‘For what?’ I asked, dutifully, as the mower cooled, as Ron returned to his shed, as Ernie passed carrying Fi-Fi.

‘The map.’

‘It’s a long way.’

‘Not so far.’ As he tried to convince himself, again. ‘Even if we hired a four-wheel drive.’

‘We’d have to, eh?’

‘Plenty of water, coupla of spares. Make sure it’s in good nick. We could do it.’

‘We could.’

‘Big adventure?’

I waited for the word. Lasseter.

‘I worked it out the other day. Three days driving, coupla days looking, perhaps. Day digging, then home. Less than a week.’

He waited for my approval.

‘Three days?’

‘Four if it’s hot.’

‘Where would we stay?’

‘Motels, or camp out. I’m not too old for that.’

It all sounded so simple. As it had for years. Ever since that day, when I was six or seven, when he’d led me to the shed and opened the big toolbox he always kept locked, took out a piece of paper, unfolded it and showed me. ‘There … see?’

‘What is it?’

The name on the top. Lasseter.

He’d run his finger along the Stuart Highway, then the road west, into a blank of sandy dragons and hellfire. ‘Look!’

More roads, with scribbled names, pictures of a mountain range, valleys, ‘NATIV PYNES’. Like some idiot pirate had drawn it.

I’d asked. ‘Where’s this?’

‘Ah.’ And he’d tapped the side of his nose. Then, in a whisper, ‘But look.’

At the end of the journey, a cross, and the words: ‘Lasseter’s Reef’.

Then he’d said, ‘Years ago I was drinking in a pub and this fella comes over. Says, Son (I still had hair back then), I’ve only got a few days left. And I said, Till what? He says, To live. And I’m thinking, Why are you telling me? Then he says, You’re young, starting out, you could do with a break, couldn’t you? I says, I s’pose so, mister. He says, Well, could you or not? There are plenty of other people drinking in this pub. Well, I’m thinking, You stupid old prick, but then he puts this map on the bar. Says, Me and my dad found this reef of gold twenty years ago. Hundred yards long. Worth millions. I studied the map. He says, We left it there so we could go away and raise enough money to return, with machinery, take it all out, properly. But then me dad died, and I got sick, then better, then hit the bottle, then forgot about it, got sick again, better again, now I’m really sick. And I looked at him and tried to decide. Worth millions? Could I get that lucky? Or was he just … mad?’

I’d been amazed. I’d said, ‘Is it real?’

He’d said, ‘Well, that’s what I had to decide. Then this old fella says, Son, you decide.’