Digger Field (15 page)

‘Yeah, shut up,’ said Tearley.

‘I chased a red-bellied black snake into her sitting room, yeah,’ said Mr Black. ‘It would have killed her if it had bitten her. She found me and said I was trying to steal her stuff. She wouldn’t believe me. She was very nasty, yeah, but people are people. You shouldn’t judge. I bought those biscuits as a present but she wouldn’t even let me in. I left the biscuits on her front doorstep.’

‘They had oyster sauce in them,’ I said. ‘They would have made her sick.’

Mr Black looked thoughtful for a moment.

‘That’s funny,’ he said. ‘Probably serve her right, yeah.’

‘So, your friends,’ Tearley said. ‘You mean the reptiles, right?’

‘What?’ said Wriggler.

‘Yes, they are my babies,’ he said. ‘I should have let them go right away when my neighbour reported me, but they wouldn’t have survived. So I hid them here in the cellar so I could take them out at night and let them get used to looking after themselves, catch their own food, yeah. I wanted to let them go gradually.’

‘We thought you were a trafficker,’ said Wrigs.

‘Why would I sell my babies, yeah?’

The phone rang again. I answered it. It was Stevens again.

‘Digger, I went to your place but your brother said you weren’t home. Where are you?’

‘Nowhere,’ I said.

‘Has Mr Black found you?’ she asked.

I didn’t say anything.

Mr Smiley lowered himself and looked around again.

‘You are at the river, aren’t you?’

I took a step towards Mr Smiley. He bolted away from us and into the bushes.

Stevens said, ‘You can’t talk. We’ll be there in three minutes.’

‘Okay,’ I said and hung up.

I felt sick. Mr Black was about to be arrested for something he didn’t do. And it was my fault.

‘The police are coming,’ I said to Mr Black.

‘Now, yeah?’ He suddenly didn’t look like a gangster any more. He was just a skinny guy in a bad pair of sandshoes.

‘Sorry,’ I mumbled, ‘for saying you were, y’know, I mean, when I saw the manhole, I just thought, sorry.’

‘Things aren’t always what they seem, yeah,’ he said. ‘You should have just asked me, yeah, instead of making up stories. I wouldn’t have bitten, yeah.’

I stared at the ground. I couldn’t meet his gaze.

‘We all make mistakes,’ he said. ‘You and me, we’re friends, yeah?’

I looked up. He was smiling. I nodded.

He smiled at Tearley and Wriggler. ‘We’re all friends, yeah?’

‘Are we?’ said Wriggler.

Tearley kicked him. ‘Yes,’ she hissed.

‘I gotta go, yeah,’ said Mr Black.

‘Are all the animals okay?’ asked Tearley.

‘There is just one left, yeah, up in the bushes. Make sure he’s safe, yeah,’ said Mr Black. He ran his hand through his hair. ‘Adios, yeah.’

He gave us another little smile, turned around and hurried up the path.

‘I wonder where he’s going,’ said Wriggler.

‘Probably back to wherever he came from,’ said Tearley.

Two minutes later Tranh and Stevens came running down the path.

‘Where is he?’ said Tranh.

I don’t know how they could have missed him. Mr Black must have hidden while they drove down View Street.

‘He’s gone,’ I said.

‘Where?’ said Tranh.

‘I heard him drive off a while ago,’ Wrigs lied.

‘Yeah, he’d be kilometres away by now,’ said Tearley.

‘He was hiding in the bushes during the raid,’ I said. ‘He took all the animals up there and was letting them go.’

We pushed through the bushes and found a clearing full of cages. They were stacked up neatly. A lot of them had name tags, and a couple even had little plastic toys in them.

They were all empty except for one.

Inside was a blue-tongue lizard.

‘Now, nobody get scared,’ said Tranh.

Blue-tongues are the least scary lizard in the universe. I bent down and opened the cage door.

‘I think he’s asleep,’ I said.

‘That’s what he wants you to think,’ said Tranh. He spread out his feet, bounced on his toes and crouched slightly with his arms raised in a karate pose.

I gently tilted the cage and the lizard slid out.

‘Everyone stand back,’ said Tranh. He was poised and ready to strike. ‘
Aa-ii-gh yi-ii!
’ he yelled at the lizard.

The lizard took a good look at us, stuck out its blue tongue, then waddled off.

‘Okay, that was close,’ said Tranh.

‘No, it wasn’t,’ Tearley said.

‘Well, there are thirty or forty snakes and lizards in the direct vicinity,’ Tranh went on, ‘and some of them are poisonous. We should evacuate the area. Quickly.’

Tranh and Stevens dropped us back to my place. As we got out of the police car Tranh said, ‘Don’t worry, kids. We gave Mr Black a good scare. I don’t reckon he will ever come back.’

I hoped Tranh was right. For Mr Black’s sake.

‘What about the tinnie?’ said Wriggler as the police drove off.

The tinnie! I’d forgotten all about it.

We went into the living room and I turned on the computer. I looked up eBay to see how high the bids had got. But I couldn’t find the tinnie anywhere.

‘Uncle Scott mustn’t have put it up yet,’ I said.

‘I’ve always wanted a tinnie,’ said Tearley.

‘What?’ said Wrigs.

‘You never told us that,’ I said.

‘You never asked,’ said Tearley.

Well, that changed everything.

CHAPTER 35

DAY 38: Monday

School is back tomorrow.

I’m Australian champion.

It’s the last day of the holidays.

All in all, it’s been a pretty successful summer. I’ve had my face on the front of the paper twice. That makes me the most famous person I know.

The first photo was the one that caused all the trouble with Mr Black. And then on Friday there was a huge photo of the police opening the manhole and everyone looking in. I was right in the middle of the picture, looking confused and wondering where all the animals had gone.

There’s good news about the tinnie, too. Tearley came up with the best plan ever and Uncle Scott agreed to it. We’re going to set up a web page for his mobile coffee van and make a video about it. We’re also going to work for him on the weekends.

Instead of paying us, he is going to take our wages off the price of the tinnie. It’ll take a few months to pay for it, but we should end up with the boat. Eventually.

At least, we will if the ‘Coffee with Scotty’ idea works. Uncle Scott has started a lot of businesses that have failed pretty quickly.

I didn’t get the world skimming record. I should be disappointed, but I’m not. It turns out I’m the Australian champion. I did some research and I can’t find anyone who’s got more than twenty-five skims.

I sent an email about it to Wills at the
Daily
, so there’s a chance I’ll get in the paper again.

Three times in the paper.

Now that would be extraordinary.

HOW TO SKIM A STONE

By future world champion, Digger Field
*

•  Pick some water. It has to be pretty wide. The calmer the better. Rivers and lakes are good. Beaches are okay as long as the waves aren’t too big and there are no surfers.

•  Find a rock that is flat, round and smooth. It can’t be any bigger than the palm of your hand otherwise you won’t be able to control it. If it’s too light you won’t be able to throw it hard enough. If it’s too heavy it will sink without bouncing and you’ll look like a dumbnut.

•  Place the rock flat between your thumb and your index finger. Stick one edge into your thumb and the opposite one into your index finger.

•  Aim the rock. (Check for kayakers. They don’t have a sense of humour.)

•  Visualise the throw. Close your eyes and imagine the rock hitting the surface of the water and bouncing along. Though be careful not to stand there for too long with your eyes closed and your arm swinging because you will look like a freak.

•  Practice your throw. The idea is to throw sidearm so the rock hits the water flat. Until you get used to the feeling of throwing sidearm, jam your elbow into your hip and throw so your arm runs parallel to the ground—a bit like a table tennis forehand.

•  Now it’s time to throw. When you release the rock, snap your wrist for extra power, like when you throw a frisbee.

•  Count the number of times the rock skips.

•  Don’t worry, great things take time. When it finally works there is nothing better than watching a small rock bounce across the water.

•  Once you’ve mastered the art, here is one more secret tip that will make your stones travel further than anyone else’s … Angle the stone in your hand so the front is slightly higher than the rear.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

Thank you to Margrete Lamond for asking me to write
Digger
, and for her and Libby Volke’s incredible efforts in shaping and turning a collection of words and random thoughts into a coherent book.

Thank you to Daniel ‘Digger’ Davis for letting me borrow his name, and to all the Davises as a whole.

Thanks to Anna, Sam and William Tearle, and to all of my kids’ friends for nuggets of inspiration.

And of course, to my beautiful family, Sally, Georgia and Oscar, for all the extraordinary ideas and support and everything else in between.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Damian Davis is a television director and has a Masters of Journalism. He is married with two children. He has parents, brothers, sisters-in-law, brothers-in-law, nephews, nieces, friends, workmates, muses, sparring partners, archenemies and a dog, which makes him feel very lucky. Damian Davis is not sure about alliterative names.
Digger Field: World Champion (maybe)
is his first novel.