Harry Curry: Rats and Mice

by Stuart Littlemore

  A woman in a pink uniform pushed a rattling trolley into the room, and they both asked for white tea, two sugars. She gave them biscuits in little packets, and pushed the trolley out again.

  ‘The detectives been yet?’ the policeman asked.

  ‘One bloke came. Didn’t take a statement, but. Said not yet, I wasn’t ready. Think they’re coming back next week, if the doctor says it’s okay.’ He took a sip of tea, put the cup down and tore open his biscuits. ‘Gunna have to think about what I tell them.’ He ate the Scotch finger, and left the ginger nut.

  ‘Get your story straight, you mean?’

  ‘Yeah. Seeing what you said about the compo. Whose fault and everything.’

  ‘I’ll print you off the forms at work, and drop them in next time I’m out this way. But I’d better be getting back. My shift ends at four o’clock.’ The policeman bent, retrieved his cap, and stood. ‘See you later.’

  ‘Yeah. Thanks for coming, Kev.’

  Kev straightened his cap on his head. ‘You’re right, mate. Keep your chin up,’ and he left.

  David Surrey had worked late and was locking the door of his Goulburn office when he heard the phone ring inside. His first thought was that it would keep, but his second thought was that trade had been very quiet, so he pushed the door open and picked up the receiver.

  ‘Surrey solicitor.’ He always answered the phone like that.

  ‘Oh, Mr Surrey, it’s Detective Sergeant Bowmaker, Queanbeyan detectives. I’m in Goulburn, and we’ve got a man in custody here who wants to speak to you. You got time to talk to him? I’ll put him on.’

  ‘Righto, sergeant.’ Surrey turned on the light and sat behind the receptionist’s desk. He didn’t have a receptionist. He pulled a pad and pencil from the side of the desk and prepared to make notes.

  ‘This is Bruce den Boer, Mr Surrey. You know my father and mother. I’ve been arrested, and I’m being charged with attempted murder. They want to interview me now. Can you come down?’

  Surrey looked at his watch. A bit after quarter to seven — cynically the police had contrived to delay their prisoner’s phone call until a time when they believed all the local solicitors would be at home, uncorking the first bottle of chardonnay. So much easier to extract a confession with no lawyer breathing down your neck. ‘I’ll be there directly, Bruce. Put the sergeant back on, will you?’

  A pause. ‘Bowmaker here.’

  ‘Sergeant, I’ll be there in ten minutes or less. You are not to commence any interview with my client until I’m present. That’s quite clear, I hope.’

  ‘Yes, clear.’

  ‘Good. I’ve made a file note of this conversation. I’m on my way.’

  He scribbled a note of the conversation and the time on the pad. In fact, Surrey’s office above the Commonwealth Bank was only three minutes’ amble from the Goulburn police station, but he had allowed himself time to ring Nancy and tell her he’d be late, then to dig out his old dictaphone and put a new battery in it. He made sure the machine was working. Having done that, he slipped the recorder into his side pocket, turned out the light, and locked the door. He still reached the front desk of the police station three minutes before his time had expired, and asked for the detectives. ‘You’ve got my client in custody. Den Boer.’

  He was shown into an interview room where a young man in jeans and a Rip Curl T-shirt, handcuffed, sat at a table with a uniformed officer standing close behind him and a huge man in a suit sitting opposite. Introductions were made.

  ‘What’s the charge, sergeant?’

  ‘Well, I’m waiting for advice from the prosecutors in Sydney, so we haven’t done the charge sheet yet. Either attempted murder or malicious wounding with intent.’

  ‘What time was the arrest?’

  The new client spoke up. ‘Twenty past three, Mr Surrey.’

  Surrey looked at him, then at the sergeant, grinning under his ginger moustache. ‘And it took you more than three hours to allow him a phone call?’

  ‘Oh, well,’ the sergeant stood up and grinned even more widely, ‘forensic procedures, DNA. Outstanding warrant checks. You know. Takes time.’

  ‘Enough time to ensure legal advice would be out of reach, I suppose?’

  ‘Perish the thought, Mr Surrey. You’re here, aren’t you?’

  Surrey took the dictaphone out of his pocket, turned it on, and placed it on the table. ‘That’s a recording device, gentlemen, and it’s on.’

  ‘If that’s the way you want to play it.’ The sergeant stopped grinning.

  ‘It is, sergeant. Did you take anything down in your notebook?’

  ‘Only particulars of the arrest. Time and place, what we said to him.’

  ‘Tape-recorded that, did you?’

  ‘Unfortunately, I forgot to bring one up with me from Queanbeyan.’

  ‘You do realise, then,’ Surrey said, ‘that you won’t be able to use anything he said in court?’

  The client spoke up. ‘I didn’t say anything. Did I, sergeant?’

  ‘No, you didn’t.’

  ‘And you want to do an ERISP now, I assume?’

  ‘That’s the procedure, yes.’ The sergeant waved his hand in the direction of the video and audio recording equipment at the far end of the table. ‘We’re ready to go.’

  ‘Well, Sergeant Bowmaker, on legal advice my client declines to answer any questions until he’s consulted his lawyer.’

  ‘Will he at least go on tape to say that he won’t be interviewed?’

  ‘No, sergeant. On legal advice, once again.’

  A sullen look — delaying the phone call hadn’t worked.

  ‘And, constable,’ Surrey addressed the uniformed man, ‘Sergeant Bowmaker wants you to remove the handcuffs while we arrange the formal charge and then bail, don’t you, sergeant? I have to observe, for the record, that it appears to me that the handcuffs were put on far too tightly.’

  The detective said nothing in response, but nodded to the officer to remove the cuffs. Once they were off, den Boer rubbed his wrists vigorously. From there, he and Surrey accompanied the two policemen to the charge room where he was charged (curiously, without any advice or assistance from prosecutors in Sydney) with malicious wounding with intent, and eventually overnight bail conditions were formulated, requiring him to stay at his parents’ house and appear the next day in the magistrate’s court when more comprehensive arrangements would be made. Surrey held the Dictaphone throughout the process, having turned the little cassette over to ensure a continuous recording, although the real purpose of the device was to act as insurance against verbals.

  Having freed his client at last, Surrey took den Boer to his Falcon, still parked behind the Commonwealth Bank building, and they sat in the front seats.

  Surrey lowered his window. It was dark outside. He took a good look at his client. Even in repose, he seemed threatening: close to two metres, probably, and heavy in the chest and shoulders. Shaven head, multiple earrings — from one of which dangled a crucifix. One of those straggly forked beards affected by bikies. A jury of housewives, chemist shop owners and dry-cleaners were going to be terrified of him.

  ‘Bruce, you probably expect me to interview you now to find out what happened, but I’m not going to do that. A very smart barrister, who I hope is going to take your case, once told me that I don’t need to get my client’s story until I know what’s going to be alleged against him. You understand?’

  ‘I think so.’ His voice was incongruously mild, respectful.

  ‘What I want you to do now is go home to your mum and dad’s, don’t leave the house until nine in the morning, and get your father to drive you back here by 9.15. That’s my office, upstairs there. Your dad knows it. Then we’ll go down to the courthouse and get new bail conditions set by the beak. But the most important thing that happens tomorrow is that the police have to lay out their allegations against you, but not yet their evidence, and a deadline’ll be set for service of their brief. That means a date by w
hich they have to send me all their witness statements and DNA reports and fingerprints and anything else they want to use against you. After court, we can talk. Are you with me?’

  ‘Yes, Mr Surrey.’ They sat quietly for a while, looking ahead through the windscreen. ‘I don’t mind telling you I’m scared.’

  ‘Who wouldn’t be? But it’s early days yet, Bruce. A long way to go before you face court. We’ll be well prepared for that.’ Surrey paused and looked at his new client’s tattooed arms. ‘Incidentally, what’s your criminal record like?’

  ‘Haven’t got one. Speeding, you know. That’s all. Wouldn’t have a security licence otherwise.’

  ‘What’s the bikie look for?’

  ‘I just like it. Free country, they say.’

  A long pause, after which the new client sighed and turned to Surrey. ‘Any chance of a lift to my folks’ place?’

  Surrey looked at his watch and laughed. ‘Sure. They’re still out on the Crookwell road, aren’t they?’

  ‘Yep.’

  Surrey started the car and drove through the quiet streets. ‘How are your parents? The delicatessen’s doing well? My wife’s always in there. Sundried tomatoes and artichoke hearts.’

  ‘Dad wants to retire, so they’re talking about selling the business.’

  ‘Not the best time for that. Plenty of empty shops in Auburn Street.’

  They drove through the outskirts of Goulburn, where suburban bungalows and gardens gave way to hobby farms, their houses set well back from the road. Den Boer pointed ahead. ‘There it is.’ A neat white-painted fence gleamed in the headlights, and Surrey could just make out fruit trees with papery daffodils beneath them, and a low-slung white ranch-style building.

  He dropped his client off at the open gate and headed home, wondering whether the den Boers’ delicatessen was profitable enough to fund their son’s defence. He hoped it was.

  The vast Victorian courtroom was cold. The elderly magistrate polished his reading glasses with his handkerchief and replaced them on his nose, then blew his nose on the same handkerchief. ‘Yes, sergeant, matter of den Boer. Mr Surrey, you appear for the defendant, and he’s present in court, yes? Question of bail conditions?’

  The police prosecutor remained standing and read from a folder. Bowmaker stood beside him. ‘The defendant was arrested yesterday afternoon at his parents’ house in Goulburn. He was charged last night with malicious wounding with intent. The short facts, your Honour, are that he is employed by Safansecure Pty Limited in the Australian Capital Territory. Late on the night of October the third and early in the morning of the fourth, he was on duty patrolling the company’s clients’ business premises in Civic, Fyshwick and Queanbeyan. The victim, Troy Jayden Kellaway, is a man aged nineteen, employed by the same company as an apprentice alarm technician, who was travelling in the security patrol vehicle with the defendant. He first gave a statement to detectives in hospital only five days ago — Mr Kellaway that is — which is why there’s been a delay in making the arrest. There are no witnesses to the incident, so no arrest could be made, or other action taken against the defendant, until we had the victim’s allegations on record. It now appears that the defendant had agreed to give the victim a lift home in the early hours of that morning, but only when his patrol rounds passed the victim’s place of abode. He said he wasn’t going to make a special trip. When he reached the premises of Hot Adult Imports Unlimited at Queanbeyan, the defendant asked the victim to help him secure the premises by checking the doors and windows on the southern and eastern sides of the premises, while he attended to the north and west. The victim went to get a drink from a hose at the front of the building, and then the two men met at the north-eastern corner of the premises, whereupon the defendant is alleged to have said, “What are you doing sneaking around in the dark? I could have shot you.” The victim replied that he was only doing what the defendant asked, and the defendant is alleged then to have said, “Yeah, but I think I’ll shoot you anyway”, took out his revolver, and shot the victim. The bullet lodged in Mr Kellaway’s lower spine, rendering him paraplegic.’ (He also pronounced the word ‘parapalegic’.) ‘The victim is in the spinal unit at Canberra Hospital.’

  ‘Good God!’ said the magistrate, before he could stop himself. Given that reaction, it took all Surrey’s powers to persuade the shocked judicial officer to grant bail, and even then it was on condition that his client surrender his passport, undertake to reside with his parents under a very strict curfew, and report twice daily to the Goulburn police station. Surrey’s plea that the conditions would prevent his client earning a living fell on deaf ears.

  The formalities completed, Surrey, his client and Mrs den Boer (her husband was holding the fort at the delicatessen) left the majestic courthouse — Victorian Free Classical in style, Surrey had read, in warm red brick and yellow Hawkesbury sandstone, its recently restored central copper dome and two arcaded wings fronted by flower beds and lawns — and turned left at the main street. Back in his office, Surrey explained the process that had begun its inexorable course: the prosecution brief of evidence would be provided in a month, the defence could have a committal hearing if they wanted to test the evidence, but the victim wouldn’t be subjected to cross-examination (so, he advised, it would probably be best to save the den Boers’ money and go straight to trial), and Bruce’s defence story had to be got down on paper, refined and polished, and evidence had to be gathered to support it. But the great priority was to retain and brief counsel, and Surrey’s counsel of choice would be Mr Harry Curry of Burragate, via Eden. Money was discussed, and Mrs den Boer disclosed that she and her husband had all but sold their business — the exchange was in three months time, and they’d be able to borrow against that. She sighed and made reference to the proceeds of their hard work going to the lawyers, and Surrey pointedly made no comment on that.

  ‘If Bruce wins,’ she asked, ‘do we get our legal fees back?’ A strong Dutch accent.

  ‘Hardly ever,’ Surrey admitted.

  Bruce’s mother looked resigned. Bruce kept his eyes on the floor. Surrey handed over a copy of his standard letter disclosing his own and counsel’s fees and the likely expenses of criminal defence — expert witnesses, private investigators, subpoenas, photocopying, transcript fees. Mrs den Boer’s eyebrows rose above her reading glasses as she scanned it, then she folded the pages and put them in her handbag with her glasses. The handbag clicked shut. She pursed her lips, rose and shook Surrey’s hand. Bruce followed her out. He paused at the door.

  ‘When do I see Mr Curry?’

  ‘The sooner the better, I think.’

  As it happened, it wasn’t as soon as Surrey or his client had hoped. Harry resisted the family’s efforts at arranging an early meeting, insisting it would be premature. He’d read through the transcript of the police prosecutor’s allegations from the bail hearing, and advised Surrey that he still needed to have the complete police brief before sitting down with Bruce and extracting from him the very highly detailed instructions they were going to need for his defence. ‘Anyway, Dave,’ he told Surrey over the phone from Burragate, ‘we can go over this on Sunday. You are playing, aren’t you?’

  ‘Playing what? Where?’

  ‘Kameruka, of course. Cricket. The annual Far South Coast lawyers versus police social game. Don’t tell me you’re not coming — I was thinking of getting Bella to come down. I only accepted because they said you’d be there.’

  ‘Well, I know about it — of course — but I wasn’t intending to go. Nancy’s got some women’s political thing in Canberra over the weekend, at Manning Clark House, and I’m supposed to look after the girls. How did you get a guernsey, anyway?’

  ‘Warren Andrews rang and asked me. He organises it every year — he’s captain of the solicitors’ side. I told him he’d have to call it the lawyers’ team if I was going to play. Seems to me you’d be an asset. Didn’t you once tell me that you coached the high school firsts?’

  ‘Big ga
p between coaching and playing, I’m afraid. Those who can play cricket do, and those who can’t … they coach. All the same, I’d love to play at Kameruka. Beautiful ground. Maybe I could be twelfth man.’

  Harry laughed. ‘The way Warren tells it, we’ll be lucky to cobble together eleven players. He says some of the young coppers can play a bit, but most of them are fatter and older than the solicitors. Be good to beat the bastards.’

  It was a foregone conclusion. Surrey had to talk to his daughters and persuade them to come with him (which was the last thing they wanted to do, until they heard that Mr Curry was promising to bring Arabella, with whom they had both fallen in love), and Harry had to discharge his end of the bargain, which he did by emphasising the bucolic splendour of the venue and its fascinating history.

  Arabella, who took remarkably little persuasion, arrived at the Merimbula airport late on Saturday afternoon. She’d followed Harry’s advice that the nights were still cold, and stepped off the plane carrying an overcoat, scarf and warm hat. ‘It won’t be that bad,’ he laughed, kissing her and holding her close for quite a long time. ‘It’s only cold at night, and we’ve got plenty of firewood. I bought a chainsaw.’ Harry was dressed in clean KingGee workwear and had wiped off the Blundstones.

  ‘Shouldn’t you have training before you use that? They’re terribly dangerous.’

  ‘It’s only my left hand. I can still write, and the prosthesis should be ready in six months.’ She punched him on the shoulder.

  They drove south in the LandCruiser to Eden, and ate an early dinner at the Fishermen’s Club — local Wapengo oysters seasoned with nothing more than lemon juice, a daube with a green salad, and a raspberry and almond millefeuille. Mineral water, no wine. Harry explained to a delighted but curious Arabella that the club had enlisted the help of a recently retired French chef from Melbourne, if only for the spring and summer months.

  As they drove west on the darkening gravel and occasionally tar-sealed road to Burragate, Harry being careful of the black wallabies working over the green pick on the verges, he essayed a few subtle references to the quality of life at RonLyn. The usual stuff — clean air, space, growing your own food, yabbies in the creek, no neighbours peering over the fence …