Challenge

by Paul Daley

  I can smell the sweet sherry on her breath. She has a short fuse when she drinks, which is frequently and too much these days.

  Then, suddenly, it’s all, Oh come here, love and she opens her arms and I, this big bloody boy, let go and rest my head on her soft bosoms and then I start sobbing, first in little bursts, then in big, snotty, convulsive howls.

  Tell Mummy what happened, darling, she says. Tell Mummy. She’ll make it okay.

  It was Tom, I blubber out. I think maybe he’s killed someone. But everyone thinks it was me. I’m scared, Mum. Are they going to come and put me in jail?

  Mum says she’s damned well going to sort it out tonight—and I won’t be taking the blame for anything that that Tom McQuoid has done. She doesn’t care if the bloody McQuoids run the bloody world.

  I say, Mum—you’ve no idea how much the guy deserved it—the bloke Tom fixed up. He’s Chisel. He’s hurt so many people. He did this to me. And we saw him nearly kill a man who was just standing there on the station with his wife and kids. Tom said he was going to fix him up as soon as we saw that happen. And then when this happened to me … I don’t think he did the wrong thing, Mum.

  Nonsense, Danny, she says, you can’t go through life just using your fists to sort things out. I’ve told you. Tom’s got a temper. He’s a bad example. And you, you’ve got your HSC coming up and you’re out fighting. Are you trying to break my heart, too—after your sister, after all she did to me?

  I can’t stop her ringing Paddy McQuoid there and then, waking Kate, who answers and says it is inappropriate for Bev to call at such an hour.

  I’ll give you inappropriate, Bev says. Do you know where your damned son is? I bet you don’t Mrs la-di-da. I’ll give you an earful whenever I like—your wicked boy, he’s getting my lad in trouble again with the fighting and I won’t stand for it! Let me speak to Paddy now, I don’t care if he’s asleep.

  Paddy comes to the phone, tells Bev he’ll look for Tom and call her back.

  Ten minutes later the phone rings and Paddy says, Bev, Bev we’ve got a big problem here—a very big problem. We need to meet up tonight with the boys and work out what to do. The newspapers took pictures of the boys fighting, so we’ve got to work it out or I’ll be ruined.

  You’ll be bloody ruined? Bev says. What about me and my boy? You McQuoids, thinking you can own the world with your law firm and all your money and politics and your influences at the school and here and there.

  And so, at 2 am, there is a meeting around the kitchen table at Kokoda Street, with Bev and Paddy McQuoid and us two bloodied boys—and Vince Dethridge as the McQuoid confidant and witness. And here it is agreed that neither Tom nor I will ever talk of what has happened again.

  Paddy says he has ins with the police, through the firm and from his time as a prosecutor. His mates down at Russell Street have already assured him nobody in CIB—or Homicide—would be too concerned about a hoodlum like Vic Chislette.

  Homicide, Bev screeches, Homicide—if there’s Homicide involved your boy’s going to take the blame for killing that bloody wretch. My boy’s done nothing. It was your boy, Tom.

  Bev, Paddy says, let’s be plain about this. It was our boys who were involved in this—not my boy. We’re not going to get into blaming one another here—into dobbing in our mates who look after us, are we eh—Danny? Tom? If one of these boys go down, both go down—you understand, Bev, boys?

  I’m pressing dunny paper against my bloodied head. Tom and I look at one another. We both nod.

  Tom says, Fair enough, Dad.

  I stammer out, Yyyyeah righto, Mr McQuoid.

  Bev—listen carefully, Paddy says. It’s for the best. You have to do what we say or the boys’ lives are over. You hear?

  Vince Dethridge sits silently throughout, impassive but for the occasional nod to emphasise something Paddy says.

  There is a long silence while Bev makes tea. First, she pours sherry into her teacup before topping it up from the pot.

  Paddy says, Bev, don’t take Danny to the hospital for this. I’ll send around our Doctor Spencer to stitch him up.

  Bev nods.

  I convulse again, lean over and start sobbing into my hands. I stutter, Mum, I can’t breathe, I can’t breathe.

  She comforts me, says, Darling, slow down and concentrate like the doctor showed you. It’s just a panic attack, love.

  Bev asks, What about the photographs—Danny says the photographers were there, taking pictures of him when this Chislette, Chisel, was punching him and everybody thinks it’s him kicking him when he’s on the ground. Danny’s going to get blamed and he says he never did it.

  Paddy replies, Well, we’ve got a pact here. If ever the police come you just say that you don’t know who did this to him. Nobody can prove it. The face of whoever did this to Chislette was covered. And Danny and Tom were dressed the same, see, so they can never prove anything. But I can make it so the police don’t come asking. Everything will be okay, smoothed over—and everyone will be looked after. Okay, Danny? Danny, you and Tom needn’t rake over this anymore. In fact, I don’t want you ever to discuss it again. It’s over. Danny, you are very special to our family. We’ve been looking after you and we’ll look after you, make sure your talent and your hard work pay off—wherever you are in life. You are one of us. And we care for our own, Danny. Always.

  And so the lie is planted in Kokoda Street. It took root and grew as we became men.

  And it is true that Victor Chislette died on the wet tram tracks at the intersection of Flinders and Swanston that night. In his place Vaughan Charles was born to Paddy McQuoid and Vince Dethridge. They sponsored and supported him through rehabilitation—anonymously at first and, later, less so, as they saw the potential dividend of their investment. Tom knew of course. Tom always knows everything.

  So, Vaughan Charles became the most exotic curio in their collection—an embodiment not just of their philanthropy but of their faith in the power of redemption, but mostly of money and influence.

  But Vaughan wouldn’t be owned. Well, not entirely.

  I had to admire that about him—his willingness to bite the hand that had fed him after all these years.

  43

  The document left in the geocache for me says that ASIO has been closely watching two groups of men, one in Sydney, one in Melbourne, for the past fortnight. Both are believed to be planning attacks, it says.

  Last Saturday afternoon after my meeting with Drysdale, the agency was granted ten arrest warrants because it apparently had detailed intelligence based on HUMINT, surveillance, email and telephone intercepts that one of the groups—which included a Normalian and four other Muslim men—may have been planning an attack, perhaps a suicide bombing, at a public event such as a concert or a football match.

  The other arrest warrants were for five members of an extreme right-wing group, the Crusaders of the Southern Cross, whose aim is to fight the fire of Islamic extremism in Australia with fire. They had been training with automatic weapons and explosives on a farm outside Canberra, plotting an attack on sympathisers of the infidel—shorthand for anyone sympathetic to the plight of Normalian Australians.

  The Crusaders had mentioned in phone calls and emails their plans for a possible bomb attack on Parliament House or the Sydney Opera House.

  The document says that Drysdale was aware of this intelligence when he sought my support for his lock-’em-up-and-throw-away-the-key terror laws on Saturday. Even though his stated reason was, singularly, the purported threat of jihadi terrorism.

  But, critically, the document says unequivocally that there can be no reason, beyond the domestic political, that ASIO, under the Drysdale Government, did not immediately execute the warrants against either of the two groups. It asks: Why wait, given the purported seriousness of the threat?

  It goes on to say that in the American Embassy’s view, thanks to its sources within ASIO, there is considerable internal concern about the agency’s failure to act, under pressure fr
om the government, on the arrest warrants.

  So the Crusaders are still out there. And so, too, are the Muslim extremists. I’m holding proof that Drysdale has leant on ASIO not to act and, worse, that ASIO, courtesy of its government-friendly director, has capitulated. That is, if the document is authentic. And who can tell? I have no option but to believe that it’s genuine.

  I am in my office watching the monitor and waiting for the Vaughan press conference. He’s late. This buys me a minute or two, but what I really need is hours or, better still, days.

  All I care about is the document that I’m now clutching to my chest.

  Eddie says: What’s that?

  Nothing or everything, I say.

  Well, use it well, she says. Want a drink?

  I don’t answer. She fills two tumblers with whisky. I scull mine, say, Fill her up please, Eddie, and she does and I drink the whole thing again.

  The monitor flickers to life. I expect to see Vaughan Charles on the podium in the Blue Room. Instead I get Deth.

  Since I saw him last night he’s shaved, tied his hair back in a ponytail.

  Eddie asks, What the fuck—Danny, you know about this?

  No, I say, since when do I know what’s going on?

  Deth stands at the lectern. All of the journalists know him—the older ones, personally, the younger ones by reputation.

  Deth begins, Ladies and gents, welcome. I’m the stand-in guy today. Vaughan Charles is indisposed. He can’t make it. But you can follow him on Twitter as @Devilindrag. Then again, that might just be Father Tom McQuoid. I’m not sure which really. Anyway, whatever, I’m pretty sure that account will be closing right about now. And so I’m here to talk about time and motion. Physics. The tick of the clock. A kick. A kick in time that changed the life of Vaughan Charles—turned him into a paraplegic. Vaughan Charles, you all know, is the victim here—he was someone else at the time. Victor Chislette—Chisel. He was Chisel in 1974. Most of you have seen this picture of him being attacked, kicked in the head. Most of you think the man attacking Mr Charles is Danny Slattery. But you’d be wrong to think that.

  Deth is holding up two photographs. One clearly depicts me shaping up to punch somebody (Vulture, his name was, Vulture—nasty little prick, sidekick of Chisel). That was just before Chisel floored me and I crawled back into the crowd. The second photograph shows a man—reasonably assumed to be me because he, too, is wearing cords and a white t-shirt, although his face is obscured by a piece of clothing—about to kick the injured Chisel in the head.

  Now this, Eddie says to me, is very fucking interesting.

  And it is becoming even more so, because Vaughan Charles has just wheeled himself into the front of the press conference.

  Eddie, I say, I’m done with interesting. I think I’ll start packing some boxes.

  She grabs my arm, says, Wait. Listen.

  Deth steps off the podium, says, Aha, let’s welcome the guest of honour, then asks him, Mr Charles, you think Danny Slattery is responsible for putting you in that wheelchair?

  Vaughan says, Yes, because he’s the last person I saw before I went down. I’d just punched him … assumed it was him, yes, him having hidden his face, coming back for me. And the eyes—I remember his eyes even though his face was hidden.

  Fair enough, Mr Charles. You can’t really tell eye colour from these old black-and-white photographs. Do you remember what colour those eyes were?

  The eyes were blue-green—just like the water in this book at primary school—there was the manta ray, like a sea monster, I always had dreams about it swallowing me, and the water, well it was that colour. Same as Danny Slattery’s eyes.

  Like the manta ray’s water? Deth asks.

  Yeah, they reminded me of the colour of the water in a picture in that book that I stole from the library in primary school.

  The journos laugh.

  And the feet, Mr Charles, the feet—which foot did your attacker use to kick you with?

  Left. The left foot.

  Deth turns the photograph around so that Vaughan can see it properly.

  Sure?

  Yeah, ’course I’m sure. It’s the last thing I saw—the left. He kicked me with the left foot. You can see there in the photo, where he’s about to kick me in the head, he didn’t have any shoes on. I remember that clearly. It came back to me years later—he didn’t have shoes on. Bare left foot.

  What colour are Danny Slattery’s eyes? Deth asks.

  I’ve seen him face-to-face plenty of times, sat opposite him. He says, They are blue-green.

  Like the manta ray’s water in that library book you pinched?

  Yeah. Pretty much.

  And would you know much about Danny Slattery’s kicking technique? I mean he was a famous right-foot kick when he played Aussie Rules, right? A great player. A premiership captain. Fantastic with his right foot, but known for his weakness off the left. I reckon he’d have put one into you with his right foot, yeah, if it was him that did it to you? And in the photo here, whoever is kicking you is using the left foot. With no shoe.

  Deth shakes the other photograph of me shaping up to Vulture just before Chisel king hit me, to emphasise it to the room.

  This is Danny Slattery taken on the same night, right? Deth asks.

  Yes, Vaughan says. I’m just about to punch him, but you can’t see me in the frame. I’ve looked at this photo a thousand times since that night.

  Okay then—look at his feet, Deth says. He’s got shoes on, right?

  Vaughan nods in agreement.

  But you’ve still assumed for all of these years that he was responsible for this injury to you?

  Yeah, Danny Slattery. It’s him in the photographs.

  Are you sure?

  Well, it’s him in one of them. Definitely.

  Sure it is. But can you just tell the ladies and gents here if someone else ever told you, confirmed to you, that Mr Slattery was responsible for doing this to you?

  Um, yeah—Paddy McQuoid. I had a lot to do with Paddy over the years. He helped look after me through the law firm after the, um, incident. He said it was Danny, that the boys were out together that night, and that Danny done—er, did—it, but they all agreed never to speak about it. But to look after me and we’d all get on with it. I was hopeless. No real job. A thug. Then no legs. But in a strange way it gave me an … opportunity. And also Tom, I’ve had a lot to do with Tom—with Father Tom, Father Tom McQuoid, I mean—in recent times. He’s confided in me, too, that it was Danny. But he said that it doesn’t really matter anymore. But it does to me, because everyone’s after Danny for what he did but I want to say that Danny did me a favour, really …

  Fucking Tom, I say to Eddie. Unbelievable. Did you know what a snake he’d been?

  Suspected, Eddie says. It’s why I’ve kept him close. Quiet, listen.

  Deth interrupts Vaughan, holds up the two photographs, shakes both, asks, Mr Charles, do you think it’s possible that these pictures feature different people?

  Possible, he says.

  So, the first person is clearly Mr Slattery—you can see his face.

  Yep.

  And the second—the man kicking you in the head, with the left foot, the left foot without a shoe?

  I dunno, Vaughan says, then smiles—the smartarse. But he gets where Deth is leading with this.

  Okay, you’ve spent a lot of time with Tom—Father Tom—you say. Describe his eyes.

  Blue-green.

  Same as those of whoever did this to you. Like the manta ray’s water, yeah?

  Yeah.

  Same as Danny Slattery’s?

  Yeah.

  Mr Charles, did Tom McQuoid do this to you?

  Well, Mr Dethridge, Vaughan replies, I guess we’ll never know because whoever did this to me had their face covered, right?

  44

  I’m busting to get into Question Time so I can belt Drysdale. If I’m going down then the old cunt is coming with me.

  I’m pacing the off
ice. Steve Crawley and Usher, Errol and Eddie are here with me. Usher says they’ve got the petition. Fine, I say. I’m going to need to see the names on it before I call a spill.

  Not a chance, she says.

  Then no fucking way, I say. Deal or no deal, sweetheart.

  Crawley is looking sheepish, saying to the floor that it’s the only path ahead for the party, I’m sorry it had to happen like this, Danny, etcetera, etcetera.

  The phone on my desk rings. That never happens unless it’s Eddie calling from her office next door. And she’s right here.

  We all look at it.

  Eddie answers. Nods. Says, You sure? Um, okay? Hang on.

  She covers the phone with her hand and says, Kirsty, Steve, Errol— do you mind … the leader and I need a minute.

  They leave.

  What’s up? I ask.

  Um, Danny, Eddie says, there’s an old man at House of Reps security—says his name’s Terry Morgan. Says he’s your dad. You know anything about him?

  I look Eddie in the eye, say, Eddie, this came out of nowhere for me yesterday. A letter from this guy, Morgan. I’ve never known who the old man is—just gone with Bev’s story about him being Terry Slattery, KIA Malaya. Always figured that was rubbish. My birth certificate says father unknown. So, I thought maybe this Morgan’s just a crank—he’s got this story about being a stick-up merchant, convicted murderer, looked after in the courts, through parole, by McQuoid, Dethridge & Partners. That bit checked out. So, um, no, I can’t rule it out. I’ve been trying to get Bev on the blower to talk it through but we keep missing each other … though she left a message last night saying Morgan was a bad bastard and could’ve been Dana’s dad. But not mine.