Читать книгу Fox - Bill Robertson - Страница 12

By the age of seventeen, Fox had worked for two years with Joe Darrigan’s Boxing Troupe. He was lean, muscular and tough. At five feet ten and weighing eleven stone, Darrigan decreed Fox good enough to mix it with the suckers. On this afternoon, he was on the platform banging the old base drum: ba – boom, ba – boom, ba – boom. Behind him, a weathered mural portrayed long past pugs in a montage of combative postures. Tent boxing these days was a threatened activity. Whispers from government, as yet unconfirmed, hinted at new rules to control fight frequency. The do-gooders proclaimed: too brutal, too crude, too violent, too foul. Too uncomfortable.

‘Bloody neo-religionists,’ Darrigan had responded, ‘too thick to realise one of Australia’s best known pastors, Doug Nicholls, was a tent boxer.’

Ba – boom, ba – boom, ba – boom. Darrigan whistled through his fingers and bellowed, ‘Holdah! Holdah! Holdah! C’mon boys – step right up and give it a go. Don’t be lily-livered. Twenty dollars to go the round – fifty if youse last the full distance. Show us ya courage. Holdah! Holdah! Holdah! If youse have a score ta settle this is the place! Who’s gunna take on “Killer” Conroy here? Me little firecracker from Tassy. Get up here “Killer”.’ Darrigan whistled again. “Killer” Conroy, a short, nuggety man in his early fifties climbed onto the platform, white towel around his neck, resplendent in a crimson satin robe.

‘“Killer” here, ladies and gents, is a gun woodcutter from Tasmania. He’s yusta felling big bluegums and mountain ash. Shearers, stockmen and miners are mere kindling to ’im.’ The balding Conroy, whose original features had been generously reshaped by his many battles, scowled at the crowd.

One by one, showcased in spurious tales of pugilistic glory, Fox drummed Darrigan’s team onto the platform – a colourful, pseudo belligerent, shockforce of warriors. And slowly too, the platform filled with volunteers as Darrigan conned them from the throng, challenging their manhood with his mixture of flattery, scorn and financial reward.

Fox paused as Darrigan continued his invocation. Indifferently, he scanned the crowd, wondering who next would step up to the mark. The mugs were all types: serious brawlers, bullies, brash kids, tough stockmen, half drunks chasing a quid and occasionally, the odd nervous one who wanted to boast later that he’d done it – mixed it with Darrigan’s finest. Country boys loved a stoush, especially the Aboriginals. In the heat and dust of the outback, tensions could fester. The boxing tent brought legitimate and colourful relief, and men and women alike flocked to the spectacle when it hit town.

Fox’s eye fell upon a lanky sun bronzed man with features as sharp as gibber rocks. Skinny – bloody – Rogers! That bloody copper bastard who, with that vile turd Mullett, had pinched him and Lucy! He raked Rogers with a cold glare. He hadn’t seen him in more than ten years and instantly wanted to batter the shit out of him. Darrigan’s policy wouldn’t allow that, even if he could. He used the beat of the drum to calm his turbulent feelings. He remembered Rogers’ iron fists and how they’d flattened the men of his camp. Ba – boom, ba – boom, ba – boom. Mentally, he began to challenge Rogers, to draw him near, every beat a blow upon his soul.

The transition to Darrigan’s had not been easy. From conversations with old men at Moore River Fox learned of three girls who ran away from the place in 1931 to find their way home by following the rabbit proof fence. The old men also told him about Geoff Guest. Guest was an Aboriginal boy sent to a cattle property near Toowoomba in 1936. Aged only eleven, sometime during 1939 – 1940, Guest fled the station after its English overseer inflicted a serious flogging that left him badly scarred and stuttering. Guest had breached the Englishman’s decree that no Aboriginal was to speak indoors. One afternoon, while alone with the overseer, Guest spoke. Enraged, the man grabbed his whip to deliver a hiding but Guest got in first and felled him with his own lead-tipped yard whip. Fearing he had killed the man, Guest shot through. The escape had been long planned for the right time and a horse and provisions were stashed in readiness. Fox filed this story in his memory bank and at Mount Barker, began hiding his own stores in the bush.

After upending Brother John, Fox dashed to his cubicle, grabbed his hat, stuffed Lobsang Rampa and his few clothes into a sugar bag and slipped silently into the night. Unlike Guest, he had no firearm or tools but he did take a horse and saddle and rode to his stores about a mile north of the mission. His plan was simple: live off the land and make his way to Turkey Creek via the Canning Stock Route. The “wallopers” would soon be after him so he needed to stay out of their way and make as much ground as possible.

Cantering under starlit skies Fox skirted the vineyards and worked his way deep into the bush, an ugly chapter of his life abandoned in idyllic surroundings. East lay the beautiful Porongurups, a ribbon of ancient hills first seen by white man in 1829, four years after convicts settled at Albany. North was the breathtaking Stirling Range. A spine rich with wildflowers, craggy peaks, heaths, woodlands, birds, animals and thick scrub. For Fox, it was a veritable supermarket. By dawn he had reached Kalgan River – forty-nine miles lay between himself and the mission.

His dreams informed him that he would be okay all the way to Turkey Creek, 1700 miles north. After that, he had to be patient.

Ten days out from the mission and 350 miles on, Fox veered east from Southern Cross to skirt Lake Deborah East. A tourist information board said the Lakes, settled in the 1890s, were surrounded by granite outcrops and fresh water wells. These days, the “Cross” was prominent because of its commercial wildflower crops and rich flora – delicate salmon gums and red barked gimlets. The board mentioned too that camels used during an 1891 Elder Scientific Expedition were troubled by lack of food. But Fox knew it was kwongan country – heathland – and that he and his horse, Bob, would be fine.

On his solitary moonlight journey Fox envisaged Lovett and Brother John beginning to waste with fear. On the screen in his head, he watched Lovett writhe; witnessed the remorseless pounding headaches, smelled the stench of his body odour and heard Lovett cry out as he grappled with the slithering knot of King Browns squirming in his mind. He observed Lovett slowly descend into madness. One by one, his mates stopped visiting and soon, Dan Lovett, who had lost more than half his body weight since being cursed, was dead.

Brother John, on the other hand, pretended nothing was happening. Yet Fox sensed the cold dread stalking him, the clammy, suffocating iciness he could neither deny nor shake. Forever looking over his shoulder, logic told Brother John it was nothing but imagination. Yet, when alone, dank, withering tentacles of claustrophobia reached out to strangle him. He became terrified of confession and experienced indescribable horror every time he entered the box. There, darkness weighed him down with such a palsy he felt unable to leave. His hair fell out, boils developed, his weight dropped away and he began talking in strange, nonsensical sing-song tones. Laughing and cackling, he wandered the mission corridors in preference to sleeping at night. Truth to tell, he was afraid of sleep because his ghosts magnified tenfold.

None of this was a mystery to Fox.

His journey home made him feel alive and of the earth again. The scent of gums, grasses, rain and dust seeped into his pores. Goanna, snake, bush potatoes, the odd fish, kantilli and lizards were all plentiful. But best of all, as the earth-spirit embraced his soul, there came a freedom as unencumbered as the sky, as rich as desert sunset and as sweet as wild honey. Nothing about this epic ride was anything other than fulfilling. His only sorrow was Lucy’s absence – always he had planned for them to return together.

And then he rode into Turkey Creek, slap-bang into a mourning ceremony. Looking around the old camp, his heart contracted. His mother’s shelter and possessions were nothing but a pile ash, burned to the ground as a shield to her spirit. He saw the scars of mourning wounds; witnessed the silent communication between women who dared not utter Rosie’s name and understood. Spirits of the dead must be isolated and left undisturbed. These were ancient practices connected with death.

Sitting high up on Bob, Fox did not recognise the wail assaulting his ears was his own. Having been taken from his home, the dream of returning with Lucy had sustained him. Her death had deeply wounded him and were it not for the thought of his waiting Mum, he might have given up. Now he was alone.

The Aunties said when Rosie learned of Lucy’s death, a flame had died. It had been her birth that helped with the loss of Duncan, her loving husband. Her big, strong stockman, a man proud of his Scottish roots, a man who had cherished them all. He had been taken by a mindless drunk-driver soon after Lucy’s birth. After that, Rosie moved away from Leopold Downs and back to Turkey Creek. There, with her children and family, she had slowly become strong again.

And then came Mullett and Rogers and Brigette. Her children taken to join the ranks of the living dead. She had no rights, no news and no hope of seeing them. Gradually, Rosie declined. Three years later, word arrived of Lucy’s murder. Rosie knew nothing of Colin, only that he was in a mission – somewhere. Rosie’s world collapsed, depression accelerated and quietly, she wasted away. Fox’s arrival coincided with the final phase of her mourning.

He stayed three months. He saw the end of the mourning and left with no great plans other than finding work. He decided to head for Noonkanbah, a huge cattle station on the Fitzroy River between Camballin and Fitzroy Crossing, some 360 kilometres east of Broome. There he could comfortably work with horses and cattle and be among the Yungngora community, traditional land owners who ran the station for its owners.

But, in 1968, there was trouble at Noonkanbah. The old station, a former Royal Australian Airforce base and staging post for the Netherlands East Indies Air Force during 1943-44, was rank with discontent. The Yungngora people were intensely dissatisfied with pay and conditions and highly suspicious of the insatiable minerals hunt in the Kimberly. As mining exploration forged ahead, conflict between Western Australia’s Court government and Yungngora people grew. The issue at heart was whether sacred Aboriginal sites should be protected from vested interests wanting the mineral wealth. Later, this rancour would crystallise until its essence stood raw – mutual distrust and disrespect between traditional Aboriginal law and white western law.

Fox found the atmosphere toxic and moved to Broome. A willing and hard toiler, he had no trouble getting a job on the fishing boats. One quiet Saturday afternoon he visited Darrigan’s Travelling Boxing Troupe with his mate Tommy Barker. The hype, the smell, the noise and the action instantly appealed and between shows, Fox presented himself to Darrigan and asked for a job. Darrigan thoughtfully sized up the slim young man.

‘Come to the next show and I’ll see how yer go in the ring. Ask me again after that.’

Two hours later, Fox volunteered for a bout with one of Darrigan’s team, another Aboriginal named Danny Stocker. Stocker, about thirty-five, was experienced, muscular and skilled. While Darrigan’s rules forbade the boxers from seriously hurting punters, they were still to look after themselves. At almost sixteen, Fox had no great strength to his punches but he out-paced, out-thought and out-boxed Danny Stocker.

And so it was he thumped the drum: Ba – boom, ba – boom, ba – boom. The steady rhythm throbbed. Rogers stared at him, a thoughtful, penetrating gaze. The drum pulsed louder: ba – boom, ba – boom, ba – boom. Silently, Fox called Rogers to him. Challenged him. Told him he would never win. Silently, Fox reeled him in. I will humiliate, not retaliate. Take your pride, not your strength. Lance your arrogance and sear your soul.

In the next pause, when Darrigan challenged the suckers to battle, Rogers’ rough voice called, ‘I’ll take the young darkie.’

‘Dunno about that mate, you look a bit too big and experienced to be takin’ the boy on. He’s for kids his own age and size.’

‘Yeah? You’re piss weak Darrigan. He’s up there isn’t he? Let him speak for himself.’

Fox grinned at Darrigan and nodded. Ba – boom, ba – boom, ba – boom!

Humiliate don’t retaliate; humiliate don’t retaliate; humiliate don’t retaliate. Fox’s grin spread slowly from ear to ear. His personal misery – Lucy’s death, Rosie’s death – all triggered by this man’s intervention. Joe Darrigan would never know the satisfaction Fox was anticipating. He was unbeatable. As Fox’s steely grey eyes bored into him, Rogers’ memory stirred. Familiar eyes. He couldn’t recall when, or where, or the circumstance, only that he remembered them. Fox laughed inwardly watching Rogers’ face pucker in concentration, memory chafing, recall working overtime. Fox playing mind-games.

Ba – boom, ba – boom, ba – boom. Humiliate, don’t retaliate!