‘Not at all. Love working for him. Good money, good boss, plenty of time to do my own thing.’
‘Married?’
‘Not any more.’
‘Children?’
‘No.’
‘Regrets?’
‘No.’ Bert looked at me again. ‘What’s with all the questions, Steve?’
‘Nothing’s with them. Just curious. Have you seen Fern since the Afternoon of the Long Scissors?’
‘No.’
‘I wonder where she is. Has Tasso tried to contact her?’
‘I think he’s tried calling.’
‘Did you know about the boy?’
‘Yes, I knew about young Harry. I drive Tasso to the house sometimes.’
‘I can’t believe he kept it secret from the rest of us all this time.’
‘There was a reason.’ Bert adjusted the mirror, for no reason.
‘I know. But now the shit has hit that particular Fern.’
‘Yeah.’
‘Did Hiskey know?’
‘I wouldn’t have thought so. Fern might know, Steve, but hopefully the rest of the world doesn’t. It would be better kept a secret, you know. For the sake of the boy.’
‘I see your point but don’t like the chances. Someone gave that photo to Fern.’
‘Yeah.’
We had driven through Kapunda and taken the Sturt Highway to the north-east. Just before Truro we turned right onto a minor road. The cops had set up not far off the highway at the entrance to a long limestone driveway. Several cop cars were parked on the road, blocking it, and at least another dozen cars were parked along the side. Someone was putting up a small marquee. Three separate television crews were manning cameras on the roofs of their four-wheel drives, and I recognised from television a pretty young female reporter, looking at herself in a mirror. A uniformed cop waved us to a stop. Bert lowered his window.
‘Where are you gentlemen headed?’ said the cop. Bert looked at me.
‘The shootout,’ I said. ‘We just want a looksee.’
The cop grinned sourly. He was already sick of tourists. ‘Sorry, fellas, no rubberneckers allowed. Turn around and go home.’
‘Is Tarrant there?’
‘Detective Inspector Tarrant?’
‘Yeah. Tell him Steve West is here and I’ve got information for him.’
The cop stared at me for a moment. ‘Wait here.’ He strolled away, speaking into his mike. We waited. It was a warm morning. The density of flies was much higher here than in the city and they were coming in the window.
‘Do you have information for him?’ said Bert.
‘A tidbit. Enough to justify wheedling our way in. I hope.’ Beyond the cocky fence, the driveway cut through a dusty paddock for a few hundred metres to a farmhouse nestled in a clump of trees. More cop cars were gathered there, and a cop caravan.
The uniform returned. ‘You’ll be escorted in.’ He pointed across the paddock. ‘They’ve set up a command centre in the caravan. Tarrant is there. He’ll see you.’ He stepped in front of us to allow a cop car to pass, then waved us through. ‘Follow him,’ he said.
The owner of the property had recently tried to turn the driveway into an avenue by planting a row of trees on either side of it, but the trees were stunted and sick, and some looked like they wouldn’t make it through summer. The bare brown paddock was suffering under a hot shimmer of air.
The driveway forked at a clump of mature eucalypts and did a biggish loop around a single-storey brown brick house. I counted six cop cars parked at the fork. Our escort drew to a stop near the caravan. It had the braiding and insignia of the South Australia Police on its side. Beyond it, about a dozen men and women, most of them in uniform, were walking a line through dead grass in the direction of the house. They were marking spots on the ground with little flags and photographing them, and they were picking things up from the ground and putting them in bags. The helicopter was still hovering. Bert unfolded a large floppy hat and put it on.
‘Worried about getting too much sun on your bald spot?’
‘No, I just don’t want to be on TV.’
A cop had emerged from our escort car. We got out of our car and followed him to the caravan. The cop knocked on the door of the caravan and went in. It took a while, but eventually Tarrant emerged, donning a repugnant pair of sunglasses as he did.
‘Well, well, well,’ he said. ‘Steve West and his ex-military sidekick. Didn’t like the idea of someone being shot up without you?’
‘They’re picking up cartridges, I take it,’ said Bert, waving towards the line of stooping cops.
‘Yeah.’
‘It must have been a hell of a fight. They’ve picked up at least forty, just since we’ve been here.’
‘It was a pitched battle,’ said Tarrant, working his resident chewy. ‘The last one like it was in Afghanistan. Take a look at these.’ We followed him to a trestle table at the base of one of the eucalypts, covered by a tarpaulin. ‘Lift up the tarp,’ said Tarrant. ‘But try not to show the chopper.’ Bert lifted the edge of the tarp and peered underneath. There were a dozen or more large clear plastic bags, each of them tagged, each containing a nasty-looking weapon. Bert walked the length of the table, raising the tarp as he went, then turned and looked at Tarrant.
‘I see what you mean,’ he said. ‘This is an Austeyr,’ he said to me, pointing at one of the bags. ‘It can fire nearly nine hundred rounds a minute. Probably pilfered from the Australian Army. They’re using them in Afghanistan.’ He pointed to a couple of other bags. ‘Shotguns. There’s a machine pistol, that’s a Beretta. I don’t even know what this one is. Home-made, by the look of it.’ He counted the weapons, put the tarp down and looked at Tarrant. ‘There’s fifteen guns here. Fifteen shooters?’
‘We’re not sure how many shooters there were,’ said Tarrant. ‘We have four dead and eight wounded, but some escaped before the first cops arrived. They were smart, by the way, those two cops. They came up from Kapunda, but they pulled over on the highway up there’—Tarrant waved to the highway formation on the far side of the big brown paddock—‘with their lights flashing and called for backup. They could see the muzzle-flashes from there, but the battle died pretty quickly after they arrived anyway. A few of the shooters legged it across the paddocks, and our boys saw two cars speed off. There might have been more weapons, for all we know. We can probably work it out with forensics, but that could take months.’
‘I’m surprised there’s only four dead,’ said Bert.
Tarrant nodded. ‘We estimate about four hundred rounds were fired, all up. Fortunately, no one seems to have known how to use these things properly. Plus it was dark.’
‘Found any of the ones who got away?’ I said.
‘We got a couple on foot, and we’re still looking for others.’
‘Maybe you should ask the helicopter to do some scouting for you.’
Tarrant looked up at it. ‘Yeah, it’s really starting to piss me off. But ours is already out looking.’
‘So who was doing the shooting?’ I said.
Tarrant shook his head. ‘Uh uh. I’ve told you all I’m going to tell you, most of which the commissioner will tell the media in a few minutes anyway. You said you had information. Let’s have it.’
‘I’m not sure it’s relevant.’
Tarrant glared through his awful sunglasses. ‘It better be.’
‘It depends who was shooting. Was it Harlin’s gang?’
‘It might have been elements of his so-called gang.’
‘And the Mad Dogs?’
‘It’s possible.’
‘Because yesterday Barenfanger and I had a chat. Barenfanger is president of the Mad Dogs.’
‘I know who Barenfanger is. I didn’t know you knew him.’
‘I didn’t. He introduced himself.’
‘And?’
‘He wanted me to tell him where Harlin’s drug lab was.’
‘And did you?’ I could see Tarra
nt’s mind working and his blood pressure rising. ‘Fuck, West, if you started this little civil war I’m going to … Fuck, I don’t know what I’m going to do.’
‘Calm down, Tarrant, or you’ll swallow your chewy. I didn’t tell him squat. For one thing, I didn’t even know where Harlin’s lab was. Is it here?’ I pointed at the farmhouse.
‘I don’t believe you.’ Tarrant spoke the words slowly. He looked at Bert. ‘Do you believe him?’ Bert might have assumed it was a rhetorical question because he stayed quiet, or maybe he didn’t believe me either. ‘Let me tell you why I don’t believe you,’ Tarrant said to me. ‘I don’t believe you because the funny thing is that this place does happen to be a clandestine lab. One of the wounded does happen to be Barenfanger, and Harlin’s gang does happen to have been involved. All this the day after Barenfanger asked you to set it all up.’
‘I don’t know how Barenfanger knew about this place,’ I said. ‘Because I didn’t know about it and therefore I didn’t tell him about it. Honestly.’ I pulled off my sunglasses so Tarrant could see my honest eyes.
‘Here’s another funny thing, West,’ said Tarrant. ‘Barenfanger said he knew about this place because he received a tipoff yesterday.’
‘Did he say from whom?’
‘He said it was anonymous. Bullshit. You know how these gangsters never name names.’
‘It wasn’t me. I didn’t know about this place. And even if I did, I might not have told him.’
‘Might not?’
‘I’m being honest here, Tarrant. I don’t like Harlin or Coy or any of those gangsters. Part of me would have liked to have set up this gunfight. I don’t know what I would have done if I’d known about this place. But the fact that I’m here telling you about the conversation I had with Barenfanger should tell you I wasn’t the one who tipped him off.’
Tarrant stared at me for a while. He waved away a fly. ‘You can put your sunglasses back on, West. I’m not falling for your eyes.’
Bert laughed, and it broke the tension. The helicopter revved and headed off. The sudden silence was nice.
‘The other odd thing is,’ said Tarrant, ‘that Barenfanger reckons Harlin’s mob was waiting for him. Barenfanger said his plan was to take them by surprise, break a few jaws and torch the place. But as soon as they got here the shooting started.’
‘Harlin’s mob had been tipped off, too,’ I said.
‘So it seems. Barenfanger’s mob had superior firepower, but they were caught in the open. So they copped the worst of it.’
‘How bad is Barenfanger?’
‘He’ll live.’
I thought for a while. ‘I’ve got a theory,’ I said.
‘Can’t wait to hear it.’
‘First, tell me this. Is Harlin one of the dead or injured?’
‘No.’
‘What about Coy?’
‘No. Is that significant?’
‘I didn’t think Harlin would be. I thought Coy might be.’
‘Tell me your theory.’
‘I think Harlin tipped off Barenfanger, and then told Coy that Barenfanger was coming.’
‘Why?’
‘First of all, he would have known about this place. So he had the knowledge. Second, Coy gave me the hammer that killed Hiskey. Harlin would have hated him for that. This was a way of getting revenge. It was smart. Barenfanger did his work for him.’
‘But why would Harlin tip off Coy?’
‘Because he didn’t like Barenfanger, either. Who would? He probably tipped off Coy early this morning, to make sure Coy and co didn’t have time to piss off. He engineered this battle, hoping both sides would get wiped out.’
Tarrant blew out his cheeks, one after the other, several times. ‘It works. Except Coy might not even have been here.’
‘Harlin probably didn’t know where Coy was, he just hoped for the best. Coy must have phoned the guys to warn them.’
Tarrant nodded and his attention was drawn to the caravan. A tubby, balding and obviously important person who looked like the police commissioner had emerged from it, with slightly less important, less tubby and less balding persons on either side, and was walking towards one of the cop cars.
‘He’s about to do the press conference,’ said Tarrant. ‘I have to go.’ He looked at Bert. ‘Get this guy out of here, will you? Without incident?’
Bert and I drove back to Adelaide. I called Melody, who was eating lunch with Chris and Paul. She sounded unexcited by it. I knew from experience that lunch at their place involved little more than opening a can of tuna and a loaf of white bread and combining the two, washed down with a cup of thoughtfully brewed tea. While we were chatting, Bert’s phone rang and he answered it without taking his eyes off the road.
‘Sweet Jesus.’
‘What’s up?’ I said.
‘Harry’s missing.’
‘Tasso’s boy?’
‘Yes. He’s been taken from the hotel.’
39
We were there in twenty minutes. Appleyard greeted us with the bleak look of someone staring at the back end of a gravy train he had just fallen off. He let us through doors and corridors to the security centre. It was a small, windowless room with a bank of television screens showing various parts of the hotel, a couple of computers, a couple of phones, and a small kitchenette with a coffee machine and a fridge. Seated on an office chair was a young, slim woman with long black hair and a taut face. Next to her, a middle-aged man was playing with a computer mouse, and standing behind him were Tasso and Goldsworthy. All four were staring at one of the television screens. Tasso glanced at us as we came into the room. He looked drained.
‘She put him in the hotel day-care, for fuck’s sake,’ he said.
The woman in front of him turned, angry. ‘Only for half an hour, Tasso, only for half a fucken hour.’ I gathered she was Melinda, the mother of Tasso’s boy.
‘She needed a manicure,’ said Tasso.
‘So how did they get him?’ said Bert.
‘A woman went in there claiming to be her sister,’ said the middle-aged man, turning. He had the deceased eyes of an ex-cop. ‘She knew all the details, and the staff booked the child out.’
‘They should be fired,’ said Melinda. ‘I don’t even have a sister.’
‘They’ll be looking for new jobs tomorrow,’ said Appleyard, ever the kiss-arse.
‘Don’t be stupid, Appleyard,’ said Tasso.
‘What time was it, Barry?’ said Bert to the guy with the deceased eyes.
‘She was booked out of the day-care centre at 2.08,’ said Barry. I looked at my watch. ‘Melinda discovered him missing maybe forty minutes ago.’
‘Do you know who the woman was?’ said Bert.
‘Show them the lobby,’ said Tasso.
Barry moved his mouse and brought up footage of the front lobby. For a while, nothing interesting happened. The concierge was behind his counter and an elderly couple wandered through. Barry moved the mouse again, and the motion slowed. ‘Top right-hand corner,’ he said. As we watched, a woman in dark glasses entered the frame, carrying a child with dark curly hair. Barry paused the tape. The image wasn’t especially sharp.
‘Jesus,’ I said.
‘Recognise her, eh?’ said Tasso.
‘That’s Fern.’
‘It is.’
‘That’s right, Tasso’s fucken girlfriend has stolen my baby,’ said Melinda.
‘I can see why they thought she was your sister,’ said Barry. It was true that Fern and Melinda were both slim and had long straight black hair.
‘Shut up, Barry,’ said Melinda.
‘Have you tried calling her?’ I said.
‘Of course,’ said Tasso. ‘No answer. I called her parents; they don’t know anything. Goldsworthy has sent a couple of guys to their place anyway.’
‘Cops?’ said Bert.
‘Not yet.’
‘We need to let them know,’ said Melinda. She was wringing her hands, with their beautifully man
icured fingernails.
‘Fern won’t hurt the boy,’ I said.
‘I don’t know about that, Steve,’ said Tasso. ‘You didn’t see her the other day. She was crazy.’
‘It’s one thing to cut up a few suits. Hurting a child would be completely different.’
‘I hope you’re right.’
‘Call the cops,’ said Melinda, her voice almost a snarl, almost a plea.
‘She’s right,’ said Goldsworthy, the sweat on his forehead caught in furrows as if they were contour banks. ‘The sooner people are out looking for her, the better. I’ve got my team on it, but there’s only so much we can do.’
‘Yeah, we need the cops,’ said Barry.
‘Not sure there are any left in Adelaide,’ I said. I told them about our trip to Truro and the massive contingent of police up there.
‘Their resources might be stretched a bit thin,’ said Goldsworthy. ‘But they still need to know.’ He pulled out his mobile phone. Tasso’s phone rang and he answered it. Immediately he held up his hand to Goldsworthy, who stopped dialling. There was a deep frown-line between Tasso’s eyes, and his skin was pale.
‘Who is this? Is this Fern?’ He listened. ‘Where’s the boy? What have you … Don’t you hurt him. You hurt him and you’re … No I haven’t called the cops. I want to speak to Harry.’ More listening. ‘Whatever you want. But I want to speak to the boy.’ The call must have disconnected because he looked at the screen of his phone, held it back up to his ear and then looked at it again. We were all watching him. He took a couple of deep breaths.
‘What’s happening?’ said Melinda. ‘Where’s Harry?’
‘I don’t know,’ said Tasso.
‘Was that Fern?’ I said.
‘I don’t know who it was. The voice was kind of electronic. I think they were using one of those gadgets that distort voices, whatever they’re called.’ He was still frowning, looking at the blank screen of his phone.
‘Voice changer, that’s all,’ said Goldsworthy. ‘Cost less than fifty bucks. You can’t even tell if the speaker is male or female.’
Tasso looked up. ‘Whoever it was, they said they had Harry and he was unharmed.’
‘Do you think it was Fern?’ I said.
‘I don’t know. I don’t think so. I can’t imagine Fern being so business-like about it. Besides, what does she have to gain from holding my boy for ransom? She can get money from me just by asking.’
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