How to define a variadic function

I'm looking for something similar to Javascript's arguments array:

function parent(){
  child.apply(this.arguments);
}

I'm aware of the dot notation for variable argument lengths and also scheme's apply function.

This doesn't seem to work as the dot is taken to be the first argument:

(define (parent .) 
          (list .))

(parent 1 3 4 6 7)
Error: bad argument count - received 5 but expected 1: #<procedure (array arg-list)>

This works but isn't ideal. I'd like to call the function without the extra syntax to define the args list:

(define (parent args-list)
     (apply list args-list))


(parent 1 3 4 6 7)
Error: bad argument count - received 5 but expected 1: #<procedure (array args-list)>

(parent `(1 3 4 6 7))
(1 3 4 6 7)