Curly Malone

By Phil Cantrill

The story opens during World War II, when Curly Malone and his patrol are ambushed in the jungles of Sanananda, New Guinea. In saving his mates, Curly is severely wounded. Barely alive, he is flown to the mainland. During his recuperation, he meets Sonny Galea, a likeable rogue.

After his return home to Sydney, Sonny renews his acquaintance. This friendship leads Curly into the world of criminals and black marketeers. Attacked by a rival, he defends himself, only to learn later that his attacker has died, and police are searching for him.

By this time, he has met and fallen in love with Debbie. They marry and, at her suggestion, moved to Brisbane. Curly finds work at an illegal casino but again falls foul of rival criminalsone of whom is the brother of the man who died in Sydney. Arrested by a crooked police officer in cahoots with that brother, he is severely bashed while in police custody.

Curly is extradited to Sydney to stand trial for the murder of his former attacker. Has he survived the war only to be hanged for a murder he did not commit?

• Language: English
• Publisher: Partridge Publishing Singapore
• Release date: Oct 22, 2014
• ISBN: 9781482827316

Phil Cantrill

Phil Cantrill was a barrister for many years. In his profession, he often met people who reminisced about their experiences during World War II. Upon becoming a writer, he decided to turn some of these tales into a novel. His published works include four novels and several short stories.

Book preview

1

O ur first hint of trouble came when the sniper took out Mick. The enemy’s machine gun opened up even before we dived for cover. Joe didn’t make it. Bill got one high in the shoulder, but reached shelter behind a coconut palm. We were pinned down and in real trouble. I was scared shitless, and I reckoned Bluey was no better. Luckily, we had no time to panic. I glanced across at Dusty. He never seemed to lose his nerve no matter what.

Dusty Rhodes was our Sergeant. He was a few years older than the rest of us – tall, skinny, with blond hair cut short and the bluest eyes I ever saw. His real name was Fred, but we knew him as Dusty, just as I was Curly because my best mate was Bluey. For those too young to remember, maybe I should say there was in those years a cartoon comic strip in the daily papers featuring a couple of larrikin diggers named Bluey and Curly. Most people with red hair were nicknamed Bluey.

Can anyone see him? Dusty called. I knew he was talking about the sniper. We could all see where the MG nest was -- about thirty-five yards dead in front of us. The camouflage had been perfect until it started its woodpecker imitation.

I pointed. He’s in those palm trees to the left, Sarge.

"Right. You, Bluey and Zac, take your Owens¹ and circle right. Get that machine gun. Bob and Chilla, take the Bren² and go left. Get that sniper. When you’ve done that, move in on the machine gun too. Bill and I’ll cover from here. Keep low, all of you, and good luck."

Dusty and Bill tried to pin down both lots of the enemy with their Thompsons³. We fanned out, right and left, taking advantage of every scrap of cover as we moved to encircle them.

*     *     *

Bluey Roberts and I had been mates forever. We shared the same birthday and he lived next door to me in Balmain. From the time we could walk we lived in each others pockets. As kids we played and fought together against all comers, later sharing a common love for the Tigers⁴, for whom we also played and fought. He was a prop, I was a winger. We started at the local parish school on the same day, and left high school together to take up apprenticeships at the same Ford dealer.

We went together to the Unity Hall pub with our dads the day we had our first legal beers. Even then we knew there was a war coming, but like everyone else we thought it’d be with Germany – the Japs were too busy invading China to bother us.

Drink up boys. Dad said, winking at Pa Roberts, you can do it legally now, so don’t hold back. As he spoke he took a generous pinch of Champion Ready Rubbed,⁵ rolling it into the Tally-Ho⁶ he had in his other palm. One lick, tamp the ends with a matchstick, quick spin of either end on moistened lips and he was ready to light up while I was still raising my schooner for the first sip. Dad could roll a smoke quicker than anyone I ever saw.

It wasn’t the first time either Bluey or I had tasted beer, but we both made a show of pulling a face. I don’t think either Dad or Pa was fooled.

I remember going with Bluey on Saturday nights to Surryville⁷, hair Brylcreemed slick and shiny like a couple of mug lairs, ogling the girls on the dance floor, egging each other on as we tried to pluck up the courage to ask for a dance. We took a couple of brackets to eye off the girls, then pounced when they started the Barn Dance. I can’t remember the name of the girl I took home, but I do remember it as my first fumbling sexual experience. Bluey and I compared notes the next day. We thought we were pretty good.

*     *     *

I felt at peace as I floated near the ceiling. I had no idea how I got there, but it didn’t seem odd to me at the time. Ahead was a bright light that seemed to draw me. Below was an unmoving body of someone who looked vaguely familiar, swathed in bandages and connected to various tubes and wires. People, gathered round in white coats, were working flat out. One man stopped and looked at the woman beside him.

He’s gone.

He said something about noting the time of death.

As the woman wrote she said, I don’t know how he lasted this long. It’s a miracle he survived the plane trip.

The one who had first spoken replied, He was lucky the bullet only grazed his scalp, but it should have knocked him out. How he could run on that leg is amazing too. The report says he went berserk. One of the gun crew bayoneted him, but he still shot them all, took their machine gun and turned it on a grove of trees where a sniper was hidden. He killed the sniper and was unconscious over the gun when his mates found him. His C.O. recommended him for a medal.

I realized they were talking about me. Bluey Roberts had copped it right in front of me. The sniper was using dum-dums, and Bluey’s torso just exploded. I remembered my blind rage. Bluey was my best mate. We’d come through the Kokoda mud without even a scratch between us. We planned to open a garage in Balmain after the stoush. Even the endless mud and slime, the mosquitoes, the dysentery, the humidity, and an enemy who refused to quit had never caused us to doubt our plans.

Remembering Bluey’s death as I hovered there, I was enveloped again by the same rage. No way was I leaving yet. I had a job to finish, sending every one of those Sons of Nippon to join their ancestors.

Suddenly I was back in my body, disoriented, in agony despite the morphine. I opened my eyes as the nurse was reaching across to disconnect something. I can laugh now when I remember the look of utter astonishment on her face. The pain was too great to laugh at the time.

*     *     *

My mates and I had been virtually shanghaied to make up strength for the 53rd Militia. We were sent north to defend the Empire, starry-eyed and in no doubt that we’d easily stop the peril that was presumptuously descending on us from the north. With almost no training or proper equipment, we were thrown into battle along the Kokoda. They slaughtered us at Isurava, but we slowed them enough to make them give up trying to reach Port Moresby.

After that, we who survived dug trenches around Moresby or unloaded supplies at the docks. Still nobody gave us any real training in jungle warfare, or how to use the new Owen guns. All we knew was what we’d picked up on the Track. We learned fast or died. Sometimes both.

In about November ’42, the survivors of our 53rd were merged with the 55th and flown to Popondetta to meet the Nips in the foetid swamp called Sanananda.

I still remember the Army brass, early in the war, telling us the Japs were all short-sighted: poor soldiers who’d never be able to stand up against us big bronzed Anzacs. Malaya and Singapore gave that one the lie direct. The few who had lingering doubts lost them, often quickly and permanently, in the sticky, steaming jungles of Papua and New Guinea.

Between the Nips, our lack of proper training or good intelligence, scrub typhus, malaria and dysentery, we were a pretty sorry bunch. The Yanks were in better shape, but their training was inadequate too, and their discipline worse. It seemed to us they did their best to avoid a good stoush unless the odds were in their favour.

*     *     *

I don’t know how long I was in Intensive Care. It was ages before I was transferred to the general ward. There, for a few weeks, I was in the bed next to Sonny Galea. I still don’t know what unit he was with, or how he got wounded. He was always cagey about that. Some blokes hinted it was self-inflicted. They were guessing but, knowing him now, I wouldn’t be surprised.

Sonny told me his parents emigrated from Malta during the Depression. He was born in Gozo, he said. The Australian kids at school used to tease him and call him a wog because he was short and dark, and he spoke ‘funny’. Strange, I thought, because he had the most Ocker accent I ever heard. I wondered if he was putting it on to be ‘one of the boys’, or to draw his own caricature of an Aussie. He seemed to delight in telling me how he outsmarted them or showed them up as ignorant yokels – at least in his own mind. I thought he was a smart-alec, but underneath the show-off there was something likable about him.

As I recovered, I listened to the other blokes talking of their war experiences and the rumours they heard. Sonny seemed to have an endless supply of tales: some true, some imagined. Where he got his information, I never did find out.

"Brizzie’s⁸ full o' Yanks, he said, all braggin' about what great soldiers they are."

I knew that was right. Not just Brisbane, but Sydney too. From MacArthur⁹ down, they regarded themselves as heroes. Bloody hell, they’d never beaten the Japs so far without our help. They’d been done over properly in the Philippines. Our boys, not them, were first to turn the tide at Milne Bay, and we had precious little help from the Yanks on the Kokoda. We all knew MacArthur had abandoned his men to die at Corregidor. The press called him our saviour, yet when Gordon Bennett¹⁰ escaped from Singapore in similar fashion he was pilloried. He never got another active command.

Sonny knew about the debacle at Buna, and I’d seen what a useless lot the Yanks were there and at Sanananda as well. We had no respect for them, particularly when MacArthur was telling the world how he’d beaten the Japs in the beachhead campaign. Christ, all they did was hang around Huggins’ Roadblock while our boys fought and died for every yard.

MacArthur could never admit that it was our blokes who first did over the Nips. We got ourselves shot up so the Yanks could strut around as if they owned the place. So far as we were concerned, they were just a bunch of flamin' chockoes¹¹, commanded by a bloke who could only tear his eyes away from his own shaving mirror long enough to read his latest press release.

All of us who were there knew it was Pottsie’s¹² fighting withdrawal that saved Moresby. Blamey’s reward was to relieve him of his command. Removing Rowell¹³ and Tubby Allen seven days after he went on national radio to give them his ‘full support’ did nothing for our respect either.

Sonny looked serious. Remember 'ow 'e told the boys o' the 21st Brigade they’d run like rabbits?

There was a general grunt of agreement. We all knew they stood up to the Nips with the best of them.

I reckon, he continued, that Blamey’s so far up MacArthur’s bum 'e can’t see daylight. If 'e ever sticks out 'is tongue you’ll see the brown stain. It’s a wonder it’s not on 'is moustache. There was a general chuckle as he went on, Blamey’s a bloke 'oo’s risen to the very 'eights o' mediocrity, not by military skill but by bein' monkey cunnin' enough to spot any threat to 'is position. Look at the way 'e got rid o' Bennett, Rowell and Allen as well as poor old Pottsie.

Yeah, I know, said another digger. Ya couldn’t respect the prick. S'far as I’m concerned, I’m fightin' fer Australia, not fer 'im.

The problems started when the Yanks came. Most of the ward murmured their agreement with Sonny. The Poms reckon there’s only three things wrong with 'em, an' I reckon they’re spot on. Apart from that, most Yanks’re good blokes.

I was dumb enough to fall for it. What’s wrong with them, apart from the fact they’ll only fight if the odds are all their way?

Nothin', 'cept they’re oversexed, overpaid, an' over 'ere.

It was an old joke, but I felt embarrassed as the whole ward erupted in raucous laughter, causing a nurse to come in asking what the matter was. Sonny let the room quieten down again before continuing, 'Oo’s 'eard about the Battle o' Brisbane?

Even though most of us were a bit busy when it happened, we’d heard rumours. Sonny reckoned he had the good oil¹⁴. It started on the Yanks’ Thanksgivin' Day last year, he told us. "A bunch o' diggers stood up for a drunk Yank soldier, a darkie, gettin' flogged by some of their bloody MP’s for tryin' to go into Brisbane City. Ya know what cunts those bastards are. The way I was told it, the Aussies chased 'em all the way back to their PX. Then their mates come outa the woodwork an' shot one o' our boys. They killed 'im an' wounded seven others, includin' a couple o' civilians. The diggers were all unarmed.

Then the riot was on properly. About five thousand of our blokes was involved. It lasted two days.

Sonny reckoned MacArthur was in his headquarters when it started. 'E 'eard the noise an' thought the crowd was cheerin' 'im. The dickhead went to 'is window an' stood there wavin' at 'is 'adorin' crowd’ till 'e realized what was goin' on. Suddenly, Sonny chortled, 'e needed to travel to New Guinea urgently. They put out a story that 'e’d gone there before it started, but some blokes reckon they saw 'im at 'is window. They 'ushed up news o' the riot, but they couldn’t stop the fellers talkin' about it. Too many was involved.

I don’t know if what Sonny told us was all true, but it made a good yarn. We believed him at the time. Sonny told us the Yanks who started it were exonerated in their own so-called inquiry. All the blame was put on four unarmed diggers. No diggers were called as witnesses, nor were the Yank MP’s that started it in the first place. Some investigation.

It was these things that made me so disillusioned with our top brass and with the simple-minded arrogance of MacArthur and Blamey that I was later willing to join Sonny in his escapades. No one cared about us poor bloody cannon fodder – we had to look after ourselves.

Sonny reckoned the only bloke not just boosting his own ego was Curtin¹⁵. I think he was right. Curtin was at least game to stand up to Churchill¹⁶, insisting that our boys be brought home from the Western Desert when things looked at their worst for us. He couldn’t do much about MacArthur’s arrogance, because without the Yanks’ help we had no hope of holding the Nips back for long. I reckoned it would’ve galled him, but there were a lot of other blokes in our governments who wouldn’t know their bums were on fire if they smelt burning fat.

Suddenly, getting revenge on the Japs was not so important after all. I knew somehow even then we were going to win in the long run. The best way to make Bluey’s death mean something, I reckoned, would be to show up the bunch of no-hopers running things on our side.

*     *     *

It was about this time, too, that the dreams started: reliving the mud and the battles, seeing Bluey shot; even weird things I didn’t understand. Some of the blokes in nearby beds told me I was shouting in my sleep, but nothing that made much sense. That didn’t surprise me, because by then I thought the whole bloody war made no sense.

2

T he Army sent me on indefinite leave when I left hospital in April ’43. I scrounged a lift back to Sydney. I was hobbling on my crutches down the ramp at Central Station, struggling with my kitbag, when I heard someone call Curly Malone.

I turned to see a bloke racing down the ramp towards me. I recognized the shortish stature, swarthy complexion, black hair, permanent grin and dark eyes that never seemed to look directly at you. I knew he was one of the blokes I’d met in hospital, but couldn’t think of his name. He was in uniform, with a corporal’s stripe.

Sonny Galea, remember me? He extended his hand.

Yeah mate, g’day, I said as we shook. Where’d you spring from?

Just seein' a mate off. Thought I reconnized ya. Yer fitter-lookin' than when I last saw ya. 'Ow’re ya feelin'?

Not too bad, mate. Still couldn’t run a four-minute mile, though.

Ya go a beer, or 'aven’t they patched up all the 'oles yet?

I chuckled at the old joke. "I’ve stopped leaking, mate. But there wouldn’t be any sessions¹⁷ round here this time of day, would there?"

No worries. I know a sly grog place. Where’re you stayin'? We can stow your kit an' 'ead on over.

Sounds good. I’m booked into Mansion House for a couple of nights. They’ve put me on indefinite sick leave, so I’ll have to find a place to stay. Only Yanks can afford to stay in pubs.

Mum had written to me when I was still in Moresby that she and Dad were spending the duration of the war on her brother’s farm near Bathurst, so I reckoned the house would’ve been locked up tighter than a drum.

Right y'are. Give us yer kitbag. We’ll get ya settled an' be off.

Without waiting for a reply he grabbed it and slung it over his shoulder. He easily kept pace as I swung down Central Ramp, across Belmore Park and up Elizabeth Street to the private hotel. He walked jauntily, almost cockily, but his eyes darted everywhere like a sparrow’s in a sky full of hawks. All the way he chattered about the mates he’d met in Brisbane, and about how he was making heaps of money now he was back in the Smoke. He was going to show the Yanks a thing or two, he said. That got my attention.

After I checked in we took the rattling old lift up to the fourth floor to dump my kitbag. Back at street level, Sonny hailed a taxi. We headed up William Street to the Cross. When we alighted in Kellett Street he peeled off the fare from a roll of notes Jack Rice¹⁸ couldn’t have jumped over.

The plane trees were wearing their autumn coats, the sun dappling the pavement. A cool afternoon wind was whipping dead leaves about in little eddies as we walked up the street. He took me up a narrow lane and knocked on a blue-painted door. It was the tradesmen’s entrance to one of those once-genteel mansions, dilapidated and falling