by Jon Cleary
Malone returned the smile, hoping for some level of accord with this stiff, tightly-controlled man. “Did you query the omission in the GMO’s report about those fingermarks on Mrs. Hardstaff’s throat? And no sign of a struggle?”
Narvo nodded. “I also mentioned in the running sheet that there was no sign of forced entry into the house, though it wasn’t unusual back then for doors to be left unlocked. It’s different now,” he added.
“Where was Chess Hardstaff?”
“He was out on the run, he’d left at daybreak. They were putting in a new dam out on the far boundary and he’d gone out to do the preliminary marking-out of where he wanted it. He got back at breakfast time and by then the body had been discovered by the housekeeper. Old Chester was still alive then, he lived in another wing of the main house, and he’d already called the police. I was the first one out there, I was coming in from Cawndilla and I took the call on the radio.”
“So what happened after you queried those omissions?”
“I was transferred, right out of the blue.” His hand strayed to his desk, re-arranged the already neatly arranged papers, the leather cup that held half a dozen pens, the diary. Malone wondered if he had always been so ordered, if he had been just as corseted as this when he had been a junior constable and naive enough to ask unwanted questions. “I was sent to Murwillumbah.”
That was six hundred kilometres from Collamundra, just inside the border with Queensland, the edge of the world. “Is that why your memory is so good on the details?”
“You’re sharp, aren’t you? You mean because I still hold a grudge? I don’t know why I’m telling you this—but yes, I still think I got the dirty end of the stick.”
“Who was in charge of the investigation?”
“Peter Dammie. He’s now the Superintendent over at Cawndilla. The coroner’s verdict was that it was done by person or persons unknown.”
“I think that’s what a lot of people would like to think about the Sagawa murder—person or persons unknown. No cop likes that on a file, not if he’s honest.”
“I was young then, I thought if you helped solve a murder case, you’d be marked for promotion . . . There’d been a few blokes in the district at that time looking for work. We used to get families who’d pull up here for a couple of months, camp out by the river and do some casual work, then head south for the Riverina, down by the Murrumbidgee and around there, for the fruit harvest. It could’ve been one of them, though nothing was reported stolen, no money or jewelry. Anyhow, that was the verdict.”
“But you were never called as a witness?”
“They weren’t going to bring me all the way down from Murwillumbah. Peter Dammie gave all the police evidence.” He leaned back in his chair, pushing himself back with his hands on his desk and leaving them resting on its edge. The starch had gone out of him, but he hadn’t wilted. “Scobie, forget it. There’s no evidence at all that anyone locally did it. You make waves and Chess Hardstaff will have your arse kicked in and you’ll finish up at Murwillumbah like I did.”
Malone grinned. “Tibooburra is the new threat.” Tibooburra was in the far north-west of the State, as remote as one could get from a city posting, out where the kangaroos considered themselves the rightful voters and the only politician ever to visit the place had fainted from lack of attention. “Righto, I’ll paddle quietly. But if I wanted to look up the Hardstaff file, where would I find it?”
“You wouldn’t. Just out of curiosity, I asked Peter Dammie about it a year or so ago. He told me it had been lost. It was a bald-faced lie, but Peter’s good at those. After that, I decided to mind my own business. Some day I may be District Superintendent, if I tread carefully. Maybe I’ll look for it then. But officially, I’ll let it stay lost.”
The two men were silent for a while, a sudden bond established between them that had been undetected in the making. Narvo got up and went and opened the door again; the sounds of the station once more could be heard. Based at Police Centre in the city, Malone had almost forgotten the atmosphere of a local police station. Now there were snatches of noise, like daubs on an abstract painting: a drunk being hauled in, a woman shouting abuse, the chiacking amongst some cops as they came in from the beat. Out at the front desk he knew there would always be some citizen asking questions, demanding rights, paying fines: the duty officer would be doing his best to be polite, though bored almost to unconsciousness by the same-every-day routine of it. Normally a country police station would be relatively quiet, but today’s activity seemed to reflect the atmosphere outside in the rest of the town: the beginning of what might prove to be a wild weekend. The annual Cup meeting, a murder, a suicide: all the ingredients were there.
“Are all your men going to be on duty this weekend?”
“They’ll need to be. You’re not going to ask for one or two, are you?”
“No, Curly and Wally Mungle will do. Who do you get in town on a weekend like this? Pickpockets, hookers, stuff like that?”
“No pickpockets, not that I know of. Some hookers, but they are mostly casuals, not full-time. They come in from some of the bigger towns, they’re no real problem. We never pick them up, unless we get complaints about them. When we do, we just run them out of town.”
Life, it seemed, was normally so simple here in Collamundra; except for the occasional murder. Malone stood up, at ease now with Narvo. “If I want to use the computer, is it okay?”
“Sure, just tell Janine. She’ll fix it.”
“What’s it connected to?”
“District Headquarters, Police Central in Sydney, shire registry, the motor registry.”
“The hospital?”
Narvo frowned, sensing waves again. “Yes. It’s not usual, but the hospital board okayed it. It happened three years ago when we had the bad floods through here, and we haven’t been disconnected.”
“Where will I find Ray Chakiros?”
Narvo looked at his watch. “He’d be down at the Legion club, he’s always there this time of day. Is he on your list?”
“Of suspects?” Malone shook his head. “I haven’t even talked to him yet. But he owns a Mercedes, doesn’t he?”
“What’s that got to do with it?”
“Billy Koowarra told me he was out at the gin the night Sagawa was murdered. He saw a Mercedes parked alongside Sagawa’s car. There was no mention of that in the running sheet. There’s been some pretty sloppy work on this one, Hugh. I’m not going to report anyone, but you can’t expect me to continue the sloppy work. I think I can guess what happened on Billy’s evidence about the Merc. Wally Mungle probably interviewed Billy and decided the less Billy knew about the case, or showed what he knew, the better. Billy was his cousin and a Koori, he was going to look after him. I don’t condone it, but it’s understandable—I’ve known cops who look after each other.” He waited for some reaction from Narvo; but there was none. He went on, “You spoiled things, Hugh, when you invited Russ and me in.”
For a moment it looked as if the glaze might set in again; but then once more there was the slight crack of a smile and Narvo nodded. “Go ahead and talk to Ray Chakiros. Or go ahead and listen. He’ll do all the talking.”
Malone went back upstairs to the detectives’ room. The drunk, still shouting, was being led along to the cells in the lock-up; Malone felt some relief that he was a white youth and not a Koori.
Clements was adding to the running sheets as Malone came into the room. “How’d it go?”
“Narvo’s on our side, up to a point. He won’t like us making waves, but he’s not going to stop us. Go down and see Janine in the office—she’s a blonde who should stir up a red-blooded feller like you. Ask her to plug in the computer to the hospital, tap into their records and get all you can about Doc Nothling and Dr. Bedi. Where’s Curly?”
“Wally Mungle rang in. A coupla Abo stirrers have come up from Canberra. They didn’t know about Billy Koowarra’s suicide till they got here, but Wally thinks they’re gunna make
something of it.”
“Where are they?”
“Out at the blacks’ settlement. Curly’s gone down to hear their pitch before the uniformed guys move in. I gather some of the young uniformed blokes wouldn’t mind a bit of a stoush with the young Abos. It’s been building up.”
“Well, that’s none of our business. Go down and see what you can get out of the hospital computer on Nothling and Bedi. I’m going to ring Greg Random.”
Random, newly promoted, was the Commander, Regional Crime Squad, South Region. He and Malone had worked together in the old Homicide Squad before regionalization and they knew the limits and strains of each other’s field. He greeted Malone’s call with, “What are you doing out there—having a holiday?”
“Never had it so good. Greg, this job has got—what used the kids say?—vibes.”
“I never listened to my kids when they talked like that.” Malone knew that in lots of ways he himself was old-fashioned, but Random could be turn-of-the-century; yet he was a good cop, one of the best. “What sort of—vibes?”
“I dunno, I can’t put my finger on them. But trying to get information out of some of the locals here is like trying to get it down in Chinatown or out in Cabramatta amongst the Vietnamese. Did you know this is Chess Hardstaff’s territory? I mean his territory?”
“I knew he lived out there, I never knew how much clout he had.” In the days of the Labour government, country politicians, elected or otherwise, had had little effect on the Police Department. Then the Premier, Hans Vanderberg, The Dutchman, had also been the Police Minister and he had brooked no interference from the hayseeds. Now one of the hayseeds was the Minister and the Department was having to change focus.
“He’s King out here, Greg. He’s told me to phone first for an interview.”
“I hope you didn’t tell him what I know you’re capable of telling him.” Random was as dry as a salt-caked creek-bed. “Is he involved in the case?”
“I don’t know. That’s the trouble—I don’t know much at all at the moment. It’s like trying to catch scraps of paper in the wind—”
“Very literary. Cut out the bull and tell me what you want.”
“I want to stay out here—and keep Russ with me—till I can wrap it up.”
“If you do wrap it up, is it going to make waves?”
“Crumbs, you sound just like the locals. Yeah, I guess it will. Does it matter?”
“Simmer down. It might matter. Our much-admired Police Minister has already been on to the Commissioner, who’s been on to an Assistant Commissioner, who’s been on to me. The gist of it all is that Mr. Dircks wants to know why you can’t be sent to Tibooburra to direct traffic or arrest kangaroos or something.”
“Are you sending me there?”
“No. But just go carefully and get it over and done with as soon as you can. Things are still quiet down here, but it can’t last. If it does, we’ll all be out of a job.”
Malone hung up. Murder, he knew, was like the common cold: no one had yet discovered a cure for it. He was not often philosophical, but he sometimes wondered how the world would have gone if Abel had managed to sweet-talk Cain out of killing him.
II
The Veterans Legion had for years been one of the jealously guarded domains of men who had served overseas. At one time its political clout had had the fire-power of a division of howitzers; politicians who had opposed its ultra-conservative views had been blasted off the map; only discretion from more sensible members had stopped the national committee from emblazoning these victories beside their wartime battle honours. Time passed and so did many of the old members: age did not weary them nor the years condemn, as the Legion’s prayer said, but death did not listen and took them anyway, just as it did the conscientious objectors, the communists and all the other enemies. Eventually the Legion, to survive, had to open its doors to virtually all and sundry. Well, sundry, perhaps, but not all. There were still candidates for membership who found themselves blackballed and not just because they might be Aborigines. There were no blacks from the river settlement who were members of the Collamundra Veterans Legion Club.
The club was a solid red-brick building built from the proceeds of the club’s poker-machines; the one-armed bandit was now a national icon, along with the long-gone two-armed bushrangers. The club’s conservatism was flexible.
The car park was full and Malone had trouble finding a space for the Commodore. Once inside the club he had trouble finding space for himself; it was thronged with men and women, the latter outnumbered ten to one. The hubbub seemed to be the human equivalent of the noise he had heard out at the cotton gin; he had to shout at the top of his voice into a nearby ear when he asked where he could find Ray Chakiros. The ear leaned away from him and a fist, holding a foaming glass, came up and waved towards the back of the big main room.
Malone pushed his way through the crowd, aware that some men, recognizing him, made no effort to make way for him; he brushed by them, once feeling a shoulder thump against his own. Though it was only five o’clock, many of the men already looked close to being drunk, as if they had been drinking all afternoon; red faces turned towards him, mouths opened and beer fumes enveloped him as if he were swimming through a brewery vat. But he was used to it: he was a beer drinker himself and this was not the first time he had had to make his way through a crowd intent on getting a skinful. He had never been that sort of drinker, but he had learned to tolerate them. Except when they got outside and got into their cars and drove out to endanger other people. He sometimes wondered how tolerant he would be as a highway patrol officer if, after the carnage of a bad accident, he had to arrest a drunken driver. He had, occasionally, been more sympathetic towards a premeditated murderer, a wife, for instance, who had shot her brutal husband, than he might have been towards the involuntary killers.
He slipped out of the crowd, went through a doorway into a short hallway and found Ray Chakiros in his office at the end of it. There were two other men with him: all three men looked much the same, in their late sixties, plump and well-fed and prosperous-looking, businessmen and not farmers. They all looked at him with the same mixture of suspicion and puzzlement: what was he doing here in the club uninvited?
“Can I see you alone, Mr. Chakiros?” He wasn’t sure which was Chakiros, but took him to be the grey-haired man with the thick moustache behind the desk, “I’m Detective-Inspector Malone.”
“As if we didn’t know,” said Chakiros and smiled at the other two men, neither of whom smiled in return. “D’you mind, George? Les? We can continue our business later. Come in, Inspector, sit down.”
The two men got up and without a word went out of the office, leaving a faint chill behind them. But Malone was used to that; he had walked into as many chill winds as an Antarctic explorer.
“I’m on the Sagawa case, Mr. Chakiros. But you probably know that, as well.”
“Naturally, naturally. There’s practically nothing that goes on in this town that I don’t know about, Inspector—that’s part of being president of such a club as ours. We’re the biggest in the district—bigger than the golf club or the bowling club—” He was ready to run on, his tongue full of running, but Malone cut in:
“That’s why I came to you, Mr. Chakiros. What did you know about Mr. Sagawa?”
The club president sobered. “All that I needed to know—which wasn’t much. He was a Nip.”
“Yes, I’ve established that.”
But Chakiros was impregnable to irony; it bounced off him as off an anvil. He had been a handsome man in his youth and there were still hints of it under the plump cheeks and the jowly jaw-line; but his sense of humour had always been shallow, had not deepened with the years. He laughed a lot, but it was an empty sound, like canned TV laughter.
“How did you meet him?” said Malone.
“He came here, he wanted to join the Veterans Legion as an associate member. They tell me he was a great joiner—the golf club, the bowling club, he trie
d the lot. The bloody hide of him! A Jap, not even a veteran, wanting to join the Legion!”
The room had now started to impress itself upon Malone. It was a tiny museum to patriotism; not that he was against that sentiment, but this seemed overpowering. The walls were covered with photos of heroes, decorated men in uniform; furled flags stood in corners waiting to flutter in the breeze from unseen trumpets. Large prints of paintings of the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh hung behind Chakiros; there were no photos or paintings of the Governor-General or the Prime Minister; patriotism, evidently, should not be too localized. Yet, on a level and of a size with the Queen and the Duke, there was a painting of Chester Hardstaff, Past President of the Club.
Malone said, “It would have been worse, wouldn’t it, if Mr. Sagawa had been a veteran? Say he’d fought against you in New Guinea?”
Chakiros’s eyebrows were not grey like his hair and moustache, but were black, almost as if they had been charcoaled; they came down now in a thick dark line that almost met across the bridge of his nose. “You’re not pro-Jap, are you? Don’t get me wrong—I’m not anti-Jap.” His acting was terrible; he wasn’t even a good hypocrite. “I just don’t think they should be buying up the country the way they are.”
“I don’t believe Mr. Sagawa was buying up the country. He was just the general manager of South Cloud.”
“Same thing. He represented the buyers. They’re gobbling up the country, buying up the farm.”
“Who’s selling it to them? Selling the farm is like doing the tango—it takes two to do it.”
“I can see you’re a city feller, it sticks out all over you. Everything is a business deal down there.” “Not in the Police Department.”
“Oh? You could’ve fooled me, from what Gus Dircks has told me. I understand he’s really cleaned up the Department. I don’t mean you to take that personally.”
“I’ll try not to. Speaking of Mr. Dircks, I understand he’s a partner in South Cloud, that he sold off part of his farm to them. Is he pro-Japanese?”