Out of Tune (4 page)

It was at about this time that David began going to school. In many ways, he was something of a late starter. He didn’t actually
begin talking until he was about three years old. He also had a lot of trouble controlling his bowels when he started school,
at the age of five. He often hid in the grass after class near our school (Elwood State School, which was a few minutes’ walk
from Glenhuntly Road where we lived). I would leave school with my friends, and one of them would say, “Look, there’s your
little brother hiding in the grass.” I would go over and fetch David, who had dirtied himself, and take him home where my
mother would put him in a bath to clean him. David did this frequently, almost every day. To me, this kind of behavior illustrates
what a sensitive and anxious child he was.

David messing himself was just a fact of life, something we got used to. My father never whipped David for this with a wet
towel as happens in
Shine
. He never hit David, nor would it have been in his nature to do so.

I also recall that David didn’t much want to go to school: he cried frequently, not wishing to be separated from his parents.
I remember, too, that as a young child he was also scared of lighting the gas kettle. Even when he was older, David was not
very practical. For example, as a teenager he couldn’t tie his own shoelaces. Perhaps this was a foretaste of later life when
David went to London and it soon became apparent that it wasn’t good for him to be away from a loving, nurturing environment,
without anyone to take care of him. In London he had difficulty looking after himself, managing his finances and surviving
on his own. His reluctance to leave the family nest as a child was in marked contrast to myself; I didn’t have any problems
about going to school. On the contrary, I have always been curious and eager to try out new things, in contrast to David at
that time.

David had to wear eyeglasses from a very early age. I think he must have been five, perhaps even four and a half. He was,
and is, extremely shortsighted, the only child in our family who began to wear glasses so young. His glasses are the kind
known in Australia as Coke bottle lenses because they are so thick. Nowadays David sometimes wears contact lenses, although
he finds that they cause irritation. He may have been encouraged by others to wear them for his concert performances, even
though he is not very comfortable with them.

Like my younger brother Leslie, who could be a bit of an adventurer and get into all sorts of mischief, I, too, was quite
a naughty child. David was more serious, spending much of his time from an early age sitting at the piano, lost in music.
I remember I owned a skirt that I absolutely hated and my mother would try and make me wear it. Early one evening I snuck
out of the apartment and went down to the canal near our home in Glenhuntly Road and threw the skirt into the water and that
was the end of that. That canal was perfect for throwing unwanted items into.

Another thing I remember is the circus that came to town every year. It pitched its tent on the big field just across from
where we lived, bringing its horses and lions and tigers and elephants. I used to hang around day and night, intoxicated by
the exotic atmosphere and nomadic feeling. David loved visiting the circus, too, and liked watching the firework displays
that sometimes took place across the road from us, for example on Guy Fawkes night (an annual British tradition that used
to also be celebrated in Australia).

I also had some rather macabre interests, and these got me into trouble. As a young child I was fascinated by matches and
fire. When we stoked up the boiler I often used to throw an empty container of toothpaste into the fire, causing some chemical
process whereby wonderful colors would be emitted from the old toothpaste container as it burned.

One day when I was about six or seven, I was in the kitchen standing near the very flimsy muslin curtains above the kitchen
window. I was lighting one match after another seeing how fast they could burn down until they got to my fingers and then
I would blow them out. Then disaster struck. I had stood too close to the curtains and suddenly they were engulfed in flames.
I was alone in the kitchen and didn’t know what to do. So I rushed to fill an empty milk bottle full of water and, like an
idiot, threw it at the window—not realizing of course that the bottle would completely shatter the window. So not only was
there now a fire burning out of control but there was also broken glass all over the floor.

Just at that moment, my little brother David came in and looked at the huge fire blazing and me standing there in a state
of near paralysis not knowing what to do. Shocked, he screamed “What have you done! I’m going to go and tell on you.” I was
really afraid I was going to get into trouble and I pleaded with him not to. I had this vision that the fire could be put
out without anybody knowing, even though in the meantime the wooden window frame had started burning and I didn’t know what
to do. But David ran off in a panic to tell my mother. Just then I noticed my father’s old gray shaving mug. I grabbed it
and began rushing back and forth from the tap, repeatedly filling it up and throwing water on the fire until eventually I
managed to put it out.

Now, although I was quite proud of myself for putting out the fire, the kitchen still looked an absolute shambles. The curtains
had been reduced to a smoldering burned rag, the window frame had turned completely black, and there were hundreds of bits
of broken glass from the window scattered all over the floor amidst puddles of water. At that moment my mother and David walked
in, my mother looking horrified. Dad was due home from work shortly and I was scared that I would be punished for all the
damage I’d caused. So I hid in the bathroom. My mother of course told my father what had happened. Dad came to the door of
the bathroom and said: “Come on, Margaret, come on outside.” And I said: “No, no, no. I know I’ve done an awful thing. I don’t
want to be punished.” It took my father quite a long time while I stayed barricaded in the bathroom to persuade me that nothing
was going to happen to me.

Eventually I agreed to come out, and just as Dad had promised, I didn’t get punished at all. He simply explained to me why
it was dangerous to play with matches, and that was the end of it.

There was another incident a few months later where I again did something terribly stupid that could have ended in disaster.
One of the things I used to be very curious about was the idea of hanging. I’d heard and read about people getting hanged
for crimes, so I thought I would try to see what this hanging experience felt like. I suggested to David that we should try
it out. Being my obedient little brother he did what his big sister told him. We went to the back of the apartments with a
rope (our apartment was part of a small two-story block of four apartments, with stairs between the floors) and I told David
to go up to the top of the landing while I stood at the bottom of the stairs. He then threw one end of the rope down to me
as I instructed and I made a noose and put it around my neck. I then ordered him to start pulling. At first it was fine, but
gradually I could feel the rope tightening around my neck and it stopped feeling fine. Luckily, just as I started gasping
for air, one of the neighbors came out, saw us, and raced inside frantically shouting, “Mrs. Helfgott, Mrs. Helfgott, come
quickly!” My mother rushed out, took the rope away from David, and I was saved.

I
n 1953, when I was eight and David was six, my parents decided the family should move to Perth, which is on the west coast
of Australia, facing the Indian Ocean and more than 2,000 miles by road from Melbourne. I once asked my father why, rather
than move to say Sydney or Canberra, he chose to go to Perth, which is after all one of the most isolated cities in the world.
(The nearest city, Adelaide, is over 1,700 miles away.) He told me that he’d taken out a map of Australia and picked the farthest
place he could from Melbourne. Its distance was precisely the reason for the move. He wanted to make a totally fresh start.

When my father first came to Australia he had been reasonably successful. But over the years he suffered a string of business
failures and things hadn’t always gone well for him. (In 1942-43, he had served in the Australian armed forces.) He also worked
in a knitwear factory, keeping the mechanical and electrical tools in order. But as well as disappointments with work, he
had become disillusioned with several of his friends in Melbourne, which was particularly painful for him.

By nature, my father was a giver. He had a big personality with a big heart and would do anything for his friends. Yet several
of the people he thought he could rely on had let him down badly. In the early days in Melbourne, he used to give shelter
to newly arrived migrants from Poland—many of them refugees from anti-Semitic persecution—in his house in Pigdon Street. In
most cases they had no money, and my father would feed, clothe, and look after them without taking a penny. He would find
them jobs, and help them get established.

But many of the people whom my father had befriended and helped failed to stand by him when he experienced tough times. This
was the case even though some of them had become very wealthy. When my father had been in a position to help people, he had
done so unstintingly; yet when he himself needed assistance, very little was forthcoming. I remember Dad telling me that people
he had helped in the past, and who had since made a lot of money, had done everything they could to avoid him in his time
of need. Even though he had four young children (Louise wasn’t born yet), had lost his business, and was in financial difficulty,
these people, when they saw my father coming down the street, would actually cross to the other side: they didn’t want to
have to place themselves in a situation where they might feel obliged to offer him help. My father was absolutely stunned
by this behavior. When he used to tell me about these incidents I could see how hurt he was. My heart went out to him and
I realized even then, at an early age, that people weren’t always nice and didn’t always do the right and decent thing.

There were of course two or three notable exceptions, with whom the family are still in touch. I recently spoke to Ida Zoltak,
an elderly lady who still lives in Melbourne and whose husband David Zoltak had boarded with my father when he arrived from
Czestochowa in 1937. She made a point of telling me that she had seen
Shine
and thought the way Peter was characterized was “a disgrace.” “The real Peter Helfgott,” she said, “was a very nice, gentle,
and lovable man. I can only say nice things about him because there was nothing bad about him.” Another person who became
a lifelong friend after my father had put him up when he arrived from Poland in 1938 was Laizar Shaw. Laizar came to visit
me in Israel a few years ago and also told me what a truly wonderful man my father was.

However, most of my father’s so-called friends somehow disappeared when he needed them. This was one of the reasons why he
wanted to make a fresh start in Perth, although the main factors were harsh economic conditions and his difficulty in finding
suitable employment.

Before we sailed for Perth, Dad wanted to give David and me a special treat to put us in a good mood and prepare us for the
trip. In June 1953, when Elizabeth II was crowned queen, all the kids in Melbourne were given a day off school to mark the
event. Australia at that time was a very loyal member of the British Commonwealth. First Dad took us to lunch at a big department
store in Melbourne called Myers and spoiled us with special kinds of candy and ice cream. Then we went to an amusement park
called Luna Park. Its entrance was constructed so as to resemble an enormous clown’s face and one had to walk through his
giant wide-open mouth to get in. We had a great time there eating cotton candy and having a go on all kinds of rides; it was
my first experience of the big dipper, which hurtled up and down at terrific speed and was so absolutely terrifying that I’ll
never forget it.

We made the 2,200 mile trip to Perth, which is the capital of Western Australia, by sea. Our journey took us first through
Bass Strait (which separates the state of Victoria from the island of Tasmania) and then we sailed across the Great Australian
Bight on the southern side of the continent. The boat took six days at that time, with no stops. All of us were utterly seasick,
except for my father. We just wanted to stay in our cabin bed but Dad insisted that we go up on deck and breathe in the fresh
air. After a couple of days of his urging, David and I finally emerged from our queasy slumber and went up on deck. The salty
fresh air made us feel better in no time, and in the end the trip turned out to be quite fun. We ran around playing games
all over the boat. However, the journey was an ordeal for my mother and father, since at the time Suzie was just a six-month-old
baby and Leslie was only two and a half.