Poor Fellow My Country

by Xavier Herbert

  Prindy snivelled, ‘I been promise I take her away if policeman come.’

  ‘And I’ve promised to get her free again.’

  Unconvinced, Prindy dropped fair head to hands and wept. Stroking the head, and sounding close to tears himself, Jeremy muttered, ‘D’you know . . . I’ve never seen you cry before. I reckoned you were too much kullum kundera for that.’

  Prindy sniffed hard. ‘Too-much my gawang cry.’

  ‘Right . . . now, how’re you going to carry these tablets, in case that ape Bugsby wants to take a look?’

  ‘You put in little bit paper. I carry-him-up in my toe.’

  ‘Good idea. Now, put on your pyjamas and make it look as if you’re going to say goodnight.’

  Bugsby did run his hands over Prindy’s slight person, even to feeling in his hair, but didn’t even glance at the stubby bare brown feet, with the little brown-paper packet between big toe and the next.

  So soundly did Rifkah sleep that at dawn she had to be roused with shaking, and thereafter was drowsy, drooping, withdrawn, still tearful, but no longer sobbing. It looked as if she had resigned herself to things. However, most likely Jeremy had doped her heavily to ensure just such a state, and might even have got Nan to sneak her another dose in the little breakfast she would take. The police, trackers and all, ate breakfast in the kitchen, at Jeremy’s orders. The morning was as wild as the night.

  Soon after breakfast and a tearful farewell of Rifkah by all who would not be going with her, the start was made for the Beatrice — and what beyond? Rifkah was placed in the police utility, between Stunke, driving, and Inspector Ballywick. The other police rode under tarpaulins behind. Jeremy, Prindy, Darcy, and some blackboys, followed in the big truck. Both vehicles were fitted with skid-chains.

  Thus they travelled through the sheeting rain, having to stop from time to time for the removal of downed trees or branches from the track, or to be manhandled out of mud, or in the case of the utility, shoved or towed out by the truck. The journey took till mid-afternoon. Already the train was back from Charlotte by the time they arrived.

  As the trucks came roaring up from the still-unflooded river, Pat Hannaford, in oilskins, was waiting at the railway crossing. Rifkah’s bright hair could be seen through the streaming windscreen. However, it was doubtful if she would have recognised him, for all his waving, even if Stunke did, as was pretty certain the way he scowled through the celluloid side-screen. Pat jumped onto the running-board of the big truck to go with it as it followed the utility to the Police Station. Jeremy told him he had got his message from Darcy and had passed it on to Rifkah, and thanked him for his effort.

  There was nothing they could do at the Police Station but stand outside and stare. The police truck was run into its shelter under the residence, and the gate quickly shut against intrusion, by Tipperary. Then Rifkah was pulled out of the vehicle by Ballywick, who taking one of her arms, while Bugsby took the other, hurried her out to the stairs and up to the front door of the residence, which was opened on the instant by Mrs Stunke, and almost as quickly closed again. She went drooping, evidently unaware of those outside. Stunke shot these a hard inquiring glance, then went into his office.

  Pat said, ‘The bloody bastards!’

  ‘Yes,’ murmured Jeremy.

  ‘But we’ll beat ’em,’ declared Pat.

  ‘I hope so.’

  ‘Hope?’ demanded Pat. ‘We got to . . . or admit the bloody Gestapo’s taken over!’

  ‘That’s right. I’ll do everything in my power.’

  ‘Such as?’

  ‘Invoke the law . . . the press. Have you got any ideas?’

  ‘Plenty.’

  ‘Let’s hear them.’

  Pat eyed Jeremy cautiously. Then he said, ‘Come down to my quarters.’

  ‘What about you coming along to Tom Toohey’s? We’re wet through and up to our eyes in mud. Want to wash and change.’

  ‘Okay.’

  Prindy was standing at the gate that had been shut against them, grasping it as if to pull it down, while his lips moved as if he were talking or singing. Jeremy called to him. He looked back, eyed those behind with a strange hard look in his vivid eyes. Then after taking one more glance at the shuttered house above, he turned and came to join them.

  IV

  It seemed as if everybody in Beatrice township, temporary and permanent residents alike, and white, of course, since others perhaps knew better how to mind their own business, converged on Tom Toohey’s when the news of Rifkah’s arrest and incarceration and of the presence there of people from Lily Lagoons got around. Even Shamus Finnucane turned up, battling the storm in oilskins some said they’d never seen him in before. Perhaps he did the unprecedented thing, which included leaving his bar when there was drinking going on there, to test his famous powers of blarney in a feat where everybody else had failed. Still, it could have been out of genuine concern as well, since above the roar of the rain on the verandah roof, he bellowed through the door shut these several hours against the curious, ‘I understand yer feelin’s. Shame on us that a lovely gurrl loike that should be locked up like a common criminal . . . and for what? In God’s name, for what?’

  But for the select few who knew, no one was telling — especially to the Biggest Ears belonging to the Biggest Mouth in the Country, and more especially when by then they were concerned not so much with what had happened as what should be done to counter it. By now they constituted a conspiracy, the leaders of which were, in order of vehemence of expression of purpose, if not in actual feeling in the matter, Pat Hannaford, Jeremy, Clancy.

  Already Jeremy had telephoned his lawyer in Town, Bill Billings, asking him to make preparations for the issue of a writ of habeas corpus on behalf of one, Rebecca Rosen, allegedly unlawfully detained, and if necessary to brief a leading lawyer from the South, all done without giving away more of the game than absolutely necessary to the many ears that would be listening-in. Pat had got in contact with his local Party principals, Scotty McClaggity and Geordie Jenks, and talked to them in a jargon that would have little meaning to an outsider, but had that pair fairly shouting for glee in promising to organise, or perhaps more properly to disorganise, things immediately. Clancy would have rung Dicky Doscas, who besides being Clerk of Courts and many other things, was Registrar of Births, Deaths, and Marriages, to ask for the Special Marriage Licence considered as a useful adjunct to the claim he would make to being Rifkah’s fiancé, in seeking her release from custody pending legal proceedings. The idea of Clancy as fiancé was Pat’s idea, a matter of sheer subterfuge and expediency, as frankly he declared by saying that if it came to having to marry Rifkah off to beat the law, it would be done through Party processes, as on other occasions, which would leave her completely free in fact from the outset and secure her freedom in law at the earliest possible time. How Clancy took it would be hard to say. He went very red when the matter was raised. But this could have meant several things: embarrassment at being involved in more than he bargained for, pleasure in it, or resentment at being used as a mere stooge in a matter he considered delicate. To begin with, Jeremy also looked embarrassed.

  By local law, a period of three days must elapse between the issue of a Special Licence and actual marriage. Hearing this from his father, Clancy suggested that the sooner he applied the better. However, Jeremy argued that although Dicky Doscas was the soul of discretion in official matters, he might not take this as one, seeing what it implied without his knowing the circumstances, and gossip might be started, at least by his female staff, that might contribute to forestalment of their plans — and how could Dicky be asked over the telephone to keep it to himself?

  ‘Better leave it till you get to Town, son,’ said Jeremy. ‘Dicky’ll be in his office on Saturday morning. He’s got so much to do he’s always there. Anyway, he’s such an obliging bloke, he’d go there if you asked him. I never knew a fat man so helpful and so kindly. Very fat people’ve usually got a mean streak in ’em.’
/>   The conspirators had been left to themselves for a couple of hours, but were still behind locked doors, when, soon after ten, they were startled by Tom Toohey’s wife’s screaming from her bedroom that there was an intruder in the house. They came rushing with the pressure lamp to the kitchen, where a clatter had followed Nolly’s shrill announcement. It was Prindy, presumably gone to bed this long while, but certainly not looking dressed for it now. He was wearing wet oilskins, and at the moment of discovery was snatching a bundle of similar clothing from the table. Evidently he had been in the act of taking food from a cupboard, and would have fled the kitchen by way of a partly open tin shutter if not headed off by Jeremy. Even when cut off, he tried to dodge round Jeremy, who then grabbed him by an arm, causing the bundle to fall and spill its contents — a sou’wester, a small pair of elastic sides and socks, and a towel. Jeremy, staring into the wild-looking grey eyes, asked in surprise, ‘Why . . . what’re you up to, sonny?’

  The other grey eyes became defiant. ‘What’s wrong?’ asked Jeremy. He released the arm. Immediately Prindy swung back towards the shutter. But Jeremy leapt ahead of him and slammed it shut and bolted it, then turned on him. ‘Tell me what’s the matter?’

  They stared at each other. The defiance turned to something like desperation. At length Prindy said, so low in the uproar of the rain that Jeremy had to ask him to say it again and to bend to hear, ‘I go back home.’

  ‘Eh? Why?’

  ‘I don’t like here.’

  ‘The truck’ll be going back tomorrow as soon as the train goes.’

  ‘I don’t want see train go.’

  ‘All right. But what’ve you been doing out in the rain?’

  ‘I go get horse.’

  ‘You’ll never catch a horse in this rain.’

  ‘Tom got two horse in shed.’

  Jeremy looked at Toohey, who nodded. Then Jeremy picked up the stuff from the floor. ‘What’s this? Who’re you taking with you?’

  The grey eyes rolled, as if looking for a way to escape. Jeremy drew a sudden breath, put a hand on the small shoulder. ‘What’re doing son . . . not trying to get Rifkah away from the police, are you?’

  That look of desperation again. Jeremy went on, in a gentle tone: ‘You can’t do it, sonny. They’ve got her locked up.’

  Prindy blurted it out, ‘I been do it now!’

  Jeremy gasped. The defiant look came back, flashed round the others crowding in to hear. Jeremy swallowed. ‘Tell me what you’ve done . . . come on . . . you can trust me.’

  Prindy said, somewhat truculently, it seemed, ‘You all talk-about get him ’way from police. I been go get him.’

  Hannaford’s narrow green eyes widened. ‘Good on you, kid! That’s what’s called direct action . . . the fait accompli.’

  But Jeremy looked worried. ‘Tell me what you did. Where’s Rifkah now?’

  Prindy explained that he’d gone out to do what he called Sing Goodnight to My Mumma, and found that there was a sort of party going on in the Police Station residence, loud talk and laughter and the clink of glass, a situation that, combined with the fact that the trackers were shut up in their quarters against the roaring rain, emboldened him to sneak into the house by way of the back stairs to see if he could speak to Rifkah, whose voice he hadn’t heard amongst the others’. He heard her in a room used by the Stunke children when they were at home, still crying. The door was locked, but the key in the lock. Apparently neither Rifkah nor he had thought of anything but the freedom offering when he opened that door, and had seized it on the moment. As Prindy added with a smug smile at the faces staring at him aghast: ‘Old One been do it all right.’

  He and the girl had run straight to the rising river, crossed and headed straight for home. However, they’d had to stop at the Racecourse, as Prindy put it: ‘She been knock-up foot. She got no shoe. Missus Stunke been take away her shoe to dry. Road up from river too rough from washout by rain.’ Evidently she had cut her feet quite badly, not being used to walking barefoot. Hence his return, leaving her in the shelter of the grandstand.

  When the story was told, Jeremy was the only one to comment, ‘God . . . what do we do now?’

  Tom Toohey, looking troubled as usual, said, ‘They’ll be buzzin’ round here like bloody hornets.’

  Jeremy said, ‘We’ll just have to get her and take her back to them.’

  Prindy went rigid, crying shrilly, ‘No-more . . . you can’t do it!’

  ‘Now, listen, laddy,’ said Jeremy gently. ‘You know we’ve got it all worked out to get her back. It’s got to be done properly, you know . . . whitefeller way . . .’

  Jeremy was proceeding to give the latest details of the plan, when Pat Hannaford interrupted: ‘Bugger it . . . this is a fait accompli! Never go back on a fait accompli, they say.’ Perhaps it was a Communist tenet. Eagerly he went on to say that, having her free, the most important thing, they must keep her so until they secured her freedom legally. He was for Prindy taking her, as he’d first tried to do, away into the Sandstone, where with his nous he could baffle the police for weeks even.

  But Jeremy argued the dangers of the girl’s inexperience of the bush: ‘You don’t know anything about the real bush, Pat . . . you only see it from an engine. I’ve seen it kill strong men. Look what’s happened to the girl’s feet after walking only half a mile or so. These boots and clothes he’s got for her won’t last a week in this weather. As it is her feet’ll turn septic. For a certainty she’ll get a fever out of this rain. Even the blacks suffer in this kind of weather. If he takes her into the Sandstone she’ll die. For chrissake be sensible!’

  ‘Then we’ll take her to Town,’ snapped Hannaford.

  ‘How?’

  ‘While they’re lookin’ for her. Let ’em think the boy took her. Let him go himself. They’ll go after him. Then we’ll sneak her away. It’s fait accompli, I tell yo’.’

  ‘How’re you goin’ to sneak her away?’

  ‘I snuck away people before, ain’t I?’

  ‘You’re not putting her in any coal-tender!’

  ‘Won’t be necessary with the Johns out o’ the way. If we take her up the road a bit, I’ll pick her up in the mornin’ . . . and we can easily keep anyone off the injin, or plant her under a tarp worst comes to the worst. We got a tarp there to keep the rain out while we’re shuntin’. Tom here can give’s a hand. You got a pump-car over the other side the bridge, Tom. What about we run her well up the road on that tonight. We could run her far as Granite Springs and pick her up while we’s waterin’.’

  Looking haggard, Tom swallowed. ‘With them Johns runnin’ round like hornets . . .’

  ‘Not askin’ you to do it. Me’n Clancy here . . .’

  Jeremy interrupted: ‘Better leave it to me and Clancy, Pat. She mightn’t go with you . . .’

  ‘Eh . . . what’s wrong with me?’

  ‘What I mean’s she’ll have to be talked into going. I’ll go over with the boy . . . with the horses. Clancy can come with us, and get the pump-car out of the shed. Anyway, Pat, when they wake up and start hunting round, and they find you gone, they’ll immediately take a jerry. Better for you and Porky to get back to your camp right away. If they catch me and Clancy, we can say we caught the boy taking the horses, and went straight out to get the girl and bring her back to ’em.’

  ‘Okay,’ said Pat, reluctantly. Then he became vigorous. ‘Right . . . we’ll get along. First we’ll take a look-see everything’s normal at the Cop Shop. If one of us ain’t back in five minutes, you’ll know the coast’s clear. See yo’s!’

  That five minutes of waiting weren’t wasted. While Nolly made up a bundle of dry clothes, food, and stuff for dressing Rifkah’s feet, Jeremy, Tom and Prindy went to get the horses, two old campers, used by Tom to keep an eye on the handful of stock he ran along the river, which while making some objection to being dragged out into the rain, proved docile enough in capable hands. The only precaution taken was to see to it that, where human tracks mig
ht be left, those of the men were superimposed on Prindy’s, to support the subterfuge that the boy had done everything unbeknown to his elders. Outside it didn’t matter, because all signs were washed away practically as made. Toohey, utterly miserable with the prospect of being bullied yet again by police in search of fugitives he was suspected of harbouring, agreed no less readily to tell the man-hunters, should they come before Jeremy’s return, that he had gone looking for the fugitives himself. Within ten minutes, Jeremy, Prindy and Clancy, were mounted and away, heading along the railway track so as to avoid running into anyone along the road. Jeremy had Prindy up behind him.

  By the look of things at the Police Station, the little party was still proceeding happily. The horsemen dropped down to the river, to find it knee-deep on the causeway.

  Jeremy found a very different Rifkah from the stricken one who earlier in the day had scarcely seen him for her flooding tears. The great eyes revealed by his flashlight were quite dry, and glinted with suspicion as he outlined his intentions. There was no clinging to him. It was evident from her behaviour that, but for the condition of her feet, some of the wounds which Jeremy declared should be stitched for proper healing, and the fact that he told only half-truths in answer to her inquiries about what was planned for her eventual freedom, most likely he would never have got her to go with him to the railway. Particularly did she resist the idea of going without Prindy. As for Prindy, but for being told that, as likely as not, she would be back with them utterly free on next week’s train, he might well have cruelled the whole scheme by refusing to be parted from her. It was evident that they did not trust him as before. Even his final instructions to Prindy, to make contact with him secretly at Lily Lagoons after losing the police party that would surely pursue him into the Sandstone, was received in silence.