DINING WITH DEVILS -- A Tasmanian Thriller

by GORDON AALBORG

  “Christ on a bloody crutch!” he cried, then repeated the oath less noisily after rearing up to thump his head on the driveshaft so hard it nearly knocked him out.

  “G’arn . . . get out of that, you mongrel bloody dog, or I’ll kick yez into the middle of next week,” shouted old Viv, who meant not a word of it, as both Charlie and the recalcitrant Jack Russell terrier well knew.

  “Dammit, Viv. That evil dog of yours will be the death of me one day,” Charlie said as he rolled out from under the vehicle, one greasy hand pawing at where his head was already smeared with grease from its impact with the undercarriage.

  “Bluey didn’t mean nothin’. He likes you is all.”

  “He doesn’t like me. That bloody mongrel doesn’t like anybody. I’m half surprised he didn’t bite me in the balls. Or piss on me. It wouldn’t be the first time.”

  “He only pisses on people he likes.” The old man graced Charlie with a nearly toothless grin, while Bluey sat at the diminutive ancient’s feet, grimacing at the policeman through too many teeth, his yellow eyes alight with an unholy glee.

  Charlie kept his eye on the dog as he rolled over and got to his feet, using the Land Rover’s bumper to give him leverage . . . and something to hang onto if he was forced to defend himself against Bluey’s affections.

  “Any road,” the old man continued, “that’s not what we’re here for.”

  “Good,” said Charlie. “Just don’t tell me I’ve got to dog-sit the brute again, that’s all I ask.”

  “You did fine . . . a ripper job.” There was a slight note of condescension in old Viv’s tone.

  Charlie tried to ignore that. He kept his eyes on Bluey, trying in fact to hold the dog in place with his own gaze, like a sheepdog dealing with a recalcitrant ewe. Fat chance! Bluey returned the stare, not in the least intimidated and indicating that with a slightly curled, sneering upper lip.

  “But I’m worried you might have missed some of the more important aspects of our case there yesterday,” Viv continued, his voice now holding the tones of a superior officer addressing an underling.

  Charlie winced, but tried not to show it. Nor did he speak his unbidden thoughts.

  OUR case? Bloody oath, Viv . . . give it a rest!

  Ever since the old man and his damned dog had been (admittedly) influential in the solving of Teague Kendall’s Specialist case more than a year earlier, the old man had been a right royal pain in the arse. Hardly a week went by without him dropping by the St. Helens police offices to deposit gratuitous, generally useless advice about some case or another.

  It was annoying beyond all logic, would have been funny if it wasn’t so annoying, and – worst of all – showed no sign of abating. Viv had become the Jessica Fletcher of St. Helens, but with none of Angela Lansbury’s grace and charm.

  The problem for Charlie was that he genuinely liked the old reprobate, even if he couldn’t put the “why” into words and actually didn’t dare to try. Old Viv was a genuine rum’n – bush Australian for an incorrigible, unrepentant rogue. Which, in Viv’s case, was putting things mildly. The old man was incorrigible, had been (and probably still was!) a poacher, had absolutely no regard or respect for authority of any type, and could be depended upon in most circumstances to do the wrong thing for even the most right reasons. And he drank. A lot. And he had that damned dog . . .

  But Viv was an honest scoundrel, a man liked and even respected by far more people than the few who didn’t like him, and those few didn’t really know him. Charlie knew him. Respected him. Couldn’t help but like him. The old bushman was the living essence of rural Tasmania, a sort of fossil that lived and breathed and walked around in a world that was slowly but surely outgrowing him. Not necessarily for the better.

  To Charlie, that was a pity. His own view of the world as it was and should be still had plenty of room for Viv and his unique set of values. But . . . he could be such a pain in the arse sometimes.

  “Okay, Viv,” Charlie said, wiping ineffectually at his greasy hands with a rag that was already dirtier than the fingers it touched. “Has that damned mongrel been talking to you again? Does he have a workable theory about yesterday’s shooting, or is this one something you’ve come up with all on your lonesome?”

  “He was there, wasn’t he?”

  “And don’t I bloody know it? If there was justice in the world, it would’ve been him got shot, if you want my opinion.” The dog’s eyes flared yellow and he sneered his indifference to the slight, but Charlie ignored that and carried on bravely. “Come on, out with it. It must be pretty top stuff for you to come all this way to tell me about it.”

  The old man met Charlie’s eyes with a defiant stare, glanced down at his geriatric dog, then back up at Charlie, who braced himself for a possible assault by the creature.

  “They shot the wrong bloke.” The words were spat out like warm beer.

  “They? There was more than one shooter? Christ, Viv . . . did the damned dog tell you that, or what?”

  Viv merely glared. “It’s all over the wireless and the telly, not that I’d expect you to notice. Nobody can come up with a single reason why anybody’d want to shoot that dog judge. The bullet didn’t hit who it was aimed at is what I’m telling yez.”

  “So who was it aimed at? There were only about a hundred people there on the trial site – take your choice.” Charlie’s patience was flagging, not least because he’d already come to the same conclusion as Viv . . . even before he’d handed over the crime scene and made the long drive home in the dark. With that damned dog.

  “How should I know? I wasn’t there.”

  “So what are we talking about, then? Bloody hell . . . I spent all the day there at Ormley, half the night getting home and delivering your mongrel dog, and now you want me to solve riddles?”

  “You’re a copper.” Spoken as if that was what policemen were there for – to solve riddles for curious old bushies with nothing better to do than make them up.

  “And a bloody tired copper, in the bargain,” Charlie replied. “So can you just cut to the chase, so I can get back to my tinkering with this wreck of a vehicle?”

  “Huumph. That thing’s a piece of shit and I would have told you that before you bought it, if you’d asked. If you knew what I know about where it’s been and what it’s done, you wouldn’t have bought it at all.”

  Charlie hesitated. He knew the geriatric Land Rover wasn’t on anybody’s “hot” list, and it wasn’t worth enough to have a lien against it. But he didn’t know the vehicle’s unarguably lengthy history . . . and suddenly feared that Viv might. It wouldn’t be any huge surprise from a character who was filled with surprises.

  “Look, Viv,” Charlie began, keeping his rising temper under control. “The bloke that got shot was a judge in an area where everybody’s walking round with their egos on the end of a leash. He mightily pissed off that blind bloke, from what I heard, and that suggests he’s probably done the same for God only knows how many other people back down the line. Just because no obvious suspect has turned up doesn’t mean there isn’t one.”

  “ ’Twasn’t him they was shooting at.” Not one iota of give in the old man’s voice.

  Jesus! I might as well talk to the bloody wind.

  “Well then, who was it?” Charlie growled, trying to intimidate Viv with his strongest policeman’s stare and having even less success than when he’d tried it on the dog.

  “It could have been that writer bloke – Kendall.” The old man didn’t sound convinced, so Charlie held his peace. Teague Kendall was no more logical a target than the Canberra retrieving trial judge, in his view, but maybe no less logical either.

  The silence grew, but Charlie couldn’t tell if Viv had gone to sleep mentally, was waiting for a response, or merely building suspense. Kendall? Might as well say it could have been that other writer, Henderson. Or me, for that matter.

  Viv’s next words echoed Charlie’s last thought, and he couldn’t halt the shiver that crept
up his spine.

  “Don’t do that!” he muttered, as much to himself as to the diminutive old man in front of him. Being shot at was, in theory, part of any policeman’s potential fate, but it had never been high on Charlie’s risk list. He’d never, in the line of duty, been shot at, had never fired his gun, seldom so much as drawn his gun, and fully expected to end his career the same way.

  “Well yez might think about it, any road,” the old man muttered in reply, clearly unimpressed by Charlie’s response. He half turned away, then swiveled back to ask, “And I suppose yez didn’t remember about my book?”

  So this is what it’s about. I should have bloody well guessed. Charlie sighed.

  “No, I didn’t forget. Things just got a little bit busy out there is all. Not that it matters. Kendall will be stopping by sometime during the week, he said, and I’m certain he’ll sign a copy of that damned book for you while he’s here. Although,” he added, suspecting as he did so that he was wasting his breath on the unsubtle hint, “you’re usually supposed to buy a copy of a book before you ask the author to personally autograph it.”

  “Bugger that for a joke,” was the half-expected reply. “He should be giving me a share of the royalties. There wouldn’t even be a book if it weren’t for me. And Bluey, of course.”

  The dog, half asleep against the old man’s Blundstone boots, perked up at the sound of his name and looked from Charlie to Viv and back again, his fangs bared as if in anticipation of an attack command. The evil in his yellow eyes was so fierce that Charlie had to force himself not to flinch.

  “Yeah, sure. Maybe I shouldn’t tell you that Kendall expressed a specific desire to meet you, although I can’t for the life of me imagine why,” Charlie added. “He’s already met that damned dog, and the mongrel bastard must have decided he likes Kendall, too, because he pissed on his boots. So there you go, Viv – lessons from your dog on how to deal with the rich and famous. Piss on ’em! How’d ya go with that?”

  Charlie couldn’t hold back a staccato snort of laughter that drew a snarl from Bluey and a filthy glance from the beast’s master. Charlie laughed even more gaily when old Viv could only glare in reply, clearly – for once – lost for words.

  Two minutes later, old Viv’s bush ute departed in a cloud of oil fumes and a cacophony of rattles and bangs and shudders that made Charlie look at his own “project” with renewed skepticism.

  “I wonder what the old bugger does know about you,” he muttered as he slid back under the vehicle, but it was only moments before his mind turned back to the discussion with Viv about who had been the intended victim in the sniper attack.

  Like the old man, Charlie didn’t believe for a moment it had been the dog trial judge – the concept made no sense at all. At least to him. It was the man’s first-ever visit to Tasmania, so it was unlikely he’d mortally offended anyone else locally, and those at the trial had said anybody high enough in the local trialing fraternity to have been that significantly offended during a mainland visit were there, on the ground, when the sniper struck.

  But if not the judge, then who? Charlie didn’t believe for a minute it had been himself. The old bugger had merely been stirring him with that suggestion. But who? Illogical it could have been Rex Henderson, despite the American’s bullet-burned ear. But Kendall? That made no sense either that Charlie could see. Still, they’d been the three people closest to the line of fire, or what was assumed to have been the line of fire.

  For all anyone really knew, the damned bullet could have come from a mile away, a total freak accident – except that Charlie was sure that wasn’t the case. The massive hole in the dead man’s chest from the entry wound was enough to tell him that. The fatal bullet was a long-range shot from a high-powered rifle, but not an accident from a mile away.

  “Not my problem. Thank God,” he muttered as he reached for a misplaced spanner and concentrated on his tinkering. He was able to stave off the offending thoughts for a short time, but old Viv’s visit had ruined his Sunday afternoon and Charlie eventually had to admit it.

  He stopped work and went inside to make a cuppa, and noticed the blinking light on his answering machine. That was enough to make him check the cell phone that lolled on the kitchen counter instead of being on his belt where it should have been, day off or not. And found it, too, bristling with the promise of voice-mail messages floating out there in cyberspace.

  He knew before he heard a single one that it could only be bad news, and for once it was no surprise at all to be right.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  Kirsten swam up into consciousness, a slow, confusing ascent made worse by the dryness in her mouth and a hammering headache. It felt as if someone was banging on her skull with something that managed to hurt and boom, echo and tinkle . . . all at the same time.

  She opened her eyes to find light, but not much of it. The space surrounding her was huddled in shadow, obscure. And it smelled. Despite the dryness in her mouth, her nose was conscious of a damp, musty odor, one of age and decay and neglect.

  She rolled over on her side, realizing as she did so that she couldn’t move her hands properly. Peered down through barely focusing eyes to see what her sense of touch had already told her – her hands were bound in front of her with some sort of plastic, the cable ties used by electricians, she thought.

  One major difference between a horse and a mule – apart from the obvious – is their reaction to fearful things. A horse will fly into panic over nothing more threatening than a blowing leaf, a swooping bird. A mule’s reaction is the opposite of panic; a mule will almost always prop, or balk, and stay immovable until it has figured out what the problem is. Mules generally get into far less trouble than horses.

  This bit of trivia scampered about in Kirsten’s mind as she stared at her bonds, then slowly, patiently, let her gaze roam around the interior of the dank-smelling hovel. Noting, assessing, questioning. Learning nothing that made any sense at all, except that she seemed to be alone.

  Good. I hope. Don’t panic. Be a mule. No need to panic. Yet!

  Managed then to swing her legs over the side of the cot on which she lay. She struggled to her feet, aware that there was a light chain wrapped twice around her waist. Snugly. And fastened behind her, somehow. She couldn’t figure out the fastening, but she could turn and see where the other end of the chain was run through a large eyebolt in the wall. And padlocked.

  Standing, now, choking back the bile of panic, she once again scanned the entire room, noting the boxes of food, the camp stove, the folding table already set up, the second camp bed still folded away. Noted how everything was neatly arranged, a sharp contrast to the overall aura of the hovel itself. Recognized her own fanny pack, neatly laid out on the folding table.

  Realized, suddenly, that despite the darkness in the windowless shack, there was light peeping through pinholes in the roof, through cracks in the slab walls.

  Daylight? Must be. But . . .

  She ran her mind back, tried to replay the tape that mentally catalogued where she’d been, what she’d done. Got as far as returning to the suite she and Kendall shared in the hotel. The knock on the door. The vague, blurred memory of the tall, lean man who’d stood there when she’d answered it.

  Then nothing.

  But it was night, then. Last night? When?

  Now, panic began to nibble at her equilibrium. Not a lot of it. Yet! But enough to increase the dryness in her mouth, enough to turn the headache into a sense of somebody trying to open up her skull with a jackhammer.

  And she had to pee.

  Her eyes found the bucket at the end of the cot. She was, barely, able to drag it closer. Getting her jeans undone, managing to actually use the makeshift toilet was somewhat harder. Getting her jeans back in place was hardest of all. But she managed.

  And then – blessings upon blessings – she noticed the two-liter bottle of water there on the foot of the camp cot, and with it a small container of headache tablets.

  Fa
t chance I’ll be taking any of that! God only knows what’s in there.

  But the aspirins were in an unopened cardboard box, and when she fumbled the childproof lid off the plastic bottle inside, she found it, too, sealed. New. Unopened. Kirsten had random thoughts about how somebody might tamper with aspirin tablets, then the jackhammers at her temples took control.

  She dug her way through the seal with a thumbnail, gave the tablets a cursory inspection, then swallowed four of them with a gratifying swig of water from the bottle, which was also new and unopened, for what that might be worth. It didn’t matter. If she couldn’t cure the headache, she couldn’t think. If she couldn’t think . . .

  At first, the only thing eased was her raging thirst. A second quaff of the water, which tasted fine, helped that. Then the jackhammers in her head slowed, faded. Her mind took at least a semblance of control and she resealed the bottle and set it safely away on the cot. Who knew, who could even imagine how long she might be here before more water was provided? Who knew anything?

  Now the panic was beginning to take larger bites.

  She tested the chain, at first tentatively, then by yanking on it with all her strength. It might as well have come off a logging truck for all her efforts accomplished.

  Then she tested the limits of her reach. First standing, then kneeling, then on her hands and knees and reaching out with her feet to see what she could somehow drag close enough for it to be of use to her.

  Nothing. She could reach not one damned thing that might help her.

  She slumped on the camp cot, lowered her head and closed her eyes for an instant.

  Think, dammit!

  Again, she surveyed her surroundings, hoping to make some sense of it all. Failed. There was no sense to this, or at least none she could think of.

  Kidnapped? But why? I’m not worth anything to anybody. This is Australia, not some obscure, third-world country where the peasants automatically assume anyone who looks American must be rich, must be worth holding for ransom.

  She took some gratification from not having been beaten up, not having been sexually assaulted. Not having been killed. Judging from the stock of foodstuffs and the neatly arranged gear in the shack, there was some intention to keep her there for a time. But none of it made any sense.