Meet Pearlie Read online

  They walked along the Esplanade.

  ‘Look – there’s Frank,’ Pearlie said. Frank was Dulcie McBride’s older brother, but he was nothing like his mean, spoilt little sister. Pearlie liked Frank because he never talked to her like she was a child.

  Attached to Frank’s arm was his girlfriend, Eleni Spirou, Mr Spiros’s daughter. They’d been sweethearts since high school. Eleni wore a pink dress and green high-heel shoes. Her lips were always painted a vivid red.

  ‘Do you want some baklava, kids?’ she said, holding out a paper bag. ‘My mum made it.’

  Now that she was no longer scared, Pearlie suddenly felt hungry. ‘Thanks,’ she said and reached her hand inside the bag, taking a square of the sticky cake. It was made from nuts and pastry, and was sweet and delicious.

  ‘Like it?’ Eleni said.

  ‘Hmmm,’ Pearlie replied, her mouth full of the honey cinnamon flavour.

  ‘What about you, Naoko?’

  ‘No thanks,’ Naoko replied. ‘I don’t like sweet things much.’

  ‘Oh well.’ Eleni shrugged and carefully popped a bite-sized piece into her mouth without touching her perfectly applied lipstick.

  ‘Frank will know what to do! He’s in the army,’ said Pearlie to Naoko.

  ‘Do about what?’ Frank said.

  ‘We have important information to report to the army,’ said Naoko. ‘Can you help us?’

  ‘Well, if I think it could be something, I’ll tell my commanding officer,’ Frank said.

  ‘The thing is, though . . . it’s sort of secret,’ Naoko said.

  Frank cocked his head. ‘How secret?’

  ‘Top secret,’ Naoko whispered. She leaned forward. ‘It’s about that spy who’s working for the Japanese.’

  ‘Strewth! Are you sure?’ said Frank. ‘It’s not easy to uncover a spy.’

  ‘We’re positive,’ Pearlie said.

  ‘Then I reckon you girls had better go and see Colonel Mitchell at Larrakeyah Barracks. He takes care of that kind of business.’

  ‘Thanks, Frank,’ said Pearlie.

  Eleni tugged on Frank’s arm.‘Come on, baby, we’ll be late for the pictures. I want to pop into Zero in the Tropics for an ice cream first.’ She fanned herself. ‘Bye, girls. Be good.’

  They waved goodbye to Frank and Eleni, and headed for Larrakeyah Barracks.

  AS Pearlie and Naoko were on their way to see the colonel, they met Dulcie, who was out with a few of her friends, Peggy, Flora and Margaret.

  Dulcie sniggered as they approached. ‘Here comes the Jap spy’s daughter,’ she sang.

  Naoko was about to strike Dulcie but Pearlie held her back. ‘Don’t, Nao,’ she said, pulling her away. ‘Don’t take any notice.’

  ‘Naoko’s father’s a Jap spy, a Jap spy, a Jap spy. Naoko’s father’s a Jap spy and Naoko is one too!’ Dulcie sang to the tune of Girls and Boys Come Out to Play.

  Then they formed a circle around Naoko and began to chant, ‘Jap spy, Jap spy, Jap spy . . .’

  The next thing Pearlie knew, Naoko had grabbed Dulcie’s ponytail and was yanking her head backwards. Dulcie squealed and fell to the ground with Naoko on top of her. Then Dulcie slammed her fist into Naoko’s nose. It began to bleed.

  After that there was no stopping them. They punched and scratched and kicked one another, and all Pearlie could do was watch helplessly while Peggy, Flora and Margaret cheered Dulcie on.

  Suddenly, there was a loud explosion and a fork of lightning struck a nearby Poinsettia tree, ripping a branch from its trunk. It fell, almost in slow motion, landing only a few feet from Naoko and Dulcie. They jumped up in shock. Then the rain came down in huge sheets.

  Pearlie grabbed Naoko’s arm. ‘Let’s go, Nao!’ she shouted.

  Dulcie and Naoko glared at each other for a few seconds, neither one of them wanting to give in. Then another flash of lightning sent everyone scurrying into the open.

  Naoko was puffing hard. One of the sleeves of her dress was hanging by a few threads and blood from her nose had stained the material pink. She put her hands on her hips and yelled after Dulcie and her gang, ‘My dad isn’t a spy! I hate you Dulcie McBride.’

  ‘Are you hurt?’ Pearlie asked.

  Naoko shook her head. ‘It was a pretty good fight, wasn’t it?’ She grinned.

  ‘Naoko!’ said Pearlie, shocked.

  ‘Well, it was. I was the winner by far.’

  ‘You liked getting punched? Getting a blood nose?’

  ‘It’s made me feel a lot better.’ Naoko shrugged.

  ‘Well, I’m glad about that,’ Pearlie said. ‘I suppose it’s too late to see the Big Colonel now. Anyway, you look a mess.’

  ‘We’ll go first thing tomorrow. Come on, friend.’ Naoko put her arm in Pearlie’s and they walked home through the rain.

  It was dark when Pearlie reached Chinatown. She walked under the old wooden verandahs to their shop. Dad was still working, his face lit by a kerosene lamp. She opened the door and went in.

  ‘Why are you so late, Pearlie?’ he said, looking up from his sewing.

  ‘I had a delivery to do,’ she lied.

  ‘Aiya!’ Dad said. ‘If you come home this late you have to give up your job. Come here. You are dripping on my floor.’ He went behind the counter and brought out a small hand towel. Then he began to dry her hair, squeezing water out of her pigtails and wiping her face as gently as Mum would have done.

  ‘I can do it, Dad,’ she said.

  He handed her the towel and began putting away his sewing things. ‘When I was your age I was taking silk worms to market to sell, walking ten miles from my village to the town and back,’ he said. ‘Your grandfather and grandmother let me do this because I was a boy. But if I was a girl it would have been different. Girls can’t go running around after dark. Not now.’ He turned to face her. ‘There are a lot of soldiers in Darwin, and many go to the hotels and get drunk. It is not like before. Do you understand, Pearlie?’

  She nodded. Nothing was like it had been before.

  Dad sighed and lifted the glass on the lamp to blow out the flame. Golden sparks danced around the wick then died, leaving Pearlie with a strange sense of dread.

  She followed Dad into the living quarters at the back. As she lifted her arm to part the curtain that separated the shop from their kitchen, she stopped dead in her tracks. She stared at her empty wrist and her heart began to pound in her chest.

  My bracelet!

  Pearlie put her hand on the wall to steady herself as she felt a cold sweat creep over her. What if it fell off in Beake’s house? she thought with horror. If he finds it he’ll know a girl called Pearlie has been snooping around!

  At daybreak, Pearlie was outside Naoko’s window. She hadn’t slept all night.

  Naoko peered sleepily around the side of the mosquito net. ‘Who’s there?’ she croaked.

  ‘Get up, Nao,’ Pearlie said through the window bars. ‘Something terrible’s happened!’

  Naoko rubbed her eyes and, seeing Pearlie’s grave face, said, ‘Meet me at the front door.’

  A few minutes later she appeared, a plaster strip on her cheek and scratches down her arms from the fight. She was dressed and ready for action, an apple in her hand. ‘Want a bite?’

  ‘I can’t find my bracelet. I think I lost it in Beake’s house,’ Pearlie said, pacing around.

  Naoko stopped chewing and frowned. ‘When did you last see it?’

  ‘I had it on when I was hiding in the cupboard. But I can’t remember if I had it on when we left. The clasp’s loose and it comes off all the time. I should’ve had it fixed. What am I going to do?’ Pearlie’s knees felt weak.

  Naoko threw her apple core into the scrub and wiped her hands on her dress. ‘We’ve got to report Beake right away.’

  Pearlie could barely get the word out. ‘Do you think he’ll k . . . kill me?’

  ‘Don’t worry, he’ll be in jail before anything bad can happen.’

  ‘Let’s go now,’ P
earlie said, looking around. She couldn’t help but feel that someone was watching her.

  Pearlie and Naoko stood at the main entrance of Larrakeyah Barracks. The guard on duty was joking with another soldier.

  ‘Excuse me,’ said Naoko. ‘We want to see Colonel Mitchell. We have something top secret to tell him.’

  The soldier chuckled.

  ‘The Colonel’s got a war to run. He doesn’t have time to see little girls. Go on with you now!’ the guard said with a snort.

  ‘But we have to see him,’ Pearlie said. ‘It’s a matter of life or death.’

  The soldier stepped forward. ‘You heard what the man said. Scram!’

  At that moment a green army truck bumped down the road and pulled up behind them. Pearlie and Naoko stepped to one side. The guard said a few words to the truck driver then opened the gates to let him through.

  Naoko looked up the road. A second truck was heading for the gates. ‘Stay close and do exactly what I do,’ she whispered to Pearlie.

  ‘What –’

  ‘There’s no time for questions.’

  When the truck stopped, Naoko ran around behind it, staying out of sight of the guard and the soldier. Pearlie kept close to her side and when it drove into the army base, they ran alongside it, hidden from view. At the last moment they peeled off and slid behind a parked jeep. There they waited until the guard and the soldier were busy talking again.

  ‘You’re a genius, Nao,’ Pearlie said.

  Naoko beamed back at her.

  Once inside the barracks, all they had to do was ask and they were pointed in the direction of the main headquarters where Colonel Mitchell’s office was.

  The building was made from concrete and steel with large windows, and looked very modern. In the foyer a man in uniform sat behind a desk.

  ‘I don’t think you’re in the right place, girls,’ he said. ‘Are you the cook’s children?’

  They shook their heads. ‘We came to see Colonel Mitchell,’ Naoko said.

  ‘We have top-secret information to tell him,’ Pearlie added.

  The soldier eyed them both. Pearlie’s feet were bare and she still had on her dress from yesterday, which was filthy. Naoko was clean and she wore sandals but the cuts on her face and arms made her look tough. He must think we’re runaways, Pearlie thought in despair.

  She stepped forward boldly. ‘My name is Pearlie Chan,’ she said. ‘This is my friend Naoko Ito. We’ve come to report a spy. His name is Beake, Mr Beake. He’s American but he works for the Japanese. We saw inside his house and he’s got lots of pictures in his darkroom of guns, and the storage tanks and the ships in the harbour, and he’s got a miniature camera that spies use and a radio transmitter . . .’

  ‘He has a Japanese wife and Japanese swords on his walls and books in Japanese,’ Naoko took over from where Pearlie left off.

  The man’s look grew more serious. ‘Just wait here for a moment,’ he said. He stood up, walked down the hallway and disappeared.

  ‘I think he believed us,’ Naoko said.

  ‘He must be talking to Colonel Mitchell.’

  They sat on the couch by the window. The building smelled of coffee and cigarettes. Down the corridor came the clickety clack clack of a typewriter. Outside they heard the tromp tromp tromp of soldiers marching.

  After a short while the man came back and sat down at his desk. He took a clean sheet of paper, wound it into the typewriter and looked at Pearlie. ‘Now, Pearlie Chan, tell me exactly what happened and what you saw. The Colonel wants me to make a report.’

  Pearlie stood up and began to tell him everything in detail, finishing up with her gold bracelet. ‘It must have fallen off inside Beake’s house. It’s got my name engraved on it so he knows I’ve seen his secret stuff,’ she said.

  The man finished typing then said, ‘Colonel Mitchell takes all reports very seriously. He will read what you have said and assess the situation. There’s one question he wanted me to ask. Do you have any proof with you that this Mr Beake is a spy?’

  Naoko shook her head. ‘We didn’t want to take anything, otherwise he’d be suspicious.’

  ‘All you have to do is go to his house and see for yourself,’ said Pearlie.

  ‘All right, girls. Don’t worry. If we need to talk to you again, we’ll contact you.’

  ‘When are you going to put him in jail?’ Pearlie said.

  ‘Well, it’s not as easy as that. We can’t go around arresting just anyone on hearsay. We need proof first,’ the man said.

  ‘But Pearlie’s life is in danger,’ Naoko said.

  ‘I’m sure it’s not as serious as all that. Children have big imaginations sometimes. I know – I have three of my own.’ He picked up the phone and spoke to someone. Within minutes, a soldier appeared at the front door. ‘Escort these two young ladies off the base, corporal. Goodbye. You’ve been a great help.’

  Pearlie didn’t want to leave. She felt safe inside the barracks. Out there, around the town, in the scrub, Beake might be lurking, waiting to kill her.

  ‘I’m scared, Nao,’ she said again as they walked towards the gates.

  ‘Don’t worry, Pearlie. I’ll think of a way to save you and my dad.

  AS they walked towards town, the wail of an air-raid siren sent Pearlie and Naoko scurrying for shelter in a nearby ditch. It went off every second or third day now – a frightening whine like a giant mosquito.

  Pearlie lay on her back scanning the sky, listening for Japanese planes. Soon the siren for the all-clear sounded.

  ‘Another practice drill,’ Naoko said. ‘I’m sick of them.’

  ‘I’m glad it’s just a practice and not for real,’ Pearlie replied.

  Naoko stood up, brushing ants off her legs. ‘I was thinking just then that the only way the Big Colonel will believe us is if we get proof. Now, we think that Beake’s been inside Diamond Cave because of the battery we found, right?’

  Pearlie nodded.

  ‘So what if that’s where he goes each day at four o’clock? Maybe he uses the cave to send secret messages to the Japanese army. I can borrow my dad’s camera and take photographs. Then we’ll have real proof. Good idea, hey?’

  It would be dangerous, Pearlie knew. But it was better than waiting around to be killed. ‘It’s better if we follow him,’ she said. ‘Just in case he goes somewhere else instead.’

  ‘Hmm . . . good thinking, but how do we do that? Beake drives a motorcar!’

  Pearlie’d already had her own daring idea. ‘Reddy can drive us!’

  ‘Reddy!’

  ‘He drives all the motorcars and trucks his uncle fixes in his garage. He even said he’d take me for a ride one day.’

  ‘You’re a genius, Pearlie Chan.’ Naoko grinned. ‘Almost as smart as me.’

  Pearlie hesitated.

  ‘Okay, you’re not smiling. What’s up now?’

  ‘There’s just one thing,’ Pearlie said, screwing up her face. ‘Reddy’s never driven on a road before.’

  ‘Oh great.’ Naoko crossed her arms over her chest. ‘But there’s always a first time.’

  They found Reddy on the oval playing football with two mates.

  Pearlie waved, and Reddy kicked the ball in a high arc to Mick then trotted over. ‘What are you two up to?’ he asked.

  ‘You know that man Beake I delivered the package to the other day?’ Pearlie said.

  Reddy snorted. ‘How can I forget him?’

  ‘Well, we have real proof that he’s a spy.’

  Reddy cocked his head to one side. ‘How didya find that out?’

  ‘We snuck into his house.’

  ‘You did what?’

  ‘We broke in and found all kinds of spy stuff,’ said Naoko.

  ‘You better tell me more.’ He shouted across the oval, ‘I gotta go, guys. See you later!’

  The guys waved back and kept kicking.

  Pearlie and Naoko told Reddy about what they’d seen and how they tried to report Beake but they need
ed proof.

  ‘So we want to follow him to see where he goes at four o’clock each day,’ said Pearlie.

  ‘We think he’s sending secret messages to the enemy on his radio transmitter and he’s doing it from Diamond Cave,’ Naoko said. ‘But we can’t be sure.’

  ‘That’s where you fit in,’ Pearlie said. ‘We need to follow his motorcar and we want you to drive us.’

  Reddy shook his head and began to back away with his hands up. ‘No . . . no . . . I told you, Pearlie, I’ve only driven round paddocks.’

  ‘A road is just like a paddock, except it’s a lot smoother, and there are no cows to dodge,’ said Naoko.

  ‘But they’re narrow and windy and trucks are rushin’ at you. If I get caught my uncle’ll give me a walloping. I could even wind up in jail myself!’

  Pearlie dropped her head and Naoko rubbed her back sympathetically. ‘Beake’s going to murder Pearlie if we don’t do something.’

  Reddy stared at Pearlie. ‘What do you mean, murder?’

  ‘I dropped my bracelet when we were snooping around his house. It has my name on it so he knows I’ve seen his darkroom and the photos and everything.’ Pearlie sniffed back a sob.

  ‘Oh, great!’ Reddy rolled his eyes, sighing. ‘I guess I have no choice now, do I? I must be crazy!’

  The next day after school Pearlie and Naoko hid in the bushes opposite Beake’s house. Reddy told them to keep an eye on the spy while he went to get the truck. It wouldn’t be easy to sneak the truck away while his uncle was in the garage. But the plan was that he’d meet them there just before four.

  ‘I hope he hasn’t chickened out,’ Naoko said impatiently.

  ‘He wouldn’t do that,’ Pearlie said. ‘He knows my life’s in danger.’

  At exactly four o’clock, Beake came down the steps carrying a brown kitbag. He had a scowl on his face. Rusty, the Tompkins’ kelpie came out from under the house. Pearlie was shocked to see how thin and mangy he looked. Hadn’t Beake fed him? Then, as Beake passed the dog, he kicked it in the ribs, which sent Rusty flying through the air. He yelped and landed by the fence. Then, with his tail between its legs, he slinked back under the house. Pearlie felt a rush of anger. She hated that man more than ever.