‘Just be aware. He borrowed five million for his mining exploration, seismic surveys, drilling and so on. Crooks are wanting to take his leases.’

‘Claim jumpers?’

‘You’ll see when you’re down there. Anyway, he told me last night that the banks are asking for their five million. He said he was shitting himself over a meeting he has soon with his two main creditors.’ Wombat chortled ruefully. ‘He says he has been praying overtime for a solution.’

‘What did his god say this time?’

‘Tell jokes.’

‘What?’

‘God told him to tell jokes when he meets his bankers.’

They both laughed.

3 DIVINE JOKER

3

DIVINE JOKER

Even if he had any funny stories up his sleeve, Cavalier would not have a chance to tell Haut. The oilman was already meeting his bankers that morning in Melbourne’s CBD.

Brown-haired Haut cut a business-like figure in a smart light blue suit and dark blue tie when he arrived at the Stock Exchange on classy Collins Street, a mix of heritage-protected nineteenth-century buildings and modern skyscrapers that fought for domination of Melbourne’s uncertain image.

Despite his natural smiling demeanour, Haut was nervous as he clutched his briefcase in one hand and a small notebook in the other. He didn’t even notice the four young women in the lift with him as he nudged the button for the tenth floor, keeping his eyes on the jokes in the book instead. The lift did not move. The girls chatted. Haut looked up.

‘Morning,’ he said to them, ‘I’ve got to make a speech. Any of you have any good one-liners?’

The girls giggled and shook their heads. The lift door closed.

‘C’mon,’ he pleaded, ‘you must have one!’

A chubby redhead with a cherubic face piped up, ‘I’ve got one, but it’s more than one line.’

The lift began to move.

‘Okay. Let’s have it!’

‘A burglar breaks into a house at night and hears someone say in the dark, “Jesus is watching you.” The burglar finds a parrot in a cage and asks it, “What idiot taught you to say that?” The parrot replies, “The same idiot that called our rottweiler Jesus.”’

The girls were in a paroxysm of laughter as they bundled out of the lift at the fourth floor.

Haut scribbled this new joke in his book and alighted at the tenth floor. He was confronted by a phalanx of security guards, all ex-SAS and armed with sub-machine guns. Haut was frisked and his briefcase was checked. He was asked for ID and then ushered into a huge room. There were twenty more security guards, fifty suited people from fourteen banks and about a hundred customers who owed or who were owed money.