by Jon Cleary
“We’d gladly sit back,” said Malone, “except that the media and all the law-and-order do-gooders keep beating their drums.”
Janis came to the door. “Jack darling, I can’t find a tray.”
Jack Junior hesitated, not wanting to lose his grasp on this interview. But Janis stood stock-still in the doorway, firm as a wife. He got to his feet and followed her out to the kitchen, closing the door there behind him. At once she attacked him:
“Don’t you ever do that again! I am not your bloody tea-lady!”
“Janis, I had to get you out of there. You were ready to start baiting them—you’re baiting Dad, too—”
“He’s baiting me—haven’t you noticed?”
Jack Junior had found a silver tray, was putting cups and saucers on it. “Make the tea strong, that’s how Dad likes it.”
“Don’t tell me what to do! He’ll get it as it comes!” Then she simmered down, took the tray from him. “Are there any biscuits or cake or anything? What are they talking about in there?”
Jack Junior found a tin of biscuits. “They mentioned a couple of guys from Melbourne, a guy named White and his mate, someone called The Dwarf. What’s the matter?”
“What? Nothing.” She had kept from him, at his demand, the names of anyone with whom she was involved in the drug smuggling. He had agreed to supply the finance, but, in the early stages, he had said, he wanted to know no more than was necessary. It was contrary to his usual business practice, but what he was doing was contrary to anything he had ever done in his life before. His mother’s ashes were spinning in the wind.
He put his hand on her arm, his grip hurting her. “Come on! Do you know these guys?”
The electric kettle was boiling. She jerked her arm away, turned and poured the boiling water into the china teapot; for a mad moment she had the urge to pour the water over him. She hated men who hurt her physically: Jack Senior would be interested to know she was not a masochist.
“You said you didn’t want to know any names—”
“I want to know now! Come on. Are they working for you?”
She put the teapot on the tray, added a milk-jug and sugar-pot. She had noticed the quality of the china; Jack’s mother had spent his father’s money well. When she made her own money she would not spend any time in a kitchen, but she had remarked that this kitchen was the sort that would give the average housewife, which she was not, a culinary orgasm.
“Yes.” She picked up the tray, paused and looked at him, taking delight in the fact that she knew she was going to shock him: “They are the ones who tried to kill this Denny Pelong.”
“Jesus Christ!”
“Open the door,” she said calmly.
He stared at her, seeing for the first time the icy calmness of which she was capable. All at once he was frightened of her; he had none of the gangster’s gorilla courage that had enabled his father to survive so long. He opened the door, following her out of the kitchen, his mind quickening again, wondering already how he was going to get rid of her and get out of this venture that looked as if it might turn into an unholy bloody mess. He knew that if he had his father’s character, the simplest solution would be to kill her: or have the killing done for him. But he also knew that he could never go that far. He was his mother’s son as well as his father’s. He had inherited his father’s greed for power, but his weakness would always be his mother’s morality, there in his genes like another disease.
In the living room the tea was poured and handed around with the biscuits, “Iced Vo-Vos?” said Malone. “I haven’t had ’em in years.”
“My favourite,” said Aldwych. “Them and Monte Carlos. My wife always had old-fashioned tastes.”
Just like Sally Kissen, the whore, thought Malone. He wondered if Arnotts, the biscuit manufacturers, had ever thought of calling on them to appear in their commercials.
“If Denny Pelong falls off the perch,” said Aldwych, chewing on an Iced Vo-Vo, “I wonder who’ll take over?”
“Maybe the Triads.” Clements had been quiet up till now; but he had seen that Malone’s mouth was full of biscuit. “Or the Vietnamese. Nice cuppa, Miss Eden.”
“Thank you. The Asians, they’re a problem?” She hadn’t even considered them, despite the killing several weeks ago of Trang, the Vietnamese.
“They’re going to be,” said Malone, swallowing the biscuit. “Do your clients ever talk about them?”
She shook her head, the light glinting on the auburn shine of it. She’s a looker, Malone thought; and a lady, though he had learned from experience that not all ladies were to be trusted. She held her cup delicately, little finger raised; she had the knack of biting into a biscuit without leaving crumbs around the corner of her mouth. Something told him she would wield a knife with the same delicacy, whether on a plate or at someone’s throat.
“No,” she said, “my clients never mention the Asians. Are they the ones who are doing these needle killings? It sounds sort of Oriental.”
“What makes you say that?”
“Well, Occidental killings—”
“That’s a good one,” said Aldwych. “Occidental killings.”
She gave him a smile that chilled the tea in his cup. “Okay, Western killings. They are cruder, aren’t they?”
“Would you say they are, Jack?” Malone looked at Aldwych, the expert.
“Killing is killing, Scobie,” said Aldwych, still the Pope. “It’s still a crime. Except like now, in the war.”
“I didn’t know that,” said Malone, finishing his tea.
Aldwych smiled. “I like you, Scobie. It’s a pity you and me were never on the same side. We could of run this town.”
“I thought you did it pretty well on your own, Jack.” He got to his feet. “I’m sorry to’ve kept you up so late. But Russ and I had to clear up that you had nothing to do with the shooting of Pelong. You can sleep easy now.”
“I always have.” Aldwych stood up.
“Do the bull terriers bite on the way out?”
“Never my friends, Scobie. Come back and see me when you’re retired.”
Jack Junior showed Malone and Clements out, past the fangs of the bull terriers who, if they knew that the police officers were now friends of their master, preferred the tear—’em-apart enmity of the good old days. Once in the car Malone said, “We’re going to see that Eden woman again. She keeps turning up too regularly.”
Inside the house, when Jack Junior came back to join him and Janis in the living room, Aldwych, playing himself this time, said, “All right, what are you two up to? And don’t try any bloody lies with me!”
II
Malone was sitting at the computer, putting yesterday’s and last night’s events into the system. He had run back the data, but it read like nothing more than a shredded crossword puzzle. There was a thread, but it kept breaking off; and there was one element in the puzzle that eluded him. Who was the needle killer and why?
Then the phone rang in his office. He got up slowly, tired and stiff; he felt as he had occasionally felt years ago, after bowling twenty-five overs on a stinking hot day. He had had only four hours’ sleep and that mostly broken by a mind that had tossed and turned more than his body. He went into his office, half-expecting that the call would be the news that Denny Pelong had died during the night. The morning newspapers had carried stories on last night’s shooting, but there had been no editorial comment, no remarks on the spreading of “the plague of murders.” Saddam Hussein was the target for today, both for bombs and editorial opinion.
The caller was Inspector Joe Nagler, from Special Branch. “Scobie? I bumped into Irv Rubens last night.”
Nagler was another of the few Jews in the Department. Malone wondered if the meeting last night had been accidental or whether, because of the Gulf war, Sydney Jews were gathering to form committees. Whatever they were doing, he had other things on his mind. “Yeah?”
“He told me about those murders you’ve got on your plate and
that you think they have something to do with a drug war. That right?”
“I don’t know, Joe. I’ve got a dozen loose strings and I can’t tie ’em together.”
“I know how you feel. I’ve got enough loose strings to make a shark net, only the bloody sharks would probably still slip through. Anyhow, are you interested in a character named Dallas White? I think they call him Snow White.”
Malone sat up. “Very much. Go on.”
“Well, I don’t know whether you know it, but we’ve been handling security at certain points with the Feds, I mean because of this Gulf business. We’ve had fellers out at Kurnell, at the oil refinery, and I’ve had a coupla guys hanging out at La Perouse.”
“La Perouse? You expecting the Abos to go to town for Saddam?”
“They’ve got more nous than that. No, we’ve just been keeping an eye out in case someone gets ideas about lobbing mortars or firing a missile—”
“Joe, come on.”
Even over the phone Nagler’s patience was apparent. “Scobie, you’re more intelligent than that. Just because we’ve never had terrorism out here doesn’t say there aren’t people here capable of it. I don’t know why I bother with you guys in Homicide—you live in your own little world of little murders—”
“Righto, Joe, I apologize.”
“Okay, then. Anyhow, we’ve had these guys on lookout at La Perouse, out on the point overlooking Bare Island. Yesterday afternoon there was a green Jaguar, an old model, parked there. Dallas White was in it on his own for almost half an hour, then a girl drove up in a red Capri and joined him. No kissing or any hanky-panky when they met—”
“Was she Jewish?”
“Pull your head in. They nattered together for twenty minutes or so, then they drove away independently. One of my fellers, an Abo, incidentally, took the numbers of both cars. I’ve checked this morning—the Jaguar belongs to Dallas White.”
“And the Capri?”
“That’s registered to a Janis Eden.”
“Joe, I love you!”
“Watch it, sport, I’m a married man.”
Malone hung up as Clements came in, looking as if he, too, could have done with more sleep. He slumped down in Malone’s spare chair, spread his heavy legs; never unrumpled at the best of times, he looked now as if he had slept last night in his clothes in the street. His thick-browed, heavy-jawed face had the slackness of a boxer who had stayed in the ring one punch too long.
“Pelong’s still alive. I’m going out now to talk to Mitre, see if he can give us a lead. He goes up before the beak again this morning. You want him held?”
“Get the Police Prosecutor to put it to the beak that we don’t want Mr. Mitre to be the next victim. Mitre himself might decide that it’s safer for him to stay in custody. Talk him into it.”
“I’m buggered.” Clements heaved himself out of his chair. “Did Phil Truach get anything out of Les Chung last night?”
“Nothing. But he got an earful from Mrs. Chung about getting them out of bed in the middle of the night.”
“She would’ve still got more sleep than I did. What’re you gunna do now?”
“I’m going to talk to our girl Janis. Joe Nagler’s just been on to me with some info. Janis is a friend of Snow White’s.”
Clements opened his eyes wide, as if forcing himself awake. “Well, well. It’s a small world, ain’t it?”
III
Janis, too, had had a sleepless night. It had had nothing to do with the fact that she had been in a strange bed; she was not wanton nor a travelling saleswoman, but she had been in beds other than her own and never felt strange and restless. True, Jack had not come to her bedroom, but if he had, she would have kicked him out. She was still angry with him for his treatment of her last night. But he was the lesser of her troubles: Jack Senior was her big worry.
“What are you two up to?” he had said. “And don’t try any bloody lies with me!”
She had seen at once the change in him. All attempted urbanity had gone, he had reverted to type, he was the old gang boss, the emperor. She had looked to Jack Junior to answer, but he was blank-faced. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, Dad.”
Aldwych had stared at his son; then he had switched his gaze to Janis. “Okay then, what are you up to?”
She decided to take him on head-on: “If I’m up to anything, as you call it, I don’t think it’s any of your business, Mr. Aldwych.”
“It is, if it concerns him.” He nodded at his son. His old man’s face had not suddenly become young again, but it had hardened, as if muscles under the slack jaws and loose cheeks had regained their strength. “Don’t get too clever, girl, or you could end up out in the bush somewhere.”
“Dad!”
“Shut up, Jack. I’m trying to save your hide. Now which of you is gunna tell me what’s going on?”
It was Jack who told him: “Dad, we’ve got a scheme going . . .”
Aldwych, without rising from his chair, if not urbane then at least composed, had generated a chilling anger as Jack had outlined the scheme. He had not exploded; the very low temperature of his anger was more frightening. For the first time Janis realized how Aldwych had risen to the top, that he was a coldblooded killer who, even if he did not do the killing himself, would order it without compunction. She was suddenly and for the first time in her life terribly afraid.
“Jack, I never touched shit—you know that. I hate the fucking stuff.” He was talking to Jack Junior as if Janis was not in the room. “It was a promise I made to your mother—the only time we ever talked seriously about what I did. I hated it, anyway. I still do. Why the hell did you have to get into it? Christ, don’t we have enough money? Haven’t you got enough to occupy you, running the companies? What the hell do you want?”
Jack Junior looked down at his hands, as if he hoped to find an answer there that would satisfy his father; but his hands were empty. Both the father and the girl next to him recognized the weakness in him. Aldwych with sorrow, Janis with contempt.
Janis said, “He wants power. The same as I do. I want money, too. This was all my idea and Jack came in because he loves me.”
She wasn’t sure why she was defending Jack. She wasn’t even sure he loved her, he’d certainly never told her so. But to mention love was always a good ploy, it softened the heart. If Jack Senior had a heart, something she was beginning to doubt. Though that thought didn’t diminish him in her eyes. Her own heart did no more than pump blood.
Aldwych turned his head, looked at her as if he had forgotten she was there. At first she thought he was going to ignore her, turn away again, then he said, “You got him into this?
She hesitated, still afraid, then nodded. “Yes.”
“How many helpers have you got?”
“Just two.”
“Who are they?”
“What are you going to do with them if I tell you?”
He ignored that “Just tell me!”
For a moment she thought of defying him; but she could see the ruthlessness in him now. She had never had to face anyone like him before, a dictator who brooked no opposition. “Two men on the wharves. Dallas White and Gary Schultz. Dallas White is running for union secretary and we’re financing him. We’ll run the wharves when he gets in, we’ll be able to bring in our stuff more easily.”
“Bullshit.” Aldwych looked back at Jack Junior. “Do you know these blokes? You didn’t bat an eyelid when Malone mentioned them.”
“I didn’t know about them till Janis gave me their names out in the kitchen, when we were getting the tea. That’s the first I knew who they were. I knew she had some helpers, but I’d told her I didn’t want to know. All I was doing was supplying the finance. Just like a bank.”
Aldwych permitted himself a thin grin. “You’re no different than a lotta the so-called legitimate banks. Some of them didn’t wanna know, either.” It had been one of the pleasures of his retirement to see how some of the big-name banks had been suckere
d by some of the entrepreneurs. He had felt almost pious: at least his robbing of banks had been straightforward, a hold-up or a break-in. “Well, anyway, your little scheme is over. Finished.”
Jack Junior and Janis exchanged glances then she said, “It’s not as easy as that, Mr. Aldwych. We’re committed.”
“Committed to what?”
“We’ve got a shipment of cocaine coming in—the ship it’s on is already in port. We’ve paid half, we have to pay the other half on delivery.”
“Forget it.”
Janis suddenly generated her own anger, her fear of him for the moment pushed aside. “It’s not as easy as that! It’s too big—it’ll be worth at least five million on the street—we’re not going to give that up!”
Aldwych had been defied before by women, by brothel madams such as Tilly Devine and Kate Leigh, the two toughest women Sydney had ever known; but this girl was different, she was challenging him without any of the back-up those other women had had. He studied her, wondering just how much hold she had over Jack Junior. “Who’s the shipment consigned to?”
“It’s a shelf company, Dad. One that’s got nothing to do with our legitimate ones.”
“Where’s it coming from?”
“From Antofagasta, in Chile. It’s come down there from La Paz in Bolivia.”
“Why cocaine? Heroin’s the big seller.”
“That’s next,” said Janis.
“Next?” Aldwych raised an eyebrow. Despite his distrust and dislike of this girl, she intrigued him. He had never worked with women at an executive level in his gang days; there had been only one executive, himself. “How did you get into this?”
“I went to Los Angeles . . .”
That had been nine months ago, when her ambition to be rich had started to stir, before she had even begun to think of power. She had applied for a study grant and a benevolent government, eager to promote its image of helping women, had given her one. She had gone to Los Angeles, made a perfunctory study of the drug problem there and the efforts to combat it, and spent most of her time making contacts in the trade itself. Then she had met the man from Cali in Colombia. She had had to spend a weekend with him in Las Vegas because, as he had told her, he was a ladies’ man and all the women in Cali, even the ugly ones, missed him when he was out of town. He was insufferable, but he was part of the cartel and she had suffered him with a smile and the appropriate praise for his sexual prowess. She had perfected the co-ordination of closing her mind and opening her legs at the same time. He was United States—and Europe-oriented and she had had to explain to him where Australia was and that the natives were civilized enough to want to buy drugs; in the end he had seen the possibilities of the market and agreed to supply her once she had established the credit he demanded. He was a ladies’ man but not in business.