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Yamashita's Gold

Page 9

by Phillip Gwynne


  The effect was almost instantaneous – we were now headed straight for the Mattners, them for us.

  I kept the revs to maximum.

  Us for them. Them for us.

  An old-fashioned game of chicken.

  Getting closer and closer.

  Twenty metres.

  Fifteen metres.

  Imogen was hugging so tight my ribs were cracking.

  Ten metres.

  Five metres.

  Imogen had found a handful of flesh and was squeezing it hard.

  Us for them. Them for us.

  I could see the grins on their faces.

  An old-fashioned game of chicken.

  Every survival instinct I had was telling me to get out of the way.

  My knuckles were white, elbows set.

  Two metres.

  Grins on their faces.

  I’m not sure who deviated, but instead of colliding full on, our handlebars clashed.

  Jetskis, riders, sent in all directions.

  I came up to the surface, and Imogen was right next to me.

  ‘Imogen, you alright?’

  She nodded.

  ‘You okay to take this jetski?’ I said, pointing; it was only a metre or so away.

  Another nod.

  I looked at the other jetski, the nearest Mattner to it, did some instant Pythagoras theorem.

  He was definitely closer to it, maybe five metres closer, but he hadn’t moved yet.

  And maybe he was a gun swimmer, the Thorpie of Reverie Bay.

  But sometimes you’ve just got to back yourself, don’t you?

  Without a wall to kick off, getting up momentum was difficult. I got my bearings, took one deep breath, put my head down and swam, pumping my legs and thrashing my arms as hard as I could.

  As I did, Tristan’s advice scrolled through my head: Dude, you’ve got to roll. Dude, elbows up higher. Dude, you got to push that water behind you.

  I knew I had never, in my entire life, swum as fast as this.

  I was surfing a wave that I had made myself.

  I could see the white shape bobbing ahead.

  I could see a black wetsuit making for it.

  It would be touch and go who got there first.

  Dude, I was rolling. Elbows up high. Pushing water behind me.

  Hand touched metal – I’d got there.

  A hand touched my foot – the Mattner was just behind me. Roo.

  I pulled myself onto the jetski, managing to stand up, and an enormous hand gripped my ankle.

  I spread my legs, found my balance. I turned the ignition, twisted the throttle.

  Roo still had hold of me.

  The other Mattner was making for us.

  The jetski wobbled this way and that.

  With relief I could see Imogen ahead, managing her jetski fine.

  I pointed down at the Mattner.

  She understood, changing direction until she was alongside.

  There is really no other way to describe it – she just gunned it and ran her jetski into the trailing Mattner.

  Immediately he let go of my ankle and dropped off.

  I pointed to the ski boat.

  Imogen understood.

  We swapped the jetskis for the ski boat, figuring that the Mattners were in for a bit of swim, but it would give us enough time to get home.

  Neither of us said anything as we headed back, until we pulled into the jetty.

  ‘I’m so sorry,’ I said. ‘Are you okay?’

  ‘I’m fine,’ said Imogen. ‘But what was that all about?’

  ‘I’m not sure,’ I said.

  Imogen’s eyes searched mine and they kept on searching even when I didn’t want them to.

  ‘What the hell is going on with you?’

  ‘One day I will tell you, okay? But right now you just have to trust me.’

  Imogen considered this for what seemed like ages.

  ‘So I guess we need to come up with some cock-and-bull story to tell the olds.’

  ‘I guess,’ I said.

  Which is exactly what we did.

  We’d hit the shore and I’d fallen forward and smashed my head.

  I could tell that Dad definitely didn’t buy it. Mom probably didn’t, either. But they didn’t say anything, and I guess Imogen thought that we’d pulled a pretty major swiftie. But what she didn’t know – how could she? – was that it was all part of the game us Silvagnis liked to play, called Messing with The Debt.

  Ω Ω Ω

  That night I couldn’t sleep.

  It was a familiar feeling now, the aftermath of a major adrenalin hit, a lingering buzz.

  I was tired and I was sore but I just couldn’t find those zeds.

  Thoughts were whizzing around in my head like dodgem cars, smashing into the rails, smashing into each other.

  I felt guilty because I’d involved Imogen, because she could’ve been killed. Or had her ‘face rearranged’. But it had also felt good to share with her just a little of what my life had become. And I kept thinking of that kiss-of-breath I’d given her underwater.

  The Mattners probably weren’t the most formidable opponents around out there, but we – well, Imogen – had outsmarted them and that felt good, too.

  And the biggest dodgem car of them all – I felt so close to Yamashita’s Gold here; I could almost see its gleaming bars of gold, and I just knew that soon I would be given my fifth instalment, soon I would be joining E Lee Marx.

  A few times the dodgem cars stopped and I thought, Here we go, it’s off to zed-land.

  But then another car would start up and that would get them all going again.

  There was a knock on my door.

  ‘Who is it?’

  ‘I can’t sleep, can you?’

  I got out of bed, put on some shorts and a singlet, and opened the door.

  Imogen was wearing a T-shirt and men’s pyjama bottoms.

  ‘You want to watch a movie or something?’ she said. ‘A really, really bad one?’

  ‘Sure,’ I said. ‘Can’t think of anything better.’

  I flicked through Foxtel until I found a movie that seemed to suit our purposes perfectly. It was a kung-fu movie called One-Armed Hero because – surprise, surprise – the hero had only one arm.

  ‘This looks perfect,’ said Imogen, stretching out on the bed, face down, pillow under her chin.

  ‘How about some supplies?’ I suggested.

  ‘You really are an ideas man, Dominic Silvagni.’

  I made a guerilla raid on the kitchen, returning with quite an impressive haul of cashews and M&M’s.

  ‘He really is amazingly good for somebody with one arm,’ said Imogen. ‘They just had this fight where he wiped out about twenty baddies.’

  We lay side by side, working our way through the supplies, making silly remarks about the movie. Not that difficult, given that the whole movie was basically one long, silly remark.

  When that movie had finished, I found an even worse one called Monster a Go-Go.

  ‘This really is terrible,’ I said after a while.

  But there was no reply.

  When I looked over at Imogen I could see why – her eyes were closed, she was asleep. I removed a fragment of chocolate from her bottom lip.

  Made sure the blanket was over her.

  And then I, too, went to sleep.

  Thursday

  The Hispaniola

  When I woke up, Imogen was gone.

  I checked my watch.

  Nine thirty-five!

  The boat for my open-water dive left at ten.

  Why in the hell had my parents let me sleep in like that?

  I cycloned downstairs.

  Everybody, including Imogen, was sitting around the table, which was laden with croissants and Danish pastries and all those other things parents feel obliged to buy while they’re on holidays.

  ‘It’s my open-water, why didn’t you wake me up?’

  Mom looked at Dad.

  ‘A
fter your fall, we thought maybe it was better you didn’t go. I already rang the dive school.’

  ‘Well, unring them,’ I said. ‘I’m diving.’

  ‘Dominic,’ said Mom. ‘Have you seen your face?’

  ‘I don’t care about my face, I’m going diving,’ I said.

  I looked over at Dad.

  The croissant he was holding, which his mouth was half-open to receive, was poised midair, as if he wasn’t quite sure what to do with it.

  ‘Maybe I can go too, just as a passenger,’ said Imogen. ‘Just to make sure he’s okay.’

  Dad looked at Mom, then me, and finally the croissant, before he put it back on his plate.

  ‘Okay, if you feel you’re up for it, and the divemaster is okay with it, then I guess I better take you.’

  He looked over at Imogen. ‘You too, if your mum’s okay with it.’

  Mrs Havilland took a gulp of coffee.

  ‘It’s okay,’ she said, her voice unchacteristically forthright, but then it faltered as she added, ‘But you’re not going underwater or anything, are you, darling?’

  ‘No, Mummy,’ Imogen assured her. ‘I’m just going along for the ride.’

  Right then, I wondered how Mrs Havilland would react if I told her that last night her one and only daughter had been held up at gunpoint, had made an underwater escape and had then driven a jetski at high speed.

  ‘I’m not sure,’ said Mrs Havilland, who seemed to be spiralling now into uncertainty.

  ‘For chrissakes, Beth!’ said Dad, his voice full of aggression.

  Startled, Mrs Havilland looked at Dad, and seemed to shrink right back into her chair.

  Was she scared of him?

  ‘Maybe you just need to give the kid some space,’ said Dad, his tone softer.

  Something really complex was going on between Dad and Mrs Havilland, because now she was glaring defiantly at him.

  ‘Of course you can go,’ she said to Imogen.

  Immediately, I rang Maxine.

  No, of course they wouldn’t leave without me, their ‘star pupil’ as she put it.

  Yes, of course Imogen could come along.

  We said our goodbyes, we got in the Jazys’ Merc, and Dad got us to the wharf in no time at all.

  ‘Are we going on that thing?’ said Imogen, pointing to the steel boat tied up at the wharf.

  I could understand her concern. The Hispaniola, as it was called, looked pretty old and pretty decrepit, streaks of rust down its steel sides.

  Not the sort of thing to get into when you’re wearing white linen pants, suede loafers and a silk Hermes scarf?

  But Maxine had seen us by then, and was beckoning from the wharf.

  ‘I’m sure it’s okay,’ I said to Imogen.

  She smiled, wrapped the scarf tighter around her neck and said, ‘I’m sure it is, too.’

  After asking all the obvious questions about my face and me giving the now well-practised lies, Maxine helped us onboard what she told us was a ‘converted trawler’. We were soon on our way, the Hispaniola rocking this way and that as it smacked against the waves; it was obviously a tough old vessel.

  The two Swiss backpackers – sorry, travellers – thought it was pretty funny; they kept making I’m-going-to-chunder jokes.

  Joy Wheeler wasn’t finding it quite as amusing, however.

  She was pretty green and really did look like she was going to indulge in a bit of the old chunderama.

  As for Imogen, she seemed to be in an almost dreamlike state, entranced by the sea, the ends of her Hermes scarf trailing in the wind.

  It was only when I introduced her to my fellow pupils that I remembered Imogen and Joyless Joy actually knew each other through email.

  I wasn’t about to tell them this, however.

  Bag. Cat. Out.

  ‘We’ll be sheltered once we get around that point,’ said Maxine, pointing to a rocky outcrop painted with bird poop in front of us.

  She was right – we rounded a headland and the water was instantly calmer.

  The Swiss looked almost disappointed.

  ‘Where are we?’ I asked Maxine, because there was something familiar about this area.

  ‘Not sure,’ she answered. ‘We don’t usually come here, but Skipper thought it would work with this wind blowing the way it is.’

  ‘Maybe I can ask him?’ I said.

  ‘Sure, go ahead.’

  We’d been given a brief introduction to the skipper when we’d boarded the boat, but that had been pretty much the extent of my interaction with him.

  I’d noted how much like an archetypal skipper, a seafarer, he looked – like he could’ve stepped off any sort of boat anywhere in the world in the last few hundred years: a pirate boat creating havoc in the Caribbean, a clipper racing to the fabled Spice Islands, an aircraft carrier dodging torpedoes during World War II.

  All windbeaten and salty and, well, skippery.

  Now he was standing, one hand on the steering wheel, eyes on the echo sounder as it transcribed the sea floor.

  I was surprised at how jagged the line was – the sea floor was obviously very irregular.

  The skipper was concentrating intently, so I didn’t say anything.

  When the seabed levelled out he said, ‘Can I help you, son?’

  ‘Was that Gunbolt Bay we passed before?’ I said.

  ‘Sure was,’ he said.

  I considered saying something about the Zolt, but decided against it.

  ‘It’s where young Otto was holed up,’ he said.

  ‘The Zolt?’ I said.

  The skipper smiled, obviously amused by this nickname. ‘Yes, the Zolt.’

  ‘So you knew him?’

  ‘Sure I knew him,’ he said, eyes back on the echo sounder. ‘His old man and me, we grew up together.’

  The skipper eased back the throttle. ‘It was a different world back then. This whole island was our playground, if you know what I mean. We’d be on our bikes pedalling from one end of the island to the other. Fishing. Shooting. This place was an absolute paradise.’

  ‘It sure must’ve been,’ I said.

  ‘The hippies moved in, then came the yuppies, and that pretty much stuffed it up.’

  In the absence of any meaningful response I just went with, ‘Yeah, right.’

  ‘Now look at us, eh? Bones is out of the picture, and CJ practically owns the island.’

  ‘CJ?’ I said. ‘Cameron Jamison?’

  The skipper nodded.

  ‘And Bones, is that what you called Mr Zolton?’

  ‘Always been Bones as long as I’ve known him,’ he said. ‘Let’s be honest, Dane is no name for a bloke.’

  I thought of that map, Dane G Zolton written on the back of it.

  My brain was whirring, trying to put the other pieces together.

  ‘So were you in business with them?’

  The skipper gave a wry smile. ‘I was in the beginning, but you didn’t want to get into bed with those two. Top blokes to have a drink with, but that was about it.’

  The skipper bellowed, ‘Chuck the pick!’ to the deckhand.

  We’d arrived, we’d be diving soon, but I had so many questions bouncing around in my head. I picked one at random.

  ‘You said Bones is out of the picture. Does that mean that you don’t think he’s dead?’

  The skipper narrowed his eyes.

  ‘What did you say your name was?’ he said.

  ‘Dom Silvagni,’ I said, but I knew I had to give him something else, something that would explain all these questions.

  But what?

  ‘I’m interested in Yamashita’s Gold,’ I blurted.

  ‘It’s, like, this hobby of mine.’

  Something passed across the skipper’s face and for a second I thought I’d really done it, that like his seafaring ancestors he would make me walk the plank or perhaps even keelhaul me. I could almost feel the coral ripping the flesh from my body.

  But that look passed and he gave me a fr
iendly slap on the back and said, ‘Another one, eh?’

  ‘Another what?’

  ‘No offence, young man, but another sucker. Do you really think Yamashita’s Gold could’ve ended up in these waters?’

  ‘A lot of people seem to,’ I said.

  ‘Look, Bones was a mate of mine, probably my best mate. But he was a conman, a snake-oil merchant. He invented this Yamashita’s Gold at Reverie story, thought he’d make his fortune out of it. And do you know what, it wasn’t such a bad idea.’

  ‘The pick’s down, Skip,’ yelled the deckhand.

  The skipper killed the motor.

  ‘Time to get you fellows into the drink, eh?’ he said.

  Thursday

  Cinatit

  The four of us – the two Swiss, Joy and me – sat at the stern of the boat while Maxine described the dive we would be taking, our first open-water dive.

  Imogen was inside the wheelhouse somewhere.

  I’d asked her if it was boring for her and she had seemed almost shocked by the question.

  ‘Of course not,’ she’d answered. ‘I love it out here.’

  Maxine told us how we would be going all the way to the bottom, which was ten metres.

  ‘Any questions?’ she asked.

  Instead of girly swot me, it was Joy who had about a thousand of them. All of which Maxine patiently answered. Eventually even Joy ran out of questions and we could get ready.

  I’d been keeping a lid on it, but now I could feel the excitement bubbling up – really, my very first open-water dive. I felt a great flush of love for Mom and Dad – what a great present, the best ever.

  And with this, when the fifth instalment eventually arrived, I would be totally prepared to dive on Yamashita’s Gold.

  I put on the wetsuit, slipped into the BCD. Fins.

  Went through the safety checklist.

  Weight belt.

  Regulator.

  Mask.

  ‘I’d like Roger to buddy up with Stefan for this dive,’ said Maxine.

  The two Swisspackers high-fived each other.

  ‘And Dom and Joy, you two can buddy up.’

  Joy looked at me, and there was something in her eyes.

  Not sure what it was, but it was definitely there.

  Did she think I was too young?

  Joy, I wanted to say, maybe you should check out the exam results. Or do you remember that I’d already swum my two hundred metres while you were still on your second lap?

 

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