The Complete Stories of Alan Marshall

by Alan Marshall

  The father walked in. ‘What are you two laughing at?’

  ‘Sit down, Tom,’ I said. ‘Ted’s just been telling me about the bloke he worked for. You needn’t worry over Ted. He’s all right.’

  ‘I’ve mastered it now,’ said Ted defiantly.

  ‘Of course you have,’ I said.

  ‘He gets crook at nights sometimes,’ said Tom.

  ‘I don’t believe in them visions any longer,’ said Ted. ‘It’s only a headache I’ve got, that’s all.’

  ‘That’s good,’ said Tom. ‘He has to have a bath every night,’ he said to me. ‘He has to lie in it.’

  ‘Can I have a medium cold one to-night?’ asked Ted.

  ‘No,’ said Tom decidedly. ‘Don’t make a fuss to-night. Jack has just come home.’

  ‘Jack can go to hell,’ said Ted rising. ‘I’m not going to have a bath.’

  ‘It’s always the same,’ Tom said to me. ‘We got to tip him in the bloody bath. I’ll have to get Jack. Jack!’ he called.

  Ted stood against the wall breathing deeply.

  A man of about twenty-three walked in. He was thick-set and resembled his father. Tom introduced us.

  ‘Jack, you’re a bastard. I like you and I don’t like you,’ cried Ted.

  ‘That’s all right,’ said Jack. ‘You come and have your bath.’

  ‘You go to hell.’

  ‘You get on one side of him, Dad.’

  The two men moved towards the youth. He shrank closer to the wall, his face expressing revulsion at the thought of being touched. He drew a breath, expelled it with sudden despair as they closed with him, then struggled furiously, bracing his legs and lowering his chin upon his chest.

  The father and elder son clung determinedly to his arms, the father striving to twist the one he clutched, up behind Ted’s back; Jack seeking a wrist-lock.

  Ted gasped and swore. He whirled savagely. The father swung outwards and collided with the end of the bed. Ted jerked his arm free and, turning, sought to tear himself away from his brother who had flung both arms around his waist.

  ‘I’ll kill this son of yours,’ Ted gasped to the father. He raised a fist for a rabbit-killing blow on the back of Jack’s neck. The father sprang forward and wrapped his strong fingers round the youth’s throat, bearing him backwards so that the three crashed on the bed. Ted struggled desperately, but the father clung to his hold and Ted’s struggles grew weaker.

  Jack clapped a wrist-lock on his brother’s weakening arm.

  ‘What about it? Don’t choke him, Dad. I’ve got him now. Let up. . . .’

  Tom drew back. Ted lay gasping on the bed, his eyes closed.

  ‘Jesus!’

  ‘Now will you have your bath?’ asked Jack, increasing the pressure on Ted’s wrist.

  ‘You’re in the best position now,’ panted Ted, ‘but not for always. I’ll have my bath.’

  Still gripping his wrist, Jack lifted him to a sitting position. Ted sat with his head drooping forward, making faint sounds of distress. He raised his head at last.

  ‘I’ll fight you anywhere, Jack—in the ring, in the back yard, down the beach.’

  ‘Next week,’ said Jack. ‘Come on now.’

  Ted rose. Mick was standing at the door.

  ‘Look at that dope,’ said Ted. ‘Why didn’t you hop into the old man?’

  ‘He’d of belted me,’ said Mick.

  ‘You’re only sissified, that’s all,’ Ted said.

  ‘Like hell,’ said Mick.

  ‘That’s right,’ Ted said vaguely, his mind suddenly swinging away.

  ‘Come on,’ said Jack.

  He followed us quietly, through the kitchen, across the little back yard, through a wash-house smelling of suds and washed clothes. In a lean-to at the rear of the wash-house a galvanised bath against the wall was half-full of steaming water.

  Ted began to undress. Mick, who had accompanied us, began to roll a cigarette. Jack and I sat on a wooden box Tom had dragged from the corner.

  Tom stirred the water with his hand.

  ‘It’s got to be as hot as he can stand it,’ he explained to me.

  ‘Who had me by the throat?’ Ted asked.

  ‘I dunno. Who did?’ replied Mick.

  ‘Garn, you dreamt it!’ Jack put in.

  ‘I dreamt nothin’. I was about that far off unconscious.’ Ted held up his hand with the finger and thumb slightly apart. ‘Who ever it was, was pretty strong—the strongest man who ever held me.’

  ‘Hurry up,’ said Tom. ‘The water’s getting cold.’

  ‘Like hell it is,’ Ted said.

  He lowered himself slowly into the water, his head thrown back, his face twisted. He sat a moment without moving, holding his breath.

  ‘Let’s go over and have some tea,’ said Tom. ‘Come on, Mr McCormack. Ted has to lie there for half an hour.’

  We all walked back to the house. Ted commenced to sing from his bath:

  ‘My baby has goo-goo eyes . . .’

  In the kitchen the mother was pouring tea. She looked up as I entered.

  ‘How do you think he is, Mr McCormack?’ she asked anxiously.

  ‘Much better than I thought,’ I replied cheerfully. ‘He’s only strange part of the time. He’ll be right as rain in a few weeks.’

  ‘There, what did I tell you, Mum,’ said Tom. ‘It’s only an attack.’

  ‘The doctor says he thinks it would be a good idea if we sent him to Royal Park Hospital for a week or two.’

  ‘I think so too,’ I said. ‘You do that, Tom. He’ll get the best attention there.’

  ‘Lots of people in the rats go there,’ said Mick. ‘They come out cured.’

  ‘You oughta go there, Mick,’ said Annie from behind the blue dress.

  ‘Annie does piece work sewing at night,’ explained the mother.

  ‘I’ll go and get Ted,’ said Tom, later.

  He returned leading him by the hand, like a child. An overcoat was wrapped around him.

  ‘I’ll die. I’m dying,’ said Ted weakly. ‘I’ve got no strength left, I’m weak as a dog.’

  Mick rose and walked round to help him.

  ‘I’m only a tea-leaf, Mick, that’s all. ‘Member when we used to pinch fruit off the barrers? We’re just a couple of tea-leafs, that’s all.’

  ‘I’ll go and sit on the bed with you,’ said Mick.

  ‘Leave him awhile,’ said Tom. ‘Talking excites him. Hop in now, Ted.’ He led him into his bedroom.

  When he came back, he said, ‘He’s knocked off talking now, and is starting to twitch. Where’s those capsule things?’

  His wife handed him a little bottle. ‘They make him sleep,’ she explained.

  ‘Two, isn’t it?’ asked Tom, holding the bottle up to the light.

  ‘Yes,’ she said.

  ‘I want to see that bald bloke,’ Ted called from the bedroom.

  The parents, confused, looked at me quickly.

  ‘Give me the capsules,’ I said smiling. ‘I’ll take them into him.’

  I walked into the bedroom. ‘You’ve got to take two of these,’ I said.

  Ted placed the two capsules on the palm of his hand.

  ‘They’re like little torpedoes going down,’ he said.

  ‘What about water?’ I asked.

  ‘I can swallow them without water.’

  ‘Away you go then.’

  He flung them into his mouth, swallowing them rapidly.

  ‘These people think I’m mad,’ he said, jerking his head towards the door.

  ‘No one thinks you’re mad,’ I said.

  ‘I’m mastering it,’ he said, lying down.

  ‘Good man.’

  He closed his eyes and began breathing deeply.

  I crept out.

  Two months later I was passing Tom’s machine when he stopped me.

  ‘He’s right now. They tell me he can come out on Monday. Mick’s going to get him.’

  ‘I’ll go too,’ I said.
/>   ‘That’s good,’ said Tom. ‘I’d like you to meet him now he’s right. It’ll be fair to him.’

  So I picked up Mick on the Monday night and we drove to the Royal Park Hospital.

  ‘I won’t be long,’ said Mick, alighting.

  I smoked. Beyond the gates through which Mick had passed, the buildings crouched in a restless darkness. Sometimes there were sounds from within their walls, then a more pregnant silence.

  They emerged suddenly. Ted carried a bag.

  I leaned out of the car. ‘Whato!’ I cried. ‘Give me your bag, Ted. Hop in.’

  ‘Wait till I get some fresh air into my stomach,’ said Ted, taking a deep breath. ‘I’m glad to get out of that joint, by God I am!’

  ‘Come on,’ said Mick.

  ‘Hell!’ said Ted. ‘I feel good.’

  ‘Like a couple of rounds?’ asked Mick, his foot on the step.

  ‘Go on, hop in,’ said Ted, putting his hand on Mick’s shoulder. ‘I want to talk. I’ve gone rusty from misuse.’

  ‘Like hell, you have,’ said Mick. ‘You’re always talking.’

  ‘Let’s all talk,’ I said.

  ‘I was lucky to get out of that joint without a hiding,’ said Ted, looking back as the car moved away.

  ‘Pity you didn’t get one,’ said Mick. ‘It’d’ve done you good.’

  Ted laughed, enjoying himself.

  ‘There was a cove used to come there to see somebody,’ he said. ‘He wasn’t only well-built or anything like that.’ Ted was ironical. ‘I was crook, see, and all for scrap. One day this chap chips me and I let him have one. He had a tart in tow—a nice piece—and when I crowned this bird she got the breeze up, and no bloody wonder. He got up and made a pass at me. I tonked him one where he hears. He bashed me on the molars and then slipped me one in the guts. I sat down . . . Christ, did I sit down! The warders came then and ran him out. His good sort told them off. Did she go crook! . . . strike me! But, by God! that chap could scrap.’

  ‘I met a bloke like that once,’ said Mick. ‘A big joker. He chipped a judy I was with. Me cobbers were near and I whistled them up. We all took a crack at him and he cleaned the lot of us up.’

  ‘Let’s eat,’ I said. ‘We’ll finish our talk in the cafe.’

  ‘I’m broke,’ said Mick. ‘I gave a bloke a couple of bob to put on Gay Mariner to-day, and he took the crash, the bastard.’

  ‘I’ve got enough for the lot of us,’ I said.

  ‘Good on you,’ said Ted. ‘Let’s have a feed, then. I’m sick of eating with loonies, poor buggers.’

  Kiss Her?—I’d Kiss Her!

  As soon as I saw her I was gone. She wore a yellow jumper pressed into the curves of two oranges. She was standing on a platform before the tent.

  ‘A quid if you can kiss her on the lips,’ yelled the spruiker beside her.

  She looked over the heads of the crowd as if they weren’t there. Away back somewhere she was looking—over the show arena, over the stiff, parading cattle, past the hills that stretched behind the town. Animals in cages look like that.

  Kiss her? I’d kiss her!

  Her lips were as red and full as a tomato. She stood firm on a pair of legs that quickened the beat in me and dried my voice so that it came thirsting from my mouth—‘I’ll take her on.’

  She looked at me then. Her eyes moved over me, cool as shade. They were dark and when they paused a moment on mine they narrowed at what she saw behind my glance.

  ‘Come up on the platform,’ said the spruiker. He lifted his megaphone and bawled across the ground. ‘Can your local lad kiss Princess Nava on the lips? Nava, the unconquerable. The most skilful female ju-jitsuist in the world today. The beautiful Nava against this powerful male opponent. Can he kiss her on the lips in two three-minute rounds of furious action?’

  The crowd grew. Upturned faces—gazing—gazing. Disdainful, contemptuous, eager, hungry for sensation. . . . What did I care? They were strangers to me. I was on the road. Here today and gone tomorrow.

  It was spring and the wattle was out along the tracks. My veins were full as the creeks I had passed.

  To hell with the faces! It was her I wanted. Not for the moment . . . For always. She shot warmth like a coal. I could feel her there, breathing beside me.

  I’ve been with women. I’ve kissed them and left them. This was different. I just knew she was the one I had been looking for.

  Through the side of my mouth I said, ‘I’m not kissing you for a quid. I’m kissing you for keeps.’

  ‘You’re not kissing me at all,’ she said.

  Her voice was low. It had a bloom on it like a peach.

  ‘This is no life for you,’ I said. ‘Come away with me. I mean it. I’m on the level.’

  ‘I’ll put you there again when we get inside the tent,’ she said.

  ‘. . . One shilling admission: children half price,’ yelled the spruiker. The contest of the day. Form a queue and don’t push. There is room for all. Nava, the irresistible; the ruthless, the genius in self-defence.’

  ‘I can take it—from you,’ I said.

  You’ll get it,’ she said. She was smiling.

  ‘Inside now,’ said the spruiker.

  The girl dropped to the ground at the rear of the platform. She lifted the flap and disappeared into the tent. I followed with the spruiker.

  ‘Are you a wrestler?’ he growled.

  ‘No,’ I said.

  He looked relieved.

  ‘Take it easy,’ he said, shortly. ‘Give them a run for their money. And no funny work with the dame,’ he added through his teeth, suddenly showing his hand.

  ‘What’s she to you?’ I snarled back at him.

  ‘I heard you throw your stuff,’ he said. ‘Lay off her or I’ll fix you.’

  ‘Like hell, you will,’ I said.

  He drew a breath. I thought I was for it and stiffened, ready. But he turned away.

  ‘Get back to the canvas. Stand back, please.’

  The crowd formed a ring. I took off my coat and waited.

  After a spout of talk from the head, the girl appeared. She was in bathing togs.

  ‘Right,’ said the boss, looking at his watch.

  I didn’t waste any time. I closed with her. She slipped through my arms like an eel. She slammed a grip on me that came from nowhere. She heaved with her shoulder. I went clean over her and landed flat on my back.

  The crowd roared.

  We got going again and I mixed it. I didn’t like squeezin’ her too hard. She was sorta soft. Then she put the Indian death lock on me. She wasn’t so soft. I forgot I was there to kiss her. I fought to get away from her. I broke it and grabbed her round the neck. I had all the strength, but I didn’t know how to use it.

  I panted in her ear, ‘Meet me to-night, will you? Where are you stopping?’

  She threw me.

  At the end of the round she had me thinking twice at once.

  Next round I pleaded in her ear. ‘Meet me to-night. I’m on the level, I tell you.’

  But no good. She fought me off. I gave her all I had, but I didn’t have enough. . . .

  When the time was just about up, I got her in a headlock. Her face came back. She was mine. My cheek was near hers.

  ‘You’re done,’ I whispered. ‘But I’m not forcing a kiss. Where will you be to-night at eight?’

  ‘I let you get this grip,’ she gasped.

  I kissed her—hard and long. She came up to my mouth.

  The spruiker grabbed me by the shoulder and jerked me back. She was free.

  The crowd cheered.

  I stood back while they filed out.

  The spruiker thrust a quid into my hand. ‘Hop it,’ he snapped.

  I walked to the opening. The girl came after me with my coat.

  ‘I’m stopping at the hotel. Nine o’clock,’ she whispered rapidly.

  I went outside. I was walking on air.

  That night we stood in the shadow of a shed at the rear of the pub
and I told her I loved her. I put it right.

  I meant it. And she knew it. She gradually shed her reserve, her disbelief. We seemed to have known each other a long time.

  ‘How can you keep me?’ she said at last. ‘You haven’t got a job.’

  ‘I’ll get one,’ I said. ‘I’m making for one now. A cove I know in Wagga wants a truck driver.’

  She put her hands on my shoulders then looked into my eyes. I met her look. I had nothing to hide.

  She was satisfied. She looked at the ground and, with a sudden distress in her voice, said, ‘What about him? He’ll follow us.’

  ‘You’re not married to him,’ I said.

  ‘As good as,’ she whispered.

  ‘What of that?’ I said. ‘I’m not worrying.’

  ‘He said he’ll kill me if I ever double-cross him.’

  ‘They generally say that. He’s yellow. You will be all right with me.’

  ‘If I only knew . . .’

  ‘Do you love him?’

  ‘No. No. I hate him.’

  ‘Then hop in and pack your things. I’ll wait for you. We’ll get married in the morning. Come on.’

  ‘No. Wait.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I want to go with you. You don’t know how much I want to,’ she cried. ‘But . . . See . . . I—I—am afraid. He can be terrible. Say if he found me.’

  ‘Look at me,’ I said.

  She raised her eyes. I held them.

  ‘You need never be afraid of him again.’

  She moved close to me. I kissed her and held her tightly.

  He came treading softly round the corner. I pushed her back and faced him.

  ‘Get inside,’ he said to her. His voice was hard and came from him like a thrown knife.

  He had no time to say anything else. I drove at him. I didn’t get him square and he smashed two into me before I got my balance.

  He could scrap. But I can rough-house with the best. We grunted in the dark and blood warmed my fist. There was no sparring for position. It was flat out from the start.

  I could feel her there standing silently against the wall, watching. It steadied me. I got him with my left, then hooked him with my right before his head had finished its jolt.

  He just lay there. I turned to the girl.

  ‘Hop in,’ I said. ‘Hurry. Get what you want.’ She sped away.

  In a moment he sat up. I leapt at him and flung him back to the ground. I jammed my knee on his chest and wrapped my fingers round his throat.