Her Stolen Passenger, page 2
Harp reaches over, taps at the numbers with agitated jabs and she puts the speaker to her ear.
“Who’s this?” a male voice answers.
“Have you heard about the fire?”
“Oh damn, Harp? That you? Yeah, I heard.”
“What are you doing?”
“Hey, come one, don’t be like that. Just ‘cause I don’t work for you no more doesn’t mean I’m gonna ignore ya. We’ve been trying to find you.”
“Good.”
“We’re on the way up now. We’re almost at the ferry.”
“Come back to the last servo on the highway. I’m here. I’m on the move.”
“What? Why? Your goddamn house is on fire.”
“The house is gone. I don’t care about that. Find Wu.”
“Why? Wasn’t she in the house? I thought she’d be with you.”
“No. She’s disappeared, and there was only one kid inside the fire.”
“Only one?”
“Yeah.”
“Which one?”
“Is that a serious question? How the hell would I know that? It’ll be weeks before the charred-bloody-crispy body is identified.”
“Damn. I’m sorry—”
“Shut your mouth.”
“Yeah, you’re right. We need to find Wu.”
“Yes, we do.”
“OK. I’ll put the word out, and I’ll meet you at the servo in fifteen minutes.”
“Good. Be quick. I don’t want to stay in one place. The cops just found a kid’s body in my house. They’re looking for me.”
Harp hangs up and calls out, “Thanks again,” in a sweet, chirping tone as she walks out of the building.
She moves with her stick and that quick, unsteady stroll out to her vehicle and drives it across the street to sit at a highway rest stop. A spattering of small, white moths congregate around the lights of the car and Harp listens to the snap and crack of the cooling bonnet in the hushed space beside the road. When Harp sees the vehicle of the men she’s waiting for arrive at the petrol station, she flicks her lights at them, and they drive over to park beside her in the vacant bitumen plot. All windows are rolled down and the four men in the second car announce how sorry they are.
“Shut your mouths, all of you. What have you done so far?”
“Big Ben spoke to—” one of the passengers begins to answer, but the driver cuts him off.
“I’ve spoken to the boys in Brissy. If she goes south, they’ll be waitin’.”
“That’s too far. We need to get to her before then. We need to find her now. I don’t want this to draw out.”
“Where do you reckon she’ll go?” Ben asks through a beard so dense that his lips look like nothing more than fingertips.
“Definitely south, there’s too much road to the north and not enough people for a little Asian slut to blend in.”
“Sydney?”
“If she’s an idiot. There are so many cameras and toll booths on the highway that we’ll find her straight away.”
“Do we need to watch the airports?”
“No, she doesn’t have a passport; she’s here illegally.”
“Good. Canberra?”
“Forget that, let’s find her tonight.”
“All right, well,” Ben begins as he sticks a thick finger into one nostril and scratches around a bit. He flicks a long string of snot out the window, and it spirals through the air like the tail rotor of a helicopter. He says, “We’re watching her credit card, and we’ll know if she gets a parking ticket in that green piece of junk she drives, so we’ll find her soon enough.”
“Good. When you find her, I want you to tell me where she is and back off.”
“What? Why?”
Harp widens her eyes so that the men can see the rims of the huge black bowls within them and says, “Because I’m going to get her myself.”
A passenger in the second car mutters, “Are you sure that’s a good idea?”
“What? Who said that?” Harp asks the back seat of the vehicle.
“What he means is,” Ben says, “this is really Angela’s problem, with the kid and all, so don’t you reckon we should probably put everyone on it? We don’t want to screw it up.”
Harp leans back in her seat and grins to herself. She takes a moment to mutter something in Mandarin before looking back and saying, “Boy’s, little boys, I’m going to do it myself because I know you’ll screw it up.”
The men all look to one another and Ben says, “We can do—”
“I don’t care what you think you’re capable of; this needs to be done properly. We’re talking about my grandson here. There will be no excuses and no errors.”
“If you say so.”
“What did Angela say when you told her about the fire and the body?”
Ben doesn’t answer; instead, he looks forward through the dirty windscreen and shakes his head.
“What does that mean?” Harp asks.
“No one knows where she is. She was at a club in Surfer’s Paradise last week, and she was really, really messed up and—”
“That’s just bloody perfect. Perfect. Christ, she’s so hopeless,” Harp continues to mutter under her breath, and the men all stare down at their laps.
“Listen to me, Ben,” now Harp points a bony finger at him, “find that useless boyfriend of hers and, are you listening?”
“Yeah.”
“Cut off one of his feet if he’s lost her too. Do you understand?”
“Jesus, yeah, all right. I get it.”
“I’m not playing now. We’re going to sort this out now. Agreed? Tonight.”
“Yes, boss, whatever you say.”
“Good. Now, you’re all going to go back into that petrol station I was in and make sure they don’t have surveillance footage of me, destroy every cassette. You’re going to make sure that the little prick behind the counter forgets seeing me. You’re going to stay together in a group tonight and call everyone we know. In the morning, you’ll wait by the phone in the Mossman house. I’m going to call you tomorrow, and you’re going to tell me where I’m going to find the whore. Agreed?”
“Yes, boss, whatever you want.”
“All right, get out of your car.”
“What?”
“The police will be looking for this vehicle, so we’re going to swap.”
“Fine, no problem.”
The men exit their car and stand waiting as Harp steps out of the Thunderbird and takes a moment to straighten her spine in a series of jolting cracks. When she’s sitting in the new vehicle, Harp says, “All right. I’m going to drive south for a while, so I’ll already be on top of her when she appears.”
“Wait a sec,” Ben begins, “what happened out there? I mean, in the house?”
“Just do your damn job.”
4
WU
The sun is hot on Wu’s face as she sits outside a little café with a black crocodile on the sign. There are people strolling up and down the footpath in their bathers, and children are standing beside the road with no shoes. The park on the other side of the street is freckled with teenagers lying on colourful towels, and small dogs on long leashes sniff at the round bases of palm trees. The sea breeze blows the menu off Wu’s table, so she moves inside. Here, under the morning air conditioning and beside the fridge full of soft drinks, she hugs Harrison to her chest. His perfectly white skin is a sharp contrast to her pale buttery tone, but he smiles up into the mother’s face as if he knows they will share the same fate.
Wu is bouncing Harrison on her tubby little belly when she notices a note on the paper menu that reads, ‘Please order at the counter. Thank you.’
She steps up to the register, and a short, brown-haired woman with a chin dimple asks, “Good morning, coffee or breakfast today?”
“Apple juice please, thanks, and two scrambled eggs on raisin toast.”
“On raisin toast?”
“Yes please,” Wu beams with her most exaggerated grin, and the waitress nods back at her before Wu hands over her credit card, then returns to her table.
“What do you want to do today, my sunshine?” Wu asks the infant. Harrison giggles as he grips Wu’s fingers and she bobbles him on her thick, soft thighs.
The food comes, and Wu eats quickly, sipping at the juice as she looks out towards the busy street and the park and all the kids skateboarding.
“Excuse me, where are the bathrooms?” she calls to the barista.
“Just behind the café, you walk through that hall, past the kitchen.”
“Thanks.”
Wu stands in a slow, lazy stretch and kisses Harrison on the forehead as she carries him into the thin hallway. It’s long, and she turns left, and pushes open a door and ends up standing in a wide room full of steel top benches and cooking equipment. The space is loud, and two women at the other end of the room are shouting to each other, laughing.
Harrison begins to wail over all the noise, and his face turns bright red.
“Shhh, it’s all right, my sunshine.”
“Are you looking for the dunny?” a young man with sweat patches under his arms asks.
“Yeah, sorry.”
“No worries, happens all the time, just go back the way you came and follow the hall to the right.”
“Great, thanks.”
Wu kisses Harrison’s forehead again and bounces him a little as she walks. He settles as they emerge from the building and enter a little concrete courtyard. The tall, plastic bins here are all a deep green, and they all have little black wheels and streams of sticky looking muck dribbled over the rims. The bins sit beside a wire fence that sags at the top like a roll of human fat. Wu finds the doors leading to the male toilets and the female toilets, and she leans into the scratched wooden panel to open it.
Wu uses the facilities, and she looks at herself for a moment in the mirror. She didn’t bother with makeup this morning, and a new zit is poking out of her chin to join the swathe of acne on her face. She looks at the zit for a second, then gazes down at Harrison and pulls a funny face before walking out of the bathroom without tending to the blemish.
She’s on the way back into the café when something catches her eye. Wu doesn’t recognise it so much as notice the shape and colour. To the side of the little concrete courtyard is a wire fence leading to a small car park. In that small car park is a white ute, a yellow motorcycle and a red Thunderbird.
Wu’s feet cautiously step her up to the fence, and she stares at the vehicle with a trembling jaw. She stares at it for a long time, and she reads the licence plate out loud. She finds the door to the fence, and when she tries to open it, she finds a thick padlock holding the deadbolt in place. Wu turns around and walks cautiously back down the hallway, towards the cafe.
5
HARP
“She’s in Cairns,” Ben announces to Harp through the orange handset of a public payphone Harp has pressed to her ear.
“Good.”
Harp looks out of the clear, plastic capsule and gazes at the banana plantation beside the road. The horde of low trees have wide, green leaves fanning out at head height, and a sign on the fence reads, ‘Private property. No photos. No work’. The sun assaults the earth with powerful, burning magnificence, but the world is still damp so early in the morning.
“Where are you?” Ben asks.
“Besides the highway, not far. Your car needs a service.”
Harp looks at the white piece of junk she’s been driving and adds, “In your line of work, you need something reliable. Don’t they pay you properly anymore? Don’t they teach you anything?”
“Come on, Harp, give it a rest. We’re helpin’ you instead of workin’. Where are you on the highway?”
“South of Cairns.”
“Further south already? How long were you driving? Did you sleep?”
“Shut your mouth and tell me exactly where she is.”
“She used her bank card to draw two grand down near the beach, not far from the port. Do you know where I mean?”
“Maybe, near the park?”
“That’s it, by the last strip of restaurants before the ocean.”
“She’s going for breakfast.”
“You reckon? Why does she need two grand?”
Harp scoffs, and grips at the little booth she’s in to twist her back and crack it. She gazes up to see a black spider in the corner of the booth, and she pinches it between her thumb and rude finger, letting the smashed star of twitching legs drop to the floor.
“Why does she need all that cash?” Ben repeats.
“That’s obviously her max daily withdrawal limit. She wants to go into hiding. She’ll want to draw another two thousand bucks as soon as she can, but she won’t get the chance. I’m not far away.”
“Oh yeah, of course.”
“In two hours, you will find a payphone and call this number, call this payphone I’ve called you on. Then move to a different payphone to call again on the hour, every hour, until I pick up. I’ll bring the child back here. Wu’s just a stupid whore; we’ll finish this today.”
Harp hangs up and moves back to her car with a grin firmly planted on the bottom of her face. She cries out in Mandarin, claps her hands together and the locusts in the dirt around her car take flight as the engine starts.
The vehicle rattles back the way it came, and it follows the big green highway signs to the heart of Cairns. Harp parks the machine at the port, and she steps out into the mid-morning, tropical warmth. There are tourists everywhere, and a gargantuan ship rises out of the sea to cast a shadow on Harp’s vehicle. The smell of sweet fruit dances on the air, and the rolling-rattle of skateboards is everywhere as Harp hobbles through the park.
Harp stands on the grass of the open space, across from the popular strip of restaurants, and she looks at the individual eating areas. There’s a two-storey bar with a fake kangaroo out the front, a little chicken burger place, a gift shop, a café with a crocodile on the sign, and a tiny room lined with tourism brochures.
Harp walks quickly, her torso shuddering, past the fake kangaroo and into the bar.
She takes a deep breath and forces her scowl up into a smile. She calls out, “Hi there, how are you this morning?” to the bartender with an enthusiastic wave.
“Morning, I’m good, you?” the tall, moustached man replies.
“I’m fine. Thanks for asking.”
“Beer? Cider?”
“No, not right now, I’m actually looking for my friend.”
“Cool, what does he look like?”
“She’s a young Thai girl with a round face. She’s short, and she’s travelling with a baby.”
“A baby? Nah, haven’t seen her. Sorry.”
“Are you sure? It could have been a few hours ago.”
“I’m certain. I’ve been here all morning, and I would remember a kid. Maybe you want to get a drink and wait?”
“That sound’s lovely, but I really need to find her. Thanks, maybe later.”
Harp moves over the hot, paved sidewalk to the chicken burger shop, and asks the same question with a polite smile, and the teenager at the counter disappoints her.
She moves down the line and peeks into each shop and asks a few questions until she enters the café with the crocodile on the sign.
Harp’s glare flicks around the restaurant, and she sees an old man yawn, a child select a can of Fanta from the fridge, and Ben speaking to the girl at the cash register.
“What are you doing here?!” she shrieks, and the old man is so startled he almost falls from his chair. The child leaps back away from the fridge to hide behind a rack of souvenirs.
“Harp?” one of Ben’s buddies snaps.
“WHAT ARE YOU DOING HERE?!”
Ben stutters, “I’m-I’m helping. I’m—”
Harp shambles forward, knocking over a chair, and the few patches of customers in the café turn to stare. Out on the sidewalk, someone drops a paper cup of tea.
“Get out of the way,” Harp urges Ben, and he stumbles to the other side of the room.
Harp asks the waitress with the dimple in her chin, “Listen, listen carefully, have you seen a little Thai girl with a young boy?”
“Yes, yes they were here only a minute ago.”
“Where are they now?”
“I don’t know. I thought they were still here.”
“Find them!” Harp orders the men, and they each charge off in a different direction with Ben running down the little hallway to the bathrooms in long, lumbering strides.
“Listen to me, girl,” Harp begins and steps forward. She drops the hiking stick and grabs at the waitress’s collar. Harp leans on the young girl, and the young girl screams, and Harp says in a frantic whisper, “Shut your mouth and tell me, tell me—”
“What? Please don’t hurt me, what?”
“What did the kid look like? What coloured skin did the kid have?”
“What? I don’t understand.”
“Tell me!” Harp tightens her grip, and her knuckles press into the soft flesh of the waitress’s throat, “Was there something wrong with the baby? What coloured skin?”
“White, the baby was white, and it was all fat with weird eyes. Short, fat neck.”
“And the mother?”
“The mum was Asian.”
Harp grins, and releases the girl, and squats to pick up the hiking stick.
“White? With a disability?”
The waitress nods in little, terrified tremors.
“Back here, Harp, in the kitchen.” Ben’s voice fills the restaurant and Harp charges on towards the thug.
He’s standing with the young, sweaty chef in the doorway to the kitchen, and Ben tells the kid with a firm growl to, “Tell her what you told me.”
“The girl you’re looking for came in here, and she- she- she asked for help.”
“Yeah, and?”
“She was in the toilets, and she wanted to leave through the back, and she showed me her receipt, so I knew she’d paid—”
