Riverslake Read online

  “She’s a rummy customer, all right!” he muttered, speaking more to himself than to Murdoch. Murdoch laughed.

  They were walking between the huts now, their footsteps crunching on the gravel paths. Most of the camp was in darkness, and Murdoch exclaimed with surprise when, rounding a corner, they saw a stream of light coming from a window of the kitchen.

  “That’s funny,” he muttered, looking at it speculatively. “Someone must’ve left that light on, after tea. Come on over.”

  When they got nearer, they could hear someone talking. They stopped under the window to listen. It was Zigfeld, but neither as harsh or domineering as Randolph remembered him. The words that filtered out to them were indistinct and frayed at the edges.

  “He’s plastered,” Murdoch whispered, “or damn near to it. But who the hell’s he talking to? Listen.”

  Zigfeld’s voice came through the window.

  “You got no right to be in here, even,” it remonstrated, jerkily. “It’s bad enough during the daytime, but this time o’ night—you oughta know better.”

  “Holy cow!” Murdoch exclaimed softly. “It’s Para—he’s copped Para!”

  “What’s Para doing here, this time of the night?” Randolph whispered.

  “He’s got a sheila over the Causeway—he brings her into the kitchen for a smooch, cold nights. It’s warm in there. Shh!”

  Zigfeld’s voice edged out again.

  “An’ you certainly got no right to bring that harlot in with you. You got a nerve, all right!”

  “God almighty!” Murdoch emitted a low whistle of consternation. “Para’ll flatten the silly old bastard. Here, I’m having a slew at this!”

  He tiptoed over to a heap of boxes stacked against the side of the boiler-room, tested one for strength, and brought it back. He placed it carefully below the window, stepped on it, and motioned Randolph to follow.

  Only one small globe was on in the kitchen, hanging like an outsize glow-worm in a dark cave. Below it, close to the end of the range, Zigfeld sat on an upturned box, like some obese figure in an oriental joss-house. He held a wine bottle in one hand, and another lay on its side at his feet. A yard away from him, regarding him impassively from slitted golden eyes, the Dummy’s big ginger tom-cat sat erect and motionless, like a cat of honey onyx. Another, a sleek black cat, curled beside him. The pale-gold light gleamed on her distended flanks.

  “Look at her!” Zigfeld said, pointing dramatically, and the ginger cat blinked. “Up the stick again! Won’t you ever learn, Millie, you old prostitute?”

  He slanted the bottle to his lips and drank greedily. His skinny legs were bent up on either side of him like a grasshopper’s, and his ponderous belly hung obscenely between them. The silence and the brown shadows of the kitchen enfolded them, the man and the two motionless cats. It was hard to tell which was sitting in judgment on which.

  Murdoch dropped lightly to the ground.

  “Come on,” he muttered, “let’s get out’a here. It’s a flaming rat-house!”

  Chapter Four

  Randolph’s first month at Riverslake passed quickly and uneventfully. As he knew he would, he soon drifted into the routine of the place, which was largely the same as that of any kitchen he had ever worked in. He was soon on good terms with all the cooks, excepting Condamine, and had even learned to overlook Zigfeld’s rudeness. He felt after a while that he had never worked anywhere else.

  One day he was standing with Murdoch and Charlesworth beside the range, talking about nothing in particular. It was a warm day outside, and sunny. Although the trees were still bare of leaves, and gaunt against the pale washed blue of the sky, little black warts had begun to appear along their bone-like branches and twigs. They were hard and unpromising, but still they were the forerunner of the heavy foliage that before long would transform the city.

  The three had just finished the afternoon shift, the final preparation for the evening meal. They were about to leave the kitchen for a short break when the door opened. A stranger walked in—a stranger to Randolph, though Charlesworth greeted him with noisy enthusiasm.

  “Torchy!” he shouted. “You old bastard—where’ve you been? We haven’t seen you for a hell of a while!”

  “Been busy,” the new-comer announced. He said the words easily and made them sound important. He was a short and heavy man whose heavy face seemed to be arranged in three tiers—heavy bags below his twinkling eyes, heavy cheeks draped on either side of his fleshy nose, and heavy jowls hanging from a strong jaw-line. As he came through the door, he took off his hat. He had a mop of the most flaming red hair that Randolph had ever seen.

  “This’s the union rep, Randy,” Charlesworth announced. “Bob Randolph, Torchy—he’s been here a few weeks. Torchy Binns, Randy.”

  “Yes, I heard. It’s what I come—came—down about. Glad to meet you, Bob.” Torchy Binns held out his hand. “You’re a member, I suppose?”

  “Sure,” Randolph replied.

  “Good. Brew on?”

  “Won’t be a moment.” Charlesworth grabbed the big pot that always stood on the end of the range. “Where’ve you been—up the court?”

  “Yeah—tying them in knots!” Binns exulted without modesty. “The bloke for the bosses didn’t know if he was punched or bored. All you got—all you have to do is to keep your head and let them do the talking. Play dumb, and they’ll make all the blues.”

  “You’re a bloody bottler!” Charlesworth cried warmly. Even Murdoch grinned.

  Torchy Binns was idolized by most of the men working in the kitchen at Riverslake. He spent his days between the different hostels and hotels throughout Canberra, fêted and welcomed at all of them. He came to Riverslake about once a month, and brought to the lackadaisical kitchen an air of noble strife and hard-won achievement. He seemed always to be either coming from or going to some court case against “the bosses”, and regaled the staff with endless tales of what he had to say to the judge and the boss’s advocate and the reporters. Until he left all work was suspended in the kitchen; Zigfeld glowered in the background, itching to shout them back to their jobs, but not really game to open his mouth.

  Charlesworth poured him a cup of tea and cut him a slice of the “cooks’ cake” that Mancin had baked during the morning. He sipped his tea for a moment in silence.

  “You like it here, Bob?” he asked suddenly, bending a direct glance on Randolph.

  “Uh-huh—it’s a good stope,” Randolph shrugged. “Much the same as any kitchen.”

  “That’s right. It’s not a bad set-up. Blokes are good—stick like glue.” Binns stared again at Randolph. “We’re strong in the Territory.”

  “The union?”

  “My oath. If we stick, and if Menzies’s mob don’t—doesn’t—get in next time, we’re on the pig’s back. We’ll beat ’em!”

  “We’ll beat ’em, all right,” Charlesworth echoed him. He nodded his head, a reckless grin on his lips.

  “Beat whom, Slim?” Randolph asked casually. The union rep’s keen eyes flickered over him.

  “Well———” Charlesworth said uncertainly.

  “The bosses,” Binns said shortly. “We’ve nearly got them under, but one kick and they’ll bob up again. They’re banking on another depression, but we’ll beat them. Chif’ll see to that!” He turned to Murdoch. “How’s the Balts here, Kerry—all right?”

  “You know.” Murdoch shrugged. “They’re O.K. Some good, some bad. Not a bad mob on the whole.”

  “They work all right?”

  “They do their share.”

  “They’d better,” Binns said. “There’s a row on over at Mulwala.” He spoke of one of the “white-collar” hostels. “A Balt waitress spilt a bit of soup on one of the guests and the old girl went crook on her. The manager took the old girl’s part, so the Balt sheila jacked up. Looks like the cooks might go out, too
.”

  “What, over a bloody Balt?” Charlesworth demanded.

  “Well … she’s a member …”

  The talk drifted then, to happenings and characters around the hostels. Randolph didn’t know many of the men or matters they discussed. He was glad when Binns tossed down the dregs of his tea with an air of finality.

  “Well, must push off,” he announced. “Got to be over to Capitol Hill this afternoon. One of the cooks there had a blue with a Balt in the mess, and he reckons the Balt’s got to be shifted or else. Tell the boys I was sorry to miss them, Kerry? I’ll be round again one day next week, if I can manage it.”

  “O.K.,” Murdoch said. “Keep it clean.”

  They accompanied him to the door of the kitchen, and stood there while he cycled off.

  “He’s a bottler,” Charlesworth said admiringly. “God, he never lets up!”

  “What’s he after?” Randolph asked idly.

  “After? Better conditions, of course.” Charlesworth looked at his watch. “Hell, I better be off—I promised to meet the boys at the Kingston. See you later.”

  “Yeah. Keep sober,” Murdoch advised him.

  Randolph tossed a small parcel he had been holding.

  “I’ve got a bit of meat for Felix’s cat,” he said. “Zigfeld knows he’s got one, and watches him like a hawk, so he can’t get it himself. Coming over, while I give it to him?”

  “Sure,” Murdoch said. “He’s a good bloke to keep on the right side of, Bob.”

  “Who—Felix?”

  “No, you gig. Torchy.”

  “Anybody is,” Randolph observed. “But thanks for the hint—I will.”

  “That’s all right, then,” Murdoch said.

  Felix Radinski lay on his bed and watched the golden square of sunshine below the window creep slowly up to envelop his legs. After a while he raised himself on one elbow and looked at it, and then sent a hand down to investigate it; the bare skin, resting on the leg of his trousers, was hardly aware of the weak caress of the spring sunshine. But it drew glowing colour out of the rough woollen rug beneath his legs. His hand dropped on it, his fingers running over the raised pattern, feeling the rough warmth of it.

  It had been worked for him by a Lithuanian girl in the migrant camp at Bathurst, by Marika; worked exquisitely, in squares and diamonds of red and blue and gold and green, with a wide black border. It roused memories of skirts and shawls his mother had worn, and on many a night in the winter just passing he had been glad of its warmth and weight on his legs.

  But most of all he was glad of it because it had been made for him by the Lithuanian girl. The one he loved, Marika.

  They met on the ship that had brought them to Australia. Then she was a pale, thin girl with hair as fair and as fine as thistle-seed, and with high, wide cheekbones and green eyes. She used to stand at the rail of the ship and stare for hours at the water as it slid by into the creaming wake. Radinski used to stand not far off and watch her—from his own experience, he knew the meaning of the changing expressions that flowed across the remote calm of her face from time to time. He could read her story as if it had been his own. Not because he was especially observant, but because he had seen the same story so many times.

  She was young, and must have been very pretty, even beautiful. She would have attracted the attention of a lot of men at times when she hadn’t much chance of fending them off. He knew how she would have fared under the German and the Russian occupation of her homeland, and then in her flight across Europe, and later in the camp in Germany. Radinski knew of whole families of girls who had gone into troops’ brothels, or, if they had something more in charm or talent, had become the mistresses of German and Russian officers. There was no escape from it; they did it for food and protection for themselves and their families.

  He had been almost as a brother to some of them and yet when he heard sooner or later what had happened to them, it was without much shock or grief. It was usual. It did nothing but make even emptier the void that had been his feelings.

  Knowing with instinctive sureness that that would have been the story of the girl at the rail, he knew something more—that only now, when it was all over, did the real impact of those years hit her, sliding past her staring eyes endlessly reflected in the water below, returning and returning, as his own memories did, to ride red-eyed through his dreams with a terror he had never known before.

  His sure knowledge of what she had been through filled him with tenderness for her. Some fiddling device got them acquainted, and in the ensuing days they spent long and happy hours talking together, he eagerly, she shyly, of the life that lay ahead of them in Australia. He was a Pole, and she a Lithuanian, but each knew enough of the other’s language, and of German, for understanding. They had a book of English phrases and found it good practice to sit on the sunny deck and examine each other in the lists of curious words. She had a shy sense of humour, and they laughed much. He never tried to force her reserve, for he knew what had put it there, and now she forgot to look over the side of the ship at the water below.

  Radinski was only twenty-three years old, though during the last ten years he had been a refugee, a soldier, a prisoner of the Russians and then of the Germans. He had only a vague remembrance of what life had been before the war, of what his mother had looked like and of the sound of his father’s voice. His three brothers were dead, and any love he had known since he was thirteen had been either the cool, sexless love of men in mutual danger and hardship, or the calculating love of harlots whenever he had been near a town.

  His lonely heart responded to the loneliness of this pale girl, and before they reached Australia he was in love with her. Gently, because she was gentle, and hesitantly because he did not want to frighten her who had been frightened so much. His love was tender, but it was strong. He knew he could wait and, if it were for her, could take whatever the new country offered and bend it to his wishes.

  He sat up and threw his legs over the side of the bed. The pale coverlet of sunshine, disrupted for a moment, settled without a wrinkle on the woollen rug, and the coloured blobs glowed like jewels. The other Marika, his cat, lay curled on the mat beside his bed. She looked up when he moved, yawned and stretched, and uncoiled her tortoise-shell body, unsheathing her gleaming claws. He bent and stroked her body.

  “Ah, Marika,” he murmured, a grin illuminating his thin face, stitching fine puckers at the corners of his pale blue eyes, “babies come! Bad puss!” He stood looking down at the cat, turning the phrase over in his mind. Babies come. It could be improved. Babies coming. You babies coming. It was better, but still not right, somehow. He would ask Mr Randolph. He said the phrase aloud, “You babies coming!” and the cat looked up at him, mewing softly.

  “Ah,” he muttered, touching it gently with his foot, “you milk like, eh? You milk want, no?” Like, want. So much alike, so different. He sighed and stooped to his cupboard. He took out a clean jam-tin full of milk and poured some for the cat.

  “Kits, kits!” he murmured softly, as the cat hunched greedily over the saucer. “You happy cat, eh?”

  The cat stopped drinking suddenly; it started and looked at the door, its green eyes cocked, tiny dew-drops of milk quivering at the ends of its whiskers. Footsteps were approaching along the corridor. They stopped outside the door, and someone knocked.

  “Please!” Radinski said. He waited a moment, then he opened the door.

  Randolph stood in the passage, with Murdoch’s thin face grinning over his shoulder.

  “Hullo, Felix,” Randolph said. He held out a small paper package. “I brought you some tucker for your cat.” He had noticed the boy’s efforts to sneak food out of the mess for his pet, and had got into the habit of doing it for him, giving it to him outside. This day he had missed him, and brought it to his room.

  “Thank you, good,” Radinski said, taking the package. “You see,
my cat now happy. You very good.”

  “Bull—it’s easy,” Randolph said, feeling slightly embarrassed. “Ziggy doesn’t kick when I go into the freezer.”

  “Don’t you worry about Ziggy,” Murdoch broke in. “He’s a wake-up. He’ll rubbish you like hell one of these days, and if he don’t, then that little runt Condamine will.”

  The Pole had been watching their faces, trying to pick up the train of their words.

  “Mr Condamine?” he said. “He not like it Europe body.”

  “Europe people,” Randolph corrected him.

  “Europe people. Thank you.” Randolph grinned wryly. “Very much not like. Ah!” He darted across to his bed, smoothed it down and bowed slightly. “You please. Come in, sit down!”

  “Well———” Randolph hesitated, and the Pole took him by the arm.

  “You, please. You for my cat bring meat. I for you, wine!”

  “The grape!” Murdoch exulted close against Randolph’s ear. Before he could object, Randolph was pushed across the threshold, and Murdoch followed him.

  It was a small room, almost unbelievably cluttered. It would have been filled with the normal furnishing, a bed, a table, a chair and a wardrobe, but Radinski had added whatever he felt necessary to his comfort and entertainment. The result was that in order to cross to the bed, the two Australians had to duck and weave for fear of hitting their heads and shins. A bicycle hung from two pegs on the wall beside the wardrobe, entirely filling one end of the room and making it impossible to open the door more than a couple of feet; a radiator was strung from the ceiling on an ingenious arrangement of pulleys, and a large wireless set stood on a second smaller table beneath the window. An extra chair and a small box holding a spirit stove and a frying pan, with some plates and cups, completed the furnishings. It left only a small space in the middle of the floor.

  Coloured paper streamers left over from the previous Christmas were draped from the hanging lamp-shade to the sides and corners of the room. The walls and the tops of the tables were covered with photographs, framed and unframed, some with recognizable Canberra backgrounds, some posed against buildings and landscapes of another country, some new and glossy, others yellowed and dog-eared. In a clear space above the head of Radinski’s bed a black wooden crucifix hung on a nail, surrounded by a symmetrical arrangement of brightly coloured holy pictures and silver medals.