Journey to the Stone Country

by Alex Miller

  Amazing Grace

  BEYOND THE TOWN PERIMETER THE ROADSIGN SAID, YACAMUNDA. Bo drove for a kilometre or so then turned off onto a sidetrack by a piece of cleared ground. There was a disused training track for racehorses, a wide ellipse of lancewood railings and two ripple-iron sheltersheds. An old Allis Chalmers bulldozer stood abandoned and rusting behind the sheds.

  Bo gestured at the bulldozer as they went by. ‘I bet that young feller of Trace’s could get that machine going. We’d more than likely get hold of her for the price of scrap.’

  Annabelle looked back at the bulldozer. It was half-buried under a rank growth of Madagascar rubber vine. She thought of Mathew Hearn and the Madagascar table at Zigzag. She turned to Bo, ‘Are you thinking of doing some land clearing?’

  ‘You never know what you’re gonna do,’ he said reasonably. ‘When you got land, a piece of machinery’s like a friend. It’s good to have it around when you need it. But you never know when you’re gonna need it. You gotta keep an eye out for opportunities.’

  Annabelle said, ‘I don’t think that bulldozer’s ever going to move again.’

  ‘I wouldn’t give up on it that easy.’ He raised his voice and sang, ‘If you’ve got the money, I’ve got the ti-ye-eem.’ His singing was tuneless and off-key and he did not persist with it. He coughed up some phlegm and spat out the sidewindow, then dragged deeply on his cigarette.

  They followed wheel ruts past the sheds. The track looping through open box and ironbark for two hundred metres, coming to an abrupt end by a square fibro-cement house with an unpainted ripple-iron roof. The house was set on a patch of cleared ground, a fresh regrowth of silver-leaved wattles and bitter barks seeding among the sparse wiregrass tussocks, patches of thin red ground showing through like wear in an old carpet. Fibro-cement sheets around the base of the house holed and split. A family of grey kangaroos watching their approach from the edge of the scrub.

  Bo pulled up by a hedge of blood-red geraniums overgrowing a netting fence along the near side of the house. Outside the netting a rusted windmill hung in the air, the gantry crippled and leaning, resisting the wind like a frail old man. A new open-sided pole and ripple-iron shed stood alongside the windmill, a Queensland railways’ tarpaulin hanging at the open side, bellying in the wind, its loose ropes trailing across the rear end of a Commodore sedan heeled over on pancaked tyres, wheelrims bitten into the dirt, the bootlid sprung like a surprised mouth.

  ‘Here’s the boy coming now,’ Bo said. He reefed on the Pajero’s handbrake and swung his door open.

  Annabelle lifted her arm and took a sniff of her armpit. ‘I need a shower.’

  ‘I don’t know if Elsie and Tiger got a shower.’ He stepped down and went to meet the man who was crossing towards them from the house gate.

  Annabelle got down and went around to the front of the Pajero. Bo introduced her. Tiger surprised her by embracing her warmly and giving her a firm kiss on the cheek, his short arms going around her and squeezing. He was a small man with narrow shoulders and a firm round pot belly. He had a droopy moustache and wore spectacles with thick lenses and heavy black frames, a red and white baseball cap set square on his head, the peak pulled down hard over his black hair. He stepped away, grinning, an impish expectation in his regard of her, as if he had arranged a practical joke for her reception and couldn’t wait to spring it. ‘Where’d you fellers camp last night?’ His voice was high and nervous, as if he repressed a desire to laugh, or maybe to mimic a bird. He looked quickly at Annabelle and giggled, sharing his private joke.

  Bo made a lazy gesture back towards the road. ‘We was over at Aunty May’s old place. There was a bit of work I had to do there.’ He sounded defensive, or reluctant to reveal their last night’s camping place.

  Tiger winked at Annabelle. ‘Yeah, we know. Clarrie Stokes come by last night. He told us you was camped over there. The kids was up half the night expecting you.’

  ‘Well we’re here now,’ Bo said. ‘If you knew where we was, how come you asked? That kind of question don’t make no sense to me at all.’

  Tiger went, ‘Ooo! He’s arcing up here, Annabelle.’

  Arner ambled up and offered his hand to Tiger. Tiger took Arner’s enormous hand in both his own as if he was being given a present of a loaf of bread. He stood holding Arner’s hand and gazing up at him from under the peak of his baseball cap with a look of exaggerated awe on his face. ‘Whoa there!’ he said. ‘You are a big boy Arner! You are bigger than your old dad. And Dougald was a big man the last time I seen him.’ He stepped back a half pace, extending his arm and still holding Arner’s hand in both his own. ‘What I want to know is how much bigger you are planning to get?’ He turned to Bo and Annabelle. ‘What are we gonna feed this boy? We already got the starving millions in there.’

  Arner smiled slowly and eased his hand free of Tiger’s grip. He went on ahead of them up to the house, ducking his head at the trailing vine going through the gate. He was carrying a box of CDs.

  ‘You wait till old Panya sees you,’ Tiger called after him. ‘That old owl gonna want to keep you.’ He turned to Annabelle. ‘Old Panya likes the big Murri men, Annabelle.’

  ‘That old Panya still going then?’ Bo asked, a note of concern in his voice. ‘How come she didn’t die? She been threatening to die any day ever since I was a boy.’

  ‘Panya’s never gonna die. You know that, Bo. You make sure you get down there now! Say hello to her before you head out to Verbena, or she’s gonna put one of them old Murri curses on you.’ He laughed. ‘Come on! Let’s get into the house out of this wind. Elsie’s real keen to meet you, Annabelle. She’s had Les on the satellite phone from up there at Ranna asking him all about you.’

  ‘Les back at Ranna?’ Bo said.

  ‘Them dam people are making a start on the construction road along the Broken River Range,’ Tiger said importantly. ‘Les has gone up there supervising.’

  ‘You know that Broken River Range country, Tiger?’ Bo asked, a lazy drawl in his tone that seemed to indicate disbelief or a desire to ridicule any such claim on Tiger’s part.

  ‘I know you and Dougald mustered all that country, Bo. We all heard that story about a hundred times. It’s Bowen Basin water now, not cattle. You know very well I’ve never been there.’

  Bo sucked his teeth noisily, ‘That what Les told you? He’s supervising?’ He looked over at Annabelle and grinned.

  ‘Les Marra knows what he’s doing,’ Tiger said, as if this assertion answered Bo. He was evidently not afraid of being challenged on the question of his brother-in-law’s competence.

  Bo was silent as they followed Tiger over to the house and in through the gate. He paused to stub his cigarette on the gatepost. ‘Elsie’s got a rule about smoking in the house,’ he said gloomily. He slipped the half-smoked butt into his shirt pocket. ‘On account of the kids.’

  Annabelle touched his arm.

  Bo said, not lowering his voice. ‘Tiger’s a Indian. Them fellers think different to us. Tiger don’t know what’s going on. He only knows what Les tells him.’

  Tiger was waiting for them on the back verandah, watching them come up. The verandah was roofed over with green corrugated perspex sheeting, a curtain of passionfruit vine trailing from the coping and muting the hardness of the sun. Two old refrigerators and a pile of split logs against the house wall, a small white dog curled up on a tyre mat at the kitchen door in the green shade.

  Tiger paused by the door. ‘This is Pig, Annabelle. He’s our watchdog.’ The dog observed them warily. ‘You gotta watch out for Pig. His snoring will keep you awake at night. Don’t step on him, he’ll bite you real quick.’

  They stepped over Pig and went into the kitchen. It was a large, bright, square room with a long window down one side overlooking a wildgrown garden and facing away from the verandah. Orange and brown squared linoleum on the floor. The room bare of furniture except for a chrome tubing and laminex table, an assortment of chairs set around. A smell of woodsmoke
and family. The sound of the teevee loud from the next room. A good-looking woman in her middle thirties turned from the sink where she was washing up dishes, a girl of twelve or thirteen drying for her. The girl was slim and brown and very beautiful. Annabelle saw something of Arner’s remoteness in her look. As if she belonged to another world and was present among these people for a brief time by some fortunate dispensation of the gods. The mysterious gods working their secret plan for humankind. No revelation of the details. Annabelle smiled and the girl smiled back. Annabelle experienced a sharp pang of regret that she would never be a mother herself. There would surely be a kind of wonder in being the mother of such a girl!

  The woman called a greeting to Bo over the noise of the teevee and took the tea towel from the girl. She came over, drying her hands on the towel. She was taller than Tiger, her face broad and flat, her features handsome, her gaze level and direct, confident, an impression of composure. As if she had been briefed on the secret plan.

  Tiger stood watching her, admiration in his gaze.

  Bo said with a certain formality, ‘This is Annabelle Beck, Elsie.’

  ‘You don’t say, Bo?’ The woman laughed and embraced Annabelle, saying a friendly hello and giving her a firm hug and a kiss on the cheek. She held Annabelle’s arm and reached out her other hand behind her. The girl stepped up and took her hand and Elsie drew her towards her, her arm sliding around the girl’s waist. ‘This is our daughter, Sarah, Annabelle.’ Elsie gazed at her daughter, pride and emotion in her eyes.

  The girl put her arms around Annabelle and gave her a hug, then stepped back, holding Annabelle in her gaze, her cheeks glowing, her dark eyes glassy with feeling.

  Bo was standing looking into the other room where the teevee was. ‘You got a house full, Elsie,’ he called over.

  ‘So when’s Trace getting married to the Zigzag boy?’ Elsie asked him.

  Bo swung around, ‘Nobody said nothin about marriage.’

  ‘Les was asking this morning if you fellers had come through here yet. We told him we was expecting you any minute.’ She turned to Annabelle. ‘Les left us a satellite phone if you want to make a call. The Land Council’s paying the bills.’ She laughed. ‘You gonna have a drink of tea, Bo?’

  ‘You got Bushells?’

  ‘Of course we got Bushells. What else you think we’re drinking here?’

  Tiger drew Annabelle aside and pointed through the door to the back room. ‘Someone’s happy,’ he said.

  Arner was enthroned in the centre of a big old settee, two teenage boys and another of around ten years sitting up close against him. They were going through Arner’s CDs, the teevee ignored and blasting away in front of them. A girl of sixteen or seventeen dancing alone in the space behind the settee. The girl looked across and grinned and gave Annabelle a wave.

  Elsie called out, ‘Don’t worry, Annabelle. They’re not all mine.’

  ‘It’s a kid’s world, Annabelle,’ Tiger said, gazing into the room and confiding his melancholy secret.

  She looked at him.

  He shrugged. ‘Me and Elsie’s just doin what the good Lord Jesus told us to do. He has blessed our house with the care of these young people.’ He brightened suddenly and swung around, calling over to Bo, ‘We got a railways apprenticeship for Phillip, Bo.’

  Bo was sitting at the kitchen table, his hat set on the back of his head. He was looking at his packet of tobacco. He looked up. ‘Well, that’s good news, Tiger.’ He spoke without enthusiasm.

  ‘Them apprenticeships are not easy to get,’ Tiger explained to Annabelle.

  Elsie said, ‘Shift that dog out of the way and sit in the doorway if you want to smoke Bo. I don’t mind that. But I’m not having you sitting there sulking all afternoon.’

  ‘I’m not sulking,’ Bo said.

  ‘You’re sulking. Set your chair in the doorway and shift that dog!’

  Bo stood obediently, lifting the chair by its back and carrying it over to the doorway. ‘Come on, Pig, Elsie says you and me got to share this spot.’ The dog turned and looked at him reproachfully, baring its teeth and drawing in its hindquarters. ‘Now don’t you start,’ Bo said. He set the chair down half over the dog and rolled a smoke. Sarah took a mug of tea to him. He told her, ‘Set it on the floor, Sarah.’ He reached into his shirt pocket and drew out a five dollar note and took the girl’s hand and palmed the note to her as if he was slipping a tip to a doorman.

  Tiger said, ‘I could do with some of that, Bo. You got any more of that stuff?’ He laughed.

  Arner’s music started up, Boom-boom ba! Boom-boom ba! Boom-boom ba! Ba-boom-boom-ba! A girl’s voice lamented some terrible wrong, a man coming in over the top of her promising to settle a grim retribution upon the crippled world they had inherited from their elders.

  Tiger closed the door. ‘We’ll have some realmusic later, Annabelle.’ The closed door did nothing to muffle the sound of the music.

  Elsie shouted to Sarah, ‘Tell them to turn it down, darling.’

  Sarah went into the back room and a moment later the music stopped. She came out again and closed the door. ‘Arner turned it off.’

  Elsie said, ‘That’s what they do. It’s either on or off. They don’t understand turn it down.’ She laughed and turned back to the sink. Sarah went over and helped. Elsie was washing shirts and underwear and other small items of clothing by hand in the sink. Sarah was taking the washed things and rinsing them then carrying them out to the line, stepping around Bo and laughing at the wet clothes dripping on him. She came back in and waited for her mother to finish another.

  Annabelle asked Elsie if she could get a shower and Sarah took her out along the verandah and showed her where the shower was under the water tank at the back. Tiger sat at the kitchen table drinking his tea and eating sweet biscuits from a tin. Bo in the doorway smoking, the smoke drifting straight through the kitchen. The sound of the teevee from the back room again.

  Bo and Tiger and Elsie talked genealogies and family histories until late into the afternoon, updating their knowledge of where everybody was and what they were doing, who had died and who had gone south looking for opportunities. Occasionally they found a point of dispute between them that needed clearing up. Elsie sat a while, listening and adding her information and asking Bo a question here and there, then getting up and going on with her chores. Annabelle just listened. Elsie wouldn’t let her help with the chores. She said there was nothing to do, but she kept doing things herself all the same.

  It was late when Bo got up and went out for a leak. When he came back Tiger said bitterly, ‘I got nothing out of all these Land Council grants and all that stuff.’ He looked at Bo, waiting for his reaction, or maybe hoping for an explanation of his failure.

  Bo leaned forward on the chair in the doorway, his arms on his knees, looking down at Pig. ‘This little dog’s been bad sunburned,’ he said. ‘He’ll get a cancer if you don’t watch him. You wanna get him a tube of that plus fifteen and rub it on.’

  ‘And who’s gonna pay for it?’ Tiger said. ‘I just don’t know how to get along with them people.’ He looked across at Elsie, appealing for her support and for an understanding of his situation. She was standing at the sink opening a big two kilo can of baked beans like the ones Annabelle had seen them using at the Burranbah canteen. She paused in what she was doing, hugging the can to her breasts and looking back at Tiger as if she was proud of him and knew him to be a man who could do no wrong. Suffering neglect and injustice. ‘It’s true, Bo. We got nothing out of any of that. Les just tells us to wait.’

  ‘He’s been telling us that for years.’ Tiger turned to Bo, ‘You ever get anything?’

  ‘I don’t want nothin,’ Bo said. ‘If you want grants and stuff like that then you gotta go to them meetings. You gotta get to know them people. You gotta have mates on the committees. You gotta get on the committees yourself, like Les does.’

  ‘I went to a meeting,’ Tiger said. He was silent, gazing at the biscuit tin. ‘
Some people don’t know they’re racist.’

  Annabelle heard a suppressed fury in this, a hatred and resentment that was general and was perhaps directed at everyone who had ever managed to get a living together for themselves out of the chaos, black or white.

  No one spoke. Bo murmured something kindly to the dog, sharing a discreet observation.

  Tiger said, ‘At the meeting I went to that Eva woman, whatever her name is, she got up and told them, What’s he doin here? Indians don’t qualify. So I never went to no more meetings.’ He looked around at them, checking each of them for a reaction.

  Sarah left her mother’s side and went over and sat on her father’s knee and put an arm around his neck. She sat gazing out at the hostile world of Evas and committees with her father.

  Bo said mildly, ‘There’s a lot of spite in Eva. She used to pretend her people come over from Spain years ago. Always dressed up like one of them peasant ladies with those flouncy skirts and the handkerchiefs on their head.’ He put his hands to his hat. ‘You know, the scarf on the head and lots of jewellery, and sort of ruffles.’

  They all looked at him and grinned.

  ‘Olé! Spain. Or is it Italy?’ he said. ‘Them old movies where the women have bracelets and bangles and big earrings. Eva used to wear powder on her face too, to make herself look paler.’ He laughed softly. ‘Dougald always said she was got up for an Italian musical. Funiculì Funiculà.’