Matthew Flinders' Cat (15 page)

‘Well, then, I’ll be off. There’s no rest for the wicked.’

Billy sat on the bedside chair and bent down to untie the laces of his soiled trainers. It proved to be a difficult task as he only had the use of one hand and it was his habit to double-tie his laces. The curtain surrounding the bed stopped short of the floor so that, with his head down near his knees, he could see beneath the bed adjacent to his own. There, under the bed opposite, was a pair of scuffed Cuban riding boots and a battered Akubra he’d have recognised anywhere.

Ryan arrived just after sunrise the next morning at the bench outside the library and shook Billy awake. ‘Did ya speak to him?’ he asked.

‘Wha ...what?’ Billy protested, sitting up slowly.

‘See, I told you it was broken,’ Ryan said triumphantly, ‘Yiz got plaster on.’

‘Yes, yes, six weeks,’ Billy muttered, trying hard to focus. The hospital had given him a pill to take when he went to bed and asked him to try to stay off the grog for one night, a small miracle he’d successfully achieved, so he’d slept well and even survived Arthur and Martha.

‘Did ya speak ter him, ter Trim?’ Ryan repeated.

‘Hey, what happened to your head?’

‘Yes, I spoke to him,’ Billy moaned, not yet fully awake.

‘You’ve got this big piece of sticking plaster above yer eye.’

‘Accident.’ There was no getting away from Ryan.

‘So?’

‘Nothing. It’s nothing. I fell at the hospital.’

‘But yer wasn’t drunk. I know yer wasn’t drunk.’

‘Just an accident, could have happened to anyone,’ Billy lied, not wishing to go into the incident.

Ryan seemed to accept this explanation. ‘Have ya talked ter the cat yet? Ter Trim?’ he repeated.

‘Steady on, lad. Just give me a few moments.’

‘Here, I bought yiz some water.’ Ryan handed Billy a cardboard cup.

Billy drank most of it. He wasn’t feeling too bad, all things considered. He’d have to give Ryan something to go on with. ‘Yes, Trim and I had an interesting chat.’

‘Yeah? What did he say? Did you ask him my question?’

Billy couldn’t quite remember what Ryan’s question had been and so he said the first thing that came into his mind. ‘He told me about his life on board ship.’

‘Cool!’ Ryan said excitedly. ‘Can you tell us now?’ Billy groaned. ‘I just woke up, son,’ he protested. ‘It’s going to take more than a cup of water to get my tongue wagging.’

Ryan drew back, then said accusingly, ‘You know I can’t go in a pub, kids are not allowed. If I wait outside, you won’t never come out ’til yer pissed.’

‘No, lad, it’s not like that. It’s coffee I need. Down at the Quay. I need a coffee fix.’

‘I can get yiz a coffee at Martin Place, it’s closer.’ Billy looked up and shrugged. ‘I’m a creature of habit, I’m afraid, lad. I’ve got a Greek mate at the New Hellas Cafe at the Quay who sets aside his first coffee of the day for me. It’s . . . well, it’s how I start the day,’ Billy explained. ‘What’s the time? When do you have to be at school?’

Ryan glanced down at the oversized rubber-encased watch on his wrist. ‘Six o’clock, school starts after nine.’ He paused. ‘Can you write proper?’ Billy recalled the scene with the receptionist in casualty and realised that the boy knew very little about him. Ryan had assumed that, like some homeless people, he might be illiterate.

‘Yes, but I’m not writing a note to your teacher, you’ve got to go to school.’

‘Who says? You can’t make me!’

It was a good rebuttal and Billy had to think for a moment. ‘Well, no I can’t, but I imagine your nana can, she doesn’t sound like the sort of person who will let you miss school.’

‘Nah, she used to get real cranky, gimme the strap, but now she’s too crook to have a go at me.’

‘Well, your mother then?’

‘Nah, she don’t know if I go or not. When they come round last time she told them to fuck off.’

‘They?’

‘Someone sent by the school, from the department.’

‘Was that okay? I mean did you approve?’

‘Nah, it was stupid, me mum was drunk. This social worker, she come snoopin’ round.’

‘What? From the Department of Community Services?’

‘Who?’

‘From DOCS?’

‘Yeah, them.’

‘Well, there you are, life gets complicated when you break the rules.’

‘It don’t for you?’

Billy sighed. ‘There aren’t too many left for me to break, unless it’s jaywalking.’ He shrugged and looked down at his knees. ‘You wouldn’t want to end up like this, would you?’

Ryan was silent for a moment and Billy thought he was being polite but then, true to form, he said, ‘Nah, I’m already not that dumb.’

Billy laughed. ‘I sincerely hope not, but going to school may help you to avoid just such a calamity.’

‘Didn’t you go to school, then?’

Billy cleared his throat, it had been a long time since he’d had to accommodate his thinking to a young, questioning intelligence. His new world was brutal and direct, with very little in it coming from a critical or inquiring mind. ‘Yes, I did and to university.’

‘Well, school didn’t help yiz then, did it?’ Billy looked up at Ryan. ‘There are more paths to a man’s destruction than simply a lack of education, but ignorance certainly qualifies as one of them.’

To his surprise Ryan said quietly, ‘Cool. I’ve still got fifty bucks, we can get the coffee and some breakfast and you can tell me about what the cat told yiz. Okay?’

‘Fifty dollars? That’s a lot of money to be carrying around.’

‘Me mum give it ter me, she don’t like ter cook, see, ain’t never in the mood.’

Billy nodded, it was not his place to ask questions. He’d kept his mouth shut about the fifty dollars yesterday, but it had worried him and he was grateful for the child’s ingenuous explanation. ‘And school? Will you go?’

‘Yeah, yeah, I promise. What about your ablu...ablu . . .’ Ryan couldn’t quite remember the word.

‘Ablutions, it just means having a wash and a crap. I can do it in the toilets at the Quay.’

‘Want me to carry yer briefcase? With your crook wrist, the plaster and all that?’

‘No thanks, Ryan.’

Ryan pointed to the cast on Billy’s wrist. ‘Can I write on it? It’s lucky if you’re the first in.’

‘Sure, do you have a pen?’

‘Nah, but I’ll bring one next time I come, you won’t let no one write on it before, will ya?’

Billy knew he had a biro in his briefcase but he didn’t want Ryan to look inside. ‘Of course, what will you write?’

‘You just put your name on it like, all your friends do the same. It’s like saying they’re sorry you broke your wrist and all that.’

Billy gave a wry grin. ‘In that case I think you can safely leave it until tomorrow, lad.’ Realising that he was feeling sorry for himself, something he tried never to do, he attempted to cover up. ‘Do you know what they said in the hospital?’ Not waiting for an answer, Billy continued, ‘That my left arm and shoulder was considerably more muscular than my right, which is a bit of a laugh really, and comes from my habit of carrying the briefcase in my left hand. So, I’ve decided for the next six weeks while I’m in a cast to use my right wrist, even things up a bit, eh?’

Ryan’s eyes travelled slowly over Billy’s emaciated body. ‘Well, ya ain’t no superman, is ya? Can ya wipe yer bum now?’

‘Don’t be impertinent.’ Billy laughed. It was the happiest he could remember feeling for a very long time and he told himself to be careful, Ryan was slowly prising open a compartment to which the lid had been firmly screwed down.

They began to walk down Macquarie Street towards Circular Quay. They were several metres from the New Hellas Cafe when Con started yelling at Billy. ‘Gidday, myte! Where you been yesterday?

Whazamatta? I make a coffee, you don’t come? I say the girls, Billy no come, coffee we put, yesterday-bread we put, something maybe is wrong.’ He looked at Ryan. ‘Who you got? Street kid? Bastards! They steal chewing gums, Chuppa Chup, bloody oaths, fair dinkums, struth!’ Con now noticed the plaster on Billy’s wrist. ‘Bloodyhells! What you do your arms?’

‘Morning, Con, this is Ryan Sanfrancesco. I fractured my wrist and he took care of me.’ Billy turned to look at Ryan and placed his arm about him. ‘Don’t reckon I could have done it without him.’

‘He’s a good kids, huh?’ Although Con’s expression clearly indicated that he had grave doubts that such a thing was possible. ‘You want two coffee?’

Ryan took out the fifty-dollar note. ‘A coffee and a Coke,’ he said to Con.

Con looked surprised, then rejected the money with a wave of his hand. ‘Keep your bloody money! You want ice in the Coca-Cola?’ He took a large Coke container from the dispenser. ‘A can! I want a can!’ Ryan called out.

Con turned to face Ryan. ‘Whazamatta? You don’t got no manners! You don’t like ice?’ He held the Coke container aloft. ‘You think I cheats, huh?’ He tapped his forefinger on the side of the Coke container. ‘I put in here more than they got in the cans!’

‘Steady on, Con, it’s not like that. The lad simply asked for a can. He prefers to drink from a can.’

‘I’ll pay,’ Ryan said, holding up the fifty-dollar note again. Billy could see that there was something worrying his friend. ‘What’s the matter, Con?’ he asked.

‘Fifty dollar, where that boys get fifty dollar, hey?’

‘His mother, she gave it to him to buy food,’ Billy replied.

‘Food? You think Coca-Cola that foods?’

‘It seems she doesn’t like to cook, I don’t know all the details.’

Ryan held the note out again. ‘Yer gunna take the money or what?’

‘Jesus Christos! You want to pay? Okay, smarty alecs, you pay!’

‘What’s got into you, Con?’ Billy asked, surprised. Surely Con hadn’t changed from his usual friendly self because the boy wanted a can of Coca-Cola and had offered to pay for it?

Con didn’t reply. Instead, he leaned over the counter, snatched the note from Ryan and placed it on the ledge above the drawer of the till, removed a can of Coke from the drinks cabinet and plonked it down on the counter next to Billy’s already prepared coffee. Then he returned to the till, opened it and was about to give change when he hesitated and gave Billy a strange look, his eyes hard. With a nod towards Ryan he said, ‘He your fren, fair dinkums, Billy?’

‘Yes, as a matter of fact, he is my friend,’ Billy said, still looking puzzled.

Con snatched the note up from the till and waved it at Billy. ‘You give that boy fifty dollar?’

‘Of course not! It’s pension day tomorrow. I’m broke. I told you where he got it.’ Billy suddenly knew what Con was thinking and flushed deeply. ‘Are you suggesting ...? What are you implying, Con?’

‘You think me I am stupid? You put your arms round him. Where a boy like this, streets kid, get fifty dollar, eh? You think I don’t know? Here, take your bloody money!’ He reached for the note and threw it back over the counter at Ryan. ‘Con, what’s the matter?’ Billy cried.

‘Billy, you my fren. You help me. I help you. You don’t tell me you bloody poofter, Billy!’

‘Poofter? Me, a homosexual?’ Despite himself, Billy began to laugh. ‘Con, I’m an alcoholic, a drunk, I can’t get it up. Besides, I’m nothing of the sort.’

But Con was sniffing back his tears and wasn’t listening. ‘Take coffee, Coke, fuck off!’

‘He thinks yiz a rock spider,’ Ryan said calmly, using the underworld term for a paedophile. He reached down and picked up the mustard-coloured banknote from where it had landed at his feet.

Billy, trying to recover the situation, turned to Ryan. ‘No, lad, Con is concerned about your welfare.’

‘I can take care of myself,’ Ryan replied. ‘But he can stick his Coke up his arse!’

Billy looked up at Con. ‘You’re quite wrong, Con.’ He shook his head slowly. ‘Christ, what has the world come to?’

Con was shaking and tears ran down his face. ‘You my fren, Billy. You help me!’ he lamented again, then he suddenly leaned forward over the counter and through his tears shouted, ‘Now, you fucking poofter!’ He pointed towards the street, ‘Bugger off! You don’t comes my cafe!’

‘Con?’ Billy said, trying to make sense of what had happened. ‘You don’t understand! It’s not . . .’

‘Come, Billy, let’s go,’ Ryan cut in, grabbing Billy by the arm and pulling him away. Then he stopped and turned to look at the Greek cafe proprietor, squinting slightly, his head held to one side. ‘Me mum says the Greeks are the worst turd burglars, they do it with girls.’

Billy was shocked, but remained silent until they’d reached the concourse.

‘That was unnecessary, Ryan, it will only make things worse.’

Ryan halted and turned to Billy. ‘He called yiz a poofter, didn’t he! You ain’t never going back, is ya?’

‘I don’t know,’ Billy replied, plainly distressed.

‘Con’s my friend.’

Ryan was silent for a moment and then asked in a small voice, ‘I’m your friend, Billy. You ain’t a poofter, is yer?’

The shock showed clearly on Billy’s face for the second time. ‘No, mate, never was, never could be.’ He tried to smile, to reassure the boy, though he now realised that he cared about what the child thought of him.

Ryan smiled. ‘Yeah, cool. I didn’t reckon yer was.’ It was apparent from the tone of his voice that he needed no further reassurance and that the child wasn’t in the least put out by Con’s outburst.

‘Ryan, your mother, she didn’t really say that to you, did she?’

‘Say what?’