The Clay Dreaming

by Ed Hillyer

  ‘“The team”,’ she read, ‘“has adapted itself to the individualism and science of the modern world. Watching the ‘native’ eleven thus enjoying themselves, one remarks the perfect good humour which prevails throughout the games: no ill-temper shown, or angry appeals to the umpire, as is generally the case in a match of Whites.”’

  ‘Of course not,’ retorted Lambert. ‘They were winning!’

  ‘“We – ”’

  Noisily he blew his nose.

  ‘When you’ve quite finished…’ she said. ‘“We are reminded of one of our own former Sketches in Australia, as graciously supplied by Dr Doyle (October third, 1863), freely adapting the end of a successful hunt to the quitting of the cricket field in the afterglow of victory, the sportsmen, ‘laden with the spoils of the chase, wend their way campwards across the rugged hills, forming a single file as they go, adding greatly to the picturesque effect of an Australian sunset’.”’

  ‘Bravo,’ mocked Lambert. ‘No, you keep it. I think I shall close my eyes for a few minutes. They are rather tired.

  ‘You can stay.’

  Sarah was keen to make ready, but there was an hour or two yet before she would have to leave. The second day’s play at Lord’s would begin around eleven; allowing for travel time, she should easily make it by at the latest three o’clock, when play resumed after lunch.

  Too preoccupied during the previous week to have much enjoyed the news, she took the opportunity to catch up. One article in particular caught her eye.

  ‘ROYAL INSTITUTION LECTURES: Sir John Lubbock, Bart., F.R.S., gave the first of a course of six lectures On Savages on Thursday week, the 4th inst.’

  On Savages! She had missed this!

  ‘In his opening remarks he stated that, in the gradual progress of civilisation, we find several principal stages – 1, the omniverous, in which man lives on fish, roots, fruit and insects; 2, the hunting stage, in which he feeds on the produce of the chase; 3, the pastoral, in which he consumes the milk and flesh of his flocks and herds; 4, the agricultural, in which he adds grain to his diet; and, 5, the stage when letters and coin come into use.’

  How could she have missed this?

  ‘Ignorance, said Sir John, is the characteristic of barbarism; the application of knowledge that of civilisation. In his apology for savages, he noticed their want of any means of cleanliness and comfort; their great resemblance in language and habits to the children of superior races of men; and, in regard to their moral character, he expressed his opinion that considering their whole mental condition, they ought not to be judged by our standard, if judged by us at all.

  ‘The idea that savages are free is erroneous.’

  Lubbock then, according to the report, described a variety of excessively minute regulations fettering their daily social intercourse, such as a woman’s being prohibited from looking at or speaking to her son-in-law, these many restrictions being based on their universal dread of witchcraft.

  One of Lambert’s eyes was open, like that of a lizard, watching her. Sarah pretended to ignore him.

  ‘As an initiatory rite to admit them into the tribe, young men are tortured. Their dances take on a religious and theatrical character. Commenting on cannibalism, Sir John adverted to various reasons assigned for the practice, it being adopted by some for the sake of food; by others from motives of revenge, annihilating the enemy so that he might not be met with in the world of spirits; or with the expectation of acquiring the wisdom, courage, and other qualities of the deceased. Sir John concluded with a discussion of the language of savages. He noticed the occasionally complicated grammar, a deficiency in abstract terms, and finally, the use of the fingers in counting, which he considered to be the true basis of the decimal system.’

  ‘What are you reading?’ asked Lambert, finally. ‘Obviously it appeals to your imagination.’

  ‘A lecture, given at the Royal Institution,’ Sarah informed him. ‘Sir John Lubbock, On Savages.’

  ‘Humph,’ he said. ‘Cannibalism and such, I don’t doubt.’

  ‘Yes, as a matter of fact.’

  ‘I saw that,’ he said. ‘Read some to me.’

  ‘“Second lecture, Saturday the sixth.”’ She paused. ‘Should I…?’

  ‘No, no,’ he said, ‘from wherever you were is fine.’ His eyes closed again, as if in meditation.

  ‘“In his second lecture,”’ she read out loud, ‘“delivered on Saturday last, Sir John Lubbock contrasted the paucity of the language of savages with the great variety and excellence of their weapons and their skill in using them, since on them they depend for their food from day to day – their very means of existence itself.”’

  The comparison came across as a little fatuous, but perhaps one had to have been there.

  ‘“Comments on the implements of savage life he illustrated by a numerous collection from all parts of the world. The singular curved Australian weapon, the boomerang, was shown. It has the special characteristic of returning to the point from which it is thrown, if so desired. Mr Eyre describes the weapon as ‘particularly dangerous, as it is almost impossible, even when seen in the air, to tell which way it will go or where descend’. He once nearly had his arm broken by one whilst standing within a yard of the native who threw it and looking out purposefully for it.”’

  ‘Mr Eyre?’ queried Lambert, sleepily.

  ‘Governor Eyre,’ said Sarah, ‘I presume.’ She recalled the book overlooked at the library.

  ‘Oh, well,’ mumbled Lambert, ‘perhaps he had the fellow hanged for it.’

  Sarah flicked back through the pages until she found the corresponding news item. The next lecture in the series was advertised for Thursday the 18th, at three p.m.

  Lambert’s breathing had become loud and steady.

  ‘Father?’

  He was asleep.

  She searched around the bed to find the ‘CALENDAR’ feature from the previous week’s edition. Her lax housekeeping could, at times, be of benefit.

  She had narrowly missed the third lecture. The fourth would take place that same afternoon. If only she had seen the announcement earlier. Could she make that? No, of course not. Lord’s it was.

  Next Thursday, then – stealthily she tore out the timetable of future dates.

  ‘Pay no mind t’ what the newspapers say. Your lads acquit themselves very well, aye, an’ shown conspicuous skill at the game.’

  The accent was Bristolian, the speaker powerfully built for such a young man. His jaw was almost blue with the beginnings of a ferocious beard.

  Charles Lawrence managed to look a little less pained. The Times, England’s sniffiest newspaper, would insist on referring to his team as ‘conquered natives’, and the day was infernally hot.

  Bill Hayman nudged him in the ribs. The burly giant was still vigorously shaking his hand.

  ‘Theys’ll change their tune soon enough,’ the fellow persisted. ‘Always do. Saw you at the Oval too. Athletic fellows! Like to challenge some of ’em to a long throw after the match, if you’re game.’

  Lawrence smiled weakly. He released himself from the upstart’s grip. ‘If they are game,’ he said.

  Hayman stepped forward. ‘Certainly, certainly,’ he said.

  ‘Jolly good. Ta-ra, then.’

  ‘Bye!’

  The door closed behind him. They were alone again. Hayman wheeled about. ‘You know who that was, don’t you?’ he said.

  ‘He was only a boy,’ deadpanned Lawrence.

  ‘Grace!’ said Hayman.

  ‘Which one?’ said Lawrence. ‘There are three of them.’

  Hayman frowned, tutted, and then shrugged.

  Lawrence looked out of the window at the sun shining on the Lord’s ground, the green of the pitch, and the heaving stands. ‘I think we should set the trap on our bolter.’ He spoke in monotone. They found it easier somehow, not mentioning Cole by name.

  ‘Involve the police?’ said Hayman. ‘You’re cracked!’

  ‘It’s been
nearly a fortnight.’

  Bill Hayman chewed his lip.

  ‘God only knows what’s become of him,’ Lawrence said. ‘Or what might. Their morale suffers. They need a boost… You’ve seen the match reports. Even the newspapers have noticed! That bloody commentary in the Brighton Gazette… seems like it was picked up and repeated by half the papers in the country!’

  ‘Which is a good thing,’ Hayman observed. ‘Or would you rather have all that free publicity discourse on how we’re so inept that we lost one of our own?’

  ‘Why should the press have to know?’ said Lawrence. ‘We’ll just go to the police.’

  ‘Oh, yes, that’ll stay a secret,’ said Hayman. ‘Don’t you know how anything works?’

  Lawrence looked abashed.

  ‘I worry about it all as much as you do, Charles, but must we risk everything? You know how they do. He’ll probably walk through that door at any moment, as if nothing’s amiss.’

  They found themselves both looking at the door in expectation.

  ‘Besides,’ breezed Hayman, ‘we’re not doing so badly! Mullagh’s taken what, five for 82 off 45 overs. He’s bowled the Earl of Coventry, and Fitzgerald too. That’s their top scorers gone! 185 plays 164, in our favour. We may beat them yet. The M.C.C.! Our second victory in a row!’

  ‘Don’t get ahead of yourself,’ said Lawrence.

  ‘I’d say His Lordship’s playing very well, considering. Eleven runs at Ladywell.’ Hayman’s jest met with no response. ‘Even better than Dick-Dick, the “merry young soul”, why not sub Johnny Mullagh instead?’ he suggested.

  ‘They would spot Mullagh,’ said Lawrence. ‘I can’t believe they haven’t spotted Dick. Why are you laughing?’

  ‘Sorry.’

  Lawrence looked worse than ever.

  ‘How’s the leg?’ asked Hayman.

  ‘Badly strained,’ admitted Lawrence. ‘I’ll need Cuzens as a runner.’

  ‘Charley, we won. Have you forgotten that already, or the good word it generated? No, let’s everybody concentrate solely on the things that go wrong!’ Hayman momentarily lost his veneer of good humour. ‘Look ahead, man,’ he chided, ‘look ahead.’

  ‘I do.’

  They had won. The team was adapting itself, as the newspapers said. But Lawrence could not help thinking – the mutual support of the group was what maintained their integrity, and, explicitly, Cole was denied it.

  ‘Sub Twopenny,’ he said.

  The umpires, Grundy and Farrands, would never know the difference.

  The interval for lunch is little more than a half-hour long. The Aboriginal team’s guardians take up the time in arguing, or else they would surely be alarmed to find the majority of their men disappeared.

  Throughout the latter part of the morning they have been engaged in frantic finger-talk with some distant object behind the outfield blinds. Now, and as directed, they crowd into a tiny broken-down shed on the far side of the ground.

  Inside an arena surrounded by six thousand or more pairs of eyes, eight grown men accomplish this unobserved.

  ‘By Chrise, whitepellas habin’ a proper bust-up ober it you,’ says Neddy.

  ‘Smash it up all fall down!’ adds Tiger.

  They exaggerate, of course, for effect. All look into the shadows, in wonder, a little in fear. They speak to make themselves brave.

  ‘Orrince bant ta set the plukmans on ya,’ intones Peter, and sets himself to nodding.

  ‘Lawrence, him gonna to give you the bullit,’ chips in Twopenny, advancing to point. ‘Take up a holemaker an’ tchoot you deadpella! Ptchoo!’

  ‘If ain’t already.’ Tiger’s words have the ominous ring of truth. Everyone takes a step back.

  Dick-a-Dick spanks the empty air in front of their faces and frowns. Turning to the corner of the hut, he attempts to reassure. ‘Yeah, so Lawrence said!’

  ‘Wha’chall doin’ in this ’ere gunya?’ Cuzens, a latecomer, appears in the doorway. The shadow in the corner flinches. ‘HOLO!’ Cuzens cries out, alarmed. Startled at first, his eyes swiftly adjust to the gloom of the interior. All delighted smiles, he strides forward. ‘Mate!’

  The others gather round to block his path.

  ‘Ma pitja! Ma pitja!’ wails the apparition.

  For some reason he does not want any of them to come near. Gladly they respect his wishes. He keeps to the shadows, almost out of sight behind a broken upturned table, in amongst the muddle of a ground-roller, stacked wooden planks, and a thicket of handles to rusted tools.

  He has made his way to Lord’s, as ever, by his own brand of magic.

  ‘What up, Bripumyarrimin,’ says Cuzens. The others look to their irrepressible team-mate and shrug. ‘Bet you banting some tucker, eh,’ he adds.

  Brippoki’s shadow moans. Each man searches his pockets and throws various scraps in his direction. A grateful hand reaches out to gather them up. It appears shaky. He gurgles, thrusting the foodstuff at his unseen face.

  Patient for the most part, they wait him out.

  At length, their erstwhile colleague utters a plaintive mumble.

  ‘Na?’ demands Red Cap. He speaks a little Wergaia – the tongue of the Wudjubalug, and of other mobs that once roamed the eucalyptus scrublands of the Malleegundidj. ‘Puru watjala…putuna kulinu. Na?’

  ‘He said “many days, no sleep”,’ snaps Dick-a-Dick, showing annoyance. ‘Keep to English.’

  His protective instincts are to the fore, his main concern for the greater good.

  ‘Bael? Bael Nangry?’ says Red Cap. ‘You sure?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Look like it.’

  ‘Gulum-gulum,’ someone sniggers. ‘Him gone wild.’

  ‘You let us down, mate,’ says Dick-a-Dick, firmly.

  Dick reflects; Neddy comes from somewhere near to Sydney, Cuzens down south at Rose Banks. Brimbunyah – Red Cap – like him, come up from Bringalbert woolshed. Tiger and Peter are Marditjali from Lake Wallace South. Most belonged to sand, and some belonged to swamp. The survivors of many distinct clan groupings, as a team they are only loosely affiliated. But wherever they might be from, all of the totem crests respect his word. In questions of behaviour, and in dealing with the whites especially, the others most often take his lead.

  ‘King Richard’, the white men dubbed him. ‘King Dick’.

  The names that are given are the names that take. Even before the coming of the white man, this has always been true of their society.

  Since those earliest days between black man and white, many have adopted European names, their identities doubling, or halved. A man might become lost or die, but his namesake could live on, a ghost of sorts of his former self.

  In the exchange of names, of clothes, manners, language, any joke, often enough repeated, becomes fact. They are stuck with bastard English as a common lingo not because it is worth believing in, but because it is easier to pretend. Their arts of mimicry ensure their invisibility.

  Dick looks around at his fellows and their paled faces. Johnny Cuzens, Tiger, Mullagh, Jim Crow. They are people with names of their own, but nobody alive left to speak them. They might exist, but do not live.

  It is survival, of a sort.

  King Dick. His name is Jungunjinanuke.

  ‘We looked for the smoke of your fire, mate.’ Dick puts an unkind stress on the last word. ‘Couldn’t make it out.’

  ‘Murry murry pire this place, how we spot his?’ asks Neddy, incredulous.

  Twopenny clips his ear.

  ‘Ball…Ballrinjarrimin? Ba-been!’ Brippoki cries out for his best friend and only real kinsman. He cannot see him anywhere in this crowd.

  ‘Him not ’ere.’

  ‘Sundown? Him not feelin’ too good,’ explains Cuzens. ‘He’s back in Town… Nung, eh?’

  He adds, as an afterthought, ‘They look after ’im good.’

  Slinking deeper into the shadows, Brippoki begins keening. He asks for Ballrinjarrimin, insistently, repeatedly, only to be told – qui
etly, sympathetically – that he is absent.

  ‘We bloody tellin’ you,’ says Neddy finally, ‘…’e’s not ’ere!’

  As Brippoki moves about they can see glimmers of white. They smell the animal fat on him, and their curiosity is piqued.

  All things being equal, a man’s authority and influence increase in proportion to his years. This is not true with regard to Brippoki or Peter, who are both considered foolish – for entirely different reasons. Cole, with his child’s penis and his peculiar ignorance in matters of the Truth, is mainmait, the perennial odd man out – whereas Peter is merely stupid.

  As full-grown men, however, they are left to their own devices, Brippoki not excluded any more than is necessary.

  ‘Bet you wanna know how we doin’, eh,’ says Cuzens, brightly.

  He seeks to change the subject. The others, cottoning on, chime in. Despite their fears, they mostly feel sorry for Brippoki.

  ‘Yeah! We doin’ bloody alright!’

  ‘Keep on winnin’! Shoulda seen ‘em Win-dy. Bloody mad mob, dem pellas!’

  ‘It Purs-die!’

  ‘…Win-dy, me bleve.’

  ‘Pursdie!’

  ‘Pssssh!’ With a curt gesture Dick-a-Dick bids them cease.

  Mullagh steps forward. He unwinds a chain from around his neck that holds the fob watch, and places it on the ground amid the food crumbs. At length the piteous sobs quieten, and then a skinny hand reaches forth to take it up.

  Within the darkness, Brippoki reads what he can of the inscription on the casing. ‘“Pine”,’ he repeats, ‘“pine gentlyman”.’ He replaces it, paying his respects. ‘Budgere pella!’

  A flash of teeth from the shadows is returned, six or sevenfold.

  Mullagh stoops to take up his prize, and leaves something else in its place. This he pushes forward, to signify that it is a gift for keeping. Not a gift, to his mind, but Brippoki’s rightful share of recent winnings.

  ‘Plenny tic-pent,’ smirks Peter. ‘Some it you!’

  The spidery hand steals forth again and claims the large coin. Everybody approves. Mullagh is clapped on the back for his good sense.