Affection, p.6
Affection, page 6
The man was carrying a medical bag and tottered down the gangway towards us.
I’d been nervous about the reception the doctor would get in Townsville and seeing Jefferis Turner again, his stature, I was certain now that he would be quickly crushed.
Except for the white suit he was exactly as I remembered: small and dapper. His slight build hardly tipped the scales in the doctors’ favour.
As Mayor McCreedy had said, they were a tough breed in the North. They were quick to note any weakness in Southerners. The man seemed unsteady as he negotiated the moving gangway and McCreedy appeared to swell as the Government doctor approached.
He was the centre of everyone’s attention now; even the other passengers watched as he stepped off the gangway as if off a Brisbane tram.
Humphry in front of me went to step forward, but the Mayor in one long stride beat him, reaching out a practised hand.
‘Doctor Turner? A. E. McCreedy. I’m the Mayor. Good of you to come.’
I caught the ‘fank you’. I saw McCreedy’s face now and it was beaming, and Bacot was staring with his mouth open. My God, I thought, Turner was light-weight, English middle class, bookish, with a speech impediment; the antithesis of the northern male.
The Mayor eclipsed the doctor as he stepped forward, causing the rest of the party to move forward and surround him. For a moment I fancied they’d eaten him.
I heard McCreedy introduce the others. I could just see the top of Turner’s oddly large head.
‘And where is Dr Row?’ I heard him say.
‘Who?’ said McCreedy.
Humphry looked around, saw me, and stepped aside.
‘Here I am,’ I said.
I took the hand that Turner extended between Bacot and Humphry. ‘I never expected such a crowd.’ Cwowd.
Bacot, I swear, sniggered.
Turner smiled at me as if we were old friends. In his eyes I saw a confidence no doubt naïve and dangerously misplaced.
I said I was glad to see him again. I wished I’d meant it.
Alderman Willmett, as chairman of the Epidemic Board and a gentleman, asked Turner if his trip was comfortable and Turner told him it was, but for the last leg from Rockhampton, which was ‘wuff, vewy wuff, but jolly good fun’.
I stood back and Turner vanished again among the black suits. The other passengers were now coming down the gangway and the Mayor was gesturing at the locomotive, one of the train’s carriages having been especially organised for the dignitaries. I heard Turner from within the scrum assure him he shouldn’t have bovvered, but the Mayor wouldn’t hear of anything but the best for a respected medico and escorted the doctor to the carriage.
Humphry fell back beside me as we moved off.
‘We’ve been sold a pup.’
‘Why do you say that?’ I said.
‘Weally?’ mocked Humphry. ‘Come on. You didn’t tell me he was a jockey.’
I saw Turner walking between McCreedy and Bacot. ‘He’s no jockey.’ I supposed he didn’t look like the man who could fight our battles. ‘He’s the Brisbane featherweight boxing champion. Took my title.’
‘Ha!’ said Humphry. The train whistle blew. ‘Wonder if they have beer and sandwiches.’
We stopped by the carriage.
‘I brought my Carbine.’
‘You know, Lin, when you say that, I look around for your gun or your horse.’
‘It’s only a mile back to town. Seems silly to take a train.’
‘Nothing’s too silly for the Government’s bacteriologist, apparently.’
I left them and walked back to my bicycle with mixed feelings about Turner’s arrival.
I’d just put my foot on the pedal when I heard a shout. Our chairman Willmett was waving me over. I wheeled my bicycle back to the train.
‘Dr Turner was wondering where you’d got to,’ he said as I came nearer. Turner’s head without the helmet appeared from a window.
‘I have my bicycle,’ I said.
‘Bwing it on board and wide back with us,’ said Turner.
I could see Humphry through a window waving a sandwich. I reluctantly wheeled the bicycle over to the wooden foot step. There was no platform at the wharf, so with the help of a fellow who was apparently the conductor I lifted the bicycle aboard, Willmett climbed behind me, and the train moved off.
The solid figure of the Mayor sat opposite Turner, making the little doctor appear even smaller on his seat. Willmett squeezed next to the Mayor. McCreedy began asking Turner if he’d been north before. Turner said he was sorry to say he hadn’t but he’d been jolly well looking forward to it. He was watching the townscape unfold through the carriage window.
It seemed extravagant to have the short trip catered, but the council had put silver platters of beef sandwiches on board and Humphry passed one to me. Turner had two, and the conductor came with tea.
‘Do you have coffee?’ said Turner. The man went away.
McCreedy and Willmett kept exchanging glances, having difficulty comparing the man they had in front of them with the one they’d been told to expect.
Willmett had a go at the weather. ‘Heat’s gone now, so that’s a good thing.’
‘I’m afraid that won’t help you at all,’ said Turner. He was looking out the window at the tents and iron shanties beside the spur that linked the wharves to the town.
‘Won’t it?’
‘The plague bacillus isn’t bothered one way or the other about the weather,’ said Turner. Some grubby-faced children appeared and ran beside the train. I saw undergarments hanging on a wire strung over a dusty yard, a drunk leaning against the rusty side of a tin shack.
‘Of course, you know,’ said Turner, not taking his eyes off the scene now, ‘it’s the rats we have to watch. They’ll start wandering around in search of food in cooler weather.’
There were piles of rubbish beside the track, and some of them were smouldering. I caught a glimpse of children playing cricket in a dusty lane with kerosene-tin wickets.
‘I wouldn’t take too much comfort in the weather,’ said Turner again. All the carriage windows were closed, and Turner stood to open his. He had trouble getting it to budge.
‘Don’t do that,’ said McCreedy, putting out his hand, but the window suddenly shot up with a bang and Turner put his head outside. A fetid smoke from burning rubbish and cooking fires filled the carriage. I saw a dog carcass in a drain.
McCreedy leaned forward and put a hand on the window. ‘With the drought and everything, men have been arriving in town in droves. You know the type.’
Turner shut the window and sat down again. ‘Disease loves poverty.’
‘Eh?’ said the Mayor. ‘Is that so? Well, what we need are projects, you follow me? Get these coves working. Railway lines, that sort of thing. It’s the patriotic thing to do. And, as you say, disease prevention.’
Willmett was frowning and I suspected the Mayor didn’t have complete support for all of his private projects.
‘This is fun,’ said Humphry in the uncomfortable silence. ‘We should do this more often.’
The train rumbled over the Ross Creek railway bridge and as we were approaching the station Turner leaned into the aisle and asked Humphry and me about the Cintra passengers.
‘Still quarantined,’ said Humphry.
‘And the man who is sick?’ said Turner.
‘Oh, he’s recovered,’ McCreedy cut in, ‘fully recovered.’
‘Splendid.’
‘Yes, we think it may not have been plague after all,’ said the Mayor, shooting a savage glance at Humphry.
‘Really?’ said Turner. Weally? ‘Why do you think that?’
‘Well, because the man’s recovered. Dr Routh’s our man on the island and he thinks it was just a bout of typhoid.’
‘Rot,’ said Humphry.
McCreedy glared. ‘Well, it was Dr Humphry who diagnosed plague in the first place so I suppose he has every right to defend his position.’
‘I’m not taking a position,’ said Humphry. ‘The man has plague. It’s a fact, not a matter of opinion.’
Turner looked to McCreedy, who rolled his eyes.
Turner said, ‘I can only go on the advice of the district medical officer over this, but I’ll keep an open mind. Until I see all the facts for myself.’
‘Of course,’ said McCreedy. ‘Only right, I’m not saying otherwise. Just saying what the West Point medical superintendent reports.’
‘West Point?’
‘That’s the quarantine station they’re at. Magnetic Island.’
‘An island? And how far is that?’
‘About six miles,’ said Humphry. ‘Across the bay.’
‘And is this the preferred place for a plague hospital?’ said Turner.
Dr Bacot leaned forward from his seat behind McCreedy and Willmett. ‘It hasn’t come to that yet. We won’t be needing a plague hospital.’ He nodded to himself and sat back, folding his arms.
‘Well,’ said Turner, ‘I can’t imagine an island’s the best place to put people who are sick.’
The Mayor grinned and leaned forward. ‘My thoughts exactly. Exactly.’ He slapped Turner on the knee and sat back, nodding. ‘Completely inappropriate. That’s what I told the Premier. You just can’t incarcerate people on an island willy-nilly. Thank you, Dr Turner.’
The train rolled slowly into the station and shuddered.
‘Well,’ said Turner. ‘The most important thing now I think is for me to examine the patient as soon as possible.’
Humphry stood and said, ‘Whenever you’re ready.’
‘This afternoon,’ said Turner.
‘Not sure I can arrange the launch by then.’
‘Tomorrow morning.’
‘Difficult.’
‘I see. How do you get to the island in an emergency?’
‘There’s never been an emergency.’
Turner stared at Humphry for a while. ‘I’m sure someone can arrange transport.’
‘All right,’ said Humphry. ‘I’ll see what I can do.’
‘Tomorrow morning,’ said Turner, firmly.
Humphry nodded.
‘Jolly good,’ said Turner, and he stood. We all filed out of the carriage on to the platform.
As I collected my bicycle, Humphry whispered to me, ‘You know what they call him in Brisbane, don’t you?’ Actually, I did. ‘Gentle Annie. I thought it might have been a joke, like calling a big man Tiny.’
Humphry then started whistling the tune ‘Gentle Annie’. He stopped.
‘McCreedy thinks he’ll have this fop of an English doctor around his finger soon. I’m not so sure.’
I didn’t say anything.
Outside in the full sun, small eddies of dust and paper played across the drive at the railway station’s entrance. McCreedy was bustling Turner into his own buggy, almost grabbing the doctor by the arm. Dr Bacot and Alderman Willmett found a hansom cab and were negotiating who should get in first. I left Humphry standing at the bottom of the station steps and walked my bicycle around the traffic.
It was Turner who called out. ‘Where are you off to now, Dr Row?’
‘Back to my office.’
‘Good. I’ll meet you there. There are matters I’d like to discuss.’
‘But we have a lunch organised for you now,’ said McCreedy.
‘Even better. A good chance for Dr Row, Dr Humphry and me to brief each other,’ said Turner.
I saw behind him the cab roll by, the faces of Willmett and Bacot looking out at us.
McCreedy said, ‘I believe Dr Humphry might have other matters to attend to.’
‘My lunch date cancelled.’
‘Oh, all right then.’
I followed the dust from McCreedy’s buggy. It was only a short distance down the main street to the Town Hall. Humphry, who found himself without a lift, said he’d walk. His tuneful whistling faded behind me.
I waited in my office for Humphry and we went together to the Mayor’s chambers, where McCreedy had invited his peers and the aldermen to a reception for Turner. Humphry and I, uninvited, stood at the door. Men were standing around in small stiff groups.
‘Let’s go,’ said Humphry, and he started to turn away, but I saw Turner, who waved.
‘There are beer bottles on that table,’ I said, and Humphry followed me in.
The mayoral suite was panelled with cedar. Red velvet drapes were drawn over what would have been large windows opening on to a balcony overlooking the street. McCreedy always kept them drawn against the heat and dust, so even in the day the room had to be lit by gaslight. The furniture was dark and heavy, as were the unsmiling portraits of four previous mayors. McCreedy’s own face hung behind the mayoral desk so that when he conducted interviews, the effect was like being interrogated by large twin uncles.
Men stood around with drinks and it would have been all very civilised if a dog fight hadn’t then started up in the street below.
‘I hope to Christ we missed the speeches,’ said Humphry.
Turner seemed even smaller in the large room of large men. I saw McCreedy offer him a whisky and Turner shake his head, and with that I knew he’d failed the last test of northerly manhood. Bacot was hunched with some aldermen near the table of food, looking furious and hungry.
Turner might as well be bleeding in a pool of sharks.
Willmett came up with a tray of tropical fruit and Turner took a banana.
Humphry had veered towards the table of bottles. Willmett offered me some fruit and I thanked him but shook my head, and he wandered off.
‘It’s good to see you again,’ said Turner.
‘Yes.’
‘Under better circumstances this time.’
I nodded. They could hardly have been worse.
‘Your wife?’
I nodded again but said nothing.
He looked around the room. ‘You and Dr Humphry have created a bit of a kerfuffle.’
‘Have we?’
‘Incarcerating two Members of Parliament. One of them a former Premier, no less. And three ministers of religion. You’ve made quite a few people uneasy.’
‘Well, the man had plague,’ I said.
‘Quite.’
Humphry came over with two glasses of beer.
‘I was just telling Dr Row that you’ve both done an excellent job so far,’ said Turner, shaking his head at the glass Humphry offered.
‘The Board of Health even mentioned it to me in a letter,’ he continued, patting his breast pockets. ‘I have it here somewhere.’
‘Really?’
‘It’s what we’d hope from our medical officers along the Queensland coast. Unfortunately, not all of them are as thorough.’
‘That’s true,’ said Humphry.
‘Ships are going to and from ports without check now. Local councils are thumbing their noses at Brisbane. Well, that’s hardly news, I suppose. Anyway, it will be a disaster.’ Turner finished his banana and looked for a place to put the skin. I held out my hand. ‘Thank you. Of course, as you know Townsville is especially vulnerable, being in the tropics, with its port and…how many people live here?’
‘Seventeen thousand,’ said Humphry. ‘Not counting blacks, of course. About twenty thousand in the gold fields.’
‘That many? Anyway, it appears you’ve made Townsville a shining example of disease prevention. So. Well done.’ He reached out and shook our hands again.
I felt the suspicious gaze of men from all corners of the room. I saw McCreedy look away.
‘There are still a few problems,’ I said.
‘That’s why I’m here.’
Many of the aldermen were openly smirking. I had the impression they’d made up their minds about this little man and had already dismissed him. He was a southern intruder who had no business in the North anyway. When they came up to shake his hand, there was a patronising politeness. Enjoying the weather? Not too hot? Best avoid the Commercial Hotel.
Between these introductions, I told Turner about the problems we had arranging quarantine. Supplies had been slow in coming. There’d been a backlash from some doctors and many local authorities.
I then told him about the Mayor’s request to free Dawson for the Bowen railway hearings.
‘Did he? Preposterous,’ blurted Humphry.
‘Keep your voice down.’
‘What did you tell him?’ said Turner.
‘I said I’d put it to you. He’s the Mayor.’
‘It’s simple. Anyone who tries to break quarantine will be arrested,’ said Humphry. ‘You can tell the fool that,’ and he shot a tight smile at the Mayor who was looking at us.
‘Keep it down,’ I told Humphry. ‘The man’s just asking.’
‘Just asking! Do you know why he’s just asking?’
I had to admit I didn’t.
‘Sleepers,’ said Humphry. ‘Railway sleepers. From McCreedy’s sawmills. I suppose he wants the contract for the Bowen line.’
I was wary of Humphry, the natural cynic.
‘Nothing to do with northern development. It’s business,’ Humphry was saying, looking pleased with himself as the implications occurred to him. ‘So Dawson wasn’t just whinging. When’s that hearing?’
‘Late next week. Several days before quarantine ends.’
‘Well, well. It seems incarcerating Dawson’s really put the wind up them. I’m beginning to think this plague is the Almighty’s punishment on the wicked.’
Turner said, ‘Whatever the reason, if there’s one thing we can’t do it’s compromise the regulations. Once we start making exceptions, laws become useless and civilisation is in peril.’
‘Right. I’ll get us something to eat,’ said Humphry, happy with his theory.
Would the Mayor of Townsville really jeopardise the city for personal gain? McCreedy prided himself on ‘doing the right thing’. I wasn’t sure.
Humphry returned with sandwiches, took one and pulled apart the two slices of bread to inspect the meat.
‘I’m tired of sandwiches,’ he said then. ‘Can’t we do anything else with this stuff?’
