Four–thirty a.m. The stars were retiring, and just a sliver of low moon peeped from behind clouds that wrapped around the distant hills. A bare hint of soft pink tinged the horizon with promise. Save for the careless thunder of the surf, all was silent. The morning bird chorus hadn’t yet begun.
The fax machine beeped and hummed, spewing curled pages on to a slowly growing stack on the floor beneath it.
“Damn nuisance idiots sending bloody advertising crap in the middle of the night again,” I muttered, “Can we turn that thing off at night or move it somewhere else, Fran?”
“Turn it off? No! U.S. companies send their faxes during their daytime and our night. Move it? Where do you suggest, Paul? If I can make this business work, I might be able to afford to move out of that pokey little office and into decent–sized rental premises, but it will take patience.”
“Something I’m very short on,” I mumbled, rolling over to put my back to Fran. I hated being woken early in the morning.
Fran had started a computer software business about a year earlier. Compelled to take a crash course in computing to secure any kind of work in a low–employment area, she’d found those strange new-intelligence machines intriguing. Rich with promise, they were enthusiastically embraced as the harried business owner’s salvation --- an end, at last, to burning midnight oil labouring over accounts records.
Ill–advised software selection and user illiteracy too often meant a wasted investment on a pile of hi–tech metal and plastic assigned to reside under a desk or in the back corner of a storeroom. Fran saw her opportunity and grasped it thirstily. She partnered with U.S. companies to source software and knowledge. While not yet returning a profit, she was compiling a growing client list eager to convert written–off spending to productive capital investment by mastering database tools to tailor their own software.
The little office next to our master bedroom had been transformed into a busy hub, cluttered with books, software boxes, files, cartons, and the beloved green–screen monster that so captivated her that I often found her tapping at its keyboard long before rooster call.
While Fran obsessed over disks and danced with excitement at new software releases, I poured over volumes of legal–speak documenting the proposed terms for commercialising my latest brainchild, the SIDS alarm.
I had answered an advertisement offering free legal services and sourcing of commercialisation partners or capital in return for a percentage share of profits. Warwick Griswold, the young, glossy–haired attorney, was well presented, and his references seemed sound. His offer was compelling. When I related the story of finding our younger daughter, then aged 11 months, in her cot ashen-grey and barely breathing, Warwick needed no convincing of the market potential of an alarm device.
Seven a.m. The morning sun bathed the house in light and warmth and silvered the dew on the lawn outside Fran’s office window. I was awake, but resisting the conscience–voice reminding me the night was done.
“The fax is for you, Paul,” Fran called from her office, “and it’s not advertising. It was sent from Switzerland.”
I leapt out of bed and headed for the shower. Fran often worked in her pyjamas until mid–morning. I had never shed deeply ingrained habits. Routine was king. However late I rose, and no matter what excitement awaited, I began the day religiously with a shower and breakfast, deferring all work and leisure until after the morning meal and wash–up was done.
At half past the hour, I sat at the kitchen table pouring over an offer from a Swiss company of a $2 million loan at half a per cent interest --- principal and interest to be repaid from profits.
“But they want to add 15 additional technical functions, Fran,” I said, frowning. “That will make the alarm device hideously complicated and it will most likely price it out of reach of the average family. The whole idea was to make it so affordable that no mother would want to be without one.”
“So tell Warwick that part of the deal isn’t acceptable.”
“And what about the rest? Do we really want to be $2 million in debt?”
Fran shrugged. “I guess we’ll have to ask Warwick to explain the terms.
When’s he back?”
“Six weeks, I think.”
“Guess we postpone any decisions until then. There’s no rush is there?” I folded the document and placed it carefully in a desk drawer.
“Racing in Murwillumbah today, Fran,” I called. “You haven’t forgotten?”
“I’ve packed lunch for you, and I filled the car with petrol on the way home from the shops yesterday.”
“Have you been told today?”
She laughed and kissed me lightly. “Save it for after the race meeting, my darling. I think a little celebration is in order. I’ll make a special dinner. You, lover, can supply my dessert.”
For perhaps the first time in my life I was genuinely happy. My relationship with Fran was good. My children --- exceptionally mature and level–headed for their age and thankfully staying well clear of the student temptations --- were excelling at school and university and planning bright futures. I enjoyed my job at the race track. Swab steward collecting horse urine may not sound like a rewarding occupation, but I loved those beasts and it was satisfying to know I could persuade even the most difficult of them to respond to my commands. The pay was lousy, but I was acquiring a wealth of knowledge that would one day see me achieve my long–cherished ambition of devising a betting system to deliver consistent profits. Talking to trainers and jockeys was steadily adding to my wealth of knowledge about those elusive factors determining when and where a racehorse will win.
I loved being part of the town band. The occasional paid gigs with the Bavarian band were pure ecstasy, although sadly they were far too infrequent to boost my income to anything close to respectable. Fran and I were living on hope, and my hopes rested with Warwick Griswold, the patent attorney who partnered with inventors to find ways to convert ideas to reality.
Humming happily, I backed the car out of the drive and turned on to the highway.
#
“A prominent Lismore patent attorney was last night arrested on fraud charges.”
The regular Channel Nine newsreader was on vacation and his novice stand–in struggled to hide her inexperience. Sitting stiffly at her desk in her crisp linen suit, hair a flicker of fire and eyes slightly glazed, she read with nervous precision, too focused on presentation to expose any emotional response to the story she relayed.
“Warwick Griswold partnered with over 30 inventors over the past six years promising to lodge patents and arrange commercialisation loans or investment. Promising lucrative deals for clients, Mr Griswold induced them to borrow tens of thousands of dollars to secure patents and pay up–front costs to facilitate contractual agreements. But Griswold never applied for the patents and the contracts never eventuated. Instead, Warwick Griswold sold intellectual property and patent rights for any genuinely promising inventions he stumbled across, and fleeced millionaires for hundreds of thousands with promises of shares in companies he claimed could produce fuel from water or electricity from vapour, regrow amputated limbs and cure deadly diseases. Police were waiting for Griswold at Brisbane International Airport when he returned yesterday from a trip to Switzerland. He has been charged with thirty–two counts of fraud. Police say they estimate Griswold stole more than $3 million from clients and investors.”
I stared numbly at the television set. The demons taunted me. I reached for my beer and noticed my hands were shaking slightly. I felt cold.
Fran came to me, looking wretched and haggard. She put her arms around my neck, but I pushed her roughly away. Glistening tears rolled down her cheeks.
“What can I say, Paul?”
“Say you should have known better than to hope, Paul Wilson. And stop blubbering, Fran. It’s not as if it’s anything new. Snafu! Situation normal. All fucked up.”
I walked to the fridge for a stubby, then changed my mind and fetched a large bottle of vodka from the pantry. Fran sighed and said goodnight.
#
It was mixed emotions and a good deal of trepidation that I listened one evening, two months after Warwick Griswold’s arrest, to my wife’s suggestion that we up stakes again, and make a third dramatic life change. Our youngest child was about to graduate high school. The other two were already studying away from home.
“We can’t afford to keep three kids in university, all living away from home, Paul,” she said. “If we move to the city, they can live at home while they are studying.”
I didn’t know how to respond. I honestly didn’t know what I wanted. Not to leave the Bavarian band, nor to give up stewarding. But the combination of those two occupations with the intermittent casual work I was picking up didn’t pay the bills. Fran struggled to make a small profit in her little business and the hours she worked to achieve that were crazy. She had some sort of plan for another business in the city. We both figured that, from a financial perspective, things couldn’t be much worse.
A month later, an agent posted a ‘Sold’ sign in our front yard and we loaded a removal van and moved to the city. I struggled desperately to find a shred of hope to cling to, that the pattern of my life might yet somehow change. Hopes and beliefs die, but the fire of determination still burnt strong. I had a point to prove, and I had yet to exact that long–awaited revenge.
~~~~
“I’m an inventor,” I declared. It wasn’t a lie. So what if I omitted to mention that I had never actually made a dollar out of inventing and my paid occupation was embarrassingly insignificant? One thing retired army musicians never did --- well, probably most men never did, in fact --- was retreat from a pissing contest. And pissing contests were a significant feature of Australian Army Band Corp reunions.
This one was in Adelaide. I hadn’t been to one for several years and Fran had never been to South Australia, so we decided to go. As long as I didn’t have to reveal too much about my current employment status, I figured I could enjoy a few beers and plenty of good laughs with old mates.
Peter Tuck was first to ask the inevitable question and I was well prepared for it. I practised my public pose as diligently as I had practised music in my youth. Well, maybe ‘pose’ wasn’t quite the right word. I didn’t actually pretend to be something I wasn’t. It was more what I didn’t say --- the lack of significant clarification --- that might be said to mislead just a little.
Peter opened his mouth to ask for more information, but the waitress intruded just then with the hors d’oeuvre tray. Then some of our other mates from those heady young days in uniform joined us to drink and laugh over somewhat distorted and often exaggerated recollections of past exploits.
“Remember the day that pommy sergeant couldn’t remember the command ‘Fix Bayonets’, and yelled out ‘Knives on guns put?’” someone laughed. “The entire platoon cracked up!”
“What about that time Ray Waldon lost it after the drum major ripped into him? He threw his trombone high in the air and it somersaulted, split apart and crashed to the ground. We all watched in horror. It all seemed to happen in slow motion. First the trombone turned over and over, glinting in the sunlight, then first one piece then the other somersaulted and dropped at the drum major’s feet. Everyone was certain Ray’s career in army bands was over.”
“So what happened?” someone who hadn’t been there inquired.
“The drum major marched him into the boss’s office and told the boss what happened. The boss just looked at him and said very calmly ‘Then get him another one’.”
Disbelieving stares.
“True story! The boss knew the drum major had been on Ray’s case for a long time.”
Someone recalled a time, in Korea, when a group was stealthily creeping through the jungle, alert for any sign the enemy might be lurking. One of the group, renowned as a bit of a comedian, said, “I think we need some suspense music just now” and hummed the first few bars of Beethoven’s fifth, as used in the movie The Longest Day.
“That was Viv Law,” Peter said. “One of the nicest blokes you could ever wish to meet.” I nodded agreement. Vince had been a very special friend.
Sam chimed in then, having been with Viv when it happened. “He was about six yards in front of me in the ‘J’,” he said. “He looked around through the bushes and called out to me in a loud whisper. I said ‘What?’, then he said
‘What we need is some dramatic music’, and he did the boom boom boom baaah thing. I nearly drowned, ’cos we were up to our arses in a swamp.”
I recalled our compulsory sports afternoons in Singapore. An angry sergeant eventually put a stop to our antics, but for over a year we chose between card games, chess, darts or ‘tennis’. Someone had produced an article comparing the physical exertion involved in having sex with playing several sets of tennis, so the newlyweds among us --- and singles who could find obliging partners --- often opted to play ‘tennis’ in bed, and signed off declaring we had played eight sets.
We had some good times. Peter had done his 20 years, as had most of my mates, and I envied them the security of their army pension. I wondered, listening to them and remembering, just how I could have hated the life so much when we’d had so much fun.
What if I hadn’t left? Where would I be today?
It was a question I didn’t want to ponder, because, in hindsight, that decision had cost so much. Twenty–four years of struggle in jobs I hated, on lousy pay. Twenty–four years to realise the things I hated so much about army life were part of life in general. Authority, fools in power making decisions they aren’t qualified to make and screwing up the lives of others. Inflated egos, senseless rules, jobs that are only occasionally satisfying and more often involve boring routine. Actually, the job of an army musician was far more stimulating and fun than most, and a lot better paid than anything I’d done for more than 20 years after. And the mateship! We were trained to stand shoulder–to–shoulder against any enemy, and although we might be out of contact for decades, most of us would still defend a buddy to the death if the need arose. When challenged by outsiders, we could team up to hold successfully against a formidable enemy, but among our own the ego contests were fierce and unrelenting.
Well, I was an inventor. I invented or modified tools for every job I tackled and created all sorts of little gadgets to automate household tasks and enhance my own and Fran’s lifestyle. I’d invented three potentially commercial devices and patented two.
My next invention, a year or so later, was to be more successful. It would lead me to embark on what Fran and I would come to refer to as our ‘wild ride’ in the heady world of international big business. It would be hard to find a more unlikely couple to run a global information technology company, but we were to find ourselves, at the height of the so–called I.T. bubble, courting global industry leaders and counting millions.
At the time of Peter’s question, though, I was substantially unemployed, completely unmotivated, and lacking any realistic prospects for improvement in my situation, had I been at all inclined to want to make any. Overall, life was tough and unfulfilling. My self–esteem was at rock bottom. I eased off the drink because I couldn’t afford it, but I craved it when those frequent waves of depression washed over me and when boredom and frustration overwhelmed me --- and that was most of the time.
After years of struggling to make a decent profit selling software and services, Fran had hit on an idea that seemed destined to succeed and, having had to quit my job as a steward when we moved to the city, I was working as her ‛gofer’. I spent my days running errands, photocopying courseware on a single–shot photocopier, and laboriously manually collating and binding lesson books. I certainly wasn’t going to confess my true occupation in a pissing contest. Despite never having made a dollar out of inventing, I wasn’t telling any lies.
By the time we were alone again, Peter had apparently lost his earlier train of thought and thankfully didn’t ask again about my occupation. Instead, he inquired after Fran. Peter was divorced. He could never leave Helen while Ede was alive, and he reckoned he’d suffered years of marital misery until his mother died and he was finally free to make the break. I suspected it was more likely Helen who suffered. Peter was always a bit of a cad, and I suspected Ede knew it.
He’d transferred corps about the time I got out and he did pretty well for himself. After discharge, he worked as a hospital orderly and then trained as a paramedic. He also ran a band for disabled kids, but he wasn’t paid for that.
“Of course you knew Mum passed away a few years back, didn’t you?” Peter said, as an afterthought.
“Yes. I sent flowers. I wanted to go to the funeral, but there was just no way we could get to Perth at the time.”
Peter nodded. “And your mum? Is she still alive?”
“Yes. Still fit. Misses Dad, but one of my brothers lives with her and she always has a stack of grandchildren around.
“She came up to stay with us for a while after Dad died,” I told him. “The kids were ecstatic. They adore her. Fran sorted out her pension entitlements. Turned out Dad had never received a veteran’s pension, even when he became invalid. Bloody shiny–arsed pencil–pushers never bothered to tell him he was entitled. Fran fought to get Mum a war widow’s pension, and finally succeeded. She got $11,000 back pay and to her it was as good as winning a million in the lottery. They’d been moved into government housing when Dad got sick, but she had very little furniture, and no conveniences. She bought her first washing machine, a vacuum cleaner, a microwave oven and a new lounge suite. She was in heaven.”
“It’s hard to imagine a woman in Australia still living without those conveniences into the '80s.”
“She’s a tough old bird. Never complained, and it doesn’t seem like the hard work did her any harm. She’s full of energy and has a wonderfully happy disposition.”
While she was staying with us, and later when I went out and spent a few weeks on my own with her, I finally got to know my mother and to really appreciate what a remarkable woman she was. Dad had lectured me about treating women with respect and my mother told me that as tough as her life was, she seldom suffered a harsh word from her husband. It wasn’t due to Dad’s upbringing. Elsie was a gentle, patient woman, but she had a fire in her belly and a very firm way of enforcing her high standards in the home.
She was totally unselfish --- generous to a fault --- and she had a wonderfully positive and forgiving attitude to life and people. The only time I ever heard her utter an unkind word about anyone was when my daughter told her she had been to Japan on a school exchange program. Mum could never forgive the Japs for what they had done to Dad. Anyone else’s transgressions were forgiven within five minutes of being committed. She would state her opinion very matter–of–factly and quite openly --- never behind anyone’s back --- and she would have nothing further to say ever again.
“Actually, I think your mum and mine were a lot alike in many ways,” I added. “Maybe that’s why it was so easy for me to call Ede ‘Mum’.”
Peter smiled broadly.
We chatted on for a little while about my brothers and sisters, their families, Peter’s kids and mutual friends. Then a loudspeaker buzzed, announcing the evening’s formalities were about to begin. Thankfully, there weren’t a lot more questions about my occupation. Those that were asked were deflected with the same practised response and without elaboration. The next reunion I attended, my status had changed so radically that I relished the questions.
“Four more orders in the mail and two on the fax machine. That’s over $14,000 already this week!”
Kaylee, Fran’s bubbly young personal assistant, had started work part– time, shortly after Fran started writing her computer training course. She seemed completely overwhelmed by the success of it. She had been with us several years now --- moving to full–time work before the end of the first year. It seemed she would never cease to be astonished at the way orders flowed in and courseware flowed out.
“And I just took another order over the telephone,” Fran laughed. “Looks like your job is secure for another week.”
“Steve called while you were on the other line. He wants you to call him back a.s.a.p.” Kaylee said, “He said he has good news.”
Minutes later, Fran danced out of her office singing. “Prospectus approved, Paul. Call the printers! We are going public!”
It was 1998. I had just turned 50, Fran had been marketing her training course for eight years and the sales just kept growing.
I had conceived yet another invention. I’d never taken more than a passing interest in computers, but using an innovative mechanical approach, I believed I’d worked out how to copy protect digital music.
When a friend first suggested looking for venture capital, Fran had no idea what the term meant, but she went to a seminar on ‘Becoming Investor Ready’ and came back bubbling with enthusiasm. Business plans were based on the projected profits from expanding Fran’s training business, but flavoured with the excitement of potentially solving a major global dilemma by allocating a sensible percentage of turnover to research.
Fran wrote investor offers and mailed them, then for months received letters of rejection one after another. Then an offer came through, followed quickly by several more.
“Are they all going to be like this? It won’t be our business at all. We might as well sell out and be employees.”
“I suppose they figure if they are putting up the money, they should own the goods.”
“Do they have to be so insulting? Look at this! ‘Ideas are everywhere. We need to be confident that you will match our investment of dollars.’ If ideas are so easy, why don’t they come up with their own instead of wanting such a big share of ours?”
I shouldn’t have been surprised when Fran came to me one day announcing that she had figured out a better way to fund business expansion. By now, nothing Fran did should astonish. She’d started marketing her training courses before they were written. A ‘market test’, she called it. When the orders flooded in, she couldn’t bring herself to tell customers there wasn’t actually a product yet, so she told them she would send a lesson a month for the next year.
Eager customers cheerfully handed over deposits and signed authorities to charge their credit card each month, when another lesson would be sent. Super–charged with electric energy generated by the combination of desperation, determination and ecstasy at the results of her sales campaign, Fran toiled by lamplight in the early hours of the morning. Still clad in PJs and fuelled with nothing more than strong caffeine, she persevered until late morning, before turning her attention to marketing and boring, but essential, administrative tasks.
This continued for a full year, while I alternated between panicking over the possible consequences of her failing to deliver, and panicking that she would crash and burn. I feared a physical collapse, or perhaps a psychological transformation from mad (which she had admitted to being for some time, but with a craziness that thankfully didn’t interfere with her capacity to function) to incompetently insane.
If I hadn’t cooked and compelled her to eat, she would have starved. Despite my incessant pleading she refused to sleep, but seemed quite capable of coping without it. Such is the power of the human mind that the body can, it seems, run on adrenalin for extended periods when either need or desire is strong enough.
By the end of our first year in the city, Fran had 22 happy graduates, 73 students at various stages of learning, and was taking regular orders for her1,500 pages of courseware at $1,400 a sale. From then on, she pursued one seemingly ludicrous idea after another to grow the business and by some miracle, they mostly worked. The dollars just kept flowing. She hired an assistant and bought a duplex copier. Eventually I rejoiced at being rendered redundant as course–maker with the purchase of a $60,000 fully automated digital printer.
I then graduated to resident graphic artist, teaching myself photography and how to use ‘Photoshop’ and discovering talents I never dreamt I had. Adrenalin, it seems, can also stimulate creativity and power the mind to reach spectacular levels of knowledge absorption and skills mastery. Or perhaps the reality was that earlier assessments of my intelligence were flawed and my mental capacity had always been quite adequate to meet the challenges of retraining, if only I’d been given half a chance.
The music industry was struggling, at the time, with the losses caused by CD piracy. As a former musician --- sympathetic to the dilemma this presented to struggling artists --- the problem both disturbed and intrigued me. After listening to our son recant a television show about how the Egyptians used scrolls to send encrypted messages, I conceived an idea to prevent copying of music CDs. I explained in detail to Fran how I proposed to work with a team of programmers to implement it, and Fran said she was determined this invention would succeed. I knew if there was a way, she would find it.
“We can take the company public, Paul. Sell shares.”
“What? On the stock exchange?” I laughed, a cruelly sharp, ridiculing cackle rising almost to hysteria as I tried to envisage Fran and I as members of the Wall Street suit brigade.
“No,” she replied, lips twisting in an indulgent sneer. “There’s such a thing as an unlisted public company. You sell shares privately, through brokers. I have spoken to a broker and he says it might cost us $100,000 or more to produce a prospectus, get it approved, and then we can sell shares to the public.”
I took some convincing. The idea seemed more than a little far–fetched. The idea that people like Fran and I could travel such a path seemed, quite frankly, about as feasible as flying in a rocket to Mars. But once persuaded that this seemingly wild scheme was actually feasible, I struggled to contain my excitement.
The stoic Paul Wilson, who didn’t experience normal emotions, recalled how it felt to stand on a little dais after winning a backstroke race. I had feelings, and it felt grand!
We suffered months of agonising anticipation waiting for a broker to find initial investors to fund the first stage of expansion, then spent months in and out of lawyers’ offices painstakingly reading and amending the prospectus. I was appointed chairman of the company.
I rehearsed declaring my occupation as ‛Chairman of a Public I.T. company’, and put my talent for inventing to good use designing CD duplication equipment and perfecting efficient production processes. Well– to–do, well–educated entrepreneurs and directors of successful corporations treated me with respect, even showing admiration for my skills. I basked in the glory.
After Steve’s call, I called the printers and told them to start the presses. Then Fran and I proceeded to work through a list of people who had given early indications of interest in investing. Within the week, cheques were flooding in.
“Here’s one for $50,000,” said Kaylee.
“And another $100,000.” Fran exclaimed. “Must be nice to be so wealthy that you can risk that much in a start–up I.T. venture.”
It was the height of the I.T. boom. Computing innovations were solid gold. The world was possessed of a madness that, just a few months on, would result in one of the biggest stock–market collapses in history and would see I.T. companies worldwide closing their doors and advising shareholders to write off their losses.
For now, though, Fran and I were counting millions and planning first– class travel to visit the leading corporations of the I.T. world, offering my invention for sale.
~~~~
“Ladies and gentlemen, please fasten your seatbelts, raise your window shades and prepare for landing.”
It was 20 minutes to five on a cold Monday morning. Fran and I were steadily descending through a classic London pea–souper towards the bobbing landing lights of Heathrow.
“I hope the hire–car people are efficient and the hotel is easy to find,” Fran whispered. “I’m desperate for a shower and a proper sleep.”
We had spent an exhausting week in San Francisco meeting with executives of leading I.T. companies --- right at home, astonishingly, among Wall Street suits. Then we’d gone on to spend a week in Boston with a marketing consulting firm whose job was to teach us to elevator pitch to overcome the inherent distrust of the dour, tunnel–visioned egotists who decided which technical innovation would drive the next big wave. Now we were preparing to present our remedy for music CD piracy to the specialists in copy–protection technology. They were talking a $100 million deal if I could impress them, and our Boston tutors were confident their training had equipped me to sway the most challenging sceptic.
Sondal had already tested the technology. “We have good news and bad news,” the head of their technology testing division had said in a call several weeks earlier. “We’ve cracked the protection.”
After two years of painstaking research, repeated testing and costly modifications, I refused to be disappointed. “Really? Then I would be very pleased if you would tell me how and send me your copy to examine. I’m sure we can strengthen the protection further if necessary.”
“I doubt it’s necessary, Mr Wilson. The good news I mentioned is that it took an investment of over $1 million and eighteen months of our most skilled cracker’s time to break it.”
Hours later he called back, embarrassed. “It seems I spoke too soon, Mr Wilson. We duplicated the disk and it appeared to be a valid copy. When we played it, the sound was all broken up.”
I laughed and danced with Fran. We filled the room with champagne froth and dined on prime rib steak and I told Fran I knew all along that they hadn’t cracked it. I had been watching the time to see how long it would take them to figure it out.
#
“Lunch,” said Fran, bouncing out of bed in our room at the classic old Tudor Inn in the heart of High Wycombe, after a welcome morning nap. “A genuine English pub lunch, and then some sightseeing. What do you say to that?”
“Fine for you. I have to negotiate strange roads and English traffic!”
I was as eager as she to explore our surroundings. I had drooled over the settings of English television shows and yearned to wander down narrow cobblestone lanes, past century–old houses, and drive past rolling green pastures littered with the poetic remnants of ancient castles. I was interested in the cathedrals, bridges and Trafalgar Square, but quaint little villages with their picturesque old stone-and-thatch pubs, patchwork fields, hedgerows and lakes that inspired the early poets held more appeal. England was a feast for the artist and a symphony for the writer, and Fran and I were in our element surrounded by its ancient beauty.
At the something–or–other–Arms, a 17th century whitewashed stone and shingle–roof structure with flagstone floors, we lunched --- or gorged, for the servings were enormous --- on sausages and mash. Ignoring Fran’s reminders that I was driving in a strange country, I washed mine down with a half–pint of bitter and was not entirely surprised to discover that I still hated warm beer. I hadn’t swallowed ale warm since Singapore, but at least English bitter tasted better than that vile Asian Tiger. We basked in the warmth of two roaring open fires while lunch settled, then began an afternoon trek through the poets’ paradise.
The following day, a fellow director --- an English banking executive who commuted regularly between offices in London and Sydney --- met us in the hotel lobby. We braved light snow to set out for the London offices of Amcorp, detouring for a quick tour of famous landmarks on the way. I snapped pictures of the guards at Buckingham Palace, and we stood in the sleet to listen to Big Ben announce the hour. We stopped briefly at the Tower Bridge and we braved the weather again to climb the steps of Westminster Abbey.
The warmth of Amcorp’s office was welcome, and we were greeted with an amazing feast of cold cuts, gourmet sandwiches, fruit salad and wines. I declined the offer of wine, partly because of the early hour and partly because I was wary of the warm, inebriated glow slowing my reflexes. It was as well I did, because the questions were challenging. Interestingly, though, the only real objection to our technology was that it was too secure. According to one of the evaluating panel, some minor flaw in the protection is necessary to keep the Chinese Mafia or some similarly powerful vested interest group satisfied.
“The objective, Mr Wilson,” a poker–faced financial director declared, “is not to stop the big commercial pirate groups, but rather to block copying by Mr Average-Home-Computer-User and the small to mid–range copy houses. Preservation of the status quo is essential to economic stability, and ensuring the continued viability of enterprises run by major criminal elements is an essential element of that endeavour.”
Fran and I stared at him bug–eyed, but later we agreed that we ought not to have been surprised. The world of commerce was a dirty, corrupt place where the dollar was king, and ethics were in short supply.
Fran and I returned home via Korea and Hong Kong. In Hong Kong, I ordered four new tailored suits and a smart–mustard coloured suede sports jacket that I christened my ‘Jack the lad’ jacket, and delighted in wearing for years after. Fran had silk blouses made and a smart red power suit that looked stunning on her. She wore it, always, to meetings that promised to be volatile. Somehow it bestowed an aura that thoroughly intimidated her opponents.
We took an evening cruise on the Hong Kong harbour. Colourful reflections from hundreds of neon advertising signs danced over the water to light the night --- a commercial war in technicolour. Every major global corporation appeared to be represented.
Boats of every kind drifted serenely. Luxury cruise boats laden with tourists idled across the harbour, cameras flashing from the decks. Paddle– boats and steamers and tugs loaded with stores chugged busily to and fro. On shabby little junks, clothes lines across the rear deck displayed family underwear, and wizened old Chinese gentlemen cleaned their teeth and spat toothpaste over the side, while women leant painfully down to fill washing buckets from the filthy sea.
I marvelled at the contrast between steel and glass towers scraping the skyline along the foreshore --- accommodating suited businessmen and elegantly dressed ladies in plush offices and decadent hotel suites --- and the grubby little hovels. The streets were crowded with crippled and stooped paupers who spent their days begging or slaving in market stalls or the back rooms of tailor shops, struggling to feed ragged little urchins sucking at mothers’ breasts or scrounging for scraps in hotel garbage bins. It occurred to me, again, that I had enjoyed a fortunate life by comparison with these pathetic creatures, and it amazed me that many of them wore wide smiles.
We returned home from the trip to a conditional offer of purchase of our technology for $USD100 million. I was an inventor, and it seemed I was finally to see the fulfilment of every inventor’s wildest dream.
~~~~
Fran and I stood in the Tech Ventures reception lounge in stunned silence, staring vacantly at the dozers digging deep trenches on the construction site across the road.
Digging. Digging.
We were digging for answers.
How could the investor pull out now?
He’d had his pen poised over the cheque form. A $100 million deal, and all we needed was a piddling $200,000 to put the finishing touches to the product. Packaging, mostly. The technology was tested and proven. The risk was virtually nil.
“You must know more than you’re saying, Kel. Please!”
Kelvin Hodgson, our investment broker, was reluctant. He’d been sworn to silence, and his sources were valuable to him.
“Does he not trust the buyer? Amcorp are among the world leaders in the industry. Surely their credentials are not in doubt?”
“No, Paul,” Kel replied. “The investor has complete confidence in the prospective buyer, and that the offer is genuine.”
“Then what’s the problem?” I said, in a more demanding tone than I intended. “Christ, Kel, it’s a measly 200 grand --- for 20 per cent of $100 million. And the development is so close to complete. What’s his problem? Does he think we aren’t up to finishing the job, or is it just cold feet?”
Hodgson bit his lip. “I was sworn to secrecy. I really didn’t want to be the one to tell you this, but due diligence inquiries turned up a significant problem. No–one can invest in Tech Ventures until it’s resolved.”
“What? What are you talking about, Kel, for Christ’s sake, don’t talk in riddles. Spit it out.”
“The grant application Fran lodged. Was it all above board? It was, wasn’t it?”
Embracing the promise of a $100 million licence sale of our copy–protection technology, Fran had sought to take advantage of Federal Government assistance for exporters, applying for an Export Market Development Grant.
Robert Johnson and Frank East had reviewed the application. They raised no concerns, but advised Fran that the application processing would take some time to complete.
“Of course it was. What kind of question is that, Kel? You know us!” He nodded thoughtfully, then drew a deep breath.
“There’s to be a police investigation, Paul. Apparently the assessor picked up on something in the substantiating material that disturbed him. He suspects fraud. He’s asked the police to do some digging --- check it out and make sure it’s all clean. The investor won’t move until their investigations are complete, and who knows how long that might take? These things don’t happen in a hurry.”
“So while Johnson fiddles and police procrastinate, we eat steadily away at our working capital reserves and watch our world slowly crumble,” Fran said despairing. She’d suddenly started to sway. I was staring at the construction machines.
Digging. Digging. Digging for what? What could they possibly think...
Fran turned milk white and her legs caved. I caught her going down, but my head was spinning too. The room inverted and the furniture was floating. The persistent sound of dozers digging increased to a deafening roar, and a policeman holding handcuffs swam towards Fran --- swam through air.
The walls turned dull grey and the carpet lifted and floated away, leaving a bare cement floor. The window shattered, a million tiny shards of glass showering Fran and Kel. Bars appeared. Kel was outside them. Fran was inside, pressing against them, sobbing. I was with Kel, on the outside, reaching in. I smelled fear.
“Paul, thank God you’re here. Everything will be all right now.”
I shook my head. “I can’t help you, Fran.” I said. “But now, at last, you believe me. The world is an evil place filled with evil people. Only a fool trusts. Only a fool strives.”
“But I’m innocent. The application was honest. I did nothing wrong.”
“Yes you did,” I said, overcome, now, with weariness and furious that I’d allowed myself to forget who I was and what world I was doomed to live in. “We are both guilty. The guys at Amcorp warned us, but we forgot how the system works. We caught a glimpse of the brass ring, and we were gullible enough to believe the powers–that–be would let us rise above our station --- that ability and honest toil could place that ring within an orphan’s reach.”
The war in Iraq was in full swing. Gallant sons and daughters were again called to sacrifice themselves for political expediency and the preservation of wealth and privilege. In daily papers, reports of U.S. forces taking control of Saddam International Airport vied for attention with announcements of stock–market gains and with Labor politicians’ gripes about the claimed slow destruction of Medicare.
Nothing changes. The world had made no progress since I contemplated battle in Vietnam --- no progress, in fact, since my father marched off to be incarcerated on foreign shores. But after endless months of idling away the hours reading propaganda and scanning race guides, it seemed that Fran and I might finally see an end to the nightmare war between Tech Ventures and the bureaucracy.
When Hodgson first broke the news, we counted how long Tech Ventures might survive, and took bets on how long it would take for Johnson and his mates to satisfy themselves that their nonsense suspicions were unfounded. Days became weeks and weeks became months. Ultimately, Fran lost patience. She wrote to the Commissioner of Police and Federal Attorney– General demanding the investigation proceed immediately and threatening class action by shareholders if delays caused the company further damage.
I was delighted when two detectives arrived at our office. I welcomed them warmly, rejecting their advice to call a lawyer and giving them open access to files, computers and staff. Detective Sinn replied that he ought not to be surprised by the reception. Fran had somehow managed to have a minor investigation prioritised over investigations of drug importation and prostitution rings.
More months passed. Endless police interviews exposed no clue to Johnson’s motives or purpose.
“Mr Johnson’s claimed concerns remain a mystery to me, Paul,” Sinn declared. “I can find no irregularities, and I’ve told him so, but his department is my client and without his agreement, I can’t close this matter.”
Johnson steadfastly refused to let it go.
“I’d like to do something a little unconventional, but only if you and Fran agree. It might be uncomfortable for you, to say the least,” Sinn said in a phone call one late May morning. “I’d like to bring Mr Johnson to a meeting at your office and ask him to question you directly. Tell you exactly what his concerns are and let you respond.”
Fran and I replied that we would relish the opportunity to challenge our specious accuser.
#
On June 3rd, 2003, Robert Johnson entered the Tech Ventures boardroom with his head bowed. Refusing my extended hand, he pushed right past the others to take a seat at the end of the table and stare intently at a carving of a maple leaf on the edging around the boardroom table. Detective Frank Sinn of the Australian Federal Police followed him, greeting us with hearty handshakes and a broad smile.
There were four on the Tech Ventures side of the table. Dan, the lanky but distinguished looking ex–politician had taken over from me as chairman a year earlier. Dylan, our fresh–faced young technical director, sat beside Fran and I along the east side of the room, facing a row of Dobell prints and with framed company registration certificates, partner agreements and award certificates behind us. Fran wore her red power suit and I suppressed a smile, admiring her. At 55, she was still slim and attractive, with just a hint of salt in her hair giving her a mature, distinguished look. She had a reputation as a kind, gentle woman until crossed, but a potent adversary and one who inevitably had right on her side and would not tolerate evil.
“Well, Mr Johnson,” the detective said, when all were seated with introductions complete. “You may now begin your questioning.”
Awkward silence. Johnson continued to stare at the maple leaf, colour rising in his neck.
“Mr Johnson?”
Heavy silence. Fran’s eyes blazed at Johnson and Sinn’s face worked in an uneasy contortion of frustration.
“Mr Johnson, I warned you this would be your last opportunity to ask these questions you say you need answered. At the end of today’s meeting, I am going to close this investigation.”
Silence. The detective fiddled with his notebook.
“Mr Johnson,” Fran addressed him now, and her tone caused me to draw breath sharply. “You have made a very serious accusation and ─”
“There was no accusation made, Mrs Wilson,” said Detective Sinn. “Mr Johnson raised concerns.”
“Concerns? Concerns?” she shouted. “Let me tell you about our concerns, Detective Sinn.”
I kicked her under the table and Dan made a face at her, but she ignored us.
“Mr Johnson comes in here just when we are about to close a $100 million deal and accuses me of falsifying a government grant application. Grounds for accusation? I have no idea. He interviews me twice and then goes away without a word. The next thing I know there are police interrogating us and our staff and searching our computers and files for heaven only knows what and our business is frozen. Instead of closing an amazing deal that will make all our shareholders rich, we are struggling to survive until Mr Johnson satisfies his claimed ‘concerns’, which he will not articulate and which it appears, from his behaviour today, were never valid to begin with.”
“I didn’t cause your business to be frozen,” Johnson sniveled, without looking up. “You were free to keep marketing product.”
“We are a research and development company, Mr Johnson. The product the company was founded on became obsolete due to web technology changing the landscape in computer programming. We turned our focus to music copy protection --- the product that underpinned our public offering --- because it promised our shareholders a return of 20 times their investment. We were on the verge of finalising a deal when you intruded.”
“So what stopped the deal?” Sinn asked in a tone that implied genuine curiosity.
“It was subject to the addition of several product features. We had an investor willing to fund the research to add those features, but he pulled out because the due diligence process uncovered Mr Johnson’s allegations. We couldn’t secure investment capital to fund the necessary further research until this matter was resolved.”
Sinn nodded, then addressed Johnson again, this time in a forceful tone. “Mr Johnson, I consented to arrange this meeting because no matter how many times I tell you I can’t find any evidence of irregularity, you keep telling me your concerns are not satisfied. I am giving you one final opportunity to ask questions. You have exactly five minutes, sir, and then this meeting, and my investigation, is over.”
Johnson continued to stare in sullen silence at the maple leaf.
Your name should be Simms, I thought, suppressing a murderous rage and reminding myself that I had yet to exact that long–planned revenge.
“Tapped phones, bugs in our living room,” Fran shouted. “God, you have put us through hell, Johnson. And now you sit there like a pathetic, wimpish little schoolboy who was caught out lying and ─”
I kicked her harder this time and motioned to her to be quiet. Sinn frowned. “The police didn’t bug your home or your phones.”
“Someone did,” I said. “An amateurish attempt too. A bug fell out of the overhead light in our living room.”
Johnson reached for a folder in a pile on the centre of the table, upsetting the pile in the process. He began thumbing through it, seemingly without any real purpose.
“If I could just take some of these files away with me --- ”
“Absolutely not! Those files are company property and valuable,” Dylan roared. “Tell us what you are looking for and we will locate it and copy it for you.”
“He doesn’t know what he’s looking for. His purpose seems to be to cause total disruption and he’s achieved it. He’s killed $100 million deal, wiped out a business, and caused shareholders $5 million in losses. And now he’s sitting there dumbstruck and unable to think of a single legitimate question to ask.”
Fran was on her feet now. I feared any moment she would go right across the table and punch Johnson.
“I’d like to leave now,” Johnson said in a sheepish whisper. “I feel like I’m being railroaded.”
“Railroaded?” Fran screamed. “You feel like you are being railroaded? You sniveling little bastard! Do you have any idea how much damage you have done with your careless accusations and stupid baseless assumptions?”
Sinn closed his notebook and put it and his pen in his top suit pocket. “I think we are done here. I am very sorry to have imposed on you and I thank you for your co–operation. I will file my report.”
Johnson bolted from the room without even pretence of courtesy. Sinn lingered a while and I noticed Johnson pacing nervously about the parking lot, obviously impatient to make his escape.
“I must say, Mr and Mrs Wilson, it was quite an experience for me, meeting you. When I announce myself, most people can’t get to the phone quickly enough to call their lawyer. An offer of coffee and an open invitation to inspect files and computers at my leisure was not what I expected at all.”
“When one has nothing to hide, Mr Sinn, there is no need for lawyers and no reason not to assist an inquiry in any way possible,” Fran replied.
“And Mr Wilson, thank you for introducing me to the internet Wayback Machine. It will prove very useful in future investigations and it certainly made it easy to respond to Mr Johnson’s incorrect claim that Market Tactics never existed.”
I wondered again how a senior detective with the Australian Federal Police could not know of the existence of a website that archived nearly everything ever published on the World Wide Web.
Sinn shook hands then and apologised again for the intrusion. It wasn’t his fault, of course, and he had done his best not to cause disruption. I stood at the window and watched them drive off.
It was finally over. Months of police visits, interviews, employee questions, stress and living under a cloud of suspicion, and we still hadn’t the faintest notion what it was all about. Johnson never gave even a hint of the reason for his suspicions and Sinn was far too professional to disclose why he had been called in. The thickset, greying detective with kind eyes questioned us politely, asked to see documents, apologised constantly for having to intrude and disclosed absolutely nothing. Johnson drove away in a sleek black sedan, taking all our hopes and dreams with him.
It was over; all of it. The resolution had come too late. Tech Ventures closed down, the liquidators claimed the last of the cash reserves and assets in payment of their claimed fees. Their invoice exceeded their quote by a factor of five and totalled, coincidentally, precisely the amount they calculated the company was worth at the time of closure. Harry, the company accountant, said that was normal practice.
The $600,000 debt the company owed Fran and I in unpaid salaries was written off, along with debts to other directors. There were no other creditors. The shareholders were politely advised their shares were worthless and they may be entitled to claim a tax loss.
My fingertips had touched the brass ring, but a shiny–arsed bureaucrat snatched it from my grip and removed it to dangle seductively just beyond my reach. I cursed my stupidity for forgetting who I was and what I was destined to be.
All that I desired… black car departing.
I was left with that old sensation of emptiness --- that same hollow ache I recalled feeling when the black car left me at St Patrick’s all those years ago.
Cold. Naked. Exposed.
All my tomorrows lay out in front of me like paving stones forming a path through the gauntlet: a tortuous, purposeless path without any end.
#
Dan phoned the following Wednesday.
“I had a call from Mr Johnson’s boss. I’ve been making some quiet inquiries, Paul, using my connections. I want to know what that inquiry was all about.”
“And?”
“I’m meeting with him at 10:30 today. I told him I wanted you and Fran with me, but he was emphatic that he wouldn’t speak to me with either of you, or Dylan, present. I think it’s disgraceful, but I want to question him so I’ve consented to go alone. I just wanted you to know. He’s cautioned me that everything he tells me is absolutely confidential and I mustn’t breathe a word of it to you or Fran. I’ll play his game just long enough to get to the bottom of this. I’ll stop in on the way back from the meeting.”
He arrived at our house just after noon. Fran made chicken and salad sandwiches for lunch. Dan’s demeanour gave nothing away, but there was keenness in his greeting and when Fran asked if he cared to eat first and talk later, he was quick to state his preference to talk while we ate.
“So,” Fran said when we were seated, “What did you find out?”
“When East and Johnson came in for the second interview, did he ask you where Market Tactics conducted their seminars?”
“Yes, and we told them we didn’t know the address off hand, but would look it up for them if necessary. They said it wasn’t important.” I answered.
“We gave them the taxi vouchers from the hotel and back, and we described the place in some detail.” Fran added.
“Hmmm.” Dan paused to sip his coffee before continuing. He looked somewhat careworn now, as though the morning meeting had been too much for him. “Fran, apparently the invoice from Market Tactics had an address on it which included a suite number.”
“It did. In the U.S., they often quote a suite number when using a post office box or a secretarial service for receiving mail. Market Tactics sold out just after we went over there. They closed their Boston office and relocated to the buyer’s offices in New York. They used a post office box address to finalise collection of payments, etc., because they no longer had a physical address.”
“Did you tell Johnson all that?”
“Absolutely. Why?”
“Because Johnson wrote in his report that he asked you if the address on the invoice was the address of the place the seminars were conducted and you confirmed that it was.”
“That’s a lie and I can prove it. Check our records. The meeting was fully minuted.”
“Well, it seems they flew a detective to Boston to check --- twice --- and he took photos of a post box. Johnson then sent the photos to the Federal Police with a statement that you were claiming to have attended seminars in a post office box.”
I prepared to restrain Fran. I don’t know what I expected her to do. She liked and trusted Dan. None of this was his fault. He had been wonderfully supportive throughout. He could have done as Johnson’s boss made him promise to do --- not tell us what he had discovered. I knew, though, Fran was furious enough that if Johnson or East were here now, they would be in mortal danger.
“And that’s the sum total of his claimed ‘concerns’?” I asked Dan.
“Apparently. Combined with the fact that Market Tactics didn’t exist at the time he started assessing the claim.” He shifted in his seat.
“They had sold out already. That was fully explained also.”
“I’m sure it was. I’m satisfied both Johnson and East were thoroughly incompetent, and I said so, but unfortunately there’s very little we can do about it now. I doubt they’ll even suffer any penalty. It’ll be put down to an unfortunate mistake.”
I didn’t trust myself to respond. I had suffered too much as a result of pencil–pushing bureaucrats’ unfortunate mistakes.
Dan shook my hand warmly, and hugged Fran. “I don’t know what to say. I wish there were words to help you feel better about all this.”
“It was good of you to tell us, Dan. I know it wouldn’t have been easy to make a promise you had no intention of keeping.”
“It was a promise they had no right to ask for. I will never consent to supporting wrongdoing and I won’t apologise for doing what I have to do to try to make things as right as they can be. I just wish I could fix the mess these fools have created with their incompetence.”
“Not incompetence, Dan. Lies. Johnson knows what was said in the interview.”
He didn’t respond. He had been part of the system for a long time. He knew how it operated, and he was no ordinary politician. His integrity had cost him dearly in that profession.
He turned at the front gate. “By the way,” he called back to us, “It’s small comfort, I know, but they’ve approved the claim. Of course nothing will be paid now that Tech Ventures is no more, but at least no–one can question your honesty.”
~~~~
I didn’t watch the news on December 11, 2007. Once almost addicted to current affair shows and documentaries, I had long since lost confidence in reporters who danced to tunes played by commercial interests and distorted truth for the benefit of lobby groups and power clusters. It wasn’t until sometime later, in conversation with a friend, that I heard of newly installed Prime Minister Kevin Rudd’s momentous announcement that an apology would be made to Australians who were stolen from their homes as children.
I did watch, tense and angry and with gut churning, at 9:30 the following February 13th when Kevin Rudd made his very public address to the Australian Parliament, apologising for the profound grief, suffering and loss suffered by stolen Aborigines.
On the morning of February 13, I was forced to again relive that terrible day in 1956 when everything familiar --- everything safe --- was suddenly snatched away.
I revisited the awful playground in which I stood, lonely and terrified, counting the Sundays, believing that after just a few more I could go home. I suffered, again, the terrible beatings, often for no reason at all, inflicted by the people I was supposed to trust to keep me safe. I relived those days in the schoolyard, branded ‘home kid’, rejected and cast out; and the desperate yearning for home and family --- for the world I was born to.
They had loaded a battered 12–year–old boy and a tiny suitcase filled with shabby, ill–fitting clothes into a sleek black car and taken him far away from his sister --- the only family he had left. My 16th birthday had passed before I saw her again, and but for Uncle Bill, I might have lost contact with her for ever.
They handed me over that day like a freight consignment. I was signed for and duly delivered without a word of attempted comfort or reassurance, after being indoctrinated to believe I was too rebellious to be allowed a home among decent people, and threatened with torture and persecution until I finally conceded and fell into line.
I remembered the horror of signing away eight years of my life at age 15, leaving, yet again, everything familiar in my life for a new and frightening world; a different prison.
I recalled the awkward uncertainty of the day I at last went home, wondering if I would recognise my parents. I had rehearsed my greeting, consumed with fear of rejection and terrified our meeting might validate the nuns’ condemnation of them, and thus of me. My brothers thanked me for my performance that day. No–one would ever know the strain the actor endured, nor the awful struggle whenever I was around them: battling to reconcile my craving for a mother’s affection with a simmering contempt for a woman whom I thought had so dismally failed in her obligation to protect me. Wanting to belong, yet afraid to be part of a world I was taught to shun; wanting forgiveness and to forgive; wanting to know, yet afraid of knowledge. Consumed by undefined guilt and fear, emptiness, and endless confusion.
A tape recording in my head replayed the words I heard my mother utter from her deathbed --- words of love and pride. I cried that day, concealed in the darkened hallway of my mother’s home. When my wife came and wrapped her arms around me, I buried my head on her shoulder and mumbled, “Did you hear her, Fran. She said she loved me and was proud of me. I’ve waited nearly 50 years to hear her speak those words.”
Ten thousand happy memories had dulled my pain. Love had healed wounds and faded scars, but nothing can ever adequately compensate.
Jenny phoned me shortly after the speeches ended. “How many stolen Aborigines did you know, Paul?”
“None,” I replied coldly. “I shared institutional dining halls and bathrooms with more than a 120 homeless children at different times. Four had Aboriginal blood. I estimate at least a quarter of the kids I knew were stolen. Many, most likely --- like you and I --- taken from parents who wanted them and would, if not crippled by deprivation and social injustice, have cared for them competently and loved them well. Every one of those was white.”
“A woman talked of swinging on a gate, hugging a dirty rag doll, crying for her mother,” Jen said. “That was me, Paul. It was my story. A black woman told the tale and claimed it as her own, but that little girl was me,” she sobbed. “Do you remember, Paul? You do, don’t you? It was me!”
I remained silent, listening to her soft sobbing, wishing I could hold her and comfort her.
“Aborigines were stolen, I’m sure,” I said, “but they’ve not only had their plight acknowledged, they’ve been richly compensated. Their entire race --- not just those who suffered. Free adult education, free legal help, preference for subsidised housing, special business and employment grants, higher rates of study subsidies for children, the list goes on and on. What do we get, Jen? Not even recognition.”
“Apparently, it’s all about the reason for taking kids, Paul. Aborigines win sympathy because they were taken for no better reason than that they were black.”
“I’ve read plenty of claims that they were taken more for their own protection, because their tribes rejected mixed–blood children, or because they were neglected or abused. But what difference does it make, Jen? Kids like us were stolen for no better reason than because families were poor --- because our parents didn’t understand their legal entitlement to a pension and no– one cared enough to help them. Was that any less of a crime? And while Aborigines born into privileged families lined up for generous handouts, we stumbled through life scarred and bruised, with neither a helping hand nor even truthful acknowledgement of our plight. We don’t exist.”
“Do you think they will ever acknowledge that it happened to white children too?”
“I doubt it, Jenny. It’s not politically expedient, is it?”
“I guess not. I feel sorry for the Aborigines. I do. But --- ” Her voice trailed off.
“It’s not their fault, Jen. It’s the white and privileged mixed–blood activists, the politicians and the system.”
“Positive discrimination. That’s what they call it, Paul, but it’s racism, and it’s wrong.”
“I told myself I’d forgotten the trauma. I told myself the suffering had ended and I was healed. But inside, something has never seemed quite right. I envy my brothers their security, their self–confidence --- their relaxed, friendly acceptance of life and people. I wonder what I might have been, had I been allowed to be me.”
“I had won, Paul. I had put it all behind me. But today --- ” She sniffed. There was an uneasy silence, and then I heard her sobbing.
“We survived, Jen. That’s what matters. We survived and we made good lives for ourselves. We have partners who love us and good kids who respect us. We’ve done OK, in spite of everything. We can hold our heads up and be proud of what we have achieved. That little girl with the rag doll grew up to be smart, strong and beautiful, a good wife and a great mother. And she still has a lot to look forward to. We have a few years left on this earth yet, and we’ll make them good ones.
“I’ve got to go now, Jen. But I’ll call you later, yeah? Chin up, old girl. No more tears.”
#
A brown–paper envelope arrived by special delivery a few months before my 60th birthday. Fran brought it to me and I held it, unopened, for what seemed like an eternity, though it must only have been minutes. Here was the story of my life. Here were the official records of a ‘crime’, a court case, and the 17 years of incarceration that followed. Here were the dirty secrets of lies and social injustice that condemned little children, ripped out mothers’ hearts and tore homes apart.
I had applied for my file under revised Freedom of Information laws. I was uncertain, now, precisely why, but after reading advice on the Care Leavers Australia Network website, I had signed the form and paid the fee. Now I wasn’t at all sure I wanted to know. My hands trembled as I held it and I felt the coldness as the blood drained from my face. Fran stood there expectantly, silent. At last, I tore the flap away and pulled a thin file from the envelope. A dozen pages, maybe. Less than 1,000 words to tell the story of my life. I began to read.
An hour later, I set the file aside. I sat staring silently into space for a long time, struggling to comprehend. Fran picked it up then and read it. I saw the look when she came to that middle page. It had shocked me too.
I wished I had tracked Geoffrey Simms down and murdered him. Ede convinced me that the crime was not his. Perhaps he was a misguided fool when he found me on the riverbank, but the lie four years later was a crime for which he could never be forgiven.
Geoffrey Simms visited my parents just before my 12th birthday. My mother signed the record of interview. They wanted me sent home. Three days later, Geoffrey Simms signed a statutory declaration confirming that he had been unable to find my parents and, in these unfortunate circumstances, I must be retained in care until age 15. Footnote10
The judge had ordered that I was to be committed to St Patrick’s until the age of 12. No order beyond that date. On my 12th birthday, I should have been sent home.
I was stolen twice.
When I read the false claim that I had expressed a strong desire to join the army, the bile rose in my throat and choked me. My eyes watered; my neck and face burnt. I shook with rage. Again, there was a false declaration that my parents could not be located. “In these unfortunate circumstances,” the social worker had written, “the Commissioner for Child Welfare must sign the consent form in their place.”
My father had declined consent, but they had overridden his wishes and lied again. I could have been a bootmaker. I could have gone home.
The days that followed were a blur. I went mechanically through the motions of living, without feeling and without purpose. I drank too much. I lay awake at night reliving days when the torment seemed unending. I wanted to find Simms and kill him, but I supposed by now he was almost certainly dead.
Finally, I made my resolve.
“I survived the injustice, Fran,” I said. “I made a life for myself. I put it behind me. I won’t let the reopening of old wounds destroy me. I’m stronger than that. But I want justice.”
“How?”
“I’m going to sue the State of New South Wales. False imprisonment. Plenty of people have succeeded with compensation claims for –”
“People falsely accused of a crime, Paul. It’s a different situation entirely.”
“How? I was charged with a crime. The crime of being a neglected child.”
“And how will you prove that you weren’t?”
“Eight healthy brothers and sisters raised by loving parents in a happy home. Surely their testimony is enough? And what about the lie when I was 12. If nothing else, I was wrongly incarcerated from age 12 onwards. That’s documented. How are they going to argue with that?”
~~~~
The offices of Thompson, Stanley and Smythe were on the 11th floor of a recently constructed Sydney harbour side tower. Fran and I entered via a marble–tiled lobby, climbing in little glass cells that hovered over the silvery blue harbour. We stepped out on to carpet that swallowed our shoes to approach an extravagantly carved reception counter topped with polished black granite and decorated with elegant stone and brass statuettes. After a brief wait, seated on a soft suede bench in a room filled with original oils by contemporary Australian artists, we were ushered down a long hallway.
In the meeting room, thick velvet drapes were pulled back from huge picture windows overlooking the water and plush leather chairs surrounded a slick, grey-glass and chrome table. I felt conspicuously misplaced surrounded by such opulence, yet attired casually in jeans and open–neck shirt, with Fran beside me in a loose cotton sun frock, sandals and no stockings. We could dress to impress and look quite at home in surroundings like this when it pleased us, but creating an impression of having done well for ourselves was not consistent with today’s objectives. Today was about winning sympathy for the battler who survived years of deprivation and abuse.
George Smythe was a dapper little man with a quaint moustache and prominent bald patch in the middle of his scalp. His nose was too big for his face. Thick eyebrows hung low over tiny slits of suspicious eyes always demanding further explanation. His favourite word was ‘evidence’, and he prefaced every sentence addressed to Fran with ‘my dear lady’, which irritated me intensely.
“My dear lady, we shall need strong evidence to support a claim that your husband could not reasonably progress a complaint within the time limits provided by statute,” he said.
“And it isn’t enough that he had no access to information until very recently?”
“My dear lady, well of course that is relevant, but your husband may --- ” “With respect, Mr Smythe,” I interrupted, “the dear lady’s husband is in the room and you may speak to him directly.”
Fran kicked me under the table and made a face. We wanted this fellow to represent us pro bono or on a success fee basis. We should be trying to win his favours, not offend him.
“Quite right, Mr Wilson. I do apologise. It’s just that all my communication to date has been with your dear lady wife. And not all victims are articulate, let alone sufficiently confident to discuss the legal implications of their situation.”
“I’m not a victim, Mr Smythe,” I said, slapping the top of the glass table for emphasis. “I was wronged as a child and I believe under International Human Rights Law, which Australia has consented to recognise, I am entitled to reparation.”
“Quite right. Quite right, and I shall endeavour to see that it is paid. However, you must understand that the law presents considerable difficulties in cases like this, and the first is timing. We estimate that an application for dispensation to pursue your claim outside the usual time limits will cost $15,000. If you lose, you could face an order to pay the costs the State incurs to defend the application. They will engage the best lawyers available. Money is no object for the N.S.W. Government in matters such as this.”
A pasty–faced young woman in a tailored dark-grey pant suit entered just then and took orders for coffee and tea. Before taking her leave, she poured water from a pitcher on a glass–topped sideboard and set a filled glass in front of each of us.
“That’s sad,” Fran said, “That they will expend taxpayer dollars so freely to obstruct a fair hearing and deny someone justice.”
“My dear lady, you must realise that the issue here is precedent --- the avoidance of setting one, that is. There may be many care leavers who are eligible to file claims. This firm is currently considering representing more than 40. If the floodgates are opened via a successful case, the State may find itself responding to hundreds of claims. It could become very expensive.”
“I am not a ‘care leaver’, Mr Smythe,” I declared emphatically, “and I object to that terminology. I was a stolen white child.”
“But you were a child in care, Mr Wilson.”
“Hardly! At least not for the first four years of incarceration! I was deprived and abused. There was no ‘care’ involved!”
“That may well be, Mr Wilson, but you will need strong evidence to support any claim of damages.”
“I was snatched from a loving home because my father was never granted his entitlements after serving his country in a theatre of war --- losing his youth and his health imprisoned for three long years in a war prison. A callous welfare worker lied to prevent me being returned home four years later, in compliance with the original removal order which applied only until my 12th birthday. I was denied access to my family. I was denied my identity.”
“That’s quite shocking, I agree. Quite shocking, but I say again, my dear man, you will need evidence to support your claim.”
“I have evidence to support my claim that a welfare official lied, costing me my freedom for a further three years and the opportunity to follow a career path of my choosing. Surely you have seen the documents evidencing that lie, Mr Smythe?”
“And what evidence can you present of consequential damages? That is the key question. For example, have you had lasting health issues requiring ongoing medical care?”
I stared at him for a moment, struggling to comprehend. Prisoners didn’t need to evidence permanent health damage in order to be compensated for wrongful imprisonment. It was automatic. The damage was quite apparent.
“Can your doctor attest to a history of mental illness?”
I might have leapt across the table then and punched him, but for the soft knock on the door and the girl entering with a tray. She set a fine china cup down before each of us and a platter of biscuits in the centre of the table. She refilled Fran’s half–empty water glass and fetched neatly-folded paper serviettes from the sideboard to place beside our cups.
“I thought I made it clear, Mr Smythe,” I said, struggling to maintain an even tone. “I am not a victim. I was brought up to be resilient, a survivor. My father taught me never to let anyone or anything get the better of me.”
Smythe studied me thoughtfully for a minute, his bushy eyebrows descending even lower over his eyes so they seemed to almost disappear, and his forehead creasing with deep worry lines. He opened a file and closed it again without reading anything from it.
“Unfortunately, courts have little sympathy for survivors, Mr Wilson. We want to show that you endured a lifetime of suffering. Medical records attesting to mental illness, evidence of chronic alcoholism, broken marriages, disturbed children, violent outbursts --- criminal behaviour even --- these are the sorts of complaints that win public sympathy. But back to the first obstacle. Timing.”
“Yes, timing,” I said, stirring my coffee vigorously and raising my pitch. “It seems to me, Mr Smythe, that by obfuscating evidence for decades, the State escapes answering for its crimes. All one has to do, apparently, is ensure a victim of crime has no access to the proof of wrongdoing until the statute of limitations expires, and no matter how evil the deed, there can be no penalty and no redress.”
“You have to forgive my husband --- ” Fran began. I glared at her. I didn’t need her to make excuses for me, and I had no intention of apologising for my anger at such obvious injustice.
“My dear lady,” Smythe cut in, “I am quite accustomed to victims being resentful and angry, and, quite frankly, dear, I agree with your husband. The statute of limitations is, in this case, patently unfair. Not to extend the time limit is a denial of natural justice and I shall be arguing accordingly, but you need to understand the risks of embarking on this course. The fact that you and I --- and no doubt many citizens of this State --- may regard laws as unfair is irrelevant. It is still the law. We have to overcome the time obstacle and then we have to find a way to prove quantifiable damage --- damage to which the courts can attach a dollar value, damage the average citizen understands and sympathises with.”
I ate a biscuit, sipped my coffee and gazed out over the harbor at the rowboats, motorboats and big, luxury cruisers rocking gently with the waves lapping at their sides, and the sailboats with their sails billowing in the breeze. The Commissioner for Child Welfare would have sat in an office like this one, perhaps not quite so luxurious, but cosy in winter. He would have sat there signing children’s lives away and looking forward to taking his own children on weekend boat rides across the harbor while I washed pissy sheets in freezing water and suffered agonising chilblains, hunger pains, bruises and lesions from vicious beatings. And I had to not only evidence lasting damage, but I had to fight for the right to be heard at all, because the good Commissioner concealed evidence until long after the statute expired.
Smythe was still prattling on about the kind of disabilities that might prove I had suffered harm --- chronic unemployment, even having been charged with robbery or an act of violence, but being a loony was obviously the most compelling proof.
“Mr Smythe,” I said sourly, rising suddenly to leave before he finished his sentence, “Thank you for your time. I appreciate your offer of help, but it seems we are wasting our time. If reparation for wrongdoing is payable only to those who can evidence that they let the wrong destroy them, then I don’t qualify. It did me a great deal of harm. It deprived me of my identity and the right to choose my own destiny --- took away the right to be me. That caused me a lifetime of pain and suffering, but I would never let the bastards defeat me.”
~~~~
Ern Stanley, somewhat out of place --- and visibly uncomfortable --- attired in stiff blue jeans and starched chequered shirt, climbed into the passenger seat of the black Roller Ghost, flicked the air conditioner switch and settled back for a long ride.
Over the past months, he had listened for endless hours while I related parts of my story. We drank vodka and wine. We dined together. Ern took me home and introduced me to his wife and children. We went yachting on the harbour. Ern complimented my resilience, but never patronisingly. He met my brothers and sisters and conversed with them as equals, never condescending. We talked and poured over legal precedents until the small hours of the mornings.
Ern had contacted me three months earlier, having waited a respectable length of time after I had stormed from his partner’s office. After suffering George Smythe’s affront, I was hesitant to speak with Ern, but a deeply ingrained respect for the rules of courtesy required me to grant a reluctant and resentful hearing.
“Mr Wilson --- may I call you Paul, please?”
I didn’t answer, but Ern took my silence as consent.
“Paul, I have enormous respect for people who survive adversity as successfully as you did and it disturbs me that my partner may have been patronising and unhelpful.”
He paused. Cold silence. Let him sweat --- if that’s what he’s doing. But
Ern was remarkably at ease.
“I’d really like to help you, Paul. But more importantly, I’d like to know your full story.”
“Thank you for your interest, Mr Stanley,” I said, my voice iced with contempt, “but your partner made my position quite clear. I didn’t let my childhood turn me into a criminal or a hopeless drunk and I’m not insane. And if the ‘effluxion of time’ obstructs even entering a courtroom, then my case is hopeless. It’s been over 50 years. Most of those who might bear witness --- on either side --- are dead. And I survived.”
Ern was silent for a moment, and for an instant I thought perhaps the line had gone dead.
“The ‘effluxion of time’ is a challenge, but not insurmountable,” he said at last. “There are very good reasons why you could not instigate an action sooner and the State’s lawyers will have great difficulty arguing otherwise.”
“If I can stump up thousands to buy a hearing, and I’m prepared to risk paying the exorbitant costs the State’s fat-cat barristers will bill if I lose.”
“We can come to some arrangement. I won’t mislead you about the risks, but the obstacle presented by timing isn’t insurmountable and I’m willing to go out on a limb to get over that hurdle.”
“For what? If I need to show --- ”
“Would you indulge me, please. Let me get to know you, at least, and make my own assessments. There are many forms of damage. You don’t have to have been weak. There is often a high cost to being strong.”
“There was a high cost, all right! Every day of my life was a confused struggle. Still is. But I’m not sure I want to relive the saga, Mr Stanley. Just how much reminiscing would be needed for you to make your assessment? Would I have to see a shrink? Pretend to be a loony, maybe?”
Ern laughed. “I’m aware of your distrust of doctors, Paul. And no, pretence is neither necessary nor desirable. A psychologist’s report would be helpful, but it will attest to your strength and resilience, and to the fact that you are, quite clearly, perfectly sane and rational. What I seek is an understanding of the type and extent of pain and suffering you endured, both as a child and as an adult, as a consequence of the crimes committed against you, and any economic loss that resulted. Tell me, what kind of reparation do you think would be appropriate?”
“An Aborigine, allegedly ‘stolen’ and wrongly committed to foster care when his mother ‛forgot’ she had left a sick baby at a hospital six months earlier, was awarded $525,000 compensation. Compared to his claim --- ”
“That’s not a valid comparison. And there are no real precedents relating to care leavers claiming for abuse.”
“It’s a valid comparison, Mr Stanley.” “Call me Ern, please.”
“Thank you. Ern, I am not claiming for abuse, although I suffered it. My claim is that I was stolen... twice. I was taken from a good home with loving parents, disconnected from my roots and denied contact with my family. I lost my identity and subsequently the freedom to choose a career and my destiny. What’s that worth, do you think?”
“Three major criteria are considered in calculating reparation. First, any quantifiable expense or economic loss is considered, then there must be consideration of pain and suffering. And finally, judges consider negligence or wrongdoing.”
“There was plenty of pain and suffering, and the damage was quite clearly caused by wrongdoing. Lies, Ern. Blatant, outright lies. And negligence. Economic loss? I spent most of my life in shit jobs that paid peanuts, but we got by. Despite all the hardships and setbacks, we are better off now than many retirees, and I guess that would go heavily against me.”
“Hmmm,” he said, and was silent for a moment. “I can’t make assessments until I understand your case better. It’s a long, hard road and it will require you to relive your trauma. That can be therapeutic, I’m told, but I’m not the one risking more suffering. It has to be your decision.”
“And if I agree to proceed, how would we go forward. ”
Ern chuckled. “My methods are regarded as unconventional, to say the least, but I am thorough. After an initial interview session, to extract the critical information, I’d want to take a trip with you. ”
“A trip?”
“Down memory lane, but not just in the psychic sense. I want to get to know Paul Wilson, intimately --- explore the home you came from, meet your family maybe. I want you to take me back to where you were born and let me inside you to experience your thoughts and emotions while you relive your life.”
“What will that cost me?” I put a heavy emphasis on ‘that’.
“Nothing initially. If I proceed with your case, we’ll discuss costs. Your case might set the stage for actions by others. It could become a class action. If I don’t proceed, I’ll put the time spent on the trip down to an investment in knowledge and character building. ”
Nothing? An investment in character building? Please! The guy was born rich. He’s part of the system. What’s his real purpose?
“Let me sleep on your proposal, and talk to Fran. I’ll get back to you. ” “Please give it serious thought, Paul, and try to trust me. I know that’s a tall order, but I really am sincere. ”
#
Water–laden clouds blackened large expanses of grey sky and the wind cried and swept the town pavements clean of their litter the day Ern Stanley gathered up the voluminous legal file he had compiled over a month of journeying with me through time, and we drove through the gates of Dubbo airport. Later, Ern would remark that he came to associate the black day with the black story I told. Over a month of travel, listening and observation, I had forced him to confront, full force, the ugly side of the society that fed him, and it scarred him.
We had visited St Patrick’s, now a luxury resort. No evidence remained of little children labouring before dawn, washing pissy sheets by hand in freezing water, nor of the dark, dank dormitories where children struggled to tuck bedcovers in with perfect mitred corners, pulling covers tight enough to bounce a coin on. The dusty barren playground was gone, and there was no sign, either, of the worn scrubbing brush that was used to beat the devil out of evil urchins, nor of the sagging timber tank stand on which it had rested.
We visited the town school where I learnt to read and the bakery --- now run by the grandson of the man who had kindly saved ‘staffies’ for hungry waifs.
I ran on the football fields where I had triumphed, suffered the humiliation and terror of being caught stealing a pie, then rejoiced in the kindness and understanding of Father Joseph --- one of very few robe–wearing Catholics I had respected --- even come to love.
Ohio was now a magnificently restored National-Trust-classified heritage homestead, but the owners kindly allowed me to take Ern on a guided tour of the house and grounds. We stood for an hour in what was once the boot shed. I know Ern cried inside for the little boy who, laboriously welding bits of tyre rubber on to damaged leather soles day after day, had cherished dreams and aspirations that were so cruelly ground to dust.
We visited the site of the old Army Apprentice School at Balcombe, and walked the five miles to the beach on Mornington Peninsula. We walked through an old romni hut in a mini–camp now converted to a tourist site. I saw the folded linen and blankets stacked in perfect symmetry on the beds; the rows of stretchers lined against dark, windowless walls; and the long, open ablution blocks with not the smallest pretence of screening for privacy. Deep in my stomach, something turned. I was again wrapped in an icy shroud of dread, remembering the indescribable horror of returning --- after the comparative freedom of Ohio --- to total regimentation, constant verbal abuse and bullying, and soul–destroying boredom. I again smelt fear and remembered the unutterable agony of betrayal. I had let down my defences; trusted the Boss; even allowed myself to love him. And the Boss had repaid that love and trust by sending me to be incarcerated again, destroying all ambition and hope, shattering all my dreams.
I showed Ern the spot on the route to school where a hit on the head with a wooden pencil case started a pain that would never heal.
We walked over the property on which the shack my family called home once stood. I pointed to the place where the black car had parked the fateful day Simms drove me home, and to the place where my father laboured with the axe, glistening rivulets of sweat trickling over and between deep carved muscles. For a brief instant, I was a little boy again, trembling in expectation of the sting of my father’s belt across my buttocks. But I was spared that brief discomfort, and sentenced, instead, to seven years hard labour in a children’s prison and the loss of my freedom for life.
“It was just as the Aborigines describe it, ” Ern wrote in his notebook. “He was put in a black car and taken away from everything safe and familiar.”
“I was feral before they took me,” I said. “I was forced into sterile institutions, to wear uniforms and sleep in barracks, but I belonged in the bush, living off the land and in touch with nature.
“Aborigines talk of one’s ‘dreaming place’. You may never see it, but you will always long to return to it: the place of your conception; the world you were first born to. My dreaming place was the outback --- the ‘Never Never’ land of blazing suns and blistered red earth, breaking wild horses and herding cattle from waterhole to waterhole and sleeping in a swag under the stars. ”
Ern had convinced me to see a shrink. I was reluctant, but I consented. “The medical reports say you suffer from post–traumatic stress disorder,”
Ern said, perusing the report that labelled my condition. It reported alcohol abuse, employment issues, lack of confidence to set and pursue life goals, relationship difficulties, anger–management issues --- including periodic outbursts of violence --- and claimed inability to experience normal feelings and emotions.” My laugh --- when Ern read it out --- was tight with resentment. “Shrinks love labelling people, don’t they. So I’m PTSD, eh, like soldiers who witness horrific brutality in war zones?
“The smells!” I said then, suddenly conscious of the enormous power they had always held over me. “Men who live through the trauma of war are often haunted forever by memories triggered by the most seemingly insignificant sounds and odours. I used to condemn them for their weakness; regard them with contempt. Later I recognised that contempt as the reaction of a man intensely focused on fighting his own demons, and denying their ability to control him.”
A family of travellers shot us a curious glance as they pulled cases towards the terminal. My gaze followed them, granting Ern a moment to surreptitiously pull a handkerchief from his pocket, wipe his face and regain his composure.
“The memory of the smells never left me,” I continued. “The disinfectant and floor polish in dormitories. The kitchens, the ablutions blocks, sweaty young men. They controlled me. The institution controlled me. When I came out, I was lost --- so thoroughly desensitised that I didn’t know how to make a decision. For the rest of my life, the need to make a choice terrified me and I felt cold, nauseous and frightened for ages after. I expected whatever I sought to be snatched away, and I struggled to deny wanting and to prevent anyone from knowing what I longed for or what gave me pleasure.”
“How frequently do your senses cause you to relive the trauma, Paul?” Ern asked.
I shrugged. “Not often now. It started to reduce a year or so after I left the army, but every now and then something triggers a bad memory. Honestly, though,” I said, composing myself quickly, “It wasn’t childhood trauma that hurt me most. You relive the pain often, but you do get past it. The trauma ends and even while reliving it you can remind yourself it’s just a memory and it’s over. It was the ongoing persecution that did the real damage --- the withdrawal of freedom and denial of rights long after I ought to have been allowed to control my own destiny. Bureaucratic bungling and unfair dealings that seemed to go on without end, and my own endless confusion. Outwardly, I appeared capable, controlled and content, but I lived in a constant state of turmoil. When I suffered unfairness --- like the wrongful denial of retraining I was legally entitled to --- I hadn’t the knowledge, the perspective or the confidence to fight for my rights.”
I told Ern how vehemently I had hated the army and everything it stood for.
“Yet you wanted to go to Vietman?” Ern said. “There must have been a streak of patriotic fervour somewhere deep inside you?”
“No. I hadn’t the slightest inclination to contribute to the defence of a nation that sacrificed my father over something that was happening in Poland, and rewarded his sacrifice by condemning him and his children to a life of misery. Why would I? I wanted to go for money and adventure. If the truth be told, I suspect that’s what motivates most modern volunteer soldiers, and was the driving force behind the signatures of any Vietnam vets who weren’t conscripted.”
Ernest Stanley’s cash–register eyes tallied and popped when I told him how Robert Johnson had destroyed Tech Ventures, but I merely shook my head.
“If you took that matter on, you’d get a visit,” I said sourly. “Robert Johnson was connected. We were told it was incompetence, but then I did some digging of my own, and what I found was no surprise. Amcorp warned us. We should have run a mile when they mentioned Asian Mafia, but we were floating --- hovering somewhere between the top of the clouds and the end of the rainbow, blinded by the gleam of that elusive brass ring.”
“So much injustice!” Ern said.
“You know, I never really thought of it that way,” I replied. “At least not in relation to my childhood. I was often angry and depressed, but when I thought about it, it was with resignation. It’s just how it was. My lot. In many respects, I had a fortunate life. I didn’t go to war. I found a good woman to love, and she loves me. I’ve got great kids.
“It was that damned Apology that changed my attitude. So many benefits I was denied because I was white. And ultimately I was denied acknowledgement. My childhood never happened. I don’t even exist!”
Ern gawked at me. He’d obviously never thought about it that way. Positive discrimination seemed right and proper to the privileged.
“So much injustice,” Ern repeated, “but I’ve always seen it as my mission to address injustice. Mine and my fellow professionals. I’d like to believe we enjoy a measure of success in that endeavour.”
I laughed, a sharp, mocking laugh. “I’m sorry, Ernie. Really. But it’s such a ludicrous concept, isn’t it? You and your fellow professionals are players in a game --- a game in which power and money, not righteousness, determines who wins.”
“Economic reality is, unfortunately, a significant factor in determining whether or not justice is achievable, Paul,” he said, “but we strive hard to ensure that the righteous party prevails as often as possible.”
“Economic reality. Yes. That’s the justification, but the reality is it’s all just a game. And the winners don’t care who they persecute during the play,” I said, aware my tone was caustic.
“Then we shall play the game to win, my friend,” Ern said brightly.
“Win?” I snorted. “There is no win. My father sacrificed his life fighting evil and all he achieved was to prove that it’s a lost cause. The corrupt and evil will always prevail. The best men like me can ever hope for is to maybe occasionally put a small dent in their armour.”
Ern’s little indulgent smile was almost a sneer. “What you can hope for, my friend, is a generous award of compensation --- following a no doubt lengthy and immensely satisfying battle of wits that will give all on the legal teams on both sides a handsome feed.”
An implacable rattling voice in my head reminded me of the cynical warnings it had issued when I’d acceded to the lawyer’s request. I fought the inclination to feel betrayed, but I was dog-weary and aware that my eyes were accusing. Silence hung between us, heavy and awkward.
“So where do we go from here?” I asked at last.
“I go back to my office and compile my notes, and then I prepare and lodge a written claim. And then, my friend, the real journey begins.”
“Enjoy the adventure, then,” I replied, my tone still acrid. “I’ll try my best to enjoy mine.”
“What will you do, Paul?” Ern asked.
“With the money, if it eventuates?”
“No. With your life. It’s not yet over. You have a great deal of ability. A law suit is a distraction, not an ambition.”
“That racing system. I’ve finally fine–tuned it enough to implement it with confidence, and I have an idea for another invention I think I just might pursue. It’s taken longer than I planned, but I’ll get rich yet!”
Ern nodded. “Never give up. One day you may just catch that brass ring.”
I gave a cynical little chuckle. “Or maybe I’ll finally find some way to end the nightmare of confusion and just be me, whoever me may be.”
I smiled then, as a curious feeling of satisfaction and relief washed over me. “I got one thing right though, Ern. An achievement few can lay claim to in today’s world and certainly not too many waifs or urchins managed. It took a very long time, but I eventually learnt how to love and care. I made a success of marriage and raising kids. My dad once said the only thing we have control over, ultimately, is our attitude to life and the way we treat others. If he could see me today, I think he’d say I did OK. I’ve had a fortunate life despite all the setbacks. I never let the bastards break my spirit, and I did finally exact my revenge. The sweetest revenge of all: I lived a good life, in spite of all the condemnations and the efforts of so many to break me.”
I lifted my case from the boot and checked my watch. A small plane pelted down the runway, skidded, turned into the taxiway, and glided to a halt. Inside the terminal building, the loudspeaker crackled.
“They’ll be calling my flight shortly.” I swapped my case to my left hand and extended my right. “Drive safely, Ern.”
“I will if you return my keys,” Ern laughed.
I grinned and fished in my pocket. “Thanks for letting me drive. It’s a damn fine car,” I said, passing him the engraved silver ring.
The sleek black Roller Ghost slid out of the parking lot, swung on to the main road, and disappeared in a mist of grey and dust. Watching, I felt a familiar emptiness engulf me. A dull, hollow ache started low in my belly and worked its way slowly up to squeeze my chest, dry my mouth and make my forehead pulse.
Black Ghost leaving. Demons finally departing, or Paul once again deposited at the door of a new life, with all the fear, threats, challenges, heartaches, uncertainty and promise that encompassed?
Court rooms. Interrogation. Pompous arseholes in long white wigs slamming gavels to confirm declarations that rupture the fabric of a family’s reality, break spirits, kill souls. And Ern Stanley and his cronies, cash–register eyes popping and tallying, contemplating satisfying intellectual battles and fat pay cheques.
Endeavour, frustration, but the ever–enduring hope that, one day, if you play the odds right, that horse your hopes are riding on just might romp home. And what will you do then? Watch some game–playing arsehole exploit the system to take it all away from you, then pick yourself up and stake your hopes on another.
“It’s all bullshit, Dad,” I muttered aloud. “You just gotta enjoy the journey and be happy.”
#####