Pompey was still around, living in increasing squalor in the hut by Blackfellow Creek. He'd been telling me for years to look up George Davis in Tolga, a younger man who knew Yidiny well. George took a bit of finding – he now lived in Atherton – but it was worth it. And by this stage I'd been working in North Queensland for so long that in any group of Aborigines there'd be likely to be someone who knew me, someone I'd given a lift to a few years back, or someone who knew George Watson, or some other link. I'd almost always be greeted as a friend, and given all necessary help.

George Davis had been born in 1919 and brought up by his grandfather at a farm out along the Goldsborough Road. The old man worked for a white farmer, but he was imbued with traditional ways and spoke mostly in Yidiny to young George, taking him off to the bush at weekends and passing on much of his knowledge about trees and animals and legends. George had learnt about Gambuun, small spirits just a few inches high who can warn their master by whistling when a stranger approaches. George's grandfather told him he had two Gambuun, called Banggurr and Baybaguwarr, but could only see them when he was alone. And the two of them – grandfather and grandson – had drunk opium together.