the machine before flying it beneath the bridge. What she didn’t know is that I had done it for a bet. I got good odds because everyone remembered how Johnny O’Day had killed himself doing the same thing three months before.
It had all been in the
Advertiser
. Annette had read it the day before. But now Phoebe was telling the story a third time. She wasn’t doing it for Annette’s sake. She was yelling into an empty well, only wanting to hear her happiness amplified.
“You are going to make yourself very, very unhappy,” Annette said.
But it was she who burst into tears, not Phoebe.
Phoebe tried to comfort her but she jerked away. She picked up the Swinburne and threw it at the wall.
“It’s ridiculous,” she screamed. “It’s stupid. You haven’t even
spoken
to him.”
15
I did not like the Geelong snake, nor did I trust it. But I was stuck with it, this cranky creature in the hessian sack beneath my bed. I had considered “losing” it, but I’d already had some nasty experiences “losing” snakes. A lost snake can unhinge the most stable household and produce conditions that are most unfavourable for a man who wants to be put up. That aside, the McGraths were almost as proud of my relationship with the snake as they were of my connection with aviation. Jack brought an odd collection of characters home from the racetrack to view my performance with the snake. Sharp-looking punters and toffee-nosed horse owners all collected in Western Avenue and were as different from each other as the chairs they sat on. I was called upon to demonstrate my “pet”. The manager of the National Bank, whose cast-off Pelaco shirt I wore, was nearly bitten on his beckoning index finger and was foolish enough to giggle about it.
You can do nothing to protect yourself from a brown snake except keep well away from it. You cannot milk its poison for (in summer especially) it’ll have another batch ready in seconds. There would be no peace with the snake, no treaty. It would not become tame or even accept its captivity. All day long it pushed its head against the sack, as persistent as a blowfly against glass. It was a cunning thing and not capable of being bought off.
By the Wednesday morning I had found no one to supply me with either mice or frogs and I set off early to walk along the Melbourne Road where, one of the punters had told me, there was a soak with plenty of frogs in it. I left the Ford at home and walked. I always liked to walk. I strolled like a Gentleman.
I had observed, very early in life, that the way a man or woman walked gave a much better indication of their place in society than their accent. Although I was now very careful not to say “ain’t” and “I never done it” and other habits of speech I had picked up working for Wongs at the Eastern Market, I was happy enough to use the natural nasal Australian accent which had so enraged that imaginary Englishman who sired me. I despised those people who pommified their speech but I was, always, very particular about my walk.
A man who lives by physical labour will move in a different way. A man who lumps wheat will move differently from a man who shears sheep—he will carry his muscled arms like loaves of bread; he will lock the muscles at the base of his spine and lean forward to take some imaginary weight. I had thousands of classifications of walks and I adopted the “Gentleman’s Stroll” because I fancied it would make people trust me without ever knowing why.
It wasn’t a very scenic route to the soak, but that didn’t worry me. I followed the main Melbourne Road beside the railway line. There were few houses out there in those days, just a few weatherboard workmen’s cottages dotted here and there along the road. A wagon or two, piled high with ingeniously balanced goods for country towns, passed me and I gave them a nod. I didn’t pay much attention to the look of things, the colour of the horses, their breath in the early air,
It had all been in the
Advertiser
. Annette had read it the day before. But now Phoebe was telling the story a third time. She wasn’t doing it for Annette’s sake. She was yelling into an empty well, only wanting to hear her happiness amplified.
“You are going to make yourself very, very unhappy,” Annette said.
But it was she who burst into tears, not Phoebe.
Phoebe tried to comfort her but she jerked away. She picked up the Swinburne and threw it at the wall.
“It’s ridiculous,” she screamed. “It’s stupid. You haven’t even
spoken
to him.”
15
I did not like the Geelong snake, nor did I trust it. But I was stuck with it, this cranky creature in the hessian sack beneath my bed. I had considered “losing” it, but I’d already had some nasty experiences “losing” snakes. A lost snake can unhinge the most stable household and produce conditions that are most unfavourable for a man who wants to be put up. That aside, the McGraths were almost as proud of my relationship with the snake as they were of my connection with aviation. Jack brought an odd collection of characters home from the racetrack to view my performance with the snake. Sharp-looking punters and toffee-nosed horse owners all collected in Western Avenue and were as different from each other as the chairs they sat on. I was called upon to demonstrate my “pet”. The manager of the National Bank, whose cast-off Pelaco shirt I wore, was nearly bitten on his beckoning index finger and was foolish enough to giggle about it.
You can do nothing to protect yourself from a brown snake except keep well away from it. You cannot milk its poison for (in summer especially) it’ll have another batch ready in seconds. There would be no peace with the snake, no treaty. It would not become tame or even accept its captivity. All day long it pushed its head against the sack, as persistent as a blowfly against glass. It was a cunning thing and not capable of being bought off.
By the Wednesday morning I had found no one to supply me with either mice or frogs and I set off early to walk along the Melbourne Road where, one of the punters had told me, there was a soak with plenty of frogs in it. I left the Ford at home and walked. I always liked to walk. I strolled like a Gentleman.
I had observed, very early in life, that the way a man or woman walked gave a much better indication of their place in society than their accent. Although I was now very careful not to say “ain’t” and “I never done it” and other habits of speech I had picked up working for Wongs at the Eastern Market, I was happy enough to use the natural nasal Australian accent which had so enraged that imaginary Englishman who sired me. I despised those people who pommified their speech but I was, always, very particular about my walk.
A man who lives by physical labour will move in a different way. A man who lumps wheat will move differently from a man who shears sheep—he will carry his muscled arms like loaves of bread; he will lock the muscles at the base of his spine and lean forward to take some imaginary weight. I had thousands of classifications of walks and I adopted the “Gentleman’s Stroll” because I fancied it would make people trust me without ever knowing why.
It wasn’t a very scenic route to the soak, but that didn’t worry me. I followed the main Melbourne Road beside the railway line. There were few houses out there in those days, just a few weatherboard workmen’s cottages dotted here and there along the road. A wagon or two, piled high with ingeniously balanced goods for country towns, passed me and I gave them a nod. I didn’t pay much attention to the look of things, the colour of the horses, their breath in the early air,
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