‘This is Jock. I’m Doober, by the way.’
‘Chris.’ He stands and shakes Doober’s hand. Jock doesn’t respond to Chris’s outstretched hand; he makes a show of carefully wiping his hands on the rag he brought in.
‘Chris is a friend of mine,’ says Doober.
Jock blinks to acknowledge this. ‘What’s up?’ he says.
Doober leans back on the bench and crosses his bare arms and legs. He seems happy.
‘My niece was murdered a few days ago in Hagley Park,’ Chris says. ‘She’s the daughter of the Night Train.’
Jock fires a look at Doober and stops wiping his hands. Chris sees that Jock’s suspicions about him are hardening into dislike.
‘She’s half Japanese,’ Chris continues. ‘The police won’t tell us anything.’
‘He got locked up for the night just for asking questions,’ Doober tells Jock.
‘Do you think a Kiwi could have done it?’ Chris asks.
‘Could’ve, mate,’ says Jock.
‘I think he means to ask if the organised resistance would make that kind of hit,’ says Doober.
‘Could do. Half Jap. That’s fucked up.’
‘He means did you guys do it?’ says Doober.
‘No,’ says Jock.
‘Did you talk about it?’ says Doober.
Jock’s face wrinkles as if something stinks. ‘Yeah?’ He turns to Doober and his face says, Where’s this going?
Doober is enjoying the interrogation. ‘Was it tabled as a possible mission?’
‘Nah, mate. Not that. Not us.’
‘Thanks, Jock.’
‘Yeah.’ Jock turns and struts out. The three ends of a tattooed cross poking out from his singlet indicate a crucifixion scene covering his entire back.
‘Could be a rogue unit,’ offers Doober, ‘but they couldn’t organise a piss-up in a brewery. Then there’s the Lord’s Angels, the outfit Jock’s unit was basically at war with a while back. They’re out of Wellington. They went back there.’ He grins.
‘I’ve heard of them.’
‘I could give you an address in Wellington but you’d need some balls to see those guys about this issue. They’re very, um, racially orientated.’
‘You think they might have done it?’
‘It fits their style: easy target, non-military.’
Chris stands. ‘Thanks for your help, Doober.’
‘No worries mate. Sorry about your niece, eh. I’ll get your car and that address and you can be on your way.’
He heads south via New Brighton to avoid the CBD, intending to go straight back to the farm. Traffic is sparse and the lights all go his way. He hopes Patrick is at home and not out trying to find him. He passes a phone box; it’s too good to resist. But when he brakes, the pedal goes straight to the floor; there’s nothing there. Eighty metres ahead and approaching fast is a four-way intersection. A single car has stopped at the red light, a Toyota ute. He goes to change down and the engine graunches loudly; it won’t go. The oncoming lane is clear so he swerves into it, back and forth, to buy a second of time; tries to chop down again. It goes, the engine screams, and he tries second. He hits the horn, tries to chop down again; it won’t go. He knows not to hit an immoveable object such as a tree or power pole but something that will give. It has to be the back of the pick-up. He honks and swerves again to gain a microsecond. He manages the chop down to second just before he backends the Toyota. His head hits the windscreen, his shoulder hits the door and he’s on the road. There is broken glass. The pick-up comes to a rest across the intersection. The light turns green. He gets up. I’m okay, he thinks, touching the tender spot on his forehead. I could be dead.
‘What the fuck?’ The driver of the pick-up is looking back, out of his window. For an awful moment Chris thinks it’s the bogan from yesterday, but it’s not; it’s another bogan. This one’s older, with a short bushy beard. When the man’s feet hit the road they are in jandals rather than steel-capped boots. The lights have changed again and traffic is running between them. He shouts across the road, ‘What the fuck do you call that, mate?’
Chris sees the ute has no obvious damage. He holds up a hand. ‘Sorry, mate, you okay? Brake failure. My foot hit the floor, nothing there.’
The man seems to slump a little. He circles his shoulders, mutters into his beard and looks for a break in the traffic. Chris is relieved he won’t have to disarm him. He puts the little car in neutral, turns the wheel and begins to push it to the side of the road. The man’s arrival is signalled by a lightening of the weight.
‘Brakes failed?’
‘Yeah. I went to stop to use that phone box up the road. Lucky I took my foot off the gas back there, I suppose.’
‘Yeah, it could have really hurt.’
‘Ha. Sorry man.’
‘Nah, nah, glad you’re okay, mate.’
The Mazda is parked and Chris feels a lump growing on his head where it hit the window. ‘Is this kind of brake failure common?’ he asks the man.
He breathes deeply and exhales. ‘I wouldn’t buy a Mazda, personally. You usually get a warning with brakes though. If the lines have been cut they’ll feel sluggish before they fail.’
‘Right.’ The car drives like a brick at the best of times and Chris is unsure whether he used the brakes this morning before they failed.
‘I’d tow you, mate, but you don’t have brakes.’
‘I think someone’s tried to kill me.’
‘I don’t know about that, mate.’
‘Where can I find the brake lines? I want to see if they’ve been cut.’
‘On a Mazda?’ The man kneels in front the car and checks the road surface. Finding it clean, he turns on his back and wriggles underneath. ‘Yeah. Mmmm.’
A police car pulls up, apparently summonsed by a member of the public.
All I need, Chris thinks. The police are often Settlers who have come to the end of their first probation period. They usually resent the job and are quick to anger. Worse yet are the Koreans, who tend to take out their frustrations with the Japanese on Kiwis. The officers climb out of their car and put on their peaked hats. They’re Japanese and bored. He fears his recent stint in the cells will give them an excuse to throw him inside again. Because the man is under the car looking at the brakes, Chris can bow respectfully.
‘Yes?’
‘Sorry, my brakes failed,’ Chris says in Japanese.
They see the bogan’s legs poking out under the car and their eyes widen.
‘I’ll need spanners and a torch, mate,’ comes his muffled voice.
The officers laugh. They laugh again, and Chris sees the funny side too. The man wriggles out and sits up to see what’s happening.
‘They thought I’d run you over,’ Chris tells him in Japanese. The man leans his head back and laughs as well.
There is a mirror in the waiting room at the A&E and as he paces the empty room he glimpses the alarming lump growing on his forehead. It’s the size of half a squash ball now and he can feel its presence, an awful jiggle, as he walks. He had initially rejected the offer of a lift to hospital but the police had insisted and even dropped him off. And now, as the headache kicks in and the lump continues to grow, he is grateful that he will be seen by a doctor and given painkillers. He tries a payphone.
‘Chris?’
‘Patrick. Thank God. I thought I was going to miss you. It’s been crazy.’
Patrick speaks English. ‘Where have you been?’
He quickly recounts his misadventures and his current location at the A&E, aware as he’s doing so that he will have to broach the subject of Chiyo’s lie and how much that will hurt his brother. ‘Patrick,’ he says, still unable to come to it, ‘I have to go back to Wellington this evening or I’ll lose my job, so I can’t come to Sarah’s funeral, but I can come down again next week, Monday and Tuesday. Also, about the car—’
‘Chiyo told me what happened at the park.’
‘I was coming to that, b
ro.’
Patrick sighs. ‘She’s told me everything. I think.’
‘Good.’
‘She says she lied about who she met, and the other kid seeing a “black man”. No one saw anything. But everything else she said, the time Sarah was out of her sight, the locations, that’s all the same. So she met a Japanese man. A man she is or was interested in. She says he’s from Japan, a new regular at the kids’ park on the weekend and they got chatting and started meeting on his lunchbreak without his kid there. I have two doubts about her story. One, she claims she let Sarah out of her sight for only two minutes. I think it was longer. And two, I suspect that this guy who was always at the fucking park may have set her up so the killer could get Sarah. Now, I could be wrong about him. Endo is his name and he’s in Wellington next week on an education conference about Non-Business English. He’s a big-shot in education apparently. He won’t recognise you, so can you talk to him and check him out? If he’s a cracker, I think we have a lead.’
‘Okay. Endo. I guess if he refuses to talk to me, like on a face-to-face level if I “run into him”, that’s information in itself.’
‘Exactly.’
Chris tells Patrick about the brake failure and concludes that they could have been tampered with at the police station or at the tow yard. ‘The tow operator has a deal with the police,’ he says. ‘They have his card at the front desk, so—’
‘I’ll talk to him.’
Doober’s motives are obscure to Chris; he suspects the man could be active against the Japanese and just as easily be killing for them, but he knows Patrick will come to an understanding quickly. The prospect is oddly thrilling. He gives Patrick Doober’s address. ‘He knows who I am, who you are, and about Sarah. If he claims ignorance, it’s a lie. I can’t believe I didn’t get to see you.’
‘Yes, you need to go straight to the ferry. Don’t worry about Sarah’s funeral, Chris. There’s no point in losing your job and you can help by seeing this Endo character. I feel better for talking to you. Thanks for all your help.’
Chris glows. His chaotic weekend is instantly ordered by his brother’s praise, rendered useful at a single stroke. ‘No worries, man.’
‘Stay out of jail next time!’ Patrick manages to laugh.
Chris laughs as well. As he puts the phone down, he sees Doober standing at his front counter and Patrick’s vast shadow darkening him and the wall behind him; Doober saying nervously, ‘You’re a big unit, mate?’ Then the headache resumes and a new pulsing beat announces itself in the lump on his head. His name is called by the nurse.
Chapter 7:
Number four
Chris sighs deeply as he opens the door to his tiny Japanese-style one-room apartment. A gift from Patrick, he feels more grateful than usual for owning it and being able to live alone. He unrolls the futon in his living/sleeping area and lies down. The contusion on his forehead has begun to drain into his right eye, making it a dirty yellow-brown and squishy like rotten fruit. On the return voyage he went directly to the sleeping lounge and slept the whole way back, yet he feels he could sleep again. He wonders about Miss Kurosawa, about bringing her back to his apartment. It’s a fantasy, he knows. The danger of being seen is too great.
Once, when very drunk, he brought a woman back to the apartment. It was closing time, 11 pm, mid-winter, and in retrospect he suspects she needed a bed for the night more than anything. She was an Auckland supporter and wore an Auckland scarf and a lot of clothes. Swaying, they had looked at his posters: Lennon, the Night Train. ‘My brother,’ he said and she laughed. And Colin Meads, the old-school lock who inspired him to run with the rugby ball one-handed. She hadn’t recognised Meads. ‘My other brother,’ Chris said. His memory of their fuck was that it went on and on. She left her socks and jersey on. Her dark hair spread out over the pillow. He was too drunk; the condom felt thick and barred any intimate sensation. Desperate to feel something he imagined her to be Japanese, the young racist teacher at work, Miss Sato, lying on the photocopier. It didn’t help. He soldiered on, waiting for some feeling to develop, until she finally said, ‘You’re killing me,’ and he stopped. She got up early in the morning and he let her go, feigning sleep. The apartment was exactly the same as before except for one thing: the insides of the windows were heavy with condensation, something that never usually happened. She was real after all.
The phone rings. It’s Marty. He’s heard about Sarah and expresses his condolences. He sounds sad. Says he has some weed. Chris explains he has to work in a couple of hours because he owes a colleague some classes. Marty says he’ll pop around quickly.
Half an hour later Chris opens the door and Marty is standing there with his disappearing blond curly hair. Magician-like, he opens his hand to reveal a big unlit spliff.
‘Jesus.’ Chris hauls his friend inside before anyone can see.
‘What happened to your face?’
‘I banged my head just here on the inside of a car window. The dead blood or whatever is draining down.’
‘Dead blood? Lucky you teach English not science.’
‘Tea?’
‘Thanks.’ Marty drops the joint on the table. ‘For you, Chris; might take the edge off.’
‘Cheers. You know, I didn’t get to see Patrick the whole time I was down there.’
‘How come?’
‘I got thrown in the cells for trying to discuss the case at the jail. Don’t ask. Then my car got towed. I got it back and the brakes failed … hospital, ferry, home. The funeral’s in a couple of days. I can’t go.’
‘Jesus. I’m sorry to hear that, mate.’
Chris sits down heavily at the table. He’s aware of the time and his impending appointment with Masuda’s wrath.
‘You’ve been in the wars all right,’ Marty adds.
‘Yeah.’
‘Three years old?’
‘Yeah.’
‘Jesus, there are some psychos out there. The country’s fucked.’
‘A funny thing happened in the cell: I had a kind of vision of Johnny Lennon. He said I should help Patrick. Like it was up to me to save him. It was weird. Very intense and realistic.’
‘Did he say anything you didn’t know already?’
‘Um, not really.’
After looking gloomily at the floor for some time, Marty says, ‘Did he mention dark-haired strangers? Going on a journey?’
For a chilling moment Chris suspects his friend knows about Miss Kurosawa, that his secret is out. But Marty couldn’t know. And she has blue hair anyway. ‘No?’ he says.
‘Be nice to just get on a plane and leave, wouldn’t it?’
‘Yeah.’
‘Or steal a yacht or something.’
It’s an old dream of theirs. Chris nods and thinks of Miss Kurosawa.
‘Got time to cut my hair?’
‘Eh? Your crowning glory? Your mum’ll kill me.’
‘We’ll put it in a bag for her.’
‘But I don’t know how to use a curler and hot irons.’
‘Very funny. Just do it like you do Bill’s.’
Chris has clippers and every month, Bill, his old locking mate and the team captain, comes around for a number four and a beer and tries to convince Chris to quit his job and play rugby. The Japanese have made it mandatory that rugby teams be captained by Maori as part of their policy against former racist colonial masters. The result is that the official captain is not always the actual captain, and if a game gets niggly, refs will sometimes call in exasperation for ‘the real captains, please’. They always know that Bill is the real captain.
‘Sick of the piss-takes?’ Chris says.
‘Not really. I think I’ll miss it.’
The truth will come out, Chris thinks. ‘Do you want to watch?’ he asks as he takes the clippers down from the cupboard. ‘I’ll cut it here but I can get the bathroom mirror.’
‘No.’ Marty takes his jersey and shirt off. He’s a bit serious.
Chris holds the buzzing cl
ippers above Marty’s remaining blond curls, still thick at the back and sides. ‘I can’t do it. They’re too beautiful.’ Marty doesn’t bite so Chris begins shearing. Marty catches a tumbling bunch of ringlets, looks at them, then lets them fall to the ground. It’s a sombre haircut. It feels to Chris like a coming of age, a rite marking the end of Marty’s childhood and passage into decades of work as a casual labourer in road gangs and construction. The result is jarring: Marty’s hair has been such a big part of him. ‘A number four,’ Chris announces grimly as he turns off the clippers.
Marty runs an experimental hand over his head and goes to the bathroom. ‘I’ll get used to it,’ he says when he returns a minute later, wet-faced from washing his head and neck.
Chris has swept up the hair with a brush and shovel and is about to drop it in the bin.
‘I actually will give that to Mum,’ Marty says.
‘Right.’
‘No, really.’
Chris tips the silky hair in a plastic bag.
‘Thanks.’
‘Don’t tell her I cut it,’ Chris says. ‘She’ll never forgive me.’
‘I won’t.’
A moment of heavy silence.
Chris ruffles Marty’s scalp. ‘I’ll miss it, you know. Is there a special occasion?’
‘We’re going down on the ferry for the Wellington–Canterbury match. You know, big piss-up, lots of fights.’
‘Shit, I’m working.’
‘Word is there’ll be a huge fight this time.’
‘Yeah?’
‘Yeah … ’ Marty runs his hand over his shaved head again, regretfully it seems. ‘You know, with us being regional champs now. Few points to prove.’
‘Right, yeah. Pity I have to work now,’ says Chris. ‘I would love to sit down with a couple of beers, some good music and a smoke this arvo.’ He means it. The trip to Christchurch he could do without, though: the downing of beers until oblivion, and the punch-ups and the bullshit and the hangovers. And he senses Marty knows that.
‘Yeah,’ Marty says significantly. ‘Shame.’
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