Deadly Unna?

by Phillip Gwynne

  Darcy always called maggots, ‘gents’. It was the polite term.

  Gents were Darcy’s passion. Ever since he retired, about two hundred years ago, he’d been breeding them. He sold them to the campers – fifty for a dollar. Darcy’s gents were famous – guaranteed to catch a feed of fish, or money back.

  ‘What do the silly old buggers do when they retire?’ he’d ask, and then he’d answer his own question.

  ‘I’ll tell you what they do, young’un. They grow bloody great pumpkins that you can’t eat. Or they spend all day long playing bloody bingo. Or they hitch a caravan up behind and drag it round the country at thirty miles an hour clogging up the highways. Or they do a bit of concretin’. Or they breed roses. Well, young’un, I breed gents. There’s no tickets on me, you know that, but I’m proud of what I do. There’s plenty breeding roses, but I tell you what, there’s not many of us breeding gents.’

  He picked up an empty Vegemite jar from the floor, pulled the feather out of his hat, and used it to sweep the maggots, one at a time, into the open mouth of the jar. I could hear him counting under his breath – ‘Forty-eight, forty-nine, fifty,’ he said, and then he handed me the jar.

  ‘Wanna put some burley in this one for me, young’un?’

  ‘Sure,’ I said. I held the jar up to the light. I’m no expert but your Darcy gent did look special – fatter and whiter than your average maggot. More squirm to them, too.

  ‘What type of gents are these anyway?’ I asked as I screwed the lid on.

  If you got old Darcy talking gents, there was no stopping him. Usually I didn’t encourage him too much – it wasn’t my ideal topic of conversation – but tonight was different. I wanted to get the Thumper out of my head.

  ‘That there’s your fruit gent. Bred ’em on some old bananas I got from Robbo.’

  Darcy had this theory – that different types of fish went for different types of gents, depending on what they were bred on.

  ‘Your tommy ruff’ll bite on that. So will your leathery. But your gar prefers the meat. And your flatty, well your flatty is a vicious bastard, he’ll take just about anything. But I reckon nine times out of ten he’ll bite on the pig guts.’

  ‘Is that so?’ I said, expecting Darcy to continue. He had numerous theories about maggots; this was just one of them.

  But some of the remaining maggots were trying to escape, making a run for it, across the Prime Minister’s scowling face. Darcy carefully steered them back into the middle. No matter what he was doing – tying a knot, baiting a hook, landing a fish, or sweeping gents – Darcy did it slowly and precisely. I suppose this is what happens when you get old, you get into a groove, like a fishing reel.

  ‘Lively buggers. They’ll dance on the hook, they will,’ he said.

  ‘Young’un,’ he said. ‘Did I ever tell you about when I was in the RAAF and those chooks got on the runway?’

  ‘Nuh, don’t think I’d heard that one,’ I said.

  I had though. I’d heard all Darcy’s yarns before. Umpteen times. But I didn’t mind sitting through them again. Darcy had a way of telling a yarn – he’d chuckle, he’d shake his head in amazement, he’d repeat the punch-line at least ten times. Like he was hearing it for the first time himself.

  As he told the yarn, I thought about what they said in the front bar, that Darcy hadn’t been in the air force, that he’d spent his working life as some clerk at the post office. I didn’t believe them, of course. If he hadn’t been in the RAAF then how did he know so much about the war? Sure, he had a lot of books – I reckon he had every Biggles book that was ever written – but that wasn’t enough: he must have been there, too.

  ‘What about “Kaiser Bill”?’ I said.

  ‘Kaiser Bill’ was a poem about some old German who gave everybody a hard time during the war. It always gave me a thrill to hear Darcy recite ‘Kaiser Bill’. Just like when Arks said arks, or Shirl got on the turps and started one of her ‘Mick, you rotten bludger’ tirades. I think it was because even though Darcy swore a fair bit, he didn’t use the really bad swear words, but ‘Kaiser Bill’ was chock full of them.

  ‘ “Kaiser Bill”, eh?’ said Darcy, looking over his shoulder, as if there might be somebody there. ‘Crikey, you’ll get me in strife one day, you will, young’un.’

  He stopped sweeping maggots, and leaned forward towards me. His eyes narrowed.

  Kaiser Bill you bastard

  Why did you start this war

  and send us all a-fighting

  you dirty rotten whore

  And when he came to the last verse his voice became low and conspiratorial –

  and when you’re tired of living

  a hopeless bloody wreck

  may you slip back through your arsehole

  and break your fucking neck

  I liked that about Darcy, he didn’t say ‘break your effing neck’, or ‘break your flippin’ neck’ or ‘break your ruddy neck’. He said it just like they said it back then, in the trenches, or wherever they were.

  Darcy tipped the maggots back out of the jar onto the paper.

  ‘What’d you do that for?’ I said.

  ‘Lost me count.’

  He started sweeping again, counting out loud. ‘One, two, three … forty-seven, forty-eight, forty-nine. Damn! I’m one short.’

  ‘Who’s gunna know?’ I said.

  ‘They pay for fifty, they get fifty,’ said Darcy emphatically. ‘I’m not gunna start gypping people now, not at my age. Be right back.’

  He folded the newspaper into a neat square. Then he got up, grabbed the torch that was on the table, and disappeared down the front steps. The gents lived out the back in forty-four gallon drums. He returned a couple of minutes later, his right hand cupped.

  ‘Here he is,’ he said. ‘Number fifty, and a fine-looking gent he is too.’

  He dropped the gent into the jar with the other forty-nine.

  ‘You’re looking a mite preoccupied tonight, young’un. Not your usual self. Got something or another on your mind?’

  ‘The footy,’ I said.

  ‘The footy. I thought so,’ said Darcy.

  He didn’t really follow the footy, he was too busy fishing and breeding gents. But he knew we were in the grand final. The whole peninsula knew that.

  ‘They disqualified Carol. So I’m the first ruck now,’ I said.

  ‘A lot of responsibility, eh?’

  That word again – responsibility. I’d been hearing it so much lately. From my teachers, from my parents, from everybody. Because I was tall (was that my fault?) and I played footy (what else was there to do in the Port?) and we made the grand final (blame Dumby Red for that – he’s the one who kicked the goal that got us through) and Carol gets disqualified (not by me) and the game is won and lost in the ruck (a fact of life), I ended up with all this responsibility. It didn’t seem fair. It wasn’t fair.

  ‘Too much.’

  ‘Well, young’un. All I can say is, do your best.’

  Do your best. That’s what Mum had said, too. But what if my best wasn’t enough?

  Mum’s voice came floating over the fence. ‘Gary, are you over there? It’s way past your bedtime.’

  ‘Gotta go, Darcy. See ya later. Coming, Mum!’

  ‘See ya, young’un,’ said Darcy. ‘Good luck for Satdy.’

  The bedroom light was off. The other siblings were in bed, one of them was already snoring. I climbed up onto my bunk, and slipped under the covers.

  ‘Good night, Bucky,’ said Team-man.

  Bucky. That was the best he could come up with. Bucky as in Bucky the Bucktooth Beaver.

  It was so pathetic I didn’t even bother replying. Just closed my eyes, and tried to sleep.

  9

  The only dentist I’d ever been to was at school, and she wasn’t a proper dentist, only a DT, a dental therapist. She travelled around the peninsula with a caravan, visiting all the schools. She had thick glasses and her breath smelt like peppermint.

&nb
sp; After giving me a couple of fillings she said, ‘You know you should really see an orthodontist, get those front teeth straightened out. That’s a severe occipital occlusion you’ve got there. Get it done now and you’ll have a lovely smile for the rest of your life.’

  ‘Yeth, ith shooth,’ I said, which is what ‘yes, I should’ sounds like when your gums are numb.

  She gave me a card with the address of an orthodontist on it. It was in town, of course. On that posh street where Team-man had to go after he busted his eardrum.

  I knew I had a severe occipital occlusion. It wasn’t as severe as Bucky Matic’s, his teeth were just about at right-angles to his face, but I knew mine stuck out a bit. Every now and then somebody would stir me about it. The same old joke.

  ‘Geez, mate, you could eat an apple through a bird cage.’

  Funny, ha ha. The same old joke, but it still made you feel microscopic.

  Whenever I looked in the mirror I remembered what the DT said, ‘Get it done and you’ll have a lovely smile for the rest of your life.’

  Did I want a lovely smile for the rest of my life?

  You betcha!

  I wanted a smile just like Dumby Red’s, a smile that made other people feel good. Dumby had never worn braces, he was just lucky I suppose, born with teeth that didn’t stick out. Imagine having a smile like his, like a weapon. Things are going bad, you bring out the smile. Whammo! You’re on top again.

  I asked Mum. She was hanging out the washing.

  ‘Mum, how much does it cost to go to the orthodentist?’

  My poor Mum didn’t have any teeth. She’d gone into hospital and they’d taken them all out, every last one. It was because of us kids. In her wedding photo, she’s got this amazing smile, teeth all white and pearly, like she just stepped out of a Colgate ad. She always brushed them too, when she had them, and she never ate cake, or lollies, or ice-cream, or any of that crap. No, it was us kids. I read about it in a Women’s Weekly. When a woman’s pregnant the body takes calcium from the teeth to give to the baby in the womb. After eight kids I reckon there wasn’t much calcium left in Mum’s teeth, her body had taken it all. They became weak and rotten, so they took them out. They gave her falsies, of course, but she never got used to them. They spent more time in the top drawer of the kitchen cupboard than they did in her mouth. You’d be searching for something in the kitchen, open the drawer, and there they were, looking right at you. Scared the shit out of you, it did. But I never said anything to Mum. I felt a bit guilty.

  ‘It’s orthodontist, dear.’

  ‘Okay, an orthodontist, but how much does it cost?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘Is it expensive, or really expensive?’

  ‘Why don’t you ask your father when he comes home?’

  I didn’t. For a start I was always in bed when he came home. Besides, I knew what he’d say.

  ‘Negative.’

  Just like that mad robot in ‘Lost in Space’.

  ‘Negative, Will Robinson. Negative.’

  10

  ‘Coming up the oval for a few dobs?’ asked Mark Arks as we got off the school bus.

  He handballed a footy towards me. I went to grab it but my hands were still sore from the night before, from thumping the bloody thing, and it slipped through.

  ‘Nuh, reckon I’ll go home,’ I said, watching the footy rolling down the road.

  But instead I walked back down the main street, past Arks’s shop and the old post office, until I came to the intersection where the main street met the coast road. I walked over to the anchor. It was a sort of memorial, I suppose, to the old days, when huge sailing ships called windjammers used to sail into the Port to load up with wheat and barley. Then they’d race back to England. But as old Froggy used to say, and it was about all he ever said, ‘Them days are gorn.’ The anchor itself was huge, painted black and mounted on a concrete block. It was shiny on the top because little kids used to slide down it. Next to the anchor was a faded map. It was for the campers I suppose, so they didn’t get lost. How anybody, even a camper, could get lost in the Port beats me. Either you were in the centre of the town or you weren’t in the town at all. In front of the anchor, facing the sea, was a bench. I sat down.

  It was an overcast day, and the sea was grey and lumpy looking, like old porridge. There was nobody on the jetty. It looked bored today, like it had nothing to do, just squat there on its thick wooden legs, and wait for a visitor.

  I loved that jetty. I really did. I couldn’t imagine the Port without it. I couldn’t imagine living in the Port without it. If, for some reason, the jetty went, then so would I. I’d put all my belongings in one of those red hankies with the big white spots, tie it to a stick, and go out into the world in search of fame and fortune (and another jetty).

  About three-quarters of the way up the jetty was the shed. That’s what we called it anyway, though it was probably really a shelter, because one side of it was completely open. It was covered in graffiti, inside and out. Names of pop stars, football teams – all sorts of stuff. And we used to carve our initials into the wooden uprights with our pocket knives. It was sort of a tradition in our town. But only us boys did it. I’d never seen a girl carve her initials. Actually I’d never seen a girl write any graffiti. The only time a girl’s name would appear was when one of us wrote it, like ‘Monica is a slut’ or ‘Josie is slack’. One day somebody wrote ‘Sharon B gives head’. It took me ages to scratch it out. I was so mad with Shaz, I didn’t talk to her for ages.

  To my right was the playground, the swings slowly twisting in the wind. In front of that the beach, piled high with seaweed. And out from there the boats, nodding at their moorings. My eyes followed the inward curve of the bay, past the caravan park, empty now in winter, past Black Rock, past the sandhills. I could just make out the Point in the distance.

  I’d never been to the Point. And not because it was too far – it was only about three hours by foot. Once Dazza and I decided we were going to do it, walk along the coast, all the way there. We’d made it just past the sandhills and there was still plenty of time. But then we started thinking about those stories they told in the front bar – wild Nungas with spears, boomerangs that come from nowhere and knock you senseless. We got scared and ran all the way back to the Port.

  From behind me came the sound of footsteps. I turned around. It was Pickles. He leaned against the anchor. He sniffed twice. He farted once. Then he started making that noise with his throat, which only Pickles could make, like he was dredging something up from his feet. The noise stopped. He rolled that something from cheek to cheek. Then he spat it out. I watched it fly through the air. It was green and horrible and it landed with a wet thud on the map.

  After a while it started to move. Just missing the school, it ran slowly across the oval, slid along the highway for a while, then reached the edge, where it dropped off onto the gravel below.

  Meet Pickles Mickle, one of my very bestest friends.

  ‘You really the first ruck now?’ he said.

  ‘Seems like it,’ I said.

  ‘Christ!’ he said.

  ‘Thanks a lot, Pickles.’

  Pickles was a hopeless footballer. There were plenty of Nungas not in the team who were better than him. But Pickles was from the Port, he was a local. And Shirl and Mick, his olds, bought their ciggies from Arks. Shirl and Mick smoked a lot of ciggies, they were probably Arks’s best customers. So you couldn’t drop Pickles for a Nunga. Pickles was always on the bench though. Sometimes, if we were well in front, Arks’d give him a run in the last quarter. But only if we were well in front, at least twenty goals.

  Actually Pickles didn’t really care, he wasn’t that keen on playing anyway. But he liked to be in the team because you got to go to other towns on the weekend, and he could watch the girls play netball. He said it was because netball was an exciting and fast-moving game, but I knew he just wanted to perve on the girls’ undies.

  ‘I was thinking, we’
ll be dead-set heroes if we win, won’t we?’ he said.

  ‘I s’pose.’

  ‘Girls really go for heroes, don’t they?’

  Here we go, I thought. It’s about to start.

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘I’m telling you, they do. They’ll be begging us for it.’

  ‘Calm down, Pickles.’

  ‘No, I’m telling you. They’ll be all over us like a rash.’

  ‘Mate, you’ve already got a rash.’

  Pickles had the munga. Real bad. The munga, in case you don’t know, is a fungus. It grows in warm damp places. Like Pickles’ groin. He was always scratching at his munga. Pickles, we used to say, why dontcha buy some cream, get rid of that filthy munga? But he never did anything about it. He enjoyed the company, I reckon.

  Pickles ignored my comment.

  ‘If we win we’ll be in like Flynn,’ he said.

  ‘Geez, Pickles, that’s really poetic.’

  ‘Nuh, I’m not kidding. We’ve gotta win this game.’

  More responsibility. Now I was responsible for Pickles’ pathetic sex life.

  ‘By the way, did I tell ya, got me finger in down the bushes? That Kerley moll,’ he said.

  The bushes was a bit of sandy scrub, on the other side of the jetty, towards the boat ramp. People went there, late at night. Usually in pairs.

  ‘She was beggin’ for it, she was,’ he added.

  As usual he was lying. Pickles and his hyperactive sexual imagination. You should’ve heard him, the way he went on. Got a pash down the bushes. Got a bit of tit down the bushes. Got a finger down the bushes. Got pulled off down the bushes. Got this down the bushes. Got that down the bushes. The truth is that he got nothing down the bushes, no girl would go anywhere near the bushes with Pickles. Not even Mary Kerley and she’d been down the bushes with practically everybody (apparently).

  Pickles wasn’t exactly ugly. The problem was his personal hygiene. His hair was a rat’s nest. He never cleaned his teeth – they always looked like he’d just eaten a bowl of pond slime. His fingernails were filthy. He farted constantly and a Pickles’ fart would clear a room in five seconds flat. And his undies had more skid marks than the Grand Prix circuit.