The Gilded Madonna

by Garrick Jones

  We’d been leaning on the railing next to the pier at Woolloomooloo, watching the ferries ply their way across the harbour while Harry ate his lunch.

  “I’m thirsty,” I said.

  “You’re a grown-up. Do what you like. But I think more beer in the middle of the day is not going to solve anything, Clyde. However, the Café de Wheels does very good spiders … what flavour do you fancy?”

  The spider, a bottle of carbonated soft drink poured over a scoop of vanilla ice cream in a tall sundae glass and then variously eaten with or sucked up through a straw, was one of my favourite non-alcoholic drinks. On a hot day like today, it was the perfect suggestion to replace a schooner of God’s gift to man.

  “Ginger beer, please.”

  Harry returned five minutes later with two tall milkshake glasses, mine frothing pale brown at the top, his yellow-gold. “What’s yours?” I asked.

  “Passiona,” he replied. “I know you find it too sweet, but I love the flavour of passionfruit in any way I can get it. Now tell me about Johnny.”

  I’d already told him about our group “No Holes Barred” and how I’d met Billy, Johnny, and finally Sonny Mullins. It had been Billy who’d brought us together as a group. Unknown to us all, he’d been misbehaving with us individually for a few months, until one day, in a cheap hotel in Alexandria, where we were enjoying five days furlough, he’d suggested we play truth or dare by spinning a bottle, which Billy artfully manipulated to point at him. His dare had been for us to play strip poker. We’d all had a skinful, so, for a bit of fun, we’d all agreed. He’d lost every hand in a short period of time, which had left him sitting cross-legged on the floor, stark naked, twanging his erection with his thumb, while the rest of us had looked at one another tentatively, wondering who’d make the first move.

  Thereafter, for the following three months, we’d got together in pairs, threesomes, and sometimes, on the odd occasion we could manage it, all together as a group. I’d grown very fond of Johnny, much to Billy’s chagrin, because he’d been besotted with me from day one. I cared for him very much, but Johnny Edgar had been an early version of my Harry. Had he lived, perhaps he’d have been the first and only man I’d fallen in love with.

  The week before Johnny had died, I’d had a terrible stomach bug and had been in the sick tent with “sand poisoning”, as we called it. Delhi belly, the Scours, it had all sorts of names, but was a mild form of dysentery, caused by some bug—shigella, from memory. I’d been back on my feet for the first time on the day Johnny was to move out, so the last time I’d seen him was my quick hello while he’d been sitting on the jerrycan, cracking jokes about the C.O.’s water supply.

  I’d got my marching orders the next day to ship out to Malta to begin guerrilla training at the British base in Golden Bay, and while walking up the gangplank onto the steamer, I’d learned of what had happened to Johnny and his men, just twelve hours earlier. I remembered standing on the deck of the ship, Billy on the dockside, his face streaked with tears, waving a sheaf of papers in this hand, miming that he’d write. It was the last time I’d seen him for nearly four years.

  I went over and over my recollection of that last week before Johnny’s death with Harry. There was nothing. Absolutely nothing that sprung to mind that linked anything untoward to Johnny or anything I’d done or said to anyone that involved or was about him.

  Nothing.

  *****

  I called past the Boomerang theatre on the way back to the office, pleased Harry had talked me out of that second beer, because I knew myself well enough that a third would have been on the counter in front of me before he’d had a chance to intervene.

  The manager of the cinema told me the usher I wanted to speak with had a day off. Wednesdays were quiet as a rule. So I went to the man’s flat. No one was home, so the moment I arrived at the office I called Craig and asked whether he’d seen him. Craig told me he often came in on Wednesdays to use the steam room late in the afternoon and then hung around to talk with his friends when they started to trickle in from work after five o’clock. I told him I’d call past for a swim and would explain why I’d disappeared so unceremoniously on Boxing Day. I also thanked him for taking the leftover food to my flat.

  Tom was busy on the phone in Harry’s office when I went to look for him. He waved and signalled he’d come see me when he’d finished. I could tell by the look on his face it was one of those tiresome callers—most likely a man who’d lost his dog and wanted me to find it, or someone who wanted me to read their new novel and publish a review for it in the newspapers I was contracted to write for. I didn’t do other people’s literature. I kept thinking it would lay me open to criticism if I ever got my own Australian war story of the century further than the twenty or so pages I’d written over the past year.

  Instead I phoned Luka.

  “Hello, Clyde. How are you?”

  “Shaken. I opened your envelope.”

  “Are we still friends?” he said after a short pause.

  “Yes, we’re still friends, Luka. I don’t particularly want to talk about it over the phone, but I can’t say that what you wrote didn’t shake me to the core. I don’t understand, and I’m not sure that now’s the right time to spend my energy trying to. I think I need to speak with D.S. Dioli about giving you access to your gilded Madonna, even if it is still being held as evidence.”

  “He won’t take much convincing, Clyde.”

  “What do you know that I don’t? He seems very regimented, almost closed-minded.”

  “Fear of failure, Clyde. I heard it in your voice when you were talking about him.”

  “I barely said four words!”

  “I can’t discuss this right now, Clyde. There’s a customer in the shop. Can we meet later?”

  “I’m going to be busy for a while this afternoon, but I’ll be heading off to Craig’s pool at around four thirty if you want to have a swim. I must warn you though, I’m going there to meet up with the usher from the Boomerang you seemed to like, so I’ll have my business hat on.”

  “Gălbenele is away for the day, so I’m by myself. I close at five, so perhaps I’ll see you closer to half past?”

  “That sounds good. Would you like to have dinner with me? I’m not sure what Harry’s up to, but I have the makings of a three-course meal in the fridge.”

  “Three courses is normally far too much for me, but I’d be delighted, Harry or no Harry.”

  “See you at the swimming pool, then.”

  Tom was leaning on the doorjamb when I hung up the receiver. “Lost cat,” he said, followed by a deep sigh and then, after my chuckle, “I’ll be back shortly. A fiver is a fiver, and that fifteen bob will help me buy some second-hand furniture for my new flat.”

  “Hang on, before you go, can we run through a list of things I need to have done over the next few days?”

  “Sure, Clyde. But this woman is a repeat customer, and I know where her cat is … I’ll be back before you know it.”

  “She is, and you do?”

  “I don’t bother you with details, unless it’s important, but she’s one of the clients I worked for during my first week. Remember? I gave you a tenner just before Christmas.”

  “And the cat?”

  “It was next door last time, curled up on the windowsill of her neighbour. They don’t get on.”

  “But charging five quid, Tom? That’s a lot of money.”

  “Not to her it isn’t, Clyde. What’s the most important thing to her in her life? Her cat. You need to see it in perspective. Not every trivial thing to you is unimportant to other people.”

  For some reason his words resonated in my mind. Trivial, that was the word that kept going around and around. I’d missed something; something small, something apparently insignificant, but which in itself was an important clue. Perhaps it wasn’t small or insignificant, perhaps it was just trivial to me. What was there about Johnny Edgar that someone who didn’t know him might think was important but w
hich I glossed over as being not worthy of investigation?

  Harry had gone home to see his parents and to find out whether Mary had been able to gather her friends to start on Dioli’s house. I phoned.

  “Hello, Mary,” I said.

  “If you’re after Harold, he’s nose down in what he calls his ‘crampon chest’. It’s a large green wooden box he keeps in the old coal cellar. And sorry, hello, Clyde. Would you like me to fetch him?”

  “Not if it’s a problem, Mary.”

  “It’s no problem at all.”

  A few minutes later, Harry picked up the phone, slightly out of breath. “What did you forget?”

  “Lots of small things it seems. Tell me if this is a bad time or not, but Tom said something that has me wondering.”

  “Uh huh.”

  I took that as a “go ahead”. “Is there anything, no matter how small, about anything I’ve mentioned about Johnny Edgar that you thought odd or interesting and I seemed not to?”

  “You mean apart from him being an orphan, something you mentioned a lot, but not which boys’ home he was in, do you mean?”

  “What?” I nearly shouted it down the phone.

  “Clyde Smith, if you haven’t investigated the possibility that Howard Farrell and Mark Dioli weren’t somehow connected to your mate Johnny Edgar by way of the Petersham Boys’ Home, I might have to trade you in for a new model. Clyde? Clyde … are you there, you big lug?”

  My voice came out in a squeak. “I’m an idiot.”

  “You mean …?”

  “It didn’t cross my mind, Harry.”

  “Oh …”

  There was a moment of silence, I could hear him waiting for me to speak.

  “Harry?”

  “Yes, my love?”

  He didn’t say that to me too often at all, endearments were not part of his general vocabulary. He saved them up for special occasions.

  “Please tell me I’m a fool?” I said.

  He laughed and then I heard he’d moved somewhere out of hearing of his mother.

  “No, I won’t say that, because I don’t believe it for one instant. But, if you want me to make-believe, then perhaps tonight I can …?”

  “You need an excuse?”

  He burst out laughing. “No, but Mother’s hovering. I’ll be back in the office at four thirty to get everything ready for my induction meeting with the new group. Will you be there?”

  “No, sorry. I’m going to catch up with Craig and then meet the usher from the Boomerang to see if he recognises the sketch of our killer, and then I’ve arranged to meet with Luka there, at the baths. What time will you finish?”

  “Seven, I suppose?”

  “I’ve invited him to dinner. Will you join us?”

  “One sec, Clyde,” he said and then covered the receiver. “Mother? What are your arrangements for dinner this evening?”

  Her reply was muffled.

  “There seems to be something planned,” he said a minute or two later. “Mark has invited everyone out for dinner at that Chinese restaurant you like so much at Bondi Junction.”

  “The Sun Si Gai?”

  “That’s the one.”

  My heart fell a little. I loved the place and we hadn’t been for ages.

  “I can tell him I’ve already made other arrangements if it’s important?”

  “Well, seeing I’ve invited Luka, I thought I’d cook up something special.”

  “I’m sure Mark will be just as happy without me. I’ll tell him I’d already made arrangements. Any excuse for one of your special meals, Clyde.”

  I smiled. “All right, then, I’ll see you at around seven. We’ll eat around seven thirty if that’s all right with you.”

  “See you then, sweet man.”

  “I’ll give you sweet,” I said with a chuckle.

  “Then make sure there’s no asparagus with dinner,” he said and then hung up in my ear.

  I loved his out-of-the-blue smutty talk … far too much!

  *****

  Tom returned while I was making tea. I saw him park his car on the other side of the road through our kitchenette window, which I threw open and then whistled loudly. He looked up and I mimed, pointing into my mouth. It was half past three.

  He gave me a thumbs up and then disappeared out of view under the awning that covered the entrance to our shop. I hadn’t missed the bunch of flowers in his hand, which had mysteriously disappeared when he eventually came into my office with a paper bag containing two custard tarts, bought from the milk bar across the road. It often stocked pastries and cakes.

  “The flowers were for me?” I asked.

  “What flowers? You’re imagining things, Clyde,” he replied, unable to meet my eye, but blushing.

  It was Harry who’d alerted me to the blossoming romance between our shared factotum and Miss Evans who worked in the employment agency downstairs and who babysat Baxter if all three of us had to go out at the same time unexpectedly. I realised it explained his newly acquired car. It made me smile and I winked at him.

  “What?”

  “Nothing,” I replied. “Tea?”

  “Sure thing.” He poured while I went through my notes again.

  “The cat?” He opened his wallet and passed me a folded five-pound note. I put it in my billfold and returned two-pound notes to him.

  “I owe you five bob,” he said.

  “Keep it, Tom. Flowers are expensive, and consider it an invest­ment in your future happiness.”

  He half-scowled at me over his custard tart, from which he’d just taken an enormous bite. A glint of pleasure showed in his eyes. I knew he hadn’t had a girlfriend before, and Miss Evans was a hardworking, pleasant young woman. I’d known her parents for years.

  “Tomorrow morning, I’m going to the gym to try to recruit some of my pals to see if I can talk them into being decoys.”

  He had his daily agenda on a clipboard. It was marked into three columns and divided horizontally in half-hour blocks from eight in the morning until seven in the evening. I noticed he’d already filled in a few things for both Harry and himself. Column three, which was mine, was empty.

  “What time, Clyde?”

  “I’ll get there at nine, that’s when the early birds start to arrive. Might do a bit of mat training while I’m there, so block me out until half past ten. Then at eleven I’ll catch up with Steve Davidovic.”

  “Who’s he again?”

  “The bloke who witnessed the murder, remember? Used to be a cop, but he’s working as an accountant at Lowes these days. I wanted to check in on him and see he’s okay. There’s another reason too, Tom. It would always be handy to have a backup with senior detective experience if we get overloaded with those no jobs too big or too small cases.”

  Tom’s scowl turned to a grin when I winked at him. “And after that?”

  “I’ll be back here, no later than midday. I’ve asked Billy Tancred to find something out for me while he’s at the Children’s Court tomorrow morning. His application hearing should be done by half past twelve. I’m expecting him to call me.”

  “Children’s Court?”

  I told Tom about my morning. He was gobsmacked. Perhaps it was because he was younger than I, but he was far more prepared to be open-minded about what Luka’s letter had revealed. I ended up by telling him what Harry had said about the boys’ home.

  “Why didn’t I think of that?” he said. “It’s something one of us should have picked up early on.”

  “Well, Harry did, Tom, but he assumed we’d investigated it already.”

  “So, Mr. Tancred’s going to ask to have a look at court records tomorrow?”

  “If there was an assignment to an orphanage or an institution, it will be on record.”

  “And if, by chance, your friend Johnny was also at Petersham Boys’ Home, Clyde?”

  “Mark Dioli’s too young to have been there at the same time as, but there are two other people we could ask.”

  “Howa
rd Farrell?”

  “I knew I hired you for more than your devastating ways with women, Tom.”

  “Please, Clyde,” he said in the most exasperated tone, rolling his eyes.

  We both laughed. “And there’s also that scumbag, Greyson. He’s in protective custody at Long Bay right now, but as he’s petrified of what might happen to him if he ever gets moved into the general population at the jail he’ll tell me what I want to know.”

  “If, Clyde.”

  “Yes, Tom. If—and it’s a big if. There are half-a-dozen orphanages in and around Sydney. It’d be one hell of a coincidence, but I’ve learned during my life that nothing’s worth dismissing out of hand.”

  “You mean like Luka Praz’s visions?”

  I know my mouth flapped open. Hoist by my own petard.

  “You’ve been listening to that Harry Jones way too much, Tom.”

  “Or not enough, by the look on your face.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  “Are you sure, Craig?”

  “Never surer, Clyde. But as I said, I haven’t seen him in years.” Craig had recognised the man in Art’s sketch almost the moment I’d shown him the photo I’d taken of it.

  I’d finished explaining why I’d pissed off so unceremoniously on Boxing Day at my own party. He’d laughed and told me that it was so typical of me no one really cared.

  “How long did he come here for? I mean not hours in the day, but over how long a period?”

  “Only about three months, Clyde. It was nearly four years ago. I remember exactly because it was when I had the railings last painted and the silly bastard hadn’t read the signs and had sat on one. He was so hairy I had to get the painter back again to clean it off with turps and then repaint it. He was noticeable mainly because he was so … odd. Popular in the steam room though.”