by JR Carroll
It was five in the afternoon and they were going to shoot rabbits at a favourite place of Brett’s, having left Wally and one of the part-time girls in charge for two hours. This was Wednesday, always pretty dead. With his elbow out the open window, Dennis watched dust-clouds swirl over the parched yellow grass when Brett swung left onto a track that led them to a chained-up gate with PRIVATE PROPERTY—ABSOLUTELY NO ENTRY painted on it. He stopped and got out and undid the chain, which was not locked but just arranged to look that way, then they drove on uphill with the farmhouse out of sight behind a copse of gums on their left. The owner would have spotted or heard them already, but that didn’t matter because Brett had an open invitation from him to come and decimate the rabbit population as often as he liked.
They pulled up alongside an old disintegrating barn half-full of hay and immediately rabbits ran out from everywhere and concealed themselves in the grass. Brett got the .22s out from the back, his new Ruger semi-automatic and an old, chipped, bolt-action Winchester for Dennis. Although the Winchester’s stock was secured to the barrel with electrical tape it was still a sound gun, accurate at forty or fifty metres. They loaded their weapons and then Brett pocketed a fistful of ammunition from an old army box with 7.62 MM stencilled on it. Then they walked up a slope with the sun and a breeze behind them and no clouds at all, just cockatoos in the sky.
After twenty minutes they had just one each. The rabbits were plentiful enough but would not sit. In the next ten minutes they hardly saw any at all, and decided to split up—two men together sent too many advance signals that had the little creatures scurrying into the safety of their holes. They arranged to meet at a dead gum tree a couple of hills away in half an hour and bet the first two pots back at the pub on who would get more rabbits. Brett gave Dennis some extra rounds and struck out towards the north.
Dennis continued east across a saddle between two hills, then changed direction so that he could be upwind. Brett was already out of sight. When Dennis paused, scanning the landscape through narrowed eyes for signs of movement, he heard cracks from the Ruger off behind him somewhere. There was no doubt who would win the bet, he thought. By himself Brett would whistle the little buggers out of their holes and shoot as many as he liked.
Dennis lit up a cigarette and then saw the tips of a pair of bobbing ears thirty metres away. He crouched and waited for the rabbit to stop. The grass was nearly too high for him to keep the rabbit in his sights, but then it came out partially into the open and sat next to a stump. It looked in Dennis’s direction, nose twitching, and then straight ahead, presenting a perfect profile. Dennis put his cigarette on the ground, lined up the rabbit, took a breath and pulled the trigger. The butt jolted his cheek and the rabbit disappeared from view. Satisfied, he lowered the gun, worked the bolt and put the cigarette back in his mouth.
By the time he made the rendezvous with Brett he had five more. Brett had eleven. It was nearly six-thirty and they strolled back down the hill to the ute with the rifles over their shoulders and the rabbits swinging between them, strung together with wire through their paws. When they’d put them and the guns in the back Brett said, ‘I’ll clean those up if you like, and you could put ’em on the menu one night.’
‘All right. They’ll do for a bit of a change.’
‘Punters’ll love some local game.’
‘They should. Free range baked bunny, expressly shot by the host and head barman.’
Brett laughed. They leaned against the ute while Dennis smoked another cigarette. After a few minutes Dennis said, ‘I think I’ll sell the pub, mate.’
Brett said, ‘Uh huh,’ as if he already knew that. ‘What are you gonna do then?’
‘Don’t know. Go back to Melbourne and get a job if I can find one.’ He drew on the cigarette and added, ‘Could go to Sydney. Go wherever I fuckin’ like.’
‘That’s right,’ Brett agreed.
‘There’s nothing here for me now, is there?’
‘No. I guess not.’ He looked quickly at Dennis and said, ‘So how are you handling it these days, anyway?’
‘Oh well. It comes and goes, you know. Comes and goes. Mostly it comes. I seem to be walking around in a fuckin’ dream half the time. Occasionally I feel my own face just to make sure I’m really there. That takes getting used to.’
‘Yeah,’ Brett said, looking down again. This was not the kind of conversation he excelled at, couldn’t see at all what contribution he could make. But he listened and held his mouth well.
‘I guess that means you’ll be out of a job, mate. Sorry about that.’
Brett, looking at the ground in front of his feet, shrugged. ‘Doesn’t matter, Dennis. I’m ready to move on too.’
Dennis wondered what sort of a move Brett would make, but felt disinclined to ask in case he didn’t know and had just said that off the top of his head to be accommodating. That was how it had sounded to Dennis.
‘What are you doing for Christmas?’ Brett said.
‘Christmas? Buggered if I know. I think it might pass me by this year. Why? What are your plans?’
‘I’ll have it with the oldies in Maryborough as usual. You could come too if you like. Mum’d like that. You’d be most welcome.’
‘Thanks, Brett,’ Dennis said in a faintly negative way. ‘I might see how things turn out first.’
‘Yeah, sure.’ Brett looked at the sparse tufts of grass and the dry, cracked ground in front of them. ‘Sure could use some rain around here. Not going to get any, though. Come on. I gotta collect my winnings, haven’t I? You were hoping I’d forget about that.’
‘Winnings? Did we bet on something? Don’t recall.’ Dennis grinned like a gold-toothed rat at Brett and they got into the ute.
Some way down the road Dennis said, casually, ‘What did you make of those two guys, Brett? The Odd Couple.’
‘Make of them? Blow-ins from Melbourne, I guess. Day-trippers.’ Then he added thoughtfully, as if he’d just remembered a detail that might be important, ‘They had a good look around though.’
‘What?’
‘Yeah. I saw the little guy go out the back for a squiz. Peggy said she saw him upstairs when she was doing the rooms. His poofy mate had the wanders too.’
Dennis digested this. ‘What do you think they were looking for?’
‘Fucked if I know. Nothing in particular and everything in general. Just poking around, you know. Checking the place out. Why, what did you make of them?’
‘I got the impression they didn’t know each other very well,’ Dennis said. ‘That they weren’t—friends. While they were eating lunch the little guy was distinctly shitty about something his mate was saying. I thought he was gonna snap him at one stage.’
‘Yeah. He was a fairly unsavoury piece of work, that one. Did you see his tatts?’
Dennis had not, because Teddy dropped his hands from the bar when Dennis had arrived to serve them.
‘KILL and MAIM on his wrists,’ Brett said. ‘Wonder where he got those?’
‘I wonder.’ The words YOUR NEXT. THINK ABOUT IT ARSHOLE flashed unprompted into Dennis’s mind, accompanied by Teddy’s ruddy face with its rug of thick, greying hair and unfashionably long sideburns. KILL. MAIM. YOUR NEXT ARSHOLE. Couldn’t be, could it? No. Yet everything ran perfectly together and the parts fitted. The vision of Teddy would not go away but instead grew more vivid and insistent. With his elbow out the window while they bounced down the corrugated road he experienced a moment of cold shock along his spine, pure and brilliant, like the cracking of an iceberg. When the attack passed he breathed out, eyes closed. He walked right in, he thought, and I let him walk out again. He presented himself to me and I did nothing.
‘He didn’t look like a day-tripper to me,’ Dennis said, and glanced sharply at Brett for a response. Looking at Dennis, Brett saw from his suddenly changed demeanour that he’d just undergone some kind of unsettling experience. ‘They weren’t day-trippers, Brett,’ he said more firmly. ‘I’d bet my balls on it.’
‘What were they then?’
Dennis didn’t answer. He was looking out of the window now and thinking. He was thinking how blind he’d been. Noeline Gallagher and the girl at the pizza shop had given him enough after all and he’d blown it. He’d failed to grasp his chance.
‘Do you think they sent you that letter?’ Brett said. Dennis merely nodded. He was gazing unseeing at the bush rushing by. Brett hesitated a moment, then went the next logical step. ‘Do you reckon they had something to do with what happened to Karen?’
Dennis fixed him with a hard stare. There was something emphatic and compelling in his face that alarmed Brett, an unflappable man and one not given to fears. But this was not the Dennis he knew, and that was what had alarmed him. This was someone he had never met, someone capable of doing anything. ‘Yes, Brett,’ he said. ‘That is what I think.’
‘You could be wrong. That’s a big jump to make.’
Dennis didn’t hear that. ‘I’m going to find out who the fuck they were. I’m going to find what hole they came out of. Then I’m gonna blow ’em up.’
Brett drove on. He turned right at a T-junction and soon outlying houses and the back of the town came into view. ‘How are you gonna manage all that?’ he said, not with reproof or even disbelief, but interestedly, curious to know. But again Dennis didn’t hear him.
Back in the hotel they drank four dust-slaking pots and then Brett went home. After he’d gone Dennis went out the back and stood in the middle of the yard, looking to see what might have interested Teddy so much. Maybe I’m wrong, he thought, but if so, why do I feel so convinced? He could feel Teddy’s repellent presence right where he stood, yet that presence did not repel him at all. He wanted to meet Teddy again, soon, but on his own terms this time. Going back inside, he thought, of course he’d feel safe coming in here. He doesn’t know I’m looking for him. He thinks he’s safe. He’s not, though. His time is short and getting shorter.
He got in his car and drove to the Blind Eagle where he asked his opposite number there, George McMenemy, if two men answering the description of Teddy and Graham had stayed there the previous Saturday night. No, George said, but he remembered seeing them in the bar. The short, tough-looking one stayed on by himself after the other guy left, he said. Then both of them came back later, had a few drinks and a counter tea. They left together sometime after that. George didn’t see them go. He didn’t hear either of them refer to the other by name.
Next Dennis visited the Golden Lizard, the only motel in town. The manager, Ray Olson, was in the garden attending to the sprinklers. He had been off playing golf on Saturday but Julie, his wife, could probably help. He called her and Julie came out from their little flat behind the office. Dennis gave her a big smile.
‘Hi, Julie.’
‘Oh, hello, Dennis. What’s up?’ Dennis knew the Olsons only slightly, though her sympathetic tone of voice revealed that his troubles had not passed them by. ‘Two men,’ he said. ‘One short, mid-forties to fifty, bit of a roughnut, the other younger, taller, probably gay. Did they stay here last Saturday?’ He had already decided to offer no explanation for his interest. Julie Olson was an obliging, open-faced woman.
‘Yes, they did,’ she said straight away. ‘Why?’
Ignoring her question, he said, ‘Julie, I wonder if you could check their names in your register. It’s just that I need to get in touch with them rather urgently.’
Julie reached for the book and flicked back a few pages. Dennis’s heart began to race. He watched her finger going down the page. There were five names on it. ‘Here we are,’ she said. ‘T. Power and C. Grant, both of Melbourne.’ He turned the book around and examined it. ‘The taller one signed for both of them,’ Julie said. ‘That would’ve been Mr Power.’
‘Yes, I suppose it would’ve been,’ Dennis said. There was nothing in those two meagre lines of writing to assist him, except that the phoney filmstar names and the lack of addresses confirmed for him that he was headed in the right direction. These men didn’t want anyone knowing who they were. He hadn’t been wrong.
‘What about their car?’
‘Cars. They had two.’
‘Did they? But they arrived together?’
‘Yes, they certainly did.’
‘What sort of cars, Julie? Can you remember?’ There were no rego numbers in the book—that had apparently ceased to be a requirement of motels, at least of this one.
‘Mr Power had a van of some sort, a new one. Burgundy colour. I couldn’t tell you what sort, though. It was very smart-looking. Very sleek, with a sort of a pointy front.’
‘Right. What about Mr, ah, Grant. What did he have?’
‘That was a Commodore. White. Beautiful car with lots of chromework. I commented on it to him.’
‘Did you? What did he say?’
‘Nothing much. Just that he liked looking after it, something like that. He wasn’t very talkative.’
I’ll bet he wasn’t, Dennis thought. ‘Julie, you don’t happen to remember the registration numbers of either of these cars, do you?’
‘Goodness, what a lot of questions. No, I’m sorry, Dennis. I didn’t notice that.’ The phone rang then and Julie answered it. Dennis thanked her with a wave, said goodbye to Ray in the garden and got back into his Magna.
It had been five days since he’d been to see Tony Gilhooley, and the detective had not got back in touch yet. Dennis decided he’d better keep on his case and call him first thing in the morning. If only he could get a name. That was all he’d need. A name or an address. Something a bit more useful than T. Power or C. Grant. The guy certainly had a sense of humour. Power was supposedly a homosexual and Grant, handsome and suave, would be about as far removed as you could get from that villainous-looking piece of shit with the tattoos and the hair. Dennis wondered if he appreciated the joke or even knew that one had been played on him. Probably not. And he wondered too who or what had brought these men together, what their relationship was, why they had come to town in separate cars, what their next moves were. Somehow he had to get behind and upwind of them, gain the advantage. Chained to the hotel he was a target, a bunny in the clear. He had to turn the thing around if he could.
When he rang Ballarat CIB at quarter past nine next morning Gilhooley was not in his office. He tried again an hour later and a young man’s voice said, ‘Ballarat CIB. Good morning.’
‘Good morning,’ Dennis said. ‘I’d like to speak to Tony Gilhooley if I could, please.’
‘Just a moment,’ the young man said, and put the phone down with a clatter. Muted talk went on in the background. Dennis waited, stirring a cup of coffee on the bar. Then the same voice came back on and said, ‘Excuse me, sir. May I ask who’s calling?’
Dennis got a funny feeling then, and hesitated, but gave his name. Why not? He was a citizen speaking with a member of the public service.
The young man disappeared again, Dennis growing uneasy, then a much older voice, one without much charm, said to him, ‘Hello, Mr Gatz, is it?’
“That’s right. I wanted Tony Gilhooley. Is he in?’
‘Sergeant Gilhooley is not in, Mr Gatz. Do you mind if I ask you the nature of your business?’
Dennis hesitated. ‘It’s … personal.’
‘Is it.’ The officer cleared his throat, then said, ‘Mr Gatz, this is a busy police station, and we don’t have time for personal business. Sergeant Gilhooley has been reminded of that fact. You’ve managed to land him in a bit of bother.’
‘I don’t follow,’ Dennis said blandly.
‘I think you do. As a former police officer yourself you will know that police time and resources are not available for the use of private citizens where a complaint has not been filed or a crime committed. For that you go to a private detective agency. They’re in the phone book.’
‘What’s happened to Gilhooley?’
‘That’s a police matter, and none of your business, Mr Gatz. Goodbye.’
‘Wait on,’ De
nnis said. ‘Would you mind telling me your name, at least? Just so we’re even.’
‘Inspector Grimshaw speaking,’ the voice said.
‘Inspector, there’s the small matter of a letter that Tony was looking into. A threatening letter sent to me. I don’t suppose you know anything about that?’
‘I’m not aware of any such letter. But if it turns up I’ll leave it at the front desk and you can pick up your property from there.’
‘My property.’ Dennis laughed. ‘But Inspector, how will I know if it’s turned up?’
‘That’s your problem,’ Inspector Grimshaw said.
‘Thanks a bunch, mate. You’re a class act. Can you just tell me one more thing, please?’
‘What’s that?’ Grimshaw said testily.
‘Were you born a prick or did you have to do a course for it?’
Grimshaw didn’t say anything for a moment, then coolly answered, ‘I know all about you, mister. You’re a sick individual. You specialise in insulting people to compensate for your own failures.’ Then he disconnected.
‘Arsehole!’ Dennis shouted into the dead phone. ‘Everywhere it’s the fuckin’ same.’ He replaced the receiver and sipped his coffee, but it was too cold and he tipped it down the sink. Inspector Grimshaw had the mail on him all right, but they weren’t his words. They sounded more like Frank Stannard’s.
SIXTEEN