by Nick Spill
The loud crash made Terry jump.
“Perhaps we really have a thief upstairs,” he snarled at the inspector and ran up the stairs followed by John. At the top of the stairs he turned to the inspector.
“I think we need police protection.”
Grimble had wanted to stay in the basement, examine it more.
Plum Blossom heard a dull thud. She could not locate where it came from. She could no longer bear the isolation. She let out an explosive scream. She banged her head against the door.
Terry the Turk at the top of the stairs yelled into his house with his high tenor voice:
“Who’s there? Am I really being robbed now?”
The inspector did not appreciate the irony as he followed John into the hallway. Terry closed the basement door behind the inspector and marched into the living room to face Sergeant Cadd. The sergeant stood in the center of the Persian rug, hands behind his back, rolling on his heels, looking at the plaster cornices around the ceiling, like butter would not melt in his mouth. The bureau was shut.
Chapter Eight
Friday
“Have any trouble with Tony?” Matthew asked Clovis in the cramped room backstage that smelt of stale beer and cigarettes.
“You mean that big Samoan?”
“Yeah.” Matthew grinned.
Tony was the four-hundred-pound Rarotongan bouncer. He stood at the bottom of the steps leading up to the second floor lounge, the Gluepot, where the music stage was. He was security and Matthew’s friend. Matthew made sure Tony got 5 percent of the gate, and Matthew always drew a big crowd.
“They just searched my violin case as if I was carrying a machine gun,” Clovis joked, relieved that Matthew was not going to vent in front of the other members of the group.
“They’re really nervous tonight, for some reason.” Matthew winked at Clovis as if to reassure him he was among friends.
“Oh. I should introduce you. Clovis and I go way back. You know Rodger, on keyboards.” Clovis shook Rodger’s hand. In the Cat’s Pajamas, Rodger had a full-length beard, hair to his waist and a paisley waistcoat that Clovis swore he slept in. Rodger now sported a crew cut, a dark suit and white shirt with a narrow black tie.
“You dig the outfit? Rodger is the weirdest one here. Looks like he’s a Mormon. This is Sheila. Every good group deserves a girl bassist.”
Sheila raised her tuning machine to Matthew. She wore a teased platinum blonde beehive. The tight black leather skirt was too short and showed the tops of her black nylon stockings. Her black sequined top and black eye mascara completed her look.
“Love your outfit,” Clovis replied.
“Yeah, it’s my new beehive. Very patriotic.” She pouted.
The others hooted.
“This is Billy Whitehorn, our lead guitarist. Billy, you remember Clovis?”
“Yeah. The Ying Tong Song.”
Matthew and Billy erupted into the first bars of the song.
“You should go over a few licks with Clovis so you can do fifths and octaves and stuff, you know,” Matthew continued. “And this is Rua. You guys know each other, right? See, we’ve got everyone, white boys, a girl and a Maori.” Matthew raised his hands in the air.
Clovis and Rua hugged. He was a three-hundred-pound six-foot Maori with eighteen-inch biceps, who could beat any drumhead into submission.
Matthew left Billy and Clovis to practice guitar and violin runs together. He went downstairs to talk to the pub’s manager and check on the gate. Matthew had friends at the cash register, and he took precautions not to get screwed out of his 80 percent take from the $5 cover charge. A running tally would not hurt.
Clovis unwrapped his violin from its silk scarf, tuned it quickly to Billy’s electronic “A” and uncoiled the wires to his amplification system as he explained how it worked to Billy.
“A friend in Wellington made it for me. It’s a contact mike on the bridge, see, plus a pick up modified from a Gibson Les Paul here.”
“Far out. It must be an angel of god, like mine.” Billy’s eyes bulged.
“Which doesn’t touch the bridge or alter the acoustic sound, though with this weight it’s a little muted,” Clovis continued, not sure if he had heard correctly. “I get two signals coming through this pair of wires which I use singly, split and put through different power sources and change their sounds again, or I can put them together so I get a straight reproduction. I get real eerie effects and some wild stereo. Also with a delay function through a synthesizer, I can play against or with myself.”
“You play with yourself?” Sheila asked.
Clovis didn’t know how to reply to her. So he smiled and connected three small metal boxes with short wires he took out of his side pocket. Billy looked on, his mouth wide open.
“This goes straight in here, the master box. I can split them into these two or over the PA system or a slave unit or whatever. Are you using your own equipment?”
“You’re kidding. Of course. But we’re using their PA as well. Hey. You know. We should really have our own mixing board out there, but like, Matthew prefers to do it himself. He’s got a mini right in front of his mike on a stand. He keeps control that way. Kind of like Moses on the mountain with condoms in his back pocket. Know what I mean?”
“Yeah.” Clovis nodded although he did not have clue what Billy meant. He did know the same old Matthew was going to go berserk at him after the show and take his share of the money to help pay for the Studebaker. Clovis could see it coming. No wonder Matthew was so nice. Billy showed Clovis some of the riffs and licks he would use and they quickly ran through these together.
“Shit! There’s a big crowd out there. Let’s get going.” Matthew rubbed his hands and roared with no trace of irony. “Rock and Roll!”
Almost a parody, Clovis mused, almost.
• • •
Hei Hei had been drinking beer all afternoon downstairs in the public bar of the Three Lamps. His kidneys ached and he had pissed blood, thick red clots of it. His ears bothered him, even though the dull throbbing had stopped. What would it be like if he went upstairs to listen to his favorite local band, Particle Board? He downed his last beer and hauled himself up the crowded staircase to the lounge together with three of his close mates, Rere, Mokau and Freddy. He had forgotten about his large white head bandage until Freddy started to call him a sheik.
“It’s a Sikh! Dummy!! A sheik is a rich Arab! Besides, this isn’t a turban! You Maoris are a bunch of racists!”
Hei Hei found some seats for Rere, Mokau and Freddy by the windows and a few Pakehas moved away without being asked. He looked around the lounge. There would not be any of Wiremu’s people; they would be at the marae.
Clovis stepped out onto the narrow stage and squinted at the audience. He knelt down, set his boxes in a row, adjusted the dials, then ran two black cords to two different amplifiers. He tested the sound levels, toyed with the reverberation controls on one amplifier, then played a quick lick over all four strings that led to a high “A” that changed to a harmonic. The note hung in the air and quivered as he twiddled the knobs on the floor boxes. That note sent a charge through the audience. Clovis and the rest of the band could feel the excitement.
Hei Hei put his left hand over his left ear and grimaced. He sent Rere to get more beer.
The Gluepot had not changed. The red walls were darker, there was no real stage lighting, just a bunch of colored spots aimed at the stage. Clovis could make out thick velvet curtains that covered the windows on the right. The long bar on the far left was jammed with young men waving their empty jugs at two bartenders. Framed prints of race horses lined the back walls, an echo of another era when older men would smoke unfiltered cigarettes, discourse on the day’s racing form and the occasional dance with their wives.
Clovis did not see Henry, Mel and Wiremu enter when the house lights dimmed and Particle Board swung into their opening number. Despite his size, no one recognized Wiremu. Mel had cut his hair to short ti
ght curls. Clean-shaven and dressed in Henry’s light grey woolen sweater, Wiremu could pass for a missionary from the Islands. Mel had added a pair of black-framed glasses to complete the conservative look.
Wiremu would have laughed at this change, but he was weighed down with grief. He was not at the tangi, sitting by his brother’s coffin on the Mangere marae. That was where he would be able to unload his sorrow, sing a waiata and spend one last night with his brother’s spirit. Hone would have wanted the tangihanga at Mangere rather than up north. At the marae he had helped launch Te Ropu Matakite (Those with Foresight), the Land March.
The police would be outside the marae, waiting for him. They would not expect him to be listening to a local band in a Ponsonby pub. This time he did not have the shotgun up his trousers. He wanted information about Moana and Plum Blossom and the Chinese gang he would have to face.
Sheila unzipped her black leather dress and threw it over her hundred-watt bass amp. Her long legs, in black nylon stockings, were held up by a black and red frilly garter belt. She kept the beat with her bass. She rubbed her Fender bass guitar between the creamy parts of her thighs and stroked the neck as if it were a giant penis. Her thighs were caught in the white spotlight she stepped into. Her low bass line walked across the top of the spellbound audience. The dance floor was jammed tight with sweating bodies. No one could dance, only sway against each other and wave their hands up in the air. Men in the audience stood on their chairs and stretched their necks to get an eyeful of this blond bass player in black panties.
Sheila built up the tension and speed of the bass line as the other members of the group waited in silence for the last phrase that would signal their full volume entrance. Matthew smiled; he had lost his bar count as he stared at Sheila’s small rounded buns. Best player on two feet, he swore. Pity about the cardinal rule he set himself, the only rule he had kept; never screw female members of your band. Boy, was she hot tonight. Maybe he should fire her. Nah. Then it arrived. The last four bars. The last four beats in the final bar slurred to a slow false end.
Clovis on his electric violin, Billy on his black Gibson Les Paul, Rodger at his Roland synthesizer and Rua using his double snare drums, bass pedal and four cymbals hurtled into a grand chord that hung in the air then exploded at breakneck speed. Billy and Clovis kept in perfect tune, an octave apart soaring through the riff that became a repeated melody over Rua’s crisp drumming and Sheila’s firm bass.
The crowd roared their approval. Sheila came to the edge of the stage and executed a high kick at the audience, teasing the men with a quick peek at the insides of her thighs. The audience erupted in a burst of roars, whistles and screams.
Billy slipped into a fast riff to leave Clovis open for his spot. Clovis looked over at him and Billy nodded back. He was surprised at how good Billy played. Despite an acid scrambled brain, he could still make his guitar sing.
Matthew was beside the drummer beating a cowbell 1-2-3-4. His mini mixer up front was unattended and turned up full. So this must be my instrumental, Clovis surmised as he changed the riff and hit a switch on one of his boxes. His violin became a cross between an alto saxophone in tone and Jimi Hendrix’s Stratocaster.
Clovis Tibet closed his eyes, danced over his fingerboard and sang with his bow. He accented the first and third then the second and the fourth beats as he whirled around the riff and ran up and down the violin, chorus after chorus.
Clovis sustained a high “C” at the edge of his E string, changing the tone with his foot controls. Billy broke out of his supporting chords and held the same note on his guitar, bending it a full half tone up then down, so that Clovis too imitated these bent microtones. They started to change notes, mimicking each other.
The dissonance between the two stringed instruments, as if they were animals crying to each other, was too intense for Hei Hei. His ears wanted to explode, as he sat in a corner surrounded by his mates. He spotted a tall Chinese man edging his way through the crowd near the stairs. Before anyone could restrain him, he leapt up and hurled a full beer jug across the room at the tall figure.
The jug missed the young man and hit a Samoan woman in the back of the neck and drenched her large pink dress in beer foam. She shrieked and jumped up. Her eyes caught the Chinese young man and she swung her right fist into his chin. Too shocked to react, he took the blow and collapsed.
Hei Hei roared. “Atta boy! Sock the Chink!”
Sheila jumped up and down on the stage with her hypnotic bass riff to Billy’s soaring guitar solo. The entire dance floor was jumping in unison with her.
“Shit! That’s Hei Hei!” Wiremu spoke in Mel’s ear as he caught a glimpse of the flying beer jug.
Mel and Henry turned from the stage. They watched from their corner seats as Hei Hei yelled at a nearby group.
An unseen hand let fly another jug of beer aimed at the Samoan table. The Samoan’s boyfriend was drenched. This giant in a purple shirt picked up the entire table, glasses, ashtrays and plastic beer mugs and hurled it in the general direction of the unknown assailant.
The band was so involved in the music and the audience’s response that they did not notice the beginning of the riot, except Matthew. Matthew was banging on his cowbell and he saw everything. Oh Jesus! he mumbled. There go the takings! The manager will deduct the damages from the gate, blame the band for stirring up violence, and then he’d say we did not fulfill our contract by playing the set hours. How the fuck could we? If this were a movie we would break into “God Defend New Zealand” and the entire crowd would stand up with their hands on their hearts and belt out the national anthem. But this was real life. All he could do was beat the shit out of his cowbell, one, two, three, four, one, two, three, fuck!
Ricky Wong crawled to a safe table then got to his feet. His face was creased in pain. He had been enjoying the music whilst keeping an eye on a group of Maoris. But he could not make out anyone who fitted Wiremu Wilson’s description in the lounge. He had not seen Hei Hei, only felt the beer jug whiz past. What if that Maori was somewhere in this chaos? He ducked again as something large sailed past. He tried to get to the stairs but dozens of people already had the same idea.
The music stopped. Clovis cradled his violin, picked up his boxes and ran to the back room. Billy with his Les Paul and Sheila with her leather dress and bass guitar followed. Rodger disappeared behind them. Rua stood with his arms folded in front of his drum kit holding his drumsticks like knives. No one was going to put a hole in his drums. Matthew stood next to him, clutching his cowbell. He could not understand how this had happened.
Ricky managed to get to the stairs behind a group of screaming Pakeha girls, one of whom clutched her right eye as blood poured down her black satin dress. Tony stood at the bottom of the stairs and blocked a group of young Maori men from going up whilst letting the frightened crowd out.
Once past Tony, Ricky headed straight for the Hungry Wok. He wanted to talk to Moana. She had not told them everything. He wanted answers.
Hei Hei had recognized the Chinese man who had taken Moana. He left his three mates to deal with the Samoans nearby as he worked his way through the crowd. He followed the object of his revenge down the stairs. Hei Hei ducked into the doorway of an unlit shop as three police cars followed by a large black police bus squealed to a halt outside the Three Lamps. He watched his target cross the road and enter the takeaway.
Wiremu ushered Mel and Henry in front of him down the stairs. They squeezed past Tony as a stream of eager blue uniforms rushed into the pub with their drawn batons.
Hei Hei walked to a doorway opposite the takeaway shop. He could see two men behind the counter and vats of boiling oil. Hei Hei reckoned the shop would empty out soon as word spread about the riot and the curious onlookers converged on the ring of police vehicles.
The downstairs bar filled up with the rock audience who ordered more drinks to relieve themselves of the pandemonium upstairs. Wiremu wanted to wait for the first wave of police to rush upstairs b
efore they made their discrete exit.
“Weren’t we doing this last week?” Henry asked as they followed Wiremu.
Hei Hei walked one block away from the Three Lamps and down a side street. On the left was a wooden fence and a gate to a ramshackle house. Just inside the gate on concrete steps were two empty glass milk bottles. He scooped one bottle up and slid it into his leather jacket. He crossed the street to a large dumpster at the back of a discount furniture store and, shuffling with his feet, found a few polystyrene peanuts that he picked up and squeezed into the milk bottle. He continued his walk down the street until he came to a familiar car. His mates were still upstairs smashing heads whilst he opened their trunk. The handle came off and the lid sprung open. Hei Hei felt around the spare tire. He eventually found a long rubber tube, half an inch in diameter.
He walked around to the gas cap, unscrewed it and eased the tube down the hole. Blowing air out of his lungs, Hei Hei bent over and sucked as hard as he could on the rubber opening. After all the beer he had drunk, his ribs did not hurt so much. The cool liquid hit his mouth as he squeezed the tube shut and stuck the tube into the bottle. He half filled the bottle and thanked his friends for not having an empty gas tank. He screwed the cap back on, threw the hose back in the trunk and took out a greasy rag to wipe his mouth and hands. He winced as the rag caught on his swollen chin, although the fumes seemed to help the throbbing in his head. He closed the trunk and turned to the sidewalk as the headlights of a slow-moving police car turned into the street from Ponsonby Road and hit his eyes. He turned into the darkness with the Maori cocktail tucked into his jacket. The rag was now partly stuffed into the mouth of the bottle; the peanuts had turned to jelly in the gasoline.
A large crowd had gathered behind the police cordon as Hei Hei stepped to one side of the Hungry Wok. He peeked around the corner and saw there were two customers at the counter. Behind him, flashing blue lights bounced off the shop windows. He could smell the pungent smell of the gasoline seeping through the rag hidden in his jacket.