It was almost noon and I had just finished welding the heavy-gauge steel mesh into the angle-iron base when Frank and Jim Caswell arrived. Jim was rumoured to be old man Pettifer’s illegitimate son. Frank was somewhere in his seventies with a big, bony head, patches of hair, exploding eyebrows and ears like baseball mitts. Jim was about fifteen years younger, full head of grey hair cut short, small-featured, neat. He looked like a clerk in some old-fashioned shop. Usually they both wore the squatter’s uniform: tweed jacket, moleskins, blue shirt and tie. Today Jim was in a dark suit, white shirt and navy tie.
They sat down on the bench against the wall and watched me marking the position of the axle mountings. These visits were a feature of the construction period.
‘Nice job so far, Mac,’ Frank said. ‘Paying attention to the plans? Worked out in every detail.’
‘Like I was building a Saturn VI,’ I said.
‘Good man.’ He turned to Jim. ‘So who was there?’
‘Langs, Rourkes. Carvers, Veenes, Chamberlain, Charlie Thomson, Ormerods, Caseys, Mrs Radley, Frasers. Just about everyone. Old Scott.’
‘Old Scott?’ Frank said. ‘Danny Wallace hated the miserable old bastard. What did he want?’
‘Same as everyone else, I s’pose. Came to pay his respects.’
‘Anybody ask after me?’
‘No.’
Frank scratched a moulting patch of hair. ‘Not a word? What about old Byrne? He must’ve noticed I wasn’t there.’
‘Didn’t say anything.’
‘Well,’ said Frank. ‘That’s that bloody mob for you. I knew Danny Wallace since ’47, day I king-hit him in the Golden Fleece. Used to put him to bed. That drunk he’d get on a horse backwards.’ He patted his jacket. ‘What happened to my smokes?’
‘I though he was cryin a bit at the end,’ Jim said. ‘By the grave.’
‘Who?’
‘Old Kellaway.’
Frank found his cigarettes and lit one with a big gold lighter. He coughed for a while, then he said. ‘Old Kellaway? Bloody crocodile tears. Sanctimonious old bastard. Spent his whole life crawlin up the cracks of the rich. You know where the bastard was in the war? Y’know?’
‘I know,’ Jim said.
‘Chaplain in the Navy, bloody Australian Navy, two pisspots and a tin bath. Hearin the bunnyboys’ confessions.’ He put on a high voice. ‘ “Forgive me, father, I cracked a fat at Mass.” ’ Then a deep voice: ‘ “My son, the Lord forbids us to lust after petty officers’ bums. Say fifty Hail Marys and, report to my cabin after lights out.” ’
‘He’s all right,’ Jim said. ‘Hasn’t been much of a life for him.’
‘All right?’ said Frank. ‘All right? He’s far from bloody all right. If he was all right he’d never have landed up here so he wouldn’t have much of a life. He’d a been a bloody cardinal, wouldn’t he?’
Frank took a small leather-bound flask out of his inside pocket. ‘Just thinkin about bloody Kellaway gives me a need for drink,’ he said. He took off the cap and had a good swig.
Jim muttered something.
‘What’s that?’ Frank said, wiping his lips. ‘You say somethin?’
‘Nothin.’
‘Don’t bloody nothin me. Somethin to say, spit it out.’
‘Bit early for the piss, innit?’
Frank nodded knowingly. ‘Sonny,’ he said, ‘don’t come the fuckin little prig with me. I’ve had disapproval from a whole family of disapproval experts. I feel like it, I’ll give myself a whisky enema for breakfast.’
I was looking at the plan. ‘What’s this twisty thing you’ve drawn here, Frank?’
He eased himself up and came over. ‘It’s a spring, Mac. A shock absorber.’
‘Right,’ I said. ‘That horse mounter needed a shock absorber.’
‘I need a bloody shock absorber,’ Frank said. ‘Shares goin down like the Titanic and the bastards call an election. This country’s buggered, y’know that, Mac. Get butchered for bloody king and country twice, then it’s for the Yanks. Now everythin’s for sale. Power stations. Telephone. Bloody airports. Negative gear this bloody Parliament buildin chock-a-block with liars, thousands of bloody bent police thrown in. Buy the whole country.’
‘What about Crewe?’ I said. ‘Going to get back, is he?’ I went over to the cabinet to look for some suitable springs for the shock absorber.
‘Anthony Crewe,’ Frank said. ‘Lord only knows how they made that bastard attorney-general. Bloody miscarriage of justice if ever there was one. Done that shonky will for old Morrissey.’
‘That’s enough, Frank,’ Jim said.
Frank turned his big head slowly. ‘What?’ he said. ‘What did you say?’
Jim looked away. ‘You know what Mr Petty always said about repeatin gossip.’
A look somewhere between pleasure and pain came over Frank’s face. ‘Little man,’ he said, ‘don’t quote The Great Squatter to me. I’ve told you that before. I had those sayins straight from the horse’s arse for thirty-five years. Now a miniature ghost of the old shit follows me around repeatin them. Is that what they mean by everlastin life? You’re dead but your miserable opinions linger on to haunt the livin?’
He turned back to me. ‘Now, as I was sayin, the bastard Crewe shoulda been in jail over that will.’
‘What will?’ I was looking in the box for springs.
‘Will he produced after old Morrissey turned up his toes. Half the bloody estate to the physiothingamajig. Who happens to be Mr Shonky Crewe’s current rootee. Lorraine was her name, I recall. Latest in a long line. Once he got his cut, he was into that Kinross Hall warder. Dr Marcia somethin or other. All legs and hair.’
I looked up. ‘Crewe had an affair with Marcia Carrier?’
‘That’s what they say,’ Frank said. ‘He’s the boss cockie out there, y’know. Chairman of the council, whatever. They should take a bloody good look at that place. God knows what goes on there. I see the quack switched off his lights the other day. Hanged himself down there in Footscray. Least he picked a place with a decent footy team.’
‘Frank,’ Jim said. He had a habit of sitting with his hands clamped between his knees, palms together.
‘Shut up,’ Frank said. ‘Dr Barbie. Good name, eh? I’d take the wife rowin, though. That Irene.’
‘What’s he got to do with it?’ I said.
Frank lit another cigarette. It started a coughing fit. When it ended, he wiped moist eyes and said, ‘Where was I?’
‘Dr Barbie. Where’s he fit in?’
‘Kinross quack. Inherited the job from old Crewe. Looks just like old Crewe, too. Now Dr Barbie’s mum, she was the receptionist for umpteen bloody years.’
‘You never bloody stop, do you?’ Jim said.
‘Take that girl Sim Walsh picked up,’ Frank said. ‘Now where did she come from? Naked as your Eve. On Colson’s Road. Out there in the middle of the night. Covered in blood. Been whipped like a horse.’
‘That’s serious,’ I said.
‘Bloody oath. Told me about it one night he’d pushed the boat out to bloody Tasmania.’
‘Drunk talk,’ said Jim. ‘Sim Walsh was drunk for forty years. Most likely made the whole thing up.’
I said, ‘When was this?’
‘Good way back,’ Frank said. ‘Around ’82, could be ’83. Thereabouts.’
‘What happened?’
‘Nothin. Said he took her home, cleaned her up. Girl wouldn’t go to hospital, wouldn’t go to the police. Scared out of her wits. Put her to bed. Next day, gone.’
‘She tell him what happened?’
‘No. Kept talkin about a bloke called Ken. You got springs, then?’
‘I want the right springs,’ I said. ‘Not any old springs. Who was the girl?’
Frank stumped over to the door and flicked his cigarette end into the yard. ‘Juvenile harlot from Kinross Hall,’ he said.
‘She told him that?’
Frank thought about this. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘near enough. Sim said she was ravin. Drugs, he reckoned. Mind you, he was ravin a bit himself that night.’
‘Never reported it?’ I said.
‘Don’t know,’ Frank said. ‘Come round the next day, eyes narrer as bloody stamps side-on. Said, do me a favour, what I said about that girl, forget it. Load of rubbish I made up.’