‘What do you do with yourself?’ he asked.

Then, even though she would have liked to stop herself, she could not. She said: ‘I write poems. I’m going to write one about my Aunt Daise, like she was, gathering carnations early in the dew.’

‘What’ll you get out of that?’

‘Nothing,’ she said, ‘I suppose.’

But it did not matter.

‘What other sorts of pomes do you write?’ he asked, twisting at last the dead head of the banksia off.

‘I wrote one,’ she said, ‘about the things in a cupboard. I wrote about a dream I had. And the smell of rain. That was a bit too short.’

He began to look at her then. He had never looked into the eyes of a girl. They were grey and cool, unlike the hot, or burnt-out eyes of a woman.

‘What are you going to be?’ she asked.

‘I dunno.’

‘You’re not a white-collar type.’

‘Eh?’

‘I mean you’re not for figures, and books, and banks and offices,’ she said.

He was too disgusted to agree.

‘I’m gunna have me own truck. Like Mr Black. Darkie’s got a trailer.’

‘What?’

‘Well,’ he said, ‘a semi-trailer.’

‘Oh,’ she said, more diffident.

‘Darkie took me on a trip to Maryborough. It was pretty tough goin’. Sometimes we drove right through the night. Sometimes we slept on the road. Or in places where you get rooms. Gee, it was good though, shootin’ through the country towns at night.’

She saw it. She saw the people standing at their doors, frozen in the blocks of yellow light. The rushing of the night made the figures for ever still. All around she could feel the furry darkness, as the semi-trailer roared and bucked, its skeleton of coloured lights. While in the cabin, in which they sat, all was stability and order. If she glanced sideways she could see how his taffy hair shone when raked by the bursts of electric light. They had brought cases with tooth-brushes, combs, one or two things – the pad on which she would write the poem somewhere when they stopped in the smell of sunlight dust ants. But his hands had acquired such mastery over the wheel, it appeared this might never happen. Nor did she care.

‘This Mr Black,’ she said, her mouth getting thinner, ‘does he take you with him often?’

‘Only once interstate,’ said Lummy, pitching the banksia head away. ‘Once in a while short trips.’

As they drove they rocked together. He had never been closer to anyone than when bumping against Darkie’s ribs. He waited to experience again the little spasm of gratitude and pleasure. He would have liked to wear, and would in time, a striped sweat-shirt like Darkie wore.

‘I’d like to go in with Darkie,’ he said, ‘when I get a trailer of me own. Darkie’s the best friend I got.’

With a drawnout shiver of distrust she saw the darker hands, the little black hairs on the backs of the fingers.