by Rodney Hall
– Do you think you don’t? It’s just that our stories are more interesting. Even a mathematical equation is a story: 2x plus 3y over 5 equals the imprint of an elephant’s foot in a controlled tray of sand. Ha ha, I’m with you you see.
During this speech she digressed to pick up objections as people thought them, slipped in a sketch history of Greek imperialism, plus a philosophy of gardening as model-perception of the land (Mr Ian McTaggart, she said, could verify her point), criticized obedience to orders and the performance of duties by those ignorant of their consequences. She opened her propositions to any objection, but it was she herself who listed alternatives and then refuted them. By the time Miss Brinsmead finished, as I’ve mentioned, with private mutterings that there would be more said and in different ways, the main party of Whitey’s Fallers had already begun staggering homeward, finding the going even more exhausting than the climb, leaning back against the slope and tottering along in tiny steps. They had no call to stay, their point had been put.
– That Felicia, Mum Collins suggested to her neighbour, gets a bit carried away. Considering, I mean, he’s a good-hearted swindler.
For Uncle, his eye on that vast mass of gold, more was needed. Into the bargain, speech-making came easier now without Ian McTaggart pursing his lips at so many words.
– Listen Senator I’ve got somethin else on me mind, son. A moment ago you was throwin round a few fine-soundin sentiments: prosperity wasn’t it? and security? and progress? So what are they when you come down to it? Prosperity is nothin more nor less than greed. That’s a fact. I know that one for sure. It’s havin more than you need, so’s you’re not obliged to go on doin honest work. Correct me if I’m wrong won’t you? What you call prosperity I call sin. We see your prosperous people up here time to time. Look at yourself; you’re what you’d call prosperous. You took more thought this mornin to what you’d wear and how you’d make the right impression than how this would upset us. And what did you mean by progress? Don’t be surprised if we’re wonderin. It’s progress I’m really wantin to tell you about. It’s on account of progress I’m havin my say and I want this lad here to listen. I’ve had somethin to do with progress in my time. There’s been a few outbreaks of it even up this way. My own son’s one of them progress people. Silly as a rabbit. And young Tony’s father, he’s another. But I’ve never stood for a bar of it myself. Didn’t I fight against the hospital? They wanted to put up a hospital here. I said home’s good enough for the healthy it’s good enough for the sick. We hadn’t even got a blacksmith at the time and they wanted a hospital. Progress is a way of gettin you out of your homes when you’re too sick to put up a fight, I said … and chargin you money for it too. I fought the hospital when I was a young man and there was a lot more livin here than what we’ve got now. There used to be close on a thousand in Whitey’s in them days. And another thing they wanted was an old people’s home. I fought against that too. We won that one as well, and thank God we did. Imagine me or Miss Brinsmead here in an old people’s home. We’d have been dead long ago, dead of a nasty bout of progress. Every time there’s been plans and schemes to let us out of our family responsibilities, I fought em. I fought against the police station being set up. I did, I fought against school too, even though Mercy Ping was a little darling thing with the youngsters and gave them curry when they played up. By God she laid about them! I fought against the draft and I fought against any number a government johnnies like yourself. The school’s the only time I ever lost out too. Mind you, it was never just me fightin: people here has always been against progress. Strong against progress. They’re a good little community, no doubt about that. We wouldn’t let them put away our old people, nor our sick people neether. And what did we need a policeman for? If anyone got out a line we’d soon put them straight to our satisfaction. There’s always trouble when folks live together; no reason to shut bad ones away. We’ve got to live with them. They’ve got to live with us. That’s it, isn’t it? They’re no more happy than we are about it. But prison’s the worst thing you could think of, I shouldn’t wonder. Now what you’re callin progress is a new road. Right? A lot of fools killin themselves in fast cars, lot of fat people with full bellies complainin about being hungry; lot of empty heads gawkin at ordinary folk as if they was in the zoo; lot of empty hearts hoping to fill their lives with trinkets and souvenirs of where their cars have been driven through. Your progress means money. Noise. Stink. Death. Correct me if I’m wrong. We’ve lived here the way we’ve lived. Nobody’s bothered us up until now. And this is the way we’re ready to die too. I hope you’ve understood me. We deserve that: to die our own way. We’re old. He slapped the blade of a bulldozer. Greed machine, he said.
Tony shuffled uncomfortably. This was all beside the point. He sensed the argument was not having any effect. He alone of the Whitey’s Fallers could tell this was a mistaken approach. But he had no words of his own. And Bill stood nodding as if giving a public lesson in appreciation.
– We never asked anythin of yous, Uncle concluded. Don’t want anythin. No good moanin it’s too late, road’s begun. It isn’t finished is it? If you’d had the common decency to come and ask, we’d a told you we don’t want the road in the first place. So you’d best arrange to take it another way. Just skirt round the bottom of our mountain. There’s the T-ridge forks off north a couple of hundred yards from where we are right this moment. You could take your graders down that way.
– But this is wholly unreasonable! the senator burst out. For the past fourteen years we have been writing to you and never had a reply. Then two years ago we published the regional development scheme. It was discussed on television. It was in the newspapers. He allowed himself the luxury of a lapse into sarcasm – I suppose the papers do reach this far? You had ample time to lodge an appeal. No government could have been fairer. The Aesthetic and Historical Resources Commission wrote offering to restore your buildings.
– And my brother replied on our behalf to say no, said Felicia.
– Exactly, the only response we had. Which is why the Commission asked me to come and see you while I was in this area on that first occasion. Surely there you had proof if it was ever needed of the government’s concern for you.
Billy joined the dispute.
– Did you do anything? he asked.
– About what?
– Well, you wanted to paint the place up. Mr Brinsmead wrote you a letter to say no. So what’s happening?
– I can tell you, Senator Halloran answered this enemy with a lizardlike flicker of the eye which made Vivien loathe him as the sort of official Aunt Annie would attack with an umbrella. We noted that decision of yours. We regretted it, we thought you were wrong because it’s not just up to you, this highway will serve the people of the whole nation, but we noted it. It’s not simply a question of the selfish interests of one tiny town on the way; still, we accepted your decision for what it was worth. Then, of course, the other letter arrived and changed the complexion of everything.
– There was no second letter, Felicia said.
– Well this represented the views of other citizens of Whitey’s Fall, the dissenting view you might say, or more properly the assenting view, he joked mirthlessly. To suggest we set up an impartial inquiry, a very sensible idea which we are in the process of implementing. If Senator Halloran felt uncomfortable while delivering this considered opinion, it was because that mad woman with the filthy hair was giving him such a peculiar look, eyes boring at his, examining the fine print.
– The letter, she said squinting to read the signature at a distance, is from George … Uncle! she turned accusingly. It’s from your George.
Temporarily the protestors were in disarray, baffled by George Swan’s treachery, ashamed: Uncle of his son, Billy of his father, Tony of his uncle by marriage, Felicia of the boy who had once threatened her he’d bust in one night and find out all her secrets.
The mountain muttered and the gold pushed up to draw attention t
o itself.
– Leave him to us, Billy said grimly. His father had strained filial loyalty beyond endurance. He had actually written a letter to the government. A family would break over this, break permanently. The form of the tragedy was known and established long ago.
– I must say, Senator Halloran was speaking again. I’m more than a little surprised you’d have any reservations about the upgrading of a road that’s a danger to you. Heaven knows we’re all aware of the fatal accident on it recently. He looked from one wizened face to another, each void of expression, the eyes chinks of glass. What’s more, he oiled their resistance. This village is a national treasure. You don’t seem to realize what you have here. The asset, I mean. It’s like the last surviving relic of the Empire, it really is a link with those days.
The irony of these words sang to Felicia, so she clapped her hands. Uncle snorted dismissively, fifty years ago a man in a morning coat had called him and his bullock cart a national treasure and had the opportunity to reconsider from the new perspective of being flat on his back in the muck. But the words didn’t register with Billy, preoccupied, caught in the crosscurrents of how to disown his father, yes and he remembered Suzanne Jessop bringing an official envelope for him that day he felled the tallow-tree, remembered the crisp paper rammed into a pocket out of sight; then he thought of something equally uncomfortable, himself and his friends joyfully smashing Mr Whitey’s empty place at London. If Milliner’s men were vandals why not him and Tony?
The two old people accepted the matter as settled and in Billy’s hands. They set off together, returning down the long track home, comrades-in-arms, not needing to talk, heads cocked for sounds a stranger couldn’t hope to interpret. The deep strength they shared could only be guessed by those who knew how they hated each other, their relentless antagonism through the years to this moment.
– You told them Felissy, Uncle said eventually. You told them good and proper my dear.
– I saw it was gold, Felicia whispered with uncharacteristic caution. I can tell what you’re thinking Uncle.
– And it was. They just got down deep enough with them machines of theirs. But considerin they don’t know what to look for, and never guessed there’d be anythin worth lookin for, they just levelled her out and made her ready for the bitumen.
– Until somebody comes along who does know.
– I think, said Uncle fossicking in his pocket for his pipe. I think it’s worth a punt. Keep their minds off what’s under their feet, and they’ll go ahead and cover it up for us.
– My lips are sealed.
– Somethin I been meanin to ask you about Felissy. That tobacco of mine. Did you ever track down the old brand? I’m gettin jack of this new scented muck.
– I hope to have good news for you, I can’t say more than that.
– Well it was four years ago come Christmas I put me order in.
– I have always paid due respect to your virtues, Mr Swan, she countered chivalrously.
A storm of dust smothered them as the senator drove past tooting his horn and nodding nervously, mesmerized by the horrors of the surface he had to negotiate, but proceeding on their assurance that the track was clear right down to the town, his nice shiny car kangarooing across the bumps, slurrying in gulches, leaving a skirl of dust droning in their ears.
They stopped for a blow while the consequences of civilization abated. Uncle treated himself to a couple of well-rehearsed hawkings and spittings. Felicia watched him with ladylike composure.
He began to distrust his own optimism.
Thus Fido:
SECRET. Diary, this is what happened. You know I was going outside to find somebody, well I went today and it was horrible. Uncle’s locked the shop and told me they’d be away for the day and to keep out of sight but I could play the radio quietly. I let them go because they may as well go for ever for all I care. So I got the idea the time had come and this might be my chance. I wasn’t afraid, I felt really excited. I went out into the garden. The sun was dreadful, it hurt my eyes so I couldn’t stop sneezing. I used to love the sun I think. But I said there was no going back so I went on though my hair kept blowing in my eyes. There wasn’t anybody about. I looked at our shop which is going to fall down any minute, then I ran back because I thought I heard a sound. You see what I’m like? I had dust all over me. Anyway I went again to find somebody up the hill to talk to. The biggest place has The Mountain written on the wall, but it’s nothing compared to India. And outside I met Boy, he was watching me from inside a car, barking at me and I jumped. Then I could see there wasn’t any danger so I tried my whistle on him. He liked it better than they do here because he stuck his ears up. I talked with Boy through the glass. Then I went on further but still there wasn’t anybody about so I began to get scared of course and ran back. But Boy barked for me so I had to stop. I’ve seen Boy with that man who used the telephone, and I know he lives in the city. I planned to get in the car with him and lie down on the floor in the back and that’s how I’d escape. So I opened the door but Boy snarled at me and I slammed it shut again. He wasn’t a friend after all. And I was having trouble with the wind too. But the worst thing was when I wanted to run home. I told myself I’d get caught, some person would ask me my name and where I live. The only thing was to stop the man getting away in his car without taking me. That’s why I’m panting now and dizzy so my writing’s wonky. The thing is I did it, I did go out by myself. I definitely don’t believe this is Australia. I haven’t found a single mention of Whitey’s Fall in all those newspapers or a picture of boredom like this. Australia in the papers looks like everywhere else, but this doesn’t look like anywhere I’ve ever seen. I’ll soon know because I’m determined Boy’s owner will not go without me. I let down the tyres to hold him up. It worked just the way those boys showed me in Naples. He can’t go until I’ve smuggled a message to him. This is an adventure.
Fido wrote this when safely back home, not having noticed the matriarch McAloon asleep on her divan out on the porch where she’d had herself put to see the townsfolk off to stop the crown flunkeys extending the empire into their front yards, asleep like a heap of waterdamaged paper, a dinosaur of the insect world, a scatter of ironing, appearing no more alive than the remains of the bog princess, and snoring in tune with the wind among leaves.
Four
By the time Uncle and Felicia arrived back home it was found to be already evening. The town lay hushed with fear, the curse of gold on everyone’s mind. Cells of conspirators and covert alliances discussed how to claim against the Department of Main Roads, how to keep it a secret for long enough to get it out of the ground. Meanwhile somebody, impossible to imagine who, had let down the tyres of the senator’s car. Such a thing had never been thought of. It was a foreign idea and an uncomfortable one. In the dim rooms lamps were being groped for while fortunes were planned. One houselight, apart from all this, shone at Wit’s End, which filled Billy with shame for his parents. Also a feeble twinkle winked deep inside the welder’s workshop as Rupert Ping performed the ritual of joining an element to itself. When Felicia Brinsmead poked her nose in where it wasn’t wanted, a goggled Mr Ping applied the oxy flame to steel: miraculously a sun began to appear through the metal, a gold-white molten blob of sun, the unthinkable brilliance of it. And Mr Ping, creator, priest and communicant.
– You weren’t with us Rupert, Miss Brinsmead’s voice floated on oil.
– No. He didn’t look up, holding in his eye what he must not lose.
Four or five wars ago, Felicia promised she would do herself an injury which she could take to Rupert Ping and show him, even some cut-off part of her hateful body, perhaps have it delivered into his hand, something awful needing no explanation. Yet it was he who eventually did that, slashing himself for the world to see. Remotely, she heard her brother’s voice speaking to her from the roadway.
– They’ve come before their time.
The lights of the pub flooded on simultaneously, so the
empty shell blazed against the night’s shadow.
Senator Halloran was explaining that after he had driven ahead of them he parked his car outside the Mountain Hotel and took a walk to explore the beautiful countryside and find the waterfall etcetera but when he got back, right on dark, this is what greeted him. He poked the toe of one Italian shoe against a sagging French tyre. Otherwise he restrained his anger at their childishness. Vivien felt mortified, not yet being close enough to the community to trust them completely. She dared assume her neighbours might be glad about this spiteful gesture. Was it their bucolic humour? Yes, she was ashamed. Coming after the pride of hearing Uncle’s speech and Miss Brinsmead’s great harangue and at the very moment she felt she might permit herself a parting shot at officialdom on their behalf. She regretted this let-down keenly.
– I shall need to stay overnight, Frank Halloran said accepting the situation with a certain largeness and leading the way to the pub, where he ordered drinks for everybody and, wowser though he was, had one with them. It seems you’re so upset with me you don’t want me to leave! thus he made a joke of it to save face for the elders who grimaced and jangled their heads.
– You should have a word with Mr Schramm, Uncle growled gloomy as a McAloon.
But Mr Schramm latched the door marked GUESTS ONLY, the empty rooms upstairs echoing.
– You don’t stay in my hotel. I’m full up. Regret. Can’t be helped.
The senator ordered another round to play for time. Outside the cold wind called him. The last of the evening light faded. An unseen hand switched on the single streetlamp. He turned again to his drinking companions and raised his second glass. Smacked his lips with distaste, the beer nauseatingly bitter and wallowing in his gut. He gulped the remainder to be rid of it in one dose. If he knew where to go he would have made his getaway, duty done. Perhaps return to the workers’ camp? But it was a long way in the dark on the mountainside. He stayed.
