by Garry Disher
The worst part was working with trash. He found Sugarfoot Younger waiting outside the front gate, his fleshy face perplexed by Placida’s squawk on the intercom.
****
Ten
Sugarfoot nodded hello, keeping it cool, letting Bauer know he wasn’t fazed. He took in the dark cord trousers and the ribbed blue pullover under a short leather jacket, the pale hair cut close to the scalp, the shadows like gashes in Bauer’s hollow cheeks.
But Bauer ignored him and punched numbered keys next to the intercom. The electric lock disengaged. Bauer said, ‘Please go in, my friend.’
Sugarfoot felt like sneering. Bauer looked tough, until you heard that stupid accent. ‘Ta,’ he said, entering the front garden.
He let Bauer go ahead of him down a brick path to the front door. It was plain and solid, with no knocker or buzzer, only another set of numbered keys. Sensing movement, he glanced up. A security camera was trained on him. He looked at the windows on either side of the door. They were barred, but Sugarfoot wouldn’t mind betting there were also electric eyes everywhere. Bauer was probably like Ivan in that respect-had a consuming sense of security and survival. ‘Nice place,’ he said.
Bauer ignored him and entered another code. The front door clicked open and he stood back and said again, ‘Please go in, my friend.’
Sugarfoot stepped into the house. The hallway was cold and smelt of furniture polish. He’d barely taken two steps when he heard the click of paws on the wooden floor and a dog emerged from the shadows. It crouched, utterly still, observing him. Sugarfoot held his breath. Among the many things Ivan had warned him about was Bauer’s killer dog, a Rhodesian Ridgeback. His hand slipped instinctively inside his coat.
‘Keep still,’ Bauer said softly. Then more sharply, ‘Down!’
Sugarfoot began to drop.
‘Not you,’ Bauer said, and Sugarfoot saw the dog lie flat and baleful on the floor.
‘Not a bad dog,’ Sugarfoot said.
Bauer regarded him expressionlessly for a moment and Sugarfoot wondered if he’d offended the man. ‘Don’t upset him,’ Ivan had said. ‘Just watch and learn and do as he says.’ Sugarfoot tried to meet Bauer’s eyes.
Suddenly Bauer smiled, a slight relaxation of his facial muscles, and said, ‘So. You are here to help me with your brother’s problems.’
Sugarfoot cleared his throat. ‘Ivan said this bird at Calamity Jane’s been skimming off the top.’
Bauer nodded. ‘Come in. Sit for a minute. Would you like something to drink?’
Surprised, Sugarfoot said, ‘Got any Corona?’
‘Corona,’ said Bauer oppressively.
‘Yeah, you know, it’s this beer.’
‘Sorry, no.’
‘Oh well, give us a Fosters, whatever,’ Sugarfoot said.
Bauer barked, ‘Placida!’
Sugarfoot heard footsteps. He looked along the corridor toward the back of the house. A young, dark-haired woman had appeared. She was meek and subservient and excessively still.
‘A bottle of beer for our guest. I will have mineral water.’
The woman disappeared and Sugarfoot followed Bauer into a sitting room. The carpet was sombre, the curtains thick. A massive sideboard faced a suite of black leather armchairs. There were no books or pictures, only a hunting magazine on a low glass coffee table.
Sugarfoot thought about the woman. According to Ivan, Bauer had ordered her through a mail-order bride catalogue. She was more servant than wife. Bauer kept her shut away here, dependent on him for a few dollars to send home to her family. Ivan reckoned Bauer was recreating the life he’d had in South Africa, without the risk of prosecution under some immorality act. Sugarfoot lost Ivan at that point: it all sounded complicated, like something on Sixty Minutes.
He looked at Bauer. ‘How do you reckon on doing it?’
‘Doing what?’ Bauer said.
‘Throwing a scare into this woman,’ Sugarfoot said.
Bauer held up his hand. ‘Wait.’ He looked past Sugarfoot to the door. ‘Put the drinks on the coffee table. You may listen to the radio in the kitchen.’
Jesus, Sugarfoot thought. Poor bloody bitch.
When Placida was gone, Bauer said, ‘We will go there and we will talk to her.’
He wouldn’t say more than that. Sugarfoot drank his beer quickly, wanting to get this over with. You don’t exactly yarn over a beer with the Bauers of this world.
Sugarfoot found it all a bit shadowy. He knew that Bauer worked for the Sydney outfit, which had fingers in several pies-drugs, gambling, kickbacks, places like Calamity Jane’s- but he couldn’t quite work out the chain of command. Bauer was sort of in charge, but you wouldn’t exactly call Ivan a member of staff. He had money invested with them and he managed some rackets for them. The only explanation Ivan would give him was that, in this game, the left hand doesn’t know what the right hand is doing, and you don’t ask questions.
Sugarfoot put down his glass. Bauer said immediately, ‘We will go now.’
Sugarfoot drove them in his Customline. As they wound through the streets of St Kilda, he dropped a few leading remarks about the V8, the restoration job, where to go for a good rechroming, but Bauer ignored him.
So he raised the Calamity Jane job again, approaching it sideways. ‘There was this bloke,’ he said, ‘I put the frights on a couple of year ago, before I started working with Ivan. Anyway, he threatens to go to the jacks. I said, mention my fucking name, mate, and you’re dead. I said, if you go to the cops, I’ll come in your bedroom and kill you while you sleep. That’s fear for you, going to bed not knowing if you’ll see the morning. I go, I’ll burn you and all your family, me, personally. You, I said, your daughters, especially your daughters, plus that slag you’re married to, every one of youse. I said, you got to sleep sometime, pal, you can’t fucking stay awake twelve months of the year. Work it out for yourself, I said. What’s more important, keeping up your payments or waking up one morning with a hole in your head?’ He paused. ‘Worked,’ he said, nodding his head.
There was silence. Bauer stirred. He said deadeningly, ‘You talk too much.’
Yeah well, fuck you. Sugarfoot cornered the Customline and pulled up at the kerb. Calamity Jane’s resembled a western bordello, complete with a red clapboard facade and Wild West decor and writing. On summer nights the girls lounged on the iron lace balcony in saloon-style garters, ribbons and corsets, hooting invitations to passing men and insults at women. A number of signs were tacked to the wall near the front door: ‘Private Suites’, ‘Adult Movies’, ‘B amp;D’, ‘Waterbeds’. The word ‘Aids’ in ‘Sex Aids’ had been painted out and the word ‘Appliances’ substituted. Sugarfoot had an image of doing it with a Mixmaster.
They went in. There was nobody in the front room. Whenever he came here for a freebie, Sugarfoot tried to place the smells: cheap perfume, cleaning fluids, incense, no trouble there, but under it all was a faint, troubling smell he supposed was sex itself.
‘Yes, gentlemen?’
They turned around. A young Thai woman stood in the doorway of a room along the corridor. Then she recognised them and her professional expression disappeared and she looked afraid.
‘We want to see Ellie,’ Bauer said.
She went upstairs. Two minutes later a well-dressed, middle-aged woman came slowly down the stairs. She stopped on the last step, saw Bauer, and paled.
‘We want to talk to you,’ Bauer said.
She looked at them, nodded briefly, and turned to go up again. They followed her to a room at the back. It was furnished with a king-size waterbed, angled mirrors and a mohair rug. A small open door revealed an ensuite bathroom.
Bauer turned to Sugarfoot, said, ‘Do not speak. Do not interfere, just watch,’ and pushed the woman onto the bed.
Sugarfoot watched him take a thin nylon rope from his pocket. He bound the woman’s ankles and wrists, bent back her knees, and looped a noose around her neck. If she struggled or straightened her legs a fract
ion, the noose would tighten and slowly strangle her. Even as Sugarfoot watched, the woman began to choke. She struggled against it, which only increased the risk.
Bauer placed his face near hers. ‘You are dirt,’ he said. ‘You are nothing. You have been extracting a percentage for yourself each week, am I right?’
Sugarfoot gathered from the woman’s noises that she was assenting. He saw that she had wet herself.
‘We are short by seven thousand dollars,’ Bauer said. ‘You will repay that, with interest, yes?’
Again the woman gurgled.
‘You will work for it, here,’ Bauer went on. ‘Yes?’
The woman nodded her head, moved her legs, and blacked out.
‘Release her,’ Bauer said.
Sugarfoot bent down and fumbled at the knots, feeling oddly disturbed and excited by the coldness, the professionalism. Bauer was mad, no risk, but Jesus, he knew his stuff.
He heard taps being turned on in the ensuite bathroom. Bauer was washing his hands.
****
Eleven
Pedersen arrived twenty minutes late. He came into Wyatt’s room at the Gatehouse bringing with him a smell of Chinese food and industrial toxins. He shook Wyatt’s hand, crossed immediately to the window, and prowled the perimeter of the room. Habit, Wyatt thought. Pedersen was thirty-five and had spent half his life in small spaces-cells and cheap rented rooms.
Pedersen finally sat on the edge of the bed and crossed one leg over the other. He wore an oiled black japara, jeans, thick socks and-a vain touch-expensive, soft ankle boots. A John Deere cap was pushed back on his head. Wyatt heard keys chime on a key-ring on his belt. Pedersen had the smallest mouth Wyatt had ever seen on anyone, and a plain, forgettable face, but he seemed to be harder and more alert than Wyatt remembered. Perhaps, like many ex-cons, Pedersen had built up his body in prison and maintained it when he got out.
‘Beer? Scotch?’ Wyatt said. He was drinking tea.
‘Got any mineral water? My guts.’
Wyatt tensed at that. He opened the little refrigerator. ‘Soda.’
‘That’ll do,’ Pedersen said.
He reached, and Wyatt grabbed the outstretched arm and pushed the sleeve up above the elbow.
Pedersen jerked back, tugging at the sleeve. ‘Fuck off, Wyatt. I went off it five years ago. Cold turkey. And I’ve gone off the booze.’
Wyatt held out the bottle of soda. Pedersen took it, his face tight. ‘Where’re the others?’ he asked.
‘On their way.’
Pedersen drained the little soda bottle. Wyatt said nothing, wondering what Pedersen would do. He never felt the strain of waiting, of long silences. Pedersen scowled, as though he knew he had to start sounding convincing and resented it. He’s fresh out of gaol, Wyatt thought, and if he’s working again already it’s because he needs the funds or he wants to prove to himself it was a fluke he got caught.
Pedersen looked at him sourly. ‘You got me here early’
‘Fill me in. The woman, the money, everything.’
‘She knows the money’s there,’ Pedersen said, his voice bored. ‘She can’t get at it, so she hires herself a pro.’
‘Like you.’
‘I’m good, Wyatt. Unlucky, that’s all.’
Wyatt nodded. It was true that Pedersen was good. And, like all the others, he explained everything in terms of good or bad luck. ‘What I’m getting at is, how come this classy female lawyer takes a pro aside and asks him to crack her partner’s safe?’
Pedersen shrugged. ‘Nothing surprises me.’
‘Try’
Pedersen breathed out heavily, as though bored. ‘She doesn’t seem bent,’ he said finally. ‘I’d say this is a one-off job for her.’
There was a knock on the door. ‘Damn,’ Wyatt said. He got up and opened it and stood back as Hobba and Anna Reid entered the room.
‘Nippy out,’ Hobba said, hunching his shoulders and rubbing his hands together. He seemed to be unsettled by the Reid woman’s proximity and luminous looks. After introducing her he sat in the chair in the corner of the room, his bulky frame consuming it.
Wyatt ignored him and watched Anna Reid. She examined the room and nodded briefly at Pedersen. Then, regarding Wyatt expressionlessly, she unbuttoned a bulky, broad-shouldered leather jacket. When she turned around, looking for somewhere to hang it, her black hair swung with the movement, gleaming with light. She smelt of shampoo and scented soap. She was tall, and Wyatt had an impression of physical and mental agility. Saying nothing, he took the jacket from her and draped it over the back of a chair. She nodded guardedly and sat far apart from Pedersen on the edge of the bed.
Hobba opened his tin and fumbled for a mint, then offered the tin. ‘Anyone? Anna?’
Her look said he had to be joking. She turned to Wyatt. ‘I had to cancel something to come here. I don’t know anything about you, but they say you’re good, so it looks like I’ve got no choice.’ She hesitated. ‘I’ve put myself on the line, I’ve handed you a dream of a job, now it’s your turn.’
Her voice was low and deep, tinged with the impatience Wyatt had noticed that afternoon. Perhaps she was starting to regret this, was measuring him by his down-at-heel partners. He said, ‘Explain the job to me.’
‘Haven’t the others told you?’
‘I want to hear it from you.’
The voice was low and bitter. ‘I’m in trouble. I owe someone a lot of money, I can’t pay him, and he’s threatening me.’
Wyatt watched her. He could see a bleakness under the sleek exterior. ‘Tell me about the money,’ he said. ‘We don’t want cheques.’
‘Don’t worry, it’s cash,’ she said. ‘This isn’t the sort of deal Finn puts through his books.’
‘But three hundred thousand dollars? That’s some kickback.’
‘We’re talking about a ten-storey office block in the city,’ she snapped, ‘not someone’s bathroom extension.’
Wyatt nodded. ‘All right. But who’s getting the money? Why cash? Banks report large transactions.’
‘What do you care? I don’t imagine your share is going anywhere legitimate.’
Hobba spoke for the first time. ‘Groundwork.’
They were all looking at her now and she curled her lip. ‘Oh, I am relieved,’ she said, putting her hand to her heart. ‘Just imagine if I’d put myself in the hands of amateurs. The money goes to a fucking charity, all right? They go to the bank and say they’ve had a successful fund-raising. Then it’s moved sideways.’
Hobba and Pedersen grinned, enjoying this, but Wyatt kept pushing. ‘Split four ways, we get seventy-five thousand each. Not bad, but not huge, either. Are you going to risk everything for that?’
‘Until Max brought you and Hobba in on this,’ she snapped, ‘my share was twice as much.’ She brought her voice under control. ‘It pays my debt, so I’ll take a chance.’
‘Tell me about Finn.’
‘He’s a sleaze. He gloats. I’d like to rip him off.’
Then she smiled. It held a challenge, as if she were daring them to question her motive. Wyatt watched her, assessing the personal factor. In his experience, simple greed was a reliable motive, revenge wasn’t. There are well-buried secrets here, he thought, none of them good.
‘Okay,’ he said, still pursuing her, ‘he’s due to hand over three hundred thousand dollars, but someone comes along and rips it off. What’s he going to do?’
‘He can’t do anything. He can’t afford to draw attention to himself. The thing is, he can absorb the loss. He won’t like it but that’s what he’ll do.’
There was a pause. Wyatt said, ‘Describe what happens on Friday.’
‘The money arrives lunchtime. Finn hands it over late that evening, about ten o’clock.’
‘Today’s Monday. Doesn’t leave us much time.’
‘So let’s get on with it.’
‘How do we do the hit?’ Wyatt said.
She stared at him. ‘Why ask me? Ask Max, he’s th
e safe expert.’
This will be her plan, Wyatt thought, watching Pedersen. Pedersen cleared his throat. ‘Anna turns off the burglar alarms when she leaves work on Friday. We break in at six, six-thirty, cutting the alarm system so it doesn’t look like an inside job, blow the safe, then split in different cars to confuse possible witnesses. I take the money to my place and we divvy up there.’
No thanks, Wyatt thought-potential there for a sweet cross. He automatically rejected plans that others made. The only plans he relied on were his own. He looked at Hobba, Pedersen and the Reid woman, assessing them quickly. Every job was the same: there was someone he could trust, someone he’d never met, someone who could finger him, someone who might try a cross. The ones to watch were Pedersen and Anna Reid. There didn’t seem to be anything between them, but if they did cross him, he’d kill them. Pedersen would know that.
‘Well?’ Anna said.
‘No good.’ He began counting on his fingers. ‘Security patrols, noise, people on the premises after dark.’ He looked at her. ‘Plus which, you’re an automatic suspect.’
They were silent. Then mints rattled in Hobba’s tin. ‘How about we intercept it?’ he asked, looking around at them.
‘Intercept?’ Pedersen said.
‘Yeah, you know, find out the route when it’s being delivered or after it’s handed over, block the road, grab the cash, you ride by on your Honda… ‘
Wyatt was watching Anna Reid. Her face was irritated now, but for a moment there’d been something like panic there. He heard her say, ‘What’s with all this macho stuff? Do you want the whole world to see? If they use a security service, are you going to shoot it out with them? God!’ she said, shaking her head. She looked at Wyatt. ‘What about you? Have you been watching too many films?’
Her green eyes were challenging and complicated and unimpressed, and he wondered what exactly was eating her. ‘Only re-runs of Get Smart,’ he said. ‘Yeah, I agree, a street snatch is out. What we do is hit your office Friday afternoon when you’re at work.’