The Bat by Jo Nesbø Read Free Book Online Page A

was going to sleep. The woman in white pulled the ropes behind the Murri. Bobby changed tactics and went for the head, but Toowoomba avoided the punches by moving his body forward and backward in a slow, lazy glide. Almost like a hooded snake, Harry thought, like a …
    Cobra!
    Bobby stiffened in mid-punch. His head was half turned to the left, with an expression suggesting he had just remembered something, then his eyes rolled back, the mouth guardslipped out and blood spurted in a thin, even jet from a tiny hole on the bridge of his nose where the bone was broken. Toowoomba waited until Bobby fell forward before hitting him again. The marquee went quiet, and Harry heard the awful crunch as the blow hit Bobby’s nose for a second time, and the woman’s voice as she screamed what remained of his name:
    “… bbyyy!”
    Red spray composed of sweat and blood flew off Bobby’s head and showered the corner of the ring.
    The MC charged over and signaled, somewhat superfluously, that the fight had finished. The marquee remained silent, just the clatter of the woman in white’s shoes as she ran up the central aisle and out of the tent. Her dress was spattered at the front, and she wore the same surprised expression as Bobby.
    Toowoomba tried to get Bobby to his feet, but the two assistants shoved him away. There were scattered claps, but they faded. The whistles increased when the MC went over and raised Toowoomba’s hand in the air. Andrew shook his head.
    “Must have been a few blokes who put their money on the local champion today,” he said. “Idiots! Come on, let’s collect the cash and have a few serious words with this Murri drongo!”
    “Robin, you bastard. You should be locked up—and I mean it!”
    Robin “The Murri” Toowoomba’s face lit up in a big smile. He was holding an ice-filled rolled towel over one eye.
    “Tuka! I could hear you out there. Have you started gambling again?” Toowoomba spoke in a low voice. A man who is used to being listened to, Harry thought instantly.The sound was pleasant and gentle, not like someone who had just broken the nose of a man almost twice his size.
    Andrew snorted. “Gambling? In my days betting money on a Chivers boy could never be called gambling. But now I suppose nothing is certain anymore. Fancy allowing yourself to be taken in by a bloody white yahoo. Where’s it all going to end?”
    Harry cleared his throat.
    “Oh, yeah, Robin, say hello to a friend of mine. This is Harry Holy. Harry, this is Queensland’s worst hoodlum and sadist, Robin Toowoomba.” They shook hands and Harry felt as if his hand had been trapped in a door. He groaned a “How are you?” and received an “Absolutely magnificent, mate—how are you yourself?” and a gleaming smile by way of an answer.
    “Never better,” Harry said, massaging his hand.
    These Australian handshakes were crippling him. According to Andrew, it was important to say how unimaginably well things were going; a bland “fine, thanks” could be interpreted as very cold.
    Toowoomba pointed his thumb at Andrew. “Talking of hoodlums, has Tuka told you that he once used to box for Jim Chivers?”
    “I suppose there are still quite a few things I don’t know about … er, Tuka? He’s a secretive guy.”
    “Secretive?” Toowoomba laughed. “He speaks in tongues. Tuka will tell you everything you need to know so long as you know what you have to ask. Of course, he hasn’t told you he had to resign from the Chivers team because he was considered too dangerous, has he. How many cheekbones, noses and jaws have you got on your conscience, Tuka? Everyone reckoned he was the best young boxing talent in New South Wales. But there was one problem. He didn’t have any self-control—no discipline. In the end he knocked down a ref because he thought he had stopped the fight toosoon. In Tuka’s favor! That’s what I call bloodthirsty. Tuka was suspended for two years.”
    “Three and a half, thank you very