...16...

Just after my fourteenth birthday, my father got the sack from his job at the munitions factory. By then, my part in the war had also diminished, now that the American servicemen were leaving Sydney, and Bondi in particular, which had quickly reverted to its previous indolence. Sampson Collins was honest enough to admit to me that he had lost his job because he was finally caught spending so much time turning out souvenirs - he had widened his market by using the bottoms of shell casings for ashtrays; these, together with the hexagonal nut cigarette lighters and tiny whisky mugs (which I thought were pretty grouse) were enough to get him booted out. The supervisor told him, 'Over the bloody top, mate, not only you, Sam, the whole bloody night shift is doing it. But listen, Sam, under the Manpower Regulations, you've got to have a job.' 

    Sam told me this, at the same time putting a pound note in my hand and not actually mentioning my birthday. He did not seem worried. Together we walked to the top of the street to a phone box. I gave him the tuppence for the call. I squeezed into the box with him. He consulted a fat notebook, a relic of his days as a knight of the road, a notebook once a ready reference to ladies such as his current wife, Shirley Compton, and my hated stepmother.

    I heard the two pennies drop as the number connected.

    'Hullo, Morris? Is that you? Morris Stein?' said my father. I reckon if he didn't have to hold the earpiece he would have struck one of his postures with his hands thrust in his braces. As it was, he gave me the notebook to hold and stuck his thumb into his belt. 'Guess who this is, cobber?' A pause, then, 'It's Shmuelly from the Commercial Travellers' Club days - remember? You and me and the boys?'

    My father? Shmuelly? I curled up inside. But Sam took his thumb out of his belt and actually ruffled my hair. My father repeated this corruption of his name, this time with a note of exasperation. Then a smile broke out and he went on. 'Listen Morrie, the Manpower will get me if I don't get a job. They'll stick me any bloody where. You're flat out with the shmattes. How about I come and work for you?' His voice took on a whining note. 'All those orders for uniforms to get out. Put me in packing, Morrie, I don't care - day or night work.'

    I couldn't stand it. I pushed open the telephone box door and leaned against a pole, all the time watching my father's changing mannerisms inside the box. Finally he came out.

    'Howdja go, Dad?' I asked.

    'He'll take me on, son, but the dough is a fair bit less.' We walked back to 48 Francis Street, and all the while he was muttering about tough Yids and so on. I nearly laughed out loud. I had heard it all before: at school, in the streets, in shops. What else was new! 

    It was a Saturday. I was still wearing threadbare clothing, including sandshoes with my toes poking through; I hadn't changed from my early-morning job selling papers on the trams. Sam entered through the front door. Immediately I heard Shirley pounce on him.

    'Two bloody weeks and no money. How am I expected to feed you and the brat? Live on fresh air and love?' She corrected herself. 'And not bloody much of that either, thank Christ.'

    My father replied, 'Got a job, start Monday. Now will you for Chrissake get off my bloody back, and while you're at it, stop picking on Alan.'

    I could hardly believe it. In the entire few years of their marriage, this was the first time that he had come to my defence. I hugged myself with the thrill of it. I was nearly tempted to abandon my usual habit of skulking down the side passage and instead to mount the few steps to the verandah and go through the front door! Instead, I found my fingers tightening around the pound note. Bugger it, I assured myself, I had money, I had power now to . . . I didn't know quite what.

    I continued on down the side passage, quickly changed into my best pants, shirt and jumper, and a pair of sandals Sam had bought me at the insistence of the school. My two halfbrothers no longer lived at home. The stick insect, their grandmother, had died. With the proceeds from the sale of her Marrickville house, her daughter Shirley had packed the two small boys off to a Catholic boarding school at Bathurst. The idea was to give her a clear run with Abe Feldstein, whose enthusiasm for his shikse was beginning to wane. My father had the temerity to suggest that I be permitted to move into the house. He was still forced to sleep alone in one room and thought it might not be a bad idea for me to share. No and no, she made it very clear, the brat is not coming into this house.

    Togged up in my best clobber, the pound sticky in my fist, I entered the lending library, my very own bank. The place was its usual scene of depressing quiet, as mute and silent as the owner who sat hunched over the desk. If, instead of books, the stock had been fags or booze, I wondered whether I could have waltzed off with my schoolbag full of them.

    Under the yellowish desk lamp his thick-veined hand lay deathly still, holding open, like a sculpted paperweight, a book that looked and smelt new and would not lie flat and be subdued.

    'That's a big book,' I said in a silly effort to be noticed.

    'About blackfellas.'

    'I know about blackfellas,' I said.

    'Ever seen one of 'em - face to face? Not a bit like the pictures in your school geography book. Standing there with a spear or nulla-nulla gazing out at . . . at nothing.'

    He raised his eyes from the book he had imprisoned like a pinned butterfly. I grabbed the chance to tell him of the Aboriginal carvings in the sandstone on the plateau on the North Bondi headland. Having engaged him in a sort of conversation, I asked him what the book was. He released it from under his hand; the book sprang closed. Smart as paint, I read the title. We of the Never Never. On the cover was a middleaged lady wearing a floral hat and a blackfella child kneeling before her. Her name was something Gunn, I couldn't say the first name. Anyhow, since my experience with the Seventh-day Adventists and kneeling and all that . . . 

    'No, you can't borrow it.' No reason. Ah well, this was not the purpose of my visit. I took the pound note from my pocket and pinned it with my hand to the counter. 'Could I please have my tin?' Now he took notice of me, dressed neater than in my usual ratty clothes. His sharp eyes drilled into me. 'Done up like a dog's dinner, aren't you, and you've got another quid, Alan. You must be as rich as Croesus.' I kept quiet. He paused for an interminable moment, then felt under the counter and I heard the click of a switch. Somewhere under there a drawer slid out enough for him to reach in and bring out my tin moneybox. The thrill of avarice ran through me - and I hadn't even opened it. The (nameless) librarian, custodian of all I possessed, again with tantalising slowness, slid it across the desk. He withdrew his hand to resume pinning down the Never Never.

    The tin box had a lock but no key. This never worried me. I never kept a tally of what was in the box; I just liked the idea of seeing actual money rather than a figure in the Commonwealth Bank's savings book. Opening it in front of the librarian didn't worry me either; in any case, there was nowhere else to go - just shelves of books, not even a chair. He didn't encourage borrowers to sit around once they had selected a book or two but he did clear a small space for me on the desk. And moved the desk light to beam down on my tin box.

    I levered the lid up. I could not believe my eyes. It had been a while since I had looked in the box; sometimes when in a hurry I would dash into the library and leave him a handful of coins and notes - I just knew he'd add them to my tin. But the bloody tin was half full, even without counting . . . just by looking, I was dead sure there was more money than I had 'deposited'. In the cleared space on the desk and in the light of the lamp, I emptied the tin, letting the coins trickle out slowly and as quietly as I could. Next I folded the notes flat - all were ten- shilling and pound notes, and then . . . and then a fiver! I lifted it out gingerly and put it to one side, then the other notes in another little stack. Next I sorted out the halfpennies, pennies, threepenny bits, sixpences, shillings and two-bobs.

    The librarian took no notice of me at all - at least that's what I thought, but with those hooded eyes . . . Anyhow, as noiselessly as I could I put the coins into stacks, counting them as I did, then mentally adding them to a total. Fourteen pounds, nine shillings and tenpence-halfpenny. Now for the notes. Six orangecoloured ten-bob notes, seven dark-green pound notes and . . . my miraculous beautiful dark-blue five-pound note. Let's see, that comes to £29/9/10 - twenty-nine pounds, nine shillings and tenpence-halfpenny. Shit, oh shit, I nearly forgot - my father's pound note at the other end of the desk. I swept it into the pile and I had more than thirty bloody quid!

    Even at this moment of acquisitive greed, I had to be honest with myself; it was just not possible to have saved all that - if for no other reason, the mysterious presence in my tin box of a five-pound note had to be explained. I picked it up and put it on the page of We of the Never Never which the librarian was holding flat.

    'Mister,' I began nervously, 'how, how for gosh sake, did this get into my tin?'

    'Ask no questions and you'll be told no lies.' He removed the fiver from the page.

    'You put it there, didn't you?' I placed the fiver right under his nose. I felt hot tears starting to well up, a sensation I had managed to suppress for most of my young life. Now his eyes met mine for perhaps the first time ever. Was I mistaken or was there a moist film over them? He took out a handkerchief, passed it over his eyes and pulled the desk lamp back beside him. He was not going to answer me. I was dying to have him ask me what I was going to do with all this wealth. Instead, he found a little calico moneybag and held it open for me to sweep the money into it. I did this and pulled the drawstring tight. He put the tin back in the drawer. End of matter. Finished. Piss off, Alan.

....    ....

I did not know how to cope with this bag of money. It hung from my wrist as I left the lending library, and with every step it seemed to grow heavier. What was more, I found to my dismay that the bag had printed on it the emblem of the Commonwealth Bank of Australia. Straight away I took it off my wrist and stuffed it inside my shirt. I dared not bend down because the weight of the coins nearly burst my shirt buttons. I walked up Bondi Road, bent over like some decrepit old man. I wanted to stop and look in the shop windows, to let my fingers wander over the merchandise. There were toy shops with things I had at one time longed for, such as a Meccano donkey engine that steamed and whistled, a magic set with a wand held aloft by Mandrake the Magician while Narda (whose allure made my crotch tingle) looked up at him adoringly. A cutout figure of Don Bradman holding a cricket set did not tempt me.

    What did tempt me was a very large beach towel with the emblem of the Bondi Surf Bathers' Life Saving Club on it. I straightened up and entered the shop. I would fool nobody into thinking I was a lifesaver - me, a skinny bignosed Jewboy with the first layer of sunburnt skin already peeling off me. But right then I wanted that towel more than anything else in the world, and certainly more than anything in the shop. For years I had taken to the beach a rag-thin scrap of towel not fit to dry a dog. Now I could see myself wrapped in the luxurious folds of this wondrous towel, the club emblem falling casually across my shoulders. I would then walk from one end of the beach to the other, enveloped in it so nobody could actually see my narrow chest and matchstick arms and legs.

    'Yeah?'

    'Please show me that towel,' I touched it as it hung on a shop model. 'Please get it down for me.'

    'Can't have that one, sonny Jim. It's for display only.' He was a very big man with tight grey curls, and built, as one of my old gang would say, 'like a brick shithouse'. He turned to leave me. I tapped him on the arm. He spun around. The moneybag thumped against my ribs. 'Please can you get me one I want to buy one I have the money.' It came out in a rush.

    'Well, bugger me,' he grinned, 'you've got chutzpah, sonny Jim.' He stroked his chin. 'You're a Yiddisher boy if I'm not mistaken.'

    He turned and went into the stockroom at the rear, returning with my towel. He went behind the counter with it. Again, with the assurance of a man with money, I asked him to open it up. A bit reluctantly he took it out of its cellophane envelope and shook it open. I almost grabbed it with excitement and draped it over my shoulders. Mandrake's cape had nothing on it to compare with the magic of this towel. I was transformed into I don't know what but it felt simply marvellous.

    The salesman was looking curiously at me. He came around to my side of the counter and bent down to stare into my face. 'Now I know,' he said, 'now I know who you are. Of course, I've seen you around here before. You're poor Alva's boy, aren't you.'

    What could I say? Bloody nothing. I was fearful of not getting my towel. The genial giant went on. 'I'm your dad's second cousin, Arthur Symonds. This is my shop. You're Alan, if I'm not mistaken. Lost track of you after poor Alva died. It was your idiot father who messed things up. Half the family wanted to take you in, raise you, all that sort of thing. But no, mister know-it-bloody-better Sam put you into those bloody homes. Well, we all just washed our hands of the whole business.'

    He must have stored this away for all . . . well, for all these years. He continued to shake his head and mumble, 'Alva's boy, would you believe it?' The towel was still around my shoulders. I gripped it tightly. 'Mr Symonds,' I said as firmly as I could manage, 'can I still buy this towel . . . please?'

    Ever so gently he removed it from my shoulders, folded it in its original creases and put it back in the bag. He examined the price tag and leaned across the counter. His toned changed. 'Now, young Alan Alva Collins - yes, I know a bit about you - you know what this towel sells for? Nineteen and eleven, that's what I would normally sell it for, but for you, as you're family,' he drew breath, 'only fifteen bob - always assuming you've got the means to pay.'

    What did I know about family? Not much when you add it up. My Aunt Enid, a long-dead Aunt Fanny stretched out in her wooden box, a few bestforgotten others. I didn't count my father's numerous wives as family. Yet I felt I could trust 'Uncle' Arthur Symonds. Don't ask me why. In front of him, I unbuttoned my shirt and took out the Commonwealth Bank savings bag. He watched me closely but did not speak. I put my hand in the bag and felt around, trying with my fingers to extract the right amount. It would not work. I put the bag on his counter, loosened the drawstring until I could actually see inside. I could now extract a tenbob note, two twobob coins and one shilling coin. Total: fifteen shillings.

    'My God, you are a chip off the old block, Alan, thanks.' He scooped up the money and fed it into a huge National cash register that rang up the money with a loud ring of its bell. Next, he tore a long sheet of a brown paper off a roll and expertly wrapped up my towel. Then string went around it and a loop to carry it.

    'What are you going to do with all that money, Alan?' Arthur Symonds asked kindly. I felt a ninny stuffing the bag back under my shirt. I truthfully did not know what to do. Fancy having money being a problem! I shook my head in reply. 'Dunno, Mr Symonds, what do you reckon?'

    'Call me Uncle Arthur, why don't you?'

    Was this because of my bag of money, I wondered. Does suddenly being 'rich' bring new worries, even new relatives? The need to respond was put aside by the shop door being filled by the portly figure of Gertie Rosen's dad, with his most divine, gorgeous, devastatingly beautiful daughter close behind. As the two of them moved down the store, Uncle Arthur shook hands with Harry Rosen and uttered the all-encompassing Yiddish word for 'how are you, what's new', etc. etc. - "NU?"

    I stood there dumbfounded, hugging my package to my already bulging chest. Arthur Symonds said, 'Harry, this lad is my, er, my nephew I suppose, anyhow it's Alan Collins, you remember? Poor Alva's boy?'

    Harry looked me up and down, took the cigar from his lips and nodded. 'I think Gertie's met him once or twice.'

    The divine Gertie shook her head in mild annoyance, firmly correcting her father. 'Now Daddy, please try and remember, it's Trudy, alright?' She turned her full attention then to me and in melting tones, still with the faintest trill of her little girl's voice, 'How are you, Alan? Still living in Francis Street?' Before I could answer, she asked me what I had bought.

    Arthur stepped in. 'Well, he's just gone and bought the most expensive towel I've got in the shop, that's what ' and paid for it himself.'

    Gertie smiled sweetly. I pointed at the towel on the shop model. 'It's like that one there.'

    'Lovely,' she said, 'just what a nice boy like you needs, being so keen on the beach and all that.'

    Oh, I'm a nice boy, am I? Was this a verbal pat on the head or was I whatever a nice boy should be? Now and again I suppose I was a nice boy, like when I helped Mrs Gelman with her vegies and when I was riding on the plough on Jack Bayswaite's potato farm. But, oh so lovely Gertie (or Trudy) standing there in a flouncy blue floral dress, you don't know the half of it. Let me tell you of how I stole fruit from the Dagos' shops or sometimes gave short change selling papers on the tram at six in the morning and cheating Yanks while you, divine Trudy, were snug between soft snowy sheets. And beautiful girl, while you are dining off real china plates I am standing at a copper washtub eating scrag-end meat from an enamel dish. Do you have an indoor dunny at your home on Dover Heights? Do any of the nice boys you know sleep with their heads against a dunny door, their feet against a wash-house door? Do they have to fold up their camp stretchers two or three times a night to let their parents go for a pee?

    Dear Trudy! We had both lived our childhood in Bondi, the centre of Jewish life in Sydney, and except for a year or two when we both attended Bondi Beach Public School, our paths could never cross. Without a word, we sidled off to a corner of the shop, partially hidden by the life-size cutout of Don Bradman. The intervening years seemed to fall away. I put my parcel on the floor, stood close to her and reached out for her hands. She did not object. I leaned towards her. The bag of money fell forward and bumped her chest. I tried to retrieve it and, in doing so, caught hold of her breasts. She remained demurely calm while my heart, in truth the whole of me for the merest instant, did not seem a part of me. I straightened up.

    She put her hand on my shirtfront. 'What have you got there, Alan?'

    'It's my money,' I said hoarsely. 'It's my savings, it's all I've got - Trudy.'

    'That's OK, Alan, my daddy sometimes does that when he's carrying too much money at the races.'

    Holy shit, would you bloody well believe it? Harry Rosen, bookmaker, carried his dough around his neck? There and then, I unbuttoned my shirt and took the bag from around mine. I dropped it at my feet, took Trudy's hands once more and pulled her to me and kissed her. All she said was, 'Well, Alan, it's been a long time since we snuggled up on the back seat of Daddy's car.'

    Uncle Arthur was wrapping up something for Harry Rosen. Trudy nonchalantly sauntered over to her father. When the purchase was handed to him, the two of them walked to the door. Trudy paused a moment, turned and fluttered her fingers at me. 'Bye now, Alan, hope we meet again ' soon.'

    If she said anything else, it was swallowed up by the rich click of the car door closing on them and the purr of the Buick as it pulled away from the kerb.