Choices. Jeff Edwards

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СКАЧАТЬ needed to replace around here. Now it has all come out and I’m out of a job. I’ve completely stuffed our lives.’

      There was silence around the table as my friends considered my confession.

      ‘And what have you been up to since you left?’ asked Sandy.

      ‘I don’t know what came over me, but I panicked when I was in the dock. I tried to deflect their questioning by saying that I couldn’t answer because of the Official Secrets Act, and intimated that what I had been doing came under the heading of national security.’

      ‘Which is where the story of spying for ASIO came from?’

      ‘Yeah. They added two and two and came up with six, and I let them.’

      ‘You still haven’t said where you’ve been.’

      ‘I thought that if they dug further and found out that I was spinning them a yarn it would be worse than if I had told them everything they wanted to know, so I tried to make it look like I really was working as a spy.’

      ‘What did you do?’ asked Sandy.

      I took another drink of beer, and told them all that had happened to me from the time I left until the time I arrived back home.

      The three of them sat in wrapt silence until the very end, not daring to interrupt my story. Even after I had finished they remained quiet, digesting all the information I had told them.

      Finally, Rick downed a large mouthful of beer and exchanged a very strange look with Sam. He said quietly, ‘Danny boy, I don’t know if you’re the dumbest person I have ever met, or a bloody genius, but I think the first option is probably the one I’d go for.’

      ‘You’re probably right,’ I nodded, ‘but I was desperate.’

      ‘You must have been to try something like that,’ commented Sam.

      ‘I convinced myself that the more bulldust I spread around out there, the more likely it would be that they would start to believe some of it.’

      ‘What will happen now?’ asked Sandy.

      The answer to that question was suddenly placed on hold, as the back door crashed open to whoops of joy from my children, Brook and Josh, as they arrived home from school to find that not only had their father returned, but that their two most favourite people in the world were also present.

      Throwing their schoolbags into their rooms with complete disregard for their contents, my son and daughter then dragged their uncles outside to show them all that had been done since their last visit some months before, and it was not until Sandy called them all in for supper that some semblance of calm finally descended on our home.

      * * *

      Later that evening when Brook and Josh had finally been exiled to their rooms and told to go to sleep, we were at last able to return to our discussions.

      ‘The mortgage and the other bills still have to be paid, so I’m going to have to go out there and try to find someone who will be prepared to hire me.’

      ‘Can you hold off for a few weeks?’ asked Rick. ‘Our next trip to Bali is coming up.’

      ‘I was hoping to cash in my ticket. I can’t afford to waste that sort of money right now.’

      ‘The trip has already been paid for. I doubt that you’ll be able to get back anywhere near what you paid. Besides, you need to have a break after what you’ve been through.’

      ‘But I can’t afford it.’

      ‘You can’t afford to waste a last opportunity,’ said Sam.

      Sandy nodded. ‘I agree with the boys. I think you should go. It will give you a chance to get your head together so that you can face whatever’s coming.’

      ‘What if they won’t let me leave the country?’

      Rick shrugged. ‘That will be a sure sign that you’re in the shit.

      It might be the only indication that you get to warn you that the axe is about to fall. I say that you give it a try, but don’t worry, Sammy and I will still have a good time over there even if they drag you off the plane.’

      ‘Thanks heaps!’

      ‘Not to worry mate, we’ll bring you back a nice postcard or something,’ he grinned.

      ‘So I’m expected to sit around here until the time comes for our flight with the press hanging around outside, am I?’

      ‘Nah,’ waved Sam. ‘We’ll stick you into the back of the van and drive straight past the bastards out there. You can come up to the cove and earn some beer money doing some labouring for us. We won’t let you miss out when it’s your turn to buy a round of drinks, will we Rick?’

      ‘You can count on it Sammy.’

      I looked over at Sandy and she nodded. ‘I’ll stay here with the kids until the school holidays, and then we’ll head up to mum and dad’s. We’ll meet you at the airport when you get back which will be in time for the next school term, and you can start looking for a new job.’

      Having my immediate future decided by my wife and friends was somehow very comforting to me. My own efforts at decision-making over the past few days had ended disastrously, so I was more than willing to pass the responsibility on to others. Now I would not be the one held to blame if something went wrong.

      CHAPTER 7

      ‘You Aussies sure have a strange way of treating your agents,’ drawled Radford Spink. ‘We wouldn’t have stood aside while a local corruption investigation hung one of our people out to dry.’

      Spink was Graeme Connors counterpart at the CIA, and both men were engaging in their usual exchange of information. Low-level meetings of this kind between the less senior officials of both countries were encouraged and in the past had proven vital to the overall security interests of both countries. Often the seemingly minor snippets of information that crossed from one organisation to another proved vital in creating better overall understanding of risks faced by both parties.

      ‘If you’re referring to that idiot Daniel Travers, then I can assure you that he is not one of ours, and if anything happens to him as a result of his stupidity, he will have deserved it.’

      Spink looked bemused. ‘Not one of yours you say?’

      ‘Most definitely not. Why do you ask? What’s he to you?’

      ‘To us, nothing. But I thought your people would have placed a higher value on his services.’

      ‘Services?’

      ‘You aren’t using him?’

      ‘Why would we place a mole inside one of our own police departments? What is he supposed to have done there? Searched for information which we somehow requested, then pass that information on to a second party who is then supposed to have passed it on to us? What a load of rot! We have direct access to all police computers in all states. СКАЧАТЬ