Shit it was funny and I laughed along with the little blackfella and even bought him a beer for the entertainment. I couldn’t believe what had happened but it really served the big bloke right. Ever since then I’ve carried a baseball bat in my Toyota and I call it “Big Brother”!
‘I enjoyed my stay in Port Hedland. I shacked up with an Aboriginal girl called Joanna Kelly and lived with the local blackfellas. I had my Customline and I felt pretty flash as I carted my extended family around. When I wasn’t working I’d go out hunting with the blackfellas. I’d shoot scrub turkeys and they’d spear turtles. Joanna’s brother David Kelly was an expert with a spear and we always ate well.
‘I was beginning to feel like a normal person. It had now been twelve months since I’d sneaked out of South Australia and I hadn’t been in trouble with the police. It felt good. I’d been in Port Hedland for about three months, and while it had been a very pleasurable stay, there was lots of country still to see.’
Roy spotted his workers moving amongst the trees.
‘Chop up tomorrow’s crab bait and fill up the boxes,’ he yelled. ‘Get it done now before you get stoned, you useless pricks,’ he added. All movement ceased and then they changed direction to head begrudgingly towards the crab shed.
‘They only understand one thing,’ Roy grumbled as he shook his head. ‘Abuse. Without that I’d get nothing done.’
That night had a party atmosphere with the family there. Anne took over the kitchen with lenice. al an and I cracked a beer. Roy had his usual lemon squash and Kimberley ran amok trying to get some attention amongst all the animated talk.
When I got them all on track I heard that during the ‘60s and ‘70s Roy was really a lost soul. A smattering of six years schooling wasn’t likely to give him a wide choice of career paths. Like the majority of lads of that time he could only expect to be a labourer. But he always had big ideas for himself. He could be a good worker if he wanted to be. He was strong, shrewd in a lot of respects, street smart and a survivor. All he had to do was find his niche. He had to keep looking.
‘I said my goodbyes to my girlfriend Joanna and my new found mates and headed for Broome,’ Roy reminisced as he settled back in his ever complaining chair. ‘The road was just a dirt track and I had a bit of a problem near Anna Plains, just above where Sandfire Roadhouse is these days. I came over a crest and there were a heap of cattle lying half asleep in the middle of the track. I saw them a bit late and they didn’t see me at all. The next thing I knew I’d hit one. As I ploughed into their bedroom I did a fair bit of damage to the first cow and also to my beautiful Customline. I have been known to react before I put my brain into gear and this time was no exception. I grabbed my rifle and shot the wounded cow. But I was still mad … so I shot three more!
When the gunsmoke cleared I thought, ‘ Shit! What have I done? ‘ Thinking quickly, I grabbed an old axe from the boot and broke a couple of legs of each dead animal with the back of the axe. The next vehicle that came along, perhaps the owner of the cattle, would think what a kind chap I was putting these poor, suffering animals out of their misery. With a clear conscience I limped on towards Broome.
‘Ah, Broome in the ‘60s,’ Roy sighed. ‘What an idyllic place. There again, when I went back on that trip in ‘76, I couldn’t believe it. I bought myself a handline and some bait and went out on the Broome jetty. There were hundreds of tourists there with cameras around their necks. I threw the bait over the edge followed by my line and never went back. It wasn’t the Broome that I remembered. I was sure disillusioned. That’s why I love where I live these days. Peace.
‘Broome then was a beautiful multicultural town. There were whitefellas, blackfellas, Chinese, Japanese, Malay and mixtures of some or all of them. Everyone did their own thing and everybody got on. They all had their own customs and tucker and I loved it because it was laid back and you could get away with almost anything. I remember going to a Chinese joint one day with two bob and winning twenty pounds on kudja kudja. That’s their version of dominos. I didn’t know much about it. I just put my money where someone who was winning put his.
‘When I was first in Broome my best clothes were a pair of leopard skin underpants. They weren’t real leopard skin of course – just the pattern. Being a lair, I wore them around the streets and shops and in the pub. They really got the girls in. They looked like bathers and became my trademark. Naturally I didn’t work in them. They were just my best going out clobber. No-one cared. That was the old Broome.
‘Joanna was back in Port Hedland and I’d been hooking up with black girls for a while. In fact I never had a white girl after I left South Australia. This is something I’ve been completely comfortable with all my life. When I got to the Top End it became almost compulsory. I remember many years later when Annie here asked me the reason why I loved black girls, she looked shocked when I said it was because you never saw the varicose veins on the backs of their legs.’
‘You’ve always been hopeless, you big log,’ Anne grinned lovingly at her brother.
‘I couldn’t think of any other excuse,’ Roy laughed. ‘The real reason is probably because the young ones are plentiful and pretty. Anyway, over the years no white woman would have put up with me.
‘While I was in Broome I lived with the Aborigines again. It just seemed to be the natural thing to do. I teamed up with a girl by the name of Angie James. We eventually had the first child that I ever knew about. A girl called Josephine. I haven’t seen her for years but she always rings up every few months to see how I’m going. She’s a lovely girl. Must take after her mother!
‘I started working on the wharf in Broome and that was a good lurk. It’s strange that I could never take a job at face value. There always had to be an angle. It was a typical wharf situation where anything that wasn’t nailed down, and a few things that were, would get knocked off on a regular basis. This was my sort of job. The State boats delivered everything for the town the same as they did at Derby because there were no road deliveries. The roads were a joke so no-one in their right mind would take a truck up there on a regular basis. Anyway, the boats were quicker. I’d be down in the hold loading freight into slings and other blokes would swing the load up onto the wharf. You worked for half an hour and had twenty minutes off. It was a shame to take the money!
‘Because I always worked on the “give me an inch I’ll take a mile” theory, it wasn’t long before I went overboard with the pilfering and got the sack. The local businesses smelt a rat when half their order didn’t turn up on a regular basis. It didn’t take them long to find the rat.
‘After that I got a job as a yardman in a Broome pub. That worked out okay because one of my jobs was to mop the bar out at 5am. The pub used to sell little flat bottles of rum. I’d lift a few and smuggle them out past the boss in the mop bucket full of dirty water. I’d water it down and make two bottles to flog to the blackfellas for a huge profit. Well, it was 100% profit!
‘Later on in my Broome days I’d go to the pub and buy a flagon of plonk. Then I’d find some empty bottles and make six bottles – half plonk and half water. The blackfellas were happy to pay a quid a bottle for my brew and I survived like that for quite a while. My Broome days were from 1960 until the end of 1963. I know that because I’ve got “Angie 63” tattooed on my leg. I’m a walking calendar.
‘Before we had the baby, Angie and I were living in a tent and when I won my kudja kudja money I bought an old kerosene fridge to go in it. I thought I was a king.
