Gone Fishing (13 page)

‘Call me Theo' arrives a few seconds after his citrus aftershave. He approaches with his hand outstretched, a wide, narcissist's smile on a soft-living, unblemished, beautician-cured face. Beneath fiercely plucked, trimmed and (presumably) dyed brows, insincerity floats in his eyes like an oil slick. If politicians were meant to be charismatic, then this bloke has had a triple by-pass. Sam stares at the hand as though it might bite, unable to decide whether to take it in his own great paw or let it hang. Before he can make up his mind, Mulvaney, with the finely honed survival instincts of a city rat, picks up an off vibe. The hale-fellow-well-met mask dissolves. His smile disappears; his eyes go hard. He puts the desk between them in a couple of long steps, refrains from offering Sam a seat. ‘Friend of Eric's, are you?' he asks. His tone is brisk. Frigid. Sam realises he's lost the element of surprise – never a smart tactic. With nothing more to lose, he goes for broke.

‘Sam Scully. Wouldn't mean anything to you, of course, although Eric Lowdon knows me well enough. Might be an overstatement to refer to us as friends, though. Big overstatement.' Despite the fact that he believes unflinchingly in the nobility of his mission, he's surprised to find himself more than a little intimidated by his expensive surroundings. He catches another whiff. This time of power. So strong it's almost tangible. He needs a moment to settle his mind into a customarily stable balance. He shifts a crystal paperweight, a few papers, from the edge of the desk and perches there. ‘Nice office you've got here. Good views. Plenty of space. Your own loo?' He points towards a door tucked discreetly off to the side of the room. ‘Bet it's got a shower. All the luxuries.'

‘Look, I'm not sure what you're doing here . . .' Mulvaney is irritated. He checks his watch, makes a whole lot of other signals that he's a busy man. Sam picks up the paperweight, tosses it from hand to hand. Mulvaney snatches it away. ‘If you're here to play catchy, I'm all booked up.'

Sam makes what he hopes is an educated guess and decides to go way out on a limb. ‘Just wanted to let you know that the residents of Cook's Basin are fully aware that you, personally, signed off on the Garrawi development and the community is pissed off. Ropeable. No consultation. No environmental studies. No impact statements. Just your name on a document, followed by a champagne toast, I imagine. And, hey presto, a fat cheque lands in your personal bank account and that's the end of it.'

‘You accusing me of taking bribes, you numbskull? Get out and get a life, sonny. Before I have you kicked out.' Mulvaney moves a few papers around. Looks up. ‘Still here? Go on, get out.' He waves his hand dismissively, like he's dealing with an idiot.

One decent punch, Sam thinks, seeing red. Settle the quarrel like men. One almighty whack on that over-cleansed weak little chin. Even better, two. He clenches his fists by his side. Holds back from striking out with an almighty mental struggle. Hang around scum and you turn into scum. Then where do you end up? With an effort, he smiles, hoping it comes off as more Bond than Clouseau. In a normal voice, he says: ‘Thought it only polite to let you know that from now on, every time you turn around for the foreseeable future, I'd recommend you duck real fast because there'll be a bullet coming your way.' He pauses, fixes a friendly grin on his face. ‘Figure of speech, of course.' He wipes the grin. ‘This time, you've taken on the wrong crowd, mate. Big mistake.'

Mulvaney launches himself around the desk, reaches for Sam's shirtfront. ‘You threatening me, you dickhead? Do you know who I am?' Instead of alarming Sam, the assault settles his resolve to stay calm under pressure. He unlocks Mulvaney's fingers, one by one. He briefly – very briefly – considers trying to sell the bloke on the idea of a paradise that's attracted dreamers, poets, lefties, commos, young love, old love, kids and dogs. Realises he'd be mining a barren seam. ‘By the time we're finished with you and your dodgy land deals, you won't have the kudos to OK a public lavatory. Your name will be mud. Nah. Worse than that. Slime. Scum. Not even your mother will own up to you.' He dusts his hands, continues, almost conversationally, ‘Wouldn't want you to be under any illusions.'

Mulvaney lets rip with a deep, gut-busting laugh. The smile returns, dirty with malice. ‘Go home and take a long last look at your beloved park, which according to the report on my desk is infested with ticks and used as a garbage dump. The developers are doing you a favour. In three weeks, the bulldozers move in. You're whistling Dixie if you think a few raddled pot-smokers and bozo surf bums are going to stand in the way. Oh, and just so you know, the government of New South Wales bought the park from the Trust a month ago. Lock, stock and barrel. And we've sold it to the highest bidder. It's a deal as clean as a whistle.'

A well-groomed and discreet assistant or secretary, Sam has no idea which, materialises out of nowhere. But Mulvaney's not finished: ‘You say one word about me that I find offensive and I'll sue your pants off. By the time I'm finished, I'll have your house, your car. Even your fucking underwear. Now get out.'

Sam is tempted to make a crack about his jocks. Decides Mulvaney isn't worth the effort. The secretary holds the door open, indicates Sam should go ahead of him.

When it's just the two of them in the empty corridor, the dapper little man, polished from the tip of his balding head to his black leather lace-ups, says, quite pleasantly: ‘Don't come back. Not if you want to live a long life.' Said with a poker face, like it's a hack line in a lousy sitcom he gets to repeat over and over.

For some reason he'll never understand – his bloody instinct again – Sam offers his hand, feels heartened when it's grasped almost warmly. ‘They play for keeps,' the secretary adds, in a manner that's clearly meant to inform, not threaten. He pauses. Then, ‘Is the park really full of ticks, a dump?'

‘No, mate, it's paradise.'

He lets out a sigh heavy with regret. ‘They always are.' He disappears back into what Sam can only think of as an expensive rat hole.

Out on the street, Sam takes a minute to thank the two sweat-soaked security guards at their sauna-hot gatepost for – as he puts it – looking after a man more at ease on the open waterways, a bargeman named Sam Scully who doesn't set foot on land too bloody often. Not if he can help it. ‘And by the way,' he asks, ‘just so I can get my bearings, where would Mulvaney's office rank in that three-storey stack of windows?'

The guards, stomachs hanging over their belts, shirt buttons stretched to breaking point, swagger a little and laugh. ‘Top floor, mate, three from the end. Right next door to the premier and breathing down his neck like a rabid dog.' Heh, heh.

Heading home, Sam silently declares his mission a success. Mulvaney is as rotten as a week-old sardine. Why do they think they can get away with it? Because they always have, he thinks, feeling a layer of innocence peel off him like sunburn. ‘But not this time,' he says vehemently. ‘No freaking way.' He pounds the sun-bleached dash of his rusty old ute, then apologises to the car as if it can hear him. Up ahead, flashing orange lights warn him there's been an accident on the bridge. He checks his petrol gauge and crosses his fingers.

Once again, Sam lies in his own bed. Lightning strobes through the window. Thunder rumbles. Once, it cracks louder than a gunshot next to his ear and he feels a sudden lurch of dread. Raindrops tap the roof. He counts the beats between light and boom, following Jimmy's instructions. One . . .
bang
! Another house-rattler. The storm feels like it's on top of him. He'd invited Kate to spend the night in his house but she'd turned him down even though she understood he didn't want to leave the premises unoccupied for a while yet. Come to think of it, she'd barely ever set foot in his home. If he were the kind of bloke who tended towards cynicism he'd put it down to a fear of losing control. His house, his rules. He turns over, punches his pillow into a shape to fit between his neck and shoulders. Curls into a ball. Squeezes his eyes shut tight like a small boy. The wind picks up. He hears bark peeling from spotted gums and crashing noisily to the ground. There'll be a mess in the morning, he thinks. Water in the tanks will go even browner. It's fortunate Islanders favour strong colours in their clothing. Which brings him to Kate's sparkling white T-shirts. How does she do it? And why won't she join the committee? When he asks, all he gets is a shrug and a hard look that warns him it's a no-go zone. Eventually, the monkey in his head tires of the Kate loop. Sam falls into a fitful sleep.

At the tail-end of the following day, Sam is nobbled by Jenny, who roars up to him in the Square, beaming with victory, her hair still wet from a quick swim or a shower, he's not sure which. She waves a fist full of cash under his nose. ‘Smell this. Sweeter than roses. Signed up every local to the cause except for three. Two weekenders and Artie. Three thousand nine hundred and seventy dollars. The fighting fund is under way. Gotta run,' she says, shoving the money at him, ‘or the kids will take off without me and I'll have to swim home.'

Artie, he thinks. Artie refused to join?

He holds the cash out from his body as though it might bite. Where's he going to stash a shitload of money until the committee opens a bank account? He checks out the commuter crowd with their frigidly cold beers, chewing the fat, hawk-eyes on the puddles to avoid soaking their only pair of going-to-town-shoes. Sees a cheeky, wiry terrier ambitiously trying to mount a thuggish, barrel-chested Staffy. A bad move that ends in flashing fangs and an all-out brawl until the terrier rolls over, four paws in the air, pink tongue hanging out of the side of his mouth. Complete surrender. Two mums strip their red-faced toddlers to splash about naked in the cool water. A bunch of kids help load groceries into tinnies. A few dragging their feet. He'd trust every one of them with his life but he wouldn't put a single soul in charge of a ten-cent coin that wasn't his own. The committee needs a treasurer.

‘The one committee job that can't be casually passed around is treasurer,' Sam explains to Kate and Ettie. The two women stare at the pile of notes that Sam holds towards them like a gift.

‘So who do you think would make a good treasurer?' Kate asks, ignoring the money.

‘Well, you would, Kate,' Sam says, wondering why she's even bothered to ask.

Ettie returns to fastidiously wiping the counter. Kate hangs out the closed sign. Sam shuffles from one foot to the other. Afraid he's come down on the twig again just when he hoped he and Kate might be beginning to settle into a mutually acceptable routine that he reckons any relationship needs, no matter how hot and sweaty at the start, to avoid either dying out or exploding. The silence goes on and on. He looks to Ettie for support. Her eyes are focused on a stubborn dirty spot on the counter, which she's rubbing furiously. Kate begins to refill salt and pepper shakers. Sam shifts about nervously. Not sure what to do with the cash. The summer mugginess feels heavy in his lungs.

‘I'm still regarded as a blow-in, Sam,' Kate says eventually, spilling a little salt, picking up a few grains, tossing them over her right shoulder.

‘Left,' Ettie says. ‘The left shoulder. Right is bad luck.'

‘Give the job to someone who is more sensitive to the undercurrents of Cook's Basin life.'

Sam shuffles. ‘Aw, jeez, Kate . . .'

Ettie breaks in. ‘She's right, Sam. Find someone else.'

Beaten, Sam gives in with a loud sigh and shoves the cash in his back pocket. The best laid plans, he tells himself philosophically, often backfire. But at least he has an idea now of why she's stuck to the sidelines. And even though he hates to admit it, she has a point.

Outside in the Square, his mind switches to Artie. He didn't sign on, he thinks again, puzzled. He makes a silent promise to call in on the old bloke.

On dusk, a strong sea breeze threatens to shift the ballooning humidity but it peters out before it does any good. Dankness settles in once more. Dogs are listless. Birds make short-distance flights. Pythons coil sleepily with fat, rodent-shaped lumps in their stomachs. On the beaches, even toddlers sitting like fat little Buddhas in the tepid shallows lose heart and start to whinge. There will be a run on heat-rash ointment in the next couple of days. Everyone is over it. Blasphemy or not. Sam grabs a Briny take-away curry out of his freezer and heads for the
Mary Kay
. Artie is more inclined towards hot and spicy than sauso rolls, which he once told Sam reminded him unhappily of cheap flagon wine parties in the 1970s. He comes alongside Artie's yacht: ‘Fenders are out, I'm rafted up. Permission to come on board?' he shouts.

Artie wheezes assent. Half a second later, Sam's solid legs find the top of the cabin steps. He drops, his hands holding on to the top of the opening. Lands lightly.

‘Ya wanna know why I refused to hand over me money, don't ya?' Artie says straight off. He sips from a glass of water like it's poison. He's nursing a black eye and a purple bruise on a lump the size of an emu's egg on one side of his forehead.

‘It's a free world, mate. You been in the wars?'

‘Felt like a sauna down here around midday. Hauled meself up on deck to get a breath of fresh air. Easy as pie. It was the comin' down that created a few, er, issues.'

‘Next time, call me.'

‘Watched a sea eagle surf the thermals. Goin' round and round in lazy circles until he dropped like a bullet to the water. Barely broke the surface before he launched upwards again with a bloody great fish in his claws.'

‘Bad day for the fish, eh?'

‘Evolution. How's the war faring?'

‘What have you heard?'

‘You need an event. A demo of some sort to get wider attention. Jack Mundey, he galvanised a nation. Not sayin' you can pull off a stunt like that. There's a difference between fightin' for a small park and saving the most historic area this young country's got. Which is what he did even though millions of dollars were shoved under his nose to encourage him to go home and put his feet up until every sandstone building in Sydney was reduced to a pile of rubble and there was nothing more to be done about it. Coulda lived like a king. 'Cept he understood livin' with himself was more important.'