Diamond Dove

by Adrian Hyland

  'The suggestion's come down from Doug's office,' I replied, dropping the Chief Minister's name in the spirit of that famed Territorian informality.

  'Doug's office…' he repeated sadly, his man-of-the-world tones drizzling into the woodwork.

  'Yes. They're concerned that there's been too much negative publicity about the impact of land claims upon development - so much so that it's scaring off potential investors. The new approach is to put a positive spin on the situation, publicise some of the more successful examples of co-operation between black owners and white partners.'

  While Massie was busy looking aghast, I glanced out through the open door, where Candy was still sending me strange signals.

  'This could be a little less… straightforward than I'd anticipated,' he intoned, bending his brow and vigorously checking out the contents of his left ear with a little finger. 'Perhaps if you could fill me in on what you've covered so far?'

  'Well, the major mines - Ranger, Gove. The Granites. Kakadu, of course. Uluru… They're all on aboriginal land.'

  Massie sat there looking more and more deflated as the list went on. His paunch began to reassert itself, his moustache drooped. What examples of thrusting Indigenous enterprise did he have to compete with Uluru and Kakadu? The couple of moth- eaten blackfellers they dragged out of the pub to put on a show out at the Rodeo River dude ranch? Captain Racket's Silver Billy Tea Tours?

  'Perhaps in the Bluebush region,' I suggested sympathetically, 'we could concentrate more on potential than on up-and-running projects?'

  'Hmmm,' he replied, nodding sagely but unable to keep the relief from bubbling up at the corners of his mouth. Potential? I could almost see him thinking. Just my line. Wind me up and watch me go. He looked like he'd been feeding off 'potential' for twenty years. 'That would be a sensible move. Some really exciting opportunities opening up in this region. And, loath as I am to… blow my own trumpet, this office' - he swept a grandiose arm around the room, lowered his voice and his eyebrows - 'has been a driving force behind them all.'

  I spent the next few minutes scribbling into my notebook while he got his mouth into gear and dragged a dozen projects in from the outer limits of the Never-Never. The Heartache River Nickel Project, the Wonder Gully Gold Mine, the Black Snake Tourist Park. They were all cutting edge, they were all imminent, they were all the results of his own hard work, they were all awaiting a final component, viz. nickel, gold or tourists, and they'd be off like a fleet of rockets.

  He gave me prospectuses, surveys and impact statements, he gave me shiny brochures and pamphlets. As evidence of his black- feller bona fides, he gave me a guided tour of the little collection of artefacts on the sideboard: boomerangs and beads, coolamons, clapsticks and a dot painting.

  'And this,' he said as he picked up a red chalcedony knife at the end of the sideboard, 'is the centrepiece of our little collection. It was given to me by a dear friend, the chief of one of the local tribes.'

  'What is it?'

  'It's the weapon a kadaicha man would have used to' - he gave a wicked smile, leaning so far forward that I copped a blast of whisky breath, and inscribed a curve through the air between us - 'slice you open.'

  'Oh my goodness!' I gasped in mock horror, clutching my hands to my chest.

  When we were back in our seats, I leaned back, crossed my legs, glanced at my notebook and asked, 'And I've been told there are some interesting initiatives at… let me see, now - Moonlight Downs? something to do with one of its neighbours?'

  His smile froze, stuck like a bull in a bog. 'Moonlight Downs?'

  'Ye-e-es.' I flicked back to a previous page. 'An Aboriginal cattle enterprise. Among other things.'

  He leaned forward, flashed his lightly browned teeth. 'Caroline - do you mind if I call you Caroline?'

  'My friends call me Caro.'

  'Caro?' he beamed, his eyelids fluttering. 'Moonlight Downs is at a rather… delicate stage right now. I wonder if we might discuss it over a drink, perhaps? At the Blue Lagoon?' He glanced at his watch. 'They do a martini which is simply' - he actually kissed his fingertips - 'superb.'

  I considered his proposal, my fear of discovery being rapidly overhauled by an intimation that with a bit of booze in him this bloke would be rabbiting on like a Kakadu bus driver. Probably hoping to be rabbiting on in other ways as well, but we'd cross that bridge when we came to it.

  'Why not?' I said.

  As we walked out through reception, Candy was staring at her computer and desperately pounding away at the keyboard.

  'Candy,' he said, 'Ms Crowe and I are popping down to the club for a short break.'

  'Right,' she said, not looking up.

  'Back in half an hour.'

  'Right.' She continued to hammer the keys.

  'Or SO.'

  'Good.'

  Massie looked at her for a moment, slightly puzzled, then guided me through the door, but we'd only gotten as far as the carpark when a great boozy bellow stopped us in our tracks.

  'Hey, boss!'

  Freddy Ah Fong was standing across the road, swaying like the last pickled onion in the jar, a broad beam illuminating his soggy face. He began to travel in our direction. I put on my glasses and kept my back to him, praying that he wouldn't recognise me.

  'Christ!' Massie muttered. 'The Great Black Hope… just ignore him.'

  But thirst had given Freddy wings. He was moving faster than we could ignore.

  Massie drew a keyring from his pocket and pressed the remote. A magnificent metallic gold Range Rover fitted out with every imaginable extra - alloy wheels and winch, tinted windows, ladders and racks and rows of halogen driving lights - flashed back at him.

  'Hey! Boss!' called Freddy again.

  He was almost upon us when Massie said, 'Excuse me for a moment, Caro. Occupational hazard.'

  He turned to face Freddy, a grimace on his flushed face. The conversation I couldn't catch, but I did spot a tenner appear and disappear. Massie was slipping the wallet back into his clingwrap daks when Freddy, mission accomplished and boozer looming, yelled a cheery farewell: 'Thanks, boss!' Then he slipped me a great, slobbering wink. 'An you watch out for this feller, h'Emily, e's a randy little bugger! Like a bit of black velvet.'

  Massie stopped, his shoulders suddenly hunched, his cheeks red, his eyes swivelling suspiciously. He turned around and asked, 'What did you just say, Freddy?'

  I discovered a sudden itch behind my right ear, and began to back away, very slowly, to where my own car was parked.

  'Why nuthin, boss,' rasped Freddy, picking up that there'd been a sea change and that it might have had something to do with him. 'Just a little joke between me and the missus ere. Why I never even knowed you know 'er.'

  'You know her yourself, Freddy?'

  'Why h'Emily? Sure!' He relaxed, grinned. 'She all doo-dahed up right now, but I'd know that little girl anywhere. Daughter for ol Motor Jack!'

  'Motor Jack? Jack Tempest?'

  'Yuwayi/'

  'This is his daughter?'

  'Yuwayi,' Freddy beamed. 'Just about growed 'er up meself.'

  I was retreating more directly now, but I couldn't let that one pass. 'Bullshit, Freddy! Only thing you ever growed up was a beer gut!'

  Massie turned around, glared at me, his face flushing from bright red to deep purple. He was nearly as black as Freddy when he snapped, 'Candy!' She'd followed us out and was standing in the doorway. His brow buckled, the tendons in his neck leapt out. 'If Miss Tempest enters these premises again, I want you to call the police and tell them we've got a trespasser.'

  I took off my shoes, walked back to my car, my feet breathing sighs of relief. As I drove away, I glanced back at Massie: he was standing beside his overblown motorcar, his fat face fuming, his fists clenched.

  And as I looked at him, another face rose to the surface of my memory: a toddler's face, this one. A toddler who'd ascended my leg at a basketball game and turned on a similar exhibition when his mother wouldn't give him a boile
d lolly.

  The Director's Cut

  I was lying on the couch that night, licking a Paddle-pop and my wounds, when the telephone rang and a husky voice came down the wire.

  'Hi, Emily.'

  'Candy! Well I fucked that one up good and proper, didn't I?'

  'Yeah, I'd skip the Mata Hari bit if I were you. That's what I was trying to warn you about: Massie knew you were back in town. We had Earl Marsh in here grumbling about you just the other day. It was fuckin Emily Tempest this an fuckin Emily Tempest that.'

  'Bastard doesn't talk like that when his wife's around. I have heard I'm not Earl's favourite person; now I suppose I'll have to add Massie to the list. Needless to say, you didn't fess up to knowing me?'

  'I value my job more than that. You had little Arseholes fooled for a while with the Country Party tart thing, but even he can put two and two together if you give him a calculator and hit him on the head with it.'

  "Specially if he's got Freddy Ah Fong on the team.'

  'Ah, Freddy…' she sighed. 'He's a bit of a regular round here.'

  'What are you doing working there, Candy?'

  'Well, it's a job, honey. And in case you haven't noticed, there aren't that many round here that don't leave you over-exposed to the sun or the sack. More to the point, though, what the hell are you up to?'

  I considered my options for a moment or two, then settled back on the couch, rearranged the cushions and gave her the director's cut. An old friend in whom I could confide was something I'd been sorely missing of late, particularly in light of my troubled relationship with Hazel.

  'Well, why didn't you just ask me?' she exclaimed when I finished. 'I had a lot of time for old Lincoln.'

  'Candy, I didn't even know you were working there.'

  'So you really think Marsh could be involved in Lincoln's death?'

  'I don't know, but I'm sure as hell trying to find out.'

  'He and Massie are thick as a meat worker's dick…'

  'Why Ms Wilson!'

  '…but I'd be surprised if they were up to anything you could call illegal. Massie's quite a stickler for the rules, actually.'

  'We're talking murder here, Candy. I imagine it tends to operate by a different set of rules.'

  'Maybe. You still at Toyota Towers?'

  'Yep. Number 6.'

  'Gimme a day or two. I'll see what I can rustle up.'

  Late the next afternoon she appeared on my doorstep with a wary expression on her face and a fat envelope in her hand. I invited her in, offered her a beer.

  'Just the one,' she replied as she settled onto the sofa. 'Gotta get Teisha's fish fingers on. Anyway, more than me job's worth getting sprung with the likes of you.' She tapped the package. 'Especially if anybody saw me giving you this.'

  'What is it?' I asked.

  'Everything I could find in the department's records that had anything to do with Moonlight Downs. When you're finished with it, destroy it, okay? Every page.'

  'No worries, Candy.' I gave her a hug. 'I don't know how to repay you.'

  'You've already repaid me, Em.' Her eyes gleamed. 'Life was never boring with you around.'

  As I got the drinks and flopped down on a chair opposite her, we chatted and filled in the gaps in our respective resumes: her father was managing a station out at Saddler's Well, she'd had half a dozen different fellers, none of whom had had the sense to stay around. Like me, Candy had done time down south - Sydney, in her case - and never fitted in. She'd been back in Bluebush for a couple of years, and had begun working as a receptionist for the Department of Regional Development a year ago.

  While we talked, I was scouting around for a chance to put the question that was on my mind, but it wasn't until she raised the topic of her employer that I saw an opening.

  'Candy, do you mind if I ask you a rather… delicate question?'

  'Delicate? Emily, you wouldn't know the meaning of the word.'

  'What can you tell me about your boss's sex life?'

  She raised her eyebrows. 'See what I mean?' She tilted her head back, took a swig of her drink. 'Okay: Massie's sex life. Two things come to mind straightaway. One, there's not as much of it as he'd like there to be, and two, I'm not part of it. Thank Christ.'

  'Do you remember Flora?'

  Candy said nothing, but looked suddenly discomfited.

  'Hazel's little sister,' I prompted her.

  'Yeah, I remember Flora. Never know if she remembers me, though.'

  'She wouldn't perchance be part of it, would she? His sex life, I mean.'

  Candy cradled her face in her hands, made a long, involved study of her glass.

  'You're looking particularly thoughtful there, Candy.'

  'It's like this, Emily. From what I can gather, Massie'd fuck a dog chained to a tree, or try to. Whether he had it off with Flora, I've got no idea. Her little boy is, what, one or two years old? Whatever happened was before my time. But, er…'

  'Ye-es?'

  'Well… you aren't the first person to raise that possibility.'

  'Who was the other one?'

  She paused, drained her glass and looked at me. 'Lincoln,' she said at last.

  'What!'

  'Couple of weeks before he died.'

  I leaned forward. 'Tell me more.'

  'It was one of the stranger meetings I've seen in my time there. Couldn't exactly call it a meeting, I suppose: more of a whistle- stop encounter. Lincoln wandered in, unannounced, wanted to speak to Massie. Wasn't accusing him of anything; just had a rather unusual request.'

  'Which was?'

  'He'd seen one of those heavy-duty prams, four wheel drive jobs. Apparently Flora's living rough in one of the camps… he wanted to know if Massie would buy her one, that was all. Said - this made as much sense as everything else in the discussion - said he'd give Marsh the water if he bought her the pram.'

  'What water?'

  'Buggered if I know.'

  'How did Massie react?'

  'In his usual high-powered, senior executive manner: died in the arse.'

  'I can well imagine. Changes colour quicker than a chameleon, your boss.'

  'Lincoln didn't even get past the front desk, actually. Massie looked at him like he was a raving maniac, suddenly remembered a meeting he had to attend and hit the road running.'

  'What did Lincoln do?'

  'You know Lincoln: he was his usual even-tempered self. Just shook his head, said to say hello to my old man for him and wandered out.'

  We sat there in silence as the implications of what I'd just been told ran around my head.

  'What are you going to do now?' Candy asked.

  'I know what I'd like to do: get drunk, stoned, rooted and as far away from this mess as possible. But I don't suppose any of those things are likely to happen. Look, Candy, why don't you leave it with me for now? You've got a lot more to lose than I have - a job, for starters. I'll have a look through this stuff.' I patted the paperwork. 'See if I can make any sense out of it. In the meantime, keep your eyes open; let me know if you spot anything. I'll call you in a day or two.'

  'Okay. If you're happy with that, so am I. Must admit, it'd be a disaster for me to lose my job right now - they're like the Mafia, this mob. Get em off-side and you end up at the bottom of the billabong in concrete gumboots.'

  She stood up and I gave her a farewell kiss.

  'We'll catch up when I'm not odour of the month.'

  'I'd like that.'

  When she'd gone, I ripped the envelope open and examined its contents: a folder full of photocopied documents and computer printouts. I looked at the first page: a letter from Massie to his masters in Darwin. The 'Re' was 'Moonlight Downs'.

  There were a lot more: letters, memos, planning applications, mineral exploration leases, business plans.

  Candy had been busy. So, by the look of things, had Lance Massie.

  Sun Tzu Out of Chicken Soup by The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People

  An hour later I shoved the
folder into my backpack and headed down to the boozer. I pulled up at the corner, uncertain of where to go. Tonight felt more like a Black Dog night. I needed something rugged to wash Massie out of my system.

  It wasn't his evil deeds that were troubling me as much as his evil prose. The motivational gurus on his bookshelves had trickled down into his computer and you couldn't read a line without bumping into a core value, a hypervision or a mission statement. His Collected Works had more windows of opportunity than a Hamburg whorehouse, more cutting edges than a combine harvester, more benchmarks than a drunk's forehead. For a bloke who'd spent twenty years with his snout in the public trough, Massie had an amazing grasp of the language of private enterprise. His conceptualisation ranged from blue sky to black hole, his strategies from eagle to seagull. He dared to dream, and when he'd done dreaming it was time to walk the talk and churn white water.

  All of this, I reflected, from some pathetic fuck shuffling taxpayers' money around a quarter of a million square kilometers of spinifex?

  I ordered a glass of the Black's black-market bourbon, repelled a couple of drunken boarders and took my wad of papers out to a quiet corner of the beer garden.

  Okay, I decided. Somewhere in this lexical septic tank there must be some hard information. I pulled out a notebook and scrolled through the folder. Whenever I came across an actual fact - a date, a location, a person, a meeting held, a deal done - I jotted it down. Out of those disparate bits and pieces a pattern - if such a thing existed - must surely emerge. At the very least, I hoped to find some speck of an insight into what was going on at Moonlight Downs.

  I worked rapidly and in half an hour I'd finished.

  I took a swig of the bourbon and studied my notes. What did they tell me?

  Not much, but that may have just been the bourbon, which had a kick like a one-armed bouncer.

  The main function of the Department of Regional Development in regard to Moonlight Downs, it appeared, was to milk the land claim for all it was worth. This meant recruiting to the cause every disgruntled neighbour with a ground axe or a disjointed nose, every local entrepreneur who could dream up some detrimental effect of the land going back to the blacks. There was, it appeared, the possibility of Commonwealth Government compensation for lost earnings.