The Minnow Read online

  It only takes about twenty minutes to reach the bend. Once I’m around it, the pontoon will be in sight. But that means I’ll be visible. I realise I’ll be less conspicuous if I row closer to the bank.

  I turn the boat with one oar and row towards a group of trees about twenty metres this side of the bend. Now that I’m getting close, I start to feel nervous. What if Sergeant Griffin is right and it’s not safe at the shed? What if the men at the jetty were hit men? What if Mr Handsome knows about the identikit? Will that mean they’re looking for me? And what if Bill is there, hiding out? How will I explain myself if he catches me rummaging around?

  I reach the trees. I lift the oars out of the water and into the boat. I need to think. I wish I’d brought the binoculars.

  ‘Check under the seat,’ says the Minnow.

  Of course. Bill keeps a pair in the tinny. I stand carefully and lift the seat. There are two plastic containers. One is a holdall for spare fishing line, hooks and sinkers. It also contains a fishing knife and a rusty can opener. The other container holds the binoculars. I take them out, lower the seat and sit back down. In place of the strap, Bill has tied a piece of blue rope and I put it over my head. I check that the rope’s knots are secure, then unbutton the case, remove the binoculars and take a look around.

  First I look back towards the inlet. It seems remarkably close. I scan the jetty. Then I sweep back and forth across the water. When I’m sure no one has followed me, I turn my attention towards the bend. Again, I check for any movement on the water. Just to be sure, I adjust the focus and search up and down the bank. Nothing.

  I want to see exactly what I’m heading into, so rather than rowing in the normal way, I reverse my position on the seat so that I’m facing the boat’s pointy end. Push rowing is odd, but not impossible. I lean forward and grasp the oars and swing them around in a wide arc so that they enter the water in front of me, rather than behind. I then reach forward, pushing the oars from front to back. It feels strange at first, but I soon find a rhythm.

  Rounding the bend, I quickly lift the oars into the boat and use the binoculars to check my destination. There is no sign of anyone. I continue rowing, stopping once, only briefly, when something catches my eye.

  I reach the pontoon without incident and tie the boat to one of the railings. I climb out of the tinny, walk up the floating ramp and across the pontoon to the steps. The steps are made of old tyres filled with gravel. The gravel makes a crunching sound which is quite loud, but not loud enough to be heard from the shed.

  It is steeper than I remember, so I take my time.

  ‘I should have left the binoculars in the tinny,’ I say to the Minnow when I realise they’re still hanging around my neck. I look around for somewhere to stash them but it’s no good; if I leave them here I’ll never find them again. I’m annoyed with myself. The last thing I needed was to carry something unnecessarily. Thankfully, the rest of the walk to the shed is a flat dirt path.

  ‘Shhh,’ says the Minnow, stopping me in my tracks.

  There are voices up ahead. Male voices. I crouch down and try to hear what they’re saying, but they’re too far away. I crawl a bit further up the path. The Minnow’s extra weight means that crawling hurts my knees—but I’m too scared to stand up in case I give myself away.

  I look around for somewhere to hide. To my left there is an entrance to a smaller track. It is quite overgrown and normally I would avoid it, but right now I need to get off the path in case they come this way.

  The track turns away from the voices and seems to curve around in a semi-circle. I keep following it until it finishes behind the old chook pen. I’m not sure what to do next. My knees are aching and my legs are starting to cramp. I can’t hear or see anyone, so I decide that it’s safe to stand up. I stretch my legs and try to get my bearings. I think the chook pen was to the right of the boatshed but, if I remember correctly, it had an old rusty roof. This one looks new.

  ‘Maybe there’s a second chook pen,’ suggests the Minnow.

  ‘I don’t think so,’ I answer. ‘Bill has replaced the old roof.’

  I’m trying to decide whether to stay put or sneak back to the pontoon, when I’m interrupted.

  ‘You’re sure it’s here?’ says a man’s voice.

  ‘Positive,’ replies a second voice, also male. Neither man sounds like Mr Handsome. There is a crunching sound and suddenly someone appears in the small clearing about ten metres in front of me.

  Sarah and I hardly ever played hide-and-seek. Mum said it was an unfair game because Sarah always ended up in tears when she couldn’t find me. I absolutely loved hiding and it never bothered me if Sarah wouldn’t play, because I had just as much fun hiding on my own. Dad said I could hide in plain sight. I’m not sure how I did it, but I could stand flat against a wall and Mum would walk straight past and not notice I was there.

  It took a few years of practice—and a lot of help from Papa—to hide from Dad. Papa said Dad’s army training was our biggest hurdle. I tried asking Dad about it once, but he just walked away from me.

  The trick, according to Papa, was to stay perfectly still and never look at anyone directly. Eyes are so powerful, he told me, that other people can sense when they’re being observed. ‘But that’s just the beginning,’ said Papa. ‘The only way you’ll ever hide from your father is if you master the art of invisibility.’

  I retraced my steps back along the track to the main path. Even though the men had left, I walked as quietly as possible. I kept expecting to hear Bill’s voice.

  The boatshed door was open. The place was in such a mess, a cat could lose its whiskers (Nana again). Upstairs, the loft was empty, except for the bed and an old rug that used to live on the veranda. It was a sad little room and it didn’t look like it had been slept in since I left. It was hot and stuffy, so I unlatched one of the doors to let in some air.

  ‘Jesus, you’re a nosey little shit.’

  It was Bill. Even though I was half expecting him, I got such a fright that I banged my head on the beam and a loud yell escaped from my mouth.

  ‘That would’ve hurt,’ he said.

  I turned to face him. ‘Papa says you’re a sneaky bastard, and he’s right,’ I said, rubbing the sore spot. It felt like it was bleeding.

  ‘Your Papa’s dead,’ Bill replied with a sneer.

  ‘And you will be, too, if those men find you.’

  ‘What do you know about them?’

  ‘Nothing much,’ I said, wishing I’d kept my mouth shut, ‘except that they were here.’

  ‘I’m more interested in what you’re doing here,’ he said.

  That was the trouble with Bill. He wasn’t easily distracted.

  ‘I came to see you,’ I lied.

  ‘Liar,’ he said, edging closer.

  ‘Tell him you rowed over to see him, but those men were here, so you hid and waited for them to leave,’ said Papa.

  ‘You left the tinny at the inlet,’ I said. ‘I thought you might want it.’

  ‘Even better,’ said Papa.

  ‘Thought you’d snoop around, you mean,’ said Bill.

  ‘Why would I snoop?’ I said. ‘I was just looking around because the men had left the place in such a mess. I was worried.’

  Bill thought about this, weighed it up.

  ‘What’s with the go-cart?’ he asked.

  The question caught both Papa and me off guard. Bill must have hiked to the jetty with the intention of collecting the tinny. Shit.

  ‘It’s all right,’ said Papa, reading my thoughts. ‘Bet he doesn’t know you tried to bring it with you.’

  ‘The go-cart is Jonah’s idea,’ I said, keeping my voice steady. ‘It’s my new wheels for the FishMaster.’

  Bill gave me a look that meant he needed more information.

  ‘So I can walk to the inlet without Jonah,’ I explained.

  I watched him digest this.

  ‘Well, your fancy-pants tackle box has been stolen,’ said Bill.
/>   My heart was beating so hard, it felt as though the Minnow was kicking me in the chest. ‘I left the FishMaster at home,’ I said, explaining away the empty go-cart. ‘I hadn’t planned on fishing today, just taking the tinny out. Thought I’d give the go-cart a road test.’ I gave him my best smile. Everything’s fine, my smile said. ‘Anyway, I’m glad you’re here,’ I added, still smiling. ‘Those men were pretty hectic.’

  Bill just stared at me. I could tell he wasn’t buying it.

  ‘What’s with the binoculars?’

  Shit, shit, shit.

  ‘Sightseeing,’ suggested Papa. It was pretty lame, but I had nothing else.

  ‘I took my time rowing here,’ I said. ‘Dr Patek says I have to take it easy. So I did a bit of sightseeing.’

  Nana says lying’s not so hard if you wrap it around the truth.

  We were interrupted by the sound of car tyres skidding to a halt on the other side of the boatshed. The engine cut. A door slammed.

  ‘Tom!’ It was Sergeant Griffin.

  Bill turned on me with his angry face. ‘You tell that idiot you haven’t seen me.’

  ‘What about those men?’ I asked.

  ‘You haven’t seen anyone. Okay?’

  ‘Okay,’ I answered.

  ‘Don’t fuck-up, Tom. Now get downstairs and don’t let him come up.’

  I could hug Sergeant Griffin.

  ‘It’s called the tipping point,’ says Jonathan Whiting, slowing to thirty as we enter the roundabout. ‘It is a particular number, a critical mass. It is the moment when enough people buy something or like something or use something that propels that something into play.’

  ‘Uh huh,’ I say. ‘You mean like Coke?’

  ‘Coke is a difficult example because it is so heavily advertised. Think of something else, something unusual, not necessarily mainstream.’

  Jonathan Whiting and I have started having conversations on the way to the Mavis Ornstein Home for the Elderly. He knows heaps of really weird and interesting stuff. Papa would get upset if he knew about it, so I haven’t told him.

  ‘There was this kid at school, before the flood. Brandon Holloway. Brandon had this weird way of drawing people. He would always start at the feet and work up to the head. All the boys in his group started copying him. I think at first they did it for fun, but by the end of term the whole art class was doing it.’

  ‘What about the rest of the school?’

  ‘Ummm,’ I said, pressing my forefinger to my mouth. ‘Don’t remember. We all knew about it, but I don’t remember any of the other classes following suit.’ I learned ‘following suit’ from Jonathan. He says it all the time. ‘Would the whole school have to join in to reach the tipping point?’ I ask, replaying the question in my mind just to hear it again.

  ‘Not necessarily,’ Jonathan replies. ‘Think of a wheelbarrow full of concrete. You put in the sand, gravel and cement, and then you add water until everything’s wet and well mixed. It takes a certain amount of water, doesn’t it, before the mix is right?’

  ‘I’ve never made concrete.’

  ‘Okay. But are you with me?’

  This is what Jonathan does. He gets me thinking about a subject. He calls it the ‘primary engagement’. He then throws in something that seems totally irrelevant. He calls this the ‘expansion point’. Concrete is his cue for me to expand my thinking. Jonathan says our minds are magnificent, and not only do they cope with the unexpected they thrive on it.

  ‘Concrete is like a cake. The ingredients need to be exact for it to work,’ I say, thinking out loud.

  ‘Exact?’

  ‘Yes. Sponge cakes require the exact ingredients.’ Mum told me the secret to the perfect sponge was precision.

  ‘Go on. Remember not to limit your thinking.’

  I stop for a moment. Dad used to say his best ideas were never planned.

  ‘I have the exact amount of water in a bucket. The bucket leans over the cement mixer and the Brandon amount spills in. When one of Brandon’s friends starts drawing the feet first, the bucket tips in a bit more water. Another friend joins in, another and another, until, whoosh, the bucket has tipped past the point of no return and all the water falls into the mixer.’

  ‘Excellent. What’s your reasoning?’

  ‘I’m thinking that the tipping point was the size of Brandon’s group of friends. It was large enough to produce the trend that caused the class to embrace Brandon’s style.’

  ‘Tom, I think you’ve made your case.’

  ‘So, Tom,’ says Sergeant Griffin, unclipping his seatbelt and turning to face me. He has driven me to Jonah’s house, even though I said I would rather row home.

  ‘So…?’ I answer.

  ‘Tom, don’t play games. What were you doing at the boatshed?’

  ‘Sorry, Sergeant Griffin.’ I’m still trying to figure out how he knew I was there. ‘Please don’t tell Dr Patek.’

  ‘Listen to me, young lady,’ he says, jabbing his finger in the air. ‘This has nothing to do with Dr Patek and everything to do with you not cooperating with the police.’ Sweat beads on his chin. He loosens his tie and pulls at the collar of his shirt.

  ‘I have cooperated, Sergeant Griffin. Why can’t I go to the boatshed?’

  ‘Because you’re a fifteen-year-old pregnant girl,’ he says, almost shouting, ‘and you could be in danger. We still have no idea who those men are—and Bill has been missing since they turned up.’ He sucks in a deep breath, then exhales loudly.

  ‘Sorry, Sergeant Griffin.’ I unclip my seatbelt.

  ‘Listen, Tom,’ Sergeant Griffin says, in a voice that is more familiar. ‘I hate to get angry with you, especially after everything you’ve gone through. But this is my town and you’re my responsibility. You understand?’

  I nod, yes. I have to get out of the car before I suffocate, and I push open the door and haul myself out. Sergeant Griffin leans across and catches my eye. ‘Don’t make things any harder than they need to be, Tom.’

  As I walk down the drive to Jonah’s house, I realise the binoculars are still around my neck.

  Jonathan Whiting used to be a lawyer. He retired when he turned seventy, but he still works as a consultant to keep his brain active.

  ‘I have a task for you,’ he says as we pull into the car park. Tasks can be anything. One time he handed me a Rubik’s Cube and asked if I could fix it. I thought I was doing him a favour.

  ‘N.i.b.l.i.c.k,’ he says, spelling a word. ‘I want you to look it up and give it an origin.’

  I grab my notebook and write down ‘niblick’ and ‘origin’ and wait for more instructions.

  ‘One week from today,’ he says, ‘I’m playing in the Old Silks golf tournament. I’ll be away eight days. Think you can find another chauffeur for a week?’

  ‘I’ll ask around,’ I say, closing the notebook. ‘I didn’t know you played golf.’

  ‘There are probably lots of things you don’t know about me. Just like there are lots of things I don’t know about you.’

  Old and weird moment. My cue to get out of the car.

  ‘Thanks, Jonathan,’ I say. ‘I’ll be with Nana in about halfa.’

  ‘You’re not going there now?’

  ‘I want to talk to Hazel first.’

  I can hear voices, far away.

  I let my mind drift.

  I feel weightless, calm.

  Someone is humming.

  ‘Tommy? Is that you?’

  ‘I’ve been sleeping like a baby.’

  ‘That’s the ticket,’ says Clare.

  ‘I’ve been thinking about a turtle.’

  ‘Don’t know. We used to get the occasional. Hang on.’ Clare walks out the back. ‘Marge,’ she says—and I realise she’s talking to Mrs Blanket—‘Tom’s here asking about turtles.’

  My eyes drift up to the carp tank. Mrs Blanket hasn’t replaced Oscar. I don’t think her heart is in it.

  I feel a bit dizzy. Mrs Blanket has a customer chair in the ai
sle next to the guinea pig hutch. I walk over and sit down. There’s a small brown guinea pig asleep on a heart-shaped pillow. It’s one of those little pillows that florists attach to bouquets of flowers. Mrs Blanket’s Oscar flowers. As I stare at the little guinea pig, he stretches and yawns and rolls off the pillow onto his back. He has a small wisp of white under his chin. ‘Hi, Rumbly,’ I say.

  Fielder’s Pets and Supplies hasn’t been part of my Saturday ritual since Dr Patek introduced the moderate exercise rule. But, as of today, James Wo now comes by the house on Saturday mornings rather than after school on Fridays. Friday afternoons had begun to clash with school meetings. Jonah arrived home yesterday afternoon with a message from James Wo regarding the change.

  ‘What if it doesn’t suit me?’ I said to Jonah when he relayed the message.

  ‘Don’t be annoying, Tom.’

  ‘I’m serious,’ I said. ‘What if I’d made plans?

  ‘Have you?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Made plans.’

  ‘That’s not the point. Does he expect you to cycle all the way back to school and give him an answer?’

  ‘Don’t shoot the messenger,’ said Jonah.

  ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’

  James Wo arrived this morning at nine. I had just had my shower, so he waited outside for a bit. I might have made plans. I might have been planning to go back to the boatshed.

  ‘You can come in now,’ I called, once I was dressed.

  We sat at the kitchen table. He reviewed my work and outlined the lesson plan for the following week. Then he offered to drive me into town.

  ‘Do you drive into town every Saturday?’ I asked.

  ‘You’re like an open book, Tom.’

  It has been over a month since I left the Mater Women’s Hospital in West Wrestler. Dr Frank has checked me over and is on the phone to Dr Patek. They’re both happy with my progress. The Minnow is coming along nicely, positioned head down, ready for her exit. Dr Patek and Dr Frank assume this is stressful for me, but it isn’t. The Minnow is quite happy. She and I have reached an understanding. She has even told me the date: December twenty-six. Dr Patek says I’m due on the seventh of January. She has also warned me that first babies can be up to two weeks late.