Dastardly Doings - Part 1

SPECIAL NOTE.

It may be felt that recent tales on this blog have become a little bit far-fetched. I know that most of the things that have been described are commonplace in the greater world, but not in Bogan and certainly not in Jimboomba. So we are going to return to basics. No more Gods and Demons, no more time travelling and no more magic. We are going to concentrate on reality and the mundane day-to-day lives of country folk who have no business in the foggy world of metaphysical bollocks. It will be a simple country diary if you like, recording the doings of simple country people committing simple country murders and simple country mayhem which may then be solved by a simple country private detective agency like “Barjy-Bean Investigations” of Jimboomba.

DASTARDLY DOINGS –PART 1.

(For many years Sean Bean has been ignorant of the poisonous underbelly of Jimboomba but he becomes bored with his part time councillor job and begins to look around for a pastime more worthy of his talents. This leads Sean to Jimboomba - the tawdry unsolved-crime centre of Bogan – and a new part time career as a pugnacious private detective. However, Sean knows he cannot succeed on his own.

Sean Bean is not what may be described as cerebral; herbal perhaps, in that he is green and inclined to give some people the shits, but definitely not cerebral. He is dimly aware of this and, to improve his chances in life, Sean often tries to link up with a partner who can read without moving the lips.

In this latest escapade Sean has become friendly with Arjy Barjy a fellow Bogan councillor who is also bored and looking for ways to further her ambition to rule whatever it is needs ruling and can get the best media coverage. It is Arjy who has discovered Jimboomba’s infamous reputation as a place where strange things have a habit of happening.

Yet the local police seem disinclined to do anything about the lawless situation in Jimboomba. Their total contribution to law enforcement, apart from traffic warden duties, is to compel the Jimboomba Times’ editor to publish Senior Sergeant Slideback’s timely reminder to parents that they should be aware of where their children are at all times. In short, Jimboomba’s residents live in a constant state of fear.

They live in fear of unbridled littering, vandalised mailboxes, illegal tree felling, hoons and regular forays by the local serial killer – the Jimboomba Ripper. The whole community has gone to the dogs that also roam unchecked and savage a succession of pet lambs that are almost always named Florence. It is to this community of the poor and downtrodden that Sean Bean and Arjy Barjy have come in order to start their new careers as private detectives and Barjy-Bean Investigations gets off to a flying start. But we are getting ahead of ourselves.

When the pair moved into Jimboomba the first problem was finding somewhere to live. They had decided to save money by moving in together, not, it must be hastily added, that there was anything improper between them. Sean had enough difficulty with his shoe laces let alone the complications of carnal knowledge and when asked about her relationship with Bean, Arjy famously replied that she would rather romance a cane toad’s arse.

The accommodation problem was solved when an opportunity arose to rent the twin clock towers at Jimboomba shopping centre. Standing each side of the Woodies supermarket the clock towers were ideal. Arjy and Bean each had their own unit but a common rental agreement. Their living space was a little cramped and access via rope ladder was awkward but it was central and had stunning views through the lubrication holes in the clock faces. One of the reasons the rent was so cheap was that it was the tenants responsibility to keep the clocks synchronised. This proved to be difficult when it became obvious that there were periods when the clocks seemed to be not so much in different time zones but in completely different worlds. However this may have been because of certain recent traumatic incidents already described in previous postings and therefore we will waste no further time on it.

Arjy Barjy was the most inconvenienced by the tiny living space because of her prodigious height. She was six feet 10 inches tall in old money and most of that was legs. Sitting down with her knees drawn up beside her ears she resembled a grasshopper looking over its shoulder but heaven help anyone who said so. She had once been quite a normal size but on a budget holiday in Moscow she suffered an accident for which she was not insured. Unable to afford the cost of treatment Arjy was obliged to undergo experimental surgery in payment for saving her life. The Russian surgical team were desperate to perfect height-increasing techniques because of intense pressure from a particularly nasty and demanding client who was making their lives hell. They tried out each method on Arjy before settling on a procedure that increased the nasty client’s height by a paltry few centimetres but by then Arjy had legs that could receive radio signals from Pluto.

Despite the drawbacks, Arjy settled reasonably well into her new home and began work on looking for a crime to be solved and some extra income to supplement the miserable pay of a Bogan councillor. It didn’t take her long to come up with the goods. She had been seriously reappraising her relationship with Sean. Her best efforts to train him had not been altogether successful and he was still the most stupid man she had ever met. Indeed, by comparison, he even made Andy McDuck look like a genius. Last night she had told Sean he was about as sentient as a bar of soap and he had looked puzzled but quite pleased. This was just after he had returned with the weeks shopping for both of them and had bought exactly the same items that Arjy had purchased a few hours before. Somehow he had convinced himself that Arjy’s Woodies receipt he had found on the table was a shopping list and had promptly duplicated the purchases at Cols. Arjy almost gave up.

Later she was hunched over her tiny desk trying to reconcile their joint expenses when something about the Cols and Woodies receipts caught her eye. The prices were identical. She checked it again and then reached for the phone. Well, it wasn’t a phone exactly, it was a baked bean tin with a length of string threaded through the base and knotted. The rest of the string passed through a tiny hole in the clock tower wall and stretched across the open space to a similar arrangement in the second tower. Arjy pulled the string taught and twanged it.

As luck would have it Sean was about to call Arjy when she pulled the string. Sean was yanked forcefully toward the wall that stopped his head abruptly and he collapsed, stunned and bleeding, onto the floor among his scattered comics. It was a few minutes before Arjy could get any sense out of him.)

Arjy: Sean, you bloody prat, answer me!

Sean: Yes Arjy, wod gan I do for you?

Arjy: What’s wrong with you? You sound pissed!

Sean: By dose id bleedink.

Arjy: Well shape up and listen. It’s about the receipt you brought back from Cols.

Sean: I said I wad sorry aboud dat.

Arjy: Shut up, I said listen. The prices on the receipts from Cols and Woodies are identical – down to the last cent. There’s only two ways that can happen. Coincidence, which I don’t believe in, and collusion. It’s my belief that Cols and Woodies are price fixing and that’s illegal. If we can prove it we’ll have them over a barrel and we can bleed the bastards dry.

Sean: Why would dey do dat? Idn’t it bedder if dey compete for more cusdomers?

Arjy: Oh, to a point, yes. But the only way to make real money is to keep the prices high not cut them. So they settle on a market share and then synchronise prices. They’ll disguise it a bit with special offers but basically the pricing structure is the same. Then they start to carefully hike the prices. They coordinate shortage stories and all the thousands of reasons why a price should rise and then dollar-by-dollar they begin to steal. The less well off will be forced to the stage of malnutrition as they try to economise but at the end of the day we all have to buy food so as long as they stick together, Cols and Woodies can loot the entire community and nobody will stop them. Even the Australian government were forced to back down and drop their price watch website. This is the biggest blackmail operation in Australian history and we’re all victims. Cols and Woodies are telling us to pay up or starve to death.

Sean: How can we prove dat?

Arjy: The only way for Cols and Woodies to accurately work this is to link their computer pricing systems. I know a friend of a friend who’s a bit of a hacker. I’ve used him before to trash blogs that criticize me. I’m going to get him to access the Cols system tomorrow and change the price of Alaskan yams to 30 cents a kilo. No supermarket would knowingly agree to set a price that low and the only way it can happen at both supermarkets is if their systems are linked. So at 9-30 am tomorrow I want you to go into Woodies and buy some groceries including a couple of kilos of Alaskan yams. Don’t do anything to draw attention to yourself, just get in, buy the stuff and leave quietly. Got that?

Sean: God id! Bud wod if dey are hacking us? Wod if they’ve dapped dis phone?

Arjy: For fucks sake, Sean – how are they going to tap into a piece of string? That’s why we have this system between us. It’s probably the only secure communication line on the planet. Just make sure you’re at Woodies tomorrow at 9-30 am to get those yams.

BACK IN THE PRESENT.

(It is 9-30 am and Sean is on his way in to Woodies supermarket. He is held up at the door by an almost continuous stream of shoplifters running out but eventually he is inside. Arjy has told him to conduct his business quietly and get out without any fuss so he strolls around the shelves picking things up at random and slowly filling his basket. He carefully selects a bag of yams then makes his way to the checkout. A kid gets in his way for a moment but the little brute bounces off him and continues on its shrieking way. Sean plays it very cool and resists the urge to do what he usually does and trip the noisy little bastard. It is only when he reaches the checkout that he realises the fucking kid has lifted his wallet.

Sean is in a quandary. Arjy has told him not to cause a fuss. He must pay for the yams to get a receipt but without his wallet he has no means of doing that. Arjy further warned him that the purchase must be as soon after 9-30 as possible before the price change is noticed. It is now or never. In front of him an incredibly fat woman is getting served. She has a snot nosed three-year-old kid sitting in the trolley and the woman’s handbag is crammed in beside the grubby child. The woman is one of those beasts who have tattoos all over them. Her hipster trousers are probably struggling to conceal several pictures on the woman’s huge arse but Sean desperately tries not to think about that. His hand slithers into her handbag and unclasps her purse while the woman loads the checkout belt. He snatches at what feels like a bank note and is relieved to see a fifty-dollar note when he withdraws his hand. He is not relieved by the sight of the snotty kid glaring at him suspiciously.

Fortunately the woman pays with a credit card and doesn’t notice the missing 50-dollar note. Her daughter is trying to attract her attention but is told to shut her whinging little trap. Sean drops his basket on the checkout belt and smiles at the checkout chick who glares at him venomously and when Sean looks at the stuff he has casually dropped into his basket he can see why. Apart from the yams he has a huge pot of Vaseline and 4 packets of coloured condoms. He has also chosen a pack of tampons and a small tube of Anusol haemorrhoid ointment. The girl begins to sneer.)

Checkout Chick: Big night tonight Sailor?

Sean: Uh … this is for a friend of mine.

Checkout Chick: I’m sure it is. I bet he’s looking forward to seeing you.

Sean: No, you don’t understand. None of this is really for me. I just …..

Checkout Chick: Oh well, what’s your friend’s name, George Michael? That will be $52.70.

Sean: Oh no! Um … I’ll have to return something; I’ve only got a fifty note.

Checkout Chick: Aahh! What do you want taken off?

Sean: The …uh … tampons I think.

Checkout Chick: Good choice. You can always use a gerbil eh?

Sean: Look! Will you just bag it and shut the fuck up!

Checkout Chick: Oooh! A bit butch today are we? Haveaniceday.

(So much for not attracting attention. Sean steps away, his face bright crimson and his temper barely contained. As he walks toward the exit another mob of shoplifters make a break for the door and send him crashing into the display of pot plants and cut flowers. When he eventually gets outside he is soaked and draped with carnations. He walks slap bang into the illustrated woman who has at last listened to her daughter and this time she has her son with her for additional support.)

Illustrated Woman: ‘Ere you. My Kirsty Kristabelle Jane says you were rootin’ around in me ‘andbag. What did you take, you thievin’ bastard?

Sean: Don’t start on me lady and your bleeding kid is obviously a few bottles short of a good piss up. Now get out of my way! Hang on a minute; does this boy belong to you? He’s the shit who pinched my fucking wallet!

(Sean grabs the woman’s son and frisks him, ignoring his screaming mother. The boy has several wallets and purses stuffed into the lining of his jacket. Sean selects his own wallet and throws the other booty on the ground.)

Illustrated Woman: You leave that stuff alone! That belongs to my Mathew Thomo, that does! Don’t you dare open that wallet!

Sean: Oh yes, and I suppose this picture of me on the driving licence is a photo of you before you put on the extra 400 kilos is it?

(The woman lashes a huge fat arm at Sean who is dumped on his arse. His shopping scatters and the precious receipt is whipped away by a gusty breeze. During the ensuing struggle with the woman she steps on the tube of Anusol. Sean kicks the woman smartly in the guts and sets off after the receipt but he is soon speed skating across the supermarket forecourt on a huge glob of Anusol. After crashing through the window of the Travel Agency, Sean picks himself up, breathlessly apologises to the Travel Agency staff and sprints outside again to continue his pursuit of the receipt which dances before him like a butterfly.

Around the corner and past the hairdressers, Sean continues to chase and leap for the receipt. Suddenly another gust takes the scrap high and out of sight over the roof. Sean panics and streaks to the rear car park where he can see nothing of the receipt. But there in the shadows an industrial waste bin squats with its lid part open. As Sean looks at the bin a leaf comes dancing by and is almost blown into the opening. He dashes across and wrenches the lid fully open.

Inside, the wreck of a body lies distorted on a bed of garbage. It is obviously the corpse of a man and a murdered one at that. But it is so battered and mutilated it is hard to tell much more. As Sean takes in the sight his eyes widen. There, sticking to the exposed brain matter forced through the shattered skull is a scrap of white paper. Sean reaches in and plucks the paper up. It is a Woodies receipt and on it he can clearly see yams priced at 30 cents per kilo.

Sean lets the lid slam shut and he carefully tucks the receipt into his wallet. Clutching the wallet as if his life depends on it, Sean runs back around the building and heads for the safety of the clock tower he calls home. It is their first important clue in their first important case and he can’t wait to tell Arjy all about it.)

TO BE CONTINUED.














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