Take a Life

by Phillip Gwynne

  Gus followed me as I made my way along the path, the gravel crunching under our feet. The last time I was here I’d been in a state of high anxiety with choppers searching for me. I wasn’t sure I’d find the crypt straightaway, but I didn’t even have to look for it. It was like it was dragging me towards it.

  ‘This is it,’ I said, stopping in front of the boxy-looking structure.

  Gus took out a flashlight, used it to read the plaque. ‘Tabori,’ he said, spitting on the ground, and added something in Italian. He tried the door; it was locked.

  ‘Can I borrow that?’ I said, taking the torch from him. I used it to look closer at the lock – just as I’d expected, it was new. Obviously they’d upped the security at the Tabori crypt.

  ‘You stay here,’ Gus said. ‘I’ll be back in a jiffy.’

  I didn’t want to stay here, by myself. But I also didn’t want Gus to think I was some sort of wuss, so I did as he asked.

  With my eyes closed.

  There was the crunch of gravel, and Gus was back, carrying a toolbag.

  ‘Hold the torch steady and we’ll have this thing opened in no time,’ he said, taking out a screwdriver.

  He was right, it took only a couple of minutes for us to get inside the crypt. It was much like I remembered from last time.

  ‘What are we supposed to be looking at?’ said Gus.

  I showed him where the plaque was, except it wasn’t – it had gone! Gus looked at me.

  ‘There was a plaque here!’ I said.

  He looked closer, using the torch.

  ‘I can’t really see any screw holes,’ he said. ‘But I believe you – maybe they just filled them in.’

  What a relief, we could go now. But why was Gus taking a crowbar from the bag?

  ‘What are you doing with that?’ I said.

  ‘I have to see him,’ he said. ‘I have to know for sure.’

  I didn’t get it, and even in the dark Gus must’ve seen this I-don’t-get-it written all over my face, because he launched into an explanation. ‘Alessandro disappeared when he was fifteen.’

  ‘Disappeared?’

  ‘Like that,’ said Gus, clicking his fingers. He jammed the crowbar into the door and started levering it back.

  Snap! The door swung open and hung off one hinge.

  ‘So you never knew if he was actually dead or not?’ I said, and of course I couldn’t help thinking about Mr Havilland. And Imogen.

  ‘I knew in my guts that he was gone, but there was no proof, no body,’ said Gus, and he was silent for a while before he said, ‘It’s what sent my mother to an early grave.’

  He cleared away some dirt with the end of the crowbar; I could see the end of the coffin. It was very plain, unadorned, more like a wooden box than something you would put your loved one in.

  ‘But how did he end up here?’ I said, my brain in overdrive, trying to make sense of all this information it’d been fed.

  ‘Well, I guess they did him in and put him in here.’

  ‘They? The Debt?’

  Gus nodded. ‘The Debt.’

  But answers were spawning even more questions. ‘But why would they kill him?’

  ‘I’m not sure about that, but Alessandro obviously upset them somehow.’

  ‘Enough to kill him?’

  ‘You seem surprised,’ said Gus.

  ‘And why would they put him in here?’

  ‘Keep your friends close, your enemies even closer,’ he said. ‘Nobody would ever look for him in here.’

  ‘But that plaque I saw, why in the hell would they put that there? That doesn’t make sense.’

  ‘Who says they put it there?’ said Gus.

  But if they didn’t, who did? As soon as I asked myself that question, I knew the answer: the Preacher.

  ‘Anyway, we’re getting way ahead of ourselves here; give me a hand sliding this out, can you?’

  ‘Sure,’ I said, as if this was the most normal request in the world, like an old lady at the supermarket asking you if you could reach the packet of All-Bran on the top shelf for her.

  ‘Easy as she goes,’ said Gus as we slid the coffin out.

  Again, I noticed how plain it was, and how much this fitted with Gus’s crazy story.

  ‘We’re just going to put it over there,’ said Gus, indicating a sort of stone bench with the torch.

  The coffin didn’t weigh that much, but it was pretty awkward handling it, especially in such a confined space. But we managed to get it around and up onto the bench.

  Gus handed me the torch. ‘I’m just going to prise the lid off,’ he said.

  Again, his voice was so matter-of-fact.

  That’s a dead person in there, I wanted to scream. A really, really old one. And what you’re doing has actually got a name: grave-robbing.

  But I bit my tongue. What would I know? Gus’s brother had been missing for more than fifty years; didn’t he have a right to find out what had happened to him?

  The lid didn’t need much prising, it sort of came apart. Gus said, ‘Okay, let me have the torch.’

  That suited me fine, I didn’t really want to see what horror was inside. He took the torch and played the beam around inside the coffin.

  Eventually he said, ‘It’s not my brother.’

  ‘It’s not?’

  ‘No, this is a full-grown man.’

  Poor Gus, I thought. ‘So what now?’

  ‘I guess we put him back and get out of here,’ he said, the disappointment dragging his voice down low.

  It sounded like an excellent idea to me: get the hell out of this hellish place. But I knew I hadn’t imagined that plaque.

  ‘Give me the torch,’ I said to Gus. I got down on my hands and knees and shone it into the hole from which we’d taken the coffin.

  I could just make out something at the other end. Just.

  I pushed myself, head first, into the hole.

  Immediately, I could feel it coming at me. Cured myself of coimetrophobia, my rectum.

  It was coming at me, and it was coming at me hard, icing my guts, constricting my air passage. I had to get out of there!

  But I closed my eyes, steadied my breathing.

  It worked.

  Now the torchlight picked out wood.

  ‘There’s another coffin here,’ I said.

  ‘There is?’ said Gus.

  ‘For sure,’ I said. ‘I’m going to crawl further in, you take hold of my ankles.’

  ‘You don’t have to –’ started Gus, but I cut him short.

  ‘I’m already on my way.’

  Using my elbows, I crawled commando-style deeper into the dark hole. As I did I thought of those stories you heard: people being buried while they were still alive. The horror of that was inconceivable.

  Buried alive!

  I reached out, tapped the end of the hole. Just as I’d thought, it was wood.

  ‘Pass me the crowbar,’ I said, reaching back with my right hand. Soon I could feel the cold metal. I brought the crowbar forward, and rammed the pointed end into the coffin. The wood was quite brittle, and by twisting the crowbar around, I was able to make a hole large enough for four fingers.

  I hesitated before I reached in – what would my fingers find?

  But then I thought of Gus’s words: only the vessel he inhabited. I thrust my fingers through the hole – they felt nothing – and grabbed the wood as tight as I could.

  ‘Okay, I’ve got it, drag me back,’ I said.

  I’m pretty sure Gus hadn’t done all those weights, all those bench presses, bicep curls, tricep dips, so that one day he’d be able to drag his grandson and a coffin out of some dank hole, but they sure came in handy.

  Soon I was out of there and on my feet.

  We carried this coffin over and put it next to the other one.

  The first thing I noticed was that it was shorter, and a shiver travelled up my spine.

  I’m sure Gus noticed, too, because he quickly prised off the lid while I held t
he torch. As before, he then took the torch from me to inspect the contents. As before, I kept my eyes averted.

  Eventually he said, ‘It’s him; it’s Alessandro.’ In his voice I could hear sadness, and relief, all sorts of emotions.

  But then it occurred to me: how did he know?

  Gus must’ve read my mind. ‘He broke his leg when he was nine, fell off a tractor. I can see where it mended.’

  I knew Gus needed some time, but I had to get out of here now.

  After waiting for what I thought was a generous period, but what was probably less than a minute, I said, ‘We should probably get going?’

  Gus, the arch-atheist, closed his eyes and muttered something that sounded suspiciously like a prayer.

  ‘Let’s go,’ he said, opening his eyes.

  He took a black garbage bag out of his toolbag, shook it open, reached into the coffin and brought out a bone.

  ‘What the hell are you doing?’ I said.

  ‘I’m not leaving my little brother in this godforsaken hole any longer.’

  ‘But, but, but …’ And then I remembered: ‘That’s only the vessel he inhabited during his time on earth.’

  ‘Alessandro is coming,’ Gus repeated, putting the bone into the garbage bag.

  At this rate, we would be here all night, so what choice did I have? I helped Gus put his brother’s bones into that black garbage bag. Not his skull, though. There was no way I was going to touch that. And indeed it was Gus who dealt with the skull, placing it carefully into the bag.

  When we’d finished, when there were no more remains in the coffin, Gus tied a knot in the top of the garbage bag. We shoved the now-empty coffin back into the hole, pushing it right to the end. We were just about to do the same with the other coffin when I had a thought, a really terrible one.

  If this wasn’t Alessandro, which it clearly wasn’t, then who was it?

  ‘Give me the torch,’ I said to Gus.

  ‘I think we’ve done enough,’ he said, but I wasn’t about to be put off now.

  ‘Give me the torch.’

  Gus handed it over. I shone it into the coffin. Even after spending several minutes manhandling human bones, it was a shock to see a dead person like this. I had to look away, and it took a while to compose myself.

  But compose myself I did, shining the torch onto his skull; the eyeless sockets seemed to look back me, the jaw seemed to say, Let me be.

  I played the torch down the ribs, and amongst them I noticed the cigarette butts. It took me a little while to understand what this meant, but when I did it shocked me more than anything else I’d witnessed on this most shocking of nights: who would be so callous as to throw their butts into a coffin?

  Then I saw it, the flash of silver. Around one wrist was a watch.

  I leant over, grabbed it, and shoved it into my pocket. It felt heavy in there: solid, incriminating.

  Graverobbers, that’s what they’re called. I’m not sure Gus saw me or not; if he did he didn’t say anything.

  ‘Let’s get out of here,’ I said.

  Gus put the lid back on as best he could, and we manoeuvred the coffin back into its hole. Gus screwed the door back on.

  We were out of there like bats out of hell – maybe we weren’t quite bats, but that really had been hell – crunching back up the path, me carrying the toolbag, and Gus stomping along with the bag of his brother’s bones over his shoulder. If ever there was a time for Gus to come out with his favourite saying: hell’s bells and buckets of blood, it was this, but Gus said nothing.

  Into the ute, and onto the freeway, and at last I had time to sit back and exhale, to try to process what had just happened. There was one question that needed to be asked: why did they kill Alessandro? But I wasn’t going to ask it. Not then.

  There had been too much death, too much dying. I could smell it coming off my hands. Off my clothes.

  I checked my phone: I had three messages, but none from The Debt.

  Mom again. That dentist appointment was on Thursday.

  Miranda: it’s ok I found dvd

  And one from Imogen: did you really leave school?

  I replied to the first one: ok; I replied to the second one: good.

  I hesitated before I replied with yes to the third one; I could feel the weight of the grave-robbed watch in my pocket.

  We turned back onto the freeway; it was less hectic now, and Gus was in less of a hurry. I looked over at my grandfather. It was hard to gauge what sort of mood he was in.

  ‘Gus, you okay?’ I said.

  ‘I’m tired,’ he said. ‘But I’m good; it’s been a long, long wait.’

  Again that question in my head: why did they kill Alessandro?

  But now sure wasn’t the time to ask it.

  We took the exit off the freeway, heading for Halcyon Grove. A siren from behind, and a flashing blue light.

  ‘Wonder who they’re after?’ I said.

  The police car came up alongside us, and the policeman in the passenger’s seat made a pull-over gesture. Gus grimaced. ‘Might just be us.’

  Graverobbing. What was the penalty? Maybe not years in jail, but imagine the story on the internet!

  Grandfather and Grandson Break into Crypt.

  If that didn’t go viral, nothing would.

  My hand felt the watch in my pocket. I could drop it out of the window, shove it under the seat, but I didn’t; nothing was going to make me let go of it.

  We stopped on the side of the road, the police car pulling up right behind us. The policeman appeared at the window.

  ‘Evening,’ he said, in a pleasant way.

  ‘Evening, officer,’ said Gus, in an equally pleasant way.

  ‘Do you mind if I have a look at your licence?’

  Gus took out his wallet, extracted his licence. The police officer disappeared with it for a minute or so. When he came back he said, ‘No problems there.’

  ‘Can I ask what this is about?’ said Gus.

  ‘One of your tail-lights isn’t working.’

  ‘I didn’t realise,’ said Gus. ‘Don’t take the old girl out much at night these days.’

  Like, derrrr, Gus! Why would you ever say that to a cop?

  ‘You don’t?’ said the policeman, and I could see that he was having a look in the back of the ute. To my mind we were now goners: there was a toolbag, there was a black garbage bag, of course he was going to put two and two together and deduce that we’d used the tools in the toolkit to break into a crypt and steal the human remains that were in the black bag.

  His face appeared again in the window.

  ‘Make sure you fix the light,’ he said. ‘The good thing about these old cars is that it’s probably just a globe.’

  ‘I’ll do it tomorrow, officer,’ said Gus.

  The policeman got back into his car and drove off.

  ‘Jesus!’ I said. And Gus gave one of his low seismic laughs.

  It was only when I was back at Gus’s house, and in my room, that I was able to inspect the grave-robbed watch more carefully. It was a beautiful old timepiece, an Omega Speedmaster. On the back was an inscription.

  To Graham from Beth. My One True Love.

  Hell’s bells and buckets of blood! We’d just found Imogen’s missing father.

  WEDNESDAY

  THE ASSOCIATES

  You would think that after such a horrendous experience, I would be awake all night, wracked by nightmares – each more gruesome, more explicit, than the one that went before. Wrong. I slept really well. You would also think that after such a revelation – I knew where Mr Havilland was! – my mind would be in turmoil, deciding what do with this explosive information. Wrong. I felt weirdly calm. Maybe whoever was in charge of the good ship Dominic Silvagni had decided that enough was enough, that I needed some steady-as-she-goes plain sailing. Otherwise I was going to end up wrecked on some rocky shore.

  So the next day I went off to work as if nothing had happened. It was more of the same, which is not
to say that it was boring – far from it. It was good to do something that had nothing to do with either graves or robbing, and I was really starting to get the hang of it now, following these convoluted money trails. And Hound seemed very happy with what I was doing.

  But around midafternoon, I found myself with nothing to do. I’d done the work too quickly. Hound was out of the office; he’d gone to court for the afternoon, so he wasn’t able to give me something else to get stuck into. So I was just mucking around on my computer, checking out the credit rating of a few people I knew.

  Mr Cranbrook, the principal of my school (very good, by the way).

  Dr Chakrabarty (didn’t have one!).

  Mrs Havilland (very very bad!). Then I got this idea in my head of doing some digging on my father, he of the empty cobwebby office.

  That swagger I’d recently acquired concerning my cyber-sleuthing – I lost it pretty quickly. My dad, and my dad’s financial dealings, were elusive.

  I could sense that they were there, but I just couldn’t quite find them. Every time I thought I was on some sort of roll, when I’d found a trail, it came to a dead end. A couple of times I even gave up, walked away from the computer and went down to Cash Converters to annoy Ratface Ponytail a bit more. But then I’d get an idea and I’d rush upstairs again to put it into action. But that would result in another dead end, another trail gone cold. One entity that kept popping up, however, was Coast Home Loans.

  So I decided to concentrate on that connection. I was really getting somewhere too – my dad was obviously a major investor in that company – when Hound came charging up the stairs, spurs jangling, and over to my desk.

  ‘Let’s go, Youngblood,’ he said. ‘We’ve got a business meeting.’

  ‘Where?’ I said.

  ‘The boardroom, of course,’ he said. ‘Cozzi’s.’

  I got up, and was about to follow Hound when he said, ‘Why don’t you slip your jacket on, makes you look older.’ So I slipped my denim jacket on.

  It was only a fifteen-minute walk to Cozzi’s, but why walk when you’ve got a Hummer, perhaps the world’s most ridiculous car? We got on board – with a Hummer it really does feel like you’re on board – and made our way there.

  Unusually there was no rap playing on the stereo, but something much more folksy, like Bob Dylan.