THE DEVIL IN THE RED DIRT: DIVIDED IN LIFE. UNIFIED IN MURDER

by Michael Smith

  “What’s that smell?” Harris asked.

  “You recognise it?” Cooky was curious. Harris stayed quiet, he was in no mood to reminisce. “That’d be embalming fluid. What you’re smelling is formaldehyde, I’d guess. It’s got a kind of pickle juice quality to it. This stuff’s homemade and not especially effective. So, the corpses are decomposing pretty rapidly.” Cooky paused. “Impossible to ascertain a time or date of death outside the lab due to… Tampering. There’s evidence of manipulation. Seemingly after rigor mortis set in. Bones are broken, joints are dislocated… suggesting there’s been multiple attempts to… pose the subjects.” Cooky spoke expertly as his eyes nimbly moved over the victim’s bodies.

  Harris’ eyes moved to a bible lying on the back seat between the pair, he lifted it carefully to inspect it. He recognised the passage it had been left open upon. A passage commonly known as “By the rivers of Babylon.” A passage in which the author promises revenge on those who go against God, and godliness. Harris ran his eyes down the page, silently reading until he came to what he was looking for, “Blessed be he who seizes your little ones and dashes them against the rocks.”

  “Not the most Christian of sentiments is it?” Cooky barely lifted his eyes from the children to respond.

  “You need to rethink your understanding of Christianity.” Harris answered.

  Moments later, Harris and Cooky sat on the curb near the scene of the crime. Harris offered Cooky a cigarette and the pathologist accepted. Harris looked like he’d aged a decade in the last twenty minutes.

  “I’ve seen all kinds of death, but I’ve never seen that. They looked just like china dolls.” Cooky remarked.

  “Humans are capable of… All sorts. Never underestimate our propensity for cruelty.” Harris looked beaten up.

  “Speak for yourself.” Cooky chastised the very suggestion.

  “I speak for all humans when I say that.”

  “You can’t think a normal person would do something like that?” Cooky rejected the notion out of hand. “To children.”

  “What’s normal? The Holocaust? The terror-famine of Soviet Ukraine? The colonisation of Africa? South America? North America? Australia? Entire races and cultures wiped off the face of the map. If there’s one thing we know, it’s that humans love to kill humans. And we love to dream up new ways of doing it. Somewhere out there, this has happened before.” As he spoke, Harris’s mind drifted back to Belsen. To roaring fires and rotting corpses. The bodies stacked high, the cold, ambivalent eyes of the Nazi guards who’d given themselves up, and the blackness in the eyes of the broken survivors.

  Cooky crossed himself superstitiously.

  “He’s not going to help us. If he was… Don’t you think he’d have stepped in before now?” Harris chastised.

  “Don’t tell me you don’t believe in God?” Cooky was surprised. Such plainly spoken atheism wasn’t common back then.

  “If enough people believe in something, it’s real. So, God is real. To all intents and purposes, he exists. Because he lives in the hearts and minds of people who’re looking to fill a hole in their life. In that way, his effects on the world are very tangible. In fact, they’re sitting in the back seat of that car.”

  “But…”

  “But we live in an age of enlightenment. Our knowledge of science and the world is developing faster than ever before. Before we know it, man will walk on the moon. But all of that discovery and advancement pales in comparison to the greatest realisation of the 20th century? The myth of the great man upstairs. A human construction.” Harris was steadfast. He’d spent a lot of time articulating these ideas to himself.

  “It pays to be a little more open-minded than that, especially in our professions.” Cooky didn’t like his belief being questioned but it was he who had started the conversation.

  “I’d be open-minded were it not for the overwhelming evidence to the contrary. We’ve got all of these expensive telescopes pointing up there into the great unknown. No one and nothing’s looking back at us, just silence and emptiness. We’re on our own, Cooky.” Harris paused. “If ever there was proof that God is a man-made concept, it’s sitting in the back of that car. We must have created God, because no God would create anything capable of that.”

  “Strange sort of Pom, aren’t you?”

  “If you say so.”

  Fred Lescott was perhaps the only person in the station who had no idea what had occurred on the street outside. He was sitting at a desk drinking a warm bottle of beer and smoking a cigarette when the ghastly events unfolded. That was his day. All day, every day. To say he was a drunk was an understatement. Surrounded by boxes and boxes of case files that stretched through a long, dark room, he drank like he was trying to drown himself. Files were spread over his desk and upon the floor. Crime scene images, reports, not the stuff you’d want to spend your Friday looking at, but Fred Lescott was a man apart.

  He was youthful, perhaps in his late twenties or early thirties. His dark brown hair was out of place, his tie loose, his sleeves rolled up and his shirt untucked. He had the appearance of a man who couldn’t have cared less about his appearance. The dark rings under his eyes had their own set of dark rings. He was equal parts stressed, drunk and exhausted.

  Lescott was Head of New South Wales Police’s Missing Persons department, the son of a highly decorated VICPOL chief, and a former anti-corruption campaigner. The latter had made him an outcast amongst his peers. When DC James Harris walked through the open door and waited patiently for the sorry excuse for a detective in front of him to look up, he simply didn’t look up.

  As Harris looked around, he noticed the Missing Persons department was entirely empty, aside from the man in front of him. The dim lights flickered, and the place smelled of stale beer and dust. Harris cleared his throat.

  Lescott looked up at Harris suspiciously, as though he was questioning the very veracity of Harris appearing before him. He clearly hadn’t been expecting company. “G’day?” Lescott continued to peer at Harris distrustingly for a moment before giving his head a shake, “I’m sorry. That was rude of me. For a second there, I thought I’d dreamed you up.”

  “You want to start having more pleasant dreams.” Harris grimaced at the peculiar little fellow in front of him. “Looking for the Missing Persons squad?”

  “You found it.” Lescott looked back down at his papers.

  Harris found the silence within the department deafening. “Where is everyone?”

  “Clue’s in the name…”

  Harris stared blankly at Lescott.

  “They’re missing.” Lescott gave his own joke a drunken laugh before putting his cigarette out in his bottle of beer. He stood up, tucked his shirt into his trousers, half-heartedly straightened his tie and offered his hand to Harris. “What can I help you with, Banquo?”

  “Banquo?”

  “It’s from Macbeth,” Lescott explained. “He appeared as a ghost at the…”

  “I know Macbeth.” Harris dismissed the peculiar reference, but noted that they must have been the only two men in the station with a working knowledge of the Bard’s canon. “It’s DC Harris…Two missing kids. I guess they just turned up. I’m hoping to ID them.”

  “Judging from your face, they didn’t skip back into Darlinghurst with smiles on their faces and a tune on their lips?” Lescott read the grave expression upon the man’s face. “They never fucking do.”

  “I don’t know where to start.” Harris, it appeared to Lescott, was speaking to himself. “I think I might be out of my depth.”

  “But you’re honest… And judging from your accent. You’re English? Are you sure you’re in the right place?” Lescott kept shuffling through his papers.

  Harris could see he was loaded, “That’s the first time anyone has referred to me as English in… I don’t know how long. Everyone else calls me a Pom.”

  “Well I’m not going to do that. There’s an ugliness to that word. There’s an ugliness to any word meant
to drive separation between the speaker and the listener. Is there not?”

  “I guess you’re right.” Harris shrugged. The term had never really bothered him, but he could understand the drunk’s thinking.

  Lescott gestured to the stacks without looking up from his papers, “Help yourself to the files, just put them back where they belong when you’re done.”

  Harris looked up and down the rows and rows of boxes of files. “These people are all missing?”

  “They either are or were. Everyone who’s gone missing or inexplicably turned up in New South Wales in the last decade. If you want to go further back than that, you’ll need the basement.” Harris looked at Lescott in confusion. They were in the basement. Lescott nodded, and added, “The other basement. He was clearly in no mood to clarify his words.

  Harris poured through box after box. He looked through crime scene photos, mug shots, he read witness statements and crime scene reports. He smoked cigarette after cigarette. It felt futile.

  At the same time, Lescott worked through a stack of his own files. He possessed that absence of urgency found in a man whose mind has given up, only for his body to continue going through the motions. Other than Lescott occasionally peering over at Harris suspiciously, they ignored each other’s presence. After what felt like an eternity to both men, Harris stood up and put his jacket on. “I’m headed out, but I’ll be back. Do you need this space?”

  Lescott looked up with a bemused expression. His eyes slowly moved around the empty department and all the space therein. Before he could drunkenly stumble over a self-pitying retort, he turned back to see Harris had gone.

  Chapter 4

  It was a busy day. Busier than usual. Harris had relocated to a leaning position against the bar of a Darlinghurst Road brothel. An environment in which you would frequently find off-duty policemen. On-duty ones too. James Harris was quite at home in the space, he barely noticed the scantily clad women sitting on plush sofas, talking about birth control or whatever else it is that sex workers talk about. Every so often, one of the girls would pass and say hello, but Harris never gave them much more than a polite tip of his flat cap.

  When George Watson sauntered in, Harris pretended not to see him. Watson was flanked by his two trusty bodyguards, Lenny and Stan. Two of the toughest, meanest former dock workers that Sydney’s waterfront had ever seen. If they hadn’t been quite so incompetent, they could have run a little crew for themselves. Watson saw Harris right away and made a beeline for him.

  “Gorgeous” George Watson was a smug-looking man. He was short, but he carried himself like he was tall. His pale blue eyes were big and wild, like those of the mackerel sitting on ice at the local fishmongers. His dark hair was peppered with silver streaks. He had the swagger of a man six inches taller. In spite of his small stature, he walked through the place with the air of someone who ought to be feared. An aura that may have been contrived, but it was not to be ignored. Unlike Harris, Lenny, or Stan, it wasn’t his physical presence that provoked fear. It was his murderous mind and growing reputation. Often the bigger, harder lads in our business had to clench their teeth and do what they had to do through a grimace. Watson, on the other hand, revelled in the business of hurting people.

  During his climb up the criminal ladder, he’d been making a lot of noise. He’d made grand statements of ambition and that had left a lot of people looking over their shoulders. He’d shown that he had a taste for torture. By 1963, the only people in Sydney who commanded more fear than Watson were James Harris and Ronnie Prince. This fact ate away at young Watson, who wanted to be the biggest, baddest villain in the city. Conversely, it was this desperate need for validation that held him firmly behind Harris and Prince in the pecking order.

  Harris was subtle in how he cultivated his image. His clothes were modest, if not inexpensive. He didn’t speak loudly, and he spoke quieter still when he meant someone harm.While George Watson did just about everything for the benefit of those within earshot, Harris was the polar opposite. He did nothing for the benefit of anyone other than Mr Prince. Watson was a mewling alley cat; licking at its own undercarriage. Harris was the common brown snake, lying in wait, quiet, calm, and deadly.

  “How’re you going, Pom?” Watson asked with his hand outstretched. It went without reaction. Watson reacted in mock sadness. “Going to ask how I’m doing?”

  “Probably not.”

  “You’re not very chatty today, James.” Watson smirked.

  “I was down at Harrington’s today.” It was at this point that Harris looked up at Watson. He stared at him with a menace that you just can’t mimic.

  “Harrington’s?” Watson feigned ignorance.

  “The Woolloomooloo brewery you’ve been extorting.” Harris kept up the intense, unblinking stare.

  “Now I remember.” Watson laughed. Lenny and Stan joined in, like the loyal lap dogs that they were.

  “Well you’d do well to remember Woolloomooloo is Prince’s turf. You leave them alone. You want a brewery… I’m sure there’s a shithole in Wagga Wagga that would be happy to have you.” Harris turned away. Those lingering around the bar and lounge had shut up. Harris was chewing Watson out. This was a clash between Titans. “You can leave. I’m done with you.”

  “Tsssss.” Watson exhaled through his front teeth and shook his head. “Everyone else around here respects me… Why don’t you, Constable?”

  “They don’t respect you. They fear you… Because you’re a nasty little cunt, George.” Harris stood up and walked around to the business side of the bar.

  “And you don’t fear me?” Watson watched him with a sadistic smile upon his face.

  Harris reached up, grabbed a bottle of whisky and gave it a sniff before he began to pour himself a drink. He simply ignored the question, having deemed it ridiculous in nature.

  “Hear you caught a real wrong’un today, Officer.” You had to hand it to Watson, he wasn’t shying away from the bigger, meaner bully. In fact, he was goading him. Because he knew if he could make it onto Harris’ radar, he’d make it onto Prince’s radar, which would mean he’d made it.

  Harris wasn’t about to talk to Watson about the Rolls Royce, he simply moved back around the bar, and sat back down in his stool. He wasn’t engaging. Watson was nosy. He wanted to get his fingers into every rotten pie in town. Harris wasn’t about to help him by passing him information.

  “Did you see the old ball and chain last night? On the tele?” George asked boastfully.

  “Thought you were married to a nurse?”

  “My wife… Jesus… No one would put her in front of a fucking camera.” Watson was famed for working his way through the models, actresses, dancing girls, the backing singers of Darlinghurst. His prey were the most glamorous and best-looking of those strange creatures who had a hankering to cosy up with the darkest men. His poor wife stayed at home with their young child, while he spread his repulsive seed across town.

  The woman he was talking about in this instance was Elsa Markle, a singer currently sending all the local men crazy. She’d started off on Darlinghurst stages before making it as somewhat of a national star. There was talk of her recently being scouted by a Hollywood film studio and being on the verge of making it big over there. George’s eyes followed the form of a woman in lingerie as she walked past the pair. “You had her?”

  Harris rubbed at his temples. The conversation was getting on his nerves. “You should….” Watson managed to speak to Harris like they were firm friends, while Harris gave him nothing back whatsoever.

  “Not my thing,” Harris sipped at his drink.

  “You some sort of queer?” Watson turned to Lenny and Stan, who were enjoying the show.

  “No.”

  “Then what do you mean, not your thing?” Watson was studying Harris, his mannerisms, his idiosyncrasies.

  “I wouldn’t put mine… Where you’ve put yours… And to be honest, I think if you have to pay for it… You probably don’t fucking deserve i
t.”

  “Alright… Queer.” Again, Watson sniggered towards his two bodyguards. “When are we going to see you down the track? I’ve got a real peach racing this Saturday.”

  “I don’t gamble.”

  “It’s not gambling when you know who’s going to win.” Watson slid a note in front of Harris. Harris inspected it; it was the name of a racehorse. “They might as well be giving out free cash… But only to mates of George Watson.” Watson spoke loudly enough for everyone to hear.

  “I’m not your mate.” Harris unceremoniously shut him down.

  “You could buy yourself a shiny new truncheon.” Lenny and Stan sniggered loudly which only served to encourage George. It seemed to add six inches to his height. When Harris clenched his fists on top of the bar, Watson noticed. “Don’t be so sensitive… I’m just having a laugh. Do you need a hit or something? You’re awfully tetchy.” Watson was probing for a knockout blow.

  “If Lenny and Stan weren’t here, and if they didn’t have pistols in their overcoats, I’d give you a fucking slap.”

  “Lucky for me that they are then. Isn’t it?” George’s voice broke a little as he replied. That putdown had made him feel like a little boy in the school playground, at the mercy of the bigger boy. He had one last gambit up his sleeve. He took out an envelope and handed it to Harris, attempting to remind Harris of his status in servitude, “For your boss.”

  “Great. Now fuck off.” Harris placed the envelope in his pocket.

  George began to retreat towards the door, giving Lenny and Stan a gesture to follow, “Come on then boys. We can’t stand around here nattering like old ladies all day. We’ve got important things to do.”

  Harris watched with a keen eye as they disappeared. When they had left, he beckoned over one of the working girls. He handed her the slip of paper with the name of the racehorse and said, “Tell all your friends to put money on this horse at the weekend. Fuck with his odds.”