by Peter Klein
When I came back from my second surf on Sunday afternoon, I still hadn’t heard from Maxine. So much for her promised call. I rang her anyway and left a message. I stopped off at Gino’s for dinner on the way home and caught up with Billy over a pizza. He said we’d had an okay week, but that was as far as talking business went. All he wanted to do was talk about Matt being the strapper killer. Billy had lots of theories on why he’d turned out the way he had; I must have heard at least a dozen in the half hour I spent with him. I was secretly glad when it started getting busy and he had to leave me and lend a hand behind the counter. When I got home I still hadn’t heard from Maxine. It wasn’t too late to call her, but I figured she’d have rung me by now if she was going to. Besides, I was knackered from my two surfing sessions and the drive back from the peninsula, so I took a shower and went straight to bed.
On Monday morning after breakfast, I dropped by Beering’s office. He was leaning back in his chair reading the formguide.
‘Don’t you ever make appointments, Punter?’ he grumbled.
‘Yeah, I can see you’re so busy.’
‘Well as it turns out, I’m not. Leastways not after Saturday. Coffee? Help yourself, you know where it is,’ he said. Beering put aside his formguide and I poured myself a coffee from the percolator and sat down in the chair in front of his desk.
‘It’s all out of my hands for the moment,’ he explained. ‘The police are conducting the search for Renford. Meanwhile, they’ve gone through his flat, turned it inside out. And his car too.’
‘Find anything interesting?’
‘They’ve found enough. DNA from his clothes and bed linen which match the DNA found at the murder scenes. In his flat and car they found plenty of clear prints and a roll of venetian cord, consistent with what he tied his victims up with.’
‘What about his wife and kids, where do they all fit into this?’
‘There is no wife and kids. At least, none that we’ve been able to discover.’
‘But he told us all he was . . .’
Beering shook his head. ‘That’s all just part of the fantasy world he created. See, they can be very clever, the way they portray themselves, these people. Making out he was just a regular family guy was part of his devious personality.’
I thought back to when I’d asked Matt about his family. ‘He once spun some yarn about his wife always going shopping on a Saturday afternoon while he was at the races. And his kids; I remember him being a little unsure of school holiday dates. Didn’t think anything of it at the time.’
‘Why wouldn’t you believe him? He played the part so well he probably believed it himself.’
‘He told us all he didn’t have to work, that he’d been left some property investments by his parents. Is that just make-believe, too?’
‘Actually, we’re still trying to get all the history from the real estate agent. Wells was talking to them yesterday. But it looks like he was left the house and the flat out the back by his parents. His stepfather was a builder, who built them both. It seems Matt rented out the house and lived in the flat. He survived on the rent, never had to work. So I suppose the property investor part is true.’
I took a sip of my coffee; lukewarm and bitter, been sitting in the jug since early morning. I downed it anyway. ‘He had a pretty comfortable life then, didn’t he,’ I said. ‘The house as income. The flat to live in. No boss. Could come and go as he pleased.’
‘Yeah, well, he won’t be doing that from now on. That lifestyle vanished as of Saturday. He’s got you to thank for that, Punter. You and that artist mate of yours.’
‘Did they find the silks?’
Beering shook his head. ‘Must have taken ’em with him when he shot through. We can’t have missed him by much. I reckon he must have high-tailed it back to his place and grabbed what he could. One of the kids in the front house reckons she saw him ride off on his bike. Apparently he was into cycling.’
‘Doesn’t make him any easier to find.’
‘Nope, it doesn’t.’
‘What do you think he’ll do, I mean for money and stuff?’
‘We know he withdrew two and a half grand of his savings on Sunday from an ATM in the city. So for the time being he’s not short of a quid.’
‘You reckon he’s hiding out in town somewhere?’
‘Could be anywhere. Police are going through all the hotels and motels. Issuing copies of his photo. They got a watch out at the airports and stations. Wells reckons he’s probably still close by. He can’t use his credit card without leaving a trail, so that cancels out a lot of options for him. It’s a game of hide and seek now, but the police are confident they’ll flush him out soon.’
In the afternoon, I did some form for tomorrow’s Geelong meeting then went down to the garage to put a new set of fins on my wave ski. My plan was to get a morning session in at Torquay Point, then catch the races at Geelong on the way home. I spent the best part of an hour fiddling around in the garage. Che was helping me, of course. Jumping up on the workbench and trying to cram his head into the jars of nuts and bolts. You never know; could be a moth hiding in there that needed pouncing on. The only thing he caught was a scolding from me for getting in the way. I replaced the old fins and was glad I did, because the middle one had a crack running down to the screw and would have split on the very first bottom turn I cranked out on a wave. I tightened the new fibreglass fins in the boxes, then checked the seatbelts and footwells. All good, so I shooed Che outside, locked the garage door and went back upstairs. When I checked my phone, Maxine had left me a text message: Kinda busy all wk. Maybe Friday night?
A text, for Christ sakes. Couldn’t she just call and talk to me? What sort of a stupid message was that anyway? Kinda busy. Busy doing what? Work, another art gallery opening? Presumably she still had to eat; not out of the question she could at least share a meal with me. I mean, I could even manage an early-morning breakfast meeting if she managed to fit me into her busy schedule. And what’s with the maybe? Why not say, ‘Meet me at 7.45 pm your place’, or the Canary Bar, or wherever. Somewhere, some place you actually make a commitment to. I cracked the top off a Beck’s and sat at the kitchen table sulking over the text. I felt like a task that had been reprioritised. Is that what this relationship had really got down to? Me, a chore to be attended to when time allowed?
I ended up sinking another two beers at the table with Che as my drinking partner. Don’t laugh; at least he spent quality time with me. By the third round, I’d composed some fantastical, long-winded response in my mind that I was going to send back to Maxine by text. Firstly, I’d question her ruthlessly on just what was keeping her so busy. Raise the issue of her time management skills and work-life-relationship priorities, so forth. Che thought it sounded all right when I recited it to him. Meowed encouragingly at the bit where I said I wasn’t going to wait around like a cancelled appointment waiting to be rescheduled. And by the way, where did she think this relationship was headed? The damn thing sounded like a letter in an Agony Aunt column.
‘Forget it, Che,’ I said, giving him a scratch under the collar. ‘It would take me half the night to send by text, anyway.’
No, I’d handle it in my own usual, unsatisfactory manner, the same way I always did with the female of the species. Too proud to communicate my feelings. Too stupid to do anything but mull it over endlessly and say nothing. Stew on it. Let it build up till the whole thing explodes in my face. You’re a fucking mug, Punter.
At Torquay Point the next morning, I surfed aggressively. Manoeuvring myself way inside everybody else, clinging to the prime take-off spot like some selfish eighteen-year-old short-boarder with attitude. More than once I called another surfer off my wave with a curt ‘Oi!’ as I attacked the wave face and screamed past them. I chased down every swell that came my way, a greedy little wave hog who didn’t even look like he was enjoying himself. Nor was I having a good time. That’s not my normal surfing style. I usually give away as many waves t
o others as I catch. But today I was sitting grim-faced on my ski, wanting to take on the whole world.
When I came in from my surf, I ate a chicken wrap at Spooners on the main drag. The guy who served me just wanted to yap and I didn’t feel much like talking, so I pretended my phone was ringing and put it to my ear. Pathetic, isn’t it, when you have to resort to deceptions like that to make an escape. Afterwards, I killed some time wandering aimlessly through the surf-second shops looking for something to buy. Couldn’t find a single thing I needed. The day had turned to shit and it didn’t improve any at the races. My main chance was a late scratching in the third. He’d hurt himself in the float coming down to Geelong, which meant I’d have to wait around until the seventh race before I could do any business. I found myself getting bored and restless and breaking my cardinal rule of having ‘play’ bets. Even play bets start to add up and I was chasing my tail by the time the seventh eventually came around. The mood I was in, the day I was having, most people would have packed up and called it a day. Not me. John Punter, number one sucker for self-inflicted punishment, decided to stay for a final round. I backed three horses in an eight-horse field. Broke another rule doing that, too. Small fields, beware. I took the shorts about the favourite, saved on the other two and then watched in disgust as a bolter stormed down the outside to relegate my horses to second, third and fourth. Score: Punter, zilch. Bookmakers, a big smile on their faces.
I didn’t go to the Triangle that night for our regular game of snooker. I was feeling too shitty and I just knew the whole night would be one endless question and answer session about Matt anyway. So I rang David with some excuse and told him I was a no-show.
On Wednesday I hadn’t heard any more from Maxine. I debated whether to call her or respond to her text. Decided to do nothing. I went out to Sandown in the afternoon. A better result for me than the previous day; I only played the one race and it won convincingly. Thursday was Bendigo. Although I didn’t end up having a bet, the day turned out okay. I spotted a couple of runners worth jotting down in my black book for next time and enjoyed a nice fisherman’s pie in a local restaurant on the way back home.
She still hadn’t rung.
On Friday I launched into the weekend’s form straight after breakfast and tackled it solidly all morning before my phone rang about lunchtime. It was Kate.
‘I’m sorry to hear about you and Maxine,’ she said.
‘Sorry?’
‘About you and her breaking up.’
‘Come again?’
‘I just saw the picture in the afternoon Xpress, you know, her and that lawyer caught pashing on at the food and wine festival yesterday.’
I’d had a nasty feeling all week. The radar on the back of my neck had been sending signals and yet I’d been ignoring them.
‘Punter, you there?’
‘Yeah, I’m here. And thank you very much for that,’ I said as sarcastically as I could. ‘Not often a guy gets the heads up from his ex that he’s just been dropped. I think I would have preferred to find out first from Maxine.’
I could have heard a pin drop at the other end as Kate realised the huge gaffe she’d just made.
‘Oh my god, I’m so sorry. Punter, I didn’t realise that she –’
‘What, that it might have slipped her mind to tell me?’
‘I’m sure she –’
‘She’d get around to it?’
Sure she would. If she wasn’t so kinda fucking busy.
21
I slammed the phone down and tossed it onto the table. Was it true? Was that what Maxine had been up to behind my back? On Saturday night she’d said she was sick and the rest of the week she’d been too busy. Busy all right. Busy with I bet I knew who. I stormed up to the newsagent to get a copy of the afternoon Xpress and opened it inside my van. Sure enough, there she was on page four in the City Confidential section, kissing that smarmy lawyer, Rodney Ellis. All over him like a rash and he was hardly fighting her off. I forced myself to read the caption, though it just about made me sick: Girl about town Maxine Henshaw snapped yesterday at the Southbank food and wine festival with prominent QC Rodney Ellis. It appears Ms Henshaw was doing a little tasting of her own when spotted by City Confidential.
Rodney bloody Ellis. I should have known. Interstate business seminars. Weekend planning sessions. After-hours briefings. What a crock of shit; she’d been out with him the whole time. But why couldn’t she just have told me it was over instead of playing games? I tried to think back to other times in my life when a relationship I’d been in had ended. It usually finished after an argument, or someone had gone away or simply hadn’t bothered to get back in touch. Sometimes, as with Kate, we’d remained friends and just moved on with our lives. But this was different; I’d been traded, dumped for another. A huge kick in the backside of a man’s pride. I felt humiliated, ridiculed. The ego’s a fragile thing and mine just wanted to run away, but it’s hard to hide when your girlfriend’s plastered all over page four with another guy. Rodney bloody Ellis.
I drove back home not quite knowing what to do. Then I realised I’d been sitting in my parked van for a good ten minutes and that I should get out, go upstairs and do something. Should I ring her? No way. Absolutely not. I had my pride. About the only thing I had left from this relationship. If she wanted to make contact, then fine, so be it. But I wasn’t going to call the bitch first.
I don’t remember much about the rest of the afternoon. I know I went for a walk by the Yarra. Did a nice slow circuit at the back of Scotch College and followed the river back by the parkland down behind Riversdale Road. But I don’t recall seeing anything. I must have been a walking zombie. When I got back, I took a bath; a very long one. Lost myself in the steamy waters and the comforting mask of a hand-towel draped over my face. I stayed until the water got tepid, then I let some out and topped it up again with more hot water. So much for the number four drought restrictions. Yarra Valley Water could go screw itself, and send the bill to Maxine Henshaw while they were at it.
I wasn’t going to call her. End of story. How many times do I have to say it, for Christ sake.
I fed Che; he knew something was up. They say animals can sense human emotions; death, sadness. Unfaithful girlfriends? He looked at me with his ears pricked, his head on the side. It didn’t stop him eating his dinner, but he ate cautiously, taking little mouthfuls and watching me the whole time as if he knew.
‘You never liked her anyway, did you, little fella?’ I said to him. ‘She was always tripping over you in the hallway, wasn’t she?’
I cooked up some stirfry for dinner. It tasted like crap and I had no appetite anyway, so I threw it in the kitchen bin after two mouthfuls. I cracked the top off a Beck’s and sat in front of the TV, aimlessly flicking through channels. One beer downed soon became two. I got up to grab another from the fridge, aware that I was starting to get into dangerous territory. The booze was kicking in on an empty stomach. My mobile lay on the kitchen table where I’d left it, as if challenging me not to use it. Mocking me, knowing what a weak bastard I really was. I’ve already told you, I’m not going to do it.
When I called her, she picked up straightaway, almost as if she’d been expecting me. ‘Is there anything you want to tell me?’ I said.
When I ride past on my bike it’s dark, but at least the apartment block’s floodlights light up the Glenferrie Road side. There’s an entrance there and the letterboxes out the front are numbered one to four, indicating there must be at least another four flats around the other side, because the telephone book said he lives in number eight. I stop for a moment and reach into my shoulder bag. I pull some advertising leaflets out that I stole earlier from the local shopping centre and make a show of inserting them into all the letterboxes, even the ones that say ‘No junk mail’. Anyone watching me would see just another pamphlet deliverer. A good disguise, isn’t it?
I ride around the corner and into the side road to another collection of letterboxes and a secon
d common entrance. This is where Punter lives, the block of apartments opposite Scotch College, and to be sure, there’s his van parked in the driveway. They’re nice Art Deco units. Punter owns his. I know that because I’ve heard him drop it in on conversation once or twice, the conceited bastard. I used to have a flat and a house too. Technically I still own them, but thanks to Punter I can never return. Now then, what to do?
I drove over to meet Maxine, wondering why I was even bothering to go. I’d have been quite happy to end it on the phone with her. After all, there’s no rule that says you have to have a face-to-face. I still had the keys to her South Yarra apartment; could have just posted those back to her with a little note saying ‘Fun while it lasted’. Didn’t even need to do that, really, since she wasn’t going anywhere near the place again. But she wanted to talk, to explain what had happened. Would have thought page four of the Xpress did a pretty good job of that.