Dirt Music by Tim Winton Page B

The old man wouldn’t speak of it but the stiffness that came over his father’s body at the mention of the name said plenty.
    Fox can’t help but think of Jimmy Buckridge at school, his brooding presence at recess. He was untouchable; his word was law, but some days he turned up with unexplained grazes and once or twice a shiner even. Still you’d never pity him—even if you could feel such an emotion you wouldn’t dare admit it, not even to yourself. There was something frightening about him, something spoiled in his nature. Poisoned was the old man’s verdict, but he never would elaborate.
    He remembers best a single boyhood day on the White Point jetty.
    Jimmy Buckridge when he must have been eleven years old. One of the big kids, it seemed to him then, and a townie as well, out to impress the visiting city girls with feats of cruelty. Stomping blowfish, ripping the jaws from live trumpeters. Fox remembers looking on, coiling his own handline with an absentminded intensity while the finale unfolded. A live boxfish, harmless and silly-looking, about the size of a softball, was shoved beneath the back wheel of the idling depot truck. The spray of gore, the laughter. And then some brave mother who’d seen it from the beach striding up to give the Buckridge kid a high mouthful in front of the entire holiday assembly. Later, while she was back on the beach attending to her toddlers the boy tipped whale oil through the open window of her car. King of the kids, Big Jim even then.
    Back at the house the dog is already panting on the step and it leaps against him for comfort, as though the whole day has been a confounding of routine. Fox sits a moment to ruffle its ears and consider that he’s well out of it if Georgie goes back to Jim Buckridge and puts the whole episode behind her.
    She’s impulsive, sure, but smart too. She knows which way the wind is blowing. They’re both better off letting it go. But the entire business has rocked him. He cannot believe the ludicrous hopes he’s entertained these past few hours. In her presence he was all over the place; it was a kind of madness.
    While the night deepens he lets the dog mug up to him, licking his hands and face for all it’s worth. He’s too disgusted with himself even to bother pushing it off and eventually the dog grows bored and slopes off under the house.
    Georgie knew within the first half-hour that neither the vodkas nor the ten milligrams of Temazepam would get her over the edge tonight. She felt mind and body holding sleep at bay. The anxiety reminded her of those nights in Jeddah when she was afraid to sleep lest she dream once more of Mrs Jubail stalking her down the hospital corridors. The nightmare pursued her from Saudi Arabia and on to the States, to Indonesia and home to Australia.
    For a long time at White Point she thought she’d shaken it off but it had reprised itself of late. She recognized the creeping sense of dread. She thought of how epileptics and vertigo sufferers could feel episodes approaching. That’s how she felt tonight with Jim Buckridge lying so still and quiet beside her.
    His breathing was too reserved. He was feigning sleep.
    She didn’t dare move. She understood what it took during 124 the lobster season to keep him awake after midnight. So why not just front him with it? Why lie there pretending alongside him?
    Unless he really was asleep. But that stillness felt like restraint. And somehow that holding back, the force of it—it unnerved her.
    Georgie considered how little money she had saved. She thought of working again. Of the boys. That house out in the bleached paddocks. The hire car. The towing fee. The hotel bill. The things she’d miss.
    At four-thirty Jim sighed and rolled out of bed. She half expected him to say something. Lying there doggo she thought he lingered a moment before padding into the bathroom. She wished she’d said something, told herself it wasn’t too late, but she let him dress and make his