The Aussie bikers had gone out in their cars, vans and trucks. They left the clubhouse using a secret exit into the backyard of a Chinese man who pretended they weren’t there, passing through his side gate while his family sat at dinner. The door that exited the clubhouse was furthest away from the front gate. It was a crawl-through hidden behind empty forty-four-gallon drums, emerging into the Chinaman’s back shed.
Barry Brown and another biker named Ted nudged Devon toward the Chinaman’s front gate. More bikers followed behind them. Barry looked left and right, then crossed to his Monaro, now parked under a tree across the road. Devon was dumped into the back seat while Barry got under the wheel and two others piled in. Barry started her up and headed down the quiet street, headlights off until they hit a main road. Devon could see the reflection of the distant police cherry tops on the high walls of an apartment building. Ted, the younger biker, who wore coveralls and tennis shoes, took a CB radio handpiece from the glove box and tested it, but didn’t speak. The departure of the gang members from the clubhouse had been done with the efficiency of a military operation. Nobody had spoken and everybody knew what to do.
It was only now that Ted broke the radio silence. ‘See you turning onto Whatley. You got visuals on Dave, Mick?’
‘Roger that,’ came the reply.
‘Proceed separately to the place. Over.’
‘Roger that,’ was repeated seven times.
It was only now that Devon felt it was safe to speak. ‘I don’t know why you got me. I didn’t have nothing to do with that, back there.’
Barry Brown was silent for a long while. ‘We’ll talk when we get there. In the meantime, don’t speak shit. The only reason those Nazi morons would shoot us up, is because they know that we have you. You mean something to them. Which means that you knew something about them stealin our money, our guns. You’ll get your chance to talk soon enough. You saw that I packed my drill?’
Devon hadn’t seen and the thought made him tremble. He could smell the piss on his uniform trousers. For some reason, when the bullets began firing he’d assumed that the attack would clear him of involvement, that he’d be let go. Now he saw that the opposite was true.
‘I swear, Mr Brown. I only met them once. I didn’t tell them anything except –’
‘… except about our deal. Now shut the fuck up. I don’t know if anybody’s told you this before, but your Kermit-the-Frog Yank voice is hard to take. Only reason you’re still alive is because you got some worth to those boneheads. But you open your mouth once more, I’m gonna put my fist down it, hear me?’
Devon nodded, sat deeper into the leather seat, tried to control his shaking hands.