Laughs, Corpses... and a Little Romance

By Michael White

The book is a story of events and laughs in the lives of a river boatman and his two sons as they work each day on the river, including their reluctant involvement in helping the police solve several crimes. It gives the reader a view of the personalities of the father and his two sons, their opinions of each other, and how these change as the book progresses, particularly as the youngest son matures. The book contains many sidelights about life on the river, its ambience, and its local inhabitants. Part one of the book is told by the father, Ted, part two by the eldest son, Jack, and part three by the youngest son, Tim.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Michael White
• Release date: Jan 18, 2013
• ISBN: 9781301294848

Michael White

Ex-drummer, Ex-software author and Ex-flares wearer Michael White was born and lives in the northwest of England. In a previous life he was the author of many text adventure games that were popular in the early 1980's. Realising that the creation of these games was in itself a form of writing he has since made the move into self-publishing, resulting in many short stories and novellas. Covering an eclectic range of subjects the stories fall increasingly into that "difficult to categorise" genre, causing on-going headaches for the marketing department of his one man publishing company, Eighth Day Publishing.Having accidentally sacked his marketing director (himself) three times in the last two years, he has now retired to a nice comfortable room where, if he behaves himself, they leave him to write in peace.In his spare time (!) Michael likes to listen to all kinds of music and is a big fan of Steven Moffat, whether he likes it or not.Michael is currently working on several new projects and can be contacted at the links [e-mail], or via my own website on http://mikewhiteauthor.wordpress.com, or via twitter on @mikewhiteauthor.

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Laughs, Corpses..... And a Little Romance

The River Postman and his Two Sons

Author Mike White

Published by Mike White at Smashwords

Copyright 2013 Mike White

All film and TV rights reserved, Mike White 2013

Cover photo by the author, copyright 2013

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this ebook with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you are reading this ebook and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

All characters and events described in this book are completly fictitious.

Part One, TED

I guess everyone gets the occasional morning when they wake up feeling full of beans, in tune with the world, and life seems just about perfect. I started off that way one beautiful spring morning, right up until the moment, that is, when I spotted the corpse.

I’m Ted Farley, a river postman and ferryboat man, and my boat is the Lady Annabelle or Annabelle for short. At 5.30 that the morning we heaved ourselves out of bed, all except Jack of course, as usual I had to yell at him. My missus in her old blue dressing gown and slippers made us a bit of breakfast, plates of cereal for the boys and a poached egg on toast for me. We ate our breakfast hurriedly and pretty much in silence; not much to talk about when you’re all still half asleep. We climbed into the cab of our old truck and I backed out into the street. We drove through the town just as the sky was getting lighter. The street lights were still on, and a few folk were about, scratching and yawning, and trying to get their brains into first gear. I turned along the wharf, where Annabelle was floating quietly at her moorings, covered in dew. She looked as if she was just struggling to wake up too. We set to work squaring her up ready for the day’s work, but I paused for a moment and leaned on the starboard rail, savoring the perfect start to the day. In the dawn hush there was scarcely a breath of wind. The air was balmy, with a hint of floral perfume. The reflections of boats and masts on the water were barely shivering. The boat yard was silent, but across the harbour a winch rattled on a fishing boats back from a night at sea. I took a deep breath of cool salty air, feeling very relaxed and contented.

I put the kettle on and soon it was gently sizzling in the back of the wheelhouse. Jack was drying the dew off the passenger seats with an old towel in a slow-moving sort of way. Tim had the hatch up over the engine, and was down there polishing and fiddling. When the kettle came to the boil I brewed three mugs of instant, and the entrancing smell of coffee filled the wheelhouse. I called to Jack and Tim. Jack dropped his towel and came immediately, ever ready to stop work. We’d half drunk our coffee and Tim still hadn’t appeared. Jack snorted in disgust. He's playing with that bloody engine again. Annabelle has an old-fashioned slow-running diesel engine, the sort that lasts forever if looked after by an expert, but otherwise they can be a real pain in the ass. Well at least he keeps it running smoothly I said, I just wish sometimes you could get off your backside the way he does. Jack looked away from me. He’d heard that sermon too many times already.

I shouldn't refer to Jack and Tim as my boys really. Jack is twenty-two, and Tim nineteen, and they are as opposite as port and starboard. You can tell the difference from their bedrooms. Jack’s room is always a mess, clothes all over the floor, and posters of the latest rock bands and racing cars stuck up on the wall. Tim’s room on the other hand is neat and tidy, with everything put away, and the only poster on the wall is a picture of an old steam locomotive.

Jack is a biggish bloke, curly brown hair, brash and self-confident, but, alas, idle with it. He could have done much better at school if he'd wanted to, but he preferred to mess around and waste his time. Now he spends a lot of time fussing over his appearance and trying to impress the girls. I had hoped he would get his master’s ticket and take over the business from me, as I had from my dad, but gradually I’ve come to realize that he’ll never make it, he just can't be bothered. Still, he does have one redeeming talent; he has a quick wit, which often makes me smile.

My younger son, Tim, was small as a child, quiet and almost painfully shy. Tim for Timothy and Tim for Timid my missus always said. At school he never gained good results even though he tried, and he was always picked last for any sports team. However he has one skill he picked up hanging around in boatyards as a lad, he’s a wizard with anything mechanical. It isn't anything he's learnt from lessons; he just seems to have a knack for it. A mechanic only has to show him something once and he can do it too, just like that. The tradesmen in the boatyards didn't seem to mind a kid hanging around, helping out, like an old-fashioned apprentice. They quite like explaining their skills to an interested boy, and soon he was getting paid for doing odd jobs. Now he can charm any machinery into working. Give him an old outboard motor, and within half a day he’ll have it stripped and reassembled. A bit of grease in the bearings, a magic tweak of the carburetor, and it starts purring like a contented cat He never thinks of himself as skilled. He can't understand why anybody can't do the same as he does. Because of that he never gets paid what he's really worth, but at least I know he'll always be able to earn a living.

Annabelle doesn't really need a three-man crew, two can manage quite easily, but I can hardly fire one of my own sons, so Jack collects the fares, does a little cleaning, and tries to chat up the girls, while Tim does most of the maintenance and keeps the engine running like new. Any other employer would fire Jack, but if I did that he’d probably end up unemployed, and I’d sooner have him work for me than hang around town getting into trouble.

We earn a living on the Hawkesbury River, north a bit from Sydney, a big tidal estuary with lots of islands and side branches. Our harbour is really a summary of life on the river. It’s a jumble of jetties and rusting sheds, and a small fleet of fishing boats, prawn trawlers, oyster boats, ferries, tour boats, private yachts and expensive cruisers. There’s a busy boat yard with a slipway and the smell of fresh paint. There’s a flashy marina with beaten up motorboats for hire. Shoals of tiny fish swirl and dart in the shallows around a neglected hull half sunk. There’s a fish co-op where the professional fishermen clean their catch, and where you can sit outside in the sunshine and get a grand feed of fish and chips. In the cool of the morning our harbour is a busy bustling place, but often in the heat of a summer afternoon it drowses quietly. We moor Annabelle at the inner end of the harbour, handy for the car park and the railway station. You can catch a train from there right into the centre of Sydney.

******

Our first job each weekday is to pick up commuters from Mulloway Island. Mulloway is a great hump of sandstone sticking up two hundred feet out of the water like a giant turtleback half a mile long. Early explorers coming upstream camped out on it, and caught lots of fish in the river, among them a fish called Mulloway, so they called it Mulloway Island. It's still mostly covered with bush and trees, but a necklace of houses encircles the Island just above river level. Quite a few folk have made permanent homes out there, even though there's no bridge, so they have to come and go by boat. Some of them have jobs in Sydney, so each morning on my first couple of runs I pick them up from the jetty at the Island store and drop them off near the station for a train ride to the office or shop. They all seem to think living on the Island is very romantic, and they love the quiet isolation and the absence of crime. Traffic noise is replaced by the singing of birds. It’s one last corner of Australia where people still don’t bother to lock their doors.

When it was time for our first trip I checked the run of the tide as I have every morning for forty years. I called down the hatch, Start up, Tim. The engine sprang to life and a puff of black smoke came out of the exhaust pipe. Jack cast off the mooring lines. I backed Annabelle out from the wharf into the centre of the harbour, then slipped the engine into forward, turned the wheel and headed south past the marina and west out across the river.

The sky was clear blue, with just a couple of wispy white clouds. Some outboard boats were making a racket rushing and thumping across the water. A couple of oyster farmers were chugging out to their oyster leases in their workboats. It was all very familiar, and I felt very relaxed at the wheel. We were nearly half a mile out when I saw a bump in the water that shouldn't have been there. I fished out my binoculars and then cursed under my breath. I knew my perfect morning had just turned sour. Jack and Tim felt Annabelle heal over a little as I changed course to go and have a look. What's up dad? I'm not sure. They both strained to look ahead.

During my many years on the river I'd seen corpses before, and this was another one, drifting up the river on the incoming tide. I steered Annabelle slowly alongside and eased the engine back to idle. Tim peered down at the body. It looks like a girl, dad. I heard a tremor in his voice. I realized he’d never seen a corpse before. Pull her in to the side, Tim. I don't want to touch her. Jack jeered at him. What's the matter, d'you think she's going to jump out and grab you? He fetched the boat hook, deftly hooked it into the collar of her dress, and pulled her in alongside. Tim moved away, looking suddenly pale. I climbed over the rail and put my hand on her throat. The skin was as cold as the water. Whoever it was had been dead for many hours.

I clicked on the CB radio I use to talk to NIcky. Hey Nicky, you there yet? Nicky is the part-time girl who runs our office on the wharf, taking bookings, sorting out freight, keeping the ledgers, and all the other odd jobs of a small business. Yes Ted, what is it? We've found a corpse in the river, half way out to the Island, looks like a young girl. Phone the cops and see what they say, would you? A corpse? Uh, a girl did you say? Jesus! Hold on a minute

We drifted alongside the body. Nicky came back on the radio. Police ask if you've checked for vital life signs, have you tried CPR? She's been dead for hours. I know a stone cold corpse when I see one. We waited again. Tim had moved right over to the other side of Annabelle. I could see he wasn't going to be much help. The radio hissed again. The police say their launch is being repaired. They ask could you recover the body and bring it in please. They'll meet you here at the wharf. I felt irritated. What a damned liberty I half yelled into the radio, What do they think I am, an undertaker or something? Sorry Ted, I'm just the messenger. Yeh, sorry Nicky.

I clicked off the radio. The cops had a launch in their boatshed near the wharf, but it never seemed to be in working order when it was needed, although it always seemed to be shipshape when some top brass wanted a river cruise. I was on the verge of refusing to have anything to do with the corpse, I didn’t want to get mixed up with doing the police a favour; it was sure to be a big waste of time that I’d get no thanks for. Then, stupidly, I started to think about my civic duty and all that stuff, and I could hardly leave the poor dead girl drifting about in the river, could I? That’s how I came to get mixed up in the whole damned business.

I had an idea what to do. Get that spare role of canvas out, Jack. We spread the canvas out on the deck near the boarding gate where the passengers come aboard. Tim, open the gate, Jack, help me lift her onto the canvas. Tim opened the gate and turned his face away. Come on Jack, I said, I know it's not a nice job, but it's got to be done, so let's get on with it. As I glanced at him he grinned. Do I get paid extra for undertaker’s duties? I realized the unfeeling bastard was almost enjoying this, like a new and exciting experience. I caught hold of the girl under the arms, and lifted her body, dripping wet, through the gate. Jack leaned over the rail and lifted her legs, and we put her down on the canvas. She didn't seem to weigh much at all. We rolled her over on her back and straightened her out. Tim shut the gate, trying not to look.

She was a slim, middling-tall girl, probably early twenties, long blonde hair pulled back in a ponytail, the sort of look many young Australian girls seem to want. Her lifeless blue eyes seemed to be staring into the distance. She was wearing a cheap muslin dress, badly torn, and obviously not much in the way of underwear. She also had a lot of purple bruises that didn't come from a fall. I wrapped the canvas around her. Come on Jack, let's put her in the freight locker out of the sun. We carried the body forward, lowered it into the locker, and closed the lid. Back in the wheelhouse I pulled out the river chart, took bearings off three landmarks on the riverbank, and penciled a cross on the chart. I expected that some time in the future someone would want to know the exact position where we'd picked up the corpse.

I went back into the wheelhouse, opened the throttle and turned the bow towards the Island. Aren't we going to take her back first? asked Tim, all concerned. I've got a living to earn I said, and there are people on the Island waiting to go to work! D'you think the cops are going to pay us for doing their dirty work? Anyway she's in no hurry any more. Why don't you sprinkle some water on the canvas to keep everything cool. Tim silently scooped up some river water in a bucket, opened the locker and tipped it