The lathe was noisy and obstreperous, its motor shorting every few minutes, although it did the job. The iron on the outside of the rod peeled easily enough; it was the coring that took time. So much time that Ryan fell asleep on the coffin, a dead rollie hanging from his lips, the transistor radio plugged into his ears. He had a smile on his face that made him look like the boy Pascoe remembered, dreaming of jockeying a Melbourne Cup winner, coming from five lengths back with a furlong to run, the crowd bringing him home.
The length of tempered iron had been cored to the width of a .303 cartridge. Pascoe took it off the lathe and slipped a cartridge down its mouth. It was a snug fit – not too tight or loose. The problem was fitting the new barrel inside the flare gun’s existing barrel. He could use the single-point lathe to carve a thread onto the outside fitting of the new barrel and an internal thread on the flare-gun barrel, but it’d take time. If the bloody thing shorted out during either operation then the ratio of distance to the spindle rotation might be compromised, and then he’d have to start from the beginning with another length of iron.
Pascoe took a long draw on the oxygen bottle. One alternative was to groove out an internal thread and use superglue to fill the grooves and hold the barrel inside. After all, the way Pascoe had planned it, he’d only need to test the weapon once, and use it once before throwing it away.
Better to do it right. He took another lungful of the cool sweet oxygen and put the bottle aside. Ryan had told him that he could get more, if needed. No call to ration what he had.
Pascoe worked out the gearing of the lead screw and put on his safety glasses. He was working in his jocks because of the heat, and his slack muscles were silvered with sweat. He turned on the lathe and got to work.
An hour later, both parts were threaded. Pascoe wiped the internal barrel with an old rag, used a rod to push the rag inside the flare-gun barrel to remove any shavings. He began to screw in the iron barrel, lubricated by spit. It fitted perfectly, and the length was right.
Ryan awoke with a cough. He lit his rollie and clapped his hands. ‘All those hours we spent makin gidgees paid off, eh? That looks a nice snug thread. Pass it here.’
Ryan looked down the unified barrel, examining the hammer position, appeared satisfied that it’d strike the percussion cap of a .303. ‘Nice work, old boy. You got yourself a pistola. Now, to test it.’
Pascoe was one step ahead. He’d already found an old steel garbage bin. It was home to three red-back spiders, whose silky egg pods were too numerous to count. Pascoe got the hose on them and blasted them out into the pile of grey dirt that was mounded by the back fence. ‘Get me a couple blankets?’ he asked. ‘Let’s make us a silencer.’
‘You mean a suppressor?’
‘You know what I mean, smart-arse.’
Pascoe began to smash out the bottom of the bin with the remainder of the iron pole. It was heavy and he felt his chest gurgle and his heartbeat begin to slip before Ryan took his arm. ‘Stupid old bugger. You ain’t dyin here. Not till we’ve had a farewell session.’
Pascoe watched Ryan’s shoulders rise and fall with the weight of the rod. He was a proud old rooster and hadn’t let himself go.
‘There. Done.’ Ryan turned and twisted the bin into the sand pile. He took an old grey army blanket and folded it until it was the circumference of the bin, before packing it around the inside. He did the same with a moth-eaten red blanket. The same with another army blanket.
Pascoe leaned over and peered inside. Just enough room for the flare-gun barrel.
‘Here goes nothin.’
Pascoe put in a .303 cartridge, pointed it at the ground. It was heavy with the new iron barrel but the shell didn’t fall out, and therefore didn’t need packing.
‘Kinda like a reverse musket,’ Ryan added. ‘You’re gonna have to use a rod to get the casings out, each time.’
‘Yep.’
Pascoe had a good listen to the neighbourhood. His hearing was ok, and there were no conversations in the houses on either side. He put the flare gun into the bin and looked to Ryan, who was waiting with a rusty old fire-extinguisher, probably been in the family for fifty years.
Pascoe held the flare gun with both hands and pressed the trigger. The flash and bang was loud but it was the recoil that took him by surprise, throwing his hands over his head and toppling him backward onto the sand.
Ryan put down the fire extinguisher, but only so he could laugh better. Pascoe’s ears were ringing. Ryan put his hands on his belly and slapped his thighs, hopping about on the spot and laughing his arse off. Gradually, Pascoe’s hearing returned.
‘Ah, you silly old bugger. Funniest thing I seen in ages.’
Ryan helped him up.
‘Least it didn’t blow up in my hand. Not like that mortar you made, remember? Nearly took out a wall at school. You looked like Wile E. Coyote with yer smokin hair, yer singed eyebrows.’
Ryan slapped Pascoe on the back. ‘Yeah, that was too funny.’
Pascoe gathered himself and went to the oxygen bottle. He put the mask over his face and took a long draw, the flare gun on the table beside him.
It was only then that he looked at the neighbour’s fence, saw the young bearded longhair watching him.
Pascoe held the man’s stare until Ryan noticed and quit sweeping the lathe. ‘Tone, meet Sat Prakash. Satty, meet an old mate of mine –’
‘… Tony Smith,’ Pascoe finished.
‘Oh yeah,’ Ryan said. ‘Tony Smith.’
The bearded man nodded, looked to the smoking bin that had acted as a silencer. ‘Sorry, Des, thought I heard a gunshot. Sounded like a forty-four Magnum, my old gun.’
Des Ryan leaned on the broom. ‘Satty’s a Sannyasin. Follower of the Bhagwan. Mob of them live next door. Feed me sometimes when I’m broke.’
Pascoe didn’t know much about the Rajneeshees beyond what he’d read in the morning paper, which characterised them as a dangerous sex cult. He didn’t believe any of that – it was the kind of thing that the paper regularly served up to its largely old and conservative readers. Pascoe had been the target of misinformation in the same paper, back when he was free.
‘You knocked off for today?’ Ryan asked the bearded man, clearly knowing the answer. ‘Tone, Satty’s a bricklayer. His crew have renovated half the homes on this street, half the neighbourhood.’
The bearded man looked at Pascoe strangely, then past him to the shape of the adapted flare gun, hidden beneath a hessian sack. ‘I know who you are,’ he said. ‘You were on the front page of the morning paper. Just wanted to get that out the way. You’ve got nothing to worry about. Des trusts us, I hope you will too. Both of you, come over for dinner in a minute, if you’re keen. I’ll put the paper in the chook cage, where it belongs.’
Pascoe was about to speak but Des cut him off. ‘Sure, mate. That’d be good. I could eat the arse out of a horse.’