Box Office Browning

by Peter Corris

  'Well, Browning,' Farnol says, 'what brings you here?'

  'You were in court.' My spirits were low and I didn't feel like chatting.

  'I was asleep. Come on, tell us the tale; we've got a lot of time to pass.'

  Like most people I'll talk about myself until the audience drops off. I told Farnol the whole story going back as far as Dudleigh Grammar. I'll allow I embroidered a little, such as by suggesting that it was my romp with Mrs Carew (my fellow wagerer's mother, you'll recall) rather than the run-outs and the skied catch that expelled me from Dudleigh. Farnol swallowed it all down with his eyes gleaming and he chuckled often. Splendid chap, thinks I.

  'Excellent, excellent,' Farnol chortled when I'd finished. 'What a cad you are. I hope I can remember it all.'

  'Eh?'

  'I'm a writer, old chap, or trying to be one. It runs in the family, writing.5 A few of us have had a go at it and I'm the latest. There's great material in your story.'

  I felt a bit glum about that but there was an obvious rejoinder. 'Well, Farnol, you've heard me out. What're you in for, eh?'

  He chuckled, shook his head and vaulted up on to a top bunk. I heard him rustle around for a while and then his breath came in deep, steady gusts. Henry Barton snored and I own I felt like weeping as I stood there with my back to an iron-bound door one foot thick at least.

  It was Farnol who explained to me why Flinders was giving us such a hard time. This was after his third upsetting of the slops bucket so that the contents poured back into the cell. At least ten times he'd delayed our getting to the mess hall so that we had to eat our meal, typically a disgusting mess of boiled lamb and rice, stone cold. At first I couldn't believe what Farnol told me?'

  'He thinks that of me?'

  Of us both, probably.'

  'There was none of that at Dudleigh,' I said.

  'Not much at Rugby either,' he said. 'Plenty at Winchester though.'

  It puzzled me why the English named their schools after games and guns and thank God I didn't make this point to Farnol. He already treated me like a colonial ignoramus and I'd learned to keep my mouth closed and eyes and ears open. I was a good mimic as I've said – my Peter Dawson impression, remember? – and I picked up a pretty good English gentleman act from Farnol and others which I turned into money many times. (I've often wondered whether Farnol got any books published. I'm not much of a reader, especially of novels. I've started a few but I don't recall ever finishing one.)

  Anyway, once I'd found out about Flinders, who was a fat, fair individual by the way, with a nauseating kiss curl plastered to the centre of his forehead, I took good care never to be alone with him. The daily routine, as far as I can remember it, was: awake at 6 am, mess hall at 6.20 am, cell cleaning until 7.10 am, exercise until 8 am and work from then until midday. There was a half-hour meal break before two more hours of work after which we were locked in the cells, fed at 6 pm and lights out at 8 pm. This schedule allowed prisoners little time to make themselves available to men like Flinders but it was managed – around meal breaks, on sick parade and at the twice weekly bath muster.

  Flinders could not have been more wrong about Farnol and me. If anything, Farnol was a randier cove than myself and, apart from note-keeping, he gave little thought to anything save the fair sex.

  For this preoccupation there were good reasons: the work was hard – we built sections of the prison and the walls, cleared scrub on the hillsides, stacked bricks and timber. The food was bland – boiled meat, rice, potatoes, bread, sweet tea and fresh fruit once a week. It was boring but filling and nourishing enough. I missed my grog and good cigars – the tobacco ration was of poor quality twist that I could hardly smoke. I used to barter it for extra soap and fruit and luxuries like biscuits. On this regime, anyone given to dissipation but blessed with generally sound health, like Farnol and me, saw it improved and we suffered from our natural urges accordingly. I'd lie in my bunk and listen to Farnol sighing and thrashing around and eventually giving himself relief and try to concentrate on thoughts of aromatic Havanas, French brandy and the thrill of having an outsider go first past the post with some of my money on its back.

  Occasionally, of course, Flinders cornered me in the wash house and the conversation would go something like this:

  He: You have very white skin, Browning.

  Me: Not when I've had a bit of sun on it, Mr Flinders. Gets rough and red I can tell you. Could you please step aside, sir?

  He: I could make this place a lot more pleasant for you, Browning.

  Me: Oh, it's not so bad, sir, considering the type of people you have to deal with.

  He: What d'you mean by that? Is that insolence?

  Me: No, sir. Do you mind, sir? I'll be late for prayers.

  After a few such encounters my nerves were shredding and I had to have further consultation with Farnol.

  'You should have a moustache, old chap,' he said.

  'I had one but I had to shave it off to work in the film. What's that got to do with it anyway?'

  Farnol went on to explain that I should grow my moustache back because Flinders and his kind didn't like facial hair. (Things changed a hundred per cent in that regard over the next fifty years.) But I needed a quicker solution than that and Farnol could see the point; his food was cold too and we were both trying to avoid using the bucket at night to cut down on the amount that might be slopped on the floor any morning.

  'An Eton chap told me about something he did once,' Farnol said. 'Desperate measure, but it worked.'

  'Tell me, I'll try anything. Otherwise I'll kill that bastard and get myself topped.'

  Farnol told me. The next bath day I was slow in washing and made sure that Flinders noticed it. When the last of the other inmates had left he was there, truncheon in hand and with his pink face flushed.

  'I know what you want, Mr Flinders,' says I.

  'Yes?'

  'The harassment will stop?' The word puzzled him and he looked uncertain. I was fighting the nausea that was rising remorselessly in my guts. 'I mean the business with the bucket and the food . . .'

  'Yes. Yes.'

  I turned around, unbuckled my belt and let my trousers fall. I could smell him getting closer and I had to grit my teeth as I felt his hand reach for the band of my drawers. At least he was direct; there was none of the amorous fumbling that Farnol had warned me about. He pulled my drawers down and immediately let out a high-pitched scream.

  'What is that!'

  'Nothing.'

  'Have you got them anywhere else?'

  'Not where it matters, not for a long time. Come on, Mr Flinders . . .'

  But when I turned around he had gone. I had given myself an 'Eton arsehole' – made from a combination of soap, hair, blood, iodine and whatever other substances were to hand. The effect was of a large, raised, multicoloured wet sore placed near the anus.

  Flinders ceased his attentions and Farnol and I were able to get on with the standard prison activities of malingering to avoid work, bartering to secure the finer things of life and planning for the future. Apart from seeing himself as a great author, Farnol had another object in view which was to obtain access to the Women's Reformatory. He had made a close study of our sister institution when outside on work detail, questioning prisoners and guards and plotting the schedules of deliveries and other visitations.

  It occupied his nimble mind, kept him cheerful and passed the time, but there seemed little prospect of success.

  'It can be done,' he would say. It must be possible.'

  'If you can fly or tunnel, certainly.'

  'Or if I were a woman.'

  'Flinders could help you there.'

  After a period of hard study, Farnol informed me that he had a plan.

  'I'll need your help, Browning,' he said.

  'Ah,' I said cautiously.

  'Did I or did I not save you from the clutches of Flinders?'

  Put like that, what could I do? I agreed to help him although the plan seemed m
ore and more bizarre as it unfolded. Farnol had a subtle mind and he early associated the idea of posing as a woman with the notion of playing the clergyman. He rejected it as too obvious a stratagem (I use his words) but eventually he hit on the variation. There were a number of Jews incarcerated along with the rest of us – gentiles, Asiatics, Aboriginals, etc. – and on Saturday a rabbi visited to minister to their spiritual needs. Pick-pockets, pimps and forgers mainly, their needs in that regard were probably minimal but Rabbi Jacobsen appeared on their Sabbath without fail.

  'I've got a costume,' Farnol said, 'black coat, white shirt, horsehair beard. It's cost me dear in tobacco and letter writing I can tell you.'

  'You're mad.'

  'Not at all. I've spoken to our Israelites and I am informed that the rabbi visits a number of women of their faith after his work here. One of these women in particular is said to be fond of male company.'

  'Even suppose you got out and got in, as it were, how would you get back?'

  'That need not concern you. What I need is a diversion to be created so that the passage of two rabbis is not noticed.'

  'Impossible.'

  'Not so. The Hebrews will delay Jacobsen until after the guards have changed shift. Some abstruse point of Old Testament interpretation, no doubt. The second shift must be so occupied as to be unconcerned by his late appearance. You have the necessary qualifications, Browning.'

  'How so?'

  'A fire, a small one.'

  Saturday was a work day in the prison but there was a certain laxness in the arrangements that Farnol planned to take advantage of. The Jewish religious service interfered with the head count and heavy lunches, an anxiety to leave early, and interest in public sporting events all contributed to a lowering of vigilance. Farnol would be able to absent himself from the work detail and lunch, and a fire in the cell block would cover his absence and return as well as providing a distraction to the new guard.

  I wasn't happy about it though. If the plan went wrong I would be associated with a rebellious escapade or, at worst, an escape attempt. My task was to be at the head of the prisoners being returned to their cells and to have the fire underway before the lock-up was completed. It was risky but I agreed. Farnol was a forceful character and considerably older than me; well, a few years older at least.

  The selected Saturday arrived. Farnol slipped away before muster and I toiled through the morning imagining him, behind a copper in the laundry, scrubbing himself to get rid of the prison odour and glueing on his false beard. After a shortened afternoon work session we downed tools and I worked my way to the head of the line, shoving unceremoniously (and uncharacteristically) to get to the front. The guard touched me on the shoulder just as I was about to step through the door as the second man in line.

  'Fall out, Browning.'

  I stared at him and shuffled forward.

  'Fall out, I say. You're to see the Superintendent.'

  My bowels loosened as Nature apparently intends them to do when danger looms, and I was escorted down a series of light-starved passages and up a chilly staircase or two.

  I imagined the interview: You are evidently the brains behind a mass escape attempt, Browning. What have you to say?

  The guard knocked on the Super's oak-panelled door and we went in. I'd only seen him at a distance, haranguing us at assemblies and, heavily flanked by guards, inspecting walls and certain special facilities like the solitary confinement cells. Up close he was unimpressive; a little, roundish chap, thin on top and short of chin. He waved the guard back and beckoned me to stand closer to his desk. He'd been half-standing and now he dropped down into his big chair. He was smiling. Can't be solitary or the cat, I thought.

  'Representations have been made, Browning, on your behalf.' He turned over a piece of paper on his desk. 'From a firm of solicitors in . . . Newcastle. Ah, Dunstan and Houghton.'

  My heart sank. I glanced out the window; it was a novelty to look out of an unbarred window. As it happened I had a clear view of the visitors' entrance by the main gate and I saw Farnol, in fusty black, crisp white and frothy horsehair, being marched towards the cells.

  The Superintendent scribbled. 'You are to be released today on licence.' He looked at the solicitor's letter again, paused and got up into the half-squat again and stuck out his hand.

  'You know what my advice to you is, Browning?'

  I gripped his smooth, oily-feeling hand in mine which was roughened by hard work. 'Tell me, sir.'

  'Join the army, young man. Join the army.'

  6

  I was surprised by the cool reception I got from my fellow inmates after I was marched back to my cell. Barton turned his back on me and a couple of the others growled like animals.

  'I say, Barton,' I said, 'I'm getting out.'

  'Judas.'

  'What's that? August? No, now. Today.'

  'You sold him out, didn't you? You smarmy scab. If I was younger I'd split you up the middle. You better be getting out, you wouldn't last long in here.'

  I saw it then. They thought I'd informed on Farnol. 'But look,' I gabbled, 'I didn't . . . I mean, they came and got me before I . . .'

  'Good plan,' Barton said, still with his head turned. 'Worked. When did you say you were getting out? You better hope it's before evening muster.'

  I sat shivering in the cell. I'd have sworn I could hear the scraping of metal on stone as makeshift knives were sharpened. I stirred myself to gather my few things together – they'd allowed us to use our own shaving tackle and I had a book on card-playing techniques that I used to carry around with me. Farnol's meagre possessions were on his bunk and I idly turned over the pages of a tattered copy of the Strand.

  'Don't rob him as well,' Barton snapped.

  'As if I would!' But I dropped the magazine. 'Where is he, anyway?'

  'Solitary, where else?'

  'Did you mean that? I'm in danger here?'

  He chuckled and turned. His eyes were bright in his drink-blotched face. 'And outside too. The word'll get around, believe you me.'

  'You mean . . . in Sydney?'

  'And elsewhere.'

  This was terrible. I didn't fancy the idea of looking over my shoulder every step I took along Pitt Street, or being afraid to take off my pants in Kate Leigh's6 in case some low-life wanted to make a reputation. Barton was watching me with a smile splitting his ravaged face. He's ragging me, surely, I thought.

  'Er, Barton . . . how about Newcastle?'

  His shout of laughter brought on a one minute coughing fit. When he recovered he stuffed shag in his foul clay pipe and tried to hold the match steady over the bowl. 'Worst place of all for someone like you.' He drew his hand sharply across his throat. Toughs everywhere, razor men.'

  'Jesus!'

  'Only thing for you, boyo, and I tell you this because I suppose you can't help being a coward and a weakling, is to go bush.'

  Now, contrary to what you may have heard, not all Australians like the bush or feel at home in it. I detest it myself – nasty grey drab stuff, full of snakes and nothing to drink. My idea of the countryside is the Bois de Boulogne or Central Park without the muggers. But what choice did I have? Alive in the bush would be better than dead in the city, just.

  I put a brave face on it, did some scoffing for Barton's benefit and to cheer myself up. It was only after they'd conducted me from the cell that I thought I should have left some sort of note for Farnol. I resolved to write to him when I reached safety (I never did, write, that is).

  The release procedure was pretty simple – a strip wash (although I'd already had one that day), down some stairs to an airless basement where I signed a paper and received two pamphlets – one on the evils of drink and another arguing the case for conscription in Australia. The latter was a piece of freelance propagandising by the store-master who winked at me as he handed over my clothes and a letter bearing the solicitor's name stamp. Inside was the magnificent sum of five pounds. There was a note in the envelope, not written by 'Wi
ld Bill' of course; I was never sure that he could write, but from Dunstan or Houghton advising me to proceed to Newcastle at once. I tore it up.

  Newcastle lay to the north. I walked out of Long Bay prison and turned my thoughts south. I had a vague acquaintance with the Illawarra district to the south of Sydney, having spent some of the last summer there in the company of a publican's widow at Coalcliff. The name sounds unsalubrious enough and indeed the miners of the south coast are rough fellows, as miners are everywhere. But mines, after all, are underground, and the hotel at Coalcliff is poised on a headland overlooking a fine beach and a splendid sea. I had visited the hotel on my wine and spirit selling duties, fallen in with the bereaved Kitty Neilson, who was gamely struggling to carry on, and so found myself a soft billet.

  I'd managed to convince old Robespierre that the south coast was promising and needed a locally based man to explore it. (All twaddle, of course; the miners thought beer was the only drink worth swallowing and the farmers thought the same. The only other inhabitants of consequence were God–fearing folk who seemed to fear liquor about equally with God. There was, I'll admit, a priest or two with a nose for port but that was a limited market.) Nevertheless, I bunked in with the consolable Mrs Neilson, toured the district a bit in her fine buggy, and learned the lie of the land. I'd had to depart rather smartly, it must be said – a combination of a summons from Robespierre, who measured success only in order forms, and pressure from Kitty who'd taken to making remarks like 'I know I don't look my age and you are such a mature-looking man, Richard.'

  It wouldn't be so bad. I could hop a train to Nowra and pick up a job on one of the dairy farms. Grow a beard, use a different name, and lie low for a while until any threat from Long Bay died down. Humping my two bags, I set off towards the nearest tram stop. I'm an optimist first and last – I might be able to get into Wollongong and see a fight or two, have a bet. Then there was Kitty just up the line . . . no, that was too optimistic.