Dreamland

by Gilling, Tom

  Nick shrugged. ‘It didn’t do me much good.’

  ‘Don’t undervalue yourself. Mr Milhench and I have had intermittent professional dealings over the years. I’d have to say he is one of the more ingenious criminals I’ve had the pleasure of representing.’

  ‘It was a lucky tip,’ said Nick. ‘It could just as easily have gone to someone else.’

  ‘But it went to you.’

  ‘Yes.’

  The solicitor took off his glasses. The act of polishing them seemed to clarify his thoughts. ‘In my experience, Mr Carmody, life rarely happens by accident. The purpose is not always obvious, I admit. But luck seldom offers a satisfactory explanation.’

  Nick didn’t speak. He hadn’t come here for a philosophical discussion. His own experience, at any rate, told him exactly the opposite: most of the time luck offered the only explanation.

  Bellamy put the glasses back on his face. ‘You and Daniel have known each other for a long time?’

  ‘About twenty years.’

  ‘Old friends.’

  Nick wondered whether the solicitor knew that he was only here because he was being paid. He remembered something a criminal barrister had once told him: a good lawyer never asks a question to which he doesn’t wish to know the answer.

  ‘You understand,’ said Bellamy, ‘that I am acting as Daniel’s solicitor. You have been brought to my attention as a material witness to an incident involving my client. Daniel has informed me that you were the person driving his car when it was photographed speeding on Moore Park Road on the night of New Year’s Eve. If you are prepared to corroborate Daniel’s statement then I am prepared to advise a course of action. Is that why you are here?’

  ‘That’s why I’m here.’

  ‘The court will require a signed statement explaining how you came to be driving Daniel’s car at the time the offence was committed. Are you willing to provide that?’

  ‘Just tell me what to write.’

  Nick had expected the case to be dealt with summarily: a summary admission of guilt followed by a summary punishment. But the police smelt a rat. They had a confession but it wasn’t the one they wanted. Now Nick was frightened. Danny’s case would go to court, with Nick as the principal witness. The prosecution would try to catch him out. The process had probably started already. Somebody would be checking Nicolas Carmody’s driving record, his criminal record—they might even investigate his mobile phone records. Thank Christ he hadn’t made any attempt to contact Danny.

  It was too late to back out. He couldn’t withdraw his statement without admitting to perjury. Besides, there was the money. The money made it conspiracy to pervert the course of justice. So far all he’d taken was the five thousand dollars in cash given to him by Grogan’s chauffeur. The envelope, opened and hurriedly re-sealed, was sitting in the bottom drawer of a locked grey filing cabinet at work—a radioactive presence he could feel glowing in the corner of the newsroom. It was the safest place he could think to hide it, buried beneath piles of notebooks. No cleaner had gone near those filing cabinets for years—decades, even. An air of cultish superstition hung over them. There were locked drawers belonging to reporters who’d left the paper, who’d been sacked, who’d died. A drawer, once assigned, could never be reassigned. The faded name tags were like a memorial. If you dug deep enough you’d find shorthand notes of interviews with every prime minister since Menzies.

  Sitting by himself in the staff canteen, picking at a Caesar salad consisting of nothing but iceberg lettuce and mayonnaise, Nick read about an amateur skydiver in Sauk City, Wisconsin who fell twelve thousand feet into a suburban carpark, suffering only bruised ribs, a fractured collar bone and a broken jaw. Passers-by watched in horror as the skydiver hurtled silently out of a cloudless sky and landed face-down on the tarmac. According to Real Life magazine, Laura-May Holmes lay rigid for several seconds before realising that she was still alive, then sat up and asked for a drink of water.

  Roy Bellamy was wrong. At some elemental level, Nick knew, survival was purely a matter of chance. If his father had driven a single kilometre per hour faster for the last forty-five minutes of his life, then the semitrailer that swung across the road, killing him and Nick’s mother, would have slid harmlessly into a ditch.

  Nick remembered, at twenty-one, stepping carelessly between two parked cars, hearing the blast of a horn and the rush of air as a delivery van hurtled by, centimetres from his face. Had he stepped out a fraction further, or had the delivery van been travelling a fraction faster, his short career at the Daily Star would have been over.

  Two years later, as he stood outside the Glebe Coroner’s Court, a butcher’s van had left the road and struck a bus shelter, killing an old man from whom Nick had just cadged a cigarette.

  Twelve years at the Daily Star had given Nick a pragmatic view of life. He had seen too much evidence of the randomness of misfortune to believe in fate or predestination or just deserts. Journalism reinforced his gut belief that life just happened, that any attempt to draw a moral or extract a meaning was futile.

  Nick remembered being sent, as a fresh-faced cadet, to interview the tearful widow of a man who’d drowned in his backyard swimming pool after apparently being attacked by his next-door neighbour’s pitbull terrier. The headline was MAN DROWNS AFTER FIGHT WITH KILLER DOG. The following day Nick was sent back to speak to the dead man’s daughter, who swore that the pitbull had in fact been trying to pull the drowning man from the pool.

  The next morning’s headline was HERO DOG’S FIGHT TO SAVE DROWNING MAN. The Daily Star even used the same grainy photograph for both stories, taken with a disposable camera from a nearby block of units. According to the remorseless logic of the midday news conference, the second story didn’t negate the first, it just superseded (and perhaps even improved) it. Of course by then the unfortunate animal had already been put down, but Nick’s story didn’t mention that.

  In the newsroom of the Daily Star Nick had achieved a kind of fame as author of the ‘dead dog yarn’, but Nick himself had been too embarrassed to own up to it, even to Carolyn.

  As a reporter Nick wanted to believe that truth mattered, that truth was the one thing that did matter. Lying to save Danny Grogan from prison went against everything he stood for as a journalist—and yet, he reflected, it probably wasn’t the worst lie he’d ever told. He’d told bigger lies and convinced himself they had been necessary to get the story—and perhaps they had. He wished he’d turned down the money, forgetting for a moment that money was his reason for doing it. It was funny how you could make yourself forget a thing like that. Would he have taken the money if he and Carolyn had still been together? He didn’t know the answer to that.

  The press outside Central Local Court were more numerous than the pigeons. Nick knew half of them by name: Stuart Scullion from the Star and his brother Barry from the Herald, Sue Garfield and Keith Eddy from Australian Associated Press, plus reporters from 702 and most of the commercial radio stations, and crews from the four television networks, drinking takeaway coffee and checking the batteries in their tape-recorders.

  Somehow, in the weeks that Nick had had to prepare for Danny Grogan’s trial, he’d managed to convince himself that this was going to be a private affair. He’d never had more than a casual conversation with Scullion in the canteen queue but he nodded anyway and said, ‘G’day Stuart.’

  ‘Nick,’ said Scullion, detaching himself briefly from the scrum. ‘Don’t say they’ve got you covering this?’

  ‘Not today, mate.’

  Scullion knew that Nick knew that everyone knew about his fall from grace. Thirty seconds after Nick had walked out of the editor-in-chief ’s office the whole newsfloor seemed to know his fate. Les Perger had made an example of Nick—but an example of what, nobody was quite sure.

  ‘Still subbing?’

  ‘That’s what it said the last time I looked at the roster.’

  Scullion took an involuntary step backwards, as though subediting
was a disease that might be catching. ‘So…why are you here?’

  ‘Mate, I’m just a witness.’

  ‘Yeah?’

  ‘In the Grogan trial.’

  ‘You know Grogan?’

  ‘A bit.’

  There was a pause. Then Scullion said, ‘Anything I should know about?’

  Nick shrugged. The ‘should’ suggested a moral imperative. Reporters like Scullion took it for granted that the world owed them information. Nick had always felt the same—until today. ‘Are you lot here for Grogan?’ he asked.

  ‘Hardly,’ said Scullion. ‘The Love Rat’s on today.’

  The Love Rat—Shane Dick—was one of the Star’s obsessions: and these days the Star set the agenda for most of its rivals. It was a travesty of news values but celebrity was the driver and Shane Dick had shot to fame by coming third in an early series of ‘Big Brother’. Since then three different women had sued him for breach of promise. Now a fourth was claiming Dick had stolen her car for the purpose of seducing her sister. On any other day a court case involving Danny Grogan would have made at least page three but thanks to the Love Rat, Nick could see Danny’s trial being relegated to a few paragraphs on page seven. Scullion knew that too. He was already looking past Nick at the arrival of the black Toyota LandCruiser known to Star readers as the ‘Rat Wagon’ while Danny Grogan—in dark suit, dark glasses and Chicago Bears baseball cap—trudged up the stairs unnoticed.

  Danny’s name was second on the list for Court 1, behind a man named Parish on a break-and-enter charge. Shane Dick was listed first in Court 2. The reporters would be hoping that Parish’s solicitor kept Court 1 tied up long enough for them to watch the Love Rat get his comeuppance before hotfooting it down the corridor to catch Danny Grogan in the dock. Otherwise they’d have to draw straws or it would be left to one of the agency reporters to cover Grogan.

  After studying the court lists Nick went outside for a cigarette. Roy Bellamy had arrived and was standing at the bottom of the steps with a man Nick recognised from his time on police rounds as Albert Merriman QC.

  As well as reputedly being Sydney’s most expensive Queen’s Counsel, Albert Merriman was a staple of the weekend colour magazines. He’d made his name in the 1970s defending a Kings Cross nightclub owner, Joe Steffano, from the attentions of the vice squad. One October night in 1988 Steffano was shot dead outside a Randwick laundromat by a Kings Cross detective. In the long-running trial Merriman appeared for the detective. Nick could still remember the grin on the detective’s face as he and Merriman stood outside the Supreme Court, surrounded by jostling newspaper reporters and TV crews.

  As the two lawyers crossed the chequerboard terrace at the top of the stairs, Merriman stopped for a moment and cast a knowing look at Nick. If the glance was meant to be reassuring, it had the opposite effect. Nick knew what to say but that didn’t mean that when the time came he would be able to say it—or at least say it convincingly.

  He watched the two walk inside. Danny was standing beside the vending machine. When he saw Bellamy and Merriman coming towards him he turned and walked away.

  By Nick’s watch it was a couple of minutes after ten. The doors had been opened. Furtive defendants and confused relatives stood up and looked at each other as if this might be the last time they would ever meet. He’d expected Danny’s parents— or at least his mother—to be here but they were nowhere to be seen.

  Nick finished his cigarette and tossed the butt over the balustrade and immediately lit another. He’d brought his Simenon novel to read, thinking it would help him relax. He took the book out now but couldn’t concentrate. He found himself reading the same two lines over and over again: ‘For a moment, it seemed that Van Damme was about to recover his self-assurance and cheerfulness, even accept the invitation to dinner…’ He couldn’t even remember who Van Damme was, let alone who had invited him to dinner. What did it matter who Van Damme was, when in half an hour he was going to stand up, swear to tell the truth and nothing but the truth, then lie his head off to keep himself and Danny Grogan out of prison.

  He stared at the sentence again. ‘For a moment, it seemed that Van Damme was about to recover his self-assurance and cheerfulness, even accept the invitation to dinner…’

  In the corner of the entrance lobby Roy Bellamy was pushing coins into the vending machine while Merriman swapped jokes with a court official. Nick couldn’t see Danny; Danny wasn’t there.

  A sign on the wall pointed to the gents toilet. Nick walked down the corridor. As he opened the door he heard one of the toilets flush. He waited for the door to swing shut behind him. Then he said, ‘Danny—are you in here?’

  There was no answer. Nick bent down, as he’d seen a dozen cops do in a dozen TV shows, and walked slowly along the cubicles. In the gap beneath one door he saw a shoe. A sock was lying nearby.

  ‘Danny,’ he said, ‘is that you?’

  A moment later the toilet flushed. The cubicle door opened. Danny stood there, looking straight through him. His eyes were glassy.

  Nick waited for several seconds before speaking. ‘Did you just hit up?’

  Danny didn’t reply.

  ‘Are you mad? This is a criminal court. The lobby is crawling with police.’

  He grabbed Danny’s arm and turned it over. Danny didn’t offer any resistance. The arm was covered with bruises but Nick couldn’t see anything that looked like a fresh puncture. He glanced at Danny’s left shoe. The lace was undone and there was no sock on his foot. He must have injected between his toes.

  ‘What the hell were you thinking of ?’

  Danny slowly focused his gaze. ‘What’s it to you?’

  ‘I’m risking—’ Nick lowered his voice to a fierce whisper. ‘I’m risking my job to keep you out of jail.’

  ‘I’ll be fine…I can handle it.’

  Nick remembered how Danny had looked at the club. ‘When did this start?’

  ‘Does it matter?’

  ‘It matters to me. I’d like to know who the fuck I’m sticking my neck out for.’

  Danny pushed past him to the washbasins and turned on a tap and stared for a few seconds at the water gushing down the plughole.

  ‘I thought you’d be able to tell me that.’

  Nick was still trying to work out what those words meant when he noticed a shadow behind the frosted glass. The door opened. Roy Bellamy stood there and said, ‘Get out of here, Daniel.’

  It was a long time since Nick had set foot inside Court 1, but little had changed except the dock, which was now surrounded by perspex walls to deter remand prisoners from impulsive escape attempts. The leather cushions on the public benches looked exactly the same as the ones he’d sat on as a cadet journalist.

  As he walked through the public gallery Nick glanced at Danny, who held his gaze for a few seconds before turning away. He looked haggard, fearful. Something had gone from him, some quality of self-belief. Nick had seen other visibly drug-affected prisoners in court but not many who had shot up while waiting to be called. No doubt Albert Merriman would have explained by now that his client was on ‘medication’ and had dragged himself out of bed to be there.

  The barrister adjusted his tobacco-stained wig and stood up. He stared for a long time at Nick without speaking. In the days and months and years to come Nick would often reflect on that gaze, wondering what it signified. While asking Nick to state his full name and address, the barrister smiled, but there was no warmth in it. ‘Where were you,’ he asked, ‘on the night of New Year’s Eve?’

  ‘I was out. Celebrating.’

  ‘Alone, or with friends?’

  ‘Alone.’

  ‘Where did you go?’

  ‘I spent a couple of hours in the Judgment Bar.’

  ‘This would be the Judgment Bar on Taylor Square?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Obviously you were seen there?’

  ‘I dare say the barman would remember me.’

  ‘But you weren’t drinking with any
one in particular?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘How much would you say you drank?’

  ‘A couple of schooners. Three maybe. Light beer.’

  ‘Not enough to be intoxicated?’

  ‘Absolutely not.’

  ‘You weren’t tempted to stay and see in the new year?’

  ‘I was tempted. But I left about 9.30 p.m.’

  ‘And ran, by chance, according to your statement, into your old friend Mr Grogan?’

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘Who—again, according to your statement—was attempting to get into his car, which was parked on Riley Street, Darlinghurst, close to the corner of Campbell Street.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘But on recognising you, he handed you the keys and asked— “begged”, I think, is the word you used—begged you to drive him home to his apartment in Bondi Beach.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Why did he do that?’

  ‘Danny was pretty drunk.’

  ‘Was Danny with anyone?’

  ‘No. Not when I saw him.’

  ‘So he was alone in the car?’

  ‘Unless he had someone in the boot.’

  Merriman smiled indulgently. ‘Did he intimate to you that he had anyone in the boot?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘It didn’t occur to you that it might be simpler just to put him in a taxi?’

  ‘On New Year’s Eve? He would have been waiting until daylight.’

  Albert Merriman obliged with a sardonic laugh while the police prosecutor shuffled some papers on her desk.

  If the ritual of adversarial cross-examination hadn’t been familiar to Nick from his two years as a court reporter, it would have been familiar from the countless American crime shows and made-for-TV movies he’d watched. In fact, as Nick stood there in the witness box he couldn’t help feeling this was a made-for-TV movie, that he’d stumbled by accident onto the set of a second-rate courtroom thriller. Wandering around a photogenic city like Sydney, you sometimes found yourself surrounded by location vans and catering trailers, watching a pair of actors you dimly recognised going through the motions under a thicket of lighting umbrellas. And yet, from where he stood, the role of Nick Carmody felt ambiguous. Was he the hero, or just a subsidiary character—a cameo? Was he playing the part of the faithful friend or the duplicitous accomplice?