in this morning there was one on my desk saying Tidy desk, tidy mind.’

  He nodded. ‘You always did have a dirty desk.’

  He straightened up, stepped back from the car, cast an eye across the miserable scene before us. Father Dal Santo, the Filipino priest, was eyeing his watch.

  ‘Nice of you to come and pay your last respects to Doc,’ said Jack.

  ‘I liked him. He was the one who got me interested in geology.’

  ‘Thought I did that.’

  ‘No Dad, you just taught me how to smash rocks. Doc had a little more finesse.’

  ‘Finesse?’

  ‘Knowledge.’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘Possibly even a degree.’

  ‘Okay, I get the idea.’

  We watched Tiger inching his awkward way back to the car.

  ‘Tiger not a one for funerals?’

  ‘Guess not,’ said Jack, raising a puzzled eyebrow as the old miner reached into the cabin. The eyebrows went haywire when he emerged with a shotgun and began waving it in the general direction of the graveside.

  ‘Christ!’ came a cry. ‘Tiger’s goin on a rampage!’

  Everybody hit the turf, a row of bony arses sticking up from behind the pathetic rose bushes and broken headstones. Only Father Dal Santo—steely of hair and character, said to be a feisty bugger at the best of times—stood his ground; maybe such things were part of the ritual at Filipino funerals.

  Jack vanished, then reappeared, Jeeves-like, beside Tiger.

  ‘Mate, mate…’ He gently relieved him of the weapon. ‘What are you doing?’

  The old bloke looked bewildered.

  ‘This is a funeral Tiger, not a wedding. No need for the shottie.’

  ‘Fuckin vampires. Take a few of the bastards with me.’

  I followed his outstretched finger. A squadron of hooded kite hawks brooding hypnotically in the lower branches of a ghost gum near the grave.

  Jack nodded, passed the gun across to me. ‘Better give this to Emily for safe keeping, eh? Wouldn’t wanner give anybody the wrong idea.’

  ‘Blood-suckin black fuckin…’

  ‘They’re just hawks, mate. Kite hawks. See em every day of the week. They don’t suck your blood. Might nibble your nuts if you were road-kill, but we haven’t come to that yet. Come on, Tiger—Doc’s waitin to say goodbye.’

  He took the old man’s elbow, led him grumbling and stumbling out over the gravel.

  As I locked the weapon away, I spotted a thin, boyish figure on the other side of the road.

  Danny Brambles. I hadn’t seen him since the crash out on the highway. He had his thumbs in his pockets and his eyes raised to where the kite hawks perched. He didn’t look any keener on the birds than Tiger was.

  I walked over to him. ‘Danny.’

  ‘Em’ly.’

  ‘Where you headin?’

  ‘Into town.’ He shook his head, stared at me. ‘Hey Em’ly, need to ask a favour.’

  ‘Yes?’ I noticed, for the first time, the slight sway, the blurred expression in his eyes. I spotted Willy and Dixon Crankshaft lurking in the distance. Guessed what was coming next.

  ‘Couldn’t fix us up for a coupla bucks, could you?’

  ‘What’s a couple?’

  ‘Mebbe fifty?’

  ‘Fifty! Cents, if you’re lucky. Thought you were staying out at Stonehouse Creek.’

  ‘Had to come in.’

  ‘What for?’

  He studied the ground, didn’t answer the question, didn’t have to: we both knew drink and drugs were the magnet that drew a lot of young people in from the bush.

  He figured a change of topic was about due. ‘Who they buryin?’

  ‘You ever meet ol Doc?’

  ‘That kartiya from Green Swamp? Seen him. He used to come out to Stonehouse. Lookin at the rocks.’ He frowned. ‘What appen?’

  ‘You wouldn’t wanner know.’

  ‘Somebody finish im? Who?’

  ‘Another miner, looks like.’

  He nodded darkly. ‘This country, dangerous for kartiya…’

  ‘Dangerous for everybody—especially this time of the year.’

  Danny’s gaze sharpened, seemed to take in for the first time the uniform I was wearing. They still hadn’t found a pair of pants that fit, but they had given me a badge. Emily Tempest: ACPO.

  ‘I seen you at the car crash. You’re a kurlupartu?’ A cop.

  ‘Nah, not really. I’m an undercover blackfeller.’

  ‘But you got the outfit?’

  ‘Just the top half, Danny.’ I ran a hand down my skirt, grinned. ‘Like to catch a glimpse of me skinny black legs from time to time, remind myself who I am.’

  But he was uneasy, I could tell. When he was in town Dan
ny ran with a pretty wild crowd and nothing in uniform had ever done him any favours.

  I spotted my father among the mourners. He beckoned with his chin: festivities were about to get underway. ‘I gotta show me face in there. Feller was a friend of Jack’s.’

  Danny nodded a farewell, set off to join his disreputable mates with an eagerness I didn’t like the look of.

  ‘Hey Danny!’

  He paused.

  ‘When you goin back out bush?’

  ‘Soon.’

  ‘You look after yourself in town—wouldn’t wanner lock you up.’

  He smiled, a flash of the cheeky-boy grin he’d had before the grog got him. ‘Have to catch me first.’

  Fun for all

  I WENT INTO THE cemetery, nodded at a few individuals. Most of them were too busy staring at the ground to notice.

  The atmosphere was…funereal. Grave. A pathetic little affair, shot through with the mourners’ despair. Whether for the deceased or for themselves was difficult to tell. Maybe it was the resonant frequency of their collective DTs. Twenty or thirty people, mainly men of course, most of them looking mildly surprised that they weren’t the guests of honour. Yet. For a lot of them it couldn’t be far off.

  Doc’s wasn’t the only ghost floating over the assembly. The other was Wireless. The bastards hadn’t even given him bail, shipping him off to the remand centre in Alice Springs after the most perfunctory of hearings.

  We seemed to be waiting for something. I stood at the back of the crowd, let my mind wander. Found myself contemplating the scenic wonders of the Rabble from the rear. Aside from your everyday sweat and diesel stains, there were the acid splashes and gelignite flashes of their trade, starbursts of crushed quartz and red ochre, smatters of ash and axle grease, goat shit and goulash from the roadhouse kitchen.

  Staring at the play of light on their patched and baggy clothes was like staring into lino on the toilet floor. Images emerged; among them a wobbly map of Antarctica, a galloping dog and, across Pissy Wilson’s broad arse, a Pieta. I was pondering what you’d get for that on eBay—apart from an intervention order—when I noticed that June Redman, the publican’s wife from Green Swamp, had put in an appearance. Her charming other two-thirds was nowhere in evidence. From what I’d seen of him Noel Redman would probably be billing Doc’s estate for her lost wages. She spotted me, nodded a greeting.

  She was wearing heavy sunglasses, but the corners of her mouth suggested strain. Couldn’t blame her: I’d be strained if I was married to that.

  Father Dal Santo was holding an umbrella over his head in a hopeless attempt to ward off the sun. He was looking particularly shrivelled today. God save us, I thought, even the imports are getting on. He must have been round here for twenty years. I wondered idly if there were more where he came from. Perhaps young Filipinos were beginning to see the dark.

  Two cars arrived a little after the others, pulled in behind my own. The first was a rugged white Holden Rodeo, from which two young men emerged.

  Probably eighteen, twenty years old, both lean, physically poised, slightly ill-at-ease at finding themselves in this geriatric assembly. They were fitted out in the ubiquitous moleskins and riding boots of their caste. The main distinction between them was that one RM Williams shirt was a slightly darker blue than the other.

  The second vehicle was a green Range Rover, the driver a solidly built older man in a suit, of all things. A black suit, the only one in sight. Even the undertakers hadn’t gone that far.

  He climbed out, stretched his back, walked across to join the boys—obviously his sons. He was clean shaven and dark eyed. Big hands, hairy knuckles; a gait somehow suggestive of a man accustomed to keeping a level head on rough terrain.

  The other occupants of the Rover effected a more chaotic exit. A languid woman in a dark blue dress wafted from the passenger seat, opened the back door in a manner that bespoke a need to conserve energy. The reason for that shortly became obvious: two flashes of blue and gold burst forth, tumbled over and picked themselves up. Honey-haired girls of seven or eight, twins.

  They darted around the other side of the car and scrambled back in; emerged moments later, vaguely pursued by a longsuffering older girl with a thin, pale face, dark hair and a sombre dress. The twins completed a circumnavigation of the car, stuttered to a halt when they ran into their mother, doubled back and disappeared into the rear door.

  The father, anticipating their next move, went round to the driver’s side and swept them into his arms as they leapt out. His family fell into an easy formation around him, and they headed in for the service together.

  They’d all done this before.

  ‘Mate, it’s a bloody fun for all,’ muttered Jack, wryly amused by the performance. As they joined the crowd I got a closer look at the little girls. The nearest craned her neck, grinned and slipped me a wink.

  It was the wink that slotted them for me. The photo on Doc’s bedside dresser.

  I touched Jack’s sleeve. ‘Who are they?’

  ‘Wishy and his clan. Doc’s brother. Think her name’s Loreena.’

  ‘Shit. That’s Doc’s brother?’

  ‘Younger.’

  ‘Seems to have suffered the slings and arrows better than his brother.’

  He stared at the coffin ruefully. ‘Being sober helps. Used to be a surveyor round here, Wishy; mapped half the tracks out in the Terra Del Fuego.’

  ‘Can’t say I’ve seen him round.’

  ‘Been away for years—WA, Top End. Heard he was back here with the Transport and Works mob.’

  The funeral kicked off. Father Dal Santo raised his arms, appeared exhausted by the effort. He droned a couple of wafer-thin prayers, asked if anybody had anything to add. He was obviously hoping nobody had; the weather wasn’t getting any cooler.

  But the brother stepped forward. He cleared his throat, joined his hands. ‘I didn’t say much at the church. Mainly because Albie—most of you knew him as Doc, but to me he was always Albie—my brother was never much of a man for churches. Hated em, truth be told. Raging atheist if ever there was one. Sorry mate,’ he added for the benefit of the puzzled priest.

  I smiled. I could relate to that. And I could understand the family’s dilemma: your Bluebush burying options were limited, to say the least. It was the Filipino priest, the lezzie ladies from the Outback Mission or the town tip.

  Wishy Ozolins paused, took in the crowd, nodded at the coffin. ‘Albie…Don’t know where he’s going, can’t even say I know everywhere he’s been, especially the last few years. But I know where he came from because I was there, tagging along behind.’

  He hesitated, wondering whether he was holding his audience. He was sure as hell holding me. There was something about this fellow’s voice that drew you in.

  ‘Some of you—those who knew us from the early days—you know the story; you got the same one. Family come out from Latvia after the war, things in their memories nobody oughta have and moved to the Gunshot Goldfields. Our mother died soon after, the old man went into his shell. From the time I was a little nipper he spent most of his life swingin a pick or settin charges underground. And it was my big brother who stepped into the breach.’

  He drew a finger across his chin, scratched idly, like he was trying to rustle up a memory. He ran his eyes across the crowd, seemed to take us in, every last one of us. He was a commanding figure, this brother of Doc’s.

  ‘Like to share a story, if I may. There’s this one time, Albie’s following a lead—limonite, it was—trying to see how far it went. No reason, nothing to be gained, he just wanted to know. We’re in the gully behind Black Patch Hill. Getting nowhere fast, digging into solid rock, so Albie flogs a few sticks of leaking gelignite off old Cranky Baker. Flogs a few too many sticks I presume, because the explosion turned the Patch into Dog Bite Ditch and blew the shithouse there to kingdom come.’

  ‘That was Doc?’ interrupted Tiger, his vampires momentarily forgotten. ‘I remember that! Pickin turds out
of our tea for days, we were! Always wondered who…’

  Ozolins smiled, shaggy eyebrows arcing.

  ‘Yeah, we weren’t ownin up to that one in a hurry. But that was Albie. He always had a wild mind. Wild? Inspired, curious, full of questions, forever pulling things apart or blowing em up. Even then, he was a man of ideas.’

  He screwed his face against the glare, gazed at the coffin.

  ‘Sure, maybe those ideas got a bit too much for him in the end. Went a little haywire. Maybe he didn’t find his Grand Unified Theory…’

  ‘His GUT!’ giggled one of the little girls, and the mother sighed, drew her closer.

  ‘Maybe nardoo root was never gonna be the crop that’d feed the world. Maybe that—what was it again? Snowman Theory…’

  ‘Snowball!’ piped the girl from her mother’s arms.

  ‘Snowball, Snowman, whatever. Doesn’t look like it’s gonna revolutionise outback geology. I’m a practical bloke and I don’t know about those things. But I do know that he was a brother to me when I needed one, and the world’s a poorer place for his passing.’

  He paused for a moment, glanced at his family. ‘Tiffany?’

  The little girl with the big mouth frowned, then stepped forward and placed an obsidian crystal on his coffin. It sat there, a mess of intersecting lights and dark flash.

  ‘So long, brother.’ The surveyor’s face was like stone as he watched the coffin sink into the ground. The rest of the crowd formed a jagged line, shuffled forward. Fistfuls of hot red earth rained down into the hole.

  Half an hour later I was rolling down the road, Wishy Ozolins’ oration ringing round my brain. He’d painted a portrait of the Doc I remembered: a decent man. Full of enthusiasms and surprises.

  Maybe he’d been overwhelmed in the end, but we’re all overwhelmed sooner or later. Most of us by things a lot worse than our own zeal.

  I felt I owed him something. We all did. If nothing else, we owed him more than the poor excuse for an investigation into his death carried out by my colleagues.

  Had Wireless really killed him in some drunken argument about Greek philosophy, or had Doc been getting on somebody else’s goat? Who’d rifled through his books and papers? Who’d been up on the cliff top, spying on his shack? And why could I not shake the image of that man-made rock formation from my head?