Chapter 25
Max stared into the pit where his son’s eye had once sparkled. The bruises were gone and the skin repaired. His son had the look of a tranquil baby in its cot. Except for the mess of tubes with fluids flowing through them McLuhan could have been asleep.
The doctor was at his side and was pressing a needle into the soft part of McLuhan’s neck. Max winced as the instrument disappeared for a moment before reappearing again, emptied of its magic potion.
‘What d’ya think, doc?’
‘Mr Hollard,’ he began and Max knew when they started with his name like that the news was no good. ‘We can always hope for the best. His heart is strong and his organs are sound. There is some disturbance to the nerves along his spine and, of course, to his neck. We just have to wait. I have an idea he’s in there sorting things out before he awakens.’
‘Thanks doc!’
Max turned away from his sorrow and gave the surgeon a steady look. The doctor pressed his lips together and left. Max returned his eyes to his son, trying to reach beyond the intransigence of the inert body and into the soul that hung so desperately to life. Then he walked out of the hospital.
Frank waited by the van.
*
Max drove along the coastal road, bumper to bumper, the windows open and hot wind brushing his beard. The breeze had picked up somewhat and the sea had begun to move again. He looked through the windscreen from the limbo of his mind and steered the van by habit. The words of Frank seemed remote and unclear like a distant evocation at a far-off séance.
‘You didn’t catch a thing I said, did you?’
Max swung the van off the coastal road and hit the dusty track with a skid. His wooden house loomed as an object in a forgotten dream. He dreaded going inside to face his nightmare, preferring to remain with the van.
Frank waited.
‘You want me to handle this, mate?’
‘Nuh!’ Max replied with a gentle shiver. ‘Hannibal’d never send Murdoch in alone, would he?’
Frank grinned as they climbed the stone steps to the verandah. Rane and Juno were waiting in the cool of the late afternoon shadows. Their eyes were glowing and were full of the vivacity of youth. Juno smiled at her father, rather shyly, and he gave her a wink. Then Frank grasped Rane by the shoulders and gave the lad a good going over with his eyes, as if seeing him for the first time.
‘You may be good to have around, son.’
*
‘Ya know somethin’ I don’t?’ shouted Max as the big bike headed to the city.
Frank strained to hear. The helmet he wore flopped about his head and the toilet paper he had stuffed to make it fit had crept out and was flapping comically about his face.
Approaching the Spit Bridge Max gave the throttle a squeeze and the bike roared and leapt forward as if stung by its own exhaust. They passed over the bridge at two hundred kilometres an hour, two middle-aged knights on an errand of rescue. Frank crouched in behind the massive shield of Max. The road beneath their eyes was as smooth and black as a blackboard. At the crest where houses squeezed against the road the bike slowed to sixty and Frank had the disconcerting feeling that he could get off and walk faster than the bike.
Max parked the BMW outside a delicatessen in Victoria Street at the front of The Cross and they walked to the old club in the filthy lane. Up the way a bit they noticed the black LTD with the silhouetted driver inside. The late sun was nearing its rendezvous with the Sydney Tower and the rest of the city reached up to eavesdrop. The driver turned a page of his newspaper.
The way down the stairs was free of litter and the aroma of fresh coffee met them at the door. Milan came out of the kitchen at the far end and shouted his greetings. He was dressed in shorts that flapped around his bony thighs like a flag around a masthead. His floral Hawaiian shirt shone vividly in the light of the prismatic beams from the ceiling.
‘You are a Visconti creature today, Mil.’
‘But I’ve never been to Venice, Frank.’ said Milan as his hands decorated his sentence.
They lumped themselves around a centre table and slurped their coffee. Delicate pastries were on doilies until they vanished into Max who now pushed his chair from the table and extended his mammoth legs. He leaned back and folded his arms with his face angled away from the particular yellow beam that tried to encompass him.
‘When do you get to the movies, Mil?’
‘I own a theatre, Frank.’
Frank put his hands together in silent applause.
‘You win, Mil.’
‘I always do, Frank. More pastries?’
Milan chatted amiably about cricket while Max tried to fit comfortably into the cheap chair. Scurrying rats shrieked and interrupted Streisand wailing from the speakers. The air smelled of twenty years ago. Max shuffled his feet. He was bored and had that lecture-room glaze to his eyes. Listening to the rats he wondered if the woman’s song was upsetting them. He shifted uneasily; he couldn’t fold his arms with comfort so he dropped them to his lap. Then he rocked on his chair and draped his arms to the floor. He was watching Milan carefully. He heard each tilted word, each detour into cant.
‘I’m pleased you phoned when you did, Frank.’ Milan decided to ignore Max. ‘I only had come in the door when the music began.’
‘Music?’ Max laughed derisively as he listened to the nasal notes of the singer. He was reminded of a salesman he had once met at a dull party. He could always pick a salesman at a party.
‘Oh yes!’ said Milan to Frank, ‘I had my electronics expert install a series of rhapsodies in my phone, on tape, of course, and they play when I am wanted on the phone. It’s so much more pleasant than the strident ring of an ordinary telephone. I find that music obviates a certain annoyance one feels with the telephone. So, when someone is calling me I am interrupted by Beethoven and Brahms.’
As he was speaking Milan had begun to gesture to Max and his cupid mouth worked the words that spilled out like gaily-painted picture cards. Then he sat forward and placed his hands squarely on the table and craned his neck imperiously. His face moved into a beam of light and his wrinkles now glowed green.
‘Forgive me, Max?’ Milan pleaded obsequiously, ‘I have not taken the opportunity to commiserate with you on the untimely departure of your children. Please accept my sincerest condolences.’
Max shivered involuntarily. He was tired of eulogies to his children. He was fed up with those who had written off his son for dead. ‘I’ve lost one child, pal!’ Max said with heavy scorn. ‘Don’t bury the others yet!’
‘Of course.’ Milan replied with smarm. He smiled a green smile with rows of green teeth that reminded Max of green tombstones on a green night. ‘There has been so much death lately.’
Milan paused for effect. Alive with irony he lit a Sobranie and the flame at the end of the cigarette gave his face the appearance of someone opening a coffin. Streisand ended in mid verse and there was a brief and harsh sound of rats caught in electric wiring. The lights flickered for a moment. Then he said to Frank, ‘I presume you’ve apprised Max of the situation?’
‘Who’s payin’?’ was all Max could say. Over in a corner a rat gnawed at the skirting board. Max grunted loudly and it stopped and listened.
‘Obviously we cannot allow our friend Hans a further sojourn at the Bay. Nor do we charge in like valiant fools. We must remain aloof. We must allow other forces to work. There must be no thread from Hans to us. Any of us! That is essential.’ Milan glowered at Max for a half-second. ‘It may be possible to arrange for some activity at the other end of the Scales.’
‘He’s goin’ all cryptic on us, Frank!’ sneered Max. ‘What he’s sayin’ is he’s fuckin’ bought a fuckin’ judge.’
Milan eased away from the green light and into the grey twilight between beams. ‘No, Max, that script may be grist to the television mill but it has no application in our case. There is no way a judge can preside outside the law. He simply applies the law his way.
‘You see, Max, our representatives in parliament have not been meticulous in their drafting of the laws. There is so much scope for jurists; it’s ludicrous! If Parliament framed our laws to exactitude there would be faint use of the upper echelons of the judiciary. The law would be cut and dried and easily administered by the magistrates. There would be reduced grounds for litigation. There would be fewer solicitors, barristers and judges.
‘Now, could you imagine all those lawyers accepting redundancies? Never! And their regal honours would become old crows waiting in their barren chambers while the lesser birds peck at their crumbs. But, of course, I speak hypothetically.’
‘Milan?’
‘Yes, Max? Is something unclear?’
‘Ya’ve said a lot without tellin’ us anythin’. What’s the cop for all this shit? It’s fuckin’ plain to me that we’re here because the plan ya’ve got crammed up ya arse wouldn’t make it without us. And if ya don’t fuckin’ get to the point, I’m gunna get fuckin’ angry.’
Milan stiffened his shoulders and the light went out in his eyes. A sound like a separate cry from a splintered ego came from his head. He said slowly, ‘Frank has to go to Africa.’
‘What?’ Max stood and removed the stiffness from his body. From the little man he steered his focus onto Frank who had ceased to smile. ‘Ya knew ya were goin’ to fuckin’ Africa and ya didn’t fuckin’ tell me?’
‘I cannot disclose any details, Max;’ Milan continued with an abrupt, almost triumphant smile, ‘it is enough to say that for Hans Dorfman and, in effect, the three of us here, the whole element of prosecution shall be effectively eliminated.’
‘Bullshit!’ Max crossed the floor and towered over Milan. ‘It’s all fuckin’ bullshit, sport! I tell ya what, ya fuckin’ arsehole of a fuckin’ clown, ya fuckin’ ratshit bonkers!’
Frank interceded with a calming gesture, ‘Hang on, mate. Hear him out!’
‘Let him rant, Frank.’ Milan said contemptuously with a dismissive wave of the hand. ‘The poor man obviously has problems.’
He had seen Rane do it with snakes and he wanted now to pick the little man by the ankles and crack his head on the floor.
‘You’d better apologise to Max,’ warned Frank as he knew the violence that was certain to follow, ‘before we lose everything, Mil.’
‘Apologise? For what? It was you who came to me for assistance. You were disoriented and up to your eyeballs in deep waters. Now you blame me for delivering you from a fate you certainly wouldn’t care for. Be reasonable, Max, for heaven’s sake.’
‘Ya too smooth with words, Krulis!’ Max said with odium. ‘If ya can get fuckin’ Hans off the fuckin’ hook by sendin’ poor old Frank on some fuckin’ fool’s errand then ya damned-well can fuckin’ get fuckin’ Hans off the hook anyway. Ya’ve cooked this fuckin’ mess for ya own profit, ya cunt!’
Milan’s mouth moved slightly with an intention to reply. Then it stopped and set itself into a soft curve as the eyes above it fluttered. ‘Max, you’re absolutely right.’ he said cheerily, like an offbeat adolescent in his ridiculous outfit. ‘I do apologise for my ill-chosen words. I really have over-looked the fact of your terrible bereavement and utterly incomprehensible anguish.’
He moved his eyes to Frank. ‘Frank, you know I would never accommodate a malicious thought about my friends.’ Then back to Max. ‘I’m human. I am susceptible to moods and fluctuations of spirit and behaviour as the next man. I meant no harm, Max. Really!’
‘I suppose ya think there’s no better way of gettin’ to me than by ya fuckin’ mea culpas, hey!’ Max snorted. ‘Ya not cut out to be a fuckin’ breast-beater before the fuckin’ Wall. Ya can’t even beat the fuckin’ meat between ya fuckin’ legs, Krulis!’
The big BMW slipped gently away from the curb and joined the throng of traffic in the streets. Two middle-aged knights were returning from their joust with their armour dented.
