by Gee, Maurice
I sat on the mudguard of the truck, waiting for Teresa to come out. A cold wind was blowing down Orchard Street into the drive. Jimmy and Mike came out. They placed a beer bottle on a stump and started firing at it with shanghais. Teresa saw me from the sittingroom window. She was cleaning the fireplace. In a moment she came into the yard with a pan of ashes.
‘I’m just the servant,’ she said.
‘I’ll give you a hand,’ —although I didn’t want to help Frank Collymore after Jimpy. ‘Do you want me to dig a hole for that?’
‘No, those two can. You’ll break that bottle,’ she yelled.
Jimmy and Mike took no notice.
‘Come in the shed,’ Teresa said. We wandered among bath-tubs and mirrors and leadlight windows. ‘Dad lets them do anything,’ she complained.
‘Can you come to the flicks tonight?’
‘I suppose.’
A stone from one of the shanghais ricocheted through the door and hit a kettle.
‘It’s Jimmy, he can’t shoot straight,’ Mike yelled. They laughed like newsreel kookaburras. Another stone whizzed inside and cracked a mirror.
‘You two cut it out. I’m telling Dad,’ Teresa yelled. She was almost crying. Jimmy and Mike started shooting stones at the door. Teresa ran out and I followed. I would have loved to give those kids a hiding for her.
Frank put down the phone and wrote in his exercise book. The yelling in the yard brought him shambling to the door. ‘Quit that playing games, Teresa. Come and wash the dishes,’ he said.
Teresa looked at me. Her face was flushed and her eyes were wild. ‘See,’ she said, ‘see.’ She started walking to the house, but turned and came back. ‘If Eileen marries your dopey brother, I’m the only one left.’
I walked home, feeling useless. I wished I had a place like the army hut to take her.
Later in the morning I heard a car go down Orchard Street, driving fast. I ran to the gate but was too late to see. A nasty smell blew in my face and blew away. ‘What is it?’ I asked Mum, back in the kitchen.
She had caught a whiff too. ‘It’s Mrs Pike cooking a linseed poultice for her boils.’
‘Poor old Bike,’ I said. I went back to polishing my football boots. I was playing for the Loomis seventh grade team at the local park that afternoon, and had not told Teresa because I was not a very good rugby player. I didn’t want her to see me plodding round in the pack. Mum was resting on the sofa, listening to the radio and drinking her sixth or seventh cup of tea. It was quiet under the house—maybe Dad was thinking about his future or his bets. He would be up in a minute to listen to race two. (His horse in race one had lost.) Now and then we heard a thump next door as Mr Redknapp got his furniture ready for taking away.
At five minutes past 11, Teresa ran across our lawn and down our path.
Walking home from the pictures that night, she told me what had happened at the Collymores’…
The car came bouncing and revving up the drive. It skidded to a halt by Frank’s truck. Three policemen jumped out. They were Sergeant Horton and Constable Porteous from the Loomis station and a man Teresa did not know. Horton and the strange man ran for the kitchen door. Porteous, helmet in hand, ran to the front.
Frank started snatching bits of paper from the table. They looped everywhere like butterflies. He grabbed the exercise book and skimmed it over the lino to Teresa, who was scouring the porridge pot at the sink. ‘Run,’ he yelled.
She grabbed it and nipped back through the kitchen. Both the policemen were in the door.
‘Game’s up, Frank,’ Sergeant Horton said.
Teresa ran into her bedroom. She stuffed the exercise book into her shirt and climbed out the window—more nimbly than Eileen had climbed out her’s, I’ll bet. The new policeman, a constable with fat white cheeks and yellow hair, put his head out in time to see her vanish into the track leading through the scrub to Flynns’ farm. He ran through the kitchen and set off after her. Sergeant Horton had everything in control. He called Porteous from the front and sent him chasing too.
‘See that moron doesn’t touch her,’ he said.
Teresa wriggled under the fence into the bottom paddock. The policeman, 30 yards behind, had to climb. He tore his trousers on the wire. Teresa made a beeline for the convent. She had the crazy idea that the nuns might hide her. Although she could run fast—faster than me—the man began to gain on her. Porteous was over the fence and coming too.
The exercise book bounced in Teresa’s shirt, making it awkward for her to run. She clamped it to her stomach and looked behind. The policeman’s hair was standing up in spikes. He held his helmet under his arm like a front row forward with the ball. That was when Teresa had her bright idea. She cut off at an angle and dived under another fence into the scrub. He was only a yard or two behind, but she knew the tracks in there and took the narrow side one leading to our section. The policeman missed it, going downhill, and had to climb back and start again. By that time Teresa was in our back yard. He must have glimpsed her there, and seen her again as she ducked through the door under the house. I heard his boots smacking down our path.
Dad was in his hideout with the door-disguised-as-firewood open wide. He was sorting the leaflets he had printed, one of each, to keep a record.
‘Hello, Teresa,’ he said, looking up.
‘Arrgh,’ Teresa cried, like the shot man in a comic. She had meant to open the secret room and hide in there. She turned to run outside again. Too late. The policeman burst through the outer door. His pale face was swollen like potatoes. He seized Teresa by the nape of her neck.
‘Now,’ he cried, and rummaged for the book in her shirt.
‘Hey, you lay off that,’ Dad cried.
The policeman saw him; saw the hidden room, the press, the Gestetner. He had probably been on raids against the wharfies. He knew what he saw. ‘By God,’ he said.
Porteous arrived, with Mum and me a couple of steps behind.
‘Let her go, you fool,’ Porteous said.
‘An illegal printing press. Call the police,’ the policeman said.
‘We are the police. Let her go.’
The blond constable didn’t want Teresa any more. He had been squeezing her unconsciously. He let her go and stepped into the hidden room. He grabbed the leaflets from Dad.
‘Get out of here. Get out of my house,’ Mum shrieked.
‘Everybody is under arrest,’ the policeman said.
‘Ah, come on,’ Dad said, ‘the strike’s nearly over.’
‘Under the regulations I have the power to search this house.’
‘You’re not a sergeant,’ Dad said.
‘Call Sergeant Horton,’ the constable said to Porteous.
‘I thought we were after Frank Collymore.’
‘This is bigger fish.’
‘Teresa,’ Porteous said, ‘give me what you’ve got in your shirt.’
Teresa handed over the exercise book. She was looking sick, and taking little sidelong looks at me.
‘Now we’ve got what we came for,’ Porteous said.
‘Not on your life,’ the other man said. ‘This is a cell of communists. If you won’t telephone, I will.’
Porteous sighed. ‘Come on, Mrs Dye. Come up to the house.’
‘I’m not leaving my husband with that man,’ Mum cried.
‘He’ll be all right.’
‘He’ll beat him up. Austin, you stay. Watch what happens. Fight him, Eddie.’
‘Come on,’ Porteous said patiently. ‘Teresa, you go home.’
She went, with a last guilty look at me from the door. Mum and Porteous walked up to the house, and there, before he phoned the sergeant at Collymores’, Porteous said, ‘Have you got anything else in the house that might get you in trouble?’
‘A typewriter,’ she said.
‘Take it in the garden and bury it while I phone.’
Mum did as she was told. She buried the typewriter and the stencils deep in the compost bin. I stayed under the hou
se and watched to see the constable didn’t punch my father. He stood in the door with his hands on his hips and grinned and puffed.
‘Go on, try it,’ he said.
Sergeant Horton arrived.
‘You’re a silly bugger, Eddie.’
‘Never mind,’ Dad said.
They searched the secret room and the house. Later on they called a second car from Auckland and drove Dad and Frank Collymore away. Apart from the smell of boiling linseed, Orchard Street came back to normal again. But Mum hadn’t finished fighting yet. She phoned a lawyer. Then she phoned the billiard rooms.
‘Lesley, come home.’
When he arrived, she said, ‘Borrow Frank Collymore’s car. We’re going to town.’
‘What for?’
‘Just do it. Before I lose my temper.’
She and Les drove to the police station in Auckland. Later they went to the magistrates’ court, where Dad and Frank Collymore, separately, were charged.
I phoned my football coach and told him I couldn’t play that afternoon. I didn’t phone Teresa. I was furious with her. My father was going to jail, he would get hard labour. Part of it was my fault, for showing her the room—but running there with a cop on your tail, I’d never heard of anything more stupid.
By the middle of the afternoon I had cooled down. I began to think that what she had done was pretty good for a girl. She’d only needed a couple more seconds and she and Dad would have closed the door.
But I kept on feeling sick about Dad. Six months in jail. I couldn’t believe it.
Late in the afternoon I called Teresa and asked if she’d heard any news about her father. She said no, and was getting ready to apologise, when I heard voices on the path—Mum and Dad.
‘Hey, they’re here,’ I cried.
‘So’s Dad. There’s his car. I’ll see you, Dinky.’
They came in, Mum looking grim and triumphant—the one expression—and Dad grinning quietly to himself.
‘What happened?’ I cried.
‘Out on bail,’ Mum said. ‘There’s some justice yet.’
‘I need a cup of tea,’ Dad said.
‘Frank Collymore too. Although I’d just as soon see him locked up.’ She kissed Dad’s cheek. ‘Not a bruise on him.’ She put the kettle on. ‘One thing I’d like to know, how did Teresa know about that room?’ She wasn’t looking at me but I knew who she meant. ‘Does someone have an explanation for that?’
‘Well …’ I said.
‘Yes, I thought you might.’
‘Enough’s enough for one day,’ Dad said.
‘Just to impress his girl,’ Mum said. She left it there and made the tea, and Dad turned on the radio for the race results. One of his horses had won. Mum said there was fat chance of getting any money out of Frank Collymore now.
The thing that kept me quiet, and kept me humming secretly inside, was the way she had said that Teresa was my girl. I didn’t push my luck for a while, but presently Mum said it was far too late for cooking tea, and anyway she wasn’t up to it and no wonder, so I’d have to go down town for a packet of fish and chips.
‘Sure,’ I said. ‘And later on, if everything’s OK, I guess it’s still all right if I go to the flicks?’
‘Ha!’ Mum said. That, in a sort of way, meant yes.
I rode my bike down to the takeaway shop. I rang Teresa. Les and Eileen dropped us at the pictures in Frank’s car. They were heading for the Fruitgrowers’ Ball in Oratia. It seemed impossible to me—and sometimes wrong—that I should be sitting in the pictures, eating chocboms, holding hands with my girl, on the same day that our fathers had been arrested. Teresa apologised and I told her it was all right. We walked home. I saw her as far as her gate, where we stood for half an hour, talking and shivering in the cold. I kissed her goodnight. She tasted of chocolate and ice-cream, and of Eileen’s lipstick, which she’d pinched. I rubbed my mouth with my hanky, walking home, and tried to work out how I could hide it from Mum.
It had been a Saturday full of happiness and fright. July 7, 1951.
That should have been the end of it.
Chapter 13
Bike makes a friend
In fact it was Sunday when I heard the shots, although I did not know the time till later. It was several minutes past one o’clock.
I heard Les come in and rattle round the kitchen, and half heard the door close as he went out to the army hut. I must have gone straight back to sleep. Eileen crossed the paddock, behind her bobbing torch, but I was dreaming by then.
I thought the pistol shot was a door slamming. I sat up, wide awake, wondering who had come into the house. Two more shots sounded. They did not make the boom I had imagined from Zane Grey, but were like a hand smacking on a table. I jumped out of bed and opened my door and found Mum in her nightie in the sittingroom.
‘Eddie,’ she called, ‘something’s happened.’
Dad came out. We heard voices in the back yard, raised in yelps of urgency and fear.
‘That’s Lesley,’ Mum said, and ran for the door—which opened wide, swinging past her face and slamming against the wall. Les came in, wearing only his singlet. He was as white as mashed potatoes, staring-eyed, open-mouthed. He held Eileen in one arm. A muted wailing came from her mouth. Blood ran from a splinter of wood embedded in her cheek. It made scarlet streaks on the sheet draped around her like a sarong.
‘Someone’s shooting out there,’ Les cried.
Mum grabbed Eileen. The sheet slipped off her shoulders and I saw she had nothing on. Dad slammed the door.
‘Get her up to the front of the house. Call the police, Ossie,’ he said.
‘Don’t you go out there. Don’t go,’ Mum screamed.
‘Where is he, Les?’
‘Up behind the army hut. He shot Eileen.’
‘Oh God, Lesley, what have you been doing? Eddie, don’t go,’ Mum cried.
‘No, I won’t.’ He turned the key. ‘Who was it, Les?’
‘I don’t know. Eileen, sweetheart,’ he cried.
Her noises had become a kind of mumbling. She was trying to pull the sheet back around herself. Mum walked her into the sittingroom. ‘Get some clothes on, Lesley. Oh, you stupid boy,’ she said.
‘Ossie, have you phoned yet? Just 999,’ Dad said.
‘Ask for a doctor too. Oh Eddie, what if he comes in here?’
Dad picked up the poker from the hearth. I telephoned, then looked out the front window and saw neighbours in the moonlight, in the street. I opened the front door.
‘Someone’s shooting,’ I yelled, then closed it fast in case the gunman ran up the steps.
Dad turned off all the lights except the one in the bedroom, where Mum was lying Eileen on the bed. He made me squat on the floor in case whoever was out there fired bullets through the window. Then he telephoned Frank Collymore.
‘It’s not serious, Frank, it’s just a scratch.—No, someone’s taking pot shots. I don’t think you should come up here. We’ve called the police.—No, calm down, she’s not dying.’
I tried to ask if Teresa was there. I was crying a bit myself by then. I wanted to tell her to stay away, and also to come and be with me.
A long time passed, or so it seemed. Dad and I sat breathing in the sittingroom—although once he got up and rushed into the bedroom to make sure Mum had the curtains closed. Mum pushed him out and pushed out Les as well, wearing clothes of Dad’s too small for him.
‘It’s Bike, I know it’s Bike. I’ll kill the bastard,’ Les said.
‘You won’t kill anyone,’ Dad said. ‘What have you been doing with that girl?’
Porteous arrived and said the sergeant was on his way. He made Les describe what had happened, which made Les mad—shouldn’t he be out there catching Bike?
‘That’s the Pike boy? How do you know it’s him?’
‘It’s got to be. He’s after Eileen. He’s got the bank revolver.’
‘How many shots?’
‘He’s got three more. You should get
some rifles and shoot him.’
‘Tell me what happened,’ Porteous said.
‘We’d just turned out the light and someone shot a bullet through the wall.’
‘You and Eileen Collymore?’
‘Yes. I thought she was shot. I could feel the blood. Then two more bullets. I got her wrapped up and brought her down here.’
‘And no more shooting?’
‘No. That’s a bit of wood from the wall stuck in her face.’ Les started to cry. ‘I’m going to marry her. I love her,’ he said.
Feet came up the front steps. Sergeant Horton and the doctor came in. The doctor went straight into the bedroom. Horton made Les tell the story again. He seemed in no hurry. Then he told Porteous to follow him and went outside to the army hut.
Mum came out of the bedroom and closed the door. She looked at Les as though she hated him.
‘You stupid boy, you’ve ruined your life.’
‘Why? How?’
‘She’s all right. She’ll have some stitches.’
‘Calm down, Lil,’ Dad said, although she seemed calm enough to me.
‘Eileen says she’s pregnant, that’s all,’ Mum said.
Frank Collymore burst into the room.
‘Where’s my girl?’
‘In there with the doctor. There’s nothing wrong with her, just a little cut. What she is is pregnant, she’s missed her period twice.’
‘Ah,’ Frank said. He looked at Les. ‘So you couldn’t wait?’
Les was gulping. He seemed to have shrunk until Dad’s clothes fitted him. ‘She didn’t tell me,’ he said.
‘Well, no harm,’ Frank said. ‘No harm, Lil.’
‘Of course there’s harm. And I haven’t invited you to call me Lil.’
‘Lily-ann,’ Frank said, and sat down. ‘You can’t ask a couple of kids to wait when they’re in love.’
‘I can,’ Mum said. ‘I do. But it’s too late now.’ She looked at Les. ‘You stupid boy.’
‘Stop calling me that,’ Les said. ‘I’m glad she’s pregnant. I’m glad.’
‘At seventeen?’
‘Eighteen next week,’ Frank said. ‘We’ll throw a party. Then we’ll get you hitched before it shows. Who’s this pot-shot geezer, anyway?’