‘I told the committee we needed to appoint someone to sort the photos,’ Elsie said. ‘But will they do anything practical?’
‘These men who worked at Harkness Park,’ I said, ‘do they have family still here?’
‘Why don’t you just go out there and knock on the door?’ Elsie said. ‘It’s still in the family. Some cousin or something got it.’
‘They sold it. I’m interested in knowing what it was like twenty or thirty years ago.’
‘Col Harris’s boy’s here,’ the taller one said. ‘Dennis. Saw him a few weeks ago. Wife went off with the kids. Shouldn’t say that. He works for Deering’s. They’re building the big retirement village, y’know.’
I said thanks and had a look around the museum. It was like a meticulously arranged garage sale: nothing was of much value or of any great age, but assembling the collection had clearly given the organisers a lot of pleasure.
Finding the new retirement village wasn’t a problem. It was at an early stage, a paddock of wet, ravaged earth, concrete slabs and a few matchstick timber frames going up.
A man at the site hut pointed out Dennis Harris on one of the slabs, a big man in his forties with long hair, cutting studs to length with a dropsaw. At my approach, he switched it off and slid back his ear protectors. Dennis’s eyes said he didn’t think I was the man from Tattslotto.
‘Sorry to bother you,’ I said. ‘Ladies at the museum thought you could help me.’
‘Museum?’ Deep suspicion, stiff shoulders.
‘They said your father worked at Harkness Park. I’m trying to find old photos of the place.’
Dennis’s shoulders relaxed. He nodded. ‘There’s pictures in his old album. Lots. He used to work in the vegie garden when he was a young fella. Before the war. Huge. Wall around it. There was five gardeners there.’
We arranged to meet at the pub after knock-off. Dennis brought the album. ‘Take it and copy what you want,’ he said.
‘I could give you some kind of security for it,’ I said.
‘Nah. What kind of bloke pinches old photos? Just bring it back.’
I bought him a beer and we talked about building. Then I drove home and rang Stan.
‘Research,’ I said. ‘Paid for by the hour. I’ve got photographs from the 1930s.’
‘No you haven’t, lad,’ he said. ‘Not yet. Not enough hours.’
Ten minutes into the last quarter, it began to rain, freezing rain, driven into our faces by a wind that had passed over pack ice in its time. We only needed a kick to win but nobody could hold the ball, let alone get a boot to it. We were sliding around, falling over, trying to recognise our own side under the mudpacks. Mick Doolan was shouting instructions from the sideline but no-one paid any attention. We were completely knackered. Finally, close to time, we had some luck: a big bloke came out of the mist and broke Scotty Ewan’s nose with a vicious swing of the elbow. Even in the rain, you could hear the cartilage crunch. Scotty was helped off, streaming blood, and we got a penalty.
‘Take the kick, Mac,’ said Billy Garrett, the captain. He would normally take the kick in situations like this, but since the chance of putting it through was nil, he thought it best that I lose the game for Brockley.
‘Privilege,’ I said, spitting out some mud. ‘Count on my vote for skipper next year. Skipper.’
I was right in front of goal but the wind was lifting my upper lip. I looked around the field. There were about twenty spectators left, some of them dogs sitting in old utes.
‘Slab says you can’t do it,’ said the player closest to me. He was just another anonymous mudman but I knew the voice.
‘Very supportive, Flannery,’ I said. ‘You’re on, you little prick.’
Squinting against the rain, I took my run-up into the gale, scared that I was going to slip before I could even make the kick.
But I didn’t. I managed to give the ball a reasonable punt before my left leg went out under me. I hit the ground with my left shoulder and slid towards goal.
And as I lay in the cold black mud, the wind paused for a second or two and the ball went straight between the uprights.
The final whistle went. Victory. Victory in round eight of the second division of the Brockley and District League. I got up. My shoulder felt dislocated. ‘That’ll be a slab of Boag, Flannery,’ I said. ‘You fucking traitor.’
‘Brought out yer best,’ Flannery said. ‘Psychology. Read about it.’
I said, ‘Read about it? Psychology in Pictures. I didn’t know they’d done that.’
We staggered off in the direction of the corrugated-iron changing room. On the way, Billy Garrett joined us. ‘Pisseasy kick,’ he said.
‘That’s why you didn’t want it, Billy,’ I said. ‘Not enough challenge.’
After we’d wiped off the worst of the mud and changed, we drove the hundred metres to the Heart of Oak. Mick Doolan had about twenty beers lined up.
‘Magnificent, me boyos,’ he said. ‘Out of the textbook. And good to see you followin instructions, Flannery. Hasn’t always bin the case.’
‘Instructions?’ Flannery said. ‘I didn’t hear any instructions.’
The outside door opened and the big bloke who’d broken Scotty Ewan’s nose came in. Behind him were four or five of the other larger members of the Millthorpe side, just in case. He came over to Mick.
‘Bloke of yours all right?’ he said. ‘Didn’t intend him no harm. Sort of run into me arm.’ He looked down at his right forearm as if inquiring something of it.
‘Perfectly all right,’ Mick said. ‘Hazard of the game. Nothin modern medical science can’t handle. Won’t be out for more than three or four. Shout you fellas a beer?’
‘Thanks, no,’ the man said. ‘Be gettin back. Just didn’t want to go short of sayin me regrets.’
‘You’re a gentleman, Chilla,’ Mick said. ‘There’s not many would take the trouble.’
After they’d left, Flannery said, ‘There’s not many would have the fuckin front to come around here afterwards. Might as well’ve hit Scotty with an axe handle.’
‘Think positively,’ Mick said. ‘Some good in the worst tragedy. Got the penalty. And we won.’
‘Bloody won a lot easier if you’d play Lew,’ Billy Garrett said. ‘Be the only bloke under thirty in the side.’
I said, ‘Also the only bloke who can run more than five metres without stopping for a cough and a puke.’
Mick took a deep drink, wiped the foam from his lips, shook his head. ‘Don’t understand, do ya lads? Young fella’s pure gold. Do ya put your young classical piano player in a woodchoppin competition? Do ya risk your young golf talent on a frozen paddick with grown men, violent spudgrubbers and the like? Bloody no, that’s the answer. Boy’s goin to be a champion.’
‘Speakin of champions,’ said Flannery. ‘Reckon I’m givin away this runnin around in the mud on Satdee arvos, big fellas tryin to bump into me. All me joints achin.’ He scratched his impossibly dense curly dog hair. ‘Could be me last season.’
Mick’s eyes narrowed. He rubbed his small nose. ‘Last season? That so? Well, Flanners me boyo, get to the Grand Final, I’ll point out a coupla fellas ya can take into retirement with ya.’
I took the next shout. Then Vinnie came in from fighting with the cook and sent the beers around. Flannery’s younger brother came in with the lovely and twice-widowed Yvonne and shouted the room. Things were good in trucking. Other rounds followed. In due course, Mick broke into ‘The Rose of Tralee’ and Flannery’s voice, shockingly deep from the compact frame, joined him. The air warmed, thickened, became a brew of beer fumes, breath, tobacco smoke, cooking smells from the kitchen. The windows cried tears of condensation and my shoulder was healed of all pain. It was after ten, whole body in neutral, when I decided against another drink. I was saying my farewells when Mick put his head close to me and said, ‘Moc, other day. That Ned thing we were discussin. Met the fella today, works on the gate at Kinross Hall. Says Ned was there a coupla days before. Before he-y’know.’
I wandered out into the drizzle, cold night, black as Guinness, smell of deep and wet potato fields. The dog appeared and we found our way across the road. I stopped for a leak beside the sign that said Blacksmith, All Metalwork and Shoeing. Flannery had done it for me in pokerwork and it wasn’t going to get him a place in the Skills Olympics. Down the muddy lane the two of us went home, both happy to have a home. Homes are not easy to come by.