The Glass Kingdom (3 page)

It wasn't just the men. At least once a night a couple of women would go at it too, and I'm not talking handbags at twenty paces. These fights were brutal scrapes that always ended with someone spitting up blood. People hate each other in these godforsaken places.

Two coppers passed by Target Ball, half-eaten pies in one hand, the other hovering near holstered pistols. They had that look about them: small-town lawmen who knew they might have to draw down on someone before the night was out. They seemed oblivious to the noisy family crowd, accustomed to disregarding it, picking up on what was happening just out of sight. They stared in the direction of the Cyclone, but that was an unlikely spot for a brawl. The pushing and shoving usually took place in the dustbowl surrounding the main attractions, visible enough for spectators but at a safe distance from any families.

I leaned out of the stall to follow the cops' haphazard progress, their calm voices parting the crowd. '
Scuse me,
miss. Step aside, please, mate.

Whatever shambolic wrestling took place would be quickly broken up, and the participants moved on or taken into custody by coppers who knew them. They might spend a night in the cells if the sergeant deemed them too pissed to return to their wives. Matters only took a nasty turn if the cops sided with the aggressor, maybe through bitterness at the mess the show inevitably brought to town. If a discreet payoff didn't do the trick, we'd all be up at dawn the next day to break down the rides and strike camp.

No one wanted that. It rarely happened, though. There was always some copper willing to take the juice. It's the fucken Wild West out here.

Shrieking sounds coming from the Ghost Train were par for the course but the way the two roaming coppers accelerated towards them told me a fight had broken out over spilled drinks or a poorly timed wink at someone else's girl or some old grudge. The crowd surged, eager to witness two blokes pummelling each other.

I stayed put. In Echuca, two men with handguns had robbed Shark Bites during a scuffle. It all happened in seconds. By the time Delia had alerted Ronnie, who'd just stepped out to see what was going on, the thieves were long gone. Ronnie was furious that his missus had been braced and the night's takings pocketed. He'd scoured the alley for an hour afterwards, clutching a crowbar, ready to stove in the skull of anyone who so much as looked askance at him.

The coppers returned five minutes later, escorting two young men in handcuffs. The prisoners were clearly a little worse for wear, their eyelids drooping and feet struggling. One guy was bleeding from the corner of his mouth and tried to spit as he passed by our stall, a pathetic dribble of blood and saliva trailing from his puffy lips. The other's right arm was exposed, the sleeve of his shirt torn away in the fight. One of his eyes was closing up fast, pink and swollen where it had encountered a fist or an elbow.

Normal service quickly resumed. The unscheduled entertainment for the evening was over, at least for the time being. I wondered if the fella with the messed-up eye managed to clock the legend carved into the wooden beam over the entrance to our section of the carnival.
In the Kingdom of
the Blind, the One-eyed Man is King.

As the crowd began to disperse, I saw one of my regulars hovering by Shark Bites. I hadn't seen him since the last time we'd come through these parts and I hardly recognised him. His cheeks were sunken and his hair had thinned badly. His gaunt figure was drowning in a hoodie that had probably once fitted him. He obviously wasn't going to be a customer much longer.

He gave me a questioning nod and I realised he was reluctant to approach because of Mikey. There'd been someone else working the stall last time. I nodded that it was okay.

‘Take five,' I told Mikey.

‘I'm a'ight, boss, I already had a break.'

‘Smoko. Go on.'

Mikey sucked air in through his teeth, glancing between me and the guy in the hoodie shuffling his way through the crowd. He said nothing but I knew he'd most likely worked it out by now, or at least suspected something. I unlocked the door and let him out. He sniffed, hiked his jeans, pulled a crumpled ciggie from his top pocket and wandered off, though not too far.

I handed the guy in the hoodie a plastic bucket with five tennis balls.

He slipped me a fifty-dollar note.

‘That'll buy you a point,' I told him.

‘Any change?' he muttered.

‘Nah. But if you land three of those balls in one of the hoops, I'll give you a bonus point.'

‘For reals?'

‘It's all in the wrist. Let's play.'

He gulped and tried to concentrate, but his first throw didn't even make the backboard. It hit the lower edge and rolled under the counter.

‘Make a fucken effort,' I growled.

His next two balls at least hit the main board, but then he was done. He stared dejectedly down at the two remaining balls.

I reached for one of the blue koalas on the top shelf and handed it to him. ‘Congratulations, sir, you've won a prize. Thanks for playing and do come again.'

He attempted to smile. His teeth were black and rotten. Off he went, clutching his cuddly koala. I added the fifty to my roll as Mikey flicked his ciggie away and came back to the stall, wearing a shit-eating grin.

‘Getting generous there, boss, giving away prizes to chumps.'

‘Don't miss much, do you?'

‘I know not to hand out those blue koalas to the kiddlywinks.'

‘See that you don't.'

I retreated to my seat at the back and watched him throw down some bally for the marks. He had a way of intriguing the ladies (there was a tiny bit of handsome hidden underneath that fake-gangster exterior) and goading the men just enough that they would want to prove themselves. Sometimes he flirted too obviously with the women and infuriated the blokes, but seeing him in action the past few weeks I'd become convinced he could handle blue-koala duties, which would free me up to visit the labs and step up production. He was the best prospect I'd seen in a long time. Also, he was the only prospect.

If you want to build an operation, you need competent soldiers. You don't have to trust them. In fact, you'd be stupid to do so. You just have to know the limits of their abilities. Same thing in the army. I might've made colonel if I'd stayed in. It pissed me off how they treated me at the end, but it was tactical experience that I was now putting to good use.

The crowd thinned out as the evening wore on, and Mikey counted the poke. He'd made good money at a time when there wasn't much cash floating around, but the constant interaction with chumps had left him ragged. There were big sweat patches on his Freo shirt. I broke open a bottle of water and handed it to him.

‘Man, there were so many bona-fide white-trash puckered-up
assholes
in tonight, I can hardly fucken believe it. I mean, what's the asshole-to-normal-Joe ratio in these towns? S'gotta be three to one, maybe four. And the skanks circling those assholes? Jesus, Mary and Joseph, brother, why'd you wanna be orbitin' brown stars like those guys? Dock your titty starship in my space station, princess, knowwhumsayin'? Tractor beam
engaged
.'

He always said ‘asshole' instead of ‘arsehole', which annoyed me. Another American affectation. As if I didn't hear enough of that whiny shit in the service. I noticed his hands were shaking as he gulped the water. There was definitely something wrong with the kid. Probably should be on medication for hyperactivity.

‘That's the job,' I said as he handed me the evening's sticky takings.

‘It's okay for you sittin' in back, nobody's gettin' on your case all night, asking for free shit and where's the dunnies and I want to make a complaint 'cos my daughter got sick after riding the Cyclone. So what the fuck you let her on it for after stuffing a large pepperoni pizza, three Cokes and half a fucken kilo of fairy floss into her Jabba the fucken Hutt pie hole?'

‘I worked this stand a long time, Mikey. People give me shit too.'

‘Yeah, not for very long though, huh? You just give 'em that look and they crap their pants and step the fuck off.'

‘I've got a look?'

‘Go check yourself out in the hall of mirrors, dawg… Hey, lift your shirt and show me your tatt again.'

‘What for?'

‘Just do it, a'ight? I've been thinkin' of gettin' one.'

‘Not like this, I hope.'

I'd made the mistake of showing him my battalion tattoo that first day in the car. He'd told me his pop had been in the military but flunked out.

I glanced around to make sure no one was watching and rolled up my right sleeve. The tattoo was of a snarling blue heeler. The Sixth Battalion motto,
Duty First
, was etched underneath the slobbering hound.

Mikey stared at it, rocking back on his heels. ‘Fucken awesome. Does everyone in the Bluedog get one of them?'

‘Pretty much. You've been keeping it to yourself like I told you, right?'

He slid a forefinger and thumb across his mouth. ‘I know you don't want no dumb-ass questions.'

‘No more'n usual, if I can help it.'

I rolled my sleeve back down, rueing that I'd ever shown him the tatt. Must have been desperate to recruit him.

The chumps were still filing slowly out of the alley, which would take half the night to clean up, bins overflowing with takeaway wrappers and tinnies, not a pretty sight.

I knew some of the crew were planning to head into Wodonga proper and go on the tear. These outings rarely ended well for the carnival hands, though it depended on the bar and how much the locals had lost that day. It was not usually a great idea to throw money around on booze if you'd just taken it out of the pockets of the people sitting in the same establishment, as a rule of thumb.

‘You comin' for a drink?' Mikey asked. ‘Or you gonna release the hounds on Steph tonight? Man, that be one fine figure of a lady you got there, that girl got some
grounds
, knowhumsayin'?'

‘I'd tell you to watch that mouth of yours, but it wouldn't make any difference, would it?'

‘Probs not,' he grinned. ‘Come on, boss, come have a brewski with me, maybes we can talk some
bidness.
'

The little shit had the jump on me. Have to always watch your six. I nodded and dangled the keys to my ute. He snatched them out of my fingers and began to sing the Dockers' club song.
Oh Freo, give
'
em the old heave-ho!

The sight of so many utes in the car park of the Pumphouse was reassuring. I directed Mikey to a spot where we wouldn't be hemmed in if we had to get out in a hurry. The bar would be raucous and packed with farm workers, many of them itinerant. Hopefully we could blend in. It wasn't like the piano player would stop mid-tune and everyone would turn to stare at us, although you never knew with some of these fucken shit-kicker places.

Once inside, I elbowed my way through a crowd of flannel shirts to find a rickety table at the far end of the room, close to the toilets and within sight of what you might call a dance floor, if you had a vivid imagination. A trio of heavily made-up local girls were doing the Melbourne two-step around their gaudy handbags. Half a dozen men in tight jeans were cradling pots while checking them out. A Lady Gaga song was straining the speakers. I couldn't tell you which one—they all sound the fucken same.

Mikey headed straight to the bar and squirmed back a few minutes later balancing several rounds of drinks. He had his fingers inside the necks of four beer bottles, some cheap European shit I'd never heard of that was on special. Once it touched your lips, you understood why. He was cradling a couple of shots, which I grabbed before he lost his grip and added to the stains on his shirt.

I didn't like the look on his face, a mixture of disgust and wide-eyed excitement. ‘Is this a fucken fag joint, or what?' he shouted, loud enough that I noticed at least four men glaring in our direction.

‘None of them in towns like this,' I told him, sipping the beer and wishing I'd gone to the bar instead of sending him. ‘At least not that anyone would cop to, anyway.'

‘Yeah, right, you notice the music and the name of the place? I rest my case, your honour.'

‘The girls seem to be enjoying it.'

Mikey turned in his seat to survey the dance area, shaking his head in despair.

‘Yo, the gaylords from Duran Duran called, ladies,' he shouted, one hand up to his ear as if accepting a phone call, ‘they want their fucken eyeliner back.' He turned back to me, cackling. ‘Man, you seein' this train wreck of fashion here? It's like this place got caught in a time warp or somethin'. What a fucken travesty. By the time this town catches on to the hip-hop revolution, we'll be flyin' round on jetpacks an' shit.'

I pinched the bridge of my nose between forefinger and thumb. ‘Fuck sake, Mikey, you're going to get us kicked out of this place in record time. At least let me drink this awful piss first.'