‘Nice one.’
She didn’t look at me, her eyes fixed on the courthouse towering over us. I didn’t need to ask what was wrong.
‘Tobe’ll be ‘right,’ I said. ‘He’s as tough as they come.’
She just kept staring, doubt clouding her eyes. I tried to smile, to make her believe the words I didn’t.
‘Hey, it’s okay. I’ve known him a long time, he can take care of himself.’
She nodded almost imperceptibly.
‘Shall we?’
She nodded a second time and we continued our march. The noise grew, soon became incredible. Once more, I had no idea where to go. But Ruby seemed to know what she was doing—she led us down more alleys, confidently taking left turns and then right turns. I followed her, watching as she gave each ruined excuse for a home a thorough once over. Families of holdouts slept in some, exposed to the open air thanks to missing walls. Somehow they had adapted; they didn’t stir despite the din. Belongings and makeshift beds occupied others, while some were completely empty. The people we passed eyed us with suspicion. None of them tried to talk to us.
Somewhere ahead, a dog starting barking. In an instant, Ruby darted off.
‘Hang on…’
She ignored me. Overburdened, I couldn’t hurry after her. I dropped my pack and load of scrap, limped on, found her crouched outside a shack, a puppy at her feet. Ruby gave the puppy a good scratch behind the ear—it rolled onto its back so that she could get to its belly.
Ruby smiled, actual happiness in her eyes.
The puppy noticed me, wriggled around like an upside-down beetle, squirmed from side to side, got to its feet, started barking furiously.
‘Jude, shut up!’
The voice came from behind a threadbare curtain covering the door to the shack. The puppy paid it no mind, kept barking, getting steadily louder. Ruby quickly managed to settle it down. The curtain twitched aside and a grizzled, unshaven face stuck itself out.
‘Shit, ah, g’day,’ the stranger said.
He sized us up. He smiled, gap-toothed and wide. I guessed that Ruby and I didn’t pose much of a threat.
‘I haven’t seen you around before,’ he said. ‘You folks must be new. My name’s Jacko—welcome to the camp.’
And then he held out his hand for me to shake.
NINETEEN
Jacko’s kindness was the only thing that made that first night bearable. We didn’t ask why he had taken a shine to us; grateful for a friendly face after everything that had happened, we simply soaked up and basked in his hospitality. He helped us carry our meagre possessions into the abandoned shack adjoining his, helped us cut up the ruined tent we had found, helped us hang the pieces curtain-like around our new home so that we could have a modicum of privacy.
All around us, the shadows grew thicker as dusk approached.
‘Bugger, I forgot,’ Jacko said from nowhere. ‘I’ve got something for you both.’ He shuffled out of the shack, leaving Ruby and I to keep working.
‘You okay?’ I asked, even though I knew the answer.
She didn’t reply. We worked on in silence. I wanted to comfort her, but didn’t know how.
‘Yoo-hoo, anyone home?’ Jacko soon called out.
I was grateful for the interruption. And despite our tiredness, Ruby and I both smiled as he forced aside the broken door.
‘Here,’ he said, pulling something from his pocket, limping across the shack.
It was a rusty hand-cranked lantern, a tiny godsend.
‘Cheers.’
‘No worries.’
Jacko and Ruby started to knock up a makeshift bed, using the bent poles we had found and whatever strips of tent were left over. I cranked the lantern until I thought my wrist would break, finally hung it from a nail that had been driven into the wall. Jude lay flat on the raw dirt floor, watching us work, occasionally wagging his tail. Sometimes, he would look at us so pitifully that you would swear he had never been patted or scratched.
When the bed was done, I gratefully took a seat. Ruby and Jacko joined me; we sat side by side, it was a bit of a squeeze.
‘Think of it as cosy,’ Jacko said.
‘I’m not complaining.’
And it’s true, I wasn’t. If it hadn’t been for Tobe’s absence, I would have called myself vaguely content. The bed was more comfortable than I had expected, we had enough water to see us through until morning, and it didn’t feel like we were in any immediate danger. As well, Jacko had generously shared his rations, refrained from prying, and hadn’t asked any rude questions.
It was almost—almost—peaceful.
‘Excuse me,’ Ruby said, yawning loudly, surprising herself, smiling shyly.
I caught her yawn as easily as getting sunburnt. It had been a long day.
‘Okay, I’ll leave you be,’ Jacko said, laughing. He made it to his feet.
I joined him, held out my hand. ‘Ruby and I can’t thank you enough.’
We shook.
‘No worries, Bill. If we don’t look out for each other, what’s the bloody point?’
‘Too right,’ I said.
Jacko’s old-fashioned attitude made me smile. The world would be very different if everyone thought as he did.
‘Ruby?’ he asked.
She looked at him with sleep-heavy eyes.
‘It was a pleasure to meet you.’
She smiled. ‘Nice to meet you, too.’ She reached down, scratched Jude behind the ears. ‘Go on, good boy.’ He jumped up, licked Ruby’s hand, ran to Jacko, sat on his feet, and looked at him with love.
‘I’m off, then. Pleasant dreams.’
We bid him goodnight as he disappeared behind the makeshift curtain with Jude scrabbling at his heels. I heard him wedge the broken door in place, enter the alley, and call out to someone in a booming voice. Jude barked playfully. Someone else laughed.
Ruby once again yawned loudly. She stretched her arms, cracked her back. Still standing, I smiled to myself as she cottoned on to the fact that she had the bed to herself.
‘Good one,’ she muttered. She fell back. She shuffled around until she was lying flat.
‘I’ll, uh, take the floor, I guess.’
She didn’t answer. I sat down, threw my legs out straight, propped my pack behind me. Holes in the roof let moonlight in, a beautiful shining silver-blue.
‘Goodnight, Ruby,’ I said. ‘Sleep well.’
‘You too, Bill,’ she replied in a thick voice.
She was soon snoring. I got undressed and wormed around until I was comfortable enough, lying flat with my pack as a pillow.
The floor was more a slice of jagged earth than a decent place to kip.
‘Any port…’ I said to myself.
I stared at the sky through one of the holes in the roof. A spluttering orange glow occasionally broke the smear of stars and inky black; the insomnia sounds of the camp slowly became clearer, voices cheering far in the distance, soft as campfire whispers. I strained to understand it, never quite making it out. Ruby didn’t stir; oblivious to everything, she kept snoring.
The hand-cranked lantern hanging from the wall started flickering. A moment later, it went out, plunging the room into darkness.
‘Tobe,’ I murmured, barely knowing what I was saying.
His absence had never made itself felt so strongly. Instead of huddling in the dark, he would have cracked a joke or hurled a childish insult at me. He would have done something—anything—to make our new home bearable.
In the same breath, I cursed his name and hoped that he was okay.