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Available in e-book form Print version coming soon! |
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Dead Cedar by L P King There is more to Gulargambone than meets the eye... Andrew Clovelly goes home and finds more than his cousin's killer. |
It wasn't until I came upon the narrow entrance to the town that the wall of noise hit me. Cemented deep in the bowels of Western New South Wales, I swear this little piece of nothingness endures out of pure spite. Don't think for a moment you can sneak through it unnoticed. By the time I had reached the other side of town there was no need for me to stop and say, "Yeah, I’m back". Cec Dinley had watched me motor past his quaint little garage next to the old Blacksmith’s Shop. The return of the prodigal son would have the whole town talking for most of the day. People would shake their heads and blubber on how they usually blubber on in such circumstances. Such a shame… and so young too. And, worst of all, How are they ever going to cope?Did I mention the wall of noise? Right... the voices. You'll figure that one out eventually... everyone does. Today I mostly heard collective sighs of relief that I had made it back safely. In a way that made me feel good inside. The good feeling slowly curdled into fear as my car lumbered off the tiny white wooden bridge spanning the enigmatic Castlereagh River. I say enigmatic because a person can easily be fooled by the lunar surface of the riverbed, thinking that it is perpetually dry. Locals know how to reach down below the surface to caress the cool trickle of water that will only cheekily show itself when it feels like it. There has been the odd time, though, when the river has really wanted to show off. Without warning, the water level can rise with enough vehemence to swallow a tractor whole and carry it off for miles, only to deposit it in a tree as if it were a spent old crow. It’s not being poetic to talk about the river like that. Things are not always what they seem. Take Gulargambone, or "Gular", for short. The town’s Aboriginal meaning of Watering Place of Many Birds always seemed peculiar to me, but then I know I’m a cynic and I wouldn’t be the only one. One look at the dry riverbed and you're trying to figure out why there are more birds left than people these days. I kept my eyes straight ahead so that I wouldn't have to see just how decimated the place had become. Even on a busy day there’s not much here that wouldn’t make your average city dweller seize up with withdrawal symptoms. No fancy shopping malls, fancy cinema complexes or fancy anything. And, if you’re tempted to stay a while, you’d better get used to having smelly armpits and dust up your nose. |
The often dry and sandy riverbed of the Castlereagh River which runs through Gulargambone |
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What is left of Martin's Corner. It used to be a garage and you can now barely see the old Coca-Cola® sign. |
Today, instead of wallowing in the peace of Martin’s Corner, I found myself mesmerised by the heat haze concentrated on the dirty bitumen road. It wouldn’t be long now before a mirage started to invade my head. You come to expect that when you travel along these roads that are subjugated by the sun. I sat there in that sweatbox, willing the thing to come, almost hoping that it would be Jimbo himself. February is always the hottest month in these parts and the car’s air conditioning had its work cut out for it. I rubbed a combination of sweat and longing for sleep from my eyes as I let the car find its own way along that deserted and narrow time tunnel. I thought I could see something in the distance as I approached the turn-off at the Nine-Mile… but somehow I couldn’t quite make it out. As I focussed on the ball of white light up ahead I could feel an energy drawing me closer, hungrily sucking the strength from my body as it callously toyed with the bewildering patterns dancing around in my sorry head. The indicator on the speedometer gradually rose and rose and I could have easily ended up telephone pole bait as I fought to keep the car from veering down into the table-drain. As the white light grew greater in intensity heat filled the car in a cruel and merciless attempt to sear the skin from my very bones. I wasn’t even hung-over, but I was sure beginning to wish I was.
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"Sorry
to hear about Jim," Cec Dinley slapped me on the shoulder a couple of
minutes later, "pull up a pew and take a load off for a while."
I was honoured
to be given visitor status at Martin's Corner. To one side of the
petrol pumps a makeshift pergola had been constructed with left-over
bits of wood covered with shadecloth. I could see Cec had added a few
plants in big black plastic pots since the last time I was here, just to
gussy the place up a little. One of the pots contained a droopy little
tomato plant and I didn't imagine Cec would be having many salad
sandwiches for lunch if that was all he had to rely on.
It was a slow
day at Martin's Corner. Besides Cec, there was only Don Jeams and Kev
Baxter. Cec, Don and Kev are kind of like the Great Lords of Martin's
Corner and Auntie May is the only one I've ever known to question why
they have so much time on their hands. Cal put her in her place by
saying that women aren't the only ones who have a mandate on gossip.
He had tried to backtrack once he realised what he'd said, but by then
it was too late.
Cec
pushed a cold bottle of Coke into my hands and Don started to roll
another cigarette. Don always gets more tobacco on the ground than he
gets into the cigarette paper, but I don’t think he really cares. I
watched his nicotine-stained fingers work the paper into a skinny roll.
He held the paper in one hand and sealed it with saliva while his free
hand searched his pockets for some matches. All through this ritual I
waited, anticipating the smell of unfiltered tobacco which would
inevitably overpower my nostrils. When it came, I shifted my plastic
chair around and a little to the right, to be downwind of Don. Cigarette
or no cigarette, that was always a good idea because Don never was
exactly on friendly terms with soap and water.
"I'd never
of thought Jim’d be a bloke to do himself in," Kev said quietly.
"No one can
believe that," I mumbled.
All
four of us leaned back in our chairs and stared into the vacant space
across the road and for a moment I was in that place where you know you
are with friends, sharing grief but not the burden of words. I felt
safe, sitting here with these old men who could say they had seen it all
from a plastic chair at Martin's Corner. All the births, deaths and
marriages of the generations that people my age barely notice because we
are all too concerned with our own pitiful lives. Before this was all
over I would learn just how much these little people count. I heard one of the old men sniff and that brought me around enough to ask, "You fullas know anything about Jim's bird, apart from the fact that she is a good-looker, I mean?"
"Yep, she's
a sly one all right, that one."
"What do you mean, Kev?" |
Across the road from Martin's Corner. |
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The bush outside of Gulargambone. |
“You think Jim was murdered?” I heard my Grandma ask me in an even voice. “Hey, you, since when did you get to be a mind-reader?” “You’d be surprised, my darling. I saw you brooding away to yourself all day. I also saw you dragging Riley back down to the haystacks as I was driving up to the house.” “Well, Grandma, I’ll tell you something… I’ve sure got a lot of questions in my mind and it has nothing to do with my professional training. How about you? What do you think?” “I guess we’ll know more once Riley and his men are finished with all the tests.” “Yeah. Do you know whether Jim was in any kind of trouble? Did he have a fight with anyone? Anything?” “Not that I know of, Andrew. I used to see Jim nearly every week, as you know. I last saw him on Friday and he was his usual cheeky self.” I thought I heard a sob being brought into check so I just kept my eyes on the road ahead. On either side of the road were the weathered and grey fence-posts that had been held together by rusty fencing wire for years. I imagined the craggy old posts forming a sort of Guard of Honour as the car glided by. Even the hundreds of tiny heads of the ragweed that clogged the table-drains seemed to be bowing reverently as we slid down that dusty aisle of a country road which wound through what had been Jim’s only real church since the day he was born. “So, Grandma, how about telling me all about Melanie?” |
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