Shark, p.6
Shark, page 6
‘You never had a father, either, did you, Pop?’
‘Must have. But I never knew him. Never knew my mother. I was adopted out. Bit like old Rooster. Never even knew I was Koori until I was over twenty. Rooster could see that as soon as he knew about mirrors.’
‘You might be able to find your ... Mum.’
‘She’d be gone by now I reckon. No, I tried through the missions and that, but they reckon I was given away at birth and the name my mother gave in hospital didn’t match up with any of the families. On the Murray River somewhere was the closest I could get. One of the churches paid for her bus trip from Mildura to Melbourne. That’s the only thing the hospital knew. By the time I went looking no one remembered much about any half-caste girl giving up a baby. She could have come from anywhere. Maybe nobody bothered telling her she was Koori either. But it’d mean something to me, Rube, if I could just go and see some of my mob, some of the people who could tell me what was what. . . anything, even what this tree was called or that lake, anything just so I’d have a few words ... some things to know.
‘See, you’re part of that mob, too, like your mum and me, but you’ve got this other mob, and they know you, they want you to know all about their stuff. That’s something, Rube!’
They were sitting on the deck of the Tea Gardens while Fox worked on the anchor winch. Rueben held a torch so his grandfather could work with two hands reaching down into the anchor locker.
‘Now, it doesn’t mean you piss off from us. That’s not what I’m saying. And a boy should never want to leave his mother anyway, but what I’m saying is you’ve got to keep in touch with that mob and later on if they want you to go up there for ... some learning, then you should go.’
They finished their job and Fox leant against the bow rail while Rueben fished for the garfish and skipjack that swept in schools in the shadow of the boat.
‘I’ll go back, Pop, but not till I can ride a bike properly.’ A flicker of amusement flared briefly in the man’s eyes.
‘Why’s that?’
‘All me cousins have got real bikes, big ones, even the little kids can ride their brothers’ an’ that. I had to walk with the girls.’
‘Well, we’d better see about a bigger bike. Christmas or something.’
‘Yeah. And a boat.’
‘A boat!’
‘Yeah, I’ll call her Keer Weer.’
‘Keer Weer?’
‘My grandmother says that’s where my spirit come from.’
‘Not a bad name then. If you get a boat.’
‘Yeah. If.’
Fox stared down at the water, watching as the fish finned tentatively near Rueben’s bait. He enjoyed the kid’s company. It was softening to him to watch the seriousness and gentleness of the kid. They got on together and it was a comfort to Fox to look at the black face warmed by his own blood.
Rooster Clark had a black face but he was also a bit mad. Fox was sitting with him at the kitchen table. The kids had gone over to the sandbanks at the mouth of Duck Creek to net for prawns and mullet. The table was cluttered with sauce bottles and the bits and pieces of Rooster’s electrical repairs.
‘Now this ‘as been a pretty good old toaster, this one. Automatic one. This switch has got me a bit tossed but we’ll try this.’ He grunted as he tightened the last screw in the electrical switch. ‘It could be the bloody thermostat thingummy or it could be these two wires here.’ He plugged the toaster in and switched it on. It flashed brightly once and then a thin stream of very black smoke rose from it. ‘Burnin’ the toast already by the looks.’ He pulled it apart again and prepared to unscrew the wires. Fox turned it off at the power point. Oh, thanks,’ said Rooster. He swapped the green wire for the black one. ‘Switch her on now, cuz and see how we go.’ The element lit up brightly and so did Rooster.
‘Eh, Deidre, get us some bread. We’ll have a bit of a cook up.’
‘Got no bread.’
‘Well, bloody hell woman, what good’s a bloody toaster then.’ He got up from the table and rifled through the packets and dishes on the bench.
‘Here we are, some good old bloody crumpets. These’ll do. Bit blue like but not too bad.’ He dusted a bit of mould off and picked off the worst spores with his thumb and forefinger and flicked them at the door where the chooks and a dog set up an instant demarcation dispute. Chook tucker or dog tucker.
The crumpets were a bit thick for the toaster but Rooster pushed them down with his finger. Rooster and Fox watched the toaster. Deidre glanced balefully at it once before shooing the chooks away from the door and giving the dog a bit of a boot for his trouble.
The crumpets began to smoke and after waiting a little while Rooster jiggled at the lever but the crumpets had stuck to the wire grills. He pushed and prodded at them with his finger but the machine flashed brightly and a rich curl of black smoke spiralled up once more. He wrenched the plug from the socket and shook the toaster upside down until the crumpets fell out.
‘Fuckin’ thing. Be alright with bread don’ ya reckon. Bread wouldn’t jam in its guts like that.’ He scraped at the crumpets with the screwdriver. ‘Eh, they’re not that bad. Let’s ‘ave a go at ‘em. What ya reckon?’ He found the butter and spread it on the crumpets and then dived his screwdriver under the table into a kerosene tin full of honey.
‘Bloodwood honey, this. Best bloody honey in Australia. Don’ worry about the bees in it. They’re kind of preserved – you know, like mummies and stuff. Balmed they call it. Balmed bees. Probably a luxury in China or some place.’ He rolled some honey onto a crumpet with the screwdriver and passed it to Fox. There’s a bee in that one, tell me what ya reckon, any good or what.’
Fox couldn’t see that bees embalmed in their own honey would be much of a luxury anywhere but the honey itself was wonderful. The crumpet had a penicilliny taste and a bit smoky like burnt rubber but you couldn’t knock Rooster back.
Deidre came back into the house with a plastic basket full of washing.
‘Cup of tea wouldn’t go down too bad now, bride.’
‘Don’t bride me, you old rooster. Why don’t you plug the kettle in yerself – or are ya too scared?’
‘This bloody toaster’ll be alright – the crumpets was too thick. Thas all. We ever get any bloody bread in the place it’d be different.’
‘This place’ll never be any different Rooster, you’re here.’ And she left the room, flicking on the jug as she went.
‘She must love me,’ Rooster grumbled and he picked and sorted through the things on the table, looking for a screwdriver without honey on it.
‘The kid go up north did he?’ Rooster asked as Fox handed him a cup of tea.
‘Yeah, went up to see his father’s people. Thursday Island mob.’
‘Be good for him I reckon. You know, talk to the old mob an’ that.’
‘Yeah, he liked it. He’s going back after Christmas. The old blokes want to show him a few things.’
‘Business stuff, ya mean?’
‘I think so.’
‘Initiation an’ so forth?’
‘Think so.’
‘My mob all missed out on that stuff – me too.’
‘Where did your people come from, Rooster.’
Rooster scuttled his hand amongst the tools, jars and electrical parts in front of him. He cleared his throat and shifted in his chair.
‘It’s a dry argument now, Fox mate. Here,’ he reefed six stubbies out of the fridge, ‘let’s go down to the bank and wait for the kids to come back.’
They walked underneath the clothesline where Deidre was hanging more clothes. She had three plastic pegs in her mouth and mumbled something at Rooster.
‘They should think about doin’ that to those pit bull terriers. Stick a few pegs in their mouths. Seems to work.’ There was a log on the sandbank covered in a confetti of dried fish scales. Rooster pulled two stubbies off the beer pack and buried the rest in the damp sand.
‘Her mob,’ he jerked his thumb back towards the house, ‘they all come from roun’ the Murray somewhere. Robinvale. Close to your mob, maybe. She knows a bit of stuff. Her sister an’ that come down every now an’ then and they get on the piss an’ the teapot together. Can’t make head nor tail of ‘em – yabberin’ away. One of the old aunties knows a bit of language and she gets the girls, the old boilers, gets ‘em talkin’ in their lingo. She’s not allowed to look at me she reckons. ‘N bloody Deidre says, bloody bag, “You’re not missin’ nothin’ aunty.’” Fox almost caught what looked like a crease of a smile at the edge of Rooster’s mouth, but, before he could work out whether it was warm recollection or a grimace of distaste, a stubby was plugged into the mouth and the expression was gone – almost as a wilful disguise.
‘Anyway, all I know is that I’m from one of the Gunditj mob an we’ve got relations over at Framlingham. You know the Clarks over there?’
‘Heard of ‘em.’
‘Well they’re related to me. Occasionally Percy, me cousin, comes over with a few kids an’ that an’ we go fishin’ but we’ve got no stories or that. Framlingham mob have but my people was all killed off. My ol’ man was already in gaol when the rest of the crowd was all killed together at Convincing Ground. Place down near Pentland. This is what Percy reckons anyway. My mob goes down there to get this whale washed up on the beach and then this whalin’ mob, white fellas, come along an’ says it’s theirs, the whale, see. Ours, says my mob. Ours, says the whalers. No, say the blackfellas. Well, we’ll convince yez says the white fellas an’ shot the lot of ‘em. Convincing Grounds, see.’ Rooster was breaking up splinters off a broken branch of the log and throwing them onto a bunch of dried gum leaves. ‘Percy wanted me to go down there. Have a look at the place. But I couldn’t. Don’t think I could ‘ave stood there, ya know. Anyway, that’s when I went out on the shark boats. Ended up here. Gunditj mob used to travel all over this country.’ He waved his arm generally over the lakes and rivers area. ‘Ya can see the ol’ fire places an’ stuff.’ He bent down and set the leaves and sticks alight. ‘It gives me the creeps you know. I couldn’t live over with all them other Gundj mob. No one knows much an’ it just spooks me seein’ all that mob wanderin’ around. Like these shell pits an’ that. The hair stands up on me bloody neck sometimes, I tell ya Jim. Makes me a fuckin’ nervous wreck. Black as a coal shovel an’ I know less about what’s what than some bloody bank manager’s son at high school. Read this, read that, says that Framlingham mob. Read what, I can’t fuckin’ read. If I could fuckin’ read I wouldn’t near electrocute meself every second day. Even little bloody Rocky can read a bloody wiring chart. “Look here,” he says, “see it says green here an’ black there. Yer got ‘em roun’ the wrong way.” Little smart arse.’
Rooster pushes the sticks together and shakes it down so the coals collect in a cobbled glow. ‘He’s a good boy that Rocky. Smart kid. Probably takes after Deidre. Ya know what me oldest girl Alice says last Christmas? “‘E must be one of Mum’s mob, Dad, ya never see him sparkin’ an smokin’.” Christ, those kids ‘ave got sharp tongues. Good kids though. No respect for their ol’ man, but not as bad as some. Not in gaol or nothin’. Ya know that’s what ol’ horse face prays every night. She don’ mind me, she just kneels down an’ prays that the kids will be safe an’ well an’ not go to gaol or end up like their ol’ man. That’s what the ol’ bitch says. An’ she ends up, nearly always same sorta thing, “an’ don’ let Rooster electrocute his silly bloody self and if he does, not make a mark on the laminex.” How’s that, eh? I fuckin’go up in smoke an’ she doesn’t want no mark left on her fuckin’ furniture. Las’ year the census fella says, “You the head of the family?” “Bullshit,” I said, “I come after the fuckin’ chooks.” “No ya don’t Dad,” says Alice, “not after the ol’ bantam one anyway, she’s really stupid.” In front of the census fella she said that, the lil’ bitch.’
Fox caught the twist at the edge of the mouth this time. The stubby was screwed into the lips, but he was sure that it was a smile.
It was good fun out on the lake. Rueben sat on the bow of the boat with Rocky, who was holding his little sister, Patricia.
‘Now you bloody hang on or you’ll be over the side an’ chopped up by the motor,’ Rocky said to her.
‘An’ you bloody sit still, Rocky,’ said Gary, who was steering the boat, ‘no wonder they call y a bloody Rocky.’
When they got to the sandbank the older kids, Sally, Rocky, Gary and Rueben towed the net in a wide arc around the deep entrance where the tide cut between the two shelves of the sandbanks. The younger kids, Patricia and Vincent, ran around in the shallow water, splashing and shrieking to chase the fish into the net. It was a good spot to fish. Illegal, but the Clarks didn’t worry too much about that. ‘We never needed no size limits until youse blokes arrived, anyway,’ Rooster would tell the inspectors and stare them down. Occasionally, just occasionally there was an advantage being black. Any white bloke caught fishing the mouth of the river would have his boat confiscated. ‘Ya gunna take the boat off some lil’ Gunditj kids are ya? Ya gunna stop ‘em fishing in old Gunditj lake are ya? Ya’d be a white fella then would’n ya?’ No inspector could risk having Rooster bringing that one up in court. The butcher’s bench fairly bristled with indignation when the Clarks’ immunity from fishing regulations was discussed. ‘An’ they’re all on bloody welfare,’ Ern Glossop, the builder fumed.
It didn’t worry the kids. None of it. They had the sandbanks to themselves and all afternoon to fool about in the water.
The net brought in prawns, mullet, flathead and little pink snapper.
Fox could hear the pearly ring of their voices chiming off the water well before the boat came in view.
Rooster had a kerosene tin of water boiling on the fire and Gary casually tipped the prawns into it.
‘Not a bad haul there, young un,’ Rooster said, piling brush and coals around the tin.
‘Yeah, not bad,’ Gary said. ‘Few decent flatties in this lot too.’ He sorted out the fish on the chaff bag that Rocky had brought up.
‘Eh, Tricia, go an’ get some spuds an’ we’ll bung ‘em on the fire. Tell the ol’ lady to bring down some more beer.’ Patricia ran off with her wet skirt flapping like fish tails against her legs. ‘Tell her to bloody hurry. No bloody ums and ahs.’ The girl had already ducked under the washing and in through the back door, ‘Tell her the head of the household is waitin’.’
‘Who’s that, Dad?’ Gary asked. Rooster kicked him in the bum.
‘I’m the head of the house, that white fella from census said so. Must be right.’
‘Yeah, no white lies are there, Dad?’ said Rocky.
Rooster winked at Fox. ‘What’d I tell ya. Sharp as a bloody tack. You kids get on with the tucker. Me and ol’ uncle Fox here are gunna have ‘nother beer.’
‘I don’t tell people my name’s Fox, Rooster. Good reasons too.’
‘Yeah, well I don’t know all the reasons, cuz, but there’s not much that Framlingham mob don’t know about blackfellas wanted by the law. You’ll be right. No one out there’ll say boo but ya shoulda told us, mate, what have us southern Kooris got except our poor bloody selves, eh? Fuck all mate. So don’ keep no more secrets. Ya want the boy to be a blackfella, I know what yer up to, sendin’ ‘im up north, bringin’ ’im up the river to us, well that’s alright, no worries, but don’t think you’re not part of it. Can’t have it both ways, Foxy. No coconuts drink at my fuckin’ beach. Yer black or yer bloody not. You owe us somethin’ now; you’re part of our mob, so no more actin’ like yer not. Deidre says the people up Shepparton way know all ‘bout what went on, so you call yourself McConnell or whatever ya want, but up there, up on the river, they call yer Fox and yer a bloody legend – along with any other bloke who killed a whitefella.’
‘It was my stepfather. He adopted me. We had a blue and he hit his head. That’s it. That’s all there was to it.’
‘Yeah, but he died an’ that makes all the difference. Cops have been after you ever since, haven’t they?’ Fox nodded and looked at Rooster’s scrawny face.
‘Don’t look at me like that. . . cuz, no one of your mob’s gunna dob ya in. But ya shoulda told us see. Then we woulda known, no more drama, no more pokin’ under ol’ bits of tin tryin’ to find out what was shadowin’ ya. Yer drag a bloody cloud aroun’ behin’ ya, ya know. Blots out the fuckin’ sun sometimes, too. So no more bloody clouds. There’s too many hangin’ over our camp already. ‘S why silly ol’ Deidre keeps prayin’ that the coppers stay away. Can’t have strangers bringin’ ’em up the river.’ Rooster knew that Deidre had walked up behind him with another pack of stubbies. ‘She might be a silly ol’ bag but she does somethin’ right every now an’ then.’ Deidre passed Fox a stubby, pulled one out of the pack and dropped the other four on Rooster’s foot. He laughed, but pushed his toes into the wet sand.
‘Sunshine,’ he said. ‘Lil’ ray of sunshine.’ He laughed again more convincingly. ‘Deidre’s got a cousin out Sunshine way so that’s what they call their boy. Ray. Lil’ Ray of Sunshine. They’re not all like Deidre ya know, some of ‘em ’ave got a sense of humour.’
‘Ya killed yer old man, did ya?’ Deidre asked Fox. Rooster spluttered into the neck of his stubby.
‘See what I mean,’ he coughed, ‘more fun than maggots in a bunch of snags. Leave it alone now. We’ve had a mag about it an’ that’s that.’
‘Coppers still after ya?’ she persisted.
‘I’ve been up north, in the islands for years. They think I’m dead. It was in one of the PNG papers that I was killed. They would have stopped looking for me then.’
‘They stop looking, do they?’ she wryly queried.
‘Leave it alone for Christ’s sake, Deidre. We’re just sittin’ on the sand waitin’ for our prawns. Here, Tricia, come on, get them prawns on the plate an’ make sure ya mother gets the first lot. Somethin’ to put in her mouth. Unless you got a ol’ sock boilin’ away in there too.’
Patricia handed around plates of prawns and they tore the shells off them and sipped their beer. Fresh prawns and cold beer. Leave the Ritz for dead. The kids shared a big bottle of Coke and Deidre could see Rueben sneaking looks at Fox. Must be news to the kid, she thought. Wonder if they’re boiling up a foot in that tin as well.
