Scornful Moon

by Gee, Maurice

  I could see James kneeling straight-backed on the cushion, and straightening even more at the touch of the Governor-General’s sword, but could not bring Vi into the picture, so returned him to his chair in the dark. He smoked while sitting there, Charlie had said — and solitary pleasures suited him best. In public he lit up only with friends, in uneasy camaraderie; he turned his back on women when they smoked. (May had lately taken to fishing out Eric’s tobacco and rolling her own, which so offended James that he had to leave the room.)

  I turned these fragments over as I went into the street. It disturbs me how little I knew James.

  ‘Sam, are you going my way?’ Oliver Joll came up behind me. He fell in step.

  ‘You’ve missed your pudding,’ I said.

  ‘I wanted to get away from that gang. And have a word —’ which would be about James. He put it off as we strolled down to Lambton Quay, and instead praised that morning’s leader, which he’d picked as mine. ‘You must have lunch with me soon, Sam. We haven’t had a chance to talk since — when?’

  ‘Akatarawa. At the relief camp.’

  ‘So it was. I thought those articles you wrote were right on the button. Although you must have had to … ?’

  ‘Cut my coat? It was the Dominion, after all.’

  ‘Owned by a man as fat as those poor buggers out there were thin.’

  ‘You sound like a red.’

  ‘Me? Good God, no. I’m for trade, you know that. And old-fashioned self-interest. This thing is over, this Slump. Well, as good as. I give it about a year and we’ll come out the other end. Then we can all put some beef on. But of course what we need is people who’ve got their eyes facing front, not looking out holes in the back of their heads.’

  ‘Practising, Ollie?’

  He laughed. ‘Just oiling up the vocal chords. Forgive me, Sam. That was an interesting day, out there. It gave me quite a shake-up.’

  He had gone to the Akatarawa camp with a group of local government councillors, and I had tagged along to see the place. It was summer so we had dust not mud. The relief workers called the camp Aka Aka. They lived in constructions of canvas and corrugated iron, part hut, part tent, and worked building a road into the hills towards the coast — you can get the details and the colour from the piece I wrote (as much as I was able to put in). One cheeky fellow, pegging out his socks on a rope between tents, worked Ollie Joll and me aside and told us the camp had been cleaned up for our visit. ‘We have our bath in the drains and wash our clothes in the horse trough. If either of you gents can wangle me a job in town? I can turn my hand to most things —’ and so on.

  Ollie gave him half a crown.

  ‘I wouldn’t make too much of that drains and horse-trough stuff,’ he said as we caught up with our party. ‘Or trust that chap as far as I can throw him.’

  When we reached Lambton Quay, he said, ‘Are you busy, Sam? Walk with me a little way. I’ll show you a bit of the underside the Mayor and his sidekicks pretend not to see.’

  We went through to the quays and moved along at an ambling pace. An easy man, perhaps a lazy man, Ollie Joll, but capable of bursts of energy generated by ambition, and by his liberal nature too. He was selfish and unselfish both, accumulating good things for himself while spreading good cheer bountifully — that’s one of a number of summings-up I’d attempted since Joll barged on to Council half a dozen years earlier, and one I hold to, although I’ve made harsher judgements recently.

  After a while he said, ‘Do you have any influence with James?’

  ‘None at all.’

  ‘What does he think he’s doing, Sam? He served a useful spell, we admire him for that. But he’s had his day. Can’t he recognise it? You know what they’ll label him? Prehistoric. He can only damage himself, coming back.’

  I agreed, but wasn’t going to say so. We walked some more, Joll more energetic now, agitated.

  ‘Don’t think it’s self-interest making me say this. It isn’t, you know, because I’ll beat him, nothing surer. But it doesn’t do the party any good to have us scrapping. We should be aiming all our shots at Labour now. They could win this election. They’ll win the Melling seat if James is standing. But not me. I can beat them. Because I can talk to workmen, Sam, and persuade enough of them. You must see that. I’ve got the lingo.’

  Once more, I agreed.

  ‘And if it gets out that he’s flirting with this New Zealand Legion mob, he’ll do the party some real damage. We’ve got to keep away from that sort of stuff.’

  ‘Who says he is? I haven’t heard it.’

  ‘He thinks the same as those people on a lot of things. And he’s had a couple of meetings with Campbell Begg. Had him out for lunch at his house last week.’

  ‘So you’ve got spies?’

  ‘No, I hear things. It’s something I’m good at. And one of the reasons I’ll be good in Parliament. People come to me.’

  Had he told me that he would let the story get out, or perhaps get in to where his party bosses kept their accounts? Either way James was done for. I could not believe he’d been stupid enough to be seen with Begg — although he was stupid enough to share a good many of his ideas. Begg was, speaking bluntly, a loony, and his New Zealand Legion an embryo fascist party. I had had it in mind when nutting out our detective story — pushed it into deeper lunacies, of course, down where Mosley and his British fascists worked, and then a little deeper into political murder, where Campbell Begg, although a silly man, would never go. But taking even a single step with him would ruin James.

  ‘So you hope I’m going to warn him to stay away?’

  ‘Would you, Sam? Say you’ve caught a whiff.’

  I shrugged, was non-committal, and wanted to get off the subject of James. I had a sense of betraying him.

  ‘I turn off here.’

  ‘It’s only another step. Come along.’

  Joll manufactured boxes, cartons, packaging of all sorts, for soap and prunes and processed cheese and Rinso, everything. He had factories in Petone and Palmerston North but kept his office upstairs from the small original one at the bottom of Taranaki Street, between Courtenay Place and the harbour. The showy man in politics became the plain businessman there.

  He took me up wooden stairs, sat me in a chair in front of his desk, which was ink-stained and chipped along the edges.

  ‘A whisky, Sam.’

  ‘Too early for me.’ My mind was still turning on James, on his obsession. He would empty all the life left to him to satisfy it.

  Joll sat down. ‘What I’ve told you, Sam, do I have to say … ?’

  ‘I’ll keep quiet. I’m not really a newspaperman any more. Not the newshound sort anyway. If I was, I’d wonder about you, Ollie. Why you’ve decided to leave Council when another term would set you right for Mayor.’

  ‘I like a larger stage. I want to go where the big important things get done.’

  ‘Sit on the backbench? Can you do that?’

  ‘For a while. Not too long.’ He grinned. ‘And it won’t be.’

  ‘And then I’d wonder about your contradictions.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ he said, a little sharp.

  ‘You do the large thing well, but here you are in a poky office in a run-down factory. It looks as if you can’t be bothered.’

  He spread his hands, then dismissed his surroundings with a flick. ‘Well, I can’t, Sam. Not with this. I don’t spend much time here anyway. My business is sound. It’s going to grow when this country gets on its feet again. In the meantime it ticks along. But it bores me, that’s the truth. So I hire good people to run it. I’ll go and do something more important somewhere else.’

  ‘Your wife might have enjoyed being Mayoress,’ I said, indicating the photo on his desk — a pleasant-looking woman with two shy daughters. ‘The other sort of politics can be hard on families.’

  ‘They’re behind me. Dorothy knows what’s what.’ He frowned, his first sign of impatience. ‘Anyhow, I’ve said my piece. I’ll show
you this thing I brought you for.’

  The main window of the office opened above the street. A smaller one in the side wall faced the harbour, overlooking half an acre of wasteland. There, amongst mounds of trodden dirt and dried-out puddles, thirty or forty men stood in a group, staring down as though at fighting dogs or someone run over by a car. The distant cries I’d heard since climbing Joll’s stairs came from there.

  ‘What is it? Union meeting?’ I said, although it seemed unlikely. Most of the men wore workmen’s clothes but others were in suits like office clerks.

  ‘They’re there every day. I went out once. Won a bob,’ Ollie said.

  ‘Two Up?’

  ‘It’s harmless. It’s just fun. Nobody loses much.’

  ‘Some of them look as if they couldn’t afford to.’

  ‘Well, free men, that’s what we are. There’s the lookout, see, watching for the law. This is a well-organised school. They rig up poles on boxes and make a square. If you want to play, you’ve got to sit down.’

  ‘And you did?’ I was astonished he’d taken the risk. ‘You’d end up in court. You could say goodbye to politics after that.’

  ‘The whole of life’s a risk, Sam. See how they’re using dice, not pennies. Spots for heads and squares for tails.’ He wanted to go down and join in.

  ‘You’re going to find Parliament pretty dull, Ollie.’

  ‘I’ll liven it up.’

  A shrill whistle sounded. I mistook it for brakes squealing in the street, then saw the lookout sprinting over the waste ground towards an alley on the other side. He skidded, sending up dust, as four policemen ran from the opening in single file.

  ‘Now this’ll be good,’ Ollie said.

  Two cars sped up, so close their bumpers seemed locked. They braked like limousines in a movie, but constables not gangsters tumbled out. The action was furious after that — run, swerve, tackle, wriggle free; torn jacket, spinning helmet, tangle of wrestlers inside the poles as though in a ring. Men and women cheered from upstairs windows. I kept my eye on a fellow dancing like a rooster. He eluded outstretched hands with a dip and twist, hopped over fallen men, arms spread like wings, then ran free, grinning back, below our window, and slipped round into Taranaki Street. Ollie strode across the room, rattled open the front-facing window. I joined him in time to see the man dart into the factory door, leaving his hat spinning on the footpath. A chasing constable appeared, ran a little way, looked across the street.

  ‘Yes,’ Ollie called, ‘over there. He went into Courtenay Place.’

  ‘Ollie, you can’t do that.’

  ‘He’s one of mine. It’s not as if it’s murder, Sam. Life’s a game.’

  The constable turned back. He picked up the hat, looked inside it for a name, then dropped it, drop-kicked it, finding none.

  We watched a while longer. The police arrested ten or twelve men. The Black Maria arrived and they mounted, scowling most of them, one or two raising grazed arms, showing their wounds. The crowd clapped in the street. The doors clanged shut.

  ‘The triumph of law and order,’ Ollie said. ‘Come on down, Sam. I’d better have a word with young Lennie.’

  We went downstairs into the storage shed, past bales of uncut cardboard and folded sacks.

  ‘All clear, Lennie. Out you come, boy,’ Ollie said.

  The man emerged from between the wall and a pile of cartons.

  ‘How many did they get?’

  ‘All the bosses. That’s the end of that school. I wouldn’t go hunting for a new one, either. If you get in court, I’ll have to fire you.’

  ‘Sure. That’s fair. Can’t fire yourself though, can you?’

  ‘Don’t be cheeky,’ Ollie said sharply. ‘And you’d better nip outside and pick up your hat before it gets pinched.’

  ‘Sure, boss,’ Lennie said, imitating some gangster from the talkies. I did not like the look of him: mouth too mobile, over-expressive, turning into a smile that might be a sneer.

  ‘I’ve seen him,’ I said when he had gone.

  ‘Have you?’

  ‘Akatarawa. He’s the one who told us about the horse trough.’

  ‘You’ve got a good memory, Sam.’

  ‘So you hired him?’

  ‘He got my name. Came in here. I use him as a runner. Messenger boy. He’s all right. He knows the way from here to Petone and back. Saves me some work.’

  ‘He looks like a smart alec,’ I said.

  ‘Sure, he is. Anyhow, Sam, if you want a story, Lennie’s not the only one. I’ve got a file of letters up there this thick.’ He showed me with his hands. ‘Men wanting work. Telling me what they can do. Do you know about desperation? I’ll give you some to read.’

  ‘Everyone in politics gets letters like that. James still gets them, and he’s out.’

  ‘Yes, but they chuck them in the waste-paper bin. I do something. I find jobs. I try, at least. Does James do that? I must have found fifteen or twenty men jobs.’

  Lennie came back with his hat.

  ‘I was two bob up out there,’ he said.

  ‘Hard luck. Go and see Jean. There’s a pile of stuff for Petone.’

  ‘Can I take the car?’

  ‘No, the train. Go on, shift. Earn your pay.’

  ‘Sure, boss.’

  I shook hands with Ollie and walked home along the harbour front. Lennie passed me, sprinting again, with a brown-paper parcel held like a football in his arm.

  ‘He should pay me for that two bob I lost,’ he yelled.

  He was like Owen Moody: looked nineteen but was probably thirty. If he’d come to me for a job, I’d have barred the windows.

  Chapter Five

  That busy two or three months seems all outings. I’m a man who likes to sit at home, with a record on the gramophone: Peter Dawson, John Charles Thomas, Richard Tauber. I like sea shanties, plain emotions, love of the countryside and the sea, of women and of being in love. I like robustness and a soaring voice, no tremolo, after my life of hunting among grubby successes and faked emotions and greedy schemes for this bit of news and that. It’s a second-rate life. I like to sit with Tennyson, Rudyard Kipling, John Masefield, Alfred Noyes, only Rose in the room with me, reading too, and find beauty in that company, and fresh clean thought. Then my home is ‘bright with a calm delight’, in the words of another poet. But March, April, May, I seemed to be always in galleries and halls and meeting rooms and in our city’s ‘pent streets’.

  Eric was a man for being out and about — lectures, concerts, meetings, wrestling matches: he went to them all, dragging me along when he could. We walked up Lambton Quay, took the cable car to Upland Road, enjoyed the view over the harbour to the black elephantine hills beyond Days Bay, enjoyed the moon, Eric with his scientist’s eye, I with my poet manqué’s (he explained the craters, I replied with young Robin Hyde’s ‘the scornful crystal moon’), then walked along the crest of the hill to the observatory, where he gave a talk on Jupiter and its satellites, showing slides of them on a screen.

  When we came out, a woman from the audience stood waiting in the forecourt, her clothes moon-silvered on one side, gilded on the other by light flooding from the door.

  ‘Professor Clifton, that was most enjoyable. I think my favourite is Ganymede.’

  Eric introduced us. She was Mrs Maxey, a small, well-rounded woman of sixty or so, with a considering eye but, as far as I could tell, a comfortable nature. She wore a modest boa, no fox face peeping out, and a grey dress with a silky shine. Her car was parked in Upland Road. Could she offer us a lift?

  ‘We’ll walk you there,’ Eric said. ‘But Sam and I are going down through the cemetery. We’re meeting our wives.’

  Mrs Maxey laughed and Eric, waking up, laughed too: ‘No, no, they’re alive and well. We’re meeting them at Parliament.’

  I wondered at the hint of flirtatiousness between him and this woman, and his countervailing defensiveness. He had been quick to mention wives. We went past the cable car terminus, talking of moo
ns — Jupiter’s multitude and our one — and disputing lightheartedly (I was silent) about the naming of more, should they appear. At the car, she said, ‘Our new moons will be Savage and Fraser, don’t you think?’

  ‘Heaven forbid. No politics up there. The Germans would want Hitler and the Russians Stalin. I’d sooner name them One, Two and Three. But I know what you mean, Savage and Co. Their time is right, and a good thing too.’

  She looked at him archly. ‘In spite of all the experience on the other side.’

  ‘Ha!’ he said. He opened her car door, handed her in and she drove away.

  ‘I’ve seen her somewhere,’ I said.

  ‘I hope not.’

  ‘Why?’

  He was quiet for a moment, but had let himself in for telling me. We walked into the park. ‘She’s the owner of a little brothel over by the Basin Reserve. It’s very select. Discreet, you know? You can’t go unless you’re recommended. That makes for a small clientele.’ He laughed. ‘I like the idea of Mrs Maxey blackballing certain people.’

  I said nothing.

  ‘You’re not shocked, Sam?’

  ‘What’s a woman like that doing at a talk on astronomy?’

  ‘Come off it. Do you think a brothel keeper can’t have a mental life? She comes to lots of my talks. She’s got books over there even you haven’t read. It’s planetology, by the way.’

  ‘So you’ve been?’

  ‘You’re pretty sharp. Moralists can see the tiniest crack. But rest easy, boy. I only make social calls. It’s in the same building, but she keeps a firewall between.’