Geoffrey Cousins - The Butcherbird

He hated the idea that his carelessness was causing her pain. It was months since his weekend on the Honey Bear. Who would plant a story like that after all this time-and why?

He dressed carefully in faded blue jeans and a white linen shirt Louise always loved against his brown skin, combed his hair and then ruffled it again so it looked as casual as possible, and slowly walked downstairs.

‘Mr Beaumont, there’s a Mr Stockford on the line. He says it’s a personal call. Will you speak?’

Jack sighed at the ‘Mr Beaumont’ and the query about whether he’d take the call. He reminded Beryl every day to call him Jack and to put calls through whoever they were from, unless he’d specifically instructed otherwise. He’d wanted to bring his own PA from his old firm, but Sir Laurence had told him that was inappropriate in a public company and he should use the person already in the job. He was probably right, but God she was painful.

He picked up the phone and said, ‘G’day, Bruce, it’s nice to hear a friendly voice at the start of a new week.’

There was a nervous cough before, ‘Yeah. That was a nasty little piece, Jack, but what can you expect from a rag like that? I wouldn’t worry about it, mate, it all adds to your colourful reputation.’

‘That’s not quite how Louise saw it.’

‘No, I guess not.’ Again the short unnecessary cough came down the line. ‘Listen, Jack, I know you’re swamped with work, but I was wondering if we could get together today, just for a coffee or something.’

‘Sure. It’ll be refreshing to get away from here for a while.

How about three o’clock at your club?’

‘No, it would suit me better to come to you, if that’s okay. What about the coffee shop under your building?’

It was not a place Jack often frequented because it was always full of HOA staff and he was usually relieved to be anonymous rather than being greeted from every second table, as he was now. Nor was it the usual haunt of Bruce Stockford, who preferred wood panelling or framed boat pennants to stainless steel and hissing Italian coffee machines. Nevertheless, he sat in the hard-backed chair that seemed designed for anything but comfort, and was as uncomfortable as he’d ever been.

‘Jack, I really don’t know how to start this. I’m terribly embarrassed by it all.’

Jack looked at him in surprise. ‘Well, we’re old friends, Bruce. Whatever it is, just spit it out, mate.’

Bruce Stockford ran his hand over his eyes. ‘I’ve never encountered anything like this before. Your name is on the board at the club, as you know. That means your membership application has been through all the initial approvals and it’s there for the members to be aware of.’ He paused. ‘And here’s the thing, Jack. I’ve been asked to withdraw your nomination.’

Jack was stunned. His face was ablaze, and he reached for the shirt button and loosened his tie, so much heat seemed to be emanating from him. ‘I see.’ His mind was whirling. ‘Christ. I’m terribly sorry to put you in this situation, Bruce. Is it to do with that bloody article?’

Bruce shook his head. ‘No. The president spoke to me on Friday, before that ran. I’ve been mulling it over all weekend, trying to work out what to do about it.’

Jack grabbed him by the forearm. ‘Listen, old fellow, I won’t have you embarrassed one minute further on my account. Christ, it’s hardly a big issue, I’m already a member of just about every other club in Sydney. I don’t even particularly want to be a member, it’s just that you asked me. But it’s bizarre. I mean, half the people in the Colonial Club are good friends of mine and the other half I’ve certainly never had any problems with. To be blackballed just seems so-I don’t know-somehow low and vindictive.’

Bruce nodded and shook his head almost in one motion. ‘You haven’t actually been blackballed. I’ve been asked to withdraw your nomination and told the application won’t be successful if I persist. It’s as odd a thing as I’ve ever heard of. I can tell you, Jack, it’s left a taste in my mouth like a dead rat.’

They rose, shaking hands and looking one another in the eye, then parted.

Jack didn’t return to his office. He strolled down to Circular Quay and leaned against the railing near the ferry wharves.

Fishermen were trailing lines from old cork rolls into the slightly oily water near the wooden piles. These days the harbour was alive with fish and you could see the stubby prawn boats at night, trawling only a few metres from the Walsh Bay wharves where the theatregoers were sipping wine of undetermined origin. Behind him a swarthy, weather-beaten figure in a cloth cap was seated at a table patiently constructing a model of a Spanish galleon. He sat there most days and had done so for as long as Jack could remember, and slowly the majestic little ship had grown from the pile of matchsticks. Jack had watched a passer-by stop once to admire the work and light a cigarette. He remembered thinking to himself, ‘I hope he doesn’t throw a spark too far.’ But he wasn’t thinking that now. The sun was finding merging rainbows in the watery oil slick and he peered down into them as if looking for an equally shifting truth. What was happening to his orderly, comfortable, easy life? It seemed the plates were sliding under the earth that had always been solid and stable before, but the force was invisible. There was no cause, no reason, no noise, no shaking, no molten material to gape at. Just a queasy, empty feeling in his gut that he was no longer in control of his life.

At about one p.m. each day, as the flow of people through the garish doors of the Australian Rugby League Club’s dining room gradually increased, it was customary for many of the diners to nod to the heavyset figure with the rough-hewn face of a Gallipoli veteran seated at the table to the right of the doors.

There was a certain deference in the attitude of the few who approached to shake hands and chat briefly. He ate alone, with a book as his companion. There was no aura of holding court, and yet everyone in the room was somehow aware of his presence.

There was certainly nothing in his manner or dress to warrant particular attention. The suit was a nondescript blue and appeared to have been purchased from St Vincent de Paul, the tie was a narrow strip from the 1960s, held in the middle by a faded silver clip with a Returned Serviceman’s badge in the centre. His slab of a face was capped by a thick full head of hair, remarkable for a man of his age, but shaved up at the sides in a fashion no longer seen. There was a forward slope to the whole face, with a jutting chin, huge ears like a prize fighter’s but without the scars, and rectangular glasses that, along with the hair and the tie, stated clearly that he regarded fashion as the first sign of moral decay.

Those who summoned the courage to stop by his table as he chewed slowly on his cutlets, chips and peas or, on Fridays, fish, chips and peas, were a rich stew of harbour creatures. Book-makers, rugby league footballers and sometimes those from other codes-businessmen, politicians from state parliament or from local councils, a judge or two (although they mainly nodded from a distance), and others on the make. He was happy to talk about sports or politics or events of the day, but cut off any attempt to discuss legal matters by returning to his book. He was said to be a formidable powerbroker in the right of the New South Wales Labor Party, but how and through what channels this power was wielded no one seemed to know.

His chambers were nearby in Phillip Street, and there a very different stream of supplicants passed through. It was rare for Hedley Stimson QC to appear in person in a courtroom these days, but he still rendered opinions of great force and clarity for others to plead. As he spoke, the body was slumped back in the chair but the face and the attitude leaned forward, intent, alert. His hands waved slowly with the words like a conductor, and they commanded mesmerising attention because they were enormous, out of proportion with the rest of his body, like the ears. But with his final opinion about to be delivered, the hands ceased moving and one finger came up with the words ‘therefore…’ No solicitor who had ever briefed Hedley Stimson had failed to learn that once the finger was raised and the ‘therefore’ produced, the meeting was concluded.