Poor Fellow My Country

by Xavier Herbert

  ‘I’ll back them for the world’s champion cadgers,’ remarked McCusky.

  Mrs Tasker said with still more emphasis, ‘Poor things!’

  Another wink between the two officials.

  Prindy and Nell fell in with the Barbus at the end of the line, with the big truck growling in low gear on their heels and the yellow-faced driver tootling lightly on his horn and giving Prindy a toothy grin every time he looked back at him. But for all this silly business behind, apparently Prindy was missing nothing: the crowding, gobbling, staring blacks, most of them in rags if adult, naked if children and snotty-nosed, and staring at him — the hovels and skinny dogs and cats, the earth treeless and grassless to this point, red gravel with all fertility trodden out of it long ago. But suddenly there was sand and patches of grass, and ahead a thicket of stunted wind-bent trees, through which silvery flashes of the sea. Prindy was staring at the sea, when his attention was caught by an odd-looking hovel amongst twisted tea-trees, made out of a couple of big corrugated iron water-tanks, rusty and badly dinted and distorted, wreckage of some storm, seemingly half buried in the sand and joined together and with a door cut in an end and a tin chimney and a bit of a porch, to make a substantial dwelling, and round about stacks of metal drums and crates and piled bottles. But odder than the house was its occupant, standing out on her porch watching the procession. She was a big woman, strikingly dressed in yellow with touches of red, nothing cast-off for sure and nicely laundered, and strikingly handsome of face, which metallic brown and shining, in profile looked like the intaglio of some savage queen on a copper coin, regal quality given to it by the way her grey hair was dressed, no mere mop of curls as affected by practically all Aboriginal women of all breeds, but pulled back and tied in a knot on her nape and half covered with a spotted red bandana. Not that the oddity lay in this difference from other inmates of this poorest of all poor-houses in the land. She had but one leg, the other being a so-called peg, and stood supported by a crutch. She was smiling and waving at everybody, and getting the same in return, but her smile vanished as she caught sight of Prindy and his mother. She stared sharply. Then she raised a hand to give the Skin sign Nelyerri. Nell’s free hand half rose to reply, then dropped back. Then the woman tried it on Prindy. He gave back Julama. She smiled widely, showing bright teeth, and came lurching towards them: ‘Eh, ullo!’ she cried in a high musical voice, then broke into lingo, addressing Nell. For answer Nell drooped her head. ‘Wha’s matter . . . you lose him lingo?’ Nell nodded.

  The truck blared behind them. The woman caught Nell by her free arm and pulled her clear. As he passed, the driver leaned out, and with slant eyes on Nell and Prindy, called: ‘Don’ you have nothin’ do dat one Peg-leg . . . she no-goot woman!’

  Peg-leg screeched back at him, ‘You go an’ git pug, you bloody missionary.’ Then she said to Nell: ‘You forget me, eh? I chister belong you.’ She broke into more lingo.

  Nell looked at her with something like recognition, but with fear also. Peg-leg stroked her arm, saying, ‘No-more fright, burruwa. I look out my lil chister. I been hear about trouble. Dat same bloody bastard, Bobwirridirridi, been mek’m dat trouble for me.’ With a movement she indicated the truncated leg and the other one, which was twisted, and showed a misshapen arm, and scowling now, she hissed: ‘I kill-him-die by’n’by, kill him finish!’ Then she looked at Prindy, smiling again: ‘I look out my ngaggun too . . . you pretty boy!’ She smoothed the golden hair, the caramel cheek. She swung on Nell: ‘Me . . . I boss long o’ Compound Queen. She projected her lips back towards her strange dwelling: ‘I got him store dere . . . anysing!’

  ‘Hullo, hullo, hullo!’ They all swung towards the loud voice.

  Messrs McCusky and Turkney were coming back up the steep sandy bank through the trees. It was McCusky’s voice. He added: ‘Getting’ in early procurin’ new blood for your whoreshop, eh, Queeny?’

  ‘What you talkin’ about?’

  McCusky leered at her: ‘You know very well what I’m talkin’ about. Leave the girl alone.’

  ‘She my chister.’ There was nothing like the usual sycophancy in the quick reply.

  ‘I know all about your sisters.’

  ‘Dis one properly my chister from Alice River.’

  ‘Yeah? That doesn’t mean you won’t sell her to some soldier or bloke down town and take half the money she gets.’

  ‘What you talkin’ about?’

  ‘Course you don’t know . . . you don’t know nothing but what suits you.’ McCusky turned to Nell and Prindy: ‘Go on . . . you go along with the picnic mob. They’re tapping the ginger beer.’ The two went off at once.

  Looking back at Queeny, McCusky asked, ‘How much money’d you make sellin’ grog to the blacks over Christmas?’

  She snapped, ‘I don’t sell grog nobody.’

  McCusky turned to Turkney: ‘What about we’ll take a look-see if she’s got any grog in her joint?’

  ‘Sure, sure!’

  They started towards the tanks. Queeny swung on her crutch, and with a couple of loping strides got ahead of them, and turned, saying, ‘What about you mek bet you find’m grog?’ They both chuckled. ‘Come on,’ she said. ‘I bet you five pound.’

  They both burst out laughing, Turkney saying, ‘No doubt about you, Queeny!’

  Turkney said, ‘You won’t find anything, Eddy. I raided her Boxing Day.’

  ‘You fright’ mek bet, eh?’ Queeny jeered.

  ‘I’m not bettin’ with you!’ chuckled McCusky. Then to Turkney he said, ‘We’ll take her word for it, eh, Tub . . . the word of an honest woman . . . ha, ha, ha!’ He swung away from the place, heading back towards the track, calling over his shoulder, ‘Happy New Year, Queeny!’

  She answered readily, ‘Happy New Year, Boss. Happy New Year, Mist’ Turk’ey.’

  Turkney called back, ‘Same to you, Queeny, love. Keep your legs together.’

  She answered with a peal of laughter, turning from them to watch her tribal sister and nephew disappearing through the belt of marine scrub, then after shooting a glance back at the whitemen and seeing them preoccupied in laughing conversation, swung on her crutch to go down after the others.

  Nell and Prindy came out onto a grassy stretch, a sort of ledge between the scrub and the steep beach, to see the picnic crowd milling round the rear of the truck as the ginger beer barrel was being slid down to a stand, but to give it scant attention, in view of the wonder expanding vastly before them, the sea. From where they stood, not only could they see much of the harbour at its widest part, up to six miles across, but also a slice of the infinity of the ocean beyond. It was an expanse of blazing silver, lying motionless with the tide at neap and unruffled by wind, mirroring the westerning Sun and a colossus of white cloud rising as if to meet it. Due westward the shore was most distant, low, a mere green line of mangroves. Southwestward, much nearer, because it was actually an island, connected only at low water with a neck of land splitting off a part of the harbour, was Rainbow Head, blazing of itself and mirroring itself, because it was composed of micaceous quartz, not entirely bare of vegetation, but with so slight a capping of it as not to matter. Beyond it, still southwestward, was Rainbow Beach, again a dazzling thing, since composed of the same stuff as the headland, as indeed were all the beaches hereabout, with a glimpse of the red roofs of the buildings there, and of the several launches and luggers riding the silver offshore. Then the view was cut off in that direction by the red wall of Point Lookout surmounted by its lately erected paraphernalia belonging to what was known in this quarter as the Kerosene: a signal mast, gun-turrets, and the like.

  Nor was it distant strangeness that seized their obvious wonder. A short distance away along the Compound Beach, towards Point Lookout, fish-netting was in progress, being conducted by a couple of blackmen wearing nothing but red nagas, or breech-clouts, and a host of naked black children. There was the wide arc of corks, round which two dug-out canoes patrolled, each packed precariously with children usi
ng hands for propulsion, while also splashing and yelling to discourage fish that could be seen here and there leaping the invisible fence. Other children were hauling with the men at the water’s edge. As they stood gaping, Queeny Peg-leg reached them, saying, ‘First time you been look-him sea, eh?’ They gave their affirmation in swift glances. Then back to the wonder of it.

  But they were not here for sight-seeing. At least not as far as their picnic mates thought. Maggy Barbu called to them: ‘Eh . . . come gitchim ginger beer!’ That attracted the attention of others, among them Mrs Tasker, who stood out and called, and being white must be obeyed. Dragging their eyes from the sea, they headed for the truck. Queeny stayed behind. They were pounced on out of the crowd by more old friends: the Jumbo Delacys, mother and children. Jumbo was there too, but standing off, sour-faced, either not wanted by the respectable ones or not wanting them.

  Mr Tootle, manufacturer of soft drinks for the locality and the leading advocate of temperance, had just tapped the keg and drawn the first glass for sampling by Mr Tasker. The Reverend Gentleman sipped, smacked, swigged, looked at Mr Tootle and said, ‘You’ve surpassed yourself, my dear Enoch. Superb!’

  Mr Tootle replied in a broad North-County English accent, ‘Aye . . . I thought ’twould please you, Reverend.’

  ‘My dear . . . your glass!’ Mr Tasker cried to his wife, then drained his own, and as Mr Tootle filled his spouse’s, shoved his own forward for refilling. Then he turned to the crowd and said, ‘Now, hurry up and fill your glasses and pannikins . . . because we’re going to drink a toast to the New Year.’

  With professional celerity Mr Tootle charged the multitude of vessels thrust at him, just a mouthful for the toast, as he kept saying — plenty for everyone afterwards. There was a lot of sly sipping during the waiting, by whites as well as darkies. But soon they all had something. Mr Tasker raised his full glass: ‘And now, dear friends, I ask you to drink to a Happy, Prosperous, and Godly New Year to all of us!’ The response came trailing out. Then up went the vessels, down the drink. Then a rush for replenishment.

  Maggy Barbu asked Prindy, ‘How you like him, Prindy?’

  Prindy smacked his lips over it: ‘Goot-feller!’

  ‘Well, come on we gitchim some more.’

  Prindy joined the throng pressing towards the barrel, but with eyes turned back to the fishing. Now the net was halfway in and a great upheaval going on within it, and not without a bit of fun owing to the capsize of one of the canoes.

  Mr Tasker halted the general hogging of Mr Tootle’s brew by reminding the gathering of the games they were to play and the prizes to win. Included amongst the boxes and baskets being unloaded with folding tables and chairs from the truck was a pack of pretty picture books. Still Prindy was more interested in what was going on down there along the beach, judging by his frequent glances, even in the midst of a ring game he was shoved into.

  Prindy was standing out of a game for girls only, giving all his attention to that coup de main of net-fishing, the final slow haul when the convulsing belly of the net, if the catch is good as this one was, becomes a veritable cornucopia, symbol of the abundance of earth and the waters thereunder and man’s easy lordship of it all. He turned on hearing a step, to find his great-uncle Jumbo beside him. Jumbo grinned: ‘Ullo . . . you never see fishin’ like dat before, eh? Come on down, we look him close-up.’ He put an arm round the boy’s shoulders, looked down at him as readily Prindy went along with him, adding, ‘How you doin’ eh? I been hear him you get mix up trouble . . . da’s right, eh?’ Prindy looked away from the quizzing dark eyes. Jumbo went on: ‘Must be you witch-nitch long o’ Court. I come look him you.’

  Prindy may not have been listening, so intent were the grey eyes on the fabulous sight ahead. The black kids formed an almost solid wall behind the overflowing net, beating back the leaping silver. As if carried away with it, Prindy broke into a run, went leaping into the water to fill a sudden breach in the wall caused by diversion elsewhere and taken instant advantage of by the fish, and grabbed at a huge spiny-finned salmon in the act of flapping itself to freedom, got a poke from a spine and a dash of salt water in the face that evidently made him as surprised with the taste of it as all the rest, the way he kept licking himself. Black kids who had seen his tussle with the fish shrilled with laughter. That fish got away. But there was half a ton of others, of many varieties and sizes, now safely (for the fishermen) up out of the water, gasping and flopping on the silky silver sand. Even the sand was a wonder, the way the grey eyes stared at it, and brown hand reached down to take up a handful of it. As different from the coarse-grained stuff of inland streams as this harsh pungent water was from the sweet stuff of the creeks and rivers. He bent breathless over the catch, while everybody looked at him, if not attracted simply by his obvious naïveté, then surely by his odd appearance. Queeny standing propped on her crutch, declared the former in that high soparano with a fruity laugh: ‘Him myall . . . he never see sea before!’

  Eyes and teeth sparkled in black faces to silent laughter.

  One of the two blackmen, a stocky fellow, grey-haired, fat with good living as few of his kind ever got to be, caught the grey eyes, and raised his right index finger. Prindy hesitated, then gave his Skin sign. The black face split in a smile as the hand gave back the sign Jelyerri, which meant they were maternal uncle and nephew. The old man approached him, to touch him and to ask, ‘Where you come from, my-boy?’

  But as Prindy opened his mouth to answer the attention of everybody was diverted to something behind and beyond him; and he turned with the others to see his mother coming running towards him. She let out a screech, ‘Boy . . . what you doin’ dere . . . come here!’

  Prindy stood his gound. She grabbed him as she came up to him, but with eyes popping at the fish. Queeny swung up beside her, saying, ‘You like him one goot fish, Burrawa, I cook him for you, eh?’ When Nell looked at her she added: ‘Half dat-lot fish belong ’o me.’ She shot what looked like a challenging glance at grey-head, who looked away and spat.

  Another diversion, from the same direction. Maggie Barbu was calling. Beside her was Mrs Tasker. Nell said, ‘We got ’o go back.’

  ‘I cook him you fish for you supper, chister,’ said Queeny.

  The grey head spoke to Prindy: ‘Mummuk, Kokanjinni . . . by’n’by you come hellip him me long o’ fish-trap, eh?’ He jerked his lips towards a pattern of stakes running out from the beach further down. Prindy nodded. There was more yelling, and now waving, from those wanting them back at the picnic. Nell drew Prindy away.

  Jumbo fell in beside them. He said, ‘Dat old-man . . . he call himself huncle belong you. Dat-one King George.’ He chuckled. ‘Smart old bugger. He King o’ Compound . . . on’y dat Peg-leg Queeny too goot for him.’ Then catching Prindy by the shoulder, he swung him so that he looked towards Rainbow Head, saying, ‘Dat mob Delacy dere . . . our mob. Your properly father dere . . . Martin . . . properly father, whiteman way.’ He looked at Nell, who had swung to stare with them. ‘Dat right, ain’t it?’ he asked. She didn’t answer.

  More yelling from Maggie Barbu, to be heard now, ‘We goin’ ’o have tea . . . hurry up!

  As they turned to obey, Jumbo said to Prindy, ‘Don’ you let dat Delacy mob beat you. You Delacy. Don’ you forget it, sonny boy.’

  As they came up to the picnic crowd, Mrs Tasker popped out from somewhere to say to Jumbo, ‘Now, we don’t want you, Jumbo. This’s for children and mothers . . .’

  Jumbo sneered: ‘What about all them white bloke . . . and your old man . . . dey children and mother, eh?’

  ‘Now, go away, there’s a good man, and don’t make trouble. Let your wife and little ones have a bit of a treat for once.’

  ‘Gi’s a drink o’ ginger beer, then.’

  Mrs Tasker spoke sharply: ‘I’ll give you nothing. You’re only here to make trouble. Go . . . or I’ll send for Mr Turkney.’

  Jumbo leered: ‘T’ink I drink dat rubbitch? I on’y gammon.’


  ‘Pity you didn’t drink that instead of beer . . . and wine . . . and any of the real rubbish you drink and make your family unhappy with.’

  ‘Arrh! grunted Jumbo. ‘You on’y drink ginger beer ’cause you got ’o drink sumpin . . . but you fright’ real stuff . . .’

  Mrs Tasker went very red: ‘I warned you, Jumbo Delacy . . . another word out of you . . .’

  ‘Arrrh!’ Jumbo swung away, back to the fish.

  The children of the picnic party and such coloured female adults as had come along with them were seated in a rough semi-circle on the grass facing the sea, with the food tables behind them and before them, as if that should be the focus of their attention rather than the view, the harmonium with a thin smallish lady with fair frizzy hair seated at it, and beside her the Reverend Mr Tasker with a pale hand half raised to imply that he was waiting for everyone to settle down so that they all might sing. Those seated had paper plates and their pannikins before them. The Mission people, ready with the goodies on large enamel dishes and the ginger beer in big enamel jugs each crowned with golden foam, were lined up behind. The Sun was not dazzling now because mostly hidden by the silvery edges of that southward drifting berg of cloud. Prindy and Nell were pushed into a place already held for them by the Barbu children and Big Dolly, while everybody stared at them, particularly at Prindy in his wet khaki clothes.

  At last everybody was settled. Mr Tasker nodded to the organist, who played, with a merry little trill, the opening bars of the hymn Old Hundredth. Then he raised the poised hand and beat: One, Two, Three — and the voices rose with the music: Be present at our table, Lord . . .

  Prindy, in line to see something of what the organist was doing with feet and hands, stared at her so intently as to catch her eye, causing her to smile at him and nod to the music, perhaps to encourage him to join in. Since his lips did not move as seen when previously he had heard new music of a kind that obviously had affected him emotionally, evidently his interest was not so much in the music itself as in the device that produced it. His experience of musical instruments so far would have been confined to those he’d heard played at dances during Race Meetings, good enough for its purpose, but lacking something an ear like his might need especially, melody closer to natural sound, no doubt, since he was adept at bird mimicry. Not that there was anything so natural-sounding, at least to an ordinarily perceptive ear, about what that wheezy old organ was pumping out.