by Jon Cleary
“Who did tell Customs about the shipment? That was a pretty substantial loss. I can’t take too many like that.”
“I think it might of been that fucking Malone, the cop from Homicide. He’s a real pain in the arse. We give him one warning, when we dropped that little prick Grime in his pool, when we found out Scungy had been grassing for him. Scungy was on to us, you too.”
She felt a sudden stab of unease. “Me? How?”
“He followed me and Gary one time when we met you. We tried to catch him that night, but he got away from us. We was gunna do him, but that same night someone got to him with the needle. By the time we caught up with him, he was dead. We found him in the entrance to the flats where he lived. So we put him in the car and took him out and dumped him in Malone’s pool. We thought it a bit of a joke at the time, but now I dunno.” He looked more surprised than perturbed, as if doubting his own actions was not usual with him.
“We still don’t know who killed him.”
“There was another one last night, a young guy named Lugos, he worked for Denny Pelong. Same method, needle in the bum.”
“There was a third. A prostitute down in Palmer Street. She knew Lugos, his name was Leroy Lugos. He ran some girls around the Cross. I’m counselling one of them. She was in to see me at lunchtime, she told me about Leroy.”
White turned away, looked out across the bay. Far over, as he knew, was where Denny Pelong lived. Nearer, running out from the southern point, was the long wharf of the Kurnell oil refinery; a tanker was moored there now, discharging oil. He had learned from talk on the waterfront that security had been tightened there since the start of the Gulf war. He had no interest in any wars but his own, he couldn’t care less what the fucking Arabs did so long as they stayed off his turf.
“It’s gunna rain. I washed the car this morning, I don’t like getting it muddied . . . I think there’s a third party in this game, but I dunno what they’re up to. Do they think they’re gunna scare the shit outa us and get a piece of the action, either from us or Denny Pelong? Pig’s arse, they are.”
She wondered if Jack Junior conducted his business meetings in these terms. She had just read a book in which Wall Street types, straight out of Yale and Harvard, had been as foul-mouthed as the street types she dealt with at the drug clinic. Had her father been as vulgar as this at his stockbroking meetings? Only after his suicide had she realized she had never really known her father. He had been jovial and affectionate towards her and her brother, but he had loved the good life, the constant liquor, the lunches and dinner parties, the Mercedes and the yacht, and when the good life had been taken away from him, all the joviality and affection were suddenly gone and he was a weak and bitter man. Her mother, who had loved the good life just as much, had caved in after the suicide and gone back to the religion of her childhood, had given up laughter and taken to mealy-mouthed piety, swapping Zampatti for sackcloth and blaming herself for her husband’s suicide. Janis sometimes wondered where the steel in herself came from.
“What about the Vietnamese, Trang, whatever-his-name-was?”
“We done him. We found out he was dealing for both us and Pelong. We couldn’t let that go. That’s conflict of interest. They oughta send guys to jail for that, but they don’t, not the white-collar crims.” Like all crims, he didn’t like the law being manipulated for those who were not, strictly, professionals. He looked sideways at her, grinned. “You got a conflict of interest, you know that? You sell the shit to the junkies, then try to tell ’em how to get off the stuff.”
“You think I ought to go to jail?”
“You’ll never go to jail, love. You’re too fucking smart. You know, I been working for you, what, three months? You come up with cash for the stuff, no worries—but where d’you get it from? Someone’s backing you. Who is it?”
“Dallas, you don’t need to know that.” She had no doubt that he would find out eventually, but for the moment it was her own secret. Jack Junior had warned her that if ever it became known that he was the source of her funds, he would drop out. She had been surprised how respectable he had wanted to remain, while greed gnawed at him like cancer. That, she gathered, was his mother still exerting her influence from the grave.
“If we get rid of Denny Pelong, I think our cut of the take has to go up. It’s me and Gary who’re taking all the risks.
“Who do you think is taking all the risks in the Gulf war? It’s not the generals. But that’s the way things are, Dallas. The guys who supply the money and the brains, they stay away from the shooting.” She had a woman’s contempt for war as a means of resolution.
He grinned again. “You think of yourself as some sorta general?”
“If you like, yes. And I’ll decide how the take is going to be cut up.” She was a little surprised at her own bravado. But even as a child she had always been prepared to take on challenges: abseiling with her brother, water-skiing with her father. She had no physical fear and she was not going to be intimidated by this thug she had recruited. “You’ll get your fair share, but don’t you tell me how much it’s going to be.”
The grin remained frozen on his rugged face: it pointed the thin line between a smile and a snarl. “Don’t get fucking smart with me, love.”
She turned her head away, looked up towards the small crenellated tower at the top of a rise in the park across from them. It had been built some time before 1920 as a watch tower against smuggling; it amused her that two smugglers, herself and White, should now be sitting metaphorically within its shadow discussing the business of smuggling. Two young Aborigines in jeans and black T-shirts stood looking down at the Jaguar, their expressions impossible to read at this distance. The area around here was still, officially, an Aboriginal reserve; here, two hundred years ago, the Aborigines had looked down on the first European settlers as they had sailed into the bay. The first to step ashore had been the British; two days later two French ships, under Jean, Comte de La Perouse, had anchored off the small beach round the point. Anglo-French relations, for once, had been amicable, whether because they were at the other end of the world from their usual squabbles or because they wanted to impress the local savages with their civility, Janis didn’t know. The Aborigines then might have looked down on the newcomers with the same expressionless stare as the two young men up by the tower. Whatever it was, it would not have been civil; civility does not come easily to people about to be conquered. Janis knew her country’s history; had she not been so selfish, she might have been patriotic. She looked back at Snow White, who was only patriotic at sporting fixtures and then only if he had got good odds on Australia’s winning.
“I think you should understand one thing, Dallas. I am not frightened of you, so don’t threaten me. If anything happens to me, the financial backing goes out the window, understand? You need me more than I need you. It’s just like the war, Dallas. Good generals and the money behind them are hard to find, but soldiers, grunts, I think they call them, are a penny a dozen, especially in a recession.”
He stared at her, then the grin thawed and he nodded his head in admiration. “Jesus, you’re something! You make Mrs. Thatcher sound like Mother Theresa.”
“Well, just keep that in mind. Okay, if you have to get rid of Mr. Pelong, then do it.” She was surprised, but not much, at the matter-of-fact callousness of her instruction. But she had been callous to begin with, getting into this venture. She knew the percentage of those buying heroin who would die from an overdose: the collateral damage, as the military spokesmen would call it. It was all in a cause. Maybe not a good cause, but hypocrisy was not one of her faults. “If you have to, then you have to.”
“What about this other guy, the one with the needle?”
“Get rid of him, too, if you find him.” She had one moment of squeamishness; she could not bring herself to say the word kill. Which was hypocritical, though she would not admit it.
“Okay, I’ll be in touch.” He leaned across and opened her door. “That’s
a nice perfume.”
That surprised her almost as much as anything else he had said, “It’s Arpège. Do you have a girlfriend?”
“A couple. Maybe I’ll buy each of ’em a gallon of that. Here comes the fucking rain. I’m gunna get the car wet.”
She ran back up to her own car as the first drops began to splatter on the still-warm roadway. She was struggling to put up the top of the Capri when the two young Aborigines appeared, one on either side of the car, and took over from her. When they had the top secured, they stood back, both smiling, and one of them gave a mock bow.
She hesitated, feeling the rain becoming heavier, then she said, “Can I give you a lift somewhere?”
“Nah.” Both of them were good-looking boys, with a touch of white in them, the ultimate conquering. “We’d ruin your reputation.”
As she drove away they were still smiling: no, laughing at her. All at once, for no reason at all, she hated them. A mile further on, driving now through pelting rain, it occurred to her that the blacks were only part of her problem. Her father had left her with a burdensome legacy. She trusted no man, not even Jack Junior.
She would have felt her lack of trust vindicated had she seen one of the young Aborigines take a notebook from the pocket of his jeans and add the number of the Capri to that of the Jaguar 3.8.
II
“Do you like Australian wines?” said Lisa.
“Some of them,” said Peter Keller. The Germans, thought Lisa with Dutch prejudice, had never been noted for their diplomacy. “This one, yes, very much. It is from South Australia, the Barossa Valley? Where the Germans are settled? I wanted to go there, to feel at home, but my wife wanted to be on the beaches of Sydney. So did Romy.” He made an attempt at being a man martyred to the whims of his women. It didn’t go down well with Lisa, who knew, as all women do, who are the martyrs in any marriage.
The rain had stopped and the evening was mildly cool, though still humid. The Malones, the Kellers and Clements were dining out in the small patio between the house and the pool. Malone had lit some burners to repel any mosquitoes, and a gentle breeze, all that was left of this afternoon’s southerly buster, rustled through the jacaranda in the Cayburns’ back yard. The police guard had been removed this afternoon and Lisa felt that peace had once again settled on her house. The only jarring note, in her present mood, was Peter Keller. She felt guilty about her antipathy to him, wondering if it had something to do with her Dutchness.
“The war’s going well,” said Clements, not helping things: Lisa had been thinking about another war on another continent, one fought before she was born.
“It’s unreal,” said Romy. “I watch all those smart bombs homing in on their targets and it’s not like watching a war at all, it’s more like some kids’ video game.”
“That’s what our Tom said,” said Lisa. “I had to veto him watching the news.”
“I’m looking for the one they home in on Saddam,” said Malone, though he could not get excited about the war. Perhaps it was the Irish in him. Never having invaded anywhere themselves, they have never understood the value of imperial wars.
“When the war is over, he should be caught,” said Keller, skilfully boning his blue trout. “We should hang him. Or better still, chop off his head.” He removed the fish’s head with a clean cut.
“I don’t know that Australia would agree to that.” Lisa was prepared to disagree. “We don’t believe in the death penalty.”
“You sure?” Malone smiled at her. He could sense her dislike of Peter Keller and he knew she would be regretting having suggested the dinner. “Call for volunteers to hang Saddam and you’d be trampled to death in the rush.”
“We don’t have the death penalty in Germany.” Romy, Clements noted, spoke as if she were still German, still in Germany.
“A pity, too,” said her father. “An eye for an eye . . . The Old Testament had so many good things in it. Today, even judges have bleeding hearts. A woman is raped and the man who did it gets—what?—three or four years, with time off for good behaviour. What about his behaviour while raping the woman? They should castrate him.” He began to chew on the trout, nodding in appreciation. “Beautiful fish, Mrs. Malone.”
“Call me Lisa,” she said, suddenly determining to be less disagreeable. “A rape case would be different with a woman judge.”
“How many women judges hear rape cases?” said Romy. “How many women judges sit in criminal courts in this State?”
“One, maybe two,” said Clements.
“We need a dozen at least. Hard-hearted ones,” said Romy, but then she smiled.
Lisa had been hoping they would get through the evening without any shop-talk, but she should have known better. Politicians talked politics, cricketers talked cricket: why should a forensic medicine specialist, two policemen and an ex-policeman be different? She gave in: “Have you traced where this killer might be getting his curare substitute, what’s-it-called?”
“Alloferin,” said Romy. “No, there’s not much hope of that. Hospitals don’t have to keep a tight record of it. It’s not like some other drugs, morphine for instance, where the stock has to be signed for as each shift comes on. We don’t stand much chance of catching him that way, not unless he’s caught in the act of stealing it.”
“Luck,” said Keller. “Every policeman needs it, yes, Scobie?”
The discussion went on, till Lisa grew bored with it and changed the subject to that of music. To her surprise, Peter Keller seemed to welcome the change, plunging into an enthusiastic monologue on the bicentenary of Mozart’s death, asking if she had seen the recent screening of Don Giovanni on television. “Every year Romy and her mother and I would go to Salzburg . . .”
“You like music, too?” Lisa asked Romy.
“Love it. I’m trying to educate Russ that there’s music beyond Elton John and INXS.”
“Ach!” Keller threw back his head in mock disgust. “What music do you like, Scobie?”
“Glenn Miller.” Malone grinned down the table at Lisa. “Russ and I often dance together when things are slow at Homicide.”
“He always wants to lead,” said Clements.
Keller stared at them both, then he laughed, though awkwardly. “I always take things so seriously. Music, everything.”
“We’ll change that,” said Clements. “Another ten years here and you’ll be like the rest of us. We never take anything seriously.”
“Except sport,” said Lisa, still only half an Aussie.
Then Malone, who had learned a few graces from Lisa, raised his glass and toasted the tenth anniversary of the Kellers’ coming to Australia. Claire, who had finished her homework, came out to say goodnight; Maureen and Tom were already in bed. Keller beamed at Claire and raised his glass to her.
“To you, Fräulein, and your beauty.”
For a moment Claire was flustered, toasts to beauty were not common amongst the natives; but she recovered quickly, borrowed some of her mother’s poise. “Thank you, Mr. Keller. I think my mother and Romy are beautiful, don’t you?”
My diplomat, thought Malone with pride.
“Oh, indeed, indeed.” Keller raised his glass again; he was all at once the life of the party. “To all the beautiful women here tonight.”
Malone and Clements raised their glasses. Lisa smiled at Romy. “Ain’t it wonderful? Civilized at last. Should we call in all the other women in the street? It’ll never happen again.”
By the time the evening was finished Keller had had a little too much to drink, but he was jovial rather than awkward or argumentative. He became almost the archetypal Bavarian; Lisa waited for him to forget Mozart and start singing beer-hall songs. At the front door he kissed her hand, not with a mock flourish but as if that were his everyday farewell to women. Lisa responded graciously, then gave her cheek to Clements’ kiss. “Next time, kiss my hand, Russ. Teach him how, Peter.”
They were all at the front door when the phone rang. Malone cursed, knowin
g only bad news came at this time of night, and went back down the hall to take the call. Romy and her father stepped out on to the front porch, but Clements remained in the doorway.
“Damn,” said Lisa, instinct telling her that she was going to be left alone to clear up the dinner things.
Malone came back up the hall. “That was Phil Truach. Denny Pelong has just been shot, down in Dixon Street.”
III
Aldwych sat back, pushed away the plate of lychees and ginger ice-cream. “No, I’d better not. I’m getting too old to eat so much just before I go to bed.”
“I’ll have them, said Jack Junior, who had already had one serving of dessert.
“Watch it,” said Janis. “You’re going to finish up looking like one of those Japanese wrestlers. How do men like that make love?”
“Squashily,” said Jack Junior.
Aldwych had been watching the interplay between the two of them, the glances, the smiles that were as intimate as notes passed between them. Happily married for forty-five years, he had not had much experience of young women, not today’s young women. Jack Junior had brought home a few, but they had been uncomfortable with Aldwych, his reputation frightening them into acting like novice nuns. But this one, this Janis who seemed to have Jack Junior on a string, was altogether different. She amused him, but he wouldn’t trust her out of his sight. He had always had a suspicious nature and, now he was retired, he had more time to indulge it.
Leslie Chung was in the next booth with his wife, a small, very attractive Chinese woman loaded with enough gold and diamonds to have saved a couple of shaky corporations from bankruptcy. Aldwych had never understood a woman’s, and less so a man’s, need to wear jewellery, and he had never bought Shirl anything other than an engagement and a wedding ring; he had been shocked, after her death, to find she had bought herself a boxful of rings, bracelets and necklaces. He wondered now if Les Chung had a couple of minders out in Dixon Street to make sure that Mrs. Chung was not mugged.