Prohibited Zone (2 page)

‘How many got out?' I asked.

‘More 'n twenny.'

I put the card in my wallet. ‘If I see anyone wearing a turban I'll give you a call.'

‘Those bastards don't wear turbans, you silly bugger. Only the women.'

‘The women wear turbans, you reckon?'

‘Yeah, 'course they do. Don't they?'

‘See you, Dicko.'

He gave me a mock salute and waved me on with his torch as if he were ushering through Prince Charles. I bet he'd printed dozens of those cards on his home computer and was busy handing them out to everyone he pulled over. Maybe it was his copper's zeal, or maybe he thought that tracking down an escapee or two would earn him enough brownie points to get him the hell out of Woomera. I raised my hand to the other two cops and the Pajero as I drove away and into town.

The streetlights were on but Woomera was dead, even by the standards of a government town. In the 1950s the British government had needed a large, uninhabited area, preferably in a country other than its own, where it could peaceably go about testing nuclear weapons and assorted missiles. The Australian government, never wanting to miss a chance to lick arse, had offered them a huge slab of desert country, which it named the Woomera Prohibited Area, from which it henceforth banned ordinary people. The Brits had tested their weapons there for decades, and the Americans had built a secret base nearby. Woomera had sprung up, a neat little town made of neat little streets lined with neat little houses. It had been an army town, filled with neat little citizens wearing neat little haircuts. But the Brits and the Americans were long gone now. The town was still owned and managed by the Department of Defence but the heyday was over, and most of the neat little houses were empty.

I drove past the Eldo Hotel, the only pub in town. More cars than usual, including five cop cars, were parked outside. I wondered why the cops weren't out hunting for detainees, but maybe first they had to work out whether it was a state or federal operation and who would get to sleep on the top bunk. I didn't stop, and soon Woomera was just a mirage in my rear-view mirror.

2

F
IVE KILOMETRES SOUTH OF
W
OOMERA
the road joins the Stuart Highway, which dissects Australia from north to south, connecting Darwin at the top with Adelaide at the bottom. At the junction is Pimba, a tiny town stricken with terminal indifference. It seemed that nobody in Pimba had ever had the energy to do the things that make a town a town – like build proper houses or roads or put up a few shops. There was no church because not even God could be bothered to exist there. The town's sorry huddle of houses was complemented by an equally apologetic row of tin sheds lining the dirt road at the back of the houses; they seemed to lean on each other for moral support, which was not much support at all. Pimba's only noteworthy feature was Spuds, a ramshackle roadhouse and pub. It sat in the triangular corner of the highway junction and attracted drinkers like flies to a sheep's crotch. Just before I reached the junction I turned right onto an access track and drove along it for a hundred metres or so. I bypassed the two rows of petrol bowsers and parked in the dirt outside the bar.

As Dicko had predicted, the place was livelier tonight; at least twenty cars were parked there. I recognised some of them – belonging to locals, mostly. I guessed that the protesters had dispersed as quickly as they could after the riot and were heading back to Adelaide.

I sat where I was for a moment to let the dust settle. Stars were coming out. There was no breeze and almost no movement apart from the dust. I got out of the car, not bothering to lock it, and walked up the one step to the beer garden, a gravel wasteland adorned by four large tables made of old railway sleepers and overhung by a trellis, upon which grew a shabby vine in chronic need of more water and less urine. No one was sitting outside but there was plenty of noise coming from within. I pushed the door open and entered.

Besides being a pub and a petrol station, Spuds was also a motel, a restaurant and a shop – the only shop, in fact, in Pimba and the only form of group entertainment for at least a hundred kilometres in any direction. It had a low roof and a high bar and a population of drunks, ratbags and the occasional and highly valued old tart. It also had a décor with only one guiding principle: minimal investment. Five surfboards hung from the ceiling, probably installed after they had blown off their car roofs (there could be no other reason; the nearest surf was three hundred kilometres away). Old car registration plates, no doubt salvaged from car wrecks, were nailed to the wall. A couple of barrels served as poseurs for the resting of beers. There was also a huddle of more conventional tables in another corner, which was known as the restaurant. I could see many familiar faces, as I expected I would, and no one who looked like a protester, an escaped Afghan or a camel.

Rabbit sat on the far side of the pool table with his wife, Doreen. He grinned at me and nodded and I grinned and nodded back. An elderly couple sat in the plastic restaurant chairs, shovelling down what looked like fish and chips and glasses of the house white. They were probably grey nomads – retirees doing a slow-paced lap of the country to prove to themselves they were still alive.

A pool table lined with red felt occupied a prominent position close to the bar. Chook was leaning over it, cigarette in hand, preparing to pot the blue. I'd seen him in the same pose a week before. He looked up from his cue as I came in, his eyes almost as red as the table. He grinned quickly, showing an array of teeth that were as crooked, as dirty and as sparse as the headstones in the Pimba cemetery. Lank hair fell across his eyes, and he blew it out of the way with smoky breath as he returned his gaze to the blue.

‘G'day, Chook,' I said. ‘How're they hanging?'

‘Like huge fucken lumps of lead, Westie,' he said as he took his shot. The blue went in, but so did the white. ‘Fuck it, you put me off me shot.'

Somewhere, someone laughed. I took up position at the bar next to Simon Rice, one of the guards at the detention centre. He was mostly called Baz, as in basmati. He was a mate of mine and we had arranged to meet for a beer on my way through. We greeted each other with a grip of the hand, thumb around thumb.

‘Fellow legend, how are ya?'

‘Somewhat legendary, mate.'

Spud had already rolled a stubby of Coopers Pale Ale to mix the sediment and was twisting off the top. I tossed a five-dollar note onto the counter, which was wet with beer. Like all its notes, Australia's five-dollar bills are beer-proof. In fact, Chook had – several times – put forward the theory they were made of plastic for that very reason.

I nodded. ‘Spud.'

‘Westie,' said Spud, returning the nod with a straight face, which was all he had. He put the Coopers down on the bar and took the fiver. Spud was bald all the way down to his ears, below which he wore sideburns that hadn't otherwise been seen since 1978 and should have been outlawed then. He was a lanky, stringy piece of gristle about six-foot-three long. His chest was barely as broad as a billiard cue but his heart was as big as Uluru.

He was taking an order from Trent Nelson, a haul-truck driver at Olympic Dam, the same place I worked. He was a huge and hugely ugly man. A rock had once almost crushed him to death after he rolled his truck, and they'd needed a crane to lift it off his face. But that didn't explain how ugly he was. He had legs that could have been used as bollards for a ship and disappeared into unlaced, ankle-high boots that could have doubled as garbage bins. He was leaning on the bar with both forearms, chewing on a cigarette.

‘I hear there's been a bit of a blow on at the detention centre,' I said to Spud.

‘Bit of one,' he replied, still holding Trent's beer in his thin hand and looking at me. ‘We've had a fair few protesters come through, picking up supplies for the trip back to Adelaide. I guess their work's done here.'

‘Good for business, eh?'

‘God bless their anti-establishment hearts and their unemployment cheques. Heading down to the big smoke yourself?'

‘Yeah, got a week off.'

‘Good break.'

‘I need it. I'm burnt out.'

‘You look it, mate.'

‘Hey, Spud, you gunna keep warmin' me beer for me?' called Trent, removing his cigarette from his mouth and exhaling smoke as he spoke. ‘How 'bout fetchin' me anuvver one, yer cunt. A cold one.'

Spud walked over and put the beer in front of him, waving the smoke away with his hand.

‘You'd be bloody lucky,' he said.

Trent fished around in his pocket and drew out some coins, which he tossed one by one onto the bar until they added up to five dollars. ‘Anyway, you don't get a fucken tip,' he said.

Spud gave his trademark laugh – a single, explosive ‘Ha!' – and came back to me.

‘See what I have to put up with?'

Trent raised his bottle to me. ‘Here's to our 'ole in the groun', Wessie, and to all the 'oles in our women.'

‘Charming,' said Spud.

Trent clinked his bottle with mine and the one Baz was holding. Then Baz and I clinked.

‘So how's it going, Baz?'

‘It's going good, Westie. The lads have actually got something to talk about tonight.' He twitched his lips into a smile and took a swig of his beer. He was the best-looking bloke in the pub and possibly the state, but he didn't let it worry him. He had the poise of a model, the handshake of a gym instructor and a wit as dry as the Strzelecki Desert. He made bar-leaning look like an art form. He had probably had a rough day but looked as fresh as a bud.

‘I could do wiffout the mouff 'oles, though,' said Trent. ‘On me women.'

‘Jesus, Trent, they've gotta eat,' said Spud. He looked at me and shrugged, a look of thin despair on his face.

‘Whachya gunna do for a head job if you do away wiff their mouffs?' muttered Hose, the third counter-leaner. He was another of the detention centre guards. His face was brutalised by a broken nose; maybe he had worn a rock once, too, but more likely someone's forehead. He was still in his uniform, the short sleeves of his shirt showing off powerful forearms and a tattoo of what at first glance looked like two dogs humping. I didn't bother to take a second look. He lifted his head to make the comment and then went back to studying the label on his beer.

‘Vacuum cleana, same as I orlways do,' said Trent.

‘Ha!' said Spud.

‘Remind me never to borrow your vacuum cleaner,' said Baz. He looked at me and rolled his eyes. I grinned at him.

‘So you lost a few inmates today,' I said.

‘Ah, just a few,' said Baz. ‘Don't worry about it. We'll have most of them rounded up by tomorrow. Won't we, Hose?'

Trent grunted. ‘You'd be fucken lucky,' he said. ‘They'll all be in Adlae by tomorra or Sinnie the day afta.'

Chook had come to the bar. ‘Who gives a rat's, anyway?' he said. ‘What they gunna to do, escape back to Afghanistan? Let 'em.'

‘Nah, yer can't trust them fucken towel 'eads,' said Trent. ‘Yer never know when one of 'em's gunna blow up in ya face.'

I refrained from telling Trent that in his case nobody would notice the difference.

‘Nobody's safe in this country anymore,' said Chook in a quavering voice, mocking him.

‘Too fucken right,' said Trent.

‘Maybe one of 'em's doin' your missus as we speak,' said Chook, grinning at the rest of us.

‘He's bloody welcome,' said Trent.

‘Worse, he might be doin' your vacuum cleaner,' said Baz.

‘I'll kill 'im if he is,' said Trent. ‘I fucken love that fing.'

‘They should all be sent back to their own fucken country,' said Hose, who was now peeling the label off his beer. His face was inflamed with anger or alcohol or a combustible mixture of both as he looked around at us. ‘It shits me – no one invited 'em and when they get here they expect five-fucken-star 'ccomm'dation, and then they start riotin' when they only get three-and-a-half-fucken-star. I wish the gov'men' would pay all
my
fucken 'ccomm'dation.'

‘One day I expect they will,' said Baz. ‘For two to four years, I'd reckon.' He winked at me, and I grinned.

‘Fucken towel 'eads,' repeated Trent. ‘Half of 'em are probly terrists. Y'know the gov'men' just put the terror ratin' up ta 'xtreme. Means an attack is imm'nent or 'as already occurred.'

‘It's a pretty useless rating system if it goes to extreme
after
the attack,' said Baz. ‘Talk about stating the bleeding obvious.'

‘Well, nothing has happened yet, as far as I know,' said Spud. He had been cleaning glasses and now he threw his dishcloth onto the counter. ‘So it must still be imminent.'

‘Yeah, imminent,' said Chook, enunciating the syllables. ‘Means it's about to happen,' he explained to Hose.

‘Fuck off yer little prick,' said Hose. ‘Anyway, bitta luck they'll fucken blow up parlymen' 'ouse. Do us all a fava.'

‘What's the matter with you tonight?' said Baz. ‘Didn't enjoy the nice riot?'

Hose grunted. ‘Nah, I didn't enjoy gettin' spat at and punched and kicked in the fucken balls.' He stood up from his leaning position, got his legs tangled and decided it was easier to resume leaning. ‘Nah, fuck 'em. You hear what they was yellin' out? “Fuck Woomera, fuck Austraya.” Ungrateful shitheads. Bunch o' fucken animals.'

‘And that's just the women,' said Baz to the rest of us.

‘I'd like a shtring a few of 'em up by the balls,' said Hose.

‘Jesus, the women even have balls,' said Baz.

‘I heard that one of the escapees is a shit-hot woman,' said Chook.

‘If ya like dark meat and big eyebrows,' said Hose.