The Crocodile Hotel

by Julie Janson

  ‘It clear we own dis place, alla time walk about dis place, grandfather time all over, sit down place Dreaming place, little frill neck goanna place, dey still here today. Not Singapore Dreaming place. Not queen place, not crown place.’ Old Pelican said.

  ‘Lanniwah always live on this land. That government want make us Aboriginal people slaves on our own country’, David said.

  ‘Old men talk about dat Gurindji mob; dey standem up, walk off Wave Hill Station.’ Old Pelican raised his voice; he was emphatic.

  ‘You tellem bout dat.’

  ‘They weren’t going to work for old man Vestey for nothing, but what dey get? Dey hungry.’

  ‘Well, they had their homeland handed back by Gough Whitlam. That red sand trickling in Vincent Lingiari’s hand. We saw it on the TV.’

  Jane feeling like a messenger of doom, a mouthpiece for the bloody government. She made dinner. Aaron chattered; she was dying of loneliness; she wanted romantic love. She wanted some hot sex. She ached for it.

  A letter arrived from Mr Pageworthy. He needed more information and asked her to send in her year’s program, in duplicate on a carbon copy. There was no carbon paper. She wished he would drop dead and be found with his beige shorts around his knees in some cheap motel with a bong by the bed.

  Jane saw how the Boss could be cruel and treat the Lanniwah like dirt, except he did respect the old men, like Old Pelican. He would sit on the fence at the back of Hubert’s veranda and smoke with him; they were good friends. She watched them from her caravan, they were on the fence talking for hours about something, smoking and laughing. What were they talking about? Maybe fishing lures and cattle station business. It was amazing.

  Hubert and Old Pelican had a grudging mutual respect. The Lanniwah elder had walked hundreds of kilometres across his mother country, he could sing the song lines, knew the real ceremony; he was a maker of men from boys. He made her shiver. Jane saw Hubert pass him the Drum tobacco.

  ‘Take what you need. We got plenty.’

  The sun was setting and the old man lifted himself heavily from the fence.

  Jane guessed that there would be no mention of land rights in those conversations. Old Pelican was shrewd and knew how to keep the peace. He was an actor.

  Jane heard nothing from the Education Department, and hoped it meant she had passed inspection, somehow.

  CHAPTER 13

  A Storm

  Sheets of white lightning summoned the Lightning people spirits. Jane peeped out the window and could almost see the old women spirits breaking stones and throwing them from the cliff top. She guessed that spirit familiars of her old lady friends walked the earth, murmuring. Jane hoped they could protect her … Inside the caravan, Jane’s body boiled.. Her blanket was damp with humidity, and warm, too warm. She clutched little Aaron, terrified and crying. She rocked him back and forth and sang broken lullabies.

  Rain pounded down in sheets and the thunder and lightning crashed around the ironstone. Purple light shattered the darkness, great flashes of electricity ripped along the ridges. Jane and Aaron huddled in one bed in terror, it felt like the end of the world. The whole plain lit up in jagged lightning bolts. Each one like a bomb in intensity, they coursed through the land and Jane’s body shook. The rain was in sheets of teeming water, it thundered on the roof and the caravan felt like a tiny box about to blow apart.

  Afterwards the earth smelt of sweet ozone, of life and rebirth. For the Lanniwah, the rising flood had ceremonies and stories, it explained the world. The water rose slowly, with flocks of white birds, pelicans and white herons descending where there had been gullies of dust.

  Jane could see Aaron was happy, he ran about all day with Lanniwah kindergarten children and he was a prince, a leader at school. He had new friends in the big house who thought he was cute. Every day after school, he ran over as the Boss’s children finished their School of the Air lessons. He seemed blissfully at ease.

  Shirley loved sitting with Jane on the caravan steps…

  ‘This country where we belong, we lucky because dis country teachem us. And Boss, he teachem me ’bout music; I play organ, he good boss’, said Shirley

  ‘Everyone know dere place. Mummy teachem, Granny teachem.’ Jane saw that it was the past, present and future.

  ‘We can’t leave it dis place – we die, spirit finish up.’

  Jane, who had grown up in Darug country, thought the giant eel sign she saw everywhere was the symbol for the Parramatta rugby league club, ‘Go the mighty Eels’. It was much later that she learnt that Garangatch the Eel was a Darug and Gandungurra creation ancestor. Now that was a revelation. Had the Englishmen who took the country hunted her great great grand mother for sport? Did they laugh and make bets about who could shoot her down?

  In Lanniwah country, it was important for Jane to be placed in a classification system – a ‘skin’ or moiety. Old Pelican had determined Jane’s moiety.

  ‘You granddaughter for me now, yeeai. You learnem ’bout dat. Burnie your daddy now. You not talkem alla ’bout son in law. Taboo for you. You learnem dat fella could be husband yeeai? Who im, who dat Bulli right husband for you’. Old Pelican laughed at her squirming. Jane was about to enter a parallel universe where nothing was as it seemed. A tree was not just a tree but also often a repository for an old person’s spirit. ‘Don’t touch dat tree, Miss Jane. That old woman place; she live dere’, said Lizzy.

  The old people mostly spoke in Lanniwah language and creole, and used English in a broken pattern that followed the Lanniwah grammar. The children spoke several languages from their mother’s or father’s side. They spoke a musical sounding Aboriginal English, and they worked hard in school learning Standard English. Jane picked up the intonations of Aboriginal English quickly and Aaron was fluent in a few weeks.

  As the rain kept coming, brown water crept along the road. This was the only road out of the station and now it was a river. Jane was marooned and there was no possibility of escape except by Hubert’s plane, and that seemed impossible – he barely spoke to her

  One day after school, Jane watched David and Aaron talking, and Aaron’s endless questions. He was very popular and everyone knew his name. The Lanniwah called out to him when he went past and he played all over the cattle station. He collected stick insects and a spiny desert lizard he kept in a shoebox. He amazed Jane with his curiosity and love of nature. Jane was proud of him and imagined he would be a naturalist saving species. David walked with him and explained the Aboriginal universe.

  ‘You see that rock, not just rock but little fella like you, he go foot walking then he steal food then he turned to stone’, said David.

  ‘When? That’s just a story.’

  ‘No, true! That boy stealem his mother’s food: he was punished.’

  ‘I won’t steal, ever. Witches eat children if they steal’, said Aaron.

  David held the child’s hand and smiled.

  ‘You see billabong, that place for little lizard, golden one, special place here.’ David spoke softly.

  Jane listened to how the seasons gave different things, and ceremony had to happen to make sure the flowers bloomed or the rain came.

  ‘We learn a little bit at a time; as people grow up, learn more. When they old they like big library’, David said.

  Suddenly a bomb of black mud hit Jane on the shoulder. She swerved to see Aaron and Leroy making mud pies and laughing at her.

  Jane listened to the boys.

  ‘My daddy is dead; he died when I was in Mummy’s tummy.’ The other boy nodded. Jane went up to Aaron and took his hand, she needed to talk. ‘Come here, darling, I want to tell you something. Your daddy is not dead; he had to go away’, she said.

  ‘We can find him, then’, Aaron said.

  ‘No. He wouldn’t want that.’ Jane smiled a limp smile.

  ‘But he will. He must be just lost a bit. He will want us.’

  ‘Maybe one day, but not now, Aaron. You can look when you are a big boy.’
/>   ‘I’m a big boy now. I want my daddy.’

  Aaron ran to their caravan and took a blue Japanese cloth from the wall. It had a white bird flying across it, a crane. Aaron made a Superman cape and the little boys tore it from his back. Later, Jane found it a rag in the dirt. She was furious, insane with frustration and old grief. She yelled at him.

  ‘You naughty boy! That was my special thing from daddy. You stole it. You wrecked it. I can’t stand you being so naughty. I will send you away to the children’s home, and you will never see me again!’ Aaron’s face was a mask of white. He let out a piercing scream, ran to his bed, and wept. Of course, Jane was sorry; she touched his back, and he shuddered.

  Next day, Edie was at Jane’s side, walking to the store. It was cheque day and she had to open up. Jane carried a pile of children’s workbooks; her body bent over, her face haggard, she was exhausted. Edie watched her sideways.

  ‘You want to burn out? You do too much for them. You’ll be carried off in an ambulance babbling like a lunatic’.

  ‘I’m okay – it’s just so many to teach to read’, she said.

  Edie thrust a letter into Jane’s hand. ‘It’s just come from the Department. You want to open it. It’s a few weeks old’.

  The letter announced the assignment of another teacher to Harrison Station, who would be flown out from Katherine the next month. Jane dropped her books and hugged Edie.

  ‘Hey, watch it.’ Edie pushed her away and picked up her hat from the dust.

  It was a miracle! Another teacher was coming to Harrison on secondment. Jane prayed that they would be human. She put the book pile on her head and waded to school, Aaron swimming behind her as trees and occasional dead cows floated by. Gertie hung out washing from the big house veranda, and the dogs howled on their chains as the flood licked at their kennels.

  ∼ ∼ ∼

  Jane had organised a theatre night for the school and the children had been rehearsing for weeks. The girls arrived at school breathless and giggling. They were nervous, had never performed for their families before. Jane put lipstick on their mouths and blue eye shadow on eyelids. They looked gorgeous.

  The senior students had written their own play about Dracula and the Indians, a mix of American movies and horror. Ricky played Dracula, with white make-up and dripping red lipstick blood. ‘I want ? suckem your neck.’

  Back stage, inside the school, David smiled at Jane; he was a reliable stage manager.

  ‘You are really something’, she said.

  ‘What thing?’

  ‘Wonderful’, she said.

  He froze, and then his eyes met hers – at last, a burst of connection.

  ‘This night, mean a lot, like nothing they done before, you know, really good, makem kids feel real strong. Train em up. You not like all Wunungah’, he said.

  ‘I have a grandma who is Aboriginal’, she said.

  ‘You carrying dat blood. You beautiful, pink lips; you make me … you know.’

  ‘I don’t know. What?’ she said.

  ‘Wantem you.’

  It was out, the thought, the spoken desire. She blushed, taken totally by surprise at his boldness. He looked down, his feet shuffled, a nervous moment.

  ‘Oh that, okay … well, thank you, we work together … it’s …’

  His eyes and lips motioned towards the billabong.

  ‘You wantem come?’ His head inclined. ‘With me, tonight?’

  ‘No, I can’t’, she said. He looked down; he seemed devastated. His eyelashes fluttered. She watched the top of his head, the Brylcreemed curls bouncing. His lips trembled. Children piled into the classroom to change their paper costumes, screaming with joy. David walked outside. Jane breathed out; she could barely believe what had just happened. It changed everything.

  Jane wasn’t proud of herself, she hid in the storeroom, she clutched her thighs together, she was burning up with longing. No, it was ridiculous! Not now, not here; she couldn’t be in love with her teaching assistant even if he was the right subsection. It was utterly unthinkable. She would not give in. She would be strong, she would live on raging hot fantasy, but she felt extreme desire for this lovely man. She pounded the wall next to her head and sank on her knees in tears, and then the storeroom door opened. David looked at her, he took in her body, he looked at her brown legs pressed together, her hand pinching her thigh, her eyes burning with want. He nodded and his head dropped to his chest. He sighed. She pushed her hand across her mouth willing the feelings to evaporate. He turned slowly and shut the door. She leant against it and sobbed.

  However, David didn’t speak alone to her again; he hid behind his professional work, and Jane tiptoed around him. She pushed away any romantic thoughts about him. It was impossible; it was not the way to progress with her position or the trust of the community. She would find someone else. There were single men in Katherine; she would look out for a likely person. Maybe a pilot or an engineer, someone with a degree, a man who was tall and kind, non-racist, someone she could trust.

  Storms rocked the country and every night thunder men threw their spears into the ground.

  PART TWO

  NORTH EAST WIND BLOWING, END OF WET SEASON, PELICANS NESTING – 1976

  This is the beginning of the dry season. It is the time for fruiting trees and a cold strong wind. Jane settles into life with the Lanniwah. She learns how to collect fruit and hunt tortoises. Crocodile hatchlings are carried in their mothers’ mouths.

  CHAPTER 1

  Meeting Orlando

  Jane escaped the waterlogged station to attend the Katherine Education Conference. She looked at the delegates as they signed in and a young man caught her attention, he looked exotic as she watched him walk out the door.

  That night in Katherine, there was a dinner dance at the school gymnasium. Ten minutes before she walked in, she had a crisis of confidence. What could she wear? She tried on different combinations of transparent cotton – no, they were all wrong. A black sleeveless velvet dress, long – silly really, but it would do. Jane felt high anxiety, she tried some red lipstick, she looked like a harlot, and she rubbed it off. Perhaps this would be a chance to meet someone, find a lover. Her yearning consumed her. Behind her were the years of dressing in black, clutching a book of poems and haunting libraries and coffee shops, the search for an artist to love. Waiting for her destiny. Outside the entrance, she sat on a bench, caught her breath to summon up courage. There was no point going into the hall. People might stare, but it was only a gathering of lonely teachers – no one would care. Get a grip! Her heart pounded.

  It was a relief to hear rock and roll music. It was a Jerry Lee Lewis song, ‘Great Balls of Fire’ – oh yes, bring it on! Gum leaves and tropical flowers decorated the green corrugated-iron walls. Jane’s eyes scanned the hall; balloons drifted amongst party pies. She looked around wishing she could talk to someone, anyone. She would settle for an entertaining old woman, there would be no eligible men. She felt like an awkward wallflower at a scout hall stomp in 1965. She began to dance self-consciously, alone.

  Jane saw a dark haired young man across the floor. She asked someone who he was. His name was Orlando. Jane saw his jiving, rhythmic dance moves, and his seductive smiles. She walked across the floor towards him and time slowed down, he watched her approach, he stood with his hands on his hips, she felt full of light. What was happening to her? His eyes were fire and his lips beckoned.

  ‘Would you like to dance with me?’ He breathed into her ear.

  ‘Please take me away.’

  He put out his hand and took hers; he pressed it to his heart. They began to slow waltz; they slid into an embrace. Hot electricity passed between them.

  Jane surrendered to his touch, knew that she would follow him anywhere and that he would eventually run off, and leave her because that is what always happened. But, oh, God, she was weak at the knees at his dark curls and blue eyes. A 1950s style band was on the stage murdering a snare drum. Orlando groaned and knocked back
neat vodka from a bottle. He ate a pickled cucumber from a dish. She expected him to smash his glass in a fireplace. He poured her vodka; she threw it back, wiped her mouth with her hand, and felt utterly wild and uninhibited.

  ‘Na Zdorovie’, he said. They got drunk. Orlando grabbed Jane’s hand and led her away, into the darkness of the school hall. She was aware that her dress was limp with heat and perspiration, and it stuck to her breast and her nipples. She pulled the fabric away and fanned herself. His hand rested on her waist, pulsating with fire.

  ‘I have been waiting for a transfer to a permanent teaching position. I’m tired of Katherine town. I’m envious of the travelling musicians doing concerts and tours. I’ve met some who are Afghan and Aboriginal. You should hear the drums, zithers, and Arabic sounds. Sorry I talk too much, eh?’ he said.

  ‘What on earth are you doing in the Territory?’ she said as she swallowed another vodka.

  ‘The outback called me as if I was a boy wanting to join a carnival circuit … I’m drawn to Aboriginal communities in a way that … well; I just had to get up here.’

  Jane nodded and touched his hand. ‘You are very attractive. I’m glad you’re here. Are you married? Do you have a girl friend?’

  ‘Straight to the point eh?’ He whispered. ‘No.’

  ‘Good.’

  They searched each other’s eyes.

  ‘Come outside, you’re beautiful.’ They glanced at the room of drunk teachers, exhausted sunburnt people with worn out eyes, Christian people who would be horrified to know that Jane and Orlando were about to share a joint in the bush outside the tuck-shop. He leant towards her and kissed her. That first kiss.

  The night throbbed with heat. He stroked her hair and breathed it in, lifting her curls into his face, absorbing her femininity and sweet Indian perfume. She sank into his arms, already in love; she began to breathe hard as he ran his fingers inside her dress. He lifted the hem and suddenly his fingers found her knickers and stroked softly.