Take a Life

by Phillip Gwynne

  At first I was sure I must be imagining this; how could Droopy Eye, somebody who belonged to the subterranean spaces of San Luca, possibly be in my school, as an overseas student?

  But even when I kept looking, blinking a few times to make sure my eyes weren’t clouded or anything, Droopy Eye continued to be Droopy Eye.

  He looked over at me, and I saw the smallest smile play on his lips.

  It was Droopy Eye.

  He brought his hand to his neck. Maybe he was adjusting his tie – after all those weeks of holidays, of wearing nothing but singlets and boardies, a lot of kids were adjusting their ties – but maybe he wasn’t, maybe he was drawing an imaginary knife across his neck.

  TUESDAY

  AFTER-SCHOOL ACTIVITY

  I was supposed to find my own way home after the first day of school, but I thought what the hell – why didn’t I have me a coffee!

  So instead of heading back to Halcyon Grove I went in the opposite direction, towards Cozzi’s. I wasn’t sure if I was feeling really adult or really try-hard – an after-school latte when you’re only fifteen?

  But the Droopy Eye thing had rocked me, and my body was telling me that it wanted caffeine and how can you argue with your body? Which, it occurred to me, is probably the same line of reasoning that millions of addicts all over the world use.

  I caught a bus I didn’t usually catch, one that was crowded with kids from Miami State High. They did the usual you-private-school me-public-school thing and I copped lots of smart-alec comments and a few stray elbows in the ribs. Maybe, once, and not so long ago, I would’ve been pretty scared. Not now, however. I’m not bragging or anything, but if you’ve been through what I’ve been through, if you’ve been stabbed, locked up underground, dropped in the middle of the sea, had half your fin bitten off by a white pointer, then you just don’t scare so easily any more.

  Hey, my dad actually went to your high school, I wanted to say to them.

  But I knew that would probably antagonise them even further – if Miami State was good enough for him, why wasn’t it good enough for me? That sort of thing.

  Once I got off the bus, I started walking.

  As I did I had this sense that somebody was watching me. In this age of CCTV that’s not unusual, somebody probably was watching me! But this wasn’t a CCTV-type somebody-is-watching-me feeling, this was a real somebody-is-watching-me feeling.

  The street I was walking along was busy, and there were a lot of people around. If you knew what you were doing it wouldn’t be that difficult to follow someone and remain anonymous.

  There wasn’t much I could do – it was just a feeling, after all – but keep on walking.

  It was a relief to reach Cozzi’s, to slalom my way through all the people sitting on chairs outside and join the queue inside. It was the same man serving as before, he of the perpetual five o’clock shadow. I mentally rehearsed my order. But there was no need, because when it was my turn he looked me up and down and said, ‘Triple espresso, right?’

  Compared to this dude, elephants were forgetful.

  Actually, I was going to order a latte, but once you’ve been pegged as a triple-shot-espresso sort of guy it’s not easy to go all milk-based.

  ‘You got it,’ I said in my best triple-espresso voice.

  He smiled at me. Well, I think it was a smile; there was a change in lip shape and some teeth were definitely visible.

  ‘Take a seat and Ferret’ll find you,’ he said.

  A tattered copy of today’s Gold Coast Bulletin was on the table I sat down by. I did what I always did with newspapers and flicked to the sports section. There was nothing of interest.

  So I read the comics. Not remotely funny.

  I had a look at what movies were on. None of them took my fancy.

  Finally I turned my attention to the front page.

  Coast Housing Bubble to Burst? was the headline.

  I read further.

  Apparently, the housing market in Australia and especially the Gold Coast was in trouble. Low-collateral loans had been given to people with low incomes, but rates had risen and now those people couldn’t afford the repayments. Not only that, the market was in freefall, so the value of their houses was far less than their mortgages. This was so not my usual area of interest, but I couldn’t help recalling what Mr Jazy, Tristan’s father, had said once about the whole of the market being one big Ponzi scheme.

  And the final sentence was sort of chilling: Could this result in the sort of civil unrest we saw during the Great Depression when people took to the streets, rioting?

  Ferret arrived with my coffee.

  ‘That’ll kickstart your day, amigo,’ he said which was exactly the same thing that Snake used to say. I wondered if Cozzi’s had a manual of snappy sayings that each employee had to memorise.

  ‘So Snake doesn’t work here any more?’ I said. I wondered if, somehow, I had been responsible for that by uncovering the criminal conspiracy he had with Guzman and Nitmick.

  Paying off the five instalments had meant – what was that phrase? – collateral damage, that’s it. How much collateral damage had there been?

  ‘No, but he might as well,’ said Ferret, indicating a distant table with a tilt of his chin.

  There were three men sitting around it: Snake, Guzman and Nitmick, and they were in deep conversation. And when I say deep, I mean deep, man; this looked like the sort of chinwag that required scuba gear to move around in. And maybe it was entirely innocent, maybe they were discussing the relative merits of certain UFC fighters. Silva da Silva’s amazing takedown rate. Or Brock the Rock’s strike rate of over eighty per cent. But somehow I doubted it. These guys were plotting something criminal.

  And I felt a little disappointed, because I’d actually believed Nitmick when he’d told me that he was giving up crime to settle down with Eve Carides, the numismatist, and become Joe Citizen.

  The three men got up and disappeared in different directions. I drank my espresso, one thermonuclear sip at a time, and as my brain synapses sparked, an electrical storm gathering in my head, I thought about Droopy Eye. Was it just a coincidence? It could be, because let’s face it, anything could be a coincidence, but somehow that seemed really, really unlikely.

  So why was Droopy Eye at my school?

  The completely over-the-top answer to that question was: Droopy Eye was there to kill me. Other adjectives apart from over-the-top also came to mind: outlandish, ridiculous, melodramatic.

  But since The Debt, wasn’t that the sort of world I lived in, an outlandish, ridiculous, melodramatic one that was completely over the top?

  ‘Youngblood!’

  There was only one person in the whole world who called me by that name and, sure enough, when I looked up, there was Hound de Villiers, PI.

  He was wearing triple denim again, a sartorial crime punishable with death by stoning in some countries.

  ‘Hound!’ I said.

  I wouldn’t say I was happy to see him – he was too scary for that – but I wasn’t unhappy to see him, if you know what I mean. Maybe the way to put it is: having Hound de Villiers around made my life more interesting, it gave it texture.

  ‘Back at school?’ said Hound, taking in my uniform.

  ‘First day,’ I said.

  ‘Waste of time,’ he said.

  ‘He who opens a school door closes a prison,’ I said, quoting something he’d once said to me.

  Hound smiled. ‘Kid, you’ve got a mind like a steel trap and that’s why I need you to come and work for me full-time.’

  ‘Yeah, right,’ I said.

  ‘I’m serious, here,’ said Hound, fixing me with his serious-here blue eyes. ‘School’s just the place for some kids, but not for you.’

  It had never occurred to me that school was optional. And for sure, it had never occurred to my parents either. I doubted it had ever occurred to anybody but Hound de Villiers. Lateral thinker. Philosopher.

  But now that he’d suggested it, no
w that the lose-school genie was out of its bottle, dancing its sexy dance, I was a bit excited. Maybe it was just all that caffeine, but the advantages of a school-free existence were pretty obvious. For a start, I would have more time when eventually I received the final instalment.

  ‘Youngblood, you still with me?’ said Hound.

  ‘Sorry,’ I said. ‘Got lost in my thoughts.’

  ‘Why don’t you join me and my business associates?’ said Hound, indicating a table nearby where a couple of men were sitting.

  Actually, they looked more like gangsters than business associates, but, hey, who was I to judge?

  ‘We’ve got some pretty exciting projects happening and there’d be plenty of scope for somebody with your particular skill set.’

  ‘Sure,’ I said, feeling flattered – despite the triple denim, Hound de Villiers had a pretty impressive skill set himself.

  ‘Just one thing,’ said Hound, taking off his denim jacket. ‘Put this on, can you? Makes you look a bit less like a schoolboy.’

  I did as he asked. The jacket was about three sizes too big and I swam around in it like a goldfish in a goldfish bowl, but actually I did feel less like a schoolboy.

  I shook hands with the business associates/ gangsters and we traded some small talk until I sensed it was time for me to leave.

  ‘And remember,’ said Hound, gripping my hand, ‘that job’s there waiting for you.’

  I went to walk off, but suddenly I remembered the jacket.

  ‘Your jacket,’ I said, going to take it off.

  ‘It’s yours, Youngblood,’ said Hound.

  All denim jackets are pretty nasty, I reckon, and this one had a touch of the stonewash that made it even nastier than usual, but I can’t say I wasn’t chuffed to receive it.

  I’d better get home, I thought. First day of school and all that. But as soon as I’d had that thought I had another one, which totally kicked the first thought’s butt.

  Why should I go home?

  I’d been stabbed.

  Why should I go home?

  I’d been dropped in the middle of the sea.

  Why should I go home?

  I’d had electrical stimulation applied to my groin by two men in Shane Warne masks.

  Why in the hell should I go home?

  What was stopping me from heading to the spy shop, shooting the breeze with my very good Kiwi mate Hanley?

  Nothing was stopping me.

  So me and my nasty oversized denim jacket set off in that direction. And again, I had the feeling somebody was watching me.

  Hound? I wondered. Was he having me tailed for some reason?

  There were fewer pedestrians, on this street and to tell the truth it was starting to spook me a bit.

  Or could it be The Debt?

  Again it was a relief to reach my destination, the dinky little arcade with the spy shop and hurry inside.

  The only customers were an older couple who had that typical Gold Coast sunbaked look, like a matching pair of leather sofas. Hanley was doing his usual hopeless job at selling them something.

  ‘We’re very worried about the escalating crime rate,’ said Mr Sofa.

  ‘The newspapers do tend to exaggerate a bit,’ said Hanley in his very entertaining Kiwi accent.

  It was time for me to jump in.

  ‘Some people up the road from us just got robbed,’ I said. ‘Actually, I think it was technically a home invasion.’

  The customers turned to me – this was more like it!

  ‘A home invasion?’ repeated Mrs Sofa, keen to hear all the horrifying details.

  ‘Apparently they came in through the window,’ I said.

  ‘Was there any … any … bloodshed?’

  ‘I’m not sure.’ I figured now was the time to go for the jugular. ‘But my dad said he was very glad he’d put in those perimeter alarms.’

  ‘Perimeter alarms?’ said Mr Sofa.

  I looked over at Hanley: time to take over, braz!

  Braz took a while, but finally he got it. ‘Oh, yes, we have several excellent perimeter systems here.’

  Hanley’s cash register lived up to its name and the Sofas left with an armful of hardware.

  ‘You’re amazing,’ said Hanley. ‘Did you know those poor people who were robbed? That sounds like a terrible experience.’

  ‘Sort of,’ I said.

  ‘It’s a pity you’re still at school,’ he said. ‘I could do with somebody like you in here.’

  ‘Funny you should say that,’ I said.

  I thought of that feeling I’d had, that I’d been watched. I thought of Droopy Eye, standing in the Great Hall, sworn to mortal revenge.

  ‘Il tuo sangue,’ he’d said in Italy. Your blood.

  ‘What would you recommend for personal protection?’ I said.

  ‘The pepper spray’s still a very popular option – is there anything wrong?’

  ‘No, it’s for a friend of mine – she gets worried walking home through the park at night by herself.’

  I ended up buying the pepper spray – mate’s rates, of course – and shoving it into the pocket of Hound’s nasty denim jacket.

  Of course, I would never need it, but I did feel a bit better with it there.

  I had another mosey around the shop, and then went to check out what Hanley was doing.

  He was tinkering with some piece of hardware, soldering away. Not for the first time it occurred to me how smart he was – software, hardware, he could do it all. I certainly wouldn’t be running a funny little spy shop in a crappy arcade if I had sick skills like that. As I was watching him, I took in the other stuff on his desk: the other bits of hardware, the fine-precision tools, the well-thumbed technical papers.

  The title of the top one caught my eye. I’d noticed the paper – ‘The Use of Multi-Sensor Data Fusion in Marine Archaeology’ – last time, but it hadn’t meant much to me then. But that was before I’d been on the Argo, before Felipe had told me all about a new sort of transducer, one that could transmit both acoustic waves and electromagnetic currents simultaneously.

  I casually took the paper from the pile. Casually flicked through it.

  The paper was heavily notated but on page five, written in the margin in Hanley’s distinctive writing, was the word ‘Cerberus’.

  It took me a while to make sense of this, but when I did it hit me like a metric tonne of bricks: Hanley worked for The Debt!

  But of course he did. That’s where their extraordinary technological expertise came from: ClamTop, Cerberus, all of that.

  The spy shop was just a front.

  Hanley looked up from his soldering, saw the paper I was reading, saw the look on my face, and immediately put two and two together.

  ‘It’s not what you think, Dom.’

  ‘Yes, it is – you work for them!’ I said.

  I wanted to test out the pepper spray right then and there, give him a faceful of it.

  ‘I thought we were friends,’ I said.

  ‘We are,’ he said.

  I grabbed the piece of hardware he’d been working on and threw it across the shop and stormed out.

  Maybe he wasn’t actually part of The Debt. Maybe he just worked for them. But I didn’t care – as I walked through Broadbeach, my body was hot with anger. The I’m-being-followed feeling was still there too. Was I just being paranoid? I mean, it was just a feeling, wasn’t it? There was no empirical evidence to back it up, no confirmed sightings of dagger-bearing cloak-wearing men. Still, I kept my eyes peeled for taxis to hail, but it was change-of-shift time and there were none around; none that were vacant, anyway.

  I joined the queue at the bus station.

  The 393, my bus, approached, and then passed without stopping. The passengers at the windows all had the ha-ha-I’m-on-the-bus-and-you-aren’t look on their faces. I waited another twenty minutes. Another 393 approached. Another 393 passed. Same look on the passengers’ faces.

  An old lady with blue hair said she was going to
write a letter to the paper.

  Fat lot of good that’s going to do, old lady with blue hair, I thought as I took off on foot.

  Still no taxis.

  But I had that same feeling, of being watched, of being clocked.

  Dom, you’re just being paranoid.

  Maybe that wasn’t even Droopy Eye you saw in the Great Hall today.

  Just as I thought this they came at me, two of them, one tall, one short.

  I had my pepper spray out in no time at all, was just about to give them a spray each, when the shorter one said, ‘Dom, it’s us.’ Girl. Girl’s voice.

  The taller one said, ‘Don’t shoot!’ Boy. But still a girl’s voice.

  Immediately I knew who they were, but my mind was resisting that information.

  No, it can’t be them, it was telling me. They stole Yamashita’s Gold; they’re sitting on some remote tropical island somewhere, doing whatever it is that really, really rich people do on remote tropical islands.

  ‘Dom, we need to go somewhere private now,’ whispered the person I didn’t quite believe was Zoe.

  ‘Really soon,’ said the person I didn’t quite believe was Otto.

  The evidence before my eyes – they looked like Zoe and Otto, they talked like Zoe and Otto – was getting the upper hand over my disbelief.

  ‘Somewhere private?’ I said, trying to shift my brain up a few gears. ‘I know, follow me.’

  They kept on my heels as I hurried down one street, turned into another, down another and into a back entrance to Preacher’s.

  We took a couple of tracks, and pointing to the stormwater drain I said, ‘In there.’

  ‘This is perfect,’ said Otto once we were inside. ‘How do you know about this place?’

  I was just about to tell him how, but I held my tongue. That was another thing The Debt had taught me: knowledge is currency, you don’t spend it unless you’re in the market to buy something.

  ‘I just do,’ I said.

  Zoe had taken off her hoodie and even my mind was no longer resisting the available evidence: no denying her Zoe-ness, this was Zoe Zolton-Bander. Otto removed his cap and glasses. Same deal here: no denying his Otto-ness, was Otto Zolton-Bander aka the Zolt aka the Facebook Bandit.