The January Zone

by Peter Corris

  ‘He could be looking out. If he sees you at the wrong place and the wrong time it could be trouble.’

  ‘I can get to the pub down the back way. He couldn’t see me from any angle.’

  ‘Do that then. Mike and I’ll take a look around and we’ll meet in the pub to decide the next step. January might have to put in an appearance. You know where to reach him, don’t you.’

  ‘Mm, he’ll come for sure.’

  ‘Yeah. Guts aren’t his problem. God, it’s a bloody rough plan but its something.’

  ‘What if you can’t locate Borg?’

  ‘I said it was rough.’

  But I did locate him. He was sitting in the rooftop spa at the Gazebo looking up at the pale blue sky. Maybe he was dreaming of Broken Hill.

  ‘Hey, Hardy,’ he said. ‘You should try this, it’s great.’

  ‘Maybe later. How’d you like to do a little work?’

  ‘What kind?’ He pulled himself up. The pale, freckled shoulders breaking the surface of the bubbling water were knotted with muscle.

  ‘When does your plane go?’

  ‘Tonight. Come on, I was so bloody bored. What’s going on?’ He got out of the pool, picked up a towel and rubbed himself. He was thick and solid all the way down. There was at least one bullet scar on his upper body.

  ‘To do with January. Have you got a gun?’

  ‘I’ve got two. Let’s get to my room and you can fill me in. I can cancel the booking.’

  ‘If it’s for tonight you won’t have to. It’ll be settled one way or another before that.’

  28

  BORG looked surprised when he saw the Falcon. Living in Washington he probably hadn’t ridden in a car that old for years. He was wearing a lightweight suit but he’d left the tie off. He had the Washington bulge under his arm and a light in his eye. I filled him in on the drive.

  ‘Sounds like an amateur,’ he grunted. ‘Think he was shooting to kill when he took a pot at Trudi?’

  I jockeyed the car into the centre lane among the heavy afternoon traffic on Parramatta Road. ‘Hard to say. Did I say the bomb killed a kid in January’s office.’

  ‘That right? Could’ve been an accident. Well, it doesn’t matter much, you gotta treat ‘em all different.’

  ‘That’s why you’re here,’ I said. ‘I think Tobin’s philosophy is to treat them all the same.’

  We had a long wait at the lights; January’s office and the health food shop were down the street a couple of blocks from the turn. I tried to call up a picture of Charles but I couldn’t get much. My image was confused by the police artist’s sketch. I remembered that Weiss had remarked on muscles. Magda, his wife, was easier to think about. Did she have the kind of beauty that could turn a man’s mind? Hard to say—minds turn for different things.

  Everything seemed normal in the street, which is to say that it was busy and parking spaces were hard to find. I squeezed the Falcon into a semi-legal spot outside the Post Office and Borg and I approached the pub down the lane Trudi had mentioned. Borg reminded me of good non-coms I’d known in Malaya—cover spotters, escape route mappers…survivors.

  We went into the public bar. The pool table was in use and so was the dart board. A machine behind the bar that dispensed coins for the pinball machines clattered and a stream of money flowed into a glass. The bar was about half full with a scattering of people at the tables and a few along each wing of the three-sided bar. It was the time for casual conversations, when the social drinkers are having a quiet one and the real drinkers are still pacing themselves and minding their own business.

  ‘Good pub,’ Borg said. ‘Can we see the joint from here?’

  ‘Yeah, from the window over by the phone.’

  ‘I’ll take a look. You find this Julian.’

  Julian was at the bar; a six foot three inch Maori with tattoos on his arms and shoulders, and there was a hell of a lot of arm and shoulder to work on. He had a schooner in one hand and a cigarette in the other, very bad for his health but I wouldn’t have cared to tell him so. He was staring straight ahead and his big, heavy face was wrinkled in concentration.

  I ordered two beers. ‘Get you something, Julian?’ I said.

  The huge head turned slowly. He examined me carefully, took a drag on his cigarette and nodded. ‘Hardy,’ he said.

  ‘That’s right. Trudi’s called, then?’

  ‘Just now. She said to watch for you and I saw you come in.’

  ‘What? Through the back of your head?’

  He pointed in the direction he’d been looking and I saw a mirror mounted high up so that it exactly framed the doorway. ‘She said you’ve got a bit of time. Know about that mirror?’

  I shook my head. Paid for the beers and sipped. It seemed best to humour him. ‘The story is there was a man used to drink here who had to watch ‘is back, know what I mean? Well, he was popular so they put the mirror in so’s he could watch the door.’

  ‘And?’

  The laugh started deep down in his belly and spread up through the vast auditorium of his chest. He bellowed and took a swallow of his drink. ‘One of the blokes that was after ‘im got a job as a barman here. Shot ‘im straight through the chest. Great story, dunno if it’s true. Yeah, Trudi says she’s on ‘er way and the cop won’t be far behind. I wrote it down.’ He pulled a TAB ticket from his pocket and read off the initials. ‘He’s comin’ with a TRF. Wazzat?’

  ‘Tactical Response Force,’ Borg said. He reached across me for the other drink. ‘You must be Julian. Gidday.’

  Julian nodded. ‘What I can do? Mr January’s coming too, Trudi says.’

  ‘Just keep an eye on them both,’ I said. ‘Try to stop him from doing anything silly.’

  ‘I see the bloody guns. Trouble?’

  ‘I don’t think so,’ Borg said.

  We went to the window and looked across the street to the building. There was a clear view of the top storey room at the back of the health food shop; it was across two flat roofs from January’s office and it afforded vision into the street in front and to the back and left.

  ‘Can’t see a bloody thing from there to the right,’ Borg said. ‘I did a quick reccy. That back room, that loft thing, has a blank wall on the right and you can get up to it across the roof. I walked past the shop. It’s just a matter of through and up the stairs at the back. It’s an easy set-up to penetrate but I’ve seen easier fucked up before.’

  ‘How?’

  ‘The target’s too tempting. They lob tear gas into the loft, the guys inside panic and take a shot and they shred it from the street. Very messy.’

  ‘Tactical Response Force,’ I said. ‘Heavy mob.’

  ‘You said it. It doesn’t look hard, Cliff. One in the front and one over the roof.’

  ‘Could you see who was in the shop?’

  ‘Not properly. A woman in the front but I got an impression of someone else.’

  ‘I guess I take the roof. He’s seen me in the shop and probably in his ‘scope.’

  Borg nodded. ‘I’ll go in. Sit on him. You kick in the window and get the woman if she’s there. We meet in the middle. Timing’s the thing. I’ll go in at …2.35. You hit the window at the same time. Of course there’s one thing.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘He could be standing at the window with a gun.’

  ‘Or sitting on the stairs.’

  ‘Yeah. Why’re you doing this. Cliff? For January?’

  ‘Hardly. I don’t really know. What about you?’

  We’d kept our voices low but something about the tightness in us and the rigid alertness of Julian were beginning to attract attention. It was time to go.

  Borg cleared his throat. ‘I’m bloody sick of Washington. It’s all bullshit and brainless bigwigs: If this goes well I could get a classy posting back here. I’d love to get back to the Hill for a bit.’

  ‘What if it doesn’t go well?’

  He grinned. ‘I always try to think and act positive. We clear? 4.05
and in!’

  I went further down the lane and skirted around to come up on the blind side of the loft. I had 12 minutes to get onto the roof and across to the window. Borg’s reccy had been good but you can’t see everything from ground level. Climbing onto a roof three buildings away from the health food store was no problem. From a paling fence up onto a garage and across its solid iron roof to the next. Then the problems started; the tin on the last roof but one was rusted through and I could see the rotting bearers underneath. It didn’t look as if they could take my weight.

  I worked forward along the good roof with my eyes straining at the dilapidated one. The flashing had come away and the whole of the first section of iron was a mess. And the next section didn’t look much better. Eight minutes. I needed a long plank to put across but there was nothing around to serve and I didn’t have time to go back to ground level and look. Six minutes. I was going to have jump across and hope for the best.

  Eight, maybe 10 feet across the rotted timber to a point that looked sound. Looked. Five minutes. I’d cleared 19 feet 9 inches in the long jump at senior high school. Third place. But then I had a 60 yard cinder track run-up, now I had about three steps to take before the jump. Four minutes. I took the steps back and got ready to go forward and across and Borg’s question came to my mind: why was I doing this? I still didn’t know.

  I made sure the gun was secure in the holster; I kneaded my calf muscles and took the first step—right foot so I’d be on my take-off foot with the third step…two, three—I jumped, straining for distance and trying not to land too hard. The roof creaked and groaned as I hit it but it held. I straightened up, breathing hard. I’d jarred one knee but I scarcely felt it. The loft was 12 feet away. Two minutes.

  I bent below the level of the window and scuttled across. The four panes of the window were dusty and there were cobwebs on the outside and inside. Less than a minute. I lifted my head to look through the bottom corner pane. Through the dirt I saw Charles standing at the other window looking out onto the street. I couldn’t see Karen Weiner. I straightened up and at that second Charles broke the window, shoved a rifle through and fired into the street. I looked down and saw a man in a grey flak jacket duck back under cover. The street had gone suddenly still.

  Charles fired again. He screamed ‘Magda!’ and ducked out of sight. I kicked the window squarely in the middle and the wood and glass collapsed inward. I pulled out the .38 and climbed through ready to shoot at anything that moved. Nothing did. Karen Weiner lay on a mattress on the floor. She was tied and gagged and her eyes were wide open in terror. I made some kind of gesture that was meant to be comforting and went through the door to the steps which were steep, and turned once before reaching ground level.

  An explosion from below seemed to shake the steps. I went down in three plunging leaps which carried me into the back of the shop. Charles was several feet in front of me, squatting behind a large bin slamming shells into a double-barrelled sawn-off shotgun. The air was filled with echoing sound and fine, swirling flour. Men were shouting in the front of the shop and on the street. I could see Borg’s reflection in the shop window. He was inside, crouching below the counter on the customer’s side with his gun out. He signalled urgently and authoritatively for quiet behind him.

  ‘Charles, put it down!’ Borg shouted. ‘It’s okay—I’m not the police.’

  The commotion around the doorway got louder. A shotgun was fired over Borg’s head; the blast destroyed a shelf and sent more flour into the air and sprayed Charles and me with sweet smelling liquid. I had Charles’ eye view more or less; Borg moved and his shoulder was unprotected. Charles lifted the gun.

  I levelled my .38. ‘Don’t move, Charles, or you’re dead.’

  He swivelled and fired at me. I didn’t think; I dived under the blast and tackled him around the knees. He went down but he held onto the gun. A shadow flitted from behind a rack of spices a few feet from where we hit the slippery floor. I dropped my pistol and clawed at Charles’ hands holding the shotgun but he twisted away. The shadow moved fast, became white. Charles fired again and the shadow screamed and red blotches erupted over the white.

  ‘Madga!’ Charles stood and lurched forward. The shotgun boomed again from the front of the shop and Charles was lifted and spun around; his knees buckled and he collapsed on his back into a spreading puddle of oil that smelt of warm winds and flowers.

  Tobin stepped over the woman. He held a pump action shotgun and his enormous chest was covered by a bullet-proof vest. He glanced down at Charles. ‘Don’t stand there, Hardy. I should have your balls but it looks like it went all right. Where’s the woman?’

  ‘Upstairs.’

  ‘Gelignite? More guns?’

  ‘Probably up there too.’

  ‘Good. Who’s this?’

  Borg had put his gun away and was crouched, feeling the pulse in the slim brown wrist. He shook his head and stood. ‘You don’t need to know,’ he said. A siren wailed outside.

  ‘Get the woman out the way you came in, Hardy,’ Tobin said. ‘I’ll keep to the deal.’

  I grabbed Borg’s arm and pulled him towards the steps. ‘You never kept a deal in your life, Tobin.’

  ‘Piss off.’

  ‘I’m taking her out the front. You clear us a path and keep any press away or I’ll pick up anything that’s in that loft and sling it into the street. How’d you like that?’

  Tobin sniffed. ‘Smartarse, I should’ve got you too. Make it fast, then.’ He turned and started shouting at the men who’d crowded into the shop. Smoke and flour filled the air along with the smell of honey and sweet oil and death.

  29

  IT was Christmas in October—everybody was getting what he or she wanted. Tobin had set up a production crew for his raid; he had cameramen and reporters, an explosives expert and a medical team all ready to go into action. He orchestrated the whole thing and he got maximum coverage for removing the threat to the hero of the hour, Peter January.

  Tobin appeared on the front page of the tabloids looking menacing and effective in his TRF gear. Charles Galloway came into the public eye as a dangerous sociopath, a man obsessed with his own obscurity and with a hatred of the opinion-makers. Tobin destroyed the last note and Trudi received a broad hint that the emergence of the earlier notes from Galloway would mean trouble for January. There was no point in resisting: Madga Galloway was ‘slain’ by her husband as a last desperate act. Some gelignite, detonators and various guns were artistically photographed.

  Galloway was a childhood immigrant from Northern Ireland, a fact not lost on a sensation-hungry media. The case was closed on Alison Marshall, ‘the politically sophisticated 16 year old who had died as a result of Galloway’s twisted terrorism’.

  ‘What shit!’ Mike Borg said. He crumpled the paper and shoved it in a bin. We were at the airport two days after the raid and I still hadn’t heard from Helen. I shook hands with Borg and told him I’d like to work with him again if he came back to Australia.

  ‘Might hold you to that,’ he said. ‘I gather you don’t always work for these crap holes, like January and Creighton Kirby?’

  I shook my head. ‘First and last time.’

  I drove back to Glebe with the last pieces of the case falling into place in my mind before I would start to file and forget them. Tobin had thrown a smokescreen over the way his identification of the terrorist Galloway had been arrived at. Karen Weiner had not been mentioned; January had got her away into safe-keeping. I saw January briefly the day after the raid.

  ‘Karen understands that I never laid a finger on the woman,’ he said. He wore only a gauze pad taped to his forehead now. He had an interesting bruise and I fancied a few more grey hairs. ‘She understands that it was all a blind.’

  ‘I thought she might,’ I said. ‘What did she say about Galloway?’

  He shrugged. ‘Not much. He wasn’t very rough. Had his wife terrified 24 hours a day. A nutter.’

  ‘What now for you and Karen
?’

  He smiled, ‘I don’t know, maybe we can come to some arrangement with Weiner. Like you’ve got with Michael Broadway. Works doesn’t it?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘You handled it well, Cliff, very well. I’ll have to go back to America again and…’

  ‘America! You’re going back for more?’

  ‘What’s the difference? Look what happened here.’

  ‘It’s organised there, you know that. Here it’s… more individual. It’s not built in.’

  January shrugged. ‘Just as dangerous from my point of view. What I’m asking is whether you want a steady job?’

  I shook my head. ‘I’m going to vote independent for the rest of my life.’

  Trudi voted independent too. She quit her job with January and said she was going to write a book.

  ‘What about?’ I asked. We were leaning against the Falcon parked outside my house. Trudi had walked Gunther from Lilyfield and was going to walk him back. I patted Gunther’s sleek head and he smelled cat on my hand and growled.

  ‘Men,’ Trudi said. ‘What’re you going to do about Helen? I can tell from your face that you haven’t heard from her.’

  ‘Looks like you’ve got the qualifications to write about men. No, I haven’t heard.’

  She handed me an envelope. ‘From Peter to you. From some slush fund or other. See you, Cliff. We have to finish that ping pong game.’ She kissed my cheek and tugged at Gunther’s lead.

  ‘Aren’t you going to give me some advice? About Helen?’

  Her back was to me. She raised her arm and wiggled her fingers, like Liza Minnelli at the end of Cabaret.

  Inside the envelope was a six figure cheque and a note from January. It read: ‘Thanks anyway. Love to Helen.’

  The next morning I made arrangements with my neighbour Harry Soames to feed the cat. Harry doesn’t like me but he likes cats. I put a message on the answering machine and I locked the house. It was a fine, warm day and I was noticing things I’d been looking through, like the banana tree leaning over the fence from Soames’ place. It had several bunches of bananas on it which Soames had wrapped in plastic. I liked that.