by Rodney Hall
– … in time to reassure you, the senator persisted. Benefits will accrue. As a result of this highway. Whitey’s Fall to live again. Does that mean nothing?
– Nothing, Sebastian Brinsmead confirmed.
Caterpillar treads squealed, engines throttled and lumps of the mountain lurched before blades as big as faith.
– People will come, the politician roared. New families. Will settle. Children. The school. Trade and money. The life will. Town. Saved, they heard him say.
The old people formed up into a choir of heavy breathers, confronting him in a manner calculated to arouse his anger.
– Our government, he made a fresh start, but the renewed din overpowered his attempts at persuasion. He gave up. If he had used this time to observe his antagonists he might have learnt a remarkable fact. The younger people still watched him. But the great majority of the old were dreaming, their eyes fixed blankly on something beyond. He could hardly suspect they were hypnotized by the cutting itself. At the bottom of the sheered rock a stratum lay bare as a straight black line. Gold. The roadbuilders, heads down, conscientiously doing a job, saw only the road they were employed to lay. And even when they switched off the giant motors and blinked at the sun, they were no nearer to knowledge. As the sounds of the mountain rushed in to cover the wounded silence, the politician seized his chance of finishing what he had to say.
– I know this leaves it rather late to explain the details of our regional development scheme in person, but I have been arguing your rights in the Senate for months. I want you to believe that. And finally the Commission authorized me, as one of your elected representatives for the State of New South Wales, to come in person and lay it out before you. You have nothing to fear. You wouldn’t be protesting if you understood. It is a forward-looking scheme to help everybody and build for the future, for your kids and their kids.
Workmen, no more than lads too young for such responsibility, jumped down from the cabs of their crushers and levellers.
– This will put you on the map again, Halloran promised, a buttery tone intruding now he had freedom to play his instrument. The Buddalls, the McAloons, the Brinsmeads, the Collinses, the Schramms, the Langs, the Swans and the McTaggarts confronted him with their stubbornness. On the map, he repeated to emphasize their present obscurity. He was kindly disposed toward them and wanted them to be pleased. He was, after all, working in their interest, he represented an enlightened view. Mrs Collins stepped forward and fixed him.
– Tell me this then son. What are our interests?
– I’m sure they’re of the same standard as everybody else’s, he responded. Reforms to provide all the amenities necessary for the quality of life.
– Qualities, Mum Collins agreed promptly thinking of fullness of heart, loving children and good health God willing.
The workmen avoided looking any more, so as not to intrude on a funeral.
– Yes indeed, public services, Senator Halloran said into the very air they charged with awareness of the gold. His sermon was a flapping of seaweed tongues, a lunar riddle.
Mum Collins came back at him with her final dismissal.
– If you was two-faced, she said. You’d show the other one.
Vivien hung back, cautious about butting in. The senator’s soft male hands which had enveloped her own on the afternoon the police came to take details of Mrs Ping’s death strangled each other briefly. Fury and impatience were stamped on his every feature. He despised Mum Collins, whatever she was saying. Vivien felt a surge of anger against him, a protective energy on behalf of that darling old lady who’d been the first to make her feel welcome, then she noticed Billy struggling with electricity, she recognized jealously when she saw it and smiled faintly. Were her reactions to be interpreted by him? Because she had criticized Billy in public, she had no intention of consoling him now with an attack on his enemy, so she resisted the desire to rush over and take Mum Collins’s part.
Birds flocked in to fill the empty air with wings.
– Miss Lang, the senator called, relieved for here was an educated person who could be his intermediary. Miss Lang would you please explain to these good folk how the new road will be a boon to them.
– The poor coot, Mum Collins whispered. He does try, you got to hand it to him.
– Will it be a boon Senator? Vivien asked.
The assembled Whitey’s Fallers knew how she’d first met the government man to address him with such assurance. Next thing the workmen were gathering in conference just out of earshot, baffled by the idea that anybody might want to obstruct their job.
– The first prosperity for Whitey’s Fall since the goldrush days. The business prospect will be very promising, petrol stations, more shops, a boost for the pub. You know what I think would go really well? An antique Devonshire tea shop.
– With us in it, Miss Brinsmead cried out.
– So that’s an idea for you. And once things get going there’ll be money for other projects. It can’t fail.
– You don’t need me to explain that, Vivien said lightly to disavow any right to an opinion.
– It seems this lady here thinks I do.
– I think nothing to do with you! Mum Collins fired back.
Mr Ian McTaggart slapped his stone thigh with a stone hand, dislodging a little fall of dust. The cobwebs across his lips stretched and tore as he opened his mouth.
– There’s plants that eats vermin.
– Winnin form, Uncle cheered.
– We’ve never found a better life anywhere the world over, Felicia Brinsmead declared, than we have here. And that’s the bitter truth.
– I understand, ladies and gentlemen, the senator addressed them collectively more easily than he could speak to individuals. I understand that you’re concerned for the future of your historic township. You are absolutely right. Please believe me when I tell you you have friends throughout the nation. Your government is concerned too, and that’s what really counts. You may be sure we’re doing what is best for you. I’d like you to think of this. We are bringing you a priceless gift: communication. Ecology is a web. This road will make you part of it. That is what these men here are doing, building for your benefit. You’ll be put in touch with the rest of the country because the secret of communication is mobility. Let me cite the tragic accident on this … murderous … road so recently. Mrs Ping. You know what I mean. Tell them, Miss Lang.
– We know exactly, she answered in a tight voice.
What was that supposed to mean on a rainy Christmas, Uncle would like to be told. He shot a look at her, seeing her for the first time as someone unknown, possibly an enemy. Grief sucked the strength from him. He had to lean his whole weight on his walkingsticks. He’d trusted her as if she was Annie. But she was not Annie. A distant boom of dynamite sounded the approaching war.
Felicia concentrated on the meeting of roadmen, in case they might be discussing life in Acapulco or the Amsterdam diamond market. But no, they turned their backs on the motherlode of gold they had uncovered. Even so, she braced herself because they were now advancing in deputation order.
– Down with the amenities, said Sebastian Brinsmead and with the hauteur of a ruined Nordic hero set his face toward the mountain, snubbing the senator.
– Down with the government, the two Mrs Collinses agreed joyously.
– Walk gently on the land, Ian McTaggart warned the labourers.
Jasper Schramm shook his head to clear the confusions of half a century’s peace of mind.
The people, the fat and the crooked, malformed hands dangling, ancient simple clothes, men’s hats and women’s hats, those doughy with age and those carved of worn wood, shuffled past the senator to meet the destroyer, raising puffs of dust and escorted by their squadron of miscellaneous pets, dogs, cats, a budgerigar (travelling on Mr McTaggart’s head) plus a cow who ambled along on swollen ankles knowing perfectly well what to say when face to face with mountain wreckers.
Nobody knew wha
t to say. Trembling and wheezing, they simply confronted the men. Still in a state of shock, they had reached the bend in the road bed, staring with disbelief at the mutilated land, the horrifying scope of destruction sweeping a hundred miles west over the range to the cities of the plateau. Vivien supported Mum Collins whose flesh caved and shrank from the impact. Even Senator Halloran’s services were accepted by two ladies, burdening either arm. The cow, weighed down by the assayable gold dust in her milk, sat in the dirt with an unashamed sigh of relief. The foreman of works hitched up his shorts, pulled in his beer gut and stepped forward.
– Sorry folks you can’t come any further on the site, he said mastering his astonishment, his laughter. It gets a bit dangerous up the way, what with the felling and the blasting and that.
– We can’t? one of the locals roared in a cavernous bass, his tone not exactly conciliatory. On our mountain? What’s your name?
– Milliner. Hughie Milliner. And all I ask …
– Milliner? Uncle took up the name, passing the criminal’s identikit round for possible recognition. Anyone heard of it? I never have. No Milliners in this district. I used to do the mail run, what’s more.
– Well I never lived here, Mr Milliner replied reasonably. My people’s from Queensland. Up Biloela way.
– Queensland! Uncle was not convinced the panjandrumate existed.
– Never heard a Bill O’Wheeler neither, the publican spoke up, positive on this point.
– O’Wheelers is from another neck of the woods too then? Uncle suggested kindly.
The workmen closed ranks, large healthy specimens with friendly eyes, massed footballers confronting a team they don’t have to play.
– Come on grandma, what’s your problem? one of them laughed.
– How much for a drink of milk off of the cow? asked another.
Plainly it was time for Senator Frank Halloran to introduce himself, which he did, to whistles of approval from the less respectful elements among the road men.
– These are the people of Whitey’s Fall, he explained. Luckily I arrived in time to join them and hear their point of view.
On being invited, Foreman Milliner squatted to make a drawing in the dust of where the highway would pass in relation to Whitey’s Fall: right through it. He answered the senator’s questions and expressed himself perfectly satisfied it could bring only good and become the greatest boon since gold. Uncle looked up sharply. Frank Halloran spread his large white hands, it was true, open and above board. The workmen prepared to amble back to their earth-moving equipment.
– You’ve had your say mister, Uncle stepped up in front of his party. Now I’ve got somethin of me own to put. We know one another, all us locals here. His gesture included his second cousins, his nieces, his grandson, his brother-in-law, his grand-nephew and his half-sisters. No amount of talkin is goin to fool us, he said.
– Good on you Uncle, shouted Billy.
– Good on you Uncle, other voices encouraged him. The cow added a weary moo.
– What’s happenin here, said Uncle a fine anger burning him (you know what these old bush people are like). What’s happenin here is a whole mob of outsiders and Hallorans, O’Wheelers, Milliners and Christ knows who, has come along with bulldozers to make a muck of good hillside that we don’t want touched. No fancy words’ll change the truth a that. My father, he shouted now to prevent the senator from interrupting, lies buried not far from here. And the grandfather too. I don’t suppose many of yous young fellows would know who yer fathers was even, let alone where they was buried! These fighting words sent a tremor of delight through the defenders.
– Now you look here sport, a grader-driver advanced his menacing expression so that Tony pushed his way to the front to block the man’s way. Uncle went on regardless.
– And if I was them I wouldn’t want to own up to siring the likes of yous neether. That’s a fact. Come bulldozin through other people’s country. Haven’t you learnt no manners? This is our bush up here. We always had it. We know every yard a this scrub we do. (You could see him trembling with rage; and inwardly he was also trembling with the premonition of defeat.) Now I’ve come with me mates to tell you somethin. We haven’t come to be told. No, we’re doin the tellin. We haven’t come to be reassured about our fears like Senator Whatsit says. No. Speak for yourself Senator, or keep you mouth shut sonny. We know what’s ours, we understand alright. If we don’t talk it’s because we got good manners and don’t like tellin you what’s in our minds.
The workmen, creatures of their machines, used to the isolation of high cabs, deliberate thinkers on the whole and unaccustomed to insults from helpless geriatrics, gaped angrily while Uncle concluded what he had to say.
– We come to tell you somethin in person. And this is it. Get off of our mountain. You done enough damage and more.
Mr Ian McTaggart sniffed disgustedly. In his opinion Uncle talked too much. As for himself, it was a point of honour not to blab. He turned his back on them and shuffled down in the direction of his garden, the bright blue bird sitting pertly on his head, all expectation.
– Let’s be calm and discuss this thing, Senator Halloran suggested, looking them over, these tough flap-eared hairy-nosed coarse-skinned grannies, struck by the fact that most of them bore marks of family resemblance, even the two ancient mongoloids (perhaps the oldest in existence) holding hands at the back. The exceptions were the publican with his face of a drunken cake from a cold oven, and the Brinsmeads set apart by their large aristocratic features, fine-boned cheeks and noses. He realized at this moment that the Chinese welder was not among the protestors, a fact which he filed for future use. He continued to lecture them.
– We’re talking about growth and productivity. We’re talking about tourism and maybe some non-polluting cottage industry.
– A boomerang factory? Miss Brinsmead suggested acidly.
– Now there’s an idea. That’s the spirit. The old days of isolation are finished. It’s no good trying to crawl back into the burrow. Today’s lifestyle depends on mobility.
– You’ve got to have mobility, the foreman of works agreed.
– Everybody owns a car these days and the country’s opening up. The wonderful thing for you people in the bush is that you can continue to live in this beautiful pollution-free environment while also enjoying the benefits of city life, the extra sophistication, the money, the public services.
– It’s the dust I reckon, Hughie Milliner contributed.
– Quite right, said the senator.
– When the road goes through you won’t have all this dust in your tea.
– We’ve got to live with progress. Turning a blind eye is kidding yourself. The better the roads, the cheaper the transport costs on commodities like your everyday food.
– Don’t say Miss Brinsmead should know, said Miss Brinsmead.
– Miss Brinsmead should know, Senator Halloran argued. The problem is that…
He did not finish his sentence, for Miss Brinsmead, coughing her surprisingly girlish cough, fixed him with one of her fifteen expressions and dumbfounded him by announcing the angry thought coursing through his brain.
– You’re still deluding yourself that we haven’t understood. From his face you could tell this hit home. The trouble is, she went on, that though you’ve been elected to office, you haven’t grown into it, you haven’t related power to responsibility, nor perceived the opposition between the morality of dialectics and unprincipled passion. I dare say Mr Swan or Mrs Collins could teach you a few things if you knew how to listen. Instead of which you condescend to us, you persist in reassuring yourself that since we do not agree with you we cannot have understood.
Remember your history of campaigns, Julius Caesar advised her.
– That’s right, she said. We understand with excruciating clarity Senator Greek. We know precisely what your wooden horse is worth. We will not be talked out of Troy. As Mr Swan so rightly explained … and do you understand him? …
even if there were something to be discussed it would not be with you, nor with your bulldozers and your dynamite. We are the ones to say whether or not any discussion is appropriate and you already have our answer. Mr Swan (if he will forgive me for repeating him, and I only take this liberty because it seems we are dealing with a singularly obtuse class of person Mr Swan) has said we’re here to tell you, not to be told.
The invader’s principal weakness is that the soil will never be his, Julius Caesar confided.
– We’re not here to have our fears allayed, Miss Brinsmead went on and her creaking hair agreed. We’re asserting our rights. It’s perfectly accidental that you are here today, you’ve done nothing for it except drive your vehicles. But we belong. We’ve made this place and been made by it, that includes those who hate it as much as those who love it. We won’t accept that we’ve been sacrificed for nothing, you know.
Put a road through, Caesar explained. And you’ve changed the terrain.
– One can’t damage this mountain without damaging us. We know you’re sent by people who don’t even want the bother of cutting their own bread. People who’ll do anything for convenience; they don’t want to drive up and down mountains, so you gouge a great slice out of the top thank you. Tomorrow they won’t be willing to drive round corners, you wait and see.
A valuable weapon, Caesar explained. Is the envoy whose job is to put the people’s fears into words. Their ignorance is worth two cohorts and forty horses.
– We know who you represent, dispatched here to reduce us.
Yes, creaked the good woman’s burden of hair.
– This is what we have come to say. If you have sufficient intelligence to understand, all well and good. Otherwise, as I fear, there will be more to be said and in different ways… she allowed her voice to trail off, murmuring private fears. As for gold, she added an afterthought. You’re crass enough to speak of gold as a boon. Watch out we don’t put the curse on you. All you’ll be left is stories to tell in the ruins.
– Yes madam and you seem to live by yours, he retorted, a touch of temper showing.
