by Paul Collins
Rachel suddenly realised: ‘You’re Jimmy, aren’t you? I’m a drummer, too.’
‘And you want to know what it’s like playing with the Beatles, right?’
She did, but suspected he was tired of being asked and shook her head.
‘It says in the papers that this is going to help your career when you go home. Is it?’
He chuckled, a little sadly. ‘Maybe. I can start a band now. But - when you’ve played with the best - you know?’
She nodded. She did know.
The other man came back. ‘Come on, Jimmy, time to go. I can’t waste time - the lads have a busy day.’
Jimmy rose. He winked at her. ‘I wouldn’t have missed it for anything.Just so you know.’
She smiled back at him, and checked her watch. Time to go.
Dad and Beck were waiting for her in the hospital foyer. ‘Where were you?’ Beck demanded. ‘I was out of my mind! If Dad hadn’t told me when I rang .. .’
‘Shh,’ said Dad. ‘Let’s go and see your new brother.’
The baby was in his cot behind the window, red and wrinkled. Rachel loved him right away.
Then they went to see Mum. Rachel hugged her.
‘Ouch!’ Mum said. ‘Be careful! Well? Seen your brother?’
‘He’sgorgeous, Mum.’
‘He looks like Winston Churchill,’ said Beck, add ing, ‘like every other baby.’
‘Thanks for that inspiring comment,’ said Mum drily. ‘You know, Rachel, we might call him Richard. How’s that? Ringo’s real name?’
Rachel smiled, but shook her head. ‘No, Mum,’ she said softly. ‘Call himJimmy.’
Tasmania, 1935
George pedalled along the wet road. His knobbly knees were hidden under flannel trousers, but his toes muttered a complaint at the tightness of his shoes. Water fanned up from his bike tyres and wet his legs. His mum would have said he was looking for trouble. Maybe she would have been right.
George was a working man now. He’d been dux of the school. He could have gone to high school and excelled there too, but Mum said no. High school meant train travel and she knew about trains. Broken windows, slashed seats and larrikins scrawling rude words on the floor of the carriage. Seven years of schooling was plenty. George could sit the Post Office exam.
George sat the exam. He’d topped that, too. Now he boarded with his brother Arthur, who was twenty years older.
George had a couple of hours before teatime and he didn’t want to spend them with his giggling nieces. He turned off the main road and pedalled down to Mill Dam to look at the river.
The weeklong rain had stopped, and it looked as though the river had swallowed it all. It flowed merrily along, churning up smooth khaki-coloured waves.
George got off his bike and watched bits of tree glide downstream. The roaring formed a background for his thoughts, just as his brother Reg’s sax sang a background at tea dances. George leaned his bike on the rail and played imaginary drums on the rounded metal pipe. He was a drummer in Reg’s dance band, and they were playing at Mrs Pitts’ place tomorrow. George hoped there might be buns.
His invisible drumsticks whirled into the river as he spotted a rope knotted to the rail a few yards downstream. He squelched over for a look. The rope was stretched tightly enough to twang. George put his hand on it, and felt the vibrations thrumming up from the captive boat on the other end. He leaned over the railing. The boat was a dinghy, a ten-foot flattie with upturned metal rowlocks and a pair of oars stowed tidily on the bottom boards under the seat.
George considered the river, the boat, and this un expected opportunity. He knew how to row a boat. Mum had been angry when Reg took George out on the lake because George couldn’t swim, but rowing had come easy. George was more than six feet tall and Reg said his long legs meant he was built right for rowing, ‘Cause you can brace your feet, see,’ said
Reg, his eyes twinkling. George had always wanted to try it again, and here was his chance.
Being tall was a bad thing when you inherited clothing and shoes from brothers who were older but shorter. You got cold ankles, cold wrists and your toes got pinched out of line. Still, thought George as he climbed over the rail and let himself down to stand in the boat, there are advantages. If he’d been a shortie he couldn’t have reached to untie the rope from the rail.
The boat jittered on the river like a pony. It wanted to glide away. George sat down and pulled the oars out from under the seat. He slid them into the row locks and jigged them about to make sure they were secure. He barely heard them clonk above the song of the river.
George stood up again, swaying, and reached to untie the rope. It was fastened in a highwayman’s hitch, so a single tug had it free. The rope slithered into the boat and his breath oqftd out as he sat down harder than he had intended. As he grasped the oars, he realised he’d have to move fast. Already he was several yards downstream from the boat’s mooring. George swung the heavy oars backwards like a bird’s wings then brought them down to bite into the water. He braced his feet as Reg had shown him, and pulled his fists towards his waist. The boat responded. It didn’t go upstream, exactly, but at least it wasn’t going downstream quite so fast.
George swung and dipped and pulled again and felt the boat creep a few inches backwards. That was splendid, but when he lifted the oars to swing again he more than lost the progress he’d made.
‘Must try harder,’ said George, which was what the schoolmaster used to write on his cousin’s report cards.
He swung the oars faster, churning away like the paddle steamer he’d seen at the pictures. It was splashy, but he was making headway. George whistled between his teeth as he bent to his task. He thought he’d better get the boat back to where he’d found it, tie it up and pedal off home.
All went well until one oar missed its bite in the water and skittered through the tops of the little waves. The other plunged deeply and the boat bucked and swung in a half circle. George fell sideways, cracking his head on the rowlock.
‘Ow!’ he said, dabbing at his face. Now he’d have a black eye and Arthur would think he’d been fight ing. He sat up, and realised the boat was headed downstream again.
Well, he obviously wasn’t going to get the boat back to where he’d started, so he’d better just paddle to the rail and tie up where he could.
George bent over the oars and pulled with all his strength. They acted like a brake, but he wasn’t sure how to make the boat go sideways. He tried paddling with one oar, but the dinghy just spun.
By now he was so wet that a few sudden spatters of rain didn’t seem to matter, but the iron-grey sky was darkening towards evening. If he didn’t hurry, he’d be late for tea. George rowed as hard as he could. He could feel his heart thudding and his breath coming short. Rowing was hard work, but that wasn’t all. He was getting scared.
The river seemed to be galloping along now, toss ing its mane of foam like a cranky horse. George gave up on rowing, since it seemed to be making no difference, and hung onto the gunwales. Should he jump out? But he couldn’t swim! (That was Mum’s fault too. She said if he learned to swim he’d be off getting drowned as soon as her back was turned.) Reg said he could learn by standing on one toe in the river and paddling his arms until his legs floated up. If he ever got out of this fix, George resolved to learn.
He was wondering if he could possibly stop the boat by wrenching an oar out of the rowlock and digging it into the riverbed like a punt pole, when he saw a curved line cutting across the river ahead. It was the Mill Dam weir.
George went even colder. Either the dinghy would crash into the weir, or else it would go sliding over on the rain-swollen current. Neither was a good thing, but just maybe he could jump out and haul himself along the weir to the bank. George shipped the oars as Reg had taught him. Then he returned his hands to thei
r white-knuckled grasp on the gunwales. The roar and swish of the river masked his galloping heart as he readied himself to jump.
This was going to hurt. If he was lucky, he’d be bruised and battered. If he was unlucky, he’d be dead; drowned or bashed to death. Mum would cry when she saw his bloated body and she’d say she’d told him so ...
The dinghy tore towards the weir like a horse at a hurdle. George hauled a deep breath into his lungs and flexed his knees. Then, before he was ready, the bow lifted on a wavelet and slammed down on the we1r.
George yelled and bit his tongue, but the boat wasn’t finished yet. It shied sideways, slithered and crunched, and then jerked twice as it tried to float in the too-shallow water. Unable to complete the trip over the weir, it tipped instead. The gunwale dipped under water and before George could make a move, the boat turned turtle.
George tumbled into the water, gulped in a mouth ful and choked. He flailed his arms and legs as the current slammed him against the side of the boat. Distantly, he heard a crunching crack as the marine ply splintered under the pressure. George thought he was dying, but one of his feet hit against something hard. The weir. Gasping and spluttering, he grabbed and dragged, then draped himself over the rocky lip with cold water trying to carry him off. His hands were numb but he clung to the rocks and squirmed until he was lying lengthways along the weir. A huge shape, which he realised vaguely must be the boat, lolled and crashed repeatedly beside him.
Startled to find himself still alive, George squinted along the weir to find out which bank was nearer. Then he began his slow and painful journey back to dry land.
George shook uncontrollably as he pedalled towards Arthur’s house. Everything hurt and he had lost a shoe. Wearily he got off his bike and propped it against Arthur’s fence. The door opened, spilling light out into the street.
‘Blimey!’ said Reg. ‘I came over to see if Arthur’s piano’s in tune and find a drowned rat. What hap pened to you, George?’
George explained.
‘Blimey,’ said Reg again. ‘If that was old man Tupman’s flattie you did for, he won’t be too pleased. Still, you got your pay. Might take a few months wages, but you can set him right.’
George sighed. He was a working man now. It was up to him to get out of the mess he was in.
‘Hope you’ll be up to playing tomorrer?’ said Reg.
‘Yes, Reg.’ George examined his skinned and bat tered knuckles. He’d have to be right for drumming. If he didn’t drum, he didn’t get paid.
Reg clapped him on the shoulder. ‘Chin up,
George. If I’d known you were that desperate to learn this swimming business I’d have tossed you in the river myself’
George lifted his chin and managed a grin. Come summer, he’d be balanced on one toe in the river and paddling his arms. If he could be dux of his school and the Post Office exam, he reckoned he’d excel at learning to swim.
My name is Iqbal Masih. I come from Muridke, a rural village near the city of Lahore, Pakistan.
In our village, my family is the poorest of the poor. Six hundred rupees is a fortune to them. It buys two goats and a pot filled to the brim with lentils. Six hundred rupees is how much my family received when they sold me.
I do not blame my family for bonding me to the cruel man. They could not afford to feed me or my sisters or pay for my brother’s wedding. The day I was four years old and the city man put money into my mother’s hand was the saddest of my life. The man, my owner, put me into the back of his car and we drove away. I had never been in a car before. It drove so fast. We travelled a very long way, far from the fields of my home to a place in the city. And that is where I learned my fate. I was to become a carpet weaver.
The factory is enormous compared to my family’s hut, and filled with many looms. All day and half the night the sounds of carpets being made throb in my ears. Combs beat against the woven thread.
Wood clanks. Men, women and children cough. It is so dusty in this factory, so dark. A place of much sadness. A place I hate with all my being.
I am always afraid. The supervisor and the owner scold and shout. They beat me on the back and head and curse me. If I make a tiny mistake, if I acciden tally cut the thread, the supervisor takes a belt to me. Like the others, I work fourteen hours a day with one hour off. I am never allowed to go outside. My fingers bleed from where the threads cut me. When I cry with pain, the supervisor puts coffee powder on it and tells me to keep working. There is no medicine when I am sick.
This is the path that God has put me on so I have to work. It is written on my head and nobody can change my life. I don’t want to weave, but there is no other way. Perhaps one day I will repay the six hundred rupees and return to my family.
I sleep in the factory with Nadeem and his cousin
Amin. We prepare our food here and sleep in a space between the machines. Every morning at four we get up. Today I am yawning and stretching from sleep when Nadeem whispers in my ear, ‘Amin and I are leaving today.’
I look at him, much puzzled. In the six years I have been in the factory nobody has ever left the looms.
‘We are running away,’ says Nadeem. ‘Do you wish to come with us?’
To run away! Such a thought!
‘There is a freedom celebration in the city,’ says Nadeem. ‘Yesterday I overheard the owner speaking with the supervisor. And this morning the door is not locked. So, Iqbal, are you with us?’
I nod, and my heart leaps with joy. But also I am filled with much fear.
Crouching low, we make our way through the darkness out of our prison.
The colours of outside almost blind me. I had forgotten that the sky could be so blue. And here, too, are people who smile, who do not reach out to slap my head. Or call me names that not even an animal should be called. And such smells! My belly rumbles with hunger. But there is no time to stop. We must get as far from the factory as we can. Along the crowded streets we run, until we are out of breath.
‘I wonder what this says,’ says Nadeem when at last we pant to a halt. He points to a large sign strung between two buildings. I cannot read the words but later, when I have been taught, I know they read BONDED LABOUR LIBERATION FRONT (BLLF).
Nadeem asks a stranger what the sign says.
‘It is a meeting today,’ the man says, ‘against chil dren working in factories.’
I want to tell the man that this is Nadeem, Amin and me. But I hold my tongue. The stranger might know our factory owner and tell him we are here.
‘When will the meeting be held?’ I ask.
‘In one hour,’ says the man. ‘They are giving free food.’
Free food! I can scarcely believe it.
While we wait, we walk around the nearby markets looking at fruit and vegetables, grains and spices, things that we have only dreamed about for years. At one stall a vendor holds out slices of mango. ‘Try some,’ he offers.
Never in all of my life have I known such sweetness!
The juice dribbles from my mouth, my tongue flicks out to catch every last drop. I smile at the vendor. When did I last smile? And the vendor- bless him in Heaven - hands me a mango. A whole mango, can you imagine?
‘Thank you, thank you, sir!’ I say. Nadeem and
Amin and I wish him bountiful blessings. We are so happy!
We head back to the meeting place. Near a raised platform there some women are cooking chicken over a fire, a smell made in Heaven. My friends and I are filled with mango, but there is room for chicken. We linger around the women and are soon rewarded with chicken pieces on sticks. It is so delicious I can not describe the taste.
The square fills with people. Men in white shirts and western trousers are standing on the platform. There is a microphone. One of the men calls for attention.
‘The BLLF is here today,’
he says, ‘to call a halt to child labour.’
‘I am told,’ says the man, ‘that children are some times chained to looms.’
‘This is true - I know!’ Suddenly I hear my own
VOICe.
People turn and look at me.
‘If it’s true,’ someone says, ‘go up and tell of it.’ Why I push through the crowd and climb onto the platform I do not know. But suddenly I am no longer afraid. I am filled with anger. Anger that so much of my life I have been chained like a dog. To a loom that I hate. Working for an owner whom I hate even more.
‘My name is Iqbal Masih,’ I say into the micro phone. ‘I am from the village of Muridke. My family sold me to a carpet-factory owner for six hundred rupees.’
That day on the platform, the day of our escape, was over one year ago now. So much has happened since then. More than I could ever have dreamed. I have been home again, felt my mother’s arms around me, shaken hands with my older brother and seen the tears running down his cheeks. I have held my sisters in my arms and been astonished at how tall they have grown.
Mr Ehsan Ullah Khan, from the BLLF - a group working for the rights of children - helped me gain a letter of freedom from my former master. It gave my family money and paid for me to be schooled. It paid, too, for doctors to treat my bad lungs and to help me grow. (I am small for my age. The doctors say this is because of crouching so many years at the loom.)
Khan Sahib has told me much of how other children are treated poorly. They are slaves, as was I. ‘Twelve million bonded child labourers in our country!’ he says.
I have tried to help the BLLF and Khan Sahib for their great charity. I have excelled at my studies, and I have spoken in public - many times - of my years at the loom. One day I marched with the BLLF and with the help of the courts we freed hundreds of children from their enforced labours.
Today Khan Sahib is beside me on a stage. We are in a great hall in Sweden - the largest you can imagine. Here, thousands of good men and women are gathered. I am to talk to them. For weeks I have been practising my speech. But now I am shaking with fear. It is not the fear of my owner beating me. But the fear that I will forget what I am to say. My mouth is dry.