No Witness, No Case

by Bill Robertson

  Aldrittson flashed a wolfish grin.

  ‘Never let sentiment get in the way of a good victory Spence. Everything you ever suspected about political backstabbing is utterly correct. Now, how’s that diversion scheme coming along?’

  ‘Too early to say. I’ve got some real good irons in the fire and should be in a better position after the weekend. As soon as I have a firm plan, I’ll let you know.’

  ‘Okay Spence, one last thing. You might enjoy this little job. Remember when I first came to you about Santini I told you he had given me a deadline on something.’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘His death didn’t affect that because the material was for Giuseppe Pescaro. I still had to deliver.’

  Johnson interrupted curtly. ‘I told you that messing about with the Mafia is dangerous. I hold to that.’

  ‘Pescaro’s collector was this absolutely drop-dead gorgeous woman, Teresa Santini. I met her last Friday night at Ruffles. I’m seeing her again next Friday, at The Squid’s Legs. Can you be there?’

  ‘What do you want me to do?’

  ‘I want you to check her out – who she is, where she lives, what she does, what’s her background. I want to know everything you can discover about her. Out of ten she’s a twelve!’

  ‘You’re not telling me you’ve got the hots for a Mafia sheila?’ Johnson’s tone conveyed disbelief.

  ‘Only to the extent that I want to get her between the sheets. She’s got me intrigued and she’s very bloody smart. I want to know all about her.’

  ‘Benny, it’s not my place to give you advice, but I will. You’re crazy! You just said Meadows warned you about electoral defeat and here you are talking of pumping a Mafia bitch. You know what I think about the Santini caper and the cops aren’t buying the “blow-out” theory. For Christ’s sake, cool it. Playing with Pescaro is deadly. If he finds out you bumped Santini not only will nothing save you, but your death will be lingeringly slow and excruciatingly painful. Now, listen up – keep away from that bird.’

  Aldrittson gave Johnson a glacial stare. ‘Tell me about the diversion plan. Now.’

  Johnson shook his head in wonderment.

  ‘Okay, but understand this – the risk is huge. No, amend that. Put it in the cata-fucking-strophic category. And, my friend, if it goes tits up, you wear the consequences.’ Aldrittson nodded for him to continue.

  ‘The Russian Mafiya here is restless. They want real money and action but Pescaro’s got most things tied down. I’m thinking of putting the two factions at each other’s throats. It will be a gamble and could get very bloody. If that happens, it will definitely give the cops a headache but my personal advice is, stay away from it. I’m asking you to think very bloody hard about this before you say: “do it”. We’ll talk more about it after the weekend.’

  Aldrittson remained impassive. ‘Find out about the girl. We’ll talk about the other next week. I like the concept, it smacks of rough justice. I’ll think about it though, there might be an alternative. If there’s nothing else from your end, I’ll see you Friday at half seven. Be invisible but find out what you can. I’m off to see my Old Man.’

  ‘Righto Benny. One last thing. If we go with this Mafiya caper, it will cost you big bucks, so think about that too.’

  Aldrittson opened the front door to his parent’s home. Although Jack Aldrittson greeted his son warmly, he seemed subdued. They walked down the hall to the kitchen where Jack turned the TV off.

  ‘You know where everything is – help yourself to a coffee or beer. ‘

  Ben set about building himself a sandwich and coffee.

  Jack watched in silence and eventually said, ‘I see one of your polly mates topped himself. What was that all about?’

  ‘Don’t know really. Came as a shock to all of us. I may have been one of the last to see him alive. Met with him last Wednesday to talk over an alternative power scheme I put up. He agreed to kick in some funding for start-up. He seemed fine then.’ The lies slipped out as smoothly as oil across a pond. ‘His death is the main reason I’m here.’ He brought his coffee and sandwich to the table where his father sipped a beer.

  ‘Baker mentioned he had been working with the New South Wales Environment Protection Authority on illegal dumping. Seems they got quite a scare after that Walwa episode. He told me his crew were working on toxic dumping in Victoria which means we could have difficulties. If New South is on alert it would be foolish to continue dumping there and that also rules out Queensland. You’ve already mentioned the Browne problem, and your additional workload, so we could be under pressure. And just for extras, Pescaro wants Meadows to accept our waste management scheme ASAP. Are you able to draw back on the dumping rate?’

  ‘No way,’ said Jack. ‘Pescaro’s muscle has made our unlawful activity so bloody good demand is spiralling beyond belief. Today everybody wants more of everything. More of anything means extra waste and demand for toxic disposal is constantly increasing too. As a matter of fact, we had three new enquiries this week. I’m beginning to agree with Pescaro – we need to get our scheme legitimised sooner rather than later. Though I am damned if I know the reason behind his pressure, he hasn’t explained that.’

  This was not the response Ben wanted.

  ‘What about South Australia? We don’t seem to be having any ripples there do we?’

  ‘No, I suppose we could up the ante there a bit. But this whole thing is beginning to get me down. We’ve led a charmed life for so long sooner or later things have to go wrong. If not from some bastard dobbing us in, then from some poisonous bloody shit we dumped years ago being traced back to us. Even worse, there are other pricks doing illegal dumping who could bring us unstuck. Did you see that story about arsenic in the bay the other week? Thank Christ it wasn’t ours, but what happened there could happen to us any time and become our nightmare. I appreciate the warning Son because I’ve heard nothing. New South must be keeping really bloody quiet. We need a long term solution real soon. As I said, demand is up to me fuckin’ ears and I have to think twice about knocking people back. Any one of them could get shitty and tip us in. We really do need our scheme approved.’

  ‘Alright Dad, I’ll see what I can do with Meadows. Now, what about Martin Judd, what do you think?’

  ‘Santini trusted him as much as he trusted anyone – very little – but he trained him well and he commended his work to me more than once. For Santini, that was huge. So, I think he’s competent. But Judd doesn’t know about the black stuff. Santini kept that to himself and coded the entries. Like I said, I’m having trouble juggling everything else and doing Santini’s job. Judd hinted a couple of times that he could take the strain, but I don’t want him in if he’s the sort who’ll piss off to the Department of Environment or the cops. That’s my dilemma.’

  ‘Is he married?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Got kids?’

  ‘Yes, three young ‘uns – all at primary school.’

  ‘Has he got ambition?’

  ‘Don’t rightly know. We’ve never talked about that and I can’t say he’s done much to show it. He was a truckie before he took this job so I guess he’s just your average bloke. I don’t think he ever had a crack at starting his own business or anything like that. But,’ said Jack slowly and reflectively, ‘he has shown a flair for this work. I think he’s even surprised himself.’

  ‘Any history, you know, criminal stuff?’

  ‘Don’t think so.’

  ‘Okay. I’ll get one of my friends to look at Judd. Based on what you’ve said, I would give him a fly. Can you last another week?’

  ‘Of course I bloody can.’ Jack sounded irritable. ‘I’m acting now because pressure is building and it’s in a month or two that I won’t be able to manage.’

  Ben changed tack. ‘Have the cops been in touch about Santini’s death? Browne’s too if it comes to that? ‘

  ‘Not recently, no. And it’s been a while since they spoke to me about Danny. Last I heard they
were thinking it was accidental. Fluid dripping on a hot brake drum caught fire…something like that. Nothing’s changed in regard to Santini. As far as I know, they still think a blow-out caused him to lose control. He was just unfortunate. By the way, his funeral’s on Wednesday. Are you going?’

  ‘No. Too busy in the House. Keep me posted on any police enquiries. The minute you hear anything, tell me. I’ll give you a call about Judd early next week. Say hello to Mum, tell her sorry I missed her. Maybe you should tell her to slow down on all that charity work, I never seem to see her these days. Anyway, I’ve got some heavy reading for tomorrow so I better get going. Thanks for the coffee and sanger. Stay well Old Man.’

  Jack gave him a wan smile. His double life with Pescaro was taking its toll. Finding out that Santini had been a “plant” for all those years had snuffed out something vital in him.

  ‘Yeah, right son,’ he said tonelessly, ‘you can see yourself out can’t you?’

  Chapter

  TWENTY-NINE

  The impressive neo-Gothic architecture of St Patrick’s Cathedral, its 104 metre spire a giant finger pointing towards God, was, Pescaro thought, as much a celebration of vision and stamina as it was reverence for a house of worship. It was an entirely appropriate venue for honouring Nardo Santini’s life. Pescaro was pleased that the first little wooden church built on a site bequeathed by Governor La Trobe in 1847 had evolved over ninety years or so to the magnificent structure of today. It had not been easy. Conflict soured the land grant and the gold rush had lured tradesmen away from Melbourne on the prospect of quick riches. In all, three churches were built and demolished before William Wardell’s inspirational 1858 design eventually resulted in the present day cathedral.

  Pescaro saw parallels between the Cathedral’s evolution and Santini’s life: humble origins, constant improvement and adherence to a single purpose. Teresa had organised everything perfectly: hymns, flowers, attendants, press notices, obituary, interstate Families, airport limos and superb catering after the service. It would be a fitting celebration and farewell for a loyal and trusted lieutenant.

  Pescaro focussed on Teresa. On Saturday morning she had given him Aldrittson’s ministerial briefing. She hadn’t stayed long and appeared preoccupied. Today he had watched her pinning down last minute details for the funeral – she seemed her usual efficient self. Before going home she mentioned she had matters to discuss with him after the funeral. They agreed nine o’clock Friday morning. Pescaro knew she was ready to talk about the letters.

  For him, that matter was not complex. Angelina and Alfredo had disobeyed “the code” and paid the price. Angelina’s death had hurt him grievously. Indeed, so deep was the wound he had never contemplated another serious relationship. There had been plenty of women for sex, but nothing else. Feeling so utterly betrayed by Angelina he had deliberately cauterised his emotions. Although time eventually dimmed the pain and softened his anger, his memories of Angelina remained vibrant. At the time, he had also felt deeply for Adriana Marchese. She had had no idea of Alfredo’s infidelity and even the presence of her little daughter, Teresa, had not prevented her from taking her own life.

  From then on, Giuseppe had committed himself to caring for Teresa. At arm’s length he had done so through the Benedettis and believed it worked well. He watched Teresa grow into an intelligent, beautiful and diligent young woman brimming with bright ideas. If she had weaknesses, they were her honesty and insatiable curiosity. And that curiosity was an amazing resource. It caused her to question practices, policies, ideas, systems and techniques so that she constantly sought to refine and improve whatever she was doing.

  He knew little about her love life but Family members had reported she was discreet. He had never been aware of any serious liaison – it seemed she had not met the right man.

  He fully expected his revelations to shock Teresa. Murder is an ugly subject – messy and awful. His tale would be especially painful because it was about her parents and her loss.

  He, of course, had never expected or believed that his Angelina would be unfaithful. They had owned a beach house at Rye where, apart from weekends and holidays together, he occasionally would take Santini fishing. He vividly remembered the warm September weekend in 1975. A meeting planned in Melbourne was unexpectedly cancelled so he decided to take advantage of the good weather and go fishing. He and Santini arrived at the beach house at 4:30 a.m. on the Saturday to start their day on the bay. Angelina had flown to Sydney on Friday afternoon for a weekend with friends.

  He and Santini had been surprised to find Alfredo Marchese’s car in the driveway. The house was unlocked and when they entered, Pescaro instantly knew his betrayal. He breathed in Angelina’s perfume and saw the mix of clothing lying around the lounge room. He had walked quietly to the bedroom and there, asleep in the shadows, the two naked lovers lay entwined, the room redolent with the musky scent of sex. He backed away and summoned Santini. Together they viewed the sleeping pair in silence and slowly, Santini withdrew his gun, a Browning .38 automatic. He had looked enquiringly at Pescaro for what seemed eternity, then stepped into the room. Pescaro had touched his arm, taken the gun, and walked to the bed.

  He stood beside Angelina as she breathed softly in her sleep. Tears streaked his face. Suddenly, he raised the gun and fired once into Alfredo’s head and, before she fully woke, again into Angelina’s head. Death for both was immediate. Pescaro had wept, both for the deception and for the loss of his beloved Angelina and Alfredo, a man he had called a friend.

  The shots, it seemed, disturbed no one. He and Santini cleaned up and removed all traces of the lovers presence. Alfredo’s car was taken to a Mafia “chop shop.” Two days later, Santini removed the heads, hands and feet from the bodies and personally destroyed them in the AWD destructor at Bayswater. Afterwards, the bodies were stuffed into the boot of a stolen car and driven to Sorrento and abandoned on the foreshore. Pescaro circulated a story that Angelina had walked out and disappeared after a fiery row.

  When Adriana Marchese called a few days after the murders, worried by Alfredo’s absence, Pescaro had faintly implied he might be with Angelina and that she could, if she wished, officially report him missing. He knew Adriana would quickly understand the truth. The Don remained the Don – supreme, powerful and the ultimate dispenser of justice to his world. Even after the bodies were found, the Family remained silent and, within a day or two, Adriana had taken her life.

  Later still, Santini received Angelina’s letters found in Alfredo’s car. Retained by Santini, with several of Alfredo’s letters, they were stored in his strong box. Over time, memory of Angelina faded to the point where it seemed that Pescaro had forever been single. Eighteen months after the murders and following extensive renovation, Pescaro sold his beach house. He never went fishing again.

  Teresa had to know these facts and deal with the consequences. Pescaro was as fond of Teresa as any father could be of a daughter. He truly believed she would become a first class Family mediator and contribute substantially to the wealth of their enterprise. Above all, he believed she was an excellent replacement for Santini. She was sophisticated and at home with the modern Mafia business world. However, as deep as his feelings were, if Teresa could not conform, she was replaceable. Such was the Code.

  Chapter

  THIRTY

  Drummond was tired. Settled with a cold beer by 7:00 p.m., he was watching the Channel 2 news. Wednesday had been another long, hard day. The previous two had flashed by as he worked to unscramble Santini’s codes, yet despite the effort, there had been little progress.

  He sucked on his beer. Thinking about the information he had assembled since Browne’s death convinced him there was reason enough for police to investigate Aldrittson’s firm. The stolen records could certainly help frame an investigation, but their evidentiary value was limited – he was sure they’d be declared inadmissible. Facilitating an enquiry could, therefore, be difficult. Finding a way for Tony to accept the records
without revealing how he got them would be tricky – he was a bloody stickler for doing the right thing.

  Drummond closed his eyes and lay back in the chair thinking. The name Santini drew him sharply from his reverie. He listened as the news reader continued: ‘…and St Patrick’s Cathedral was filled with mourners today for the funeral of Mr Bernardo Santini who died in a collision on Westgate Bridge earlier this month. People have come from all parts of Australia and include many of his former work colleagues at Aldrittson Waste Disposals. Police were also present as many of those attending are believed to be linked with the criminal underworld including Giuseppe Pescaro, Leonardo Falcone and Giacomo Altierre.’ As the story unfolded, the camera panned across scores of men dressed in smart black suits, hand tailored silk shirts and dark glasses. Many wore tough, scowling expressions, designer stubble and excessively short haircuts. Some were slender, others muscled and others, just plain fat. The few women present were stylishly dressed in the latest Italian and German fashions. In the background, the bells of St Patrick’s tolled dolefully.

  The camera halted momentarily on a slim man of average height in his seventies. His hair was thick and silvery, his face tanned, lined and hawk like. Beside him, standing at the top of the steps, was an attractive woman in her early thirties with short dark hair. Dressed in a simple black frock, she looked composed yet bursting with vitality. The hawkish man and beautiful woman were watching eight sturdy pallbearers struggle down the steps towards a gleaming black hearse. The coffin, an elaborate, bronze coloured affair, seemed crushingly heavy. As it tilted towards its destination, a massive wreath of plain white roses on top defied gravity and remained perfectly positioned.

  Behind the hearse, four shining, black, glass-sided Cadillacs formed up to carry flowers. In line behind them, a string of sleek stretch limousines waited to convey mourners to the Fawkner Crematorium.

  The camera moved on and picked out a man Drummond recognised as Jack Aldrittson. He was in the midst of a group and Drummond wondered if he was looking at any of the “special” drivers. It struck him that Santini appeared to be much more than a foreman and office administrator.