Free Coda by Thea Astley Page B

swivel skull to the smallest breeze, gazing appetently up and down the coastline, seeking new empires.
    â€˜Smashing, isn’t it!’ Brain said. ‘Unfortunately I’ve run out of money. I had intended a restaurant.’
    â€˜Restaurant?’
    â€˜Sure. Stairs up each leg, lavatories at theflies—suitable, hey?—dining room at the paunch and a revolving lookout in the skull. Say cocktail bar, huh, where all the brain damage occurs. Nothing like a metaphor. It’s a nice idea, isn’t it?’
    â€˜I think you’re bloody mad,’ the shire engineer said. ‘Get it down.’
    â€˜Hey, wait a minute,’ Brain protested. ‘It’s a statue. It’s not a dwelling. It’s not a restaurant. Not yet. There’s nothing in the by-laws about erecting a statue. It’s beautification of my land, mate.’
    Rage transmuted the shire engineer’s face into a clone of the one swivelling above them. Congested fury made him goggle. For a minute Brain thought he was speaking faster than sound.
    â€˜You’ll hear more about this. There’ll be a council ’dozer up as soon as I can organise one. That’s if you don’t get busy yourself. The thing’s caused traffic snarls, near accidents. Just look down there now. Can’t you see what it’s doing?’ There were indeed five cars parked below on the highway with excited families clambering up the road margin. ‘It’s a bloody public hazard.’
    He stumped off down the slope to his car, now wedged between a bus and a truck. Japanese cameras clicked crazily as he approached.
    Brain smiled. Already reporters had beenup to take shots and run stories in the local press. He liked to think of Shamrock’s and Len’s outrage when the Brisbane papers took it up. May they choke on their croissants! he hoped. He could hear the cough-splutter of tortured windpipes. It was a good likeness. Len could hardly fail to recognise his horrible self.
    Brain grew high on wild sensations of pride. Flair, that’s what it was. Flair.
    His tragedy was a multiplicity of small talents.
    â€˜Hey!’ Chaps said that week, on one of his brief visits home for money. ‘Some kook has built a bloody great statue thing on the Cook Highway.’
    â€˜What of?’ Bosie was waggling her finger-nails to dry them. She appeared to be clawing air.
    â€˜Well, it’s a guy in a snappy safari suit. Looks like Uncle Len, actually.’
    â€˜Len?’
    â€˜Yeah. Got those bloodshot eyes. Shifty. You know how the Unk looks when you ask him anything. Guess it’s a kind of libel. Doesn’t look like a tribute.’
    Attemptingindifference his father asked carelessly, ‘Did you go right up?’
    â€˜Couldn’t get a park. There were two buses and half a dozen cars pulled in. I slowed right down, though. It’s a gas!’
    â€˜My!’ Brain laid down the paper and reached for the coffee pot, savouring the scent as he refilled his cup, savouring the prospect of a relaxed afternoon by the pool. ‘Causing a stir, is it? Maybe some civic-minded grateful member of Len’s electorate decided it was time for public thanks.’
    Chaps rubbed his freckles thoughtfully. ‘It’s certainly causing a stir. Everyone up in Port was talking about it. Maybe some hippy whacko freaked out.’
    Bosie and Brain had been playing happy families: Mother, Bimbo and Chaps, all up for Mother’s yearly visit. Bimbo had looked in only for a couple of nights on his way to Darwin. Chaps, who was leaving the next morning, could think only of that long run down the coast in a beat-up Holden that badly needed an overhaul. He judged, nicely gauging his father’s pleased smirk about something or other, that it was time to put in the nips.
    â€˜What the hell do you do with your allowance? What about those casual jobs you’re always telling us you’ve got?’ Brain