Not the way it was being sung all round them now: And he sang as he shoved that jumbuck in his tucker-bag, who’ll come a-waltzing Matilda with me . . .
Alfie hauled him back, howled at him, ‘Are you sure?’
Close to her ear again he sang with the crowd: ‘Marching with Marlborough, marching with Marlborough, who’ll come a-marching with Marlborough and me . . . and we sing as we shove our halberds up the Dutchie’s arse, who’ll come a-marching with Marlborough and me. According to General Esk, who ought to know.’
She had turned quite pale. Then the blood rushed to her face. Her eyes blazed, mouth opened to give vent to anger. He grabbed her close, saying swiftly, ‘No . . . not here. Keep it for your book. Here they come.’
She shrank against him, trembling.
The crowd were roaring it as the band came up blaring it . . . Pompom-a-pompom, boompom-a-boompom, pomboom-a-pomboom, a-pompom-a-pom, and he sang as he sat and waited while his billy boiled, who’ll come a-waltzing Matilda with me . . .
Behind the brazen blare were two tall bannermen with flags: the Five-starred Banner in which the Southern Cross is cancelled out by the crossword puzzle of St George, St Andrew, St Patrick, and St David — and the Puzzle itself, in all its ancient arrogance. A few paces behind these came the Senior Officer, with naked sword at the slope. At his heels were a squad of fellow gentry similarly accoutred. Then the gleaming forest of bayonets, a suspended flickering forest of flame.
General Tubs came to the salute as the flags drew level. Simultaneously the Senior Officer screamed, ‘Eyeeees left!’ and with the swivelling of his own eyes, brought his sword to the Present.
A flourish of other swords, and surely a score of cricked necks.
The scream went down the fiery line: Eyeeees left . . . Eyeeees left . . . Eyeeees had a good home and Eyes left!
Streamers flying and confetti cascading while tramp-tramp-tramp the Flower of the Nation passed to the beat of the one song they could call their own:
Who’ll come a-marching, who’ll come a-marching,
Who’ll come a-marching with Marlborough and me,
And our ghosts will be heard when you stand beside the Cenotaph,
Who’ll come a-waltzing with Blarney and me!
Passing, passing — out of sight — out of hearing. The crowd hung as if stunned by it. Even General Tubs was slow to drop his hand, as if in momentary acknowledgement of the silent army of the past that trudged behind. Then he about-turned right smartly, marched himself out with chubby dignity.
Alfie looked stunned. Jeremy took her arm. ‘Let’s get a move on.’
But she pressed against his shoulder.
‘What’s the matter?’ he asked.
She sobbed, ‘Poor fellow my country! Isn’t there anything any good in it at all?’
He got her moving. Already the crowd about them were dispersing, while down in the street the police were dismantling the barricades. He said, ‘I thought you’d worked that out. Isn’t that what your Last Australians is for . . . to show the lousiness?’
She kept her head against his shoulder. Nothing unusual about a weeping woman there and then. But surely the others wept for very different reasons, some perhaps even for show. Sniffing back the tears she said, ‘I’ve been hoping that showing the lousiness might rouse up those who are capable of becoming the First Australians . . . those who’ll want to build a True Commonwealth, not just exploit a lovely land and one another.’
‘Don’t despair of it.’
‘I do now . . . after that. It looks as if we’ve got no originality, no special quality at all, nothing that’ll be of any use to mankind . . . so no reason to become but a dumping-ground for excess populations not wanted elsewhere, and a farm and a mine owned by outsiders to supply outsiders first . . .’ She broke off with a sob.
While she was dabbing her eyes he said, ‘You’ll see something even worse round at this recruiting rally. What about cancelling it?’
She drew a deep breath: ‘No . . . I’ll see it through.’ She began to put her face to rights. She added: ‘Then you can take me away to that place in the desert. That’s where the book ought to be finished . . . in a desert . . . in despair.’
‘All right then. But we’ll have to move. Otherwise we’ll never get there.’
They found the taxi waiting. By more clever manoeuvring they were taken to the Domain in a few minutes, set down amidst great Moreton Bay figs within twenty yards of the stand erected for the recruiting rally.
As yet the stand was deserted, except for a single policeman lounging in one of the cane chairs amidst the hanging bunting and the standing microphones. The usual Sunday-afternoon Domain mob were crowded along the road leading up from the city and round and down to the wharves of Woolloomooloo, to watch the passing troops. Already the troops were in the region. Now the band was playing something less ambiguous: The British Grenadiers. Already the glint of bayonets could be seen above the wall of the crowd.
Not everybody was interested in the passing troops. Under one of the big trees was a group of about fifty, standing round one of the portable rostrums that of ordinary Sundays were to be seen all over the Domain, but today were missing because of all-powerful opposition; except this one, belonging to a coterie brooking competition from no one — the Communists. That it was the Commos was announced by Alfie, who said that ordinarily they had held this best of all pitches and were very sore about having been ousted by the Soolers and interfered with recruiting rallies as much as they dared. Jeremy need not have been told who they were. On the rostrum stood that big fellow he had called Geordie, the one whose protuberant gut had made his locally famous straight-left to the solar nationally infamous as a foul blow. Doubtless his keen bushman’s eye would have spotted the man. However, it was unlikely that the Pommy townie Geordie, trained only for spotting trouble he could exploit to the advantage of his Cause, would have recognised him at that distance. Geordie was haranguing his mob with belligerent gestures, perhaps annoyed because some were stealing glances at the marching Stooges of Capitalism. Nevertheless, Jeremy drew staring Alfie out of his line of sight. They halted under a fig tree quite close to the recruiting stand.
The band swung out of the procession, to stand aside and play the Stooges past, now with Goodbye Dolly Gray. Then when the latter were gone, to thump out the rest of their contact with their native land to the rhythm of their own foot-slogging, they shut up, formed themselves into marching order, and with trombone and trumpet at the slope, came marching towards the recruiting stand. Behind them came the small squad of officers and OR’s of the Three Services, so-called, who would deal with those taken in by the ballyhoo from the stand. You have to act smart, before the mugs get time for second thoughts. Sign ’em in while they’re coy with the public act of heroism, then whisk ’em away for the medical and swearing in. An Army truck stood by.
At the stand, the band formed itself into the order of the Salvation Army outside a pub, while the recuiting personnel settled themselves at flag-covered trestle-tables ranged behind barricades in front of the stand. The band’s leader flourished his baton with a one, two, three: and it broke into what probably is the only truly Australian folk-tune, since it so truly expresses the people’s simple faith: Australia Will Be There.
The crowd came pouring like meat-ants. Alfie and Jeremy were right against the barricade.
‘There he is . . . the fat little sooling bastard!’ hissed Alfie, as onto the stand by way of a rear stairway came a middle-aged man in expensive grey suit and trilby, but with left breast ablaze with beribboned medals.
A murmur from the crowd, too: ‘There he is . . . Jasper Jemeson!’
A flutter of hand-clapping rose to a crashing wave. The plump little red-faced man, coming to the edge of the stand, removed his hat, to bow as if taking a curtain-call for one of his La Scala performances. Behind him was another man in civvies hung with medals, this one in blue serge and black homburg. Jeremy and Alfie recognised him together. Alf
ie would have hissed again, only Jeremy grabbed her, drew her back a couple of ranks from the rail. It was Tom Colt. Still the band was playing.
The Famous Baritone rose out of his bow to favour the audience less formally, with a wave and a larrikin grin, then turned towards the band, and signalled diminuendo, got it, waited till the refrain recommenced, and burst into magnificent song:
Rally round the banner of your country,
Take the field with brothers o’er the foam,
On land or sea, wherever you be,
Keep your eye on Germany,
Old England, home and beauty, have no cause to fee-ah,
Should old acquaintance be forgot? No, no, no-no-no!
Australia will be there-ere-ere-ere-ere, Australia will be there!
From the last deep resonant note, Jemeson raised his great voice and short arms: ‘Now, all together . . . one, two, three . . . Rally round the banner of your country . . . come on, come on! That’s better . . . Wherever you be, keep your eye on Ger-her-many . . . that’s the stuff to give the troops . . . Should old acquaintance be forgot . . . now into it!’ He signalled the band crescendo. It came crashing from the brass and a thousand throats:
Australia will be there-ere-ere-ere-ere, Australia will be there!
The short arm silenced the band: finito!
In the sudden silence Jemeson leered at the crowd. So often had he held multitudes with that big voice in the little body. All the roaring had not frayed it by a fibre. It came booming forth like organ music: ‘Thank you, friends, fellow Aussies, brothers in arms. I’ve told you before . . . but I’m never tired of telling it . . . how good it does my heart to sing to you like this under the blue skies and the golden Sun of our own good country. All the grand theatres in the world, all the grand audiences of kings and queens and dukes and duchesses, are nothing compared with this . . . the stage of the great Australian outdoors, and the audience my fellow-Australians.’
A burst of applause, with yells of, ‘Good on you, Jasper!’
He stopped it with a wave. ‘But joyous as it is to my heart, it’s not for the simple joy of it . . .’
‘No . . . it’s for the dough!’ yelled a voice from the back.
At once a howl from the crowd: ‘Shut up!’
The chubby man drew himself up with dignity to glare at the point of interruption, resumed: ‘I have a purpose . . . a great and urgent purpose. My friends, we are at war again . . . and with the same brutal enemy who mauled us so badly in the Last Turn-out. This time we mustn’t let him get the advantage . . .’
From another quarter at the rear another yell: ‘He’s already got it. You and your Capitalist mob give it to him at Munich, reckonin’ he’d attack Russia . . .’
The great voice rose even above the hubbub rising to support him. ‘It’s thanks to your mob, Comrade, he’s got an advantage.’ A finger shot accusation at the point. ‘Thanks to the treachery of the Workers’ Fatherland!’
The crowd generally roared approval. There was scuffling.
The chubby hand called quiet. The rich baritone dropped to a tone of beguilement: ‘Prepared to the hilt we must be . . . with every man capable of bearing arms trained and ready to use them. We don’t want it like last time . . . with half our boys over there giving their lives, while the other half stayed at home bludging on their sacrifice . . . not even able to be shifted off their cowardly behinds by two referenda to conscript them . . .’
Stir amongst the crowd; some angry shouts and scuffling. Alfie, flaming suddenly, raised her voice with other protestors: ‘What a thing to say!’
A big woman, oldish, whiskery, standing at her shoulder, said, mildly enough, as if putting someone right on a point not understood, ‘’S right, too. Skulkin’ mongrels wouldn’t even go when they was conscripted.’
Alfie swung on her blazing. ‘They were never conscripted!’
The hairy face puffed ruddily. Now the woman snapped, ‘No . . . the dogs wouldn’t be conscripted!’ She added, with sudden drooping of jowls and sagging of corners of baggy eyes: ‘My boy was killed in France.’
Alfie shrilled: ‘So you’d have all the boys killed there, too!’
The eyes straightened up to glare. The voice was growling now: ‘What . . . you a bloody Commo?’
The attention of those close was caught, and even that of Jasper Jemeson, halted in his delivery by the stir. Jeremy took Alfie’s arm to draw her away. She pulled against him, to shriek up into the hairy face, ‘No . . . I’m an Australian . . . not a transplanted Pommy!’
The woman showed false teeth under her fluffy moustache, shoved her face down, yelled in a hoarse alto, ‘Don’ you call me a Pommy, you dolly-faced bitch!’
The baritone boomed from the stand, ‘What’s the trouble down there?’
Those blocking his view drew back, as if it were his right to see. The big old woman turned to him, waving a great flop-muscled arm, raising her great voice: ‘Commo piece ’ere, stickin’ up for bludgin’ slackers!’
Jeremy tugged at Alfie, growling, ‘Come on out of here.’
Alfie would have gone with him now, pressing back through the crowd. But the old woman grabbed her other arm. ‘No you don’t!’ Jerking Alfie away from Jeremy, she swung her so as to present her to those in front, those on the stand, the recruiting officers. ‘Take a look at ’er . . .’fore she goes underground wi’ the rest the Commo rats . . . I ’ad a lovely boy killed in France by the likes o’ ’er . . . IWW’s and Sinn Feiners . . .’
Jeremy lunged back, seized the wrist of the big restraining hand, twisted it to free Alfie, barking at the woman, ‘Hands off, you bloody old fool!’ He gave her a shove that sent her staggering back into the crowd, which had to grab her to stop her falling.
The woman yelled, ‘Bill . . . Bill!’
Bill must have been the huge old man who came shouldering through the press, rumbling, ‘Dong me wife, would yo’!’ He aimed a blow at Jeremy that caught him on the left collar bone. Jeremy raised the arm and swiped the old man with it sideways. Thereupon the whiskery woman uttered a hoarse scream, jerked out of her helpers’ hands, fell upon Alfie with hands clawing. Alfie grabbed at the hands. One of them, snatching free, lashed out backward, with a flash of a heavy gold ring, smote her across the face. Alfie fell back against the rail, goggling, blood beginning to burst from nostrils. The old woman raised the hand to give her another, but was grabbed by someone. Jeremy was flinging the old man off again.
Jemeson boomed, ‘Ladies, Ladies . . . this’s a man’s war!’
A burst of laughter. But Tom Colt, now at Jemeson’s side, didn’t laugh. From hard staring, he raised a finger and pointed, shouting, ‘They’re not Comms . . . they’re pro-Germans!’ It came bellowing out of amplifiers in the trees.
Jemeson leaned towards the Colt to speak. The Colt answered in a shout for everybody, ‘Belong to the pro-Nazi Free Australia Movement . . . I know ’em!’
Jeremy grabbed Alfie again. But there was the old woman again, fairly mad now, spittle flying to her cracked-voiced screaming, ‘Bloody ’Uns . . . killed my boy!’ She came in battering. Jeremy tried to stop her, but was grabbed behind, hauled back into the crowd. Old Bill gave him a parting crack in the mouth, then turned to join his wife in dealing with the now collapsed Alfie.
The Colt’s voice crashed out of the Moreton Bays, ‘Pro-Germans . . . chuck ’em in the drink!’
Uproar rose — Pro-Germans — Huns — Nazis!
Jeremy, well back in the crowd, and pinioned, saw another heavy face before him, red and sweaty, but not berserk, cold and calculating even in its expression, the ruddiness and sweat probably due only to the exertion of getting through to this point of scented trouble. It was Geordie. He even grinned as he lifted his big fist, growling, ‘Cop this, yo’ Fascist bawstid!’ He smashed the first into Jeremy’s solar plexus. Nothing below the belt about this. As Jeremy sank breathless in the hands of those who held him from behind, Geordie brought his boot up into his crotch. Goggling Jeremy fell
to the ground. Other boots dealt with him there.
Someone yelled, ‘Fair go . . . fair go!’ The voice stopped suddenly, as if silenced with a fist. There was female screaming from where Alfie was. Policemen and soldiers could be seen on the edge of the milling crowd. Fists were flying everywhere. Jemeson’s voice boomed vainly through the amplifiers, ‘Order . . . order!’
As if by prearrangement, a group of four snatched up senseless Jeremy, barged with him through the crowd, which gave way to them as if they had authority of some kind. They passed right through the crowd, dropped their burden when Geordie appeared from behind the wide root-buttressed trunk of a fig tree. All looked round. No one was watching. All other interest was centred in the brawling crowd. No doubt that was how Geordie and his men had planned things. Geordie bent over Jeremy. ‘He’s only knocked out,’ he said. ‘He can take a bit more.’ He reached for the left hand, caught the wrist, brought the arm backwards over his own bent knee, gave it a jerk that made his own eyes pop with the effort and brought Jeremy’s open — Snap! As Geordie dropped the arm inert, he grinned at the grey staring face. ‘You won’ be usin’ that dirty left o’ yourn in a ’oory, choom.’ When Jeremy tried to struggle up the big fist shot out again, this time to take him on the chin. Jeremy dropped back with a grunt.
Geordie took another swift look round, then, rising, said, ‘Chook the bawstid in the drink . . . loike ’is Fascist mate said. It’ll bring ’im round. Get a move on. I’ll keep nit.’
The water was close — just down over a grassy slope, over a pathway, a low sea-wall. The four took up their burden as before, the one on the broken arm not gentler than before. So down — and a heave-ho up onto the wall. The tide was well down. The shore-line was another wall, steeply sloped, of weed-grown boulders. They lowered him over. He went skidding down the slimy slope, splashed into the opaque green water. The contact revived him on the instant. He floundered for a moment, then grabbed at the rocks, looked up, to see the four faces watching. A second — and they were gone.
It was only with the right hand that he gripped the rocks. He kept trying to bring up the left, but could do no more than raise the upper arm. Also, he was breathing badly, in short gasps that jerked his body. By his grimacing, all effort was at cost of considerable pain, of which, evidently, he was not yet fully aware. His clinging seemed to be little more than instinctive, to prevent his being pulled away by the tide. Rubbish floating in the murky water, a great flotilla of it, consisting of ice-cream cups and lolly-packets and the like, tossed from the lawns of the Botanic Gardens round the corner, showed the run of the tide here as parallel to the shore, flowing towards Woolloomooloo Bay. A couple of times, in dazed striving to use the useless hand, he lost his grip with the other and went along a yard or two with the rubbish, instinctively to grab at the rocks again.
Poor Fellow My Country Page 204