By seven he had everything he needed packed for the trip and had found time to make a big feed of steak and kidney for dinner. Warren was home from the advertising agency eating it with him while Les told him his plans for the next two weeks.
‘So, Woz, old buddy, old pal,’ said Norton as they attacked the stew. ‘I’d get into this while you got the chance if I were you. ’Cause it’s the only decent meal you’ll be getting till I get back. For the next two weeks it’s back to McDonalds and the Pizza Hut for you, old son.’
Warren smiled as he ate. Loath as he was to admit it, Les was right. Warren hated cooking and the big Queenslander could certainly cook up a good home style feed when it came to it. ‘Ohh, I dunno,’ he said, forking up some more stew. ‘That Tom Piper stuff in the tins tastes pretty much the same as this.’
‘Good,’ replied Les. ‘Well, get yourself a couple of dozen cans first thing tomorrow. It’s on special this week at Flemings. Right next to the dog food.’
Warren smiled and conceded the point. ‘So, where are you going again?’
‘Just the other side of Coffs Harbour — some bloke’s property. But if anybody asks you where I’ve gone, you don’t know. Okay?’
‘Suit yourself,’ shrugged Warren, adding a little more pepper and salt. ‘But why all the secrecy with this bloke anyway? I mean, what’s the point? He’s just had his dial splattered all over the Telegraph. Unless you haven’t noticed, wally.’
‘I noticed it all right, you little shit. And don’t think your cynical remarks and innuendoes at the breakfast table this morning didn’t go unnoticed either.’ Warren grinned straight at Les. ‘No,’ continued Norton, ‘the poor bastard just had a nervous breakdown in England and I’m taking him up the bush for a bit of peace and quiet for a couple of weeks. Away from reporters and the rest of that shit.’
Warren’s grin turned into a raucous laugh. ‘Nervous bloody breakdown,’ he guffawed, ‘he looked all right in the paper this morning. I think the only nervous breakdown he had was when you showed him the spare room. I noticed you gave it a bit of a tidy up and took down my poster of Rodney Rude too.’
‘Yes. I certainly did my best,’ sighed Norton. ‘I guess there’s just no pleasing some cunts, is there?’
They finished dinner, then had a couple of cherry danishes Warren had brought home from one of his yuppie cake shops in Paddington. While Warren washed up, Les rang Eddie at the Sebel Town House and was surprised to hear that Peregrine had changed his mind about going out that night. Eddie would stay with him all night, Les needn’t worry and he’d see him in the foyer at six-thirty sharp. What Norton didn’t see, when he hung up, was Eddie sitting back on the turquoise lounge in the Sir Robert Helpmann suite, one eye on the TV down low, the other on the door with a chair propped under the handle and a third eye on Peregrine laying back on the bed eating a lobster, staring daggers at him and wanting desperately to go out somewhere, get drunk on champagne and do a bit of womanising. But Peregrine knew the only way he was going to get out that door was to go through Eddie, and he had more chance of getting through Turkish Customs with five kilos of hashish strapped to his head. Monday night in Sydney looked like being a very quiet one for Sir Peregrine Normanhurst III.
After the washing up, Les and Warren turned up the heater and watched a Clint Eastwood movie on Channel 10 in which Dirty Harry once more swept the streets of San Francisco clean of machine gun-toting low life, armed only with a .357 Magnum and without wasting a single bullet. It was a freezing cold night, Les had to be up early, Warren was tired and they were both in bed before eleven. The last thing Norton did before he hit the sack was take the spark-plug leads out of his car, just in case there might be someone in Bondi desperate enough to want a ’68 Ford sedan, the duco of which had never seen a chamois nor the interior a whisk-broom in the best part of a year.
TUESDAY MORNING WAS teeth-chatteringly cold when Norton got up at five-thirty and made some coffee and toasted sandwiches. There was no rain and not many clouds, but a bitter sou’wester was blowing — the kind that cracks your lips, freezes the back of your neck and makes your eyes and nose run. Thank Christ I’m getting out of this for a couple of weeks, he thought, as he tossed his gear in the back of the station wagon. He was out the front of Tony’s flats at six-fifteen sharp, but no Tony. Then Norton remembered something. When it came to getting his arse into gear Tony Nathan moved about as fast as a tortoise towing a speedboat. He gave him a couple of minutes then started bipping the horn, little ones at first, then he just left his hand on it. Before long, windows were being flung open and a torrent of curses and abuse in about twenty different languages and accents was being directed at Norton. After a minute or two of this Steelo, wearing some sort of coloured Balinese jacket with his camera bag slung over his shoulder, came strolling nonchalantly down the side passage eating an apple. Acting as if he had all the time in the world, he ambled towards the car, quite oblivious to the avalanche of vituperation raining down from above and completely oblivious to Norton fuming in the station wagon.
‘Come on, fuck you,’ cursed Norton as he reached the door.
‘Don’t panic,’ replied Tony casually. ‘We’ll get there.’
‘Don’t panic. Fair dinkum — you’re like a fuckin’ old moll. Get in the back too.’
Still taking his time, Steelo climbed in the back seat. He barely had time to find the seat belt, let alone put it on, before Norton spun the station wagon up Delview Street like he was doing a Le Mans start, sending Steelo, his camera gear and his apple sprawling all over the back seat.
‘Jesus fuckin’ Christ,’ sputtered Steelo. ‘What have you done? Just robbed a bank?’
‘In your arse Steelo, you prick.’
Steelo managed to retrieve his Johnathon. He was still chewing on it when they rocked to a halt outside the Sebel.
‘I TRUST YOUR brief stay with us was enjoyable, Sir Peregrine?’ smiled the desk clerk as Peregrine settled his account.
‘Yes, quite — thank you,’ he answered with a thin smile, trying to ignore Eddie’s stare and the smirk planted across the little hit man’s face.
‘And will there be a forwarding address, sir?’
‘There’ll be no forwarding address,’ cut in Eddie quickly. ‘After that unseemly incident in the bar, Sir Peregrine wants his privacy.’
‘I understand perfectly, sir,’ smiled the desk clerk. ‘Well, enjoy your stay in Australia, Sir Peregrine.’
‘He will,’ answered Eddie, winking at Peregrine’s scowl. ‘I’ll make sure of that.’
Eddie glanced at his watch: it was exactly six-thirty. At sixthirty and two seconds he was pleased to see Norton pull up out the front. He picked up the larger of Peregrine’s bags and walked out of the foyer, motioning with his hand for Peregrine to stay where he was. After checking out the street like a fox sniffing the wind he nodded to Peregrine to join him.
‘How’s things, Les?’ he said, tossing Peregrine’s bag in the back of the station wagon.
‘Good,’ answered Les. He got out of the car and moved round to the back. ‘What about yourself? Everything sweet here?’
‘Good as gold,’ winked Eddie. ‘Couldn’t be creamier.’
Norton turned his attention to a very sullen Peregrine, dressed in blue corduroy trousers, matching wide-shouldered jacket and the same trilby he had on at the airport. ‘Hello, Peregrine,’ he said. ‘How are you, mate?’
‘Fine,’ replied the Englishman tightly. He climbed in the front seat without waiting for anyone to tell him what to do.
Les noticed Eddie eyeing Steelo in the back. ‘He’s all right. He’s a mate of mine. I’m giving him a lift to Newcastle.’
The little hit man nodded an impassive approval. ‘Just wait here for a minute, Les,’ he said. Eddie jogged down to his Mercedes parked about a hundred metres down from The Sebel, opened the boot and took something out. He was back in an instant and handed Les a small overnight-bag.
‘What’s this?’
�
��A gun. It’s an old 9mm Robinson. So don’t lose it.’ Norton accepted the bag reluctantly. ‘Snooker it under the seat or in the tyre well. You probably won’t need it; but take it just in case. Have a bit of target practice. There’s two hundred rounds of ammo there too.’
‘Yeah — all right.’ Norton nodded without any expression.
‘Well,’ Eddie smiled and gave Les a quick handshake. ‘Have a good time up north.’
‘I’ll ring you as soon as we get there,’ said Les, getting behind the wheel of the car.
‘Do that. See you later, Peregrine.’ Eddie gave the Englishman a cheeky grin and tapped the roof of the car. ‘Keep smiling.’
Peregrine returned Eddie’s grin with a very sour, very quick, once up and down. Les gave the horn a toot and they were on their way.
‘Peregrine. This is a mate of mine, Tony.’
‘G’day Peregrine,’ said Tony, offering his hand. ‘How are you mate?’
‘Fine, thank you,’ replied the Englishman with a quick shake.
‘I’m dropping Tony off at Newcastle, about an hour and a half’s drive from here. Tony’s a photographer.’
At the mention of the word photography, Peregrine’s eyes lit up. He was also pleasantly surprised to meet someone who wasn’t either a hit man or a heavy. ‘You’re a photographer, Tony?’
‘Yeah,’ replied the Dan, without a great deal of enthusiasm. ‘Worst thing I ever done in me fuckin’ life.’
‘I dabble in photography,’ said Peregrine. ‘A close friend of the family back in England is quite a famous one.’
‘Yeah. Who’s that?’
‘Lord Snowdon.’
‘Lord Snowdon!’ Steelo was visibly impressed. ‘Shit! Is he a mate of yours?’
ABOUT HALF AN hour or so later Norton was on the other side of Hornsby heading towards the toll-gates at Mt. Colah and the start of the expressway; roughly the same time as the two English journalists introduced themselves to Katherine the PR lady at The Sebel Town House. They were handsome, dark-haired men, impeccably mannered with soft, rich, yet slightly strange English accents, and there was the hint of a smile in their inquisitive green eyes. They left their car just down from the hotel with a third journalist behind the wheel.
‘Yes, Katherine,’ smiled the journalist holding the camerabag. ‘We’re with the Manchester Guardian. We’re here to do a feature article on Sir Peregrine’s visit to Australia.’
‘Oh, what a shame,’ said Katherine, returning their smiles with a sympathetic one. ‘You’ve missed him by about half an hour.’
For a split second the smile in the two reporter’s eyes turned to icy steel. ‘We’ve missed him?’ said the one on the left.
‘Yes. He checked out at six-thirty.’
‘Did he say where he was going?’ asked the one with the camera.
‘No,’ Katherine shook her head. ‘I’m afraid Sir Peregrine didn’t leave a forwarding address.’
‘Was he with anyone when he left?’
‘There was a gentleman who stayed the night with him. But Sir Peregrine drove off with two other gentlemen. In a white Ford station wagon I think it was.’
‘The two men he drove off with, were they English?’
‘I don’t know,’ replied Katherine. ‘But the gentleman who stayed with him last night was Australian.’
‘And you’ve no idea where they went?’
‘I’m sorry.’
The two reporters exchanged a brief glance. ‘Okay, Katherine,’ said the one holding the camera-bag. ‘Thank you very much, anyway.’
‘You’re welcome, anytime,’ smiled the PR lady.
Grim faced, the two journalists returned to their car, where the English accents quickly disappeared to be replaced by a much stronger brogue.
‘Sonofabitch!’ cursed the one with the camera-bag. ‘We’ve missed the bastard by a half fockin’ hour.’
‘Christ!’ said the one behind the wheel. ‘It’s enough to make you sick.’
They sat in silence for a moment staring moodily at each other. ‘What do you think we should be doing?’ asked the third.
‘Drive back to the flat,’ said the one with the camera-bag. ‘Ring up. Tell them we’ve lost him — only for the fockin’ time being, though.’
The driver looked at his watch. ‘It’ll be almost midnight back there. Not the best time to be waking Liam with news like this.’
‘Nor his mother.’
‘Don’t be worrying too much about old Mrs Frayne,’ said the one with the camera. ‘That woman is well used to this sort of thing by now.’
NORTON’S PLANS FOR an enjoyable trip, cruising along listening to his new music and having a bit of a chat to Tony and Peregrine were well and truly thwarted, much to his disdain. He’d had the radio on very low, listening to nothing in particular as they headed out of Sydney and intended dropping a cassette in as soon as they got onto the freeway. Peregrine and the Dan, however, had got into an engrossed conversation about photography. Peregrine the pupil, was listening intently, and Tony the expert was in his element. Norton was like the cocky on the biscuit-tin: not in it at all. He drove along in enforced silence and by the time they were at Berowra he was fed up to the gills with f/1.8 lenses, f/1.4 lenses, light-emitting diode displays, depths of field, aperture-preferred automatic metering, silicon photocells and more bullshit that went straight over his head. As soon as he dropped his sixty cents in the basket at Mt. Colah, he slipped on a Divynls cassette. The band had got through the first four bars when Peregrine gave him a look of sour and utter contempt.
‘I say, Les,’ he bristled, with frigid politeness. ‘Would you mind turning that down, please? We’re trying to have an intelligent conversation here.’
‘Yeah, piss that fuckin’ shit off,’ barked Steelo. ‘I got to listen to that disco fuckin’ garbage four nights a week at the bar. I’m half deaf now from putting up with it — low fuckin’ top-forty shit that it is. Stick it in your arse.’
Peregrine had to blink at Steelo’s tirade. ‘I wholeheartedly agree,’ he nodded.
Norton reluctantly turned off the cassette and switched on the radio, but the local music was so bad and they made him keep it down so low he may as well have not had the thing on at all. He drove on fuming in silence. He was fuming so much he forgot he had to go through Newcastle and took the Wollombi turn off. Tony was so engrossed in bayonet-mounted lenses and four frames per second power winders with Peregrine he didn’t notice where they were going either. Then it dawned on Les and he screeched to a halt just out of Hexham where they rejoined the Pacific Highway.
‘Well, here you are, Steelo,’ said Les cheerfully. ‘Newcastle.’
Tony looked around him and screwed up his face in disbelief. ‘Newcastle?’ he howled. ‘This isn’t fuckin’ Newcastle.’
‘Yes it is. What’s that sign say over there?’ Norton pointed to a sign on the opposite side of the road: Newcastle 20 kms. Hexham 1km.
‘I got to get to Bar Beach,’ protested Tony.
‘Well I’m not stopping you,’ shrugged Norton. ‘And I sure as hell ain’t getting stuck in Newcastle traffic at eight o’clock in the morning.’
‘Jesus fuckin’ Christ!! How am I gonna get there?’
‘Walk. Catch a bus. How do you think, you wombat?’
‘I’ve got two bucks. That’s got to get me my lunch and my fare back to fuckin’ Sydney.’
Norton shrugged indifferently. ‘Snip your surfie mate Mark Richards. He’s the world champion. He should have plenty of money.’
‘Ahh, Jesus fuckin’ Christ!! Fuck it. Fuck, fuck, fuckin’, fuck, fuck …’ To an accompanying string of further profanities, Tony picked up his camera-bag and got out of the car.
‘See you back in the old steak and kidney, Steelo,’ grinned Norton.
Peregrine waved a quick goodbye just as Les bipped the horn and they were on their way again, Tony Nathan’s curses still ringing vividly in their ears.
‘I say,’ said Peregrine. ‘That was a bit
unsporting of you, wasn’t it? Leaving your friend stranded there without any money.’
‘Steelo?’ answered Norton. ‘Mate. He wouldn’t have it any other way.’ Norton watched Tony disappearing in the rearvision mirror for a second or two. ‘Now Lord Normanhurst, warden of the cinque ports or whatever you are,’ he chuckled, turning off the radio and replacing it with a cassette. ‘I think it’s well and truly time we got the Les and Pezz show on the road.’ He pressed the cassette, hit the volume and immediately the Divynls began howling into ‘Siren’.
‘Oh my God.’ Peregrine turned his face away in anguish. ‘That’s ghastly.’
‘No,’ grinned Norton, bopping away to the music. ‘That’s Christine Amphlett. She’s grouse. You ought to see her in her school uniform.’
After they’d travelled about fifteen kilometres or so Norton felt he’d had enough fun and Peregrine had copped a good enough blast of rock ‘n’ roll, which he evidently didn’t seem to be too keen on, so he turned the car stereo down. Considering he’d had an early night and not much to drink, the Englishman still seemed tired and edgy apart from the annoyance of the loud music, which had Norton a little curious as to why; although he did notice a definite bad vibe going in Eddie’s direction when he cheerily bid Peregrine goodbye outside the Sebel at six-thirty.
‘So how are you feeling now anyway, Peregrine?’ asked Les, realising this was the first real start of any conversation he’d had with the Englishman since they’d left Sydney.
The Godson Page 8