I arrive at her desk and I never know exactly how I arrived there. That is, I know instinctively that I passed the Sports desk and the Classifieds room to my left and the beer fridge beside the Motoring writer, Carl Corby, and the framed Queensland State of Origin rugby league jersey signed by the courageous Wally Lewis, but I don’t recall passing these things because I am only ever locked inside the vision tunnel of Caitlyn Spies. I always die on the way through this tunnel and she is the life-preserving light at the end of it.
She’s talking on the old black rotary-dial phone at her desk.
‘Buzz off, Bell.’
That’s Dave Cullen, the paper’s hotshot police roundsman. Solid reporter. Solid ego. He’s a decade older than me and has the facial hair to prove it. Dave Cullen runs triathlons in his spare time. Lifts weights. Rescues children from burning buildings. Glows.
‘She needs to concentrate,’ Dave says, head down in his word processor, fingers tapping furiously.
‘What did the cops tell you about the Penn family?’ I ask.
‘What’s it to you, Bellbottoms?’
Dave Cullen calls me Bellbottoms. Bellbottoms is not a crime reporter. Bellbottoms is a fairy who writes colour.
‘They find any clues in the house?’
‘Any clues?’ Dave laughs. ‘Yeah, Bellbottoms, they found a candlestick in the conservatory.’
‘I grew up out that way,’ I say. ‘I know that street well. Logan Avenue. It runs down to Oxley Creek. Gets flooded all the time.’
‘Awww, shit, thanks, Eli, I’ll mention that in my intro.’
He taps furiously into his word processor as he speaks. ‘“Shocking revelations have emerged in the case of the missing Penn family from Oxley with sources not at all close to the family saying they lived on a street that often flooded in heavy rain events.”’
Dave Cullen leans back in his chair proudly. ‘Fuck, mate, this is gonna put the cat among the pigeons. Thanks for the tip.’
But the joke is on the great triathlete weight-lifting smartarse Dave Cullen because as he’s enacting this posturing sideshow of malicious sarcasm my eyes are searching for details across his work desk. A Batman coffee cup with the Caped Crusader’s fist causing the word ‘Kapow’ to explode from the cheek of the Joker. A large orange in a state of decay. A small photograph of the Queensland swimming champion Lisa Curry pinned to his desk divider. A Birdsville Hotel stubby cooler holding six blue ballpoint pens. And a lined Spirax notepad open beside his desk phone. On this notepad are several scribbled lines in shorthand from which I can identify several key words. These words are Glenn Penn, Regina, Bevan, heroin, Golden Triangle, Cabramatta, king, reprisal.
But there are two words I find more compelling than any others. Dave Cullen has placed a question mark beside these two words and he has underlined them. These two words make me shiver. Absurd words that make no sense on their own but make some sense if you have spent a bizarre childhood being raised by drug dealers in the outer western suburb of Darra.
Llama hair?
The name falls out of me. It erupts from me. The hot molten lava of his name.
‘Iwan Krol.’
I say it too loud and Caitlyn Spies spins around immediately on her chair. She recognises the name. She stares at me. Spies digs deep. Spies digs right.
Dave Cullen is puzzled.
‘What?’ he says.
Brian Robertson’s door opens and Dave Cullen sits up in his seat.
‘Bell!’ the editor barks.
It’s a thunderous holler that makes me jump as I turn towards the monster standing in his office doorway.
‘What did I tell you about sniffin’ round the fuckin’ crime desk?’ Brian shouts.
‘You said, “Stop sniffin’ round the fuckin’ crime desk,”’ I say, displaying my uncanny journalistic recollection of the facts.
‘Get in here now!’ Brian screams, walking back to his office desk.
I take one last look at Caitlyn Spies. She’s still on the phone but she’s looking at me, giving me an encouraging smile now, nodding knowingly, giving the kind of smile fair maidens give to knights who are about to be eaten alive by mythological dragons.
I enter Brian’s office.
‘I’m sorry, Brian, I was just trying to give Dave some—’
He cuts me off.
‘Sit down, Bell,’ he says. ‘I’ve got a project I need you to turn around quick.’
I sit in one of two empty swivel chairs sitting across from his single brown leather desk chair that does not swivel for anyone.
‘You heard of the Queensland Champions awards?’ he asks.
‘Queensland Champions?’ I gasp.
‘It’s a load of back-slapping bullshit the government’s organised for Queensland