White Knuckle Ride

by Alan Carter

  ‘Hello,’ said Dave to the customs man as he handed him his passport.

  ‘Good morning, sir,’ he said. ‘Anything to declare?’ Before Dave had time to manufacture his lie, or make up a really good joke, the customs man looked over Dave’s shoulder.

  Dave turned. The thin man in the good suit stood examining Dave, his left hand cupping his chin, his index finger tapping on his pursed lips. He looked past Dave, and nodded, precisely.

  ‘Thank you sir,’ said the customs man. ‘Have a nice stay in the Netherlands.’ He put Dave’s passport on the counter and looked up for the next passenger.

  A more circumspect man, given to cosmic questioning, might have taken a moment at this point. Dave, on the other hand, believed in gift horses and never looking them in the mouth. He picked up his passport and walked through.

  Dave stood in the freezing wind looking down at the houseboat. It was sagging and badly in need of paint and possibly a bilge pump. It was dark inside.

  Dave looked back at the row of well-preserved three-storey brick buildings squeezed along Amstel, Centrum. They had shiny brass number plaques and warm yellowish glows from upstairs windows. Across the canal were other houseboats and street lamps and pretty trees. Dave barely had time to note its olde-worlde charm before a cruising police car sent him scurrying onto the deck of T.0.59.

  He hurried to the door of the upper cabin, pushing it open to reveal wooden steps leading below. ‘Hello. Um, Angus, here,’ Dave called.

  He moved slowly down the steps searching the wall for a light switch. There was one at the bottom of the steps, but it clicked uselessly. Dave bumped into a table and then a chair before he found a curtained window. He pulled the curtains open, allowing in some dim yellow light from across the canal. The cabin was threadbare and dusty. There was a kitchenette and a dining room table with a kerosene lamp. He put his bag of diamonds on the table and got a thin blanket from the bunk bed built under the stairs.

  Dave went to a door at the end. ‘Hello. Angus MacThingie here.’ He opened the door to a little toilet and shower. He went back to the bag of diamonds and put it under the pillow of the bed. He sat on the bench seat under the window shivering in his thin Telstra shirt. He was cold and hungry and tired. He could use a beer. He looked at the bag poking out from under the pillow under the stairs. He got the bag and emptied the stones into the drawer in the kitchenette. He stood, shivering, and looked out the window. Across the canal, on the wall of a big building, the sign said Amstel Diamonds. ‘The glamorous world of international diamond smuggling,’ said Dave, a little ungraciously.

  There were many bridges and many women sitting in windows in their underwear. There were blonde women and dark women, fat women, gaunt women, African women, Thai women, Japanese women. There were women who may not have been women. Men window-shopped, occasionally being let in the front door.

  Dave roamed, freezing and hungry. He passed ‘video cabins’ with X-rated signs in neon pink, Live Shows, Live Girls, sexual memorabilia shops, marijuana cafes amidst the Heineken signs. And there seemed to be drunken youths from every country in the world stumbling and staggering with forced laughter amidst the red and occasionally green lights.

  However, Dave could not find a real shop. He needed warm clothes. He asked some young guys who replied in American accents. ‘You can get sex and drugs twenty-four seven, but try buying toothpaste.’ ‘Or a decent hamburger.’ ‘All the shops shut at six.’

  A man in a black leather jacket stopped next to them to light a cigarette.

  Before Dave could approach him a Moroccan youth appeared in front of him. ‘Hey, how you going? Havin’ a nice time?’

  Dave doubted he was the diamond contact, but said, ‘I’m Angus MacFergus and I’m cold.’

  ‘Cool. Cool man,’ said the Moroccan. ‘You want anything? I got ecstasy. Really good gear.’

  ‘How much for your jacket?

  The Moroccan wore a denim jacket with a fleecy collar. ‘Jacket? What’s that? I can get anything, man. Not sure we call it that here.’

  ‘Your jacket. I’ll buy your jacket. And some warm pants.’

  ‘Fuck you, man. You want that, then go to the flower district. I’m selling drugs.’

  The offended youth pointed his finger at Dave then lost tension and floated away with the other pedestrians. The guy in the black leather jacket was talking to his cigarette packet but caught Dave watching and turned away before Dave could make an offer on his jacket.

  Dave saw a bright blue and red parka ahead. It was on a young guy outside a shop window where fat African women were gyrating in their underwear to no discernible common rhythm. The parka looked waterproof. It looked like it was full of some eiderdown or equally Nordically-tested warm material.

  Dave tapped the youth on the shoulder. ‘How much for your jacket, mate?’

  He said, ‘Fifty euros for the fuck and suck,’ in a French accent.

  ‘How about fifty pounds?’ Dave peeled off a fifty from his envelope.

  The youth in the parka stepped back and abused Dave in seemingly unpunctuated French. The youth’s two mates slapped the French youth on the back and pushed him in the chest, laughing and obviously urging him to accept Dave’s unintended offer.

  ‘The girls, not me,’ the youth finally said in English.

  Dave raised his arms in apology. ‘Sorry, mate. I want to buy your jacket. I’m freezing.’ Dave took out a hundred pounds and waved them.

  One of the African prostitutes banged on the window and gestured for them to move off.

  ‘Why should I freeze?’ said the French guy.

  ‘Two hundred pounds.’

  More French. His friends were urging him on. ‘Get his shirt. It’s cool,’ said one of them pointing to the Telstra shirt.

  ‘Okay,’ said Dave, ‘jacket, pants and shirt. Two hundred pounds for the lot.’

  Dave looked around for a place to change then dug another fifty-pound note out of his magic envelope and waved it towards the African prostitutes behind the window. The door opened and Dave and the French guy and his mates all piled in. The African ladies started yelling in Dutch. The French guys started assuring in French. The African women smiled and started speaking French to the boys.

  There was now no room to change in the window area so Dave grabbed the parka youth by the elbow and started up the stairs.

  A big Maori stepped out on the landing above. ‘What’s going on down here?’

  ‘Just a bit of a fashion parade, mate. Hands across the ditch?’

  ‘Not bloody likely.’ The Maori looked past Dave and yelled, ‘Hey, what are you lot all doing in here and not buying?’

  ‘They’re making sure this man doesn’t try things,’ said the Frenchman.

  ‘How about ten pounds for the use of the room? To change. Mate, I need some warm clothes. You can chaperone. Two minutes.’

  ‘Chaperone, yes,’ nodded the French guy.

  ‘Twenty,’ said the Maori.

  ‘The All Blacks are losing it.’

  ‘Thirty.’

  ‘Fair call.’

  The Maori opened a door to a tiny, windowless room. There was a single bed, washstand and tiny dresser. The ceiling globe cast a smoky blue light.

  ‘Very classy,’ Dave said to the Maori bouncer as he went in.

  ‘I’ll thump you,’ offered the Maori, mildly.

  Dave took out thirty pounds and gave it to the Maori, and then another two hundred pounds and handed it to the young guy. He peeled off his Telstra shirt and his pants. The French kid was doing the same but watching Dave very warily.

  As they swapped clothes Dave became aware of a slightly different tenor to the general commotion downstairs. He could hear a loud Aussie voice. ‘Let’s go darlin’. I like ‘em big and meaty, like me. Up this way? Fifty euros eh? Only place in the world where the prices haven’t gone up. You know, I reckon I’ve been in here before. Hope they’ve changed the sheets.’ The Aussie swayed into the doorway. It was the older business
man from Perth, from Schiphol. He was puffing from the stairs, his face bright red and sweaty.

  ‘You,’ said Dave in alarm.

  ‘Oh, sorry. Room’s full huh?’ He winked at Dave then fixed his eyes on the French kid now dressed in Dave’s Telstra shirt.

  One of the African prostitutes had pushed up onto the landing outside the room, and the Australian bumped into her as he turned away. ‘Changed my mind.’

  ‘Hey,’ said the Maori looking from Dave to the other Australian. ‘What’s going on?’

  The Aussie pulled a mobile phone from his pocket and said, ‘Contact. Go, go, go.’

  The Maori slammed him to the wall. The African prostitute screamed, her bright red bra and the landing wobbling dangerously.

  Dave grabbed the red and blue parka and started out of the tiny room, squeezing upstairs through the threesome of large people on the landing.

  The front door was being pounded. The French guys and the other African prostitutes howled and pushed back against the door. ‘Descente de police!’

  Dave clambered up another flight of stairs, turning to see the Maori and the Aussie grappling on the landing. The French youth ran down the stairs. The front door gave way and uniformed policemen pushed through the screaming Africans and yelling French. They rugby-tackled the Telstra shirt. Then the Australian and the Maori fell, tumbling down onto all of them amidst the screams and yells of a pretty good scrum pack.

  Dave raced around the bend and found an open window. There was a fire escape and he slithered down it into a series of alleys filled with garbage and the smell of urine and the sound of many scurrying things, smaller than Dave.

  Dave came out further up the street. The flashing blue mixed prettily with the red lights coming from the brothel window and the yellow from the street lamps. It was the light. It was frozen in balls in the night like … like …

  Dave nearly crashed into Margaret, who was berating a man in staccato Dutch. She turned to see Dave in surprise. ‘Angus!’

  ‘You speak Dutch,’ Dave said.

  ‘I shouldn’t come along here at night,’ she said, indicating the departing man. ‘Nice jacket.’

  ‘I’m trying to blend in, like a native.’

  ‘I’m never going to get rid of you, am I?’

  ‘Can’t fight good luck.’

  She raised an eyebrow, but then took in the commotion down the street. ‘Actually, if you wouldn’t mind, you can escort me out of here. I’m getting sick of the attention.’

  ‘Okay. Can we eat?’

  They went away from the police action, Margaret switching into tour guide mode. She’d explained on the plane that as part of her travel agency she regularly saw the sights so she could tell her clients first-hand where to go. She’d already told Dave where to go a few times by that stage. As they walked Margaret pointed out historic areas, listed the seafaring history of the Dutch and explained why the cyclists might be getting angry with him — because he kept blundering across the dedicated cycle lanes.

  And then they were back by another canal and standing in the middle of a high stone bridge looking at the yellow lights flickering in the dark water. She pointed across the canal. ‘There’s a wonderful restaurant up there next to Amstel Diamonds.’

  The sign looked familiar. Dave looked to the other side of the canal. ‘You’re not going to believe this, but I live up that way.’

  ‘You’re kidding! You don’t. In one of those gorgeous houses?’

  ‘A little closer to the waterline.’

  ‘What does that mean?’

  ‘I’m in a houseboat.’

  ‘How wonderful. That’s not a bad idea for tours. You know. Fly to Amsterdam and stay on a canal.’

  ‘Well, I don’t think they’d be keen to stay on mine. More your hovel boat.’

  ‘Oh? Why are you staying there?’

  ‘Ah, that’s a long story.

  ‘You seem to be good at those.’ She stood smiling at him, some lamplights gleaming from her eyes.

  ‘Enough about me. Let’s talk about you and me.’

  ‘Is this hovel boat one of your compulsions?’

  ‘Huh?’

  ‘On the plane. You said you were the impulsive type. Compulsive impulsive I think you said.’

  ‘And you remembered. Told you I’d wear you down.’

  ‘I think it was somewhere after Singapore. Not that you wore me down. But I must have been listening at some point.’

  ‘Ah, good, I think.’ There was a small boat coming along the canal with its lights on. Dave looked towards the Amstel Diamonds sign and where he supposed food was cooking. Margaret didn’t seem in any hurry to leave the bridge.

  He said, ‘I was listening to everything you said. I believe you told me you were married.’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘But there’s no ring.’

  ‘Maybe I’m simply not wearing it.’

  ‘And maybe you were lying.’

  ‘Why would I do that?’ She smiled. She was enjoying herself.

  ‘Maybe you thought it would put me off.’

  ‘Whereas it made no difference whatsoever.’

  ‘Maybe.’

  ‘You are right. I am a liar.’ She was flirting and she was good at it. ‘Are you?’

  ‘What?’

  She studied him a moment, then looked towards the Diamonds sign. ‘It looks too busy.’ There were some Volvos and a dark van all manoeuvring for parking spots nearby.

  She suddenly squeezed Dave’s arm and said, ‘Let’s go to your houseboat.’

  Dave could not quite believe his luck. He managed to gasp, ‘Yes.’

  She took back her hand and looked down, a little shy, but then she looked up and said, ‘See, I can be impulsive too.’

  Dave leant to kiss her, but she stepped past and he missed.

  He lit the lamp and turned it down. Margaret stood examining the inside of the houseboat.

  ‘So you reckon it might not make your tour list, huh?’

  ‘It did look better before you lit the lamp. Authentic would be the real estate word.’ She went to the window and looked out on the water. ‘Must be a policeman’s birthday.’

  Dave went to the window and looked out. ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘At the restaurant.’ She looked at him.

  ‘What?’

  ‘The police Volvos. The vans with tinted windows.’

  Dave looked across the water. ‘Are they?’

  She drew the curtains and they both straightened together and she kissed him. It was gentle and she tasted like white wine, but as he tried to kiss her more fully she stepped back, crinkling her nose.

  ‘Hold that thought, lover. I believe you smell.’

  ‘Testosterone?’

  ‘Possibly. Or twenty hours on a plane with a hint of three different kinds of very cheap Middle Eastern perfume.’

  ‘Ah. I stink huh?’

  She nodded, still smiling. ‘Nothing a shower and shave and clean teeth and nakedness won’t fix.’

  Dave’s mind went blank, like he’d put everything on the last race and was waiting for the start.

  She was speaking again. ‘What say I meet you in there?’ She pointed to the bunk under the stairs.

  ‘You bet.’

  Dave had shaved and showered as she’d instructed and stepped out of the bathroom and into the main room of the houseboat in Amsterdam wearing nothing but his best smile. Margaret was waiting for him.

  Unfortunately, also waiting were two men.

  ‘Oh,’ said Dave on seeing the men in the dim kerosene lamplight. They looked as displeased as Dave felt.

  ‘Angus,’ said the tough-looking one in a thick Scottish accent. He stood blocking the stairs leading up to the deck.

  ‘Ah,’ said Dave.

  The Indian man held a briefcase and looked from Dave to Margaret. ‘What the …’ he said in a London accent.

  Margaret got up from the table. ‘Angus, you’ve obviously got things to do. How about we take a ra
incheck. I can see this isn’t a good time.’

  ‘Wait,’ said the Scot. He had scars crisscrossing both cheeks. ‘Whit’s she daein’ here?’

  ‘I just met her,’ said Dave.

  The Scot looked from the bunk bed to Margaret to Dave and then down to Dave’s shrunken aspiration. ‘Ye just met her?’ He didn’t look like he believed any of it.

  ‘On the plane,’ said Dave.

  ‘And the brothel?’ asked the Indian.

  ‘Getting a jacket. It was cold. Speaking of which.’ Dave gestured towards the pile of clothes by the bathroom door.

  ‘Well, whatever was going to happen won’t now,’ said Margaret with what Dave was sure was regret. A lot of regret. ‘If you’ll excuse me gentlemen?’ She took a step to get past the Scotsman, but he grabbed her handbag.

  ‘Hey,’ said Dave.

  ‘Ah doon’t like surprises. Let’s see who we’ve … Ah. Deary, deary me.’ He pulled a plastic bag full of uncut diamonds out of Margaret’s handbag.

  Dave stood blinking, hurt.

  ‘Sorry, Angus. They looked valuable, and well, I did tell you I was a liar. I suppose I’m also a thief. Nothing personal.’ She fluttered her eyelashes.

  ‘Evidently not,’ said Dave, feeling further diminished.

  ‘Whit ye goot gooin’ here, Angus?’ asked the Scot. ‘A doublecross?’ He looked over to the Indian, then to Dave again.

  ‘Why would I travel all this way before I did it, if that’s what I was going to do?’

  The Scottish heavy passed the plastic bag of stones to the Indian, who had his briefcase open on the table.

  ‘Gentlemen,’ said Margaret, edging towards the stairs. ‘You’ve said nothing yet that in any way implicates anyone. So, I know nothing and I’d rather not know anything.’

  ‘It’s no’ up to ye to “rather” anything.’ He was continuing to block her.

  Dave said, magnanimously under the circumstances, ‘Come on. No harm, no foul. You’ve got the stones.’