Shard sat down at the hippie’s table and leaned across, poking a finger into the hippie’s chest.
“I want a word with you.”
An eye opened, two eyes. A hand rubbed at them. “Who’re you, then?”
“One guess.”
“Oh, the fella from where was it.”
“London.”
“That’s it.” Eyes focussed through the drug cloud.
“I said, I want a word.”
“I’m listening.”
“Not in here.”
“Why not?”
“Never mind for now. Just come outside.”
“I’m not moving.” Fear now sounded loud and clear in the hippie’s voice. He looked around at the other customers, as wan as he. “I’m not well. I’m tired. I’m not bloody moving, I tell you.”
“You’re moving, all right.” Shard’s hand dropped beneath the table. “I wear an ankle-holster, and I’m reaching for my gun. I could kill you right now, nice and quick and certain, and make a clear getaway before any of these bastards came out of their trips and ticked over. You know that as well as I do. See sense for once in your life, why not?”
The eyes glistened, opening wide. Behind the mat of hair, the flesh was dead white and puffy. The hippie looked all round, saw no help anywhere, and got slowly to his feet, staring at Shard.
Shard jerked his head towards the door to the street. “Out. We’ll take a walk.” He ushered the shaking hippie in front of his gun’s hidden presence, out into the street. They walked away and as they walked Shard spoke quietly, close up against the hippie.
“I had visitors, last night.”
“Oh”
“Two men. Petersen and Bunt were the names.”
“So why tell me?”
“You know them, don’t you?”
“Me? No, I don’t know them. Should I?”
“Yes. You put them onto me. After I was sick. You got suspicious, right? I wasn’t used to Christmas cake.”
“I didn’t do anything.”
“Maybe you didn’t, not physically. But you put a word in. You’d better tell me. I can still kill you.”
“You wouldn’t do that.”
“Tell me why not.”
“Because,” the hippie said sulkily, “you’re a cop…aren’t you?”
“That’s the conclusion you came to, is it? After our last meeting?” There was no response. Shard went on, “So you got panicky and you told someone what you suspected. That someone may or may not have been Petersen or Bunt direct, but whoever it was, that person led eventually to those two bright bastards. And you, friend, are the link. You, friend, are one link in a chain of pushers, probably of importers. Now, that sort of thing carries a long, long sentence. If I should propel you towards the nearest nick, you won’t see freedom again till you’re a bloody sight older than you are now. This, you know. I won’t stress it. Well?”
“So you are a cop?”
“Yes. And I mean to know who you gave that information to. If you tell me, we may be able to make a bargain.”
The hippie said, “Look, I never told anyone anything. But…”
“Well? But what, friend, but what?”
“Suppose I had done that. Suppose what you say is right, copper. What sort of bargain could you offer anyone?”
“No charge preferred…in return for information freely given. I’ll tell you something else, honestly and frankly: I’m from Britain and I have no jurisdiction here, but I have certain fairly formidable strings to pull. When I give you my word, you can be sure that word won’t fail you. Well?”
“You keep being personal…saying you. I said, I’m not involved in anything. I’m talking hypothetically.”
“All right,” Shard agreed. “Go on talking hypothetically.”
“I will. This person who…accepts your word. What happens to him, when the others get to hear he’s grassed? You’re a copper. You know what happens to noses.”
“There’s always police protection.”
The hippie laughed, a hollow sound of disdain. “Get lost!”
“Just think about it. Hypothetically, of course. This person might even be repatriated if that was what he wanted. With a nice clean record. It’s worth bearing in mind. The world over, the police are grateful for help. And all I’m asking for is a name. A genuine one, of course. False information would make me vindictive.” They walked on, no more talk. Shard was leaving the hippie to digest the facts. They walked past pools of yellow light spewed from cafes and bars and restaurants, hot in the close Sydney summer night, through variegated cooking smells, garlic, fish, exotic meats. Frying everywhere. Shard was feeling a fair degree of hope that the hippie was softening up, but he had a shock when they had moved on into a dark section of boarded-up shop windows, an area ripe for new development: at the lip of a side alley, the hippie struck. A fist swung into the side of Shard’s head and sent him reeling with sheer surprise as much as hurt. He staggered, but didn’t fall, and when he recovered his balance he heard the running feet in the alley, which was black with unrelieved night. Shard went in fast, stumbling over refuse, bricks and rubble. From the top of a high wall to his left, a cat spat and screamed, reminding him of the cat, the quiet cat up at the Gilder station, not so many nights earlier. He stopped to listen for other sounds: the running was no longer in his ears, but the hippie had to be there for the alley was a dead end by the look of it, no lighted street ahead, just blackness, and probably another brick wall. This case seemed always to end in blank brick walls! Shard moved on again, dead slow now, trying to make no sound, alert for sudden attack, perhaps from some concealed doorway on his route. He heard distant sounds of music, a juke-box kind of sound, pop record noises. Another cat, two cats fighting, mutually, spitting hate. He moved on, sent some metal object clattering, stopped again. The surroundings were eerie: Shard’s nerves were on edge. The hippie was not, intrinsically, dangerous; but the total darkness made him so.
Useless to stand still: the hippie would simply wait wherever he was concealed, till workaday Sydney was on the move again — or maybe he knew his way out. Shard crept on again. He had gone something like ten more yards into the dark unknown when he went down on his face, tripped by something unidentifiable. Before he could scramble up, the hippie was there, the hippie who had been waiting for this. The hippie, before running back the way he had come, put the boot in.
*
Shard wasn’t out for more than ten minutes: he had a tough constitution and the hippie had been in a bit of a hurry to get away. Hadn’t even taken Shard’s gun. Parts of Shard hurt badly: face, thighs, genitals. And head. He felt very sick. He staggered, lurching from wall to wall, back along the alley towards the street, made to his left towards light and night crowds when he had cleared the alley. His brain seemed dulled but he was able to curse himself with bitterness: he was a bum copper. The whole of this thing had gone badly and it had been his fault. Time to quit, perhaps. Hedge was going to be livid, that was for sure! Just as he came to the pools of yellow light, he felt the world go black again, black with whirls of brilliance, and he passed out in a heap on the pavement.
A crowd gathered: an ambulance was called; before it reached Shard a cop car had stopped. Coming round in the ambulance he was shushed at like a drunk. In the hospital, an examination by a doctor, then bed and bandages with a sedative. In the morning he felt okay to face the police questioning. After the preliminaries he was left in peace till the brass arrived in the form of the Commissioner of Police in person.
“Hear you don’t want to lay charges against anybody?”
“No.”
“Why not, eh?”
Shard said with quiet patience, “Stirring up hornet’s-nests, in this case, wouldn’t be a good thing. Let’em lie.”
The brass stared pugnaciously. “You’re a bloody nuisance, Mr. Shard.”
“I’m — ”
“Look, we don’t want you here. We just don’t — that is, not after the Gilder inque
st. That’s tomorrow. Reckon we can’t handle our own crime, do you?”
“No, I — ”
“Take my advice. It’s well meant.” The police chief leaned over the bed, grim and determined. “Get out after the inquest, Mr. Shard. Back to London. There, you are wanted — badly. Canberra’s been tearing its bloody hair over you. Look, you had those orders for London. Time you obeyed them — right?”
Shard felt deflated, useless, a failure. He said, “Yes, right. Things have come unstuck — I’m sorry. I’ll fly off home. But just one favour first.”
“Anything to get rid of you. What is it?” Shard said, “A touch of publicity. Just a word that’ll get around, that’s all. A word that the interfering bastard from London is pulling out. You’ll do that?”
“Why should I?”
“I hope you’ll find out, in time. Just do it to speed a pom on his way! Drop the word as to which flight I’m taking, too.”
*
Good-bye Australia, Shard thought as the airliner lifted off from Mascot next day. Somewhere broadly below his flight path lay the Gilder station, with the bodies in the morgue at Narromine, waiting burial. Shard had left a sworn statement behind as to that night’s events, and his involvement in that, as well as the question of his personal appearance in court one day, was still to-ing and fro-ing between the High Commission, the New South Wales legislature, and the police authorities. After coming out of hospital the day before, decently dressed again in his own clothing sent down from Canberra, he had been flown to Narromine for the inquest, a formal affair at which a verdict of murder by a person or persons unknown was an obvious enough conclusion to the proceedings. It hadn’t taken long. Shard pondered on that sad inquest: the only relative in Australia, an aunt of Gilder’s living in Brisbane, had seemed in a state of total shock. The station hands, clumsy and ill-at-ease, had looked wary of Detective
Chief Superintendent Shard from the Metropolitan Police: almost, they might have been attending an inquest on him. They’d been lucky!
More glumness settled in, more feelings of failure. Either his message hadn’t penetrated where it was meant to, or he’d been barking up the wrong tree from the start: in any case, the sharp-faced man was certainly not aboard the plane.
*
Always, in the trade, the watchers were also the watched: the toughs were when necessary dealt with by those who were even tougher. It was a natural law of the business, and another law was not to forgive double failure. That night Petersen and Bunt were found in a hideout in north Sydney. Not by the police, who had been given an early slip. Found by Tuball in person and four strong men. Run to earth rather than just found: it had been a manhunt, much enjoyed by Tuball. At the killing, he personally became a hound, going for the throat. Petersen and Bunt were held by the strong men and Tuball used the knife. He used it again on the stomachs, his eyes bright as the blood flowed dark red. It was a classic Sydney killing: weighted sacks and deep water, a fast boat in the darkness, and it wouldn’t really matter if the bodies were found eventually. The organisation was watertight: no provable links — and publicity could be a help in maintaining discipline.
CHAPTER X
“You’ve been wasting your time,” Hedge said angrily. Shard framed a rude answer but didn’t give it: he was feeling edgy. Leaving the airliner at Heathrow, he had phoned home to talk to Beth and there had been no answer. Now, he watched Hedge dab at a streaming nose with a handkerchief: Hedge had a filthy cold. Shard, having plunged into London’s winter chill and damp, felt in danger of joining him. “Simply wasting your time.”
“No, I haven’t. How else would you have found out about Tanya Gorukin, Hedge?”
“Oh — ”
“What about the body, the corpse snatch?”
“What about it?”
“Any suspects?”
Hedge glowered. “None, as I understand from Hesseltine — ”
“So the Yard’s taken over, Hedge?”
“On that score, yes. Policemen were involved. But it’s still being handled with
full security cover — I was able to insist on that, thank God! Naturally, Hessel-tine’s not actively in on the Soviet business. He just offers his damned advice.”
Hedge had briefed him on that. “What’s the progress?”
“Negotiations are proceeding.”
“I see. Hedge, who do you think did this job?”
Hedge spread his hands. “How can I possibly say? I would naturally assume it was…well, either the Russians making sure of getting what they wanted — and I hardly consider that seriously, of course — or it was someone who didn’t want the Russians to have the body. If so, why?”
“For a start, Hedge, how about this: someone doesn’t want Barclay and Elgood back from Russia. Barclay and Elgood could talk when they get back. Right, Hedge? Someone doesn’t want them to.”
“It’s a point. As a matter of fact…Hesseltine’s already made it.”
“And you don’t agree?”
Hedge snapped, “I haven’t said so.” Shard looked at him narrowly, suspecting a strongish element of determined non-co-operation with Assistant Commissioner Hesseltine. For his own money, Shard backed the Barclay and Elgood theory. He said so.
“Why?”
Shard shrugged. “I’ll be hoping to find that out, Hedge.”
“Oh, damn it, don’t talk to me in riddles!”
“Then let me go on handling this my own way, please, Hedge.”
“You don’t seem to have achieved much so far.”
Shard held on to his temper: it was getting more and more difficult a task. He was never a disloyal man, but he wished Assistant Commissioner Hesseltine all the luck in the world in any professional tussle with Hedge. He said, “Well, that’s a matter for debate, certainly. But I’ve a feeling things are going to look up soon.”
“In that way?”
Still obscure, Shard said, “I’m hoping for a shift of the centre of gravity…from Sydney to London. I think it may come. I’ll be watching, personally. In the meantime, if you don’t mind, Hedge, I’m locking up and going home.” The meeting had been arranged for the stamp shop in Seddon’s Way and Hedge was looking as much like a stamp dealer as possible. “I’ve things to do.”
Hedge said, “Ah, yes. Yes.” He seemed smitten by something, something he’d overlooked and was embarrassed on account of it. “Dear me. I’m so sorry. Your wife, Shard.”
Shard loomed over him, face suddenly haggard. “Yes, what is it? Come on!”
“Oh, nothing to alarm you, Shard. But she’s in hospital, Barts. An operation — ”
“When?”
“Yesterday. And all’s well, Shard!”
“What for — this operation?”
“I gather it was to do with — the brain, Shard. A tumour. I’ve been keeping in touch. I spoke to your mother-in-law — Mrs. Micklam. There’s no need to worry, my dear chap — ”
“Get out, Hedge,” Shard said suddenly. “I beg your pardon?” Hedge simply couldn’t believe this.
“I said…oh, never mind, Hedge. I’m sorry. But this is my own private business. Please go. Please go now”
Hedge was offended. “Oh, very well, then, I will.”
He went, pinker than ever, feathers very badly ruffled. He slammed the door behind him. Through it, vaguely, Shard heard some sort of staircase altercation, a right-of-way dispute. Upstairs, Elsie was as in demand as ever. Hedge would never forgive Shard if he was currently being regarded as a satisfied out-going client. Shard dismissed Hedge from his thoughts, riffled through a telephone directory, and rang Barts direct, private wing — he was on PPP. The news was alarming: naturally he could visit, but he must not expect too much, she wouldn’t know him. That was all they would say. Shard opened a cupboard, the door of which was plastered with squared paper bearing stamps, and brought out a bottle. His hand shook badly. He jerked whisky into a tumbler and took it neat and fast, then locked the office and grabbed a taxi.
*
“Don’t!” Mrs. Micklam put her hands over her face: she looked as if she’d been crying for days. “They said she came through well, through the operation I mean.”
“They told me that too — a registrar. Now it’s the after.” They were outside Beth’s private room, waiting in comfortable chairs. Mrs. Micklam had been there, or with Beth, almost all the time. Shard gave an involuntary groan. “You should never have given consent without my knowledge, Mother-in-law.”
“Simon, I had to. It wasn’t easy. Oh God, it wasn’t easy…”
“No. But if she dies…”
“Don’t say that. Please, don’t say that.”
Shard looked at her, saw, through his own distress, her distress. He felt bitter, he felt hatred: but it wasn’t really for her, it was for Hedge, Hedge and the system, the system that turned you into a slave, a robot supposed to be without feeling or emotion, a thing to be manipulated in the interest of the State. To the brass, what did Beth matter? She was a good copper’s encumbrance, that was all. Beth…Shard’s eyes misted and he reached out a hand, clumsily, to his mother-in-law. “I’m sorry,” he said. “But…she didn’t know me, not a flicker. That’s been a shock.”
“I know, dear. But didn’t the doctor tell you?”
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