Barefoot Kids

by Steve Hawke

  As Janey gets up, Buster looks at her. ‘Sometimes you just have to trust that feelin’ in your guts,’ he says.

  Bella gives her another squeeze, and they head off arm in arm. Buster is still contemplating the pendant when he hears a car pull up outside. A few moments later Big Al is standing there, with Mack at his shoulder.

  Buster and Big Al exchange a long look, measuring each other. Buster puts the pendant gently on the table between the two of them. ‘My father gave this to Bella.’

  Big Al says nothing. Buster eyes him quizzically, trying to guess his age. ‘Long time back now, I was just a young feller. You probably weren’t even born then.’

  The silence that follows is broken by Bella, shouting as she scurries across the yard with Janey and Jimmy on her heels. ‘Get out of here you snake! How dare you come into my yard!’ She snatches up the pendant. ‘I’ll see you in jail for this!’

  ‘You thief,’ Janey adds.

  Big Al puts on a bewildered expression. ‘What are you talking about?’

  ‘This, you liar.’ Janey holds up Bella’s hand, clutching the pendant. ‘It was in your desk.’

  Big Al grins evilly. ‘Hear that Mack? The girl admits she was in my office.’

  ‘Every word boss. You going to press charges?’

  Buster’s eyes narrow as the other Jirroos exchange glances. Big Al fixes his gaze on Bella. ‘Five hundred dollars was stolen from my desk this afternoon.’

  Big Al stabs a finger in Janey’s direction, but keeps his eyes on Bella. ‘She just admitted she was in there. I’ve got the sandals that she left behind. And I’ve got a sworn statement from two hotel guests whose room she broke into. It looks like an open and shut case to me.’

  Janey is shaking, but Jimmy finds voice. ‘She never!’

  Big Al turns on him now. ‘I’d watch it sonny. We’ve got you down as an accomplice.’

  He leans forward and scans them all with a cold stare. ‘I’m still tossing up whether to report the theft to the police, or just forget about it.’ Finally he returns to Bella. ‘Now what was it you were saying about this necklace of yours?’

  Bella purses her lips and stares back. If looks could kill! She puts an arm around Janey. Big Al and Mack turn on their heels and disappear back down the driveway.

  Janey spends most of the hours between Big Al’s visit and her parents’ return cradled in Bella’s arms, too shocked to speak. When the Landcruiser pulls into the driveway she runs to her mother and bursts into tears for the second time that day.

  Once they manage to wrap their heads around all that has happened, Ally and Eddie are too scared — and too angry at Big Al — to have any harsh words for Janey. As Bella had predicted, it is a long night.

  Dancer and Buddy arrived home two days later, bursting with stories to tell. But they came back to such turmoil that their own adventures seemed to get shoved into the background.

  The family drew in on itself as they tried to digest the latest developments. They began to think that it was in fact what it appeared to be — a daring bluff on Big Al’s part. He would not make any report about Janey’s so-called theft, as long as they kept quiet about his.

  One evening late in the week they all gathered in the backyard and agreed on a course of action. If anyone outside the family noticed that Bella had her pendant again, they would say it had been returned anonymously in the mail. The events of last Sunday would stay a secret.

  Janey was gradually emerging from her state of shock. She had sat quiet through the family meeting, but as it was breaking up, she said in a steely voice, ‘We’ve still got to stop him though.’

  Little Joe pulls Janey aside after the family meeting. ‘You’re right girl, we do still have to stop him. I went down and had a look at his model. Scared the bejesus out of me it did. But we might have found a few friends at last.’

  He grins at the spark that appears in Janey’s eye. It is good to see, considering how subdued she has been. He tells her that now Big Al has gone public, people are starting to ask questions. Not just the locals. There’s a greenie he’s been talking to. ‘Green in more ways than one,’ Little Joe laughs. ‘He’s got a few things to learn about how things work up here, but he’s a good feller. He’s doing some research, and we’re talking about trying to stir things up a bit.’

  Janey splits the first week of the holidays between the usual pursuits of crabbing, fishing and music down at the shack with the other kids, and long hours with Little Joe and Bob the Greenie.

  Jimmy is trying to get them fired up about the band. They work up Dancer’s Bullfrog Hole song into a band version, which means now they’ve got two songs, plus their original tune with Janey’s verse and a half of lyrics. But so much has happened since they first came up with the plan, that to all of them except Jimmy the idea of the Barefoot Kids just doesn’t seem so important any more.

  Bob the Greenie is on an extended visit from Perth. He has been searching information on the net. The impact on marine environments of clearing mangroves. The ecology of the dunes. And his particular hobbyhorse, the potentially devastating impact on the water table of pumping the amount of bore water it would take to turn the fairways of the golf course green. Janey devours all the data that Bob turns up, and regurgitates it for anyone who will listen. Little Joe has been busy too, with plans for a public information night to spread the message and test how strong the opposition to Big Al’s resort might be.

  One night, as Janey is lecturing her parents about the decline in dugong numbers in the Whitsunday Islands, Eddie and Ally drop their bombshell. ‘There’s something else we’ve got to talk about,’ Ally tells her.

  The tone of her voice immediately puts Janey on edge. When Eddie starts praising her exam results and her report, and talking about how much talent and promise she has, she becomes even more wary. ‘What’s this about?’ she demands. Eddie looks at Ally nervously. She takes over.

  ‘I know everybody thinks Big Al is just bluffing. He probably is. But what if he isn’t? Or what if you do something else to rile him?

  ‘Look at you now, getting all fired up again. It’s fantastic love. You don’t know how proud we are of you. But we’re worried sick. And we’re not going to let you have your life ruined by Big Al landing you with a criminal record.’

  ‘What d’you mean, you’re not going to let me?’

  ‘Janey, you know we’ve always talked about sending you down to St Brigid’s in Year Nine. We’ve brought it forward. You’re enrolled to start after the holidays.’

  ‘No way!’

  But even as she shouts her defiance, Janey knows from the look in her mother’s eye that she is not going to change this decision.

  Janey might know that she cannot win, but that doesn’t mean she won’t fight. Though Eddie and Ally treat her with kid gloves she finds reasons to lash out. She does not relish the fights, for she knows that her parents’ motives are good, but she cannot bite her tongue.

  She virtually moves into Bella and Micky’s house, where Bella spoils her rotten, cooking up her favourite salmon patties and chilli crab.

  If the band project was just limping along before, now it almost comes to a halt. They still have a couple of rehearsals, but Janey only goes through the motions. The second time Jimmy just stops playing halfway through Bullfrog Hole. ‘This is no good,’ he almost cries the words, he is so upset. The music trails away as the others peter out. ‘What’s the point anyway,’ he faces Janey. ‘You’re our singer. Without you there’s no band.’

  The words come out louder and angrier than they are meant to. ‘It’s not her fault,’ Tich rounds on him, and Janey flares back, ‘You only care about the band don’t you? What about me? I’m the one being sent away.’

  The spat is all the worse — for all of them — for knowing that they are not really mad at each other, but at what is happening to them. No-one wants to say it, but they all realise that once Janey gets on that plane to Perth, things will never be the same again.

&nb
sp; What Janey won’t admit, and what makes her feel even worse inside, is that one part of her is secretly relieved at what her parents have done, for the last encounter with Big Al truly scared her.

  She buries this secret feeling, and through a Christmas that is very subdued on Jirroo Corner, she outwardly maintains her rage. She is only civil to Bella and Little Joe. The date for the public meeting has been set for the first week of the new year, and though most of the Jirroos lend a hand one way or another, it is Janey and Little Joe who are in the forefront in the preparations.

  The more they discover about the planned resort, the more horrified they become. Jiir’s dreaming place on the headland might be ‘protected’, but the resort buildings crowd right in around it. There is a kids’ playground situated where local kids would not dream of approaching. And, while the beach itself is technically still public land, there is no way the locals will be able to access it without ‘trespassing’ on the golf course.

  Buster spends hours watching the skies from his porch up on Kennedy Hill, or stalking the dunes down at Eagle Beach, looking for signs of rain. The new year has come, and Broome has had only one small storm.

  The wet season follows its own rhythms from year to year. The really big rains, the ones that grey the skies for days on end and make the rivers flood, come with the cyclones, which are as erratic in their timing as the random paths they follow.

  Even in the poor years the hot, oppressive days of the build up are normally punctuated by sun showers, lightning storms, and every now and then a brief downpour that makes the hot earth steam. But so far this year, it is just the heat. Buster has a bad feeling in his bones.

  Somehow Buddy has convinced old Teoh Tom to venture out of his lair for the public meeting. Tom corners Janey before the meeting starts. ‘You goin’ away girlie?’

  ‘Mum and Dad are forcing me,’ she answers shortly, her mind on other things.

  He fixes her with a beady eye before she can move off. She has never had an encounter with Tom quite this close, or this intense. He twitches, and then seems his normal eccentric self again. ‘Big secrets hey! Bad business, all them secrets. Don’t you let the big men bury you with their secrets girlie.’ He scuttles off to a seat at the back.

  Janey finds Buddy and angrily confronts him. ‘Did you tell him?’

  ‘Tell who, what?’

  ‘Teoh Tom about you know what, me and —’

  ‘Course not. All I told him is that you’re going to Perth.’

  ‘Then how come he was just ranting at me about big secrets, and big men?’

  She doesn’t have time to ponder this mystery, for Little Joe is calling the meeting to order. She looks around the hall and is disappointed. All the Jirroos are there, and a smattering from some of the other old Broome families. Bob has rounded up a dozen greenies, most of them hippies in sarongs and dreadlocks. There are not nearly as many as she’d expected. Little Joe had warned her not to get her hopes up, but there are people she was sure would be here who have not bothered to show.

  From this disappointing start the meeting does not really improve. Little Joe is passionate and angry as he talks about Broome traditions and ancient dreamings. But although he is a great front man for the Dreamers, he doesn’t have the same way with words that he has with a song, and the applause is not exactly overwhelming.

  Janey finds the information that Bob spouts forth fascinating, but even she has to admit that he is drier than a claypan in September. The statistics and studies and quotes come one after the other in a rapid-fire monotone. More than once during his speech she looks around at the sound of scraping chairs to see people making their exit.

  The best news Bob has though, the thing they are pinning their hopes on, is word that the New Approvals Committee of the Planning Department has deferred consideration of the proposal until its March meeting. No official reason has been given, but Bob and Little Joe think the letters of protest and the environmental issues being raised are making them nervous. ‘We have to keep the pressure on,’ Little Joe pleads as he wraps things up.

  But everyone can sense that the meeting was something of a fizzer. As they pack up, Little Joe is trying to talk it up, telling them all it’s just a start, when a young hippie woman says, ‘We need something different. Something that will get people involved.’

  Jimmy and Janey are on their knees rolling up the banner, and he is first to see the smile that creeps over her face. Jumping to her feet she exclaims, ‘Let’s have a concert, a benefit concert!’

  ‘Cool,’ the woman smiles. ‘Who would play?’

  ‘The Barefoot Kids,’ beams Janey.

  The other four kids exchange astonished looks.

  ‘Who?’ asks Little Joe.

  Everyone in the hall is listening now.

  ‘Us mob. The Barefoot Kids. We’ve been rehearsing for months.’ Little Joe has an eyebrow raised at Janey and she can see the question in his eyes. ‘We’ve got Jimmy’s Jiir song. And Bullfrog Hole. And a protest song against Big Al.’

  Janey turns round to the other kids. Jimmy is staring at her, open mouthed. She has the good grace to look a little sheepish, but that smile is still there.

  As soon as they got back from the hall that night, the unofficial committee of the Save Eagle Beach campaign had a meeting in the backyard. Janey’s plan was given the green light.

  Only then does Janey find time to sit down with Jimmy and Dancer, Buddy and Tich. She is still on a high, as always when she has a new plan. Her moody demeanour of recent weeks has vanished. ‘Isn’t it fantastic guys! We can make it real at last, and do something good while we’re at it.’

  ‘It would’ve been nice if you talked to us first.’

  ‘Jimmy! You’re the one always obsessing about the band — here’s your chance.’

  ‘Nothing like easing into things slowly, hey Janey,’ Dancer observes. He too is wondering what Janey has let them in for.

  ‘It’ll be great!’ say Tich, who has no qualms.

  ‘When’s practice?’ Buddy grins.

  ‘But what’s this about a protest song?’ Jimmy asks her.

  ‘Our tune cuz, the one that started it. I’ve just got to finish those damn lyrics,’ she grins. ‘And change them round a bit.’

  Little Joe went off next morning to get a permit to stage the concert on the town oval. Janey, wearing her bossy boots, had given him his orders — as late in the school holidays as possible to give them time to get their show together, but before she gets sent down to Perth. He comes back waving a permit for the first Sunday in February, just before school starts.

  And on day one there is a crisis.

  ‘There’s an orientation day at St Brigid’s on the Monday,’ Ally explains to Janey. ‘You can’t miss that. Besides, it’d cost us two hundred bucks to change your flight.’

  Janey gives her a steely look. ‘Too bad Mum. The oval’s being used on the Saturday and we can’t bring it forward, there wouldn’t be time to organise everything.’

  Eddie looks to the heavens. ‘Too bad, she says. It’s two hundred bucks Janey. Did you hear your mum?’

  ‘I heard. But you better listen to me too. I’ve given up fighting this school business. I’m not happy, but I’ll go. But I don’t need to be there for some stupid orientation day.’

  She pauses, and looks them in the eye, one after the other. ‘If you make me fly out before the concert, then it’s war between us.’

  Eddie and Ally look at each other. Eddie nods. ‘Okay Janey, it’s a deal.’

  There is silence for a moment. All three are thinking the same thing: how good it feels to have a truce at last in the battles that have raged between them. Better than a truce in fact, it is a reconciliation.

  ‘You’ve never sung with a mike before have you?’ asks Eddie.

  ‘Nope.’

  ‘Want some lessons?’

  ‘Yep.’

  ‘You know I’m a whiz on organising and publicity, girl.’

  ‘You’re the bes
t Mum. You better get busy.’

  20

  LITTLE JOE AND their parents are dying to hear the kids perform. But Janey forbids it. She says they have to practise more on their own first.

  Little Joe volunteers to run them down to the shack that afternoon to get started. He hovers, and drops a hint or two, and finally asks outright if he can stay and listen. Jimmy looks to Janey, nodding encouragingly. But she sends Little Joe packing, telling him he can wait like the others, besides which, he’s got things to do, there’s less than four weeks to get the concert organised.

  ‘Less than four weeks for us to get our shit together too,’ Jimmy observes as Little Joe heads off. ‘You don’t reckon we could do with the help?’

  ‘Will you stop worrying about everything Jimmy,’ she tells him. ‘Now come on. Jiir’s Song first. Let’s just do an instrumental to warm up. Chorus, verse, chorus. Then we’ll do it with vocals.’

  Buddy and Dancer exchange a smile. They used to complain about Janey being too bossy, but seeing her like this makes them feel like the old chemistry is returning, and it’s a lot easier to deal with than the moody witch of recent weeks.

  Jimmy counts them in, and immediately there is a different feel, an energy that gives life to what they are playing. By the time they finish the instrumental, grins are floating around the circle of five. Except for Tich. ‘I missed a chord change didn’t I?’ she asks Jimmy.

  ‘Just one Tich. Don’t worry, you’ll be fine next time.’

  They go through the whole song, with Janey and Jimmy sharing the lead vocal, and all of them except Buddy harmonising on the chorus.

  I came from the north, gliding out of the sun

  In the time long ago

  Spiralling down on the wind, swooping down low

  In the time long ago

  And the rivers ran, for the very first time

  In the time long ago

  As they sing the last lines Dancer points, and the others turn and see Jiir perched in a high branch a hundred metres away, looking down towards them. The big bird gives the cry from which its name comes, and launches itself from the branch, bronze wings widespread. Tich yells, ‘Go Barefoot Kids!’