Angel Rock

by Darren Williams

  Gibson nodded, swallowed.

  “Billy, how long ago was that?”

  “Don’t know,” Billy answered, shaking his head. “Last year?”

  Gibson nodded and looked down at the fire. Billy was staring intently at him when he looked up again.

  “What’s the matter with her, mister?” he said. “Something happen to her?”

  “Yes,” answered Gibson, softly. “She’s dead, Billy. She . . . killed herself. She killed herself.”

  He held his breath and watched Billy’s reaction, but there was nothing counterfeit about it—nothing at all.

  “Killed?” Two tears began to roll down his cheeks.

  “Yes. Suicide. By her own hand.”

  Billy froze, seemingly unable to continue. A look of utter disbelief took hold of his face.

  “Why’d she do that?”

  “I don’t know. I had a sister. She did the same.”

  “You trying to find out why?”

  “Yeah, something like that. Make the tea, Billy. It’ll help.”

  Billy said nothing more for a while, but then nodded, almost imperceptibly. When the water finally boiled he dropped in the tea leaves and when they had brewed he poured the tea into a tin mug and shook in sugar from a paper bag he pulled from his pocket. He picked up a twig from the ground and stirred it round, then handed the mug to Gibson. He swirled the remaining tea round to cool it, sluiced in sugar, then began to sip straight from the billy’s lip.

  Gibson studied him as he drank. His forearms were covered in grazes and the grazes were crusted with fine sawdust. His hands were large—the skin waxy under the bush grime as if his diet was deficient—and his fingernails were thick, yellow, uncut. He felt sorry for him then—just plain sorry—without having to shore it up with anything like a reason.

  “You’ve been out here a long time, Billy. Must get lonely.”

  He thought Billy hadn’t heard him but then he saw his head nodding slightly, a faraway look in his eyes.

  “No,” he said softly. “I like it.”

  “You know, Darcy kept a diary. She wrote down a lot of the things you used to do together.”

  “She wrote ’em down?”

  “Yes. They were important to her.”

  Billy nodded. “To me as well.”

  The breeze picked up and more smoke swirled in through the trees.

  “Isn’t that fire getting close?” asked Gibson, looking up, a little alarmed.

  “No, it’s a long ways away yet.”

  Billy looked down at the ground before him and didn’t respond to Gibson’s next few questions, didn’t even seem to hear them. He asked him whether he’d seen the boys but Billy just shook his head slowly.

  “She’s not really dead, is she, Mr. Gibson?” he said, finally, beseechingly. “You’ve been pulling my leg?”

  “No, I haven’t.”

  “But did you see her? Did you see her dead?”

  “Yes. I saw her.”

  He began to cry then. It seemed to be finally sinking in, causing great ructions in his poor, muddled head. Gibson reached over and patted his shoulder.

  “Billy . . . if you’ve done anything . . . bad, you should tell me. I can help you.”

  Flood seemed to consider the offer as he wept but then his green eyes flashed and Gibson retracted his hand reflexively.

  “Mister, I might have done bad things as a youngster. I don’t remember now. I got kangaroos in the top paddock, trouble in the brainbones. I know it, but I’m not a slowie. I know what I know and I know I never did anything bad to that little girl. She’s one of God’s angels and He’d blast to hell anyone who done harm to her. You say she’s dead, but I . . .”

  Suddenly he looked up at the trees and took note of something they seemed to be telling him. Gibson watched him and wondered what words the kangaroos had whispered in his ear, what paths they’d led him down, what things he’d been shown.

  “I’ve atoned for my sins,” he said, continuing. “Like him on the cross. Like Jesus. You see?”

  Gibson nodded. “In the hospital.”

  “Yes,” he whispered. “In there. Everywhere. Couldn’t do nothin’ bad after that. Nothin’ bad ever.”

  Even as he asked his final question Gibson heard the faint crackle of fire.

  “Billy, do you remember a man named Smith?”

  Billy’s eyes opened up wide and his torso began to rock to and fro ever so gently. Without another word he stood and picked up his rifle and his splitter and walked from the clearing. Gibson jumped up to follow him, but when he reached the point he’d last seen him he stopped. He looked all about but couldn’t see which way he had gone.

  “Billy!” he shouted.

  He peered out into the smoky bush but saw nothing man-shaped. The breeze that had brought the smoke strengthened again—strong enough to bring down the tiny pale flowers from the eucalypts overhead. White and pale pink, they swirled down around him as he imagined snow might do. Except for the faint sound of the fire it was eerily quiet. He felt then as though he were standing in a cathedral and watching the hallowed spaces over the altar, before the crucifix, waiting for something to appear; where wine might become blood, and bread, flesh, and that he might be shown the mystery at the heart of everything. He stood like that for a few more minutes, the smoke swirling through the trees, until he became aware of small creatures moving through the undergrowth in the opposite direction to the origin of the smoke. Then he realised that the flowers weren’t flowers at all any more, but floating ash, and the fire was very close, maybe just over the crest of the next small hill.

  His copper’s instinct was too strong to turn his back and flee. He cursed himself for not heeding Pop’s warning, for being so blunt, for not seeing the full extent of the damage in Billy. He walked back up to where the truck was still parked and looked inside the cab. He thought he heard a peal of laughter but became certain after a time that he’d only imagined it. What he didn’t imagine was the crackling and hissing. Maybe a hundred yards away a fire front was bearing down on him, the yellow flames leaping up, the smoke shutting off the sun. He ran to his car and turned it round and drove for his life down the track.

  He kept going until it was nearly dark, east and back down into the rain, wondering whether Billy had been caught by the flames. Somehow he didn’t think so. His eyelids began to flutter with a sudden weariness and after another quarter-hour had passed and there was still no sign of a town he pulled off the road towards a structure he’d spotted away through the trees. It was an old bush sawmill made out of corrugated iron. Rusted circular saws were lined up along its half-wall like ammunition for some grim weapon. He got out of the car and stretched and in the last of the day’s light he poked about in the mill’s remains. He found some old tools but rust had seized and misshapen them and he could scarcely guess their purpose. He thought he might try to light a fire but then decided not to bother. Instead, he settled himself along the back seat of the car as best he could and wound down the window a little and watched as bright stars and then whole galaxies appeared in gaps between clouds. They lulled him to sleep and he began to dream.

  He dreamt he sat way up high under a crystal-clear sky, a sky white with haze at the edges, barren of clouds and long unacquainted with them. Just behind his shoulder were the iron gates of a graveyard. Beyond the gates were new graves with mounds of earth beside them and men filling in others with shovels. There were cracked and broken gravestones and crosses of unseasoned wood, the sap like petrified raindrops underneath the blue or white wash. A horse and cart driven by a small boy went in through the gates and he stood and followed it. The cart carried a coffin underneath a white cloth and he walked behind it to where a large number of people stood crowded together.

  “Who died?” he whispered to the man at his elbow.

  “I don’t know,” the man answered. “But they must have been great. Or very important. Possibly both.”

  The man leant on a shovel and Gibson realise
d he was the gravedigger who’d dug the grave they stood before. His torso was bare and his skin was coated with a fine, pale dust.

  The white sheet was whisked away and a lidless coffin revealed. Gibson joined the queue that formed, then waited until the shuffling line brought him by the cart. Inside the coffin a beautiful young woman lay on a bed of tinsel with her hands crossed over her breasts and her long dark hair arranged round her face to frame it. She was dressed like a bride in a white silk dress with a fine edging of lace and ribbon, her lips painted dark plum and her cheeks rouged. Her eyes were closed and a string of bloodstones lay round her neck. When the queue had passed, four men lifted the coffin from the cart and placed it on a wooden bier. They carried the bier to the grave and were about to drop it in when they heard Gibson’s shout.

  “Stop! Isn’t anyone going to say something? Where’s the damn priest?”

  The gravedigger made his way to the side of the grave and readied himself to begin shovelling.

  “Priest isn’t coming,” said the man, his damp face a bright shade of red. “It’s a sinner’s burial.”

  “What’s her sin?”

  “Killed herself.”

  He stared, struck dumb, at the young woman in her coffin.

  “Say something,” said the man, “if you’re going to.”

  “I don’t know . . .”

  “Make somethin’ up,” said another. “She’s gettin’ heavy.”

  It was then, as he looked around for inspiration, for an ally, that he saw his father. He was standing at the edge of the circle, watching him. His face in the shade of his hat seemed completely expressionless at first, but then he saw a glint of something like amusement in his night-dark eyes and a familiar curl to his top lip. He beckoned to him, holding out his forefinger and curling it up like a worm, again and again, as though he were a disobedient pupil.

  With a surge of anger and defiance he looked away from his father and stepped forward to the lip of the grave. Then, even as a few words came to him, even as he licked his lips before saying them, the four men holding the bier suddenly let it go. A cloud of dust came billowing up. The dream Gibson sank to his knees and looked up into the powdery sky—maybe he’d fainted, maybe he was praying—and he saw, fluttering on wings of gossamer and sunbeams, a whole host of angels. They seemed indifferent. He cursed them. Then the dream rewound like a film on rusty sprockets and the men were standing again at the sides of the grave hole and holding the bier and this time he jumped forward to stop it falling—but jerked awake before he could, a cool sweat on him, the sound of his second shout still ringing in his ears.

  15

  Tom woke to the sound of a puppy whimpering. It was very faint and it took his sleepy head a few moments to realise that Ham had crawled in under the bed and that that was where the sound was coming from. He reached down and coaxed him out and the little dog came and licked his hand and then began to skate around on the slippery floorboards. Tom played with him for a while before taking him outside and letting him run on the dew-covered grass. He had a thought as he watched the pup taste its freedom after being cooped up all night, and the thought grew into an intention.

  There was no sign of Henry in the house. Tom wondered where he might be but didn’t give it another thought after a while. He showered and put on some clothes and then he went and opened the door to his mother’s room and looked in on her. She was just a lump under the covers, but he could hear her breathing and see the slight movement it made.

  “Mum?”

  “Mmmm?”

  “Can I get you anything? Do you need anything?”

  “No.”

  She rolled over and said no more and Tom turned away and closed the door gently behind him.

  Outside, the sun was trying to shine, but it was still cool enough for mist to be rising off the river’s dark surface. He walked up the road towards town, towards the ferry, almost as excited as the puppy at his side. Just before he reached the ramp he looked over and saw, to his dismay, that apart from a few caravans with washing strung between them, the entire circus had already moved on. He sat down on one of the posts near the ferry ramp and stared at the vacated showground, feeling like someone who’d missed their train. He picked Ham up and held him close to his face.

  “I was going to let them out,” he whispered. “Maybe that would have been stupid. Maybe they would have been chased and shot or something, but maybe they would have found their way to the sea, tried to swim home. What do you think?”

  The pup squirmed but didn’t answer him.

  He sat for a long time and then he decided that he’d still go over and see if he could find some trace of them. It was not much of an alternative to his first plan and the last of the excitement he had felt before drained away.

  The ferry was over on the opposite ramp. No cars arrived as he watched and it stayed put. He couldn’t even see the ferrymaster inside his cabin or see his smoke. He thought of swimming the river, but then he remembered that he had Ham to think of now. He couldn’t risk it. Couldn’t risk . . . The death word flitted darkly through his head. Even unspoken, chased away, it made his heart jump up into his throat like a greasy little acrobat.

  He waited another half-hour, kicking stones along the road, and then a fully laden timber jinker came belting down out of the hills. The ferry spluttered into life and came splashing across. When it arrived he walked down to the ramp and watched as the timber jinker, black exhaust pouring from its pipes, roared up onto the deck. The ferrymaster stared at him through the swirling smoke, his long beard lifting like a flag in the morning breeze, and then he came and closed the gate behind the jinker. Tom went and walked round the lumber truck, breathing in the sappy smell of the fresh logs and running his fingers over their rough bark. The driver slumped against the door of the truck’s cab and closed his eyes. Tom went and sat on the railing by the front of the ferry. He held tightly onto Ham as the ferry began to move but the pup was more interested in taking in the new smells than running and jumping into the water and Tom relaxed a little. When they reached the mid-point of the river the ferry’s throbbing little engine suddenly cut out. Tom felt it begin to drift in the current, then the steel ropes which guided it across caught and held it with a low, moaning creak. He turned round to see what the matter was. To his surprise he saw the old ferrymaster heading his way, pipe in mouth, eyebrows wild. He stopped directly before him and scowled down, the smell of his strong tobacco making Tom’s head spin.

  “You’re Tom Ferry, ain’t ya?” he said, his voice deep and croaking.

  “Yes.”

  “Why don’t you listen to me when I tell you to go easy, when I say to wait?”

  Tom didn’t answer.

  “I don’t want anyone falling off, or slippin’, or hurting themselves. That’s all. That too much to ask?”

  “No.”

  “No. All right then. I don’t want to see anyone hurt, that’s all. Not just you. You’re not so special. Not anyone.”

  Tom nodded.

  “You’ll be more careful from now on?”

  “I’ll be careful.”

  “You’ll wait until I say you can get off? Until I open the gate?”

  “Yes.”

  “All right then.”

  The ferrymaster stared at him a little longer, sucking on his pipe stem, before turning away. Soon the ferry shuddered back into life.

  Once on the far side Tom waited for the old man to open the gates. On the bank he glanced back, but the ferrymaster was heading back to his cabin, his job done. Tom watched him a little longer, puzzled, and then the jinker came rolling off the ferry and past him. Sawdust and dirt swirled in its wake and he screwed up his eyes. When it had gone he continued walking up to the showground. Off to one side of it he found where the ring had been; a circle of trampled grass and sodden sawdust. He wandered around and found where the tent’s pegs and poles had left scars in the ground. There was plenty of rubbish about as well, and elephant dung, but that was about
it.

  He went and climbed up into the showground’s grandstand and looked down at the remnants of the circus. He wanted to talk to someone about the lions, and what the strange man in the hat had said about them, but, as the sun rose higher and the morning ebbed away, the remaining cars and caravans all packed up and left. A council man in a truck came along a little later to clear up the rubbish. Tom watched him for a while and then slipped away through the showground buildings and headed for the sawmill. It was about ten or eleven o’clock and he was getting hungry, but he wasn’t ready to go home just yet. He dawdled along the riverbank and then headed into the mill yard. The yard was filled with stacked timber and rusting machinery and jinkers and skidders and trucks that work had worn out and he’d never before tired of exploring it. Today, though, it seemed more than a little dreary. He wandered around for a quarter-hour, kicking at things, Ham in tow, and then a strange sound came his way on the breeze and was tugged away as quickly as it had arrived. He stopped and turned his head to and fro until he heard it again, fainter this time. It seemed to be coming from down near the fence where wood was stacked in great oblong piles to season. He picked up Ham and began to step quietly towards the sound. It became louder as he approached one of the stacks and he stopped at its corner and peered carefully round its edge.

  Sonny was on all fours in the weeds, his trousers around his knees. Charlie Perry was kneeling behind him, grunting rhythmically. He’d rested some sort of magazine on Sonny’s back and was staring at the open pages as his hips moved back and forth. Sonny’s forehead was creased, as though he were at school trying to work out a long sum on the blackboard. Tom could see his stiff dick slapping against his soft, pale belly.

  Tom, scarcely able to believe his eyes, was about to back away when Charlie suddenly eased up, his torso bowing back. He shook his head, then shuddered and pulled himself clear of Sonny. Tom saw a string of fluid gleam in the sunlight for an instant before dropping away. Sonny snatched up the magazine from the ground where Charlie had let it fall and wrapped his hand around his own dick. Tom watched for a moment or two more and then Sonny lifted his head and, for one horrible instant, looked straight into his eyes. Tom bolted. He ran, but after five minutes of running he slowed up and tried to see if they were following. He couldn’t see them, or hear them. He kept going anyway, jogging down to the ferry, looking over his shoulder every few minutes. The ferry didn’t take too long to come once he’d arrived and the ferrymaster, thankfully, didn’t say a word to him and barely glanced his way as he boarded. Relieved, he sat down and began to wonder about what he’d seen. There was something very disturbing about it but also something faintly comical and ridiculous. He realised how little he knew of the world and all its mysteries and the thought exasperated and wounded him in almost equal measure.