Cover

Title Page

Dedication

Then from inside the cave Polyphemus answered:
‘No One is killing me.’

Homer, Odyssey, Book IX

Chapters

For a long time I used to drive around the city late at night, but why I found myself in the ghost hours of that Monday morning nineteen years ago on Lawson Street I can no longer recall. Nothing remains for me but the sound – a dull thud, like a roo hitting the side of the car – and the dreamlike slowness of my realisation. I had almost driven past Redfern Park before I pulled over to the kerb to collect my thoughts. The park was empty except for a couple of men sleeping rough between the roots of a large fig. I drove a little further on so as not to disturb them. It must have been a dog, I thought. What else would have been on the road at that time of night?

I left the car idling and got out. At that time I was driving a Volvo station wagon I bought from a drummer who had fallen on hard times. I can’t remember now what I paid for it but it wasn’t much. I had the impression he must have driven largely by feel; there were dings and scratches all over it, and a couple of larger dents at the front and rear. His face had seemed pocked in the same way; even a three-day growth could not hide what must have been an adolescent devastation. While we were negotiating the price, I noticed how his fingers tapped out an endless rhythm on the bonnet. Over the course of the next few months I found three drumsticks beneath the seats, all of them crazed with shreds. I saw him play years later in a pub in Surry Hills but left before the show finished. I had by that time sold the car so there was nothing we might have talked about, although I had kept one of the drumsticks. I watched him closely as he played. The sticks hit the metal rim of the large drum before making contact with the skin.

The streetlight was dead where I pulled over, but I could see a dent on the passenger side where I had heard the thud, close to where the front bumper ended. It looked like a large dimple and I traced its depth with my fingers. It could easily have been there from the time of the drummer. But I had heard a sound, and the more I thought about it, the more I came to believe I had also felt a small impact. My investigations in the dark could not be conclusive, so the only solution was to drive back to Lawson Street. I have never been close to animals, but if it was a dog, I didn’t like the thought of its pain.