Peter Corris - The Coast Road

‘He kept this very dark,’ De Witt had said. ‘I doubt the police know about her.’

The woman’s name was Wendy Jones and she lived in Port Kembla.

‘When you say bikie…?’

‘D’you know the joke Roseanne used to tell when she was a standup?’

I didn’t.

De Witt assumed the pose. ‘It goes something like this: “Bikers. I hate bikers. They smell, they’re dirty, got lice in their hair and beards, they chew tobacco and piss by the side of the road-and that’s just the women.” Never met her, but from what I hear, that’s something like your Wendy. Probably not as grotty.’

De Witt didn’t have an address for her but he said there was a dirt track in a waste ground area to the south of Port Kembla where the bikies raced, drank and did the other things bikies do.

‘When?’

‘Every night, so long as the different gangs aren’t actually fire-bombing each other.’

‘Hard scene to infiltrate. I’ve never ridden a motorbike in my life.’

‘Oh, plenty of civilians turn up for the product.’

‘The cops?’

‘Know they’re outnumbered and possibly outgunned.’

‘Great.’

De Witt had been fairly specific about where the bikie meeting place was located and I wondered whether he might have made the trip there himself in his more toxic days. I drove south keeping an eye on the rear vision mirrors. The last thing I needed was to attract police interest. In fact the more I thought about it, the more sensible it seemed to get a different car. I left the Falcon in a parking station near the central shopping mall in Wollongong, lugged my bag to a Hertz office and rented a Mitsubishi 4WD station wagon.

I rang Illawarra Mutual and asked for Carson Lucas, to be told that he’d gone on leave.

‘That’s sudden,’ I said.

‘Is there anyone else who can help you, sir?’

The words, delivered in the meaningless singsong tone some receptionists use, struck me as funny and I laughed.

‘Sir?’

‘Nothing. Thank you.’

I waited and it came. ‘Have a nice day.’

I sat in the comfortable car with the mobile in my hand in a strangely thoughtful mood. There was nobody else who could help me and it seemed somewhat unlikely that I’d have a nice day. With luck, it wouldn’t be too bad. I checked the Gregory’s and tried to familiarise myself with the area south of Wollongong where I’d never been. The steelworks dominated the map and Lake Illawarra, a pinpoint on a small-scale map, almost filled a page of the directory. The NRMA accommodation guide, another essential accessory, showed that the area wasn’t well off for motels, but one at Warrawong seemed like the closest to where I was headed, had the necessary facilities, and wouldn’t make Dr Farmer have to apply for promotion.

I drove to the motel, checked in, bought a hamburger nearby and ate it with a can of beer from the mini-bar. Two cans of beer. Then I poured boiling water on two of the Nescafe coffee sachets, producing a strong cup. I drank two cups while I scribbled notes on my day’s work, connected up names and places and snippets of information with arrows and dotted lines and peppered the whole diagram with question marks. I have a collection of these diagrams going back many years and I don’t know what good they do, if any. But I still make them.

Port Kembla and parts south aren’t well lit at night and I frequently had to consult the directory by torchlight to make sure I was keeping in the right direction. It took a while with quite a few false turns and dead ends, but eventually I located the bikies’ sacred site-a large area that looked like a dried-up lake bed or perhaps a filled-in quarry. I got there more by tracking sight and sound than anything else. The area was a couple of hectares all told and a figure eight dirt track had been graded into existence and confirmed over time by thousands of spinning, skidding wheels. The track was lit by the headlights of twenty or more 4WDs parked at intervals. Riding around that surface in company with others, taking the scarcely banked bends at speed and coming in and out of shadows seemed to me like a good way to break something, from an ankle to a neck.

When I arrived a dozen bikes were in action. They were roaring, and there were at least fifty more lined up ready to roar. There was more leather and denim and greasy hair than at the Altamont Speedway in 1969, and a good scattering of what De Witt called civilians as well. Some long hairs, some baldies, some boozers, some pot heads. I was in my jeans and flannie and, having a heavy beard, I had a strong stubble sprouting. I also had a plastic-looped six pack. I got out of the car and began to wander around, swigging from a can and trying not to stumble over the discarded cans and bottles or slip on the oil slicks. There was no security that I could see. Again, De Witt seemed to have got it right. This was a no-go zone for the forces of law and order and respectability.

Within half an hour I was approached four times: twice by buyers and twice by sellers. I fended them off until I decided my presence would look suspicious. The fifth approach was from a man in leather pants, high-laced hiking boots and an Afghan jacket that looked to date back to the time when people wore Afghan jackets.

‘Lookin’ for something, dude?’ he said in an accent that might’ve been American. I had to lean down closer to hear him over the revving of the bikes.

‘Could be.’ I detached a can from the loop and handed it to him.

‘Thanks. Pills, pot or pussy?’

I laughed and he took me by the arm and led me to a shadowy spot behind an ancient Land Cruiser whose headlights were dimming.

‘What the fuck’re you doing here?’ he hissed.

‘What?’

‘You’re a cop. It sticks out like dog’s balls.’

‘Don’t know what you’re on about.’

‘You’re in the way. Sorry, but I’ve gotta do this.’

He raised his can as if to drink from it and that’s the last movement I registered. What followed was a blur and a bump and the loud, flickering, petrol-smelling scene slipped away from me as I went down a long slope into a quiet, dark place.

When I came around I was sitting in the passenger seat of a Land Cruiser, seatbelt on, depleted six pack at my feet. As far as I could tell, nothing was broken and nothing hurt more than usual. The man in the Afghan jacket was sitting next to me, smoking. The smoke made me cough.

‘How d’you feel?’ The doubtful American accent was gone.

‘Shithouse, at being taken down so easily.’

‘You were off guard, Mr Hardy, and I’ve had the training. Sorry I took you for a cop, but you had the look. Too much of the look.’

‘So why…?’

‘Try to work it out.’

I looked him over and thought about it. Almost too good to be true, the way he looked, and the ease with which he’d handled me suggested intensive training.

‘Undercover?’

He shrugged. ‘You said it, not me.’

My wallet was sitting on the dashboard in front of me, lying open. I’d left it under the seat of the Mitsubishi. This

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guy knew his business. When I was sure I could move, I looked out to right and left and then straight ahead. Blackness all around. I took the wallet, closed it and stuffed it in the pocket of my shirt.

‘Okay, you know who I am and I suppose I know what you’re doing, or what you suggest you’re doing. Undercover, sure. Easy to say. Trouble is, you’ve probably got no way of proving it.’

‘I could’ve turned you over to the bikies. They don’t make much distinction between private detectives and cops.’

Probably true. I leaned down and pulled a can from the loop. My finger was clumsy in the ring pull but I managed. The beer was still cold so not too much time had elapsed. Good detecting. Could’ve looked at my watch. The period of unconsciousness had scrambled me a little. I drank some more beer and he took a long drag on his cigarette.