Out of solitary Bodgie kept away from doing any stupid things. No matter how many flagstones he had to scrub and scrape he would do it without a murmur. Alone in his cell, sad that he had lost all of his remission days he calculated and recalculated his release date. It would fall on his eighteenth birthday when he would pass from being a juvenile into adulthood. His childhood was just about over and he had to think seriously about what would happen to him outside. His Mum had nothing but the blues and Steady Eddy changed into Fast Eddy had gone as had the two girls. What to do; what to do, and he began a comparative English course. It kept him occupied and he even scribbled songs more hillbilly than rock’n’roll; but that was how he felt.
Tommy flashed a last grin out of his freckled dial as he was led out for release. They had promised to meet outside but had not named a place or a time. If it happened it happened. Now Bodgie was without a close friend. Kev and Keith Holliway although they put out that they were brothers but were really cousins hit eighteen together. They opted for the native yard. Yarram hung about for only a few more days before he was released. Only Dennis and Bodgie were left. No other juveniles were sentenced to prison. Mr. Cousins was ordered to put the two in the First Division yard filled with first timers. They were no longer alone. Bodgie even began playing hand tennis and became good at it.
Then one day, a fortnight before his birthday and release he was marched to the administrative section and placed in a room before a group of people including a fair haired and light complexioned energetic woman in her late thirties. She immediately introduced herself as Mrs Doreen Trainer. She even thrust a hand towards him. Bodgie didn’t know what to make of it. He went on guard. A man indicated a seat and he sat. The woman asked him how his studies were going. He replied, ‘Fine,’ and left it at that. A man who looked like a parson of some protestant sect enquired if he was intending to continue studying when released. Bodgie hadn’t given it a thought, but said, ‘yes.’ He wasn’t giving anything away. They or one of them asked him if he was an Aboriginal. He replied that his father had been an American. They left it at that going on to tell him that they were a welfare group formed to help young men in need. They were interviewing him to see what they might do for him. The parson asked Bodgie what plans he had after his release. Bodgie couldn’t reply. He hadn’t any idea about what to do. Doreen Trainer spoke for him. She said that it was the most natural thing in the world that young men in his position didn’t know what to do with their lives. Bodgie listened and said not a word. He had thought about what to do on release; but it depressed him so much he fell into the Valley of Despond. He remembered the trouble he had adjusting to the outside after he had been thrust out from Clontarf. Would it be the same again? His heart quaked. He didn’t want to spend most of his time that is time after time, sentence after sentence in prison; but how to avoid that. How to?
His release day was only a few days ahead. He had heard nothing further from the welfare group then he was escorted to meet them again. He still didn’t know what he was going to do. Check on his Mum, he supposed. Bodgie was more communicative this time because he was more desperate. He needed help, but who were these people? He asked them if they were a religious group. They were and they weren’t. They had come together as Christians, though undenominational, Mrs Doreen Trainer informed him, to aid and help, to proffer a helping hand to young Aboriginal men who were in danger of losing their way.
‘But my father was an American,’ Bodgie protested.
‘Of course,’ Mrs. Trainer replied with a smile, ‘but he is no longer here and we are extending a helping hand. Do you wish to take it?’
‘Yes,’ he declared, knowing he really had to.
The group began discussing his future as if he wasn’t in the room. They called up two opinions. The first was to send him North to become a stockman, which appealed to him because he had once wanted to become a cowboy. The second was to send him to the Eastern States where he could continue his studies. He leaped at this because he could find Fast Eddy and join the Saints. They also favoured this latter option. He listened as they worked out his future. They were in contact with the Aboriginal Advancement League in Melbourne, Victoria and with them had formed a policy to send youngsters in trouble in Perth there so that they might get away from any bad influences and begin afresh.
With his future settled, they looked at Bodgie and asked if he would like to leave Perth for Melbourne?
‘Yes, yes,’ Bodgie said unable to stop a wide grin forming over his lips. ‘Thank you, thank you, I want to go,’ he said happily.