The old man stared at the can of beer in his hands. ‘I have,’ he said. ‘Not working now.’
‘Knocked off early?’
The old man sighed and didn’t answer. Muddy said, ‘Bobby Dazzler works like the meat ants. Gets up early and gets his work done before the heat gets unbearable.’
‘And if you’ll all leave me in peace, I might let that bloke in the kitchen ruin a steak for me,’ said Bobby.
Kavanagh tapped Ford on the shoulder and spoke quietly in his ear. ‘If we’re going to be waiting here for her, it would be good to get the car out of sight. You should take him up on his offer. Take it around the back.’
Ford nodded and set Grace down on a stool at the bar. The cook came through from the back. He was young and fresh-faced, his hair gelled up in spikes, his cheeks glowing from the heat in the kitchen and from the steam coming off the two bowls of noodles he was carrying. Stacey nodded towards Ford and the cook put them down on the counter. ‘Chopsticks or cutlery?’ he asked, no trace of an accent.
‘Chopsticks for me,’ said Ford, ‘and a fork for the little lady.’
‘And I’ll have the steak,’ said Bobby Dazzler, his voice too loud, echoing off the iron walls. ‘But only if you promise me you’ll only turn the bastard once. I don’t know how they cook it where you come from, but I don’t want you to cremate the bloody thing.’
The cook rolled his eyes and winked at Grace, who smiled.
‘Where do you come from?’ asked Ford.
‘Broome,’ said the cook, disappearing back towards the kitchen.
Kavanagh sat down next to Grace and dug the chopsticks into the second bowl, scooping a strand of noodles into her mouth. Ford was about to speak when she jabbed the air in front of him with the chopsticks. ‘I couldn’t resist, they smelled good,’ she said. She turned to the old man. ‘So, Bobby Dazzler, you must know everything that goes on in this town.’
He fixed her with a stare. His eyes moved up and down as he took her in, then he leaned back away from the bar and stared at her legs. He leaned in towards her and spoke quietly.
If we can score a beer or gin,
in payment for the tales we spin,
to strangers who have wandered in
to Marble Bar.
Kavanagh paused while she swallowed a mouthful of noodles and then leaned even closer towards Bobby Dazzler. ‘Don’t recite that bullshit bush poetry to me ever again. Got it, Bobby?’
The old man smiled, giving her a full flash of the gold teeth. ‘Only the mongrels in this hotel call me by that name. You can call me by my proper name. Henry, Henry Dussell.’
‘Well then, Henry, what’s been happening around here?’
‘Why don’t you buy me a drink?’ Dussell said. ‘Nothing would make an old prospector happier than a fine sheila buying him a drink.’
‘You want another beer?’
‘Nah,’ he said. ‘I’m trying this new whisky diet. I lost three days already.’ He laughed, a low rumbling growl that broke into a cough. Kavanagh nodded to Stacey and she fished a whisky bottle from under the counter and put a glass in front of Dussell.
Kavanagh smiled at her. ‘We might be staying here a while,’ she said. ‘I’m not sure the front bar is the best place for a little girl. Do you have somewhere else we could go? Maybe somewhere where Grace can watch TV?’
Stacey nodded. ‘We got rooms out the back. I’ll find the boss.’ She pressed a button mounted on the wall over the till, and a distant door chime sounded.
A man Ford assumed was the owner appeared from the back room. He was younger than he’d expected, mid-thirties, thin and athletic, his dark hair cropped short and three days’ growth on a chiselled chin. Sharp eyes looked towards Stacey with an eyebrow raised and she nodded at Ford.
The man stepped forward, forced a smile and extended a hand. ‘I’m Tom Reynard. I own the place. Can I help you?’
Ford shook his hand and tried to return the firm pressure. ‘Gareth Ford,’ he said. ‘We’re in town for the day and wondered if there’s somewhere we can freshen up. Stacey said you might be able to rent us a room.’
‘In the middle of the day?’ Reynard looked past Ford, his eyes moving up and down Kavanagh.
‘We’re waiting for somebody,’ said Ford. ‘I’d rather not have my daughter hanging around the bar.’
‘Sure. We don’t like kids in the front bar,’ said Reynard, shifting his gaze to Grace, who was leaning over the counter with noodles hanging from her chin.
‘Muddy here has agreed to fix our car while we’re here.’
Muddy had his back to them, engrossed in the football, but raised a thumb in acknowledgement.
‘What’s wrong with it?’ asked Reynard.
‘A puncture in the spare, and Muddy reckons the timing’s off.’
‘Well, he’d know,’ said Reynard. ‘That little guy is as good with diesels as he says. He has high self-esteem and a low centre of gravity.’
Muddy didn’t turn around, but raised his middle finger in salute.
‘The rooms are out the back,’ said Reynard. ‘Bring your car around and I’ll show you.’
Ford stepped out of the front door and stood in the shade of the verandah. He lit a cigarette and looked up the main street, but the town was as deserted as when they had arrived.
‘You won’t see anything moving out here in this heat,’ said Reynard, standing in the doorway. He studied Ford’s car, taking in the company logo on the door. ‘You’re up from Newman,’ he said. ‘Just a day trip?’
‘That was the plan,’ said Ford. He glanced down the street at the digital sign, which now said the temperature was forty-two degrees. ‘They tell me that Marble Bar has the highest mean temperature of any town in Australia.’
Reynard stepped up beside him and looked at the sign. ‘And when they say it’s mean, it’s mean as a bastard,’ he said. ‘Every town has to have something to be proud of. Ours is a run of one hundred and sixty consecutive days when the temperature climbed above one hundred degrees Fahrenheit. That was back in 1924.’
‘Is that the only thing this town has going for it?’
‘It has a fucking awesome hotel.’
‘Why so hot? We’re only an hour from the coast. I’d have thought there would be places out in the interior that would be way hotter.’
‘They reckon it’s something to do with the hills,’ said Reynard, waving a hand towards the range that crowded the horizon to the west. ‘They hem us in, and it’s like being at the bottom of a cauldron. The sun belts down on these rocks and the reflected heat belts back like a blast furnace.’
Ford took a deep drag on his cigarette and the smoke didn’t seem any hotter than the air he was breathing.
‘You one of those fucking gypsy miners from Newman?’ said Reynard. ‘The sort that can only stand to travel north of the twenty-sixth for two weeks at a time and then have to go running back to your accountant?’
Ford shook his head. ‘I live in Newman. Permanent. What about you? You don’t look like a local.’
‘No. I was a driller. In Kalgoorlie first, then chasing around these hills looking for copper and molybdenum.’
‘And you never got around to leaving?’
‘I like this place. Marble Bar is the only town left up here untouched by the mining boom. These other towns, Newman, Hedland, Karratha, they make them look like Perth suburbs. All those suburban brick houses and double garages, fucking mini-malls and drive-through fast-food joints.’ His eyes sparkled with something like pride. ‘Marble Bar still looks like a frontier town, a place for pioneers and prospectors. Men of independent mind and spirit. Not these ranks of fly-in fly-out pussies that expect the world to be given to them on a fucking plate.’
Muddy poked his head out the door. ‘I wondered what youse were doing out here,’ he said, ‘but since you’re taking the air, you can crash me a smoke.’
Ford handed him the packet and his lighter.
‘I was just telling our guest about M
arble Bar,’ said Reynard. ‘How the rugged individualism of the Pilbara has gone, for the most part. That this town might just be the last stronghold of it.’
Muddy lit his cigarette and inhaled. ‘You’re talking to the wrong blackfella. Plenty of rugged individualism among my mob.’
‘I can’t stand Newman,’ said Reynard. ‘Company town, completely fucking corporate. Armies of you FIFO fuckers buzzing around the desert in matching hi-viz shirts, like little yellow worker bees.’
‘They’re not bees,’ said Muddy. ‘Bees give you honey, pollinate the trees. Those miners are parasites, eh? They’re like wajapi, like locusts. Strip the country bare then move on.’
Ford nodded towards the Toyota HiLux with the red, black and yellow logo on the door. ‘That your ute, Muddy? You work in mining too?’
Muddy laughed, blowing out smoke. ‘Don’t you try lumping me in with your mob. I work for a blackfella company. Independent contractors, working for all them multinationals. Difference is, the work and the money stays in our country, goes back into community, for the kids and that.’
Ford dropped the butt of his cigarette on the ground and stomped on it, then popped the locks of his car. He sat behind the wheel and Reynard pointed down the street and around to the right to show him the way. He pulled out, followed the directions, and looked for the back way into the hotel. Reynard appeared and opened a chain-link gate, a pair of big brown dogs at his heel, jumping up at him, tails wagging. Ford drove through into a wide gravel yard; there was a small square of grass under the shade of a sturdy eucalypt, surrounded by a collection of scattered outbuildings. Most were corrugated iron, like the hotel, but some were prefab dongas salvaged from mine sites.
Reynard waved him towards a low cinder-block building along the east side, a single row of rooms opening on to a verandah, identical to the room they had stayed in the previous night at the roadhouse. Kavanagh and Stacey were standing under the shade of the roof, and Grace waved to him from one of the plastic chairs that stood outside each room.
By the time he had parked Reynard had opened the door to the end room and ushered everyone inside. The air in the room was hot and stale. ‘What are you going to do with yourselves?’ he said.
‘I’m going to have one more beer in the bar, and then take a long, cold shower,’ said Ford.
‘You do that, but you’ll soon be thirsty and dirty all over again,’ said the landlord. ‘And besides, the cold water here is the same temperature as the hot.’ He gave Ford the key and shooed Stacey out the door as he left.
Kavanagh stood between the two double beds, trying to work the remote control to the air-conditioner. She slapped it against her thigh and the fan rattled into life, throwing a blast of damp air across the room. A counter ran down one side of the room, with a small fridge beneath it and a TV and kettle sitting on top. Ford turned on the TV and waited for a grainy picture to appear. Grace jumped onto the bed, arranged the pillows, and lined up her ponies to watch the television with her.
‘If we’re going to be hanging around here waiting for your wife, then I’m going to take a shower,’ said Kavanagh, ‘so maybe you could go back to the bar and give us some space.’
Ford went to the door. ‘Maybe I’ll see if they have any more noodles. I never got the chance to eat mine.’
He stepped through the door and looked out across the yard. The main part of the hotel stretched along the far side towards the gate, and a low iron building ran along the side of the yard adjoining the road. A sign on its door announced that it was private, and Ford decided it must be where Reynard lived. In the angle between the two buildings was a paved area with a barbecue and a collection of mismatched chairs, a small lemon tree breaking through the concrete. A rusted swing set was standing on the square of lawn.
He crossed this patio and walked through a door into the hotel, finding himself in the pool room. He stepped through the archway into the bar and was met by a row of terrified faces.
Reynard and Stacey stood behind the bar, Muddy and Dussell were leaning on the stools in front of it, and all four of them looked at him with expressions of fear and bewilderment. Ford caught Muddy’s eyes darting to his right; following them, he saw the silhouette of a man in the doorway, framed in bright white light from outside. He recognised the furled umbrella in the man’s hand, and the outline of his bowl haircut.
‘Here he is!’ said a voice behind him, and Ford turned to see Bronson leaning casually against the wall beside the archway.
THIRTEEN
Bronson stepped out behind Ford, his broad shoulders filling the archway. He leaned forward and stared at Ford’s face, at the cut on his nose and the blackening ring around his eye. ‘Jeez, that came up quick,’ he said. ‘You must bruise easy.’
Wu took a step inside the front door and lit a cigarette, the umbrella hooked over his elbow to leave both hands free.
Reynard was the only other person in the room who seemed relaxed; Stacey, Muddy and Dussell fidgeted, waiting to see what Bronson would do.
‘Are these the people you were waiting for?’ said Reynard, throwing Ford a little smile to let him know he was cool with the situation.
Ford turned around in the centre of the room, looking first at Wu and then at Bronson, blocking both his exits. There was a doorway behind the bar that led to the kitchen, but he had no route to it. Bronson was enjoying working the room.
Ford sighed and perched on the end of the sofa, his elbows on his knees. ‘These are a couple of guys I thought I’d left behind.’
Stacey took a couple of steps towards the kitchen door but Bronson raised a finger and with the slightest shake of his head she stopped.
‘I’d hoped it might have taken you longer to fix your car,’ said Ford.
Bronson turned to him and smiled. ‘Normally it would take me about three minutes to jack another car,’ he said. ‘We waited an hour in that roadhouse and no other cars came through. Still, those ladies kept us going with coffee, no trouble at all, although Wu had never seen anything quite like those deep-fried spring-roll things they serve round here. What do you call them?’
‘Chiko rolls,’ said Ford.
‘That’s the beast,’ said Bronson. ‘Wu took one bite out of it and spat the thing onto the counter. No table manners, the Chinese.’
If Wu understood what was being said, there was no change in his expression to signal it.
Reynard walked lazily to the end of the bar and stood next to Dussell, put his hands flat on the counter, his head held high, letting them know they weren’t yet in complete control. Bronson turned to him next, staring at him for a long while, making him wait for it. ‘Would I be right if I said you were the manager of this place?’ he said, folding his arms across his chest, leaning one shoulder against the frame of the arch.
‘My name is above the door,’ said Reynard. ‘I’m the owner.’ He straightened his back, pushed out his chest a little more.
‘You make a living in this town?’ asked Bronson, keeping it casual. ‘The streets are deserted. Where the fuck is everybody?’
Dussell took a small sip of his beer, watching them both out of the side of his right eye. ‘There are more citizens of Marble Bar in the cemetery than there are walking the streets,’ he said.
Bronson laughed, a deep rumble from his chest. The jukebox had gone quiet. ‘I reckon there might be a few more underground before the weekend’s over.’
Muddy sniggered, swivelling on his bar stool to face Bronson, his legs dangling, his thongs waving up and down, slapping against the soles of his feet. ‘Is that why you two are dressed like undertakers?’
Bronson looked down at his black suit, brushed some specks of dust off the lapels, grabbed hold of the hem of his jacket and pulled it straight. ‘You ever see an undertaker wearing tailoring as fine as this?’
‘Must be difficult getting off-the-peg suits to fit, big bloke like you,’ said Reynard.
‘I get my suits hand-made in Savile Row,’ said Bronson, holding his
arms out wide to show the cut. ‘Get measured up every time I pass through London.’
Muddy took off his baseball cap, swept his hair back under it and screwed it down onto his head, the peak still backwards. ‘You dress like that, you look like you never been round here before, but you just walk in here like you own the place, brother.’
Bronson pushed off from the wall and took two quick steps towards Muddy, towering over him. ‘Don’t call me your brother,’ he said. ‘You’re insulting my mother.’ He licked the beads of sweat off his top lip, ran a hand across his damp forehead. He looked Muddy up and down, taking in his clothes. ‘Just because my skin is a shade darker than these pakeha, you think I’m your brother? I got no connection to you. You’re just some bush blackfella dressed up like he’s straight outta Compton.’
The tension was broken by the cook appearing behind the bar, holding a plate laden with an oversize steak crowded by vegetables. His eyes swept the room, taking in Bronson and Wu and the apprehension on everyone’s face, and a similar expression crept across his own. He put the steak in front of Dussell, then turned back towards the kitchen.
He was stopped by Wu shouting from the doorway, something sharp and unintelligible, abrupt and high-pitched. They all turned to face him in surprise, Ford thinking that it was the first time he had heard him speak. Wu’s mouth barely moved as it let out three more bursts, which sounded to Ford like a small dog barking. Bronson didn’t flinch but turned calmly to the cook. ‘What’s your name, buddy?’
The cook looked at his feet. ‘Charlie,’ he said.
‘Well, Charlie, why don’t you do as my friend asks and stay right where you are until we’ve sorted all this out.’
Charlie’s eyes were wide, still trying to work out what was going on. ‘I didn’t understand what he was shouting about,’ he said, wiping his hands on his apron, then brushing his hair from in front of his eyes. ‘Where’s he from?’
‘We’ve come here from Macau. You ever been there?’ asked Bronson.
Charlie shook his head. ‘Never left Australia.’ He looked at Reynard, and the landlord nodded his head slowly, trying to show the cook that everything was alright.
Marble Bar Page 11