You'll never catch me alive, Copper!

By Spinifex

We were all together in the big old Pontiac that Boof had recently bought and paraded around in like a 1950's bodgie, his hair all brylcreemed and ducktailed, with loud rock'n'roll blaring out and disturbing the peace all over town. He especially liked doing this early on a Sunday morning, just to wake up the neighbours and get his own back on them for treating him like a dill. From my point of view. I could never quite condemn them for their attitudes as much as he did.
But this morning was different. It was Saturday morning, not Sunday for a start. The music was still hooting, 'Chantilly Lace' rupturing the airwaves and eardrums alike, but this morning it was all for a good, decent purpose.
The Professor, face jaundiced and drawn, slumped back into the plush red leather upholstery, quivering slightly and occasionally bursting into a tremendous and violent tremor as he belched explosively. He'd just been let out by the coppers from protective custody. Picked up last night drunk as a Lord, full as a goog, tight as a tick, as drunk as ten men. In the main street, in full view of a critical public and he was a disgrace. His head was exploding, a vein throbbed dangerously in his temple and he looked like death warmed up. He had a hangover so big it could have been bronzed and set up in Peko Park as a warning to young people.
Miss Kitty soothed him with some bitter words: "You are a disgrace. You have humiliated us all, exposed us to community disapprobation and set a disgraceful example to the youth of this town." She hissed slightly and her tongue explored her ruby red lips, rather like a King Brown, I reflected, investigating its surrounds before it struck at a helpless victim. The Professor swiped feebly and futiley at a red-dirt smear across the front of his cavalier-style blouse, once brilliant-white, now stained with the dust and detritus of a long and revelrous evening.
"It is very lucky for you that it was that nice copper who picked you up," she went on. "You remember him?" she queried mockingly. The Professor shook his head feebly. "The one with the moustache and smile and funny-looking shaved head?" He shook his head again, even though it must have been extremely hurtful to him. I couldn't pick the bloke myself, come to think about it. That description could have fitted any one of a dozen of them.
"And he did literally have to pick you up, by the scruff of the neck and hold you at arm's length! He said you twisted and fidgeted like a cat having kittens and swore terribly and spat nasty, ancient druidic curses at them and then sobbed and cried and begged for forgiveness. And so they took you in, into protective custody, for your own good." She sneered at his weakness, not so much for being in a disgraceful state as for breaking down and sobbing pathetically. "It's lucky for you he was in control!"
"They weren't always in control you know," gushed Boof. He sensed the danger the Professor was in, knew he was close to a savage scratching and tried to ease the tension. The Professor was his mate. "One day back in the thirties, Cannon Lloyd had a big win. He was a famous gambler you know and after the big win he gave the money to the publican at the Tennant Creek pub who stashed it in the safe." The Professor's head dropped into his lap and Miss Kitty unfeeling grasped him by both ears and brought him back upright.
"Listen to this!" she hissed. "It's for your own good and you might learn something from it!" The gurgling from far down in the depths of the Professor's soul seemed to indicate an opposite point of view.
"You see," Boof continued quickly, "two chaps had been trailing Cannon for a week and maybe he knew. Or he was just being careful. Anyway, he went out to the toilet and they got him. He disappeared, his mates sent out a search party for both him and for the two thugs. They knew these mongrels were on the trail of Cannon. Everyone with a gun was called in and the coppers couldn't do a thing. It was mob rule. They caught up with the villains near where the Council Chambers are today, circled them up and then lit the spinifex. And then they got them. Kicked 'em, belted 'em, flogged 'em, did damn near everything bar castrate 'em! Left 'em to burn to death. They found Cannon next day, wandering around out near the Eldorado. He'd been bashed stupid by that pair and he came close to dying. The crims somehow got to Alice and they spent a long time in hospital there - needless to say they never came back! Coppers weren't in control that day!"
Miss Kitty smiled to herself. "Perhaps," she whispered. "they were more in control than you think. Coppers aren't entirely stupid, you know. Maybe what happened saved them a lot of trouble?" She smiled sympathetically at Boof and his innocent enthusiasm.
"Well," I ventured cautiously, not wanting to disturb Miss Kitty too much. I'd seen her in this sort of dangerous mood before too. "Well, there were other times when they definitely weren't in control. This is around 1956 or so and Ted Wright used to run a big game out at the Nob I think, in the laundry and the coppers were forever trying to bust the place. There was another game as well in the canteen, Nick the electrician ran that one and another one again run by Stan the blacksmith in a hut. And the coppers just couldn't win a trick. There'd be cockatoos out on the road with big torches and whenever they saw the cops coming, even if you were right in the middle of a big winning streak, it was grab the money and run. And if you were quick enough, you could grab somebody else's money as well and run. Though you'd probably be well advised to keep on running all the way to Mount Isa or further if you had any sense!"
"Come to think of," mused Miss Kitty, "they weren't entirely in control when Sailor Jack got flogged so badly he eventually died." She sighed at the thought. "Old Sailor Jack was harmless. He might have been a remittance man, you know, getting his quid regularly, never had to work. He used to buy half a dozen papers every morning though, this is back in the thirties as well, and walk around the bars selling them as he went." Boof and I winked at each other - whenever she went back into the old days things would start to cool down. "He used to stay a bit longer at every watering hole he visited and it wasn't long before he was in a condition just like you were in last night!" Oh no! She shot a furious glance at him and waved her razor-sharp, inch long fingernails menacingly. But she got back into full stride quickly. She had a soft spot for the memory of old Sailor Jack.
He'd stop off in front of timber posts that had wire strung through them and twist the wire around and around, trying to strangle the poor useless thing and abuse it and tell it that it was a bastard with no parents and a poor dumb bastard at that and give it a few smacks in the mouth. If you were walking along and spoke to him - "Gidday Jack" - he'd stop as if nothing was happening, greet you in return and then get straight back into it when he thought you were gone.
And there was one poor old oleander outside the Tennant Creek pub that he used to give merry hell to, belting it and spitting the most vicious insults at it and carrying on so much the other drinkers would lean out the door and tell him to piss off up to the Goldfields. The coppers never touched him, just told him to go home if he got too loud. And the poor touched thing would. The coppers were in control then but weren't when some animal decided that they wanted whatever money he supposedly had stashed and belted him badly and robbed him. He died not much longer after that in hospital.
"The coppers never got the mongrel," she sighed sadly.
Boof was upset at the sad direction the conversation had taken. The professor's wrong-doings were forgotten and it was obvious he wanted to lighten the sombre mood that had descended on us.
"Well," he roared, "if they weren't in control then, they're not in control now!" and planted his foot, right outside the cop-shop, and squealed and twisted and burnt rubber for a hundred metres along the bitumen all the way down to Peko Road. He laughed maniacally as he swung right, across the path of the oncoming traffic and planted the foot right to the floor this time. His brylcreemed ducktail bobbed crazily and he roared like a fool as he delighted in the insane speed he made out towards the Nob. The rest of us shrunk deep into our seats. One of the cars he'd cut off loomed larger and larger behind us, slinking up after us like a panther moving in for the kill. It was the Highway Patrol cruiser and the driver was that the copper with the moustache and smile and funny-looking shaved head.
Boof at last glanced up into the rear-view just as the block blew itself apart amid a noisome cloud of thick blue smoke. He slid deep into his own seat, head down, a tear trickling quietly down his cheek.
His own cry went sadly and quietly out into the atmosphere, soon to be lost forever. "You'll never catch me alive copper" he stuttered, just as a moustache and a smile and a funny-looking shaved head leaned through his window and winked broadly, though menacingly at us all.