‘I’m going to have to tell you to paddle south of the flags,’ Stoyle said with the automaton emotions and bristling self-importance of a highway policeman. ‘I have the authority to confiscate your board and fine you two hundred dollars.’

‘Mind if I ask why?’ Gordon said.

‘It’s illegal for a fibreglass surfboard rider to be within the flagged area.’

‘Why?’

‘Beach regulations.’

‘I mean why are you out here? There’s not a single person on the beach. They’d have to be mad, day like this.’

‘You were asked to paddle out of the flagged area.’

‘I’m not in the flagged area.’ Gordon nodded towards the beach.

‘You’re in the buffer zone.’

‘Buffer zone from what?’

‘Flagged area.’

‘Where there are no swimmers. You can’t fine me for being in the buffer zone.’

‘If you’re in the buffer zone, I can move you on.’

‘So I have to move out of the buffer zone to stay clear of where there are no swimmers.’

Stoyle paddled closer. For a moment Gordon thought he was going to square up. Anyone with any experience knew that you could not effectively attack another surfer while on water. The fighting got done later, in the car park.

Gordon back-paddled to keep out of arm’s reach. Stoyle spun his board and sat up.

‘You’ve drifted between the flags,’ Stoyle said.

‘You’ve drifted out of your mind.’

Suddenly, Stoyle clutched his stomach as if he had been gut shot.

‘Fuck!’

‘Should have worn a wettie,’ Gordon said, paddling away to the south, where Sam and Ned had drifted on the rip. He could hear Stoyle cursing as he tried to unwrap the bluebottle strands from his torso.

‘I’m off,’ Sam said. ‘You getting changed at your place, Gordo, or coming straight up to mine?’

‘Be right with you,’ Gordon said. He paddled for a wave that stood up on the inside and gave him a surprising trim into the beach. He undid his leg rope and was tying it around his board, watching Japan Ned try to get going on a limp grey peak, while Sam bellied in.

They went up the rain-firmed beach with the confident tread of people who walk on top of sand. ‘Sand people’ was one of those quirky micro-insights of Ben’s into a truth which habit had ironed from Gordon’s perception. As he walked, a little swell of love for his boy hiccupped Gordon’s breath. They passed the Bluebird Surf Life Saving Club, painted the same yellow as The Lodge’s basement, its national pennant riding its flagpole like an erect middle finger, returning the gesture. Two blue-shirted council lifeguards peered down from the watchtower, shared a word, laughed. Gordon and Sam climbed over the crest of the sand path and descended the decking slats on the landward side of the dune.