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PIHO WAS THERE, AND Pierre turned up five minutes later. He was considerably more cheerful when he saw their haul: thirteen perfect truffles in their little plastic bags, worth (according to Randy’s rapid mental calculations) more than three thousand dollars.
“Excellent, dudes!” said Pierre, carefully holding the bags up to the failing light and minutely examining the goods, “And now I’ve got something for you!” He took two envelopes from his expensive new leather jacket and passed them over. They felt fatter than yesterday’s, but the boys politely didn’t tear them open, not just yet.
“And we’ve got phones!” announced Randy proudly.
They exchanged numbers. As soon as he got Pierre’s number Randy carefully keyed it into his phone’s memory and hit CALL. Pierre’s phone began to ring. “Go on,” pleaded Randy, “I want to see if it works.” With a tired sigh Pierre complied.
“’Allo?” he said in his fake French accent.
“Gidday!” said Randy, “How ya going, mate?”
“I am zorry, zir. I do not zink I know you. Are you phoning from wizzin France, or from Orrstraya?”
“Oh geez, man! It’s me, Randy!”
“You are feeling randy? I definitely zink you have ze wrong number, zir!”
Piho nearly wet himself laughing.
Randy switched off his phone, bright red. “C’mon,” he growled, “it's getting late.”
“Yeah,” agreed Pierre, “I’ve got to be getting back too. Speaking of which, Can we meet across the other side tomorrow? This is adding ten minutes to my drive-time.”
“Yeah, sure,” agreed Piho readily, “Like where?”
“You know that little park, just before the bridge coming in?”
“Sure. Same time?”
“Works for me.” Pierre got into his van and banged his door closed. “These,” he said, waggling the little plastic bags out the window as if they were a bunch of grapes, “are going to ...”
But he didn’t finish because right then they heard the sound of a car starting, just back along the road towards Kainui. They all froze.
“Who’s that?” asked Randy nervously.
Pierre sprang out and scrambled onto the top of his van, peering into the gloom. But they couldn’t see anything. There was a clump of trees in the way. Beyond the trees the mysterious vehicle was backing up hurriedly. They caught a glimpse of light within the trees as it turned, revealing its reversing lights, then bang! It had hit something.
“Someone’s been spying on us!” shouted Piho suddenly. He ran for his bike.
Beyond the trees they heard the engine start again and rev frantically. They saw a big modern car shoot into view for a moment and drive away at top speed, its lights coming on only when it reached the cover of the next trees.
Pierre, meanwhile, had dropped back into his van and started his engine. Moments later he was away too, leaving Randy spitting out dust and rushing to join the chase. He stuffed his money and telephone into his pockets, screwed his helmet hastily onto his head and pedalled after them.
Piho called to him as he sped past the first trees, “Hoi! Over here!”
Randy turned back. Piho was examining a double-line of fresh skid marks on the grass just off the track. “Did you see it?” Randy asked as he skidded to a stop.
“Sort of. - New car, metallic grey. Might have been a Beamer...”
“Eh?”
“BMW.”
“Oh yeah, I knew that. So, like, d’ya reckon they followed us?”
“Looks like it.”
“Well it must the police or something!”
Piho snorted, “Get real! Why’d it be the police? They wouldn’t run off.”
“Well ... it was someone, and I bet they were after the truffles.”
“Yeah,” agreed Piho more calmly, “We’d better watch our backs from now on. Someone’s onto us.” Piho picked up his bike, “C’mon. It’s getting late.”
“Wait!”
“What now?”
Randy was looking at an old tree stump, half hidden in long grass just beyond the skid marks. The top of it had been freshly scraped clean. “See? They must’ve hit this.” He reached into the long grass and pulled up two broken bits of silver-grey plastic, “Broke their bumper, the dickheads. Fancy hitting that. Everyone knows it’s there!”
#
THERE WAS ONLY ONE place in town who did fancy cars; Burton’s Motordrome. Next morning, on his way to school, Randy went in, sort of expecting to see the same car, but there was nothing like it in sight. One of the mechanics noticed him.
“Can I help?”
“Ah, yeah. Um, I was wondering, like, what sort of car did this come off?” He showed the mechanic a piece of the broken plastic bumper.
“Awww, could be off anything. Where’d you find it?”
“Oh, just by a road. Um, I thought, like, maybe they came here to get it fixed?”
The mechanic shook his head again, “Nar, not recently. Not that colour.”
Randy went on his way. Piho was right - whoever it was, they weren’t from Kainui. He might as well forget it. Even so he spent a nervous day, looking back over his shoulder every ten minutes, expecting to see a big silver-grey car slowly cruising up behind him.
#
AFTER SCHOOL THE BOYS headed to the reserve as usual. Piho had bought crispy bacon (at $22.95 per kilo) for Blowfly’s rewards. “What?” squawked Randy when he heard the price.
Piho just handed Randy a big chunk, “I got extra for us.”
“Cool!”
Blowfly looked up and whined.
“You’ll get yours later, dog,” said Piho, “You go find the piggies, then you can have a bite of this piggie!”
They reached the reserve and soon Blowfly had his nose to the ground, seeking out the underground ‘piggies’. Suddenly the dog-bell rang: “Woof-woof-woof!” The boys ran up and started digging, using the little hand-trowels they had just acquired for the purpose. Soon the truffle was in the bag and Blowfly got his first taste of bacon. He set off again, keen for more. But suddenly, through the trees, they saw a bunch of people. Three men and a woman in business suits; important-looking people – the last thing Randy expected to see – and Blowfly was heading straight for them!