Free Camouflage by Murray Bail Page A

heard his voice, solemn and stiff as if these were to be the last words to his wife.
    â€˜You’re not even sorry you’re going,’ she had cried the night before.
    Now at the moment of departure something already felt missing. At the same time, everything around him—including himself—felt too ordinary. Surely at a moment like this everything should have been different. Turning, he kept giving little waves with his pianist’s fingers. Already he was almost having a good time.
    At the barracks he was told to stand to attention out in the sun with some other men. Later there was a second, more leisurely inspection where he had to stand in a line, naked. Then an exceptionally thin officer seated at a trestle table, whom Banerjee recognised as his local bank manager, asked some brief questions.
    Banerjee’s qualifications were not impressive. The officer sighed, as if the war was now well and truly lost, and taking a match winced as he dug around inside his ear. With some disappointment Banerjee thought he might be let off—sent home. But the officer reached for a rubber stamp. Because of his occupation, ‘piano-tuner’, Banerjee was placed with a small group in the shade, to one side. These were artists, as well as a lecturer in English who sat on the ground clasping his knees, a picture-framer, a librarian as deaf as a post, a signwriter who did shop windows, and others too overweight or too something to hold a rifle.
    Over the next few days they marched backwards and forwards, working on drill. They were shown how to look after equipment and when to salute. Nothing much more. A week had barely gone by when the order came to report to the railway station, immediately. It was late afternoon. Lugging their gear they sauntered behind a silver-haired man who appeared to be a leader. As Banerjee hummed a tune he wondered if they should have been in step. From a passing truck soldiers whistled and laughed at them.
    â€˜I don’t have a clue where we’re heading.’
    â€˜Search me,’ said the signwriter.
    Banerjee took a cigarette offered, though he never really smoked.
    Every seat was taken with soldiers. Most were young, barely twenty, but actually looked like soldiers. Tanned, tired-looking faces in worn uniforms. They played cards or sprawled about in greatcoats. A few gazed out the window, even after it was dark. A few tried writing letters. Some shouted out in their sleep. The motion of the long train and the absence of a known destination gave the impression they were travelling endlessly, while at the same time remaining in the one spot. To Banerjee, the feeling of leaving an old life and heading towards a new unknown life became blurry. A voice asked, ‘What day are we?’ Later another, ‘Has anyone got the time?’
    All that night, the following day and the next they travelled slowly, with frequent stops, up the centre of Australia. They were heading towards the fighting. The further north they went the more they stopped in daylight, waiting for hours on end. On the third day the train remained motionless all afternoon, creaking in the heat, and they saw nothing through the windows but low grey bush, a few worn hills in the distance.
    A young soldier spoke for the first time. ‘As far as I’m concerned the Japs can have it.’
    The horizon remained. Nothing moved. And the low horizon may have spread the melancholy among them. Banerjee tried to picture his street, his front fence and house, the appearance of his wife. Their daughter was growing up while he waited in the train. The other men had fallen silent, some nodding off.
    The train stopped. It creaked forward, stopped again. In the dark a sergeant came through, shouting his head off.
    It was Banerjee’s group which was told to fall in outside.
    The cold and unevenness of the ground alongside the train had them stumbling and swearing. They herded together, hands in greatcoats, and