Blindside

by J. R. Carroll

  ‘Siddown, mate,’ Rick said. ‘Want some of this?’

  Stan sat on the couch.‘Got any ouzo? I’ve been on the ouzo.’

  ‘Hate that stuff,’ Rick said. ‘Gives you brain damage. Destroys your . . . watchamacallit? Synapses.’

  ‘Shit, if that’s true I’m in trouble. I’ve been drinkin’ it forever and a day. My brain’s down the drain.’

  Rick grinned at him. ‘You said it, not me.’

  ‘I’ll have the rum then. That can’t hurt me, can it?’

  ‘No way,’ Rick said. He went to the kitchenette, rooting around for a clean glass.

  Stan looked at the TV. The grizzled face of Humphrey Bogart was on the screen—another old movie. Rick rented them by the dozen. They were scattered all over the floor.

  ‘What’s this?’ he said.

  ‘The Treasure of the Sierra Madre,’ Rick said. He poured some rum and handed it to Stan.

  ‘Cheers.’ Stan sipped.

  ‘Cheers,’ Rick said, but didn’t touch his drink. Instead he lit up a cigarette and tossed the dead match in the general vicinity of the ashtray.

  ‘I liked that Schwarzenegger movie, Collateral Damage. Did you see it?’ Stan said.

  ‘No, mate. I’m not a big Schwarzenegger fan.’

  ‘Fantastic show, mate. Big Arnie shoves it up to those fuckin’ terrorists nine ways from Sunday. Hasta la vista, baby.’

  ‘I’ll bet,’ Rick said.

  Silence.

  ‘Ever see Predator?’ Stan said.

  ‘Nope.’

  ‘That is an absolute classic. Best movie ever. Fuckin’ jungle turns into a monster.’

  Rick looked at him. Jungle turns into a monster. What was he on about?

  Stan remembered Suzen’s nightmare: Wild animal trying to eat me.

  ‘You can’t see it, though. It’s just . . . there. Invisible.’

  ‘Right,’ Rick said. He drained his glass and tipped some more rum in.

  They watched the TV for a while. Humphrey Bogart was having a fierce argument with an old bastard. They were in the wilderness somewhere, very rugged terrain.

  ‘Rick,’ Stan said. ‘I’m sorry about the other night.’

  Rick dragged on his cigarette and blew out a stream of smoke. ‘Forget it,’ he said, watching TV.

  ‘I lost it a bit. Didn’t mean any of that shit.’

  ‘I know,’ Rick said.

  ‘I got picked up by the cops. Spent the night in the fuckin’ cooler. Gave me somethin’ for me corner.’

  ‘No bullshit,’ Rick said. Not much sympathy there.

  Stan waited a bit, watching the screen, then said, ‘You’re my replacement brother, you know that.’

  ‘Yeah.’ Here we go.

  ‘And I love you like a rock.’

  Rick didn’t respond.

  ‘Like a rock, mate.’ He was sitting up, trying to get Rick’s attention.

  ‘I love you too, Stan,’ he said, turning from the TV.

  Stan reached over and put his arm around Rick’s shoulder. ‘I’d never do anything to hurt those little girls—Christ, I’m their godfather.’

  It was the first Rick had heard that Stan was the girls’ godfather, but he let it pass. This guy had more fantasies than the brothers Grimm.

  Stan pulled him closer, so that their foreheads were touching. ‘We’re family, you and me. We’re . . . blood.’ Now he was massaging the back of Rick’s neck, a little too roughly for Rick’s liking. ‘Right?’

  ‘Yeah,’ Rick said. Stan’s dark eyes were right in his face. There was no way he could avoid staring directly into them. Close-up, they didn’t look like Stan’s eyes at all: they were black, shining beads of alarming intensity.

  ‘We have a responsibility to watch out for each other,’ Stan whispered.

  Rick nodded. His eyes dropped: Stan’s shirt had come open a bit, revealing the sawn-off stock of the shotgun in his jeans. Straightaway Rick’s alarm system flashed on high alert. He wasn’t sure if Stan had exposed the gun deliberately or not.

  He decided to play it cool, no matter what. His number one priority now was to somehow get Stan out of the house without stirring him up.

  ‘Haven’t we?’ Stan said.

  ‘Sure,’ Rick said. Stan could sense him wanting to pull away from his firm grip.

  ‘I was thinking about what you said,’ Stan said. ‘About . . . putting it all behind us.’

  ‘That’s right,’ Rick said, squirming a bit but trying not to resist too openly. Didn’t worry Stan: he merely tightened the screws.

  ‘The thing is, I want to put it behind me, I really do. But that guy—McCreadie—stands in the road. While he lives, I can’t go on. I can’t go on.’

  Rick tried to twist free, but Stan wasn’t having any of it.

  ‘My brother, we have to take him down. After what he did . . .’

  ‘What?’ Rick said. ‘What did he do?’

  ‘It’s him or me. Only one of us can walk away from this.’

  Jesus Christ, Rick thought—it’s High Noon.

  Stan turned to the TV screen. Bogart was in a barroom fistfight now.

  ‘You know so much about movies, don’t you, buddy?’

  Still in Stan’s tight grip, Rick was also watching the screen, the whole side of his face hard against Stan’s. Stan’s heavy beard scraped him like a sheet of coarse sandpaper. Rick could smell the ouzo and, beneath that, some pungent animal odour that came from the very essence of Stan.

  ‘I’ve seen a few,’ he said.

  ‘Remember that day,’ Stan said. ‘You told the cops we spent the afternoon watching videos. What were they again?’

  Rick said, ‘It was a Paul Newman day: Somebody Up There Likes Me, The Left-Handed Gun, and The Hustler.’

  ‘That’s right. You had to tell me what they were all about in case the cops quizzed me about ’em. Which they did, of course.’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘And the order we watched them in.’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘Not that it proved anything, but if I didn’t know jack about those movies I was supposed to have watched, we would’ve had problems, wouldn’t we?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘You were so smart, buddy, and so solid. I was proud of you that day. You came up aces. And that cute Pommie girlfriend you had then—what was her name?’

  ‘Ah—Linda.’

  ‘Yeah, Linda. She was staunch too. What happened to her?’

  ‘She went back to England.’

  ‘That’s right, she did.’

  Without warning Stan turned Rick’s face towards him and kissed him flush on the lips. Rick pulled away violently.‘Christ, Stan—turn it up.’

  Stan laughed—he seemed to have embarrassed himself. ‘It’s all right, mate. I haven’t turned queer or anything. Sorry.’

  ‘Shit.’ Rick swallowed some rum. Then he lit up another cigarette. He wished with all his heart and soul that Stan would leave, but knew he wouldn’t. Stan Petrakos was one of these people who, whenever they do wrong, just say ‘sorry’, as if that fixed everything. Stan said ‘sorry’ all his life, but never changed. He was now lounging back in the couch, the shotgun stock clearly visible through his partly open shirt.

  ‘I’m livin’ in a world of hurt, Rick,’ he said.‘You can see that.’

  Rick stared at the screen, trying to appear unruffled. But his mind was working overtime.

  ‘I want you to drive, that’s all. You’re so good at that. We stop outside his place, wait for him to show, I blow him off, and that’s it—we’re away.’

  Rick blew out smoke.

  ‘He owes me too. Big time. He robbed me of everything— my inheritance.’

  Without facing him Rick said, ‘He went to jail, Stan. He didn’t have jack.’

  ‘What, you reckon he didn’t stash it somewhere for later?’

  ‘Yeah, sure.’

  ‘Well, if I can’t have it, neither can he.’ He sat up again. ‘That guy killed my people. He spilled my b
lood. He destroyed my . . . my birthright.’

  Rick looked at him. ‘What?’

  ‘He tore my world apart.’

  Rick watched him: there were tears filling Stan’s eyes.

  ‘Hang on,Stan,’he said.‘We both know you did it—not him.’

  Stan wiped his arm across his face and gave Rick a cunning, narrow-eyed stare.‘But how much do we really know, mate?’

  Rick was at a loss. ‘Listen to me: I’m not going to drive. I’m not going to do anything. I want you to go, Stan. Pack it in. Come on.’

  Stan slid the shotgun out of his jeans and cradled it across his thighs.‘I didn’t do anything, did I? It was done when I got there.’

  ‘Have it your way, brother. Come on, up. Go home, take two Valium and sleep.’ He lifted Stan by the arm, and to his surprise Stan didn’t fight him. He seemed to be in a bit of a daze. There was a slightly puzzled expression on his face, as if he’d become confused,and suspicious. Rick led him to the door and opened it. The gun was in Stan’s hand, hanging loosely by his side. He didn’t seem particularly aware of it, or anything.

  ‘Jungle turns into a monster,’ he said in a monotone.

  Rick took him outside, right to the Ferrari. Stan looked up at the sky. ‘Stars are shining,’ he said in the same dead-sounding tone.

  ‘Off you go, mate,’ Rick said. ‘Drive carefully, and watch out for cops. See you when.’

  Obediently Stan de-alarmed the car and climbed aboard. He was still holding the gun when Rick shut the door. As he crossed in front of the car he saw that Stan was staring straight ahead through the windshield. Rick gave him a wave and hurried on in.

  Stan sat in the car five, ten minutes. There was a buzzing sound in his brain. Through a hazy glow he watched himself opening the workshop door. He had on short pants and a pair of sandals. The buzz saw was screeching as if it was cutting through something. What was George doing? In he went.

  There was George: bent over the spinning circular blade, throat torn away, mouth agape, his horribly contorted face frozen in a moment of unspeakable agony, blood and gouts of flesh flying through the air. His eyes had gone so far up into his head that only the whites were visible . . .

  It was done before I got there.

  Stan fired up the engine and let it idle for a minute.‘Jungle turns into a monster,’ he said to himself. The gun was on his lap. He cruised down the street and turned left. Then he took two more lefts, until he was back in front of Rick’s house. He waited, barely breathing, before driving on and repeating the cycle. Three times he cruised around the block. On the fourth occasion he put his foot on the brake and touched the accelerator: the engine gave a low growl, like a snarling beast straining against a short leash. He lowered the passenger-side window, leaned across, drew back both hammers, took aim and blasted both barrels into Rick’s front window: BOOM! BOOM! The car was filled with an ear-splitting double-roar that reverberated around the cabin as the windows exploded amid flying shards of masonry and timber—it was as if two bombs had been thrown into the house.

  ‘HOW DO YOU FUCKIN’ LIKE THAT YA CUNT!’ he yelled.

  With his left foot on the brake pedal he slammed his right all the way down on the gas. The rear Michelins spun and burned, belching dense palls of blue smoke until the car could barely be seen through it. When he suddenly released the brake they gripped, and the shrieking Ferrari catapulted down the road with its rear end waltzing from side to side, as if it were sliding on ice. Neighbours later reported they could hear the vehicle screaming long after it was off and gone. Even when they ventured out into the street amid the drifts of blue haze, the high-pitched roar of its engine was crystal-clear in the still night air, along with the intermittent squeal of rubber whenever the driver changed gears or turned a corner—at least another suburb away.

  20

  The morning after his return from the coast, Shaun received a phone call from Wes Ford. He was not at his sharpest. When he’d arrived back at 8 pm, Jo had a ‘little surprise’: a five-star candle-lit ‘tasting menu’ dinner party for two with all the trimmings, served on the upstairs polished mahogany dining table that seated twelve. An opened bottle of Chablis Vaillon sat in an ice-filled silver bucket, and a 1981 Chateau d’Yquem with a worm-eaten label had been poured into a cut-crystal decanter; on the rosewood buffet a pair of red wines of similar aged appearance stood in reserve, both corks drawn and pushed back in. The food was served on large, mirror-bright, silver-domed tureens and platters: sweetbreads Josephine (invented for his true love by Napoleon, or so she said), a specialty from Boston called lobster Savannah, glazed Cornish game hens, roasted rare venison in a truffle sauce, Frenched veal shanks, breaded racks of lamb accompanied by a mix of exotic mushrooms, creamed spinach, pommes dauphine, plump white spears of asparagus . . .

  And so it went on. Various cheeses, fruits and desserts followed, but by that time Shaun had run out of steam and was sticking with the wine. There was no problem putting that away. But it would take at least three days of dedicated gluttony for two people to consume such a spread. At least she had the good grace to admit she’d ordered it all in from a high-end restaurant in Crown Casino: a sample from every dish on its menu. It was sumptuous, decadent and way over the top. What followed in the bedroom was even more so.

  During dinner he gave her a rundown of what had happened in Nambucca Heads after they had spoken on the phone. Although he remembered everything Turner had told him, he spared Jo the less important details, purely in the interests of simplicity. More calculatingly, however, he also omitted to mention the beating he’d dished out to Turner on the beach. This careful editing of the facts caused him twinges of concern, since he had no wish to be dishonest in his relationship with Jo. Even as he was working up to that point in the story he couldn’t decide whether to leave it in or not. Although he could justify the beating in his own mind, and had little doubt she would see it the same way, he found it a doubtful quantity nonetheless. Turner had given him the full story—what need was there for violence? What would she think of him for beating up on an old,dying man,regardless of what he’d done to deserve it another lifetime ago? It was too hard, so with serious reservations he left it out. It might have been a small thing, but it niggled at him.

  In between times he had thought about Turner’s claim that Mitch Alvarez had switched sides. Shaun’s first instinct was that it couldn’t be true, but on reflection—distasteful as he found it—the scenario Turner had described was an entirely plausible one. It explained how Mitch got the blueprints, and two or three other things: one, the guns, two, the van, and three, why he was so adamant about leaving the drugs, even to the point where he was prepared to shoot Andy. In any case, why would Turner lie to him?

  Everyone, even usually honest citizens, sometimes lied to protect their interests, but Leon Turner was on the way out— he had nothing left to protect. And it had been Turner’s initiative to come to the Blue Dolphin after giving him nothing but abuse at his house. Obviously he had thought about it and decided this was his last chance to clear the decks. There was simply nothing in it for him to lie, except maybe to shove it up Shaun. But that didn’t appear to be his motive. His time had come to open up.

  Shaun still didn’t see Mitch selling them out. His own spin on it—that Mitch was using them as a form of revenge, and had no intention of going through with any deal they thought he had made—still seemed the most likely explanation. It had come to him immediately on hearing Turner’s story, as if he were still privy to Mitch’s plans—his real plans. He knew how Mitch ticked—he would’ve jumped at the chance to take these bastards down. He was definitely no turncoat. There wasn’t a treacherous bone in him. Turner was right—they were a tight crew. The reason Mitch didn’t inform them of Turner’s and Simmonds’ involvement was obvious—he had to keep a lid on it till it was all over. Shaun remembered the three of them standing in the rain at Buzzards Hut with their hands joined. At that moment they were one person,not three. Turner wasn’t the
re, he wouldn’t know. He didn’t look in Mitch’s eyes and see what Shaun saw: total trust. At that moment he would’ve put his life in Mitch’s hands, and if he were alive he still would today.

  But what Wes Ford had to report swept all such thoughts from his mind.

  ‘Had a meeting with Simmonds yesterday,’ Wes said. ‘Bottom line: he wants me to abduct Joanna Steer.’

  ‘You’re shitting me,’ Shaun said.

  ‘No sir. I had a feeling from his voice on the phone that something was on. Told me to meet him at the Unicorn in North Melbourne. It’s one of Simmonds’ low dives. Publican’s an ex-cop. When I arrived there was a school of regular geezers in the public bar, but no sign of Simmonds. Then I saw him coming down the stairs with the publican. They were very buddy-buddy—beers were on the house, except when it was my shout. Anyhow, I was there five minutes and he drags me out the grungy back bar, which was empty. “Snatch the woman”, he says to me. Just like that. I said, “What?” I’m not kidding, brother—he was sober and dead serious.’

  Shaun’s mind was racing.‘How are you supposed to do it?’

  ‘Uh—he gave me a gun.’

  ‘Christ.’

  ‘It’s only a replica,’ Wes said. ‘Browning nine-millimetre semi-automatic pistol. Looks like the real thing to me—not that I know shit about guns, except from TV cop shows. It’s a big, mean sucker. When he reached into his jacket and produced it I filled my diapers big time. Thought he was gonna top me right there in the pub.’

  ‘Okay, okay, so you’ve got a pretend pistol. What’s his plan?’

  At that moment Jo came in the front door—she’d been down at the corner shop for the newspaper. Shaun looked at her, and straightaway he could tell she realised something serious was going down. She stopped dead, watching him, and he extended a hand to draw her closer so she could hear Wes’s voice.