Dead Heat (21 page)

“What did her father do that was so bad?”

For the first time, they truly looked at each other. His skin was worn and creased and his nose skewed to one side. He had
a puckered scar running from his right eye to the corner of his mouth as though he’d been clawed by a big cat.

“That’s between me and her. Promised her that. Ask me another.”

She glanced away at the sandy riverbank and slumped torpedoes of ancient creatures.

“Okay,” she said. “So how come she ended up here? With you and crocodiles?”

“Because she wanted to do good.” He looked past Georgia to the horizon. “It was like she took responsibility for what her
father had done. She tried to explain to me how it worked in China, and how her father had dishonored her family, big-time.
Didn’t matter what I said to reassure her, she was convinced she had to make amends, get it together to come back with something
so bloody good it would outweigh the bad he did. Rebalance the family’s scales, so to speak.”

Georgia thought of Jason Chen and his gap-toothed father and wondered if they’d be ashamed if either were dishonored.

After a while, she said. “Dutch, can you tell me about the good? What Suzie was working on? Please?”

He thought about that for a bit, then said slowly, “Well, she never told me not to say anything about it. Just to keep it
quiet for a bit.”

Georgia glanced ahead to see a sludge-green torpedo with a middle the size of a household trash can lying on the bank, mouth
agape. “Wow,” she said, distracted. “Is that Nail-tooth?”

“Nah. Too small.”

Holy moley, she thought.

“Our Suzie wanted to cure the world.” He pushed the tiller out a little to follow the curve of the river. “She’d heard about
some bloke coming out here who was interested in finding a new antibiotic. You get torn up by a croc and you can end up shite,
full of gangrene and the like, and you’ll be lucky if you live out a fortnight.”

Georgia’s nerves leaped. Tilly. Gray-faced and smelling of corrupted, decomposing flesh.

“Suzie was working with the crocs to find out why a croc can get a leg chewed off by another croc and not die in a week, as
we do. Their immune system is heaps better than ours. She was convinced the crocs offered a miracle cure.”

Tilly, forty-two hours later, practically
healed.

“Suze reckoned she found it a couple of years back. She was doing final tests with her brother. He’s a big shot with access
to a high- powered laboratory. She reckoned on presenting this antibiotic to the medical authorities any day now.” He looked
glum. “Shame she died.”

Heart jumping, she said, “Her brother? Do you mean Mingjun?”

“Jon,” he said. “Jon Ming. Like me, he found it easier to change his name a little.”

“Where does Jon live, do you know?”

“Brizzy. In a place called . . .” He scowled, then said, “Tallawoo? Talla-something, I remember that. It’s a real fine suburb,
she said. I wasn’t supposed to tell anyone that either,” he added.

“You don’t have a contact number for him, do you? An address or something?”

“Nah. Sorry.”

“If you remember the name of the suburb . . .”

“Yeah, I’ll let you know.” He suddenly scowled. “Hope Suze left her research for someone else to decode, ’cos she kept it
real secret. Aside from her brother, only me and Suzie and the crocs knew what she was up to, so far as I’m aware.”

It made sense. Robert the pharmacist had said she was doing some private research on crocodile serum. He hadn’t seemed to
know what, in particular. Yumuru, on the other hand . . .

Georgia squinted to watch a large heron flying heavily across the river. Its flight was so ponderous that it reminded her
of a bomber. Thinking for a bit, she then asked, “Do you know a Lee Denham?”

Dutch moved his head to watch a small crocodile drift past before it disappeared with a swirl of murky water. He shook his
head.

“How did you collect wild crocodile blood?” she asked.

“With difficulty.” He grinned, showing twin rows of white teeth that looked strong enough to bite through his shotgun without
any trouble. “We’d use a harpoon, one designed to go through the thick scales on their backs, no further, then we’d play ’em
till they tired out. Could take a while, depending on how big they were. Then we’d tie their snouts real well, tow them to
shore, and Bob’s your uncle.”

He nudged the umbrella with a bare foot. “That’s our secret weapon. When we’re ready to release them, one of us strokes their
eyes shut with the brolly—they won’t move an inch with closed eyes—while the other releases the ropes. When we drop the brolly
we both run like buggery.”

Good God. Crocodile Dundee had nothing on Dutch, or Suzie for that matter.

They were silent for a while, then they had another beer. Dutch had made stacks of sausage-and-pickle sandwiches, and they
ate them as they cruised back and forth, still searching for Nail-tooth. Eventually he turned the boat around and headed for
Nail-tooth’s slide.

“Reckon he’s been watching our every move,” he said. “Cunning sod.” Dutch drifted the boat toward the bank. “Bet he’s hiding
in the mangroves . . . Shit! You see him? There he is!”

Georgia didn’t see anything until Nail-tooth blinked. Suddenly a massive form sprang into view, just yards away, resting among
the mangrove roots. His head was broad as a fridge, his eyes yellow with black vertical stripes, and his spine was ridged
with scales the size of dinner plates. Although his mouth appeared to be closed, his teeth were visible. Thick, stubby blocks
of stained ivory poked down his jaw and curved up toward his scaly snout. She realized Dutch would have to have been pretty
close to give him his name—and nervously ran her eyes along the length of the beast and said, “Are you sure it isn’t two crocodiles?”

“Nah. Just the one, and don’t move. We’re a bit too near for comfort. I’m going to back away real easy.”

Infinitely slowly, Dutch switched the outboard into reverse and eased the tin boat back. He waited until they were well in
the middle of the river before he spoke again.

“Sorry.” He wiped his forehead of sweat. “Bit close there. Surprised he didn’t have us, seeing as it’s the silly season. The
males get real aggressive in the wet. They’ll attack anything going and a mate of mine had one bugger put its jaws around
his outboard motor. They’re not like the Nile croc, who won’t do anything till you’re in the water. The saltie will have you
anytime, any place, quicker than you can say sausage sarnie.”

She was still glancing behind them to check that Nail-tooth hadn’t decided to follow and put his jaws around their outboard
as they began to near the bank and Dutch’s house. The water turned a murky brown-blue, and ibis and egrets waded through the
mudflats, searching for shrimps and crabs.

“Aren’t you scared of crocs, living so close to them?”

“Nah, not with Nail-tooth about,” Dutch said. “He’s mighty territorial and most other crocs keep well quiet. They hear me
tramping around, assume it’s him, and bugger off.”

She glanced back downriver at the mangroves where Nail-tooth lay hidden. For sixty-five million years crocodiles had existed
in a virtually unchanged form, and today they lay there as they always had, still and unmoving, crusted green-brown. To have
survived so long, they’d have to be skilled not only in attack, but also in defense.

A quote from Daniel’s two-thousand-year-old guru streamed through her mind: “It is important that form be concealed, and that
movements be unexpected, so that preparedness against them be impossible.”

Sun Tzu would have appreciated crocodiles, she thought. A crocodile has the art of invisibility. It doesn’t become angered,
or afraid, or join a battle of emotions simply to
win.

It knows better, because it is a survivor.

L
ee was propped against an Alexander palm, smoking a long, slender cigar and reading a yachting magazine when Georgia drove
between the caravan park gates. He straightened as she approached and indicated for her to pull over.

She wished she’d seen him before he had seen her. Then she might have been able to call Jason Chen, tell him Lee was here,
and he’d pick Lee up then release her mother. Wouldn’t he?

Nerves jumping, she parked next to a silver Mitsubishi four-by-four with smoked glass windows, which she assumed was his since
the driver’s door was open and music was playing. She didn’t climb out of her car, just looked at him through her open window.
She didn’t say hello or greet him in any way. She wasn’t sure how she felt about seeing him standing there, relaxed and at
ease, after her experience with the Chens and the way they’d interrogated her about him, smashed her mother’s face.

Windsurfers Do It Standing Up.

The Chens wanted Lee, and she wanted her mother. What was Lee doing here?

He peeled himself from the palm and leaned against her car’s bodywork. The Band-Aid had gone, and she could see a row of neat
stitches along the jagged tear in his right ear. Another wound to wear along with the rest of his fighting-dog scars.

He looked at her bandaged hand on the steering wheel and said, “Did they do that? Chen Xiaoqiang and his gang?”

“Yes.”

He looked away.

“I’d like to see them dead.” Her tone was harsh.

“You’re not the only one.”

He took a slow pull on his cigar and inspected the glowing stub while he exhaled. “How’ve you been, anyway? Aside from the
hand, I mean.”

“Sweaty.”

“Yeah. Stinking, isn’t it?” He glanced over his shoulder at the park office, its whitewashed walls barely visible through
the banana trees, then back. “Why’d they let you go?”

She decided to give him as little information as possible. “What happened to the rental car? The car you left in the creek?”

“I got rid of it.”

“Why? They went mad. Ronnie Chen rented it and they were going crazy—”

“I rented the car. I just used Ronnie’s name. His driver’s license. His credit card.”

“Why?”

“Smokescreen.”

“Smokescreen?” she repeated blankly.

“Yeah.” He took a pull of his cigar. “You know I worked with the RBG?”

She swallowed drily. “I might have heard something about it.”

“From your mate Daniel, no doubt.”

She didn’t respond.

“Well, I kind of fell out with them. I’m now freelancing, you could say.”

She was about to ask about the two guys from the Dragon Syndicate in Fuzhou, when he said, “What occurred with Chen Xiaoqiang
and his mob?”

“What
occurred
?” An urge to hit him, to shake him out of his composure, swept over her. “Oh, nothing much. They just took a pair of pruning
shears to me, shortened my finger an inch, grabbed a baseball bat, and . . . and . . .”

It was on the tip of her tongue to tell him about her mother.

He was watching her unblinkingly. “And what?”

She looked away. “Nothing.”

He took a studied drag on his cigar, looking to one side at a bunch of coconut palms. “They’ve got someone, haven’t they?”

Georgia switched her gaze inside the car and at the speedometer, splintered with cracks.

“Who is it?” He suddenly sounded weary. “Tell me, Georgia. Who are they holding?”

The way the cracks ran from the dial made it look as though someone had slammed a screwdriver in its center. Vaguely she wondered
if that’s what had happened, and if not, how the dial came to be broken.

“Georgia.” His voice was soft, insistent. “Tell me who they’ve got.”

Her voice choked as she admitted, “My mother.”

“Your
mother
?”

“They’re keeping her hostage.” She couldn’t stop the tears welling. “They want me to find some disk. The one Suzie had in
her fanny pack wasn’t any good. They kept asking for ‘the rest.’”

He looked down at his feet, rubbing the bridge of his nose. “And they want you to find me and turn me over to them. That’s
why they have your mother.”

Her head jerked around to stare at him. He’d gotten it in one. No doubt being a criminal made it easy for him to see what
the Chens were up to.

“You haven’t called the police,” he stated. “Any reason?”

“They said they have friends in the police . . .”

“Just the one.”

“What?”

“One dirty cop.”

Small pause while she took this in.

“Who is it?” she asked.

“They keep themselves anonymous and get paid through a numbered account in Panama. That’s all I know.”

A horrible thought crossed her mind. “It couldn’t be Daniel, could it?”

Lee gave a choked laugh, almost a guffaw. “He’d like to see me strung up, sure, and he’s capable of creating his own agenda
when it suits . . . He tell you about Amy Robins?”

“Er . . . no.”

“Whole town knows that story. You should hear it. It’s a real eye-opener.” The amusement left his face as he added, “One thing
certain in this world is that Daniel Carter isn’t Spider.”

“Spider?”

“That’s how dirty cops are known. They sit in their webs and pull the strings they want, stockpiling enough readies for a
fat retirement.”

“If I go to the police, will this Spider tell the Chens?”

“Oh yes. But they won’t kill your mum . . . What’s her name?”

“Linette.”

“Well, Linette’s more valuable to them alive than dead, as I’m sure you can appreciate. But having said that, should the cops
get too close . . .”

She knew what he meant. The Chens wouldn’t hesitate to kill her mother, dump her body, and get rid of any evidence of kidnapping.

“So what should I do?” she asked. “Can’t the police help at all?”

He thought it over briefly. “Not with Spider sitting pretty. The cops make a move for you mum, they’ll just shift her around.
Make her even harder to find.” He mulled a bit longer. “You tell anyone about Linette?”

“Just you.”

“Best keep it that way. Not a word to anyone. Not even your pal Daniel, okay? Or Spider will hear.”

She gave a nod.

“Good. Because the only hope we’ve got of getting your mum back is to do it on tiptoe. Ask a few quiet questions in the right
places. Find out where they’re holding her.”