CHAPTER 84
Bobby was down at our place two hours before the start time we had suggested, ostensibly to check on the barbie but very clearly as an opportunity to answer a very simple question from Maz as he slumped on our sofa, Ish out in the pool.

“What on Earth was all that about?”

“Snirgeing, Maz”

He caught my raised eyebrows, and shook his head sharply.

“No, Mike, not THAT use of the word. This one means sliding into an operation and taking credit for someone else’s work. I’ll try and put it simply: you came up with your business system. We in WA picked it up and set it running state-wide. You expanded eastward, into Vic and New South Wales. The latter, like I told you, tried to claim it as their scheme. Andy is a Brit gone native, big style, in Sydney, so while he works for the FCO he’s still shilling for NSW, which is who his hubby works for. With me so far?”

She was leaning back now, an odd smile trying to come out to play.

“Go on…”

“Okay. Our people up here, Aussie people rather than state level, they see this as a win for us. Andy’s bloke is pushing it for NSW. You push it to your own big boss, the Brit FCO is already bloody aware, devious sods that they are, so they are trying to out-snirge everyone else. In the end, our own embassy staff ask for someone who knows the system to step in, and that is how I end up on a jolly all the way up here”

He paused, with his usual grin in place.

“There’s the Vietnamese inside knowledge as well, of course. We’re doing a bit of a circle jerk---sorry! We’re sorting out a mutually beneficial agreement where both governments share the credit, you get the profits from the work, and both the UK and us get a foot in a very lucrative door. As long as we can keep NSW from being their usual cheating selves, of course”

“And Andy?”

“Ah, his heart’s not in it. We just need to keep a seamless face, public one, for the local lot. They’re a bit clever at this sort of thing. You with me?”

We both nodded, and then Maz asked the other obvious question.

“That word. You said it had two meanings?”

Bobby laughed out loud.

“You got somewhere I can leave my stuff? Got my swimmers on underneath, and I fancy joining your boy. Mike can explain”

We pointed him to the spare bedroom for his clothing, and as soon as he was out of the door, Maz turned to me with a hint of a glare.

“That word. It’s a rude one, isn’t it?”

“Er, yeah. It’s about cycling. Ladies cycling. Cycling ladies”

“And?”

“Well, it’s when they get off the bike, and some men… Saddles. Sniffing”

“Urgh!”

“Sorry, love, but you did ask”

“I wish I hadn’t, now! What is it with bloody men?”

“I can’t help you with that, love. Changing the subject, quite deliberately: shall we make sure everything’s ready? We’re sure to have forgotten something”

“I think the boy’s probably marinaded enough. Hang on—front door?”

I left her to check offspring hydration and headed for the door, to find a slightly nervous-looking Andy Chisholm. I suspected his nerves were down to an early arrival for exactly the same reasons as Bobby, but outdone. I decided to prod, just slightly.

“Hiya! Bobby’s already here and already in our little pool. What’s in the bags?”

“Um, some beef and lamb, and a couple of big bottles of LLB. Oh, and some wine in the rucksack”

“Come on through, and get sorted. Swimmers?”

“In with the wine”

“Um… I may have overstepped a little, but I have a couple of friends in tow. If you’re okay with that, I’ll call them. If not, they’ve got alternatives they can go to”

“They our people, yours, or locals?”

He gave me quite a searching look.

“Aren’t you supposed to be ‘our people’, as in UK?”

“I’m your people, sort of, as our company is owned in the UK, but Maz and me are both Aussies, as is our boy. Bit confusing, I know. The other two?”

“Ah. Right. One of the local matrix people, and someone from our High Commission. A mate of mine. He’s…”

I didn’t know how ‘he’ was, but Andy was nervous. I backed off a little, but only the slightest of steps.

“Can I guess that it might be seen as awkward?”

He was nodding vigorously now.

“I wanted to bring Gary, get him in the loop with you. He strings for Alex, back in London?”

“Right. And this other person?”

“Audrey. She works for Mrs Chao”

“I see. Plenty of room for another two, then. Want to give them a shout? I’ll show you somewhere to change”

Things were getting bloody Byzantine. So much for a casual Friday of beer, burnt crispy bits and soaking wet offspring. I made sure that Bobby and Maz were properly in the loop, the former laughing out a ‘Sneaky, sneaky bastard!’ before putting on his friendly face for Andy. The bottled LLB wasn’t as nice as the real thing, but it still hit the spot, especially with Ish, and the only awkward spot was that I remained the only person fully-clothed.

As I explained, “Someone has to answer the door when the others arrive, and I am not doing it in a pair of budgie-smugglers!”

Andy had relaxed enough to laughingly suggest that certain men he knew would pay for such a sight, Maz replied that she didn’t have to, nyah, and Ish quite reasonably observed “Dad’s going to get in the pool anyway, and he wears board shorts, not Speedos”

Audrey and Gary duly arrived, both looking to be in their forties or early fifties, and once they were in their costumes, I simply removed my T-shirt, as I was already wearing my swim shorts. My boy, as ever, was accurate and on the ball. The barbie was heating, the first beers were picking up dew from the surrounding air, odd birds were shouting in the surrounding trees, and Ish was asking if the crinkles in his water-soaked fingertips meant he was now rugose.

As for myself, I was watching the dynamics. Bobby and Andy, for example, were delivering and receiving all sorts of snipes from each other but the impression I got was one of teasing friends rather than politics. It was the other two who caught my attention, and that was because they were maintaining a serious distance from each other. I shouldn’t have been surprised when Maz cornered me in the kitchen as we prepared the first soon-to-be-burnt offerings, for Maz always had an eye for everyone but herself.

“What do you think, love?”

I looked over towards the pool, making sure we were unheard.

“Something up between them?”

Maz had to wipe her face when she had stopped laughing.

“That, husband of mine, used to be my job!”

“Sorry?”

“Inappropriate entendre thingies. I’ll explain before they catch us plotting: if something hasn’t already been, er, up between them already, they are both hoping for it. Either of them married?”

“No idea. No rings on either of them, but no tan lines for one, either”

“Then we leave them to it. Anyway, they might relax later. In vino veritas, or at least gossip”

Whatever the story, they remained suitably spaced apart even as the wine and beer was consumed, although Gary remained entirely on soft drinks. Now and again, though, Maz or I would spot a little touch, or a glance that lasted a second longer than usual.

We left them to it, but as I was putting Ish to bed after the evening’s damper parts were over, the couple decided to head for Gary’s car just as I was closing the boy’s curtains, and I caught sight of their hands joining as they passed a streetlight. Politics? Some cultural thing about different ‘races’? It was another reminder of how little I knew about local customs, and of how lucky I was to have my wife.

Then again, having my wife was a wonder for so many other reasons, one of which was trying to smuggle his e-reader under the sheets before I could secure it for the night.

“But, Dad! They’ve just got some fossils under the ice!”

It had to be ‘Mountains of Madness’. I did a quick calculation of how long it would take him to get from ‘odd fossils’ to a tent full of butchered men and dogs, which I did not want him reading at night.

“Okay. Twenty minutes more, then I shall put it away”

“Thanks, Dad! Love you!”

I set my phone alarm when I got downstairs, just to be sure, and topped up my wine, bringing the bottle into the living room for wife and remaining guests.

“Right, final choices, boys. Bobby’s in the spare room, Andy, and there’s the sofa here if you fancy. It’s a Friday night, remember, so taxis might be a bit like hens’ teeth later on”

“Right. I’m at Chip Bee, so not that far away, but… Okay. Any of that rosé left”

We stayed off the politics, we steered clear of the Audrey-Gary question, and it turned into a long and funny evening.

I still remembered to collect that e-reader, though. Ish could read the rest of that book in the daylight.