So it was Short Arse now? Arnie smiled dangerously — and let the barman have it. “So, Bum Head,” he asked, “do you know where we can find Joe?”
The barman looked ready to jump across the bar and take Arnie on. Instead he gave an evil smile. “Joe? Now you’re really asking for trouble.” He turned and shouted through the swing doors behind the bar. “Joe? Hey Joe! There’s a boy out here asking for you. About your size, but he’s got more muscles than you and a mouth to go with it.”
“Is that so?” a voice answered. “This I gotta see.”
The swing doors burst open and Joe appeared.
“You’re Joe?” Skylark asked. She was big, butch and built like a brick shithouse. Her hair was cut in a crewcut and there was no doubting that her pecs, underneath her T-shirt, were just as spectacular as Arnie’s. She took one look at Skylark, her eyes swivelled to Arnie and, bullseye, she had his number.
“There’s only one place where you get a build like yours, boy,” Joe said, “and that’s the Army. A Company, B or C?”
“C for Charlie.”
“Bad answer,” Joe answered, flexing her biceps. “When I did my service, C didn’t stand for Charlie. It stood for a part of the female anatomy which, in deference to my sex and because there are ladies present, I shall not mention. Did you make corporal?”
“Yes.”
“Another bad answer,” Joe said. “I made sergeant, so next time you speak to me you’ll add a ‘sir’ to that as in ‘Yes sir!’ Got it?” She began to walk backwards and forwards in front of Arnie, cracking her knuckles. “Man, if there’s one thing I can’t stand it’s corporals of any shape, size or colour. Especially when they come into my bar and badmouth my staff. But I’ll give you a break.” Joe planted her elbow on the bar and motioned to Arnie.
“Come on then, Corporal, make my day.”
“Sorry, I never arm wrestle with a woman,” Arnie said. But hell, how much aggro was a guy supposed to take? “However, in your case —” He began to pump his biceps.
Immediately there was a rush to watch — and the barman, always one to make an extra buck, called, “Come on, ladies and gentlemen, place your bets!” Dollar notes came flying from all over the place. Even Skylark put a couple of bucks down.
“Is that all you’ve got to show me?” Joe sneered, one eye on Arnie’s bulging muscles. She gave a few pumps herself and the sleeves of her T-shirt rippled with the strain.
It was a battle of Titans. It was a battle of wills. Arnie kept a grim face and Joe bared her teeth. She forced his arm down to the bar but, at the last moment, Arnie forced her back. She pretended to be surprised and winked at him — and then spat him straight in the eye.
“Hey, ref!” one of the patrons called. “Foul play!”
“And here I was thinking you were a lady,” Arnie said.
Amid whistles, Arnie recovered. He forced Joe’s arm down to the bar. Closer. Closer. Almost there. He could see the sweat popping on Joe’s forehead as she tried to force his arm back.
“You may be strong for a woman,” Arnie said, “but you’re still just a pussy.”
That’s when Skylark kicked him. Hard.
“What the heck!” Startled, Arnie lost his concentration — and Joe took the advantage. With a loud grunt, she flipped Arnie’s arm down and won the bout. Immediately, there were cheers and the pounding of fists on the bar as the lucky punters jostled for their winnings.
Arnie glared at Skylark. “What did you do that for?”
“Two reasons,” Skylark answered. “The first is that you are a chauvinist pig. The second is —” she showed him her dollars — “I had a lot riding on you to lose, and I wanted to win my bet.”
“Thank you, Skylark, for your vote of confidence.”
“But the real reason is that we needed Joe to win so that she would be okay about helping us.”
“Helping you?” Joe asked, looking at Arnie. “Nobody’s helping anybody until they apologise to my barman.”
That’s when Skylark stepped in. “He’ll apologise,” she said to Joe. “Then you can tell me what’s in the Apocrypha.”
It was as easy as that. Joe’s eyes searched Skylark’s face and then probed into her.
“Apology accepted,” Joe said. She shook Arnie’s hand, and the bar patrons gave good-natured cheers. Then she turned back to Skylark. “You’ll both have to come home with me, which means you’ll have to stay the night. Meantime, you look like you could do with some food. How about some steak and eggs with a side salad. It’s on the house.” She slapped Arnie on the back. “That okay with you, Corporal?”
To be truthful, it was great to get some hot food. Afterwards, Skylark found herself ambushed by some raucous Maori women who rushed her off to the poker machines. From the corner of her eye she saw Arnie heading off with some of the younger blokes for a game of pool. He came over to her:
“Is that okay with you?” he asked.
“Sure,” Skylark nodded, “Go ahead.”
When closing time came, Baldy threw everybody out. Skylark and Arnie waited outside for Joe.
“Shall we follow you in our ute?” Arnie asked when she arrived.
Joe laughed. “Not unless it floats.” She pointed across the sea. Far in the distance, they could just make out the dark shape of an island. Above it, the Southern Cross. “That’s my home,” Joe continued. “Let’s vamoose.” She led the way along the jetty, and soon they were sliding across the dark ocean in Joe’s dinghy, aiming for the pointer star in the Cross’s constellation. The outboard motor churned a phosphorescent wake, put-putting a regular rhythm.
Joe ran the dinghy up a sheltered beach. She led Skylark and Arnie along a path, past a barn to a small house. Skylark was almost dead on her feet.
“Let’s get some shut-eye, shall we?” Joe said. “Leave the talk for the morning.” Her eyes twinkled. “But what’s the sleeping arrangements? I’ve got two spare bedrooms, but if you two are together you could have my double bed —”
Skylark cut her short. “That won’t be necessary, and I hope you don’t need me to elucidate.”
“Oops,” Joe said. “My mistake.”
Arnie blushed a deep and interesting shade of red.
The next morning, the sound of the telephone invaded Skylark’s dreams. It rang and rang, and Joe didn’t answer, so Skylark got out of bed, found the phone in the sitting room, and picked up the receiver.
“Hello?”
It was too late. The caller — Hoki — put the telephone down. Kawanatanga and his cohorts, she knew, must be well on their way by now. They would have stopped over for the night at some cliff-face eyrie near Kaikoura. In the morning, with the whales spouting out to sea, they would have woken, fed and continued their mission. Already they were crossing Cook Strait, skimming the waves, their eyes flaring red with the dawn. Kaa. Kaa.
“How can I alert Skylark to the danger?” Hoki wailed.
Meantime, Skylark wandered into Joe’s empty kitchen. She opened the refrigerator. “Yecch,” she groaned. As she suspected, stock full with rabbit food, bunches of carrots, muscle-building stuff, energy drinks and not a carbohydrate or chocolate bar in sight.
Skylark helped herself to orange juice, looked out the kitchen window and saw Joe returning from the barn. Joe wore a T-shirt and track pants and was wiping her face with a towel. She smiled and waved. “Good morning,” she said. “Feel like breakfast?”
“Yes, thanks. Do you know where Arnie is?”
“Missing him already?” Joe winked. “We’ve been working out together. But he wanted to do some extra crunches and work on his abs, so I left him in the barn. It’s set up as my personal gym.”