by Gee, Maurice
‘I could catch me some fish an’ trap some rabbits. Rabbit stoo.’
‘And when it’s over come back to Kettle Creek and be a mechanic,’ Dawn stopped. She realised she’d gone too far ahead. They were quiet for a moment. Jack turned to me.
‘What do you think, Rex?’
I did not like all three of them watching me.
‘Will she take much fixing?’
‘Some. I’ll take a look in the engine later on.’
‘You’ll have to find a place to hide your stuff. They’ll search the launch.’
‘You reckon?’
‘I bet Bob Davies knows it’s here.’
‘You can’t leave your stuff under that rug,’ Leo said.
‘Down in the engine, eh?’
‘They might look there too.’
‘Under the jetty?’
‘No,’ Dawn said, ‘I know where. Follow me.’
She climbed off the launch and led us through the mangroves and turned off at the place where they met the scrub. We went fifty yards down-creek towards the river. Then Dawn stopped and pulled some fern aside. There was Leo’s canoe, laid up neatly on a couch of bracken.
Leo turned and gave her a shove.
‘Hey,’ Jack said.
‘You pinched it,’ Leo said.
‘Yes. I’m sorry.’
‘My father gave me that.’ He was furious.
‘I would have given it back but I forgot.’
‘You’re a liar, Stewart.’
‘What’s it matter now,’ I said. ‘Help me pull it out.’
‘If it’s got any holes…’ He glared at her. But it had no holes. I saw the good sense of Dawn’s idea.
‘You can keep it tied by the launch with your gear in,’ I told Jack. ‘If anyone comes you just get in and paddle away. They’ll never know. As long as you don’t leave cigarette butts and that sort of thing.’
Jack turned to Leo. ‘Okay?’ – reminding us that Leo owned the canoe. He might say ‘ain’t no justice’ but always treated people fairly himself.
‘Yes, okay.’
We slid the canoe down through the mangroves. A thin call sounded far away. I thought it was a bird but Dawn straightened up. ‘Grandma,’ she said. The call was repeated – ‘Dawn!’ – quite clearly.
‘I’ve got to go. I’ll come in the morning.’ She slipped away. Leo and Jack pushed the canoe into the water. They got in. Leo was taking Jack to the launch.
‘I’ll see you in the morning as well,’ I said to Jack. ‘What about food?’
‘I’ve got enough for tonight.’
‘Do you need tools?’
‘Yeah, could use some. Rex.’ I had turned away, but now turned back. ‘No stealing, eh.’
‘Huh!’ I said. How did he think I’d get them otherwise? And hadn’t he run away from the war? It didn’t seem to me he had the right to worry about wrong things I might do.
I found it hard to sleep that night. I’d doze a bit, then some creak in the house or sound outside would jerk me awake and I’d think of Jack on the dark launch, with mosquitoes biting and the cold black water sliding by. Crocodiles were sleeping in the mud. Snakes were coiled on branches in the mangroves. Then I would make myself sensible and think of things he would need – matches, candles, a primus, fuel – and the difficulty of getting them would make me resentful. And wouldn’t he need petrol for the launch? And wouldn’t the battery be flat if it hadn’t been used for so long? All this helped keep other things at bay – but in the end I’d get to them, of course: Jack was scared, Jack had run away. The MPs and Marv were just an excuse. That was one side of my problem. The other: Jack was my friend and I liked him more than anyone I knew, and I had to help. All through the night it kept on hurting me like a toothache.
In the dawn I climbed out of bed and got the sugarbag I’d hidden in my wardrobe and crept out to the kitchen. It was hard to steal food. Mum didn’t take much notice of household things but she’d notice all right if too much was gone. The best idea was to take just a little bit of lots of things. But what sort of containers would I put them in? You couldn’t have loose sugar and loose tea – loose sago and rice. And what about meat? Where would I find some meat for Jack? Stealing wasn’t easy.
I put a bottle of coffee essence in the sack, hoping Mum wouldn’t notice it was gone. I put in some Pixie cheese. Then I got the loaf of bread from the bin and the bread knife from the drawer and cut three inches off. More than that she’d notice. The sound of the knife going back and forth seemed as loud in the kitchen as a log of timber being sawn. When I stopped I heard someone breathing behind me.
I know it’s not possible, but my heart turned over. I swung around. King Kong, ghosts, MPs? It was Mum, standing in her nightie, watching me with a frown on her face.
‘Mum,’ I said, leaning on the bench to hold myself up.
She closed the door to the front room and switched on the light. Then she came and took my sack and looked inside.
‘And this is for Jack?’
‘No –’ I began, but she said, ‘Shush.’ She took out the bottle. ‘He hates coffee and chicory. Still, he’ll have to put up with it.’ She put the bottle back and took not the piece of bread I’d cut but the larger piece and put it in.
‘Come with me, Rex.’ She opened the back door and crossed the porch and went into the wash-house.
‘Close the door.’ She shifted a tin on a ledge and took a key from under it. She went to Dad’s big cupboard behind the door and opened the padlock.
‘That’s Dad’s.’
‘I know.’ She opened the door. The cupboard was crammed with goods of every sort, mostly in tins. There was soup and fruit and beans and spaghetti. There was corned beef and Spam. There were Planters peanuts. Everything. And cigarettes too.
‘Most of it came from Americans so I guess Jack is entitled to some. Hold the sack.’ She filled it up but would not put in cigarettes. ‘You tell him not to smoke, it’ll stunt his growth. Is he well?’
‘Yes. He’s down at – ’
‘No! Don’t tell me.’ She locked the cupboard. ‘Now, knife and fork and spoon and plate and mug.’
‘And tin opener.’
‘Yes indeed.’ She led me back to the kitchen and put them in and found a piece of string to tie the sack. ‘Has he got enough blankets?’
‘He’s got a rug. Anyway Dawn and Leo…’ I stopped.
‘A great conspirator you are,’ Mum said. ‘Now put that under the hedge. And make sure you get away before your father sees.’
‘Yes.’
‘Rex.’ I stopped at the door. ‘They’ll catch him. You know that?’
‘No they won’t. Because he’s…’ This time I didn’t say too much.
Mum smiled. ‘Be careful, Rex. Nothing dangerous.’
‘No. Jack wouldn’t let us.’
‘I know that. You’ll be in trouble though.’
‘If they don’t catch him we won’t.’
I saw she didn’t believe he would get away. All she said was, ‘Give him my love.’
There was no time for that. There was only time to run across the paddocks and through the mangroves and hand the sack to Jack and head for school. He was shaving. The lather made his skin seem darker.
‘Hey, what’s there?’ He tested the weight.
‘It’s all right. It’s black market stuff so it isn’t stealing.’ I left it at that. But in the afternoon, after school, I had to take some tools from Grandpa’s workshop, and that bit of thieving bothered me. He was boiling pitch to plug the holes in the amphibian. I stood around, pretending to help, feeding bits of pitch into the pot bubbling on the burner.
‘Are you using this wrench much now, Grandpa?’
‘Spanner? Nope. Finished in the engine.’
I slipped the spanner into my belt and let my shirt hang out to cover it. Grandpa came and looked in the boiling pot. ‘Lovely brew.’
‘How long will the war go on, Grandpa?’ I really meant, how long will Jack
have to hide?
‘Hard to say,’ Grandpa said. ‘It looks as if Rommel’s on the run. And the Yanks seem to have the Japs stopped now.’ He meant Guadalcanal, the Solomons, where Jack had been wounded. ‘It might be too late for my amphib.’
‘We can use it for fishing.’
‘Yes, we can.’ That cheered him up. He poured boiling pitch in his tin and went back to work. I slipped a screwdriver into my belt.
‘Sorry, Grandpa,’ I whispered under my breath. ‘I’ll bring them back.’
I rode up to the vineyard, where Leo was also gathering stuff. He’d got matches and two candles, an old primus and some fuel.
‘He better not light those at night,’ I said, ‘or they’ll see and think it’s a spy.’
‘The MPs came up here,’ Leo said. ‘They’ve been looking in farm sheds and huts and things. Davies too.’
‘They won’t find him.’
But in fact they had come very close to finding Jack and were coming even closer as we spoke. It happened like this: after leaving Yukichs’ the MPs went back down the road to Stewarts’ farm. Mrs Stewart, unfriendly as ever, let them look in her sheds, and told them when they’d finished not to come back. They had a look on a neighbouring farm, then walked along the paddocks to their jeep parked on the road. The MPs were Riley and Bartz, big, heavy men, gum-chewers both. Davies wasn’t getting on well with them – didn’t like their offhand way. I guess they didn’t think a country cop needed listening to.
Bartz saw the track leading into the mangroves. ‘What’s in there?’
‘An old launch. Belongs to the lady on the farm.’
‘Let’s take a look.’
Jack heard the wires squeal under the heavy men. He had the cowling off the motor but nothing unscrewed (had no tools yet). He lifted it back on silently, then looked in the deckhouse to make sure nothing was lying around. He’d been very careful in the morning to get all his gear in the canoe. It was just as well. Davies and the MPs were walking through the mangroves. He heard their boots clump on the boards.
Jack lowered himself into the canoe, untied the rope, and paddled away, using his hands. He was only just out of sight down the creek when the MPs climbed on the jetty. Jack ran the nose of the canoe into the trees. He looped the rope round a branch and climbed out carefully. He crept back through the mangroves and crouched waist-deep in water, watching Bartz and Riley climb on the launch. Riley was swearing at the mud on his boots. That made Jack smile.
When the three men went into the deckhouse he crept closer.
‘Who’s that?’ Riley’s voice.
‘Local girl,’ Davies said. Jack guessed it was the photo of Rose. ‘You might know her,’ Davies went on. ‘She knocks around with you jokers.’ He was a bit sarcastic, Jack thought.
‘MPs?’
‘Yanks. Her daughter must use this as a hut.’
They found nothing suspicious in the deckhouse. Jack lowered himself down to his mouth in the water as they came out. He realised he’d got a bit too close. But they didn’t see him. They went along the jetty cautiously, not trusting the rotten boards to hold their weight. When he heard the wires squeak again Jack made his way back to the canoe.
It wasn’t there. It was twenty yards away, in the middle of the creek. The tide, running out, had pulled its stern round, unslipping the rope, and tugged it out. Jack tried wading after it. He got in up to his chin again, then lost his nerve. He thought he might dog-paddle as far as the canoe, but how would he get in without capsizing it, and how could he drag it to the shore?
He turned back into the mangroves and climbed through them as far as the scrub. Then he ran along the bank until he reached the track. Up in the paddock Riley and Bartz were ambling along like a couple of Jersey bulls enjoying the sun. They stopped and unwrapped gum and put it in their mouths. Davies looked impatient with their slowness but wasn’t going to hurry them, Jack saw.
He worked out the line of sight from the MPs to the creek. The mangrove jungle hid the drifting canoe. But when it reached the river it would come into their sight. And even if they didn’t see his gear tucked down inside they’d see his army cap perched on the bow.
Jack ran for Leo. He could think of nothing else to do. He kept in a gully until he reached the road, then ran along to the gate. Matty and Stipan were working at the back of the vineyard. Jack saw them on the rise at the end of the vines. He ran down the drive, keeping the shed between him and the men.
‘Leo.’ We heard his soft cry and ran round from the back where our stolen goods were laid out on the grass. He was standing under the vine trellis by the door.
‘Jack!’
He made that self-protective crouch again. He was wet and panting and his feet were white with dust from the road.
‘Canoe’s gone…I lost her…the MPs are going to see.’
We ran back along the road and down the gully and crept round the base of the hill. Up there, facing away from us, Riley and Bartz were sitting in the grass. Their helmets lay beside them like two giant puffballs. Davies hunkered cow-cocky style off to one side.
‘Where is it?’ Leo said.
‘Down the creek.’
We went into the mangroves, wriggled through, came to the water. The canoe was turning slowly, feeling the first pull of the river. Leo and I stripped off our shirts and gave them to Jack.
‘You wait here.’
Quietly we slid into the water. The running tide helped us along. We swam sidestroke to avoid making splashes, and came up fast on the canoe. It was turning in a lazy arc towards the river. We kept on glancing at the mangrove wall and in a moment saw we were too late. The canoe would be out from cover, in the MPs’ sight, by the time we reached it. There was nothing to do but keep on going and hope they wouldn’t get suspicious.
Leo reached it first. He grabbed the stern. The men up the hill were on their feet. I saw one of the MPs take half a dozen steps along the slope for a better view.
Davies shouted, ‘That your canoe?’
‘Yes, mine,’ Leo shouted back.
Then I saw Jack’s cap on the bow. It sat there at an angle and as Leo hung on the stern it seemed to bob cheekily at the MPs. Too late to hide it. I swam along the side of the canoe and grabbed the cap. I fitted it on my head and faced the MPs and saluted.
‘Chuck us some candy, Yank.’
Leo paddled up close and pushed me under. He grabbed the cap and put it on his own head. I came up in time to hear him shout, ‘Got any chuddy?’
We started fighting for the cap, ducking each other, and the canoe drifted away.
‘You kids,’ Davies shouted angrily. He must have hated our begging from the Yanks. ‘You get that canoe and get out of there.’
We scuffled, and sank, and lost the canoe, and swam after it, and fought again.
‘Go on, before you drown yourselves.’
We obeyed. The MPs seemed to have forgotten the cap. It was normal in those times for children to have American souvenirs. We got on either side of the canoe and hauled ourselves in and paddled to the creek, and Davies and the MPs, after watching us a moment, walked on up the paddock to the road. We heard the jeep start as we got back to the place where Jack was waiting.
‘Too close.’
‘We fooled them though,’ Leo grinned.
‘I’ll get you kids in trouble.’
‘We don’t care.’
‘I do. I better get out of here real soon.’
We left him at the launch, tying up the canoe, and fetched our stolen goods from the vineyard. Jack was upset by the amount of stuff and we had a job convincing him it was old or just on loan. His near escape had made him thoughtful. He only seemed to realise now how deep in trouble he was. He did not want us in trouble too.
Dawn arrived. She brought milk and apples.
‘Can you make the engine go?’ she asked Jack.
He lifted the cowling.
‘She’s a good motor. Chevvy ’28. The battery’s alive – only just. There’s petr
ol in those cans. I guess your grandma forgot she left it there. But I got a problem.’
‘Yes?’
‘Someone’s taken a couple of spark plugs out.’
Chapter 15
More thieving
He took Grandpa’s spanner and unscrewed a plug, which he showed to Dawn.
‘Won’t go unless there’s a full set.’
‘There’s two of those in the shed at home.’
‘Yeah?’
‘In a baking powder tin. Shall I bring them?’
‘We’ll get them. Me and Rex,’ Leo said. The more action there was the better he liked it.
‘No you won’t,’ Jack said. ‘You neither,’ he said to Dawn. ‘I’ll come tonight.’
‘The dogs will bark.’
‘No they won’t, they’re my friends. You just tell me where to find them.’
‘On a shelf. In an Edmonds tin. I’ll draw a map.’ She and Jack went into the deckhouse.
‘I’ll bet they will bark though,’ I said.
Leo grinned at me. I could almost hear his mind go click-click-click. ‘Want to bet?’
He would say no more than that. As well as action Leo liked a bit of mystery. ‘Pinch back one of those cans of Spam.’
When we left the launch he took me up to the vineyard. He got an old billy from the shed and we squatted in the grass out the back and opened the Spam. Leo cut it into chunks with his pocket-knife.
‘Wait here.’ He slipped into the shed. I went to the door and watched. Stipan and Matty were working in the yard. Whatever Leo was doing, it was risky. I’d just about had enough of risks.
‘Get out,’ he whispered angrily at me.
I went back to the billy and ate a bit of Spam. Very nice. I nipped across to the vines and tried a grape but they were sour. Then I looked in through the door again. He was halfway along the shed, squatting out of Stipan’s sight, filling a wine bottle from a barrel.
I slid away, back to the billy. I didn’t mind pinching from Dad but I wanted nothing to do with pinching from Stipan. He was too big.
Leo came out. The bottle was three-quarters full. ‘Port,’ he grinned. He poured it in the billy on top of the Spam. Glug glug.
‘My dad told me this. Looks good, eh?’