‘Types? Well we’ve had a couple of guys on a fishing trip. From Perth. Couple of grey nomads. From, er… Brisbane I think.’
‘Right.’
‘That’s about it. Except for the couple still here, the honeymooners.’
Mikkel nodded. He’d fulfilled his promise to himself and now he was keen to go.
‘Oh and… yeah,’ Rod added. ‘We had an Asian guy, left a couple of days ago. Korean I think. Driving this big flash SUV.’
Mikkel could have asked Rod a lot of questions at this point but decided not to. He could have asked more about the vehicle. Where it’d been parked, for example.
‘Had some funny name like… Mr…’
Rod had a sudden pained look on his tropical face, which alarmingly erupted in a series of wave-patterned frown-lines.
‘Argh!’ he said eventually. ‘On the tip of my tongue…’
‘That’s fine, Rod, thanks,’ Mikkel said.
And he, for one, didn’t give it another thought. Not for a while, at least.
*
They took off to the north-west. The Indian Ocean was only about twenty kilometres from Sandfire and the red earth soon gave way to a sandy flood plain, and then, at last, the ocean itself. The contrast of the indigo blue of the sea with the white sands of Eighty Mile Beach was dazzling. The beach itself stretched far further than its name suggested – almost twice as far – and took the form of an awe-inspiring crescent of sand covering about half the distance between Broome and Port Hedland. Looking in both directions, Mikkel couldn’t imagine anything more colourful than that view, floating a few hundred metres up in the air – dangling, as they were, on the tenuous thread of their rotor bolt – over such an extraordinary kaleidoscope.
Travis – who visibly cheered up when they reached the ocean – steered them north along the line of the coast towards Broome, maybe an hour away at their current speed, now that the helicopter was healthy again. Even Dean had sparked up, perhaps because he was off his leg, but whatever the cause, his colour had returned.
Only Mikkel was plagued with doubts and fears. As if the dead red of the interior had stayed with him.
Seemingly embodying these anxieties, he could see a thin, dark bank of cloud covering the whole of the north-west horizon. The beginning of the wet season. It appeared it had arrived early this year.
22. Like A Map
[Mascot, Sydney, N.S.W. (-33.9269, +151.1877), 19 Oct 2013, 1.35PM]
Mikkel’s memory was unfolding like a map.
The last forty-eight hours were coming back to him but slowly, section by section.
He was in a cab heading into Sydney and for a moment forgot where he was going. This was happening a lot. Why not back to Perth?
He knew people in Sydney. May as well visit, say hello.
James. Catching up with James Lavelle, that’s where he was heading (James, never Jim or God help you). And confirming it, he found James’s text, with an address in Newtown.
Mikkel could see there was a storm approaching. This made him feel uneasy, but why? What was it reminding him of? Was it the stormy horizon they saw on their way to Broome? But it was more than that, he felt, it was something else, an actual storm somewhere…
What happened after they landed in Broome? He still couldn’t remember the actual landing, but they obviously made it. What did they do there?
And then there was the flight back. Try as he might, there was nothing in his head about a daytime flight back to Perth, or any flight back for that matter, with Dean and Travis. Judging by the hangover he was experiencing, he assumed they – or at least he – made it back for those drinks.
And for some reason he had the year 1929 in his head – so what was with that? The stock market crash, the beginning of the Great Depression?
Industrial estates made way for old buildings and shop awnings and next thing he knew they’d arrived and he was paying the driver. In King Street, and it was busy. It was hustle and bustle. He remembered a particularly big night with James at the Bank Hotel, which he was now staring at. And the Zanzibar across the road, they went there too. Ten years ago, and he could remember it better than yesterday.
James was Mikkel’s age, thirty-three, and was an old friend, from their uni days in Perth. He’d been a law student, although last Mikkel had heard he now ran some kind of furniture import business. He lived in Australia Street, up at the Camperdown end, and even though Mikkel vaguely remembered where he lived, it had been years and James wasn’t answering his phone. Lucky for street maps and smartphones.
Relieved to be escaping the King Street traffic, he turned up Australia Street: he walked through an attractive pedestrianized section and then continued up the long tree-lined avenue. Past an impressive old cream-coloured building with the words “Court House” clearly emblazoned across its facade – solidly classical, it reminded him of ancient Rome somehow – and next to that… A strange sensation came over him, seeing the blue “Police” sign. It was the Newtown Police Station, should he be going in there? Or running away from it?
At that moment an attractive brunette in tight white pants and a black top – looked French or Italian, with olive skin and curly dark hair – walked out through the front entrance. Mikkel was on the opposite side of the road, but it was only narrow and he must have been staring at her because she caught his look and paused and cast him a curious, half-smiling frown, as if to say “Do I know you?”. And then a sudden gust of wind blew something into Mikkel’s eye and by the time he’d looked up again with his other eye, she was gone, walking confidently off in the direction of King Street. Mikkel cursed the tree that had just assaulted his vision and could only assume the culprit was a London Plane tree, they were deadly he remembered, from a previous Sydney trip.
But it was all happening, because as soon as he continued his walk up Australia Street, a spectacular bolt of lightning descended from the steely sky ahead of him, followed by a low rumble maybe ten seconds later. Two miles away…
And it came to him. He remembered now, he was still in Broome when the thunderstorm hit. He was in a beer garden, or somewhere more upmarket, some sort of terraced area, with a view of the sea, drinking, with Dean. It wasn’t night-time, it was the afternoon. And it wasn’t Perth, that wasn’t where he’d been drinking with Dean at all. So why were they still in Broome? And when did they return to Perth? he’d definitely arrived in Sydney from Perth. And where did he last see Dean?
He looked at his phone for a clue, but before he even got to check his recent calls, he knew. He knew there’d be nothing from Dean and he knew there’d be no answer if he tried to call him. And a feeling of dread caught in his throat and his map began unfolding some more…
23. The Black Sky
[Broome, Kimberley Coast, W.A. (-17.9286, +122.2108), 18 Oct 2013, 3.20PM]
The Cable Beach Club Resort. That’s where they’d gone.
Lightning crackled and flashed on the horizon against the black sky, still many kilometres out to sea, but where Mikkel and Dean and Travis were, it was still sunny. They were comfortably seated in cane chairs with leather cushions and they’d just finished lunch in an outdoor eating area overlooking the beach: the restaurant was on a raised deck of polished wood and surrounded by lush resort trees (including, unfortunately, a boab tree) and populated by the usual resort crowd. Beers and steaks and red wine: Mikkel should have been feeling relaxed, like the others obviously were. It was over. Done and dusted.
But something told him it wasn’t.
They’d arrived in Broome without incident – they landed at the heliport next to the airport – and had been met by Senior Sergeant Brad Hanson of the Broome police, driving a large, midnight blue Toyota Landcruiser with a double-cab chassis and tray. Their first stop was Broome Hospital, to drop off their “cargo”, much to Mikkel’s relief. It had been decided by their superiors, given the deterioration of the body and the body parts, that the autopsy and forensic examinations and testing would be conducted in Broome, an
d that Mikkel and Dean would be relieved by a second team, who were on their way up from Perth. In the circumstances, there was no need for them to hang around, and it being Friday, they were told they only had to report in to Perth base on Monday for a full debriefing.
Brad, the Senior Sergeant, was a fit, self-assured forty-year old with a shaved head and a sense of humour he wore like a suit. He gave Mikkel the feeling there was some practical joke that was being played out, and at any moment it would be revealed. Brad told them after they’d arrived at the police station that the Landcruiser was theirs for the day, all they had to do was leave it in the street out front when they’d finished with it, or even in the main airport car park if that was easier (ignition keys under the seat was fine, no worries). And as far as drinking went, no ‘designated driver’ was necessary either, because “mate”, Brad told them, “this is Broome, not fuckin’ Perth”. Hence the resort: it was Dean’s idea, they could celebrate surviving their desert adventure and catch the 5.15pm flight home.
Despite the jovial air though, Mikkel’s bad feeling continued. He could only assume it was due to all the things they’d seen in the previous twenty-four hours.
Mostly they kept the conversation to other things – global politics, national sport, and local women (as in twenty-metre-radius local) – but they were never going to be able to ignore altogether what was really on each of their minds.
‘So Deano.’ Unbelievably, it was Travis. Starting a conversation. ‘Mick reckons you’re a bit of an expert on the Golden Age of Sail.’
‘Dunno about expert.’
‘So this… Destino. If it was a Spanish galleon… what do you reckon it was carrying? I mean, like… treasure?’
‘We didn’t see any.’
‘No I know, but… half it was buried wasn’t it?
‘The ship? Yeah, but I still reckon whatever was in there was probably nicked a long time ago. Centuries.’
‘But it could be there, right?’ They’d never heard Travis as talkative.
‘I guess,’ Dean shrugged. ‘You goin’ back there with your shovel, are you Long John?’
They all chuckled, but Mikkel doubted any of them found it all that funny, least of all himself. That ship just reminded him of dead bodies in trees, and body parts in the sand… And to make it worse, he had a strange feeling they were being listened to. He had no evidence of this – call it instinct – but it was an unpleasant sensation.
Nevertheless, he was still able to appreciate the wonderful scenery. Combined with the approaching storm and the sea steadily darkening before their eyes, there was a certain dramatic beauty about it that couldn’t fail to move the glummest of the glum. The alcohol didn’t hurt either: it was doing what it was paid to do, and he gradually relaxed. Right up until his second trip to the toilets.
Feeling pleasantly light-headed, he passed tables of contented, sun-tanned patrons, and a couple of attractive Euro-types in tiny bikinis. Passed some parked cars. Looking for the sign to the Gents, he happened to notice one of the vehicles, it was hard to miss: a large, red SUV. A Porsche Cayenne with Western Australian plates. Ostentatious. Covered in red dust. Red on red. The red made him think of blood and he stopped himself. And he almost turned away – it must have been such a close thing – when he noticed something else.
The tyres. They were Bridgestones.
And he could have left it there, walked away, but the connections formed in his brain faster than he could consciously keep up and he found himself drawn in for a closer look. At the tyre tread. And it was as though he already knew the result: it was the same as the tyre tread in the tracks at Sandfire, which was the same as what they’d seen at the Destino.
Mikkel’s first internal response was to tell himself they were over three hundred kilometres from Sandfire – four hundred from the Destino – and they were in a busy centre now. There were probably many vehicles in Broome with the same tyres.
Suddenly, he was conscious of being watched and when he turned away from the vehicle to continue to the Gents, he saw the back of a portly man in a short-sleeved, batik shirt quickly retreating into the shadows of the main building.
It hit him when he sat down, rejoining Dean and Travis. He froze. It was like a cold electric shock pulsed through him. He remembered what Rod had said about one of the guests being a Korean or Asian guy who drove “a big flash SUV”.
Dean asked Mikkel what was wrong. His face must have told the story but he smiled and shook his head. And looked around, looked for an Asian face, in the scattered crowd.
He started to feel panicky. Guilty that he’d said nothing at Sandfire about the tyre tracks (if only he hadn’t seen them!). And then he started telling himself that maybe he’d been wrong about the tracks at Sandfire: he was tired, he hadn’t been himself, he’d been in shock for God’s sake, still freaked out by the discovery of the naked girl in the boab tree, and the body parts. And anyway, it was too late to say anything now, he’d look like an idiot for keeping quiet about it, it was his job to find things like that! Better to leave it, assume he never saw those tracks. And he probably didn’t, either. That would explain why he hadn’t said anything, or so he’d tell himself.
But… just to put his mind at rest…
He decided to ring Rod and find out about the make and colour of the vehicle, and the name of the owner. He excused himself to make a call (“Who is she?” Dean asked) and, just inside the doors to the resort, next to an indoor palm, tried Rod’s number, but there was no answer. He left a message and assured himself he’d done what he could. Told himself to relax. There had to be a heap of “flash” SUVs in the Kimberley, and plenty of Asians, so it was all a bit of a long bow, wasn’t it?
Of course it was.
Back with the others, and the sun was now obscured from view. The storm was close, the sea had turned from turquoise to gunmetal grey. No white horses yet, but they’d come: the sunbathers had already upped stumps.
‘4pm,’ said Dean looking at his watch. ‘I wouldn’t mind checking out Chinatown before we go. Take a look at a couple of those pearl shops. That OK?’
Mikkel and Travis nodded.
‘Should still make the five fifteen,’ Dean continued, ‘but there’s always the six fifteen and the seven ten, so it won’t be the end of the world if we miss it.’
‘Yeah well…’ Travis said, downing his beer and looking out to sea. ‘As pretty as this little scene is… I for one, have a date tonight. In Perth. And if I’m not on the five fifteen, it will be the end of the fuckin’ world.’
‘Better get cracking, then.’
On their way out, Mikkel noticed the red Porsche Cayenne was still there.
It was a short ten minute drive from the resort, back along Cable Beach Road, past the Broome Crocodile Park and around the airport to the other side of the small peninsula, where the township of Broome backed up against Roebuck Bay. Lightning flashed overhead and thunder rumbled over the town as they parked the Landcruiser on Dampier Terrace, near Johnny Chi Lane, in the heart of Broome’s Chinatown.
They took a quick look inside two pearl showrooms, and the third and final one was The Pearl Mermaids, slightly away from the more congested section of Dampier Terrace and just past where they’d parked the Landcruiser. As they approached, Mikkel’s heart missed a beat. Parked right next to the Landcruiser, and in a group of about six vehicles in total, was the red Porsche again. It was definitely the same one, same W.A. plates.
He knew it was a small town, but this felt wrong. Was it just a coincidence? Was there really any such thing as a coincidence?
Mikkel felt his throat constricting. He desperately wanted to say something to Dean, but, as before – more so – there was too much that hadn’t been said.
‘Mick,’ Dean said. He and Travis were about to go inside. ‘Are you coming or are you just going to admire the view?’
The first drops of rain began to fall on him, as heavy as small pebbles.
‘It’s OK. I might get some fresh a
ir before the flight.’
‘Hope you brought your umbrella,’ Dean said and he and Travis vanished into the shop.
Hope you brought your umbrella.
The Pearl Mermaids was the largest pearl showroom in the area, as far as Mikkel could tell, but it also felt like one of the emptiest – from the outside at least. There was no-one around. An enormous mural covered the front wall of the building: three frolicking mermaids with Asian eyes and generous breasts (nipples tactfully concealed by strands of seaweed) were swimming underwater and chasing each other’s tails, and underneath them, on the ocean floor, was an open treasure chest overflowing with egg-sized silver pearls. It was painted in the style of the kind of design you used to find on the side of surfers’ panel vans.
This time he took a closer look inside the Porsche but there were no obvious clues: it had the empty look of a hire-car, which could well have been what it was.
He stood under a nearby awning as the rain gradually grew heavier, waiting for the others. The low sky was almost continually lit up and the rain on the tin rooftops gave rise to a steadily building roar that competed with the constant rumbling of thunder. Five minutes became ten.
The startling crack of a lightning bolt sounded like a gun going off.
He looked at his watch: 4.45pm. They were going to miss their flight. He ran across the deserted street in the teeming rain and entered The Pearl Mermaids.
He’d probably been expecting something like a pearling museum, with dark wooden floors and old-fashioned diving suits on the walls, but the room he entered looked more like the waiting room of a doctor’s surgery. It was as deserted as the street outside – there was just a Chinese-looking girl with her head buried in some kind of ledger. When Mikkel walked in, she looked up sharply. No friendly smile.
‘I’m sorry we closed now,’ she said harshly.
‘Sorry, I was looking for my friends. Two men…’
Dark Oceans Page 11