Poor Fellow My Country

by Xavier Herbert

  ‘I don’ wan’ ’is flamin’ tobacco, I tell you . . . I’ll get it at Finnucane’s in future.’

  ‘And guid riddance to you, you foul-moothed ignorant slanderous loot!’ yelled McDodds.

  Oz turned on him; but Stunke got hold of him by the back of the shirt and bundled him out.

  Shamus Finnucane was on his verandah, on a step-ladder, fitting the extra lights that would be needed in a day or two to make less dangerous the passage of those many feet that would be stumbling with less and less certainty to his greater and greater profit. Glimpsing the force of the law in action before Stunke, not expecting an audience in that empty street, had time to belay, he stared. To cover it up the pair came along together as if nothing were untoward, although not speaking. As they came up, old Shame-on-us, who had given the appearance of being very busy, stepped down: ‘Ah, and a goot mornin’ to ye, gintlemen. ’Tis a braw bricht day, indade, as me frind McDodds would say, if only he was friandly enough to pass the toime o’ day wit’ me.’

  Stunke nodded greeting, murmured to Burrows, ‘See you, Oz,’ and went on towards his police station.

  Ozzie made no reply, but stepped onto Finucane’s verandah. ‘Somthin’ I can do for ye?’ asked Shamus.

  Oz said throatily, ‘Tin o’ tobacco.’

  Finnucane led the way into the bar, saying, ‘McDodds givin’ up the sale of tobacco to deal in canaries is it? Remoinds me o’ the moinin’ days, whan he give up sellin’ grog for water, because there was more profit in it, he says, there bein’ a drought on and him with the only tank-cart for cartin’ it.’

  ‘The lousy ol’ bastard!’ grunted Ozzie.

  Getting the tin of tobacco, Finnucane said, ‘Well, now, I’ll concur regardin’ the former, but can’t support ye in the latter, not knowin’ his parentage. Ye got ’o be careful wit’ these conclusions.’

  ‘Now don’t you start, too!’ said Ozzie, setting down the second payment for one tin of tobacco.

  ‘Start what, now, me bhoy?’

  Ozzie told him. Finnucane listened without comment, except to say at the end, ‘Well, ’tis noice to know we’ve got another fambly on the river . . . even if we’ll have to wait the best part of ten years before we can really call it a fambly, to be sure.’

  ‘Black bastards!’ grunted Ozzie, and went out and down to the station. He looked in on Col Collings the Station Master, as if he’d have liked to tell him; but Col, busy on the phone, waved him to go attend to the unloading of some waggons dropped off the last mail train, goods wanted by someone in preparation for the Races.

  Up and over the way at the House of Barbu, there was giggling over Barbu’s painting the rims of Prindy’s eyelids red with gulal, to simulate inflammation. Now Prindy would be able to go to the Races with the other two and serve in the booth. It was good to know how easy it was to take in those who had power, who were always the least perceptive because the least intelligent; and must be, since true intelligence would want power over none but itself.

  10

  I

  Beatrice River Races again; and a bigger spree than ever, swelled as it was by the ever-swelling population of the land under threat of war that nobody seemed to take seriously. At least nobody was serious about it, except those who thought they saw the chance to gain by war, or were aware enough of the reality of things, either through direct experience of what was going on where the dogs of war were already on the rampage, or having some version of it pumped into them by one or other parties to whom the slavering dogs belonged. At the moment things looked very grim, with the dictators of Germany and Russia hurling unforgivable insults at each other, and the Japanese frankly butchering the Chinese on account of some thing they trumpeted about in the name of Great East-Asia Co-Prosperity. Not that it made a bit of difference to the spree. The squatters and miners were those who talked of the gains they would make: the Extra Quid, as they put it; and the soldiers who were there in greater number because the Garrison at Port Palmeston was now in full establishment. Those with direct experience of the forces at work in Europe were the few of the foreign construction workers known as Reffoes, which meant refugees. These were even more rejected by the native-born than the other foreigners (the Oxes, Square’eads, Dagoes, Poms) for the reason that they put on airs, claiming to have been people of importance before fleeing their hearths, apparently for political reasons, since none of them looked, at least fully, like the Jews reported to be flying for their lives from the consequences attendant upon a grand idea the Dictator of Germany had in the matter of increasing the nobility of that noblest of breeds, his own.

  There were no British aristocrats this time. Patron of the Meeting was to be Colonel Leon Chivvy, Officer Commanding the Palmeston Garrison.

  Colonel Chivvy arrived in the same spectacular way that His Lordship, the Big Boss, had last year, by air, and in even more spectacular style, for reason that he had a pilot either less scary or with a livelier sense of the spectacular than Lord Vaisey’s man, namely, that wonder boy of the air, Fergus Ferris. They did a rip-roarin’ tour of the town as a preliminary to landing. Colonel Chivvy, a brave man by the multiplicity of ribbons on his khaki breast, looked as if he’d had his closest call with death, but quite without glory, as, grey-faced, and trembling slightly still, even though with moustached upper lip properly militarily stiff, he took the hand of Lady Rhoda Eaton in genteel greeting. As the Colonel’s 2-IC, before alighting remarked in aside to Fergus, ‘You won’t be flying the Old Man again in a hurry, feller.’

  Fergus’s split lip showed under the fair moustache in a leer: ‘Teach the bastard for putting Security onto me to find out how I got this kite.’

  ‘Well, you did get it from the Huns, didn’t you?’

  ‘I’ve got it on legitimate charter from the Junkers Company, friend. I wasn’t aware of being at war with Germany.’

  ‘We soon will be.’

  ‘You hope . . . so’s you can get in the Big Brass yourself.’

  Fergus, having no such social status, however high he might literally fly, to be included amongst the guests at the Big House, of all those he had flown down, had to ask Clancy Delacy to run him into the pub. It wasn’t his first visit there, of course. He had come down with that anthropological team collecting data for assistance in the useless defence of Bobwirridirridi. Old Shame-on-us greeted him very amiably. Quite a lot of people hailed him similarly, among them one whom he greeted in return with open arms and open mouth, all of which closed upon her before she could do anything about it — Alfie Candlemas. She struggled free of him, but laughing, looking as elfishly lovely as he said she did. ‘My fairy fay!’ said he. Then asked if she were staying there, and being answered Yes, he said with an animal-like sound of deep appetite, ‘Baby . . . you’n me’s goin’ ’o have fun!’

  She chuckled, ‘Frank’s with me, of course.’

  ‘Of course . . . didn’t I mean the three of us?’

  She laughed, saying she was going to Frank now, to join him in the lounge bar on the west-side verandah, and wouldn’t Fergus come along too? He said he would, as soon as he’d found his room and parked his dunnage.

  Fergus reached the lounge to find Alfie and her husband Frank sitting with Betty Bishoff, wife of the Stock Inspector, and Miss Kitty Wyndeyer, of the Telephone Exchange, Port Palmeston. Fergus, in greeting everybody, remarked to Miss Kitty, ‘Didn’t reckon you’d be one to play the horses, Kit.’

  Kitty blushed, saying, ‘I like my little flutter.’

  Fergus winked: ‘Maybe we can do a bit of flutterin’ together, eh?’

  She looked annoyed, saying, ‘Don’t be silly!’

  ‘You misunderstand me, lady. I happen to be an expert judge of horseflesh, don’t you know?’

  Alfie remarked, as if she didn’t believe it, ‘He claims to have been a jockey.’

  ‘Wrong,’ said Fergus. ‘I’ve made claim only to being an apprentice jockey.’

  ‘Is that really true?’ asked Betty Bishoff.

  ‘Get y
our daddy to get me a mount, Madam, and I’ll prove it in the Races.’

  Frank asked, ‘How on earth did you come from jockeying to anthropology . . . and aviation?’

  ‘Shows all you know about human beings . . . except as dirty animals,’ said Fergus. ‘Jockeying is the easiest way to fame in this wondrous land of ours . . . and, like most people, I’ve yearned for fame. I grew up near Randwick Racecourse, Sydney, and used to see the boys taking the horses out of mornings, and by doing dirty work for them, often got a ride. Found I had talent with a horse. They’re just like women, you know. You just have to have a cruel streak in you to master ’em.’ The women looked annoyed; but Frank Candlemas chuckled. Fergus went on: ‘So I decided to become a jockey. However, my father, who had no sense of sport at all, nor much sense of anything but his own importance, vetoed it completely. I was to finish High and go on to Varsity. Now, since I went after the fame the easiest way, I did the same with scholarship . . . for what’s the biggest and easiest racket to work as an academic? Why, anthrop! Nothing to learn but how to sound off about the human race in terms that nobody can understand and therefore are intimidated by . . . nothing to do but go a-rovin’ puttin’ backward peoples in their place, on fat grants, with nice side-kicks from robbin’ ’em of their most precious possessions for floggin’ to museums. See? As to aviation . . . well, it just follows that a man who can manage a horse can manage an aeroplane. Didn’t you know that the air forces of the war, when they got going, were recruited from the officers of the redundant cavalry divisions? Here’s a man who can tell you that . . .’ Jeremy Delacy was just entering the lounge with Charlie Bishoff. Rising to greet him and shake his hand, Fergus repeated what he had just said, adding, ‘The Australian Air Corps was recruited from the Light Horse in Palestine . . . isn’t that so?’

  Jeremy gave his affirmative, at the same time taking Frank Candlemas’s hand and bowing to Alfie with stiff dignity. Alfie was just as stiff with him. He plainly looked as if he regretted coming, since finding Alfie in the company. Their last dealings had been that time in Town, at the party she’d had at her own place, when overdoing Jeremy’s advice on brandy-drinking, she had at first tried to monopolise him and then fled from him. He said now, ‘Didn’t know you were having a party. Just walked up with Charlie, talking shop, I’ll be getting along back to my camp.’

  Frank came to the rescue in his amiable way: ‘No fear you won’t . . . not till we get the real low-down on this little wonder horse of yours that’s going to win the Cup. Please stop and have a drink with us, Mr Delacy.’

  Jeremy submitted graciously. The talk was then of his mare, Golden Girl, favourite for this year’s Cup. He talked of her pedigree and performance since a filly as another man might of his daughter, a fact that was remarked on by Betty Bishoff, who added, ‘You don’t have a daughter, do you, Mr Delacy?’

  He coloured distinctly at the question, and surely noting the sharp look he got from both women, the way he dropped his eyes, answered with a slight chuckle, ‘Well . . . not that I know of.’

  Fergus came in with a guffaw: ‘It’s a wise daughter that knows her own daddy round these parts.’ They all laughed.

  What probably made Jeremy burn was the fact that Finnucane’s daughter, Bridie, wife of Con Cullity, had turned up from down the Centre this year with a three-month’s old daughter, about whom the whole Finnucane family were raving, in particular her nominal daddy, Con. On account of old Shame-on-us’s grand-daughter, the festival was being extended by a day, Sunday being the day of her christening, for officiation at which no less a personage than Monsignor Maryzic would be flying down from Town. Chief reason for Kitty Wyndeyer’s being there was to play the organ at the service.

  There was amusing talk by the Bishoffs and the Candlemases about their recent experiences amongst the squattocracy during the tour they had just made together round the western stations in their official capacities, or rather in those of Charlie and Frank, Alfie had had to be particularly careful not to show herself in any other than the wifely one, because of the suspicion that she would be, as they said it had been put, Writing People Up. The fact was that she was no longer a practising journalist, having fallen out with The Palmeston Progressive, or rather with Fay McFee, which amounted to much the same thing. Betty Bishoff said, ‘In fact, such a success was she on the social side, that she’ll be going on the Ladies’ Committee tomorrow . . . what do you think of that, for one who so lately turned the snob circles of Port Palmeston upside down?’

  Jeremy didn’t laugh with the others. Alfie, with several gins in her by now, met his blank look and, somewhat thickly, demanded of him, ‘Not much, eh?’

  He asked politely, ‘I beg your pardon?’

  ‘Betty asked what you think of that . . . and I said you don’t think much of it.’

  He reddened again: ‘Well . . . I hadn’t thought about it at all . . .’

  ‘Oh, yes you did . . . I saw the look in your eye.’

  Jeremy glanced at Frank, who smiled as usual. Jeremy tried to avoid looking back at Alfie; but she demanded of him, ‘You think I’ve let the side down, don’t you . . .’

  Jeremy had to look, under his brows, just glancing, then fiddling with his brandy glass, murmured, ‘What side would that be?’

  ‘There’sh only one shide . . . shide o’ truth an’ honesty an’ human’ty, isn’t there?’

  The others were silent, watching, as if a game; even Frank, with a slight rumple to his usually smooth handsome brow, but a light of interest in his eye. Jeremy took a sip of his drink, then said, ‘Yes . . . I guess that’s right. Well, if you’ll excuse me, I’ll be getting back to my camp . . . getting on supper time.’ He rose, giving a little bow.

  ‘Wait!’ cried Alfie.

  Frank laid a hand on her arm. She tossed it off without looking at him, saying to Jeremy, ‘I want to talk to you . . . Mist’ Delacy.’

  Jeremy was turning away. He stopped, said without looking at her, ‘I’d be glad to have you and your husband down at my camp sometime. Goodnight.’

  Alfie leapt up and caught him by the arm: ‘D’you think I went round with my eyes shut? D’you think I didn’t do it all only to get to see more of what’s rotten in the damn land?’

  He looked at her now, saying, ‘No . . . I’m sure you didn’t.’

  ‘I didn’t either . . . and I tell you what . . . I’m goin’ to write a book ’bout it and blow the whole thing sky-high.’

  He glanced around. But really she was speaking only in a fierce whisper, and those about were too intent upon their boozing and making too much noise about it to hear. Still, half-turning to her again, he said, ‘Good on you . . . but if I were you I’d keep it to myself for a while . . . or you’ll never get the best bit of all for your book.’ He started off again. She went with him, still with hand on his arm.

  ‘Wha’sh that?’

  ‘A place on the Ladies’ Committee of the Beatrice River Races.’

  ‘Under chairmanship of your wife.’

  They were at the door. He stopped, removed her hand gently, said coldly, ‘My ex-wife. My wife is down in my camp on the river . . . waiting for me . . . so if you’ll excuse me . . .’

  ‘Your Aboriginal wife.’

  ‘Half Aboriginal.’

  ‘Y’know . . . I can’t un’erstand you . . . a man like you . . . married to a halfcaste woman.’

  He met her watery black eyes, staring at him so intently, said, ‘Women are all the same in the dark . . . Goodnight.’ He was gone.

  She stood for a moment staring after him, then swung back to the others who were eyeing her curiously. She said as she sat down and seized her glass, ‘Y’know . . . I hate that man.’

  Fergus said, ‘Look-out . . . hatred is akin to love, they say . . . and he’s a bit of a lad with the ladies, so I’m told . . .’

  ‘Black ones!’

  Betty Bishoff bridled: ‘Now, that’s not fair. He’s not a bit like that. And his wife’s a really lovely person . . . as swee
t a woman as I ever met . . .’

  ‘But black!’

  Fergus asked, ‘What’s happened to our nigger-lover that rocked the nation with her Terrific Indictment of Official Callousness, and pulled poor old Cobbity down?’

  ‘It’s because o’ that I hate him . . . because he refused to acknowledge that dear little boy as his grandson . . . so he’s gone and run away into the bush with his poor mother to live like blacks. I can’t forgive that. I won’t forgive it. I hate him because he’s Negative, as I said that night. He doesn’t believe in anything . . . he’s cold, hard . . .’

  Charlie Bishoff cried, ‘Go on . . . he’s just the opposite! D’you know, all the sick and wounded animals go to his place for attention?’

  ‘Animals?’

  ‘Blacks, too.’

  ‘But not that little boy, that beautiful little boy!’

  Kitty Wyndeyer sighed: ‘Yes . . . that beautiful, wonderful, little boy.’

  Fergus demanded, ‘Hey . . . what’s this, getting serious at a party? Let me tell you ’bout how I bunged the G’s on the gallant colonel as we came in, and what he looked like as he got out.’

  They were soon all laughing again.

  That night while they all sat singing in the initial concert out the back amongst potted palms and under the coloured lights, they little realised that amongst the dark faces staring in at them was the lighter one of that same beautiful and wonderful little boy, standing beside his dusky little wife — not even Miss Kitty, who once when relieving Bridie at the piano, playing Danny Boy for Sergeant Cahoon to tax those tenor tonsils with, looked right at him, at his begoggled eyes, and smiled, or Eddy McCusky doing his stuff as usual as MC.

  II

  The job young Alfie got on the Ladies’ Committee was that humblest yet most exciting of them all, the Golden Horseshoe selling. Not that she should have expected anything more exalted, her lowly social status and even somewhat dubious character notwithstanding, when she went to the Big House to receive her assignment quite improperly dressed, as she was warned by those who reckoned they knew. She was wearing a stockrider’s outfit. At least that’s what it resembled, since no true stockman would ever have dared put on anything so natty. It was in white corduroy with red piping, red neckerchief, silver-banded white wide-awake, the only common or garden bit about it being the tan elastic sides. But those knowledgeable reckoners were wrong. Even if Lady Rhoda did receive her first with a Look and then with the High Handshake, so far from being utterly disapproving was she that she remarked to someone that in fact the rigout looked quite fetching and was just the thing for the job the gal had to do. That started some of the Younger Set off saying that the next time they were going to trot along in their Melbourne-tailored riding gear; but to be silenced by a Duenna who said tartly, ‘And turn the affah into a vulgah stockman’s Buckjump Show!’ Hence the value of that hard core of social nicety to the festival. Her Ladyship, so recently having attained to true status by Letters Patent rather than to pretence of it through sheer hard striving on the social ladder, was probably only trying out a bit of noblesse oblige.