Rain Music (8 page)

Next he called the number of the house he'd been told about, but it rang out with no voicemail. It seemed luck wasn't on his side, so he decided to check out the pub.

Ned crossed the street and stepped into the weatherboard hotel with its broad upstairs verandah. The year 1885 was displayed over the door.
It probably hasn't changed much since then
, he thought. Inside, however, it looked as though it was now a very popular watering hole with tourists. He wandered over to the long bar and put down his guitar case and backpack, then leaned on the counter, propping his sore foot on the brass rail which ran below the bar. The woman behind the bar, who was swishing a beer-stained cloth along the counter, came over to him, and without looking up asked, ‘What'llitbe?'

‘What have you got?' asked Ned in a reasonable tone.

The woman jerked her head at the question. ‘What planet you from, mate?' She gave him a long hard stare, taking in his streaked blond hair and beard stubble, his tanned face, bright blue eyes and lopsided smile. A broad grin broke across her face. ‘Hey, I know you! You're that singer I saw in Cairns. Ned . . . ?'

‘That's me. Are you Yolanda?'

‘Sure am. Are you in town for a show?'

Ned shook his head.

‘Didn't think so, or I'd have heard about it. What kinda beer you drink?'

‘Better have a XXXX Gold.'

Yolanda began to pour the beer. ‘So, if you're not doing a show, what brings you up to this godforsaken place?'

‘Chilling out for a while. Recovering from writing off my car.'

‘Ah, too bad. A prang, eh? How long you gonna be around?' She pushed a schooner of beer in front of him.

Ned took a sip, and the beer went down very well after the tepid tea and sweet juices in the hospital. ‘Not sure. I just want a quiet space where I can work for a while.'

‘You write your own songs, don'tcha? That's cool. Doing a new album?'

‘Not sure,' said Ned, noncommittally. ‘I'm supposed to move into a place my mate's friend's going to lend me.'

‘Good time to stay, now. Before the wet. Some people go stir crazy at the rain, storms and not being able to drive 'cause the roads get flooded. So who's this bloke?'

‘Normie Brown. Everyone calls him Hashie. As in hash browns, I guess. Works in the music business.'

Yolanda nodded. ‘Hashie? Yeah, I know him. Bit of a pothead. I thought that was how he got his name.' Yolanda looked thoughtful as she yanked out the cloth she'd tucked into her apron pocket and wiped it along the damp counter again. ‘Heard he was moving on for a couple of months. But geez, I don't know that you'd want to
move into his joint. A flophouse, if you ask me. Still, you musos are all into sex and drugs and rock and roll, aren't you?'

‘Some are,' Ned replied. ‘Well, my friend painted an interesting picture of this area and I thought I'd like to spend a bit of time here. I tried calling, but the phone rang out.'

‘Well, let me give you the directions to Hashie's place. Come back to me if it doesn't work out. The house is on the hill, you can't miss it.' She scribbled out some directions on a coaster and handed it to him. ‘It's an old Queenslander with a lurid pink verandah.'

‘Yes, Hashie said it was very pink.'

‘Someone's not-very-smart idea, as far as I'm concerned,' said Yolanda wryly. ‘But if you like, I might be able to put you on to another place. It's low-key, peaceful like. Pretty remote, but it might suit. See how you go.' She moved down the counter to serve some of the other customers. Ned finished his beer before heading out into the glaring light.

It took only a short time for a taxi to get him to the house on the hill, which was exactly as Yolanda had described. He looked at it in dismay. It was very run-down, and there was an old lounge chair sitting in the middle of the overgrown garden.

‘You going in here?' asked the driver dubiously.

‘I'm supposed to be staying here. I'll go and see if someone's around, but I think you'd better wait for a couple of minutes, if you don't mind.'

Leaving his guitar and backpack in the taxi, Ned knocked on the front door of the house. He could hear music playing very loudly in the background. He knocked again and eventually the door was opened by
a man who looked to be in his twenties and very spaced out.

‘Yeah?' he mumbled.

‘I'm Ned. Hashie said I could stay here while he was away.'

‘You want his room? It's out the back. You'll like it here, man. Lotsa music and anything you want, if you know what I mean.'

Ned knew straight away what he meant. This was not what he had envisioned. There was no way he could stay in this place and be productive.

‘Thanks, but I think I've made a mistake,' he told the man, and walked back to the taxi as fast as his sprained foot would let him. The taxi driver nodded sympathetically.

‘That place has a pretty unsavoury reputation. Can I take you somewhere else?'

Ned decided that the best thing to do was to book into a motel, at least for a couple of nights, while he waited for a replacement car and for his stitches to heal. The taxi driver took him to a clean and attractive place in the middle of town. When Ned found out how much it was a night, he knew it was not at all suitable for a long-term stay, especially as he was going to have to put money into another car. Quickly he googled the pub and called its number, thinking he could ask Yolanda about the alternative accommodation she'd mentioned, but he got an answering machine. He left a message asking her to call him back. Having no other option right then, he booked in for the night and was shown to his room. He tooled around on the internet for twenty minutes looking at various accommodation websites but the prices all seemed
about the same. Feeling despondent, he decided to go
for a walk to clear his head and try to figure out what to do next.

He set off to
walk up Grassy Hill, which overlooked the township. He hadn't gone very far when he realised his mistake. His foot was not ready for even moderate exercise. He tripped and stumbled, losing his balance. He swore as he felt a stab of pain in his ankle. Just then an enormous four-wheel drive pulled up beside him.

‘You okay there, mate?' The driver was a large man who looked to be in his late-seventies, wearing a faded Hawaiian shirt. Beside him sat a bird-like woman, tiny and wearing a bright, loose-fitting dress, who peered at Ned with concern.

Ned clambered back to his feet and dusted himself off. ‘I'm all right. I did my ankle the other day and it's still healing.'

‘Want a lift to the top, then?' asked the man with a friendly grin. ‘I'm Ron and this is Mavis, the wife.'

‘Thanks,' said Ned, climbing into the car. ‘I think I was being a bit ambitious trying to get up even this small hill.'

‘No worries,' said Ron. ‘How long have you been in Cooktown? We've only been here a couple of days. On the way to Bamaga, but we thought we'd like to do a detour to Cooktown first.'

‘Bamaga's on the tip of Cape York, isn't it?' said Ned. ‘Long way to go yet.'

‘Only about nine hundred kays, but you have to do it before the wet, otherwise you can get caught by flooded roads. Still, we have plenty of time to get there and back before then.'

‘We weren't sure about Cooktown, because it's not on the way to anywhere. Quite isolated, sitting out here on the coast, but I think we made the right decision to take a look. It seems a quaint place. Different from the glitzy towns further south,' Mavis piped up.

Reaching the top of the hill, Ron slowed the car to a halt. He and Mavis got out and snapped a few photos. Ned stayed in the car rubbing his ankle. He gazed at the view spread below – the scattered houses, short streets and old buildings along the seafront, none of which testified to recent development or progress. Further along the waterfront, fishing trawlers huddled at a wharf beyond them, past the mouth of the Endeavour River with its tidal flats. Further out, luxury cruisers lay at anchor, while lone sailors, tourist fishing craft and diving boats plied the clear reef waters and small tenders made their way up the river to the main Cooktown wharf.

‘We're going on to the museum,' said Ron as he drove the behemoth of a four-wheel drive back down the hill. ‘Can we drop you there?'

With nothing to do but kill time until he heard from Yolanda, Ned thanked the couple and it was only a matter of minutes before they pulled up at the corner of Helen Street, where an imposing, solid, colonial brick building rose amidst old trees and tangled gardens. A sign announced it as the James Cook Museum. Several other cars and a tourist minibus were parked out the front, and some of the tourists were posing for photos on the steps that led to its main entrance beneath a wide verandah.

With help from Ron, he gingerly climbed the front steps into the museum. Opposite the front doors was a grand staircase leading to the upper floor. Near the staircase was a gift shop and information desk, while to his right was a display room. Ned could see a sign indicating the way to the James Cook Discovery Room.

In the cool high-ceilinged interior it appeared that little had changed since the building's original construction, and Ned was suddenly enveloped in a strangely nostalgic embrace. The contemporary fixtures seemed irrelevant, and he felt that if he closed his eyes he'd see the place as it had been in 1887, the year it opened. The atmosphere was redolent of other lives, friendly ghosts, stories and the music of the past, and he felt drawn to explore the place.

He paid the entrance fee and farewelled Ron and Mavis, who seemed more interested in the gift shop than the museum, and Ned made his way to the display dedicated to James Cook.

Printed placards explained to visitors that in June 1770, as Captain Cook was exploring the east coast of Australia, his barque
Endeavour
had run aground on a nearby reef. The vessel had limped into the river, which Cook had named the Endeavour River, and he and his crew stayed beside it for several weeks while the damaged ship was repaired. This enforced stay in the area gave Cook the honour of leading the first European settlement on the Australian east coast, albeit a brief one. In pride of place in the centre of the museum sat a cannon and a massive anchor. These artefacts had been rediscovered in the mud off the Cooktown coast more than two hundred years after they had been left behind when the
Endeavour
had been refloated.

Ned thought the exhibition was interesting, but he decided not to stay long. He hadn't heard back from Yolanda and he wanted to try to sort out his accommodation as soon as he could. He headed back to the pub via taxi.

Yolanda pulled him a schooner as soon as she saw him walk into the bar. ‘I was just about to return your call. You didn't like Hashie's house?' She pushed the beer towards him as he eased himself onto a stool.

Ned grimaced. ‘I took one look and declined the offer. I could never work in the chaos that seems to pervade the place.'

‘I'm not surprised.'

Ned sipped the icy beer. ‘You mentioned something about another place. Peaceful, you said.'

Yolanda nodded. ‘Let me serve those blokes and I'll be right back.'

She returned a few minutes later and leaned on the counter, tucking a damp strand of hair behind her ear. ‘So, you reckon you want to stick it out here for a while?'

Ned nodded. ‘Yes. I do.'

‘This place isn't for everyone.'

‘Cooktown, or the house you have in mind?'

She gave a bit of a smile. ‘The house, though I guess you might not call it a house; it's more of an interesting dwelling. It's perfectly comfortable, just a bit unusual.'

Ned was intrigued. ‘Whose place is it?'

‘Belongs to a mate of mine, Carlo,' Yolanda explained. ‘He built it about fifteen years ago. His parents came out from Italy and helped him with it. They liked Australia so much that they decided to stay, so they bought a place in Cairns, but they go back to Italy every year or so. Around this time every year, Carlo goes to Austria, but there's some family reunion happening in Italy so he's joining his parents and leaving earlier than usual this year.'

‘Carlo goes to Austria every year?' said Ned in an incredulous voice. ‘That's a bit of a change from Cooktown.'

‘Yeah, his girlfriend is a ski instructor and that's where she makes her money.'

‘So he visits his girlfriend each year in Austria?'

‘Oh no, Lena lives here with Carlo for most of the year. They go back to Austria together. Do you want me to ask him if you can stay at his place for a few weeks?'

‘Sure. Is his place in town?'

Yolanda laughed. ‘Hell, no! It's outta town. Him and Lena are gold prospectors – well, fossickers really, if you get my drift. You'd never find the place. It's really hidden. His folks have a caravan on the site for when they visit, but God knows how they got it in there. Have you got somewhere you can stay tonight?'

‘I've booked into a motel, but it's a bit pricey.'

‘Okay, well, when you're ready, I'd say the best thing for you to do is to go out to the Golden Mile Roadhouse. They have accommodation, basic but clean, and you can wait there till Carlo comes in from the bush. He calls in to the roadhouse before he comes to town. It'll be cheaper if you stay there than in town, and the owners, Frederick and Theresa, are great people. At a pinch they can guide you to Carlo's place. It's very isolated.'

‘When I'm into my music, isolation and time don't seem to matter. It sounds just what I want, but will Carlo want me out there?'

‘You'll be fine. Carlo can check you out, but I reckon he'll be pleased he can do you a favour, and you him, by keeping an eye on things. Carlo's place is pretty special, and if you don't mind being seriously remote, it might be just the ticket.'