Up Along the Coast
e had a tattoo on his arm that said Rats of Tobruk and that
made him a man.
I met him only once, in the spring, in a little town high along the Queensland coast whose name is no longer important. It was seven in the morning and I had left the road to walk down onto the wharf to smoke and look out across the bay toward the island. I stood with the mainland to my back, and across the channel where the current ran cool and deep and fast the island was little but a shadow above the flat surface of the water. From headland to headland the sea was sullen and grey and in the distance I could hear the sounds of the waves breaking heavy across the reef.
He worked alone, the lines coiling wet about his feet as he brought the boat hand over hand toward the shore. Beneath the soft cotton of his shirt, his shoulders, broad still and heavy, bunched and knotted as he worked the rope and in the thin light of the morning he seemed ageless, as some men do. Only in his face was he marked by time. But although the wrinkles ran deep they were dark with the colour of the sun and the number of his years stayed hidden behind the soft green light of his eyes.
The little boat fought him, for the current was slipping fast with the run of the tide. From where I stood on the wharf I could see the weight of the water heavy across his back and how, when he pulled, the knots of the ropes bit sharp in the flesh of his palms. But she came to him, finally, nodding her bow with the swell, and when the weight on the ropes eased he drew her gently to his side and tied the lines fast to the thick timber bills of the wharf. The bills were thick and grey with age, still damp with the memory of the tide and the boat kicked her stern hard, snapping the ropes taught with the strain. I could see the scars long across the deck and how age had chipped the paint rough from the bows of her, the colour faded pale from too many years in the sun. I watched as the old man laid his hands along the rails till she was still and rode quietly again on the gentle lift of the swell.
I had reached the town some hours before, and in the dark had walked the hour from the junction behind the hills. I found my breakfast in an all night truck stop where the air conditioning was too dry and the big neon sign flickered bravely in the face of the dawn. I ate alone amongst the red tables and chairs and read a five year old magazine over coffee. It was too early for another lift. Outside the air was thick and warm and the woman behind the big lino counter said the rain was on its way down from up north.
When boredom finally got the better of her, she came around from behind the counter and we spoke as people who have never met speak, politely and of nothing. I guessed her younger than myself, with eyes the colour of red wine and the smooth dark skin of one whose life was spent in the sun. Her face as she spoke was open and friendly, attractive, and I wondered briefly how she must spend her life in such a town. Under the hard white light of the cafe I could see the damp sheen of sweat about her face, the wetness of it in her shirt and on the soft dark skin of her neck.
I told her I was from Sydney, and when she asked where I was going she nodded as if the answer was something she had known all along.
�Cairns�, she said. �Most people that pass through here are I suppose�.
She had never been to Sydney, but she told me how in the summer the city people rented the houses by the water and spent their days fishing or taking long walks along the beach. She had worked in the cafe for eleven years and had come to know the regular visitors well enough that they would greet her by name, asking of the town and of her health as if it might have changed since last they were there. But it never did.
�And probably never will�, she said.
In her spare hours she studied by mail at the University or went swimming in the bay between the jetties that left the thin strip of beach to run short and hard into the water. She wanted to marry, eventually, but that, she said, was another story. In the evenings, when she was tired of her books and if the weather was good, she would walk down to the harbour to watch the moon rise cold and clear and white into the sky.
The day grew slowly as we spoke, and through the window I could see the tops of the trees on the mountains and the sky, purple in the morning light, stretching long and wide above the sea. When the first carload of travelers pressed red eyed and tired through the door, demanding attention, she tilted her head and smiled, making a face to hide her irritation. I looked at the clock on the wall.
�I better go�, I said. �I don�t want to miss my lift�.
She smiled when I said that, and told me that the best place for a ride was on the other side of the marina, just outside of town. She laid her hands flat on the faded vinyl of the table.
�There�s a cafe nearby if you get stuck�, she said with her smile. �It�s not much mind you, but it�s better than nothing�.
I could sense that she wanted to say something more.
�My names Emma, by the way�, she told me.
She said goodbye then. For a minute I watched her, then picked up my pack and headed towards the door. I was confronted there by an elderly woman smelling strongly of peppermint. I moved past her and stepped out onto the street. Beyond the driveway people walked slowly in the early morning. I crossed the road and joined the footpath beside the beach. In the distance shone the lonely lights of the fishing boats on their slow run home toward the mainland.
I made my way slowly between the silent row of houses that lined the water. She was right. The marina appeared where it should have and all at once it occurred to me that I could stay here if I wanted, that I could turn back toward the town and ask for the waitress and that perhaps, if she would like, we could spend some time together, for really there was nowhere that I had to be. I kept walking, amazed by my own presumption. �And why would you do that�, I said to myself. �What is it about you that she would find so special.�
The cars were coming slowly, and by the time I reached the marina the roads were deserted. I smoked two cigarettes and lost my patience. Behind me the wharf was quiet, the boats that filled its berths swinging silent and empty on their ropes. I imagined their captains hidden amongst the rumpled sheets of their beds. The first warmth of the sun was still an hour away. I remembered the book in the top flap of my pack. �Just in case�, I said to myself. I forgot my impatience and walked across the grass toward the water. The grass was light with dew, the wetness of it damp along the worn leather soles of my shoes.
I walked passed the last of the boats beside the wharf and all at once there was nothing but the sea and the wide green shelf of the island. It rose high and green from behind the water. The tops of the trees were wreathed with cloud and the sides fell steeply toward the sea. Beyond its farther shore lay the mass of coral snags which protected the channel from the deep swell of the open ocean.
I walked to the end of the wharf and sat with my legs toward the water. I sat against my pack. Before me today opened itself like a flower. To my left I could see a red house on the headland, to my right the town curved gently around the bay. I sat and thought about a woman from a long time ago.
I think I dozed for an hour for I did not hear him come. I had lost myself with my thoughts and the first thing that I knew was that the sun hung round and gold above the trees. My mind awoke as if from a heavy sleep. I was damp with sweat and I remembered vaguely that I was heading north. I could hear the sounds of the cars on the road. I lit a cigarette, feeling tired and irritable. The tobacco tasted dry and stale and all at once I was very thirsty. I slung my pack across my shoulders, ignoring the weight and the shirt damp and uncomfortable against my skin.
He was no more than ten feet away when I turned. He was recovering his boat, and when he was done he rested awhile on the rough timber planking of the deck. He held up his hand when he saw me.
�Hello there�, he smiled. �Hope I didn�t wake you�.
His voice as he spoke was deep and slow, rough at the edges with age.
�No�, I said, feeling foolish.
He pulled a pipe from his shirt and filled it. He sat back against the deck and lifted his face toward the sun. He did everything slowly, deliberately, as if nothing but his own actions concerned him. The sweet smell of tobacco hung softly in the breeze.
�Another smoke�, he asked. �Before you go?�
The shadows had lifted now and in the light of the sun I could see where the water changed from blue to green across the bay. I dropped my pack, forgetting for the moment my early morning plans. I lit a cigarette and sat on the jetty facing the boat.
He told me he was from Scotland, originally, but had left that country after the war to come looking for a better life. He had been a fisherman when the town was full of splendid fisherman, but most of them were gone now. Dead, he said. He was retired, if there was such a thing, and he told me it was only habit that brought him back to the water.
�Every day�, he said, �if the weather�s good�.
He had never been back to Scotland. That was where they had buried his father and a year later his mother beside him and he still had their letters from long ago, yellow at the edges and fading in a cigar box beneath his bed. He had a son, �from Sydney, like you�, he told me, and he would see him once a year when they would spend long days in the boat and afterwards, at night, his grandchildren would exhaust him and let him spoil them like no parent ever would. At night, he told me, he still spoke with his wife in his dreams. We drank coffee without milk and smoked tobacco, and afterwards, when the tide began to turn it took us an hour to load the traps, taking them two at a time from the locker and stacking them neatly beneath the rough wooden planking of the deck. We took the long lines from the pegs above our heads and with them the bright feather lures with their hooks polished and barbed, the traces and the heavy lead sinkers for the deep water. We gathered the nets and the short heavy handled gaff and when we were done I found my breath rushing and felt the soreness of my labours about my shoulders and in my legs. There was nothing more to do.
�Ready then�, he said.
The little boat ducked her head impatiently with the tide. He slipped the ropes from the wharf and stepped onto the deck. It never occurred to me to join him. From the wheelhouse he guided the boat north and into the wind. I watched as he made a check of the glass gauges beside the wheel and with one of them the little diesel engine burbled suddenly to life. I picked up my pack trying hard to ignore the ache. He had loosened his sleeves so I could see the long tattoo across his arm. He stood smoking, the upper part of his body resting easy against the open window by his shoulder. He nodded his goodbye. As the boat drifted slowly from beside the wharf his eyes told me that age had not yet caught him. I walked back toward the road thinking of nothing in particular.
