The Minnow (12 page)

Nana says lying's not so hard if you wrap it around the truth.

We were interrupted by the sound of car tyres skidding to a halt on the other side of the boatshed. The engine cut. A door slammed.

‘Tom!' It was Sergeant Griffin.

Bill turned on me with his angry face. ‘You tell that idiot you haven't seen me.'

‘What about those men?' I asked.

‘You haven't seen anyone. Okay?'

‘Okay,' I answered.

‘Don't fuck-up, Tom. Now get downstairs and don't let him come up.'

I could hug Sergeant Griffin.

‘It's called the tipping point,' says Jonathan Whiting, slowing to thirty as we enter the roundabout. ‘It is a particular number, a critical mass. It is the moment when enough people buy something or like something or use something that propels that something into play.'

‘Uh huh,' I say. ‘You mean like Coke?'

‘Coke is a difficult example because it is so heavily advertised. Think of something else, something unusual, not necessarily mainstream.'

Jonathan Whiting and I have started having conversations on the way to the Mavis Ornstein Home for the Elderly. He knows heaps of really weird and interesting stuff. Papa would get upset if he knew about it, so I haven't told him.

‘There was this kid at school, before the flood. Brandon Holloway. Brandon had this weird way of drawing people. He would always start at the feet and work up to the head. All the boys in his group started copying him. I think at first they did it for fun, but by the end of term the whole art class was doing it.'

‘What about the rest of the school?'

‘Ummm,' I said, pressing my forefinger to my mouth. ‘Don't remember. We all knew about it, but I don't remember any of the other classes following suit.' I learned ‘following suit' from Jonathan. He says it all the time. ‘Would the whole school have to join in to reach the tipping point?' I ask, replaying the question in my mind just to hear it again.

‘Not necessarily,' Jonathan replies. ‘Think of a wheelbarrow full of concrete. You put in the sand, gravel and cement, and then you add water until everything's wet and well mixed. It takes a certain amount of water, doesn't it, before the mix is right?'

‘I've never made concrete.'

‘Okay. But are you with me?'

This is what Jonathan does. He gets me thinking about a subject. He calls it the ‘primary engagement'. He then throws in something that seems totally irrelevant. He calls this the ‘expansion point'. Concrete is his cue for me to expand my thinking. Jonathan says our minds are magnificent, and not only do they cope with the unexpected they thrive on it.

‘Concrete is like a cake. The ingredients need to be exact for it to work,' I say, thinking out loud.

‘Exact?'

‘Yes. Sponge cakes require the exact ingredients.' Mum told me the secret to the perfect sponge was precision.

‘Go on. Remember not to limit your thinking.'

I stop for a moment. Dad used to say his best ideas were never planned.

‘I have the exact amount of water in a bucket. The bucket leans over the cement mixer and the Brandon amount spills in. When one of Brandon's friends starts drawing the feet first, the bucket tips in a bit more water. Another friend joins in, another and another, until, whoosh, the bucket has tipped past the point of no return and all the water falls into the mixer.'

‘Excellent. What's your reasoning?'

‘I'm thinking that the tipping point was the size of Brandon's group of friends. It was large enough to produce the trend that caused the class to embrace Brandon's style.'

‘Tom, I think you've made your case.'

‘So, Tom,' says Sergeant Griffin, unclipping his seatbelt and turning to face me. He has driven me to Jonah's house, even though I said I would rather row home.

‘So…?' I answer.

‘Tom, don't play games. What were you doing at the boatshed?'

‘Sorry, Sergeant Griffin.' I'm still trying to figure out how he knew I was there. ‘Please don't tell Dr Patek.'

‘Listen to me, young lady,' he says, jabbing his finger in the air. ‘This has nothing to do with Dr Patek and everything to do with you not cooperating with the police.' Sweat beads on his chin. He loosens his tie and pulls at the collar of his shirt.

‘I have cooperated, Sergeant Griffin. Why can't I go to the boatshed?'

‘Because you're a
fifteen-year-old pregnant girl
,' he says, almost shouting, ‘and you could be in danger. We still have no idea who those men are—and Bill has been missing since they turned up.' He sucks in a deep breath, then exhales loudly.

‘Sorry, Sergeant Griffin.' I unclip my seatbelt.

‘Listen, Tom,' Sergeant Griffin says, in a voice that is more familiar. ‘I hate to get angry with you, especially after everything you've gone through. But this is my town and you're my responsibility. You understand?'

I nod, yes. I have to get out of the car before I suffocate, and I push open the door and haul myself out. Sergeant Griffin leans across and catches my eye. ‘Don't make things any harder than they need to be, Tom.'

As I walk down the drive to Jonah's house, I realise the binoculars are still around my neck.

Jonathan Whiting used to be a lawyer. He retired when he turned seventy, but he still works as a consultant to keep his brain active.

‘I have a task for you,' he says as we pull into the car park. Tasks can be anything. One time he handed me a Rubik's Cube and asked if I could fix it. I thought I was doing him a favour.

‘N.i.b.l.i.c.k,' he says, spelling a word. ‘I want you to look it up and give it an origin.'

I grab my notebook and write down ‘niblick' and ‘origin' and wait for more instructions.

‘One week from today,' he says, ‘I'm playing in the Old Silks golf tournament. I'll be away eight days. Think you can find another chauffeur for a week?'

‘I'll ask around,' I say, closing the notebook. ‘I didn't know you played golf.'

‘There are probably lots of things you don't know about me. Just like there are lots of things I don't know about you.'

Old and weird moment. My cue to get out of the car.

‘Thanks, Jonathan,' I say. ‘I'll be with Nana in about halfa.'

‘You're not going there now?'

‘I want to talk to Hazel first.'

I can hear voices, far away.

I let my mind drift.

I feel weightless, calm.

Someone is humming.

‘Tommy? Is that you?'

‘I've been sleeping like a baby.'

‘That's the ticket,' says Clare.

‘I've been thinking about a turtle.'

‘Don't know. We used to get the occasional. Hang on.' Clare walks out the back. ‘Marge,' she says—and I realise she's talking to Mrs Blanket—‘Tom's here asking about turtles.'

My eyes drift up to the carp tank. Mrs Blanket hasn't replaced Oscar. I don't think her heart is in it.

I feel a bit dizzy. Mrs Blanket has a customer chair in the aisle next to the guinea pig hutch. I walk over and sit down. There's a small brown guinea pig asleep on a heart-shaped pillow. It's one of those little pillows that florists attach to bouquets of flowers. Mrs Blanket's Oscar flowers. As I stare at the little guinea pig, he stretches and yawns and rolls off the pillow onto his back. He has a small wisp of white under his chin. ‘Hi, Rumbly,' I say.

Fielder's Pets and Supplies hasn't been part of my Saturday ritual since Dr Patek introduced the moderate exercise rule. But, as of today, James Wo now comes by the house on Saturday mornings rather than after school on Fridays. Friday afternoons had begun to clash with school meetings. Jonah arrived home yesterday afternoon with a message from James Wo regarding the change.

‘What if it doesn't suit me?' I said to Jonah when he relayed the message.

‘Don't be annoying, Tom.'

‘I'm serious,' I said. ‘What if I'd made plans?

‘Have you?'

‘What?'

‘Made plans.'

‘That's not the point. Does he expect you to cycle all the way back to school and give him an answer?'

‘Don't shoot the messenger,' said Jonah.

‘What's that supposed to mean?'

James Wo arrived this morning at nine. I had just had my shower, so he waited outside for a bit. I might have made plans. I might have been planning to go back to the boatshed.

‘You can come in now,' I called, once I was dressed.

We sat at the kitchen table. He reviewed my work and outlined the lesson plan for the following week. Then he offered to drive me into town.

‘Do you drive into town every Saturday?' I asked.

‘You're like an open book, Tom.'

It has been over a month since I left the Mater Women's Hospital in West Wrestler. Dr Frank has checked me over and is on the phone to Dr Patek. They're both happy with my progress. The Minnow is coming along nicely, positioned head down, ready for her exit. Dr Patek and Dr Frank assume this is stressful for me, but it isn't. The Minnow is quite happy. She and I have reached an understanding. She has even told me the date: December twenty-six. Dr Patek says I'm due on the seventh of January. She has also warned me that first babies can be up to two weeks late.

Not the Minnow. She is thirty-one weeks and counting.

niblick
nib'lick, n.
a golf club with a heavy head with wide face, used for lofting—a number eight or nine iron. [Origin uncertain].

‘Haze, you busy?'

‘Always, darl. What's up?'

I know nothing about golf, but Hazel is a fanatic.

‘I need to know some stuff about a golf club,' I say, and I show her the dictionary entry.

‘This an assignment for school?' she asks.

‘No. Jonathan Whiting gives me tasks.'

Hazel looks at me strangely. ‘It's Kosher, right?'

‘Sure. He's sweet. I live with his grandson. He's in love with my Nana. I think he's taken me under his wing.'

Niblick, I wrote, is a word-cousin of nitwit. Nitwit is slang for idiot or blockhead. It means literally to not (nit) have wit. Niblick is army slang for nobility. It is used to describe English officers whose position is granted through noblesse, rather than officers who earn their rank through hard work. Niblick refers to an officer who is found wanting, unprepared for the demands of army life, ill-equipped to the point of stupidity in the face of pressure.

Niblick is believed to have been transferred across to golf, in particular, to the niblick nine iron, in honour of a group of nine officers who played a five-day golf tournament while posted in the Falkland Islands. This, I said melodramatically, is unconfirmed.

‘You made this up?' asked Jonathan Whiting.

‘Uh huh,' I answered, smiling.

‘All of it?'

‘All except nitwit. That's a real word.'

‘Brilliant, Tom. How did you know the task was an exercise in imagination?'

‘Because you said to
give
niblick an origin.'

‘Well done twice,' he said. ‘For listening and originality.'

‘Thanks, Jonathan.'

I found a stand-in chauffeur through Hazel: a guy everyone calls Peter Perfect, although the ‘perfect' bit is just a nickname. Peter Perfect's brother, Marcus, also lives at the Mavis Ornstein Home for the Elderly, in the nursing-home wing. Peter visits him every second day.

‘Come and meet him,' says Hazel, holding my elbow and steering me down the hall. ‘He lives near Jonah's house, and he says it's no problem.'

We walk past the kitchen, the staffroom and the dispensary, across a courtyard and through a security-coded door into the hospital building. We take the lift upstairs, and walk past the empty nurses' station to room seventeen. The door is ajar.

‘His brother's in a coma,' whispers Hazel. ‘You ready for this?' she asks.

I'm about to respond when Hazel knocks and enters, pulling me in with her.

‘Peter, this is Tom,' says Hazel. ‘Tom is Valerie Wolkoff's granddaughter.'

‘Oh, yes,' says Peter Perfect, crossing one leg over the other and looking altogether too neat. ‘Tom,' he says and pulls the chair next to him a bit closer, ‘come and sit down and let's get acquainted.'

I look across at Hazel. She smiles and mouths the words ‘it's only for a week'.

‘When are you going to tell Jonah about Rumbly?' Jonathan Whiting asks me as he pulls the cream Bentley into a parking spot outside Fielder's Pets and Supplies.

‘I'm waiting for the right moment,' I answer.

It's been over a week since I met Rumbly. Jonathan says he doesn't mind the detour, although his question tells me it can't go on forever. ‘We don't have to drop by every day,' I say.

‘Tom, it's fine,' he says. ‘It's almost on the way. I just think you need to tell Jonah. Then you can take Rumbly home.'