‘Lenin says …’
‘Look here, Angus, you’re out of date. I read only the other day …’
Across their jarring voices the words of Uncle came so quietly that they could hardly be heard; but something in his tone stopped their wrangling dead.
‘I fought in the last war,’ he said, ‘and while I was away they buried my father in a pauper’s grave. With a body above him and a body below they threw him to rot, and I never knew until months after.’
There was a silence. Then Snake said impatiently: ‘Let’s have a drink.’
‘I thought of him lying there,’ Uncle went on gravely, as though he had not heard. ‘And I thought of all the other dead men I had seen. But always I thought of him again. He trained me to be loyal to King and country.’
The atmosphere, which had been so full of hilarious jollity a few minutes before, felt now as though a clammy, grey mist had crept from the river, oozing around them, laying unseen, wet hands on their faces.
‘When I was dossing at the Salvation Army joint,’ Snake said in a low voice, ‘there was two men died. One old chap had heart trouble and he kept asking for brandy, but they wouldn’t give him any. He died about eleven o’clock, and they just wrapped him in a couple of blankets and left his body there all night. There were fifty-eight chaps sleeping there. The other chap …’
Snow could stand it no longer. ‘Ar, cut it out!’ he shouted angrily. ‘What about that drink?’
His violence had the effect of jolting them out of their thoughts. Snake served the beer into tin mugs.
‘Here’s mud in your eye, Harry,’ the boy said, raising his mug to the Apostle. ‘I’d sooner get a bullet in me than doss with the Sallies again.’
But Angus and the Dogger were staring at each other as though they were strangers.
‘Dogger,’ Angus said in a strained voice, ‘you don’t mean you’d lead the workers astray on this issue?’
‘Lead them astray! Hell! It’s you who’d lead them astray, with your anarcho-syndicalist tripe about not fighting Fascism.’
‘Dogger,’ Burning Angus said again, ‘we’ve had our disagreements from time to time, but we’ve worked together, and we’ve done what we could to get a bit of unionism and self-respect into the chaps we met. You don’t mean you’d chuck it in to become the serf of capitalism?’
The Dogger began to be angry. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’ His voice was hard. ‘I’ve fought Fascism here, and I’ll fight it abroad, if need be.’ His voice took on a tone of solemnity. ‘It’s the party line, and I follow it.’
Angus was silent for a minute. ‘Well, this is the finish,’ he said at last. ‘I never thought I’d see the day when we two couldn’t get along together. Here we’ve been organising this union. We’ve just got to show Snow here into it … we’ve got the chaps interested — and now you’ll drop it all.’
The Dogger sat sullenly, saying nothing.
Burning Angus rose with dignity. ‘Come on, Uncle,’ he said. ‘I can associate with the dupes of capitalism, but not with chaps who’ll mislead the workers on an issue like this.’ He ostentatiously gathered up his swag.
‘If that’s the way you feel,’ the Dogger said sternly, ‘I can only say that where I can work with you, Angus, I will. But when it’s a genuine fight against German Fascism, it’s up to us.’
They were both on their feet now: big, grim Dogger and little, sandy Angus, who had worked and quarrelled together for years.
‘If you can’t follow a line that’s laid down,’ the Dogger went on angrily, ‘you’re nothing but an individualist.’
‘I’m not,’ Angus retorted, enraged by this awful insult. ‘I follow the line of the British Independent Labour Party.’ He almost shouted it. ‘No support from the workers for capitalist war.’
‘And where the hell do you think that’s going to get you? Do y’want to see us all in German concentration camps?’
Angus fell to laughing bitterly. ‘That’s good! Who showed me the debate in Parliament about putting the chaps into labour camps right here in this country?’
The Apostle tried to make peace. ‘Why don’t you wait and see?’ he suggested. ‘There mightn’t be a war. If it comes, it may be a good thing in a way,’ he added reflectively, ‘the beginning of a more desirable state of affairs, the end of civilisation. After all, civilisation is an unnatural state for man: it puts too much strain on him. Far, far better to revert to the state of wandering tribes who cannot upset the balance of nature. Humanity was meant to be just a collection of little farming villages and hunting tribes, anyway. Perhaps we might then see men developing instead of an export trade.’
Snow dimly felt that all this had happened before. Somewhere he had heard those words, seen this firelit group. Even the broad seat of Jim’s trousers, as he bent to pick up a bottle, had the permanence and significance of a monument.
‘You and Tolstoy,’ the Dogger said scornfully, ‘you give me a pain.’
The Apostle only smiled. He had heard the Dogger’s views on the benefits of industrialisation, and the Dogger had heard his on the benefits of its absence. In fact, they had come to a deadlock so often that it did not seem worth while to go over all the old ground again. It would only end with the Dogger’s telling him he was a ‘pacifist reactionary’ and his asking the Dogger if a more efficient manufacture of bombs ever made a man kinder to his fellow-men.
Angus returned to the attack. ‘The Dogger and his gang,’ he shouted, ‘have been misleading the workers for years. Talking about democracies being better than dictatorships, when here, in our own country, they want to put the unemployed into labour camps as though they were criminals. He’s turning the workers’ eyes to tyranny abroad instead of at home, I tell you. And if there’s a war, that’s what it’ll do. It’ll smash the unions, set up Fascism right here, and the disorganised, misled rabble ’ull be powerless to stop it. And why? Because men like the Dogger have been preaching for five years that the workers must fight Fascism abroad.’ His voice echoed along the silent river. He pointed his finger accusingly at the Dogger across the fire. ‘He’s a menace, I tell you.’ And shouldering his swag and signalling Uncle to follow, he strode off into the darkness.
The Dogger watched him go, his eyes narrowed, his mouth stern. ‘Good riddance to the pro-Hitlerite,’ he said sententiously.
‘Hear! hear!’ Snake echoed. ‘Let’s have a drink.’
But the party had been spoiled. Dark and Jim muttered something about turning in, and went off to their own camp.
‘You’d better come up and sleep in the truck with the boys, Snow,’ the Apostle said quietly.
But Snow was experiencing such a flush of anger against the Apostle that he could hardly speak.
‘Y-y-you!’ he stuttered, shaking his fist under the Apostle’s nose. ‘You did it.’ The Apostle did not move. He sat frowning at the river. ‘They was all as happy as Larry till you come down talking bloody war. Can’t leave chaps alone, that’s your bloody trouble. Always stickin’ your nose in. Why? Why? Where does it get you? For two pins,’ Snow roared, ‘I’d smash your face in.’
The Apostle still watched the river disinterestedly. Snow felt his anger evaporting. He tried to spur it, but it was no use.
‘Separateness,’ the Apostle said, as though to himself. ‘It is in that that man finds his life rather than unity. Without being apart, being different, there would be no such thing as consciousness. Yes, yes, I see that now.’ He rubbed his forehead. ‘What were you saying, Snow?’
‘Arr!’ Snow had sunk back on the ground. ‘Forget it.’
A dreadful weariness beset him. He was baffled by the Apostle, baffled in his search for work, baffled by the emptiness of life. He felt a hand on his shoulder. It was the Dogger’s, who, now that his own irritation had gone, was smiling. ‘Old bloody Angus ’ull be back in the morning,’ he said, ‘large as life.’
Snake nodded. ‘He always goes off that way, and back he’ll come and abuse us
.’
‘One thing about Burning,’ the Dogger said thoughtfully: ‘he may be a pro-Fascist and a bloody fool, but he’s worked hard for this union.’
‘That’s so,’ Snake agreed. ‘We’d better humour him. I think I’ll just stroll along with what’s left in this bottle,’ he added casually. ‘They might want a drink before they turn in.
‘If you care to join up with us,’ he said, ‘I’ll just give you an idea of what we plan to do.’
As he spoke two figures loomed out of the darkness. Uncle and Burning Angus, without a word, spread their blankets in front of the fire.
‘If you think,’ Angus announced, in an awful voice, ‘that we’re going to set about finding firewood at this hour when half this fire’s rightly ours …’
‘Anyway, we’ll be moving on in the morning,’ the Dogger said ironically. ‘One more night within smell of me won’t make so much difference.’
‘That’s so,’ Burning Angus agreed non-committally, and then, ‘Meebee I was a bit hot with you, Dogger. You can’t help being misled.’
‘You can’t either,’ the Dogger replied.
Solemnly, like Livingstone meeting Stanley, they shook hands, the trackless jungles of policy encompassing them, but a small glow of friendship in the clearing.
17
Pure cowardice on Snow’s part induced him to bring Angus and the Dogger with him when he went up to the dairy to take away his van and his horse. He knew he would have a hard struggle with Dancy, who would inevitably want to come with him.
‘I tell you I’m coming too,’ Dancy insisted.
‘Now see here, Dancy; I can’t take you. I’m going to help these coves organise a union, and there ain’t no room for you sticking your oar in. Besides, the road ain’t no place for a woman. Thirty-Bob’s got the money for the sulky and the Horehound. When you get it, you can pay your fare back to Sydney, if you don’t want to stay on here.’
It was the longest speech the Stray had ever heard Snow make, except his memorable dissertation on work, when they had just met. She stood, sullen and desolate, a small figure in an old print apron at the paddock gate, while the three men harnessed Don, and Snow climbed on the seat of the van. She even held the gate open for them.
‘Where you headin’ for, Snow?’ she asked almost in a whisper, as Snow paused to say good-bye.
Snow hesitated. He knew the Stray, and while he did not want to be cruel, he could not have her following. And she would, as soon as look at him. So he hedged.
‘Well, I don’t know yet. I thought maybe I’d head out through Dubbo and Bourke. See you down at the cannery at Christmas, maybe.’
He gave her a smile because he was afraid she might cry and disgrace him, but she only nodded quietly. She knew he was lying about heading west.
‘O.K., Snow. I’ll be seein’ you.’
‘I’ll be seein’ you, Stray.’
Snow felt mean and rather ashamed of himself as he drove the turnout back to Logan. The Stray had behaved well. She hadn’t whimpered or made a scene, and when she wanted to make a scene, there was not her equal on the track. She had just taken it on the chin. Oh, well! He couldn’t be worried about the Stray. She could look after herself.
Back at the dairy, Dancy was explaining to her employer: ‘Me husbing’s heard of a job over in Dubbo, and he says if I can stay here, it’ll suit ’im till he sees whether he’ll give this job a go or not.’
‘Well, I must say, Dancy, you’re acting very queer. I’d be much easier in me mind if I knew I’d got someone permanent. Only the other day Mrs Higgs’s girl said she’d come for seven-and-six, and if I do keep you on, I can’t be paying you more than I’d be paying a permanent girl. I’ll think it over and ask Mr Marks what he thinks.’
For two days Dancy went through her work dully and indifferently. If her eyes were more red-rimmed than usual, only Charley noticed it. He tried to comfort her timidly:
‘Don’t you worry, Mrs Grimshaw. Your husband ’ull come back all right.’
‘It’s this smoke in me eyes,’ the Stray grumbled.
As she went about the house, she was conscious all the time of a terrible weariness. Her legs seemed to have lost power to move. Her throat ached, and there was a pain in the middle of her chest, as though some heavy lump was lodged there. Her eyes were sore from crying so much to herself at night, and when she swore, it was in a dispirited and hopeless fashion without any ginger in it.
‘Ain’t no damn man any good,’ she muttered. ‘Not a single one of ’em. I ’ates men.’
She was still in this mood when the Apostle left his rickety little truck at the gate and asked to see her. Dancy was so pleased to see his friendly, gentle face, that she could have cried.
‘If you like to come with us, Dancy, my wife and I would be only too pleased.’
‘It’s all right, Harry,’ she said listlessly. ‘I dunno what I’m going to do yet.’
‘Don’t cry, Dancy.’
‘I’m not crying.’ She wiped her eyes.
‘If you can just remember, Dancy’ — the Apostle hesitated — ‘if you can just remember that fretting and willing and worrying and planning are just a waste of time. Try to trust life. I know it hasn’t given you much reason to trust it, but go with it, not against it. Just know that you are watched and guarded and … loved. Then it doesn’t matter what men and women do to you.’
‘O.K., Harry,’ the Stray promised.
The Apostle pressed her hand. ‘You’re as safe,’ he said, ‘as if you were the cherished daughter of a rich man. Safer. Think of it as a kind of luck. Whatever happens, just trust to luck. And come to us if you need help.’
‘Thanks, Harry,’ the Stray said. ‘You’re good.’
Mrs Marks was not so sure. ‘I can’t have you bringing the riff-raff of the road here all hours of the day and night,’ she snapped. ‘It’s got to stop.’
But the very next day Dick and Thirty-Bob drove up and called Dancy out to the gate. Mrs Marks, whose curiosity was always her strong point, pattered about on the verandah, trying to hear what was said, and pretending to water some neglected geraniums in half kerosene tins along the verandah’s edge.
‘We brought the dough,’ Thirty-Bob said cautiously, passing over four limp banknotes in which some silver had been wrapped. ‘The four quid is for the mare and the fifteen bob for the turnout. I could of got more if I’d of hung on for a few days, but me and Dick want to get off. An’ lemme tell you, Dance, you’re damn lucky to get this. The flamin’ coppers tried to fine it off us.’
Dancy did not even count the money. She knew that neither Dick nor Thirty-Bob would cheat her. She was ‘on the road’ like themselves, and while it might be legitimate business to fleece any farmer or townsman, ‘to take down’ a woman who had ‘no come-back’ was something they would never contemplate.
‘Thanks, Thirty-Bob,’ she said. ‘Which way you heading?’
Thirty-Bob switched idly at a spray of godetia which had thrust its head through the garden fence. ‘Well, we’re going to catch up with Ma first thing, and have a look at the kid.’
‘I wanted it to be a boy,’ Dick beamed. ‘Didn’t I say it’d be a boy, Bob?’
‘Thasso. Dick here’s keen to see his young brother. Well, from there, we don’t quite know where we’d head. Might go after Snow through Mt McDonald to Crookwell. Though why he had to go that way, damned if I know.’ He winked at Dancy. ‘Comin’ along, Dance?’
Thirty-Bob had noticed the look of exultation on Dancy’s face without realising that it was due to his indiscretion in revealing where Snow had gone. So Snow was heading through Mt McDonald to Crookwell! Oh, indeed! And he’d told her he was going to Dubbo and Bourke, the black-hearted … Dancy added a few descriptive nouns under her breath.
‘Yeah, if you want to come along,’ Dick grinned, ‘we’ll give you a lift. Better than campin’ here with old fish-face on the verandah. Pity her poor cow of a husband. Fancy having to sleep with that!’
Dancy
’s first impulse was to accept the invitation, but she hesitated. She did not want to travel with anyone but Snow. He’d be sure to hear sooner or later that she was on the road with Dick and Thirty-Bob, and she wanted only Snow. Determinedly and tenaciously she was resolved to acquire Snow as her own property, and anything that stood in the way of that could not be considered.
‘Aw, I dunno,’ she said. ‘I guess I’ll hang on here for a bit.’
‘We’re not asking you to travel with us on our own,’ Thirty-Bob complained. ‘There’d be Ma. She took a fancy to you, and it’d be company for her to have you along.’
Thirty-Bob had also taken a fancy to Dancy. He had plans to acquire her for himself, but he had been too open about them, making a joke of his intentions.
‘Have it your own way, Dance. See you at Orion for the cherries or down at the cannery for Christmas.’
‘Yeah. Fanks all the same.’ Tears had come into Dancy’s eyes, and she hurried away to hide them. She was ready to cry without any real cause these past two days. She even went out into the yard to wipe away the tears when Mrs Marks had snarled at her over some broken eggs; and now she wanted to cry because Thirty-Bob and Dick were kind to her.
‘Don’t think you can get off the road,’ Thirty-Bob called after her. ‘If you once take to the road, you come back to it sooner or later. We’ll be seein’ you, Dance.’
The visit had given the Stray three comfortable things. One was the money; the other a sense that somewhere she was welcome, if it was only in the camp of the ‘Tyrell mob’; and the third was the actual knowledge where she could find Snow. So he had gone through Crookwell! And he thought he had ditched her! Huh!
Snow, plugging along with the spring weather, heading south-east with the birds, felt soothed and relieved to be by himself again, without a ‘big mob,’ as he characterised his three ex-passengers. Few travellers ever went through Mt McDonald, because the road was too hilly, but he had messages to deliver for Burning Angus at Wyangala Dam, and another message at Bigga. It might be hard going for Don, but that could not be helped. If he could pick up work, it would mean money, and money meant he would get a divorce from Molly and claim his boys.
The Battlers Page 24
