Past the Shallows (6 page)

Someone whacked into Miles from behind. He turned and Dad was yelling, red in the face, pointing at Martin who was slumped
against the wall of the cabin. Miles was still holding the dead baby shark in
his hands and Dad grabbed it and chucked it over the side. Then he slapped Miles hard in the face.

‘I can’t hear,’ Miles managed to say, or yell, but Dad just marched him into the cabin and made him take the wheel.

Martin looked bad. The sweat on his face, the colour of his skin. The shark had snapped his leg so easily. It was swollen
and strangely twisted so that it barely looked attached from the knee down. Miles thought that some of Martin’s ribs might
be broken, too, because of the way he was breathing shallow and quick. But that could have just been because of the pain.
It would take at least twenty minutes to get to Dover and then another thirty to the hospital at Huonville. Miles prayed that
the painkillers would start working soon, and that his hearing would come back.

He jumped up on the tray of the ute and sat next to Martin who was propped up in the corner. Dad had carefully put blankets
all around him and patted him on the shoulder before getting in the cab. It seemed to Miles that Dad genuinely cared for Martin.
There was something between them, something that went back a long way.

The ute choked into life. Miles’s hearing was coming back in waves. He watched Jeff walk across the road to the pub and was
glad he wasn’t coming to the hospital. Martin was still sweating, still pale.

‘Not long now,’ Miles said, still unsure of the volume of his voice.

Martin attempted a small smile and gestured for Miles to come closer. Miles was careful not to touch Martin’s leg as he moved.

‘Your dad’s gonna need you,’ he said.

And suddenly Miles knew what that busted leg meant. He wouldn’t be going to school next term. He’d be out on that boat with
Dad and with Jeff until Martin could come back. He’d be stuck out there every day.

‘Watch Jeff. I’ve tried telling your dad, but …’

Martin broke off. He rested his head against the cab of the ute.

Miles sat back, too, and watched the white lines of the road snake out from under the tray. He watched it all get further
and further away – the fishing boats and Dover, the smoke from the cannery. He watched until they were gone from sight and
there was nothing but the road and the green grass and the marshy Huon River flowing slowly.

An elderly nurse ushered Miles down the corridor into a small office as the orderlies moved Martin from the ute. She pushed
him down onto a low office chair in front of an electric bar heater and said she’d be back in a minute. Miles watched her
waddle off down the corridor and disappear.

Huonville Hospital was small, made out of the same yellow brick and big steel-framed windows as Dover High, except the hospital
was only one storey; a flat rectangle with a car park. Miles had been here when it was brand new, when it smelled of paint
and lino. And he’d thought it was lucky there was a hospital so close when Granddad was sick. It meant it was easy to come
and visit.

But it hadn’t been easy. He’d only gone once.

Granddad was on his side, all bony and yellow with tubes in his arms and a mask covering most of his face. He was crumpled
like a sheet of old newspaper and the room was full of gurgling, each breath slow and full of fluid. Granddad was drowning
on the inside, and Miles just stood at the door like a coward.

He should have walked over, should have held his hand. But he didn’t. He ran down the corridor and
out to the car park and he told Dad that Granddad was asleep and that the nurse had told him to come back tomorrow.

When they got home, Joe phoned to say that Granddad had died.

‘It’s all right. Your friend’s going to be fine – just a broken leg.’

The nurse had an arm around his shoulder and Miles realised that his gumboots were red hot from the electric heater. He wiped
his cheeks.

‘It’s probably just the shock. Here, I brought you some tea.’

But Miles didn’t have time to drink it because Dad came and found him and said they were going.

H
arry found the bushes where he had first seen the dog and he stood there hidden from the road. He called out ‘Here boy’ quietly
and waited, but the dog didn’t come. If only he knew the dog’s name then maybe it would come back and they could play here
by the road. Harry could even take the dog home for a while and give it some milk or something to eat. Dad wouldn’t know.

He called out again, louder this time, and looked into the scrub. You couldn’t see George’s house or even his front paddock
from here. You could only see trees. Maybe he’d be safe if he stayed behind the line of trees. If he saw George he could run.
George was big and all hunched over so he probably wouldn’t be able to run fast. Not like Harry could.

He’d just walk a little way, just to see if he could find the dog.

There was a track, a kind of path that he hadn’t noticed before. It was muddy and slippery with leaves and Harry was glad
he had worn his gumboots and not his sneakers. There were probably leeches here. He walked slowly and he kept on listening.

He looked up: some of the eucalypts were really tall – straight and tall and full at the top, blocking out the sky. He heard
sticks and branches crack, but he knew that sound. It was always there if you listened, always there in the distance, even
when there was no wind. It was the sound of the crack wattle cracking. The sound of the wattle dropping branches into the
river. And upstream, on tight bends and narrow channels, there were so many branches that they almost dammed the water. They
almost choked it. But downstream the current was strong. The water just swallowed the sticks and branches and flushed them
out to sea.

Harry turned a corner and suddenly he could see it, the paddock and the shack.

He’d reached the end of the trees.

He crouched down. He couldn’t see George, but the dog was there. It was lying flat on the verandah
in a small patch of sunlight that had broken through the clouds. It looked like it was fast asleep.

Harry stayed still and watched the dog. He wanted to sit down because his legs were hurting and it felt like maybe they were
going to sleep, but when he touched the ground with his hands it was wet here, too. He’d just have to stay crouching.

The dog really was asleep. It hadn’t moved at all, not even its tail or ears. Maybe Harry should go and come back in a while.
Come back later.

But then the dog raised its head. There was the creak of a spring and the door of the shack opened. Harry held his breath,
stayed perfectly still as George stepped out onto the verandah. His bent legs were burning but he didn’t flinch. He didn’t
move.

George had something in his hand. A toolbox, and he put it down on the verandah. Then he turned and went back inside. It was
Harry’s chance to get away.

He stood up, held onto a tree to steady himself. He was sure he hadn’t made a sound, but when he looked the dog was standing,
its ears up, face pointed right at Harry. And then it barked.

Harry pushed his body flat against the tree. He wanted to run but his legs were asleep. They were just dead weights hanging
and they wouldn’t work, wouldn’t move. He pushed his face into the bark.
He closed his eyes and tried to be invisible. Maybe the dog hadn’t seen him. Maybe it was barking at a bird or a rabbit or
a snake. But there was another bark and it was close. Harry looked up and he saw the dog running. He swung around and the
dog was already at his feet, jumping and whining and clawing at his legs. Harry searched wildly, but George hadn’t followed.
He was standing outside the shack.

Harry could feel the blood moving in his legs again. They were coming back to life and he could sprint away now, but he just
kept looking at the wooden shack and then back at the dog. And the dog’s blue eyes were gleaming and its tail was wagging
and it started to pull at the sleeve of his jacket.

Harry let the dog pull. He let the dog pull him away from the safety of the trees. And he moved, step by step down the muddy
paddock. He moved step by step, closer to the shack, because there was nowhere else to go and nothing to do and because the
dog wanted him to stay.

When he got down to the verandah near George, the dog became still. It sat down. Harry rubbed its head, scratched behind its
ears. He tried not to look at George’s face.

‘I like your dog,’ he said quietly.

George seemed to have trouble speaking, the way his mouth was all open and had a big hole at the top, but Harry could hear
the words. He could hear that the dog’s name was Jake and that he was six months old.

‘I’m Harry,’ he said, and George nodded. It looked like maybe he was smiling.

George walked to the door and he waved for Harry to follow before he went inside. The wooden door sprang closed behind him.

There was smoke coming from the chimney and it was probably really warm inside. Harry had forgotten his gloves and his ears
were cold. He dug his hands into Jake’s brown fur but the dog kept moving. It just wanted to play.

Harry stood up. He stepped onto the small verandah, stood in front of the door. He wished he could see inside without having
to open the door. There could be anything in there. Anything waiting for him. It could be a trap and no one would know he
was here. He took a deep breath and reached out for the door handle. The door creaked open.

Harry looked into the darkened room. George was standing by a table pouring hot water into a teapot. Jake pushed between Harry’s
legs and went inside. Harry felt warm air on his face and he followed.

George pulled out a chair and Harry sat down. He looked at the table, watched George’s big strange hands put milk and two
sugars in each cup before he poured the tea. It was exactly how Harry had his tea, milk and two sugars. He looked up into
George’s face, but he wasn’t looking at Harry. He was looking down at the cups as he stirred the tea with a spoon. He slid
a cup over to Harry.

‘Thanks,’ Harry said, and he took the cup in his hands.

George sat down.

From the outside, this place looked just like a picker’s hut, all weathered up and grey. But the inside was bright and neat
and clean and Harry thought it was nicer than where he lived, nicer than the brown house, even though it was just one room
and there was only a sink instead of a bathroom and the toilet must be outside somewhere down the back. There were even fresh
flowers in a vase. White flowers. Lilies.

Harry drank his tea quickly because he didn’t know what else to do. He didn’t know what to say and he was glad when Jake came
over and put his head on Harry’s lap. He patted Jake’s head and then he just started talking. He told George that he really
loved dogs and that he wished he could have one at
home but Dad wouldn’t let him because he hated dogs. He told George that Miles wanted a dog, too, and that he wished Miles
didn’t have to work out on the boat because he didn’t like being on his own all school holidays, and he couldn’t go to Joe’s
because Joe was busy because he had to pack up Granddad’s house and everything. And then he asked George if he had known Granddad
and George nodded. And Harry thought he would have because back then everyone knew everyone around here. That’s what Granddad
had told him anyway.

George didn’t say much, but he seemed to be listening. He seemed to understand what Harry was talking about. Harry asked him
where he got Jake and he waited for George to answer. George poured them both another cup of tea, stirred the milk and sugar
in like before, and then he took a sip.

He said that he found Jake on the road near Daryl Jarratt’s place, and that he was skinny and sick and that he was almost
dead.

Harry knew exactly how Daryl Jarratt’s dogs lived. They were wild, spent their lives on the end of a chain frothing at the
mouth and whining and barking and looking like they might want to kill something. Looking like they might want to die. He’d
seen them once from behind the windshield
of Dad’s ute – eyes red and full, spit dripping from their barking mouths as Daryl chucked a bucket of rotten scraps on the
ground.