Spinner (33 page)

‘In Adelaide, the receipts were quite outstanding, starting low, but as word of Australia's fightback and your curious and then amazing inclusion filtered out, we achieved full ground capacity. In Melbourne, the ground was sold out. By lunchtime, they broke down a fence and poured in. The official attendance was eighty-seven thousand. Some estimate that there were a hundred and twenty thousand people in the MCG to witness the ... miracle.'

Mr Biggins giggled. It was a strange sound coming from him. He looked up suddenly. ‘It was truly amazing, David. I was there. So ... exquisitely beautiful, like a piece of music. Extraordinarily ... pure.' He looked at the scuffed cricket balls in his hands and smiled. ‘But also like some crazy comic thing too. You know, people who weren't there still won't believe that it happened.'

His face went serious again. Sad again. ‘But the receipts, you see. Eighty-seven thousand, yes, but no day two. No day three or four or five. Do you see?'

‘No, sir.'

‘The greatest day of cricket in the history of the game has cost us a fortune. By my calculation, given your current age and, barring injuries, we have possibly thirty years of monetary losses ahead of us. Massive losses.'

David blinked. It was a completely different way of seeing. It ... well it was like flying really. Or like Uncle Mike suggesting no one should own a horse so that everyone can have them.

‘Can you get a loan?' said David, brightening.

‘Hmm.' Mr Biggins looked into David's eyes. ‘Can you bowl less well? Just a little.'

So, David was glad of the cotton wool in his ears. He could tell Mr Biggins felt very bad about what he'd asked, but David did not want to talk about it. Mr Biggins had not been the first to ask, but the answer remained the same. It would be disrespectful to cricket. It was completely against everything his grandfather had taught. But, even over those things, David knew it was against everything he did and the way he did it and who he was.

David sat in the plane, trying to imagine bowling below his best and every time he got near the idea he found his whole body tensing, every muscle tightening, and all the while, he could hear his grandfather's voice, deeply disappointed with him. Finally, in another plane approaching Sydney, he'd started vomiting in some bags they had for just that. He only stopped when he could see the huge city of Sydney below, with its two big bridge ends ready and waiting for a bridge to be built across the harbour.

As David came out of the plane in Sydney, Mr Biggins said, ‘Listen, David. I've upset you. I'm very sorry. Forget that idea, will you? It was a mistake on my part. You just play well tomorrow.'

David nodded, and the man patted him on the shoulder. ‘Good man. I'll get our bags. There should be a car.'

He hurried off amid the baggage and bags of mail and sheds.

‘David.'

David turned to see a lady dressed up in furs and jewels smiling at him.

‘Your Uncle Michael has a car. Round here.'

‘Where is he?'

‘In the car, darling. He's had a skinful.' She laughed, but it was quiet. She wore lipstick so pale pink that it was nearly white, and a green colour on her eyelids.

David followed her. There were wooden sheds and buildings mostly painted green. A trolley of parcels and bags of mail were being stacked outside one shed.

‘Hurry up or they'll turf us out of here.'

She wore a short skirt and it showed her knees, which were skinny. He'd have to talk to his uncle about her. She might be nice, but David needed rest to prepare for the Test match, not his uncle's parties. He wondered if Mrs O'Locklan would approve and thought not. If he could get his uncle to promise to behave, which he had done sometimes, he could get Mr Biggins to let him come to the games too.

The car was a big Dodge with four windows in the back. A driver in a loose suit had a back door open and the lady clattered on her heels to it. Then she stepped back so David could get to his uncle. Only it wasn't his uncle. It was Blackie Cutmore.

David tried to step back but the other man was behind him, pushing. Blackie grabbed David's wrist and pulled him in, as the driver slammed the car door behind.

‘Gidday, Billy.'

David was pushed back into his seat, as the car took off. The driver was driving them fast. The lady was walking away past the mailbags. David turned to look at Blackie, his smile twisted like the scar on his cheek.

‘Where's my uncle?'

Blackie had a little bottle of liquid. He started tipping it into a handkerchief.

‘You cost everybody a shitload of money, kid.'

Before David could answer, Blackie pushed the handkerchief up at David's face. It smelled like a nasty medicine, and David tried to get away from it, but felt his head being pushed back into the seat and then his head felt like it was being pushed through the seat and through air like he was tumbling out of an aeroplane and through the clouds.

Black. Nothing.

He was lying on something like a pallet in a dark room. His head ached and he felt like his arms were asleep. There were men's voices muttering somewhere below and the scuttling of rats somewhere above. He held his breath a moment and could make out someone snoring nearby, but the ache in his head grew sharper and he had to breathe again.

It was day. He could tell because a little light came in from behind some hessian bags hung over a high window. Brick showed through broken plaster on the walls. Across the bare boards David could see someone else, lying on another dirty pallet. It could be his uncle, judging from the clothes and from the back of his head, but David couldn't be sure. He tried to speak but his mouth wouldn't say words. He heard a door open and footsteps, boots on bare wood, then crunching on fallen plaster too. He made out a radio somewhere.

‘...fine start by Australia, even without Donald. Perhaps he will show, but with England three down for forty-four, this is a promising start.'

The footsteps were right there. ‘Not too much,' said Blackie's voice. ‘Don't want to kill 'im.' The handkerchief was there, stinking of the chemical.

‘Not yet, anyways,' said some other man.

Black.

When David woke fully again he was drinking warm water from a jug. He gulped and gulped but couldn't make his thirst go. He guessed he must have crawled over here while half asleep. He must have smelled the water. His head hurt like he'd been kicked, like the kicking was still going. It was early on another day judging by the light and the cold. He was on the floor next to his uncle, who still snored. There was a smell of piss and shit. There were six empty brandy bottles on the floor and one full one. David got up at once and nearly fell. He went to the glassless window, holding onto the bars. He vomited in the corner.

When he was done, he went back to his uncle and pushed his shoulder roughly. ‘Uncle Mike,' he whispered. ‘Michael, wake up.'

His uncle's face was bruised, his lip split. There was blood all over his shirt and jacket.

‘Wake up.'

‘David.'

‘We have to get out of here.'

David went back to the window and pulled open the hessian sack to peer through the bars into the dawn light. There was a lane or street down a floor, but it was filled with sandstone bricks and corrugated iron. The houses had no roofs, half their walls had tumbled into piles of bricks.

‘Where?'

‘The Rocks, I reckon,' said his uncle with a pretty clear voice, even though he remained laying on his back with his eyes closed. ‘Hear those horns?'

David realised he did. Had.

‘The ferries.'

‘Fairies?'

‘Ferry boats in Sydney harbour. They've taken up the
houses down in The Rocks so they can build a bridge across the water. We're in one of those houses. Might be Katie, the Queen of the Underworld, is my guess. Don't think Blackie works for himself.'

‘That was the man at the racetrack. The one who was going to cut off my finger.'

Michael pushed himself up, his back resting on the shattered plaster. He pulled a cork out of the full bottle of brandy with his teeth, but winced then felt with his tongue to where one was missing.

David went to try to drink more water. The stink from urine, their sweat and David's vomit made him gag again. There were big cockroaches moving about on the wall, like leaves drifting on water.

Michael took a big gulp of brandy. ‘They don't want you playing the Test.'

‘I heard it. On a radio.'

‘Not doing bad without you. Least to start with. Even Johnson made thirty.'

‘What day is it?'

‘No idea.'

‘We have to get out of here, Uncle Mike.'

‘Can't be done. They drug you, and ... me too.' He indicated the empty bottles on the floor. Then he smiled. ‘Will you throw this Test if they let you out?'

‘No.'

‘Good for you. Their original plan was for me to persuade you to throw it. They mistakenly believed O'Toole's little Fagan articles about me leading you astray. I disagreed. I never thought they'd kidnap you.'

Michael closed his eyes again, clearly ready to return to the kind of long, half-drunk half-sleep he had on the train.

David put on his brightest voice. ‘Then we should play a great trick on them and get out of here and get back to the team and win the game and cost them a packet. What a lark.'

Michael opened his eyes and smiled brightly at him, pointing a finger and nodding. ‘Spoken like a master, David. You have learned well, my son.'

David suddenly recalled his grandfather lying just so, waiting to die. He felt weak and had to sit, his back against the wall under the window. His head hurt, but he was trying to think past that, to form a plan. He looked to the door.

‘Hey,' said his uncle, ‘I haven't seen you since Melbourne. That Test was magnificent. It was like time stood still. Like something that seemed only theoretical—discovered and made real and concrete and clear. It defies description.' He gulped his brandy.

‘We have to go, Uncle Mike.'

‘Made a lot of people angry with me down in Melbourne, Davey. When I promised no wickets and you did what you did. So bad, then so wonderful all in an instant. Like a big bomb.'

‘They'll kill me, Uncle Mike.'

‘No, I'll talk to them. We'll be right. Little chat.'

‘They'll kill me because I won't do what they say and it'll be no good for them ever, if it's no good now.'

‘We'll sort something out.'

David tried to get up. His legs were too wobbly and he couldn't. He crawled through the broken bricks and plaster to the door. It was locked. One of its wooden boards was missing and David tried to see through, but there was just a landing and some stairs.

Michael drank deeply from his bottle.

David knew that he would soon be dozing, happily useless in his brandy-drink half-sleep.

‘Grandad died.'

‘I heard. I'm sorry.'

‘You didn't like him.'

‘True, but not. I didn't like that he didn't like me, but he didn't like me for very good reason. And our present circumstances rather bear out his low opinion of my character.'

‘Why don't you shut up. You're not being clever. You just say things cos you like the sound of them, but they don't mean anything.'

Michael finally blinked. Maybe he was listening.

‘He knew he was sick. That's why he let you take me.'

‘Ah. Yes. I didn't think he cared about my broken promise to Ernie.' Michael grinned, but sadly.

David sensed there was more on offer. He wasn't so fearful of the knowledge now. ‘What promise?'

‘No. Not a patch on Earnest James. Better man all round. Believer. Got the girl. Kept whispering in my ear you see. ‘Promise to do this and promise to do that ... I couldn't even run ... kept slipping in the mud and my blood and his blood. Blood everywhere. Open front of my boot kept catching on things. He's on my back and in my ear, whispering. “Love you. Love them.” Love. Promise. A bloody dance on a broken bridge. I don't even know when he stopped whispering.'

Michael gulped at his drink.

David thought about what Mrs O'Locklan had said. Was that it? His uncle's wound. David got himself up onto all fours ready to crawl back to Michael.

‘It wasn't your fault, Uncle Mike.'

‘What?'

‘It wasn't your fault he died.'

‘I know that. You think it's that? That simple?' His uncle had his nasty edge, the nasty edge of his drunk self. ‘Even though I met her first, she fell in love with him and made the better bargain. No hard feelings. Cross my heart.'

David waited on hands and knees still near the window.

Michael kept on, quiet and bitter as though talking to himself. ‘What happened is he got blown up, but that's not what happened. What happened was I promised, you see. What happened was I was supposed to come back ... to you and her—the big piggyback promise—and I was supposed to look after her. But I didn't. I didn't answer the call and she killed herself. That's what happened.'

‘What?'

‘True. You know it.'

‘No, don't say.' It was David's voice that David heard, little and frightened. Her. It was about her. David hadn't been ready for this.

‘And if you don't know it, you'll read it if you ever get out of here, because O'Toole has it plastered all over the newspaper. Blackie showed me.'

David vomited again, on the floor where he was, then tried to crawl from it. His ears buzzed. It was true. He did know it. The whole town knew it. His mother. The nice Mrs Pringle nearly saying. David realised that he had known for some time and had somehow kept the secret from himself.

‘In the dam,' said David, his head now against the wall.

‘I didn't know where until you told me at the farm.'

‘She must have been so sad.' David saw a beautiful young woman standing by the dam. He felt how she felt. A
hopelessness. It was a sadness that was as cold and deep and black as the water in front of her.