The Prime Minister

Paul F Walsh

1

‘The Prime Minister has disappeared in New… (static, static, static) …’

‘Strewth!’ Tracker reacted. ‘Did you hear that?’

‘What?’ Bluey was studying his form guide.

‘The radio! Holy smoke! They reckon the Prime Minister’s done a runner in Newcastle.’

‘All bets are off, then,’ Bluey said. ‘I wouldn’t have backed her anyway.’

The Federal election was in full swing and the disappearance of the Prime Minister was inspiring a frenzy of media speculation, but the patrons of the Fleapit Hotel knew only what they could glean from each other and Fatso’s 1960s transistor.

‘… (static, static, static) …’

Fatso blamed the static on a teenage sojourn at Newcastle Beach. Bloody sand was all he would say when the locals complained about the audio quality. And complain they did when the finish of the Melbourne Cup was drowned out by that bloody sand two years running.

‘Bloody sand!’ Fatso said, as static continued to smother yet more speculation on the Prime Minister’s fate.

‘Why not replace your clapped-out transistor with a telly?’

‘Never you mind, Bluey,’ Fatso advised, belting the said appliance with his clenched fist. ‘My pub was retro before retro, and that’s the way it’ll stay, mate. The Fleapit’s a true-blue Aussie pub. You won’t find a perfumed urinal here, mate. We even attract black drinkers like Tracker here. What could be more Aussie-retro than that?’

‘Refusing to serve us?’ Tracker quipped.

A nervous chuckle swept through the bar like an unwelcome westerly.

‘I’ll have a schooner of black, thanks, Fatso, now that you mention it.’

There was a pensive silence, made all the more ironic by a black ordering a black.

‘The Prime Minister’s black too, and now she’s missing.’ Tracker grinned. ‘Coincidence?’

Residual racism often lined the bars at the Fleapit Hotel, but Tracker was a trauma surgeon whose very presence and profession challenged the old Aboriginal stereotypes that still lurked in more than one regular’s prejudiced mind.

‘Crikey, I hope so,’ Bluey murmured.

‘I reckon she’s lost on a bus,’ Random said.

‘Who?’ Bluey asked.

‘The Prime Minister.’

‘She wouldn’t catch a bus!’ Tracker couldn’t contain himself.

‘Says you, Doctor Know-It-All, but I heard it from God,’ Random persisted.

‘Where is God?’ Bluey enquired. ‘He’s late.’

‘No, he’s in the ladies’ lounge consulting the holy spirit,’ Fatso advised. ‘Chivas Regal, no less. He and Pullet are like a pair of lounge lizards waiting for old Mrs Croaker to croak. If she doesn’t fall off the perch soon, she’ll have done her entire pension on the one-armed bandit.’

‘Why can’t we have one of those new push-button, multi-coin jobs, Fatso?’ Bluey whinged.

‘Not bloody retro, mate. And she’d lose her pension too fast; that’d be bloody cruel, and what would Pullet pull …?’

There was no shortage of long answers to that one, but Random cut them all short. He was a persistent little bastard. Annoyingly so.

2

‘I’ll give you the good oil,’ Random said. ‘The Prime Minister was last seen walking the red carpet onto the park-and-ride bus outside the footy stadium.’

‘Bullshit!’ Bluey exclaimed, blowing beer like a humpback. And he was a humpback, come to think of it.

‘Well, I’m only telling you what God told me.’

‘Must be gospel, then!’ Fatso grinned.

‘Probably take three buses and a ferry to get her from the stadium to the stadium,’ Random lamented. ‘The new system’s a real downer, mate.’

‘Good one, Random,’ Fatso chortled. ‘Cunningly cryptic! Another schooner?’

‘Sure, why not? I’m a long time dead! She’s lost on a bus for sure!’

‘Bloody capitalists and their bloody privatization, comrade.’ Tug slammed his empty glass on the bar. ‘Half of Newcastle’s lost on the buses, including the bloody drivers. Bloody capitalists! What did Marx say? Give them enough rope, and they’ll hang themselves!’

‘And us with them,’ Random said. ‘They’ve even closed the stop outside the pub!’

‘Bastards!’ Tracker exclaimed.

‘It ain’t right, I tell you,’ Tug proclaimed. ‘Big Ben has to hike two miles now to get a drink, and Fatso sets his clock by Big Ben. Time will stand still, comrades. Time, gentlemen! And all because of those bloody two-digit buses!’

‘I’ll give them two digits!’ Random gestured accordingly. ‘Not even the Prime Minister is safe!’

‘Calm yourself, Random,’ Fatso interjected. ‘You’re upsetting Bluey’s dog.’

Beatroot was a greyhound. If licking your privatization was a sign of anxiety, then Fatso was right. Beatroot was upset. She was a champion, a champion loser, who could never get her snout in front of the favourite, but everybody in the pub continued to back her, out of a sense of local loyalty. Fatso had even provided Beatroot with a bogan basket in front of the fireplace boasting a stuffed rabbit and a Pooper Cars blanket.

‘It’s not the buses, Random,’ Router argued. ‘God’s wrong. I know what happened to the Prime Minister.’

‘Yeah, well I believe in God, mate!’

‘God’s a bloody atheist, doesn’t even believe in himself. It’s the Light Rail, mate.’

The entire pub groaned. Even Beatroot passed wind. Router was one of those Save Our Rail folk. And he blamed everything on the bloody Light Rail.

‘So let me get this straight, comrade,’ Tug challenged. ‘The Light Rail has kidnapped the Prime Minister?’

‘The Light Rail doesn’t exist yet, Router,’ Fatso poured the challenge, slow and steady, like a pint of Guinness.

‘I know it doesn’t exist, but I still blame it,’ Router insisted.

‘So, if it doesn’t exist, how do you figure it caused the Prime Minister to disappear?’ Random challenged.

‘She fell down the black hole in funding, mate.’ Router grinned. ‘Sucked in, you gullible bastards!’

And then the crackling of Fatso’s transistor commanded their attention once more:

‘The Prime Minister is … (static, static, static) …’

‘Bloody sand,’ Fatso said.

3

‘I don’t know about the Prime Minister, but the transistor’s dead!’

‘Wishful thinking, Bluey.’ Fatso laughed. ‘The light’s still on.’

‘But nobody’s home, Fatso,’ Bluey persisted. ‘And I want to hear Race 6.’

Fatso immediately glanced at Beatroot.

‘No, not the dogs, mate, the horses,’ Bluey explained. ‘Beatroot’s resting up in her basket for tomorrow night. And the way things are going, she’ll be the favourite.’

‘I’ll let everyone know,’ Fatso said, as Beatroot passed wind again. ‘A hot tip straight from the dog’s …’

‘This is our big chance,’ Tracker barracked. ‘Go Beatroot!’

The dog took no notice of Tracker’s punt talk. The only reliable punts in Newcastle used to cross the harbour. And even then, it was hard to tell if the destination was a win or a loss.

‘But what about Race 6?’ Bluey asked.

‘New batteries, old son.’ Fatso poured another beer for his favourite punching bag, Chopper. ‘Before you bury my transistor, Bluey, have the decency to make sure she’s dead. A couple of double As, and you’ll witness the resurrection. What’s so important about Race 6?’

‘My Missus is the favourite!’

‘How’d you get a saddle on her?’ Fatso winked.

‘Ha, Ha, Fatso. I’ve backed My Missus, not my missus. She’d take exception to you riding her like that. She’s a feminist, you know.’

‘Apologies, mate,’ Fatso said. ‘Chopper brings out the worst in me.’

Fatso had never really forgiven Chopper for Laman St. Bloody vandal was all he would say. As in: Here’s your schooner, you bloody vandal! And it was down to Chopper that Fatso brought in his Greenie rule: Never put brown on the Greenies while they’re in the pub.

‘I blame the Greenies,’ Chopper said. ‘Bloody tree-huggers!’

‘What are you talking about, you bloody vandal?’ Fatso asked.

‘The Prime Minister!’ Chopper wiped the froth from his Ned Kelly beard. ‘The Greenies got her!’

‘Bullshit,’ Fatso retorted.

‘She done a Harold Holt, mate,’ Nick the tiler was laying it on thick. ‘Swum out to a Chinese sub off Horseshoe Beach and got taken by a shark, I reckon. Bitch deserved it too! Either that, or she went on walkabout!’

‘You racist bastard!’ Tracker waved an imaginary scalpel.

‘Now, now, Tracker,’ a familiar police voice said. ‘Come along, mate! We need you to assist our inquiry with regard to the Prime Minister.’

If it was possible for a black man to turn white, then Tracker almost managed it. He was led from the bar like a ram to the slaughter. Was the black sheep of the Fleapit family being racially profiled? Deaths in custody came to mind. Where were the bloody Greenies when you needed them to protest?

‘Time for a schooner, Porky?’ Fatso shouted.

‘No, Fatso, this is too serious,’ the Detective Inspector replied.

It must be, thought Fatso, for Porky the pig to refuse a swill at his own local.

4

‘How’s Tracker?’ Bluey looked up from his form guide.

‘He’ll spend the night in the cells, I guess,’ Fatso said.

‘It’s not right, locking a blackfella up,’ Bluey remarked. ‘Too many of them die, but if he’s involved in the Prime Minister’s disappearance …’

‘I’ll eat Chopper’s hat,’ Fatso finished the thought for him. ‘Tracker’s into saving lives, not taking them!’

Bluey returned to his form guide, penciling in mysterious alien markings as though he were an SP bookie from your anus, or some such planet. He was once, before the TAB.

‘All that formication will send you blind, mate.’ Fatso pulled yet another beer. ‘You lose like a professional, Bluey.’

‘Good one, Fatso!’ Chopper grinned from under his treeologist cap.

‘Treeologist, my bum!’ Fatso declared. ‘Tree killer, more like it! Have another schooner, you bloody vandal.’

‘Thanks. I will,’ Chopper agreed. ‘Tracker and I are both surgeons, when you think of it. I’m a tree surgeon …’

‘Bloody butcher, more like it,’ Fatso growled.

‘Here’s to bloody Laman St, mate,’ Chopper grinned.

‘Up yours too, Chopper,’ Fatso hissed. ‘Bloody vandal.’

‘Where’d you get a word like formication?’ Random randomly asked.

‘My missus,’ Fatso said.

‘Straight from the horse’s mouth, then,’ Bluey asserted.

‘Not the bloody horse, Bluey, my real missus! Why do you keep talking in horse code?’

‘Neigh, not me, mate, but, hay,’ Bluey continued, ‘how stable is your transistor?’

What’s it mean, then?’ Random persisted.

‘What?’ Fatso asked.

‘Formication.’

‘A feeling like insects crawling all over you.’

‘Like fleas in the Fleapit.’ Random laughed.

Then Router started laughing too. Pretty soon the entire pub was laughing. It wasn’t the best witticism they’d ever heard, but alcohol magnified, and Fatso often said that the Fleapit was so crowded with halfwits that you couldn’t find one wit.

And then Fatso’s transistor came to life:

‘In news just to hand, emus and kangaroos at Blackbutt Reserve have exposed a shallow grave. Police have engaged an Aboriginal tracker to assist in their search for the missing Prime Minister.’

A roar went up from the patrons. Tracker’s grandfather had taught him the old tribal ways.

‘Bastards!’ Chopper exclaimed. ‘Those bloody Greenies buried the Prime Minister under the national emblem. Tree-hugging bastards!’

‘Look on the bright side, mate,’ Bluey advised. ‘They’re employing Tracker rather than locking him up!’

‘And how good was my transistor?’ Fatso asked.

‘But if the Prime Minister’s buried in the shallow grave, what do they need Tracker for?’ Random queried. ‘What’s he tracking?’

‘The murderers, I guess,’ Fatso advised. ‘Porky won’t rest till he catches them, and he sure as hell won’t let Tracker rest.’

‘Bloody oath,’ Bluey agreed. ‘Once Porky’s got his snout in the trough, there’ll be no rest till he’s satisfied. A schooner is either full or empty with Porky. None of that glass half-full, half-empty shit.’

‘Let’s all have another beer for Tracker!’ Fatso shouted.

5

God was sitting on the throne like Zeus on his thunderbox when he heard a conversation floating from the retro urinal in the Fleapit Hotel.

‘She was dead when I buried her, mate,’ the first voice said, ‘dead as a dodo. I even checked for a pulse and a heartbeat. Dead, mate. That’s it!’

‘Why’d you bury her in the enclosure?’ the second voice asked.

‘Ground was softer, and I thought the roos and the emus would be company,’ the first voice explained.

‘She was the Prime Minister, mate.’

‘I didn’t know that, …’

‘And she was dead! Company? Are you off your trolley, mate?’

And then the voices faded as God kept his eye to the crack in the dunny door to confirm his all-seeing and all-knowing status in vain. All he saw were the shadows of the departing men.

‘You’ll never guess what I just heard in the dunny,’ God said, as he approached Fatso in the ladies’ lounge.

‘Not now, God,’ Fatso advised. ‘I’m paying out a jackpot for Mrs Croaker.’

Now everybody knew that a jackpot on the old one-armed bandit was unlikely, but Mrs Croaker seemed to be extraordinarily lucky. Her luck was governed not so much by fate but by Fatso’s sense of the Fair Go. Problem gambling was never to be a problem in the Fleapit Hotel. Fatso had once paid out during a blackout claiming that Mrs Croaker had four aces on the dead machine. She was more likely to be dead herself.

‘But, Fatso, …,’ God insisted.

‘Not now, God, wait till we get back to the public bar,’ Fatso growled.

But when they eventually got back to the public bar:

‘Stone the crows!’ Bluey said. ‘What the hell is happening?’

Uniformed coppers came from everywhere. They blocked every entry to the pub. And then Tracker and Porky the pig made their grand entrance.

‘Porky,’ Fatso said, ‘you must be desperate for a schooner to bring an armed escort.’

‘May the Force be with you, Porky,’ Random rambled, trying to outwit every other halfwit in the pub. And he nearly succeeded.

‘It gives the Fleapit a bad name with all them cop cars out the front, Porky!’ Fatso complained. ‘Next, you’ll be asking Bluey for proof of age. If you want to arrest some poor bastard, we all vote for Chopper.’

There was a chorus of bloody vandal before Porky proclaimed:

‘The Fleapit’s had a bad name since you named it, Fatso, but that’s the least of our worries! Tracker has followed footprints from the shallow grave in Blackbutt to this pub!’

There was a gasp from the patrons.

‘More likely he followed his thirst,’ Fatso winked at Tracker. ‘Fair dinkum! How gullible are you, Porky?’

‘No, Porky’s right, Fatso,’ Tracker confirmed, ‘the dead Prime Minister has staggered from her grave to the Fleapit Hotel.’

‘Jesus!’ Bluey muttered, with unintended irony.

6

Beatroot was shoe-sniffing Porky when it happened.

‘Stuff me!’ said Porky.

‘Already done, mate,’ Fatso replied.

‘Look behind you,’ Porky insisted.

The Prime Minister, covered in dirt and leaves, made a mad dash from the cellar. She growled at Bluey as she streaked past.

‘What hope have we got?’ Random observed. ‘She’s the best bloody greyhound in this town, a little black beauty! She’s even beat Beatroot from six feet under!’

And it was true.

The cellar was six feet under.

And the hapless Beatroot had lost to the favourite again.

The Prime Minister had left Beatroot standing, and the first among equals was now licking her privatization in Beatroot’s bogan basket.

‘Rooted by name, rooted by nature,’ Random said, as he watched Beatroot try to stare down the reclining Prime Minister from a standing start.

‘I blame the Light Rail,’ Router muttered, or was that nuttered?

The patrons of the Fleapit Hotel groaned, a real boozer of a groan.

‘Why don’t you give it a rest, Router?’ Tracker railed. ‘Save our railing!’

Later that evening, the entire pub had gone to the dogs, with the exception of Fatso and Porky.

‘Heard you were on CNN,’ Fatso said.

‘Yeah,’ Porky admitted. ‘Bloody media. Think it’s funny, linking our dog to the real Prime Minister. Must be a slow news night!’

‘Just like here,’ Fatso laughed. ‘Any new leads? Made a collar yet?’

‘Ha, Ha!’ Porky said. ‘We’ll never prove it, but Bluey did it, for sure, mate! You saw how the Prime Minister growled at him.’

‘So he tried to nobble her?’ Fatso observed.

‘Yeah, but the dog bolted before he could needle her. Silly bastard must have left the gate open. Anyway, the Prime Minister ran till she dropped. Apparently, if it’s stressed enough, a greyhound can slow its pulse, heartbeat and breathing to almost zero to the untrained eye.’

‘Really?’ Fatso said. ‘Sounds like my missus when I hit the hay!’

‘Yeah, horse code, I heard about that,’ Porky admitted.

‘Neigh!’ Fatso chuckled.

‘You couldn’t get a more untrained eye than the idiot who found her. Nabbed him in your car park, Fatso, came to the pub for a leak instead of a drink, bloody wanker, buried her in earth no softer than his head. Anyway, the dog digs herself out and follows this idiot back to the pub. Tracker reckons she crawled into the cellar when the external door was open.’

‘Bluey did have motive,’ Fatso suggested. ‘He and most of the pub have backed Beatroot for a win. Tracker says we’re all racists tonight, so why don’t we listen to the race, Porky?’

The transistor came back to life as surely as a dead dog in Blackbutt.

‘Beatroot leading!’ the commentator screamed. ‘Look at him run! But here comes the Prime Minister, Lazarus on steroids, oh, oh … (static, static, static) …’

‘Bloody sand,’ Fatso said.

Copyright Paul F Walsh 2021