Wild Cat Falling (6 page)

During the night of Saturday the first of April the premises of Mr Cox of this town had been broken and entered. On examining the grating abutting on the street he found that it had been forced to provide entry. From the restriction of the entrance, he decided that a child or children were responsible and, acting on his suspicions, he had questioned various residents of the town and finally the mother of the defendant. On conducting a search of her house he had found the stolen goods. From what can be ascertained the mother knew nothing of the crime and in no way encouraged her son.

“Thanks constable. That's quite enough. Will the defendant please stand.”

The Magistrate beckons and I stumble to my feet and stand alone.

“Answer the following questions truthfully. Did you or did you not break into Mr Cox's shop?”

“I did, sir.”

“How did you force entry, that is get into the place?”

“I found the grating was loose accidentally, sir. I was just mucking about and found I could get in.”

“Was anyone with you?”

“No, sir. I was all by myself. Only me it was, sir.” My voice breaks into a whimper.

“Good. You can sit down.”

My mother is now told to stand.

“Did you know what your boy was up to?”

“No, sir. He used to bring home things from the dump, some of it real good stuff too. Then he said he picked up this parcel off the road. That's the God's honest truth, sir. If I'd known he was stealing it I would have stopped him, sir, but he's always been a good boy, sir. I didn't think — ”

“Yes, yes. I believe you knew nothing about it. You can take the boy home now. The constable will call on you later.”

The last day of freedom. Mum and I are standing beside the policeman on the station platform and I am crying as the clock ticks the minutes away. At last the train comes in.

“Never mind, son. Everything will come out all right.”

I sob and cling to her. Nothing will ever be all right now. I have been tried and found guilty. And I am already nine years old. . . .

“Trouble in mind. . . .” To hell with sentimental memories! I've been through a helluva lot of trouble in the ten years since that snivelling kid left his mum and his home town for the Boys' Home near the city. Boys' Home . . . bloody awful joke that was. And it was the end of any sort of home for me. The end of Mum too by the look of her last time I was outside. Couldn't get away from her fast enough with her whining about her ailments and how none of her kids ever came to see her now. As if I didn't have enough to do looking after myself. And right now that means getting out of this blue serge prison suit.

I reach the house where my acquaintance lives. His mother answers the door and when I tell her who I am she says to wait. He comes to the door and asks me in. He seems surprised to see me and is nervous though he fakes pleased. He flings questions at me and I answer him. He bores me and as soon as possible I put it on him for the clothes. He did a job with me once. I took the rap for us both, but he knows I could still put him in if I liked. He takes me to his room where I choose black jeans, black shirt, black desert boots. I ask him to look after the prison rig for me and he says O.K. I can collect them any time I like. He offers me a drink and we have a few whiskies. Then I glide like a black shadow into the street.

The night is still young, so I turn towards the milk- bar where the old gang hangs out.

I look through the window of the lighted milk-bar and the familiar surroundings glow a “Welcome Home” to me. This joint is the meeting place of the bodgie-widgie mob. Here they all are — the anti-socials, the misfits, the delinks, in a common defiance of the squares. The juke-box, a mass of metal, lights and glass, commands the room, squat god worshipped and fed by footloose youth to fill their empty world with the drug-delusion of romance. It flashes me a sarcastic grin and blares a Rock 'n' Roll hullo. I'm back and the gang crowds round — the boys in peacock-gaudy long coats and narrow pants, the girls casual in dowdy-dark jeans and sloppy sweaters.

They question me about jail — who's in and who's getting out soon? As one of the mob I have to answer them. Then they tell me about their own activities, the last week-end party and the latest dance hall that chucked them out. One chap has been picked up for carnal knowledge, another for car stealing. I sympathize and bum a cigarette and laugh at the funny bits. Already I'm bored and feel depressed from the whisky I've had.

I drift away to a vacant table, order sandwiches and cigarettes and whisper for a cup of wine. The waiter says he is glad to see me back and passes me a bottle with a reminder about the cops. I fill my cup and put the bottle under the table. The music comes out good and sad. . . .

You can get rid of loneliness

If you can fall in love....

A theme song for the kids.

I sit and drink, peering through the haze of smoke.

“Hi, man!”

Big hazel eyes stare down at me. Long lashes flicker.

“I'm drunk, doll.”

“Like I can see that.”

“Sure am.”

I look at her as she hums a few bars of the song. It is that moment of drink when the fog rolls back and the mind clears. Every object becomes detached, vivid, intense and stark. Nothing runs into anything else. This girl Denise stands there transfixed in time.

Big eyes glow, lips nature-red are parted revealing strong slightly stained teeth. Dark hair is alive, writhing to her shoulders to frame the moon-pale oval of her face. She still attracts me. Denise is one of the few people with whom I never have to pose.

She is a semi-pro. I met her at a dance one night a couple of years ago. I paid her the first time but not after that. I couldn't care less what she does. Making money that way is better than working and her family feels the same. She lives at home, but all they worry about is the rent money.

We are glad to find each other here again. I talk.

“How're you going?”

“O.K. Thought of joining the Salvation Army to see you inside.”

“You'd have made a real hep hymn singer.”

She sits down next to me.

“I've got a bottle of wine under the table,” I say.

“Wasting your prison dough.”

“Why not?”

“Yeah. That's right. Why not?”

She walks to the counter to get a cup.

“It's vile stuff,” she says, tasting the grog. “No wonder you look rotten.”

“I'm miserable.”

“I've got some pills that'll sober you up and give you a lift. Take a couple and then we can get pissed together.”

She takes a small bottle from her pocket and gives me two yellow tablets. I gulp them down with a cup of wine. A mistake. The clearness fogs and the world grows dull again, but the music still shrieks sharply through my head. I feel bad now, real bad. Sick drunk fool! Crazy, I'm way down in the blues. Got a ten ton load on my head. I get up and fall back on to my chair. Rest on her shoulder.

“You're really drunk now, ain't you, mate?” Her voice is low-pitched and soothing.

“I know.”

“The pills will hit you in a minute. They're great kicks.”

She walks to the juke-box and back with a hip wriggle that makes me think of bed.

“I've picked a couple of good numbers that'll cheer you up.”

She's kidding me. The sad tune makes me ache with loneliness.

The bell-hop's tears keep flowing,

The desk clerk's dressed in black.

They've been so long down lonely street

That they'll never, oh never, come back.

'Cause they're so lonely, oh so lonely,

They're so lonely they could die.

The voice wails out to reach me, but now the pills are taking effect and I can contemplate my mood objectively.

Denise goes on drinking to get drunk. I go on to stay that way. The juke-box keeps playing. Mind flows with the rhythm and follows the sad-sounding horn. I put my arm around Denise and fake togetherness.

It's late and the waiter hovers about wanting to close the joint. I buy another bottle of wine and we stagger out. The coolness of early morning sobers me a bit and I'm feeling sick by the time we reach my room.

I switch on the light and open the bottle of wine. Denise puts down her little transistor radio and switches to an all-night station. I have a swig, go to the bathroom, put my head under the tap and dry it on someone else's towel. Come back to the room tired but not sleepy — the pep pills have taken care of that.

We sit on the bed drinking and listening to the radio. God, I feel awful and I want to be alone, but she's here and I suppose I have to sleep with her — oh damn.

Denise goes on gazing into space; she hasn't spoken a word since we came in. The bottle falls to the floor and she leans back against the wall. Her breasts jut under her jumper and desire floods into me. I want her and hate her for making me want her. I pull off her clothes and take her violently, like it was rape. Hate her. Hate her. Love her. It is finished. I fling away from her and she lies like a discarded doll. There's no more wine blast it! When I get drunk I usually end up with a chick, but why should this girl mean something to me? I want to be unmoved by everything — like a god.

Her hair is spread out on the pillow, soft as silk in my hands. Her breasts slope softly to dark nipples. I kiss her and she curls up against me, murmuring softly, “Be gentle this time, lover.”

She will never understand.

Awful morning. I curse the wine-sex hangover. Damn Denise and everything that makes me weak and contemptible. I want to die but I guess I'm condemned to drag along to the dreary end.

Woke up this morning, blues all round my head.

Woke up this morning, blues all round my bed.

Got to my feet, head felt like lead. . . .

I try to focus through squinting eyes. On the table sits the radio. Denise, the careless slut, has forgotten it ... or maybe left it for me. She's nice that way. My fingers fumble and turn on the knob. A bloody cheerful voice tells me what toothpaste I should use. I lie back and listen to the housewives' serial. The same square cat chasing the same dumb moll through two thousand episodes and hasn't made it yet. I turn to another station and hear the time. Half the day gone, but still the rest to get through. Yesterday the coming out . . . the golden girl on the beach. I was supposed to see her some time? This afternoon!

I make it to the bathroom, step under the shower and foam myself with someone's perfumed soap. This process soothes the mind-body pain of awakening to the dull ache of my ordinary gloom mood.

I walk back naked to my room. My black clothes are lying on the floor — protection against the light. I fling them on, zip myself up, and go out into the street.

The glare of the summer day dazzles my jailbird eyes and the heat is too intense for my jail-soft body. Light and heat bounce from the melting tar under my shoes and I begin to cook in these tight-fitting clothes. I cross to the shady side and keep in close against the wall, drifting along hunched in my bodgie shuffle. I never move different to this except when the cops are on my tail.

I catch a bus to the University and try to look casual as I saunter into the grounds. I have passed it a few times but not for eighteen months, when I saw it briefly through the bars of the police van on my way to Fremantle jail. The building is O.K., I suppose — reflection pool and tower with a blue-faced clock. The girl said four o'clock and it is still only two. God, the hours go more slowly even than in jail.

I stroll through a covered archway and across a park-like area towards the playing fields. Despite the heat of the day a number of youths and girls are vigorously hitting or kicking different shaped balls around. I try to avert my eyes and slope away towards the river, but even here the sporting spirit asserts itself in the shape of rowers exuding the team spirit from every pore as they dip and strain in their long boats. God, how it all brings me back to the Swanview Boys' Home. . . .

Spanish style buildings, cream walled with orange tiles and broad playing grounds sloping to the river's edge. I see the skinny unattractive kid I was slouching on the cricket field, mooning about, homesick for a paddock patch in a country town, and the carefree Noongar kids who had no team spirit, only a sort of native loyalty.

No clouds in the sky, no shade on the cricket field, but they must play this futile game in the beating heat. It will build up the boys' physique and take the edge off their energy for other more natural pursuits.

Bowler bowls, batter swipes, backstop catches, fielders sweat. Hell, how I detest team games of any sort and cricket in particular. Most of the other kids seem to take it seriously and yell at me when I miss a catch or fail to hit the ball when it's my turn to bat. “Who cares who wins?” I once asked. “It's only a game.” They thought I must be kidding, so I shut up after that and endured it alone.

Blessed relief when the siren blares, startling the pigeons from the chapel roof. The brother gets up from his seat in the shade of a tree, the boys pull the wickets, collect the bats and balls, and run to the locker room.

Four rows of lockers, each row a different colour — red, blue, yellow and green — belonging to the different teams. Each boy has a locker of his own and is supposed to “take a pride in it”. Off with our clothes, charge for the shower room with towels around middles and wait in line. “Sir”, bald-headed and stout in his flapping religious habit, supervises the floor show, manipulates the control valve and swipes alike the too slow and the too quick with well-used strap — his duty for God. “Hurry up there. Next. Back there and wash your face. Next. Next. . . .” Two minutes under the cold stream. Water off for the soap. On again to wash it off. A quick wipe over and out, dodging to escape the strap.

Blues, greens, reds and yellows keep up the team spirit in four lines outside the dining-room. A mark against one boy is a mark against the team and the team will take it out on him. No talking. No fidgeting. “Stop that whispering there. Blues first today. March.”