Take a Life

by Phillip Gwynne

  Also by Phillip Gwynne

  The Debt

  Instalment One: Catch the Zolt

  Instalment Two: Turn off the Lights

  Instalment Three: Bring Back Cerberus

  Instalment Four: Fetch the Treasure Hunter

  Instalment Five: Yamashita’s Gold

  First published in 2013

  Copyright © Phillip Gwynne 2013

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without prior permission in writing from the publisher. The Australian Copyright Act 1968 (the Act) allows a maximum of one chapter or ten per cent of this book, whichever is the greater, to be photocopied by any educational institution for its educational purposes provided that the educational institution (or body that administers it) has given a remuneration notice to Copyright Agency Limited (CAL) under the Act.

  Allen & Unwin

  83 Alexander Street

  Crows Nest NSW 2065

  Australia

  Phone: (61 2) 8425 0100

  Email: info@allenandunwin.com

  Web: www.allenandunwin.com

  A Cataloguing-in-Publication entry is available from the National Library of Australia

  www.trove.nla.gov.au

  ISBN 978 1 74237 862 6

  quotation from ‘Invictus’ by William Ernest Henley quotation from ‘She Walks in Beauty’ by Lord Byron

  Cover and text design by Natalie Winter

  Cover photography: (boy) by Alan Richardson Photography, model: Nicolai Laptev; (helicopter) by Getty Images; (Gold Coast) by Shutterstock

  Set in Charter ITC by BT 10.5/16.5pt by Peter Guo/LetterSpaced

  To Lizey

  Contents

  DON’T ROCK THE BOAT

  A FEW MONTHS LATER

  FRIDAY: INTO THE VALLEY

  FRIDAY: JRLO, HWKP AND HRLP

  FRIDAY: WEIRD HAPPENS

  FRIDAY: TAVERNITI’S

  SATURDAY: IM-O-GEN

  TUESDAY: FIRST DAY OF THE NEW SCHOOL YEAR

  TUESDAY: AFTER-SCHOOL ACTIVITY

  TUESDAY: A PACK OF WARNIES

  TUESDAY: QUITTING SCHOOL

  WEDNESDAY: THE MEETING

  WEDNESDAY: COPS GALORE

  THURSDAY: DARK NIGHT OF THE SOUL

  THURSDAY: SHUT UP

  THURSDAY: THE LAST DAY OF SCHOOL EVER

  THURSDAY: IT GOT A BIT MESSY

  MONDAY: WORKING FOR THE DOG

  TUESDAY: THE GOLD COAST SHARKS

  TUESDAY: TEXTURED SOY PROTEIN

  WEDNESDAY: THE ASSOCIATES

  THURSDAY: CIDADE MARAVILHOSA

  THURSDAY: RENT-A-COP

  THURSDAY: TOWER OF TERROR

  THURSDAY: AND THE BEAT GOES ON

  FRIDAY: STUNG

  FRIDAY: VIVA BRIS VEGAS

  FRIDAY: TAKE A LIFE

  SATURDAY: SOD’S LAW

  SATURDAY: SAN LUCA

  SATURDAY: BRANDON

  SATURDAY: PAGATO

  MONDAY: EXTINGUISH THE DEBT

  TUESDAY: THE MALEVOLENT WONDERLAND

  TUESDAY: FIENDS OF THE EARTH

  WEDNESDAY: OLD MAN’S FUNERAL

  WEDNESDAY: DEBUGGED

  WEDNESDAY: KRYPTONITE

  WEDNESDAY: WHO LET THE BLOGS OUT?

  WEDNESDAY: HUMMER

  WEDNESDAY: PUMPING TIN

  THURSDAY: HEARSEY

  THURSDAY: DROP IN SOME TIME

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  DON’T ROCK THE BOAT

  The stench of flesh – my flesh.

  The outrage of pain.

  My pain.

  When I looked down there were five letters PAGAT branded on my thigh, the last one still raw molten skin.

  Only one more letter, one more instalment, to go.

  I was almost there.

  But I knew that my grandfather had the same letters on his thigh. I knew that many years ago he was ‘almost there’ too. But he’d failed at the last instalment. And instead of the branding iron searing the final letter, it was a scalpel that sliced off his leg.

  I looked over at my father. And I knew that he had the word PAGATO branded on his thigh.

  He hadn’t failed. He’d paid back the instalment. Not only that, he’d prospered, becoming the rich and successful businessman he was today.

  But then I reminded myself that when I broke into his offices they were all empty and cobwebby.

  So how successful was he, exactly? And if he wasn’t successful at business, where did all his money come from? Had it come from making people disappear, for example? But I quickly banished those thoughts from my mind – he’d repaid the last instalment, and that was all that mattered to me right now. Like him, I wasn’t going to get all this way only to fall at the sixth, and final, hurdle.

  ‘We’re finished here,’ said Dad, putting the equipment away in the drawer in Gus’s desk. He moved over to me and put his arm around my shoulders. ‘Let’s not get ahead of ourselves, but there’s only one to go.’

  I nodded, and suddenly I felt incredibly close to my dad, like our skin, his skin, my skin, had melted away and we were one person, one blood, one DNA, one ambition.

  He’d done it and so would I.

  And when my eyes took in Gus, all old and wrinkled, he and his stumpy leg seemed so far away, like I was looking at them through the wrong end of a telescope.

  Dad and Gus wanted to discuss something between themselves, so I left by myself.

  One to go. One to go. One to go, I repeated as I walked home, hurrying upstairs to my bedroom.

  I got into bed, crawling under the covers.

  One to go.

  Until The Debt contacted me I was going to keep really, really low.

  One to go.

  No digging.

  One to go.

  No rocking the boat.

  Only one to go.

  No nothing.

  Just keeping low.

  I burrowed deeper into my bed and concentrated on one thing and one thing only: the pain from my thigh. Concentrated so that it seemed to become tangible. Something hard and brilliant. Like a diamond.

  A FEW

  MONTHS

  LATER

  FRIDAY

  INTO THE VALLEY

  A knock on my door.

  Go away.

  ‘Are you in there, Dominic?’ came Mom’s voice from the other side.

  It was what my English teacher, Mr McFarlane, would call a rhetorical question – of course she knew I was in here.

  ‘Hi Mom,’ I said. ‘What is it?’

  ‘Do you mind if we have a talk?’

  How could I say no? I’d been behaving weirdly. I knew it. She knew it.

  ‘Okay Mom, you can come in.’

  ‘The door’s locked.’ I got up, unlocked the door, and let her in.

  The little talk was her asking questions, which I couldn’t help but think were from some pamphlet on teenage depression she’d picked up from the GP. Or maybe she’d been on the phone to Dr Juratowitch, the mint-sucking psychiatrist.

  Do you feel like other kids don’t like you?

  Do you feel like you can’t start anything new?

  Finally, I said, ‘Mom, I assure you, I’m not depressed, okay? I’m just taking it easy until school starts.’

  ‘That’s not for another couple of weeks,’ she said.

  I looked at her. She looked at me. And suddenly I had this huge feeling of – I’m not sure how to explain it – I’m-totally-over-this-ness.

  Really, wasn’t it about time we stopped kidding each other?

  ‘I’ve got one more instalment to The Debt to pay back, okay?’ I said. ‘I don’t intend to muck it up. So I’ve
been, like, keeping myself wrapped in cottonwool.’

  Mom actually recoiled, as if this mention of The Debt was some sort of physical thing, a real slap on a real face. She recovered quickly, though, and not for the first time it occurred to me that my mother was a pretty tough sort of person.

  ‘Dom, I hear what you’re saying,’ she said.

  A handful of words, but it was an absolute breakthrough: the first time my mother had ever acknowledged the existence of The Debt.

  ‘But can you do something just for me?’ she said. ‘Can you start running again? I don’t necessarily mean competitively – a run in the morning would be enough to make this particular mother very, very happy.’

  My first thought: Running – pah phooey!

  But there was such a look of concern on Mom’s face I couldn’t help but say, ‘Okay.’

  She smiled her Californian – or was it Italian? – smile, tousled my hair.

  ‘That’s the spirit,’ she said.

  Ω Ω Ω

  The next morning it was the Baha Men who woke me from my slumber. I burrowed my head under the pillow but it was no good, their despicable canine-related lament found its way through. I had no choice: I got out of bed, hurried across the room, turned off the alarm. I was about to hop back into my now Baha-free bed when I remembered the look on Mom’s face and the promise I’d made her. I got dressed in my running gear.

  As usual, I took the quietest route out of the house, making sure I didn’t make any noises that would wake my sleeping family.

  Sitting on the front step, I laced up my runners.

  Fingers of light were poking up over the wall as I made my way down the drive. Stepping from behind a bush – a figure.

  Looming, threatening.

  I stifled a scream.

  ‘But it’s only me, Mr Silvagni,’ said the figure, in a slightly sarcastic tone.

  Roberto!

  ‘What the hell are you doing?’ I said, my heart finding its way back to its normal position somewhere in my chest.

  ‘I work here, remember?’ he said.

  Is that all you do here, Roberto? I remembered that time when Toby had gone missing, I’d seen him and Mom in conversation in the kitchen, their noses practically touching. It was Roberto Mom had turned to. And Dad had definitely not been happy.

  ‘Yes, of course,’ I said, which sounded so pathetic. I turned on my heel and took off.

  When I got to the entrance of Halcyon Grove Samsoni, the Tongan security guard, was all smiles. ‘Mr Silvagni, you’re running again!’

  ‘Yeah,’ I said, trying not to buy into his enthusiasm, but I had to admit to myself that even the short jog here had felt sort of nice.

  There was no advice from Samsoni as to where I should run this time, either. Only a very sincere ‘Good luck!’

  I followed my old route around the Halcyon Grove wall, up Chirp Street, and then over the bridge into Chevron Heights.

  I half-expected to see the diminutive figure of Seb Baresi jogging outside Big Pete’s Pizzas, ponytail bouncing. He wasn’t there, of course, and I wondered where, and how, our paths would cross again, because I knew that they would.

  Up the Gut Buster, heart rate spiking, and then down the hill towards the sea, the smell of salt now in the air. As I ran along the edge of Preacher’s Forest, it occurred to me that I should stop calling it that now the Preacher was dead. Ibbotson Reserve, its proper name, was so boring, though. I guessed it was going to be Preacher’s Forest for a bit longer, anyway. Or maybe even Dead Preacher’s Forest?

  As I turned back into Chirp Street, the resident birds were, as usual, in full song. Again I had that feeling – This running thing actually feels pretty good – but immediately I dismissed it. If it wasn’t going to help me pay the final instalment, then what use was it?

  Chirp Street was never a busy street, especially so early, and I was surprised when out of the corner of my eye I noticed a white vehicle approaching from behind. I was getting some pretty major flashback now – this was pretty much how The Debt had started. It was a white van, streamlined, sort of futuristic-looking, and seemed to make no noise at all. And because the sun was glinting off the windscreen, I couldn’t make out who was driving.

  Just as I was about to get both terrified – what did they want? – and excited – could this be the final instalment? – I realised that my mind was playing tricks on me. It wasn’t a van at all, and definitely not a streamlined, futuristic-looking one. It was Gus’s ancient ute.

  I stopped, letting him drive up next to me.

  ‘Not looking too bad,’ said Gus through the open window.

  I noticed an old Milo tin sitting on the passenger’s seat. I’m sure it wasn’t intentional, but it actually looked like the seatbelt was fastened around it.

  ‘Where you off to this early?’ I said.

  ‘Berang Valley,’ said Gus.

  ‘Where Dad grew up?’

  ‘Exactly, where your dad grew up,’ said Gus, and then he added, ‘And me too.’

  Dad had often threatened to take us kids to Berang Valley. ‘I’ll show you kids the shack I grew up in and then you’ll be grateful for what you’ve got!’ That sort of thing.

  He’d threatened, but he’d never carried through with any of his threats and we figured that was because Berang Valley wasn’t so bad after all. We even used to make jokes about it.

  ‘It’s like this luxury resort,’ Miranda would say.

  ‘Basically Palazzo Versace, but with sugarcane,’ Toby would add.

  ‘You wanna come along for the ride?’ said Gus.

  Actually, I did want to see where my father grew up, but I was also determined not to rock the boat.

  But it was just a little ride, I reasoned. No real danger of rocking any boats.

  ‘What about your passenger?’ I said, indicating the Milo tin.

  ‘He can sit on your lap,’ said Gus, going along with my excellent Milo-tin-as-a-person joke.

  ‘Why not?’ I said, moving around to the passenger’s side, opening the door.

  It was only when we were on our way, the Milo tin between my legs, that something occurred to me.

  ‘So what’s inside?’ I said, tapping the tin.

  ‘The Preacher,’ said Gus.

  ‘Very amusing,’ I said.

  ‘Well, what’s left of him.’

  Suddenly I got it: the Preacher had been cremated and these were his ashes.

  Yes, I jumped. Well, as much as my seatbelt would let me.

  ‘That’s your brother in there,’ I said, shocked at how unsentimental Gus seemed.

  ‘My brother died,’ said Gus. ‘That’s what’s left of the vessel he inhabited during his time here on earth.’

  I took his point, but it was still pretty weird to have a dead Preacher in a tin between your legs.

  We were climbing now, Gus’s ancient ute making wheezing sounds as it came to uneasy terms with the steep gradient.

  ‘Old girl’s just like me,’ said Gus. ‘Doing it tough.’

  ‘Yeah, so what did you bench press this week?’

  It was a tactic, tried and true: whenever Gus started doing that old-is-me thing, I got him on to his bench press, the thing he was most proud of in the world. His arm muscles flexed; it was if the mere mention of the words ‘bench press’ got them working.

  ‘Now you come to mention it …’ he said, smiling.

  See what I mean?

  For the rest of the trip up he talked ‘pumping tin’ as he called it, why it was so good for you, especially as you got older.

  Then the ute stopped complaining and we were in the hinterland.

  Just after one of those camera signs – You must take a photo! – Gus pulled into a parking bay.

  Some Japanese tourists were getting into a bus and when they left we were the only people there. From here we could see the whole sweep of the coast, from Southport in the north all the way down to Coolangatta in the south. Arc after arc of white sand, and beyond that the ocean
, blue and brilliant, stretching out to the horizon.

  It was incredibly beautiful, and I felt this sort of awe. I actually got to live down there, in that paradise. It made me realise something: as much as I made fun of the Gold Coast, I did actually love where I lived; I really couldn’t imagine living anywhere else. And it was my dad, empty cobwebby office or not, who had done that for me.

  ‘Pretty spectacular,’ said Gus, echoing my thoughts.

  We got back into the ute and continued on our way, turning down a small road I’d never been on before.

  We passed a winery, an organic farm, and then the road wound down into a valley. That’s when it started to get a bit weird. At first there was rainforest, but this gave way to land that was cleared – or had been cleared, because there was a profusion of tangled vegetation.

  ‘What’s that stuff?’ I said.

  ‘Lawyer vine,’ said Gus, and I could tell from the way he spat the words out that it probably wasn’t his favourite plant. ‘This used to be some of the best sugarcane country in the state, but it’s all wait-a-while now.’

  ‘Wait-a-while?’ I queried.

  ‘You’ll find out when you get caught in some,’ said Gus, laughing.

  Deeper into the valley we went. When we came to a crossroads, a dilapidated bus shelter on our side, Gus turned down an even narrower road. There were no people around, no animals; it was a pretty spooky sort of place. We pulled off the road and into a rutted drive, passing a couple of old tractors, before drawing up outside a tumbledown shed. The wait-a-while had taken this over, too, vines twining through the missing windowpanes and over the roof.

  ‘My god, what is this place?’ I said.

  Gus smiled. ‘Actually, it’s where three generations of Silvagnis grew up.’

  I wouldn’t say that all of a sudden I totally got my dad, but right then something did definitely change in my opinion of him.

  Palazzo Versace with sugarcane?

  Hardly.

  Okay, maybe there hadn’t been so much lawyer vine when he’d lived here, but I couldn’t imagine it as anything but a dump.

  It was dump, Berang Valley was a dump – it was dump, dump and more dump. I wanted out.

  ‘Would you like to take a look?’ said Gus, opening the driver’s-side door.

  ‘Not really,’ I said.