by Peter Corris
‘So do I. Give me something. A name, a place, a hint, so I don’t go into this thing totally blind. Something I can work with in both our interests.’
I drank the rest of my wine, wanted a cigarette but daren’t let go of the receiver to roll one. The pause seemed interminable. I’d gritted my teeth and my jaw gave me pain. I probed with my tongue for a loose tooth.
‘Dick Maxwell,’ she said. ‘He’s in your business.’
She hung up, but the buzzing on the dead line wasn’t a completely unhopeful sound.
The phone rang as soon as I replaced it and I picked it up with some annoyance—at this rate my bath was going to be stone cold. My injuries were stiffening up. An STD call.
‘Cliff, it’s me. How are you?’
Cyn. I’d scarcely thought of her in the last twenty-four hours. ‘I’m okay, love. Been busy. How about you?’
‘It’s very exciting.’
What is? I thought. ‘That’s good. Are you in Cairns? I didn’t find out where you were staying.’
‘I didn’t know for sure. I’m in a townhouse with one of the project people up here. I’ll give you the number.’
She did and I wrote it down. She chatted on about the job, making it sound more like one for a hydraulic engineer than an architect. I made some stock responses, not really interested.
‘Cliff, are you in trouble? You sound strange.’
‘Well, private detecting’s a bit different from company work,’ I said. ‘More demanding.’
‘Look, the weather’s great up here. Why don’t you come up when you finish what you’re doing? I assume you’re getting paid.’
Always the sting in the tail with Cyn. ‘Would you like that, love?’
‘It’d be great. You’d like it here.’
I had my doubts about that. I’d pretty much stayed away from the tropics after Malaya—too many bad memories of bullets and jungle and teeming rain—but this offer sounded good. I said so and we talked amiably for a few minutes before she remembered that her host would be paying for the call.
‘Reverse the charges next time,’ I said.
‘Goodnight, Cliff. Take care.’
You bet I will, starting on Monday. Loggins had scheduled a meeting for Tuesday morning when he expected to have comparative ballistics reports on the Meadowbank and Farquhar murders and other information. I’d agreed to the meeting, not having much option. Loggins was confident that Gallagher would attend. I wondered whether any pressure would be put on him in the meantime. I hoped I hadn’t dumped Gallagher in it—I already had one sworn enemy in the Darlinghurst detective division, raising it to two would probably mean shutting up shop.
I ran some more water into the bath and let myself slowly down into the comforting warmth. Cyn and I had got in the bath together on the first night after we’d moved into the house. We were both exhausted after throwing out several decades’ worth of rubbish, including innumerable layers of lino. A few floorboards had come up with the bottom layer. But the hot water service had worked okay and we’d had some fun in the bath and upstairs on a mattress afterwards. Pretty good memories and maybe things hadn’t gone too sour between us even now. I lay there until the water got cool. Then I put on a towelling dressing gown and made myself some Welsh rarebit with lashings of Worcestershire sauce. It was close to midnight when I sat down to eat after a day of tennis, two-way assault and battery and sudden, brutal death.
12
Sundays were quiet in Glebe. The container terminal across the water was silent and the traffic rumble was absent. The planes were fewer and came later. My neighbours didn’t bang doors and start engines at ungodly hours, and Glebe was not motor mower territory. As a result of all this silence and stillness, and my exertions of the day before, I slept late. It was an unusually peaceful sleep and I felt fine after some coffee and a toasted bacon sandwich.
I didn’t look as good as I felt. My nose was swollen to nearly twice its size and it wasn’t a small hooter to begin with. At least it hadn’t been broken again. Twice was quite enough. One eye was slightly blackened but sunglasses would conceal that. My jaw was a bit puffy but it had stopped aching. On balance, I’d hurt Pascoe more than he’d hurt me and that was only physically. When it came to pride, I was streets ahead—but that could pose problems for later on. But it was a fine, clear morning and I was a temporary bachelor with no responsibilities and interesting work on hand.
I drank some more coffee out in the concrete backyard and thought about flying up to Cairns to spend some time in the sun with Cyn. Maybe Loggins’ idea of acting as a bait was the quickest way to get through to that happy scenario. Somehow, I wasn’t able to convince myself.
The phone rang and it was Doc Lee on the line, chirping cheerfully and asking me how my Sam Spade act had worked. He sounded very uppish—maybe he’d felt rejuvenated by the tennis and had slipped it to Inge for the first time in a while.
‘It went okay, Doc,’ I said. ‘Thanks for the help.’
‘I asked around a bit about that Perkins chap. Discreetly, you understand. You need to watch your step with him, boy.’
‘I know. I spoke to Cyn last night. She’s enjoying the job. I might go up and see her in a week or so.’
‘Good idea. I’m glad to hear you two are getting along. Inge sends her best.’
All sweetness and light on the home front. A rare condition. I turned my mind to the weighty question of locating a private investigator by the name of Dick, presumably Richard, Maxwell. There was no telephone listing for him but that wasn’t too deflating. His agency might have a name, like Ace Detective, or he might work for one of the big shows like the Montalban Agency or the Blaine outfit. A few security firms employ PEAs too, and there are some attached to big hotels. I needed firsthand information and the obvious source was Ernie Glass. The problem was that the easiest place to find Ernie, the Tottenham Hotel in Glebe Point Road, was closed because it was Sunday. Easiest? It was the only place I’d ever talked with him. I knew he lived in the immediate vicinity of the pub and the only thing to do was to wander down there. The Tottenham did a steady sly grog trade on Sunday, selling bottles and flagons after midday in the backyard at double the weekday price. Maximum of three bottles and one flagon to a customer. Ernie always laid in stocks; I’d seen him toting them carefully away on a Saturday evening. An ant. But one of the Sunday grasshoppers would be sure to know where he lived.
The rear entrance to the Tottenham was in a lane quite a long way back from the main road. The business was conducted discreetly with a minimum of noise and fuss. The police knew about it, of course, and occasionally moved in to close the operation down for a few weeks. Token stuff. They either got a kick-back or decided the peace was better kept by allowing drinkers to get their poison than by depriving them. Cynics accepted the first motive, idealists the second. I tended to think it was probably a bit of both.
Things were quiet this Sunday. I wandered up and down after having a word, and passing a few dollars, to Freddy, the lookout. The customers varied between winos after their port and muscatel, and better-heeled types who’d forgotten to lay in the riesling for lunch. Ernie’s mates weren’t of either stamp—army pals, old jockeys, footballers and boxers and women of the world who liked a drink and a joke. I knew a few of them by sight and I’d asked Freddy, who worked as a barman and chucker-out at the pub, to give me a nod if one of Ernie’s friends showed up.
It was warm in the lane and I was ready for a drink myself by the time Freddy called me over. The man he indicated was middle-aged with a seamed face and a thick body that might once have been athletic.
‘Reg, this is Cliff Hardy. He’s a mate of Ernie Glass’s. Reg Kerr, Cliff. Reg used to play for Balmain. Winger.’
I shook Reg’s hand and tried not to look shocked at the realisation that he was short a few fingers.
‘Yeah,’ he drawled. ‘Just couldn’t catch the fuckin’ thing after I lost them digits.’
He had three bottles of Reschs Pilsener in a paper bag under h
is arm. ‘Party?’ I asked.
He winked. ‘Couple of sheilas coming by. Could be. Well, nice to meet you, Cliff.’
‘You need more than three bottles for a party,’ I said. ‘Freddy, you could organise another three, couldn’t you?’
‘Sure,’ Freddy said. He took the note I gave him, looked both ways up and down the lane and went through the back gate into the pub’s yard.
‘I’m looking for Ernie, Reg,’ I said. ‘I don’t have his address. I only ever meet him here. D’you happen to know where he lives?’
‘Not a cop, are you? Ernie’s a bit behind on the child support I hear.’
‘No. I’m in the same game—private enquiries.’
He laughed. ‘And you can’t find him. You blokes are full of shit.’
I grinned. ‘It’s Sunday. The usual channels are closed.’
Freddy came back with the bottles and my change and then took up his post down the lane. I stuffed the money in a pocket and offered the paper bag to Reg. ‘What do you say? I could find him tomorrow but I need him today. It’s important.’
‘Say you know him?’
‘Yes. He helped me get into the business.’
‘Who does he support?’
Fair enough question in the context, but football wasn’t one of my passions and I couldn’t recall ever having a conversation about it with Ernie. Then it came to me, his outrage when his club’s try had been declared invalid and the other side had won a finals match.
‘Newtown,’ I said.
‘Right. The cunt. Ernie’s got a flat in Ferry Road. Flat 2, 4A. Say I said hello. Ta for the beer.’
I thanked him, gave Freddy the thumbs-up and began to thread my way through the back streets. No time like the present. Ferry Road follows the lie of the land, running down to Blackwattle Bay. The area was undergoing a lot of change—rusty, ramshackle factories coming down, small boatyards and workshops closing, apartment blocks rising on the sites. There were still some of the old houses, narrow single and double-storey terraces jammed close together with built-in verandas and porches dating back to the Depression when rentable space was at a premium. Number 4A was smarter than most—a well-maintained terrace with two letter boxes on the gate, indicating that it was divided into only two flats.
Flat 2 was reached by an iron staircase running up the side of the building to a balcony at the back. I knocked at the glass-panelled door and Ernie’s distinctive shape appeared in the mottled pane almost immediately. Ernie stood about six-four when he was younger but had stooped a bit in recent years. He was still big all over—shoulders, arms and chest. He pushed his glasses back from the end of his big nose.
‘Cliff, old son. What brings you around here? Don’t tell me your wife’s left you and you need someone to find her?’
‘Hah, hah. No, mate, I need a line on one of our co-workers. I get the feeling he’s more your vintage than mine.’
That’s the way it went with Ernie and me—light jabs and counters. He ushered me through open double doors into the living room—the flat was laid out unconventionally with the living and sleeping quarters at the back and the kitchen and bathroom in the front. The reason was obvious—a wide-angle view of Blackwattle Bay from the balcony. I sat in a deep leather armchair while Ernie went to the kitchen. He came back with a bottle of beer and two glasses.
‘Any chance of a sandwich, Ernie?’
‘Jesus, doesn’t that good-looking wife of yours feed you?’
I accepted the glass and took a pull. ‘Thanks. She’s away up north on a job. I can feed myself but I’ve been hanging around the Tottenham trying to find out your address.’
‘Yeah, well, I don’t advertise it. Hang on.’
Away he lumbered again, coming back this time with a plate carrying a bread roll, a lump of cheese, a tomato and a knife. ‘Go for your life. What happened to your nose?’
I got busy with the knife. ‘A copper clobbered me.’
‘What did I tell you about getting along with the police?’
‘It’s all right,’ I said, chewing. ‘Another cop came to my rescue.’
Ernie shook his head. ‘Cliff, Cliff, I hope you know what you’re doing. I told you to make friends with some cops, not depend on them or trust them. This didn’t happen around here or I’d have heard.’
Ernie is a slow, deliberate talker. I’d eaten most of the roll by the time he’d finished. ‘No, mate. Eastern suburbs. I think I can stay on top of it, but I need to talk to a PEA named Richard Maxwell to help me do that. D’you know him?’
He reached for his glass, drained it and filled us up again. Ernie usually drinks the way he talks, as if there’s no rush. Maxwell’s name seemed to have speeded him up a bit. ‘I know Dick Maxwell. I wish I didn’t.’
‘Why’s that?’
‘He’s a pisspot Pommy poofter, that’s why. Don’t have anything to do with him, Cliff. He’d sell his sister and his mother just a split second before he’d sell his brother and his father.’
‘I have to talk to him, Ernie. It’s to do with a divorce case …’
‘That’s about all he ever does, the bastard. How he keeps his licence I’ll never know. He must have an in with somebody.’
‘Shit, that’s an angle I haven’t considered.’
‘With Maxwell, there’s bound to be a slew of angles you haven’t figured. Do you want to tell me about it?’
I finished the food and beer before answering, in order to give myself time to think. ‘To be honest, Ernie,’ I said, ‘I think it’d be better for you if I didn’t. My feeling is that this is pretty bloody dangerous. Look, I’ll get in touch if I need any hands-on help. I’m still trying to manage it the way you said.’
‘Remind me.’
‘With brains rather than biffing.’
‘Okay. last I heard he was in a drying-out joint in Heathcote.’
‘Heathcote.’
‘Yeah, bit of a hike to the nearest pub I understand. Fresh air, all that. He must be in a very bad way to go there. Fresh air and lemonade—Maxwell’s not used to them, they might kill him. Never heard of him taking the cure before, but I suppose there’s a first time for everything.’
‘How recent’s this information, Ernie? And how good is it?’
His thick, pepper-and-salt eyebrows lifted. ‘Don’t get cheeky with me, young Hardy. The information’s fresh and I think it’s good because I came upon it by accident.’
I knew what he meant and didn’t press him. You hear lies all the time, you’re more likely to overhear the truth. He gave me the name of the clinic and his own phone number and didn’t ask any more questions about the job, so we had accorded each other a mutual respect. I refused more beer, thanked him for the help and the calories and stood up. I was anxious to get moving. I was also anxious to get outside and have a smoke. Ernie is a passionate anti-smoker and to light up in his home would be like smoking in church. We shook hands at the door.
I had a last question. ‘What does he look like?’
‘Medium-sized, getting fat. Pale. Always wears a hat. He’s got this little gingery toothbrush moustache. No muscle on him. You’re a lot tougher than Maxwell, Cliff,’ he said. ‘But I’m not sure you’re smarter, and smarter usually wins.’
‘Thanks, Ernie. I’ll work on it.’
13
Heathcote was well off my usual beat. I knew you drove down the Princes Highway to get to it and that was about all. I walked home slowly, sucking on a cigarette and speculating about what I might learn from Richard Maxwell. Something about divorce. It didn’t sound too promising. I wondered what I could use for leverage on Maxwell, apart from the obvious thing. I rejected the idea for most of the walk, but had accepted it by the time I reached the house.
Inside, I checked the Gregory’s and found that Heathcote was past Engadine and consisted of two clusters of streets either side of the highway, both bordered by national park The clinic was in Goburra Road, on the right going from the city and one of the last marked roads befo
re the suburb gave way to crown land and the meandering Heathcote Creek. It was hard to tell from the map and I didn’t know the area, but it was a fair bet that the nearest liquor outlet would be at a distance only a desperate man would walk.
Ernie had said Maxwell was smart. He’d also indicated where he was vulnerable. I found an unopened, flat half-bottle of gin in a cupboard and tossed it from hand to hand. I didn’t like the idea of tempting a drunk, but it was my safety and career on the line and, apart from Cyn and a couple of friendships, there weren’t too many things more important than those. I put the bottle in a soft leather briefcase along with my .38 and a manilla folder containing some blank sheets of paper. I had one of Alistair Menzies’ cards in my shirt pocket. I debated whether to ring the clinic and decided against it. I had some money, a briefcase and Menzies’ card. If they weren’t enough, I had the gun.
The drive south out of Sydney was not the prettiest—too many used car yards, motor accessory barns and drive-in bottle shops. The landscape had been blasted by the internal combustion engine. By Kogarah Bay other forces, like wind and water, took over, and Tom Ugly’s Bridge was a nice reminder of a quieter time. Mind you, it was dull back then before the European migrants and TV and mass advertising arrived, and perhaps the noise and dirt were the prices we had to pay for more interesting lives. That was Cyn’s opinion anyway, her usual rejoinder when I got nostalgic about the taste of bottled beer, and fish and chips in newspaper and fight night at Rushcutters Bay stadium.
I turned off the highway and drove through the winding streets of Heathcote. The further from the main road they were the narrower and rougher they got. Goburra Road was a wide, unmade track with a few established houses on one side and a few more in the process of being built. The crown land began on the other side, low scrub that deepened into dense bush in the near distance. I drove slowly, avoiding the ruts and with the windows down. There was some dust from the track but the smell of the trees and the bird noises compensated. After the petrol-fume monotony of the highway it was a nice change.