Solomon's Song (28 page)

‘Rich enough, but the money you will inherit from me, I daresay, will make you the richest woman in the nation.’

‘But that’s obscene!’ Victoria cries, then quickly adds, ‘I shall give it all away!’

Hawk laughs again. ‘It won’t make a lot of difference if you do. You and Ben will inherit a majority share in Solomon & Teekleman. As fast as you give it away your wealth will be renewed.’

‘But, Grandfather Hawk, they are among the worst of the slum landlords and the developers! Did you know that they employ only Freemasons?’

Hawk nods. ‘One of David’s little innovations.’

‘It’s not little. Freemasonry, as you no doubt know, requires some expense which, generally speaking, is beyond a poor man’s resources. So David made it a condition that anyone who works for the company must be a Freemason and then the company pays for the regalia and, furthermore, as an incentive to join, the company pays their sick and old-age benefits as well.’

‘Yes, well, I’ve always thought it one of the few acts of real generosity emanating from David Solomon.’

‘Generosity my foot! You know what that means, don’t you? The benefit funds are administered by the Independent Order of Oddfellows, who have strong links with Freemasonry. Grandfather, they are in each other’s pockets up to their armpits.’

‘I would think that perfectly legitimate. If you’re going to pay for the workers’ benefits you have every right to choose the friendly society you are going to involve.’

‘You still don’t get the point!’ Victoria exclaims. ‘Lots of the company’s workers are poor but they are Protestants and now Freemasons. Lots of Catholics are poor but they are forbidden by the Church to be Freemasons. So Solomon & Teekleman deliberately pick their so-called slum areas to buy and then to clear for the building of factories, offices and middle-class homes where the workers’ cottages are predominantly Catholic, knowing that their own workers are unlikely to be sympathetic to their plight.’

‘My dear, the Freemasons are not villains, in fact integrity, honesty, moral and social virtue are the cornerstones of their beliefs. I feel sure, if they thought Abraham, as Grand Master of the Melbourne Lodge, was forcing his workers to join the brotherhood, they would soon enough do something about it. It is, I believe, one of the strongest tenets of the movement to render practical aid to the less fortunate members of the community. By helping the poorer of his own workers to embrace the brotherhood and by ensuring some sort of sinecure for them in sickness and old age, isn’t Abraham doing just that?’

‘Yes, but only for his own workers! The unions are powerless to prevent them from going ahead with a particular development by utilising the only weapon they have, to bring the company workers out on strike. As Freemasons, the company employees have elected not to join the various unions. Did you know the company does not employ a single member of a union! Nor can the unions bring the workers from the outside contractors and suppliers out on strike against them, because Solomon & Teekleman are virtually self-sufficient, they largely own all their own equipment and the resources to complete a “slum clearance” as they are so fond of calling it.’

‘Just for a moment, let’s take the company’s point of view. What have they done wrong? You call it exploiting the poor, they call it much-needed slum clearance. They are not the government, they are not required to make decisions as to what benefits the poor and what doesn’t, they are not a social welfare organisation, they are an organisation working within the law to make a profit. Moreover, they can be said to have looked after the welfare of their own employees very well indeed and, furthermore, it is the collective decision of those employees not to join a union. I can see that there may be a moral issue here for you and, of course, also for the unions involved, but in the purely practical sense Solomon & Teekleman have done nothing wrong. They are in a commercial sense completely blameless.’

Victoria suddenly stops and brings her fingers to her lips. ‘My God, I never thought of it!’ She points to Hawk. ‘You’re one of them, a Freemason, aren’t you?’ She doesn’t wait for Hawk’s reply. ‘That’s why you’re defending Solomon & Teekleman, isn’t it?’

Hawk laughs. ‘Freemasonry is a secret society in that it doesn’t disclose its members, but you are quite wrong, Victoria, I am not a Freemason, nor am I defending the company in which both your name and mine appears, but I do try to be a fair-minded and logical human being.’

‘But, Grandfather, what I say is true! They have completely manipulated the situation in their favour. John Curtin, the head of the Brunswick branch of the Labor Party to which I belong, says they’re virtually bulletproof. Frank Anstey the federal MP says the same. John Curtin says they’ve got a battery of lawyers ready to defend Sir Abraham’s actions every time he passes wind! It’s simply iniquitous and this is a company which, in part anyway, you and I own! My name, for God’s sake, is Teekleman! How can I hold my head up? How can I live with that?’ Victoria cries despairingly.

‘Come now, my dear,’ Hawk comforts her, handing her his handkerchief, for she has begun to cry. ‘It’s not as bad as all that, there’s still the Potato Factory under Tom Pickles, as decent a man as they come.’

‘Tom Pickles! Don’t give me Tom Pickles as your example. He is Master of the Grand Lodge of Tasmania!’

‘How do you know all this, Victoria?’ Hawk asks sternly.

‘I heard it at the Labor Party conference last April. From the Tasmanian delegates.’

‘Victoria, the Potato Factory has always been a strictly ethical company in its outside dealings, and the workers were always happy. It was your great-grandmother’s pride and joy that she neither cheated nor lied in her dealings with others. She would say, “I’ve done enough o’ that in me life and ‘ad the same done to me often enough. From now it’s all on the square, do unto others what you’d want for yerself.”‘

Victoria nods. ‘According to the Hobart delegate, it’s the same there as here, no problems within, with the Freemasonry and health benefits and pension fund thing working, but the company’s outside dealings have been described as industrial rape and pillage. All kept very quiet, mind, money and Freemasonry are a powerful combination in Collins Street, but it seems this is equally true of Elizabeth Street, Hobart.’

‘Why didn’t you tell me how you felt before now?’

Victoria bows her head and is silent awhile, then says softly, ‘There was nothing you could do about it.’ She looks up at Hawk, her eyes sad. ‘I didn’t want you to be hurt, Grandfather. You and Mary Abacus built the Potato Factory to be a fair place, a great and good company, you worked so hard to make it the best, now it isn’t any more.’

Hawk remembers how, when Victoria was first articled as a law clerk and started to see the lack of corporate morality and greed from the inside and realised she was inadvertently a part of it, he wanted to tell her then that in a few years she and her brother would be the major shareholders again in Solomon & Teekleman, that she would have the power to change things if she eventually became chairman.

But he held his tongue at the time, knowing that it would be eight years before she came of age to exercise her proxy, by which time, with no experience in the company, she would have little chance of competing with Joshua Solomon. He also had to consider that he might well be dead or enfeebled and no matter how brilliant his granddaughter proved to be, she would have little hope of fighting Abraham and Joshua on her own for control.

Now, with Hinetitama’s death and his ability to assume control again and with the declaration of war, everything has changed and the odds have evened up for Victoria. Everything but one thing, Hawk’s rapidly advancing age. He is already a septuagenarian and knows he is running out of time. He must move quickly if he is to get Victoria up and running as future competition to Joshua. There is only one way he can do this. He must once again confront David Solomon.

Hawk has no doubt that Victoria will be a match for Joshua Solomon if they compete on equal terms. As two people they are very different. Victoria is brilliant, confident, stubborn with a sharp tongue, perhaps a bit of a bossy boots, but without pretension, loyal and honest and much loved by her friends.

Joshua, on the other hand, seems of an altogether different disposition. On a superficial level he appears somewhat foppish and it would be easy to take him too lightly. But Hawk does not intend to make this mistake, Joshua is David-trained and Solomon-bred and while, on the surface, he may seem the antithesis of his uncouth and irascible grandfather, the old man appears pleased with the job he has done on his grandson and that is warning sufficient for Hawk.

In the year Joshua Solomon has been back from Oxford it is already established among the mothers in Melbourne’s social circles that he is the big catch of the season. It seems he has no disadvantages beyond his odious grandfather who, fortuitously, must leave this mortal coil at any time. They titter among themselves and count Joshua’s many blessings. He will be rich beyond avarice, is blue-eyed, fair-haired and handsome as can be, he is well mannered and utterly charming, with the affectations and speech of a young English gentleman. To the society matrons with unattached and eligible daughters, Joshua Solomon seems almost too good to be true. To their daughters he is truly to be swooned over. To the patriarchs of Melbourne’s business community he represents the new age, the end of the gold-rush mentality with its rough and ready business ways. Joshua is one of the scions who will define business in the new century, just the sort of young business leader to represent the new Melbourne. An Oxford blue in both cricket and rugger where he played in the 1911 Australian rugby tour of England and Wales, starring on the wing in the test against Wales, he now plays cricket for Victoria. He is urbane, bright, educated and informed. While his Jewish father is sufficient reason for him to be blackballed by the Melbourne Club, he has been accepted with alacrity as a member of the Australia Club. Old codgers in the club, witnessing the young man playing at billiards, turn to each other and remark, ‘Splendid young chappie. Wish we had ten more young members made of the same solid metal, eh?’ As Hawk approaches his Caulfield home on the morning of Hinetitama’s death he knows that he must somehow force David once again into a corner so that he will be made to capitulate. Hawk knows that Joshua is the key. He must pluck David’s teeth first, whereupon he will see Abraham about remaining as chairman. But first he must talk to Victoria and then get some sleep.

*

In the late afternoon of the day of Hinetitama’s death the butler, known simply as Adams, enters the sunlit conservatory of Abraham’s Toorak home where David Solomon, wrapped in a light blanket, is dozing in a bathchair. The butler stands beside the old man and announces, ‘Mr Hawk Solomon has called and offered his card, he requests that he might be allowed to see you, Mr David.’

‘Eh? What did you say? Speak up, man!’ David shouts, annoyed at being disturbed.

‘Mr Hawk Solomon to see you, sir.’ The butler raises one eyebrow slightly, not that David can see this clear sign of his disdain. ‘A black man, sir.’

‘Hawk Solomon to see me? Tell him to go ter buggery!’

‘Sir, he apologises for the lack of an appointment but says it is a matter of some urgency.’

‘What, his urgency or mine? The only matter of urgency I have is to take a piss. Here, get the bloody chamber-pot.’ The old man brings his legs over the edge of the bathchair with some difficulty and places them on the floor. With hands trembling he begins to fumble with his pyjama pants. He can barely see the chamber-pot which Adams now holds at the correct level. ‘Tell me when it’s pointed in the right direction,’ he instructs Adams, ‘then close yer eyes!’

‘It’s about right to proceed now, sir,’ the butler says solemnly. He is a big man with a pronounced belly and appears awkward as he bends to hold the chamber-pot at the right height and angle.

After what seems like ages, Adams hears the thin trickle of urine splashing into the porcelain pot. He keeps his eyes shut until the sound finally ceases and then allows sufficient time for David’s trembling fingers to return the fly of his pyjamas to a more decorous arrangement. Placing the chamber-pot down, he lifts David’s trembling legs back into the bathchair and tucks the blanket around him. ‘Bastard ain’t worth the piss in that pot!’ David snaps. ‘Is that all he said, a matter of urgency? A matter of urgency about what, man!’

‘Just a matter of urgency, Mr David.’

‘Yes, yes, you said that before!’ David says impatiently. David thinks for a moment and then decides that he will take this final opportunity to spit in the face of his last great enemy. ‘Tell him he’s got ten minutes and damned lucky to get it.’

‘Yes, Mr David.’ Adams bends slowly and picks up the chamber-pot. ‘Ten minutes, it is?’

David appears to be looking about the conservatory until his failing eyesight spies a large wicker chair. ‘Take that out, make the nigger boy stand.’

Adams, still holding the chamber-pot, takes the chair from the back and drags it behind him as he leaves the conservatory. ‘He’s not to be offered any refreshment, yer hear,’ David shouts at the departing butler.

Clasping his rheumatic hands so as to appear completely calm and in control, he waits for Hawk to be ushered into his presence.

Hawk’s shadowy figure stoops to allow him to enter the doorway into the conservatory. ‘Ah, Hawk Solomon, you have dared to call at my house when you know you are not welcome.’

Hawk smiles. ‘Would you have met me elsewhere, David?’

‘Certainly not.’

‘Well then, how else would I be able to say what I have come to say?’

‘There is nothing you can say that would interest me, so be out with it and then be gone, I am too old to waste what time I have left in the company of a nigger.’

‘Ah, my tidings, whether from a nigger or a white man, will cause you no less consternation, David Solomon,’ Hawk replies evenly, not in the least upset by the outburst from the old man. He stands relaxed in front of the bathchair, towering above the supine David, who can see him as a soft image, almost a dark shadow, as if he is looking into a badly smudged mirror.