Winter Traffic

by Stephen Greenall

  So this is how it ends: they send in Angel bloody de Souza. Rawson immortalises his ultimate draught with a three-second skoll and stands to dwarf the other man. He pretends a dignified calm but Ange did not bring uniforms / insulting. I AM THE FIVE WAYS AND I AM THE SEVEN WAYS AND I AM THE BRIDGE BENEATH—

  ‘Listen, Rawse—’

  ‘How do you want to do this?’

  ‘It’s Paddington, mate. There’s been a bit of trouble.’

  04

  He walks onto Winter Traffic like a man accustomed to yacht life. His trainers are silent against the deck and his designer jeans and hoodie are proof against the cold. The first thing he sees is a vacant bottle of wine on the toe rail that he takes up like a souvenir. The second thing is Dick Mountain, loitering in the stair that descends to the hold. Slane ducks his head and says nothing to the sentinel, no greeting or password necessary.

  Logan Perceval looks up with calm blue eyes. He sits against the port side with a paper and an empty mug on the table before him. At his feet, intertwined, the awesome corpse. Logan is an Atlas Terrier awaiting command, standing guard above the kill, unperturbed by death.

  The men exchange positions, a transfer of mass in limited space. Logan, head permanently bowed, moves to the galley to brew more tea. Slane rests a foot on the body but he doesn’t look down. He looks at Karen.

  She is sitting up, staring into space. The sleeping bag envelops her, the hood flaring around her neck and head to give her the appearance of a science-fiction queen. Perhaps on her planet everyone has white lips, empty gazes. Jetsam from a sinking ship, plucked from iceberg seas, warmed mostly by survivor’s guilt. ‘After I met you,’ he says, ‘I kept trying to work out what makes you so attractive.’

  Karen coughs, enforcing the overboard theory, her lungs and viscera lined with salt. ‘What’s the verdict.’

  ‘Your eyes and your hair—they’re the exact same colour. It’s rarer than you think.’

  The eyes in question focus on the talking shape. The Game. What colour are his? The answer is all different shades / they move in different directions.

  ‘Are you alright, detective?’

  The question revives her, grants the gift of the present. Karen straightens in her cocoon and clears her throat, noticing for the first time the mug of tea gone cold before her. She looks up-ship at the locksmiths—the ‘locksmiths’—and manages to raise an eyebrow. ‘Li couldn’t make it?’

  ‘Li’s squeamish.’

  ‘Ah. The ones you think will hack it are always the ones who break.’

  The gangster places the bottle on the table between them. ‘You have expensive taste.’

  ‘That was a mistake. I’ve been making a few.’

  ‘Is that a reference to last night’s phone call?’

  ‘What phone call.’

  He smiles and indulges a further viewing of The Pardoner. Then he does what she did: looks up-ship, at the men. Perturbed by death? Zero per cent. Death is the basic outcome, basic condition. ‘For what it’s worth, your information was good.’

  ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’

  ‘We had a deal, Karen. And you came through.’

  Logan Perceval rumbles, gets big on them like the boulder in Indiana Jones. He sets tea in front of his captain, white no sugar. ‘She won’t eat.’ The news is imparted in a confidential tone and Slane scowls at her with disapproval, disappointment. He says to the warrior monk, ‘What’s going?’

  ‘Soup,’ says Logan. ‘Bikkies.’

  ‘How bout it, Ms Millar—eat some soup?’

  Silence. Slane shakes his head, looking at his favourite retriever with a what-can-you-do kinda shrug. ‘You boys okay?’

  ‘Dick broke his hand.’

  ‘Right.’

  Logan retreats and Slane says, ‘Eat something. You’ve been through a lot.’

  ‘Could say that.’

  ‘I’m sorry it happened.’

  ‘That’s nice of you, Chris. Really makes up for everything. For the two guys that walked in here and fucking garrotted the bloke in front of me.’

  ‘I hope it was quick.’

  ‘What do you reckon?’

  Slane looks around at all the mundane details of the boat like one who will later be asked to bid or recollect. ‘I reckon he would have died hard.’

  ‘Ten points.’

  If she leans to her right she can see the agonised face that stares up at skylight, sunlight. He lost the balaclava in the anarchy of his passing. Where do they go to, the dead? To know that would be to know Everything. Karen does not lean to her right. ‘How did you know to send them.’

  ‘We were keeping an eye on you. Were worried.’

  ‘Bullshit.’

  ‘Truth.’

  ‘You wouldn’t know truth if it came in a thousand-dollar bottle of Grange.’

  ‘I knew you’d go after him once you read Koestler’s book. Just surprised you were so careless. He could have hurt you.’

  ‘You sound cross.’

  ‘You let your guard down. I think part of you did it on purpose. Women can be strange that way.’

  ‘I’m not a woman, I’m a cop. One who just witnessed a gangland execution. I make a pretty compelling witness by the way.’

  ‘Don’t be so dramatic.’

  Her anger makes her realise that the drug is largely processed, largely void in its efficacy. ‘You fucking owe me.’

  He weighs the claim. ‘Some might say we’re square.’

  ‘I should just shut my mouth, be grateful.’

  ‘I wouldn’t go that far.’ Chris places elbows on the table, stares at the empty shiraz. ‘Paspaley was buried deep, but I think maybe he heard whispers about a young detective down Sydney way.’

  ‘Imagine that.’

  ‘An ex-Pirate sniffing around his biggest case. The heads-up came from Sammy Holden. At least, that’s the impression Paspaley might have had.’

  ‘You set me up.’

  ‘There was profit in it. You know how many people wanted this guy done? Old grudges, detective—it’s the fuel the town runs on.’

  ‘Hit squad.’

  ‘Sometimes. I learned to run one from a wise old Irishman. One of your lot, actually. Dead now, but he took me under his wing, tutored me coming up…He called me Sarpedon.’

  ‘Jesus Christ.’

  ‘Sarp was one of the Trojans. Honourable. He gives this speech to his cousin about power, responsibility. More of one means more of the other. It’s important to give the best of yourself, even to a fucked-up cause.’

  ‘I was bait.’

  ‘So is everybody—every piece on the board. But you wait your turn, you do some damage.’

  ‘Why are you so sure I’ll keep my mouth shut. Because I traded info?’

  ‘Sold out a brother officer is what you did.’

  ‘What about him on the floor? He’s a brother officer.’

  ‘He was a rapist mongrel bastard who was lucky to live this long. If you feel the need to honour his memory, go ahead. Personally, I think you’re too smart. I think you begin to see how it works.’

  ‘How it doesn’t.’

  ‘If you like.’

  ‘So what happens now.’

  ‘You eat your soup and go for a walk around the carpark. Stop when you see a Land Rover, dark one. Drive it home and leave the keys in the ignition. Live happy ever after.’

  ‘That easy, huh.’

  ‘That. Easy.’

  ‘And this mess here?’

  ‘Don’t worry—the boys are good at clean up.’

  ‘That’s good, Chris. Because this time tomorrow the NSW Coroner is taking her out for a spin. And he’s got a bloody good eye for foul play.’

  ‘Master Chestwyn will never know a thing.’

  Karen frees her arms, picking up the cold tea and draining it. Thirst extinguished. For a while it seemed like thirst might prevail, might out-survive her. ‘I used to love this boat. Now I can’t ever come back.’

&nbs
p; ‘Because of one event? Never let a day outweigh a lifetime, Detective Millar. Éamon told me that.’

  The maxim accompanied by food: chicken noodle soup / milk arrow-roots. Logan sets it down and it looks like the meal you give a little kid. The kid she was in this very chair. ‘You told me we had a deal,’ says Karen. ‘And I came through.’

  ‘True.’

  ‘Does that mean the carpenter’s dead?’

  ‘It means the people who needed to be satisfied are satisfied.’

  ‘Politician.’

  ‘Pretty much.’

  ‘But an honourable one, like Serpico.’

  ‘Sarpedon. Yeah.’

  ‘Alright, then. Let’s have it.’

  Slane stands, fists bunched in his hoodie—for a surreal moment Karen thinks he’s going to hit her, dispense a crisp backhander for her level of cheek. The gangster places a green figurine on the table and it feels like earthquake.

  ‘Bishop,’ she says.

  Slane answers as though christening, as though confirming a thing that was previously only provisional. ‘His name, Ms Millar, is TYCHO BRAHE.’

  03

  Rawson stands in the kitchen of the Sheldon house, looking over the yard. Once upon a time he built that pergola. Or carried stuff, got in the way while others, beloved of him, performed actual labour. Once upon a time he ate breakfast with Susan and she told him it was over between her and Jem. She backed a horse on his behalf / the wicked Drunken Circus. Talk about the colt from old regret! Where are you now, you oxygen thief? In what pasture do you stand you ill-starred muppet, you adjectival galah?

  Once upon a time, a million years ago, he dropped off the amazing wonder dog and said to Michele, You’re one in a million, baby: the cabbagepatchers have 2.5 just like you.

  De Souza speaks. ‘We took Mrs Sheldon to her sister’s.’

  ‘I heard you the first time.’

  ‘No one’s seen Sutton. You said he was due at eight?’

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘It’s just gone nine…Everyone’s taking it serious, Rawse. You can’t pull this stuff with Arthur Sheldon’s missus.’

  Rawson stands with hands in trouser pockets, watching the crime-scene unit do its work. A pair of techs taking samples, blood and hair. A third circles like macabre paparazzo. Every few seconds the flash of the camera illuminates the corpse with alkaline precision.

  ‘They didn’t have to bring it back,’ says Angel in his dumb and obvious voice.

  ‘Him. Not it.’

  ‘Him. You reckon Sutton was here?’

  Course he was—eight on the dot. He saw the fuss and circled the block, came in through the yard of the next terrace over. From up there he would have been able to see.

  ‘Rawse?’

  ‘Don’t know.’

  ‘Any idea who we’re looking for?’

  Rawson turns from the glass of the sliding door, his eyes tender from not blinking. He puts a hand on Angel’s shoulder and says, Give unto me a car.

  02

  Bring bring. Bring bring.

  The sound of pickup. ‘Who’s this?’

  ‘Do you know what a cipher is.’

  ‘Kara?’

  ‘Who else. Do you know?’

  ‘That’s it, woman—I’m changing my number.’

  ‘I’ve bothered you. You’ve got company.’

  ‘I wish. What’s wrong, you sound terrible.’

  ‘A cipher is a word that makes the puzzle work.’

  ‘I know. Are you okay?’

  ‘It’s-fucked-up. Who do I sound like.’

  ‘Like someone else. You’re scaring me.’

  ‘That’s good, Scul, because I’m scared too. You enter Tycho Brahe and fuck, guess what? Bigger fucking mess than when you started. Than when you knew nothing.’

  ‘Tycho…Slow down, tell me where you are.’

  ‘You don’t know? Course not. It’s never the good men who can track you. The good men are at home watching footy.’

  ‘You’re drunk. Is that all this is?’

  ‘I cracked it, doctor. Codex Two.’

  ‘Good. Good girl.’

  ‘No—not good. Fucking zugzwang. Koestler wrote to the guy, invited him round.’

  The Supergirl pictures him sitting up, swinging sparrow legs to plant them on deck. He’s fumbling for spectacles, threading them onto skull using forefinger and thumb. An open-mouth peer at the radio clock discloses the outrageous time of night.

  ‘Stop crying, Kara. I can’t stand it.’

  ‘Men. You’re piss-weak.’

  ‘I’ll come and get you. We’ll talk.’

  ‘But there’s nothing to say. It’s fucked up, Peter Coren.’

  ‘Are you at home?’

  ‘I’m way out in the harbour.’

  ‘Don’t do this.’

  ‘I’m way out in the harbour and you can’t find me.’

  01

  The truck looks submerged, a frigate come to wreck upon a coral bed of sea. Trees abandoned to midnight wind give a strange sense of waving, heightening the sense that the scene is somehow maritime. Dangerous body of water: the dance of grass is dreamy like kelp and you must watch for dolphins, seahorses, a mermaid from story that for children is too dark.

  —

  The scanner still chattering about Artarmon. But less now, mostly gossip. They finished the canvas hours ago / it’s on again first thing. Cops and robbers says the alternative radio, the one civilians can actually hear.

  Yeah, cops and robbers. It feels like a movie. It happened to other people / people different than they are.

  —

  Rawson switches it off and watches the old girl across the way. She is tucked up near the park, half in light and half in shadow. A streetlamp is casting eucalypt branches across the spread of her bonnet.

  From distance they look like arteries, an intricate network of insidious tattoo.

  —

  The truck was in storage. Sutton must have gone to get her out.

  Makes sense. She would want to be part of it. The truck loved Bloke as much as Bloke loved the truck.

  —

  Sutton chain-smokes and watches the house. It is grand and ugly, its lights ablaze, a dozen bikes out front. He doesn’t look across when the passenger door opens.

  Rawson waits for Sutton to speak. Could be a while. Eventually the silence is not supportable so he feeds a tape to the deck, Breakfast at Sweethearts twenty seconds in.

  ‘She don’t smile or flirt,’ Rawson says when Jimmy gets there. ‘She just wears that miniskirt.’ He fetches out his Benson & Hedges. ‘You knew I was across the way.’

  Sutton exhales a jet of smoke into the diseased atmosphere.

  ‘Well, if you knew I was across the way, then you know there’s ten of them and they’re watching us.’

  Sutton nods.

  ‘You loved him,’ says the Incremental. ‘But you can’t do this. Leave it to me, I’ll sort it out.’

  ‘Sort it out.’

  ‘You’re not going in there, Jamie. If you go in there you’ll die.’

  The next song. Hunters. Good compilation, this. The number is half done when Rawson seizes Sutton by the ruff and Listen you stupid bastard, there’s fifteen of them and they are betting you can’t hack it. So find a fucken way.

  Sutton wears the assault, rides the volume. His eyes are red / they do not leave the house. Rawson feels that he is holding a crash-test dummy so he lets it go, slumps back into his corner. Sutton’s voice is a funeral. ‘I thought you had a flight to catch.’

  Bobby Cobra stinging with tears, with acid dirt and trapped acidic lashes. He breathes heavily and tries to flush them clean, looks momentarily like a man changing contacts: a turning up of lids with an open mouth, a finding of dark vows inscribed upon that secret bodily place. ‘We the police. Smackdown. Gary is fucked.’

  ‘Great.’

  ‘Don’t do this, Jem—not after what we done today. We fucken smashed it out there, brother.’

>   The words can almost inspire exhilaration in the speaker, an incoming tide you swear will drench his feet. But then it recedes, residues nothing but the certain knowledge he is not getting through. For Sutton the work of the morning is forever ago. He crushes his smoke and gets out of the truck / the yesterday Master is weaponless.

  Rawson is the roadblock erected just in time. Sutton is hoarse, scorched by pain.

  ‘They killed my dog.’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘Did you see him?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Then you saw what they did.’

  Sutton folds and Rawson comes forward to take him about the shoulders, to hold him. Sutton talks about the things they did / he shakes without control.

  ‘Come on, Jem. Let’s go.’

  ‘That’s not my name.’

  ‘Yeah it is.’

  Jem uppercuts the other man, an expert punch that makes Rawson stumble / wheel away. But it takes a hurricane to put the Big Ship on deck.

  ‘Stop.’

  Sutton obeys. It is not the tone that makes him do it / it’s the sound effect. Steel click. ‘You’re joking.’

  Rawson is not joking / he is holding a silenced Glock. ‘Get in the truck.’

  Sutton thinking about it, paying a dollar-fifty to do as told. A dollar-ten. ‘I didn’t mean for it to happen. He was just a kid standing guard.’

  ‘What kid.’

  ‘At Whit’s—the one called Nigger. I went to put him down but I got it wrong and…his neck just came apart. You know those old locks when you take them out of the door? One twist and suddenly it’s seven pieces, like how was it ever one. After that there was no going back. You get me? But then I found her in the bedroom and I was glad it went down the way it did.’

  ‘What the fuck are you talking about?’

  ‘Kristy. Shark and Bison tied her up.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘She suffocated. She died.’

  ‘Kristy’s in London you fucken nutbar.’

  ‘I had to take her up to Copperhead.’

  ‘Stop it.’

  ‘I had to carry her out to the point. I had give her to the fire.’

  A rasp comes out of the Incremental chest, a dire expression of emotional asthma. Jamie Sutton, the only strictly honest person he has known. ‘I’m going now,’ says the carpenter like wood. ‘Don’t shoot me.’