Peter Temple - White Dog

They shook hands. The dog relaxed, embarked on a sniffing spree.

‘Hurts,’ said Cam, rubbing his chest. ‘Harry, this’s Chink.’

They shook hands.

‘Know ya,’ said Chink. ‘That Derby, read that.’

He was talking about Harry winning the English Derby in the late 1950s, a famous ride, Harry seeming to lift Ceasefire’s head with both hands to edge out Pride of Shannon by nostrils. The photograph was on the wall in Harry’s study, not big, not in pride of place. The first time I saw it, I was struck by Harry’s hands — his long, powerful fingers.

Cam waved at me. ‘Jack, Chink.’

We shook hands. Chink didn’t have the air of someone who wanted to hurt but he could have clamped two leaf springs flat.

‘Want some tea?’ said Chink. He was looking at Harry.

Harry shook his head. ‘Need to keep this short,’ he said. ‘How far?’

‘Just down the track. Forty.’

‘Before we go,’ said Harry, looking around, scratching the cleft in his chin, ‘seen the papers?’

‘Nah.’

‘Could be bullshit?’

‘Bloke at the pub’s seen the papers.’

Harry didn’t seem impressed by this authentication. ‘The bloke at the pub told you,’ he said.

Chink understood Harry. ‘Know him,’ he said. He waited, then pointed a thumb at Cam. He seemed to be saying he trusted the man as he trusted Cam.

Harry nodded, satisfied. ‘Spotted the animal in the paddock, did you?’

Chink took the weight off his lesser leg. ‘Come by there one day,’ he said. ‘He took a run, rug rottin on him. Knew him for a thorough.’

‘How’s that?’ said Harry.

Chink looked at Harry for a while, unblinking. ‘Bit to do with horses,’ he said. ‘Fifty year.’

‘No offence,’ said Harry. ‘And then?’

‘Asked around. Got the name.’

Harry nodded. ‘Lost Legion.’

‘Yeah. Membered it. Funny old world.’

‘This bloke, he’s the owner?’

‘Reckon. He got left the property, everything. More brains in a tinny.’

‘We’ll follow you,’ said Harry.

We remounted and watched Chink and the dog walk towards the paddock gate. The horses and the goat moved to meet them. Chink opened the gate a crack, the goat shot through. Chink found something in his shirt pocket for the horses, they put their noses in his big hand. The trio came back, the goat walking behind Chink, butting him, the dog third, nipping at the goat.

‘Like one of them kids’ stories,’ said Harry.

Chink opened the back of the truck. The goat was waiting like someone in a bank queue. Chink picked it up as if it were weightless and loaded it, closed the door, latched it.

We followed the Dodge back to the road. The dog’s head poked out of the window, barking at the world. Its colour matched the truck’s bodywork. We turned right and, after a while, took a side road to the right, going downhill again, the country opening up.

Harry and Cam had an exchange, incomprehensible to me.

‘Can I join this universe of knowledge?’ I said. ‘Who’s Chink?’

‘Hardest man alive, Chink,’ said Cam.

‘The goat likes him,’ I said.

‘Hunted brumbies with Chink,’ said Cam. ‘In the Snowies, Tumut, up around there. All uphill, cold as buggery, snows any time, snows at Christmas.’

‘And now?’

‘No Chink, no horse. The thing’s a killer.’

‘Say no more. I understand perfectly. We’ve driven hundreds of kilometres into the wilderness for you to buy a killer horse.’

‘You, Jack,’ said Harry.

‘Me?’

‘I want you to buy it. Supposin we do.’

I studied the big, lumpy piece of Gippsland that had come into view, more settled here, the odd weatherboard farmhouse smoking under a low, troubled sky, eroded creeks, leaning sheds, rugged-up horses, some signs of agriculture.

When the land was almost flat, the Dodge, dog riding shotgun for the left flank, turned right. We followed, went through a belt of trees, down a back road for a kilometre or two. The truck pulled into a driveway. We stopped behind it. All humans got out.

A horse was in the paddock, in the middle, twenty metres away, a tatter of a rug on its back. It looked at us, a glance, put its head down. If this was the horse, I could not see how the animal could be identified as a thoroughbred.

We walked to join Chink. He was standing at the fence, hands in his pockets.

‘Small,’ said Harry.

Chink didn’t say anything. He made a clicking noise. The horse raised its head. Chink clicked again. The horse looked at us, moved its head as if easing a strain, looked away in a deliberate manner.

We waited. The horse shifted, one eye looked at us.

‘Thin,’ said Cam.

Chink turned his back on the horse, looked down the valley. Cam and Harry turned. Not to be outdone, I turned.

‘Earnin a quid around here,’ said Harry. ‘What’s the secret?’

‘They don’t tell me,’ said Chink.

A sound behind us, the horse. He was three metres away, looking at us: eyes interested but not sharp, small movements of his head.

‘No mongrel,’ said Harry. ‘Bit of wear on the legs.’

Now I noticed the scar tissue on the horse’s forelegs.

Harry looked at Chink. ‘Let’s see him move,’ he said.

Chink depressed the top strand of the fence by half a metre and made to swing a leg over. The horse took off over the wet, pitted paddock, rug flapping, ran twenty or thirty metres, stopped and looked backed at us, breathing hard.

‘Nothing,’ said Cam. ‘Chink?’

‘Sound,’ said Chink. ‘Decent tucker, bit of work.’

‘Okay,’ said Harry, ‘where’s this bloke?’

At the pub, a peeling single-storey structure at a T-junction, two utes and three dogs outside, we pulled up beside Chink. Cam got out, lit a Gitane, went around the bonnet and spoke to Chink, foot on the running board, looking up, wind erasing the smoke from his lips. He came back, flicked the cigarette, got in.

Harry looked at him.

‘The bloke’s a bit bombed, apparently,’ said Cam. ‘Also even bombed these woops can see keen coming in the dark.’

Harry turned and looked at me, the dry eyes, no lack of alertness here. He gave me an envelope. ‘Here’s the form,’ he said. ‘And Jack, the point’s not the stiff paper. I just don’t want any talk.’

I sighed and left the warm container. Chink got out of the truck, fell in with me, pushed in the dirty door. The room was overheated, cruel fluorescent light, smelling of cigarette smoke, beer-sogged carpet, old frying oil. Two men were playing pool, the one on strike showing us a deep cleft between pimply buttocks. Another man was talking to the woman behind the bar. We went over to customer number four, in the corner, a fat bearded man wearing a filthy, sagging jumper and a baseball cap. He appeared to be impaled on his stool.

‘Den, this’s Jack,’ said Chink. ‘It’s about the horse.’

Chink left, moved down the bar.

Den looked at me, the turn of head took effort, screwed-up red eyes. His nose had sores on it and it was running. He didn’t move to shake hands. I looked at his hand on a beer glass and I was glad that he didn’t.

He drank. ‘Bloody racehorse, mate,’ he said. ‘Not your bloody…’ He didn’t finish, put a hand up his fetid jumper, hand-knitted if I was any judge, and scratched himself, a task for which one hand was clearly inadequate. Then he reached down to the floor, groaned at the effort, and produced a plastic bag.

I put my back against the bar.

Den looked into the bag, dug out a small plastic-covered brown book with a window on the cover.

‘Lookit this,’ he said, opening it.

I took it gingerly and looked. It was Lost Legion’s official history. The most recent owner was given as Dennis James Chaffee. The writing was legible although a fluid had stained the pages. Some things are best left unspeculated upon.