by J. M. Green
Ben said, ‘Stella, I’m a target. I’m on their list.’
And Loretta said, ‘Yes. Because Ben knows everything. He knows too much.’
I almost laughed. ‘That’s never been a problem for Ben.’
Ben, Loretta, and the old man, all three glared at me. I had to remind myself that this moment did not fit within the Hardy family dynamic, in which mocking Ben was normal. This was a Swindon situation, with Morrie as some kind of kingpin, and Loretta as the brains. Theirs was a unique culture, with its own dysfunction. I needed to play along.
‘Alright, Ben, how do you know you’re a target? That’s the first thing.’
He looked lovingly at Loretta. ‘She told me. She basically saved my life.’
Loretta stepped towards me. ‘You’ve been telling me all about goings-on at the prison. Joe was killed, then that acrobat, and there was that dangerous man who was after us. And now you reckon they’ve probably sent someone else after us.’
I raised a hand to stop her. ‘After me, Loretta. Not you. And not Ben.’
‘You don’t know that for sure.’
I didn’t. She was right. But really. Ben did not know everything. He couldn’t. And even if you explained everything to him, he still wouldn’t get it. Loretta, on the other hand, was a wily svengali. It seemed to me she probably wanted Ben out of prison for her own reasons.
‘Alright. Let’s say you’re right,’ I said to Ben. ‘What is it that you know, exactly?’
‘The duff.’
I glanced at Loretta, at her belly. ‘Uncanny powers of observation, Ben.’
‘Not this,’ she said, touching her bump. ‘He means the massive duffing racket being run out of the prison.’
I squinted in an effort to understand.
‘Loretta’s right, Stella,’ Ben said. ‘Athol Goldwater is run by duffers.’
‘What on earth are you talking about?’
‘Theft of livestock,’ Morrie said. ‘A duffer steals cattle, sheep. Old as the hills, and still goes on. Changing a farmer’s brand is easy. Add a line and the brand goes from N to M or P to R or what have you. Now they change the tags. With these record prices, it brings duffers out. Last week a calf sold for over a grand. Put fifty weaners on a truck, you got serious coin. Neighbours steal from neighbours; small-time opportunists make a quick dollar.’
Morrie, like his granddaughter, appeared to be a dark horse. The hayseed guise concealed a whip-smart observer of the world.
‘It can go undetected for months. Stations up north with millions of head of cattle, it’s hard to keep track,’ Loretta said.
‘In those instances,’ Morrie went on. ‘We’re talking way more than one truck-load. There’s duffing cases upwards of thousands, an industrial scale.’
I didn’t know who I was more angry with at this moment: Ben, Loretta, or Morrie. I directed it at Loretta first.
‘Why didn’t you tell me about the Ben plan before?’
‘Couldn’t. Not till he was out.’
‘You didn’t trust me? Well, thanks a lot, Loretta.’ I felt betrayed.
Morrie stepped between us. ‘It wasn’t personal. The fewer people who knew we were planning to get him out the better.’
I backed off and walked a short distance away. I had refrained from contacting Ben for more information because I had assumed there would be tight security and even tighter surveillance of inmates following Joe’s death. Many times I’d thought of contacting Ben, but I just couldn’t think of how I could do it without revealing what I already knew. If anyone at the prison was listening in, a member of the syndicate would soon hear of it. Nevertheless, it was galling to think that Ben had known so much. I walked back to stand in front of Ben. ‘You could have said something.’
‘But I did!’ Ben said, exasperated. ‘That’s why I wrote duff on the documents you brought for me to sign. Duff. With three exclamation marks. What more do you want me to do?’
Oh, yes. Ben’s scrawl on the papers. DUFF!!!
‘Right,’ I said. ‘The exclamation marks could only mean a nation-wide plot to steal millions of dollars’ worth of cattle by a syndicate of conspirators including the Victorian justice minister and going all the way to Darwin to Allyson Coleman and the mysterious Paul, who is engaging BlackTack operatives to assassinate anyone who finds out about it.’
‘Exactly,’ said Ben. ‘Except for that Darwin stuff, and Allyson whatshername, and Tack Operations, and some bloke called Paul.’
I took that in. It appeared Ben didn’t know the details. ‘What did Joe tell you? Was there someone at the prison he was afraid of?’
‘He only told me about the cattle scam. He had a plan to make money for himself out of it. I don’t know anything else.’
‘You don’t?’ I closed my eyes. ‘Then Joe barely told you anything worthwhile. We’re no closer to figuring out who killed him. And I doubt very much that you are on any list.’
‘You are a target, Ben,’ said Loretta softly.
‘Oh sweetie, keep it up. You’re just amazing.’
‘Leave her alone,’ Ben said. ‘Loretta has only ever been decent to you. If you have to be a sarcastic bitch, throw your barbs at me.’
‘Very well then, here’s three for starters. First, you’ve blown your parole chances, and Mum will be furious. Second, if you were a target, Ben, you’d be dead by now. And third, I needed you to stay in jail because I was going to break into Enrique Nunzio’s office and get some proof of this duffing business. Now how will I get in there?’
Ben blinked. ‘You want to break in to Athol Goldwater? And you think I’m an idiot.’
‘I don’t get it,’ said Loretta. ‘What do you care about the cattle stealing? And what is with that horrible creep with the gold chains and the beer gut? He acts like you’re working for him.’
‘That’s none of your business.’
Morrie let out a sigh. He went to the truck, lifted out the box of vegetables, and carried it inside the house. Ben went to follow him. I pulled him up by the arm.
‘What did Joe say to you? Exactly.’
Ben gave me a pleading look. I let go of his arm.
‘He told me he had a phone, and was in contact with Foxy Meow who was going to help him figure out how they did the hack with the cattle collars.’
‘Who?’ asked Loretta.
‘Velvet Stone,’ I said.
‘Yeah, her. She’s famous for hacking into prisoner ankle bracelets,’ said Ben.
‘Is that all of it, every word?’
‘Later, he said he used the phone to record a conversation. Smoking gun, he reckons.’
‘How did Joe Phelan figure out the specifics of Pugh’s conversation? It took me ages to work out what was what on that recording.’
Ben shrugged.
‘Who was helping him in the prison?’
He shrugged again. ‘Never said.’
Morrie came out and took another box of vegetables from the truck into the house.
‘What happened about the recording?’
‘Nothing,’ Ben said. ‘He thought he could get a lighter sentence, or money, I don’t know. Stuff. Anyway he died before he could put the plan together.’
The old bloke jumped in the driver’s seat and drove the truck into a shed.
‘Anyone working at Athol Goldwater called Paul?’
He thought for a while, frowned. ‘No.’
‘What about a redhead? A ranga work there?’
‘No.’
A dead end. No way into Nunzio’s office. No lead on the shadowy Paul. And I needed to know by Monday. It was hopeless.
‘Wait, the contract manager, he’s a ginger. Comes to inspect things occasionally.’
At some point in my searching, I’d come across a listing of the Corrections Victoria executive team, including photos. I was
certain I’d seen a man with ginger hair and beard. I whipped out my phone. No network. I couldn’t verify it yet, and the memory was vague, but it was better than nothing. If I had Paul, I had leverage, and conceivably it was enough to make a new deal with Percy. It was cause for celebration, though perhaps a little premature to open the champagne.
Morrie came out on the veranda. ‘Who’d like a cup of tea?’
That would do for now.
30
MORRIE HAD put an ancient cast-iron kettle on the wood stove. Loretta and Ben were last seen wandering off, holding hands, to some secluded place on the farm. Fifty acres, Morrie told me. Not his, he said, he was a caretaker while the owners were having a rare break.
The house used tank rather than town water, and, judging from the candles and lanterns around the place, no mains power. But the little house was clean and tidy. The bare floors were swept. Filtered sunlight shone through large windows on the kitchen table, antique scrubbed pine with a drawer. Morrie had set out floral tea cups. He took a few smaller pieces of split log from a basket on the floor and threw them into the glowing wood stove. The air carried a pleasant tang of wood smoke. It was the perfect off-the-grid hideout. I was tempted to stay.
‘How did you pull off the escape?’ I asked.
‘Talbot farmers’ market. I bought some veggies, a few plants, some jars of pickles.’ He gestured to the jars on the table. ‘Parked the truck round the corner. Told the guard I had a crook back, and I needed Ben’s help to carry them to me car.’
He poured some hot water into a teapot, gave it a swirl, tipped it down the sink.
‘Ben got in the back, and I drove off. Easy as you like.’
Once he’d made the tea, he went into the pantry and cut a few slices of boiled fruitcake. The tea was strong, and the cake heaven, sending me into a spiral of nostalgia — Sunday visits, distant relations, country football meets — that was not entirely traumatic.
‘Any spare vehicles around here that go?’ I asked. ‘I need to get back to Woolburn.’
He took a set of keys off a nail in the door frame. ‘Drive a manual?’
An hour later, the good people of Woolburn celebrated my return with a tickertape parade. Except there were no cheering crowds, and the ticker tape was thousands of pieces of paper, swirling around in what I chose to believe was a celebratory flurry.
I drove to a quiet street behind the pub and parked the white nineteen sixty-four EH Holden — three on the tree, windscreen visor, driver’s door visor, and venetian blinds on the back window. As I walked around to the pub, the wind swept up a pile of the loose papers, and one stuck to my leg. I peeled it off. Kelton McHugh: a steady hand. I surveyed the main road of Woolburn. McHugh leaflets as far as the eye could see, gathering in damp muddy piles in the gutters. People drove over them and they stuck to their tyres. A man in an apron was sweeping them away from the front of the post office.
‘Good bit of rain,’ he said.
I nodded. ‘How about that McHugh, eh?’ I said, holding up a leaflet. ‘Claims to care about the environment, and look at this! What a tosser.’
He seemed shocked and turned his back on me.
I walked to the Woolburn Hotel and found Freya’s mother in the cupboard used as the accommodation reception.
‘Had a few people enquiring after you,’ she said.
‘Yes, thank you. If it’s alright, I’d like to check out and back in under a fake name.’
She didn’t blink. ‘No worries, I’ll put you in a different room, too.’ While she adjusted her books, I asked how Freya was.
‘Good,’ she said.
I took the key and went up to my room. Lime-green walls, orange carpet, mauve bedspread, a good view of the street. I stretched out on the bedspread with my phone. The hotel’s wi-fi was up, and I went to the Corrections Victoria website and stared at the photo of Mark Lacy, the executive with ginger hair. If only Colin Slade was still alive to corroborate my hunch that he was Paul.
News of Ben was scant. A low-risk minimum security prisoner who absconded on a day trip to the market was not going to send alarm bells ringing around the state. I put the phone down and stared at the cobwebs above me. How do I raise the issue of heroin with Brophy? A part of me clung to the hope that he was genuinely very ill. If I was wrong, I might offend him. If I was right …
Someone tapped on the door.
‘What?’
‘Bloke downstairs reckons someone’s hit your car,’ said a male voice.
The vintage Holden had been in perfect condition when Morrie Swindon handed me the keys. I cursed my luck, grabbed my bag, and slouched down the stairs. I walked out onto the street, wondering who had seen me driving Morrie Swindon’s car. Then I pulled up short. There he was, Shane-fucking-Farquhar, leaning on his Commodore, chewing a nail.
‘Hardy, you vindictive cow. Where’re you going?’
‘Farquhar, you brainless slob. I’m checking on my car.’
‘That fucked up Mazda of your brother’s?’
I ignored him and walked around to the back of the pub. The EH appeared unharmed. I walked around it, all the panels were still in mint condition. Then the penny dropped: someone had wanted me out of my room. I turned to go, but Farquhar blocked my path.
‘Thanks to you,’ he whined, ‘the deal with Kylie’s on hold.’
His flipping deal was the least of my worries. ‘Thanks for letting me know.’
‘Once again, thanks to you, I’ve lost out.’
I tried to walk around him, he stepped in front of me. Our eyes locked, we stood facing each other in the deserted street, a Wimmera stand-off. If a tumbleweed had rolled by, I would not have been surprised.
‘How’d you find out I was back in Woolburn?’ I said.
‘Bloke in the post office.’
Never mind Facebook, the real threat to privacy was busy-bodies in country towns.
Farquhar folded his arms. ‘You deliberately left the farm paperwork at home, didn’t you?’
‘The truth is, no. I brought the folder with the papers to the farm, when I opened it, someone had taken …’ Loretta! I connected that dot to another, and a picture began to form. ‘Shane, really, it wasn’t deliberate at all.’
He sniffed, moving wet ick in his nasal passages, and spat it at my feet.
I nearly gagged. ‘Well, thanks for the chat, but I’ve got things to do …’
A crowbar he’d been concealing behind his leg clattered to the ground. He picked it up.
‘Nice car, this. Shame if something happen to it.’
‘It’s not mine.’
‘Then you have some explaining to do.’ He swung the crowbar and smashed the side mirror off.
I froze.
‘My message to you, Hardy, is simple. Go back to Melbourne, get the papers, and bring them the fuck back here. Take them straight to Kylie, like, this weekend. Tell her the proposed land-sharing partnership between her and your pal Shane is a top idea. Got it?’
I nodded. ‘Got it.’
Shane smirked. I reached into my handbag and took three steps towards him. A glorious cloud of confusion came over him. I held the yellow taser in both hands and fired the cartridge at his crotch. The shriek stuck in his throat as his teeth clenched and his body seized up. I held the charge a little longer. Then the current stopped, and he dropped to the ground. He rolled around, clutching his groin, moaning and groaning like a big sook.
I bent to him, used a low voice. ‘My message to you, Shane, is simple. Get fucked.’
I gathered up the wires, dropped the taser in a nearby wheelie-bin, and kept walking. There was so much more to say to him, but I didn’t. When I reached the corner, I turned to look back. Farquhar was hunched over on all fours, then he staggered upright. Gingerly, legs wide, he picked up the crowbar. Then he stepped, one foot and the next, and got into his car. Witho
ut gunning the engine, or a burnout, or any primal roar of man-car hybrid, he made a timid U-turn, replete with indicator.
I hadn’t skipped in a long time, not since I was a child. Yet here I was, weaving through the snowdrifts of McHugh leaflets. It was a rare delight. And there was no wiping the grin off my yap. I couldn’t wait to tell Phuong: And then I tasered his …
No, I couldn’t tell her any of it. There were legal issues, complications. But maybe one day I’d tell her because, damn, I needed to tell someone.
31
MY PHONE rang as I was letting myself into my room.
Bunny Slipper: ‘I haven’t been able to get any useful dirt on Allyson-with-a-y Coleman. What about you?’
‘Not so much about Allyson, but I have more pieces of the picture.’ I told her everything I had uncovered. And everything Colin Slade had told me, leaving out the bit about Brash killing him. I also told her all the details Ben had given me, but not where I’d heard them. I couldn’t trust Bunny not to go to the police about Ben.
‘The contract manager?’ she repeated when I got to that part. ‘That’s quite a wild allegation you’re making there. If you can’t back it up, there’s a little thing called defamation law that comes into play. If he sued, it could ruin the ABC, and the lawyers here would never let me run it anyway. Conservative politicians make management paranoid. Imagine their glee if I falsely accuse a senior public servant.’
‘But if that public servant was found guilty?’
‘They’d all back away, act shocked, and hang him out to dry.’
‘And if I can prove Pugh is involved?’
‘They’d also take revenge on me, with smears in right-wing press, and on the organisation, with a massive budget cut.’