Remember Ronald Ryan (9 page)

RYAN
: For Christ's sake, shut the door, will you, it's freezing in here. Have you no respect for hardworking felons?

FIRST CROOK
: Take us to jail, immediately. Give us some porridge. Hooray, the coppers are here! We're in for a big bowl of Uncle Toby's!

ALL CROOKS
: Hooray!

SECOND CROOK
: I've got pneumonia!

RYAN
: I've got piles!

THIRD CROOK
: Give us a bloody blanket? Give us a damn blanket, will you?

RYAN
: [
with his hands up
] We got eight thousands pounds from the grocery shop. Most of it has the lock of the safe blown through it. A perfect hole through every pound note. You wouldn't read about it. The rest turned into cinders. I've got great luck. Haven't I? God Almighty must've been in an ironic mood when I was born.

The three
CROOKS
burst into spontaneous laughter.

ALL CROOKS
: [
together
] Stop going crook!

WRIGHT
: Wait on the footpath and we'll all go to the warm jail together.

RYAN
: Can't wait. I'll sleep wonderfully warm with Linda.

Blackout.

Jailbird music: blues harp.
JUSTICE JOHN STARKE
wearily sits down opposite
RYAN
. He lights up a smoke in a gold cigarette holder, sips a glass of whiskey, salutes him.
RYAN
eyes
STARKE
as if he were an ironic ghost.

STARKE
: Have you any reason why the sentence of death should not be passed upon you?

RYAN
: Why not? It's all been leading to this.

STARKE
reads an unravelling fourteenth-century list which unrolls over his shoes as he intones.

STARKE
: The result is that in law the case was of constructive murder by Ryan because that finding and those inferences mean that Ryan, knowing that Walker had committed the felony created by Section 35 of the Gaols Act 1958 and knowing that Hodson was attempting to arrest Walker, therefore intentionally used force, which resulted in Hodson's death, to prevent him from making that arrest. That, coupled with the fact that Hodson was, in the above circumstances, lawfully authorised to make the arrest of Walker. We have already observed that the conviction of Walker in charging. The Jury directed that the Crown must prove that Ryan killed Hodson and that the killing amounted to murder. For these reasons we are of the opinion the appeal cannot succeed.

RYAN
: Oh, give it a rest, will you? Hey, let me ask you something, Judge old boy. How did you feel when you sentenced me to death? Mr Starke, sir?

STARKE
: Some good soul handed me a glass of whiskey, if you must know.

RYAN
: I reckon the wrong bloke got it, if you must know.

STARKE
: How was the flight down?

RYAN
: Are you asking me or an angel? Oh, the flight down from Sydney. The coppers lied their heads off. You know what they're like better than anybody, Judge.

STARKE
: Oh well, they've got to be good at something, I suppose. All the best, dear boy. See you in the next room—I mean life. Here's your defence, Mr Philip Opas, to see you. 'Bye, Ron.

STARKE
exits.

PHILIP
OPAS
, Ryan's defence lawyer, enters. He cross-examines
RYAN
in regard to the flight down from Sydney, where he and Walker were arrested.

OPAS
: You flew down from Sydney in a charter aircraft, did you not?

RYAN
: Yes, sir. Mr Opas, sir.

OPAS
: The only people aboard were policemen and the accused?

RYAN
: Yes, sir.

OPAS
: Apart from the crew.

RYAN
: Apart from the crew.

OPAS
: How many police were aboard?

RYAN
: A fair few.

OPAS
: Apart from the crew.

RYAN
: Apart from the crew.

OPAS
: Were these four police from Homicide?

RYAN
: Apart from the crew, yes. I do believe there were four.

OPAS
: What type of aircraft was it?

RYAN
: Big.

OPAS
: Can you be more specific?

RYAN
: Fokker Friendship.

OPAS
: What?

RYAN
: That's the type of aircraft it was. A Fokker Friendship.

OPAS
: That's a two-engine aircraft, is it not?

RYAN
: Yes, sir.

OPAS
: What were the seating arrangements?

RYAN
: Two in the front and two in the back.

OPAS
: Did you engage in conversation with Detective Morrison?

RYAN
: Yes, sir.

OPAS
: What subjects did you philosophise about?

RYAN
: We talked about Vietnam, economics, social justice. Capital punishment and football.

OPAS
: You were airborne at the time?

RYAN
: Yes, sir.

OPAS
: Halfway to Canberra?

RYAN
: I'm not sure about Canberra. We were definitely up in the air.

OPAS
: Why did you circle Essendon Airport?

RYAN
: I wasn't aware we circled Essendon Airport.

OPAS
: You circled it several times, but you put down at Laverton.

RYAN
: We put down at Laverton.

OPAS
: Tell me how you escaped.

RYAN
: [
reliving the escape
] I was stuck in boob for yonks. The end of '64 this was, like I'd had enough. Some can do more or less can. I found it impossible for me to rot. The wife had divorce proceedings dished up to me in H. Now I happen to love the family. It was one thing or another. It came to me… [
Whispering
] Liberty.

OPAS
: Let us now speak of the trajectory of the bullet.

RYAN
: You're wasting your time.

OPAS
: You'd have to be nine feet tall to shoot him, wouldn't you? [
Out to the audience
] If Ryan did not fire the shot, who did? One starts with the evidence of Dr McNamara, the pathologist. This evidence cannot be contravened and shows that the bullet entered Hodson's body one inch above the right clavicle. It travelled from right to left, from front to back, and emerged seven inches to the left of the point of entry at a point one inch lower (measured from the soles of the feet) than the point of entry. If Hodson were standing upright at an angle of ninety degrees to the roadway, as some witnesses deposed, then it was mathematically demonstrable that Ryan, being inches shorter than Hodson, could not have fired a shot that travelled downward through Hodson's body, as the pathologist's evidence disclosed that the bullet had not deviated between entry and exit but had followed a straight path in the body.

RYAN
: Nobody will ever listen to you. You're a voice in the wilderness.

OPAS
starts to exit.

OPAS
: [
going past a
GUARD
upstairs
] Then I shall have a nervous breakdown.

GUARD
: [
reading a telegram
] Telegram for you, Ron. A. Rylah, Attorney General, 205 William Street, Melbourne. We wish, as Law teachers, to support Monash Law teachers' view that new evidence in Ryan case should be referred to a judicial tribunal for evaluation and that pending such evaluation the hanging should be stayed.

Loud Pentridge bells and prison gates.

The Governor's office.
FATHER JOHN
BROSNAN
, the Catholic priest at Pentridge, and
GOVERNOR
GRINDLAY
.

GRINDLAY
: Ryan wants to revert, Father Brosnan. Can you see to it? Wants to go back to being a Catholic.

FATHER JOHN
: Can't say as I blame him, Mr Grindlay.

GRINDLAY
: On his marriage certificate he's C of E.

FATHER JOHN
: Is he?

GRINDLAY
: Well, he wants to be a Pat again.

FATHER JOHN
: Then he is a Pat, isn't he? It's only a wish.

GRINDLAY
: What's involved?

FATHER JOHN
: It's just like re-registering a car.

GRINDLAY
: You know, Father. Some of the worst murderers in here are Baptist.

FATHER JOHN
: I wonder why that is?

GRINDLAY
: It's their music. It depresses them.

FATHER JOHN
: Obviously.

GRINDLAY
: Ryan's wife was Church of England, wasn't she? What was her name?

FATHER JOHN
: Mrs Ryan.

GRINDLAY
: Yes, I know that. What's her first name? Her Christian name? Why doesn't she come in to see him?

FATHER JOHN
: They're divorced.

GRINDLAY
: Of course. That accounts for it.

FATHER JOHN
: If Ryan had married a Mick from Preston he wouldn't be in here. He married out of his class, didn't he?

GRINDLAY
: There may be something in that. But the way he was going, it was impossible for him to marry beneath him. He would've had to marry a dead greyhound.

FATHER JOHN
: Once a Catholic always a Catholic.

GRINDLAY
: Who said that?

FATHER JOHN
: Me! Just then!

GRINDLAY
: You can revert him or convert him today, Father John, if you like.

FATHER JOHN
: What's he like? Ryan? Nobody knows much about him, do they?

GRINDLAY
: Staunch. Amusing. Funny. Funny peculiar. But not violent. Unpredictable. A fool and a pupil of philosophy. He's probably had too much boys home. Permanent brain damage.

FATHER JOHN
is let into Ryan's cell in H Division.

GUARD
: He's in here, Father.

The
GUARD
unlocks the cell door with a gigantic set of keys,
FATHER JOHN
goes inside.

FATHER JOHN
: Ronald Ryan?

RYAN
: Spencer Tracy?

They laugh and shake hands.

FATHER JOHN
: The Governor tells me you want to revert back to being a Pat. Is that right, Ron? You want to be a Catholic again, my boy? It's the only decision!

RYAN
: In my present predicament I think it's a step in the right direction. I was reared a Pat. Married Church of England. I thought I might die with some pageantry.

FATHER JOHN
: Die with dignity.

RYAN
: Never mind the dignity.

FATHER JOHN
: Where are you from, Ron?

RYAN
: Richmond.

FATHER JOHN
: What street?

RYAN
: Cotter Street, fifteen. It's demolished. Used to be a weatherboard. I had a yard once, like everyone else, except I never paid for it.

FATHER JOHN
: You may not die. The death sentence may be commuted.

RYAN
: Better off you are in heaven than this loveless environment.

FATHER JOHN
: It hasn't got much going for it, has it, Pentridge? We should call in Whelan the Wrecker. Put the ball through it!

RYAN
: Do you reckon you can get me something to read?

FATHER JOHN
: What would you like?

RYAN
: Something uplifting.

FATHER JOHN
: How about
Home Beautiful?

RYAN
: I've been in H Division a year. All this talk about stays and appeals appals me, I tell you. I don't want to live here. Lost the wife and children. She wouldn't let me see them. What's the point of anything?

FATHER JOHN
: Don't hate her, Ryan. She's a good person. She's just frightened.

RYAN
: She wasn't loyal. What do you do about these beautiful Hawthorn sheilas? Rich girls look better, don't they? Better doctors. Perfect delivery. I don't know, something. They always look better.

FATHER JOHN
: Just come to Mass. There's nothing to fill in.

RYAN
: That's how I feel. Like a hole. I got a quarry inside me.

FATHER JOHN
: Have my Bible. Keep it. You know it. Read it again.

RYAN
: What's that you've got marking your place? A bit of newspaper.

FATHER JOHN
: Race results at Caulfield. Last night's
Herald
.

RYAN
: Apparently there's a horse called Son of Man running tomorrow. Can you put a unit each way on him for me, Father? Good name for a horse, isn't it? Don't you reckon?

FATHER JOHN
: Son of Man.

They chuckle.
FATHER JOHN
exits the cell.
RYAN
sits.

RYAN
: [
to
GUARD
] What do you see when you get to heaven, screw?

GUARD
: D Division.

The condemned cell.

GUARD
: The Governor Mr Grindlay to see you, Ron.

GRINDLAY
: It's a bit of bad news, I'm afraid, Ronald. The Cabinet.

RYAN
: The Cabinet.

GRINDLAY
: The Cabinet have decided to hang you.

RYAN
: I am sorry it's got to be you, Mr Grindlay. I am sorry I got you into this trouble.