I recalled the crowded Minogue household, the empty Waughan one, and said, 'Penny needed a friend.'
Alison left the restaurant. Chandra remarked, out of the blue, 'Even if that two-legged line of snot did tell the jock, we're all right. He wouldn't believe we were going to actually do anything.'
'Because we're a pack of raving lunatics,' explicated Rory. 'And we are. We bloody are.'
'Too right,' commented Virginia. 'On a night like this.'
On the footpath, in the quiet mid-week town, businesses had closed shop. One cab cruised. A couple of night-strolling tourists browsed the flood-lit window displays under awnings. They dallied. When I saw that they were reading prices and looking at coloured pictures of houses on the real estate agents' strip, I ceased being suspicious of them. Chandra's Subaru station wagon and Virginia's four-wheel-drive with a boat trailer attached stood out in their parking spots. I noticed Rory was wearing my Nikes, not her bush boots.
'Where's your car?' I demanded of Meghan. She responded with the uncanny reading of my mind that Virginia showed, explaining that her creek-crossings were too dangerous, that Rory had picked her up in her truck, and that 'it's okay, Margot. I have my key-ring.'
'Good.'
'And on it is the key to what my boss calls "the Port Water godown".'
The last time I had been to the airport, it was to meet Vanderveen in his private helicopter. I vaguely remembered tin sheds towards the mangroves.
'It has electricity, yeah?' I was showing signs of nerves. 'So you can just take the Subaru into it, and shut yourself in?'
'Margot,' Chandra pulled my arm, and I looked down at her. She grinned, 'Do you think that was necessary?' She pointed at the twelve-foot runabout comfortably hooked to the back of VeeDub's car. The pair, I thought, were serenely at home in this shire. One wouldn't be surprised if an identical outfit turned the corner into the bare street right now, five minutes to midnight. She was laughing at me.
So was Virginia. 'You should see what else she has brought. Wetsuits, the lot.'
Rory was impressed. 'Goggles, flippers, spear-fishing equipment?' She reached into her commodious pockets and pulled out a white stone. 'I have this,' she skited as if it were a weapon. Meghan examined it professionally and gave it back with no comment.
'So you three are in the godown. Virginia and I park at the terminal, so as not to arouse suspicion. Then we ride the bikes down the runway, rendezvous near the lab, okay? And take it from there.' There are two strips perpendicular with one another: the major one for commercial craft and the lesser one for charter and private planes and helicopters. The intersection of the roads to these two activities occurs immediately after the gate. It was quicker to get to the warehouses via the tarmac, and, I determined, less obvious, there being no lighting there. Security was sure to be about.
Seventeen-year-olds with their probationary licences in their first cars buzz Alison as she drives her old brown Falcon along the wide empty streets to the canal development some kilometres from the town centre. Two Datsuns drag her off from a lonesome traffic light, with high acceleration in the low gears and lousy mufflers. The wet road gleams straight in front of her. She floors her right foot, six cylinders beneath the bonnet respond; within a couple of hundred metres, she overtakes the second. Adrenalin rush. The series of roundabouts ahead with their planted palms challenges her to take on the first. She speeds up to the tail-light, then, changing down, with high revs, weaves into the right lane of the semi-circle, leans into the altered camber, then, gearing to the superior power of her car, leaves them for dead. By the time she gets to Penny's she has assumed the character of a lout in her head. Her speediness is arrested somewhat when she sees Lenny asleep on the leather divan and Tilly snuggled up in a doona, sucking her thumb, her wide eyes tired and entranced by an animated version of an adult movie—Men in Black—on the TV screen. She murmurs motherly words to her beloved daughter and kisses her hair. She does the same to her other child, and grins at the adult women, who stand and wait.
'Black coffee is what I need, if we're going to do this,' states Penny.
'Plenty of sugar for me,' accepts Alison, as she goes to settle down at Neil's desk.
Readily sharing involvement in the task, Penny offers Iris her bedroom. Checking that Lenny is fine where he is and turning off the television, Iris bundles up Tilly, doona and all, carries her to the boudoir with its en suite and lies down on the expensive mattress.
Normally, I do surreptitious jobs by myself, my way, with thorough preparation, a thermos of warm tea among other tools in my box of tricks, everything in its right place and my body fit for the unexpected. Now, not only was I encumbered by help and assistance, physically I felt like shit and didn't really know why we were doing it. Too tired from two nights without full sleep, the blood sloughing off the walls of my reproductive organs stabbing pain like the knives the Little Mermaid felt when she exchanged fish-tail for legs and the damaged Achilles tendon giving my heel curry, I wasn't up to commanding a team. On the other hand, I was running on adrenalin and analgesics and whatever other chemicals kick in when more than usual is demanded. Bereft of the necessary talents, skills, information and womanpower by myself, I was thrilled by the danger, pointless or otherwise. Relinquishing control, letting the decisions fall into consensus, I, consciously, gave up direction as one of my tasks. I knew no more than anyone else, had no better idea of strategy nor what was in store. Virginia drove slowly, easing the trailer over the bumps and pot-holes with the rattle of tin in the galvanised steel, while Chandra had zoomed off like someone with a train to catch, neither attracting undue attention from the traffic unit on patrol.
'I should have secured that petrol can,' I muttered.
Virginia's calm at the wheel inspired the trust one would like to feel for a comrade-in-arms or a fellow castaway on a raft of folk facing survival at sea. Knowing that released another feel-good chemical in my brain. I checked behind us and saw moonlight glint on the outboard motor.
'A break in the weather.'
The rain had stopped. Clouds parted, but hung like mountainous seas frozen in the sky, stalled above the earth by barometric pressure. It seemed the moon was moving with the grace of a ship under sail. There were two vehicles in the air terminal car park, locked late-model company cars. The first flight was due at dawn. I took the mountain bike, Virginia the road-racer. She kept to the tar and I traversed the puddly grass, but we arrived at roughly the same moment at the group of storage sheds. Rory materialised from the shadows in my quiet shoes and showed us into the godown through the small side door.
Chandra was in her wheelchair already. The rest of us stood for our confab. There was nowhere to sit anyway. Although these sheds were windowless, a narrow line of weak yellow light had indicated to Meghan that Tiger Cat was probably right. Someone was working in the one three doors down. They did not make drugs in this cleverly obvious place during the day. Rory, one of those rare individuals who could whistle a Manhattan taxi from Queens, would go on cockatoo duty while we raided the laboratory.
'First, we should ring Alison and Penny,' Chandra said.
'No,' disagreed Meghan. 'Get into the factory first, secure it.'
'Why?' Virginia asked Chandra.
'Why?' I asked Meghan.
Rory, more used to meetings of this sort than I, folded her arms and looked from face to face like a chairperson, ready to step in and mediate, if necessary.
Chandra replied, 'They'll be waiting for contact. We don't want them to go sleep, or have nothing to do.'
Meghan's explanation was more manic and circuitous but I gathered that she was aching for the action to start and wanted to set up her PC portable at a desk with chair, preferably a high stool and bench where she felt comfortable and could fully concentrate. Rory considered the options and supplied the compromise. With herself as the go-between, with her various whistles and bird-calls, hiding midway near the wall of the vacant depot outside, she said Chandra should stay with her
car in the shed, ring Alison apprising her of our situation with an update, reassuring Penny and her that we would be back in touch, and then be ready for signals should strife erupt. Meanwhile Virginia, Meghan and I could do the commando bit. There was only the weasel in there doing his chemical wizardry, assuming our informer had told the truth. Meghan was bursting with excitement as if the vendetta were personally hers. Virginia's energy was quiet and menacing. I glanced down to see if Chandra was at all miffed, but her eyes twinkled, appreciating the intelligence of the division of labour, that aims are accomplished step by step and they also serve who sit and communicate; networking was her specialty. Rory, tossing her lucky stone, rehearsed her wordless vocals, attaching meanings to the sounds for procedures following all possible contingencies. I missed my thermos of tea because my mouth was dry.
We moved according to plan and snuck up to the pedestrian door of the hangar with its tell-tale sliver of light. Virginia shocked the daylights out of me by savagely banging the tin wall while I was bending forward to examine the latch with my pencil-torch. Fortunately, the heavy-duty chain was hanging loose with its pendant padlock. The weasel, if he wasn't already spilling his powders in panic, would be frightened out of his wits by the caterwauling of Meghan that accompanied VeeDub's racket. Meanwhile, I quietly jemmied the door. Silence came in tempo with the impact of a kettle-drum beat the second I released the catch. Stillness while we counted, calming our breath; then, it was positively Beethoven, the way Meghan slowly pulled the steel chain across the jagged metal of the hole, link by link. I kicked open the door. Sure enough, he was shitting himself. Wonder-woman in triplicate swam before his eyes.
His weapon was out of reach. It was a self-loading .32 calibre pistol, for which no licence can be obtained; absolutely illegal. A quick look at the magnification in the lenses of his glasses calculated with the degree of difficulty in hitting a moving target with such a firearm—unless he practised by day in a games gallery, which was possible—had me moving towards it. Virginia went directly to him. Meghan, swinging the chain like a bikie, walked around the walls examining the contents of the shelving. He didn't know who to watch. The factory was a neat set-up, with workbench and stool, Bunsen burner and test-tubes, white stuff and pharmacy scales, his cigarettes and hand gun, under a low-slung pool table light on a pulley. Cupboards with narrow brackets riveted to the shed walls had fake tin doors. In the darkness of the front of the hangar, mechanics' tools were in a mess around a vintage aircraft in pieces. All of the offensive business could be demounted in minutes to take the appearance of the garage of a fanatical enthusiast. Indeed, the weasel himself could act that part with no character affectation by slipping on the greasy coverall hanging at the ready on a standard coat-rack. With the looming Virginia staring him out, threatening to whip off his spectacles if he moved his eyes, I had ample opportunity to grab the gun and remove the clip. Meghan lost it and started smashing bottles on the concrete floor. Indecision, more than sticky faeces, more than continuing fear of us, held him to his seat. Plainly invasion of his premises had happened before, would happen again, and we were not the cops. His workshop was inherently dangerous. He knew that.
'Piss off,' he said.
Meghan, with no thought for the consequence of her action, took offence. She whirled the chain and smashed him in the head with the padlock. Then she took a bottle of ether and put it in her pocket, saying, 'We might need that.' Her icy foresight was in stark contrast with her out-of-control temper of a moment before.
'I heard you had a violent streak,' I wailed, as I went to examine the body on the floor. He wasn't dead.
'Remove it,' ordered Dr Featherstone, the boss. Then she found behind the coat-stand a broom and proceeded to sweep up the glass she broke.
Virginia and I dragged the limp form out to Rory, who picked up his feet and the three of us carried him to the godown. Chandra had rope in her car. When I returned to the hangar, Meghan had rearranged the laboratory to suit herself. It was functional. I frowned in wonderment. The shelves were clear, Bunsen burner, test-tubes and pharmaceuticals were nowhere to be seen, and she was wiping the bench with a cloth.
'Quick work,' I commented. 'Why did you do that?' I asked unhappily.
It's all in there,' she indicated a big black garbage bag. 'Gun too.' She dismissed me. 'Don't trust cops.'
The clip was in my pocket. I hauled the rubbish into the darkness by the plane and left it. The three others arrived as Meghan was fastidiously scrubbing the seat of the stool with disinfectant. Virginia took the PC off Chandra's lap and laid it on the bench. Rory reported only one movement on the drome. Night security firm checking the doors of the terminal and the Flight School hangars. 'He had a torch and flicked a calling card at each place he stopped. Not a worry. Not doing any more work than paid for, apparently.'
'Nevertheless,' reckoned Meghan. 'Time is of the essence.'
'It's just too cocky by half to leave that weasel alone all night without support,' I agreed.
'No,' said Virginia. 'Yes, they are cocky. But they will have back-up.'
Rory returned to her post. If bad guys turned up I didn't know what she could do apart from whistle in the dark. Chandra pressed out the numbers on the mobile. Meghan brought her computer to life. Virginia and I stood sentry, each privately figuring a plan of action if Rory whistled interruption.
The snatches of the conversation I caught both between Chandra and Alison and between Chandra and Meghan conveyed to me that Alison, or Penny, had found the ingenious co-ordinate geometry of Neil's sabotage plans in his geography home-work. He had a map of the east coast of Australia with all the known shipwrecks described in degrees of longitude and latitude. He had downloaded safe passage navigational routes from international shipping, hobby and professional fishing and cruising yacht club sites. Then, apparently, he'd written a program to alter the database of the highly technical, electronic mariners' compass software for both operating systems. So that if he got fifteen minutes on the cruiser's computer, he could make the skipper on the high seas think he had plenty of draught beneath his vessel when in fact he was heading for shoals. He had factored in a complicated virus that would make correction of the course completely confusing, creating reefs and coral islands where there were none. If the steering was computerised, his formula was fail-safe, because the only way the seaman could get out of it would be to go entirely manual with visual input, should he find out in time.
Meghan was relatively impressed, but 'it's such a boys' thing, isn't it?' she kept saying.
'Couldn't we do something more simple and practical?' inquired Chandra.
'Of course,' the scientist responded.
'Well, what are we wasting time for?' asked Virginia, from the doorway.
'Aw,' Meghan demurred. 'He's given me some ideas. A clever little, thorough little nerd, he was.' Meghan's rash behaviour was beginning to give me the shits: what an arrogant spoilt brat!
Chandra used that beautiful phone-speaking voice of hers to wash firm flattery of her son's ingenuity and righteous passion over Penny Waughan's sore heart, and signed off with, 'thanks, we'll need it.'
Rory's whistle, car coming, on road, turning left, triggered swift movements. Meghan pressed one key on the laptop, and closed it. Virginia threaded the assault and battery weapon through the hole in the bent door, holding the cleaned padlock. Meghan had a moment of indecision about the light, but Virginia could not have been following the intrigue of Neil's cunning because she had figured out how to close shop and nodded. We were in darkness. VeeDub quietly opened the door. Chandra was first out. Meghan hurried to push Chandra through the long, clinging grass behind the neighbouring building. Car wheels splashing on the tar made my bowels quake. Needing my pencil torch to illuminate the work of her dexterous fingers, Virginia manipulated the chain through its hole in the jamb from the outside and managed to press the arch of the padlock inside, linking the chain together quite tightly. As we crept past the weasel's parked car, VeeDub squatted bes
ide a back tyre, took off the cap and stuck a matchstick in the valve and let it down. Sensibly, she replaced the cap. A large black-winged creature flew across the moon. Rory hooted, car stopping.
Virginia and I heard it and skedaddled to the shade of the next door depot, flattened ourselves against the wall and held our breath. Two men sat in the front seat of the tow truck, their faces registering surprise as one popped his door and the cabin lamp revealed their expressions. Whatever Virginia thought, she was right about one thing. They discerned no light under the side-door of the workshop, no chemist inside. They circled the car and found the flat tyre.
'You got a key to the padlock, Paul?'
'No, mate. The lazy little shit has rung up someone to pick him up.'
'That could be so, but why not us? We're his minders.'
Paul considered the younger chap's logic, but wasn't having a bar of it.
'Girlfriend, what's the bet?' Plainly Paul and his partner were not senior to the pharmacist in the organisation, otherwise they would not be guessing about his personal life.
'Hey,' called the younger guy, rattling the chain. 'He's locked it from the inside.'
'Well, that's it, isn't?' Paul returned to his truck, as oily in the diffuse moonlight as the wet tarmac behind. Light misty rain began.
'What do you mean?' The fellow asked.
'They're at it, aren't they?'
'I never remember no mattress in there.'
'Who needs a mattress?'
'What about the puncture?'
'Cool it, kid,' Paul pulled rank. 'We'll come back in half an hour, let them sleep.'
'If they haven't got a mattress, how come the light's out?' The younger fellow was reluctant to leave with questions unanswered.
'Why haven't they got a mattress? You don't know they haven't got a mattress. If you worked in a place like that, at night, would you have a mattress? Of course, you would. They got a mattress.'
'Okay, all right, but what about the flat?'
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