Free Nine Days by Toni Jordan Page B

and handballing. The fellow with the ball goes down under a pack and the ones on top of him can hardly breathe for laughing. Silly buggers.
    I take my coat off and fold it over my arm. There’s not a lick of breeze and not enough trees for everyone to stand under. On the side of the oval, one of the stalls has penny pies and there’s a crowd gathering, brought close by the smell. I feel in my pocket for some coins but it’s too hot for pies. I can hear the talk around me: shrill, about the war.
Just because nothing’s happening yet don’t mean it won’t
, says one.
Anything’d be better than hanging around here
, says another. Before Mr Menzies declared us to be behind England boots and all, it seemed men were squaring off: one lot for love of Empire, the other believing we should only fight our own battles. Now that’s all changed—or else the doubters are smart enough to keep their mouths shut.
    I can see both sides. I’m not like these boys who think it’s a jape, who are busting to go. I’ve seen death at close quarters. A stockman crushed against the rail of the holding yard byan unbroken horse. That shearer who drank himself blind on turps and walked into the fire, camp women dead in childbirth or kicked to death by husbands. I’ve listened to the sound of dry clods hitting a thin wooden box and I’ve seen the ever after coming for me, too. I’ve known that split second where everything stops and you think:
this is it.
There’s a scar on my forehead at the hairline where a pick-head flew off and nearly lifted my scalp. It’s only luck I’m still here.
    All the same I can see why young blokes are more excited than scared by the thought of war. That mob standing under the tree; they’re making plans to farewell mothers and fathers and girls. Nudging each other, laughing. I can see through their eyes the wonder in it, the thrill, pitting your luck against the horizon and never believing you could fall out the loser. Their big chance to see European stars.
    The short hairs at the back of my neck tell me there’s a bloke close behind me, maybe more than one. I don’t turn. Then I feel a jostle, the bump of a shoulder against my arm. Two old men, one behind the other. The front one mutters something. There are flecks of white spittle in his beard. His hair is plastered flat with sweat. You can’t find a pub open on a Sunday but I can smell his breath: malty and sour, old beer.
    ‘I said, “And you, boyo”.’ His voice is a low bellow. ‘Why are you still in civvies?’
    The men around me waiting for pies hush as he speaks.
    ‘Against the law, is it?’
    ‘Against my law,’ says the old timer. He puts his shoulders back and speaks like he’s doing me a favour at great personal expense. ‘I was at Pozières, young man.’
    If I had any sense I’d turn and head home. Instead I say, ‘And you’d wish that on another living soul.’
    The man behind him has wet eyes peering out of speckled white skin. ‘I’m half deaf, they say. I’ve been down the drill hall twice and they sent me home both times.’ He cups his ear for effect. ‘The question my old friend asked was: what’s the matter with you?’
    ‘He looks fit enough, doesn’t he?’ says the old timer. He walks around me in a circle. ‘Tall. Broad. Nothing wrong with him, I’d say.’
    ‘Strong as an ox and almost as smart,’ says the second man.
    If I had nothing to be ashamed of, I’d tell them about my parents getting older and worrying and how I have to help them. The look in my mother’s eyes when she hears about another boy from the neighbourhood signing up. That if I was going anywhere it’d be back out west to the station, back where I can breathe. I’d tell them I haven’t made up my mind to go. Not yet. But I say nothing.
    ‘First soldiers are already there. Saw it in the
Herald
,’ the first man says.
    ‘Perhaps you think you’re too good to go,’ says the other.
    ‘Perhaps I think my reasons are my