Homesickness

by Murray Bail

  ‘I shouldn’t be here,’ North muttered. ‘Nothing,’ he said to Sasha. ‘I’m just talking rubbish to myself.’

  The driver waited as they stopped before a large tree growing in their path. Borelli pointed with his stick. Cut deep, still wet:

  JACK O’TOOLE

  WORLD AXE CHAMPION

  (AUSTRALIA)

  ‘Someone,’ Atlas whispered, rolling his eyes left and right, ‘has been here before us.’

  They laughed: a relief. It was like finding an empty cigarette pack in a remote picnic ground. For almost the first time Sheila looked around—and she saw a multicoloured bird swoop between the trunks.

  ‘I’m disappointed,’ Sasha pouted. ‘I thought we were really off the beaten track.’

  ‘She’s never satisfied,’ her friend Violet observed to the rest.

  As he waited, perspiration collected on the driver’s forehead and nose.

  ‘He was a real credit,’ Cathcart told Sasha. ‘I saw Jack O’Toole once clean up a Canadian, a Swede, the lot, in one afternoon. And a smarty-pants Californian who’d come all the way over. Nobody could get near him.’

  Royal Easter Show, that was: Sydney, 1956? O’Toole in the white singlet. White dungarees. White sandshoes. Arms like hams! Short back and sides. The Swede remember had a ginger crewcut and chopped in a ridiculous check shirt. Had a short fast swing; but it couldn’t last. O’Toole won. In Australia for a time he was a household name.

  ‘But who would have…?’

  ‘I knew a bloke at work who knew Jack,’ Cathcart went on. ‘He said he was a corker fellah. He didn’t have a swelled head at all.’

  With his ear against the trunk the way a safecracker opens a door Kaddok traced the block letters with his fingertips. ‘It’s still fresh,’ he told them. ‘This will be legible for another hundred years.’

  ‘That’s a good one,’ Borelli laughed. ‘Australia, in the heart of Africa. We have stumbled upon a particularly insidious imperialism. This is taking national pride to extreme lengths. Who would have thought, doctor?’

  ‘But carving messages on trees was a tradition among our explorers,’ North argued.

  Borelli laughed, ‘You’re right! Agreed!’

  ‘Don’t they talk a lot of rot?’ Mrs Cathcart commented.

  Doug nodded. He raised his binoculars and panned slowly through the trees. Stepping back Kaddok took a few quick pictures.

  ‘Such a marvellous strong tree,’ Louisa turned as they began moving. ‘It’s a pity.’

  After crossing a bridge made out of vines the path widened and they came upon a crude trilith fashioned from tree trunks, and Gerald near the driver immediately put on his pained expression. In a clearing stood a low white building in the strict Bauhaus or shoebox style, in this instance horizontal. Straight right-angled paths and lawns of mown couch were between it and the towering devouring jungle.

  The driver spat and pointed to the glass door.

  ‘I don’t see the pygmies. There’s nobody here.’

  ‘It looks more like a bush hospital… They’ve got them locked up.’

  ‘Well let’s see the little fellahs.’

  ‘Why on earth don’t they design in their own ethnic style?’ Gerald complained. ‘Such as it is.’

  North agreed. ‘The Bauhaus is a curse. The dreary disease has spread even to here. It’s like one of your imperialisms,’ he said to Borelli. ‘The colonisation of style, I think it is called.’

  The Collection of Pygmies housed inside was immediately superior to yesterday’s…museum. A sense of purpose, of clarity, showed in the smooth tiled floors, the straight lines and natural light streaming through the carefully placed windows. The pygmies were clean and placed with considerable ingenuity, often in some historical context. There were no attendants. None were needed. Each exhibit spoke for itself and in the midst of that primordial silence, the green forest always in the corner of one eye, each statement was somehow amplified or underscored, increasingly, as they shuffled and clacked with their various footwear on the stone floor. Neatly printed labels—unlike the Museum of Handicrafts—jogged the memory. In short, a surprisingly fine example of imaginative scholar-curatorship.

  Old, short men; though not all old. Occasionally, middle-aged men had the resolve and distant gaze of the very old!

  On low white boxes and striking familiar poses they exhibited all their old baraka. Quite a few wore ceremonial (purple) robes. Some had the pith helmet. But by far the majority used the pin-striped suit buttoned up, and a television-blue shirt. Where did they find all these suits? It explained the shape of the building: there were long avenues of them. The sebaceous figures held spectacles or important pieces of paper, and stared thoughtfully as if they were being photographed (Karsh of Ottawa), or they gazed at a mythical point just above the horizon: resolve and optimism which know no boundaries. Others, again the majority, seemed to lean forward with promises; or were they breaking promises? It was hard to tell. In either case, an outstretched finger or a possible handshake occasionally brushed their clothing as they walked past. And this overall impression of appealing to reason or of hectoring was further heightened by figures well known for their oratory: the arm held high conducting an invisible orchestra or ordering another round. Winnie! Feet planted well apart, gold watch-chain exposed, glaring magenta face (but this is cruel: not drinking again?). Good on you, Winnie! ‘Never has so much…’ Never mind Gallipoli, the Lusitania, the little invasion of Russia, his switch to the gold standard (’25), the British Gazette, smashing strikes and Dresden, and that ‘half-naked fakir’. Magnificent orator. Others too had their excesses preserved, indeed highlighted. And yet these trademarks, once so endearing, appeared now in isolation as ridiculous appendages: the furled umbrella there, a cane, several spotted ties (one bow), the pince-nez, her corgi bitches, the General’s golf clubs, another’s rocking chair, yachting caps and bowler hats, snuff, cold pipes and coronas, toothbrush moustaches.

  ‘There’s Bob!’

  The eyebrows, double-breasted suit draped with ribbons; one eyebrow raised.

  They shouldn’t have him like that.’

  ‘That’s how he was.’

  ‘I thought he was a big man.’

  A few were still alive. Ha, ha. Scratched recordings hidden somewhere kept repeating the same old newspeak. There were combed acephalous faces which still managed to nod and wave from imaginary balconies. The president spoke into an embossed dictaphone, leaning back in his chair, forming a cathedral with his fingers. A few exhausted ones, imagine, vibrated over memoirs. Almost inevitably a monarch wearing a tiara sat on a white lavatory, so bringing her eyes down to their level. And what was the Boy Scout leader doing there?

  Various backers, anonymous lackeys and lickboots, party advisors hovered in the background. The marvellous detail of each one kept comments to the monosyllable, or a gesture, a nod or frown, an arm suddenly pointing to a minor figure amazingly well portrayed.

  At the end of this long corridor a small drawing-room decorated with a marble mantelpiece and maroon wallpaper held a collection of apparently essential accessories. They were spread out on an oak table. Items such as hair oil, cufflinks and loudspeakers were represented with real examples, but others were shown by photographs or abstractly. Close and careful inspection showed each item was either glued or bolted down on the good table to prevent theft. Here were expensive fountain pens, the striped tie, aftershave lotions, a selection of chevrons, epaulets, ‘omelets’, a cemetery of uniforms, monogrammed Swiss handkerchiefs, aperitifs, toothpaste, medals, the ball-bearing navels, red carpet (sample of), editorial writers, the flags and bunting, panegyrics, brass bands, national anthems, constitutions and proclamations, Vernacular Republics, Workers’ Parties (haw, haw!), opening ceremonies and an ominous oubliette (blueprint of), black shoe-polish, several ways of kissing babies, television make up, black limousines and a typical firm handshake.

  The group had split around the table. Even those not interested foun
d themselves bending over, studying the paraphernalia. Each object clearly had a personal touch and seemed to belong to the one man; and the combination somehow formed a distant yet ideal figure.

  ‘The only thing missing,’ said Borelli as they filed out, ‘is a reliable deodorant, and the candidate’s blonde wife, preferably with two new babies. It’s all a joke, isn’t it?’

  ‘Our Sir Robert was a good man,’ said Mrs Cathcart firmly.

  No one else quite knew what to say. As they walked to the final room, their feeling of bafflement and annoyance increased. It showed in Mrs Cathcart: fuming, looking grim. All along she hadn’t wanted to come. On one side a series of windows revealed the jungle, the vines and teeming density, less than an arm’s length away. Some slowly flapping butterflies resembled tropical fish. Sheila who’d glanced, looked again. She thought she had seen a dark face.

  At the end of this room a group of silent African school children looked up at the wall, moved their heads left and right, and filed out.

  ‘I say, isn’t he that man from the hotel?’ Sasha whispered.

  A man looking up at the wall turned.

  ‘Howdy!’ Doug ambled over; you could always go up to a fellow Australian. ‘What d’you make of this?’ he nodded, putting knowledge into his disgust.

  The others were reading the message on the wall. It was neatly hand-lettered.

  THE LANGUAGE HAS BEEN TWISTED TO DESCRIBE THESE TYPES. TO ACCOMODATE THEM? PERHAPS WE HAVE BEEN TOO LAVISH.

  Large neat lettering, no spelling errors, followed:

  Your psychopaths and aristocrats, knights, pretenders and upstarts, padishah, sahib, arch-dukes, their genitures, governor-general, king and queen, consorts, generalissimo and admirals, plutocrats, British prime minister,

  It ran in upper and lower, apparently jumbled. The words were not listed alphabetically, but to the rhythm of drums, calypsocane. This became increasingly apparent as Gwen read out the words to her husband. All together now:

  ministers, The President, rhetorical reverends, Pope, demagogues, chancellors, ordinary members, hamstrung burghers, whip, hospodars and sycophants, obeisant encomiast, the High Commissioner, duce, orators of note, monomaniacs, viceroy, vicar viscounts, legal tenders, governor and Colonial Secretaries with plenipotentiaries, panders, the chinless wonders, deputies, the Speaker, rigid premier

  It soon became choked in general terms and abuse. Most of them stopped reading the rest.

  you lymphatic despots, lick-boots, dictator and cunctators, head prefects, idiot pierrots, banya, cryptoneurous imperialists, usurpers and backstabbers, bandogs, buggers, swine, yellow pettifoggers, major-domo, pink mad prince charming, old boy, smiling margrave, cacique, placebo, man, Jack the Ripper, Frer, bloody parvenu, mutillids, silver Order of Thistles, that ridiculous, mamamouchi, the lackeys, all griffins, halichrondroids, koobsburners, satrap, mawworms, cadaveric committees, colonialists, blue-eyed boys, seignior, pilgarlics, fanakalo, all acrita, heresiarch, pygmies!

  ‘It was only words. I wouldn’t get too steamed up,’ said Atlas outside.

  ‘Why,’ Sasha’s friend complained, ‘do they always have to bring politics into it? We came for a holiday.’

  ‘I thought it was a pretty poor show,’ nodded Doug gravely.

  They were relieved to be outside, standing and looking around, but they remained close to the building, the jungle pressing in on all sides. The clearing was small, a square of lawn. Birds could be heard chattering which didn’t help. It felt like standing on a new postage stamp of a strange alien country: one that is proud of its silent white architecture. When Phillip North went out along one serrated edge and tugged at a few leaves and kicked at a vine Sheila wished he wouldn’t. The slightest pull could bring the whole forest forward and over them.

  To photograph the building Kaddok had fitted a special wide-angle lens and even then had to lean back and half disappear into the jungle, his elbows supported by his loyal wife. While Atlas remained with the rest Borelli moved out onto the lawn and leaning on his walking stick surveyed the architecture.

  ‘It’s not as bad as you think, Gerald. In fact, I’d say it’s quite a radical design. Straight lines are anathema to these people, remember. Their experience is mainly coned and rounded.’

  Gerald shrugged. ‘You’ll probably find it’s designed by an American.’

  Hofmann looked at his watch as Louisa wiped her forehead.

  ‘This is ridiculous,’ Mrs Cathcart hissed. ‘All the way—’

  Sasha called out. ‘Come on. This is giving us the creeps. Where’s our driver?’

  North was talking to him in the corner. He turned:

  ‘For an extra few shillings he says he’ll take us back a different way. Agreed?’

  Achchha, seated in the bush again it was good to take the weight off the feet, to sit back; and there was the prospect of further scenes unfolding, and at the end at dusk the hotel with its now-familiar entrance foyer, its chairs and mustard carpet upstairs, a hot shower.

  Borelli put his chin between the Hofmanns and cleared his throat, ‘Didn’t you feel, well, I mean, a bit small in there?’

  Louisa looked at him and laughed.

  Hofmann didn’t turn from the window. ‘It was almost as bad as the place yesterday, whatever it was called.’

  Across the aisle Garry was telling Violet, ‘I’m sorry, but Africa just isn’t my scene.’

  ‘The Museum of Handicrafts yesterday? I liked that.’ Borelli stared at Louisa. ‘But didn’t you?’

  ‘I certainly did not!’ she laughed again.

  ‘If they want foreign exchange,’ Ken Hofmann said (another long sentence for him), ‘they’re sure going about it the wrong way.’

  ‘Today’s, you’d have to admit, was extremely well done. And it’s had its effect. We are a shade different from when we arrived. The damage is done. There’s a little worm inside our heads.’ He laughed. ‘And there’s nothing we can do about it.’

  But here Hofmann swung around with the rest to see the galloping giraffes and Borelli looked closely at her. ‘Then what is it you’re interested in?’ he asked. Louisa looked out the other side and frowned. ‘You’re making our holiday sound very complicated,’ she smiled.

  Borelli nodded and leaned back in his own seat.

  They were speeding across a dun-coloured plain, across the afternoon. The mimosa trees and piles of boulders broke the horizon. Spasmodic cultivation at mid-distance: sweet potatoes chiefly, some maize. Such right-angled patches here were distinctly unnatural, man-made. Over to the right a distant village, ‘Leon,’ Mrs Kaddok suddenly pointed, ‘would like to take his photographs. Do you mind?’

  Garry Atlas immediately gave two loud sharp claps to the driver. He slowed down and turned. ‘Ah!’ Sheila cried. Stock pigeons flew up from the verge and one hit the windscreen. The bus went on to the village.

  ‘But they’re beau-tiful!’ Sasha whispered as they stepped out. ‘Look at her.’

  The village women had remained squatting around their cooking fires: smooth dark bodies, their shaved heads. A young girl was pregnant. Violet Hopper and Louisa Hofmann both had their sunglasses resting up on their hair and didn’t say anything but gave them an interested smile. Bold as brass then Mrs Cathcart went up and casually stood beside a group. Pale-skinned and holding the handbag she suddenly appeared to be burdened with superfluous weights—the extra pale-blue cardigan, sunglasses, gold watch—and by her flesh which spread out and fell beyond her basic skull, camouflage. It was further aggravated or even symbolised by her hair: uplifted, distinctly caliological. It tilted like a frail tower. By comparison, the shaven heads of the village women were close to the original: sculptural, flowing into their bodies. Yet Mrs Cathcart stood around unaware. Some of the others became awkward. They found their shoes clattered on the white ground.

  Louisa watched Borelli gazing at a young girl. She had a brightly coloured greegree high on one arm, and wide solemn lips. Seeing Borelli she cupped her hand over her mouth.
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  ‘I could stay here a few years,’ Garry Atlas told North. Nudge, nudge. ‘What d’you reckon?’

  North suddenly cleared his throat loudly. Cathcart was peering inside the nearest round hut: travel broadens the mind. And Mrs Cathcart began pulling faces. There must have been a smell nearby. Or was it the dirt? Cross-eyed goats watched; dogs with sores trotted in and out among shards. Holding up money and pointing, Hofmann tried to buy a woman’s necklace, but she kept laughing and glancing at her friends. ‘Good, good, that’s it, good,’ Kaddok kept saying, shooting close up: women, balloon-bellied children, goats, their cooking pots and huts. Rapidly reloading in the shade he fumbled, such was his eagerness.

  On the ground lay large squashed insects. A dry wind rolled brittle carcasses among the huts. Bending down North smoothed the dust and inspected like a geomancer: Locusta migratoria. Wide pronotum, or dorsal selerite, yellow and black (gregarious phase). Characterised by short horns. Locust, originally from lobster? Could be. A plague here: been? gone? In many countries used for food. Balance; revenge.

  ‘Take it off, someone! Quickly!’ Sasha screamed, both hands over her ears.

  ‘Who did that?’ Violet demanded. Garry lifted a long locust from Sasha’s shoulder and stamped on it. The old women of the village were all laughing: toothless, with jewellery jingling. Their dogs began barking and ran around in circles. It seemed to the group they were liked, or had been accepted, and at such short notice.

  The Cathcarts came back to the bus, satisfied. Doug beamed a bit to show their approval. These people were all right. Some of the women stood up, breasts swinging, and children crowded around the metal door, staring. The driver started the engine.

  Mrs Cathcart bent down before getting in.

  ‘And what’s this little tacker’s name?’

  The boy pointed to himself:

  ‘Oxford University Press.’

  ‘She means your name,’ Doug put in, encouraging.

  The boy nodded.