They also made two survey trips of the district. They had the maps, but maps are never sufficient. Wyatt couldn’t work without pictures in his head. He liked to know about culverts, road signs, bends hidden by trees or farm buildings, overhanging branches, road edges churned and eroded by heavy vehicles, stretches rendered slow or impassable by potholes, sharp stones or washaways.
On Thursday morning they drove to Burra, a town that had grown prosperous on Merino wool after the copper mines had closed down. It had started as a cluster of separate townships on low hills, but they had amalgamated over time. The houses were built of local stone. Huge gums grew along the creek. Two-storey pubs with wrought iron verandahs and vines faced the town square, and the Cornish miners’ cottages in the back streets had been tarted up for the tourists. There were two tourist buses parked outside the tiny museum when Wyatt and Leah arrived. A short distance away they found Tobin.
He was leaning against his delivery van, a bulky Ford painted iridescent blue, its doors and side panels decorated with gold curlicues. He was smoking, watching the locals through his orange lenses. Wyatt noted the way Tobin ignored the men. He was interested only in the women. When a woman walked by, he took the cigarette from his mouth and swivelled his head after her, his mouth hanging open. Leah saw it too, as they got out of the ute and approached him. ‘Lovely bloke.’
‘We’re not interested in his personality,’ Wyatt said.
‘I am. The other day I could feel his eyes all over me. He’s the sort who has sweaty hands.’
Tobin saw them approaching and stopped lounging. He threw down his cigarette and grinned. All Wyatt could see of Tobin’s face were the grin, the cricketer’s moustache and the reflection of himself and Leah in the orange lenses.
It’s all psychology, Wyatt thought, working with men like Tobin. Talk their language and you’re halfway there. ‘Good run down?’ he asked.
Tobin slapped the side of his van. ‘Home to here in just under two hours,’ he said. ‘I already unloaded.’ He counted on his fingers: ‘Case of Scotch, latest release videos, souvenirs for the Tourist Centre.’
Wyatt looked at the van. The windows were smoky black; he couldn’t see inside them.
‘What time we getting back here?’ Tobin asked. ‘I got to deliver spare parts to a car place in Goyder this arvo.’
‘About twelve-thirty.’
Tobin rubbed his hands together. ‘No worries then. Let’s hit the road.’
They squeezed together into the Holden utility and left Burra heading north-west. It was ten-thirty. At eleven o’clock they picked up the Steelgard van in Vimy Ridge, Steelgard’s last stop before Belcowie. They tailed it out of the town, staying well back. The traffic was sparse, as it had been the previous week. The only road dust was coming from the van ahead of them.
‘What do you think?’ Wyatt asked.
Tobin was sitting against the passenger door on the other side of Leah his head inclined toward the windscreen. Wyatt was aware of Tobin’s excitement. He’s getting a kick out of this, he thought. The van, the money, Leah’s leg against his.
‘What do I think? I expected a bigger van. This is going to be easy.’
‘You can shift it all right?’
‘No worries.’
‘What if it shuts down-motor, brakes, locks, electrical system?’
‘Cut the brake lines and winch her in,’ Tobin said.
He turned to face Wyatt as he said it. His back was against the door how, and he’d extended his arm along the top of the seat. His fingers were curled close to Leah’s shoulder. Wyatt felt her move away from him.
‘The next problem is,’ Leah said to both of them, ‘will the short cut be too narrow to take a truck?’
Tobin was an uneducated man. Like many men who work at practical jobs, he relied on physical gestures to supplement speech. Wyatt glanced away from the road for a moment, to see how Tobin would answer this question, and saw an elaborate play of shoulders, mouth and hands, Tobin’s way of saying, ‘You got me there.’
Ahead of them the dust cloud swirled and changed direction. Good-the van was using the short cut again. Wyatt waited for ten minutes before he turned in after it. They followed the track to where it met the main road again, four kilometres north of Belcowie. Wyatt stopped. ‘Well?’
‘No worries,’ Tobin said.
He said it again thirty minutes later when they showed him the farm buildings. ‘No worries. You could hide a bloody ship in here.’
He grinned at them. He had the orange shades on. Wyatt knew he was looking at Leah’s breasts. ‘So,’ Tobin said, ‘am I in? Is it a goer?’
‘That depends. We still need a low-loader or a breakdown truck, one that can’t be traced back to us.’
Tobin actually tapped his nose knowingly. ‘Let me take care of that. So, am I in?’
Wyatt nodded.
Tobin stuck out his hand and shook Wyatt’s enthusiastically. Then he put his arm around Leah and squeezed her. It was brief, as if it meant nothing, but he looked at Wyatt while he did it, and Wyatt knew the gesture meant everything.
SEVENTEEN
On Friday afternoon Trigg said, ‘What do you mean, too expensive? Don’t you kids get pocket-money any more?’
The kid was about seventeen. He wore a prefect’s uniform. His name was Wayne and he was Trigg’s main supplier at the high school. ‘I’m just telling you what they tell me,’ he said. ‘The speed’s too expensive, so’s the dope.’
‘In my day kids had paper rounds, they mowed lawns, washed cars. Too fucking slack. These days if they’re not hanging around the mall they’re in Mooney’s-’
Trigg broke off. If the kids were in Mooney’s playing the pinball machines, how come Mooney kept holding out on the seven hundred and fifty bucks he still owed? Fucking everyone in Goyder was welshing on their debts.
‘Fucking slack,’ he repeated.
Wayne drank from the Southwark stubbie that Trigg had given him. He let Trigg rave on. The fact that Trigg was bent didn’t mean that he wasn’t like a parent when it came to what kids did these days. Half smiling at Trigg, Wayne said, ‘Some kids are doing all right money-wise. The ones with a few dope plants. They charge less than you do.’
Trigg closed his eyes. It just wasn’t worth the hassle. By the time he’d paid Wayne and the others, and allowed subcontractors like Tobin some leeway on what they owed him, he never had enough to meet the interest payment on his Mesic debt. He would have to start coming down hard on a few people.
‘So if that’s all…’ Wayne said, putting down the stubbie and retrieving his satchel from behind the door.
Trigg attempted a smile. ‘You’re in a big hurry. Why don’t you stay a bit longer?’
Wayne knew what it was about and his face shut down. He swung the satchel at the level of his knees. ‘I have to get home.’
Trigg patted the two-seater couch. ‘Just ten minutes.’
Wayne took charge. He dropped the satchel on the floor again and sat next to Trigg. He trailed his fingers absorbedly over Trigg’s knee.
‘You’ve had a haircut,’ Trigg said.
Wayne shrugged. He kept up the movements of his hand.
‘I suppose your girlfriend likes it?’
‘Now, now, Raymond,’ Wayne said. With the subdued light, the closeness, and the choked breathing, the air in the room was charged and avid. ‘It hurt me last time,’ he said.
‘Oh, babe, you should’ve told me. We’ll do it another way.’
Ten minutes later Wayne said, ‘Ten minutes,’ and he was out of Trigg’s house within sixty seconds.
Trigg made his phone calls then. He felt clammy. He picked at his clothing as he talked.
‘Mooney?’ he said. ‘You’re not getting any younger.’
‘I can give you a couple of hundred,’ Mooney said apologetically.
‘What do you do there, anyhow?’ Trigg demanded. ‘Let the kids play the machines for free?’
He cut the connection and dialled a different number. ‘It’s Trigg. You’re not getting any younger.’
The voice on the other end seemed to come through a mouthful of food. There were chewing noises and then a clearing cough. ‘You’ve got me. You might as well repossess the car.’