Maurice Gee.

Orchard Street
Auckland: Viking. 1998.

Peter Beatson
[Many thanks to David Watts for help with proofreading.]

SETTING AND NARRATIVE VIEWPOINT

Place: ‘Loomis’ – a fictionalised version of Henderson, a small but growing rural town
on the upper Waitemata harbour, around twelve miles north-west of Auckland, New
Zealand. The action takes place almost solely in ‘Orchard Street’, which bears a close
resemblance to the real Newington Road where Gee grew up.

Time: the first half of 1951, during the 151-day watersiders’ dispute.

Viewpoint: first person narration by the adult Austin Dye, recalling events when he was
fourteen.

CHARACTERS
Notes:
Characters are listed alphabetically by the given name, family name, or nickname by
which they are most frequently known to the author or other characters. The exceptions
are generic family terms such as ‘Mum’ or ‘Grandpa’ which, along with alternative
names and nicknames, are provided in brackets. The titles ‘Mr’, ‘Mrs’ and ‘Miss’ are
given when the narrative viewpoint belongs to children, who would employ such terms
for adults. Where only one name is recorded for a character, it is because others have not
been provided in the text. Unnamed minor characters are listed by their major identifying
feature, usually occupation.

‘Bike’ (Ian) Pike. Aged around eighteen, he lives opposite the Dyes and works as a
junior clerk in the same bank as Les Dye. Tall, skinny and long-limbed, he looks like a
praying mantis, and is a bit of a joke amongst his peers, although he is an excellent and
graceful runner, and a good if rather dithery rugby winger. He becomes infatuated with
Eileen Collymore, whom he convinces himself is destined for him despite her obvious
indifference. His obsession turns from a pathetic fantasy into potentially lethal violence
when he becomes aware that her real boyfriend Les Dye has polluted her supposed
‘purity’.

Collymore, Mrs. Minor; off-stage. The chronically ill mother of Teresa and Eileen, who
dies early in the novel.

Constable; unnamed. A thuggish, out-of-town policeman with white cheeks and yellow
hair, involved in the arrest of Frank Collymore and Eddie Dye. He is recognised even by
his own colleagues as prone to gratuitous violence.

Constable, Senior; unnamed. An out-of-town policeman, who tries to handle a tense

stand-off with the armed Ian Pike through aggressive confrontation rather than
diplomacy.

Cooper, Mr and Mrs. Minor; off-stage. A dysfunctional Orchard Street couple. He gives
her black eyes, she flirts with other men and runs off with a roof painter.

Doctor; unnamed. Minor. Attends to Eileen Collymore’s splinter wound inflicted by Ian
Pike.

Donny. Minor. A loutish friend of Les Dye, who tells his greasy mates a particularly
dirty joke.

Eddie (Dad) Dye. Husband of Lil and father of Ossie and Les. He is a commercial
printer, who fought Hitler during World War II, and hates the crypto-fascism of which he
accuses the National Government headed by Prime Minister Sid Holland. He prints and
writes underground anti-establishment pamphlets in defiance of the censorship in force
during the waterside dispute, but eventually becomes alienated by the ugly stand-over
tactics used by militant unionists against their own members. A client and mate of the
disreputable bookie Frank Collymore, he is not as intellectually cultivated as his wife,
and feels left out when she enjoys an erudite cultural flirtation with their neighbour
Lionel Redknapp.

Eileen Collymore. Aged seventeen; works in a milkbar. Les Dye’s girlfriend, and elder
sister of Teresa. With her pretty face and impressive breasts, she is the kind of girl who
might win beauty contests, despite her crooked teeth and short legs. She is a ‘good
Catholic’, but believes having sex before marriage is not really a sin if you are in love.

Flynns. Minor; off-stage. Own the paddocks at the back of Orchard Street where quite a
lot of the action is set.

Frank Collymore. The Roman Catholic father of six children, including Eileen and
Teresa. Ostensibly runs a cartage business, but his major occupation is as an illegal
bookie, taking off-course bets on horse races. Some people admire him as a boozing,
womanising ‘dag’, but his drinking leads to the death of the old dog Jimpy, and the
subsequent emotional collapse of Jimpy’s owner. Has an extremely relaxed attitude
towards the wild behaviour of his young sons and his daughter Eileen’s premarital affair
with Les Dye.

Horton, Sergeant. A basically decent Loomis policeman.

Jimmy Collymore. One of Teresa’s two younger brothers. Blonde, quick and wiry, and
closely bonded to his brother Mike, he is a disreputable little brat, running wild after his
mother’s death.

Les (Lesley) Dye. Aged eighteen; the older brother of the narrator Ossie. He works as a
junior in the bank with Ian Pike, and goes out with Eileen Collymore. A raffish,
irresponsible playboy, he regards everything from politics to sex as a game, but his
ineptly managed escapades always land him in trouble.

Lil (Lilian; Mum) Dye. Mother of Les and Ossie, wife of Eddie. A blend of sometimes
contradictory personality traits, she is a staunch socialist, who can laugh like a barmaid
on occasions, yet insists on gentility in the family males, and is snobbishly class
conscious. Although a strong supporter of her husband’s illegal, pro-union activities, her
involvement in them make her tired, frightened, and therefore bad-tempered. She takes
intellectual pride in her atheism, but translates it into anti-Catholic social bigotry. Though
devoted to her printer husband, she has married slightly below herself, coming from a
wealthier and better educated class background. She is therefore rather frustrated and
lonely at having nobody with whom she can share her passionate interest in ‘things of the
mind’, like art, poetry, music, nature and religion.

Mike Collymore. One of Teresa’s tough younger brothers – see Jimmy above.

‘Ossie’ (Austin; ‘Dinky’) Dye. Central narrator. The 14-year-old son of Eddie and Lil,
and Teresa Collymore’s boyfriend. He is trying to put childhood behind him by changing
his nickname from ‘Dinky’ to ‘Ossie’, and by giving away his dog Jimpy whom he feels
he has outgrown. Supports the watersiders’ cause in the current industrial dispute out of
loyalty to his anti-government parents. He likes moral issues to be clear-cut and black-
and-white, and is made existentially uneasy when a hero in his favourite author Zane
Grey’s novel is beaten to the draw by the villain. He is initiated into the awe-inspiring
beauty of the night sky by Mr Redknapp, which eventually leads him to become a
professional astronomer. He also becomes friends with Mr Redknapp’s father-in-law Mr
Worley, with whom he plays draughts, who lends him Zane Grey novels, and to whom he
gives his old dog Jimpy. Though basically self-centred, he is occasionally moved by the
mystery of human suffering.

Pike, Mr. The father of Ian, who lives over the road from the Dyes. A railway signalman,
he used to have a large collection of budgies, but released them into the neighbourhood,
with fatal consequences for the birds. He now grows hothouse flowers, which he
sometimes wires together for funeral wreaths. A belligerent anti-communist, his anger
about the underground, pro-wharfie leaflets being distributed in Orchard Street could
have serious consequences for Eddie Dye, who is printing them.

Pike, Mrs. The mother of Ian, she is an ardent vegetarian and practitioner of Radiant
Living.

Porteous, Constable. A good-natured Loomis policeman, who helps Sergeant Horton

raid Frank Collymore and the Dyes, but covertly advises Lil to hide incriminating
evidence.
Raffills, Mr. Minor. Lives over the road from the Dyes. He used to beat his three sons
up, but when they finally retaliated and threw him out, he went to live permanently in a
shed out the back, leaving the house unoccupied.

Redknapp, Mr Lionel. Middle-aged next door neighbour of the Dyes. He and his wife
make tents and knapsacks for a living. He is a thin man with a persistent cough from
being gassed in World War I, where he served under Major Worley to whose daughter
Winifred he is now married. He is a stern but kindly and sympathetic man, endlessly
patient and understanding with his ill-humoured wife, and able to defuse the armed stand-
off with Ian Pike without bloodshed. He has wide-ranging cultural interests in subjects as
various as poetry and astronomy, and initiates Ossie into the wonders of the night sky.

Redknapp, Mrs Winifred (Winnie). Lionel’s wife. A fat, large-limbed woman who
looks like a rag doll, and wears unhealthy-looking rouge and inappropriately girlish
dresses. As a result of losing a baby and not being able to conceive again, she has regular
nervous breakdowns, although capable of occasional bouts of merriment with her
husband. Her depression typically expresses itself in a disagreeably sour and aggressive
attitude towards the world in general and Ossie in particular.

Teresa Collymore. Aged around fourteen, she is Eileen’s younger sister and Ossie’s
girlfriend. She has crooked teeth and newly emerging breasts. Although she has a nice
grin and a breezy manner, she can be abrasive and confrontational at times, with Ossie as
her main target. Her bad temper stems largely from her resentment against Les Dye: if he
gets Eileen pregnant and marries her, Teresa will be left with sole responsibility for the
remaining Collymore household. Her occasional unhappiness is generated by her usually
concealed grief at the death of her mother.

Will. Minor. An unpleasant trade unionist in a gangster hat, who delivers a typewriter to
Eddie Dye for the production of underground pamphlets.

Worley, Mr. An elderly neighbour of the Dyes and father of Mrs Redknapp. Once a
major in World War I, he is a lonely figure, but his isolation is relieved partly by his
friendship with Ossie, to whom he introduces draughts and Zane Grey, but above all by
his adoption of the boy’s dog Jimpy. The dog’s companionship in the empty house
probably provides him with his only reason for living. He shares the prevailing anti-
communism of the times, but is willing to temporise when learning of Eddie Dye’s
reasons for supporting the wharfies.

Animals
Birds. Mr Price has a collection of budgies, which die after he liberates them.

Dog. Jimpy is a decrepit, 14-year-old mongrel initially belonging to Ossie Dye, but
subsequently adopted by the elderly Mr Worley, to whom he becomes an invaluable
emotional support until killed by a drunken driver.
 SUMMARY
Chapter One: Jupiter

The adult narrator recently saw a man by the Maori statue in Auckland’s downtown
square, whom he recognised, from the length and spikiness of his arms and legs, as his
childhood acquaintance ‘Bike’ Pike. They chatted briefly, and since then the narrator has
been puzzling over the events that occurred in Orchard Street around 40 years ago, and
over the real nature of the people involved.

He takes us back in time to 1951 - the year of the great waterfront dispute that is dividing
the nation. The Waterside Workers’ Union is demanding better pay and conditions, and
has been locked out by the bosses. There is acrimonious dispute over whether the
situation is technically a strike or a lockout, but Prime Minister Sid Holland’s National
Government is keen to break the power of the waterside union, which is allegedly
infested with communists, and has declared its current industrial action illegal.
Emergency regulations have been deployed, making it a criminal offence to print and
distribute any material aiding and abetting the unionists.

The narrator’s parents Eddie and Lil Dye are strongly against the ship-owners and their
government allies. Despite her insistence on genteel good manners, Mum is a staunch
socialist, while Dad, who fought in the war against Hitler, says there is another war going
on right here in New Zealand – they might just as well have invited Hitler over. To help
the workers’ cause, Dad has decided to use his printing workshop under the house to
produce pamphlets supporting the ‘wharfies’. Mum goes along with his decision,
although she is frightened that he could end up in prison. She is also worried when her
elder son Les volunteers to distribute the underground leaflets around Loomis, which he
does for adventure, not political commitment.

One night, his younger brother Austin, the narrator, gives Les a hand with the
distribution. It starts out as a game, but the boy grows a little frightened as the reality of
what he is doing dawns on him. He would prefer to be safely at home in Zane Grey’s
fantasy world. Even there, though, there are existential worries, since whereas in the
simplistic morality of childhood the hero always defeats the bad guy, in Lone Star
Ranger Buck Duane is out-drawn and shot down by the villain Poggin. Austin is
frightened that in the present political struggle, he and Dad might meet a similar fate at
the hands of their enemy, whom he imagines with Poggin’s yellow eyes and mane of red-
gold hair.

After dropping a last leaflet off at the Roman Catholic Convent, a place he finds rather
weird, the boy heads home through the Flynns’ paddock at the back of his next-door
neighbours, the Redknapps. He is unexpectedly caught in the beam of a torch held by Mr
Redknapp, who is also out in the paddock. The man asks if the boy is spying on him
again, and tells him he is a liar, but Austin knows that he is grinning. A flashback
explains the reason for Mr Redknapp’s remarks and his amusement.
Even though they have lived next door all his life, Austin has never spoken to the
Redknapps, his mother having warned him that they are snobs – although he knows she is
one herself. Regardless of the warning, Austin used to be fascinated by the couple, who
work together making tents and knapsacks. The man coughed and wheezed from being
gassed in the First World War, while his wife could sometimes be seen weeping in the
garden. Nevertheless, they had a companionable and loving relationship, laughing,
kissing and listening to classical music together. The young Austin gleaned all this from
his hiding place in the bushes, but was himself spotted one day by Mr Redknapp, who
turned the hose on him and chased him home. The dripping boy could hear both the
Redknapps roaring with laughter at his retreat.

The present evening, however, Mr Redknapp is ready to be friends. He explains that he is

out enjoying the stars, and invites the boy to look at the planet Jupiter through the
telescope he has set up in the paddock. Austin gasps and is nearly moved to tears as he is
invaded by the planet through the magic tube. Huge and impossible, it is the most
beautiful thing he has ever seen. Mr Redknapp explains it is a gas giant, bigger than a
thousand Earths, and whets the boy’s astronomical imagination by talking of other
heavenly bodies, including a globular cluster, which looks like the crown jewels, and the
stars Alpha and Proxima Centauri. He promises to let the boy look through the telescope
again, but Austin’s life has already been changed by his first lesson in astronomy. The
neighbour ends their conversation unexpectedly, however, by telling Austin to stop his
brother leaving pro-watersider leaflets in his mail box. The two then go home, Mr
Redknapp being drawn in through the door by his wife as though by a spider. Austin is
briefly worried that Mr Redknapp might know his father is involved in the production of
the leaflets and report him to the police, but decides he can trust the man, thanks to
Jupiter. As he lies in bed, the gas giant hanging silently out amongst the stars fills his
half-dreams.

Chapter Two: Jimpy

Several of Austin’s Orchard Street neighbours are briefly described, including Mr
Raffills, Mrs Cooper, and the Pikes. The main focus for the moment, however, is on Mrs
Redknapp’s old father Mr Worley, and on an important incident that occurred some time
before the events of the previous chapter.

Mr Worley is an English widower who once owned the orchard which gave the street its
name. He sold the orchard to a developer before commercial development was a viable
prospect in Loomis, and the place is now overgrown and neglected, but he still has two
fine gravenstein trees, some of whose apples he feeds to the next-door draught horses,
while he leaves others in a box outside his door with a sign inviting people to help
themselves. One evening Austin [henceforward to be called ‘Ossie’] arrived home with
some of the apples, and in return his mother sent him to Mr Worley with her homemade
jam.

When he arrived, he heard his short-legged mongrel dog Jimpy barking. Jimpy was
growing old and tired while Ossie stayed young, so the dog befriended Mr Worley
instead, spending much of his time with the old man, though still being sent home for tea.
Austin was rather glad that Mr Worley had taken his pet over.

Returning home, Austin was intercepted by the tall, thin, social outsider ‘Bike’ Pike,
whom he did not want to be seen with, and who persisted in calling him by the nickname
‘Dinky’ he had outgrown. The older boy showed him photos of the Hollywood stars
Veronica Lake and Joan Leslie, and asked him if his older brother Les, with whom Bike
worked at the bank, would like to join a Joan Leslie fan club. Ossie knew he wouldn’t, as
Les’s interests ran to real girls.

Mrs Redknapp then advanced on them, wearing little girl frills and rouge that looked like
a rash. She addressed Ossie as ‘boy’, and demanded to know what he was doing in her
father Mr Worley’s house. When told about his mother’s jam, she exclaimed: “Why is
she doing that? What’s the meaning of it?” She went on to complain about the dog,
claimed that Mr Worley did not like it around his house, and threatened to call the pound
and get it destroyed.

Bike and Ossie agreed the woman was crazy, and when his mother was told of the
incident, she exploded that the wretched Mrs Redknapp was the meanest woman, who
thought she was too good for the Dyes. She suggested that Ossie should go back to Mr
Worley and offer to give him Jimpy on a permanent basis. When Austin went back to Mr
Worley, the latter was looking very old and frail, and asked anxiously if the boy had
come for Jimpy. He was relieved and delighted to learn that he was being allowed to keep
the dog: the two ‘old fogeys’ would be companions for each other, in a way Jimpy could
no longer be for Ossie. In fact, Jimpy already had his own special basket by the fire. Mr
Worley guessed that the offer might somehow have been connected with his daughter,
and when Ossie guardedly admitted it was, he said that Mrs Redknapp sometimes got
‘excited’.

When the old man asked him if he liked reading, Ossie eyed some English classics like
Dickens, Tennyson and Thackeray without enthusiasm, but was excited by a collection of
‘blood-and-thunder’ westerns, including Lone Star Ranger. He would be allowed to
borrow one book at a time, but felt a bit cheated when he learned that in return he was to
play Mr Worley at draughts. Jimpy, comfortable but smelly in his basket, was relieved
not to have to go home with him. Ossie realised that the old man really loved the dog. He
felt good about making him happy, and was also pleased not to have the trouble of
looking after a dog any more, although just a little sad that something had come to an
end. When told Mr Worley had adopted Jimpy, his mother’s only response was: “That
will show her ladyship.”

All that happened a few days ago. Ossie is now avidly reading Zane Grey, but is also
reading any books on astronomy he can lay his hands on. Mr Redknapp sometimes winks
at him in the street.

Chapter Three: Collymores

Dad places his illicit bets with the local ‘bookie’ Frank Collymore, with whom he is good
mates even though Frank has no time for union affairs. His main interests are the races,
drinking, and flirting with women. Some people admire Frank as ‘a dag’, but Lil hates
her husband wasting time with him. She isn’t against fun, and can laugh at times like a
barmaid, but comes from a family with more money and education than Dad’s, and
believes in ‘things of the mind’, like polite manners and nice, elevated thoughts. Her
other problem with Frank is his Catholicism. She prides herself that the Dyes have no
religion – you don’t need one to be a good person. Austin, if asked, is to say he believes
in the human race: he has enough sense not to.

The Collymores have a junk-cluttered property at the blind end of Orchard Street, from
which Frank sporadically conducts a cartage business. He has a chronically ill wife, four
daughters and two uncontrolled sons, whom Mum calls ‘the devil’s cubs’. The young
boys are closely bonded, perhaps in mutual defence against their elder sisters. Of the
girls, Teresa is the youngest, the next up being the gorgeous Eileen, whom everyone says
could be ‘Miss Loomis’, if they had one, despite her short legs and crooked teeth. Eileen
works at the milkbar next door to the billiard saloon where Les and his cronies hang out,
and the two started going out together on a serious basis three months or so earlier.

Teresa is about Austin’s age. He has known her all his life, but only really notices her
meaningfully one rainy day when she helps Mum bring in the washing. She has a breezy,
outgoing manner, a nice grin, and is starting to grow breasts like Eileen’s (with whom
Ossie has previously been infatuated). He welcomes the opportunity which taking Dad’s
bets down to the Collymores gives him to strike up a friendship with the girl, their new
rapport only occasionally soured by his gauche comments about her Catholicism, in
which he is parroting his mother. Otherwise, they enjoy each other’s company, making
up limericks or exploring Frank’s piles of unsold junk.

Ossie occasionally catches sight of the invalid Mrs Collymore in her nightclothes, being
helped around the house by her daughters. One day, the Collymore boys come running
out to fetch Teresa inside: something is seriously wrong with her mother. Ossie is packed
off home, and the dying Mrs Collymore is rushed to hospital. Mrs Pike’s reaction is to
observe that nobody needs fall ill if they eat fruit, greens and plenty of nuts.

Mrs Collymore dies soon after, and everyone watches her family depart for the funeral in
the Catholic church. Austin feels inadequate about not knowing what to say to Teresa
when they next meet. He is therefore taken aback when he finds her eating scones on
their doorstep a few days later as though nothing significant has happened. She seems
matter-of-fact, even nonchalant, about her mother’s death. Ossie is relieved she doesn’t
want to talk about heaven, and is glad they’ve got through a potentially awkward
situation so easily, but is a bit disappointed that he couldn’t find anything more
meaningful to say than that he is sorry, and feels that she, too, should have said
something. His main concern, however, is how soon it will be all right to ask her out to
the pictures.
Chapter Four: Barnsky and Hillovitch
An unpleasant, aggressive man looking like a gangster drives up one evening and delivers
a decrepit old typewriter on which stencils for underground propaganda are to be cut.
Mum, who used to be a champion typist when she worked as a secretary, starts
distastefully typing out a piece of doggerel called ‘Sid’s Visit to the Moon’, attacking
anti-communist enemies of the strikers, such as ‘the Black Prince’, ‘Lord Scabaxter’, and
‘the Tame Parrot’. To Austin’s queries, his mother only says they are stupid men. Dad
works deep into the night running off pamphlets on the Gestetner duplicating machine.
As a professional printer who takes pride in his craft, it is work he despises, but is all that
the union now wants from him. Mum becomes increasingly bad-tempered and snappy as
the days go by, largely because she is constantly tired, but also because she is frightened
by all the secrecy and danger. She is tearfully aware of what is happening to her,
however, and on occasions apologises for her bitter outbursts at family members.

One morning as Ossie and Teresa walk to the train for Auckland where Teresa attends a
Catholic school, she is in a sour mood because now that her mother is dead and her two
oldest sisters have left home, the Collymore house is ‘going to pot’ (in Lil Dye’s words).
Eileen is too busy making herself up for Les to be of any help, so looking after the boys
has become Teresa’s responsibility. The mention of Eileen leads them to discuss the
relationship between their older siblings. Teresa remarks that Lil probably disapproves,
partly because Eileen is a Catholic, but also because the Collymores are not good enough
for the Dyes. Colin is glad when they reach the station, as he knows what is really going
on between Les and Eileen, and doesn’t want to blurt it out to Teresa.

In the evening, Mum sends Ossie over the road to borrow some salt from Mrs Pike. Their
neighbour is appalled at the idea of putting salt into vegetables: “You can almost hear the
vegies crying. You know salt is a poison, don’t you?” Heading off to get the salt from
someone else, the boy is intercepted by the enraged Mr Pike, who asks if he knows who
is distributing the union leaflets. They are communist lies – rotten stuff that will pervert
Ossie’s mind if he reads them. They should be burned or taken to the police, as Mr Pike
has done with his copies. With a swollen face and burning eyes, he tells the boy there are
three things he hates – a communist, a rat, and a communist. He would like to line the
wharfies’ leaders Barnes and Hill against a wall and shoot them. As an alternative
solution, he wants “Barnsky’ and ‘Hillovitch’ sent off to Russia.

Ossie escapes, only to encounter his third Pike of the evening as Bike comes through the
gate. He shows Ossie another photo of Joan Leslie, and asks him whom she resembles
around Loomis. He explains to the puzzled boy that it is, of course, Eileen Collymore,
with whom Bike guesses he is falling in love. Ossie tells him about Les and Eileen, but
Bike confidently dismisses the problem, saying that Eileen will get sick of him. He
himself hasn’t openly declared his love to Eileen yet, wanting to take things slowly, but
he advises Ossie not to tell Les in case he is upset.

Back home, Ossie tells his mother, who is in a better mood today, about Mrs Pike and the
salt, at which she only laughs. His parents do not laugh, however, when he tells them
about Mr Pike and the police. He doesn’t say anything about Bike to Les.

Chapter Five: Teresa

In the outside world, newspapers are not allowed to publish letters supporting the
wharfies, nor to report on police brutality. Instead, they are filled with attacks by
politicians on the strikers, replete with epithets like ‘filthy’, ‘foul’ and ‘savage’. The
wharfies’ pamphlets are equally virulent in the language they use about politicians, the
police and scabs. Eddie is resigned to all this, but explodes the day an anti-communist
cabinet minister called Goosman proclaimed that Hitler talked right: “What did I go over
there and fight for?” Mum comforts him, and Les says he would like to pinch the bank
revolver and shoot Sid Holland. This infuriates his father further, who says he won’t have
talk about shooting people in his house: he has seen men shot, and it isn’t a game.

However, for Les everything is a joke. Despite going steady with Eileen, he still plays
billiards and goes to parties with his mates, his ambition extending no further than getting
a job in Auckland, watching passenger liners leave port, and some day being on one
himself. Eileen’s father Frank is totally relaxed about the young man’s playboy lifestyle,
saying he was once like that himself. His concern for Eileen’s virtue is limited to warning
Les that if there is any hanky panky, he’ll skin him alive. He even lends Les his new
Humber car to take Eileen out in. Impressed by Frank’s wealth, Les is considering
becoming a bookie himself. He lives in an army hut up the back of the Dye property,
equipped with a radio, electric kettle, beer and even a flask of whisky. Girls can be
smuggled in through the back paddocks.

One Saturday night, Ossie and Teresa have met up after the pictures and are walking
home, but stop off at the War Memorial Hall where Les has taken Eileen to a dance. Les
and his greasy mates go out and drink beer between dances with Bike tagging on behind.
In theory, Bike only drinks water, but Teresa tells Ossie that he has been buying a lot of
milkshakes recently at the milkbar where Eileen works. Ossie hears him exclaiming ‘tut
tut’ over a dirty joke told by one of Les’s unsavoury cronies, whom Bike and Ossie
despise equally. The two of them walk back to the hall, as the older boy recounts how he
cut the jealous Les out during an ‘Excuse Me’ dance. He confides to Ossie that he thinks
Eileen is very pure.

Inside the hall, Ossie and Teresa watch as Pike, swaying like a praying mantis, invites the
reluctant Eileen for another dance. They are impressed with his speed, grace and fancy
steps – he has been taking dancing lessons. Les joins Ossie and stares balefully at Bike:
“If he’s not careful, I’ll punch his snout”. Teresa tells Ossie that Eileen is ‘in lerv’ with
Les, but she herself thinks he is conceited. The two young people have a dance together,
then walk home.

They are passed by Teresa’s younger brothers Mike and Jimmy, who are running totally
wild now that their mother is dead. Even though an invalid, she could discipline them
effectively, but Frank just grins and encourages their unruly behaviour. Pausing at the
bridge over the creek, Teresa at first puts on a brave front about her mother’s death, but
then begins crying and reveals that she misses her very much. Bike runs up and joins
them, boasting that he has had another ‘Excuse Me’ with Eileen, before Teresa tells him
to leave them alone. His campaign with her older sister has reached the point of
anonymously leaving flowers at her home. Ossie points out that despite his inappropriate
behaviour, Bike is not ‘dumb’ – in fact the bank manager says he is the best junior
they’ve ever had. Les, probably their worst, is also not dumb – just stupid, as Teresa says.

Holding hands, the two resume their walk in the dark. Ossie tells Teresa about the stars
and planets, explaining how his interest began with Mr Redknapp’s telescope. Ossie feels
very happy with her as they walk down Orchard Street, and wanting to do something to
make up for her mother’s death, impulsively decides to show her the secret room under
the house where Dad does his printing for the wharfies. Teresa is suitably impressed, but
is aware that Eddie is breaking the law, and could get arrested and beaten up by the
police. Ossie swears her to the utmost secrecy. The girl says that she likes his father but
does not care much for his mother, to which he replies that the latter actually likes Teresa,
but just hates religion.

As she leaves, he nervously wonders how to go about kissing her. She obviously is
similarly nervous, giggling when agreeing to go to the pictures with him some time. He is
relieved when she warns him that she doesn’t want to be like Eileen with ‘all that kissing
stuff’: at least for the moment he has nothing else to worry about. After she leaves, he
avoids talking to his parents in order to preserve his experience of the evening intact – it
has been the happiest of his life.

Chapter Six: Eileen

Later the same night, Ossie hears Les coming in after escorting Eileen home. He
subsequently sees Eileen finding her way by torchlight from the Collymores’ through the
back paddocks to Les’s hut. Ossie used to envy Les his girls, but now that he has held
hands with Teresa, his envy turns to pity, knowing that Les and Eileen are inevitably
heading for trouble, as always happens with Les.

Around four o’clock, Eileen comes barefooted across the Dyes’ lawn, being too
frightened to return through the paddocks. She gets a prickle in her foot, Ossie goes to her
assistance, and they talk about her relationship with Les. He can smell sweat, cigarettes
and perhaps whisky on her, and says that she shouldn’t be going to Les in his hut: at 17
she is too young. She at first tells him it is none of his business, but then declares
(without explicitly mentioning sex) that there is nothing wrong with ‘it’ if you are in love.
She is so much in love with Les, it is almost like a sickness, and of course Les is in love
with her, too. She sees nothing amiss about the fact that he has gone to sleep and left her
to walk home alone. Ossie confesses that he used to be in love with her himself, but now
likes Teresa, to which she responds: “Don’t you get like me and Les.” She knows that
poor old Bike is also in love with her, but dismisses him as ‘pathetic.’

Next morning, Ossie watches the Collymores heading off for church, and asks his mother
about Catholics having to drink blood. His real interest, though, is in their need to confess
their sins. He wonders how Eileen is getting on in church, and also whether Teresa will
have to confess about holding hands with him last night. He is glad he is not religious.

Chapter Seven: Draughts

Dad is growing uneasy with his illegal printing as the waterside troubles continue. He is
enthusiastic enough to expose police brutality – the kinds of things the papers won’t print
because, he says, they are on the bosses’ side. He wants to help put the balance right.
However, he doesn’t like the ‘flat beer lists’ and ‘rolls of dishonour’ through which the
strikers denounce their own backsliding comrades. He knows some of the latter
personally, and feels that even if weaklings, they should be treated as real people with
families to support, not yelled at as faceless ‘scabs’. Mum, though, is sterner and tougher.
Ossie doesn’t like their arguments, as he wants things to be black and white, preferring to
look at the stars with Mr Redknapp, or play draughts with old Mr Worley, who takes
great pleasure in beating him.

Both Mr Worley and Jimpy are growing old quickly, although the almost blind dog still
recognises Ossie’s voice and thumps his tail in greeting. Mr Worley feels the boy is not
yet ready for the ‘university’ of chess, and must stay for a while yet in the ‘kindergarten’
of draughts, but he is disappointed Ossie still prefers Zane Grey to Dickens.

One evening, Mr Redknapp comes in, saying he is out for a breath of fresh air. In reply to
a query from his father-in-law which obviously refers to Mrs Redknapp, he says she is
past the worst, and will be all right. Ossie hears his painful breathing, and thinks he is far
from all right himself.

Mr Redknapp leads the conversation around to the union leaflets, about which he and
Ossie share a private joke. Mr Worley, however, exclaims that ‘our red friends’ who
distribute them are a pack of villains. He is taken aback to learn that Ossie’s family
supports the wharfies: he didn’t realise they were communists. Ossie explains his parents
are not communists but Labour Party, to which the old man says that in that case they
should be like Mr Nash, the Labour leader, whose official position is to be neither for nor
against the wharfies. Ossie replies that Dad thinks Nash is a fool, but Goosman is a worse
one. This is a sentiment Mr Worley shares, viewing both lots – Holland and Barnes – as a
pack of villains. Ossie earnestly explains that Dad had fought against fascism in the war,
which is why he is now fighting the government at home, although he does not believe in
fighting with guns. These, like uniforms and saluting, are for lunatics: Dad just wants to
fight with common sense. The men laugh, knowing Ossie is just being a parrot, but are
pleased with the way he sticks up for his father.

On his way out, Mr Redknapp has a quiet word with Ossie about Eddie’s secret room. He
can see chinks of light escaping from it, and if he can see them, then Mr Pike probably
can too. Ossie gets a fright at this, but is pleased that although Mr Redknapp obviously
knows their secret, he has not given them away.

After Ossie and Mr Worley have finished their game of draughts and the boy has selected
his next Zane Grey novel, the old man tells him what is wrong with Winifred Redknapp,
who has recurring nervous breakdowns. Almost thirty years ago, she had a stillborn baby
girl, and her subsequent depression was compounded by not being able to have any more
children. She feels her life is wasted, and is never really happy. Hers is a sad life, but she
is fortunate to have a good husband in Lionel. He, too, is ill after being gassed in the First
World War. He had lied about his age and enlisted young, joining the company in which
Mr Worley was a major. The younger man had kept in touch after the war, which was
how he came to marry Winifred.

Back home, Ossie loses himself for hours in the fantasy world of Zane Grey, but
afterwards can’t stop thinking about the Redknapps and their thirty years with burned
lungs and the memory of a dead child. Sometimes he feels he is getting close to
understanding such grief, as he similarly begins to understand algebraic theorems, or how
far it is to Jupiter.

Chapter Eight: Smith and Wesson

After the pictures one Saturday night, Les invites Eileen, Teresa and Ossie for a cup of
tea in his flat at the bank on Great North Road, where the juniors have to take turns
sleeping over night for security. Although the flat is small, Eileen would obviously love
to live in a place like this with Les. He fetches something from another room, comes back
playing the part of the movie tough guy, points a revolver at them and commands: “Stick
’em up, suckers!” The other three are initially frightened, but Les shows that the gun is
not loaded. However, he then produces the menacing-looking bullets, which the
fascinated Ossie wants to suck like lollies, and proceeds to load it after all, despite the
girls’ protests. He explains that the juniors go down to the creek twice a year to practise,
and that he sometimes goes armed when he has to drive bags of money around in the
bank car. When the Smith and Wesson is again unloaded, Ossie can’t refrain from
picking it up and doing a Buck Duane act with it until restrained by his older brother. Les
boasts of being a much better shot than Bike, who also does target practice down at the
creek.

Les and Eileen then dance together, which would be romantic had Les not given Ossie a
wink: the boy suspects his brother might be getting tired of her. Throughout all this,
Teresa is obviously feeling hostile towards Les, and while they are waiting for Eileen and
him to say goodnight, she tells Ossie flatly that she does not like his brother. The three
walk home together, Ossie wishing Eileen were not there since Teresa seems to be
transferring her sourness from Les to him. Eileen is in tears the whole way, sobbing that
she and Les want to get engaged but everyone is against it because they are too young.
Teresa clearly disapproves of the engagement idea. It is quite obvious to the two younger
people that it is only Eileen who wants to get married: her sobbing protestations about
how much Les loves her are unconvincing.

Teresa is holding her sister’s hand tonight, not Ossie’s, and to regain her attention he
starts repeating astronomical facts he has already told her. She snaps back that she isn’t
dumb, and in fact comes top of the class at school. The idea that she might be as clever as
him takes the boy by surprise. When they reach Orchard Street, his alienation is
completed by Teresa ordering him to walk on the other side of the road.

They are intercepted by Bike, who steps out from his place and offers to walk Eileen the
rest of the way home. She says she doesn’t want him and tells him to go away, while
Teresa orders him more bluntly to bugger off. After the girls walk away, Ossie finds that
Bike has been waiting for Eileen since it became dark, and tells him not to be dumb - he
is not Eileen’s boyfriend. Bike replies that he pretty soon will be. Realising that she was
crying over Les, he adds in a sing-song voice: “I don’t think I like her going out with him
any more.”

Ossie, however, has his own problems. He has paid for Teresa at the pictures, and now
she is treating him as though he were the enemy: he feels like asking for his money back.
Then he sneers at his meanness: what really troubles him is that Teresa is unhappy.

Chapter Nine: Good Instincts

One rainy May evening, Jimpy remembers his former home, goes off down the road to
pay Ossie a call, and gets run over by the drunk Frank Collymore. He presents the body
to Lil with incoherent apologies, and to her exclamation “poor boy”, he reassures her that
he is all right. Mum wraps the ‘poor little fellow’ in a blanket, and the upset Ossie
volunteers to take the body to Mr Worley. The old man asks him to put Jimpy in his
basket, sits down, swallows, sighs and droops. Ossie sees that Jimpy’s death is an end for
him, too.

He decides to let Mr Redknapp know what has happened, but is dismayed when it is Mrs
Redknapp, huge and fat-limbed like a rag doll with a painted face, who opens the door,
obviously not recognising her next door neighbour. She explodes with anger when Ossie
explains about Jimpy, saying that Mr Worley should never have been given the dog in the
first place, and that the neighbourhood boys are devils. Her face seems to change shape,
bulging like dough, as she exclaims to her husband that they have to get away
immediately – she can’t stand it any more.

Back home, Mum is furious that Frank Collymore dared to call her ‘Lil’, while Dad,
though annoyed with his mate, keeps making excuses for him. So far as she is concerned,
now that the sensible Mr Redknapp has taken the situation in hand, the Jimpy matter is
finished: she doesn’t want Ossie brooding about it. There is a nervous knock at the door,
and Teresa arrives in her raincoat to apologise for what her father did. Mum, Dad and
Ossie all try to reassure her, but she stands with a cold, nervous face, as though herself
accused. Despite her reluctance, Ossie accompanies her home, still trying to make light of
Jimpy’s death, by saying that it was quick and painless, and besides the dog no longer
belonged to him. All she can say is that her father was drunk.

Mum approves of his gentlemanly behaviour when he returns home, and says that Teresa
has ‘good instincts’. He is told to wash his hands after touching the dog, and looks at his
face in the bathroom mirror to see if some sign of his experiences might show, having
never before witnessed a death nor seen grief like Mr Worley’s. He wonders if his
instincts are equal to Teresa’s.
Chapter Ten: Sid Holland
[Note: in the text, the ‘S’ of Sid is printed as a dollar sign, the ‘H’ in Holland as a
swastika.]

It is now winter. The Redknapps have not yet left Orchard Street, but Ossie is never to
see Mr Worley again, as the old man collapsed and went to hospital shortly after Jimpy’s
death. Teresa has the flu, and Ossie writes her letters full of local gossip to cheer her up,
although he thinks of them as love letters as well. She replies, suggesting that when she is
better they should go to the pictures together again. Mum makes him burn her letters for
fear of germs.

One night, he spots Mr Redknapp out the back with his telescope, and goes to join him,
for what will prove to be their last astronomy session. They are sweeping across the sky
with the telescope guided by a star chart, and Mr Redknapp evokes the beauty of stellar
phenomena such as globular clusters, which he describes as a pirate’s chest filled with
treasure. They speak sadly of Mr Worley, who seems to have lost the will to go on. Ossie
is sorry that Jimpy was the cause, but Mr Redknapp points out that the dog made him
happy, and gave him something to love. Neither mentions that this role should have been
filled by Mrs Redknapp.

Ossie returns home briefly, and comes across Les in the dark carrying a tin of paint,
dressed in black, his face covered with a balaclava. He is out tonight, as previously,
painting red slogans around the town, moving ‘like a shadow in the night’. This time he is
going to paint his favourite slogan ‘Sid Holland’ [a dollar sign for ‘S’, a swastika for ‘H’]
on the water tower. Ossie returns to Mr Redknapp to look at Jupiter, which as always
makes him feel overwhelmed and breathless. They decide to wait for its moon Ganymede
to appear, but never see it as they are disturbed by the sounds of people running and
shouting: “Get the bugger!”

Les comes panting through the back paddocks with Bike and his father in pursuit: he was
caught in the act of painting a slogan on their garage, and is now terrified of the
consequences if he gets caught. The desperately wheezing Mr Redknapp sends Les home,
and misdirects the Pikes towards the convent, while denying knowledge of the fugitive’s
identity. The Pikes give up the chase, but Mr Redknapp says quietly to Ossie that he does
not like lying. The boy hopes the unfriendliness in his voice is directed at Les, not him.

Ossie goes off to the army hut and has some curt words with Les on the subject of
‘shadows in the night’, then has a look at the Pike house, where Les had been painting
‘Sid Holland’ in the full glare of a street lamp. Bike comes over to him and reveals that
he knew it was Les they were chasing, and deliberately let him get away. He won’t tell on
him, as they are friends – sort of. Sadly he says he knows Dinky (as he persists in calling
Ossie) doesn’t like him, and everybody, including Eileen, laughs at him, but one day she
won’t if he waits long enough. He adds that he knows Les is making her do ‘bad things’
and is going to order him to stop. Ossie thinks it would be better to tie Les up – and Bike,
too.
Chapter Eleven: Poetry
Ossie dreams of Jupiter, of Teresa as the moon that didn’t appear, and of Bike Pike
running and running and banging into fences. He wakes with a fever: he has the flu. Mr
Redknapp rings to say that Mr Worley died the previous night. Ossie is sorry, as he liked
the old man and is glad Jimpy kept him company, but his main regret is that there will be
no more Zane Grey. Teresa comes to visit him, and they are once more on hand-holding
terms.

A few days later when he is back at school, he sees Mr Worley’s furniture being moved
out, and also learns from his mother that Mr Redknapp will be going away very soon to
join his wife, who has already left town. Ossie regrets there will be no more astronomy,
as well as no more Zane Grey.

He then hears his mother inviting someone around for a meal, using a highfaluting voice,
and putting on side by calling their usual tea ‘dinner’, and making it for seven o’clock
rather than the usual six. Ossie is surprised to learn it is Mr Redknapp, but his mother
explains it was his wife she disliked, not him. Ossie and his father are made to put on ties
for their guest, who arrives with a box of books which Mr Worley has left to Ossie. The
boy is thrilled, thinking it is a collection of Zane Grey, but is mortified to discover only
Dickens. He puts them away in disgust, determining never to read them, but some years
later discovers that Dickens is a treasure nearly as wonderful as Mr Redknapp’s Jupiter.

They sit down to a dinner of roast lamb, Dad’s stomach rumbling with shock at the late
hour. Starting off with an explanation for why the Dyes don’t say grace, Mum launches a
long, vehement attack on religion, her head back, her nostrils dilated with excitement.
Dad tries to stop her, but Mr Redknapp simply parries her attacks with dry amusement,
remarking for instance that hell definitely exists – it’s just not where the priests say it is.
He then closes the topic by gently suggesting that religion and mutton chops don’t mix.
Lil blinks: she would normally be offended that her special lamb should be mistaken for
the more mundane mutton. All she says now is: “I so rarely get the chance to talk”, which
causes Dad to droop his head.

Eddie changes the subject by asking Lionel about his future plans, to which he says that
he will live with Winifred on a beach up north somewhere: she will get well, he will fish,
and they’ll grow old together. Mum quotes: “The last of life for which the first was
made”, surprising Mr Redknapp to hear Robert Browning quoted in Orchard Street. The
two begin exchanging poetic quotations, as Eddie and Ossie watch like spectators at a
tennis match. Mum almost seems to be flirting, or at least rediscovering the young
woman she used to be: she might almost jump up and run away with Lionel Redknapp.
Ossie has never seen her sparkle like this. Then Mr Redknapp puts a stop to it by asking
for a glass of water, and as she fetches it Lil sighs and comes down to earth.

Dad gets some beer, and the conversation turns to the political situation. The dispute is
over, the Dyes’ side has lost, strikers are back at work and Barnes is out. At least there
won’t be any more need for illegal pamphlets: Eddie thanks Lionel for the warning tip
about the light showing from the hidden printery. Then, with Lil and Lionel dominating
the discussion, they range over a wide field of subjects including art, music, poetry and
nature. Lil is no longer flirting, but occasionally gives a start of wonder: it is as though
she has opened a lid and let out all sorts of things she isn’t aware she still remembers.

After they see Lionel to the door, she greets her husband as though coming back from
somewhere, not farewelling a guest: “Hello, old boy. How are you?” She puts her hand
on his cheek, reassures him that everything is all right, and asks him to help with the
dishes. Later, Ossie hears them laughing together as they wash up. The world has given a
lurch, but now settles down again. Ossie is glad that Mum was able tonight to bring out
all those things she keeps in her head, but thinks she will probably never get another
chance. Perhaps this is the best thing for the Dye family, but he wonders what use she
will be able to make of all the things she knows and cares about.

Chapter Twelve: The Raid in Orchard Street

Next morning, things are back to normal around the Dye house for a few hours. The
newspapers are crowing that common sense has prevailed in the waterside dispute, and
evil foreign doctrines have taken an honest British kick in the pants. “A belt on the head
with a baton,” Mum corrects, but is secretly glad Eddie doesn’t have to print any more
pamphlets. He is down in his hidey-hole, cleaning up and writing out bets on this
morning’s races for Ossie to take down to Frank. Les refuses to do any work around the
house and goes out.

Ossie delivers Dad’s bets, then waits for Teresa to finish some housework, which has put
her in an ugly mood: “I’m just the servant”. Her hooligan younger brothers are firing
stones from their shanghais, first at a beer bottle, then towards Teresa when she yells at
them. Frank’s only contribution to discipline is to shout at her to stop playing and come
in and wash the dishes. The wild-eyed Teresa snaps at Ossie that if Eileen marries his
dopey brother, she’ll be the only one left.

A little later in the morning, the Dyes hear a car driving fast along Orchard Street, and
shortly afterwards a breathless Teresa comes running to their house. Ossie learns later
what had happened. The two local policemen Sergeant Horton and Constable Porteous,
along with an unknown one with white cheeks and yellow hair, raided Frank Collymore’s
illegal Bookie operation. Frank skimmed the exercise book containing bets to Teresa,
who made a run for it, with the unknown cop in pursuit. Horton ordered Porteous to go
after them: “See that moron doesn’t touch her”. Teresa made for the convent, but was
headed off so instead ran to the Dye’s house, remembering the secret room Ossie had
shown her.

Picking up the story in the present, Teresa tries to hide inside Eddie Dye’s hideout, but
the blond cop catches up before she and Dad can close the hidden door. The policeman
sees the Gestetner and immediately knows what he has stumbled across: “An illegal
printing press. Call the police”. The good-natured Porteous stops his colleague
manhandling Teresa, and tries to get him away from the Dyes, now that they have got the
evidence they need against Frank Collymore. However, the aggressive cop realises that ‘a
communist den’ is much bigger fish than an illegal bookie, and shouts that everyone is
under arrest, while Mum shrieks at him to get out of her house.

Porteous, who has been told by his colleague to ring Sergeant Horton down at the
Collymores, gets Lil to accompany him upstairs. Ossie is left by his mother in the
printery, to act as witness in case Dad gets beaten up by the out-of-town cop, who is
spoiling for a fight. When Porteous has Mum on her own, he asks her about other
incriminating evidence, and warns her to hide it before he calls Sergeant Horton to search
the house. Mum buries the typewriter.

Frank and Dad are taken off to Auckland, leaving Ossie in a state about his father going
to jail for six months, and furious with Teresa for leading the police straight to the hidden
room. Meanwhile, Mum rings a lawyer, organises a rescue party, and heads off in Frank’s
Humber for the Auckland police station and the magistrate’s court. Later in the afternoon,
both Frank and the grinning Eddie are out on bail, and Mum looks grim but triumphant.
She has a few tart words, however, for the unknown person who revealed the
whereabouts of the secret room to Teresa, just to impress his girl.

Ossie hums with pleasure at hearing her use the term ‘his girl’. That evening, he and
Teresa hold hands in the pictures, and he even manages to kiss her good night. Saturday,
July 7, 1951 has been a day of happiness and fright. This should have been the end of it.

Chapter Thirteen: Bike Makes a Friend

Late the same night, Ossie is woken by the sound of three shots from the back of the
property. The near-naked Les and Eileen rush in through the door with yelps of urgency
and fear, Eileen bleeding from a splinter wound in her cheek. Someone put a shot through
the wall of the army hut while they were in bed, and Les is sure it is Ian Pike with the
bank revolver. Eileen is taken off to a bedroom, Ossie rings for the police and a doctor,
the house goes into siege mode, and neighbours start assembling in the street. Les, no
longer the swaggering playboy, is white-faced and staring-eyed, declaring his love for
Eileen and determination to marry her.

Constable Porteous is back, to be joined soon by Sergeant Horton and a doctor. Eileen is
not seriously hurt, only scratched, but confesses to Lil in the privacy of the bedroom that
she has missed two periods. Mum emerges quietly furious with Les, telling him
repeatedly that he is a stupid boy who has ruined his life. Frank has just appeared on the
scene, and tries to soothe Lil by saying you can’t expect two kids to wait when they’re in
love, and no harm has been done – they’ll get the two hitched before it shows. His calling
her ‘Lil’ enrages her further.

At first, it is not certain that it is Bike who took the potshots, but now Sergeant Horton,
who has gone up the back with Porteous, can be heard shouting: “Come down boy”, and
Bike is heard replying, as clear as a swamp bird in the night: “No. Stay away”. At the
sound of their son’s voice, Mr and Mrs Pike rush up the back of the property.

Meanwhile, Ossie has seen Teresa, Mike and Jimmy arriving. He is both fearful for
Teresa’s safety, and glad she is with him. The younger boys dart off through the
shrubbery to be closer to the action, obliging Teresa and Ossie to follow along behind
them, and they are rewarded with a clear view of events by the light of the moon and the
torches held by Horton and Porteous. Bike is sitting in a pine tree, his eyes ‘possum
blind’ in the torchlight. He turns away from the glare, hides behind the trunk, and peers
out. Sergeant Horton reassures him that nobody is going to hurt him, but he produces the
gun, which makes the two cops dive apart and turn off their torches, though they are still
clearly visible in the moonlight. Bike yells that he will shoot himself. His hysterical
mother arrives at the tree, saying that Mummy is here, and she can’t live without him, but
is carried bodily away by Porteous.

Then a figure is seen agilely climbing the tree. It is Mr Redknapp, who replies to Bike’s
threat to shoot that he is just coming up for a talk. Arriving beside Bike, he taps the
revolver aside and makes himself comfortable on a branch. Four more policemen arrive,
the senior one taking charge of the situation from Sergeant Horton. He orders the two in
the tree to come down, but they remain gazing over the rooftops as though admiring the
view. To the new senior cop’s order for Bike to throw down the gun, Mr Redknapp snaps
for them to turn off “those damn torches”.

The stand-off continues for quite a while, involving more ignored orders for the gun to be
thrown down, ineffective talk of ladders being fetched, and Jimmy suggesting they
should use a flame thrower on Bike. Ossie and Teresa are freezing cold and tired when
they see Bike rub his face, and Mr Redknapp casually taking the revolver from him. He
empties out the bullets and drops the gun to the ground, and they both slowly climb from
the tree. Mr Redknapp sinks down coughing as the police seize Bike. As he is led away,
the two politely say goodbye to each other. The Collymore boys, who have fallen asleep,
wake up and ask: “Is that all?”

Mum comforts the sobbing Mrs Pike, Les and Eileen go off together, Frank crosses the
road for a drink with Mr Raffills, who has been urging the police to “shoot the bugger”,
and the property swarms with cops and reporters. However, a story has to end
somewhere, so Ossie will finish his the way Dickens used to, by tying up the loose ends.

Dad got off with a fine of 100 pounds, and later on set up his own printing business,
though not giving up betting on the horses. Mum became a secretary. Les converted to
Catholicism, married Eileen, had five children and settled down, though he sometimes
looks dreamy, as though thinking about passenger liners sailing out of Auckland harbour.
Mum still thinks he could have found a better wife, and Ossie feels his brother has lost
his natural spark. Once, Ossie saw him touch Eileen’s scarred cheek saying it was the
mark of their true love.

Frank Collymore got hit hard by Inland Revenue for tax evasion, gave up bookmaking,
and settled down to his official job as carter. Mike became an All Black, while Jimmy,
after some shady activities, joined his father as partner in the cartage business. Mr
Redknapp went to live on a beach up north, and sometimes sent the Dyes a card at
Christmas, though not of a religious nature.

The narrator ends where he began, with his recent meeting with Bike Pike, who is now a
supermarket manager in Napier, up for a holiday in Auckland with his wife. During the
few minutes they chat, Ossie asks Bike what he and Mr Redknapp talked about up the
tree, and whether he really meant to shoot himself. Apparently they discussed the weather
some of the time, and although Bike did think of killing himself, he forgot. It was so cold,
and Mr Redknapp talked so much, he got confused and gave him the gun. Ossie asks if
prison was grim, and Bike replies that it was, but Mr Redknapp had warned him it would
be: if you do certain things, you have to take the consequences. Mr Redknapp also spoke
a lot about the war and getting gassed, which made Bike realise that he could go on, and
what a small part of his life Eileen was going to be. However, the siege really ended for a
simple reason: “I got cold. So I came down”.

As for Ossie and Teresa, he is now a professional astronomer, she a dietician. He won’t
say anything about their relationship, as it is private.