As Minister assisting the Minister for Defence, Peter January was low on the totem pole, which meant that he escaped a lot of the trappings-such as hordes of security men, departmental advisers and other nose wipers. When we assembled at Sydney’s International Terminal we numbered but five-January, Trudi, me, Gary, whose other name was Wilcox, and two guys named Martin and Bolton. Martin was from a PR section of the Department of Defence and Bolton was seconded from the Strategic Analysis Unit of the Australian National University. They were experts in politics and they used words like ‘hemispheric’ and even bio-tropic’.
Trudi distributed the tickets. ‘Business class. Any of you smoke?’
‘Yes,’ Bolton said. He was a long lean number with straight fair hair. He had several pens in the top pocket of his jacket and nicotine-stained fingers.
‘Not today you don’t,’ January said. ‘I’ll want to talk to you on the way and I don’t want to get my head full of shit before I get there. There’ll be enough of that later. Let’s go.’
The metal detector screamed as I stepped through the frame. I was wearing the. 38 in an underarm harness and I had a spare ammunition clip in a pocket. It made the attendant’s day. He suddenly stood taller and sucked his stomach in. ‘I’m sorry, sir, I’ll have to search you.’
I held my jacket open so he could see the gun but the other people standing around couldn’t. ‘The thing works,’ I said. ‘It really works.’
‘Stop clowning, Hardy,’ January snapped. He and Trudi presented the attendant with papers, which meant that his day hadn’t been made after all.
‘What was all that about?’ Martin asked. He was a small, intense man with a mop of wiry hair and big, violet-tinted glasses. He kept abreast of me by scampering down the corridor from the waiting lounge pumping his elbows like a competition walker.
‘Politics,’ I said.
It was a Trans Pacific Airlines flight stopping at Honolulu, Los Angeles and New York. The movie was Crocodile Dundee, which I’d seen and didn’t want to see again. I’d brought along Flashman at the Charge which I’d read but wanted to re-read and John Ehrlichman’s Washington Behind Closed Doors which I hadn’t and probably wouldn’t. Trudi and January talked and worked on papers; January also drank. Martin and Bolton read thick official reports so fresh the ink came off on their fingers. Bolton slipped out of his seat from time to time to go somewhere and smoke.
I read, listened to the music and thought. I’d imagined that the next overseas trip for me would have been with Helen. We had similar ideas about Paris and Rome; now I didn’t even know where she was, much less what ideas she had. I hadn’t phoned the farm, I hadn’t done anything except resolve to send a postcard from New York. That’d rock her. Maybe I could go on to Paris when January had finished in New York. Maybe Helen could join me there. Human beings weren’t meant to travel thousands of miles in a few hours-it stimulates the imagination too much and leaves reality too far behind.
January left Trudi and sat next to Bolton. They were arguing loudly within seconds.
‘You can’t say that,’ Bolton yelped. ‘You’ll offend mother major interest group with every word if you say that.’
‘Good!’ January slammed his fist on his knee. Good!’
‘They’d retaliate!’ Bolton’s voice went up in aguish. ‘They’d undersell us in wheat, wool, meat…’
January laughed. ‘They’re doing that now.’ His ice had got a little loose, the way I’d seen it before when he was drunk at my house. Trudi shot him a concerned look which I caught. I looked at my watch.
‘Food soon,’ I mouthed.
She nodded. Gary joined in the argument on January’s side and they went at it vigorously until the meal arrived.
‘They’re not the enemy,’ Bolton snapped. He felt for a cigarette and stopped when he saw how January was looking at him.
Gary looked at his tray. ‘Maybe they are,’ he said. ‘Look at the food.’
It was all pink or off-white with the consistency of freshly mixed polyfilla. I prodded at it, ate a cube of something called ‘cheese food’ but basically left it alone. January was wound up; he talked as he ate and finished the food apparently without tasting it. Trudi nodded encouragingly and managed to get several cups of coffee into him by the sheer force of her agreement with every word he said.
The leg room in the business class seats was adequate; the air wasn’t yet too stale and the drone of the engines was pleasantly muted. As he digested the ‘steak food’ and ‘ice cream food’, Peter January slept.
‘This is looking tricky,’ Gary said. ‘What’s wrong with him? He doesn’t usually throw it down like that.’
I looked at Trudi. ‘Does Gary know about Karen?’
She shook her head.
‘Time he did,’ I said. ‘I’m betting that’s the complication our master’s wrestling with.’
Trudi filled Gary in quickly. He covered his face with his hands when he heard the name. ‘Oh, Jesus,’ he said. ‘Does Frank Hogbin know?’
‘Nobody knows,’ Trudi said. ‘Except us sitting here, and Mrs Weiner, of course.’
‘And where’s her head now?’ Gary said.
On the block, I thought, but Trudi had learned 80s-speak. ‘That’s what’s bugging Peter,’ she said. ‘He hasn’t been able to reach her for a couple of days. He’s scared she might be doing something foolish.’
Gary took a sip of cold coffee and made a face. ‘What d’you think, Cliff?’
‘I’ve got the same problem with Helen.’
Gary looked at me, blinking rapidly. ‘Don’t worry,’ Trudi said. She patted my hand. ‘Cliff’s got jet lag-already.’
We went through customs at Honolulu. This time I made sure January cleared what they insisted on calling my ‘weapon’ first. I didn’t want any trigger-happy American cop thinking he’d got himself a live target at last. Back on the plane January fell into an argument with Martin. Gary Wilcox stuck close to them and seemed to be fuelling the debate from time to time.
‘You need a phrase, sir,’ Martin insisted. ‘A catchcry.’
‘A slogan,’ Gary said.
January loosened his collar. He had his jacket off and waistcoat unbuttoned. He looked a little dishevelled but nothing that couldn’t be fixed quickly. ‘What is this?’ he said. ‘An advertising campaign? Are we selling beer here?’
Gary smiled. ‘You’re falling into the style already, Peter.’
‘Shut up! Martin, have you got the breakdown of the media networks? I want to know where I can say what.’
‘Yes, sir. And the regional analysis. You’ll be travelling along the east coast a bit, I gather. Now, in Maryland…’
‘Agnew country,’ Gary said.
‘Jesus, don’t remind me. What’s that Baltimore paper that’s okay?’
‘What’s going on?’ I whispered to Trudi. ‘Gary’s getting up his nose.’
‘That’s right. The idea is to get Peter angry and charged up. Maybe he’ll stay off the grog.’
‘He might break Gary’s nose too, or Martin’s glasses. Are we going to have to nursemaid him like this all the time?’
She shrugged. ‘He’s hoping for a telegram from Karen in Washington. What about you?’
‘I’m just a boy from Maroubra. I’ll send Helen a postcard.’
‘I’ll help you draft it, if you like.’
‘No, thanks. She might smell your perfume. That reminds me, maybe we should’ve given some of those original letters to the cops.’
‘Why?’
‘They could do a microscopic analysis, get blood types from fingernail scrapings and so on.’
‘Was any crime ever solved by that stuff?’
I grinned. ‘I never heard of one. Still, something might turn up. We’ll do it when we get back.’
‘I’ll make a note. Are you enjoying yourself so far?’
‘It’s okay. No one’s shot at me. I’ll be ready for a decent feed. Where’re we staying in Washington?’
She consulted a notebook. ‘The Lincoln.’
‘Good.’
‘D’you know it?’
‘No, but at least it’s not the Watergate.’
‘I think the Watergate’s for the rich.’
‘It certainly made a lot of people rich, Watergate.’
‘Mm.’ She looked across the laps and knees at January who was arguing fiercely with Martin. Bolton, presumably, was off working on his emphysema. A steward came down the aisle and handed Trudi a note. She unfolded the paper and read quickly.
‘Great,’ she said.
‘What?’
‘Press in LA.’
‘Talk English, Trude.’
She smiled as she handed the note along to Peter. ‘Some members of the American media would like to talk to the Minister at Los Angeles International Airport.’
‘Commie Aussie polly gives Reds head,’ I said.
‘Jesus, Cliff. It won’t be that bad.’
We looked at January. He smoothed down his hair, checked his watch and did up some of the buttons on his waistcoat. Martin held out a paper to him and he brushed it aside. ‘Later,’ he said.
‘Will he be out of his depth, d’you think?’ Trudi whispered.
I watched January work his tongue around his teeth and flex his neck muscles, pulling in the incipient double chin. ‘How tall is he?’
‘Five nine,’ Trudi said.
I smiled. ‘He’s barely five eight but I don’t think the depth will worry him too much.’