by Peter Hawes
‘Where’s Betty?’ said Royce.
‘You’ll see her when we’re at sea.’
‘She knows I’m here?’
‘About the only one who doesn’t is the captain. And we’ll keep it that way. You will be what we call a ringbolt – an unofficial passenger. Usually, of course, they’re women.’
‘What’ll you do when I go to the captain and tell him I’ve been abducted?’
‘What’ll you do when he says, “They all say that,” and biffs you in the slammer for trespass? Bye.’
He smiled and shut the door. Stan smiled a lot. He was a big tall guy with a blond beard that covered most of his face. And those small, friendly eyes really did twinkle. Suddenly Royce realised that the reason for the constant smile was that he didn’t give a shit.
Funny how sight and smell go together. Look at the bags of onions, and the room smells of onions; look at the cardboard crates of cabbage, and it smells of cabbage. On a low shelf were crates of Monteiths. He took one, reorganised some lettuce boxes into seating room and sat down on a shelf to wait.
When the door opened he hid the beer can among some lettuces. Stan’s cheerful head. A blanket sailed across the room towards him. ‘Don’t catch cold in there, mate, will ya?’ The door closed.
It occured to Royce that the door may open from the inside as well. After all, what if you got locked in? He was about to get up to investigate when the door opened again. ‘Oh,’ smiled Stan, ‘there’s a telephone in the fish room and the meat room in case people get locked in. But not in here, because it’s not dangerous. Saves a bit of activity, dunnit?’ And he Cheshired a smile that hung at the firmly closed door for several seconds.
ROYCE DIDN’T KNOW how long he’d been in the vege room before Stan came back, but it involved three cans of Monteiths and a crippling attack of that cramp you get from sitting reading on the dunny too long. ‘We’ve found you a cabin,’ said Stan. ‘Come on.’ He clamped his friendly hand on the collar again and shut the door behind him. ‘You can have a yell if you like; the captain’s on the bridge – he won’t hear a thing.’
He frogmarched Royce to a stairway exactly opposite the coolers. SAILING SCHEDULE, 2 Nov, 1978, said a blackboard. SHORE LEAVE EXPIRES 20:00, SAIL TIME 20:55.
‘Upsy-daisy,’ chortled Stan and wrenched him up the stairs. Royce was still stiff from cramp and Stan was just about lifting him. Holy kermoley, that’s strength – you’re not using your biceps for lifting like that, you’re using your triceps and they’re nowhere near as strong. Interesting to see a set-to between Stan and Bob Dodds.
A dimly identical corridor; SAUNA where the coolrooms had been, a storey down. Next door a dining room set for about a dozen. On the other side of the corridor a wooden door saying DO NOT SLAM.
‘In you go, like a good boy.’ He pushed Royce into a cabin no wider than the door. ‘Now,’ beamed Stan from the doorway, ‘cabins, unlike vege rooms, can be opened from the inside. Therefore, technically you are not locked in. But I would like you to pretend you are, because I’ll be sitting over there in the dining room, facing this door and eating yoghurt. And if the door opens, I’ll kill you. I’ll be on watch, so to speak, just like a good seaman should be. There. Settle in, I’ll bring you some dinner later. I think we’re having cornish pasties tonight. Welcome aboard.’ A smile, a nod, another goddamn door.
The cabin widened further down. The narrowness was to accommodate a bathroom. Above the toilet was a list of what not to put down it. The list was so long that Royce felt constipation coming on. The cabin ended in a sideways bed and a big square porthole. Beyond the porthole the blackness of the sky and river; he was on the starboard side of the ship. The oddity of this suddenly struck him. The ship was facing the wrong way; it was pointing up river. How were they gonna turn? Yeah, well, that was something he could safely leave to the captain.
MOVEMENT WAS ONLY a feeling at first – a very subtle feeling: simply an absence of stillness. He stood in the middle of the cabin analysing the movement. There was a strangeness about it. Not simply the lack of sound accompanying the motion – somehow it was affecting his bodily tides in the wrong way. It was some moments before he realised the ship were going backwards. The captain was driving this montrous ship down the Buller River backwards! Holy shit, was he gonna take it over the bar that way?
Royce lay on his bunk, closed his eyes and moved slowly backwards towards the sea. Things were not going well. The wheels were falling off this fish-retrieving project like autumn leaves. All in all, taking everything into consideration, this was probably the deepest shit he’d ever got himself into. Well, it was the widest shit – the farthest ranging. Where were they going? He had no idea – the cement ship went up Auckland way somewhere. Mind you, he’d never been to Auckland; could be interesting. And what were they gonna do with him, really? Not a hell of a lot, probably. They wouldn’t murder him – Betty wasn’t like that, and Stan couldn’t be bothered. They’d dump him once they’d arranged to get the fish out the country – might even give him the money to get home. Overall, it could have been much worse. The bed was comfy – and there was food coming.
There was a jolt. It biffed him against the fiddles of the bunk. They had hit the wharf. Backwards. Were they going to sink? There was a lifejacket in the top compartment of his wardrobe. Should he go to the door? No. Maybe Stan could be bothered killing people. He knelt on the bunk and peered out into the night. At first, nothing. Then the lights on the Tip Head came into view, flicking up and down like pukeko tails. They swung past his view from left to right. Then came the light at the end of the wharf leading into the lagoon. Then the lights of the rail yards, with the shops of Palmerston Street behind.
Now he could see the wharf. Their ship had a round stern, and they were rolling on it, mortar and pestle style.
The ship stopped. It floated out from the wharf until it was parallel. When they moved again it was forwards. They’d turned around.
Down the big black river they trundled – far more quickly than you’d imagine. In the pale street lights and sudden, brilliant wharf lights were cranes, railway lines, the iron-strewn wilderness he’d crossed to get to the Buller Lion so long ago, the backs of pubs he’d hidden in during police raids, The Criterion, Larsens …
The lagoon, Dooley’s shed. Fishing boats at berth. A hooded figure on a bike. Put the bike beside the shed, took off the hood and let long pale hair fall down. Headed for the Aurora.
‘Linda! Linda!’ bellowed Royce, bashing at the impervious glass of the porthole.
CHAPTER THIRTY
BETTY WAS EMBARRASSED. Theft was supposed to be an anonymous act. Now she was sharing a ship with the sucker she’d stolen the fish from. Bad form, bad form all round. Well, the kid was here and presumably she’d have to face him. Damn. Betty hated victims. They were just so pathetic.
She was sharing a bed with big Stan – as in, she slept in it when he didn’t. His idea. He was a quartermaster – what he said they called a ‘mud pilot’: he steered the ship under the instruction of the captain. But evidently there was a newly qualified mud pilot who was doing the honours on the way up, so Stan had nothing really to do. Still, he just happened to have a ‘watch’ to keep – which started when she mentioned bedtime. Oh well, maybe he was gay.
She’d given Stan the money and told him to spread it around however many men it would take to get the job done; up to him how much of it he gave them. There’d been four of them to get the fish on board and all seemed happy enough with the deal. There were more than that in the know, because several others saw them bringing it aboard, but evidently smuggling was not unheard of – nor were what Stan had called ‘ringbolts’. She was a ringbolt right now. An unemployed one.
She had a fair idea of the system they’d encounter up in Onehunga and she’d have Stan with her anyway. He knew an export guy who owed him one and they’d been in touch. As it happened, quartermasters were in charge of the loading and unloading of the ship as well, so getting the fish
off at the other end without the captain knowing would be no problem. The only problem was the kid. Well, she’d sleep on it.
‘KIDS, WHO’D HAVE them?’ she muttered next morning as she cautiously opened the door, checked for captains – zero – and made her way the two doors down the corridor to Royce’s cabin.
Royce was staring out the porthole watching Wellington happen. He knew she was there – course he did; she’d accidentally slammed the DO NOT SLAM door.
‘Okay, Royce, I’ll be straight with you …’ Jesus wept – not an altogether clever opening gambit under the circumstances. ‘Look, let’s talk a little human nature here, okay? Let’s just have a look at a couple of common human qualities – morality and greed. Now, we all get taught morality and that’s good, cos it’s a damn fine quality to have. We read books about it, we have the Bible and church and socially concerned people spending their time pumping that morality into us, to make us better people. Most movies have a moral – at least American ones do; famous novels, all that type of thing – all about morality. Now, let’s just move our focus to greed, huh? You know anyone who teaches greed? You know where to go to learn the finer points of being greedy? I don’t. But there’s as much of it around as there is morality. Cos you see, Royce, greed is natural, it’s part of human nature, while morality has to be taught, see? We’re all fulla greed and none of us can do anything about it. We get born with greed like we get born with original sin. Hell, greed probably is original sin.
‘The only individuality in greed is what triggers it off. Well, in my case, it was that fish. It’s one of the best I’ve ever seen, Royce, and I’ve seen plenty. And we got it ashore in superb condition – it’s a credit to us all, the condition of that fish.’ He had turned and was about to speak, but she hurried on. ‘And it was caught at the perfect time. In Japan this year there are three double lucky days in November – that’s when a Dai-an falls on a holiday. Everyone gets married on a Dai-an and especially on a double lucky. And at weddings you eat tuna. Now, my instincts, my human nature, were taking all these factors into account when I saw that fish, Royce, and I went for it. Cos what my instinct told me was – ‘getting hold of that fish ain’t greed, Betty my girl, that’s just goddamn common sense.’
‘I think you’re not being serious,’ he said seriously. She was thinking of a reply when he said, ‘Did you know about Captain Calmwater’s boat?’
‘No. What?’
‘It got sunk at its moorings the night you pinched the fish and they all think I did it. Or you did.’
‘Shit.’
‘Did you?’
‘No. What happened?’
‘They don’t know. All I know is that old George reckoned it wasn’t me, and on account of that I’m gonna get the $30,000 back for him.’
‘What $30,000?’
‘That’s owed on his boat. Old bugger hasn’t got that sort of money and it’s not insured.’
Damn, damn, damn! These were the worst situations of all – guilt compounded by compassion. She could feel herself droop (greed), while he straightened (morality). Always life conspired to turn itself into the most banal of fairy stories.
‘Look, Royce, I’m sorry. I’ll send you the thirty grand, okay?’
‘Why are you doing this, Betty? I thought …’
God, this was purgatory – being stared at by a wet-eyed angel. ‘Look, kid, I’ve got every excuse in the world for doing what I did. You name it: impoverished upbringing, two years at Harvard Business School, prostitution …’
‘Be serious!’
She cracked. She cracked right down the flaw in her personality. ‘Okay! I’m serious! You want serious, this is serious, you arsehole! Get off my back! Get outa my morality closet! There was this $200,000-bluefin being pissed around with by a school of pathetic amateurs and I took over. I took it under my control. Under reasonable circumstances, in any decent fishing place in the world, on any non-joke fishing boat, I woulda had a stainless steel tuna missile to send down the line to clamp onto that fish’s face and haul it up. And a fife-forge, four-sided gold anodised gaff to hook it aboard and decent gear – Shime Shime blood sliming knives, narrow boners, parers, stiff boners, breaking knives, cimeters and cleavers. Absolutely none of which you had on your ragged little goddamn boat! Jesus, you amateurs. You realise what you would have done to a quarter-million-dollar fish? Nothing! Ruined it! You’d have sold it for fish and chips! Well, I’m taking it to Tsukiji market to sell it properly. You’re the bad guys here, wasting that goddamn fish; I’m the good guy – I’m restoring its market potential. End of serious story.’
‘… How much did you say?’
‘Two hundred grand – perhaps slightly under.’
He plumped down on the bed like a dropped acorn.
‘That’s my best guess and it’s the best guess you’ll get outside Tsukiji …’
‘Half,’ he said.
It sort of snuck up on her – her rhetorical sights had been set in another direction at the time. ‘What?’
‘Half.’ He stood, reached into the top pocket of his checked woollen shirt and took out an FLD: double copy. He held up the top docket so she could read it, but ready, on the balls of his feet, to spring away if she tried to touch it. It was a landing docket for the bluefin, in his name. The rest of the form was standard. Until the end. It was signed ‘D. Morgan, NZ agent for Toto Suisan (Tosui)’.
Agent for Toto Suisan!
‘How’d that foul-mouthed incinerator know about Toto Suisan?’
‘Dooley? Dunno. But he’s their agent.’
This was serious. That chain-smoking goofball could have been in touch with Tsukiji already. One thing you don’t do: you don’t mess with the Big Seven. She turns up with a Toto Suisan fish and tries to sell it freelance, she’s in schtuk. She had her loyalties, in her way. For five years she’d been giving succour and solace, so to speak, to the brave fishermen of the Daito Gyorui fleet. She’d intended to deal through them – Daito was another of the Seven. She knew several of the board and they’d have dealt with her. But not if it was a Tosui fish, no way. That sort of behaviour leads to discrete inquiries from the Yakusa …
‘Royce,’ she said, smiling a snowball burner smile, ‘I’ll give you $30,000 for that piece of paper.’
‘Half,’ said the angelic little arsewipe.
She then said, ‘Can I sit down?’ and when he’d nodded she sat on the floor in front of the not very comfortable sofa. Funny, that. He sat on the floor in front of sofas too. So had President Kennedy, they say. Maybe he’d been assassinated by sofa makers.
‘You’re in good shape,’ she said from the floor. ‘Athlete?’
‘Yeah.’
‘What – rugby, football, hockey?’
‘… Athletics.’
‘Huh?’
‘Athletics – sprinting, long-jump.’
‘Oh, track and field. Right. Not a prodigy, are you – world record-holder?’
‘Give over.’
‘Ever represented your country at an under-age event?’
‘No.’
She’d looked mournful. So did he – hell, there were international kids out there doing 10.4!
‘Never been abroad, then?’
‘Abroad?’
‘Outa the country.’
‘Oh. Shit, no. Only to the horizon.’
‘So,’ she sighed, ‘you haven’t got a passport, have you?’
‘No.’
BY CRIPES SHE was organised when she wanted to be. She called Stan in, sat at the desk at the end of the bed and started writing out lists and orders.
‘Before we start, Stan, I don’t suppose your union does passports?’
‘Christ, no, we’re not that sophisticated, Betty. We’re not the bloody Boilermakers’ Union, you know.’
‘Birth certificates?’ (She made it rhyme with gates.)
‘Oh, yeah, we can run to a BC. Sometimes have disputes over compulsory retirements and so on.’
‘Right. Roy
ce, work out how old you wanna be and where you wanna be born and tell Stan. Now, union got a tame pox doctor?’
‘In Wellington? Hmm. I’ll have to make a couple of calls. We don’t come in here that often, I’m not quite up with the Wellington system.’
Ten minutes later he was back to say they had a GP who was hooked on speed and generally did what he was told.
‘Good. Did you make an appointment?’
‘He’s coming aboard. Says there’s always a coupla three jokers on a ship that need tending. I said I’d do him a breakfast and show him around.’
‘Right. Royce, on your way into Internal Affairs, go into the passport photo agency next door …’
Stan was impressed. ‘Hell, how you know that, Betty? You’ve never been to Wellington before.’
She sighed; didn’t even look up from her notes. ‘There’s always a passport agency outside Internal Affairs, just like there’s always a pawnshop next door to a casino – it’s a law of nature.’
By the time they’d docked she’d been on the phone twice to this place called Internal Affairs, told them what an urgent case of life and death he was and jacked up an interview for him. ‘He hasn’t applied for a passport before, so you can check out if I’m lying or not before he comes in – speed up the process.’ She hung up. ‘Eleven-thirty. I asked for it specifically – they’ll go like the clappers to get it done before lunch break. The urgent fee is $120. I deliberately said, “That’s American dollars, of course?” and there was a long pause. So, take that in that pocket ($US120) and that in that pocket ($NZ120). And give me back the one you don’t use, arsewipe.’
THE DOCTOR WAS a tall guy with a splendid head of grey hair. Had a lot of ex-dignity about him and eyes as dull as schoolbooks. He sure didn’t seem like he was hooked on anything to do with speediness.
‘Kid has to be in Tokyo day after tomorrow, Doc,’ Betty said from her office at the end of Royce’s bed. ‘Terrible build-up of trimethylamine oxide – progressively rising TMA count. It’s gone from a natural level of three MG to over fourteen. Above thirty could kill him. Only one hospital in the world deals with TMA cases, Doc, and it’s in Tokyo.’
