by Peter Corris
We were approaching the Lane Cove bridge at last. ‘What’s your point, Charlie?’
‘The point? I challenged Stefan at a meeting when Phillip left and said what a balls-up it’d been. He laughed at me and said it was a triumph. A triumph! You see, we had a sort of a rival at that time, Backup. com. Bit of a maverick mob like us and in the same field, sort of. Stefan got wind of their offer to Phillip and gazumped them. Then he just threw him away like a lolly wrapper. We got on and Backup’s just struggling along now and it was Stefan’s coup, get it? Fuck poor Phil.’
The Falcon’s windscreen wipers-I’d spend some of Marriott’s money on them-battled against the rain. He was sitting in an almost unnaturally still manner and, over the noise of the wipers, I heard him slow his rather wheezy breathing and achieve a silence that matched the stillness. It was creepy.
‘What’re you doing, Charlie?’
‘Practising.’
‘Practising what?’
He held the attitude for a moment and then let go. ‘I’m a birdwatcher. Go ahead and laugh.’
‘I won’t laugh. Watchings better than killing. I’m glad to hear you do something other than tap keys and look at screens.’
‘You think I’m weird, don’t you?’
We were moving slowly but that was okay with me because I wasn’t sure exactly how to get to his street, which was off Buffalo Road. ‘We’re back to where we started, I said. ‘We’re all weird.’
‘We’re getting along all right now though, aren’t we?’
‘Sure. Can you turn into your street from here, or is it blocked off? Don’t know this neck of the woods.’
‘You can turn. Rog used to say I lived in the very heart of suburbia.’
‘Where’s Rog now?’
‘Melbourne.’
‘Maybe you should go down there and try to get him back onside. That’d be one in the eye for Stefan.’
‘I never thought of that.’
‘Could you do it?’
‘I guess. But you’d have to come, too. Do you like Melbourne, Cliff?’
‘It’s improving.’
‘Turn left here.’
We turned and I could see what Rog had been getting at-this was nature-strip, front-garden, double-garage, two-income country.
‘Here we are,’ Charlie said. ‘I’ll unlock the gate and you can drive in. There’s room to turn inside.’
It was slack of me but I let him do it. He was out of the car before the realisation of my sloppiness hit me. I was about to speak when I saw a headlight come on and heard an engine start. Adrenalin-fuelled instinct took over and I jumped out, ran around the front of the car and hit Marriott with a diving tackle that collapsed him like a burst balloon.
The two shots the motorcyclist fired missed him. All I got were impressions of the shape of the bike and the man. Both big, the bike blue or perhaps green under the yellow street light, the rider broad-shouldered, erect carriage.
The bike roared off down the street and we lay locked together like lovers on the grass with the rain falling on us.
Charlie had crashed into the bougainvillea that wound around his front fence. He was bleeding on the face and hands and his skin had a sickly pale tinge under the yellow light.
‘You see?’ he moaned. ‘What did I tell you?’
We disentangled and I picked myself up. I was unhurt but my trousers, shirt and jacket were a mess. Charlie’s expenses were mounting. Dry-cleaning these days costs a bomb. ‘Just remember to tell them in the office that your uncle played prop for Country versus City,’ I said.
I ushered a very shaken and bleeding Charles Marriott inside his house. He had state-of-the-art security magic beams, alarms and connections to one of the leading security outfits. Inside he was about as safe as a man can get.
The house was unremarkable otherwise, apart from his workroom, which had computer power to rival NASA’s. Confirming what he’d said, there was a bookcase full of books on ornithology. Apart from computer manuals, there wasn’t much else to read in the house.
Charlie cleaned himself up in the bathroom and produced his firepower, a single-shot. 22 rifle.
‘I have to admit it’s just a deterrent,’ he said. ‘I haven’t got any bullets.’
‘Just as well. Are you okay now?’
‘Yes.’
He looked it, and that puzzled me a little because most people find being shot at a traumatic experience. I did. But it takes people different ways and maybe he had stronger nerves than most, despite his erratic history. Or perhaps because of it. He was a strange one. I was surprised that he mentioned Steve going under the train just the once.
I said, ‘You’re snug as a bug here, Charlie. I’ll push off and collect you in the morning. What time?’
‘Seven.’
‘Jesus!’
‘When you’re at the cutting edge you have to start early, Cliff.’
‘Okay. And we’ll be a bit more careful about coming and going in the future.’
I drove home in the rain with a few things about Marriott bothering me. He hadn’t thanked me for saving him from getting shot, but maybe in the modern world you don’t dispense gratitude when you’re paying. He was subject to mood swings and there was an instability about him that was troubling, but what did I know? Computer freaks had to be crazy by definition. It was a paying job in a lean, post-GST time and I’d stick with it for as long as I could.
I picked him up at seven sharp the next morning and he seemed to be in good spirits, although the cuts on his face and hands were raw and he favoured his left side as a result of my tackle bruising his ribs. I’d checked the street over carefully and kept an eye out on the drive.
I parked in an allotted space under the building and we travelled in the lift up to the floor Solomon Solutions occupied. The sixth, all of it. By 8 am it was a hive of activity with screens glowing, printers chugging and phones ringing. Charlie introduced me as his uncle Cliff, a possible investor, to several of the underlings and they looked about as interested as the American people had been in the Gore/ Bush election.
I hung around for a while in Charlie’s office while he dealt with emails and phone messages and kept an eye on the door marked Stefan Sweig. I didn’t see one for Mark Metropolis. Neither had showed by the time I took myself off to the nearby shopping centre for coffee and the food I hadn’t felt like at 6 am. I waited for the lift to take me back up to the sixth floor. It arrived and among the couple of people stepping out was a tall redhead wearing a suit with an Ally McBeal skirt and the legs to do it. I stepped into the lift but couldn’t help myself watching her as she walked towards the entrance. A young man in a striped shirt, granny glasses and jeans joined me in the lift and did the same.
‘How d’you like that?’ he said.
‘Who is she?’
He looked me up and down-grey in the hair, leather jacket, Grace Bros strides, Italian shoes but old-and smiled pityingly. ‘That’s Amie Wendt, Stefan Sweig’s squeeze.’
Charlie manufactured some excuse to fly to Melbourne and I went too, all on the company account because I was a prospective investor. Business class. We both had a couple of drinks but didn’t talk much. Charlie read Business Week and I struggled with the quick crossword in the Age, which I’d bought to catch up on the Melbourne news. It struck me how similar it was to the Sydney news, all except the football and the weather.
We hired an Avis Commodore and drove to Hawthorn, where Charlie said Rog was working as a waiter while finishing his law degree.
‘Stayed in touch, has he?’
Charlie nodded. ‘In a manner of speaking.’
It must have been a strange manner because when we walked into the smart cafe, all potted plants and smoked glass, the tall young man with the curly fair hair wearing a long apron dropped the tray he was carrying. Glass shattered and a fat man emerged from the back of the place to make angry noises in Italian. The people at the three occupied tables looked up interested, as if it was a floor show.
Charlie went into action. He shepherded the man, who had to be Rog, towards me.
‘Don’t let him run off,’ he said. He took out his wallet and laid what had to be at least a hundred dollars on the fat man. They negotiated.
‘You’re Roger, right?’ I steered him to a table and pressed him down onto a chair.
‘Who the hell are you?’
‘Doesn’t matter. I’m working for Charlie.’
‘What does he want?’
‘He wants you to come back to Sydney and help him with some legal problems.’
‘You can’t be serious.’
‘He is, and so am I.’
Rog was a transparent type and I could almost see the cogs turning and the gears engaging. He’d been frightened at first, that was clear. Now he was calculating. Charlie joined us.
“lo, Rog.’
‘Charles.’
‘Charlie, Rog, I’ve loosened up. I’ve made it sweet with your boss. No problems.’
Rog didn’t speak.
‘I could use your help. Stefan’s on the warpath.’
Rog shook his head. ‘I like it here. Plus I’m enrolled at Monash and-’
‘I’d make it worth your while. Consultancy. You could transfer to Macquarie, say, and you wouldn’t have to wash dishes.’
‘Fuck you, Charles.’ Rog sprang up and walked away. I made a move to go after him but Marriott shook his head.
‘What did I tell you? He’s terrified of Stefan.’
‘I could do with a coffee. You?’
‘Latte.’
I went to the counter. A young punk woman was attending the espresso machine and she was wide-eyed at the goings-on, though trying not to show it.
‘A latte and a flat white.’ I slipped out one of my business cards and passed it across with a ten dollar note.
‘Give the card to Rog when you get a chance, would you?’
She loved it. ‘Yes, sir,’ she said, and put some extra zip into flying the machine.
We sat over the coffees longer than they deserved. Charlie said there were business things he could attend to in Melbourne for a couple of days and that being out of reach of Stefan and Rudi had to be good. I agreed.
‘Get to know the town, Cliff,’ he said. ‘I’ll book us into the Lygon Lodge. You might want to open a branch office one of these days.’
He was taking the piss and I didn’t like it but I let it pass.
Melbourne had improved since I’d last been there. It looked and felt better-more light, less shade. The people looked happier.
Rog rang me on my mobile on the second night.
‘Are you alone, Mr Hardy?’
I was tempted to use the Jack Nicholson line from Chinatown but I resisted. ‘Charlie’s off schmoozing to some people about digital something or other. You can talk to me, Rog.’
‘Can I?’
‘You must want to, and I know there’s something wrong about Charlie.’
‘Can I trust you?’
‘I could give you some numbers to ring, but why not take a chance?’
‘Zoe liked you and she’s a good judge of character.’
‘So?’
‘He’s a very dangerous man.’
‘Yes?’
‘Obviously, I don’t know what he’s told you, but I think he’s responsible for the death of one of the partners in Solomon Solutions.’
‘That’d be Steve?’
‘Stephen Lucca, yes. What’s Charles said about that?’
‘I can’t discuss it, Rog. He’s my client, but I’ll be interested in whatever you have to say.’
His laugh was bitter. ‘That’d make a change. Neither Mark nor Stefan listened to me. Oh, they both knew that Charles was mad, but he was brilliant at what he does, still is I suppose, and they needed him more than they needed Steve or me.’
He was sounding a bit panicky and I was anxious not to lose him. ‘I’m listening. Look, have you got any evidence for these suspicions?’
‘You sound like a policeman.’
‘I’m not. I’m struggling to understand what goes on in this computer business and I need some help. Did you know Solomon Solutions is going to be floated?’
‘Everyone knows that.’
Like all closed societies, the computer buffs and their satellites had the belief that everyone knew what they knew and that what they didn’t know didn’t matter.
‘Charlie seems to think that his partners are trying to squeeze him out.’
‘I doubt it. I think I’ve said all I have to say.’
‘And I appreciate it. One more thing, the cop question again-evidence?’
He sounded tired and wrung out. His sigh was like a final gust of wind as a storm dies. ‘Only what Steve told me. He said that Charles was having him followed, tracking his movements. That’s it. Goodbye.’
He hung up. As always when a problem looms, the first thing I thought about was a drink, and the Lygon Lodge did a good mini-bar. But these days I fight the urge up to a point, and instead I went for a walk through Carlton. It was cold and windy but there was no rain and the strollers and diners and tourists were out in force. You could eat food from the four corners of the world in a couple of blocks and fill a house with ornaments and paintings and books. I kept my hands in my pockets and just window-shopped, like a lot of the other people on the street.
When I got back to the motel, Marriott was waiting for me with his door open. He was pale and agitated as he beckoned me in.
‘Where’ve you been?’
‘Walking.’
‘You’re supposed to be my bodyguard.’
‘You said you’d be safe down here in Melbourne.’
‘Safe? Shit! I’m not safe anywhere.’
‘What’s happened?’
‘I’ve had threatening phone calls. I know they’re from Rudi. We’re booked to fly back tomorrow. I think he knows when.’
‘How could he?’
It appeared that he’d been at the mini-bar, well and truly. I could see two empty Johnnie Walkers and two Beefeaters and at a guess he had a slug of Stoli over ice in the glass he was waving.
‘You don’t know anything! There’re ways. You just have to know the codes, and Stefan would. We’ll go back via Adelaide. That’ll throw them.’
I shrugged. ‘You’re the boss.’
Suddenly, his bad-teeth smile was smug. The threatening phone calls were apparently forgotten and I had to wonder if they’d ever happened.
‘That’s right. I’m the boss. But we’re mates, too, right? Sorry I was stroppy, Cliff. I’m under pressure.’
Aren’t we all? I thought, but I just nodded and moved towards the door.
He took a step closer to the bed and picked up the TV remote control. ‘I think I’ll watch a movie. Goodnight, Cliff. It’s nine thirty from Tullamarine. Pretty civilised. Hop into your mini-bar, why don’t you? It’s all on Solomon bloody Solutions.’
I gave him a thumbs-up, clinked my keys in my hand and left the room. Charles Marriott might have been a computer wizard and an ace birdwatcher, but he was no actor. No one who’d drunk what he appeared to have drunk, judging from the empties, could have moved as he did when he skirted round the bed and picked up the remote control.
You’re a dangerous man, Charles, I thought as I headed for my room. But dangerous to who-or was that whom?
We flew back via Adelaide and Charlie spent a lot of time on his mobile during the break between planes. He didn’t tell me who he was calling and I didn’t ask. On the flight to Sydney, he got stuck into the complimentary champagne. When I thought he was sufficiently loosened up, I asked him whether I ought to talk to Stefan and Mark.
He almost dropped his glass. ‘No!’
‘Why not? If I’m supposed to be interested in investing, wouldn’t it look a bit funny if I didn’t meet with the other partners?’
He finished what was in his glass and signalled to the hostess for a refill. ‘There’s not long to go. You don’t have to
be around the office anymore. Just drive me in and out.’
It was a kind of an answer and I didn’t press him, but my feeling that I didn’t know nearly enough of what was going on got stronger.
I dropped him at home that night and collected him the next morning. His smart suit was a bit crumpled and he looked as if he hadn’t slept well. His breath was bad. He clutched his big briefcase and said almost nothing on the drive. He was going to sit tight in his office and that gave me the whole day free.
I was about to pull out of the car park when I saw a big man in biker leathers come out of the building and approach a blue Honda 1200cc. Something about the way he held himself and the look of the bike were familiar and when he started it up I was sure. Rudi. I swung the Falcon in front of him and he had to stop.
‘What the fuck’re you doing?’ he roared.
I approached him. ‘Hate to stop, do you, Rudi?’
‘Do I know you, arsehole?’
Confirmation. I moved up on him. ‘You should. I’m the one who shoved Charles Marriott out of the way when you pot-shotted him.’
He ripped off his helmet and came at me then but he was a bit fat and a bit slow. I ducked under his wild swing and thumped him hard in the ribs, left side, right side. No good hitting that gut. The wind went out of him and he sagged. I gave him a knee under the chin and he was finished. I pulled him behind a car and pushed his face into the oily bitumen while bending his right arm up his back with one hand and gripping his left ear with the other.
‘Okay,’ I said. ‘You’re not as tough as you thought. Do I break your arm and thump you face down and break your nose, or do you talk to me? Which?’ I gave him a touch of both to be going on with.
‘Talk,’ he said.
‘Stefan hired you to hit Marriott, right?’
He laughed and I pressed down on his head. ‘You’re ugly already. Want to be uglier?’
His voice was muffled because he was eating grit and oil. ‘Marriott.’
I eased up. ‘What?’
‘It was a fake, man. Blanks. Marriott got me to do it.’
I let him go and helped him up so he got to a sitting position with his back against a hub cap. He coughed and spat some stuff out of his mouth. ‘You’re a mug, whoever you are.’