‘It’s fine.’
Why did the estate development matter to Robyn Sturgess? There seemed to be a lot of people keen for him to stay away from Auspart. Maybe Robyn knew what was really going on. Perhaps he should make up some excuse to phone her over the next day or two — it was hard to talk about it when he was supposed to be coaching a basketball team. One thing was clear, though: he needed to track down a copy of the 1994 article about the other bloke who died on a building site so he could read the whole thing. It might shed some more light on the people who were after him.
Jack didn’t pay a great deal of attention to the game, yelling at the referee and rotating players on and off the bench mechanically. He liked his kids, and tried to do the right thing by them as a coach, but he was too tired, stressed, and distracted to do anything other than go through the motions.
The Bullets were ten points down at half-time, and went on to lose by seventeen in a low-scoring game. After a regulation chat to the team after the game and some polite goodbyes to the parents, Jack walked out of the stadium into the cold, windy night, his head splitting.
Saturday night was peak time, but he was completely done in. He would just have to make up the cash some other time. It wasn’t safe to drive: he was simply too crook. And it would be hard to concentrate on driving with a head full of dead magpies and sinister standover men.
As soon as he got back to the flat, Jack gobbled a few Nurofen and fell onto the couch. He made himself a cup of tea and sat back to watch TV, waiting for the tablets to kick in. Within half an hour, he was semi-conscious. Better have a piss, he mumbled to himself as he staggered along the narrow corridor to the bathroom. Less than a minute later, Jack was asleep, half-wrapped in the tangled bedclothes, still wearing some of his work clothes.
When Jack crawled out of bed around 7.30 and lit a cigarette, he still felt like he’d had a steamroller driven over him. His headache had subsided, replaced by a familiar Nurofen haze. When he turned his head to the left, he got nasty shooting pains in his neck.
All told, though, it could have been a lot worse. He was confident he’d be fine in a few days’ time. The rest had done him some good, and he was sure he’d be able to function in spite of the wear and tear. His mind was buzzing with nasty possibilities. Some very unpleasant people seemed to be out to get him.
Getting into the shower was a challenge because it meant stepping into the bath, but it was worth the effort. The hot water soothed his bruises and cleared his head. He hummed the chorus of Because I Love You over and over as he washed himself.
After having a few pieces of toast and a mug of Nescafé, Jack almost felt normal again. He walked out to the carpark at the back of the flats with an air of purpose.
The pickings were slim in the cab, but he didn’t care. Everything was up in the air anyway, with Ajit leaving. If Jack couldn’t find a new partner, he might even have to give up driving altogether. Then what would he do? Apart from pulling beers, there weren’t many jobs he was qualified for, and bar jobs were getting harder to find. They wanted young, attractive bartenders with interesting accents — not grumpy, crumpled old Aussie blokes. His fear of ending up on the streets was starting to haunt him. Was that what his future looked like?
His mind was still awash with sickening images of dead birds and sightless, staring eyes. By lunchtime, his paranoia had completely taken over. He stopped to grab a sandwich at a small South Melbourne café, hoping it was sufficiently obscure that no one there would know him.
After spending a few minutes fiddling nervously with his phone, Jack called Franklin.
‘Hey, John — Jack van Duyn, mate. I’m in deep shit with those pricks. Need your help. Got chased by these two blokes, beaten up at the demo, they left a dead bird at the flat …’
‘Hmm. Better have a little chat. You driving?’
‘Yeah.’
‘Drop by the union some time after three. We’re having a barbie out the back to raise some cash for Paul’s missus. Just come down the lane along the side off Swanston Street — the garage door’ll be open. Might even let you in for nothing.’
Jack hung up and glanced around the gloomy café, checking to make sure he hadn’t been overheard. The two other customers showed no sign of interest.
As he drove towards Carlton, he tried to work out what he would say to Franklin later on. Could he get him to treat all this stuff seriously? It might be normal in the building industry, but it certainly wasn’t in Jack’s quiet corner of the world.
Driving slowly up La Trobe Street towards the State Library, an idea suddenly hit him. The library would have copies of old newspapers. Surely it wouldn’t be too hard to track down a copy of the article he was after?
Jack parked outside RMIT, and wandered into the main entrance area of the library and asked for information. It turned out that the library had copies of the Age on things called microfiche going back many years. Within minutes, Jack was sitting in front of a large illuminated box with winding handles, trying to work out how to thread the spool of film into the machine. It was fiddly and confusing, but after a couple of false starts he was soon winding his way through copies of the newspaper from May 1994.
The text was reversed out — white type on a black background — which made it hard to read. Jack wound his way slowly through the May pages, taking care to look at every headline, until finally he found the one that mattered.
It didn’t tell him much more than he already knew, but it did reveal the name of the company — BuildFast Pty Ltd — and that the union’s lawyers were planning to sue them in the Supreme Court. It also noted that another worker had been seriously injured when the platform collapsed. His name sounded Dutch, like Jack’s: Pieter van der Graaf. The dead apprentice’s name was Anthony Azzopardi.
Checking his watch to make sure his parking meter hadn’t run out, Jack scribbled a few notes on the back of a business card, and removed the spool from the machine. It was time to front Franklin. The CFMEU was only a couple of blocks away, but he moved the cab just in case. He couldn’t afford another parking ticket.
Raucous laughter drifted his way as he ambled up the laneway towards the rear of the CFMEU building. He arrived at a wide entrance with its roll-a-door up, and could see people milling around inside.
Jack’s eyes adjusted slowly to the dim lighting inside the huge garage at the end of the lane. There were about fifty men crowded into the indoor carpark, mostly at the far end, around a battered barbecue, a trestle table covered in bits and pieces, and several eskies. The low ceiling and poor lighting made the yelling and laughter feel threatening as he edged his way through the crowd. A dense fog of barbecue and cigarette smoke engulfed him as he stepped inside.
His gaze jumped nervously across the unfamiliar faces and hardened men — some in T-shirts, some sporting sleeveless tops displaying bulging muscles, and others in blueys and bomber jackets. One or two stared at him with what felt like hostile curiosity as he squeezed past. Their suspiciousness hit him like a physical force.
‘Er, hi, mate. Is John Franklin here? He asked me to come and see him.’
A large, florid man with several teeth missing replied: ‘Over in the corner, mate. Grab yourself a beer.’
At least one of them’s friendly, Jack thought, as he made his way past posters carrying slogans like ‘Dare to Struggle: Dare to Win’. Even for a crusty old cabbie like him, the atmosphere felt intimidating.
Jack spotted Franklin on the far side of the carpark, deep in conversation with a heavily tattooed man in work shorts and a dark T-shirt.
‘Jack! Good you could get here, mate. Jacko, this is the bloke who saw it happen. Lives next door. I’ve known him for years.’ Franklin turned back to Jack. ‘You’ll do the right thing, help us nail these pricks, won’t you, Jack?’
Jack didn’t respond. Franklin seemed to be enjoying himself.
‘So, mate, things
are heating up. Heard from Worksafe?’
‘Some guy dropped by a few days ago, telling me if I said I didn’t see anything, I wouldn’t have to go to court. Some bloke from Worksafe.’
Franklin raised his eyebrows. ‘Yeah? Where’d you meet him?’
‘Outside my flat. He was in his car, one of them fancy Hondas …’
‘Did he show ID or anything?’
‘No, just said if I didn’t want the hassle of going to court and all that shit, I should just tell them I didn’t see anything.’
‘Sounds like a phony to me, mate. Since when do the cops start telling you how to fuck up a prosecution? What’d you say to him?’
‘Just said I didn’t want to go to court. What the fuck’s this all about anyway? Why’s anybody care if I give evidence or whatever? They hassled me going home, threatened me on the phone, and left a dead bird at my front door last night.’
‘See the paper this morning?’ Franklin said. He pulled out a folded page from his pocket and waved it at Jack.
‘Nope.’
‘Have a look at it. Tells you all about Auspart, mate. Serious crooks.’
Jack’s eyes widened, and Jacko belched.
‘Connected to the mob doing up the flats next door to your joint.’
‘Come again? Auspart’s doing up next door?’
‘The crooks in Auspart own it. That’s why they’re after you.’
Jack glanced at the paper and a word leapt off the page: ‘Mafia’.
‘Jesus! It says here the Mafia’s involved.’
‘Yeah.’
‘Shit.’ Jack could feel fear flooding through him.
‘Yeah.’
‘Christ, now I definitely don’t want to go to court.’
‘Not so fast, mate. We’ve been fighting these pricks for three or four years. They’ve already been done a couple of times for safety stuff, and now there’s a widow and her kids who’re wondering where their next meal’s coming from. The crooks are shitting bricks, because they’re exposed. We’re going to nail them, and we need your help to do it.’ He looked right into Jack’s eyes, daring him to refuse.
‘Er, yeah … but it’s the fucking Mafia!’ Jack didn’t say anything about the newspaper article from 1994 — that would just underline Franklin’s argument.
‘They’re small-time crooks, just trying to pretend they’re the real deal to frighten people. They’re not real Mafia — just the kind you see in movies. Stay cool. We’re used to dealing with people like that. They’re everywhere in our industry.’
‘Yeah, well, they’re doing a real good job of scaring me.’
Franklin stepped closer to Jack and grabbed his arm.
‘Listen, Jack. I saw my best mate die on a building site not long after we were farting around at La Trobe. Never forgotten it. I’ve seen blokes crippled, all kinds of stuff — lose their houses, marriages break up, you name it. This isn’t just about you, mate. There’s a whole lot of blokes out there just like you, getting killed and injured every week by scumbags like these Auspart pricks. You can’t just look the other way, mate.’
‘I didn’t sign up for this shit! You sure you can’t track down the other bloke — Dan, or whatever his name is?’
‘Gone for good, mate. Lives at 29 Hotham Street in Collingwood, supposedly, but looks like he’s done a runner. So you’re it. But don’t worry, it’ll never go to court. Just need you to stay cool for a week or two. We’ll screw them to the wall, it’ll be over, they’ll lose interest in you. But we won’t — whichever way you jump.’
The threat was obvious. Jack stood there shaking, vaguely wondering if this was what a panic attack felt like. Dan’s disappearance was starting to look very sinister. Maybe he was in the Yarra wearing concrete boots.
‘Come and meet a few of our blokes, Jack. They’ll be keeping an eye on you. Need them to get a look at you …’
Franklin ushered him through the smoky, beery huddles to the end of the trestle table, and bent down and grabbed a can of VB and thrust it into his chest.
‘Get this into you. Hey, Ritty, Baz — meet Jack. He’s our witness, going to make sure we sink them arseholes and get Paul’s missus a decent chop-out.’
Jack shook hands with two hulking men whose faces remained impassive. Franklin turned back to him.
‘Oh, and this is Earl.’ Jack’s eyes set upon a small, wizened man who looked a little like a monkey.
‘Don’t be fooled’, Franklin said, obviously reading his mind. ‘Earl could take out these two blokes any day, ain’t that the truth?’ Ritty and Baz smiled, but not in a pleasant way.
‘Do the numbers seven-four-two mean anything to you, Jack?’
‘Er, no.’ He was mystified. He concentrated on opening his beer without his hands shaking too much.
‘That’s how old Paul’s kids are, mate. Seven, four, and two. Missus was a shop assistant, hasn’t worked for a while. Got a mortgage, no cash, no family to look after them much. They’re depending on us, mate — and you. You going to stick by them?’
Shit.
‘Ah, yeah, guess so.’ Jack thought about crossing his fingers as he gave the only possible answer, given the circumstances. How in the fuck am I going to get out of this?
Jack felt trapped. The message was crystal-clear: if he ducked this fight, he’d be looking over his shoulder for a long time.
‘Hang in there, mate — you’ll be fine. You’re in witness protection now.’
Jack was stunned. He’d been blundering around spying on Dempsey, not realising why they were so interested in him. Jesus. They know where I live. What in the fuck do I do now?
He’d always been a bit in awe of Franklin, and it was hard to resist his impassioned plea for support in his crusade against Auspart. But against the Mafia?
Feeling punch-drunk, Jack drained the remains of his beer and said his goodbyes. He walked slowly back down the lane, feeling more despondent with every step. One lot of heavies were threatening to harm him. Another lot were forcing him to stand up to the first lot. His interest in Emily was fading. And his always-fragile finances were in free-fall. Could things get any worse?
He turned wearily into Swanston Street and approached his Falcon.
‘Jack! Thought we should get better acquainted.’
Fuck. Ritty and Baz were leaning against the wall opposite the cab, still gripping their cans of VB and crumpled cigarettes.
Jack blanched, and slowed to a crawl. What more could possibly happen to him?
‘Known Franklin for a while, Jack?’ said Baz in a friendly tone.
‘Ah, yeah. Long time.’ Jack was so nervous he could barely speak.
‘He’s a good bloke, isn’t he?’
‘Yeah.’
‘Me, I’m not a good bloke, Jack. But you know what? Compared to Ritty here, I’m fucking Mother Teresa.’
A sinister grin spread over Ritty’s face. Jack said nothing.
‘So you won’t be doing nothing to upset him, will you?’
Jack shook his head.
‘Ritty knew Paul. Worked with him on a site in the city a few years ago.’
Jack nodded. He was almost paralysed with fear. The Auspart guys seemed bad enough, but Ritty looked like a bloke who hung people off balconies for fun.
‘Well, nice getting to know you, mate. We’ll be seeing you around. Keeping an eye on you.’
They flicked their butts into the gutter, crushed their empty cans, and set them down on the roof of the cab.
By the time Jack eased himself into the driver’s seat, he was shaking so much he had to grip the steering wheel and do some deep breathing. His idle annoyance at some jack-hammering and his mild interest in Emily had somehow landed him in the middle of a tug of war between two bunches of heavies playing for keeps. And it looked like he was the rope.
12.
Emily was uncomfortable about something. They sat outside on the footpath on wobbly metal chairs, and Jack ordered coffees. At first he assumed her chronic fatigue was getting to her, but then he realised there was something more. For the first time since he’d met Emily, she seemed nervous. But about what? Him? Dempsey? Better tread carefully here.
‘They let you smoke out here?’ he asked, looking for a distraction.
‘Don’t think so. Suppose you could always light up and see what happens.’ Emily’s body language made him nervous. His first thought was that he was about to cop the ‘I really like you but’ speech. He’d had one or two of these over the years, but not that many — mostly because they usually didn’t even get to the ‘really like you’ stage.
He left his cigarettes in his pocket, and they sat there in silence for a few minutes. The freshness of spring, all chirping birds and rustling leaves, felt pleasant, and for once his hay fever was behaving itself.
‘You know’, Emily began, ‘this whole mess is getting very complicated. There’s all kinds of people involved with that company …’
‘The Mafia, so it says in the paper. And this Clarkson guy, who owns it, has form — I’ve done some more digging on that accident in 1994.’
‘I’m not sure it’s sensible for us to be involved in all this stuff. It’s starting to get dangerous.’
‘Tell me about it. Franklin told me Auspart’s connected to the mob doing up the flats next door — you know, where the accident happened, where I’m a witness, and all that stuff. Looks like they make a habit of it.’
Her eyes widened. ‘Can’t you get out of it?’
‘The other bloke at the accident’s disappeared. Franklin reckons he’s an illegal, but what if the Auspart goons have put him away? People don’t just disappear …’
‘Has the union got an address for him?’
‘Some joint in Hotham Street in Collingwood — at least that’s what Franklin said.’
‘Maybe you should check it out? Make sure you’re careful, though.’
‘Too late.’ Jack laughed, and then showed his lack of concern by leaning back in his chair with his hands behind his head. The chair creaked alarmingly, so he checked himself, just in case. It would be humiliating if it collapsed underneath him.
Comeback Page 11