The Unknown Industrial Prisoner (62 page)

‘I suppose,' he said bitterly, ‘when the ornamental trees die they'll put up posters with trees painted on.'

 

PREFACE Others carry their books inside them—it doesn't occur to them to put them in print. They build up now and then a sort of word-pressure inside, and let out words at random to ease the pressure—words from their book of life—to family, to familiar strangers in pub and club when alcohol loosens the tongue. Their books last as long as life, and hold secrets of the human universe, but they evaporate.

It has been my aim to take apart, then build up piece by piece this mosaic of one kind of human life, this galaxy of painted slides, my bleak ratio of illuminations; to remind my present age of its industrial adolescence.

Well friend, I have not succeeded in putting back together those I have taken apart, for they are split, divided, fragmented, as I am split up and divided between page and character, speech and event, intention and performance.

If the faces are familiar, the expressions will not be admitted. A man congratulates himself more or less for what he has made, but parts of others are missing and must be supplied by the reader. And I myself am missing, but this lack is essential.

 

ONE GOOD MAN The last time I saw the Great White Feather was a few weeks after the fire. Again he was hopelessly drunk. Perhaps the fire made a deep impression on him. Or his christening. Or he was determined to stay drunk till the moon grew hair. Or it was an extension of his falling-flat trick.

I couldn't help it—shortly I was to go out of their lives for ever—I asked the question.

‘That day you were leading the goat along Highway One—what was it for? What did you do with it?'

But he was unable to speak. I believe he would have told me if he had been sober. His head was resting on what looked like plans. Perhaps he had been driven underground already. A new race of miners digging for the gold of freedom. This would be an escape story where tunnels were dug with no escape beyond the barbed wire. Escape was in the tunnel. Was this their refuge after being uprooted first from the land, then from industry? Banished from the face of the earth.

The digging may have started. If so he wouldn't announce anything till the small group round him finished their work and the tunnels and underground rooms were ready. If, in the Home Beautiful the atmosphere was so free that it seemed like liberty and equality, that was, in my opinion, because the Great White Feather did what he wanted secretly and quickly. Suggestions were accepted afterwards, and improvements; he put in his ideas first. There was no nonsense about voting, or the whole thing might very well have been voted out of existence. He provided what he said they needed, knowing they were useless at making up their minds. He served them from a great height; democracy was unnecessary. Most men would have turned the Home Beautiful into a goldmine, but not all men are stupid, selfish and corrupt when they have a monopoly of power.

As I turned away I thought of another question, something about the true function of man. Perhaps his true function is to be himself, just as he happens to be, and his whole duty simply to live. But how can that be enough? It was a rather pompous sort of thing to be talking about then. Or any time. I looked for the sixty-dollar cat, but he was off alone somewhere, hunting in the surrounding swamp for animals weaker than himself.

I ducked into the bed hut to say goodbye to the girls. They were all there, all six. There was real affection in their faces for the helpless man and they seemed to be discussing their life together and the good turns he had done them—in low voices, as if he were dying. I smiled and spoke in a loud voice to cheer them up.

‘Look, I've always wanted to ask you this,' I said. ‘We've got a bloke up there that pees purple. You ever seen him down here?' They all said yes. ‘Well,' I said, ‘what colour? I mean his—you know.'

‘Lavender,' said the Apprentice and the others nodded. ‘We never mentioned it, it might have turned the boys off.'

‘Didn't you mind?'

‘Why? He paid his money. His money's just as good as yours.'

‘Goodbye girls.'

They said goodbye, but kept their voices down. I came out laughing, but I didn't succeed in bucking them up.

Just for a last look I went back to the drink hut. Far Away Places had come in and stood looking down on the Great White Feather, who now was very still. Far Away spoke to him, but he did not turn his head. Far Away watched and waited. I was grateful that he kept his hands out from under his overalls. I thought of asking him if he was going to put a
DNR
stencil on the great man's shirt, but decided not to. I stood on the clay outside the hut, the girls were talking quietly in the bed hut. For some reason they still whispered. I hoped no one would come or make a noise; I wanted to watch, undisturbed, the strange scene inside the drink hut. The helpless man muttered a little. I thought I caught the words ‘deserted soak', but it may have been nothing of the kind. Then he began to speak in a deep, breaking voice. Slowly. ‘Nothing here for strangers to see. No high mountain of home units, no harbour view, only a few huts in the mangrove-trees. But though our waterhole in the bush has been forsaken by so many of our people, and overtime more attractive than leisure and ease, a few of us still care. This place still holds me fast; and I'll look after it while I can.' He paused, his laboured breathing loud. I could see his heartbeat, which shook the whole chest.

‘Get a handful of earth.' Far Away places gaped.

‘A handful of my country.' Doubtfully Far Away retreated outside, took a stick and loosened some earth near the roots of the stolen ivy. He came back, both hands full.

‘Let me look.' And the great man opened his eyes. ‘While I live I shall love to gaze on this ancient soil.' Far Away stooped to let him look. A smile spread over the Great White Feather's face. His right hand moved and I had a sudden conviction he was about to eat part of his beloved planet. Far Away moved, but not fast enough. The great man's hand knocked his cupped hands, the earth fell on his chest. Far Away's hands were big, they held about a spadeful. ‘Purple. The purple everlastings clinging to me.' The great man's jaw slackened, his words ceased.

Far Away Places bent down, watching closely. The Great White Feather groaned a bit and Far Away waved his hand to scare a fly from his face then left his hand there and wiped away some moisture from his chin.

I looked away towards the river, thinking I heard the rowlocks of Volga's boat—when he saw the girls together he'd start ringing the silver bell no matter what—and when I looked back into the hut, Far Away was stretched full length beside the muttering man, resting on one elbow, gently brushing his hair back with his right hand. Suddenly I looked up fearing, as if the branches meeting above were an unreliable vaulted roof of loose stones that might crush me any moment at the command of the Great White Father of the universe who watched our doings idly, carelessly, irresponsibly; with no interest and no compassion.

Behind me the girls padded over the trodden clay. They were not disturbed or intimidated by Far Away's devotion, but took up positions on the far side of the Great White Feather and began brushing off the dirt and undressing the unresisting body they knelt before. Shoes and socks, shirt and trousers; each took an area for herself, performing for him the services of which women consider themselves the best custodians. I couldn't see Far Away's face, but I knew he'd be put out by this competition for the great man's favour. He put out a hand to touch the expanse of white skin, but drew back slowly. Reverently, I thought, as if he hoped to touch it later.

Their heads leaned inward like girls examining a ring, aunts inspecting a new baby, wise men and shepherds over a manger or surgeons over a patient cadaver. There was a healed incision in his right side. I was surprised to see how blue the scar was on his right ankle. I didn't look at his hands.

‘…more important…' slurred the great man with difficulty.

‘What is, boss?' said Far Away eagerly, saying the very word that might rouse him to anger.

‘…no boss—not fit to be obeyed—nothing justifies one man over another—more important…' He seemed to twitch a little under the women's fingers.

‘What, darling?' asked the Old Lamplighter tenderly and the girls echoed, ‘Darling'.

‘…neighbour—more important—god…'

This message from a remote place was unintelligible to his hearers, who shook their heads and smiled indulgently. Had he meant one's neighbour was more important than God? Or the other way round? It had nothing to do with them; they let it pass. I didn't understand, either. Once he tried to rise, but they took this for a convulsive action by which he might hurt himself, and pressed him firmly down.

That white body on the floor—seeing it there was like finding a white glare of marble cut in naked figures on the Nullarbor. I stepped inside the door and tried to phone. It worked still. On an impulse, arising from some uncharted levels within myself, I dialled a service number and held the phone to the ear of their naked leader. Both factions watched me suspiciously, jealous of each other but able to spare a little extra jealousy for a third party. On the corrugated iron up near the ceiling joists I saw several large spiders, hairy huntsmen, edging sideways from cover.

‘What's that?'

‘Who's on the other end?' The clamour of their voices made an interesting contrast with their previous quiet.

‘It's a Dial-a-Prayer. I don't know who's on the other end,' I told them, holding the phone still. As if with some idea of not letting herself be left behind, the Old Lamplighter started to sing, ‘I'll be loving you, always', in a low key, making it sound like a dedication. Without turning a hair, Never on Sunday began in a much higher voice, but very sweetly, ‘If you were the only boy in the world'. Cinderella said dramatically, ‘Some enchanted evening', the Sorcerer's Apprentice started ‘On top of old Smokey', the Sleeping Princess sang ‘Strangers in the night', but not very well, and the Sandpiper sang very badly, ‘Singing in the rain'. And you will hardly credit this but the mixture didn't sound unattractive at first. Rather like extremely involved contrapuntal church music.

Far Away Places wasn't defeated by this display of devotion; he pulled from his pocket the trumpet mouthpiece he played up on the reactor structure and started something that sounded like ‘Drink to me only'. It may have been ‘Lead, Kindly Light'. I could identify only the first four notes. I kept the phone in position so the object of their devotion could get the benefit of the prayer service, then held it to my own ear to check. The voice had stopped, there was silence on the line. Had there been a voice? I should have checked first. For a moment I knelt there feeling ridiculous. There I was, wondering whether there had been a connection and a voice, when it was more to the point to ask whether the object of this service could have heard anyway. I went outside, looking back. Again he tried to rise. Again, protectively, their gentle hands pressed him down.

Above the arch of trees the sun, a golden lion, roared in the sky against all that was dark and cold. Where I stood, it created a peculiar light around me—the lemon light of afternoon sunshowers. The kneeling women's hands played like twelve white birds on the Great White Feather's body, their voices lifted reverently in the words of their various pop faiths and Far Away Places knelt too, his lips and powerful jaws pushed against his section of trumpet. As their various songs proceeded, the differences in line length, rhythm, meaning and words seemed to complicate the whole effect unbearably. Each was determined to keep her own song and determined to be heard—and Far Away's strangled tune above all. A third time the Great White Feather struggled to rise and a third time the weight of their devotion kept him under.

With my head whirling in this miniature surf of sound, I turned to go and bumped blindly into the Volga Boatman. I didn't want to have to stop and try to explain—how could I?—so I tried to slip past him. He didn't intend to get in the way but he dodged towards me. I went the other way. So did he. His eyes were fixed on the source of the chanting and mine on the path through the mangroves to the river and beyond that to the complicated world outside where dangerous ideas presented themselves as simplifications to dangerous men who had nothing to lose but a few short years of an existence they despised. Yes, mine were fixed on the path out of the Home Beautiful. Beyond that, too, where on the far side of the great empty stomach of Australia lay a new industrial frontier in the west, where more foreigners were messing about with the lives of people for whom they had no responsibility.

That strange music was piercing my head like the golden needles of a quack in whom I had no faith; it set my teeth on edge; it was swelling inside me like that benign lump of faith I had had removed years ago. I had to get away from this meaningless ritual.

The Boatman and I were concentrated absolutely on where we wanted to go. We had no mind left over to escape each other. Back and forth we went from side to side, left right left right in perfect time, getting no farther forward; each, for the sake of a tiny inconvenience, wishing the other had never existed.