Fetch the Treasure Hunter

by Phillip Gwynne

  The church was a small symmetrical building. And, like the rest of San Luca, it looked closed. But when I pushed at the heavy wooden door, it moved.

  I pushed further and the door swung open.

  As I’d expected, there was nobody inside. It was the usual churchy set-up – pews, altar, various statues of various biblical types. I guess churches are like McDonald’s: no matter where in the world you are you’re going to get the same basic décor, the same meal.

  No books in here, however. So I kept going, moving into another room that had robes hanging up and all sorts of other stuff. But again, no books.

  So I kept going deeper, and now I had the feeling I was trespassing.

  Okay, the church was open so there was no problem popping in for a bit of casual prayer, but venturing back here?

  Along a narrow passage, through another door, and I struck bibliographic gold: floor-to-ceiling bookshelves full of great fat leather-bound books.

  So, the cockroach was right.

  Tutti i libri sono lì.

  But now I had another problem, and it struck me right then that I should be getting used to this, because it was the very essence of The Debt: a solution invariably bred a problem.

  Great fat leather-bound books everywhere, but which one was the one for me?

  How was I going to recognise it, given that my Italian was pretty much limited to the names of various pasta dishes and the phrase ‘niente polizia’? Right then I wished I’d taken a bit more notice when I’d done languages at school.

  I picked up one of the books: 1965 Morti.

  Okay, that I got – all the deaths in 1965.

  I went to another shelf and picked out another book.

  1972 Matrimoni.

  Marriages in 1972.

  I started flicking through it. A door creaked open.

  Footsteps on flagstones, echoing through the empty church. And there was somebody behind me.

  I spun around.

  The priest.

  ‘Scusa, posso aiutarti?’ he said.

  ‘Sorry, I’m not Italian,’ I said.

  ‘Actually, neither am I,’ he said.

  He was short, dark-skinned, Asian-looking.

  ‘I’m from the Philippines,’ he said. ‘My name is Father Luciano.’

  ‘I’m from Australia,’ I said.

  ‘Gidday, mate,’ he said, with an Australian accent so exaggerated it would light a barbie and sizzle a couple of snags.

  He smiled at me and said, ‘I studied at a seminary in Adelaide.’

  ‘Cool,’ I said, though studying at a seminary in Adelaide was possibly the uncoolest thing a human being could do.

  ‘You’re wondering how I ended up here?’ he said.

  Which was a pretty nifty piece of mind-reading by Father Luciano, because it was exactly what I was thinking.

  ‘There was an opening here and they thought I’d be suitable,’ he said, but it was one of those statements that was teeming with what Mr McFarlane would call subtext.

  Why was there an opening?

  Why was he thought to be suitable?

  ‘I’m from the Gold Coast,’ I said, but as I did I wondered whether I should start lying about this, say I was from Sydney, or Melbourne, or even Canberra, because let’s face it, what serious person is from the Gold Coast?

  ‘But my father’s family is from this village and I wanted to see if I could find out something about them.’

  ‘By all means,’ said the Father Luciano. ‘What exactly did you want to look up?’

  I told Father Luciano about my ancestor Dominic Silvagni. How he’d come to Australia, how’d he’d been part of the Eureka Stockade.

  ‘Amazing stuff,’ he said when I’d finished. ‘Let’s see what we can find out about Dominic Silvagni, shall we? What year did you say he was born?’

  ‘Eighteen twenty-two,’ I said. ‘But I don’t have his exact birthdate.’

  Father Luciano scanned the books until he’d found the right one.

  He placed it on the bench and opened it to the first page.

  ‘There is no quick way to do this,’ he said, his finger travelling down the column of names.

  ‘No Google?’ I said.

  He laughed at that.

  ‘No, definitely no Google.’

  When I thought about it, it was pretty wild: almost two hundred years ago this kid had been born and his parents had come down here and Father Luciano’s predecessor had written the name of the newborn in this book.

  ‘Here he is!’ said Father Luciano, and he seemed to be almost as excited as I was.

  My eyes followed his finger.

  Nome: Dominic Silvagni

  Nascita: 7 febbraio 1822.

  Padre : Guiseppe Silvagni

  Madre: Maria Nirta

  ‘Wow!’ I said. ‘That is amazing.’

  And it was amazing, amazing in a way that no history lesson I’d ever sat through had ever come close to being amazing. But hard on the heels of this amazing feeling was another feeling, equally as strong: disappointment. Because I’d been harbouring this hope that there actually wasn’t a person called Dominic Silvagni born in 1822. Because if there wasn’t a person called Dominic Silvagni born 1822, then there was no debt.

  But there was.

  Father Luciano offered to photocopy the page for me and then found a plastic sleeve for the photocopy so it wouldn’t get damaged.

  ‘And what about your faith?’ he said when he’d finished doing this. ‘Are you a regular churchgoer?’

  ‘I wouldn’t exactly say that,’ I said.

  ‘Well, you live in a wonderful country that has many distractions. But just remember, if you ever need the Lord, He is there waiting for you.’

  ‘That’s cool,’ I said. ‘Father, can I ask you a question?’

  ‘Yes, of course.’

  ‘Where is everybody? Why isn’t there anybody in the streets?’

  ‘They’re at the Sanctuary of Santa Maria di Polsi,’ he said. ‘High up in the Aspromonte Mountains.’

  ‘Is there some sort of festival?’ I asked.

  ‘Yes, a type of festival,’ he said. ‘Though the main celebration is a few days away.’

  Father Luciano was quiet after that, but I could see that he was thinking.

  I could tell that he wasn’t very comfortable with this line of conversation, so I didn’t pursue it. But eventually he said, ‘You’re familiar with the expression “godforsaken”?’

  ‘Yes, of course,’ I said.

  ‘Well, I never believed in such a thing. In my country there are some very dark places, but in them you will always find some hope, some love. A candle will be burning somewhere. But this town, San Luca, this is a godforsaken town.’

  I wasn’t big into God, but godforsaken was a pretty scary thought, especially when it came from a person who was totally on God’s team.

  ‘Your ancestor did a courageous thing in getting away from here. Because of his bravery, you have a good life. As will your children.’

  A good life? I thought of The Debt. But I knew what he was saying, and I felt sort of ashamed that I’d privately dissed Dominic Silvagni. He’d done absolutely the right thing.

  ‘You’re leaving on the bus?’ the priest said. I nodded. He checked his watch. ‘Okay, the last bus leaves in twenty minutes. Make sure you’re on it.’

  ‘I will,’ I said.

  Together we walked into the room with all the robes hanging up. There was somebody there now, sitting on a chair, a chubby boy who looked like he was around twelve.

  Father Luciano said something to him in Italian. He replied in Italian.

  We continued on the main door.

  Okay, I wasn’t big into God but I thought, what the heck? What did I have to lose?

  ‘Can I ask a favour?’ I said. ‘Can you bless me or something?’

  ‘No worries, mate,’ said Father Luciano in that silly accent.

  He blessed me, and as I walked back through the church I was feeling
pretty good about everything. But then I stepped outside.

  SUNDAY

  GODFORSAKEN

  It’s not as if I could see the danger: the streets were now completely empty. Even the cockroaches had stopped scuttling. The only movement was a piece of paper – was it a chocolate wrapper? – that cartwheeled across the flagstones of the piazza. But I could smell the danger. Taste the danger. There was somebody out there. And they were waiting for me.

  I could go back into the church, but the bus left at 5.45 pm and I had to be on it. The quickest way to the bus stop was straight across the piazza, but there was no way I was going that route – it was too exposed. I could skirt around the edge, from building to building. The trouble with that, however, was that there were lots of little lanes that led into the square and they made ideal hiding spots from which to ambush me. No, I had to get to the bus stop another less obvious way.

  I took one final look across the piazza, trying to fix my bearings, before I started off in completely the opposite direction to the bus stop. As I did, I heard a noise behind me. I spun around – there was nothing, but I still sensed danger, that there was somebody out there. I ducked into the first lane I saw, picking up my pace. High stone walls on either side – this hadn’t been the best choice. They could pick me off at will.

  So when I saw an opening ahead, an iron gate, I knew that was where I was headed. Then I saw what was beyond that iron gate – row after row of gravestones.

  ‘Coimetrophobia’ was not just a word written on a piece of paper by a psychiatrist, who smelt like mints.

  It was a zombie and it was a banshee and it was a werewolf and it was screaming at me, ‘Don’t you dare come in here!’

  But what other options did I have?

  I went in there.

  Those familiar sensations: heart racing, breath not coming, beads of sweat popping from my forehead. I took off, following one path, then jumping to another, zigzagging my way through all the deceased San Lucans.

  Apart from the sound of my own tortured breathing, it was so quiet in there, and I wondered if I’d got this completely wrong. Had I imagined the danger?

  Eyes flicking from side to side, I saw nobody, nothing. Just gravestone after gravestone. Until, finally, another iron gate.

  As I hurried through it, I checked the time: ten minutes until the bus left.

  I was back in the village: stone cottages, washing hanging from windows, pretty much standard postcard Italy. Except for the lack of people, the lack of traffic. Again I stopped to get my bearings.

  And as I did I heard voices. Okay, maybe they were innocent voices – two Italians talking about the soccer – but that’s not how my mind processed them. They were out to get me.

  I took off again, spurting up a laneway, then another, then another. There were footsteps behind me, coming from several directions.

  I checked my watch: five minutes to go.

  Another lane and I was on a road.

  And there it was: the bus!

  I couldn’t help congratulating myself on my sense of direction: all that zigging and zagging and I was only fifty metres from my destination.

  I gobbled up those last fifty metres with a hungry stride, and I was at the bus stop.

  As before, there was nobody waiting to get on the bus.

  I could see the driver inside, head back, asleep.

  I tried the door.

  It was locked.

  So I gave a gentle knock.

  The footsteps were getting closer, and there were voices now as well.

  I knocked harder and the driver woke with a start.

  He pressed a button, there was a hiss and the door opened.

  As I passed he said something, but the only word I recognised was ‘Silvagni’.

  Silvagni, your father was a goat herder?

  I didn’t care. Once inside the bus I felt safe again. Soon I would be out of here. Just like my namesake had got out of here.

  I’m not sure what had got into me in the first place: why had I ever wanted to come to such a godforsaken – Father Luciano was right about that – place?

  I checked my watch – it was five forty-six.

  ‘Isn’t it time to leave?’ I said.

  ‘We have more passengers,’ said the driver.

  And he was right: a couple of minutes later some people arrived.

  I tensed, but as soon as I saw who they were I relaxed – it was just a bunch of kids.

  There were five of them, all boys, ranging in age from around twelve to sixteen.

  It was such a relief to see some other human beings that I even smiled at them.

  They didn’t smile back at me, though.

  So what, I thought.

  The driver closed the door and we took off with a lurch.

  I looked out of the window at San Luca.

  I knew it was pretty childish, but I couldn’t help myself. Up came the digit. I gave San Luca the finger.

  As I hoped my great-great-great-great-grandfather had done all those years ago.

  The bus lurched down the hill.

  And then it stopped.

  Time to say goodbye to the kids, I thought.

  I was right: they stood up.

  The one I took to be the eldest turned around and looked at me.

  His right eyelid drooped a bit, so immediately I christened him Droopy Eye.

  I know that’s not a very nice thing to do, but I didn’t have much else to work with.

  ‘We get out here, Silvagni,’ he said.

  He knew my name, he spoke good English: there was a bit to be surprised by.

  But the fact that he was also holding a gun sort of trumped these.

  We were on a public bus!

  What was a kid doing with a gun, let alone pointing it at somebody?

  And why wasn’t the driver doing anything about it? I looked at him. He gave a resigned shrug.

  ‘You get out here, Silvagni.’

  ‘No,’ I said.

  The kid shot me.

  I saw him squeeze the trigger and I felt a pain in my leg and I thought, I’m dead.

  But I wasn’t, and it took me a while to realise what had happened: it was a slug gun. But as I bent down to rub my leg, the kid jabbed something into my arm, and blackness swallowed me whole.

  SUNDAY

  LA DISPUTA

  It was the smell that woke me. Of dust. And human sweat. And old, stale air.

  Then followed a series of sneezes, each more violent than the one before. Eventually, when they stopped, I was able to look around.

  I was on a thin foam mattress that seemed to float on a sea of rubbish: cigarette packets, condom wrappers, empty beer cans. A coarse blanket was covering me.

  And I was underground. But not that deep, because I could see, at the end of a vertical shaft, the distant blue of the sky.

  The walls, the floor, the ceiling were all hewn out of the stone – the chisel marks were clearly visible. And at one end of this cell – for that’s exactly what it was – were heavy iron bars within a heavy iron door.

  I reached into my pocket for my phone – it was gone!

  I jumped to my feet, tried the door, but it was locked.

  I could feel the panic taking over – I was locked up, for chrissakes!

  But again I recalled the words of Dr Chakrabarty, how panic was something concocted by the god Pan in order to confuse the Roman soldiers.

  I reined the panic in.

  But it unreined itself.

  And before I knew it, I had a bar in each hand and I was shaking them as hard as I could and I was screaming ‘Get me out of here!’ over and over.

  But my words just bounced, unheeded, off the chiselled walls, back and forth.

  I stopped. Got my breath back. When I did I noticed markings on the walls.

  Little bars grouped into fives, just like you see on all those prison movies. And people’s names. And other stuff written in Italian. I remembered what I’d read about San Luca. How it
s main industry had once been kidnapping.

  Footsteps, and there were suddenly six faces looking at me from the other side of the iron bars.

  The kidnappers from the bus, including Droopy Eye. And another kid who I recognised as the chubby boy from the church.

  ‘What is this, some sort of joke?’ I said.

  ‘No joke, Silvagni,’ said Droopy Eye.

  Again the right accents on the right syllables, but there was something else in the way he said my name, something that was sort of sinister.

  ‘Then what am I doing here?’ I said.

  The boys all looked at each other and grinned like I’d just said something incredibly amusing.

  ‘We are Strangio clan,’ he said.

  You’re not wrong, I thought. Really, really Strangio.

  ‘And?’ I said.

  ‘We are Strangio and you are Silvagni.’

  Again this didn’t shed a whole lot of light on my current predicament.

  ‘La disputa,’ said the youngest kid.

  This I didn’t need translated.

  ‘La disputa,’ I said. ‘What disputa?’

  Again that collective amusement from my juvenile captors.

  ‘Silvagnis and Strangios have had disputa since 1852,’ said Droopy Eye.

  1852?

  Now, why was that date familiar?

  Then I remembered: it was when Dominic Silvagni had left Italy to sail to Australia and the Ballarat goldfields.

  If this was true, then did that mean that this Strangio family was The Debt?

  ‘Are you crazy?’ I said, though I already knew I wasn’t taking the right tone here. ‘This is the twenty-first century!’

  The fact that it was 2013 didn’t seem to have any importance to these kids.

  ‘No Silvagni has come to this village since the esecuzione,’ said Droopy Eye. ‘And now you come here to spit in our faces.’

  Esecuzione? Was that what they called it when my namesake left San Luca? But it sounded more like ‘execution’ to me.

  ‘I was just looking at some stuff in the church,’ I said.

  Their faces said it all: So what?

  ‘I’m not even Italian, I’m Australian,’ I said, grabbing a handful of my green-and-gold tracksuit to show them.

  ‘You are Silvagni,’ said Droopy Eye in a tone that suggested it wasn’t something that was up for debate.