‘Thanks, sis,’ I said, and I hung up.
Tomorrow morning was too late for me, but she had given me a great lead.
But how was I supposed to follow it?
When you think about it, all the action types have a pretty nifty way to get around.
Superman can fly.
Batman’s got the Batmobile.
James Bond’s got his cars and his boats and his helicopters.
Me, I’ve got a grumpy old Brazilian taxi driver, and that’s about it.
‘Excuse me, Gus,’ I said.
‘Yes?’
‘Is there, like, anything you need?’ I said.
It was a pretty flimsy pretext but fortunately Gus said, ‘Yes,’ and then proceeded to give me some very explicit directions as to what, exactly, he needed.
‘Is there a car key in the pocket of his coat?’ I said.
‘A car key?’ said Gus, whose mind, I guess, was on other things.
A hearse key, actually.
‘I know where it is,’ said PJ.
‘Okay, where is it?’ I said.
‘You think you can handle that beast by yourself?’ she said.
‘I drove a bulldozer once,’ I said.
‘Awesome,’ said PJ. ‘Was that, like, on a date?’
Another comedian.
‘I don’t do dates,’ I said.
PJ gave me a funny look, followed by a let’s-go gesture.
I followed her out of the drain. The rain was still heavy, and by the time we reached the hearse, we were both soaked to the … yes, bone.
I watched as PJ knelt down and felt underneath a back tyre. Eventually she held up a key.
‘So where we headed?’ she said as she unlocked the door.
‘Home,’ I said.
‘Great,’ she said. ‘I always wanted to see where you live.’
As PJ drove she told me what she knew about the Preacher. It didn’t take long, because she really didn’t know any more than I did.
‘I will miss him, though,’ she said, the sadness in her voice genuine.
I recalled what she’d once told me: Us outcasts, we watch each other’s backs.
I’d already decided that it probably wasn’t the greatest idea to enter Halcyon Grove in a hearse with a sixteen year old driving, so I directed PJ to park in Chirp Street.
‘You want to stay here in the car?’ I said. ‘I mean the hearse?’
‘No way,’ she said, taking the key out of the ignition. ‘I’m so going to check out how the other half lives.’
‘You need ID to get through the front gate,’ I said.
PJ reached into her pocket and brought out a handful of ID cards.
‘Pick a card, any card,’ she said, in one of those magician’s voices.
The rain had stopped, and outside had that after-rain smell. We got through security without a problem and then hurried towards Gus’s house.
‘Dominic,’ came a voice, a voice from up high.
I looked up. Imogen was at her window.
Her hair out, she looked Rapunzelesque, like somebody out of a fairytale.
‘Hi, Imogen,’ I said, wondering how I should introduce PJ.
‘Hi, Imogen,’ said PJ. ‘My name’s PJ.’
‘Hi,’ said Imogen, and then to me, ‘I really need to tell you something.’
‘I’ve just got to get this thing for Gus,’ I said.
Imogen’s hair shifted in the breeze.
Rapunzel! Rapunzel!
‘I’ve got all this info about what happened to my father,’ she said.
‘Jesus, Imogen.’
PJ gave me a sideways glance.
‘That woman, Joy Wheeler, for some reason she’s now my best friend and she’s been sending me a whole lot of stuff.’
‘Can it wait?’ I said, and straightaway realised that I’d said absolutely the wrong thing: of course it couldn’t wait! ‘I’ll be back in a few hours, I promise.’
I felt bad, more than bad, I felt like a traitor, but what choice did I have?
‘Wow, she’s probably the most beautiful person I’ve ever seen in my life,’ said PJ as we neared my house.
I nodded.
‘What happened to her father?’
‘He was this politician who disappeared.’
‘Havilland,’ she said.
I looked at her, shocked.
‘You know him?’
She shrugged and said, ‘I heard the name somewhere.’
By this time we’d got to Gus’s house.
I followed his directions: the fourth drawer in his desk, the manila envelope.
Now I had that, it was time to hit our house.
‘Okay, so this is how the other half lives,’ said PJ as we went inside.
But that was about all she said.
My mother is nothing if not organised. She is one of those a-place-for-everything-and-everything-in-its-place people.
Like you’ll buy something at the shop – say a bouncy ball that looks like a huge testicle – and within ten minutes you’re bored with it so you just throw it in any old drawer. And within ten minutes, guaranteed, she’ll say, ‘But that’s not where the bouncy balls that look like huge testicles live. You of all people should know that, Dominic!’
So I as soon as I opened her filing cabinet I knew it would be straightforward: I would find a receipt, with a phone number. I would then ring that phone number and find a way to get them to give me the number of one of their employees: Sebastian Baresi.
I looked under K for Komang Pool Cleaning.
It wasn’t there.
P for pool.
Not there either.
C for cleaners.
Not there either.
I just couldn’t find it.
I took my phone out and googled Komang Pool Cleaning.
It didn’t exist.
I even resorted to analogue, looking up a tattered copy of the Yellow Pages that was on the shelf.
It wasn’t in there either.
Dad’s office, now this: was the whole Gold Coast one great big façade?
But then I had another thought.
‘Where we going now?’ said PJ, as I hurried out through the front door.
For a second I’d forgotten she was with me, and I wondered whether my explanation for all this – that I wanted to contact a long-lost relative of Gus’s – was looking a little flimsy.
But if she thought so, she didn’t say. I guess when you’re a street kid, craziness is pretty much your life.
‘We’re going to talk to the security guard,’ I said.
‘The one with the nice smile?’ she said.
I nodded.
‘You record the registration number of every car that comes in here, right?’ I asked Samsoni.
‘That’s right,’ he said.
‘Even the pool cleaners, those sort of people?’
‘Everybody.’
‘Do you mind if I have a look at the register?’
‘I’m not supposed to let anybody look at it, Master Silvagni.’
What to do? I really needed to see that register but I didn’t want to compromise Samsoni at all.
PJ grabbed something from the desk and made a dash for it.
Samsoni took after her.
I hurried over to the desk, opened the register. Quickly scanned the pages.
Komang Pool Cleaning.
I took out my iPhone, snapped off a photo, put the register back where I’d found it.
I was back in my place when Samsoni returned, a Maglite torch in his hand.
‘She dropped it and disappeared,’ he said, giving me a I’m-confused look and I couldn’t blame him.
I wondered if he had any idea what I’d done.
‘She’s pretty loco,’ I said. ‘Always doing stuff like that.’
‘Maybe not the sort of person to bring back to your home,’ suggested Samsoni gently.
I agreed: she wasn’t the sort of person to bring back to your home.
&nbs
p; The sort of person you don’t bring back to your home was waiting in the hearse.
‘You’re amazing,’ I said.
‘I’ve been around,’ she said. ‘Where to now?’
‘I don’t know,’ I said, because my thinking hadn’t taken me much beyond this point.
I had the rego number, but so what? You can’t ring a rego number, you can’t drop around to somebody’s rego number to watch the footy.
‘Dead end?’ said PJ.
‘Pretty much.’
‘Tell me about it,’ she said.
I told her about it.
‘Why didn’t you say?’ she said, smiling, taking out her phone, ringing a number.
‘Hi, Sticks,’ she said. ‘Can you run a rego for me?’
Something from Sticks.
‘Yes, I know. But I’m always good for it, aren’t I? Come on, you going to be one of the good guys or one of the bad guys? Your choice.’
More from Sticks.
‘That’s my boy!’ said PJ, and she read out the rego number from the photo on my iPhone.
Then she hung up.
‘Huh?’ I said.
‘He’ll send a text,’ she said, and sure enough, less than a minute later her phone beeped.
She showed me the address.
It was in Chevron Heights.
I plugged it into Google Maps and we took off, me reading out the directions.
It was actually very close to my house, only ten minutes away – an ordinary suburban house in an ordinary suburban street.
But, parked in the drive, was the Komang Pool Cleaning van.
I knocked on the ordinary suburban door.
A girl answered, holding an iPad; she looked like she was around Toby’s age and I had the feeling that I’d seen her somewhere before.
‘Is Seb here?’ I said, my voice louder and more strident than I intended; it’d been a long day.
I could see the alarm in her face.
‘Is Sebastian around?’ I said.
She said something over her shoulder in a language I recognised from Italy. A man answered in the same language and the girl slammed the door shut.
Well, not quite shut, because I managed to put my foot in the way. I pushed the door open. For a while there was resistance, but then I put my whole shoulder behind it and shoved as hard as I could.
The door swung open and I was inside, hurtling down a corridor.
‘Seb!’ I yelled, my voice bouncing off the walls. ‘You there, Seb? You there?’
People were coming at me from the other end, their figures silhouetted.
I admit, I was sort of half-deranged by now. Blood was thumping at my temples. And I was feeling completely reckless. I didn’t care what happened to me. I just needed to say something to Seb.
Voices. One? Two? More?
A mixture of languages.
Somebody trying to pin me against the wall.
But I struggled free.
And I ducked under another set of arms.
And I pushed somebody else away.
And there was Seb, sitting at the table.
‘Seb!’
I wanted to hug him.
But the look on his face was one of pure hostility.
‘You have to tell them –’ I started, before another set of arms grabbed me from behind.
I swung my elbow back and high, and collected whoever it was hard on the chin. A crack! and whoever it was let go of me.
Seb was standing, ready to get away from this madman.
But I wasn’t going to let that happen. I launched myself at him, my legs two pistons.
Caught him in the midriff. We tumbled to the floor. I had him now, and he couldn’t escape. I spat the words directly into his ear. ‘You have to tell them they were looking for Yamashita’s Gold in the wrong place.’
Hands had me and they were dragging me off.
‘The map they’ve got is a phoney.’
Seb’s eyes were burning, his face a mask of disgust.
‘I know where the real treasure is,’ I said.
‘You do not tell me anything,’ he said, and it was seriously like he was channelling The Exorcist.
‘You are a debtor!’ he said, or the devil that resided in him said.
I dragged the piece of coral with the coin out of my pocket. And I thrust it at him before I was dragged down the corridor and through the doorway and literally tossed out onto the road. But before I was, I managed to steal a look at the three men who had manhandled me out of the house.
Two of them I didn’t know, but the third one I knew well: it was Roberto, our head gardener.
PJ helped me back onto my feet and into the hearse.
‘Are you okay?’ she said.
‘Nothing broken,’ I said.
No bones, nothing like that, but I was still reeling from what Seb had said.
It was like every word had been double-dipped in hate and disgust. You are a debtor.
Like I was black in a world of white supremacists.
Like I was gay at a homophobic convention.
Jewish at a Nazi rally.
‘Are you okay?’ said PJ.
The same Seb who had helped me over the Colosseum wall, who had pulled off the great heavy-metal diversion.
What had happened to him?
‘I have never been hated before, not like that,’ I said.
‘Hmmm,’ was all she said.
She started up the hearse, drove back up the ordinary suburban street, away from the ordinary suburban house, with its very unordinary prejudices.
‘There was this one day when Brandon and I were asking for money outside that really posh place in Surfers.’
‘Palazzo Versace?’
‘Yeah, that joint. Anyway, this old bag comes along and she’s dripping in jewellery. Absolutely loaded. So I try the usual line: “Can you spare me the bus fare to get home and see my parents?” She looks me right in the eyes, and she spits in my face. Then she keeps walking like it was the most normal thing in the world. Goes inside to have her lobster or her caviar or whatever those rich old bags eat.’
I tried to imagine what it would be like to have somebody else’s spit running down your face.
Maybe You are a debtor wasn’t so bad after all.
But I only thought that for a second, for as long as it took the spit to fade from my mind.
We pulled up at Preacher’s, and it was actually a relief to turn my mind to other things.
I had intended to have a sneak preview of what was inside the envelope, but I hadn’t had a chance and it was too late now.
Now that the rain had ceased there was a rich smell rising up from the wet earth, the sort of chunky smell you could probably grow tomatoes in.
The three people, Gus, Brandon, the Preacher, were in pretty much the same position as we’d left them.
‘Everything okay?’ said Gus. ‘You were gone for a while.’
‘Fine,’ I lied, holding out the envelope. ‘Is this what you wanted?’
‘Lovely,’ said Gus, taking it from me.
Now I really wished I’d had a look at what was inside when I’d had the chance, because Gus made no move to open it.
We sat there for maybe ten minutes, nobody saying anything.
If not for the almost imperceptible rise and fall of his chest, I would’ve thought that the Preacher had died.
In that time I received two texts that I didn’t open, both from Imogen.
Eventually the Preacher opened his eyes; there was no fire or brimstone – whatever that was – in them now. But his face seemed more relaxed, all the wrinkles ironed out.
Gus slid his hand into the envelope and pulled out a photo.
I moved closer; I wanted to see.
‘Here we are,’ said Gus, his voice barely above a whisper. ‘You and Alessandro, and me.’
I inched closer; I still didn’t have a great view.
‘You were twelve here and I must’ve been fourteen.’
I
moved closer and closer until I could see the photo clearly.
Gus had said must’ve been fourteen because he still had his leg in the photo.
I’d seen Gus’s mother and father, my great-grandmother and great-grandfather, before, in that other photo I’d seen in the drawer.
The mother, old and worn.
The father with that fierce look.
‘Look at Alessandro,’ said the Preacher, and I think that was the only time I’d ever heard him say anything that wasn’t biblical. ‘My twin was an angel.’
Gus agreed. ‘An angel.’
My phone beeped again. Please, not now, Im. I looked down.
It wasn’t from Imogen.
It was from an ‘unknown sender’.
And it said, Be at Warner’s Wharf at 6 am – you are going for gold.
Punching the air with my fist, I screamed ‘Yessssssssss!’
And that was the last thing my grand-uncle heard before he died.
Friday
The Argo
Okay, I wouldn’t say I’ve got the biggest vocabulary on the planet, but I’m pretty sure the English language does not possess the word that could adequately describe the state I was in as I stood at that empty wharf at six the next morning.
I don’t think French, Portuguese or Bahasa Indonesia do either.
‘Excited’ did not come close.
Even a phrase like ‘jumping out of my skin’ didn’t get near it.
So I’m going to say that, as I stood at the empty wharf waiting to be picked up, I was !@#$%^&*, and let you fill in the rest.
I checked my watch – two minutes to go – but when I looked out to sea I saw no sign of a boat, or a ship, or any sort of seafaring vessel.
Another feeling was finding a way through all the excitement – sorry, the !@#$%^&* – a feeling of apprehension.
Had I been tricked somehow? Set up?
But that didn’t make sense.
Then the silence was broken by the whir of blades from up above.
A helicopter!
Swinging around, it hovered directly above me.
I wanted to run, but I knew not to.
I’d expected a boat, so of course they’d sent a chopper – I should’ve known not to second-guess The Debt.
The chopper landed, and I ran over and climbed on board.
The pilot held out his hand, introduced himself, but over the roar of the engine I didn’t get his name. Tanned, with a square chin and blue eyes, he looked like a Chuck or a Biff or a Wow.
Yamashita's Gold Page 18
