A Many Coated Man (39 page)

‘One hour to go,’ exclaims Slaven.

‘All six. All six. All six. All six.’ So extensive is the audience that a true unison isn’t possible and the shout sweeps through a mass many of which are too far away to see Slaven. The cry is sinuous and buffeting, racing in division at some times, catching up with itself at others in redoubled strength.

‘What do we want.’

‘All six. All six.’ The red and yellow blimps heel in pleasure at the turbulence beneath them.

‘What do we demand.’

‘All six. All six.’ In the crowd Sarah is reduced to tears and Georgina catches her breath at the enormity of the people’s will.

‘No charter, no votes.’ The Hoihos join Slaven on the stage again: time for
Welfare
Heaven
and
Blowing
in
the
Wind.

The PM and others sit in the Cabinet Room and watch the Christchurch rally on screen. Also they are in touch with the consultants one floor below and their own observers at Hagley Park.

‘How many do you reckon are there?’ says the PM.

‘Too many,’ says Alan Warden.

‘Far too many,’ adds the Minister of the Environment who did not at all enjoy watching the hands go up from his St Albans electorate when Thackeray Thomas was asking for an indication of the constituencies.

‘Too bloody many,’ he says.

‘You can never trust the South Island voter, Neil,’ says the PM. ‘You should have moved up to Te Tarehi when we offered it to you.’

‘Who let the bastard out of the Beckley-Waite. That’s what I’d like to know,’ says Neil. And who facilitated his entry? Has the deputy Prime Minister a special smile. ‘He went in there because he was a nutter, didn’t he, a stirrer of the first order, and he should’ve stayed there. Also he should have been stuck straight back in when he surfaced in Christchurch.’

‘And you would be happy to explain that in St Albans?’ asks Warden.

It isn’t that Brian Hennis and his Government have been caught napping, not at all. They have had ample warning of the rally and the ultimatum it carries. It is in any case the obvious political play immediately before the elections. The United Party has already given the PM power to make whatever decision he thinks best. Going right to the wire is what
this is about and Hennis doesn’t concede key points until he must. Who knows what can happen? Each day there is hopeful advice to him that Slaven and the CCP are losing momentum, backing down, riven by internal dissension, modifying their stance, seeking a compromise, about to be discredited, or suffering a crisis of conscience.

None of these things has happened. The PM watches the screen. ‘All six. All six.’ There’s a long shot of the endless audience over the lawns and beneath the trees and the streets clogged with cars. Slaven achieves attention with impressive ease and begins speaking again, distorted by the sound systems, but with the passion evident nevertheless.

‘It’s Western Springs all over again,’ says Warden. ‘Jesus, must be 300,000 there.’

‘Bugger the man,’ says Neil. ‘He’s got no concern for the careers of those of us who are professional politicians. He’s appallingly ignorant of how things should be done.’

‘Has anyone got a bright idea?’ asks the PM. There are only grumbles and indistinct murmurs. Hennis has known all along where the buck would stop. ‘I’m going to speak directly to Aldous Slaven and the people too, if he’ll let me.’

‘And?’ says his deputy.

‘All the polls tell us that we need CCP support, so I’m going to congratulate him. I’m going to say that the Government and the United Party are enthusiastic to adopt all the charter points and implement them when we’re re-elected. I’m going to say that this is a great day for democracy and the common people in this country. The people have spoken and our party has responded, I’m going to say. I’m going to kiss enough arse to ensure that we’re all back in power and that way we live to fight another day. That’s my pleasant duty as PM. Right?’ No one in the Cabinet Room denies it. ‘Then I’m going to be asking some hard questions about the quality of advice and briefings that I’ve had over several months on this whole Slaven and Coalition thing. Some hard questions. Some of you may like to consider that, and in the meantime I’ll talk to the dentist.’

See the people of Canterbury and beyond, standing close
together in the summer afternoon and singing
Capetown
Races,
Remember
Tiananmen
Square
and
Ice
Cathedral
— so popular after the Antarctic pickets. But most of all, like any proud people, they love their own special
Half
Moon
Bay
sung by their own Hoihos. Those close enough to watch Slaven’s face, do so as he joins in, for the significance of the song is part of the folklore which has grown-up since his near electrocution on the barge-board of his house. Can it be claimed that the Hoihos have any intrinsic commitment to the CCP and the six point charter? Certainly they know how magnificently they benefit from the association, bow to their guitars and keyboards with a will and the lead singer tenses her thighs against the blue leather skirt and sings it all again.

Baby,
baby,
come
again
and
live
with
me
upon
the
shore
of
Half
Moon
Bay.

The music critic of ‘Speak Up’ even, admits that it’s splendid of its genre and his daughter leaves off beating the hedgehog and resumes innocence with the melody. One of the Thackeray Thomas acolytes cries in Gaelic between the riffs, dapper Raymond Boydd sees the sunlight play upon the coruscating branch of an oak in an epiphanic moment of texture, Madeline Shields sways her body blissfully, a movement not dissimilar to the nodding of the Coalition blimps, Norman Proctor has lilies in his hand and delights in scents and sights which logic would have him denied.

Kinder
hearts
are
waiting,
baby,
amongst
old
friends
at
Half
Moon
Bay.

The wonder and the power, the implication, of it are nothing in Guatemala of course, in Sedalia, Missouri, the Sierra de Gata, Schleswig, Ogbomosho, or the reed beds of the Yevpotkin, nothing in the air conditioned subterfuge of the Beckley-Waite Institute, or Cardew’s Sydney El Dorado Motels, nothing even so close to home as the rear flat by the Heathcote with the river flowing on the ceiling, Athol washing the hogget blood from his hands and the goose girl asleep beside her embroidered owl.

Within its own orbit though, within the political awareness of our small country, Slaven’s rally is a mighty enough thing, sure enough. This immense crowd, Slaven, Kellie and
her fellow leaders, the PM and all the other watchers, have no doubt of it.

Let
the
polar
squalls
go
bowling
by,
as
long
as
we’re
still
seeing
eye
to
eye.

See the Right Honourable Brian Hennis, Prime Minister, make his call before the deadline. The AV people cast his face from the vidphone link to the screen at the back of the rally stage. The definition is poor in a bright afternoon, but who doesn’t know this face well enough to refurbish it from their own recollection. You are experienced enough to know how he carries it off: the mixture of warmth and sincerity in his voice, the trick of combing his hair back with his fingers as he speaks and its lapse again to the side of his face. ‘All six charter points,’ he says. ‘Let there be absolutely no mistake about that and I’m thrilled that after prolonged discussion I carry all my colleagues unanimously on this pledge.’

The Avon ducks and scavenging birds scatter in fright before the great shout of triumph. The non-committed and tardy in the surrounding streets leave their cars static in the traffic lanes and hurry to the park, stranger talking to stranger in the freedom from inhibition that such unusual circumstance begets. One thinks that scaffolding has collapsed, another that a UFO has landed. There is a wildfire rumour that the PM has offered Dr Aldous Slaven the Presidency. People press on to see whatever there is to see, so that in years to come they can say that they were here at the great rally, and so gain the floor while others give way before such first-hand authority.

A trio of thieves runs through a street of abandoned cars as if the world is ending, snatching bags and purchases as they go. Someone in a mood of celebration cuts a yellow blimp loose and it rises above the people and the city, moving slowly away from the sea. Hundreds of people wade into the Avon to cool themselves, but more sub-consciously to prove that this is a day on which anything is possible. All of the CCP leaders come out on to the stage and as the PM continues with his message, Kellie pins a spray of Powys Hayhoe flowers to her husband’s damp shirt.

So many grounds for pleasure and satisfaction, relief,
congratulation, even joy, but the response which surprises Slaven with its intensity is the sense of vindication in the call made to the conscience of the people. In his heart have been two contrary instincts: one is the belief in an open appeal to common action, the other a fear of the ancient perversity of the mob. Each time he raised the serpent to overcome those who opposed his cause he glimpsed the otherness of the pulse within its eye and caught the sulphur on its breath, but each time when the purpose had been served the creature swayed, looped down, as bidden.

Slaven’s shoulders ache with the release of muscular tension. His hands tremble and beneath the soft skin below his left eye where the suture marks are just visible, a tic is like the small movement in the pouched throat of a tree frog. Ah, Jesus, there is nothing now that can go wrong on any terrible scale. He tightens his hand in Kellie’s and in response she turns with a quick smile of excitement. This at least, at last, he can give her. The PM is praising him from a distance, the people press close to the stage.

To Slaven’s right the driver is steadily making his way through the crowd, no more self-consciously than if he were still on the landing beneath the Lyttelton wharf. See the beak of his nose and deep eyes, head up so that he can pick his way better. He is not at all furtive and stops to apologise for treading on Walter Tamahana’s foot.

Thackeray Thomas leans towards Slaven, taking his upper arm and shaking it in triumph. ‘This is the start of a new era,’ he shouts. ‘I believe that. I really do. This is the way that things will be decided from now on. It’s an irony that here we are in the technology of the twenty-first Century and yet democracy has come the full circle.’ Kellie is passed a phone from an aide and after speaking into it, she points to it amidst the hubbub and then at Slaven who reaches for it.

‘We’re watching it. We can see it all.’ Marianne Dunne’s voice has for once lost its professional calm. Slaven imagines her, elegantly tall and dark, in the tower house overlooking the city. ‘And the statement’s come over about the Government’s unconditional acceptance of all charter points. My God. The PM is going to announce it on national news too. What a thing for you and Kellie apart from anything else.
Miles is right beside me. He pretends it’s all nonsense, but wants to talk to you anyway. You know how he is.’

The driver finds a place which suits him, the sun at his back and the ventillated cover of a Kiwi Juice storage unit for support. He leans there and watches Slaven with the suggestion of a smile. Not an expression that’s meant for communication, rather the look of one who has come across an old class-mate who has done well. ‘So there you are, old son,’ he murmurs.

‘Hello, Demosthenes,’ says Miles in his husky way. His voice seems to come from a place very quiet and far away. ‘The bastards have caved in I hear. Good for you. Good for you. Push home the advantage while you can.’ The driver calmly lifts the supposed vid-camera, steadies it on the cowling and fires twice. The noise is nothing much at all amongst the clamour that is everywhere and attention focuses on the consequences of the shots not their origin. ‘Come and see me when the world allows you a moment,’ Miles asks, not knowing that the white phone is already falling from his friend’s hand.

The first bullet passes through Slaven’s left zygomatic arch into the brain and the shock of it stands his hair on end, the second strikes through the eye socket on the same side.

Do you doubt that everyone gives voice to exorcise the terror and the threat of what they see, blasphemies and screams, protestations and blessings, and various odd puffings, gruntings and groans which are quite beyond words, beyond consciousness even, the jerk of one soul at the passing of another.

Everyone gives voice — except that Aldous Slaven and the driver, those two most intimately concerned, make not a sound. Slaven has fallen with his legs strangely folded beneath him and the driver keeps his camera on target as would be expected and begins backing slowly through the tumult.

Slaven has, as you know, very straight, black hair, like that of an Italian, or a Slovak, and it lies across the pallor of one cheek despite the damage elsewhere. He has large feet, with thin ankles seeming a poor connection to them.
What description is necessary though, when you have come so well to know him, haven’t you, in the same way as all your acquaintances are perfectly open to understanding?

Miles and Marianne can’t get all this from television. They don’t hear the vast droning as if from bumble bees, don’t see the coursing blood like the Earl of Athlone flowers, but there are scenes of the supporters separating Kellie from the body and carrying it to the Square, shots of the rioting and looting within the inner city, the torching of the Town Hall and murder of a score of people separately identified as the assassin. Miles and Marianne continue to watch, but have no comment. Miles might admit to sorrow perhaps, but not surprise, for he understands that none of us has the price of the most precious things. Marianne Dunne takes the old man’s hand and he doesn’t move it from that consolation, or turn away from the screen, but he has begun to move his thoughts back to places where life had been bearable.