Peter Temple: Black Tide

The glazed look was coming on again, more glazed.

‘So,’ I said, ‘what did you recommend?’

He blinked, once, twice, focused on me. ‘Yes. Yes. Well. I’m not saying I was a stranger to complicated propositions. Not at all. No. Put up a few of my own by then. Propositions aren’t necessarily bad because they’re complicated. No. The problem is they’re often complicated because they’re bad.’

Miles smiled, reflected on the wisdom of this statement, looked at the window, eyes narrowed, cigarette burning in his fingers, forgotten, ash fell off, onto the formica.

We were running out of time: they eat early in the slammers, even the genteel white-collar slammers.

‘What advice did you give them, TransQuik?’

Alert again.

‘Sorry, tend to drop off at the end of the day. Early start. I took Levesque and Rupert and McColl into the next room. I said to them, nobody offers deals like this. This is like the fax from Nigeria offering you free money. Rupert was nodding, he agreed. McColl was watching Levesque like a puppydog, watched Levesque like that all the time. Levesque smiles, McColl smiles. He’d fart in front of the Queen if Levesque went first. Well, Levesque gives me a hard look. He didn’t like my opinion at all. “We’ve checked these people out,’’ he said. “We’re happy.’’’

The warder came in, still worried that his collection of lawyers and accountants and pyramid salesmen and shirt-lifting priests were going to storm the walls. ‘Five minutes maximum, Mr Irish.’

Miles said, ‘I told Levesque the offer was outside my experience. He says, he’s looking at me like a hungry animal, he says, “What, you want to consult an accountant? Our accountant needs his own accountant?’’ I said, “No, I’m suggesting some caution.’’ You know what he said?’

‘What?’

‘Levesque looked at me, he’s got a smile where he opens his lips slowly, you see more and more teeth. Then he said: “Fuck off, Dixon, whatever your name is. Double-barrelled bullshit artist. You’re small-time. You’ll always be small-time. You’re not required. Piss off. Get out.’’’

We didn’t have much time left. ‘Did they take the offer?’ I asked.

He nodded. ‘They paid off all debts, squared the Tax Department, unloaded the shares. Then, about nine, ten months later, the buying spree started-Leeton Stevedoring, Pacargo Air, that’s a freight airline in Papua New Guinea. Travel agencies. Truck stops. Got a new CEO, too. An American, he’d be the new owner’s man.’

‘How would you rate your judgment now? Good deal for Levesque and his partners?’

Miles was tired. Tic. A still facial moment. Tic.

‘I hate the bastard, concede that,’ he said. ‘My judgment was to take care. I’m not saying I wouldn’t have said go for it when we knew more. But as it stood it wasn’t a deal. It was an offer of money. Question is, what kind of money is it? You need to know.’

‘What kind did you think it was?’

‘I’m a bit of a stickybeak. I tried to run down Eagle Exprexxo. Had a bit of experience with Cook Islands, Caymans, places like that. In the end all I got was that Eagle had a link with a Manila company, the name’s gone…’

What was the name Stuart Wardle had given Tony Rinaldi to put to Siebold? It came to me.

‘Arcaro Transport?’

‘Absolutely. Arcaro. And both of them, they both had links with another company part-owned by a company owned by these two trusts. It’s complicated stuff. You need to draw it on paper. Anyhow, I got nowhere. Then I asked a mate of mine in Sydney, knows everything this fellow, gave him the names. He got back, he says, “This is The Connection. Walk back, walk back very, very carefully.’’’

‘The Connection.’

Rapid nods, smile, no tics, another puffing cigarette combustion transfer. ‘The Connection. I’d never heard of it. My friend says, doesn’t mince his words, “Don’t fuck with these people, Miles,’’ he says, “it’s the good old boys from Manila.’’’

Behind me, silent entry like a butler, the warder coughed. ‘I’m afraid that’s it, Mr Irish.’

Impeccable screw behaviour in this place. Not like screws at all. Perhaps there were front-of-house screws, with the real screws inside.

Miles put out his hand. His lethargy was gone, replaced by a feverishness. ‘I didn’t ask any more questions. Listen, come back, I’ve got other interesting stories. Tell Alan, tell him, tell him I don’t forget. I’ll show him that when I get out of here. Good man, excellent person. Alan. Yes.’

I came out of the neat jail, a jail designed to look like a motel, a compulsory-stop motel, and aimed the Lotus down the highway. A long day entering its twilight, a day following a night rich with unpleasant surprises. I felt invigorated, mind fresh. Perhaps the adrenaline pump wouldn’t shut down? Was I to be permanently primed for fight or flight until I simply fell over?

Sticking on the speed limit in the red Lotus from Basement 1, I thought about Miles Crewe-Dixon and his facial tic. Miles and Steven Levesque. TransQuik and Eagle Exprexxo of Tampa, Florida. Stuart Wardle and Arcaro Transport and Major-General Ibell and Charles deFoster Winter. Gary Connors and Klostermann Gardier. Steven Levesque and Klostermann Gardier and The Connection. Good old boys from Manila.

The Connection. Good old boys from Manila.

Brent Rupert, he was one of the bosses, he used to go to Manila and to America with Gary.

That was what Chrissy Donato-Connors-Sargent had said.

What had Lyall said about Stuart Wardle?

He was big on the Philippines, working on a book on the subject.

Good old boys from Manila.

I tried to remember what Simone Bendsten had told me, couldn’t recall a word. It seemed like a month had passed. I’d been too tired to register anything.

Ring her. No.

Then I remembered: her unread report was in the secret compartment of my desk.

In and out quickly. They wouldn’t be expecting me to come back to my office, not at night and alone.

I found an illegal park a hundred metres down the street and was in the office inside a minute, didn’t put on the light, had the envelope in my hands in thirty seconds. Out the front door, turned the key in the deadlock.

Rain like mist, tarmac shining. Light on across the way in McCoy’s studio, some artistic atrocity being committed. On the pavement, a steel rubbish skip. How did McCoy decide which of his efforts to throw away? Toss a coin?

I looked down the street towards the Lotus. Half a block beyond it, I could see the dark bulk of a four-wheel-drive parked outside the back doors of the old chutney factory.

Mr Pigtail the warehouse developer having a late inspection, gloating over the profits to come.

I was ten metres from the car, walking in the street, when two blocks down a car turned the corner, came towards me, turned right into St David Street.

Two men in the four-wheel-drive, slumped in the front seats, just the tops of their heads caught for an instant in the headlights of the car behind them.

Warehouse converters?

No. I knew who they were.

I stopped, froze.

Run for the Lotus?

A movement in the driver’s seat of the big vehicle. The driver sitting upright.

Get to the Lotus, unlock the door, get in, get it started.

It was an unfamiliar car. It would take me seconds to find the ignition.

No. Too late.

Run for it. Run back. Run for Carrigan’s Lane and Smith Street.

The four-wheel-drive started up, headlights came on.

Run.

I hadn’t gone five paces when I knew I’d never get to Carrigan’s Lane, never get to Smith Street.

Look back. The big vehicle pulling out from the kerb, squeal of fat tyres.