Lugarno

by Peter Corris

  I whistled softly. ‘Pricey.’

  ‘Yeah, well you know these kids. Probably a matter of time before it’s repossessed and he’s back to the bomb he had before.’

  I winked and kept him onside by buying the most expensive cap in his stock. I went out to the car park and looked at the Pajero parked in a reserved space. It was very new and very high tech. The interior was clean and neat and the dark suit on a hanger had an Italian cut and that not-much-change-out-of-a-grand look about it. There was obviously more to Jason than met the eye and I was beginning to wish I’d known about the car and the suit before talking to him. You’ll keep, I thought.

  I waited until some more players went into the shop to distract Fat Reg, scooted to my trusty but rusty Falcon and drove away.

  5

  It’d been a strange morning’s work on both matters I was pursuing. As I drove towards Lugarno, I did a cruise of the area, following Forest Road down to the river, and reflected on the coincidence that both cases involved young men who seemed to have achieved some upward mobility. It was late in the morning and I was hungry after my meagre weight-conscious breakfast. In my experience, well-heeled women like Sammy and Danni Price didn’t sit at home with a sandwich and the Midday Movie. They went out to lunch. I bought a salad roll and a Diet Coke at a milk bar and took up a position with a good view of the house, hoping one of them would emerge. If they both emerged I’d have to make a decision. It can be an intellectually challenging game, whatever Cyn used to say.

  I couldn’t see the water from my spot but I knew it was down there at the end of the road that had been carved out of the rock so that some rugged bushland rose up above it. Had to be nice looking back up at Lugarno from the river. The Price house in Forest Road was a newish rambling affair on a big block behind a high besser brick fence and large silver-frosted iron gates. The neighbourhood was a mixture of houses old and new with a few up-market townhouse developments thrown in. It was elevated and leafy, without any through traffic. Nice place if you had a good car and a swimming pool and didn’t mind being that far from the CBD. It looked as if everyone living there would be much the same—comfortable and conservative—but I knew that wasn’t true: there’d be secret drinkers and cross-dressers and One Nation voters.

  I’d finished the roll and was draining the Coke bottle when a white Celica glided through the open gates. Sammy off for lunch. With whom? Where? I got a good look at her as she flashed past. Her blonde hair was formally arranged and she wore bright, dangling earrings. For lunch? But it was her bearing and expression that had me turning the key—she was high on something, very high, and looking to get higher. She looked as though she was following the Gough Whitlam adage—the fun is where I am!

  I muttered this in my best Gough voice as I followed the Celica at a discreet distance. Sammy was a good driver and the Celica was a good car. Her traffic sense was exemplary. Unlike a lot of drivers, who speed up and pass only to be stopped at lights and intersections and get nothing out of it, she could judge how to get smoothly through the traffic and avoid hold-ups. It took me all my time to keep up with her while staying, as she did, just over the speed limit. The route was basically east and she eventually pulled up outside a block of flats on the outskirts of Rockdale. She drove into the parking area and sounded the horn three times. I stopped in the street, ready to follow when she pulled out. If she went west I’d have to do a U-turn over double lines. Dangerous stuff.

  The next three toots were louder and impatient. She got out of the car and lit a cigarette. She wore a pink suit with a tight, short skirt. High heels. After a few puffs she threw the cigarette away as a man approached her. He was tall and fair-haired, wearing a light grey suit. Blue shirt, red tie. They greeted each other very formally, shaking hands and exchanging a few words. She handed him the keys. He opened the passenger door for her and she got in with a flash of smoky nylonned legs. He moved smoothly, like a young man, got behind the wheel, backed out and we were off east again.

  Their manner puzzled me. This was obviously an arranged meeting, yet they met like strangers. These days it isn’t usual for women drivers to turn their car keys over to men, and the way Sammy drove suggested that she enjoyed it. And the suits! He didn’t drive nearly as well as she did and was easy to keep in sight. We ended up in Kogarah, a bit short of Tom Ugly’s Bridge. The Celica pulled into a car park servicing a complex that included a marina, a restaurant and a motel. Up-market, nice views. It took a while for me to find a spot a short distance away and I walked back with my golfing cap on, hoping I looked like a yachtie.

  The sun shone, the water sparkled; a great day to be lunching or boating and not so bad for snooping. Nobody bothered me as I strolled through the car park and mounted the steps leading up to the restaurant that had an appropriately nautical air. Sammy and her friend were lunching alfresco on the wide, shaded balcony that gave them a glorious view of the Georges River out to Botany Bay. I kept my distance but at a guess they were on oysters to start and they don’t usually put mineral water in a silver ice bucket.

  ‘Help you, sir?’

  A waiter type appeared from nowhere. He seemed to evaluate the retail value of my clothes at a glance and his tone was critical.

  ‘No, no. Just having a look before taking a sail. Nice place. Booking necessary?’

  ‘Absolutely, sir.’

  ‘Good. Well, another day.’

  Hanging around is one of the skills a private enquiry agent has to perfect and it’s not as easy as it sounds. It was easier back in the days when I smoked; at least you looked as if you were doing something. Of course you are doing something, but the trick is to look as if you’re not, and yet somehow belong where you are. Breaking my no-drinking-before-six rule and not for the first time, I bought a can of light beer from the liquor store that was part of the marina complex and took up a position in the shade across from the restaurant. I’d picked up the local rag in the store and had that as another prop. A man drinking beer and reading the paper on a beautiful day down by the water is doing no wrong.

  The paper was full of the usual parish pump letters and articles about traffic and air quality and sewerage and water quality. It’s funny how those very basic human needs are the stuff of local politics—and usually get stuffed up. Sammy and her handsome hunk were taking their time over the barramundi and the crème caramel. I was through to the local bowls competition results when they emerged. Sammy was tall and slim but shapely with that air some women have of appearing not to know how good they look. She tucked her hand under her companion’s arm as they went down the steps like two models on the catwalk.

  I drained the last lukewarm drops from the can and deposited it and the paper in the nearby bin. Keep Kogarah beautiful. They crossed the car park, but I didn’t even consider sprinting for the Falcon or hiring a boat—this pair wasn’t thinking anything but sex. They walked so close together they were almost intertwined and only broke away a fraction when they mounted the steps to the motel reception.

  She said something to him as they hit the last step and they both laughed—blonde heads tossed, trim, taut bodies ready for action. Their youth and vitality made me feel old and depressed. Tracking them from the office along a walkway to their room, I felt as if I was back in the bad old ‘Brownie and bedsheets’ days when a big part of the job was obtaining divorce evidence.

  Sammy’s companion unlocked the door and ushered her inside with a hand planted firmly on her behind. Would have made a good picture in the old days. No business of mine now, at least not directly. I stood at my vantage point under a stand of plane trees in a corner of the car park and considered my next move. I couldn’t see any reason to tell Price his wife was having an affair; it didn’t seem to have any bearing on his strategy to protect and help his daughter. Or if it did, I couldn’t see what that bearing was.

  I walked back to my car and picked up the mobile, thinking to call the Price house. If Danni was at home I’d go over there and wait to see if she went
anywhere interesting. It was hot in the car and I got out to stand in the shade to make the call. I was about to punch in the numbers when a man loomed up beside me. When I say loomed I mean loomed—he was tall and wide with a shaven head, and the pale hand that plucked the mobile from my grasp and threw it away was super-sized.

  ‘Hey,’ I protested.

  He just stood there, a pace away now—a hundred kilos of bone and muscle in T-shirt and jeans. I had a gun and a tyre iron and I thought I’d need both to make an impression on him, but they were in the car. For now it was just me.

  ‘What the hell d’you think you’re doing?’

  He moved a step closer and it took everything I had and a bit more not to back away. ‘You’re asking the wrong question, mate. That’s the question I should be asking you.’

  At least we were talking. I opened my mouth to reply but he swung a punch into my belly that knocked the wind out of me and buckled my knees. He grabbed me by the collar and I heard the faded denim rip as he hauled me upright and pressed me against the bonnet of my car. I wanted to talk but I was still trying to breathe.

  His breath was ripe with marijuana as he spoke close to my ear. ‘But I’m not interested in your answer, mate. I just got a message for you. Whatever you’re doing, drop it!’

  He let me go and I scrabbled at the hot metal for something to hold to stop me falling. I managed to keep my feet and sucked in deep breaths as I watched him walk away. At fifty metres off he still looked big.

  6

  I’d pressed my palms so hard back against the hot car bonnet that they felt scorched. That, plus humiliation and mystification, left me feeling that I was floundering out of my depth. Not a good moment for an old surfer. When I’d regained my wind my first reaction was anger. I wanted to storm up to Sammy and lover boy’s room and ask them to put me in touch with their minder. He’d sucker-punched me and, big and all as he was, I’d have been willing to give him another go on a level playing field. Silly thought and I dismissed it straight off.

  When my breathing had returned to normal and I was sure nothing was broken inside, I searched for the mobile under the adjacent trees. Palm trees, with spiny bits sticking out. I emerged with a few scratches to add to the bruises but with the phone. I dialled my office number and it rang. In an odd way hearing my own voice on the answering message calmed me down. I can’t think why. I was still the man who’d struck dead ends and been sucker-punched.

  I brushed dirt off the mobile and put it back in the car. Maybe the motel was a notorious hot-sheet place and my surveillance had been obvious, resulting in someone from the management having a word with someone from security. Not likely. Sammy’s assignation had a commercial look, but as far as I knew escort agencies didn’t usually lay on minders, especially when the escort was a male. So if it was an escort agency that supplied the muscle, what was so special about Samantha Price? I got back in the car, pulled out and drove back to the motel. This time I parked inside and waited to see if anyone approached me. I had the gun and the tyre iron ready. Nothing happened.

  Then the door to the long balcony opened and Sammy and her friend stepped out. She went first and he stayed a pace or two behind, watching her walk. Why not? They returned to the Celica and this time she drove. Interesting. For want of any better ideas I followed them. Less than a kilometre away she stopped at a roadside taxi rank and he got out after a quick kiss. She drove off. I knew where she was going but why hadn’t she dropped him at home? It wasn’t far off. I found a parking space and waited until a cab pulled into the rank and picked him up. The taxi headed towards the city and I followed faithfully. My mid-section was aching and I was developing a strong need for a double scotch and a couple of pain-killers.

  We ended up in Canterbury, not too far from territory I knew better than some of the places I’d been so far that day. The traffic was light and I had no trouble parking a few spots behind where the cab pulled in. Nice-looking old park on the right, the kind that would have a war memorial, maybe two, and a long shopping centre stretching ahead. He paid off the cab and started walking. Closer to him now, I could see that he was very tall, 190 centimetres plus, towering over most of the people in the street, many of whom were Asian. He looked a little out of place in the smart suit on a hot afternoon and must have been aware of it because he stripped off the tie and stuffed it into his pocket. He walked quickly with a long stride and I had to stretch out to keep up with him and that didn’t do my aching gut any good. With any luck he’d slip into a pub and I could get some medication.

  He turned into an arcade and I had to hang back so as not to follow too obtrusively. I felt a rush of something—fear mixed with anger—when a big, bald-headed man stepped around me. But it wasn’t the Kogarah Mauler and I used him as a shield as I followed my man down the narrow, tiled walkway.

  The arcade held a lingerie boutique, a chemist’s, a hairdressing salon and around the bulk of the man in front of me I could see the tables and chairs that suggested a coffee shop at the end. My shield disappeared into the chemist’s and I was ten paces behind when the man I was following pushed a buzzer on a glass door and waited. The door swung inwards and in he went. I’ve had a little eye trouble since an injury a few years back and the beam of light that hit the door momentarily blinded me and stopped me reading the name on it. When I’d adjusted to the light the name was clear enough in big gilt letters:

  LORD GEORGE INTRODUCTION AND

  SOCIAL ESCORT AGENCY

  I bought a packet of pain-killers in the chemist’s and settled down with a flat white only a few paces from the security door. My stomach was tender and I washed down three of the pills with the coffee. Nothing happened for twenty minutes and that was as long as I could spin out the coffee, so I ordered another one I didn’t want and waited some more. People on their afternoon coffee breaks came and went, mostly with take-outs but a few sit-downs. Another twenty minutes later a man came out. He was nearly as tall and just as blond and well dressed as the man I’d followed but it wasn’t him. As the pain in my middle diminished, my curiosity rose. I went over to the door, flanked by two large windows, and peered in. The man sitting behind a reception desk was a clone of the other two. I copied down the telephone number on the door and left.

  I’d been injured more than injuring and had more questions than answers. It was enough for one day. I drove home and took a hot shower. The bathroom could do with a refit and the last time Tess stayed with me she said I should put in a spa bath. I said I doubted the floor would take the weight and I didn’t fancy sitting down below with a spa bath poised above my head. Still, a spa would’ve been handy after encounters like the one I’d had today.

  I had nothing to report to Price but I could give Tess some good, if puzzling, news. I rang and got no answer. It was late in the afternoon but she said she was doing a full-time course and knowing Tess that meant full-time plus. The mail consisted of bills for my Bankcard and Mastercard, a postcard from my sister who was holidaying in Vanuatu and a tempting wine club offer. A dozen bottles of Chardonnay at a throw-out price plus three bottles of Merlot for free with every purchase. I’m fond of Merlot and don’t mind Chardonnay either, but I looked at the Mastercard bill again and was strong. The wine club offer went into the bin.

  Shortly after six p.m., having decided that I wasn’t interested enough in the genetically modified food issue to listen to ‘Australia Talks Back’, I phoned Tess again.

  ‘It’s after six,’ she said. ‘Have you got a drink?’

  ‘Glenfiddich straight.’

  ‘Bullshit. Johnny Red on the rocks more likely. How’s it going, Cliff?’

  I told her what had happened in Strathfield and at the university and how the secretary had seen her brother that morning.

  Tess was sharp. ‘How would she know him? There must be scores of law students.’

  ‘I don’t know. How did he pay his fees?’

  ‘Right. But still, he’s okay.’

  ‘Apparently, but he’s n
ot where you thought he was. That is, if I can believe the woman at that address. I don’t know why, but I’m not sure I can believe her. There was something in her manner—and that’s apart from the hostility.’

  ‘You think she was lying?’

  ‘Being evasive at the very least. By the way, how did you get that address? Did he write and put it on the back of the envelope or what? Doesn’t sound like Ramsay.’

  Again I was letting my dislike of the man show through but Tess didn’t pick up on it. ‘No. I meant to tell you but I scrawled the address down on the pad I keep by the phone for when I rang you and I forgot. I got this note on a sheet of notepaper with that address stamped on the top of it. The phone number had been blanked out. I thought it must be some sort of old guesthouse or something Ramsay and his greenie mates had taken over. But you say it’s an up-market house?’

  ‘With an up-market owner or resident.’

  ‘It’s weird. I can’t see him studying law. He’s a bloody greenie anarchist, for Christ’s sake.’

  ‘Maybe you can do Anarchy IA out there. I’ve got a mate with some Lachlan Uni connections. I’ll look into it and try to find him. Can’t be too hard.’

  ‘Thanks, Cliff.’

  ‘I have to tell you. I’ve got another matter on the go.’

  ‘Good for you. Well, I’ve got an essay due. You’ll ring me when you learn anything new.’

  ‘I will for sure. Might be a day or two. This other thing’s tricky.’

  ‘Don’t strain yourself on my account. See you.’

  I’d intended to call it a day with the scotch and an omelette and The Perfect Storm, a book I was halfway through and that had confirmed me in my belief that it was unsafe to go to sea in a vessel not big enough to contain a bar and a dance floor. But the day’s questions started to work on me and I found I was reading pages of the book and taking nothing in. So I phoned Viv Garner and arranged to go around and see him in Lilyfield.