Homesickness (6 page)

‘I think it was,' said someone over the din.

The pygmies were located in the equatorial forests north of the capital, on the other side of the hills. The usual practice was to set out early taking a lunch packed by the hotel; but there had been a misunderstanding or carelessness, for some hadn't been woken. Irritatingly, half the places at the early breakfast were empty. It was well after seven-thirty before they got moving. The tourist bus was new and painted black and white to simulate a zebra—strange sitting inside it. The road soon petered out into a ‘road', and then a track: broken, dusty, blocked with goats and cattle, and they found their young driver wearing a government cap had a policy of swerving violently towards any stray dog and playing chicken with the birds. So the bus skated and shuddered: a good thing it was Made in Germany. To reach the pygmies would be long and tiring. But it would be worth it.

‘The little fellahs?' Doug Cathcart had nodded, keen. They were the sort of things you read about. He had his binoculars with him.

There had always been a pygmy in the agricultural shows. The burlap flap pulled aside: half-naked, bulging belly, glaring on a low stool. Usually he held a tasselled spear or three bone-tipped arrows… But the agricultural sideshow and that kind of circus act are on the decline in Australia. The caravan life don't appeal no more. Civil Liberties, Invasions of Privacies (pulling back the flap!), Racial Laws, Trade Description Acts and the combined fingers of the libs and the churches have left their mark.

Early on, questions had been raised (of a semantic nature).

‘Surely they mean “colony”.'

‘You're thinking of lepers.'

‘It definitely says here “Pygmy Collection”.'

Kaddok spoke up but obscured the point: ‘From the Latin,
pygmaeus
. Less than 57 inches high—150cm. Pygmoids of course are slightly taller. Sing songs and mime. Have little concern for the afterlife.'

‘The little fellahs,' Doug nodded again.

Sheila asked about the poisoned arrows.

Doug shook his head. ‘Not any more. Not these days. You'll probably find they get fed by the government, a bit like the Aborigines.'

As they drove Phillip North sat in a pleasant daze, gazing at the shuddering grass and blurred thorn trees passing, sudden ancient gullies and rounded eroded hills, recalling other times in other lands. Occasionally, smoke marked a village among the trees, and mud and thatch huts, as baked as the land itself, appeared on hills. Their driver had another policy: throwing the bus into neutral down the slightest and even steepest hills. But while others spoke out about this and hung onto the seat rail in front North settled back contented, in pleasant limbo. Behind the mountains they saw large slowly flying birds and the silent forest beginning. The soil turned black and rotting leaves on the side made them shiver. Changing down to bottom gear, adagio, the bus took a melodic path in and out of the sun, in a sense duplicating their own zebra pattern, but gradually more black than light: until the sun now was thatched out overhead and behind them. They were in a tunnel of leaves and roots, tangled, dripping and rotting. The wheels slipped on the mulch and stopped.

Silence in the forest: broken by, what, an occasional rotten branch or falling inedible fruit.

In the Bermuda shorts and long white socks, Doug stamped the ground, a cone-shaped footballer warming up. ‘Shhh,' his wife said. The forest felt like a library or a great art gallery. Those who made comments whispered them. (‘Watch out for leeches.' ‘What?') But following the driver along a thin path Garry Atlas let out the Tarzan cry: ‘Oh oi, oh oi-oi-oi-...oi-oi-oi-oi...'

‘Shut up!' Sasha hissed as it reverberated. ‘Shut up! You're not funny.' And all but the driver agreed. They frowned and glanced around as he walked on unperturbed.

The smooth vertical trunks on either side, forming the path, were like large green pipes, rows of them, and there was one species of tree that occasionally grew hair like a human leg. The further they went in the closer the trees grew, and the trees multiplied and were divided by immense shadows and long shafts of light. They were forced to go Indian file and increasingly squeeze through sideways. Difficult for Leon Kaddok: one hand gripped the back of Gwen's belt, the other cupping the loaded camera. The driver seemed to know the path, but sometimes one of them slipped glancing behind. Following Louisa, Borelli smiled: she shouldn't have worn such fine high-heeled sandals. She also carried a snakeskin handbag. Monkeys shrieked and jumped high from branch to branch, more like sliding shadows; but the group had become used to them and watched intently for the pygmies, even one, male or female.

‘I shouldn't be here,' North muttered. ‘Nothing,' he said to Sasha. ‘I'm just talking rubbish to myself.'

The driver waited as they stopped before a large tree growing in their path. Borelli pointed with his stick. Cut deep, still wet:

J
ACK O'TOOLE
WORLD AXE CHAMPION

(AUSTRALIA)

‘Someone,' Atlas whispered, rolling his eyes left and right, ‘has been here before us.'

They laughed: a relief. It was like finding an empty cigarette pack in a remote picnic ground. For almost the first time Sheila looked around—and she saw a multicoloured bird swoop between the trunks.

‘I'm disappointed,' Sasha pouted. ‘I thought we were really off the beaten track.'

‘She's never satisfied,' her friend Violet observed to the rest.

As he waited, perspiration collected on the driver's forehead and nose.

‘He was a real credit,' Cathcart told Sasha. ‘I saw Jack O'Toole once clean up a Canadian, a Swede, the lot, in one afternoon. And a smarty-pants Californian who'd come all the way over. Nobody could get near him.'

Royal Easter Show, that was: Sydney, 1956? O'Toole in the white singlet. White dungarees. White sandshoes. Arms like hams! Short back and sides. The Swede remember had a ginger crewcut and chopped in a ridiculous check shirt. Had a short fast swing; but it couldn't last. O'Toole won. In Australia for a time he was a household name.

‘But who would have…?'

‘I knew a bloke at work who knew Jack,' Cathcart went on. ‘He said he was a corker fellah. He didn't have a swelled head at all.'

With his ear against the trunk the way a safecracker opens a door Kaddok traced the block letters with his fingertips. ‘It's still fresh,' he told them. ‘This will be legible for another hundred years.'

‘That's a good one,' Borelli laughed. ‘Australia, in the heart of Africa. We have stumbled upon a particularly insidious imperialism. This is taking national pride to extreme lengths. Who would have thought, doctor?'

‘But carving messages on trees was a tradition among our explorers,' North argued.

Borelli laughed, ‘You're right! Agreed!'

‘Don't they talk a lot of rot?' Mrs Cathcart commented.

Doug nodded. He raised his binoculars and panned slowly through the trees. Stepping back Kaddok took a few quick pictures.

‘Such a marvellous strong tree,' Louisa turned as they began moving. ‘It's a pity.'

After crossing a bridge made out of vines the path widened and they came upon a crude trilith fashioned from tree trunks, and Gerald near the driver immediately put on his pained expression. In a clearing stood a low white building in the strict Bauhaus or shoebox style, in this instance horizontal. Straight right-angled paths and lawns of mown couch were between it and the towering devouring jungle.

The driver spat and pointed to the glass door.

‘I don't see the pygmies. There's nobody here.'

‘It looks more like a bush hospital… They've got them locked up.'

‘Well let's see the little fellahs.'

‘Why on earth don't they design in their own ethnic style?' Gerald complained. ‘Such as it is.'

North agreed. ‘The Bauhaus is a curse. The dreary disease has spread even to here. It's like one of your imperialisms,' he said to Borelli. ‘The colonisation of style, I think it is called.'

The Collection of Pygmies housed inside was immediately superior to yesterday's…museum. A sense of purpose, of clarity, showed in the smooth tiled floors, the straight lines and natural light streaming through the carefully placed windows. The pygmies were clean and placed with considerable ingenuity, often in some historical context. There were no attendants. None were needed. Each exhibit spoke for itself and in the midst of that primordial silence, the green forest always in the corner of one eye, each statement was somehow amplified or underscored, increasingly, as they shuffled and clacked with their various footwear on the stone floor. Neatly printed labels—unlike the Museum of Handicrafts—jogged the memory. In short, a surprisingly fine example of imaginative scholar-curatorship.

Old, short men; though not all old. Occasionally, middle-aged men had the resolve and distant gaze of the very old!

On low white boxes and striking familiar poses they exhibited all their old
baraka
. Quite a few wore ceremonial (purple) robes. Some had the pith helmet. But by far the majority used the pin-striped suit buttoned up, and a television-blue shirt. Where did they find all these suits? It explained the shape of the building: there were long avenues of them. The sebaceous figures held spectacles or important pieces of paper, and stared thoughtfully as if they were being photographed (Karsh of Ottawa), or they gazed at a mythical point just above the horizon: resolve and optimism which know no boundaries. Others, again the majority, seemed to lean forward with promises; or were they breaking promises? It was hard to tell. In either case, an outstretched finger or a possible handshake occasionally brushed their clothing as they walked past. And this overall impression of appealing to reason or of hectoring was further heightened by figures well known for their oratory: the arm held high conducting an invisible orchestra or ordering another round. Winnie! Feet planted well apart, gold watch-chain exposed, glaring magenta face (but this is cruel: not drinking again?). Good on you, Winnie! ‘Never has so much…' Never mind Gallipoli, the
Lusitania
, the little invasion of Russia, his switch to the gold standard ('25), the
British Gazette
, smashing strikes and Dresden, and that ‘half-naked fakir'. Magnificent orator. Others too had their excesses preserved, indeed highlighted. And yet these trademarks, once so endearing, appeared now in isolation as ridiculous appendages: the furled umbrella there, a cane, several spotted ties (one bow), the pince-nez, her corgi bitches, the General's golf clubs, another's rocking chair, yachting caps and bowler hats, snuff, cold pipes and coronas, toothbrush moustaches.

‘There's Bob!'

The eyebrows, double-breasted suit draped with ribbons; one eyebrow raised.

They shouldn't have him like that.'

‘That's how he was.'

‘I thought he was a big man.'

A few were still alive. Ha, ha. Scratched recordings hidden somewhere kept repeating the same old newspeak. There were combed acephalous faces which still managed to nod and wave from imaginary balconies. The president spoke into an embossed dictaphone, leaning back in his chair, forming a cathedral with his fingers. A few exhausted ones, imagine, vibrated over memoirs. Almost inevitably a monarch wearing a tiara sat on a white lavatory, so bringing her eyes down to their level. And what was the Boy Scout leader doing there?

Various backers, anonymous lackeys and lickboots, party advisors hovered in the background. The marvellous detail of each one kept comments to the monosyllable, or a gesture, a nod or frown, an arm suddenly pointing to a minor figure amazingly well portrayed.

At the end of this long corridor a small drawing-room decorated with a marble mantelpiece and maroon wallpaper held a collection of apparently essential accessories. They were spread out on an oak table. Items such as hair oil, cufflinks and loudspeakers were represented with real examples, but others were shown by photographs or abstractly. Close and careful inspection showed each item was either glued or bolted down on the good table to prevent theft. Here were expensive fountain pens, the striped tie, aftershave lotions, a selection of chevrons, epaulets, ‘omelets', a cemetery of uniforms, monogrammed Swiss handkerchiefs, aperitifs, toothpaste, medals, the ball-bearing navels, red carpet (sample of), editorial writers, the flags and bunting, panegyrics, brass bands, national anthems, constitutions and proclamations, Vernacular Republics, Workers' Parties (haw, haw!), opening ceremonies and an ominous oubliette (blueprint of), black shoe-polish, several ways of kissing babies, television make up, black limousines and a typical firm handshake.

The group had split around the table. Even those not interested found themselves bending over, studying the paraphernalia. Each object clearly had a personal touch and seemed to belong to the one man; and the combination somehow formed a distant yet ideal figure.

‘The only thing missing,' said Borelli as they filed out, ‘is a reliable deodorant, and the candidate's blonde wife, preferably with two new babies. It's all a joke, isn't it?'

‘Our Sir Robert was a good man,' said Mrs Cathcart firmly.