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“Are you sure no one is home? There’s a light in a room out the back.”

Barry rolled his eyes. “Yeah, I’m sure, Twerp. I told ya I’ve been casing the joint all week and watching the house all afternoon. They went out at 6. They were all dolled up so probably goin to a fancy restaurant for dinner. They won’t be back for hours.”

Adam looked around fearfully. “Well… how we gettin in? There’re security screens on all the windas.”

“Only the middle bit that opens. We’ll go out the back and I’ll break the winda at the side.”

“But… what if someone hears it break? And how are we gunna get all the glass out in a hurry?”

“Geezes, you are such a tosser. You’re just like your mother. Glad I’m shot of her. I don’t know why I brung you with me.’

“I don’t know why either. I sure don’t want to be here,” Adam mumbled.

Barry reached into his bag. “See, I got a roll of tape. I’ll spread it all over the glass. When I hit it with me hamma it won’t make a sound, and I’ll be able to pull the broken glass out without too much falling and makin a noise. Besides the house is in the middle of a huge block. The neighbours are too far away to hear a thing.”

“Ahhh … then… umm… I’ll stay here and keep watch.”

“No you won’t, Twerp. I need ya to stand outside and shove the stuff I find into the bag as I hand it out the winda.”

Scanning the area anxiously, Adam reluctantly followed Barry around the house. He stood watch as Barry spread the tape in strips down the glass window.

Just as Barry raised the hammer, Adam said, “Wait, what if there’s an alarm. Big fancy houses like this usually have one.”

Barry paused and looked at him thoughtfully. “Mmm… ya right, it could have, but if it does, we’ll be well away before the cops get here.” He swung the hammer, and the first blow broke the glass.

Adam held his breath waiting for the alarm to sound. Nothing happened. He let out a deep breath. “Whew ... looks like there is no alarm.”

Barry grinned, nodded, and proceeded to smash the window all the way to the top. As it crumpled and fell, he tugged at the tape to clear it all. “Stay back, Twerp. I’ll soon have it all out.” A shower of broken glass fell to the cement path around his feet.

Adam jumped back and looked around. “Christ … I thought you said it wouldn’t make a noise. It’s loud enough to wake the bleedn dead. The place will be swarmin with cops. I’m outa here.” He turned and headed for the front gate.

“How in hell did I end up with such a scaredy-cat for a son? Go then, loser, but if you think I’m sharing the spoils with ya think agin,” Barry yelled.

As he cleared the glass from the sill and climbed through the window, a voice from the darkness in the house said, “We wondered when you would be stupid enough to break in.”

Barry froze. “Where the hell did you come from?” he said to the burly man standing in front of him.

“The owner spotted you watching the place and hired us to keep an eye every time he went out. We had to let you smash the window and get in to make the charge breaking and entering not just trespassing.”

“Yeah, so who’s the loser now, eh?” another voice said from the other side of the window.

Barry spun around to see a second guard with Adam standing sheepishly beside him. “Oh hell. They got you too, boy.”

Adam shrugged. “At least it’s over now. You’ll end up in jail this time and we’ll all be shot of you.”

Barry glared at him. “You’ll be there too, boy.”

The guard grinned and patted Adam’s shoulder. “Not if I have anything to do with it. It was clear he didn’t want to be here. Take off, boy. The cops will be here soon. Now, stay out of trouble, okay.”

“I sure will, thanks,” Adam said as he disappeared around the corner of the house.

THE INEPT DRUG MULES by Valda R

The full moon gave a strange silky glow over the ocean, as Al and Merve pushed their tinny to the water's edge.

‘Hope we can see where we are going. Ow long you think we need to wait Merve?’

‘Dunno, just keep your eyes out Al.’

Half an hour later a light offshore to the north flashed three times and the pair ran to the water, jumped into their tinny, to set off on their money making venture.

‘Don’t start the motor yet you fool. You’ll wake up the whole of Bangalee. We have to paddle until we're a fair way out. Don’t wanna be seen or heard.’

Unknown to the pair in the boat, the glow from the phosphorus in the water from the motor could be seen back on land. There was enough light to guide them to the coordinates they had been given and when they pulled alongside the luxury motor yacht, six parcels were quickly dropped overboard several meters away from them, before the large vessel took off at high speed.

‘Jeez their wake is nearly tipping us over Merve.’

‘Now quick we need to pick up the gear Al’

The wind was picking up causing a swell and the increasing cloud cover was turning the ocean steely grey.

‘Get the flashlight Al.’

‘Sorry, forgot, it’s still in the ute’

‘ You’ll have to hop over and toss the gear on board.’

‘What! I’m not a strong swimmer. It’s just as well we’re getting some good bucks out of this Merve’

‘Stop complaining, You’re only here because you’re married to me sister. You have a life jacket on so you won’t drown.’

Al reluctantly slid overboard and dog paddled towards the first of the large parcels.

‘Got one - ere.’

‘Hurry up and get the rest as the weather is changing and we need to get out of here.’

After the second retrieval Al launched himself back on board in haste.

‘Not going back in there. Bloody great fin just popped up. Probably a great white.’

‘Well here, grab the fish gaff and haul them parcels on board.’

As Al leant over the side of the boat, he stumbled and speared the parcel with such force that it tore open the contents. They watched in dismay as dozens of small packets drifted off, then in horror as two large sharks began consuming the packets.

‘What do we do now?’ Al was on the verge of tears. ‘If we capsize that’ll be the end of us with these man eaters’’

‘Get it together Al. Have to head back as it’s getting too dangerous. We’ll just tell the boss that only two parcels were dropped. He’ll surely believe us over the bloody Asian drug crooks’

As Merve pulled the starter there was no sound from the motor.

‘Ave a look and see what the problem is Al’

‘Holy cow Merve, a deadly sea snake is wrapped around the prop’

‘We'll get it off quick as we need to be heading back’.

Al grabbed an oar and began bashing the side of the boat near the motor and around the snake’s head, until it suddenly rose ready to strike. He shrieked in terror as he dropped the oar overboard and fell back into the boat hitting his head on the steel beer Esky, while the snake swam off now wrapping itself around the abandoned oar.

Merve opened up the throttle and they took off at full speed, the pair now able to dream of their rewards. A hundred metres from shore the motor spluttered.

‘Get the spare tank of fuel and top the motor up Al’.

‘Didn’t bother to fill up as didn’t have any spare cash and thought we ad enough.’

‘You're bloody useless Al. Now we’ll have to row in.’

‘Only got one oar Merve. Fighting off the killer sea snake when the oar went overboard’.

‘Well get up the front and paddle, and when the water is shallow enough, jump in and pull us ashore’.

Once the duo were back on the beach and loading their tinny with their precious cargo onto the trailer, the police tactical squad who had been tucked in the dunes for several hours, moved closer. The luxury yacht had been under surveillance for several weeks after its departure from New Guinea, and the team were communicating with their land based police contacts throughout the operation.

‘Bloody cold here Merve. I’m soaked through and I got a splitting headache. Ave to go to the hospital and get some stitches’.

‘It’ll be colder where you will be spending the night mate. No central heating in the police cells’ one of the police squad whispered to his mate.

The throb of a motor announced a vehicle without headlights slowly making its way along the beach. On arrival two men dressed in black with balaclavas hiding their identity, leapt out.

The signal was now given and the highly trained fully armed team moved silently onto the beach to surround the group.

‘Hands up and don’t move’

As Al tried to run he felt his arm twisted behind his back, his hands cuffed, and he was pushed into the sand. ‘Not a good idea mate’ the Officer whispered in his ear.

With the group now restrained, two alerted police vehicles drove along the beach and the O.IC. stepped out.

‘Well done boys. You can now stand down, go have a meal and you can accompany these no hopers to Brisbane tomorrow. We’ll station a team here to recover the rest of the drugs when they wash up onshore.’

Al was whimpering as he was thrust into the paddywagon. ‘Oh Merve, me misses is going to kill me for missing her Daydream Island holiday’.

As Merve felt his anger rising and realizing he was just a very small pawn in this doomed operation for which he would now pay heavily, and wanting to vent some of the blame to his malingerer of a brother in law, he muttered ‘Don’t worry Al she has the hots for the new gym instructor. He’ll probably take her there’.

A NEW FRIEND AT THE LOCAL by Melinda G

God helps those who help themselves’ they taught us in Sunday school; I think we may have misinterpreted the sentiment.

Scrumping was an age old tradition involving hungry schoolboys sneaking into people’s yards and liberating fruit, mainly apples, from their trees.

We would send the smallest, cutest kid to knock on the door of the house. If the owner was home he would plead “Please can we pick up the fallers from your apple tree?” Most owners would readily agree; fallers were the fruit most likely maggot

infested or over-ripe anyway. If the answer was in the affirmative we would go and shake the life out of the tree to ensure the fallers were not the maggot infested fruit that dropped off the twig of their own volition.

If the answer was “Sod off you little beggars before I call the police” we would still steal the apples anyway; just do it a lot faster before they could catch us. If no-one answered the door then it was fruit picking time at our leisure.

We never considered it stealing; we were merely preventing waste; most of these lazy buggers would probably never bother to pick the fruit anyway. Besides, god was on our side because we were helping ourselves.

On one occasion we were walking past a large house with locked gates and a wall just too high for us to climb over on our own. Naturally the apples on the trees inside looked like the most scrumptious pieces of fruit ever; we had to have them but the large wrought iron gates were shut tight. We took a vote and hoisted one of our gang over the wall. His job was to grab as many apples as he could, toss them over the wall and then we would endeavour to haul him back. Hopefully there would be no

nasty guard dogs to spoil our plot. The plan was working well until our lookout noticed the local plod heading towards

us. In those days our splendid law enforcement officers did not have the benefit of squad cars, they pounded the beat on foot. We dropped our incriminating booty and bolted. From a safe vantage point we watched as the barrage of apples continued

flying over the wall to land at the copper’s feet. Eventually the constable leant over the wall, reached out and helped our horrified mate out of the garden. He then turned to where we were hiding, and in a commanding voice called “Alright you lot, get over here.”

Fair cop guv, we were nicked. We might have been criminals, but we obeyed our elders. As we stood shame-faced and repentant before the officer he lectured us on the evils of stealing; and then he let us go, with the caution “Don’t let me catch you

stealing again.”

“No sir” we chanted in unison.

We appreciated the kindness of that stranger in letting us go; and true to our word we never did let him catch us stealing again.

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THE CHARITY BOX by Ron D

‘G’day Bob,’ said Stan as he walked over to his mate sitting on a park bench.

‘Hi, Stan,’ said Bob. ‘What are your plans for today?’

‘I can’t think of anything to do,’ replied Stan. ‘Wait a moment. Why don’t we rob a bank?’

‘Rob a bank? You’re kidding, aren’t you?’ queried Bob.

‘Well, you suggest something. Nothing I say is good enough for you,’ snarled Stan. He turned away and stared at passing people walking their dogs in the park.

‘Sorry, Stan. Perhaps that might be a good idea. How do we go about it?’

Stan brightened up and his mind began churning. ‘First, we need something to make masks for our faces, then we need toy pistols.’

‘Why toy pistols?’ asked a surprised Bob. ‘People won’t be scared of them.’

‘I bet they will. They won’t know they are toys,’ he replied with a cheeky grin. ‘Then we bail up a teller and say, “Give me all your money.”

‘What will the teller put the money into?’ asked Bob as he rubbed his head to help his thinking.

‘We’ll take a bag of course. What did you think?’ said Bob with a sneer.

They went to their homes, gathered the gear and met up outside the bank. They put on their masks and pulled out their toy pistols.

‘Go!’ shouted Stan.

They ran into the bank shouting, ‘Everyone down. This is a hold up.’

Customers looked at them briefly and assessed the validity of these two ragamuffins pretending to be thieves, before looking back to the tellers and proceeding with their banking business. One of the tellers pressed the police button under her bench before going back to serving her current customer.

Stan and Bob looked around in amazement. No one believed they were bank robbers. Their hearts sank.

‘Look over there,’ whispered Stan to Bob. ‘See that charity box?’

Bob nodded.

‘Go and grab that before we run out the door. Go!’

Bob ran over, grabbed the Charity box and tucked it under his arm before running towards the door. Our two hopeless robbers ran through the door into the arms of the law.

‘Hello, boys,’ greeted a huge policeman. He spread his arms and gathered our two heroes into a firm embrace.

‘What have you been up to this time? Robbing a bank? Why don’t you learn to live a peaceful life? But I see you have stolen something this time.’

He turned to his mate, ‘Handcuff them then return the charity box to the bank.’

‘Right, into the car with you. We’ll find a nice quiet cell where you can work on your next misadventure.’

WHAT COULD GO WRONG? by Sallie H

“It’s like this see,” Nathan said, “I’ve found a way to overcome our difficulties and get the hell out of here.”

“O.K.,” replied Terry, “do tell.”

“I’ve sussed out Bradford’s the Jewellers and their premises back onto the carpark.  There is a wall surrounding their property, so they can use the loo privately ” sniggered Nathan.  Now the roof is corrugated iron.  All we’ll need is a cordless drill with a spanner attachment, a torch and a lightweight ladder.  In the wee small hours of Sunday morning nobody is around, I’ve already checked that out.  There are alarms on both the back and front door and security cameras but that won’t worry us because we are going in through the roof.”

“I don’t get it,” said Terry,  “how will we get through the roof?”

“Listen,” said Nathan, “We get your ute and put the ladder in.  Back the ute up to the wall and using the ladder, climb over.  Pull the ladder up behind us and lean it against the wall of the building.  Unscrew one of the sheets of iron with the cordless drill, and climb in.”

“So we are now in the roof space.  I’m sure that will be fun,” was Terry’s comment.

“There has to be a manhole somewhere.  We climb through that and then we have free range of the shop,” said Nathan patiently.

“I get it,” said Terry, “sounds pretty good.  But how do we get back up to the manhole?”

“We can use the stools which are behind the counter.  Get back through the manhole and replace the cover.  Back on the roof, replace the sheet of iron and into your ute.  Easy peasy.  Job’s done and we can be away in no time”.

JUST LISTEN TO ME by Cindi B

Glad to be away from work for a few days, and in a new town,

the girl had started off on a beach path with great enthusiasm.

Now, however, having followed the challenging track up hill

and down dale, she really needed to rest before returning. She

had arrived at an expanded parking area with shady secluded

benches, but flopped down on thick grass shaded by bushes

and had promptly fallen asleep.

Ants exploring her body had wakened her, a sudden voice

from close by too. The words she heard distracted her from

her battle with the wandering ants, which had started to bite.

“I really think that he killed her.” The voice was female,

decisive, but abrupt.

‘Look’, a male voice answered “that is a terrible thing to say

when you have absolutely no proof whatsoever!”

“I would have gone to the police if I’d had any proof! When

money was disappearing out of her bank account I rang up a

Government seniors’ help line and they told me they could do

nothing unless she complained herself. They would have

listened on an elders’ abuse line now, but not then. It is too

late now. I knew she would never have complained about her

own son.’

“So why are you getting yourself upset about it now then?”

He is impatient, the girl thought, he doesn’t want to hear.

“It’s really on my mind. Just listen to what happened and I will

never talk about it again, I promise.”

“Ok” from the male voice, “go for it, I never met any of the

family, so paint me a believable picture, but remember, we are

meeting the others in less than an hour.”

“Right, well, she had money in the bank from selling her

beach house. I met her when she moved into my small

community and rented an old house there. It was mostly a

dormitory suburb by then for Town. He never held a job down

for more than a few weeks. The Boss always picked on him,

he was unfairly overworked, taken advantage of. All the

excuses. Smoked all the time and moved in with her and lived

off her. Took money from her purse, borrowed her phone

gave it back uncharged, so that when her car packed up on

the way back from town she couldn’t call anyone to help.

What else? She used to drop in, walk down and have coffee

with me, talk her problems through. She wanted to die at

eighty and as a retired nurse thought she had the means to do

it.”

“For Goodness sake, get to the point! What on earth makes

you think that he killed her? Wasn’t she staying in a caravan

on her daughter’s property when she died.”

“Yes, she was, and that was strange and uncomfortable too.

When I visited I was asked to phone first and often they said it

wasn’t convenient. When I did go she used to run to me and

throw her arms around me and hug me and we never had that

huggy sort of relationship before. She stank actually and

could not even make a cup of tea in the caravan, the kettle

had to be brought down from the house. There was no

television and she was never a reader. It was as if she was no

use to anyone any more, just an unwanted person hanging

around. I used to feel so angry and so sorry for her.”

“You are not making a case for murder. You are just letting

your imagination get the better of you because you didn’t like

them! Come on, why do you really think something so awful

happened?”

“Well, she told me there was no money left in her bank

account and that she hadn’t spent it. That was when I rang the

Seniors’ line and got no help. She supposedly died after the

cyclone, walking round the property in the rain, inspecting the

fallen trees and the wind damage with her rotten son. His

story is that she tripped and fell, hitting her head on a branch.

She died before the overworked ambos managed to get there.

He was charming to me at the funeral and he had never even

been polite before.”

“O.K. Mum, story told. I’m sorry, but it really is probably just

in your mind. You didn’t like him for good reason, I know, but

listen to your own words, why don’t you think of it in another

way? You said she wanted to die when she reached eighty!

Just accept that she got her wish because of the cyclone.

Just how many of us are that lucky?”

The silence seemed to expand. No leaves rustled and the girl

found herself holding her breath as she waited for a response.

And waited. Finally it came, hesitantly, then brightly, “Yes, it

just seemed so, convenient. Let’s get a move on, it’s time to

meet the others.”

The girl got to her feet stiffly and started her challenging walk

back, ants long forgotten.

TALKING WITH A CRIM by Trevor S