Time's Long Ruin Read Online Free Page A

asks them to wind down their window.
    â€˜Excuse me, sir,’ he says, ‘according to Railways regulations, vehicles are required to stop until the gates are fully open.’
    â€˜I realise that.’
    â€˜I also have the power to take licence numbers and report them to the police.’
    â€˜Just open the gate.’
    â€˜Understood?’
    I crossed from Elizabeth Street and went and sat with Con in his gatehouse. I balanced on a broken stool and he poured me a hot, black coffee. Then I took out my notebook and asked, ‘Anything to report?’
    â€˜One,’ he replied, holding up a finger.
    I took out a pencil and wrote down the licence number. ‘And what did he do?’ I asked.
    Con shook his head. ‘He went through as I was closing the gates. You make sure you tell your dad.’
    â€˜I will. He’ll pass it on to Traffic.’
    â€˜Good.’ And then he winked, and I wondered why.
    I sipped my coffee as he told me about his gout and more trouble with the neighbours over his healing tree. Then he moved on to his village (as he always did) – goats, blue cheese and weddings in the village square. When he paused to look across the tracks, to remember, I asked, ‘Why did you leave?
    His face lit up. ‘Why did I leave? Well . . .’
    And he was off again, repeating the same stuff I’d heard a hundred times, stopping only to check his timetable, comb his hair, close the gates and take a piss on the side of a plane tree. Returning, sitting, saying, ‘Henry, have you ever been so hungry you’d eat grass?’
    â€˜No.’
    â€˜Or trapped rats to make stew?’
    â€˜Never.’
    â€˜If you could find a rat. That’s what it was like during the war, and after. But we were the smart ones, we knew when it was time to get out.’
    A hot, steamy Sunday morning. Gathering their few possessions, putting on a suit and tie (and Rosa in her very best marmalade-coloured frock) and catching an overcrowded bus to town. Getting off – by now smelling of fertiliser, chickens and second-hand body odour – and spending too much money on a taxi to the docks. But being rewarded when they saw their ship. As big as an iceberg. Smelling of eucalyptus and freshly mowed lawn. Packed full of a thousand others like them: people who could see the future.
    â€˜I’m writing a letter to my brother,’ Con said.
    Still herding sheep on the sides of rocky mountains.
    â€˜I’ve told him about you.’
    My face lit up. ‘Really?’
    Con produced the letter from under his crossword and a half-eaten apple. He smoothed it flat and started to read, ‘“Henry Page is our local policeman. He is nine years old – ”’
    â€˜Nearly,’ I corrected.
    â€˜He won’t know; “and already running things. He wears a proper uniform and sometimes carries a stick. Henry has brown eyes, just like Alex, and a small mouth with turned-down lips that only say sensible things. He has Alex’s nose and a dozen or so freckles scattered under his eyes like dried tears. He has hair this colour – ”’
    Con took a pair of scissors and cut a strand of hair from my head. Then he took a pot of glue and stuck it down on the letter. He used his thumb to wipe off the excess glue and then kept reading. ‘“And tall. Not so tall as Alex, but by then Alex was nearly ten.”’
    This was when his son died, in 1942. Alex Pedavoli, the only son of Con and Rosa Pedavoli. The tall, goat-herding, soccer-playing hope of their lives. Alex Pedavoli, the real reason, I’ve always supposed, Con and Rosa came to Australia. Still, who’s to say? Olive-skinned Alex, smiling down at them from a dozen different picture frames, posed with school books he never bothered reading . . . Alex, now living in the healing tree in Con and Rosa’s front yard.
    Con folded the letter, placed it in his top pocket and sighed. Then