Big River, Little Fish

by Belinda Jeffrey

  Tom passes by the Guthries’ house on his way up to the main road. Cicadas invade the silence with their constant buzzing, louder here than near the river, and the moon is a small crescent in the sky above a world silhouetted in grey light. He listens, for a while, by the side of the house close to the back veranda, but there’s no noise. He wipes his hands again and is careful to keep his breathing quiet. He creeps to Hannah’s window, bending down to gather a handful of small stones to throw against the glass. But her window is partly open, her curtains flap in and out of the window with the sucking and pulling of each breath of wind.

  Tom stops one curtain with his hand and peers inside to see Hannah sitting on the bed, her legs curled up inside the edges of her nightgown. Her long blonde hair falls over her shoulders as she clutches a book in one hand and chews her thumb. She is lost away, like that. Tom lets the stones fall from his hand and they hit the ground with a dull thump. He takes one of the letters from his pocket, runs it around in his fingers quickly, before placing it onto the window ledge. ‘H’. He runs off into the night.

  It’s not lonely on his bike. On the road.

  The Swan Reach Flood Committee meets in the town hall and Ted is elected as chairman. Tom follows him around the town as he surveys where the levee banks should be built in preparation for the flood.

  ‘You weren’t even thought of in ’31’ Ted says, showing Tom where the remains of a levee bank are still visible from that flood. ‘Wiped out orchards, it did.’

  There’s a post, by the river below the pub, with years and water lines marked on with enamel paint and it’s a hundred-year record of floods in Swan Reach. Every town along the river keeps their own records like that; flood maps marking the comings and goings of Old Mother’s life.

  ‘Only thing for certain you know about Old Mother is she’ll flood. What you never know is exactly when and how high,’ Ted says as they get back in the car and drive to the garage.

  ‘Tomorrow we start building banks,’ Ted says. ‘Just preliminary banks, at first. The hard work will start when she gets close to her time.’

  The sound of Mr Guthrie hammering away on the back veranda carries on the breeze and seems to echo against the cliffs far behind Tom. He hides in the shadows beside the shed and watches Mr Guthrie saw through a dozen pieces of timber. Two gas lanterns hang from the beams above where he works and Mr Guthrie holds the cut pieces up to the light, two sticks at a time. Taking a pencil from between his teeth Mr Guthrie draws a line across one piece and takes the saw and hand-plane to it again. He blows the wood-shavings from the timber and they flutter up on the breeze, caught in the gas light like moths.

  There’s no reason Tom can’t sit up on the veranda with him, talk to him while he works, or even lend a hand. Mr Guthrie wouldn’t mind. Except there’s something sacred, for Tom, in watching him build a cot with his bare hands. A baby too small to be counted yet, and so much to be done for its arrival. Even Hannah is quiet, tucked away somewhere inside. Ray Guthrie must be wondering, as he works, whether that baby will ever get to be named. So much expectation in an arrival, and no knowing what it will bring.

  BIG RIVER

  April 1956

  Tom had been down by the edge of the schoolyard kicking a soccer ball when Harry and Wilson found him.

  Most of the class are gathered around, calling or yelling at them. Tom doesn’t know what they’re saying, it’s just noise cocooning him in on himself. Their sound is his own blood pulsing in his ears, his heart thumping. Tom holds Harry in a headlock, squeezing, while Harry’s arms swing behind thumping into Tom’s legs. Wilson wraps his arms around Tom’s neck, forcing Tom to remove one arm to fend him off, when the sound of a whistle pierces through the chanting of the crowd. Tom looks up as if he’s only, just now, aware of what is going on around him, and he sees Hannah appearing between Biscuit and Alison Caruthers, her arms folded.

  Tom had been feeling restless and unusual all morning, like if he didn’t make it down to the river that afternoon he’d drown inside. It had only been seven weeks of lessons with Mrs Guthrie but to Tom it felt like a year even though it’s only the end of April. Alphabets and words, everyone talking at him until the space around him was clogged with letters layered over each other smudged and thick, by the time Harry hammered away at him about Mrs Guthrie, there were no separate words left at all, no thinking, no space. Just a noise erupting and he was an animal with fists and feet.

  S’pose that Mrs Guthrie holds your hand, Tom.

  Pretty sort, she is. All coochie-coo in your mama’s kitchen.

  Sure it’s not the birds and bees she teaches?

  Kiss her, do ya, Tom?

  Should try Miss Pinny next. I heard your Pa wouldn’t even touch her.

  The whistle blasts again, louder this time and longer. Wilson’s arm loosens, then falls away and Tom relaxes his grip on Harry. The yelling around him becomes sharper and everything moves into focus. He lets Harry go. Hannah’s hands are folded across her chest, her lips are tight. Pinny pushes through the crowd. Tom dabs at his bloody lip with the back of his hand and straightens his shirt. He sees a dribble of blood on Harry’s chin.

  Miss Pinny grabs Tom’s ear, pinching the lobe with her fingernails and he leans into her as she pulls him away towards the classroom. Hannah rushes to Harry, and Tom imagines her dabbing his face with her cardigan.

  Tom stands as straight as he can in Miss Pinny’s room, his hands held out, palms up. He focuses on the picture of the Queen above the blackboard as Pinny brings the cane down on his hands. The cane whistles through air before slapping against his skin, burning. His eyes well up and he squeezes his lips together. Whistle. Burn. Whistle. Burn. Burn. Burn. Above him, the Queen smiles vacantly with all her jewels and her robe and her crown. Looking like it doesn’t matter whether she’s happy or sad or as angry as a tiger snake, she won’t show a thing. Tom has never seen her, either, but everyone says she’s real enough in England over the sea. God save the Queen, they say. And, as far as Tom knows, those words are a magic that’s working. You have to take people at their word, sometimes. When they tell you someone’s real even though you’ve never seen them. It helps to think of Lil like that, living grand in another world. England could be heaven, for all Tom knows.

  Mrs Guthrie is sitting at the table with a cup of tea, one of Marge’s four Royal Doulton teacups, when Tom arrives home. He can’t remember those teacups ever being used.

  Marge turns from the sink, drying her hands on her apron, then smoothing the folds of her dress. She smiles for Mrs Guthrie’s sake, but Tom can feel her all the way from the other side of the room. His shoulders slump. He’s late.

  ‘Righto,’ Marge says sharply. She leaves the kitchen without looking at Tom.

  Tom wipes his arm across his face. His lip is still swollen and his hands hurt too bad to make a fist. He slides into the seat beside Mrs Guthrie, resting his hands in his lap, the sound of the grandfather clock ticking away in the passage.

  ‘You all right, Tom?’ Mrs Guthrie says.

  Tom shrugs his shoulders.

  Mrs Guthrie clears her throat and hesitates before leaning over to pull a book from her bag. ‘How about we try some dictation,’ she says. Her voice is as soft as powder. ‘Okay, Tom?’

  Tom brings his hands up to the table. He hesitates, then reaches for the chalk, trying to clasp it between his fingers without creasing his palms. But his hand contracts and he winces.

  ‘Tom,’ Mrs Guthrie says, gently taking his wrist and bringing his arm towards her. ‘What happened?’

  ‘It’s nothing,’ Tom mumbles.

  ‘No,’ she says turning his hands over. Red lines and blisters stand out from the swollen pink of his palms. She drops his hands, making a ‘tisk’ sound, and takes his head in her hands, turning it left and right to examine his lip. ‘Tell me exactly what happened.’

  Tom
mutters something about Harry and Wilson and a fight, but he doesn’t tell her why it happened.

  ‘Well they must have done something to provoke you like that, Tom,’ she says, pulling him by the wrist towards the sink. She runs the tap and wets a dishcloth. Folding it quickly, she dabs his face and his hands before wrapping two clean tea towels around his palms. Her hands are a firm pressure around his own as she leads him back to the table. ‘Marge,’ she calls, ‘we’ll need some Dettol and bandages.’

  The sound of Marge’s hurried footsteps click on the timber floor, from the lounge room through the passage. All the while Mrs Guthrie’s smile feels warm like the smell of baking bread.

  It’s after dark when Tom knocks on Harry Caruthers’s door. He stands back and looks at his hands. A bandage strip around each one. He knocks again and kicks the ground. If only the river would rise up, Tom thinks, break her banks right now and wash him away. Right at this moment he’d happily be taken by a giant kangaroo. Anything so he didn’t have to–

  ‘Yeah?’

  The door opens and Mr Caruthers is there. ‘Well, if it isn’t the class dunce. Think you can beat up on my boy, do ya? I’ve a mind to take you down the back paddock and smack some sense into you.’

  Mr Caruthers is younger than Ted. Tom imagines him to be around the same age as his own real father. He’s big around the middle and strong, always wins the woodchopping competition at the Royal Show.

  ‘My dad sent me,’ Tom manages to say, despite feeling as if he might explode. Or dissolve.

  ‘Did he now,’ Mr Caruthers says, rolling up his sleeves to the elbows. He digs his hands in his pockets and rocks on the balls of his feet, his body filling the width of the doorway and almost the height.

  ‘Says I should fix your tractor and see to your car that’s been blowing black smoke. Do it for free, if it’s all right with you.’ Tom’s hands sweat inside the bandages.

  Harry appears behind Mr Caruthers. ‘Little bugger,’ he says, pointing towards Tom through the gap between Mr Caruthers’s shoulder and the door jamb. ‘Nearly broke my nose.’

  ‘Enough,’ Mr Caruthers says. He looks down at Tom’s hands. ‘How many’d she give you?’

  Tom flexes his hands. ‘I lost count.’

  Harry laughs.

  Mr Caruthers steps away from the door beside Harry. ‘Shake hands boys,’ he says, flicking his hand towards Tom. ‘Tom here will fix what’s in my shed and it’s squared. Go on. Settle it like men.’

  Tom hesitates but Harry steps forward and takes Tom’s hand. He squeezes and a slight smile appears on his face and Tom’s eyes water, but he says nothing. He squeezes back.

  Tom leaves the Caruthers’ shed and it’s well into the night. The car, Deidre, was no problem at all. He followed her shanks and shafts and pipes and sparks and cleaned them out and refitted them. He changed her oil and talked to her. Cars liked it when you treated them with respect. A whole lot of problems cleared right up when you just put an ear to the bonnet or engine and listened. Cars have their own words just like the bush and the river and there’s never any set way they go. There’s no right to left or top to bottom. You have to feel for it. Sometimes it’s not that a part is broken, or the engine’s worn out, cars and parts can just get out of sync. A little bit of friction between one piece of metal and the next can cause a whole lot of grief. Cars have a rhythm, every piece talks to the next piece and there’s a flow between them. Everything has to be in tune or the static will block your exhaust or blow your radiator.

  ‘Be back tomorrow night for the tractor,’ Tom says at the back door before getting his bike.

  One more week and Tom gets to take Harley apart and rebuild her, piece by piece. Tom is about to pedal his bike up to the road and back home but, instead, he turns towards the low road, and heads to the river.

  Tom finds Mrs Cath sitting at the edge of the water. Her clothes are wet and the mud has swallowed her ankles. Her hair is a dandelion.

  ‘Mrs Cath,’ Tom says, but she doesn’t respond. He stands behind her, slips his hands under her armpits, and pulls. The top half of her body stretches towards him, but the bottom half of her is stuck like a grey gum again and she won’t budge. Tom looks around, wondering what to do. He kicks the ground and his foot nudges the end of a torch. He clicks the switch but nothing happens. He bangs it against his leg and tries the switch again but the batteries must have drained flat.

  Tom leaves her, heading along the line of the river towards Jimbo’s place. The shack is dark and there is no sound, but Tom pounds on the door. ‘Jimbo. Jimbo,’ Tom calls, but there’s no reply. He runs back along the river to Old John’s place but finds him lying in bed with four hot-water bottles covering his knees and more water boiling. ‘I’m in a bad way tonight,’ he says to Tom. ‘Can you give me a hand with my pump this week?’ Tom refills the water bottles before running back to Mrs Cath. She still won’t move and she’s not talking. He waves his hands in front of her face and calls her name. Her eyes squint, and her mouth wrinkles like she’s disapproving of something. He pulls her again and she giggles and says ‘Be careful, Muriel.’ She’s too awkward, or he’s not strong enough, or the place she’s lost to has made her body heavier. There’s only one other person Tom can try.

  A light shines through the window and Tom can hear soft singing, which he decides is a good sign. Bum-crack might be in the process of slipping over to his sadder side and there’s always the hope that sadder means softer. Less likely to aim a shotgun.

  Tom knocks on the door and nothing happens. He knocks again. ‘I need some help,’ he calls. ‘It’s Mrs Cath. I need some help.’

  The singing stops then starts again and Tom hears the sound of movement inside the shack. Feet scuffing on lino. A chair scraping.

  ‘Who is it?’ Bum-crack says.

  ‘Tom. I need your help with Mrs Cath.’

  The door opens. Tom prepares himself for yelling, at the very least, and takes a step back in case it’s followed with fists. Bum-crack dislikes Tom more than just about anyone else. Except, maybe, Murray Black, but tonight he has a blank expression. His face is a softened candle. Melted. Uneven and ugly. But friendlier. He smooths his moustache and beard.

  Tom turns, pointing to the river. He walks away and hears the door close behind him. Footsteps following.

  Bum-crack doesn’t talk. He bends down on one knee and slides his arms in underneath Mrs Cath’s knees. He lifts and her body rises in his arms, her feet squelching with a pop as they pull free of the mud. Tom follows towards Mrs Cath’s shack, holding the useless torch in his hands.

  ‘She does this a lot,’ Tom explains, but Bum-crack doesn’t appear to be listening. ‘She has bad days and good days when she’s perfectly herself.’

  Bum-crack sidles in through the doorway and, with a few steps, reaches Mrs Cath’s bed. He lays her gently on top and stands back, scratching his head. Looking lost and lonely. Their eyes meet, just for a moment – his and Tom’s – and there’s a feeling between them, a memory, or a connection and Tom would like to hold him to it, just a little longer. But it passes quickly as he turns away and Tom decides he just imagined it.

  ‘She needs someone to help her.’ Tom wipes the mud from Mrs Cath’s feet with a tea towel and pulls the sheet up over her. He turns to see Bum-crack disappearing out of the door and it feels like he left a heaviness behind. There’s a smell in the shack like something has been dead a long time.

  ‘Come back, Mrs Cath,’ Tom says, shaking her by the shoulders slightly. Her eyes are open but they’re fixed on the ceiling. ‘Where do you go, hey?’ Tom says softly.

  By the time Tom pedals up to the top road, Bum-crack is singing and crying and somewhere, out across the cliffs, dogs are howling.

  No one really knows how long Mrs Cath, Jimbo Old John and Bum-crack have been down along the river. And when Tom asks them they shrug and give a vague reply. Time has a diffe
rent way of passing down there. Yesterday could have been your tomorrow and today has always been. People go there to forget, Murray says.

  BIG RIVER

  May 1956

  ‘How many letters have you got?’ Tom says.

  Hannah pedals her bike beside him. She hasn’t said a word to him since she joined him on the road to school.

  ‘You could have broken his nose, Mot. Jeez you can be a jerk.’

  Tom’s hands rest lightly on the handlebars. He’d promised his mum he’d leave the bandages on all day, but he’d taken them off and stashed them inside his satchel before he’d reached Hannah’s place. He grips the handles tighter as the road becomes uneven and he veers around a scattering of rocks. The vibration buzzes through his fingers.

  ‘Looks like I might win, then,’ Tom says, ignoring everything else.

  Hannah sighs and flicks her head back to glance at him. ‘Not if you go leaving them all on my windowsill.’