The Day of the Gecko

by Robert G. Barrett

  Les downed his bourbon and unleaded, and rattled the ice in his empty glass. ‘I’m going to get another drink. Anybody else want one? Girls?’

  The major shook his head. ‘No need to,’ he said, ‘the girls are going.’

  ‘Oh?’ said Les, trying hard not to show his joy. ‘That’s a bit of a shame.’

  ‘Yeah, but it’s all sweet, Les. We’re going with them.’

  Norton’s joy evaporated even quicker than it began. ‘We are?’

  ‘Yes,’ cooed Doreen, snuggling up closer to The Gecko. ‘Me ’n’ Coral were going to go because we were hungry. And Frank said he’d take us out for dinner and drinks. Isn’t that lovely?’

  ‘Dinner? Drinks?’ said Les. ‘Where?’

  ‘What was the name of that place you said we were going to again, Frank?’ said Coral.

  ‘Redwoods,’ smiled The Gecko. ‘Down at Bondi.’

  ‘And we’re going to have sushi,’ said the blonde, smiling at Les as she held onto the major. ‘I’ve never tried it, but it sounds really nice.’

  ‘Neither have I,’ said Coral. ‘But I’ll give it a lash. I’m starving. What about you, Les?’

  Les nodded blankly at her. ‘Yeah,’ he answered, just as blankly. ‘I suppose I could eat something.’

  ‘Well, come on then,’ said The Gecko. ‘Let’s go.’

  Norton’s eyes were starting to bulge a little. He stared at the major and desperately pointed to where the band was getting changed behind the speakers into the Sergeant Pepper’s uniforms for the next bracket. ‘What about . . .?’

  The Gecko made an offhanded gesture. ‘We’ll catch them next time we’re in town. Right now, I’ve got to catch some fish for sweet little Doreen here’s sushi.’

  ‘Ooh! Isn’t he lovely,’ squealed the blonde.

  Les nodded flatly. ‘Yeah, one of the best,’ he muttered.

  Before Norton could do or say anything else, the others finished their drinks and they were out the front of the hotel where a taxi happened to be waiting at the lights. They bundled in; Les in the front, the major and the two lovelies in the back. The taxi headed towards Bondi Beach with the major pissing in the girls’ pockets and cracking more jokes in the back, while Les fumed silently in the front. Isn’t this lovely? he growled to himself. You can bet your life he’ll want to drag the two of them back to Susie’s place so he can try and get into the blonde’s pants. And in the meantime, I’ve got to walk into Redwoods with that wobbegong on my arm. Oh God! Norton shook his head. Still, you never know. It might be a quiet night and there’ll be no one in there I know. Or maybe with a bit of luck we’re both barred because of that fight and they won’t let us in. Anything, please. The Gecko prattled on in the back about absolutely nothing, while Les tried to bury himself in the front seat. They cruised down Bondi Road before stopping for the lights at The Royal Hotel. As they drove off, Les suddenly felt a soft typist’s hand come over and lightly stroke his neck; it gave him both goose bumps and sent a shudder running down his spine. When the taxi stopped outside Redwoods, the driver gave Les a lurid wink as if to say, ‘You’re on a good thing, mate’. They bundled out and Les paid the fare.

  Despite Norton’s hopes and prayers, his luck was right out and things couldn’t have been worse. Jee was on the door and his big, happy face broke into about a hundred smiles as soon as he saw them. Jee shook Norton’s hand and thanked him for helping to get rid of the five mugs the night before; Les had been right earlier when he jokingly told Garrick they’d be the heroes of the day. Jee greeted the major like he was a member of the royal family and treated Coral and Doreen as if they were Nicole Kidman and Madonna. Then, when they walked inside, there were people Les knew everywhere. Joe Heets, the bloke that put the girl in the back of the Rolls-Royce, was standing at the bar with two models. Another bloke Les knew who ran the surf shop just up the road was there with two of his waxhead mates and another bloke Les had met that owned a yacht; they were talking to a team of young glamours from the north-side surfing scene. Every table was packed with well-dressed men or women who were either eights or nines. And I’m standing here with Phyllis Diller and the Klingon, thought Les, as everybody in the place that knew him seemed to smile and nod hello at once. Oh well, at least there’s no empty tables. That means we’ll have to go out the back where no one can see us. But no. Norton’s run of bad luck continued. No sooner had they walked in, when four people seated along the comer of the bar got up and left.

  ‘Hey! How lucky’s that,’ said the major, and herded them towards the empty barstools.

  Les sat on the end barstool next to the wall, underneath the glass cabinet containing the Redwoods T-shirts. Coral sat next to him, then the major and Doreen. Norton had just squeezed his backside onto the barstool when an arm snaked around Coral and an empty hand appeared next to him. Les pushed $200 into the empty hand, it disappeared and the major started playing Champagne Charlie. Margaritas? Of course, girls, crooned The Gecko, waving fifty dollar bills everywhere. They go down splendidly with sushi. The Margaritas soon arrived along with the food waitress and a bourbon for Les, while he tried to hide as best he could in the comer. Isn’t it amazing what a good time you can have when you’re spending someone else’s money, he thought, watching the major give the barman a tip that would have fed a family in Somalia for about a year. Yes, I’m so glad I was able to show the major a good time again. Around him, everybody he knew was either staring at them or taking quick glances. You could bet word about the fight would have got round and they were whispering about that. You could also bet they were whispering about why Les was in there with his mate, spraying up two drunken scrubbers.

  Another round of Margaritas and a bourbon for Les arrived on the bar about the same time as two large sushi platters, complete with bowls of soya sauce and little wooden chopsticks wrapped in paper. Sitting on the two wooden boards, it looked all very neat, very dainty and very tasty. Oh well, what the fuck thought Norton. He wasn’t a mad sushi fan, but he may as well have a pick. He broke open a pair of chopsticks, stirred some horseradish into a bowl of soya sauce, dipped one into it and started chewing away along with a pick of pickled ginger. Although, to Les, sushi was an acquired taste, it didn’t go down too bad. The major didn’t bother with his chopsticks and Doreen and Coral didn’t know what they were eating, so they weren’t going to stuff around trying to shovel whatever it was into their mouths with two little, wooden knitting needles. If you could dunk donuts, you could dunk sushi. In minutes, there was rice, ginger, splashes of soya sauce and everything else, from one end of the wooden platters to the other and across the bar. Les was no epicurean, but he couldn’t remember the last time he felt so embarrassed. He put his chopsticks down and sucked on his bourbon.

  ‘Hey, this stuff’s not bad!’ squealed Doreen.

  ‘Yeah. It’s all right,’ said Coral. ‘I don’t know about that green shit though.’ She dug her elbow into Norton’s ribs. ‘What d’ you reckon, Les?’

  ‘Yeah, terrific,’ grunted Norton. ‘Makes you want to go and live in Japan.’ Les sucked on his bourbon and wished he was somewhere else while the others wolfed into the raw fish. Then he noticed something. So far that night, the major only had eyes for Doreen; he’d been all over her like a cake of soap and it wasn’t half obvious what the Town Clerk from Ballina was after. Doreen was more than likely thinking the same thing. Between dunks of sushi, The Gecko took a brief look round the bar and for a moment it was almost as if he’d seen a ghost. He turned back to Doreen, who was talking to him and, although he was listening and trying to smile, it was obvious he was taking absolutely no notice and his mind was somewhere else. They dunked some more sushi and slurped some more Margarita when Coral decided she wanted to go for a pee. And Doreen, being a good Australian girl, decided there was no way she was going to let her mate pee on her own. They both left, taking their handbags with them. Les thought this was as good a time as any to tell the major he was on his own — Les was beating a retreat. Laying down h
is arms. Surrendering. Call him a coward if you will, sir, but if he had to look at the mole on Coral’s face anymore, and her moustache, he’d bring up the one piece of sushi he’d had, all over the mess they’d made on the bar. Les was about to say something when the major leaned across to him, his back turned slightly towards the bar. The Gecko smile wasn’t there either. Some other look was.

  ‘Les, listen to me for a minute,’ he said quietly and possibly a little urgently. ‘Did you say the bloke that owns this place is called Marty and he made his money flying helicopters during the Gulf War?’

  ‘Yeah, something like that,’ answered Les. ‘Why?’

  ‘You see those two blokes sitting at the bar, next to that big bloke in the white suit?’

  Les looked over at Joe Heets, who was still chatting happily away to the two models. He was standing, and sitting this side of him were two stocky, fit-looking men around thirty in jeans, T-shirts and loose-fitting cotton jackets. One had dark hair, the other more ginger; both looked foreign in some way. They were laughing over their drinks, but Les noticed their eyes were as hard as ball-bearings and every now and again, one of them would look towards the front door.

  ‘Yeah, what about them?’ asked Les.

  ‘They’re two agents with Mossad.’

  ‘They’re what?’

  ‘They’re an assassination team with the Israeli Secret Service. I know them — Zin Moise and Leo Glazer. I saw Leo’s brother in that club earlier this evening.’

  Les remembered The Gecko looking around in the Hakoah Club earlier. But he half had the shits now, being lumbered with Coral, and he wasn’t quite in the mood for anymore ASIO, KGB, MI5, Mossad or whatever bullshit. ‘So? They’re probably only in here having a drink. Same as everybody else.’

  The Gecko drew his face almost up to Norton’s. ‘Les, have a look what’s hanging off the bar in front of them.’

  Norton glanced over again. Hanging from the bar by their handles were two spring-loaded, fold-up umbrellas. ‘Okay, so they brought their brollies with them.’

  ‘Les, what was the weather like outside tonight?’

  Norton shrugged. ‘Warm. Bit cloudy maybe. That’s about all.’

  ‘It definitely wasn’t raining, was it?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Les, they’re not quite umbrellas. They’re submachine guns with silencers. I’ve used them. They’re in here to hit the owner. I know who he’s been working for.’

  ‘You do?’

  ‘Yeah, the Syrians. Anyway, it’s got nothing to do with us. And I don’t give a stuff who they kill. But as soon as those two sheilas get back, we’re out of here.’

  Norton was still a bit sceptical and wondering if this wasn’t some ploy just to get Doreen back to the flat for the giant porking. ‘Garrick, you are fair dinkum? This isn’t just . . .’

  ‘Les, as soon as the sheilas get back, I’ll find some excuse and we make tracks.’

  ‘Why not leave them here and just get on the toe ourselves,’ Les suggested.

  The Gecko gave Norton a very heavy, close-quarters once-up-and-down. ‘Les, what do you take me for? Some sort of a cad?’

  Norton was about to say something when who should come bowling through the front door in a pair of Levis and a plain white shirt, casually smoking a cigarette, but Marty the owner.

  He had a quick word with Jee, said hello to some people seated near the door, shook a couple of hands, then moved along the bar, stopping to have a word with Joe Heets, before going behind the bar and stopping again next to the till. If Les had any doubts about the two men the major pointed out being killers, he needn’t have bothered. As soon as they spotted Marty, their faces turned to stone and you could almost see their antennae go up. In almost one movement, they pulled a forty-round magazine out from each of their jackets, grabbed their umbrellas off the bar, jammed the clips in and rose to their feet — just as Coral and Doreen came up the steps from the toilets. Marty’s instincts as a combat helicopter pilot were still with him. Just as the two Israelis started blazing away, he jerked his tall, gangly frame to one side, shoving the barman to the floor as he did.

  The silenced Mini-Uzis didn’t make a great deal of noise, just this burping, rattling cough, along with the smoke and sparks coming from the barrel. However, there was plenty of other noise and confusion. The hail of bullets smashed all the liquor bottles on the shelves, tore through the wooden closet, smashed the blender to pieces, along with the bowl of fruit, scattered the paper money pinned to the shelves, ripped up the muppet doll and tore shards of wood, concrete and plaster from the walls. Bullets were ricocheting and whining all over the restaurant amidst the clatter from the empty casings hitting the wooden floor. How they never cut Marty in two or injured anybody else was a mystery. After shoving the barman to the floor, Marty was jumping and jerking around behind the bar like Ben Turpin in an old silent movie, while the bullets kept zipping and whining all around him. Women were screaming now and half the restaurant had made a beeline for the front door. Doreen and Coral were frozen up against the wall behind the two Mossad assassins with bullets smacking into the wall above them sprinkling their hair with dust, concrete and plaster. Marty made a dash for the exit at the end of the bar as the two Israelis opened up on him again.

  ‘Shit!’ cursed The Gecko. ‘I’d better do something before somebody gets hurt.’

  He grabbed one of the unopened sets of wooden chopsticks, ripped them apart and scampered down behind the bar in a kind of running crouch. He crept up behind the red-haired Israeli, rose slightly and jammed the thin, wooden chopstick straight into his ear canal. The Israeli howled with pain and made a grab for his ear with one hand while his other hand flew up and emptied the machine gun across the ceiling, gouging out lumps of plaster and chopping the rotating fan to pieces. The other Mossad killer turned round just in time for The Gecko to ram the other chopstick into his eye. He roared with the agony and shock, dropped his weapon and grabbed at his face. The major then turned and grabbed the bewildered Doreen and Coral and herded them towards the front door, leaving the two Israelis cursing and groaning as they tried to pull the chopsticks out of their heads. Norton thought this might be as good a time as any to make a move too; one ricocheting bullet had missed his head by about a foot and shattered the glass in the T-shirt cabinet. He got up from his stool and joined the others. Jee was standing inside the door, his eyes bulging out like ping-pong balls, wondering what to do, when Les and his team shoved past him along with the rest of the crowd surging out into, then scattering up, Campbell Parade.

  ‘Jesus bloody Christ!’ said Doreen. ‘What the hell was that all about?’

  ‘It seems somebody wasn’t happy with their sushi,’ suggested The Gecko, herding the two girls towards Hall Street.

  ‘I told you up at the Cock ’n’ Bull not to come here,’ said Les. ‘The place has always had a dud rap on the food.’

  ‘I dunno,’ said Coral, ‘I thought it was nice.’

  ‘Yeah, well you know how it is,’ said Les, ‘some people are very fussy when it comes to sushi.’

  The Gecko showed great concern over Doreen, asking her if she was all right, and dusting flecks of plaster from her hair while he slipped his arm around her. She was too drunk and stupid to know any different when the major suggested that a nice, strong cup of coffee would be the thing now for her nerves. That was quite an experience she’d just been through for an unsuspecting young country girl. Doreen smiled, put her arm around the major and kissed him on the cheek as they headed up Hall Street towards Susie’s flat, with a reluctant Les and an equally drunken and heavy-breathing Coral bringing up the rear. The major kept himself busy putting work on Doreen. Les wasn’t in the slightest bit interested, so the conversation between him and Coral was limited to the excitement of life in the typists’ pool at the oil company and the exciting life she led in Lithgow before moving to Sydney. She tried to get close to Les, but after running up and down those steps with the major earlier, it was easy to keep
a couple of steps in front of her. It wasn’t all that long before they were there. Les fumbled the keys from his pocket, hit the buttons and the light switches and they were all standing in the lounge room. Doreen and Coral gave Susie’s unit the once-over and the first thing they both said at once was, ‘Shit! Look at all those bloody CDs.’

  ‘Yeah,’ said Norton quickly, ‘but the CD player’s stuffed. So if you want any music it’ll have to be tapes or the radio.’

  ‘Oh, what a bummer,’ said Doreen, putting a B52’s CD back with the others.

  The major turned to Norton. ‘Les, I hate to impose, but do you think you could rustle up another plunger of your fabulous coffee? You’re much better at it than me.’

  ‘Yeah, righto,’ answered Les. At least while he was in the kitchen he could avoid the Klingon.

  ‘Whereabouts is the loo?’ asked Coral.

  ‘In there,’ pointed Les.

  ‘I’ll go when you’re finished, Coral,’ said Doreen, and settled down on the lounge next to the major.