River of Salt Page 5

  No radio to suggest a teenager in occupation. Maybe he’d got lucky and Thomas Clarke was out with a friend. He stepped onto the linoleum floor of a large kitchen. The smell of toast still clung faintly to the room. He walked through and into a short corridor and called out again.

  No answer.

  He turned right and came to a large sliding door that gave onto the lounge room. He stepped inside and found himself looking out over rolling bushland through concertina doors. They were still closed and the room was hot from the late-morning sun. He saw they opened onto a low concrete porch that sat on level ground, not a deck. He realised then that the house had been built on the top of the hill, probably into the back of the cliff with the rear built up to reach this level, hence the concrete steps. The lounge room itself displayed all the untidiness of bachelor living: newspapers and Man magazines strewn about, a couple of cushions on the floor, a sofa that had been expensive once upon a time but was now worn. Father and son living. In one corner was a bar, Blake caught sight of himself in its mirror. There was a Pye TV in the opposite corner and a large radiogram with LPs scattered on top; Sinatra, Ray Conniff, Julie London; Winston’s taste not the kid’s.

  ‘Who are you?’

  He’d not heard a sound. In his old game, he’d be deader than manners. He turned. Thomas Clarke had an ugly block head, small rosebud ears, small eyes, and was wearing shorts and singlet. He was also holding a cricket bat ready to swing.

  ‘Blake Saunders. I’m supplying the booze for your party. I called out.’

  Clarke lowered the bat. ‘Sorry. Dad didn’t say.’

  ‘Nice place.’

  ‘I’m only here for the holidays.’

  No way was this kid twenty-one.

  ‘You finish high school?’

  ‘Last year.’

  So this was for the kid’s eighteenth, not strictly legal but on a private property, supervised by the old man. Nalder wasn’t going to fuss.

  ‘Any idea what you’re going to do?’

  ‘Not really.’

  Blake knew that feeling, wished he could go back, make a different choice than the one he made when he was eighteen. But maybe you can’t. Maybe it’s all written in stone where the gods hang out.

  ‘Well, Thomas, I have two kegs to set up. I’m thinking on the back lawn there would be the best spot. I don’t reckon it’s going to rain anytime soon. It might help if you had a table or something?’

  ‘There’s a trestle table and chairs in the shed.’

  ‘I didn’t see a shed.’

  ‘It’s around the side of the house.’

  ‘Good, we’re in business.’

  He was just finishing the set-up when a pink-and-white Chevy Bel Air rolled up the driveway. Left-hand drive, he noticed, as it pulled up on the grass beside him. It was gleaming, not like the ones he remembered. Winston Clarke climbed out. His shirt was crisp white, his tie broad royal blue, handpainted showing a scene from some bay in LA or Mexico, cacti in the foreground looking down over yachts.

  ‘No problems finding the place?’

  ‘No. I figure it’s not going to rain.’

  Clarke ran his eye over the set-up, nodded approval. ‘This is a good spot for it.’

  ‘How many you got coming?’

  ‘About thirty I think. He lives up at Clough with his mother. Quite a few are coming from there. They can park all over the lawn.’

  ‘If the kids aren’t twenty-one, you know that’s not legal.’

  ‘Come on, I’ll be here.’

  ‘What you’re telling me is that this alcohol is for you and your friends and those above legal drinking-age only.’

  Clarke got the drift, his eyes twinkled.

  ‘Of course. I’ve got soft drink for the others.’

  If one of the kids did something stupid and wound up in hospital, at least Blake could assure Nalder that he’d checked.

  ‘I was just about to do a test pour on this one. You be alright with the other?’

  Clarke chuckled. ‘Oh yeah, I’ve tapped a few kegs in my time. Why don’t we wet the baby’s head?’

  Blake obliged. He pulled two glasses out of the box and poured them each a beer. The flow was nice and even. Clarke raised his glass.

  ‘Here’s to the good old US of A.’ They both drank. ‘You’re about the first Yank I can think of around here. There’re a few older guys up at the Heads, came for the war and stayed.’

  Blake shrugged. ‘Australia’s a long way away.’

  ‘I might have told you. My sister married a Yank, moved to California. I went over and worked there a few years. Paul’s in the movie business, started as a refrigeration mechanic, wound up making movies. Land of opportunity.’

  ‘Plenty of opportunity here.’

  ‘Tell that to my son. Where is he? On his bed reading a comic, I’ll bet.’ Clarke took a deep gulp, finished the glass right off. ‘No, it’s too damn dead here. I was your age, I’d be in the States, but then again, I hear that bar of yours is doing good business.’

  ‘I can’t complain.’

  ‘What brought you out here?’

  ‘A girl.’ It was the easiest lie.

  Clarke shook his head sympathetically. ‘Yeah, they can fuck everything up. Still with her?’

  ‘It didn’t work out.’

  ‘Best thing for you. You got the bar, no ties.’

  ‘I best be heading back.’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘I can leave everything an extra day if you like. Just give me a call.’

  Clarke caught him admiring the Chevy.

  ‘Could be yours, I’ll do you a good deal. Like I said, you want to project the right image.’

  ‘It’s probably a little more than I can afford.’

  ‘You ever want to talk terms, I’m sure we can look at some arrangement.’

  Blake offered a noncommittal smile.

  Clarke called after him, ‘You play golf?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Well, no matter, I’ll drop in to your bar sometime. Come into the yard tomorrow morning, I’ll fix you up then with cash, if that’s okay.’

  After setting up Clarke’s, he’d gone to the Surf Shack and with help from Duck and Andy prepared the stage and the go-go platforms for the evening competition. It was only a Thursday night but the vibe around town was building strongly and he was expecting a big crowd.

  ‘Audrey seems to be doing better.’ Andy was pointing her out. Blake reckoned he was right, the glitch in her swimming had gone.

  ‘Fingers crossed, Andy.’

  Duck joined them. ‘I’ve got a job in the Heights, better be going.’

  Blake dug two pound notes out of his pocket for him and thanked him.

  Duck said, ‘What time tonight? I’m judging the contest.’

  ‘You?’

  ‘I come cheap.’

  ‘Be here by seven.’

  ‘Is The Beachcomber on tonight?’

  ‘If I can find him.’

  Blake left Andy to clean up, got into his ute and headed north seven or eight minutes before swinging off the road onto a beach-side track among thick trees, maybe blackbutt, he wasn’t sure. About a hundred yards in, he stopped and turned off the engine and climbed out. Built in the grove was a small shack constructed of tin, hessian bags and a few bricks. A couple of sheets of rusting corrugated iron propped between branches and some wooden uprights did for a roof. He pushed away the two hessian bags tacked to a horizontal piece of ply and peered in. A bamboo mat lay on the flattened earth beside a small kerosene stove and lamp. Three empty wine bottles stood neatly beside a cardboard box of books and a suitcase, which he knew contained men’s clothes. A pyramid of shells of all shapes and sizes provided decoration. There was no sign of the shack’s inhabitant. Blake backed out and walked through spiny grass to the beach. It was narrower here and a little rocky so the tourists rarely came, preferring the broader, cleaner sand to the south.

  The surf was even as a metronome but the tide was out.
He should have realised Crane would be out scavenging from the detritus of a world he had rejected. Blake started off north but abandoned that pursuit after about ten minutes when he’d made it around the little rocky point and still could see nobody on the long beach ahead. After backtracking to his original position and walking five minutes or so south, he saw a figure stooping in the shallows, pants legs rolled up to the thigh. He called out and the figure became erect, waved and started wading in. Crane was aptly named, around six foot, thin as a rail. He had his left arm through something doughnut-shaped, carrying it like that because he had his hands full, almost certainly with shells. A shirt knotted by its sleeves was around his throat, the rest of it covering his back. His chest was bare except for a clump of white hair. Locally he was known as the Beach Bum, but he’d taken pseudonyms ‘The Beachcomber’ and ‘Robert T. Menzies’ for his weekly Surf Shack performances. He beamed at his visitor.

  ‘Ah, the footnote Hemingway declined to write.’

  Because of his penchant for complicated words and flowery expression, most people assumed Crane had been a lawyer or teacher but he’d told Blake he’d been a pastry chef before signing on to the navy in the war. The only thing Blake knew for sure about Crane was that in the dark hours he was a slave to alcohol. Now Crane was closer, Blake could see that the doughnut hanging from his arm was a toilet seat. Crane displayed it with the pride a conqueror might have brandished the severed head of an adversary.

  ‘The treasures the sea yields up are wondrous indeed.’

  Blake realised he must have pulled a face, for Crane chided, ‘Oh come on. You Americans … Neptune himself could have sat his arse on this throne.’

  Crane walked on to his shack, dumped the shells and let the seat slide off his arm into the sand. ‘Probably a damn sight cleaner than the ones in the public lav I’m normally subjected to. I tell you, friend: Shelley, Wordsworth, Tennyson et al. are valueless unless one can sit down and have a decent shit while reading them. You literally — like the literary play on words? — you literally may as well wipe your arse with them. Sherry?’

  ‘No thanks.’

  ‘Of course you won’t. Don’t mind me though.’ Crane ferreted through his part-empty bottles until he found the one he was looking for. Blake thought he better get in quick, before the night’s path was set.

  ‘You feel like doing a spot tonight?’

  Crane had popped the cork on the sherry bottle already. The aroma was calling him, his focus was loosening. Blake drove on.

  ‘You’ll be able to buy two full bottles of that tomorrow.’

  That brought Crane back. ‘Deferred gratification?’

  ‘I guess so.’

  ‘You know how to torture a man.’

  ‘Two bottles. I’ll throw in breakfast.’

  ‘How fucking ingenuous. You know I don’t eat breakfast till lunch.’ It was the usual banter between them and normally the highlight of Blake’s day. ‘For a man named after the most wonderful poet of them all, you are more than a disappointment.’

  ‘I wasn’t named after the poet. I told you.’

  ‘But why should I believe anything you tell me?’

  Blake pulled out two one-pound notes. Crane smiled.

  ‘Ah, that’s why! The currency of currency. Perhaps you could pay me upfront?’

  ‘I think not. Well?’

  Crane pushed out a bottom lip and reluctantly recorked the sherry. ‘I’ll give you ten minutes but I want to be on no later than eight-thirty. I will have drinking to catch up on.’

  Ten minutes of Crane’s weird-shit poetry was about all his audience would take. Blake hadn’t been game to put him on a weekend but it worked great on the Thursday, and even if the kids hated it — plenty did — Blake dug it. What was the point of owning your own bar if you couldn’t run with what you liked yourself? And the counterbalance of the spoken word with his own twangy guitar just somehow worked.

  ‘Done. See you at eight.’

  ‘Two bottles of your best plonk and a kiss from the delightful Doreen.’

  ‘In your dreams.’

  ‘That’s a place you would not want to visit, believe me.’

  Blake did believe him. Sometimes, after a bad binge, Crane looked like a painting on the wall of a haunted house.

  ‘You want me to get the guys to pick you up?’

  ‘I shall make my own way.’

  ‘Eight. Don’t be late. We have a dance competition too. You might enjoy that.’

  Crane curled a lip. ‘Dance is for those who can’t talk. That …’ he pointed at the toilet seat, ‘… is far more edifying.’

  Kitty had barely slept. Last night she’d spent over an hour in the bathroom practising in front of the mirror all the things Doreen had shown her in the afternoon. In the evening, the bathroom was the only safe haven in the house. She could lock the door, pretend she had period pain and was taking a bath. Days were usually easier, especially today because it was her mum’s tennis day. The trouble was she was tired now from no sleep but when she tried to shut her eyes, she was still buzzing. Todd Henley was going to be there for sure, checking out Brenda. And that meant Todd would also be checking out her. At school he’d never noticed her, not once. Of course she was two years below him, so why would he? Brenda was that irritating one year older than her, and the sub-leaving and leaving years went to the same dances and social functions, which gave Brenda so much more opportunity to toss her stupid straight hair in his face and push her tits up with her elbows. Brenda was actually small-breasted, especially compared to her, and that was one thing boys noticed … or two things as the joke went — boobs. Todd had just done his first year of engineering at university. Maths was one of Kitty’s best subjects, she could talk to him on his level … though of course he would know so much more about life now having lived in the uni college in Brisbane. All the same, what she had lacked up until now was opportunity, but that would all change tonight and Brenda with her skinny legs and cute little bum was in for the fight of her life.

  Kitty swung up and sat on the pink bedspread that had covered her body for so many nights as she’d slowly transformed from a little girl to a young woman. The shelves her dad had built for her sported Barbies whose accessories were all still neatly packed at the ready in a little wooden treasure chest. Her hockey stick rested against the wall where she had practised her arabesque and her wardrobe door bore the pencil marks made by her dad recording her annual height, a practice which regrettably had been abandoned two years ago when her body had refused to move past its peak of five foot three. Nothing in her external world had changed all that much but inside everything was suddenly incontrovertibly altered and all she could think of was Todd’s amazing, glorious lips … and him kissing her as he held her in his arms. As for what happened after that, well, Kitty really wasn’t too sure. Naturally she knew the basics of sex: the penis, the vagina, sperm, egg. She also knew she wouldn’t be having intercourse before she was married. Poor Ginny Herrison had made that mistake and been forced to drop out of school and start wearing smocks. She’d disappeared for a month or two then come back and now worked in the bakery. The baby had been adopted — or so Mary Cunningham said and Mary knew most everything, like what college at university Todd was boarding in. So no, Kitty wouldn’t be going ‘all the way’ with Todd but she was sure she could keep him happy if she could get a hint or two about what to do after the kiss. Perhaps Doreen could help? When Kitty was thirteen, while the parents were drinking beers on the back patio, Brian, her kind-of-cousin had put his hand on her breast, but she was wearing a jumper and bra and all she felt was a bit of pressure on it, as if she’d dropped to the floor during PT push-ups.

  She mustn’t get ahead of herself though. First things first. Make it through tonight’s heat at least: three were going through, seven would miss out. Brenda was a certainty, much as Kitty hated to admit it. That left two spots out of nine. The tricky thing was how she was going to get to the Surf Shack. In the end she decided to d
o what she had for the practice: ride her bike. It was mostly downhill from here so she wouldn’t sweat up too badly. She’d told her parents that she was going to a beach barbecue with some of the kids from school and that she expected to be home by eight but not to worry if she was late because they might all go over to Geraldine Wilson’s. The advantage of Geraldine was that she did not have a phone and Kitty’s parents and their crowd had nothing to do with the Wilsons, who were poor but not wild criminals-in-waiting like, say, the O’Haras or Moores. That would have brought a straight-up ban from her father. With nothing better to do she went into the lounge room, neat as a pin as usual from her mum’s vacuuming efforts, and put the soundtrack of South Pacific on the stereo. Her mum loved the record and played it all the time, which was naturally annoying because there was no space for her to squeeze in her own Paul Anka 45s, but how could you not want to sing along with ‘I’m In Love with a Wonderful Guy’? And so she played it now and danced right around the lounge room imaging that she was in a faraway place with nobody around but Todd.

  For a Thursday, the place was packed. Doreen was being run off her feet. Thank God when Blake had arrived and seen the line of kids queued up before the doors had even opened, he had told her to serve no alcohol in the main room until the contest was over. It would have been chaos. Any adults who wanted a drink, she’d invited to dine in the Conga Drum, the small restaurant serviced by the back bar. She had taken it upon herself to offer each diner a complimentary drink and Blake had better not complain or she would drop one of these crates of Cokes right on his head. She was ferrying the soft drinks through the crowd — no mean feat in stilettos — to the fridges in the back bar because the stock of cool ones in the front bar would soon be exhausted. Blake’s first set was coming to a close. The dance floor was a heaving wave of young bodies. She’d hired a photographer who was busy snapping left, right and centre. She wished she could have taken it in. Blake was playing better than he’d ever done. She handed over the Cokes to Jeff in the back bar and turned back, almost colliding with Kitty.