Fat Man, The

by Gee, Maurice

  ‘Where are we going?’ Colin said.

  ‘Belt up, kid. You don’t need to know.’

  ‘You can’t get away.’

  ‘Lippy, eh? Like your old man. You sure he was moving?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘So I guess we’re not even. How’s he gonna like losing you?’

  Verna jerked Colin’s arm to make him be quiet.

  They drove along hillsides, high above rivers that turned from green to white among the rocks. At one o’clock Herbert Muskie pulled into a clay road that angled off behind a clump of trees. ‘Out,’ he said.

  They climbed out awkwardly, tied together. Scrubby hills, eroded with slips, fell away to the distant coast. A cold wind was blowing and clouds were piling up on the higher hills behind them.

  ‘Can you untie us?’ Verna asked.

  ‘No.’

  ‘I want to put on something warmer.’

  ‘No, I said. Bring out them sandwiches. Leave the cake.’

  ‘We need a drink.’

  ‘There’s a creek over there. Don’t try and run.’

  They went across a paddock close-cropped by sheep and knelt at the edge of a shallow pool. They drank with their faces at the water.

  ‘Now we could run.’

  ‘No, we couldn’t.’

  ‘Yeah, we need to be untied.’

  ‘What’s he going to do with us, do you think?’

  ‘Keep us until he’s safe.’

  ‘What then?’

  They went back to the car. Herbert Muskie was eating ham sandwiches, taking them from the bag in threes. He had a swig of whisky from his bottle.

  ‘Can I have a sandwich?’ Verna asked.

  ‘Thought you weren’t hungry.’

  ‘I am now.’ She took two sandwiches from the bag and gave one to Colin. They sat on the sheltered side of the car and ate. Herbert Muskie put the bottle inside. He came around and sat with them, holding the paper bag.

  ‘Sandwiches, eh? Did I tell you, kid, what Pottsie and his mates used to do to me at Loomis school? They’d come lookin’ for me at lunchtime and they’d get all around me friendly like, and Pottsie would say, “We’ve got a sandwich for you, Herbie.” One of them would hold it out, and then they’d pull it back and say, “We’ll just make it taste better, eh?” They’d take the top off, see, like this.’ He took the last sandwich from the bag and lifted the top off, showing the ham. ‘Then they’d all spit on it, each one. Four or five of them, like this.’ He did not spit on the ham but out to one side. ‘Then they’d put it back together again and make me eat it. Spit sandwich was its name. I ate one of those every day.’

  Colin knew that this was not a lie. He felt his father shrink to something small and dark inside him. ‘Why didn’t you tell someone?’ he whispered.

  ‘I never was a stoolie, kid.’ He threw the sandwich away.

  ‘My mum didn’t know.’

  ‘Sure she knew. The girls all knew. Pottsie and Poultice, eh? I been thinkin’ about them for a good long time.’ He reached into the car and got his bottle. ‘I’d get into me togs down at Cascade Park. We had to go for swimming, from school. The girls would be standin’ round when I came out of the shed.’

  ‘What did they do?’

  ‘Nothin’ much, kid. They only laughed. Nothin’ much.’

  He walked away and stood on a rise, looking down at the coast, drinking from the bottle.

  ‘We’ve got to run,’ Verna said.

  ‘My dad must have done it. What he said.’

  ‘It doesn’t matter now. He’s got his razor in his case. If we can get it out, we can cut this string.’

  She made him stand up, but Herbert Muskie turned. ‘Come here, you two. Hurry up.’

  They went up the slope to him. ‘What’s he going to do?’

  He pulled them roughly in front of him. ‘Look down there. What’s that there, on that bit of road by the house?’

  They looked where he pointed, far off, where a stretch of road curved past the front of a farm house.

  ‘A car,’ Verna said.

  ‘With someone standing by it?’

  ‘Two men.’

  ‘What I thought. It’s a bloody roadblock, that’s all.’

  ‘Is it the police?’ Verna asked.

  ‘Sure it is. And that means there’s more of them coming up behind.’ He swore, using words Colin had only heard from the Rice gang before. And, of course, Herbert Muskie was right, there were more police coming behind. Someone had seen the Buick as it sped through a town, and reported it, and now Herbert Muskie was boxed in. He knew it and he swore again, and would have hurled his bottle at the roadblock, miles away, but held it back and had another drink.

  ‘No one’s lockin’ me in any prison. Get back in the car. Go on, move it.’

  They ran, tied together, and climbed in. Herbert Muskie started the engine. ‘We’re going up there.’

  ‘But it’s only clay. It’s only for horses.’

  ‘You frightened, kid? I thought you were the tough guy.’

  ‘No –’

  ‘The bloke that pinches the chocolate, eh?’

  ‘A car can’t go up there.’

  ‘You wanna bet?’ He drove the Buick, heaving, slow, like a farm tractor. It crossed and recrossed the creek, up to its running board in the water, then went up a bare hill, on a track worn by horses and sheep. Yellow clay broke under the wheels and clods bounced down into the gully. Far off, the sea glittered and white beaches showed in bites of land. They saw the roadblock from time to time. Sunlight was mirrored from the windscreen of the car. If we can see them, they can see us, Colin thought. The Buick must be like a beetle crawling on the hill. Herbert Muskie had the same idea. The track went into a patch of bush. ‘We’ll wait here,’ he said. ‘When they’ve gone we’ll drive down and head back the way we came. That’ll fool them.’

  ‘You can’t turn,’ Colin said. ‘There isn’t any room.’

  ‘Don’t get lippy, kid. I’ll back down.’ But the heavy car, on the track, backing down the hill – it was impossible, he knew.

  ‘There might be a turning place further up the hill,’ Colin said.

  ‘Shut up. I’m thinkin’.’

  Colin saw that he had lost his judgement, lost his way.

  ‘Yeah, we’ll wait here. There’s no way they can find us here. Where’s me whisky?’ He reached across to the glove box in front of Verna, where he had put it.

  ‘The top’s come off. It’s all gone,’ Verna said.

  ‘You do that, Vern? By God –’

  ‘No, I didn’t, it must have been the bumping. You didn’t put the top on properly.’ Whisky dripped from the glove box on to the floor.

  ‘Jeez. No more bloody whisky. I’m watchin’ you kids from now on. If one of you steps out of line –’

  ‘Hadn’t we better look back down the track?’ Colin said. He wanted to keep Herbert Muskie busy. If he talked and brooded, he would get dangerous.

  ‘You think you’re running this show, do you, kid?’

  ‘No, but we might see the rest of them drive past.’

  Herbert Muskie lit a cigarette and dragged on it. ‘Okay. You’re pretty smart. Out you get. No funny stuff.’

  The wind was less strong in the trees but still blew cold. Grey clouds, piling up, moved across the sun. The land went darker suddenly and when they came to the edge of the bush the hill looked different from the one they had driven up. They saw the place where they had stopped for lunch – a paddock hidden from the road, a ribbon of dark water. A little further off, towards the coast, a stretch of highway showed, running flat in a valley.

  ‘There’s a car.’

  ‘Ha, they’ve passed us. What did I say, kid?’

  ‘There’s another one coming the other way.’

  The cars met in the road and stopped and the drivers talked from window to window.

  ‘It’s the one from the roadblock. They must have seen us.’

  ‘Shut up, kid. Let me think.’r />
  ‘The first one’s turning round. They’re coming back. Both of them.’

  Distantly they heard the cars racing on the road.

  ‘They could go past. There’s no way they can know where we turned off.’

  But in a moment the cars turned into the paddock and stopped close together. Three men got out of one and two from the other.

  ‘Cops,’ Herbert Muskie breathed.

  ‘They’ve found something. Your sandwich.’

  ‘They’ve found your tyre tracks. They’re looking up here.’

  ‘Back. Get back!’ Muskie said. He heaved them out of sight.

  ‘You can’t get away now.’

  ‘I’m all right as long as I got you.’

  He made them run to the car and get in the front seat. They started off again, bucking and heaving in the ruts. The track climbed out of the bush, crossed a shallow ford, made a right-angle turn, and ran along the side of a new hill. A mile away, across a gully, they saw the two police cars climbing up. The back one stopped and a man got out and waved his arms at them.

  ‘If they think I’m givin’ up, they’re bloody mad,’ Herbert Muskie said. Then the track ran out. It petered into a watercourse that angled up the hill, from where distant sheep looked down from ledges. Herbert Muskie tried to drive on the grass and bracken.

  ‘We’re going to tip over,’ Verna said.

  But the car stuck. Its chassis jammed on a hump and the wheels, racing in reverse, would not pull it free.

  ‘Out!’ Muskie cried.

  ‘We can’t –’

  ‘Out, I said. Jesus, kid, you want me to bash you?’ He grabbed his suitcase from the back seat.

  They ran on the hillside, heading towards a spur. Verna and Colin tripped and fell, but Herbert Muskie heaved them up and pushed them on. He crashed through bracken like a boar, then ran back at Colin and Verna and dragged and butted them through the track he had trampled. Sweat ran on his face. He had lost his hat. Oil from his hair greased his forehead and made it shine. He stopped for a moment and leaned and panted. With his case, he looked like a man who had missed his train.

  Far away they heard men shouting. The front car had disappeared into the patch of bush, but the back one had stopped and the men from it had cut across the gully and were climbing the hill to head them off. Colin saw that they would be too late.

  They ran again, and reached the spur. Another hillside, on a steeper plane, ran down to the edge of a gorge. Smooth rock walls dropped out of sight. Herbert Muskie roared with rage, roared like a bull. He looked around wildly, swinging his head. Then he roared again. This time it made a grieving sound.

  ‘Wait for them here,’ Colin said.

  ‘No. No.’ Something in him shifted and gave way. Herbert Muskie turned into the fat boy again, running from the play-ground gang at Loomis school.

  ‘They’re coming,’ he cried. ‘Where? Where?’ – swinging his head for a place to hide. The scar in his cheek had almost gone, as though the worm had wriggled in and tried to get from sight.

  ‘Give me the pocket knife,’ Colin said.

  ‘He left it in the glove box,’ Verna said.

  ‘Give me your case.’ He took it from Herbert Muskie’s hand, opened the catches, found the razor, took it out. He cut the twine binding him and Verna. ‘Wait here,’ he said.

  ‘Where are you going?’

  ‘Not far. I don’t think he can run much any more.’

  It was true. Herbert Muskie was strong and quick, but he wasn’t fit. He had reached the end of his strength, and of his knowledge of where he was.

  ‘Do you want your case back?’ Colin asked.

  ‘Yes, me case. Gotta have me case. You helping me, Pottsie? You helping me now?’

  ‘Where would you like to go? Down there?’

  ‘Yes. They’re coming. I can hear them. Down there.’

  They half ran, half walked, on the hillside, angling down towards the gorge. Verna watched them go, standing on the spur. The two nearest policemen were half a minute away, with the others not far behind. When she looked back at Colin and Herbert Muskie, they were at the edge of the gorge, walking along to the place where it bent from sight. She did not learn till later that a river ran down there.

  Colin looked down at it. ‘We can’t get across.’

  ‘Yes we can. We can climb.’

  ‘All we can do is go along here.’ He looked back. The two policemen ran into sight round the end of the spur. They stopped beside Verna, who pointed at the fat man.

  ‘Muskie,’ one of them yelled. ‘Stop where you are.’

  ‘Let the boy go, Muskie.’

  ‘Come back, Colin,’ Verna called.

  Instead Colin ran. He ran with the fat man along the side of the gorge, listening to him pant and wheeze, seeing him stumble. He hoped the policemen would catch them soon.

  ‘Look, Pottsie, there’s a flying fox!’

  The wire ran across the gorge to a post on the other side. It looked as thin as a cotton thread. Another post stood on the near side, with a bracing peg set in the ground. A wooden cage hung from a wheel. It was tied to the post, above a low platform made of planks.

  The fat man stepped on to the platform. He put down his case and panted, hands on knees. ‘We can – cross. We can – get away.’

  ‘No,’ Colin said. ‘It’ll break.’

  ‘You tellin’ me what to do, kid?’ Suddenly he was Herbert Muskie again, snarling at Colin. The worm twisted, fattened in his cheek.

  Colin stepped back. He was safe. He could run.

  ‘You’re too heavy for it,’ he said.

  Tears leaked from the fat man’s eyes and dripped on the platform. He was changing back and forth. ‘Pottsie, you’re helpin’ me now. Aren’t you, Pottsie?’

  ‘If you want.’

  ‘Help me get in here, Pottsie. You and me are mates.’

  The policemen were running down the hill, yelling at them.

  The fat man put his suitcase in the cage. He lifted one leg heavily and got it over the rail. The wire sagged with his weight, but he heaved the other leg in and squatted like a child in a box too small for it, holding the couplings with two hands. ‘They’re comin’, Pottsie. They’re going to get me. Untie the rope.’

  Colin saw how eaten with rot the planks of the cage were. It strained to get away down the wire. The river ran below, deep in the gorge, white and green.

  ‘Please, Pottsie,’ Herbert Muskie wept.

  Colin saw there was no way of untying the knot. The fat man’s weight had pulled it too tight. He took the razor from his pocket and unfolded it.

  ‘Do you want to go?’

  ‘Yeah, Pottsie, cut it, eh. Go on, do it, kid.’

  Colin cut the rope. The wheel turned, it ran on the wire and Colin heard the post creak as more weight came on. The cage moved out over the gorge, with the fat man in it. It rocked and surged, gaining speed.

  When it reached the middle the post broke. Colin heard a warning crack and jumped aside. Another crack, and the post slammed down across the platform, brushing his arm, breaking a bone there. He rolled off the platform and did not see Herbert Muskie fall.

  Verna, running on the hillside, saw. The bracing peg held. The wire dropped ten feet and the cage broke in pieces when it stopped.

  Herbert Muskie fell. The fat man fell. He turned over once and struck the rocks at the side of the river and slid down them into the white water and was gone. His suitcase fell too. It opened out its lid and his shirts and underpants circled down like birds.

  Verna ran to Colin, crying on the ground. She held him until policemen came to help.

  Chapter 9

  Later on …

  Verna’s hair grew again and Colin’s arm healed. But other things never came back to normal. Herbert Muskie’s hand had been in too many things. The mill never reopened, for one thing, and Clyde became a drifter, almost a tramp, living on hand-outs from his posh sisters.

  Grandpa Potter, as we know, went to prison
for a month. He did not seem to mind it, or feel disgraced. In fact he enjoyed playing the crooked old man, and when he came out he talked of reopening the sly-grog shop in the empty shed at the mill. Grandma soon put a stop to that. She locked him in one of the bedrooms at Bellevue House and would not let him out until he’d sworn on the Bible to go straight. Bellevue House never became a pub again, but as times improved, it did quite well as a boarding house.

  When his broken ribs were healed, Laurie went back on relief. He never seemed to fully recover his spirits or his strength, although most people thought he had done well, standing up to Muskie at the end. He put his cups away in a cupboard. Maisie worked hard to cheer him up. He came off relief and worked as a carpenter until she persuaded him to go out on his own. Laurie began to prosper. He built most of the new shops in Loomis as the town grew and built a new house for Maisie, with a view over the harbour. She took out his cups again and polished them up and put them on the mantelpiece alongside the ones she was winning for croquet.

  But let’s get back to Colin and Verna.

  His arm healed, her hair grew, as we’ve said. It would be nice to say that they grew up and married, but they only met once after the death of Herbert Muskie. Verna never went back to Loomis school. She stayed with her mother at Bellevue House for a week, then they shifted to Auckland and did not come to Loomis again.

  Verna visited Colin before she left. They sat on the front steps in the sun and she wrote her name in pencil on his plaster. (It soon got lost among the autographs he collected at school.)

  ‘They all think I cut the rope because I was scared of him,’ Colin said.

  He waved with his good hand as she went away.

  For a while they wrote back and forth, a weekly exchange, then the letters stopped. But all through their lives they remembered each other.

  Verna is the only one who knows why Colin ran with the fat man in the end, and cut the rope.

  VIKING

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