Poor Fellow My Country

by Xavier Herbert

  Prindy nodded, said simply, ‘Yas.’

  ‘Now you tell me truth.’

  As simply, Prindy answered, ‘God call me.’

  The priest stared, urged, ‘Yes?’

  ‘He call, Mekullikulli.’

  ‘That mean My Little Boy, yes?’

  Prindy nodded. Maryzic asked, ‘Vy does Gott call you by blackfellow name, ven you have Christian name?’

  Prindy looked wary. The old priest urged: ‘Pliss you tell me. I am ver’ interest’.’

  Prindy breathed, ‘God is blackman.’

  The priest merely blinked, asked, ‘How do you know zat?’

  ‘I see.’

  ‘You see Gott?’ Again that wary look. Maryzic urged gently: ‘You tell me. You are mein Mekullikulli, too.’

  Prindy swallowed. ‘I hear God call. I look-see . . . dere outside verandah.’

  ‘Vot Gott say to you?’

  ‘No talk. I look-see. He gone.’

  ‘But you say he tell you go see old man.’

  ‘My foot tell me dat.’

  ‘You foot?’

  ‘Yas. My foot go. I reckon God make my foot go. I foller-him-up.’

  ‘I see!’ The priest sighed. ‘Well . . . here we are . . . Vot a crowd! Also, I see, our friendt Mr McCusky. Let us pray he ist not come to mek trouble about you.’

  By the aircraft were Jeremy, Rifkah, Savitra, General Esk and his aides, Lieutenant-Colonel Chivvy and some other military men of varying rank, and Signals Sergeant Sims standing by his kit in his usual rank-conscious way. McCusky, having just alighted from a police utility and in company with a uniformed policeman, was approaching the others.

  As Monsignor and Prindy were alighting, the former said, ‘I haf not time to tell you zat der movingk-picture projector and film arrive by der mail plane yesterday, and because der General and your grandfader go to mek military inspection of der mission stations, efferybody is in hurry to go. I suppose you vont to go too?’

  ‘Yas, Monsignor.’

  McCusky, after giving a few short greetings here and there, concentrated on Rifkah, speaking in the official voice: ‘I understand, Miss, that you’ve got some cinematographic film you intend to show to Aborigines. Is that so?’ She answered affirmatively, looking both surprised and alarmed. He went on: ‘Presumably you’re unaware of the Ordinance covering such showings?’

  ‘Ordinance?’ she murmured.

  ‘Section Seventeen lays down that all books, films, media of entertainment or instruction, must have the approval of the Protector . . . Director of Native Welfare these days, of course.’

  Fergus, appearing in the cabin doorway of his aircraft, said loudly, ‘The old order passeth . . . but its ordinances linger on.’

  A titter.

  Eddy snapped at Fergus, ‘What’s wrong with you?’

  ‘The more pressing question, mate, is what’s wrong with you? And what are the Polizei in aid of. Going to have her jailed?’

  ‘Careful what you say, Ferris!’

  ‘’Cause it may be taken down in writing and used as evidence at my trial, eh? But I didn’t think the Gestapo bothered about trials.’

  McCusky turned from him with a show of contempt, to Rifkah. ‘I’m afraid, Miss, you’ll have to hand over those films for censorship.’

  The lovely face was now drawn with that suffering Bubbeh’s look. She breathed, ‘Censorship?’

  Sims snapped out of his military trance and came striding to the rescue. ‘I can assure you, Mister, there’s nothing censorable in these films. They’re just scraps mainly . . . comics . . . passed by Commonwealth and State censors years ago.’

  McCusky looked him up and down, thrust the official jaw out a little and pulled the hat down a trifle more. ‘They haven’t been censored by me, Sergeant. I assume you’re the person who secured these things for the lady. You should have consulted me before you became involved. You’ve been in contact with Bill Norrish. Surely he told you the rules and regulations?’ (Norrish was proprietor of the local picture show.) Eddy concentrated on Rifkah again. ‘If you don’t mind letting me have those films, Miss. They’ll be returned to you after I’ve viewed them.’

  Fergus, descending the steps, called to her. ‘Tell him you want it in writing.’

  Ignoring him, McCusky said, ‘It’s the law, Miss.’

  Fergus came up. ‘I’ll bet the law is that any act made in the name of the Director has to be signed by the Director. That’s why I said get it in writing. Professor St Clair would never do such a lousy thing . . . especially to you.’

  Eddy went red, but still ignoring Fergus, said to Rifkah, ‘This matter has the authority of the Director. When I heard what was going on, I informed him of the Ordinance . . . and he told me to go ahead. You can phone him if you like.’

  Fergus let out a groan, saying, ‘How have the mighty fallen from their high estate . . . the pure in spirit been contaminated by the bugs of bureaucracy . . .’

  Eddy turned on him flaring: ‘If you’re not careful, I’ll lay charge against you for interfering with me in the course of my lawful duties.’ He swung his anger back on Rifkah, snapping, ‘If you don’t hand over those films at once, I’ll have the constable seize them.’

  Fergus cried, ‘Let any copper try seizing cargo off my aircraft without a warrant!’

  The policeman was Constable Gobally. He said sharply, ‘I have a warrant. What’s more, Flight Control’s been informed not to clear you for flight till informed.’

  Fergus, who had been boozing with the mail plane crew the night before, yelled, ‘They talk about the Gestapo and the OGPU . . . and it’s all on account of a few bits of second-hand film to amuse poor blackfellows in the bush!’

  Rifkah said urgently, ‘Pliss, Fergus . . . I vont not trouble. Please open locker.’ She turned to Eddy. ‘You can haf ze film, Mr McCusky.’

  That brought Eddy’s jaw out a bit, his hat further over his eye. His tone was more conciliatory even if the question was officious in the extreme: ‘What exactly is your intention in showing these films, Miss?’

  There were tears in the jewels of eyes. She answered huskily, ‘I . . . I only vont mek ze poor people ’appy.’

  ‘These people you’re dealing with are still tribalised and likely to cause trouble. It isn’t so long ago since they were murdering Japanese. If I find evidence of your stirring up disaffection amongst them, I’ll clamp down hard, I warn you.’

  She blinked on the tears, looked at Jeremy, who looked as if carved from rock, murmuring, ‘Disaffection?’

  Fergus, tearing open the cargo locker, flung the answer to her: ‘He means don’t do anything that’ll make the blacks detest him more than they do already.’

  Eddy flared again: ‘I’ll have you for slander, Ferris . . .’

  ‘And I’ll have you for breakfast, mug lair!’

  ‘Pliss, Fergus!’ Rifkah pushed him away. Fergus stamped forward to look at his engines.

  Eddy and Gobally began to lift out the metal canisters and place them on the ground. They had got some half a dozen, when Sigs Sarge Sims intervened again: ‘That’s all that came from the South. The rest’s damaged stuff given to me by Bill Norrish.’ Nevertheless, Eddy took hold of another canister, labelled Anna Karenina. Sigs quickly pointed to the stamp of the Aborigines Department superimposed, with a scrawl of signature that was probably Eddy’s own. ‘Look, you’ve passed it already . . . you surely don’t want to do it again.’ When Eddy jutted his jaw at him, he said, ‘Be a sport. We went to a lot of trouble and expense to get the gear up here. Let her have something to take. I want to get things going for her while I’m at the Mission.’

  Eddy thought it out officially, then said shortly, ‘Fair enough.’ Still, he looked the rest over for his stamp. Satisfied, he said to Rifkah with an air of magnanimity, ‘Well, you’ve got a fair bit to go on with.’

  ‘Zank you, Mr McCusky,’ she said humbly.

  He nodded. ‘Be out to see sometime. So long.’ He turned, and with Gobally, took up th
e half-dozen canisters and went strutting through the staring crowd.

  Rifkah gave Sims a peck on the cheek, murmuring, ‘Zank you, Zig-zag . . . zat vas ver’ sveet of you.’ He glowed, went back for his kit with eyes on his military superiors that seemed not even to see them.

  There was a sharp snapping to attention and saluting as the General, an arm linked with the obviously embarrassed Jeremy’s, moved to board the aircraft. Esk murmured, ‘D’you know, dear boy, I used to think this censorship thing of Australians was a hangover from Victorian times . . . but I begin to see it now as rather a passion for officiousness. Am I correct?’

  Jeremy rather mumbled the reply: ‘I’ve always told you we’ve the traditions of a convict settlement. The jailer’s always officious. Whereas you might call Russia and Germany Police States, ours is a Prison Bureaucracy.’

  Esk chuckled: ‘How you love to malign what you really love so well!’

  The seating was much as on the way up from Lily Lagoons. Again Rifkah sat with Dim-sims, as was only proper in view of that smart act of his. That act, in fact, was much smarter than she understood till, Putting in his Moan as best he could above the roar of the engines, he explained what was involved. The canister labelled Anna Karenina contained only a scrap of that film, badly buckled. For the rest the contents were bits and pieces of so-called Westerns actually cut out by McCusky because they showed whitemen being bested by Indians, a circumstance that gentleman evidently calculated as likely to Stir up Disaffection if seen by those for whose welfare he was responsible. Sigs said that Bill Norrish, a friend of his family’s, properly should have destroyed the cuts, but had kept them out of resentment against the Aborigines Department, because their piddling authority actually interfered with the film-seeing of all citizens. He reckoned that the bits and pieces, stuck together in some sort of sequence, should make a classic of Aboriginal vengeance on bullying colonists.

  Prindy was up in front again. Soon he was using as guide to his flying them northeastward the Shade that, although it seemed to join them by slipping out of the Jail, surely to one so recently Confirmed in the Faith, must look, with ever-outstretched arms, more like the Symbol of Sacrifice of that Faith. So, following the Shape, along the green jade swamplands of the coast, over the red and yellow tumble of the hinterland, to the silvery serpent windings made in the Dream Time, and out over the blue jade of the sea to those refuges of the ancient Booroolooloogun, so cleverly called the Prince Leopold Islands by the kuttabah.

  Fergus did a bit of fancy stuff over the Mission settlement to the hopping delight of most of the crowd out to wave them greeting. Then down to the strip and out of their dust, to find Father Glascock and Brother David awaiting them.

  There was marked contrast between the priest’s greeting of the males of the party, with all of whom he shook hands heartily, and the two females, Rifkah and Savitra, whom he almost utterly ignored. Obviously Rifkah was used to such treatment, since her smile of greeting, which he met with a curt nod, remained while she introduced Sigs Sarge Sims to him. Evidently he had been apprised of the sergeant’s coming. From the introduction onward, Rifkah might not have been there for all the notice he took of her. On her own insistence and with no objection whatsoever from him, she rode in the back of the truck.

  Again there was contrast in behaviour when they reached the settlement. The men went on to the presbytery. Rifkah and Savitra were seized by a waiting crowd, or rather a large section of it, since there was a small one that merely watched. Mother Mathias was in the middle of the mob. Sister Dymphna had the others about her, only about a dozen, all of them the bigger halfcaste girls. Whereas the Reverend Mother kissed and embraced Rifkah, Sister gave her a wan smile. Nevertheless, everybody was equally interested in the boxes and packages unloaded from the truck into the girls’ dining-room.

  Having saved so much from her win at the races through the generous help of the Answer to a Maiden’s Prayer, Rifkah had been able to buy many things that the Mission, compelled as it was, by those who controlled it from distant comfort, to temper charity with rigid economy, could not afford. A sewing-machine, bolts of cloth, cotton, buttons, braid. Pots and pans and household implements. Laughing, she confessed that she had driven hard bargains with those who had supplied her, even to getting some of the stuff very cheaply through finding flaws in it. There was also a great tin of lollies for the children.

  Mother Mathias pressed her seamed old face against the young bosom. However, she expressed herself troubled about the effect the pictures might have on the children’s sleeping, seeing that they were hard enough to settle down of nights already. Sister Dymphna took advantage of this to say with too-sweet a smile, ‘But I shouldn’t think we’ll be able to go to Miss Rifkah’s pictures too often?’

  Rifkah asked innocently, ‘Vy not?’

  ‘Well, with your good business sense, you’re hardly likely to let us in for nothing, are you?’

  Rifkah went red. Mother’s puckered old eyes opened wide, and her mouth, too: ‘Sister . . . how dare you!’

  The sweet smile was torn away. The lovely face looked haggard. Sister Dymphna muttered, ‘I’m sorry, Mother.’ But she turned away without saying the same to the other one.

  At the presbytery, the men sat down to beer and talk of war. That is to say, those of the party did so who had no bias about whom they ate or drank with. Sigs Sarge Sims, with Prindy as assistant, immediately began his inspection of the radio. Latest war-news was the invasion of Finland by Russia. As General Esk put it: ‘Czar Stalin’s wasting no time in re-establishing the Holy Russian Empire broken up by the Revolution against it in 1917. First Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, all enjoying autonomy for the first time in centuries . . . and now poor Finland!’ It seemed he knew a lot about these countries and their fierce desire for independence they could never keep, through having served in those regions with the Army of Intervention following cessation of hostilities with Germany in 1918. Talk of war brought Father Glascock to asking Jeremy why he would not take military command of these parts, as he himself wished he would. Jeremy went so far as to say he was in the process of making a decision.

  The party lunched off food brought with them. Sigs Sims had his out in the kitchen with David. Immediately afterwards, the exalted ones went back to the aircraft. The arrangement was that Sigs should stay on here for another two days, after which Fergus would come to fly him to Lady Elliott Mission.

  Sigs had no scruples about accepting the full hospitality of Father Glascock alone, as he said, when the priest, on his way back from seeing the military gentlemen off, called at the boys’ schoolroom, where Sigs and Prindy were working on the projector, to ask if he would like to stop with him. Sims said with a grin, ‘But I warn you I’m not what you’d call a Good Catholic, Father.’

  Rather coldly, Glascock asked, ‘What would I call a Good Catholic, Sergeant?’

  ‘I don’t know. But you know what I mean.’

  ‘Can’t say I do. Anyway, we’ve several long nights to put in together . . . so you’ve got plenty of opportunity to explain. When d’you reckon you’ll be able to give us our first picture show?’

  ‘We ought to be able to give a trial run tonight.’

  The trial showing that night turned out to be what the showman himself, using the cant of theatricals, called a Gala Performance. Although it was made a public affair, at Rifkah’s request, no one had thought of more audience than those properly belonging to the Mission. Even Rifkah, whose whole plan was based on the interest she’d heard that all Aborigines had in pictures, hadn’t thought of the mob of pagans on the beach, there to await the presumed coming in of the pearling luggers for the spell during spring tide, not knowing yet that, owing to War Precautions, the Japanese were now denied landing without naval escort. Even those who had never seen moving pictures had heard enough about them from the few who had to regard them as the best of the kuttabah’s magic, next to grog. Because of the roll-up of tribes-people, such was the attendance at the trial run,
with the schoolroom packed tight and the louvre-openings simply jammed with black faces, that Sigs Sarge Sims declared, ‘We could’ve filled the Sydney Regent.’

  In fact, such was the quality of the performance, with trial and error, with Prindy’s forgetting in enthralment to keep the bike-pedal turning and hence the power to fail and the picture to fade, that a Regent Theatre audience probably would have wrecked the joint. But no audience anywhere could have been more appreciative than this, of the fragmented doings of Cowboys and Indians, Riffs and Légionnaires, and a full adventure of Felix the Cat all missed by Mick Cusky — even including the nuns, the younger of whom would not have seen the like since Taking the Veil and the elder never.

  Mother Mathias was proved quite wrong in fearing that the excitement would upset the children for the rest of the night. On the contrary: probably it was lack of excitement in their lives that took them usually so long to settle down, while tonight, although they went to their dormitories as noisily as galahs battling for perches, they were just as quickly asleep.

  It wasn’t really late — just after nine, or as Sigs Sarge Sims insisted on his assistants, Prindy and Rifkah, counting the time with him, 2100 hours. Here was the first of those long nights mentioned by Father Glascock. However, His Reverence erred badly in supposing that his companion for the period would want to spend it in religious argument, or even in his company.

  Sims stayed on with Rifkah after the show to give her further instruction. Prindy, weary from yet another arduous day, went straight away to the presbytery and bed. Alone with the Maiden, Sigs wasted little time before resuming his role of Answer to her Prayer, and declaring that they’d had enough cinematography for the time, suggested a walk along the beach in the moonlight. She went readily enough, probably since now knowing how populous the region was. She even let him take her hand as they went through the casuarinas. Obviously he hadn’t expected and didn’t appreciate the warm welcome he got on the bright beach. Black figures popped up from everywhere to hail him: ‘Goot-feller picture-man . . . properlee . . . Number-one!’ He would have had her keep going on to where they might have some privacy. However, as she showed him, there were mangroves not far ahead, the mosquitoes and sandflies from which were already coming to greet them. He was quite willing to turn back when she explained that too much attention from the creatures could bring you down with fever.