Four Fires

by Bryce Courtenay

  I take an accrued stand-down day and visit the university for an interview, my matriculation pass is accepted and the registrar directs me to Professor Alan Voisey, who’s the head of the School of Earth Sciences. This is because in my application form I’ve written under ‘Desired Degree’: Something to do with trees and the bush. The professor is a real good bloke and discusses Geology, Physical Geography and Human Geography. I tell him some of that stuff sounds like just what the doctor ordered and I fill in the appropriate forms and, well, here’s hoping.

  In the meantime I’m enjoying my instructor’s job, I’m training platoon after platoon of kids, half of them perma nent army and the others nashos. Some are pretty bright and some pretty green and you hope like hell some of the really bright ones don’t go to Vietnam. Which I know isn’t the way I should be thinking, they’ve all got mothers who love them.

  I go back home on my Christmas leave and find, like Tommy, I can’t talk about my war, even to Nancy and Bozo or Big Jack Donovan, who really wants to know.

  Bozo with his right-hand man, Mrs Rika Ray, are going gangbusters with the transport business. They’re talking of opening a depot in Wangaratta. They’ve got four new second-hand trucks and they’re flat out over the Christmas period. So I’m grateful when Bozo asks me if I’d like to drive one of them. It means I’m busy and on my own and don’t have to talk to people much. I’m getting a bit short-fused too but managing to keep a lid on it most of the time.

  On my return to my teaching job, there’s a letter waiting for me from Macquarie University, I’ve been accepted to do a degree. ‘Watch out, Sarah, here I come!’ I shout out, pleased as punch. Sarah’s working as a GP in Yankalillee. Morrie, who is a gynaecologist in Melbourne because Sophie’s business has become so successful, visits Sarah once a month and runs a clinic in her practice for pregnant mothers and women with medical problems. Though she could probably afford to live in a better house, Sarah has extended the one in Bell Street and the family, including Bozo, still live together. Bozo reckons he’s too busy to be married even though Sarah tells me every girl in town is after him as the big catch.

  It’s February 1968 and I’m sitting on my bed in the sergeants’ quarters, having just returned from the orientation weekend at the university, where I bought some of the textbooks I’m going to require. I am surrounded by these books and my only reaction is a numb feeling. I pick up Stahler’s Introduction to Earth Sciences and turn to the back page, it’s page 1231, fuck, how can anyone learn all this stuff in one year and this is only one book! But the CI (Chief Instructor), who is a lieutenant colonel, likes the idea of one of his instructors doing a university degree and tells me I can have half a day off each week to attend lectures.

  It’s not all plain sailing though. I have bad insomnia and when I finally go to sleep, the nightmares take over. It’s always pissing down rain in the jungle with Nogs crawling about everywhere, sometimes it’s Murray Templeton and sometimes it’s me bleeding to death, then, flash and it’s months later and the napalm hits the village again and again. I think about seeing a doctor, but I worry that everyone will think me a sheila. Besides, what do I tell the quack? That I’m having bad dreams? Doesn’t everyone? So it’s carry on, grin and bear it, Dr Scotch will solve the problem. But I figure that if I can’t sleep, I might as well use all those extra waking hours studying, so I take on a full-time student’s load. I’m gunna try for a full twenty-two credit points. The only time I stop is occasionally to go into Sydney, to Kings Cross, to pick up a girl. Even this little necessity has its moments, there are long periods when even if I wanted to, I can’t get it up. Anyway, all the study pays off and I not only get all the credit points but I score As and Bs.

  In January 1969, the chief clerk at Ingleburn Barracks calls me to come down to the Admin Block. He tells me he has a posting order. All I can think is, please God, let it be in Sydney so I can finish my degree.

  ‘Which battalion, Chief?’ I ask, fearfully.

  ‘You’re to be posted to the Long-Term Students’ Unallotted List.’He smiles. ‘Clever bastard, aren’t you, sir?’ I can’t believe my ears, because then he adds that I am also to be a full-time student, paid for by the army with full pay, to do the last two years at Macquarie University. I don’t even have to attend pay parade, they’ll post it to me!

  My farewell is held the following Friday at the Happy Hour in the Infantry Centre where the RSM holds court. ‘Well, it’s time for the hails and farewells,’ he announces.

  ‘Today we welcome a new sergeant, Sergeant David Eck.

  Will you please raise your glasses in a warm welcome to David.’ We do as he says. ‘Righto, now we have one to farewell, none other than the student, Mole Maloney. This illustrious warrant officer has been despatched from the duty of proper soldiering and as a gentleman of the infantry to have his mind fully bent by the pinkos and supporters of the Vietnam moratorium at Macquarie University. You will all know this is a highly subversive institution where said infantry gentleman will spend the next two years completing his degree.’ He stops and looks around at the gathering. ‘Now, gentlemen and madams, a full year I have watched this fine soldier work at his own destruction going to that unmentionable place in North Ryde. I wish to go on record now as saying that I did warn him that he was destroying a fine career. What was a possibility is even more than a probability, it is now, I think, an inevitability. The bastards will turn our Mole into a fucking officer!’

  I cannot believe the joy of full-time university, though I still can’t sleep. The scotch bottle remains my best friend. I need twenty-three credit points for each year but in fact I complete thirty for each of the years. As I’ve said, when you can’t sleep or are afraid of what will happen when you do, you can get through a whole heap of studying, even when half-drunk.

  I’ve always been a bit of a letter writer but now I’m compulsive. I write to Mike in London every week, gathering the news of the family by phone. I’m getting generally more anxious too, which is driving me mad but making me get things done.

  Mike’s staying in London. He’s met a bloke he’s living with and says he’s really happy. We’ve all been waiting for it for a long time, his one-night stand with Sally Harris we all knew was a one-off. The bloke’s from a posh family, what Mike calls ‘County’, Eton and Cambridge, and the parents are aristocracy and not one of the poor ones. Mike and his mate, who has a degree from the London School of Economics as well, are starting in business together, Mike the designer and haute couturière, and his partner doing the business side.

  He sends me clippings from the fashion magazines every once in a while and it seems him and a young designer called Vivienne Westwood are the up and comers with a big, big future. Sophie is broken-hearted he isn’t coming back because she loves Mike, and Nancy isn’t too pleased either. The Suckfizzle label is now getting to be really big and, even though Mike continues to send the odd kid’s design, Sophie has to employ other designers to keep up with demand. Templeton, who is pretty as a picture, goes down to stay with them during school holidays and Sophie uses her as a model when the buyers come in. The kid loves showing off and is a natural extrovert. Sophie has turned out to be a brilliant businesswoman and she and Morrie are going to be very rich, except that she says Mike always owned fifty per cent of the business and always will. She will finance his share of his London business until it starts to make money. She doesn’t want Mike to go cap in hand to his partner’s relatives.

  Well, my course is finished by mid-October and with most of the marks being for essays throughout the year, I pretty much know I’ve graduated with two double majors and a major. One of the final year subjects taught by Dr Alan Rundle is Land Management, the role of bushfires in shaping and changing the Australian ecology. I don’t have to tell you how well I did in that.

  With my study finished, I’m told to report to Canungra in Queensland to do the Officer Qualifying Course. I don’t have to but
I’m sort of into studying and so I agree to do the ‘Knife and Forker’, which is the name other ranks use for one of their kind doing it. This is because they reckon the main purpose of the course is to teach you how to use a knife and fork properly.

  I get my uni results during the course and they’re pretty good. I do quite well on the Knife and Forker too and because I’ve got the Science degree, I’m commissioned as a captain. It seems to be going all right, except for what’s happening inside my head. I’m given a posting to Vietnam, which worries me because of the stuff going on in my head. But the posting is adjutant of the Training Team, which I’m told is a desk job at Headquarters, Australian Force Vietnam, Saigon, and well out of the battle, so I reckon it will be all right.

  Then Sarah phones, crying. Nancy’s real crook and has kidney failure. Sarah explains that she’s been taking three Bex powders a day for thirty years and the phenacetin has had an insidious effect which has been chronic for some time but has now reached end-stage kidney failure. Sarah, not sparing the details, says Nancy’s had a minor urinary infection and, small as it seems, it’s the last straw. ‘I’ve organised a dialysis machine at Albury, but she won’t hear of it.’

  She tells me what Nancy said: ‘I’ve had enough, darling. Ever since Tommy done himself in, it’s not been the same. You’re all grown up now and I’ve got the best family in the whole world. Every one of yiz has achieved something, crawled out from under the rock. The Maloneys are no longer on the bottom rung, we’re damn near at the top. Can’t ask for more than that, can yer. Now little Colleen’s engaged to John Barrington-Stone, she’ll be right as rain. It’s all done and come out well enough.’

  John Barrington-Stone is Mrs Barrington-Stone’s nephew. His family also owns a big property near Bright, abutting the Mount Buffalo National Park. ‘How long has she got?’ I ask Sarah.

  ‘She’s going fast,’ Sarah says tearfully. ‘Can you come please, Mole, she’s asked for you? She said you’ve stickybeaked everything up to now, may as well be there when she goes.’

  I get compassionate leave and catch the plane that night to Melbourne. John Barrington-Stone meets me at the airport, he’s a nice young fella and he’s got a Piper Cherokee and we’re in Yankalillee slightly more than an hour later.

  We’ve always thought Nancy would go with a heart attack, because of her weight. Sarah’s been trying to get her on a diet for years. When I arrive at Bell Street, Nancy’s still conscious and there’s a black Holden Special parked outside, a cross painted on its door with flames twisting around the cross. Nancy was right, Father bloody Crosby has got himself a limousine. I wonder if he’s just come barging in as usual. If he has, I’ll send him on his bike quick-smart, even if it is a car now.

  When I walk in, the whole family is there except, of course, for Mike. There’s also Morrie and Sophie, Mrs Rika Ray, Big Jack Donovan, Mrs Barrington-Stone and Father Crosby wearing his crook-looking, fire-appliquéd surplice.

  Sarah sees me looking aggressively at Father Crosby.

  ‘It’s okay, Mole, Mum wanted all of us to be here, Father Crosby comes as a friend.’

  ‘Aye, and that I’ve been all my life,’ says Father Crosby promptly. ‘We’ve had our differences, that I’ll admit, but we’re both Irish, that’s how it should be, a good stoush and then all is forgiven. With Nancy now, I’m sending a warning up to heaven that she’s on her way and the Lord will need to be on his toes!’

  We all laugh, old enemies are friends at last. Though I wonder if Nancy will be willing to make her confession and take communion.

  We’re all crowded into the small bedroom. I fight my way through and kiss Nancy on paper-dry lips. She gives me a weak smile and squeezes my hand and I immediately burst into tears. Shit, it’s not like me, I’ve seen scores of people dying, but I can’t help it, she’s my mum. All I think about is that I hope she’s too far gone to notice Father Crosby’s fucking appliquéd surplice. Nancy going to heaven with that being the last thing she sees is just not on.

  I’m about to ask Father Crosby to take it off but then Nancy speaks. It’s not her usual booming voice but it’s Nancy, still clear-minded. ‘You’ve all come except Mike and that’s not his fault. All the people in this room are my whole life. My whole beautiful life.’ She fixes a beady eye on Father Crosby. ‘Even you, Father.’ Despite ourselves, we grin. Then Nancy looks at me and points to the dresser. ‘In the bottom drawer, Mole.’ Her voice is fading, ‘There’s a parcel, bring it here.’

  I go to the drawer and there’s a brown-paper parcel like all the other ones we’d left dozens of times in people’s garbage bins when they’d showed us kindness. It was usually a christening dress when someone in the street was having a baby. This parcel is tied in the tradi tional Nancy manner with a piece of butcher’s twine.

  I take it over to Nancy who says I should give it to Father Crosby. Inside is a cotton surplice, made from the finest sea-island cotton. We all gasp as Father Crosby unfolds it. The back has an embroidered gold cross set among a stand of green eucalyptus trees, the trees are on fire, the flames leaping up, high into the sky. It is the most beautiful piece of embroidery I have ever seen.

  ‘Put it on,’ Nancy whispers.

  Father Crosby removes the surplice he’s wearing and replaces it with Nancy’s. The silk embroidery catches the light, it is a truly magnificent garment. Nancy closes her eyes, ‘Silly old bugger, why didn’t you come to me in the first place? Now you look decent, I’ll make my confession, make my peace with my Maker.’

  ‘Bless me, Father, for I have sinned,’ she begins, then finally says, ‘But there’s nothing I’m ashamed of doing, nothing I wouldn’t do again. I confess to being angry at the Holy Church, but never with you, God. Thanks for a lovely life.’

  Her eyes are closed and her lips hardly move as Father Crosby places the wafer on her tongue, the drop of purple wine he offers her runs down the side of her mouth. Nancy, a soft sweet young Nancy, who let Tommy’s bag of bones into her compliant, safe body when he came back from the war. The Nancy who was a fierce defender of her children. The Nancy who, single-handed, took on the Church. The Nancy of ‘hell hath no fury’. The Nancy who always welcomed Tommy back home no matter what. The Nancy who made us Maloneys crawl out from under the rock. The Nancy who drove a garbage truck and then went home to embroider exquisite baby clothes so her children could grow up to be respectable. The Nancy who taught us to take the spoon out of the sink before turning on the tap. The fearless, uncompromising Nancy. All of them were our mother, and now our mum is dead. The best Maloney of them all is gone from us and we’re howling, even Father Crosby.

  I don’t want to rabbit on, but after Nancy’s death the insides of my head becomes even more unmanageable. At least my posting is a desk job.

  On the twenty-second of December 1970 at 11 p.m. I catch the 707 back to Saigon. The government has all flights carrying reinforcement troops leave at this late hour to escape the possibility of picketing by the ‘Save our Sons’ mothers and the anti-war demonstrators. I guess they figured all the good and worthy citizens who make up the demonstrations are safely tucked into their little wooden beds.

  Vietnam and Saigon are déjà vu, the heat, the smells, the jabbering, bustling world where sudden death is as common as the Mr Whippy truck outside an Australian school. I fly to Nui Dat, where after a two-week orientation course, I am to return to Saigon to take up my job.

  However, arriving in Nui Dat on Christmas Eve, I have the distinction of being made duty officer for Christmas Day. I don’t really mind, the other officers deserve a break and, as I don’t know any of them, it’s nice they can have a drink with their mates and celebrate Christmas Day.

  Lunchtime, Christmas Day, I’m having a bite to eat, American turkey with cranberry sauce as well as good old Aussie brown gravy poured over everything, when I hear a burst of rifle fire. As duty officer, I have a look-see. Jumping into a jeep, I go towards wh
ere I heard the rifle fire. It’s Christmas and there’s a lot of grog about and I think some clown has fired his rifle into the air. Probably some grunt on his way home in a day or so. Still, that’s not allowed on the base and I’m obliged to do something about it.

  I arrive at the Task Force sergeants’ mess and I am confronted with a scene of utter horror. A soldier, Private Faraday, has staggered down the road blind drunk and somehow entered the Task Force sergeant’s mess and fired a full magazine from his SLR 7.62 mm rifle into the room. Two men are killed and four wounded, one will be a quadriplegic. Both the sergeants killed were due to fly home on Boxing Day, having completed their tour of duty.

  I’ve been in Vietnam less than forty-eight hours. Somewhere, deep within me, I hear myself asking why I’ve returned, but there’s no answer.

  I take up my job in Saigon, which, as I’ve said, has the singular advantage of not being anywhere near a jungle patrol. There are captains doing the hard yards in the boondocks, but, thank bloody Christ, I’m not among them. I’ve got a cushy job by most standards, I travel throughout South Vietnam visiting our outlying bases, bringing a bit of news, checking they’re okay, being a general dogsbody.

  In May 1971 I visit a warrant officer who is responsible for a fire-support base at Dang Hoa in the Mekong Delta. I come in by helicopter arriving with a case of VB beer and a box of frozen steaks for a Saturday barbecue, a bit of a treat for the blokes. But as I jump out the helicopter and the box of goodies is handed out, I realise things are not right. In fact, the support base is standing to.