One Boy Missing(32)

The boy looked at him.

‘It means you’re able to do your business every day. That’s important, your business.’ He gently poked the boy in the ribs. Once he’d filled the bowls he fetched the milk from the fridge and smelled it. ‘Wait a minute. Tummy bug, milk, not a good combination? What do you think?’

The boy shrugged.

‘Risk it?’ Moy placed both bowls on the table. The boy finished drying, hung the towel over the back of a chair and sat down. He waited for Moy—then they started eating.

‘I know this place isn’t much, but it does the job,’ Moy said. ‘It’s a copper’s house…a government house.’

He noticed how the boy filled his spoon, drained the milk from the bran then ate.

‘We, I mean my dad and I, moved to Guilderton when I was twelve. We used to live on a farm.’ He studied the boy’s small fingers and guessed he wasn’t a farmer’s son. ‘I used to nurse the lambs. If the mum had twins she’d only look after one. The strongest one mostly…and she’d leave the other one.’

The bran tasted stale. He hadn’t eaten cereal for years. Breakfast was generally a coffee and danish from the Hot Bread Café.

‘I had a vegetable patch, and we used to get tomatoes, hundreds of them.’ He looked at the boy’s wide eyes. ‘I bet you’ve grown veggies? Probably not tomatoes…you look like a zucchini man. No? What about carrots, or peas, there were a few of those in your business.’ And smiling. ‘No…the other business.’

The boy grinned.

‘That’s it,’ Moy said. ‘Things aren’t that bad, eh?’

The boy’s head dropped. He let his spoon fall into his bowl.

Right, Moy thought. Guess they are.

‘Anyway, I was very sad when we had to leave the farm. It was a good life.’

Silence.

‘And Dad had to sell off the sheep, and that year’s lambs.’

He touched the boy’s arm. ‘I bet it’s Wolfgang. Wolfgang, isn’t it?’

Eyes, peering.

‘Barry…Gavin, Kenny, Trevor. They were the names in my day. Now everyone’s Keanu. Christ, I hope you’re not a Keanu, are you?’

The boy shook his head again.

‘Thank God. Anyway, then we arrived in Guilderton. And I had to go to the primary school. You know what they did to me on my first day?’

‘No,’ the boy replied.

‘No?’ Moy forced his face to remain neutral. ‘Well, a whole gang of them chased me into the toilet, and I locked myself in a cubicle. Then they started spitting over the top, going outside and getting rotten fruit to throw in at me, wetting big wads of toilet paper and throwing them in…disgusting, eh?’

The boy screwed up his face.

‘Horrible kids, weren’t they?’

He nodded.

‘Then one of them climbs up on the divider between the toilets and says, how you going, Moy? Sarcastic, like that. How you going? You know, kids back then weren’t so clever. But I mean, first day, trapped in the dunny, what would you have done?’

A smile.

‘Well, I tell you what I did. I picked up the toilet brush, shoved it down the dunny and started flicking you know, business water. Right in his face.’

The boy giggled, and this time Moy could tell his voice was clear and high-pitched.

‘Get stuffed, Moy, he says, like that. Get stuffed. But there’s me, flicking more and more water at him.’

The boy was laughing, doubled over, wiping his eyes on his new T-shirt.

‘What do you think about that, Wolfgang?’

The boy had stopped laughing, but he smiled.

‘It’s good to see you laughing. You don’t know how good that makes me feel, Professor Vomit. You’re a big fan of toilet humour, obviously. That’s good. So am I. We can spend long hours farting. You enjoy a good fart, I take it?’

The boy shook his head.

‘Rubbish, I bet you do. I bet you could fart for hours.’

But the moment had gone.

‘The thing is,’ he began, slowly, ‘you might want to stay with Deidre, but if you’d prefer, you could stay with me for now?’

The boy’s head tilted. He took a moment and then nodded.

‘Fine, well that’s easy. So, my name’s Bart, what’s yours?’ He extended his hand.

The boy wouldn’t be drawn.

‘Ah, I’m pretty clever, Wolfgang. I’ll get you yet. I am a detective, you know. I find out things for a living.’

He took the boy’s hand and shook it anyway.

‘I’ll check with Deidre, see if it’s okay, eh?’

Their eyes remained locked.

‘Just for a while, mind you, until we find Mum and Dad.’