Time's Long Ruin by Stephen Orr Read Free Book Online

straightening them to cool the pink fleshy bit under their knees.
    â€˜You’d think they’d put on a few more carriages,’ someone said, in a thick Irish accent.
    â€˜They don’t think that way,’ someone else replied. ‘You can fit a hundred people into two carriages, or into ten. If this were the eastern suburbs, things’d be different.’
    But to me it was paradise, squeezed in between Dad and the window, squirming to avoid a spring that had worn through the upholstery, filling my lungs with steam and smoke as I tried to stop my underpants riding up. I looked at boys my own age standing in the aisle clutching inner tubes, wearing bath towels like skirts that covered shorts that covered jocks that would do as bathers. Their bodies as brown as the wood veneer. Their backs freckled and peeling and their shoulders straight and broad from hanging off the edge of the Semaphore jetty. Their bare feet hard and black on the underside, toes pointing straight ahead, towards an afternoon of cool, shark-infested waters and stale sandwiches eaten in the shade of the war memorial.
    I was more the white-skinned indoor kid. It wasn’t entirely my fault. I had a couple of cold climate parents. The jetty jumpers (I guessed) probably had parents with a touch of the Spanish or Greek.
    Bill Riley, sitting next to Dad, gently kicked his foot and said, ‘They’d removed all the labels from his clothes.’
    â€˜Whose?’ Dad replied.
    â€˜The mystery man.’
    â€˜He might have removed his own.’
    Bill stopped to think. ‘Yes, that was probably the case. Which meant he wanted to hide his identity. Why?’
    Dad shook his head. ‘We’ve had detectives on this for twelve years, Bill. You’re not going to solve it on the way to the beach.’
    â€˜It just needs a fresh mind, Bob. What else did they find on him?’
    â€˜The unused railway ticket, a bus ticket to Glenelg, fags and matches.’
    â€˜And that’s it, no wallet, no keys?’
    â€˜No.’
    â€˜And the claim for his suitcase?’
    â€˜Missing.’
    â€˜Stolen, perhaps, but why didn’t whoever it was go and claim the case? Not enough time?’
    â€˜Plenty of time.’
    â€˜A mystery.’
    Janice came and stood beside me, staring out of the window. We slowed for the Woodville Road crossing and she waved at someone.
    â€˜Who was that?’ Bill asked.
    â€˜A man with a greyhound,’ she replied.
    The train stopped at Woodville station and even more people squeezed in. The man with the Irish accent cursed the South Australian Railways as people jostled for room. The smell of talc and deodorant almost cancelled out the BO.
    â€˜Some bastard stinks,’ the Irishman began again. ‘Needs a fuckin’ operation.’
    â€˜Hey, language,’ Dad grumbled, looking around and finding the voice.
    â€˜You can’t smell it?’
    â€˜So what, five more minutes.’
    â€˜Five more minutes of fuckin’ hell.’
    Dad turned right around. He reached into his pocket, pulled out his wallet, opened it and showed the man. ‘We can get off here if you like.’
    â€˜Ah, big man.’
    â€˜Would you like?’
    And that was it. Could anyone have a better dad than mine? People went to the movies to see this sort of thing but I had it all the time. My dad could stop traffic, save lives, and throw people off trains. Other people’s dads made furniture and sold radios; mine stood up to murderers and thieves.
    Janice could see the pride in my eyes. She smiled and almost laughed. Looking back out of the window she said, ‘Maybe one day, Henry.’
    Bill wasn’t finished with Dad. ‘I read he was clean shaven.’
    â€˜That’s right.’
    â€˜That’s a problem. Why would you shave if you were going to kill yourself?’
    â€˜And put on a suit and tie?’
    Bill stared down at the floor. ‘Yes . . .