floodtide by judy nunn sample chapter

Floodtide

Floodtide

Four men. One unbreakable friendship.Forged in the mighty Iron Ore State.

Floodtide is the story of Mike, Spud, Pembo and Murray,and the friendship that binds them over four memorable

decades in Western Australia.

The prosperous 1950s when childhood is idyllic in the small cityof Perth . . . The turbulent 60s of free love and war . . . The avaricious 70s when WA’s mineral boom breeds a new kind of entrepreneur . . .

The corrupt 80s, when greedy politicians and powerful businessmen bring the state to its knees . . .

Each of the four has a story to tell. An environmentalist fi ghtsto save the beautiful Pilbara coast from the mining conglomerates;

a Vietnam veteran rises above crippling injuries to discover an extraordinary talent; and an ambitious geologist joins a hard-core

businessman to lead the growth of Perth from a sleepy townto a glittering citadel of skyscrapers.

But, as the 1990s ushers in a new age, all four are caught up in the irreversible tides of change — and actions must be answered for . . .

Floodtide is a character-driven, merciless rush of blood from the pen of Judy Nunn, one of Australia’s master storytellers.

‘An honest portrait of a place, peopling it with fascinating, fl awed characters . . . A stunning blockbuster’

Woman’s Day

Over the wrought-iron table and the

bloodied newspaper and fi sh guts, they

toasted each other. ‘Mates forever,’ they said.

Cover photograph © Photolibrary/Chris Garnett

Cover design by Blue Cork

FICTION9 781864 712476

ISBN 978-1-86471-247-6

www.randomhouse.com.au

THE AUSTRALIAN BESTSELLER

Copyright © Judy Nunn 2007. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

In loving memory of my father, Bob Nunn,(1908–1978)

This is a work of fiction. All central characters are fictional, and any resemblance to actual persons is entirely coincidental. In order to provide the story with a context, real names of places are used as well as some significant historical events. A number of high-profile people, such as Brian Burke, Laurie Connell and Alan Bond, are also referred to, but there is no suggestion that the events described concerning the fictional characters ever actually happened.

An Arrow bookPublished by Random House Australia Pty LtdLevel 3, 100 Pacific Highway, North Sydney NSW 2060www.randomhouse.com.au

First published by Random House Australia 2007This Arrow edition published in 2008, 2011

Copyright © Judy Nunn 2007

The moral right of the author has been asserted.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted by any person or entity, including internet search engines or retailers, in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying (except under the statutory exceptions provisions of the Australian Copyright Act 1968), recording, scanning or by any information storage and retrieval system without the prior written permission of Random House Australia.

Addresses for companies within the Random House Group can be found at www.randomhouse.com.au/offices

National Library of AustraliaCataloguing-in-Publication Entry

Nunn, Judy. Floodtide / Judy Nunn.

ISBN 978 1 86471 247 6 (pbk)

Western Australia – History – 20th century – Fiction.

A823.3

Map by Caroline BowieTypeset by Midland Typesetters, AustraliaPrinted in Australia by Griffin Press, an accredited ISO AS/NZS 14001:2004 Environmental Management System printer

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The paper this book is printed on is certified against theForest Stewardship Council® Standards. Griffin Press holdsFSC chain of custody certification SGS-COC-005088. FSCpromotes environmentally responsible, socially beneficialand economically viable management of the world’s forests.

Floodtide.indd 6 5/8/11 3:48:23 PM


C H A P T E R O N E

Young Michael McAllister could swim before hecould walk. At least that was his mother’s claim.‘He just crawled into the river one day and started

swimming,’ Maggie would say. ‘He was barely a year old.’Three years later, Mike’s baby sister, Julie, followed his

lead. Literally. Baby Jools crawled across the sand into theriver and dogpaddled out to her brother.

It wasn’t really that extraordinary. Their father, Jim, wasa boating man and a prodigious swimmer himself. Hischildren, like many youngsters brought up by the banks ofthe river, were born to the water, and throughout the yearsof their childhood the river would continue to serve as anever-ending playground.

For hours, Mike and Jools and their mates would chuckbombies off the end of the jetty, or hurl tennis ballswith all their might out into the river and try to reachthem before Baxter, the McAllisters’ two-year-old blackLabrador, beat them to it. It was some time before they metwith success – Baxter was an obsessive ball-chaser and apowerful swimmer. There were also the repeated attemptsto break the record of eight aboard the inflated tractor-tyreinner tube, an exercise that met with no success at all. But



as the children grew older, Baxter would concede defeat,the tractor tube would be replaced by dinghies and sailingboats, and the competition would begin in earnest.

The McAllister home, a rambling old colonial house,fronted on to Victoria Avenue and sloped down the hillto Freshwater Bay, with Claremont jetty to its right and,further along the beach, the old Claremont swimmingbaths to its left.

Built in the latter part of the nineteenth century, duringthe early development of the area, the house had seenbetter days, but it had a ramshackle elegance. Deceptive indesign, it appeared from the street to be a single-storeybungalow with surrounding verandahs, but steps at therear led from the balcony, which overlooked the river, toa below-stairs area that had once been the ‘batman’squarters’. The original owner had been a military man.The ‘batman’s quarters’ now housed mainly storage spacealong with a large playroom, Jim’s extensive workshopand a laundry.

The house’s sprawling back garden was abundant withfruit trees and grape vines, and a large vegetable plotyielded corn, tomatoes, beans or peas according to theseason. Beyond the garden was a flat grassy area with anopen boatshed where the dinghy and tackle was stored, andbeyond the boatshed was the Swan River where, fifty yardsfrom shore, Jim’s modest twenty-four-foot yacht, Alana,named after his mother, rested peacefully on her mooring.

It was a comfortable home that offered a comfortablelifestyle. Perth was a sleepy town in the fifties, and therewere many such homes along the banks of the river, pro-viding an idyllic childhood for those like Mike and Jools.

On hot summer nights Mike and his best mate, SpudFarrell, who was in the same class at school, would trawlfor prawns. They wore old sandshoes to protect them-selves from cobbler stings, and Spud’s brother Billy, twoyears younger, carried a hurricane lamp. Wooden poles

24 F L O O D T I D E

over their shoulders, Mike and Spud would drag thetwenty-foot funnel of netting behind them, while Billy ledthe way, the lamplight attracting the prawns to the net andwarning the boys of snags up ahead. Relentlessly, theytrawled between the jetty and the baths; it was hard workbut rewarding. Each time they returned to the beach Joolswould be jumping up and down excitedly, Baxter by herside letting out the odd bark, both of them eager for thethrilling moment when the contents would be spilled fromthe net’s pocket onto the sand and the prawns would jumpand glitter, pink-eyed, in the light of the lamp.

Jools was always allocated ‘guard duty’. She wasn’tstrong enough to haul the net and too young to be trustedwith the lamp, but Mike had assured her of the importanceof her role. ‘Someone could come along and nick ourcatch,’ he told her, and so, during their absence, sheparaded the beach like a diminutive pig-tailed sergeantmajor. Upon the boys’ return, she and Baxter had atendency to get over-excited and Mike had to constantlywarn her, as they sifted through the weed and gobblegutsand other small fish, to keep Baxter away and to be waryof cobblers. The stings of even the smallest cobblers occa-sionally caught in the net were shockingly painful.

The boys would boil up the prawns in the laundry’s oldcopper, and after they’d feasted there was always an amplesupply for both the McAllister and Farrell households.Mike invariably gave Spud the lion’s share though – therewere five Farrell kids so it seemed only fair.

The old copper came in for a great deal of use. The bluemanna crabs that Mike and Jools caught at dusk in theirwitch’s-hat drop nets off the end of Claremont jetty endedup in the copper. So did the mussels they dived for duringthe baking hot afternoons of midsummer, when otherswere indoors beside fans praying for the arrival of theFremantle Doctor – the welcome afternoon breeze thatcame in from the sea.

J U D Y N U N N 25



as the children grew older, Baxter would concede defeat,the tractor tube would be replaced by dinghies and sailingboats, and the competition would begin in earnest.

The McAllister home, a rambling old colonial house,fronted on to Victoria Avenue and sloped down the hillto Freshwater Bay, with Claremont jetty to its right and,further along the beach, the old Claremont swimmingbaths to its left.

Built in the latter part of the nineteenth century, duringthe early development of the area, the house had seenbetter days, but it had a ramshackle elegance. Deceptive indesign, it appeared from the street to be a single-storeybungalow with surrounding verandahs, but steps at therear led from the balcony, which overlooked the river, toa below-stairs area that had once been the ‘batman’squarters’. The original owner had been a military man.The ‘batman’s quarters’ now housed mainly storage spacealong with a large playroom, Jim’s extensive workshopand a laundry.

The house’s sprawling back garden was abundant withfruit trees and grape vines, and a large vegetable plotyielded corn, tomatoes, beans or peas according to theseason. Beyond the garden was a flat grassy area with anopen boatshed where the dinghy and tackle was stored, andbeyond the boatshed was the Swan River where, fifty yardsfrom shore, Jim’s modest twenty-four-foot yacht, Alana,named after his mother, rested peacefully on her mooring.

It was a comfortable home that offered a comfortablelifestyle. Perth was a sleepy town in the fifties, and therewere many such homes along the banks of the river, pro-viding an idyllic childhood for those like Mike and Jools.

On hot summer nights Mike and his best mate, SpudFarrell, who was in the same class at school, would trawlfor prawns. They wore old sandshoes to protect them-selves from cobbler stings, and Spud’s brother Billy, twoyears younger, carried a hurricane lamp. Wooden poles


over their shoulders, Mike and Spud would drag thetwenty-foot funnel of netting behind them, while Billy ledthe way, the lamplight attracting the prawns to the net andwarning the boys of snags up ahead. Relentlessly, theytrawled between the jetty and the baths; it was hard workbut rewarding. Each time they returned to the beach Joolswould be jumping up and down excitedly, Baxter by herside letting out the odd bark, both of them eager for thethrilling moment when the contents would be spilled fromthe net’s pocket onto the sand and the prawns would jumpand glitter, pink-eyed, in the light of the lamp.

Jools was always allocated ‘guard duty’. She wasn’tstrong enough to haul the net and too young to be trustedwith the lamp, but Mike had assured her of the importanceof her role. ‘Someone could come along and nick ourcatch,’ he told her, and so, during their absence, sheparaded the beach like a diminutive pig-tailed sergeantmajor. Upon the boys’ return, she and Baxter had atendency to get over-excited and Mike had to constantlywarn her, as they sifted through the weed and gobblegutsand other small fish, to keep Baxter away and to be waryof cobblers. The stings of even the smallest cobblers occa-sionally caught in the net were shockingly painful.

The boys would boil up the prawns in the laundry’s oldcopper, and after they’d feasted there was always an amplesupply for both the McAllister and Farrell households.Mike invariably gave Spud the lion’s share though – therewere five Farrell kids so it seemed only fair.

The old copper came in for a great deal of use. The bluemanna crabs that Mike and Jools caught at dusk in theirwitch’s-hat drop nets off the end of Claremont jetty endedup in the copper. So did the mussels they dived for duringthe baking hot afternoons of midsummer, when otherswere indoors beside fans praying for the arrival of theFremantle Doctor – the welcome afternoon breeze thatcame in from the sea.

J U D Y N U N N 25



The mussels, which grew in abundant clusters on thepylons of the jetty, were Jim McAllister’s personalfavourite. When the children returned with their catch,he’d pour himself a glass of beer and join them, haulinga bucketload of steaming mussels from the copper andemptying them out in a heap onto the old wrought-irontable that lived in the back garden and served the specificand ingenious purpose of mussel strainer.

Jim always made his own contribution to the exercise,mixing the vinegar and mussel juice in the pickling jars,and concocting a hot dipping sauce which the kids avoidedlike the plague. They’d sit around the table, each with apickling jar, and Mike and Jim would do their best toignore Jools who always insisted on chanting ‘One for me,one for the pot’, and was quick to catch her father out ifhe ate two in a row without contributing to his picklingjar. Not that it mattered. By the time they’d pickled andeaten their way through the first lot they were bloated,and the second bucketload from the copper was purelyfor pickling.

The old copper had proved very efficient over the years.Maggie had gladly donated it in order to preserve herkitchen from the stench of seafood and the assault of greygunge boiling out of huge pots over her stove. By thenshe’d acquired her brand new washing machine with itslabour-saving hand-operated wringer, so she didn’t needthe old copper.

Jim McAllister was not a wealthy man. He was anagriculturalist employed by the government, and the com-fortable middle-class existence he provided for his wifeand children was the direct result of hard work. He’d puta deposit on the old house shortly before his marriage witha small inheritance he’d received from his grandparents,and after that it had been his own labours and Maggie’sclever budgeting that had paid it off.

A stalwart member of Claremont Yacht Club and a keen


yachtsman, Jim was also a talented carpenter, and boat-building had become his leisure-time passion. Alana, hispride and joy, was the result of a year’s relentless weekendlabour, and he raced her regularly in the CYC meets. But,unlike many a boating man, Jim shared his yacht with hisfamily. Alana had provided successful Christmas holidaysat Rottnest Island for the past several years, despite thecramped living accommodation aboard, and her mooringat Rotto’s Thomson Bay had become the McAllisters’annual retreat.

Jim was currently applying his boat-building skills to therestoration of a dilapidated second-hand Vee Jay he’dacquired for his son. Mike would soon be twelve, andtwelve was a good age for a boy to have a racing yacht.

Jim and Maggie McAllister were caring parents, butthey weren’t physically demonstrative. It wasn’t thenature of either to cuddle and cosset their children, andJim could at times be a strict disciplinarian. He was rarelyunfair and rarely lost his temper, but when true disobedi-ence demanded retribution he believed in corporal pun-ishment. That was when the slim bamboo stick, whichremained threateningly on top of the wardrobe, came intoplay. It was pliable and whip-like, and several smartblows to the bended backside, even through clothes,delivered a hefty sting. But Jim wasn’t without a sense ofhumour. The day the kids nicked the stick and replacedit with the rolled-up and firmly taped newspaper that wasreserved for Baxter when he was going through one ofhis chewing or digging phases, and which made a heckof a racket but didn’t hurt, Jim allowed himself to see thefunny side.

Maggie McAllister, far less conventional than herhusband, had a very clearly defined sense of humour. Shewas not a water baby herself, and remained seated on adeckchair under a large-brimmed hat reading a book whileher husband and children cavorted in the river or the sea.

J U D Y N U N N 27



Nor was she a boating person, and steadfastly refused toadopt the jargon. ‘Port’ and ‘starboard’ remained ‘left’ and‘right’, ‘aft’ and ‘forward’ were the ‘blunt end’ and the‘pointy end’, and the galley, the cabin and the head werethe kitchen, bedroom and toilet respectively. It became arunning family gag, and Maggie enjoyed being the butt ofthe joke during the annual holidays at Rotto, which wasthe only time she ever set foot on Alana.

An attractive woman, she’d been a dedicated teacher,but had given up her career to raise a family, as most of hercontemporaries had done. But unlike her contemporaries,she’d returned to work when her children were both ofschool age. ‘Relief teaching – just three days a week,’ she’dassured her husband. Jim, a conservative man, had foundhis wife’s decision confronting at first, but he hadn’t stoodin her way. Maggie was a clever and imaginative womanwho needed mental stimulation, and he decided to ignorethe odd critically raised eyebrow and admire her for herindependent spirit.

Maggie instilled her own form of discipline in herchildren by appealing to their basic common sense.

‘Wendy Halliday’s mum chops it up fine.’ Nine-year-oldJools was propped against the kitchen’s Laminex-toppedisland bench, chin on fists, critically watching her mothertear up the lettuce.

‘Oh dear, I suppose that makes me a bad mum.’‘Well, no . . .’ That hadn’t been exactly what Jools had

meant.‘It’s a pity they don’t teach you how to be a mum.

I wonder if I could start taking lessons?’‘I just meant that –’‘Mind you, there are probably quite a lot of different

ways to make a salad when you consider it. What do youthink, Jools?’

Jools pondered the question, which had been offered inall seriousness, and, as she viewed the array of salads and


herbs on the kitchen bench, she also pondered the optionsit raised.

‘Yep,’ she said. ‘I bet there’d be lots and lots of differentways.’

The quickly developing independent streak in Joolscame directly from her mother.

Jim McAllister’s effect upon his children, apart from hisdisciplinary measures, was by example. He was an accom-plished man. Heralded during his university days as asportsman, he’d retained his fitness, and at forty coulddefeat men half his age on a tennis court. Furthermore,he was academically respected. One of the government’sleading agriculturalists, he was currently working on theOrd River Scheme, the audacious and innovative irrigationsystem intended to cultivate the arid north of the state.Jim was an all-rounder, good at anything he tackled, andit rubbed off on his children. They wanted to be ableto swim like Dad, and to handle a boat like Dad, and togather mussels from down deep just like Dad did. They’dbeen emulating him from their earliest years.

Now that Mike had turned twelve, and was about toembark the following year upon his secondary school edu-cation, he wanted more than ever to emulate his father.He wanted to do important work, work that really meantsomething, work like his dad did.

‘I’m going to be a scientist.’‘You mean space rockets and all that sort of stuff?’ Spud

Farrell was impressed.It was lunchtime and, having kicked the footie around,

the boys were sitting on one of the benches in the school’sgravel playground, empty lunchboxes beside them,swigging back the remnants of their milk. The miniaturebottles were doled out at midday and were always luke-warm, particularly on a hot summer’s day like today. Butthe kids drank them uncomplainingly nonetheless.

J U D Y N U N N 29



Claremont Primary School was a couple of blocks fromthe McAllister house, in Bay View Terrace, which led upthe hill to the suburb’s village centre. Its location was evenmore convenient for Spud, who lived just around thecorner in Pennell Road.

The boys had been discussing their forthcoming exams.The students of sixth standard A were to sit for the PerthModern School state-wide scholarship and entranceexaminations, which were held every year. Perth ModernSchool, or ‘Mod’ as it was known, took the top sixty boysand top sixty girls across the state into their seventhstandard. It was the beginning of secondary school andserious stuff, and the boys’ conversation had progressedto ambition. Spud’s was simple – he wanted to be rich.

‘No, not rockets,’ Mike corrected him. ‘I’m going to bea scientist, like my dad.’

‘But your dad works for the Department of Agriculture.’ Spud’s tone was dismissive and Mike couldn’t help but

register it. ‘Yeah, but he’s still a scientist,’ he protested.There was a pause. Spud’s scepticism was so obvious

that Mike took offence.‘He is so! You should do your homework, Spud,’ he said

as scathingly as possible. ‘Agriculture’s a science, youknow.’

‘All right, all right, keep your hair on.’ Spud backedaway, hands in the air in mock surrender, a look ofwounded surprise on his face. ‘Strewth, I didn’t even sayanything, there’s no need to jump down my throat.’

His reaction was so successfully that of the wrongfullyaccused that Mike felt guilty, just as Spud intended heshould.

‘Sorry,’ he muttered, aware that he’d over-reacted, butstill smarting at Spud’s inferred slur upon his dad.

‘Cripes, Mikey, I wouldn’t say anything against yourold man.’ Spud chose a different tack. ‘Your dad’s a top


bloke.’ Manipulative as he was, Spud was genuinely keento make amends. Mikey McAllister was his best mate –heck, they were so close that he was the only one allowedto call him Mikey, and that really meant something.

‘I only wish my old man was more like him,’ he said,and this time it wasn’t altogether an act. Not that he’dswap his old man for Mr McAllister – well, not when theold man was halfway sober, anyway – but cripes, look atwhat Mikey had! That great big house, holidays at Rottoon his dad’s yacht, and his old man had just given him aVee Jay for his twelfth birthday! Whether Mr McAllisterqualified as a real scientist or not – and Spud was doubtfulof the fact – the bloke was one heck of a dad. ‘My old mancould take a leaf out of your dad’s book,’ he added, ‘andthat’s the truth.’

Spud had been two years old when his family hademigrated from Ireland and he was a dinky-di Aussie – allthe Farrells were, they’d embraced citizenship and wereproudly Australian – but Spud had adopted quite a few ofhis father’s phrases, and on occasion sounded very likeSean Farrell himself.

Mike was tempted to call Spud’s bluff and tell him tostop bunging on. He admired his friend’s talent as a conman – it had got them out of trouble on many an occasion– but he didn’t like it when Spud practised his talents onhim, which he suspected might be the case right now. Butthen he couldn’t be sure. It was often the way with Spud –it was hard to tell sometimes when he was conning andwhen he wasn’t, even for Mike, and they were best mates,which, he supposed, showed just how clever Spud was. Butfor all Spud’s cleverness, Mike sometimes felt sorry forhim. Spud did it hard. An early morning paper run beforeschool, babysitting his little sister every Saturday whilehis mum and his older brother and sister worked, and adad who was drunk most of the time. Spud’s wasn’t aneasy life.

J U D Y N U N N 31



Mike decided against confrontation and changed thesubject instead, reverting to their original discussion aboutthe entrance exams.

‘So do you reckon we’ll get in?’ he asked, ignoring Spudand picking up the footie that sat on the bench beside him,bouncing it idly between his knees on the pavement.

Spud, aware that he couldn’t get around Mikey as wellas he could others, was grateful that he’d been let off thehook. He really hadn’t meant to insult Mikey’s dad. Heck,Mikey idolised his old man.

‘Sure we will,’ he replied with his cheekily irresistiblegrin. Snub-nosed, freckle-faced and ginger-haired, Spudcould be very beguiling. ‘If anyone can get us through, youcan bet your last quid Mr Logan can.’

Mr Logan was a sure-fire topic for conversation. Theone-eyed ex-POW, survivor of Changi, the infamousJapanese prison camp in Singapore, was a hero to everyboy in his class.

Colin Logan made a habit of sharing his wartime expe-riences with his students. He’d tell his stories to each newclassroom of pupils who came under his tuition. Never ina gruesome way, and nor was he boastful – his stories wereoften funny, invariably informative and always downrightcompelling. He had his pupils eating out of his hand, andhe knew it. Colin Logan was a born teacher.

Spud’s and Mike’s altercation was forgotten as theytalked about the forthcoming exams. Mr Logan had themall fired up.

‘There’s not one among you,’ he’d assured his studentsof sixth standard A, and he’d taken a slight dramaticpause, ‘not one who isn’t capable of making the grade andgetting into Perth Mod. It’s simply a matter of applicationand hard work.’

‘I reckon he’s right, Mikey,’ Spud said, with a self-assurance he didn’t really feel. ‘Mr Logan wouldn’t try andcon us.’


Spud’s doubts were not of Mr Logan, but rather ofhimself. He wouldn’t be able to cheat his way throughthese exams as he had so often in the past, and even at histender age he realised this was a defining moment inhis life. He needed to get into Mod, it was his only chance.And he needed a full scholarship what was more, other-wise he’d be doing the paper run full-time, or working asa brickie’s labourer like his big brother Eamon. And hesure as hell didn’t want to finish up at the Swan Brewerylike his dad, washing out the beer kegs and replacingthe old seals with new ones. That was the end of the linein Spud’s opinion. Not that his old man thought so. SeanFarrell thought his job was the best thing since slicedbread. Well, he would, wouldn’t he? The brewery turnedon free beer for its ten-minute morning and arvo smokos,and for another ten minutes at lunch break too. Nowonder his old man was in seventh heaven.

‘’Tis a God-given job, Eileen,’ his dad’d say to his mumwhen he came home via the pub, pissed as an owl andhappy as a pig in shite. ‘What other employer would soappreciate its workers?’ And then he’d regale the wholefamily with tales about his buddies at work and the jokeshe’d heard that day, omitting the filthiest ones for the sakeof the kids. Spud had to admit that although his dad wasa drunk, he was always a happy one. People liked SeanFarrell, they found him funny. Spud did too. His dad wasalways good for a laugh, but it didn’t stop him being aloser.

‘He’s a good man, your da,’ his mother would say whenshe sensed her son’s disapproval. ‘He’s grand with you kidsand he’s never laid a hand on me in anger. You’ve no causefor criticism, Patrick.’ She always called him Patrick whenshe was ticking him off and Spud hated it. ‘You could doa lot worse than your da, you know.’

Eileen herself knew only too well. Both her sisters backin the old country did it a lot worse than she did. One had

J U D Y N U N N 33



a husband who beat her when he was on the grog, and theother had no husband at all – Seamus had run off and leftMary with four kids just a year back. Eileen sent her a bitof money every now and then, from the wages she earnedcleaning the houses of the rich who lived around the bayin Peppermint Grove.

The Farrells had emigrated from Ireland shortly afterthe war. The Australian government’s call for migrants andits ten-pound Bring Out a Briton campaign had been anoffer too good to refuse for many who were feeling thehardship of post-war Britain. Sean and Eileen, togetherwith their three children, of whom Spud was the youngest,had been housed at the migrant hostel in Bicton on PointWalter Reserve, the other side of the bay from Claremont.But when Sean had scored his job at the brewery, they’dmoved across the river to the little rented cottage inPennell Road. From there it was just a short walk up thehill to the Stirling Highway and the regular buses which,en route to the city, passed the imposing brick edifice ofthe Swan Brewery where it sat on the banks of the river inCrawley.

Eileen had been happy with the move. She loved thecottage with its verandah and tiny front garden. She’dnever had a garden before, or a verandah for that matter –they didn’t exist in the back streets of Dublin. But afterBilly’s birth two years later, with their finances stretchedto the limit, she’d told Sean they were to practise therhythm method in order to avoid another pregnancy. ‘IfGod considers it a sin, then so be it,’ she’d said defiantly,more for her own benefit than her husband’s. Sean was alackadaisical, if not altogether lapsed, Catholic who onlywent to church to keep his wife happy. Their birth-controlstrategy had worked for a good seven years, until 1953when a mishap had occurred, resulting in baby Caitlin. Butby that time, Eamon, the oldest of the boys, was fourteenand had left school to work for a mate of Sean’s who had


a milk delivery truck, so there was an added income to thehousehold. And it wouldn’t be long before twelve-year-oldMaeve opted out of school. Maeve had her mind set onworking in a shop.

Neither Sean Farrell nor his wife had received a second-ary education themselves, and although they didn’t urgetheir children to leave school and seek employment, theysaw no problem if that was what the kids wanted. ButSpud did. Spud saw a huge problem. His brother Eamonwas sixteen now, a bricklayer’s apprentice with no ambi-tion beyond being good at his job. ‘Brickies are alwaysin demand,’ he’d boast to Spud. ‘You can earn a big quidif you’re good.’ And fifteen-year-old Maeve now servedbehind the counter at the Claremont newsagency. Her soleaim in life was to be a shop assistant in Boans DepartmentStore in the city where she’d get to wear a snazzy uniform.Spud had set his sights far higher than his siblings. He wasgoing to be rich and successful. At what, he wasn’t sure.But the way to success was through education. And theway to education was a scholarship to Perth Mod.

For the first time in his short life, Spud had truly appliedhimself. He’d received special encouragement from ColinLogan, who believed it his duty to inspire the under-privileged to seek an education, and who secretly had asoft spot for the canny little Irish-Australian.

‘You’re a smart boy, Spud,’ he’d said. ‘You could land afull scholarship if you tried.’ A scholarship was the kid’sonly option, Colin knew it. There was no way his parentscould afford school fees. ‘But you’ll have to study hard.No bludging. No trying to take the easy way out.’ The oneeye had flashed a distinct warning – Colin had nevercaught the kid openly cheating, but he’d had his doubts.

‘Yes, sir.’ And Spud had studied as hard as he knew how. ‘I dunno about the others, Mikey,’ he now said with his

customary bravado, ‘but you and me, we’ll get in, no twoways about it. Like my old man says, carpe diem.’ His dad

J U D Y N U N N 35



had picked up the expression in some pub somewhere. ‘It’sLatin,’ Sean Farrell had boasted to his son, ‘means “seizethe day”,’ and Spud had adopted the expression ever since.

Spud was really firing himself up more than Mikey.What did it matter if Mikey didn’t get in? Mikey didn’tneed Mod, his parents could afford to send him to privateschool. Heck, they already had him booked into his dad’sold school, Scotch College. The only reason Mikey wassitting for the entrance exams was because his mum hadgone to Mod, and his dad reckoned that she’d had a betterscholastic education than he had. ‘Dad reckons Mod offersthe best education in the state,’ Mikey had said. Jeez,Mikey had it easy.

Spud was envious, but not bitter. It was a simple fact oflife: there were the ‘haves’ and the ‘have nots’, and he wasone of the latter. But he didn’t mind firing Mikey up.Mikey was his mate and, besides, they were always bestwhen they worked as a team.

‘We’re winners we are, you and me,’ he said.

Spud proved right about a number of things that summer.He was right about Mr Logan getting them through. Tenstudents from Colin Logan’s class found their way to PerthModern School the following year. The previous record forClaremont Primary entrants had been five.

The grateful students of sixth standard A, knowing theirhero to be an inveterate smoker, pooled their resources andbought him a Ronson cigarette lighter, which MaggieMcAllister took to the jewellers and had personallyengraved.

‘I told you we were winners, Mikey,’ Spud said. He’dbeen right about that too. He and Mike McAllister hadbeen amongst the ten selected. But it had been Spud whohad won the full scholarship. And he hadn’t cheated once!

‘Look out, Mod, here we come,’ he crowed. Spud Farrellwas on his way.


C H A P T E R T W O

At nearly fifteen, Mike and Spud were obsessed withsex, or rather with the thought of it: neither hadactually performed the act yet. But it was only a

matter of time. They talked at great length about losingtheir virginity, and Spud had definite views on the subject.Their female contemporaries at Perth Mod were out ofthe question in his opinion. ‘Too young,’ he said with aworldly wisdom. And the final-year female students, theobjects of both boys’ lust, were simply out of their league.

‘A woman outside of school – older, and with experience– that’s what we need,’ he declared. ‘You shouldn’t pick avirgin first time round anyway. Best to set your sights onone who knows the ropes.’ It was a direct quote from hisold man.

The fact was, Spud was getting desperate. He’d tried toscore with any number of girls at Mod but he’d rarely gotbeyond the kissing stage, and that was only with theyounger ones who were interested in their own form ofexperimentation and saw him as a fellow innocent. They’dbeen shocked when his hands had groped at their buddingbreasts. And when, in a reckless attempt, he’d tried to chatup one of the older students, she’d told him to get lost.



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